One thing I’ve learned with age: the way we judge others always has something to do with ourselves more than it does the other person.  Here lately I’ve been a little hot mess.  My health is not great and I think my mind and heart are suffering from my constant worry about it.  When I’m not necessarily practicing full out & out “worry,” you’ll find me hating the repercussions of whatever illness is raging.  I will just go ahead and admit it now that the person who loved mirrors after losing weight avoids them now.  And I hate that.  But it’s a reminder that there are areas I need to embrace and work on.  I have to get it through to my heart that these 5 lbs and the strands of hair do NOT make me who I am.  In fact, giving them the control over me that I do is probably more detrimental than anything else going on in my life.  And it keeps me focused on me.  While some “me” time is essential to the racing mind, too much of “me, me, me” throughout every day and inserted into every conversation I have is probably a clue that I’m reaching outside for what is only found inside—acceptance and beauty.  I’ve blogged about beauty a long while back when my weight loss journey began so I will not do so again. 

Why I say all that is to try to give an accurate account of my mind these days.  The awesome thing about life is that an AHA MOMENT can come at any time and bring you the awareness and peace you need. Today, I woke up and my little brain is firing up and rapidly trying to lay out what must get done today as I make my coffee and let Chloe out.  And I think back on what a difficult week it’s been emotionally.  And suddenly, I had that AHA.  We judge people in areas we’re insecure about.  Let me paint this.  Y’all know that I am open to new ideas.  I’ll hang around for any conversation at least for a minute.  And sometimes I’ll speak up and sometimes I’m just amused.  But here lately I’ve felt stirred up emotionally—for no justifiable reason!  About the stupidest shit on the planet! There I was one minute being awesome and “whoosh” the hormonal monster comes out before I know what’s going on.  I am despicable at those times. 

Last night I had to really, really examine this.  Part of it has to be because there’s some hormone imbalance.  For anyone never experiencing this, your hormones are a science project and mixing it up wrong means a volcano erupts in your soul.  When everything is in tact, it’s a peaceful little mountain with no worries.  So look here, if you aren’t suffering from hormonal imbalance you need to say a prayer of gratitude right now.  But hormones are no excuse.  I firmly believe there is a peace and love inside me that I can access at any time and it’s my piece of the divine universe (see my blog about the balls of happiness).  Hormonal imbalance makes it harder to live from that place than it usually is, but I’m not going to make an excuse.  While the hormones rage, the core of my being is readily available IF I’m willing to access it and live from that.  Which goes back to my vulnerability reflections.  You have to put yourself out there. 

I think a combination of hating myself and not wanting it out there is important to acknowledge.  Mainly because you HAVE to love yourself to get love and give love.  You can’t give what you don’t have.  I am at a place where I don’t love my body.  Oh how quickly we fall.  Epic fail, me.  Today I realized I have to embrace this body and love it and care for it with the mindfulness it deserves.  It is what it is—hormones, hair loss, and 5 lbs.  It could be a helluvalot worse.  So I will slap my hair in a bun as I have been doing and wear my size 6 when it should be a 4 and go have fun and love life… with the bun and the size 6.  That’s totally doable.  If all someone sees of me is my hair thinning and my jeans tight then they are pretty lucky—there’s a hormonal villain inside that could scratch their face off at any given moment! [jokes people, jokes]

And finally, and most profound, is the fact I’ve jumped all over an undeserving subject (whom we will just call Chris) about his ‘need to be right or argue.’  I sat all night wondering if it was my hormones, the fact I have issues with not being enough, or what the hell is my sudden issue here.  We’ve conversed for months and suddenly I freak out?  Dude, weird!  And that’s when I woke up and realized I point these things out to make me feel better because I often have the need to be right [and right now I just feel like I’m all wrong anyway] and what is perceived by me as an argument is merely a perspective.  But it makes me insecure.  For one thing, and I think I wrote about this a long, long time ago, I battled the need to be right for years before I got to the happiness spot.  And, when he finds flaws with my logic or counters me, I take it as “he’s telling you how wrong you are and you can’t do anything right, Apryl.”   Let’s be clear, that’s not what he says.  It’s me and my issues popping up. It’s the voices inside lying. But when the thought struck that “I’m judging him in an area I feel insecure,” bells went off. 

The reward of self-reflection and tears is knowing more.  So today I’m going to give myself a break.  Even if it’s just one day.  I’m going to forget the hormones, forgive my imperfection, and go show this man a less beastly side. It may be a challenge but I am going to love my body today and live from the spot of calm and happiness that I worked so long to build.