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There is No Finish Line
Today, I want to talk about New Year’s Resolutions. I am aware that it is June and most of us have probably long forgotten the lists that we made on scratch pieces of paper while tipsy on champagne and expectations, but I have been thinking a lot about resolutions lately, mostly because this week I realized that I have accomplished every single thing I jotted down in my notebook on December 31,…
Namaste
Namaste http://wp.me/s5ydvK-namaste
Breathe in and breathe out. Feel the air fill your lungs with possibility and hear the sound of the ocean in your gentle exhale.
Sound familiar? You’re taking a yoga class at the gym with your girls, trying to get your vinyasa flow on, and the instructor proceeds to murmur on and on about your breath while you’re upside down eying your friends through the back wall mirror from the view between…
Make Pasta Not War
Recently, I have heard rumors and whispers and mumblings about a horrifying concept: pasta is not good for you. As an Italian (and avid pasta-eater) I became concerned. Pasta was my very being. I grew up eating Nona’s homemade lasagna and spaghetti and now I hear people saying they are cutting pasta out of their diets completely because it matches the nutritional value of candy. ABSURD! Not only…
The world of editing, photoshop, and plastic surgery that we live in supports and perpetuates an image of supposed perfection, one that does not exist. It consumes our world and creates unnecessary pressure on everyone, especially young girls and boys. It leads to eating disorders, low self-esteem, and a distorted view of beauty. This is an issue that I have always been passionate about as a girl who grew up reading magazines, looking at fashion ads, and being stared down at by 14-foot-tall airbrushed women on billboards, wondering why I didn’t look like these people, these impossibly beautiful women.
The above images are from a project I did last semester for my photography class in an attempt to highlight how the media pressures women to change their appearance in order to meet the expectations of society, and even when measures are taken to alter one’s appearance, the “perfection” we search for can never really be obtained. The beautiful women I photographed are some of my best friends. They are strong, intelligent, brave people who let me draw on their faces with expo markers and tape magazine clippings over their eyes and mouths. They don’t exactly look like the women the media projects to us, but I hope one day the industry can evolve towards a more all inclusive image of human, one where the faces of the media look more like real people because, with the increasing amount of editing and photoshop technology available, even the girl in the magazine wants to look like the girl in the magazine.
In my heart, I know that I am strong, that I am healthy, and that my body can do amazing things. I know that my legs let me jump high and run hard and hold yoga poses. I know that my butt is proof of my years as a volleyball player where I spent most of my time in a constant squat. I know that my blemishes are not something I can rid myself of with the click of a mouse and that my crooked smile is something my mother gave me and that I wouldn’t give up for anything.
Even though I know all these things, I am still continuously working towards feeling confident about myself and developing a good body image. I hope that this series of images demonstrates that changing your appearance is not the answer. It’s important to know that this bombardment of fabricated images that we are faced with each day is just that, fabricated. So instead of attempting to conform ourselves to an unobtainable beauty, let’s change the standard of beauty and the images that the media uses to portray “perfection”. Let’s embrace who we are, what we look like, and how we live our lives!
Creating Perfection The world of editing, photoshop, and plastic surgery that we live in supports and perpetuates an image of supposed perfection, one that does not exist.Link reblogged from Come as You Are with 2 notes
In Search of the Miraculous →
A collection of opinions and cautionary tales from a twentysomething girl who’s still figuring it out.
Runner’s High
I love to run. I am a runner.
When I say this, I want to be perfectly clear that I am not a runner who can finish a mile in 5 minutes flat or run at a constant speed for 13.2 miles. I am a runner who occasionally finds the time to run a few miles every couple of days.
I once read in a magazine that anyone can be a runner, and to be a runner all you had to do was start running. Whether it was at…
Link reblogged from Come as You Are with 2 notes
In Search of the Miraculous →
A collection of opinions and cautionary tales from a twentysomething girl who’s still figuring it out.
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