Perfect

I want to say that I always know what’s best for me; that in the moment I will choose ultimate acts of self love. I will choose that which fills me, grounds me, sets me at peace, makes me proud to be in this skin, proud from deep in my star shine right up and out of my eyes. But sometimes I choose things that are not good for me, sometimes I reveal to myself the dark side, show myself I’m not all free yet. I rip myself open, I fray the edges and pray for healing, I get lazy, I live in past or future, I dwell or indulge or hold too tight or just plain miss the point, miss the wonderment.

I know the truth of things. The core of me has always been able to see what I am growing towards. And its a marvelous place and time and state of self, and it will shift again and again and I will reach beyond even that furthest stretch of my inner imagination. And its not so much that I imagine it as I intuit it, I know the woman of my future, I feel her feelings, I see myself unravelled further, freer, clearer, more thankful. Which makes some of the current underdeveloped or over-indulged parts of my personality, psyche and ego stick out awkwardly to me all the more. I know I’m growing towards the goodness, but that knowledge doesn’t mean I get a free pass. I still have to live through each phase and stage. Each year the lessons get harder and I know less and less who I am and what my purpose is. My mirror is getting cleaned by someone up there and I have no doubt in the process but I feel this giant wave of surrender that still has to happen. And that means never trying to be somewhere or someone I’m not, even if my soul knows all the inevitable future destinations.

And then I remember. It is happening. I am not sitting around waiting for this process to begin... it is happening. And its not always blissful, or comfortable, and the awareness of the weird or unhealthy or selfish choices is part of the growing. I don’t feel like I am growing up... I am growing in. I am making a comfortable home here in this body, in this little life. I spoke with a friend today about the pressure I often put on myself to make these “right” choices, to be this perfect manifestation of truth all at once, right NOW! And its a beautiful thing that I know what living from that place would feel like, but I am an inside-out person. When its ripe on the inside, the outside will reveal it. Discipline is a beautiful thing, it can be. But being ready to discipline oneself from a place of self love rather than self loathing is a whole mountain in and of itself.

So many times we localise these “problems”: eating, smoking, exercise, mental states, sleep patterns. We put them, these parts of ourselves and our relationships to them under a microscope and say: this is the bit that is bad. We seek to change it, convert it, and often we project all of our fears and insecurities of not being “good enough” (for what?) onto this particular part. As if by dissolving this one thing, pattern, habit we will become whole. Guess how much anxiety and frustration this heaps on to this already very difficult task? One time, in a deep and foggy depression I realised that the judgement of myself for being depressed was actually far more debilitating than the sadness or low that I was experiencing. Once I was willing to release the judgement of that “side” of me and let it just be what I was experiencing at that time, the heaviness began to rise.

I am all for healthy minds and bodies, for feeling good and being at peace. I think the revolution of health, consciousness and looking inward is awe inspiring. But I fear that the ego, that many minds will take this journey, take the books and the cleanses and workshops and use them to try and eradicate parts of the self and therefore perpetuate pain and never truly learn acceptance and love of self. But in the spirit of living from a love based place, I release that fear and switch the intention to: I love that there are other people on the path to healing and wherever they are at with that and themselves is perfect. Where I am is perfect.