Body Image

Mesomorph, Ectomorph, Endomorph...just some of the glorious shapes and sizes our bodies come in. Apparently this affects you if you are a woman. Men, are either buff or flubby. Hmmm, or more joyously...don't care.

I'm sitting here about to dribble on about how important it is to LOVE YOURSELF, just the way you are...but that's not true. Unless you are walking and waking perfection. I've yet to meet that. (Isn't this all some kind of journey?)

I can't speak for men, so I won't.

Women...are CONSUMED with how they look. It's hard not to be...even if you're a tree-huggin', free-spirited, birkenstock-wearin', animal-lovin', organic-livin' type...there is an insidious underside to each of us estrogen-filled Beings...does my hair look ok? Omg...WHEN did that pimple show up? Do I look ok in this?

Even in a yoga class, where you're supposed to be focused on your breathing, your Self and your Awareness...the sideways glances are there...checking out the girl in the funky capri-length flared yoga pants, hmmmm, no panty-lines either (must be wearing a thong...or nothing) and she's dressed, holistically, in WHITE. Dang, I can't quite get that downward facing dog stretch all the way.........ugh, SHE can. Of course she can...she's in WHITE.

I aspire to deep breathing, Self-Awareness and WHITE.

I've tried not caring how I look. I've tried not wearing the little bit of makeup that I do (black mascara and lipstick...ok...I wear blood-drenched red lipsticks usually...but that's it!) and I'm met with, "OMG...are you ok? You look ill." Doesn't matter if I'm at the office, at a Parent Council meeting, on a Fire Call, running an event with the Mayor, or slopping ice-cream at the community centre for an event...it MATTERS how I look.

There's a LOT to be learned from tv shows like "What Not To Wear"...seriously great show. My husband started dressing me after he found the perfect episode that described my particular condition: The girl that buys clothes the next size down so that she can work her way into them and then continually complains that she has NOTHING to wear. She has (I have): small shoulders, striking neckline, small waist, ass-bomb behind (hey, kids'll do that to a girl), large thighs, small boobies that get loads of help from La Senza's amazing undergarments...a good bra is worth the money. In the right proportions, all of these imperfections go together pretty good...they call that curvy....or Ectomorph.

Whatever my husband learned from "What Not To Wear" works...he picks my shirts...I get complimented. Hmmm, and feel great...despite ANYTHING I might want to say about not needing external approval for a sense of Self-worth, the ugly truth is...we do. Which is why this consumer society we live in WORKS...it creates a sense of self-worth by endorsing whatever products it is that you will have, consume and wear that create, generate and exploit that external approval. We feel great when we are noticed. And in our raw state...we aren't noticed. So, we need these products. Or so we're told we do...and then start telling each other that we do.

Whenever I wear anything that I've chosen for myself...it's not worth mentioning...there's no external approval.

I hear you saying...omg...I can't believe you're THAT shallow!?!?!?

I'm not.

I AM brutally aware though that there are favourable responses to my body type and how I dress it and what make-up I'm wearing. Sometimes I choose to care. Sometimes I don't. When I don't though...it's not long before I start feeling really cruddy about mySelf and I find myself needing to read some Self-Love books, meditate more, take Warrior pose one stretch yonder, BREATHE, and remind myself that my purpose on this Earth is infinitely more important than the fabrics dressing mySelf or the paint I slap on it.

Are we all this shallow?

Let's put it this way...advertising works for a reason.