Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Speechless? ME? It will come as a surprise to most of my friends – and definitely to my family – for me to say that I have recently found myself more and more frequently at a loss for words. How do you write a blog when you don’t have anything to say this week? I believe you do this the same way you do most difficult things – you just do it anyway. Has Trina finally used up all the words? One of my book clubs is reading Vox soon. This is a book where women can only speak 100 words a day. A fascinatingly terrifying idea. I voted to read that book. Maybe I should wait to write this post until I have finished it, but this is what is coming up for me today, so I am running with it. There are a few reasons that I might feel more introspective lately. Let’s explore, shall we?
I am talked out
I talk a lot. I have talked a lot for as long as I can remember. I always have a story for everything. I tell the same stories over and over again. There is no room for “stop me if you’ve heard this one before.” If you have heard this one before, you should hear it again, because my stories are fantastic – and they are usually hysterical. At least I think so. Lately, I don’t care so much about making sure that everyone has heard the latest.
Silence is uncomfortable. Not just for me, but for most people. When I took speech class, no one wanted to go first. I would volunteer, because I really don’t mind speaking in front of people, and I would be grateful to have my speech out of the way. I would try to wait for others to go first. I really tried to not always be the know-it-all who raised her hand first, but someone has to go first! So I volunteered. Truth be told, I would still go first. I don’t mind breaking the ice. If it was a class, I would surely have something prepared, but if it was a spur of the moment thing, I really just might not have anything to say. I don’t feel like I need to have an opinion on everything.
A kind person once told me before a public presentation that I was the expert and there was no one better to talk about the topic than me… Maybe I don’t feel much like an expert in anything these days. Normally, I could talk for days and days about myself. I should be the expert there, right? I guess I’m not so sure about that right now.
People are worth listening to
My family talks a lot, and often everyone is talking at once. My dad protested once that if everyone is talking that means no one is listening. This is one of those times that it chagrins me to say that Dad was right. If my sisters read this, they might still disagree. However, I find myself wanting to listen more closely to what other people are saying. Evidence has shown that I don’t have all the answers. If I listen closely, someone else might have them. There is a lot of wisdom to be absorbed and my current role is a sponge.
Visibility
This one is complicated. It’s another one of those things that I really need to be on the other side of in order to articulate it, but let’s give it a shot. I feel like people treat me differently after losing 100 lbs. I feel like they see me differently. This is convoluted, because there’s a lot about me that is different now than it was before. There is also a lot that is the same. Y’know, just like there’s rebellious stuff in here that has been around since high school. Old me and new me stuff is all mixed up until I’m not sure what goes where… so naturally this affects how people see me. This post by Naomi Teeter proves that I’m not crazy. I am not the only person to lose 100 lbs and feel like people treat me differently.
Sometimes this makes me angry. Suddenly I am someone to be taken seriously, whereas before I was – what?! People make a lot of unfair assumptions about fat people. Was I undisciplined before? In fact, my terrible food habits were in part a way of compensating for being ultra-disciplined in other areas of my life. Did I formerly loathe myself then one day finally start caring enough about myself to change? Are you kidding? I have always been awesome! And 275 lb Trina had to care an awful lot about me to decide it was a good idea to give up her two favorite food groups. My brain responds differently to sugar and flour than some people’s brain does. Some people have a similar brain but a much kinder metabolism. Fat people are not inherently flawed. They are people. It isn’t fair to treat me like more of a person now that there is less of me.
On the other hand, the skills and tools that have helped me lose weight have also impacted my life in a lot of other ways. I can’t discount that. Therein lies the rub. And I have to acknowledge that part of the reason this makes me uncomfortable is because being 100+ lbs overweight allowed me to hide in plain sight. Why I might want to do that will have to be a topic for another day, but suffice it to say that nowadays I often feel like people are looking at me too much. Maybe I am trying to compensate for that by having nothing to say.
Or Maybe
There’s one last possibility… Meditation works. We use meditation to quiet the mind. Sometimes that doesn’t work and we just watch the chattering thoughts rush by and keep reminding ourselves that our thoughts are just the weather and we are the sky. Then sometimes you close your eyes and there’s just darkness and peace. Maybe there are cool swirling patterns of lights, but they have no meaning and the universe is not sending a message. Maybe you are just quiet. Maybe there is nothing to say.
I get the resentment for being treated differently as a thinner person. I resent the whole idea of that, but I also crave it in a way. And then I resent that. I was awesome. I am still awesome. I’m glad you are finally seeing it, but I’m mad as hell you didn’t see it in all the other ways I was already awesome. And I cherish the people who already thought I was awesome, and I resent that some of them resent my becoming thinner, too. It’s just not in any way simple.
Yes! It’s all kinds of complicated. It’s hard to say how I feel or what I think, because it keeps shifting.