I wasn’t sure about posting this photo Andy took when I wasn’t aware recently. I don’t look like a lot of the other yoga people in these squares. My legs are thicker, I’m still learning to stretch my 44yr old body into what are considered some pretty easy poses, and I’m not in lycra. But then a lot of showing up in this space, for me, is about my struggles with self-acceptance, with loving myself exactly as I am, not some pimped-up X-factor version, and when I look at this photo I see a woman who remains open to learning, who isn’t prepared to just sit around waiting to die now she’s past 40, and who is still enjoying the process of self-evolution. The recent poetry videos I’ve been posting on here have been the very first time I’ve watched myself perform all the way through. In the past I’ve felt excruciatingly embarrassed and still haven’t been able to view most of them. So what’s changed? I have. I’m not thinner or younger than in any of the previous videos I’ve hated (in fact quite the opposite), but I’m now at peace with myself, and my journey. I have no desire to compete. That is an incredibly powerful place to inhabit and I have every intention of rooting here for some time. Returning to thoughts on self-image: when I speak I’m expressive and so sometimes my chin doubles, sometimes it’s more pronounced. Should I adopt that weird, robotic side-look-angle thing that women have begun to believe is the only presentable way to be in this space. Fuck that. Because let’s be honest, no guys are judged solely by their chin roll, or absence of it, and I have yet to see any man fucking around with that angle nonsense. I am an imperfect woman, trying her best to be her authentic self in an imperfect world that demands perfection. I’m not sure I get it right. I know that not conforming opens a woman up to criticism from the most unexpected places. But I also feel that showing up here, as I am, is my little piece of anarchy in a world that’s pushing us all towards homogeny. ? @andyrgarside ??. #liveauthentic #livebravely #middleyears #selfacceptance #radicalselflove #womenwhogrow #yoganovice
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