We all pick ourselves apart, why do we do that? Someone recently said to me boys are much easier than girls, they don’t ask questions. Girls ask ‘why?’ in every situation. They want reasons, explanations. But these ‘whys?’ can often lead to us questioning ourselves, putting ourselves down. WHY don’t I look like her? WHY am I not taller? Why can’t I be that skinny? WHY. WHY. WHY.

The why we should be asking is why do we believe these negative things about ourselves rather than believing in ourselves, in our abilities, in our voice. Why do we focus on our imperfections rather than on our perfections. Why don’t we say to ourselves ‘I love myself, yes I look good today, wait I look good everyday’ WHY, why don’t we say this to ourselves? What is so terrible about feeling confident in ourselves? Why is my well being and the relationship that I have with myself not my priority? What is so wrong with saying, I love myself, I’m a good person. Why do we put ourselves down day after day? Why can’t we accept who we are?

WHY?

Why is it that when I put Ashley Graham’s name into the YouTube search bar that the first thing that comes up is ‘Ashley Graham plus model’, why doesn’t it say ‘Ashley Graham model’ or ‘Ashley Graham activist’? Why is it that she is automatically put into a ‘plus’ size category. The average ‘plus size model’ is between a US size 6-12, 6-12. The average clothes size of women in the US is 12-14, so many women sitting reading this would be considered  ‘plus size’.

What does the term plus size add to the modelling industry. Is it meant to add diversity? Is it meant to make women feel more accepted? What does society gain from putting women into a category where they are considered not normal. The ‘normal model’ is 0-00, so why are these women considered different based on their clothes size. They’re both women, they both have women’s reproductive organs but they have individual body shapes, that’s it, yet that drives people to believe that one is better and more beautiful than the other. Why is it that, why is it a thing? Why was that ever made a thing? The term plus size doesn’t add diversity to our society, it adds a wave of expectation, of separation between two types of women, ‘normal’ sized women and ‘plus’ sized women. When instead they truly should just be considered women. Women who work hard, women who push themselves and most importantly women who achieve greatness. Whether they’re a size 0 or a 12, a size 14 or a size 4, they’re women who love to create visuals for everyone to witness, letting them become someone else, a character, a persona which they may never inhabit in their lives other than in that one single moment in time when they are on set. Let them become that person. Allow them to inspire women through their passion regardless of their body type. We watch them come alive, we can see their passion purely because they allow us to view the love they have for creating these images. There’s a quote from Howard Thurman which reads, ‘Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive’.

I often find it difficult to understand why one woman is chosen over another. I find it difficult to understand why people believe they have the authority to make women change who they are in-order to fit into a certain ‘cast’.

I often wonder do they know how much that their words or actions can affect someone. How much their words can send a person into self-despair. How they can turn them into someone who they don’t even recognise.

Maybe, just maybe, they were confident in their body and their ability but because of these people’s words, they now feel like they’re not good enough. Who they truly are isn’t good enough.

 

And yeah, I get it life isn’t always fair.

Not everyone is going to be on the cover of vogue.

But life isn’t fair when it comes to natural disasters, Hurricane Irma whose death toll is constantly rising. That’s not fair.

People, father’s, brothers, mothers, daughters, uncles, nephews, cousins being killed and hurt and targeted because of skin colour, because of race, because of ethnicity. That’s not fair.

People being struck down with life threatening illnesses, people being taken from families because of sickness. That’s not fair.

Families living in poverty, in slums where disease runs rampant. That’s not fair.

These uncontrollable events define moments when life is not fair, they encompass the meaning ‘life isn’t fair’

There are many things in this world that we cannot stop. Things we cannot predict. And things that we can only hope do not affect us. The truth is they could hit us at any time. No one is invincible, none of us are bullet proof.

But we can change how people feel about themselves, we can eliminate these standards and presumptions about how people, women, need to look or feel to be accepted. We can help people to self-love, to understand their self-worth. We can change that.

We can learn to love ourselves. We can learn to speak up and have our voices heard. We can learn to say NO to all those who try to place us in a box, who try to tell us what we are, who we are, how we’re meant to live. There are 24 hours in day, 365 days in a year, life is short, why waste it on putting ourselves down. Why waste it on putting other people down because of our own insecurities. Allow yourself to live, allow yourself to follow your dreams and your passions, allow yourself to find and embrace your identity; your uniqueness, what makes you, you.

 

WE CAN ENHANCE, EMPOWER AND ENCOURAGE HOW WOMEN FEEL ABOUT THEMSELVES. TOGETHER. UNITED. WE CAN CHANGE STANDARDS WITHIN SOCIETY.