Embroidery of Thoughts

posted by Unknown @ 9:20 AM 0 Comments

The inner us

Most often what we feel inside radiates through our aura and through our eyes. No matter how we pretend to be happy when we are not will always radiate and reflect through our actions and how people react to us. If we feel confident, and content of ourselves, it always reflects and people around us feel our aura. I am not the very vocal type of person, and sometimes I wait for people to talk to me first. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't and I wonder why. All through out my experiences, I have learned that people feel uneasy to converse when I myself don't say anything. Being quiet may send different messages to people like you might not be interested or that you are just shy and timid. I am a type of person that takes a few to warm up to people, I don't want to think of myself as painfully shy. That's just not me. It just takes a while for me to feel comfortable around people. And that's an important rapport that I keep practicing whether conciously or not. I notice that if I brace myself and prepare to meeting people and keep in mind to have fun, I actually have so much fun than I expected. I know I am not the most articulate person but when I try I can be good,I can be very good at it. So, now conciously knowing all these I try to practice being articulate and comfortable in the pressence of other people. I am not a party goer, so I do have limited social interactions, but I am trying to meet and hang out more often to practice being being and among people. I also noticed that being yourself is so much easier than trying so hard, it would come more naturally than trying to impress people by trying hard to talk or do things that are so unlike yourself. Be yourself in social ocassions and people would actually enjoy your pressence. I have noticed that some people try to hard to impress people in social gatherings and sometimes overdo it by bragging, which becomes lame sometimes. Or that people try to be somebody who they are not, which is so unappealing to me. And if people notice that, you would turn out to be a turn off. Some people actually enjoy doing this, pretending to be so and so, and don't even notice that people are turned off. The best way to really impress people is to simple be at ease with our very own selves.


One thing I have noticed with women is that they sometimes lack confidence. I am guilty of this myself in many ways. I have always heard my female friends who keeps saying; "I'm so fat". And when I look at them they look perfect, not at all fat, even too skinny. What's up with that? How thin should a body be to be considered skinny?

In my previous job, I worked with all female collegues. They were talking about ways and means to loose weight.I noticed that one of them always brings a bottle of water everyday. She was trying to drink as much water on a daily basis, according to her, helps her in loosing weight. One day, we were hanging out and the topic of weight loosing came up again. I was feeling left out, thinking I would join their discussion, I said; " I lost 3 lbs. today." and one of them looked at me and said " Beth, you're tiny". At that time, I was honestly thinking I needed to loose weight. They consider me tiny, and here I am talking about loosing weight. Sounds like an insult to them. Well, I am not really that tiny, I am vulnerable of gaining weight too.

Why can't we be just get contented with ourselves,with our bodies?

I don't really aim for a perfect body or perfect skinniness. I have learned to try to be content with myself, to be at ease with myself. Something that I should keep working on. And something that all women should try to practice. As long as one keep working on it, taking care of the body through exercise, proper diet. Sometimes people don't choose or not able to get rid of excess body fats. Sometimes no matter how they do they can't loose it. Some people don't even try and still have curvacious body, of course lots of people envy them, including myself.

Now as I think about it, one reason of my sort of low esteem traces back to my childhood and growing up always being compared with my elder sister. Way back then, she always was considered the prettier one, fair skin. In fact she does possess very fair skin than the rst of us, her siblings. And growing up in the Philippines, having a light skin tone was considered more beautiful (might still be, even today) than the tan color. Well, in a tropical country where almost everybody is tan, it's an ordinary color, so the lighter skin tones are considered beautiful. Which is the opposite in the western world where tan is beautiful. Anyway, growing up being compared with my sister all the time made me feel ugly literally. And when you feel like that it would follow that kind of self perception towards adulthood. There was a time that in my pressence there were people I know debating who's prettier, my sister or me. I was right there listening, I didn't say a word as the other lady insisted that my sister is prettier. I don't think that is appropriate to compare people especially in their pressence. I was thinking to myself, who cares? But those things do affect how we see ourselves. My sister really is pretty, I adore and admire her. She's good at a lot of things.

I have never really thought much about it until later in my adult life. I figure, we have different personalities. I don't dislike my sister because they always say she's prettier or have better personality. I learned a lesson not to compare siblings especially within their earshot. I believe that each and everyone has their own individual beauty.

I worked with a Filipina before, she always brag about her second daughter. How pretty she is, and I agree, she is very pretty. But knowing her and her elder sister I like her elder sister better. I liked the older girl because of her personality. While she isn't as pretty as the other girl, she is very responsible, simple way of dressing up and even the manner of talking is very mature. Compared to the younger one who talks back, defiant, and puts on too much make up even if she's just 16. She also dress like she is in her 20's already. I mean the contrast is really opposite. I do go more for the personality rather than the physical look. I hope that this Filipina co-worker doesn't brag too much of her younger daughter in their pressence. I think parents shouldn't do that with their children, comparing them with each other. Praising the other more than the other. It does create a sense of jelousy when parents do that or even aunts and uncles show that they favor one over the other nephews and nieces. It hapenned to me growing up even with my aunts and uncles. One of my uncles claim that I am his favorite and that caused some of my siblings to be jelous of me. Now, I avoid making any comparisons of kids and siblings because I know how it feels.

Whenever people compare me with my younger sisters, I always avoid that topic by saying "We are all beautiful." I don'tknow why they do that. I have noticed that when I went back home. People will say stuff like "Sino'ng mas maganda o sino'ng mas mabait?" (Who's prettier, who's better personality?" Does it matter? Why does it have to be a contest? They even ask that question when one tries to introduce somebody, a sister, a friend, a cousin maybe. I consider it rude and mean, and it makes the other person squirm, uncomfortable for not being as beautiful as the other. It kills people's self-esteem, doesn't boost confidence at all. It's a confidence killer. Even if it's said in joking manner, it doesn't sound right to do that with people. It makes an uncomfortable situation.

Being away from my siblings for years now, I discovered myself better without being compared. My hubby has helped me a lot to gain self-esteem that I haven't seen before. He has helped me discover parts of myself that are simply beautiful that I never saw before. I have seen parts of myself invisible to me through his eyes. It didn't have to be physical beauty. Inner beauty is far deeper than the surface of the skin. And inner beauty will always radiate through one's personality and that makes a person really beautiful. A physically beautiful person with foul attitude and personality makes that person ugly. So to be truly beautiful, keep your inner beauty radiate and brightens your outward personality, stay beautiful with your words and actions.

posted by Unknown @ 11:52 AM 0 Comments