Over the last few years, I’ve
chased goals (and achieved them) due to the constant voice within me striving to approve.
At my smallest I weighed 8
stone 3lbs, a few lbs shy of the anorexic bracket for my height. Society told
me this weight was an achievement, I had finally reached the ‘thin ideal’
despite the fact that the relationship I had with myself and food was far from
ideal. The desperate need to be skinny had completely taken over my life, and
it suddenly became a numbers game, weighing a certain weight, fitting into a
certain jeans size, the amount of inches baggier my favourite shirt was…
Since when did we become so
obsessed with numbers? The idea that a certain number dictates level of
achievement, level of commitment, level of passion. The number of hours spent
in the gym, or the number of minutes spent with loved ones is ignored. We
forget the sacrifices made to chase that superficial dream.