A Mirror in My Life

My weight

Have you heard of the Seven Essene Mirrors?  They are AMAZING!  How does that matter?  Well, very early the morning of this writing (Sunday, July 22, 2012), I came to an epiphany and I hope I've let it in!  Unfortunately, I've had too many experiences with coming to know something and then not being able to fully learn it through daily execution to believe that just because I've had this epiphany, there will be some great changes.  But I sure do hope there will be!

After completing my viewing of a Gregg Braden YouTube about the Seven Essene Mirrors, I've seen a couple of my own for what they are.  The most amazing thing about "learning" about these mirrors is that numerous, even innumerable, experiences and thoughts have come together as a whole now.  I've been hearing about and even speaking about mirrors (emotional, predominantly) for more years than I can count.  If pressed to figure out when I started to see and know about these mirrors, I would have to do back to my teens... maybe even preteens.

But I digress.

So, this morning, I realized that my weight, in its overabundance for my frame, has been perfect.  It has perfectly served the multiple purposes for which I initially added it and for which I have gone out of my way to keep it.  It has probably functioned as innumerable mirrors for me, but the one I'm thinking of and trying to focus on in this post is the Sixth Essene Mirros of Relationship or The Dark Knight of the Soul.
You see, I have long heard (and even experienced, at times) the truth that my body seeks balance and health - even where weight is concerned.  Another way of stating this is to say, as Gregg Braden does in the YouTube, that nature seeks and maintains balance and it is only taken out of balance by masterful effort.  As masters, which he considers all of us to be, we are able to take any number of parts of nature out of balance (like me with my weight).

I haven't spent a great deal of time contemplating why I initially took my physical body out of balance by adding an overabundance of weight.  I'm going to make a quick guess that it might have something to do with a doorway in my memory of childhood that I cannot see or go into at this time in my life.

But I digress yet again.

I guess it's sort of difficult for me to get this realization out with plans to post it to my blog because it does not readily and obviously jive with the kind of who I want to be... who I am striving to be.  This epiphany about my own thoughts and feelings is not pretty and it doesn't even line-up with who I work so hard to be as a Christian and especially not an endowed member of the LDS Church.  Yet I feel compelled to share this realization.  Surely there are many purposes for sharing it, but the one I can think of most specifically and clearly is that maybe someone else can see themselves in my truth... and that by so seeing, they might be able to make a change and by changing improve themselves and the whole.
Okay, so... the fat... it's a protection.  This may be true for most of us who encircle ourselves with extra bunches of padded fluff covered over by skin.  The KIND of protection we seek, though, has as many origin points as we fluffy folk have faces.  I'm not going back to origin.  I'm focusing on now and my recent past.  I've lost weight before, AND maintained it for a while.  But each time I've gotten into what I think might be a safe relationship, I've gained weight again.

Why is THAT?  Yes, I'm getting to it.
My relationship with my husband has now been almost 12 years long.  Not long by some measures, but 12 times longer than any of my prior to him relationships.  I gained some weight before we were married.  Then, I gained a LOT more after the birth of our first child.  Then some more after the birth of our second child.  (Yes, the irony of weight gain AFTER giving birth is NOT lost on me.)  A while after our third child arrived, I lost 30-some pounds.  And then, during pregnancy #4 I gained it all back and then some.  Since the birth of our #4 child, I have lost some, gained it back, lost some, gained it back... I've been losing lately, but not lots.
Each time I shed some weight, I have certain thoughts.  And there are certain people who react to me and treat me rather differently.  One of those many people with different reactions to me is my husband.

Basically, I have come to realize that the largest and most important of the numerous reasons I have surrounded my tabernacle of clay with extra clay is that I fear myself.  I fear how I will react to overmuch attention from, especially, those of the opposite gender.  I suppose many people enjoy to be admired and appreciated by others.  And that in itself is not necessarily detrimentally destructive.  I think this must be so.  I rather hope I'm not alone in enjoying a bit of admiration now and again.  But the problem is tha I enjoy it overmuch, me thinks. This is the crux of my Sixth Essene Mirror of Relationship.  And so, I fluff my house so that the majority will not find it so appealing.... and thus I remain safe from having to fear, find, face or otherwise work through  my own reaction to any potentially possible appreciation.

You might not think it to see me, but I used to be a cute chick.  Especially as a size 10.  And what I lacked in beauty, my good humor (sometimes?), wit, and charm made up for, I've been told.

It's interesting how much less impactful my newfound personal understanding strikes me when put it fully into words!

But though it may be small and rather insignificant to others, it is huge for me in my world.  You see, chastity and virtue, loyalty and fidelity (especially to my husband), and honestly and trustworthiness  are tremendously huge among my self-established goal set.  And to be worried, concerned, or in any way anxious about how anyone other than my God and husband would perceive this shell that holds my spirit... well, it's basically one of the worst things I could do.  As Jesus Christ told us, though not in these words, if by thought we commit sin, we have committed that sin.

So, I've made my shell super soft and generally unappealing to most other shelled souls... especially the oppositely gendered.  To keep myself safe, don't you see?  So, I wouldn't have to deal with a potential dificult that could more easily arise from being as attractive (to whatever degree) as I might be if I was not so adorned.  And so I have cloaked myself because I mistrust me.  Do you see it?  Have you done it?

Then there is the part of my creating these folds of flab to deter others' admiration which has always been conscious to me, but which I find/realize now is far inferior among the reasons I've had for keeping myself fat: I didn't want others to like me for my physical appearance.  This is, truthfully, among the reasons I've kept myself chubbly.  It's just not nearly as important and change impeding  (shedding weight) as the one I have just confessed above.

And it just make so SO so much sense!  Putting this relatization alonside my understanding of toward versus away from motivation.  It just makes so much sense!  I didn't realize that no matter how 'toward' motivated I thought I was, I was really only able to move 'away from' this deeper fear and concern before I would lose motivation because I'd gotten 'just far enough' to #1 not feel comfortable/safe any more and #2 have no further reason for motivation to lose weight.

So, what does this all mean?  Am I now going to shed pounds until my physical form reaches it's natural balance?

Well, I have to tell you, I just don't know.  I don't know if I'm ready to allow it.  I think I am.  I hope so.  But, I guess, only time will tell.  I have lost more than 2 pounds this week....

I will tell you that when I was young, I always had this feeling of absolute KNOWING that one day, when I was significantly older than I was at the time, I would shed all the extra weight and it would permanently stay off without monumental effort on my part.  I do believe the epiphany I have shared above will ultimately bring this truth to fruition... sooner or later.  It's a little exciting and a little scarry to consider it.

Should you learn (or have already learned) about these mirrors, I always enjoy a good story.  If you'd like to share any of your realizations, I'm up for it.  :)