It all started with a prompt. She asked a question and I found myself pondering, at length, my answer to this question.
The question was about what thing I would want to change about myself. Because everyone has something they want to change about themselves, right?
I've been trying to change myself my whole life.
At times, I've disliked things about my body, at other times, my mind. I've disliked behaviours and habits and who I've been to create particular results.
I've disliked my emotions. Ooooh, don't get me started about how many of my emotions I've disliked.
I bet you have too. Anger? Do you like it much? Do you like how it feels when it rises up through your body and wants to erupt out of your mouth? Or are you, as I used to be, so practised at stuffing it down that you have convinced yourself you're "not an angry person"?
How about shame? Or guilt? Or disgust? Do you like how these feel in your body? Do you let yourself feel them?
They're powerful, you know, every single one of them. And every one of them has a purpose, a reason for existing, a use.
I used to think I should change my emotions, my results, my habits and behaviours and big parts of my mind and body, but now I realise that there's really only one thing I probably need to change:
My unwillingness to accept myself as I am.
To accept my precious body.
To accept my clever mind.
To accept behaviours that are often adaptations that allowed me to survive some difficult circumstances.
To accept my habits, even the ones that don't serve me, as hating on them don't seem to change them anyway.
To accept my results, because results are in the past. They are already done, and there's no power in lamenting the past.
And to accept my emotions, as they arise, even the ones that feel really bad, because they're part of being human and I can't think of anything more precious than that.
This was my response to Elizabethbit's prompt (below) this week inside the Ladies of Hive Community.
Everyone has something that they'd like to change about themselves. It might be a physical thing; a character trait; or anything at all. What is the ONE thing you would choose to change about yourself and why?
If you're reading this within 24 hours of publishing - and you're a lady - you're welcome to participate in this weekly activity.
Photo credit goes to my partner in crime life, @new.things, who did an excellent job of documenting our latest trip to Europe and the UK where I got lots of practise accepting my less than perfect human self.