November 28, 2024

The Trend Pear

Juicy News and Trends in Fashion and Lifestyle

Women’s Month – Reclaiming Beauty, Redefining Success

Women’s Month- Reclaiming Beauty, Redefining Success
It felt like cold water slapping my face. The first time I watched, it made me uncomfortable. The second time, I cried. Now I’m all fired up with positive energy about healthy female power and want to share that with you.

“It” is a 60-second video at CampaignforRealBeauty.com. Go to “Evolution film” and click on watch the film (please note: I’m not talking about the pro-age video that automatically plays).
You’ll see that this film represents a form of violence against girls (and women) that we need to be more conscious about.

Research* reveals the good, the bad and the …

o Dr. Susie Orbach has discovered that spending just three minutes looking at fashion magazines lowers the self-esteem of 80% of women.

o Distorted expectations and pressures of physical beauty effect self esteem. This leads to introversion, a withdrawal from normal life and a waste of potential.

o 6 out of 10 girls think they’d “be happier if they were thinner”
Like many of you, I recall being a young girl, cruelly teased about my looks nearly every day at school. Now I can appreciate that this urged me to develop my intelligence and other talents. Today my heart goes out to any girl feeling disheartened by mass media pressure that feels more intense than my youth era. (In my twenties a friend encouraged me to get a nose job, which helped eliminate an obstruction to my confidence.)
Good news*:

o 87% of women agree that “a woman can look beautiful at any age” and 81% agreed with “every woman has something beautiful about her.”

o 75% of women agree that beauty does not come from her looks, but from her spirit and love of life.

Author and feminist, Naomi Wolf says in 1991 most American women were still feeling bad about not looking like the thin, blonde Barbie with big breasts. She writes that now women “DO see themselves as beautiful when they are being loved or engaging in meaningful activities, involved in spiritual experiences, helping others or doing creative work.” Wolf astutely points out that when women are no longer preoccupied with “external shortcomings, they can get on in forceful ways with their internal development and creativity.” I would add, and thus be able to wake up inspired and make a difference in the world while feeling more in love with their lives.