Placing Our Body In Perspective

For many religions the body is a temple of the Divine. Yet, I became a desecrator of this holy gift. By the age of six, I was a chubby girl. Hippo was my nickname. In second grade a boy by the name of Kurt incited all the boys in class to give me a Valentine card with a Hippo on it. My mother then decided I would benefit from ballet lessons. So, there I stood, weekly, bulging out of tights and a leotard in front of a wall of mirrors, a wall of shame.

My parents encouraged me to watch my portions, and by age ten I was counting calories all on my own. I had a knee injury at twelve that required me to be more sedentary, and a year later at 5’2” I had expanded to 145 pounds. So, with high school looming, I began to starve. It worked wonderfully and the weight melted; 30 pounds came off. However, I was hungry and truly wanted to eat, so started binge-eating. This led to horrible guilt and I ran into the cornfield to bring back up all that had been scarfed down. It didn’t take long for a routine to develop. I maintained a svelte 110-pound frame by this process of purging six or more times a day… for over a decade. Bulimia was not a known term at this time. And it was my secret.

Photo by DANNY G on Unsplash

Open ourselves to the Eternal and protect the sacred spaces of our temple – increase the sacred space within and without. Some of our religious practices focus on the body; controlling it, inhibiting it, repressing it, and punishing it. However, our bodies are gifts. Think of the body as a Sacred Temple, where the Eternal Spirit may dwell.

Because we live in a physical world and bodies are what most of us see when we look around, our physical body is over-emphasized. Wherever we look, we see images of the importance of appearance and all that entails from how we dress, to what our home looks like, the type of transportation we use, to how we feed the body’s appetites.

In fact, feeding appetites seems to be a favorite theme of much of our entertainments. We have lost the sacredness of our bodies in this overindulgence of them. A child is sacred and should be loved, but also guided. One does not allow a child to have whatever he or she desires. The child may wish to have chocolate candy for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks. As parents we do not grant this wish as it would be unhealthy. Just so, we must not fulfill all the desires that we perceive come from the body as this too would not be healthy.

There must be a balance and this balance comes in placing the body in its proper place in the scheme of life. Prioritize. It is good to love and care for one’s body, but even better to love and care for the ultimate Source. Once this perspective is achieved, all else falls into place. It can be difficult in this world of plenty to consistently place the love of the Eternal above the love of the things of the world as they are so attractive, while the Eternal often may seem distant and unknown.

Thank the Divine for our bodies, for this life, for this opportunity to learn and grow closer to and at one with the Eternal. Our bodies need to be cared for as we care for a garment. Wash them, feed them, rest them, exercise them, and heal them. Nourish them with food that is closest to nature.

We are blessed with a physical form in a physical world. Our Creator does not want us to punish, starve, hurt the body, but to care and appreciate the body. This does not mean attachment to the body. Put it on, feel beautiful while wearing it, clean it, mend it, care for it and when it is past its usefulness, take it off. Enjoy the experiences you are blessed to receive while wearing it. Watch the dawn break, listen to the morning birdsong, smell the rain, befriend nature, laugh with your belly, taste a fresh peach, but do all from your Eternal Self.

Attachment to bodies and their hungers creates temptation. Fear over our bodies’ needs not being met creates discord, disharmony, disputes, and disease. God created our bodies and blesses us with our bodies. Our Creator only wants us to find joy and be joy in these bodies. Our bodies were not created to be deprived, mistreated, or denunciated. God created our bodies for us to grow into, and love with, and laugh through, and be one with.