wow, five years ago.....invisible

So, Oct 30th marked the five year mark. Five years ago I lived in Northwest New Jersey on a cute lake, in a cute house, in a cute town, with a little hobbit. My dad was an alcoholic, I know who's isn't......ahhh in the middle of starting this I realize I don't want to write about it, I don't want to write about how I ended up in a shitty relationship and lost myself, then moved to NYC in the attempt to find myself, instead I want to write about how cute my new shoes are, no, they are, but no.
I teach cooking classes and the other night a guy asked me how he could gain weight quickly, he told me he already gained 30 pounds and wanted to gain another 30 pounds. He started to notice that when he gained the weight all these people who never noticed him before started to notice him. I said, "DONUTS!! no, I get it I lost almost 60 pounds and I started to notice people noticing me, etc, and recently I kind of fell off the wagon slightly but am getting back on, and realized it is not the size, it is the feeling. When you point your attention to yourself and treat yourself as an important valuable person who deserve respect well then the world notices too and follows suit. Like, hey world, I love me so you should love me." As I shared this five people turned around and agreed in unison, it was kind of amazing. I love when we share things with people but really also need to share them with yourself. Five years ago I started a journey to get back to myself and I thought it was something I could find on the outside like a new pair of shoes, I still love shoes, but really everything we need is already there on the inside of us, you can change cities, lovers, hairstyles, but the truth is we are the magic makers and the captains of our fate. I smile as I write this, I may forget that once in a while but I do notice as time goes by the amount of time I forget it gets shorter like my breaks from my true self become less and less and so in turn the amount of love I give to myself gets more and more. Ahh, sometimes I'm smart......though my punctuation may not reflect it. A brief message to the Vicki from five years ago that I still remind myself of today, "relationships in life should make you want to be your best self not make you feel like your worst version of yourself. Life is about reflection, if you love yourself you may see the people standing in front of you change faces and probably become cuter." and Ps to Vicki five years ago...."you're hot". That's it, thank you for reading! xo, Vicki