beautiful

I think about the 13 year old Lahni sometimes, the little girl who hated her 135 pound body, the 98 pound body that she still hated. The doctors told us to put away the scale, but I couldn't, it was the only thing that defined me and determined how I felt about myself. 100 pounds was scary, so back to 99 I went, weighing myself every time I walked past the scale just to make sure I didn't go over. It was emotions and feelings and thoughts that threatened me from the very beginning, that I didn't know how to express, so having control of that one number gave me everything I needed to keep hiding from my pain and I was satisfied. Begin taking that satisfaction away from someone and all they're left to face is the one thing they've been trying to avoid. Take that satisfaction away from someone, and the hell they've been living in begins to crumble, and as they're trying to escape, there's that one demon still clinging to their leg. This was me, and the healing was harder than the hiding, and scarier than the number on the scale ever was, but it was the healing that saved me, and so it was worth it. Feeling beautiful in the realest way was worth it.

I have a journal that I used to write in, and there's an entry dated about two years after all of the madness began, and it reads,

'I feel beautiful...and that's a great feeling...I have come a long way!'

That's all I wrote. I didn't write about why I felt beautiful on that particular day, I just simply felt it. It was the first time I had ever written those words down before, not the first time since I had gotten sick, but the first time in my life. It wasn't a caption for a picture I posted on Myspace that said,'beautiful', like I'm sure I had done many times in the year my eating disorder developed, but it was a simple journal entry, a feeling so dominant in my being that I wanted to document it. Somewhere along the way, beautiful became an adjective, and that's all it was to me. It took me two years to realize that it's so much more than just a description of something...but that it's a verb, a feeling, a gift.

18 years of life are behind me now and I have covered a bit more soil since the years of my sickness. I have made more mistakes, but I've also learned new lessons, I've seen more things, met more people, been new places...I am not dead, I am alive, and that is beautiful.

Beautiful has an ever changing meaning in our world today. I fell victim to the wrath of a frightening disease because I looked at a picture in a magazine and saw beautiful. I didn't see those models taking laxatives, starving themselves, crying themselves to sleep at night, I didn't see any of those things, the things that a picture don't show you. I just saw skinny and the way it was glamourized. The word beautiful plays a new role in each movie we go to see with our friends, it has a new face with each magazine we pick up, a new body on each billboard we pass, but I have learned that I have felt the most beautiful when I have looked far from any of those people that society would label 'beautiful'. When I am in my pajamas writing, expressing myself, I feel beautiful. When I have just finished running a long distance, I feel beautiful. When I am driving with the windows down, hair succombing to any way the wind might blow it, and singing to my favorite songs, I feel beautiful. When I am talking with my best friends about life, I feel beautiful. When I am at an alter, mascara streaked face and all, I feel beautiful. When I am dancing, I feel beautiful. When I am laughing, I feel beautiful. When someone is hugging me, I feel beautiful. When I am hugging someone, I feel beautiful. When I am in the midst of God's creation, a starry night, an ocean that goes for days, a deep sunrise or sunset, I feel beautiful. To me, in it's vast and varying meanings, beautiful at it's richest and deepest is a feeling, something you can't capture in a picture.

I have learned and am continually learning what beautiful is. And I'm not saying that it's vanity to look in a mirror and see beautiful, or to see the outward beauty of others. I gaze at the mountains, and the stars, and the hills in awe of the beauty found in them, a beauty that points to a merciful and loving God, so why then should I ignore it in a reflection, in the flesh? God created us to be beautiful, to feel beautiful, and to understand beautiful. We must embrace this gift, and take care of it, it is precious and fragile, found in a flock of birds, and in a sweet smile, and given to us freely. Don't ignore it and don't abandon it.

I'll leave you with this thought...

"For if what makes us beautiful is defined by our circumstances, then aren’t we doomed? For a man could ravage your body, cancer could steal your breasts, time could warp your bones. And what then? If beauty hangs outside of us, then it is there for the taking. But if beauty is knit up in our soul, then it is only ever and eternally ours for the keeping or for the selling."

I don't remember who said this, but they're right.

So go, find your beautiful. It might not be easy, but it is completely and wonderfully worth it.

