You: Simply Fabulous!
Submitted by Johanna S. Kandel, author, Life Beyond Your Eating Disorder (Harlequin) and Founder/Executive Director of The Alliance for Eating Disorders Awareness www.allianceforeatingdisorders.com
Nine years ago, I was in the dining room of my parents’ house with my then seven-year-old cousin who was standing with her hands on the table sucking in her stomach and holding in her breath. When I asked her what on earth she was doing, she told me that she wanted to look like a very famous singer whose image appeared on the cover of every popular magazine at that time. She told me that this celebrity was so popular and if she looked more like her, maybe then more people would like her. As someone who had struggled with eating disorders for more than ten years, this clearly made me very, very upset.
It makes me so sad that we live in a world where boys and girls, men and women are taught to aspire to look like the extremely airbrushed sometimes very unhealthy images they see every day in the media. We are constantly bombarded with unrealistic images of what we’re supposed to look like, and then, when we fall short—which we will because these images are unrealistic—we feel bad about ourselves and punish ourselves for being unable to achieve the impossible.
All our lives we’ve been told that it’s completely normal to be dissatisfied with the body we have, and that we should always be striving for better: less weight, firmer thighs, clearer skin, and/or shinier hair. My question is who wins in this scenario? Is it the advertisers who are trying to sell us skin firming lotion, the diet industry that is trying to push yet another new diet, or is it the magazines that are attempting to acquire just one more subscription?
What would happen if we really did stop hating our bodies? What if we stopped beating ourselves up for everything we were not? What if we actually starting being our body’s friend and not its worst enemy? How would we feel? Take a moment to think about all the things you would do if you were your body’s ally.
Believe it or not, it is actually a great thing to feel good about ourselves. In fact, it’s simply fabulous! It’s okay to love and be grateful for the body we were given despite all those years and millions of television and radio advertisements that have told us otherwise. It’s okay to value our health, respect of bodies the way they are, and be satisfied in our skin.
We need to take a giant step back from those unrealistic ideals and start being real – which we cannot forget is different for everyBODY. So, the next time you are in the car listening to one more advertisement that is telling you just how much happier you would if you were 5 pounds lighter, turn the radio off and say out loud, “I am fabulous just the way I am.” Let’s focus on our strengths, be proud of who we are, and give ourselves that pat on the back we all deserve for simply being who we were meant to be.
