From the desk of Teresa Jordan, Executive Director – There is a piece of advice that I try to pass on to my daughter, my sisters and, well, anyone who will listen really. It is forget all of this time we spend thinking that we need to look different, be slimmer, have nicer clothes, better hair, less gray hair and on and on. We are imagining that the people we meet, spend time with, pass in the street and see from a distance are all sizing things up in the same way we do.
I will profess, I am not an expert at applying this advice and can easily fall into a pattern of thinking that I am not quite enough, but I have really tried to take to heart my own counsel. And it is this – all of those people who we imagine are deciding whether we are cool or beautiful or enough, are not even paying that much attention to us. And do you know why? Because they are embroiled in the exact same thoughts about how they measure up and are being judged.
Truly, with I suppose the exception of a very limited few, nobody is actually so interested in me that they notice all those things that I worry are completely holding me back from being “enough.” So I tell my daughter to walk confidently, focus on how she wants to feel and do what makes here feel beautiful.
There is a multi-billion dollar industry working against me here, but I am up to the challenge. So much of what we see is actually manufactured to tell us we are not enough and if we only drank the right beer, had the right hair, saw the right number on the scale we could really be cool.
I recently heard of 21 year old girl that has regular Botox injections, I see the people I love making themselves small in full rooms, and I see way too many cover-ups at the beach.
So here is what I think – you are beautiful, you are enough, you make every room cooler by being in it – so never shrink, hide or decide that you are not measuring up because everyone you think has the measuring stick in their power is hiding beneath a swimming cover up too… and really we should all just be enjoying the beach, all the time.
- Photo by Jill Wellington on Pexels.com
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