The Roulette Wheel

I was just thinking about something just now as I was waiting in line to get back on a plane and end my weekend. There was this guy standing in front of me and he had red hair. I was wondering when he had the realization of, "Hey! I'm a red head. I'm going to have to spend the rest of my life that way". Was he upset? Was he happy about it? Did he care? Or did he just accept himself for who he is?

We have a lot of things about ourselves that we just can't change no matter how hard we try. No matter how much we hate it, no matter how much others might envy us over it, we just can't change it. When we have the realization that we possess one of these qualities (we ALL possess one of these qualities it's just a matter of realizing it) we have some choices to make. Accept it. Love it. Hate it. Try and change it. Force a change.

Each person's is different. Maybe your too fat, too skinny, straight hair, curly hair, pale, myopic, too smart, too dumb, too tall, too short, it doesn't matter what your deal is, to you it's a problem. So just so I don't have to call anyone out...I'll go ahead and use myself as an example so this can make a little more sense.

***time lapse of at least a week***

I'm really skinny. Always have been. All the time people are saying shit like, "you're so lucky you can eat anything you want and as much as you want!" "I wish I was your size." etc Etc...and of course it's usually women... Me? I was born this way (yes, woman sized). Always been this way probably always will. My choice from the list above is to both accept it and do something about it. I literally must eat every meal and tons of food just to MAINTAIN my weight but I have to do regular weight training if I want to gain anything. And even then it takes absurd amounts of work to gain anything. To some people this might seem like a dream but to others, like me, it just sucks. But I didn't choose to sit around and do nothing but complain about it and hate myself. I work out and eat lots of protein. I accept this as something that's a part of who I am and something I can only have a small effect on. A little over a year ago I weighed between 134 and 138 depending on how many meals I forgot to eat that week. (yes I genuinely forget meals) I decided that I was done being regularly insulted for being skinny so I started making sure to eat big meals and meals high in protein....and then I started working out three times a week almost without fail...before the end of the summer I weighted 155. It's the most I've ever weighed in my life. But I was still getting shit and I still only looked different to the trained eye.

So I took the popeye challenge the other day and have been talking to my students about it a little and after explaining it to them they really liked it. I encouraged them all to take the challenge.

The popeye challenge is simple. It's named after the cartoon character that I have been called, with usually degrading intentions, for the cast majority of my life. But people tend not to think about what they call someone. Popeye looked pretty fucked up. Let's be real about that, he has retarded huge forarms, constantly smokes a pipe, constantly squints an eye, hunches and snorts spinach like it's cocaine. But no matter, "I 'yam what I 'yam" he still spouts. The challenge is to accept who you are for everything you are. That's it. Just be who you are! :).
I could choose to get pec implants. I could do all kinds of things to make myelf bigger. I could choose to love myself. I could choose to hate myself all the time. I could choose to just accept it. I could choose to simply work on it. You already know my choice, but....what's yours?

Tommy "my PC parts will be here tomorrow!!!" Schubert