Presenting...Your Physical Body

Have you ever wondered how others describe you to someone?
 
Here's the scenario...... you are sharing an incident that happened to you with a friend.  Your friend has a vague recollection of the person you are talking about, but asks you to describe them to help them get a better picture of who you are talking about.  You then proceed to describe them...... i.e. "The real tall guy with the real bad acne," or the, "Big fat girl that has no sense of fashion, whose clothes are way too tight for her size,"..... etc., etc.
 
Have you ever wondered how others describe you in those situations?
  • Reflect on how you think others perceive you and would describe you and write it down in your journal.  (This is usually related to internal dialogs you have in regards to things you fuss about with yourself, i.e. ‘no one has feet as big as these boats, I can never find any shoes I like in my size!’ or ‘I can never get my hair to act right!.... why couldn't I have been born with hair like so and so!’)  
  • Take a good look at yourself in a full view mirror.  Look at yourself from head to toe, front and back.
  • As you do this, pretend you were someone else trying to describe you to someone else.  What are your most striking features?  Are you exceptionally taller or shorter than others?  Do you have striking hair (or lack thereof)?  Are you average weight, above or below?  Are you a fastidious dresser or a bit more "casual"?  Are you very colorful in your dress or somewhat subdued?  Do you have one of those flawless complections or one you are forever working on?
  • After you gaze upon yourself, keeping these and other aspects of yourself in mind, write out a description of yourself the way you feel someone else may describe you to others.  
  • If you have someone (or even a group of friends) you feel close to and safe with, you may even want to ask them how they would describe you and compare it to what you wrote about yourself.  You can even do this informally, where you work into the conversation memories you have of each other from your childhood, high school, college, a prior job, etc.  It is amazing at times to experience the difference between how we think we show up in the world and how we are actually perceived.  
Keep in mind, this is not a judgmental exercise.  This is merely a tool to help you along your journey to health and well being.  As you do this exercise, don’t put yourself down, merely observe what your strengths and challenges are.  If there are aspects of yourself that you are not happy about, make note of them as areas that need some healing.  Once you have done that, make notes of the aspects of yourself that you see as your assets so you may use them as a source of strength in your journey of healing your short comings.
 
I remember a time when I was getting together with some of my friends from way back in college.  We were reminiscing about "back in the day."  I started recalling how shy and quiet I was, getting very nervous whenever someone even said hello to me.  They laughed and looked at me in surprise.  They shared that if I were quiet and shy, it must have been a real brief period as they always saw me as a real talker!  I was totally shocked by this as I had always thought they had perceived me as very aloof because of my shyness.  This opened up a whole conversation regarding the contrast between how understated I used to dress back then to the colorful way I dress currently.  The way I carry myself when I walk now in contrast to then, and how I have never seemed to have gained any weight, etc.  This sparked similar conversations about each of us, as we shared with each other traits from "back in the day" and now.  Others were also shocked to find out that some of the traits they thought had evolved over time, we recalled them having during college as well.  One of them used to always dress immaculately to the point that they had their jeans dry cleaned so they would be perfectly creased at all times.  They had prided themselves on the "hippy" look that was popular back then, and we shared that they were the best pressed "hippy" we had ever seen.  To this day, they still maintained their "pressed" look.  Back in the day they also were known for having one of the largest afros on campus.  Fast forward to now, they are totally bald!  We all had a great deal of fun that evening.  It really gave me an opportunity to see myself from a totally different perspective.
 
If you had to describe yourself to someone who did not know you, what would you say?  Visit www.MutsMer.com  for more information.
Posted by MutsMer.com at 11/25/2009 3:31 PM
Categories: Physical Body Reflection, Healthy Legacy
Tags: health college flawless physcical reflect friend recollection describe interal dialog body perceive journal features strengths hippy challenges afros exercise
 

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