My Womanifesto

My Womanifesto: by Lahni

I am a woman.

I am a lady,
I will not, however, always behave like one.

I will cry when I am sad, when I am being hugged, when I'm scared, bleeding, overwhelmed, excited, full of joy, and hysterical, I will.
I will dance in the kitchen like a fool without fear of being ridiculed by anyone who walks in and sees me watching myself through the windows.
I will laugh with my entire body & often times when it is entirely inappropriate to do so.
I will get upset often and get my feelings hurt just as much,
but I will smile just the same(again, sometimes when it's not called for).
I will feel the aches of my hurting heart.
I will heal with time and love.

My right is to sing loudly, really obnoxiously loudly, in the shower.
My right is to wear cute push-up bras, because they make me feel sexy(totally just kidding, kinda).
My right is to put, '(totally just kidding, kinda)', after any statement that I'm not really totally just kidding about, not even kinda.
My right is to spend over two hours getting ready one day and then sporting 'crazy' hair the next.
My right is to go more than two days without shaving,
my right is to wear jeans on those days, or not.
My right is to spray the whole bottle of perfume on me.
My right is to inspire deafen people with my music by turning it up just a little too much and rolling my windows down.
My right is to interpretive dance in parking lots with my friends to Celine Dion. Ladies, you know who you are, and we will stay forever this way(no pun intended).
My right is to indulge in a whole bag of PB m&m's, seriously, it's my right to clog my arteries,okay?
My right is to paint my nails with wild colors and patterns.
My right is to wear that polish chipped.
My right is to be a fabulous lover.
My right is to be the best sister, girlfriend, daughter, cousin, baby-sitter, friend, I can be(even though that doesn't always happen).
My right is to watch all 9 seasons of One Tree Hill more than once.
My right is to lie and say I'm gonna stop eating PB m&m's and go for a run.
My right is to tell myself I'm gonna get fat if I don't stop lying.
My right is to put together cute,maybe kinda out there, outfits.
My right is to be happy, actually, overly happy, kinda like the guy who sounds much too happy through the intercom thingy when he takes my coffee order every morning. Thank you, I know I'm at McDonalds, no need to welcome me.
My right is to be rude.
My right is to be nicer.
My right is to love deeply.
My right is to be enthusiastic and silly.
My right is to be terrified.

I will always search and look beyond what I feel and see, because it is not my right to be comfortable.

I will lay behind all standards that don't belong to me.
I will dance freely, doing leaps down the isles of Wal-Mart.
I will embarrass myself, but enjoy doing it.

No longer will I miss out because it's safer to do so.
I will jump in, fearless.

No longer will I dwell on my past.
No longer will I define my worth by the way someone else tries to dictate my feelings.
I am perfectly whole, despite the way I am imperfectly filled.
No longer will I look in the mirror with disdainful eyes.
No longer will my sexuality be something that can be taken away from me, claimed by the eyes of others, it will be given by me, or not at all.
No longer will I be ashamed of the mold I do not fit. I am different. Different is beautiful.
No longer will I compare myself to others.
I have come far.
No longer will I be unforgiving.
Life is too short.

Today is beautiful because I am breathing.
Tomorrow is too.

I am a hoarder of make-up, I am a dancer, I am a writer, a lover, a fighter, a listener, a hipster, a laugher, a cryer, a wild card, a nerd, a gypsy, a follower, a leader, a Jesus lover, a dreamer, a clown, a lady. A woman.

It is my right, a gift, to never choose or commit to just one. I own them all.

Life is a gift, an opportunity to discover who I am, who I am created to be & to take on this day unashamed of all that makes me me.

I embrace my imperfections.
I embrace the letter B on all of my bras.
I embrace my fair skin and hips, even though it can be hard.
I embrace my sensitive stomach,
and my even more sensitive soul.
I embrace my willpower and determination.
I embrace my skepticism and optimism.
I embrace my passion and my compassion.
I embrace my need to do more, see more, and be more.
I embrace my craziest dreams.
I embrace my fragile and vulnerable heart.
I embrace my body, every inch.
I embrace all that makes me asymmetrical.

