Just to be clear, I am not an expert. In anything. But, I am a curious soul.
Over the course of the past few years, through conversations, observations and occasional personal research on the subject, I have found a passion in learning more about the culture of dieting and weight loss within our society and the intertwining of weight, self-esteem, diet success and self-worth, particularly when it comes to western women.
I am not immune to this disease of weight-based-self-evaluation. As the curvy girl in a thin family, I have struggled for years to maintain confidence, to find value in my character rather than in my jeans size. I have dieted, both on my own and through structured programs, joined gyms, made goals, and lost weight. And, I have found myself on the other side. Whether it was true or not (and believe me, 99.99999999% of the time, it wasn't), I have oftentimes felt devoid of self-worth because of my weight, or my diet, or the way those jeans cut into my curves. I have felt the depths of pain in not measuring up to whatever standard I saw for myself. Felt pathetic, cursed, incomplete and defeated.
For me, these moments did not and do not inspire me to health. If I worked out harder, it was to find value in the way my body felt and looked. If I ate less calories, it was to prove to myself and others that I was worthy. It wasn't health. I had bought into our culture of dieting and weight loss. Whatever our weight, skinny, curvy, muscular and more, we allow it to dictate our daily self-worth, an evaluation that can ebb and flow hourly, daily, weekly (and, let's face it ladies, often coincides with the monthly visit from Mother Nature).
And these ideas, well, they are often passed down like a generational illness of self-hate and self-criticism. I find my passions ignited when I think about the generations of women who have been affected by our cultural norms, our mothers or our mothers' mothers' mothers both consciously and unintentionally passing down a vision of external perfection and self-worth that continues to influence the deepest recesses of who we deem ourselves to be. I watch as friends - beautiful, passionate, hilarious and inspirational sisters - doubt, demean and criticize themselves, becoming angry or depressed when they eat the wrong thing or look the wrong way... as if somehow that is all that they are.
I watch as I do the same thing.
And I want to change it. I would love to hear personal insights -- to learn about your experiences, to learn more about how your family of origin, your culture of origin, has shaped your view of yourself, your body and your self-worth. This is where my passion lies. In self-worth. In strengths-based self-change. In knowing that we are beautiful, worthy and courageous.
Love these thoughts! So often it's far too easy to internalize these external voices, whether from family, friends, culture, or random strangers. One off-handed comment or one line from an ad on TV can just stick with you and it's a daily battle to stand out against a culture that dictates the "right" and "wrong" ways that women should look. (And I wonder how much of this is especially targeted at women rather than men?) Thanks for sharing your thoughts! :)
ReplyDeleteThis is a hot button topic for me, too, Katie. Personally, I think the most important thing is to stop thinking of self. We were created to LOVE and to be loved. The more we love others, the more we will realize that we are loved and the more we will love ourselves. When I focus on myself, all I can see are my flaws. The more I focus on giving of myself, the less of me I see, and at the end of the day, when I am brushing my teeth and I look in the mirror, I like what I see, and I know that I am beautiful.
ReplyDeleteTo add some beautiful thoughts from a male voice, I have asked permission to forward these comments from the always articulate and well-spoken Gary Rubright:
ReplyDeleteHi Katie,
I suspect women don’t have a claim on image or self worth issues. So for what it’s worth here are a few of my thoughts.
Other than obvious health benefits, I suspect being thin adds nothing to self worth. But why stop at thin, let’s go right to beautiful because who doesn’t want that?
The world is full of ‘beautiful’ people who are miserable and ‘ugly’ people who are quite happy. Perhaps image is no requirement to finding self-worth. There are ‘rich’ people who never have enough, and ‘paupers’ who wouldn’t ask for more. So wealth is no requirement either.
But these of course are superficial at best. Even the young and beautiful wither with time. And the wealth of King Solomon in the end had to be ‘left behind’.
Perhaps our self-worth is much deeper. I think instinctively we know this but never quite see it. We are always looking outwards. The inside to us seems empty, a big nothing. It’s like a hole that we never fill up, though we never stop trying. Part of the problem is we really can’t look inward, like the eye that can see everything around it - but never itself.
If our worth is anywhere at all surely it is in the miracle within us that is nothing less than Life Itself. Our very being is the gift beyond measure. While everything we see and touch is temporal, here today – gone tomorrow, we harbor in our souls a piece of eternity. It seems to me this is our gift, and also our worth.
As for you dear Katie, and I see you well, be assured that you are simply beautiful.
Much love.