I am not really going to say too much today. It's Friday afternoon and y'all are just trying to make it to the weekend.
I also tend to skimp on media. I posted some photos earlier in the week, but my blogs tend to not be visually appealing enough. So for today, in regards to my personal health and fitness struggles and goals, I'm going to post two videos, and give just a tiny bit of background.
The first video below I ran across a few weeks ago. I follow several different tumblr blogs. This one I got from Young, Black and Fit who also runs Young, Black and Vegan. A fitness trainer receives a question from a YouTube channel viewer asking how he can make his girlfriend workout more. The trainer thinks this is a selfish and mean-spirited question and he gives his (very angry) opinion about it. WARNING: He says a few curse words, but I posted it anyway because I have NEVER heard a man say things like this, nor have I ever heard a fitness instructor say things like this.
A year and a half ago, I was asked to participate in a poetry and art show around the theme: "The Body is Not an Apology." Before you start to think I'm some awesome self-love ambassador let me tell you: I'm not. I'll never forget the lines from the movie Liar, Liar. "My teacher says real beauty is on the insider." "That's just something ugly people say." And for every time I have known a person whose face or body put them in the "ugly" category but whose spirit made them beautiful, I have judged someone's ill-fitting outfit. So, I go back and forth between believing that we as a world need to allow full-figured, curvy, fat, odd-bodied people to see and know that they are beautiful too, I have believed that we only say that until we lose weight or find the hairstyle and makeup that works for us.
At that show, I read the poem in the video below. I wore a short skirt that some would say girls my size shouldn't wear. But I have two other skirts like that now (slightly longer - I acknowledge the immodesty factor and I have no excuse for it).
As I say in the poem: "If I look like this for the next 80 years, that will be just lovely."
I just want to live. I know that I am beautiful, in a way that not all people fully accept. But somehow I am fully convinced in my own mind and the mind of my friends and family.
It's just weird to live with a tension that also wonders "what if I were 40 pounds lighter?" Because I do have a goal weight - and that is it: 40 pounds lighter. What if? Will I be less radical? Less of an ambassador for inner beauty? Because so many ex-chubby people never believed they were beautiful. Once they are smaller they throw out the old photos and promise never to get heavy again. But I don't want to leave this girl behind. I don't want to look back at this poem - even minus 40 pounds - and say "I had no idea what I was talking about."
The guy in the other video, the fitness instructor, says you work out because you want your body to be stronger to sustain your life, not because you want to look different or because someone forces you to. I agree with him. I do want to be stronger. Seane Corn, the yoga instructor in one of my photos from Tuesday, says we practice yoga "in order to do the work we need to do in the world, in order to hold that light for spirit." She believes that what you practice on the yoga mat (concentrating more, holding longer, breathing deeper, not letting go even when it burns) translates to, or maybe flows from, inner strength. I agree so whole-heartedly.
I am about to begin a journey in holistic health. I want to be healthy and strong, but I am scared to death that if I ever were to achieve that goal, I would become shallow as well.
I have a sweet friend - a hot guy actually, with a six pack and really well-defined pecs - who told me once "you are beautiful now and you'll still be beautiful if you get thinner." I love him for saying that. But I worry if I'll still be beautiful on the inside, strong on the inside?
(Note: I think next week's topic might be sacrifice.)
I also tend to skimp on media. I posted some photos earlier in the week, but my blogs tend to not be visually appealing enough. So for today, in regards to my personal health and fitness struggles and goals, I'm going to post two videos, and give just a tiny bit of background.
The first video below I ran across a few weeks ago. I follow several different tumblr blogs. This one I got from Young, Black and Fit who also runs Young, Black and Vegan. A fitness trainer receives a question from a YouTube channel viewer asking how he can make his girlfriend workout more. The trainer thinks this is a selfish and mean-spirited question and he gives his (very angry) opinion about it. WARNING: He says a few curse words, but I posted it anyway because I have NEVER heard a man say things like this, nor have I ever heard a fitness instructor say things like this.
A year and a half ago, I was asked to participate in a poetry and art show around the theme: "The Body is Not an Apology." Before you start to think I'm some awesome self-love ambassador let me tell you: I'm not. I'll never forget the lines from the movie Liar, Liar. "My teacher says real beauty is on the insider." "That's just something ugly people say." And for every time I have known a person whose face or body put them in the "ugly" category but whose spirit made them beautiful, I have judged someone's ill-fitting outfit. So, I go back and forth between believing that we as a world need to allow full-figured, curvy, fat, odd-bodied people to see and know that they are beautiful too, I have believed that we only say that until we lose weight or find the hairstyle and makeup that works for us.
At that show, I read the poem in the video below. I wore a short skirt that some would say girls my size shouldn't wear. But I have two other skirts like that now (slightly longer - I acknowledge the immodesty factor and I have no excuse for it).
As I say in the poem: "If I look like this for the next 80 years, that will be just lovely."
I just want to live. I know that I am beautiful, in a way that not all people fully accept. But somehow I am fully convinced in my own mind and the mind of my friends and family.
It's just weird to live with a tension that also wonders "what if I were 40 pounds lighter?" Because I do have a goal weight - and that is it: 40 pounds lighter. What if? Will I be less radical? Less of an ambassador for inner beauty? Because so many ex-chubby people never believed they were beautiful. Once they are smaller they throw out the old photos and promise never to get heavy again. But I don't want to leave this girl behind. I don't want to look back at this poem - even minus 40 pounds - and say "I had no idea what I was talking about."
The guy in the other video, the fitness instructor, says you work out because you want your body to be stronger to sustain your life, not because you want to look different or because someone forces you to. I agree with him. I do want to be stronger. Seane Corn, the yoga instructor in one of my photos from Tuesday, says we practice yoga "in order to do the work we need to do in the world, in order to hold that light for spirit." She believes that what you practice on the yoga mat (concentrating more, holding longer, breathing deeper, not letting go even when it burns) translates to, or maybe flows from, inner strength. I agree so whole-heartedly.
I am about to begin a journey in holistic health. I want to be healthy and strong, but I am scared to death that if I ever were to achieve that goal, I would become shallow as well.
I have a sweet friend - a hot guy actually, with a six pack and really well-defined pecs - who told me once "you are beautiful now and you'll still be beautiful if you get thinner." I love him for saying that. But I worry if I'll still be beautiful on the inside, strong on the inside?
(Note: I think next week's topic might be sacrifice.)
I'm a fan Beautiful Cheeka! Rock on Sissa :)
ReplyDelete