Before we get into today's newsletter:

"I want a new meat suit."

This was the phrase that defined my relationship with my body since I got my first monthly cycle at 16.

You see, there's never been a time I can remember when I wasn't a perfectionist. Trying to be the perfect person, daughter, student, friend, sister, employee, girlfriend, entrepreneur, creative, dog parent, wife. You name it.

And, as to be expected, I couldn't live up to the expectations I placed on myself.

So I read countless self-help books.
Dumped $$$ into courses.
Had thousands of anxiety spirals.
Moved states.
Changed jobs.
Left relationships.
Pushed harder at the gym.
Got up earlier.
Stayed at work later.

I wish I could pinpoint the exact day I asked myself, "what if you're trying to fix something that isn't broken?"

But what I can remember is moments over the decades when:

🫠 I was absolutely fed up with constantly trying to become a "better version" of myself.
🎢 I wanted off the exhaustive hellscape that was our culture's self-improvement rollercoaster.
🙅🏻‍♀️ I needed to find a way to do things differently, because this way wasn't working.

Because I was drowning.

We've been unconsciously, and in some ways intentionally, taught that when something isn't working, we need to change.

And I don't know about you, but I found myself constantly getting stuck in this cycle of:

Then I repeated this cycle for 17 years.

It wasn’t until I finally started unwinding the Hashimoto's from the neurodivergence from the PCOS that I realized things had compounded. It took years of fighting tooth and nail for answers before I was far enough away from the belief that I was what needed to be fixed, to even see the cycle I’d been repeating.

It took years.
Years of diagnoses.
Years of unlearning.
Years of realizing I wasn't broken—my systems were.

Then a few months ago (more years later) I realized I hadn't complained about my meat suit in several years. Now I see that phrase and can feel the weight of the disdain and contempt I had for my body because it wasn’t perfect. I see how it’s disappeared so slowly and quietly that I never noticed it leaving. It feels like I woke up one day only to finally see I wasn’t marinating in self-loathing anymore.

That's how I knew things were shifting.

_{(Someday we'll talk about how self-improvement mindsets fight back the a vengeance even after you begin to shift things because oh boy, do they. But I could probably write a book on it so we'll save it for another day.)}

So what happens when we see the cycle and can ask, "What if you're not the problem?"

When we stop seeing ourselves as broken machines that need repair.
But as complex people with varying needs, dreams, and ways of operating in life.

When we realize that we've been trying to operate under systems designed for someone else—someone with a different brain, body, capacity, life. 

When we see that we've built a life around pieces that don't fully support us.
And realize that when the system doesn't fit, the system needs to change—not you.

For example:

Because there's a big difference between:

Personal problem: "I need to be more efficient"
System problem: "My business requires me to override my limits"

Which one can you actually fix vs. which one you've been told has to be fixed?

The cost of, what is essentially, self-blame is high.

We start to marinate our minds in shame spirals, analysis paralysis, constant self-optimization, and energy depletion.

For me, wanting a new meat suit for almost 20 years cost me:

My confidence.
My safety.
My creativity.
My joy. 

But most of all, it cost the ability to trust myself—my decisions, intuition, needs, and desires.

So my question(s) to you today:

Set aside some time with your favorite candle, blanket, beverage, notebook and pens—whatever helps you get into that honest, but not critical reflective mood—and work through any of the following prompts that call to you.