This blog is written by Lee Gale Gruen to help Baby Boomers, seniors, retirees, and those soon to retire find joy, excitement, and satisfaction in life after retirement. Her public lecture on this subject is titled: “Reinventing Yourself in Your Retirement.” Her memoir, Adventures with Dad: A Father and Daughter’s Journey Through a Senior Acting Class, is available by clicking here Amazon.com. Click here for her website: http://AdventuresWithDadTheBook.com
Now, on to my blog:
I have written often on this subject, yet it keeps calling me back. I hear chatter, see ads, discover new offerings in this field. Yes, we humans fixate on our bodies. We find the parts that are not considered attractive in the time, age, and location in which we live, and we obsess about them. I’m too tall/short/scrawny/corpulent, my nose is too big, my hair is too limp, my eyelids are slanted, my ears stick out, my biceps aren’t muscular, my breasts are too small/large, and on and on.
Of course, styles in beauty and attractiveness change with the times. Peter Paul Rubens, late 16th century artist, painted very full figured women as that was considered beautiful when he lived. Today we call them fat. Ancient statues from Rome sport large Roman noses as it was considered good-looking at that time. Today, we seek rhinoplasty for such a protuberance.
Even though I am of average height now, I matured very quickly, and was the second tallest kid in my sixth grade class. The tallest was also a girl. I hated it and wished I could be little, cute and popular like Bunnie. I remember that we had ballroom dancing classes in school every week, and they would line us up by height, the boys in one line and the girls in another side by side. I was always second to the last in the girl’s line, or last if the aforementioned tallest was absent. Chances are, I would get one particular boy as my partner who was wimpy and had an underbite. I’m sure he wasn’t any happier drawing me to dance with during the “ordeal,” either. I hated the whole thing.
We run to our idols: doctors, surgeons, hairstylists, personal trainers, fashionistas, anyone who can disguise or change that horrible feature about ourselves that we hate. Once we do away with one, we find another to fixate on. Okay, the bump in my nose was removed, but how about my big hips? Okay, I got rid of my wrinkles, but I hate my receding hairline. Let me run to the gym and work out, let me get liposuction, let me stuff myself into girdles, slimming pants, A-shaped skirts, Hawaiian shirts, let me starve myself–anything to hide my awfulness from the eyes of others.
How sad we humans are. How funny we would seem to alien beings arriving on our planet. How strange we must seem to the animals of the world.
Does a horse fixate on its mane being shorter than another’s–darker, lighter, thicker, thinner? Yes, certain traits in the animal world attract a mate: longer tusks, larger chests, more colorful feathers, etc. However, we humans have taken it to an extreme as we are wont to do. If it doesn’t come naturally, we spend our time, energy, and money scurrying to the fixers of our fixations.
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Photo credit: Son of Groucho on Visualhunt / CC BY
Life can be such an adventure. Simple day-to-day activities can yield gold–unexpected finds and excitement.
Watson accepted the adoration of all of us gathered around him in the Home Depot aisle that day without changing his demeanor in the slightest. He inhabited his purpose in life: bringing joy to those he encountered. He didn’t become puffed up with his own importance, demanding of rewards or social position, manipulative, or any of the other things humans in such a position might have done. No, Watson simply remained Watson–a uniter, not a divider.
Throughout my life, I’ve encountered people who are described as “fragile” both by themselves and by others. These people have been co-workers, family members, friends, acquaintances, and more. Fragile seems to mean that they can’t tolerate too much pressure, stress, responsibility, expectations, etc., or they “fall apart.”
We all hide in one way or another. It can be deliberately or subconsciously. We hide the traits, aspects, details of ourselves that we think are undesirable or a turnoff to others.
Ah, the things we do for our loved ones. We go to great lengths and expend enormous amounts of time, energy, and money when the motivation is right. What greater impetus than when the object is someone/something we love. Wouldn’t you do just about anything for your children, parents, spouse, significant other, pet, etc.?
Why are so many jokes based on putting someone else down? A roast (ceremonious public ridiculing) is filled with anecdotes, jabs, stabs, and emphasis on the failings and negative aspects of the roastee. He/she must suffer through the ordeal with a smile-plastered-on-face look to prove that he can take it.
A friend recently wrote me that her beloved cat of almost twenty years had died. She commented that m