I will be inappropriate. I will stare, I will gossip, I will offend. And I will be judged for that.
But I will not allow these flaws to hold me back or define me. I will apologize and strive yet again for a kind heart and gentle(but crazy)spirit that might relay to the lives of others.

I will not give up. I will not settle.

I am a woman. I am me.

For Brandi.

Life is fragile, if there's one thing I have learned in my young life of eighteen years, that would be it. God is often thought of as the only one with the power to give and take away, but sometimes it's on us, sometimes we're the ones to give life and take it away. Think about it. That girl who's outfit was sooooo adorable...and you told her, you just gave life to her world. But then there's that other girl who you don't really know at all...and you decide to judge her anyway, you just took some life away from her world.

From infancy we naturally revolve our world around ourselves, our needs, our feelings. But somewhere along the way, past the stages of infancy and even preadolescence when it's still somewhat acceptable to be whiny and self-righteous, we got it all wrong. Somewhere along the way, we made a choice, a decision to walk our hallways, our workplaces, our churches, our homes, and our towns with the very same attitude that is instilled in us from birth. I don't think the world is as distorted as each one of our minds are. We see the world in all of it's pain and clamor and yet we create these 'utopias' that aren't utopias at all, we gossip and hurt one another, judge and discourage, and tear down, but surely because our world is 'all as it should be' and all about what we want and need, we tell ourselves that 'that kind of stuff' won't happen to me, to us.' But it does.

Unique and rare to the town of Cynthiana, compared to some places, is our close knit community, and as of recently, something I have realized we take for granted. Sure, we have the cute little story book ladies who smile and wave at you in the store from behind their shopping carts and stop and chat with you about the latest news, but that usually turns into gossip, and then even more gossip when the both of you go home and gossip to the next person. It's no wonder how fast news spreads in this town, most of us know if anything big has happened by the time we lay our heads down at night. And if nothing 'big' has happened, we still sleep at night, despite and even content in the fact that we spent our day gossiping, judging, and hurting, taking away some more life.

We're all at fault. I know I am. It's nice to be accepted, to join in on the 'excitment' of talking about others. I've been the reciever, but I've also been the giver. I've held my tongue in front of the person, but talked about them behind their back. Which one is worse? We all know the answer, but we're too comfortable in our own little lives to truly care about others. And 'joking'? Let's face it, whether it's to their face or behind their backs, our intentions usually aren't genuine.

Brandi Ballinger. A name I wasn't familiarized with until the day she was self-righteously exploited by others all over facebook after she committed suicide...after facing bullying, among other things none of us will ever know. I didn't know this young lady, but the rumors, the statuses of people who 'wished' they would have gotten to know her, or 'wished' they would of talked to her more, really upset me. If you wanted to know her and if you wanted to talk to her, you would have, but you didn't. Again, your status, it's for attention, it's about you, 'what will others think about me?' The news itself was quite unsettling, the reasons for it happening were unsettling, but the way people reacted to it made me cringe. People are heartless, saying things like, 'It was her decision to take a gun to her head' and becoming jittery at the mention of her name if they can even say it, some just refer to her as 'that girl who died' and it all makes me sick. It was your decision to say mean things to her and tear her down. A young girl, eighth grade. I can't even begin to imagine the pain that she was feeling, and the hope she wasn't. So much pain and so little hope, if any, that she was compelled to pull a trigger and end her beautiful and precious life. I can't begin to understand the dark depths of suicide.

I didn't know her, but I do know other 'Brandi's'--the people I have said mean things to or maybe just ingnored. Healing needs to take place, we need to move forward as a community. What has happened is a cry out to our town. It shouldn't have taken her life to show us how wrong we have been, but it did and it needs to be dealt with, not pushed under the rug in a few months like nothing happened. I believe this 'close knit' label on our community has been used against us in the past, and we have let it, but we don't have to anymore, it's time we bring it closer together and build from the pain and mistakes we have allowed ourselves to become comfortable with in the past. It's time we start giving more life, instead of taking it, for Brandi and for eachother.

Someone once said, 'the breath you just took was a gift, the next one is not promised.'
Where will those breaths find you? Making fun of someone? Or instead getting to know them?

Give life, give love. You never know the battle someone might be facing.