Dear Ladies, Stop Apologizing!

Has your son ever asked you the question, ‘Do I look fat in these soccer shorts?’ What about your husband…does he, after a long look in the mirror, confess to you that he hates his short legs? Or does your daughter offer apologies when her friends come over to play Shopkins, ‘Oh, sorry about the mess.’ No? Not very often? And why not? Because to do so is blinking ridiculous! Yet I see women (myself included) do stuff like this all the time! Sure, you can blame your mother--maybe she did the 1970's equivalent. You can blame the media—they put some pretty messed up feminine ideals out there. Certainly you can blame yourself for eating too much, not being on top of things, over-stretching yourself, or for falling short of Sally So-and-So down the street, OR you can JUST STOP. Stop apologizing for stuff that isn't hurting anyone. Stop justifying your choices. Stop explaining things that do not require explanation, and most of all stop comparing yourself to Sally.

I’m talking stuff like, ‘I can’t wear my swimsuit, I have such a hairy bikini line’—seriously? Like 2 billion other women on this planet.  Or ‘I keep meaning to re-vamp my wardrobe a little. Jenny always looks put-together’—Go for it, if that is the best fit for your time and money. Even the dialogue in your head like, ‘I really need to get out and travel the world. I am so ‘provincial’, but I can never seem to afford it, and I’m scared of…”—Do it or don’t do it, but don’t beat yourself up for it. Ladies, this kind of stuff can consume you, and it really is a demon of your own fabrication. So just STOP.

You know, I have this friend who's (I can't think of any more fitting word) beauty has always struck me. There's just something about her...Anyway, this friend, she certainly doesn't put hours into grooming herself. She is kind enough but not to a fault. She drinks. She swears. She’s a kick-ass musician. She is opinionated and occasionally more outspoken than I am comfortable with. We do not share common political views, parenting philosophies or even many common interests. Her house is a mess. She is not meticulous about diet or exercise. She doesn't hold a particularly impressive job, though I certainly enjoy her sense of decency and humour. If I itemize her qualities this way, it's not a particularly exceptional description of beauty, so I've asked myself, what is it about this woman I find so compelling? Well, the answer is quite simple...She NEVER apologizes. I've never heard her utter anything silly like, 'Excuse the toys all over the lawn,' or 'I just didn't get around to shaving this week' or 'I feel so bad for leaving the kids at daycare all week'. Nope. Why would she? The toys aren't hurting anything anymore than her leg hair is. And her kids are a daycare because they require care while she works. End of story. From what I can see, she just goes about her very ordinary life owning her humanity minus apologies, justifications, and explanations—a quality which I find as appealing as it is rare.

I would also put forward that all of this 'apologizing' we do, whether it be for the store-bought snacks we are feeding our kids or for the lackluster state of our social life, is far from harmless. Quite the opposite actually. I think it actively brings other women down...Take stretch marks, for example…if yours are not okay and need to be hidden, then I guess so do mine. And if Sally is complaining about her chunky thighs, what does she think of mine which are surely 2 sizes bigger? And if Jane apologizes for the cookie crumbs on her table, what must she think of my less-than-perfect housekeeping skills? Or if Katie is forever going on about how she HAS to work, that they NEED the money, even though she'd rather be home with her little one, what is the implication to her other working mommy friends? The list is endless. Someone once even apologized to me for serving soup straight out of a pot! Until that apology, I had no idea such an action could even be offensive--in fact, I still struggle to understand why... but perhaps this notion is no more ridiculous than, say, bemoaning the length of arms you were born with or making explanations for the 20 lbs you just can't seem to lose. All of this stuff—it just casts doubt and shadow over the beauty you were born with and takes others down with you.

So, maybe my fascination with the beauty of this friend of mine is self-serving as much as anything else. Because, maybe if others apologies and justifications have the power to bring us down, maybe the opposite is also true. Maybe her lack of apology and justification for these types of things actually has the power to bring me up. So, for example, if she feels comfortable having a house full of people over with haphazard food offerings and this morning’s cheerios crunching under my socks, maybe I won’t think twice about having a playdate with Sally without first ensuring all household condition are favourable to guests. Or maybe her confidence in pursuing her career sans apology for the childcare she requires will inspire me to do the same. Or her unique way of owning her natural physicality and everyday foibles is just the evidence I need to know that my beauty is not, and will never be, found in some list of desirable qualities. Rather, my beauty is already here…All that’s left for me to do is drop the apologies and own it.

