Just like most women who love fashion & probably even those that don't, I have been trying to be skinnier for most of my life. I've done every diet from the Non-Fat craze in the 90's to the Zone to the Atkins to the South Beach to the Glycemic Index and back around again to the Zone. I've even tried 3-day cleanses like the Clean Cleanse. Is cleansing really good for you anyway? It just doesn't seem healthy, in fact, if you sit back & use a little common sense, none of the fad diets seem healthy. Most of them eliminate or immoderate one or many necessary components of the human diet.
I'm coming up on my 34th birthday & after all these years, I've realized that I am exhausted, & hungry, & sick of trying to be skinnier. Call it a 1/3-life-self-intervention. What happened to eating a balanced array of fresh healthy foods & just loving the body you were given? What happened to loving the fact that we have the energy to run & dance & downward dog? Why are we trying to look like the 14 year old runway models who only occasionally indulge in iceberg lettuce (no fun!), when it is physically impossible for our body to look like theirs (blame puberty, I am just the messenger). Perhaps a better question is: why are those bodies endorsed, embraced, promoted by the fashion industry? Aren't we the ones buying the clothes? Why can't we demand that beauty is not anorexic, but healthy, & curvaceous, & heck, of legal voting age?! If Marilyn Monroe was a size 12, why am I trying to be a size 0 (that was for impact, that would be gross) & when did sample sizes change from 10 to 2?
Marilyn Monroe had her own set of significant problems, but she was certainly an icon for her time & she had a beautifully curvaceous body which she & the rest of the world embraced. If you look even further back in time at art produced during the Renaissance, all of the women depicted were very curvaceous & arguably even "fat" for our nation's current standards. Don't get me wrong, I certainly recognize the obesity issue in our nation & agree that it is a huge problem, but I wonder if this unattainable female body that our world has decided is "beautiful" might just be the root of some of those women's over-obsessive food compulsions. Maybe it is their way of overcompensating once they realize that the "perfect body" is unattainable. In many cultures around the world bigger women are admired because they can afford to eat. When most American women don't have that daily worry, then why are our we willingly depriving ourselves?
I'd love to live in a world where beauty is not based on the size or shape of one's body. A world where we all had the confidence to love the body we were given, after all it is our greatest gift. I love seeing my fellow fashion bloggers' photos posted on their sites because a lot of them are normal people, they look healthy, they are beautiful. So maybe, a blog is not such a bad platform to start a Body Love campaign, a movement of sorts. I certainly cannot speak for my fellow fashion bloggers, but I can encourage you to join me in my Body Love movement. Let's start by loving our bodies & fueling them the way they are supposed to be fueled. Lets embrace the way we look in our clothes & out of them, & then maybe, just maybe, the fashion world will follow OUR trend! After all, beauty should start on the inside & reveal itself through our healthy, energized, & naturally beautiful bodies.
 |
Marilyn Monroe |
Stylishly yours,
DKG
