Shades of Green

I fit the term "green eyed monster" a little too literally.  Lately, it's pervasive not just in eye color but in mental states as well.   And I have various reasons for it's justification.  Things not going so well, I can look towards the 'current state of blah-blah-blah and look at blah-blah and it's crappy that blah-blah and they don't deserve blah-blah' and well it's become the blah-blah-blahs.  Jealousy is a seldom admitted but often feeling that is so unattractive and leaves me petty and miserable.  And yet it disguises itself well.  Root of it, well, that's where the murkiness lies.  Insecurity, small mindedness, sense of some sort of loss, low self esteem, but ultimately it's roots are somewhere in 'I'm not enough-ness' and in that state, well, it's a sorry place to be.  But as humans, we can trace the roots of jealousy all the way back to infancy.  Studies have show infants as young as five months exhibit traits of jealousy. 
So what can I combat this with.  When I look around at the current state of blah-blah.  A gratitude list is one way.  Being grateful cultivates a state of happiness.  If there is something that I want in another person or circumstance, wanting it, not coveting it, creates a state of lack.  Can I adjust this to a feeling of 'this is something that I can attain and I am grateful.'   I'll get back to you on the rest, for now, the human experiment continues....

Training Day

So in getting "ready for the big day" there is this urgency or felt urgency to "get in shape."  And this time of year brings out the commercials of "Get in shape for summer" or "get your bikini body ready." 
I don't really feel out of shape.  In fact, I'd say that I'm in pretty good shape.  My love reminds me daily of how buff I am.  But somehow the chord of neurosis is struck when thinking of "fitting into my wedding dress" when, actually, it doesn't matter what size that dress is, because, I haven't purchased it yet!  Somehow, the self acceptance and comfort that I have is replaced by the desire to get to my 17 year old self and become "thin again."  What is "thin again?"  And what does that mean?  To get back to my 17 year old self would be like taking up stretch pants, smoking cigarettes, bleaching my hair beyond recognition and waiting for someone to love me who probably doesn't deserve my time, energy or my bleach blonde hair.  To get back to my 17 year old self's weight is like wanting to replace all the muscle that I have with some fat, start eating junk food that will surely send me to the gastrointenstinal specialist and create such anxiety that anti-depressants and anti-anxiety drugs will eventually make their way back to breakfast and after dinner mint time.  Yes, been down that road thank you.  I have no real desire to get back to that 17 year old self, so why would I want my body to go there?  What "ideal" am I clinging to that makes this somehow desirable much less attainable?
At the end of the day, what truly matters is that the person that I am marrying knows what I look like and loves it.
At the end of the day, we'll be married.
At the end of the day, ultimately, we need to love ourselves enough to be able to love someone else.
This is the Training Day.