How to be Beautiful

If you know me well, you will know that two and half years ago I stopped exercising. Stopped. Nada. Cold turkey. And if you know me really well, you will know that this is one of the difficult personal challenges I have ever faced. I still tear up every time a runner goes by. You see, for me, exercise was not a passing craze. I ALWAYS did it in some form or another. More than being a just a hobby, exercise was the thing that made me feel strong, made me feel energized, and more than anything, it was the thing that made me feel beautiful. So you can imagine the slough of challenges that surfaced as I accepted that this wasn't just a passing phase in my life. I can admit that in the absence of this thing that made me feel beautiful, there were many days when I felt just the opposite—weak, lethargic, and ugly. And I can I also admit that I treaded (and still continue somewhat) in these feelings for some time, but, like so many things, I realized that stagnating in these feelings was a choice. I could continue to wallow in a place of weakness and dis-beauty, because on some level that is a reality, or I could move on and seek beauty in other ways. Now, I wish I could say this was a simple choice where I woke up one day and was all like, “Hey, today I decided I am beautiful again,” But it wasn't, and it isn't. As much as beauty is a choice, it is also a process that takes time—a feeling that is rediscovered. But, I'm happy to say that I am at least on the way back to that feeling, and along the way, a few things have surfaced that have helped in that rediscovery process. So...in the event that you ever find yourself in a similar place, I'd like to share this with you...

How to Be Beautiful

Take a long, hard look at the next infant you see – This is not hard. What do you see? No matter what shape, size, and regardless of features, and, assuming that you are not an evil troll, that baby is beautiful. Perfect, even. And what more are you than a grown piece of that perfection and beauty? For me, this strikes home time and time again as I watch my two little girls grow. Many times people have commented, “Oh, Genevieve has your legs,” or “Melea's eyes are just like yours!” And do you know what? They are absolutely right. Genevieve does have my legs, and Melea's sweet eyes are just like mine! And do you know what else? Those little legs and those sweet eyes are complete perfection, and, what's more, they are growing everyday! And they are no less beautiful for it. So what different are my legs or my eyes 30 years on than an extension of that same beauty? On this point, I make an effort to be conscious of the joy I feel when I behold the beauty of my little girls and extend some of that same joy into how I regard my own self, and on the flip side, I try to monitor my own negative self-talk about my body regarding this bump or that lump, and realize that that negativity is easily reflected onto my children's feelings of beauty. I find this to be a powerful deterrent.

Visualize your body as an entity separate from yourself – Consider all the things about that entity. Consider all the things that body has accomplished or endured. For me, I can look at my body which, just in past six years, bore, nursed, and raised three children, endured two and half years of illness, allowed me to experience all manners of pleasure and pain, and facilitated the countless functional acts that enable me to be a participant in this world. That's pretty awesome!! Maybe your body has taken you to faraway places, made great career accomplishments, accomplished great physical feats, nurtured others, or endured trauma or injury-- whatever the case, it has been there, for better or worse, every step of the way...Now consider how you would talk to that separate entity... Because, I see this happening and do it myself all the time...Would you call your body disgusting, ugly, or lazy? Would you call that entity fat or scrutinize its individual parts? Or would choose to be more supportive, and say something like, “Hey, Good job! Keep going!” or “That was tough, but tomorrow's another day. Hang in there.” When I look back objectively, this sort of negative self-talk has been a constant in my psyche for as long as I can remember, and do you know what? It's gotten me nowhere and certainly never to a place where I was satisfied enough with my body to change that self-talk to anything positive. So why not give this a try?

Try something new. Find a new beautiful – Of course beauty is multi-faceted, certainly not limited to physicality, and it can be found in places you've never been. So if you ever find yourself in a place where you are not finding that beautiful feeling where you are, try somewhere new. Make a commitment to try something that you've always wanted to try, or dig deep and nurture those gifts that you know you have but have left half-open. Discover your inner yogi, artist, lover, reader, writer, gardener, chef, whatever...The opportunities here are endless, but with a little concerted effort, hopefully you will find 'beautiful feeling' in a most powerful way--that is by something you do. And finally...

Beauty is not something you get back to, it is something you move forward to – Because I just happen to be at this stage in my life, so often I hear friends talk about getting back their pre-baby body or pre-baby interests, whatever they may be. Maybe this speaks to a time when they feel they were sexier, smaller, free-er, more independent, firmer, or had more interests, probably all of those things and more. And there is probably some truth to that. But I can tell you from personal experience, if you seek beauty in things past, you may as well be chasing unicorns. It strikes me still that when I FINALLY get the chance to go out on the town in the evening like the good old days, how I find that I miss Alistair and being part of our cozy bedtime routine or how when I have actually managed to fit back into those pre-pregnancy jeans, there is some feeling of small victory perhaps but definitely not beauty. Those jeans may physically fit, but in any other way that counts, they do not 'fit' the person I am today. Having said that, I am exceedingly grateful for moments like these in my life. They are the push that helps me to discover beauty in my present self—a mother, a lover, a friend, a writer. So wherever you are in life, if it is that you are no longer getting that 'beautiful buzz' you once did when you were a high school soccer superstar or if you find you're looking at old photos and wistfully remembering how things used to be, whatever you do, DO NOT consider this your cue to hang up your 'beautiful' hat! Just the opposite...enjoy the memories and continue forward in pursuit of new ways of finding that feeling.

