second year carlie gambino

Everyone is guilty. That secret piece of clothing hiding in the back of our closet taunts us all with visions of surreal fashion and fitness: a pair of pants with a goal waistline that realistically would need rib removal to wear, a cutoff shirt that displays impossibly sculpted abs, or that shirt that you swear you’ll wear when you feel comfortable in your own style.

I just donated my last pair of jeans that fit in high school. I was so concerned with staying the same that I didn’t stop to consider that this college change was healthy and normal. I always skipped over the part where I was unhappy with that size in high school, but somehow in college it was my goal size. Somehow now that I was eating three square meals a day, I was supposed to maintain old sizing from my unhealthy deficit of calories and surplus of exercise days from the past.

I, like many others, found myself devastated when my high school jeans stopped fitting. I projected into the future, trying to reimagine my current body to what it was before. I squeezed into the same pair of jeans because I was always hoping that in a few weeks, a month, and even a year later, I would continue to look better and better. I do not feel attractive now, but I will always look good later. I had visions of what I wanted to be, and it never looked anything like my present body.

I was always going to have a smaller waistline later. I was going to have more defined muscles later. I was going to wear it later when I finally looked good, but there is no later because later becomes the present. My present body always falls short no matter how similarly I look like my previous visions of my future self. I lost all of my nows and while splintering into my pasts and futures.

I got caught in idealizing the future, and I forgot that I could still enjoy my body in the present. Taunting myself with unrealistic fantasies was counterintuitive and more damaging to my body than an extra size up. This is not my temporary body. My present body is not my temporary body. In each present moment, I am more myself than I have ever been. I do not have to wait for months of progress to feel attractive. I can choose to tell myself this truth right now. Once I remind myself I am beautiful right now, I’ll remember to sink into the present. I will truthfully remember the past, which will help me be realistic about the future.

I wear clothes that fit me now because there is no time to waste by worrying about what I will wear later. I listen to what my body tells me everyday and I cater to its needs. I have no more energy for unhealthy comparisons of what was or what could be. I am what I am. I am and always will strive to be happy with my present me.

Revised Visions of Self Love