Sunday, May 31, 2009

Wow! Do I love my Body?

To be honest I almost hate too look in the mirror sometimes.  If I stand there too long I can see where my skin is breaking out.  My hair is dry, and my teeth... you pretty much get the idea.  But for the most part when I stand in the mirror and I am dressed ready to go.  I am the Lioness and I am ready to conquer the world.  Because I work in the retail fashion industry I will say that almost 85% of the women are uncomfortable in the skin.  I've seen it in every race, age and size.  The skinny ladies wish they could snatch some pounds off the thick women and the thick woman wish they could slap some of there extra rolls onto thin women everywhere.  At any rate we all have some sort of distorted view of what we see in the mirror.  Now I am not putting all women in a box and trying to say that how we view ourselves as women is mostly negative, but I will say that maintaining a positive out look on how we view ourselves and our body affects more of us than you think.  I have worked with and serviced many women.  Some of who may just have had babies, going through menopause, or just getting over some sort of illness so these cases are dealing with the adjustment of your body changing.  Then there are the other women who are for what ever reason struggling with their bodies and their weight.
 It is interesting because when I was doing my research for the upcoming Body Image radio show, I came across articles talking about how the media is a huge factor in how we view ourselves.  The images we see in the magazines and on TV somehow affects us even if we feel good about ourselves.    As a child I knew that I could never look like the women I saw in these mediums but it didn't stop me from yearning to have blond hair and blue eyes or even my brown skin and big brown eyes from being on the cover of my favorite magazine.  There are many different issues that play into why we see the types of images we do on magazine covers.  As time changes though the media must respond to and represent the typical woman, and she isn't your typical blond hair blue eyed girl next door.  She is who you see in the White House, owing her own television network as well as hosting her own daytime television store, and let's not forget the mother of three holding it down in  your town.  
So as I look at all sides of the circle, it gets pretty sticky when dealing with the whole subject of Body Images.  As a society we need to get better at understanding that we may not see ourselves on television and on magazine covers, but that doesn't mean that we won't ever. 
I will probably never ever be on the cover of Vogue and I am okay with that. ( I know that I could be on the cover of The Hottest Mom in the DC area if there ever was one!).  
I have more to say with my fashion debate but I will ask you to tune into my radio show this Tuesday June 16,  I am going to dig a little deeper about the whole Body Image debate and the interesting tidbits of info that I found while researching this topic.  In the meantime, since summer is less than three weeks away I decided to put up a couple of dresses that I will be wearing this summer as I party it up and enjoy the weather.  And to be honest, it is hard for me to accept some aspects of my body, but god willing I am able to hide it beautifully and still look good and be the life of the party!!  I encourage you to do the same!  Until next time May All Your Outfits Match
Tippi

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