Recycle of Routines
I read a quote I read a while ago that required me to ironically self-reflect: "if you call yourself self-aware but you are only aware of your faults and never acknowledge your strengths you are not self-aware. you have repackaged your self-hatred."
Well, maybe, self-hatred is an awful word for it. Perhaps, it is better described as poor self-image.
No matter how hard I tried to mask everything by exemplifying the epitome of body positivity (or at least neutrality) through praises and coos (or beratement if the message cannot go through) to other women when they complain about their own perception of their body, I still have this deep-rooted issue of my own self image. The perceptions that I have of myself have been so long instilled in me that it is quite difficult to remove myself from those ideas.
It is kind of ironic being this self-aware. Being aware enough of both the self-limiting beliefs that we have set upon ourselves, while also knowing those beliefs are never necessarily true. The mind is a lonely place to occupy oneself in. Everywhere we go, there we are. Our mind follows relentlessly, reminding ourselves that unless outside perception is skewed or changed drastically, there is no way that our self-limiting beliefs would vanish completely.
Hence, I decided in mid-2024 to at least started showing up for my body. Because, even though I have always been battling my own mind as the source of both support and opposition of self-acknowledgement and self-love, I should at least correct the way I treat my body. Working out more and eating mindfully were my chosen methods.
And it worked. Brilliantly, I might even add.
I kept receiving compliments everywhere. Granted, the transformation took quite longer than it would if I were to combine it with taking meds, but it did work. But the imposter syndrome always hits hard. To this day, I still don't know how to take compliments. Let alone enjoy the fruits of my own labour.
Perhaps since the last time I had this figure was back when I was in middle school/early high school, I am still relearning on how to live in my body. How to feel safe. How to balance the boundaries between showing up and self-criticising. How to love without destructive criticism. How to change my own physical perception of myself because I often forgot that I've gotten smaller.
Regardless of how many compliments I have received, however, I still hear these voices in my head. There is one sniffling child version of myself in the corner, still feeling left out of any proper life experiences and milestones, still believing that she is that weird little girl that everyone avoided and despised enough to the point of bullying. The teenage version of myself vehemently believes the same, because, though I am smaller now, I am still unappetising and unpalatable to anyone. The older version is silent, she knows that I still do everything on my own; a recluse, not by choice.
From this particular self-experiment, I have learned it is possible to love yourself enough but still tired of everything happening around you without you.
I am still so far removed from the natural progression of life. No positive life-changing decisions or events; only passing through life doing repetitions of the same things. No novel excitements. Just a cycle of the same repeated routine.