The holidays are done. Just barely. There's still a general shimmer, an afterglow to everything that suggests fun times just ended, but that makes things feel even sadder to me. I usually try to put away Christmas decorations immediately, like right before school starts back up. Leaving the decorations up for too long feels really depressing for some reason, holding on to something that's passed.
I also have an issue with having to go back to normal eating habits now that we're back to regular life. Maybe you have grown up and learned how to do this, but I still have the childish notion that cookies eaten in December don't count. Turns out, that's not true. I stopped weighing myself this past summer because it was adding unnecessary stress, but I can see what changes the uncounted cookies and other varieties of Christmas candies have wrought on my waistline.
But I had a giant Holy Sh*t thought the other day. My world was rocked by this thought, even though I've heard versions of it forever. I realized after a re-watch that it's a pretty central message of the Barbie movie. I can almost guarantee that when you read it, you're going to be like, "Duh, it is known," but take a second with it. Let it sink in.
There is only constant change followed by death.
That's it. Even if I got to my ideal body shape and weight, it's going to continue to change. I'm aging (as are you - sorry), and that brings its own fun changes. There will be times of being able to run or work out consistently and times when I can't, as well as times of stress vs. joy. Achieving the body standard is as temporary as not achieving it. I'm not saying I'm giving up on trying to be healthy. I'm just going to stop feeling bad about eating myself chubbier this holiday, or I'm going to try. The striving and anxiety that accompanies feeling bad about myself is more exhausting than it is helpful. This isn't to say that death is right around the corner. It's just that nothing stays the same, so I have (hopefully) 50+ years of consistent change ahead of me. I'm assuming I'm going to live to be very old...
Just being honest here, I'm not yet at the point of being able to look at my body without being critical of it. My all-or-nothing inclination is to throw away all of the candy and junk food on January 1st and start a restrictive diet in the name of the New Year to lose inches as quickly as possible. I know the Instagram moms are posting about body acceptance a lot these days, accepting one's body without a critical eye. That's probably my actual goal, but I'm not there yet. So there will be no resolution this year. There will be a slide toward acceptance of a few things - what my body looks like and can do; the fact that change will continue until death, which is just how life works; Christmas cookies are delicious and unavoidable.
Here's the actual Holy Sh*t thought though: I can stop feeling so stuck in other ways too. The message we're given is that once we grow up, we stop evolving. We stop needing to learn new things or stretch ourselves in new ways. But I LIKE doing new things. I like learning and taking classes and changing how I spend my day-to-day time. This is not to say I want a complete life overhaul or that I'm unsatisfied with my life as it is now. I just think that we (or I) tend to get stuck in ruts of identity. We do things because we feel we should, not because we want to. My relationships and the way I relate to the people who are important to me are what I want to base my decisions around, not someone else's vision for my career path or role as a woman or mother or whatever other box I could be put in. That feels like something closer to freedom.
To you I say, enjoy your evolutions! Change is life, so reject the boxes people try to put you in. And Happy New Year too!
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