Part of what started the thought process for yesterday’s piece was me sitting in my closet.  I have lost nearly 40 pounds in the course of a year and it has been a struggle to fit into the clothes I have—clothes I’ve had and have worn for years now.  There were some pieces I loved, but as I looked around the closet, I realized that so many of those pieces were bought to fit where I was.  The majority were bought out of desperation, trying to find anything that fit, not something that I really wanted or that represented me.  Their purpose was to cover the truth about what I looked like—and sometimes they were simply bought because they didn’t make me feel awful when I wore them—they fit, or at least worked for a bit.  I’ve always had an issue with clothes fitting properly—like if the waist worked, they would be way too long on me etc.  Now with the loss of so much weight, a majority of those clothes no longer fit at all—either hanging on me or falling off my waist.  So as I sat amongst my clothes, I thought about the power of transformation, the fact that I have to buy new clothes. 

It seemed like I had/have to find a way to fit in my skin.  It isn’t just the clothes and finding things that fit me—it’s about fitting into a new body.  Fitting into a new life with a new mindset.  I’ve been tempted to keep some of those pieces even though I have NO intent of allowing myself to get that big again—it feels like a safety net.  Even at my heaviest, I had kept some of my favorite pieces from when I was thinner in the hopes that I would fit in them again—and I do fit in them (some of them even better than I did before).  But it struck me that’s why it can be daunting to begin anew—not only are we familiar with what we had and what it felt like, we don’t know what will fit moving forward and it can take some work to find what works in this new form.  The things that used to work, to fit suddenly hang on us, too big, the shell ready to shed.  Or perhaps it was too small and we break open and shed it that way.  It means effort put into finding what fits.  The fear hits when we put in the work on a version of us and seeing it come to live, realizing what we left behind, that we don’t really know where we are at.

The same can be said when we decide to move into a new place, to get a new job, to try a new sport, to go to a new restaurant, or even get a new car.  The new is exciting, yes, but it doesn’t always feel quite right.  It takes some time to get used to.  When I put on the weight, it was such a gradual process that I didn’t notice any discomfort in it.  Sure, I knew when I had to go up a size and I wasn’t necessarily happy about it, but it wasn’t painful.  Shedding the weight was a process and I’m still not quite done with it, but it was a different mindset, a different focus and determination than doing the same things over and over again that kept me gaining weight—it was a subconscious decision in so many ways.  I just did what I always did, the same routine.  I knew I had to change that routine if I wanted to change and it took many starts and stops.  And now partway through this metamorphosis, I can see the physical changes and I have to let my mind catch up a bit.  No, I have no intention of going back even if that is the familiar, even if I bought things that seemed to fit at the time. The fact that those pieces hang off of me now are a constant reminder that that life doesn’t fit me anymore either.  They are a reminder that I can change, that I need to change, that there is the possibility of finding something that fits better—and that I NEED to find something that fits better.  I can’t be afraid to try on new things to find who I am.