"No, thanks- I'm cutting back."
"No, I can't"
"I wish I could eat like I used to."
"That will go straight to my hips."
"That will go straight to my butt."
"I'm on a diet."
We have all heard at least one of these phrases before.
Dieting: Restricting the amount of food intake one has to either benefit physical appearance and/or better health.
Now, in my own life recently I have been attempting to "cut back." If you knew me, which many of you in this blog community do not yet, you would know that I am not overweight or approaching obesity by any means. I know I am a healthy weight for my age/height/gender. Although the phrase (and keyword in this case) self-image plays a large role in my quest for shedding some pounds. Let me give you some examples here on why I have this slimmer self-image in my mind. There was a day about a year and a half ago when everyone at my high school put on a tux or a pretty dress, did their hair and make-up extra nice and went to a dance - yes I am talking about prom. Now I wore this long black dress, and I love that dress, I would wear it again (if I were to have a reason to). I felt good in that dress. Today, right now at this point in time I can't fit into that dress anymore. Some where between the start of college and now I have gained a good ten pounds and that zipper just won't go up all the way. Like I said I felt good in that dress, my self-image was excellent in my eyes. I knew my image (my body or myself) that I was showing to the world was acceptable, that people thought I looked the best that I could have. Now again I am going to mention the 'if you knew me' because so far in this post I feel like I might be making myself sound like a snotty girl who thinks she is all that and a bag of chips- really I don't and frankly I am no supermodel.
Back to the dieting: I want to lose weight because I want to have that self-image back. Who doesn't want to feel good about themselves? I also,and maybe more importantly want to have that image back. I want the world to accept me. I want them to see me as beautiful, skinny, hot, gorgeous, flawless, attractive, sexy, cute, dazzling or any other synonym you can come up with to fit the picture of the ultimate woman. That is what brings me to my next point, that this thing this image I want to uphold and possess is created by our culture. I would never want to deprive myself of all the delicious food out there if this were not the case. I would not have the same self image of myself in anyway.
A great question comes to my mind when I think of bodies in general and the topics of image- if we had no image, no preference and no standards to which the body should be how would we all look? Would there be no such thing as matching clothes, could navy blue and black never clash and would they even exist? Would there be no make-up? Would everyone let their hair go natural? How often would we even wash our hair or wash ourselves at all? Would wrinkles still help define age? Would curves on a woman matter? What about cellulite, would there even be a name for those dimples on the back of your legs?
This class is really unlike anything I have ever taken or experienced before. These topics are broad and vague and in a lot of ways I don't understand them quite yet. The one thing I do know is that culture is the construct of every single thing in this world we live in. Besides the way the trees and grass grow culture makes everything the way it is. I think culture should just be another word for people for humans. A long time ago someone or a group of some people made a choice on what was good and what was bad. I am not talking evil vs. holy here- I mean they decided that men should have short hair and women's hair should be longer than men's. There are choices just like this going on constantly, culture is changing constantly. Right now a woman should be slender, yet she should still have slight curves, a nice firm butt and big breasts. I am not that ultimate woman right now, I'm not sure I ever will be. To attempt to get there I am dieting. Only ten or fifteen years ago the image of a woman was slightly different. The women of the 90's were to be stick slim with no fat what so ever. I know if the culture changes and big 80's hair and bangs come back I will jump right on the bandwagon and be putting hot rollers in. Again I just wonder, what if there weren't any standards what would we look like? How would we treat our bodies?
This is a great example of we can often see the cultural "expectations" of physique and develop a desire to bypass that so we can be viewed as someone who has gone "above and beyond expectations." Losing "a few pounds" means different things to different individuals; to someone who's overweight, it means getting closer to reaching a socially accepted weight, but to someone who is already in shape like yourself, it means feeling even better about your self-image and standing out in society.
ReplyDeleteGood post, by the way!
ReplyDeleteAlexa's really honest and open--thanks.
ReplyDeleteBut the thing that's so striking to me is how precisely we know what's too much or just right (and that changes over time). And how much self image (identity) and size are tied together. We don't think twice.