Today is one of those days when I just feel like lazing on the couch. Whenever I don’t have to work I have big plans for my day, but then, especially when the weather sucks like today, the only thing I want is to rest. These days then, I don’t even really want to see people or do things I don’t care about. I feel that I need to gather my energy for the next moment when I will feel projected outside.
On days like this, besides wandering around the house listening to music, tidying up without much conviction, and watching trashy programs, I get to think about my existential questions. Today I was thinking about how our relationship with our bodies affects our lives, and how it changes our perception of ourselves and the world.
I’m not referring solely to what I think of my body on an aesthetic level, but just how I feel about it, what sensations it gives me, and how the variation of these sensations changes how I feel. This is probably a bit of a twisted thought, but I want to try to give you clarity. I want to try to answer my questions.
What is the relationship I have with my body like?
Just on the spur of the moment, I’d say it’s a good relationship. While on the personality level, I’ve always had a lot of problems, on the physical level I’ve never had much to blame myself for. I’ve probably been helped by the fact that I correspond quite well to society’s standards, and that I don’t have any physical features that are totally publically condemned. But maybe it’s not just that, it’s full of beautiful people, in fact, who despite reflecting the canons, still feel bad in their skin. On the other hand, I’ve always liked my body, I’ve never seen it as a collection of pieces that are never too perfect (nose too big, legs too short, etc.), but as one organic piece, connected in all its parts. Of course, I’ve also had my insecurities and things I wish I could have changed. For example, as a young girl, I wished I had smaller breasts, because I hated having people look at my boobs instead of my eyes, then I wished I had more perfect skin, without pimples and impurities, instead, my skin is very sensitive and reactive and depending on the period I have pimples, blackheads, and dry skin, another worry is that my waist is not narrow enough and my hips are not wide enough, and there was a time when I decided to exercise every day to have a perfect butt, but then, I simply realized that my butt was just fine the way it is, or maybe it was my laziness. Perhaps the biggest worry I had on an aesthetic level was my colors, I would have liked to have very white skin, red hair, and light eyes, when I was little it bothered me that people were always asking me where I was from and if I had foreign origins.
Here, I can’t say that I never had aesthetic paturnias, but at the end of the day, none of that was ever a big deal. While I still have a hard time forgiving myself for certain things because of my character, I am basically okay with my body. I recognize and am grateful that I am beautiful, but I also accept my flaws.
One thing I struggle to do, however, is to take care of my body and my physical well-being as I would like to. For example, I love to exercise and every time I work out I feel physically good and more aligned with myself, yet many times I give in to laziness and I don’t move as much as I would like. Often, when it comes to spending money on sports, my first thought is that it would be a waste of money, which I don’t think about when I go to a restaurant or a cinema. I realize that doing physical activity, although I enjoy it, isn’t something that comes naturally to me, I have to plan it, and I have to force myself. What I always do with pleasure is walking, it helps me clear my mind and get the blood flowing, if I’m alone I always go fast and try to explore new streets in the city where I live, or, even better, in nature. I think contact with nature is extremely important, with trees, animals, water. I would stay for hours and hours in the water.
Also, the relationship with food has always been very important in terms of physical pleasure. I’ve always felt a great curiosity about all kinds of food, and eating for me is a great joy. I’m definitely not a great chef, but when I can, I love to cook, especially for others. If it were up to me, I would go to a restaurant every day, and many times I simply enjoy hearing about food or watching programs about it, like Masterchef or all the various cooking programs that are out there now.
Thinking about another key issue when it comes to the body, sex and nudity, things get more complicated. When it comes to nudity, I remember as a teenager, at the time when I was beginning to change physically, I became extremely demure. At school, I was terrified that they might look at me when we changed in the locker room before gymnastics, and even at home, I wouldn’t let anyone see me. I hated hearing comments about me, like my best friend at the time saying that I didn’t exploit my femininity enough, that I needed to go to the hairdresser and change my haircut. I desperately wanted to be fine the way I was, I didn’t want to fit in with the world by changing myself, but it was probably at that time that I became rigid in my positions, and that generated a lot of suffering because of the feeling of distance from most people. Even now, when I feel insecure, I reproduce those emotions of an ugly duckling who has to choose between loneliness and compromise with the world.
As I grew up, however, my relationship with nudity totally changed. Now I think I could stand naked in front of almost anyone, obviously in a respectful situation. I don’t remember exactly when things changed. The first time I had sex (which wasn’t too positive for other reasons) I remember undressing quickly and without any shame, at that time I actually remember that I liked being watched, but from a distance, then most of the time I’d run away terrified when someone approached me. All these years I actually lived this conflict between liking to be liked, feeling exposed, and the intolerable fear of real closeness. Maybe now I’m healing this conflict a little bit, although it’s a space inside me that still carries a lot of pain. Because of my difficulty in happy romantic relationships I often thought I had a problem with sex, but thinking about it in recent times, I realized that the problems were not with sex at all, but with attachment. I was consumed by an intense fear of abandonment and a great difficulty in trusting people. I can’t say that this has completely changed now, but I feel I can look at it from the outside instead of just feeling it taking over me.
During sex in general, on the other hand, I think I’ve always felt comfortable, confident in my body, but intimidated by the fact that I could be hurt emotionally. Even on my own, I never had trouble feeling pleasure and knowing what turned me on, but somehow I often felt behind others and especially unable to have the emotional intelligence to get what I wanted. I almost always felt that my sexual happiness depended on the other person and that I couldn’t do anything to actively seek what I wanted. Often I sought in sex a fusion with the other and too much vulnerability, and then I had a hard time dealing with the detachment or the fact that certain things didn’t work out.
At this time in my life, to sum up my relationship with my body, I feel very confident on an aesthetic level (although it has never been a big problem for me), comfortable with nudity and physical contact with others, I know how to take care of myself as far as health is concerned, although I don’t put as much effort into it as I would like, especially for sports, I wish I could exercise at least an hour a day, but I have just started a new job and in my free moments I often feel a bit lazy. But I definitely want to commit to spending more time in nature and being more consistent in physical activity. Maybe I’m not eating super healthy these days (I’m addicted to bologna), but I can’t complain either, in the end you have to do one thing at a time, you can’t expect to do everything, everywhere all at once. Finally, with regard to sexuality (particularly that experienced with other people) I just feel I need to work more on my attachment and be less afraid of being hurt so I can feel more fulfilled. In the first few months of this year I focused on finding a solid base to start from (a house and a job), now I feel I can open up more to the world.
