The difficulties that I experience with my body image are in direct conflict with my spiritual/philosophical beliefs- beliefs that this body we inhabit for a short time is ‘just’ a vessel we are in to experience the world/nothing other than a ‘carrier’ for our soul/spirit/consciousness/higher power. Like a cover that holds a book- the real value is what’s on the inside.
Despite me seeing my body as, ultimately, the least interesting thing about me, or perhaps, precisely because of this, more and more frequently, I’ve been experiencing a feeling of ‘not belonging’ in it, not in terms of gender (though I do, in many ways, relate to the concept of gender being nothing more than a made up/socially constructed theory, as I wrote about in a previous post-(https://portfolioofhope.com/2022/08/09/were-all-just-spirits-in-drag/) but more so, in terms of life in general/of my place in it. As such, I sometimes feel trapped within my body, with this feeling being further intensified by the body dysmorphia that I experience on a daily basis.
With my body dysmorphia, comes many confusing questions, the biggest, most pressing one being; ‘How do I know if I have body dysmorphia or if I genuinely look how I feel?’ (i.e., Does my stomach really look that bloated/stick out that much, or is that just in my head)? I really struggle to differentiate between what’s real and what’s conjured up by my mind. Because of such conflicting thoughts that I experience, sometimes, all I long for is to be free from my body, if for no reason other than to simply experience existence in the purest sense of the word. And this, I have learnt, this feeling of being ‘free’ from my body, is something that can be accessed- through meditation. Just the basic act of sitting down, eyes closed, breathing controlled, can make me feel ‘at home’ in myself/connected to the universe, if only for 5, blissful, minutes. And so, meditation is something that I now practice every day- every morning- to give me some respite from my mind, to make me realise that I’m not my body and, most importantly, to allow me time to reconnect back to my truest, most ‘spiritual’, self.
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