Day 4- I am Flawed

I am flawed.

Yes, you read that right. I am flawed.

Seems like a strange statement to make in my blog series about figuring out who I am. It was a strange thought to have come so clearly to my mind this morning when I was contemplating what to write about today.

I am flawed.

Why would I want to dwell on this? Well, simply put- we are all flawed. We are all going to make mistakes and fall short. It is what we do when we fall short that matters. Do you wallow in despair and let yourself believe you are worthless and a failure? Do you hide from the world and not try to make things right? Or do you fix your mistake and move forward? Do you forgive yourself and remind yourself that this is how we learn in life?

I am flawed, but I'm not worthless.

It is so easy to be hard on yourself when you make a mistake. Especially if your mistake affects others. It is easy to let that mistake define who you are, but it doesn't have to. You correct the mistake, you ask for forgiveness if you hurt someone, you pick yourself back up, dust yourself off, learn from the mistake, FORGIVE yourself for not being perfect, then you move on and be a better person than you were yesterday.

I have spent so much of my life feeling like if I am not perfect in every way, that I have failed. That I have no worth. I compare myself to those around me and always fall short when I do. I spend so much energy trying to prove that I am as good as other people that I lost myself. Frankly, it doesn't matter if "Annie" always has perfect hair/makeup/and outfit, or that "Hannah" has a perfectly clean house all the time, or that "Naomi" can dance beautifully... I will never live up to my own expectations if I am trying to be like someone else. I need to find my own strengths and talents. I need to only compare myself to who I was yesterday and work hard to be better each day.

So, yes, I am flawed. And that is ok. Because I am a work in progress.

What Is Holding You Back?

We all have a reason for not being fit and healthy. Every single one of us.

Not everyone has the same reasons. The reasons can vary quite a bit. But we all have our reasons.

The important thing is to not let our reasons be an excuse! Because no matter what, there are things we can do to be healthier.

I have struggled with quite a few reasons and find that as I work on pushing aside my excuses that I find new ones. I have never really liked to exercise. As a teen I struggled with knee pain and asthma. I was already very skinny, so why exercise? It didn't matter what I ate, I still wouldn't gain anything; so why eat healthy? I didn't get a good routine set up then and it is much harder now that I am very set in my ways.

I LOVE donuts, cake, chocolate, cookies...Like I would be happy eating them for every meal and snack. I am addicted. They emotionally make me feel "better." I have always felt crummy after eating them, but my brain was happy and so I kept eating them. Addiction to junk food- my first main reason.

Figuring out that I am quite gluten intolerant forced me to change that. It is a lot more expensive to buy pre-made gluten free junk food. And making them was time consuming and I couldn't do it without my kids knowing; which meant that I would have to share! haha So I slowly phased out a lot of that food.

Ok, now I don't have that excuse... so why do I fight being fit and healthy?

I won't bore you with each and every thing that has arisen, but the most recent one that I have realized, which I think is the root of it, is this:

I don't feel worthy of having self esteem.

If I feel good physically, am strong, have a great body from working out, great skin from eating healthy....then the natural thing would be to feel good about myself and my looks- therefore having self esteem. I have never felt worthy of that. I have many past memories of my looks being made fun of embedded into my mind. So whenever I have felt like I look good I will hear those voices telling me I am ugly, my chin is too big, my nose is huge, etc. I hear a voice saying, "How can YOU have self esteem?? You are too ugly to have self esteem!"

And this is where I am stuck. In this horrible mindset. I am afraid of looking good. I am terrified of actually thinking that I look good. And this is a crummy place to be stuck.

Am I going to let this hold me back anymore?! NO! Ok...so on the inside I am really doubting my abilities to fight this mindset... But I think the first step is to recognize what I need to work on- check! Next thing to do is to fake it till I believe it- check! I am going to say I won't let it get in my way any more. Then I will remind myself of it again in a few minutes...and then again and again until I do finally believe I am strong enough AND WORTH IT to believe I deserve self esteem. I have to do this. For me, for my husband, and for my kids. They deserve the best me that I can possibly be. And until I feel good about myself, I can't be my best.

What is holding you back? It is time to peel back the layers and work on them one by one until you finally allow yourself to get healthy!