EveryBODY is Beautiful

A few weeks ago I realized that I have NEVER said out loud, or privately, that I am beautiful. I have never loved my body...I've never really liked my body. I have said disgusting things about it to myself and to others, things I would never have thought about anyone else, but yet they seemed perfectly acceptable to say to myself because, well, I thought they were true. I'm ashamed of my negative feelings towards my body. It's impossible to be happy when someone (me) whispering in my ear that I'm too fat. 

I know I'm not the only one...and it breaks my heart.

I realized that I found my body imperfect and embarrassing whether I was 120 lbs or 150 lbs. Whether I was fit and strong or 9 months pregnant. Last night I had an epiphany of sorts, one that is nothing new but completely revolutionary to me. 

What my body looks like is irrelevant. What my body does is not. 

My body is AMAZING. Today I used my body to nurse my beautiful baby. I chased and tickled my 2 year old. I crawled, I jumped, I laughed, I nurtured, I taught, and I loved and received love in the form of hugs and smiles and sweet baby kisses. How can I be so hateful towards anything capable of so much happiness, so much goodness? EveryBODY is beautiful. Everybody is capable of being so much more than a size or number. These things mean nothing and pale in comparison. 

Kenny (husband) and I have had far too many conversations about my hatefulness towards my body over the last 6 years with neither of us coming to an understanding. He doesn't get how and why I feel this way and I don't know how NOT to feel this way. 

I still don't understand why we, especially women, feel this way. Where is it coming from? The sexualization of women in the media? Already beautiful models being photo shopped to become an even more impossible standard? I think it's more than that, deeper than anything coming from ourselves. I'm going to get a little religious here, well maybe a lot religious, but it's who I am. 

Satan and one-third of the hosts of heaven were cast out of God's presence for rebellion. Thereby being denied one of the GREATEST gifts God intended to give to all of His children, a body. So, who hates our bodies? Who wants us to loathe them as well and by so doing deny ourselves God's spirit by obsessing and creating false idols? You know who. 

So PLEASE help me and I'll help you. Let's be better. Let's love our bodies for all they can do. Let's love them for how they look (even if it's only a small percentage of what our bodies are all about). Think of someone you love dearly, the person you love most of all. Are they perfect? No. (I still love you Kenny!) They are definitely not perfect but does that make them unworthy of being loved? Absolutely not! By loving them we facilitate growth and improvement. Don't we owe our bodies that same courtesy? Loving our bodies, stating it clearly in our minds and aloud, will ONLY help. Don't be afraid. I cried hard the time (yes, only one time so far) I called myself beautiful and I honestly felt it was one of hardest personal obstacles I've ever experienced. 

I wrote this in the hopes of uplifting someone, myself included. I'm hoping that I'm not alone in needed this kind of encouragement. You're beautiful, your body is perfectly imperfect, just as it should be, and you are worth being truly LOVED!