THE VIEW

MICHAEL TROTTER JR.

RECENTLY I HAVEN’T BEEN FEELING sexy at all. I used to think it was because I was overweight, but I know some sexy people who are considered borderline obese. When I look in the mirror, I see what I could be. I see little signs of muscle here and there. But when I leave the mirror, that’s really where my issues begin. I remember watching professional wrestling as a teen and seeing bodies like The Rock’s or Triple H’s, or looking at movies and seeing Vin Diesel or Morris Chestnut and thinking to myself, If I had their bodies, would that make me sexy? I would judge my SEXINESS by the attention I would get from the opposite sex, whether it was my wife or some random look of interest from a stranger. YES! IT FEELS GOOD TO BE WANTED. But it feels even better to be wanted by the one you love.

My relationship with my body hit an all-time low one particular day in 2015. I had been feeling like a king all day not because of how I looked, but because I was knee-deep in purpose. Earlier that day, I had been a guest speaker at a motivational event for veterans. In the afternoon, I had officiated at the funeral service of a very special lady whose life had been claimed by gun violence, and through my speech I was able to get twenty young people to commit to a life of love over hate. Now I was off to see my beautiful baby receive the Mission of Love Decatur “Bucky” Trotter Humanitarian Award for her efforts with her organization, I Am Beautiful Corporation. All was well. Except for one thing: I had no clue what I was going to wear. I had recently lost a good deal of weight and donated all of my clothes to charity because they didn’t fit. I owned three pairs of jeans, one pair of dress slacks, two white dress shirts, one brown dress shirt, and one pair of gray Dockers that were inappropriate to wear to this kind of event. But the universe provides, and my friend James came downstairs with seven dress shirts that were all pressed, some still with the tag on them. Now I was ready to go to the ball.

At the event, James took a snapshot of Tanya and me seated and hugging each other. I was so eager to see the picture because I knew we looked good, but when I looked at the photo, all I saw was the weight I hadn’t lost yet.

I should have been enjoying the event, but instead my head filled with negative thoughts about how I looked. Why was my belly taking its time and not falling in line? Should I not eat tonight, tomorrow, or the next day? Maybe I should go on a fast? Yeah, that’ll do it. After considering all these ridiculous options, I finally heard the voice of truth: “HEY, MAN, GET A GRIP! It’s just another point of view!” I realized that yes, I had come a long way, but there would likely always be some angles, some shots, some views of myself that I didn’t care for. That’s what “a work in progress” means.

See, we can’t encourage ourselves by only embracing one point of view—the View. The View is what I see when I’ve trained myself to find what I’m looking for—like extra weight—rather than the joy and beauty in the picture.

Instead, we have to allow ourselves to embrace the FULL VIEW of ourselves. How can I say I see the big picture when I’m only looking through a little lens? Encouraging myself is not ignoring the FULL VIEW, but embracing the exciting work of changing THE VIEW.

From this experience, I learned that CHANGING THE VIEW and seeing the FULL VIEW of myself worked in four parts…

The OVERVIEW: My plan of attack, my goal.
The PREVIEW: What occurs when I am in motion toward revealing the future. It’s how I’m going to look. If I look hard enough while working hard in the process, I will get little glimpses here and there that suggest I am on my way.
The VIEW: What I see when I am actually looking for a version of myself that I WOULD APPROVE OF.
The REVIEW: What I see when I have reached my goal. I review what took place in the process—for example, from the moment I gained excess weight to the moment I dropped it off.

In this process of becoming vulnerable with myself, I pondered the question “Why do I feel so unattractive and undesirable?” When I asked myself this question, I had to look at some of my personal characteristics. I wanted to get to the core of my feelings, period. Not just count it all toward being overweight. What I found was life-changing, and it is helping me even at this moment. Seeing myself as desirable, now that’s a whole thing in itself! I am the kind of guy who loves attention. I love to make people laugh, and I love to help people out. I am all about being in love with someone special, but when you think about being in love with YOURSELF, most men don’t know what that means. Most men measure their sexiness by SEX. But being sexy has nothing to do with sex. In fact, being sexy doesn’t even lead to sex; INTIMACY leads to sex.

So, what leads to being SEXY? Here is what I have found to be true in my life. I feel SEXY when I am able to be myself. Like when I can help someone, or when I take a load off of my wife, I feel SEXY because I feel like I matter in this world. No one can make you feel SEXY. YOU make you feel SEXY. I initiate 90 percent of the intimate sexy moments with my wife; because she only initiates 10 percent, I could easily let that lower my level of feeling sexy and the tank would be near empty.

