For far too long we have been at odds with our bodies and have strived for a perfect ideal that, in all honestly, does not exist. Everyone is sick of it. We no longer want advertisements that bombard us with messages that make us question our self-worth. They tell us what magic beauty regimen will get rid of cellulite, eliminate wrinkles, increase our breast size, constrict our waistlines, voluminise our hair, and whatever other arbitrary beauty ideals that are forced upon us.
These social constructs of beauty are imposed upon us unwillingly and are designed to weaken the view of our self worth. If we feel negatively about our appearance, we are more likely to tap into our earnings in order to “better” our outer appearance.
It’s exhausting to constantly feel like you are never thin enough, never beautiful enough; what we have is never really enough. Even if we do “achieve” many of these ideals, we find ways to create new things to dislike about ourselves. That’s the problem – they are just things, random and unreasoned. We tell ourselves that if we just change this one little thing, everything will be better. We may think “I will love my body more when I lose five pounds,” but it never happens because self-worth will never ever be attached to a number on the scale. Getting rid of pounds of body fat doesn’t get rid of the negative feelings you think are attached to them.
You set up these expectations for what will happen when you change your current body, but you feel worse when these expectations are not met because your self worth is being tied to something temporary. Your body has and always will change, as much as you try to delay the process. Next year you may have more under-eye wrinkles, more stretch marks on your ass, more spider veins on your legs, but it’s something we all experience in time.
Why do we so desperately try to stall this natural progression and thus cling to our youth? Why do we constantly fuse together our self-respect and our appearance when it is something that will forever be shifting underneath us?
We do terrible things to achieve these ideals. A majority of us either diet or have dieted as we deny ourselves the nutrition we need. We believe that with restriction, beauty will be achieved, which only leads to unhealthy obsessions with food and hunger, often manifesting into a lifelong struggle and preoccupation with how our body looks and how it will be perceived. You are consumed with how much you eat, how much you don’t eat, whether or not you forced yourself to burn off that “cheat” you couldn’t help but devour.
Your scale becomes a physical representation of your mood; if the number goes down you feel elated and when the number goes up you feel miserable. When you do manage to lose weight, you are met by positive reinforcement from friends, family and coworkers and you become anxious about the idea of gaining the weight back because you’re concerned about what others might think.
We need to question these notions. Why is disliking ones body the norm for so many? What is the “right” body shape? Why do we discriminate against size and appearance? Why are we so preoccupied with our appearance in general?
A growing amount of people are sick and tired of the negativity, and many movements have sprung up to demand equal rights for our bodies, no matter the shape, size, colour or age. We have celebrations such as international No Diet Day, movements such as “Endangered Bodies” and “Body Love Wellness” popping up online, and countless blogs dedicated to the growing movement of body love and acceptance. We have new paradigms such as Health at Every Size (HAES) which focuses on eating intuitively and pursing pleasurable physical activity instead of strict dieting and exercise. This is just the beginning.
When we start to discuss these issues and encourage these positive movements, it helps others accept themselves. We should all refuse these body and beauty ideals and alternatively try to accept our bodies as the diverse beings that they are. Ultimately, when you stop criticizing your body, you feel better about it, and at the end of the day all we really want is to be happy in our skin.