My son got a leopard gecko for his birthday a couple of months ago. He's an interesting little creature (the gecko, that is) and aside from the diet of live crickets, he's been a nice addition to our family.
The other night I was doing dishes when I heard my son yell, "Mom, come here, quick!"
Parents of 12-year-old boys know that's not usually a good thing.
I ran up the stairs, opened his bedroom door and found him on the floor in front of the gecko's tank.
"Look," he said. "He's shedding his skin."
Sure enough, the gecko was rubbing its head against the little cave in his tank. A thin white layer of skin began to peel off. On and on it went, peeling back a bit more each time he rubbed against the rough cave.
I was mesmerized.
I sat down and watched as the gecko worked his way out of his skin, until he sat there -- completely new, but the same still. And I couldn't help but think about the ways I'm like that gecko.
First, having gone through the very public weight-loss process during my year as Shape magazine's Weight-Loss Diary columnist, I know full well how it feels to be the same, but different. People saw the "new skin" of my smaller body, but inside, I didn't feel any different. Losing weight is a physical transformation, but the old feelings don't necessarily disappear just because the new skin appears.
No, what I've learned through that process -- and through the process of writing my book on mothers, daughters and body image -- is that self-acceptance is truly a mental transformation, and that it's less dependent on the "skin" we show to the world than we might think. How many times have we said -- or heard someone say -- "When I lose 10 more pounds, I'll be happy" or "I'll do that after I lose weight."
The thing is, losing weight doesn't bring with it the guaranteed happiness and self-acceptance that we sometimes think it will. Dropping those old attitudes toward our bodies takes conscious effort and a lot of work -- just as the gecko worked to shed his skin, we must work to shed the body feelings that have held us back.
Watching that gecko, I was reminded that at any moment, the choice is mine. I can put aside negative thinking. I can leave old habits behind. I can choose to make decisions from a different place.
Like the gecko left his old skin in the sand, I can leave my old thoughts and habits behind -- trusting in the beauty of the new.
