The Hard Truth

Hello my beautiful ladies! It’s time to get a little serious for a hard dose of reality. Buckle your seat belts.

Go to the grocery store and look at cover of a magazine. What do you see? “How to lose 15 lbs in 10 days,” “75 sex moves that men crave,” “Why losing your butt means losing your man,” “Look leaner naked,” “Look 10 years younger,” and the list goes on while getting more and more ridiculous.

These magazines portray an expectation that is held for us women within society. There is an expectation that we need to be perfect. We need to look perfect. We need to act perfect. And we need to know how to perfectly seduce men. And this expectation is exemplified by magazine covers and commercials with beautiful, thin, perfect-looking models and celebrities that are adored.

Although I can say how much I dislike this until I’m blue in the face, that doesn’t prevent us actually being affected by this expectation. I think we can all agree that it is a ridiculous expectation and that is it a problem. But this is a problem that we tend to not look at seriously. We can try to ignore it all we want, but at the end of the day, do you find yourself comparing yourself to the models on the magazines or picking out every single thing that is wrong with your body in the mirror? As much as I wish I can say I don’t, I know I do.

However, we can’t be blamed by letting this expectation get to us. The affect starts with young girls. It all starts with Barbie dolls. A study of the affect Barbie dolls has on girls was done by the Department of Psychology at the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom. It was found that girls who played with Barbie dolls reported to lower self esteem and a greater desire for a thinner body than girls who did not play with them. Barbie became these girls’ idol and role model. Crazy, huh?

From Barbie, girls then move onto idolizing models on magazine covers and celebrities. And because of this, some scary things were found. According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders: 47% of girls in 5th-12th grade reported wanting to lose weight because of magazine pictures, 69% of girls in 5th-12th grade reported that magazine pictures influenced their idea of a perfect body shape, 42% of 1st-3rd grade girls want to be thinner, 81% of 10 year olds are afraid of being fat. The sad part is that these girls are looking at pictures that are not even real. 100% of photos in today’s magazines are photoshopped. Not even the models and celebrities meet the expectation of perfection. Is this what we want for the younger girls of our world?

If we don’t want this getting to the younger girls, why do we let it get to us? Why do we only see the negative in the mirror? Why does imperfection get us down? Look beyond the looks and see the amazing gifts you have to offer to this world. Next time you look in the mirror, give yourself a true compliment out loud. I dare you.

This expectation needs to end with us. Let us start to redefine what it means to be a woman in the 21^st century. We do not to need to be a size zero to be a hero. We do not need to look or act perfect to change the world. We do not need to lose 10 pounds, look 10 years younger, or even have tons of boys wrapped around our finger. We need to love ourselves as we are. We are the heroes this world needs, just as we are. Let us not conform to the expectation.

We are so much more than what society says we are. You, reading this, are amazing. Live this week knowing you are loved!

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