The older I get, the more the old adage rings true...'Life is a journey, not a destination,' and this matter is no different. The way I see it, there won't be a time when I magically 'achieve beauty' and then have it forever-after. It will always be elusive, coming and going, and maybe that's the point. The loss of exercise, while still devastating to me, has challenged me to find beauty and strength beyond physicality, taken me places—good places—that I may have never gone otherwise, and ultimately fostered healthy growth. Wondering where I would be or what I would be doing otherwise had this trial not befallen me is a path I go down more often than I care to admit, but, I am where I am, and there is beauty to be found here just as much as anywhere else.

            For Carla and Courtney for your inspiration and for Rebecca because you asked.

Not Strong--Still Beautiful

There has been a lot of hype on social media and like recently regarding a “Strong is the new skinny” campaign (if one can call it that). I'm not sure where this started and I'm not actually going to bother researching that bit of information, but it's definitely out there. I'm going to extrapolate a little and say that what I think is being inferred here is that where once 'skinny' was seen as the standard of beauty, now 'strong' is that standard. Perhaps this doesn't sound like such a bad thing. After all, isn't it time we stopped associating beauty with a singular attribute such as size and started associating it with something more useful and complex? Well, yes and no. I have a few problems with this. (Gosh, it's SO easy to be the critic!)

Well, for starters, when you make a statement declaring that X-attribute is beautiful, there is at least some (perhaps unintended) inference that the opposite is not. That is an unnecessarily confusing way of saying that, for example, during all those years where 'skinny was beautiful', there was an undercurrent that being larger was not. I'm really into analogies lately, so the way I visualize this is that when someone makes a bold statement like “Strong is the new skinny”, they create a bus...Let's call it the “Strong-is-Beautiful bus”...And this bus is decorated with banners with that slogan on it, and there are beautiful people hanging out the window, in this case, flexing their biceps, flashing their abs, taking selfies, and posting their workout schedules to facebook. As you can imagine, this is a pretty cool bus and lots of people want to get on, but there is this angry bus driver/bouncer dude taking %body fat and quadricep measurements at the door deciding who can get on and who can't. And dude just turned me down because at present, with a going chronic illness that prevents me from working out, I just didn't make the cut. Tell me, is the most prudent thing for me to do at this point to walk away with my tail between my legs and catch the first 'ugly bus' that will let me on???

Well, Strong is a state of mind as much as a state of body, you say? Well have a look at this...

F&*K! She doesn't even have a head. Assuming that the mind is located in the head, that is not what these images would suggest. And if you think that this headless image endorsing this mantra is an anomaly, you would be wrong... Have a google sometime or just take my word for it.

Going back to the “Beautiful bus”, don't think for a second that because I am on this rant that I am suggesting that I am/have been above trying to squeeze my ass on that thing in times past. I am not, and dude may even have let me ride occasionally, but the point I want to make is that the older I get, the more I realize that beauty is a feeling that has nothing to do with riding that bus or any bus. I wish I could follow this by saying that I have come to not care about the definition of beauty and instead pursue the that which makes me feel beautiful, but that is only exactly 44% true. I absolutely do try to focus on pursuing those things that make me 'feel beautiful', some of them superficial (wearing clothes that make me feel awesome) and some of them not (blogging and spending time with my husband and besties, etc.). The other 6% of the time I am trying jump on the #skinnyjeansbeautiful bus or some such nonsense. The other 50% recognizes that how beauty is defined in the media has real consequence because those buses driving by with their beautiful people and flashy signs are very much affecting each of my three children's feelings of beauty. And that matters VERY much to me.

What I would say to them about this when they are ready? Two things:

One. When you do manage to catch that bus, whatever the banner says, have a look around...you will probably notice that it is the same people that were on a different flashy/beautiful bus with a different flashy slogan a few weeks ago, and those people are no more or no less beautiful for being on that or any bus.

Two. Don't get too comfortable, because as long as you're jumping onto a bus where someone else chose the slogan and hung the banners, dude can ask you to get off at anytime.

Of course, we know that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and is most certainly NOT limited to physicality, but my point is that campaigns (or whatever you want to call them) like these are dangerous. Young people especially who are looking for identity, belonging and beauty (as we all do) really buy into this stuff with their wallets and their persons. However well-meaning or even well-chosen the trait, beauty just cannot be summed up in any single adjective. As my kids grow, and god-willing become aware of traffic (when does this actually happen?), no doubt these buses will still be passing by. They have been for all of time. My hope is just that they will have the courage to pull out a can of spray paint and decorate that bus themselves.