I have had interactions lately with other woman in my life regarding body image. While this is a common area of struggle for women, it seems that in the last week the Lord has brought it to my attention through various avenues. The four ways God has surfaced this issue are:
His Word
Personal thoughts
Friends asking for prayer in this area and
Popular culture
To begin a discussion regarding this, I want to first be a little vulnerable myself. I am someone who is not in any way immune to feelings of physical inadequacy. I have battled this for several years in various degrees. Sometimes I will go days without thinking about how I look or comparing myself to another. Other times, I find myself dwelling on it several times an hour. I haven’t kept careful track of why it is inconstant like this but my guess is that it relates to how diligent I have been in reading the word, being in prayer as well as how much I have given in to the inundated cultural portrayal of "beauty". If we as women stop to think- we will realize that this is an ever-increasing battle. As information becomes more available via technological advances, and our dependence on them more evident, we are all the more exposed to worldly and unrealistic ideas of beauty. In a given day, I may see this portrayal in commercials, billboards, magazine covers, Internet sites, TV shows, movies …the list is really endless. This inundation is putting such impractical expectations on women’s appearances that even Hollywood is competing against itself. While I have intentionally stopped reading magazines that only cause more struggle within my heart and mind, I admit, I sometimes fall into the trap of my e-mails interface page. Yahoo will have the big entertainment stories of the day- with pictures and enticing headlines that sometimes to succeed in drawing me in. What I find are articles and pictures about who looks fat, who is aging, and who is still measuring up to the standard of beauty through starvation, botox and plastic surgery. Suddenly, 50 year olds look like 30 years olds and the 30 years old must look like teenagers again. What an appalling topic for our culture to obsess over! What a futile, fruitless quest for fulfillment! And yet it seems to only be getting worse and unfortunately, easier to be snared into. Isn’t it ironic to see children today dressing as adults and wanting so much to be "grown up" while the adults are doing all they can to get back to that youth? And so, the need for Christian women to intentionally abstain from cultural influences that may cause us to struggle is HUGE! It is nearly impossible to all-together avoid this within our world, but it is possible for us to greatly decrease the impact it has on us through paying closer attention to what we allow in… less of this world and more of His Word. I think I will stop for today… but I will continue this topic over the coming days- Please feel free to share how you have been impacted by our culture and why you think our world- mainly America, is so obsessed by how we look. I will not pretend that any of my thoughts about this pertinent subject are profound- but they are prevalent. I will end with a verse I often remind myself during times of struggle:
Beauty is fading and charm is deceptive,
but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.
Proverbs 31:30
2 comments:
Hey Kate! I'm so glad you've decided to post on this topic. It really is a huge struggle for us women. It seems that in our society, the best thing a woman can be is beautiful. And we measure it against some standard that we don't seem to know the origin of. It truly is a bizarre and frustrating phenomenon. And in many cases it's a bondage.
More and more, I am wondering about two things:
1. How do we transform the cultural norm of valuing women first and foremost according to their physical characteristics (even amongst Christians)? Is it even possible?
2. What role can men play in this transformation? I suspect there are a lot of men in decision-making positions in media and magazine industries. And they have the power to shape how Americans en masse assess beauty and value women. And while we women reject media portrayals for our own sake, perhaps men also need to reject those standards for the sake of women. I think often Christian men reject media for purity reasons, while perhaps still accepting the media's standards for what is desirable. Just a thought.
On a more personal level...
I think I have been blessed in that I don't seem to struggle with this as much as the average gal. I do struggle though. I mean, I'm a skinny Black girl with an afro. I basically look like a walking microphone! That image rarely gets affirmed as beautiful in this culture. I have had to personally redefine beauty in order to simply accept and appreciate myself. Crazy.
Sorry for the long comment! :P I look forward to reading more of your thoughts on the topic. Peace to you.
Wow, what a tough topic. I struggle with body image too and have at different times (and sizes!) of my life, which shows one that this monster will devour you at any time or place. I think the verse you wrote is indeed valid and should be at the forefront of our minds as we live our daily lives. For me, this might mean that I try to bring a balance to how much time I spend in the word in comparison to how much time I spend doing my hair, putting on make-up, etc.
It just feels like such a battle to be happy when you really can't compare to any of the women in a given magazine. And, how old are we? Early 20's and we're already "lost it"? That's depressing to me.
Yet, I have been trying to reform my thinking in every situation. When someone less than perfect walks into a Bible study, a church service or a restaurant but I know that person is a believer, I think of how much more precious that person is to God because she/he loves Him and serves Him. The skinny model who is only concerned with her appearance may never have that kind of beauty in our Lord's eyes. "Man look on the outside, but God looks at the heart." Let's do our best to follow God's example.
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