Who knew that getting a lotus flower tattoo at the end of 2009 would foreshadow the year to come?
A lotus flower is often used as an example of divine beauty. Its unfolding petals suggest the expansion of the soul. The growth of its pure beauty from the mud of its origin holds a benign spiritual promise. Confucian scholar Zhou Dunyi wrote: "I love the lotus because while growing from mud, it is unstained".
At the beginning of 2010, I was living in the mud. I might have been closer to the surface than I had been in the past, but I was still suffocating from the mud. I could not see myself as divinely beautiful. In fact, all I could see was an awful mess.
Until 2010, I had chosen people (and been born to parents) who did not know how to celebrate the beauty within themselves or appreciate the beauty within me. I only knew criticism in my endless pursuit for perfection. And by the spring of 2010, I was tired to my core. It was my therapist's wise wisdom that asked me, do you want to finally get off this treadmill that is taking you nowhere and making you miserable?
From that moment forward, I have slowly shed the exhausting weight that I was carrying around. Many women know these weights - never being happy with where you are - pushing to be more successful, more skinny, more lovable.
As I did this, I surrounded myself with wonderful women. Women who believed in me, when I couldn't believe in myself. Who encouraged me, when I didn't want to take the next step forward. Who held up a mirror and said, "please see the beauty in yourself that I can see in you". And the lotus slowly crept through the mud.
It is unfortunate to say, but the final breakthrough came when my mom uttered words to me that a mother should never say to her daughter. "Smetimes you make it difficult for me to love you." My dad always had the power to wound, but hearing it from my mom finally broke me...
And through the mud of the words, I arose, unstained, as a divinely beautiful lotus.
So world, hear me sing! I am perfect and wonderful and whole today, just as I am. I have everything that I need today. I don't need to keep running on the treadmill of perfectionism, chasing a carrot that is unreachable and unsatisfying. I am perfectly imperfect. I have peace, contentment, and joy.
A word of gracious appreciation to the women who journeyed this path with me. You lovingly coaxed me through the muck and held my hand as I slowly bloomed and recognized my divinely beautiful self. There are not enough words to express my gratitude. The joy of being freed from the mud is priceless. You have a very sacred place in my heart... a place that is filled with gratitude and love.
And as 2010 ends, the Year of Me begins...
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