We all have perceived ideas about ourselves.  That, of course, is normal.  But does your idea about yourself coincide with others perceptions of you?

Yesterday I got a wake-up call about myself.  I have, for most of my adult life, been very thin.  At one point I was so skinny I was literally a walking skeleton.  Of course, at that point, I thought I was gorgeous and not skinny enough.  The reality of that was totally different.  However, as I mentioned, for most of my adult life,  I have been thin.  About 10 years ago due to life’s twists and turns, I started to put weight on.

Now, for those of us who used to get the flu once a year and consider that a diet, this was a new and excruciating event.  I had to go on a real diet.  Another thing most of us have discovered is  the fact that over the age of 50, weight loss is no day at the beach.  It is hard and frustrating work.  Add into that a medical issue or two and we are now at my situation.  Diets don’t work.  Lifestyle changes work for a bit but not forever.  So, the new personal perception has been that I am larger than I would like to be.  It makes me feel unattractive.

Here we have the crux of this blog.  Other people’s perception.  I was at a colleagues home yesterday.  She was doing some lifestyle diet – eating 6 times a day – way too much food and not all that happy with the eating.  I remarked that I too had done a 6 times a day meal diet and it was way more food that I would normally eat.  Even though you are eating certain foods at different time of the day – it is too much food.  And her remark to me was, you are so thin.  I was totally taken aback.  I looked at myself through her eyes.  She is short and a little pudgy.  I am tall and the weight is spread out across larger personal geography.

Will I be able to re-evaluate the way I perceive my physical self?  Probably not totally but maybe if one looks at oneself through the eyes of another, one can see how others perceive you.  It was an interesting lesson.  Actually, when looked at objectively, it was some really interesting free therapy!  Can I take this lesson and apply it to myself?  Can I be like Candace Bergen, once so incredibly gorgeous and skinny that she stopped traffic in NYC and say there is not a carb that I have met that I do not love?!  Can I be  like her and accept the fact that I cannot lose the weight I have been battling for the past ten years?  She was interviewed and said she tried to lose some weight for Murphy Brown but it didn’t work.  Can I be that person – happy with who they are physically?  I don’t know but it is worth a try!