I just finished watching the trailer for the upcoming film “Precious” and I had an interesting reaction to it. I found myself secretly giving mainstream media props for embracing someone who did not fit into the secret standard society has set as beautiful. As I watched the trailer, I found myself secretly applauding our media and our country for the steps it’s taking to throw out the standards and show people that it is okay to embrace yourself for who you are.
Last year, I released my second novel entitled U.G.L.Y. The idea for the book came to me in 2005 when I was having a discussion with a friend of mine about weight. As someone who has been on every weight loss program, exercise program, and fad diet known to man, wasting hours of my life discussing how much I hated my body and wished it would change was nothing new to me. I don’t know what it was, but something about that particular conversation woke me up and I realized that this was the millionth conversation I had had about my weight and the one hundredth millionth time I had talked down about myself and focused purely on the negative things. In that moment I realized it needed to stop. Yes, I am a big girl, but what does that really mean? Does my weight, the size clothes I buy, the way I dress make me who I am? Is that all I see when I look at myself? Is that all anyone else sees when they look at me? Am I truly just a ‘big girl,' or am I more?
Everyday we are inundated with commercials, magazines, songs, images, celebrities, an entire industry that tells us, what we are, what we have simply isn’t good enough. We can always be a little bit thinner, a little taller, our hair a little straighter, our nose a little smaller, anything to get us closer to that ideal, but I have a question. Has anyone actually seen this ideal? Has anyone met this magical person who is flawless and perfect, who sets this imaginary standard? My guess would be no, no one has met this person because she does not exist. Everyone has flaws, something about themselves that sets them apart and makes them unique. We are all special and beautiful, exactly how we are, but it isn’t until we embrace these so called flaws and learn to love who we are, exactly as we are that we will be able to acknowledge this. No matter what our background, where we come from, what we have been through, what we look like or what flaws we have, each and every one of us has something special and unique to offer this world. Each of us has a story to tell, a talent to offer this world to make it better.
5 years later I realize how much I needed that conversation. I realize, how much I needed to be teased and called all of those names and to be ignored all of the times I was passed over. I needed every single one of those moments because if it weren’t for those things, I would not have a story to tell. I would not have a message to send out to women, young and old, in our society to let them know that, it’s okay. Who you are, what you look like, everything you are, as you are right now, is okay. Be healthy, make wise decisions, because God made you exactly as you are, made you to be exactly who are you are right now, so I encourage you to embrace it. There is only one you in this entire world, so why not love her and appreciate her for who she is.
Guest Blogger
Brandelyn N. Castine is the author of Everybody Plays the Fool, a novel; Spoken Silence: Life in Four Parts, a volume of poetry; and the novel U.G.L.Y.
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