"Mom, can I take your picture?"

Well...I just got back from walking the dogs so I'm all sweaty. I'm head to toe dusty from digging up the garden. My shorts are hiked up so I can tan my gleaming, fluorescent legs. I've got my dollar store glasses on and I was just this very morning researching essential oils to reduce cellulite. Self conscious like many women, I most often avoid "full body shots." There is not a day that my "trouble areas" don't cross my mind. Self criticism is an effortless default I perpetually fall prey to.

But I want to change that. And slowly, slowly....it's happening. I'm endeavoring to release the negativity, to stand thankful, in awe of the purposeful beauty in God's magnificent creation that is me. To recognize myself as lovely and blessed for what I have and to remember it's all so temporary, simply made of dust working it's way back toward that end. I might as well enjoy what I've got while I am here to enjoy it.

I am 39 years old with a gratefully healthy, wonderfully functional body. It has taken me everywhere I have ever wanted to go. It is the faithful residence of my mind, my heart, my will and drive and ambition and joy and intellect and breath and being. It has ever been my continuous mode of transport, my ceaseless companion, the gift I was granted to carry me through this world, from the very first to the very last of my days. It has withstood each escapade of my choosing. 

It really is a wonder.

When I remember to, I will treat it with kindness rather than the sharp bite of criticism it doesn't deserve. I will be gentler, more humbly nurturing, less expecting it to respond to my desire for perfection and much, much more grateful for its mere presence, my precious mechanism belonging uniquely to me. 

I will work to remain glad.

"Yes baby, you can take my picture." 

Why not...