Beautiful eyebrows

It's amazing what a little thing can do for your self-confidence. You see, I used to have this problem of over-tweezing my eyebrows. Something about pulling hairs is just so satisfying, I find it hard to stop... which led to a near-bare face. (Now all I do is compulsively pull out the hair on my head. Hah.) The worst part was that this took place during high school--the time when one is most exquisitely conscious of physical appearance. So I stopped plucking and just let my brows take their natural shape, with a stray-hair guard patrol in place. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great. Then again, I have never really cared much about "creating an image", so who cares? I'm not into frilly froo froo stuff, anyway.

I have had a hard time coming to grips with my own attractiveness. I mean, I know that I must be physically attractive in some ways, otherwise I wouldn't have the man-hopping problem that I have had, right? But it is not until very, very recently that I have been able to look at myself in the mirror and say, "Yes. I am good looking."

So last week, I took a passing glance at myself and thought, "yeah, I'm okay looking... but... hmm... something is missing...." So I grabbed a pair of tweezers and proceeded to pluck my brows into lovely arches. It's nothing drastic. In fact, I think it looks quite natural--so natural that nobody noticed! LOL. However, just knowing that I have beautiful eyebrows has boosted my self-confidence wonderfully. Also, I have officially appointed Tuesdays as "eyebrow maintenance day".

It kind of goes along with my Sunday activity. I completely re-arranged my room. You see, I love love LOVE books and reading. (I just finished reading a book about twenty minutes ago. It took me about... two hours? Maybe? You can see why I go through them fast-- I devour books.) But I had no room in my room for books. They were stacked on either side of my dresser and just made my room look so cluttered and messy, even when it was clean. (If there's one thing that I absolutely must have to function, it's a tidy room. Not necessarily clean and orderly, but tidy. On my therapy days, I have to straighten my room before I can get anything done.) In addition to that, I had just kind of stored stuff in random places, because the room was a guest bedroom/storage room before I moved in.

So, I went to the thrift store, bought a pair of end table/cupboards for $10, and then moved every single piece of furniture in my room. I swept under everything, pulled it all out from under the bed and re-organized, and... you know what I found? I have SO much more room this way!! And I'm able to fit 3x as many books in my room! Plus I am using one of the cupboards to store my potpourri pie supplies, beads, thank you cards and the like.

It was great. Kind of like a purging/renewal process. C came in to see my room when I was done, and she said, "The butterfly is shedding its cocoon!" How right she is.

My beautiful eyebrows are another part of that process.

The book I read today is an old favorite of mine, and it's Cheri Peters' story of her transformation from a homeless bar dancer and druggie to the kind of person I want to be. I have always loved her book, but this is the first time I've read it since I started healing. Oh man. So amazing. I identify with her so much! And it's so interesting how God is taking us through different paths and channels for healing, but essentially doing the same thing! She had the same problem with dependence on men that I did/do, and she had to go through that fear of being "alone", too. Anyway, it's just really cool. I highly recommend it.

It's called....

A few things that are bothering me/that I have noticed that I'd like to write down so I can return to them at some point...

- I used to be almost addicted to trying to get every guy I met or saw to like me or think I was attractive/cute/sexy/whatever. Now I find that male attention causes fear to rise in my heart. Before, I'd be thinking, "Look at me. Look at me. Want me. Please, want me." Now the line running through my head is, "Don't look at me. Don't look at me. Why are you looking at me? Stop staring at me! I'M LEAVING!!" And then I book it as fast as I reasonably can, almost shaking.

What gives?

- I still find myself overeating. Then I get sick. Why, oh why, do I do this to myself? Just. Stop. Eating. Alright? It's OKAY to be hungry. It's OKAY to be almost-full. You don't have to gorge yourself to prove a point. Sheesh. I mean, aside from the fact that I get sick if I don't eat on time (i.e. if I'm hungry for too long), why am I so afraid of being hungry? Food is just food.. right?

So, yes. The butterfly is breaking out of the cocoon... but there's still work to do. That's good. I'd hate to think that I was perfect or something.