Last week, on a cool fall morning, Tony and I walked down the streets of our new city. Though we’ve been here about a hundred times over the past fifteen years, I still say, “New” because we live here now. We’re no longer visiting.
That day, we were heading to do our annual screening for our health insurance. When we arrived, we checked in with the receptionist. Then one at a time, we went into a small room where the technician drew the curtain. She measured our height, waist, and—the part I was dreading—our weight. But as she said my weight out loud and entered it into the computer, Tony’s words, from a few days before, came back to me.
“We’re not going to stress out about our health screening results this year,” he’d said after telling me about making our required appointments.
In the moment, I don’t know if he was saying it more to himself or to me. But it was exactly what I needed to hear. There are some years where you need to let go of the expectations you have for yourself (at least temporarily). When you need to offer yourself grace instead of measuring yourself up to a standard you just can’t reach.
2020 is one of those years.
For me, my weight has always been a faulty barometer for how well I’m doing at life. As if how I fit into my jeans can accurately assess the worth and value I’m bringing to the world around me. As if,
The more I weigh, the less I matter.
Some part of my brain knows this is a lie, only our culture has done a fantastic job of making women believe this. Of telling us our main concern should be to shrink ourselves into a glorified, tiny figure. But even when I am able to dispel these lies and ignore the scale, there is always that question of whether I am healthy. And there are always my jeans that could fit me a little better.
This is not the season to feel guilty about your jeans not fitting.
I share all of this today, because I have a feeling I am not the only one who weighs a little more than they did in 2019. Or feels like their usual healthy routines or goals, have gone off the rails a little bit. And if this is where you are, let me say these words to both of us:
This is not the season to feel guilty about your jeans not fitting. This is not the season to reach for your ultimate fitness goals. This is not the time to feel bad because you can’t do what you normally do. None of the things you’ve been doing to cope make you less lovable or valuable to those around you.
This is the season to do our best.
To take the extremely difficult circumstances we’ve each been given—with all their uncertainty—and do what we can. To be there for the people in our lives. To celebrate the small wins. To bring good out of hard situations. And all the while, to take care of ourselves in the healthiest way possible so we can keep showing up.
This is not the season to do a juice cleanse, fitness challenge, or even a Whole 30.
This is not the season to do a juice cleanse, fitness challenge, or even a Whole 30. This is the season to make sure there are vegetables on our plate at dinner. To get out and walk when we can. And above all, to get enough rest.
The expectations our culture has given us for our bodies, have always been unrealistic. But some of the expectations we’ve had for ourselves have been just as impossible. And they are especially so, right now. This season, let us pay attention to those standards we’ve set. Let us hold onto the ones that serve and help us, and let go of all the rest.
What expectations do you need to let go of this season?
What are those you need to hold on to?
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Photo by Danielle Rice on Unsplash
