Live Fast, through the eyes of a woman...
Guest post
Hmm. I got a little carried away, but I can't explain what I want to say about the Live Fast Die Pretty post as a cause-and-effect relationship any shorter and still make sense.
Why appearance matters…
Everyone has a potential for life. What is the maximum they can get out of themselves, truly, IF they put in the effort. The eternal question of "what if": what did they ACHIEVE in the end, what (couple) relationships did they leave behind and to what do they owe it (only to themselves), how did they shape their daily routine, what is their relationship with their parents, and last but not least, there is also the outer appearance. So there is an inner strength that drives a person subconsciously, whether they like it or not, it's there, and then on top of that comes all the crap pouring from clips, magazines, movies, that you have to look damn good and also be the best at everything if you want to be "someone" in this fucked-up world. Many people readily deny this too, saying it's just superficiality, and that they refuse to identify with it, but what needs to be denied exists, and denying it still messes with our subconscious, and feeds an unresolved - constantly generating tension - conflict within us...
The two factors together create a hell of a lot of pressure. Good lord. And if we haven't lived up to either (neither our untapped potential nor societal pressure - and the need to conform is very present in everyone), then there are some pretty big self-esteem issues by default because deep down we know we could have achieved something, and we damn well didn't, that we should be a certain way, which we imagined a long time ago, but we are damn not like that/them. And this inner failure, how we truly see ourselves, as losers, then affects everything. HOW we see the world, HOW we react to things, HOW we treat people. As Bence has often written, we can lie to ourselves about happiness, even convince ourselves that those extra 10 kilos are fine, it's okay that my "partner" is a jerk to me, because one day out of seven they CAN be so nice, and after all, I'm pretty lucky to have a job, even though I hate it like hell and would much rather be doing something completely different, but it's good enough... but that's not how it is. Those are just compromises, failures. And if that's not how it is, then there's that crap that will one day violently shatter the system of the little illusion-world where we've been photosynthesizing so well for months, years. It could be a dismissal, my girlfriend/boyfriend leaving me, meeting a former classmate. BMW, manager job, luxury holidays abroad, nice clothes, smug smile – even though they started from the exact same place as me, which then makes us feel like a piece of shit in a flash, really, and the unspoken, unresolved compromises that we swallowed over the years in the name of survival come flooding back.
And that’s exactly why they will leave/cheat on the girl/guy with the extra 10 kilos. Not because of the extra 10 kilos, hell no, it’s because the girl/guy themselves (!) hates those extra 10 kilos. The fact that they even let it happen, but even more so that they KNOW what a damn good woman/man they could be (or once were), AND YET they’ve been rotting away like this for years, doing nothing about it. And a dissatisfied person, at war with themselves, is also at war with the world. Someone who is angry is rude, volatile, irritable, and tired. Someone who is at war with themselves is the same, just amplified. And with such a person – with the daily struggle where nothing is ever right because tension obviously needs to be released on someone, and who is closest… – how can one live together long-term?? “I want this to work between us, I love you, it used to be good” – such crutches aside… With a balanced, energetic person who clearly feels good in their own skin, has plans, enjoys who they are and can smile from the heart, where everyday life is exciting and funny, it’s easy. But with a self-tormenting, angry (at the world = at themselves for their powerlessness), planless, vegetating, perpetually dissatisfied, weary, sour person, it’s difficult, burdensome, and tiring. And they even drag down the one who wants to lift them up.
I could best illustrate what I'm trying to bring up as cause and effect with a hackneyed old cliché: "A sound mind in a sound body."
So that's why I think appearance is important. We need it for ourselves. To be at peace with ourselves. To know that there's an area of our life where we don't have to be "ashamed" of who we are, where we haven't failed. If we have that, we get rid of a lot of frustrations that were destroying us 24/7 before. Because the feeling that you're crap (your body is crap) has to be endured all day long. I think that's what LifeTilt is about, in a way: If you've been messing up your boring life until now, it's time. There's a level within you that you can reach. Every body has an ideal, beautiful shape that can (!) be achieved. So here's the help, Bence tells you what to do, and put this part of your life in order. Let there be one less thing you've given up on. Let there be one more thing in your life you can be proud of. And get one step closer to who you COULD BE!
It got a bit long-winded, that's all I could fit in, sorry.
