attack of the radioactive curve monster

Dear god, I have a giant ass.  I mean this thing is epic.  I know what you’re thinking; “great.  another woman complaining about her body, how original.”  Oh no, gentle reader, you’ve got it all wrong.  I mean, I have a class A, this one goes up to 11 not just a 10, fantastic, ridiculous ass.  Sure, it’s larger than most, I certainly don’t fit into any sort of cookie cutter mold, I will never be a high fashion model, but my curves are fan-fraking-tastic.  And they are here to stay.    Of course it’s highly likely that tomorrow I’ll go back to hating my bottom half for a few days before hitting the upswing, so I’m writing this now.   This is one of my many puzzlers, how do I, as a yogi working to better myself and one day be enlightened, how can I move beyond the constant attachment to my body?   Is it better to think I’m wicked awesome with Marilyn Monroe level curves? Be humble and accept my average American body? Beat myself up over those last few baby pounds and starve my curves into submission?  Or just not care about it at all either way?  I guess the ultimate idea is to fully release yourself from your attachment to your body, but is that a realistic goal?  I don’t know.  I do know that when I’m in the “dear god I’m a large beached whale” phase, that I’m not a very nice person and I’m all around bitchy, and when I try to be humble and just accept things the way they are, I’m not much better.  The workout-til-I-die calorie counting phase is probably the worst of them all.  But those rare days when I feel like a pin-up goddess bad-ass?  I smile and laugh a lot, I get along with my family, I have an extra good time with my friends, and I feel extra connected to the world around me.    Surely enlightenment in some form can be found through a door like that.  Yes, I am not my body. I am not my abilities, I am not my tattoos, I am not my hair color, I’m not my age or my clothing size.  I am The Infinite Source.  Just as we all are The Infinite Source. Every, man, woman, child, rock, tree, cloud and bug.  So what can these bodies of ours possibly matter?  It is one thing to KNOW this information, to have faith in this information. It is another thing entirely to BELIEVE it and to live it.  And to be perfectly honest I’m not sure living as if you are not attached to your body is such a good idea.  I mean, we are here in this world, in this reality all together.  I do think that this is a beautiful world, filled with beautiful people, and that we need to take care of it.  And the first step to taking care of something is to take care of yourself.  As the patron saint of cowboy yoga, Ru Paul Charles says, “if you can’t love yourself, how the hell you gonna love somebody else?  Can I get an amen!?”  

I’ve decided, for myself, to do more things that nurture this vehicle, that honor this body, and I’ve decided to live, as much as I can, in the pin-up goddess bad-ass phase.  And I hope, gentle reader, that you will join me.  I came up with a little game that I would like us all to try. Go find two recent pictures of yourself.  If you don’t have any pictures make some, don’t use pictures from 10 years ago.

One picture, is one you hate. Write down all the reasons you hate it, be honest. One picture is one you love, where you look gorgeous.  Write down all the reasons you love it.  Now put the GOOD list and the BAD picture aside.  Take all the bad things you wrote and stare at the good picture, start saying the bad statements out loud to your good picture, and notice your perception change.  Now, do the same thing in reverse. Take all the good things you wrote and keep saying them to your bad picture.  Eh?   Now, put all that aside and KNOW that you are all those good things all the time.   You are in charge of your perception of the world and your projection of yourself shines through to the people around you.  You can be the pin-up goddess every day.  And your shine might just rub off on someone, and then that someone will shine on someone else and that some one else will shine on another and so it goes, until we all shine on.