Loving my body with a Pleasure Infusion

I was asked a question by a friend today...Why is it so easy to see the beauty all around and so difficult to see the beauty in ourselves? My take on the whole thing is that we are so bombarded by negativity, and we take the easy road of tolerance just bobbing along in the river of our lives. It is easy to bob along, wanting a better life but not willing to stretch to get it. Playing the hand we are dealt, wondering like the old song "Is that all there is?" Changing myself will take too much time, I don't think I can do that, or the world famous, totally stuck in the muck statement "that's just the way I am." Well, does the way you are work for you? Do you truly desire better, or are you completely satisfied being the same, believing your life will be better when the kids are grown, when you lose 20 pounds, or when you have a boyfriend? Maybe your life will be better when you have a new house, a better wardrobe, more money or a better job. Yes, more money would make things better. Really? I disagree. I believe you have every thing you need right now because the life you have is the life of your own creation. Yup, you created your pleasure, your pain, your joy, or your sorrows. The trick is what you do with them. Do you celebrate you? I do. I dance. I sing, I write. I go to work and I do the best I can for 12 hours. I have the desire to choose the best for me. I care for myself like I would care for a child. I admire my body in the mirror. I love myself up from the tips of each strand of my blonde hair to the red polish on my toenails. Especially when I'm not feeling good about myself. Then it becomes required that I spend extra time with me doing pleasure homework. I light candles. I take deliciously scented bubble baths. I put on my favorite music. I take a nap. I surround myself with positive energy. I don't watch sensationalist news, or read the paper or watch CSI or Law and Order anymore. I am busy stuffing myself with pleasure and I don't have the capacity to tolerate the negativity right now. I don't believe I have missed anything that I should have known that would have changed my life. A pleasure centered life, that centers around my own pleasure, is the life I am choosing right now. It is a conscious decision, a conscious choice to live a life of self love just as it would be a choice to live a life of apathy or indifference. Some days it is more work than others, but I know that during those times when I am feeling out of balance, it becomes critical that I journal gratitude, that I look at myself in the mirror and blow myself a kiss. A cup that is overflowing with pleasure and happiness is finally able to spill over to others because I'm not working on vapors of happiness that I used to have, remembrances of a body I used to have, or a lover that has moved on. I choose to find the beauty in just being me, exactly as I am, occupying this space today on the planet. Even down to the blue spider veins in my legs--they are the roadmap of my 55 years on this planet and they are beautiful. It is my full time job to find the beauty in myself...and I love my job....Today, I love my body more than the life I thought I desired, because I realize the life I desire is the life I am living. Blowing you a kiss, Gorgeous. God, you look so hot in that dress...Really. So hot...
XO,
Karen