A Secret

I just figured something out I wish I had known about 100 years ago. I will never be perfect, nor do I have to be, and who I am right now is just fine. Actually better then fine. I don't want to get all bragasaurus about it but I there is a lot to be said for embracing your good and accepting your bad. I am not going to dwell in the past, or live looking to the future. I am enjoying right now. I have felt pressured since I was a little kid to be perfect. A little of this was put on me, but much of it was generated by me. I never let up. I pushed myself wherever I could. It's no wonder that I binged my way to complete unhappiness. It's a lot of pressure trying to be perfect. It's enough to not only make you lose your mind, but not enjoy your life. I don't have many regrets. Somehow despite my issues, struggles, and what not I have had a great time, but it does make me sad for younger me. I wasted so much time thinking I was not good enough. I never just relaxed and was. I am still really grasping what that means. I know someone who married a dude because she did not feel pretty in her fifties. For real so I guess it is better to understand things whenever you do then never.

There are studies about eating disorders and perfection, the links between these two things. I had a hard time really seeing that at first because I thought I was so flawed how could I be a perfectionist? Low self esteem makes everything so complicated. I thought perfection would make me safe, keep me one step ahead, protect me, give me power despite how powerless I felt. I equated it with these things, but never knew what it was I was seeking was perfection. I understand intellectually and have for most of my life seeking perfection is futile. How did I get wrapped up in this? How did I start to think that I was so wrong, and always needed to be modified, to try harder? Somewhere along the way I replaced myself with a pursuit. I lost asking myself what I thought, what mattered to me, and instead hid behind something else.

I probably will always will wear make up in public, and I probably will spill things on my clothes, but I am okay with that, I like a pop of color and I have bad luck with spilling. There's no "thing" I need to be or have to be for anyone else and now I have a much better sense of what I do need to be. I do need to be kind to myself and others, I do need to work hard because it's what I believe in, I do need to indulge my love of pygmy animals because lets face it they're awesome. I need to do these things because they keep me valuing me. Valuing myself is what will keep me healthy mentally and physically because there is no perfection, just protecting and really the only way to protect yourself is to care about who you are and want to keep that intact.