fit4good

Okay, guys!  I have been silent over here (eating marshmallows with nutella smeared on top to appease my anxiety on several fronts, I kid you not) but I MUST pipe in at this juncture to offer this rant on why numbers on a scale are no indication of personal magnificence.

Our value as human beings cannot be measured.  Period.

Pick your poison.  Academic degrees.  Number of Facebook friends.  Dollars in the bank.  Numbers on a scale.  None of it can determine our worth.  Our worth was determined on the day the Universe granted us the gift of being alive and hard coded us for love and belonging. 

Nothing can take that away our basic human right to those things.  Nothing.  There is no more, no less, no add on, no plug in, no loss, no gain, that can diminish our worth.  We are.  We simply are. And we really are enough.

Of course, when I look at the scale, it is really hard to NOT notice that today i weigh exactly five pounds more than I did when I was nine months pregnant with my first child.  And trust me, there is no baby in there.  Sadly.

If I let those numbers mean anything but numbers, then the barage is immediate.  I suck.  I am undisciplined.  I let myself go.  And then I get hit with the big guns…no wonder my husband never wanted to have sex with me. No wonder I got nothing goin on in the somethin somethin department.

You can only imagine how great this feels!  And how productive!

No, try as I might, there are no real connections between numbers and value, try as I might to connect the dots.  People who love you, love you.  People who do not, do not.  There is nothing any of us can do to kill love or worthiness.  It is our birthright.  Our work is not to earn it, but to claim it. 

And to dance in it.

And to shake it around.  Like a Polaroid Picture.

Because this is the only shot we have at loving and belonging to our own dear selves.  Of being our own kindest allies.  You know what I mean?  If I am going to be in a fight, let it be for the privilege and peace of loving my own damn self, cellulite and all.

So, Stacey Monk and my dear comrads here, I double dog dare you to dance it off, whatever that number is on the scale.  Fuck that number!  It cannot determine our value.  We will not let it hang like a noose around our necks.  We will not let it run us around like our mothers, or our unkind fathers or those crappy girls in high school who never had to take deep breaths before someone was going to see them naked.

I will do my dance for you in my pudgy petite black dress cloaked glory if needed to brighten anyones day.  Say the Word.

Because it is so not fair for dear people like us to be working so hard to be fit FOR GOOD for christsake to feel like shit for trying.

Can I get an amen?  I think you are beautiful, Stacey Monk and I am talking about your ass, sister, not your glorious insides for a change.

Big love to all,

jen lemen (highest weight ever, not that anyone is counting)