Perceptions of yourself

How's your New Year treating you?  Up until Friday, it was C R A Z Y! I had so much going on it was not even funny.   I'm now caught up and trying to take care of a bunch of things that have been put on the back burner.

First, that "challenge" I posted about ...yeah. I've failed.    I've done a bit of this and that (new videos), got on the bike, walked, danced....but I need to work on my eating.

Now my topic is perceptions of yourself.

I'm currently going through very old photos and negatives and scanning them to digital. So I'm seeing me in all my sizes. 

It's s so amazing to me as I look at these pictures I once despised because I felt so over weight in them.  Holy Crud.   What was I bitching about?  Really, I looked fabulous.  

Even now, as I've gained weight, I look at myself and hate what I see.  However if you rewind a few months ago when I was losing and got to this "point" I thought I looked fabulous.   I admit I still look AWESOME compared to when I was severely over-weight, but still. 

I know I'm not the only one with perception problems.  It's just funny to me if I weighed this on my way down, I looked good.  Weighing this on my way up, I'm "blah".

What is it that drives our perception of ourself?   I know for a fact that I've had this problem for a long time.   Example, my long time and one of my besties has a photo of us from when we were 14 up on her FB page.   I clearly remember when I was that age how I felt about myself. I felt fat and awful.  I was skinny! I was perfect for my height.  That was the "issue". Because I'm a tall girl and have a bigger build, I tower over everyone and wore a larger size.  Therefore in my eyes, I was "BIG".   

I would love to go back to myself at 14 and tell myself "You're perfect". 
Will I ever feel that about myself?   Will any of us?