Lose the Clutter, Lose the Weight (53 page)

By next year, or even next month, you can add to your collection new and improved options that promise to work even better!

If you're unhappy with how you look, I'd be willing to bet that I would know it simply by peering in your bathroom, just as I found insight into my size-6-through-20 acquaintance from her closet.

That's because much of the stuff you keep on your bathroom's shelves and counters has the same purpose as many of the clothes in your closet. You buy these products not just because you want to cover up a blemish. At some level, you want to be like the people in the commercial or on the package: smiling, attractive, and without cares. You want your life to be just a tiny bit happier or easier, and this product offers that promise, even if it doesn't fulfill it.

You may feel that somehow merely having the right products on your counter—like keeping smaller clothes in your closet—will magically transport you to this new life. Because the bathroom is such a private place, where you can have some expectation of not being disturbed, it's easy to get caught up in a make-believe world when you're in here.

But look around your bathroom and ask yourself how well your cosmetics and hair treatments and hygiene products actually deliver on their promises. Have the products provided a good return on the financial and emotional
investment that you've made in them? How many of these products altered your life in any meaningful way? How many provided true happiness?

My guess is that few, if any, did. Aside from a core group of personal care products and basic cosmetics, you could probably toss out most of the items in your bathroom and your life would go on unchanged.

This week, take a better look at yourself than the view your mirror provides. Look deeper. I'd like you to develop a realistic plan for how you portray yourself when you leave your house. Could you be happier if you accepted more of the details of your appearance that you try to hide? Are you trying to look like yourself or the people in the commercials? Are you content to look your age, or are you desperately trying to reverse time while you're in the bathroom with the door closed?

A sense of mindfulness goes a long way in helping you answer these questions. During the first week of this program, I asked you to start paying attention to the constant stream of messages and images that your mind is sending you. In the second week, I offered suggestions for how to use mindfulness to gain insight into what you eat and why you eat it.

The same strategies—observing the way you talk to yourself, identifying why you choose one option over the other, and pausing before you make a purchase—will help you create a closet and bathroom where you can work with the appearance that you have, instead of chasing an image you'll never attain.

Task 1:

DEVELOP A VISION FOR YOURSELF

In the previous weeks, I asked you to start with a vision for specific rooms. We're going to start this week a little differently. I want you instead to create a vision for how you want to look, from your clothes to your face to your hair. Starting at this point will help you to decide more easily how your closet and your bathroom will support these goals.