If you have ever seen the movie "Goodfellas", there is the part when the wives are all sitting around doing each other’s hair and makeup, they are gossiping and such. Karen Hill (Lorraine Bracco) comments on how outsiders are never around, and how everything becomes normal because there is nothing different to ever compare to, everything that happens is just accepted. I can so relate to that.
Kinda like when you’ve lived someplace for a long time, and are always around the same people, things that transpire within your group all become the "normal". When outside people criticize, you write it off saying that they just don’t understand…are ignorant…or jealous. I remember once one of our employees came up to Mike and me and said, "I always thought the two of you fought a lot but until I saw that show ‘Cake Boss’. Now I get it, it's just a Jersey Italian thing" LOL. We are like a young version of Frank & Marie Barone form Everyonbody loves Raymond. Funny, but true.
Since we have always lived in and socialized in tight knit groups, I love it when friends and family visit. It is really nice having people from back in Chicago and NJ visit us here in Vegas. It feels like a reconnection to our past if you will. It's a great time with people who think the way we think and who understand things the way we understand it. When you live away from your hometown, you find yourself explaining things…a lot!
When I moved to NJ from Chicago, I gained a new view of life. People related to each other differently, saw everyday events differently, not wrong, just different. I realized that sometimes to accomplish what you want in life you need to separate yourself from what you know. Break out of your comfort zone. It opens a new perspective on things. Sometimes you realize something you thought to be right for so long turns out to not be the only way to view or deal with a situation.
I have a phrase posted on the wall in our office that says; "To get what we've never had, we must do what we’ve never done". In other words, if you keep doing the same things, you will keep getting the same results. You need to change your actions in order to change the outcome. Seems so basic, yet I never realized it until a couple of years ago.
This has helped me come to the realization that no matter what I do, I have to be ok with the reflection I see in the mirror. I don't have to make other people see what I see...I don’t have to make others think of me in a light that I want to be thought in. As long as I am ok with me, who cares what everyone else thinks!
Now to say that everything said to me isn't an attack would be wrong. Just the other day I had an anonymous person comment on my blog and say some rather negative things. I mean, it takes a very intelligent individual to call me fat LOL. However, I did take a step back and wonder why people have to attack. I tried to see what it was that I had done to make this person so upset & defensive. Then I realized, you can't figure people out. Personally., I would never make anonymous comments. But that’s just me. When I say something, I want people to know where it came from and exactly who said it LOL!
Over the past 18 months I have lost 110#s, gone down over 6 dress sizes and in the last 2 months I've lost over 13”. I changed the way I eat…the way I view food. I am finally able to exercise and be more active. As a result I notice so many aspects of my life improving. Not just my health, but my happiness level, my conformability in public, work, friends….everything!
I may not always be the person other people want or wish me to be, but I am always me! It took me SO long to get to this place in my life, and remarkably once I came to this realization I was able to begin changing things about me for the better. I have learned to view criticism not as a personal attack but rather unsolicited advice. I take in what applies and what doesn't, I let fly away. I was pleasantly surprised that I am ok with me...the good and the bad.