But I understand that I can’t count on her to make me feel SEXY. I count on her to be intimate with me.

INTIMACY is not SEX, but it is companionship to the MAX. What I am learning is most men want more INTIMACY than women think. There are times when I simply want my wife to rub my feet while I rub hers or we sing to each other. I’d even take a healthy debate because it is engaging and I learn the depths of her intelligence. INTIMACY was never meant to be one moment in time. INTIMACY is a day-to-day, minute-to-minute, second-to-second workout that usually involves engaging with another person in transferring energy. But we come to that aha moment again where we learn that INTIMACY is also personal healing. So I have learned to be INTIMATE with myself. And I did this by changing THE VIEW I had of myself.

Today I am seeing MYSELF differently. I see my weight as an INTIMATE space to personally heal what I have damaged. I see my character and attitude as a SEXY space where I can weed out the things that don’t make me feel SEXY. I won’t penalize others for the way they may try to make me feel, but I will walk the path of destiny and live my life as IMPACTFULLY as I can. I know that I cannot make another person feel SEXY, but I can give INTIMACY to the right people generating SEXY vibes within themselves.

EVERYONE in this world needs to feel SEXY! EVERYONE in this world needs to feel INTIMACY!

Coming from military life, I was taught not to feel. Don’t feel pain, don’t feel hurt, don’t feel good. So you simply feel only disappointment, fear, and anxiety. I was numb. I was so numb that I never realized that I was going through life not paying attention to anything except myself. It was inevitable that I would miss moments that would define my current state.

My grandfather once told me that there are two moments in life that occur. One moment is considered the big moment because it is so enormous, so monumental, so massive that it cannot be contained. You know the cosmos orchestrated it because it is so glorious that you yourself are afraid of it. This moment is what I like to call “the pause” because it pauses whatever current state you’re in and gives you a glimpse of your future, and you walk away from that moment both eager and attentive to your NOW!

The second moment is what I like to call “the breaking moment,” the teaching moment in your history. It comes alongside “the pause”; however, it is not to be missed.

I am so thankful for lessons that break me. I’ve had moments in my life where I have walked around town with my head held too high, pompously flaunting my survival of the war, but not realizing my survival was possible only because of others’ pain. During those moments, I needed more than a wake-up call. I needed a serious breaking. I needed to be humbled. I needed to be twisted and wrung out because not only was I hurting others, but I was filling myself with the soil of my own tears and it was making me bitter.

I discovered that I couldn’t hide my emotions away forever because sooner rather than later, that version of myself before the pain, disappointment, and war wanted to come roaring forward, breaking through the face of the monster I was hiding behind.

I’m more than war. I’m more than a talent. I’m more than just Tanya’s husband or Legend’s daddy. I am Michael and yes, though I’m broken, I am breaking. Breaking down the barriers within me. I am breaking away from pain. I am breaking ties with hurt. I am breaking down the hardness and stony walls that rejection, resentment, and desertion told me I had to build to create safety. Those were lies, and I am now ready to live in my truth. I am love and I am breaking.

I didn’t escape. I stopped running. I am now flat-footed, planted and grounded in this belief that I am meant to be free. Free from seeing myself through the dirty lenses of failure. I am free from seeing disappointment as my only deserving emotion. Yes, I am somebody special and unique. Born with a true purpose and a true calling to myself first. I am ready to love me and all of me for more than a second. I see my weight not as a distraction but instead as this wonderful and amazing opportunity to dig in and sculpt a work of art because of love and not pain. We have the power. We have the strength. We have the courage and the heart for this walk of life.

My mind is free from the negative stain of injustice I brought upon myself. Yes, I was once uncivil toward my peace. Yes, I was once uncompromising to my own liberty. Yes, I once ignored my right to the idea that I BELONG in the realm of togetherness. Yes, I was once convinced that I deserved only pain, and I would lie down to be walked all over. But now I have learned to cast down every stronghold, every negative remark, every guilty thought I bring upon myself. I see my bruises and I no longer cringe, but I smile because I understand I have conquered my new point of view. It wasn’t easy. I bent and twisted until I broke wide open to release the bitterness I harbored inside for so long.

I broke. I changed my VIEW. I learned to LOVE MYSELF.

You can do this too. Know that you are part of a world with an army of overcomers. You are not alone. You see the mountain and now it’s time to climb it. Take the fight and make it your own.

Whatever the “unflattering picture” might be in your life, remind yourself that you have the power to change your view and that it’s never too late.