Love yourself

So I think its safe to say that I am REALLY bad about keeping this updated. But there has been something on my heart for the past few months, and everytime I would get on here and type it out I would just get lost in my own thoughts. This post is going to require me to get really personal which can be a bit scary to put yourself out there but this subject is so important to me that I feel like something needs to be said. So here I go again...who knows maybe this one will actually get posted :)

So if you know me...by now you know that I am moving to california in approx 2 months. I have been talking about this since 2005...so now that it is happening to say I am excited is an understatement. I am going to work my way into the entertainment industry and God has already opened some amazing doors for me that I am so thankful for. However there is something about the entertainment industry that I absolutely HATE. And that is the negative views they put on body image, specifically for women (although I know that it can be the same for men too.) This really hits home for me since body image has been a huge struggle for me since the time I was about 12. Only in the past few years have I really began to deal with these struggles and try to figure out why I have a negative body image. There are a few reasons why I might struggle with this, but the number one reason I came up with is: THE MEDIA. The past few months I have really began to do some research on body image and the media. Did you know if you just type in "body image" on google the first thing that comes up is "body image and the media"? Hmmm guess I am not the only one dealing with this.

Did you know nearly 8 million people in the US suffer from an eating disorder? 90% of those people are women. 8 out of 10 women are not happy with their reflection and 50% of ten year old girls wish they were thinner. The current media ideal of thinness is achieved by less than 5% of females. Those are just a few statistics and I dont know about you but they make me absolutely sick. To know that 80% of women are not happy with their reflection in a mirror just makes me sad. It makes me sad b/c for a LONG time I was part of that 80%....and depending on the day I am still part of that 80%.

I know so many girls and women who feel this way. People that I look at and think "wow they are gorgeous" have told me how insecure they are about their looks. Its crazy! But the media feeds us lies. They tell us how we are supposed to look and that if you dont look that way then you just arent good enough. The funny thing is there is a funny little tool called airbrushing....and I would say most if not all the celebrity photos in magazines are airbrushed. I never realized how much these photos were airbrushed until I saw some pictures a few months ago:

I dunno about you but seeing these photos was a huge eye opener for me. Especially the one of Faith Hill. Not only did they airbrush and smooth her skin out but they literally took away parts of her body. Her back, waist, half of her arm...I mean no wonder 80% of women dont like the way they look in the mirror if these fake images are what the media is feeding us constantly. Anyone can look like these photos if they use photoshop. The ironic part is I bet these celebrities that everyone looks at and wants to look like have the same insecurities. If God wanted us all to look the same then we would! Its just that we always want what we dont have. The curvy girls want to be stick skinny, the stick skinny girls want to be curvy. Its an endless cycle. And its a cycle that I refuse to be apart of.

Going into the entertainment industry is a double edged sword for me. Like I said I am really excited and I know its where God is calling me to be. But can I handle this pressure? Can I handle the fact that I might walk into a casting office and they tell me I am great but would like me to lose 20 pounds before they consider casting me? As much as I would love to say that wouldnt bother me, it would absolutely devastate me. The thing is that is pretty much exactly how my negative body image started. I did a little bit of modeling when I was younger and I went to an audition and the judges there told me they thought I was great but wanted to know if I could lose ten pounds. So being a 12 year old girl who weighed 105 pounds and really didnt have an ounce of fat on my body you can imagine how hurtful that was. Before that the thought of losing weight never even crossed my mind. But that day will stay in my mind forever b/c it completely changed the way I looked at myself. Fast forward to today and I am a 24 year old woman who still struggles with body image problems. In these past 12 years I have been through a lot when it comes to this. (Some that I wont share on here but am more than happy to talk about if anyone wants to talk more in depth about this issue). I constantly compared myself to everyone else. But its been in these last couple of years (and mostly the past couple months) that I have truly learned to love myself and love my body. I will NEVER be perfect. And to be honest I dont want to be perfect b/c thats not real. It doesnt matter what the media says I should look like, or what anyone else thinks of me. What matters is that I can look at myself in the mirror and love myself for the way I am. I am not saying that I dont have days where I hate the way I look b/c Lord knows I do. But I have stopped putting pressure on myself to be a certain way. I have made a promise to myself that I wont compare myself to anyone. I will only compare myself to myself so that each and every day I can grow and strive to be better today than I was yesterday and better tomorrow than I was today. So if I walk into a casting office in LA and they tell me I am great but need to lose weight first, I hope to be able to politely say thank you for your time and walk out without thinking twice about it.

If I ever do get a career in acting I really hope to be a positive role model for girls out there. I would never want people to be looking at a "fake" picture of me in a magazine and feeling bad about themselves. I refuse to be apart of that negative aspect in the media. I want to encourage every girl out there whether they are 1 or 100 to love themselves. Dont try to find love in the wrong places to try and make yourself feel better. We cant allow anyone to truly love us until we have learned to love ourselves. I pray each day for those girls out there who are hurting b/c I know what it feels like. And if anyone reads this and wants specific prayer about this, or wants to talk or anything I'd love to be there for you. God has not allowed me to go through the things I have gone through just to keep it to myself, but He allowed me to go through it so that I can help others who struggle with the same thing. I refuse to be a bystander any longer.

In His Love, Brittany