Inspired

Just doing one of my rounds of blog-reading*. And I came across this post by Karen Healey. She says so many things on her blog that I agree with (actually, I agree with all of it). The post addresses sex and teens in YA fiction. One element that stood out to me in particular was addressed by this comment in the comments section:

I read a post lately on a blog that claimed to be Feminist in which it was stated that it's okay to call a girl a slut so long as you apply the same standard to men. I nearly swallowed my tongue.*** 


And with this too, I agree. The tongue swallowing, that is.


I am a Feminist. And one thing that gets me with the media and the pressure that is put on women to look a certain way is response to feminists when they call it out. Rather than lessening the pressure, more pressure is put on men**. So of course, we are all equal now! The women AND the men have to conform to what it 'normal'.  


It would be nice if we could all relax and be who we are, and let others be who they are, instead of who we and they 'should' be. Whether that be in body type or sexuality or self expression.




*Unfortunately growing less and less frequent.


**Funny thing, when you look at the moisturisers and 'men's products' that are appearing, the ingredients are all the same as the 'women's'. And most of the ingredients are not all that good for the body or environment. 


***Commenter was Redzolah.

Holy Cow

It is raining, raining, raining here. Swimming Saturday may as well be about swimming in the rain, there is that much water falling from the sky. But no, I will stick with actual swimming.

I said in my Theme Days post that I would post what I have learned each week at my swim teaching job. This week is kind of hard because I haven't learnt anything new. As I write this, I'm realising that there are many important things I learn and relearn each time I teach a class, yet there are rarely any epiphanies. So I will write about something that was brought to my attention this week.

I teach children from two to pre-teen. And one thing that I have learnt is patience, and how to deal with frustration. There will always be those days where I am tired, or the kids are tired (for most people, swim-teaching is part-time alongside study). If I am having a particularly hard day, the one thing I never (one should never) do is tell the kids they are being a pain. Or tell them that their friends or siblings are being a handful. You just don't. There are swim-school coordinators and staff on pool-deck who you can ask to come and watch those classes that are particularly boisterous. And a lot of the times parents are fairly understanding when you decide to sit their child out for bad behaviour. But discipline is not about criticising children, it is about enforcing safety in an equatic environment.

 I hope this all makes sense. Kids should be treated with respect. I've come to be very surprised about how well people will respond to a smile and positive encouragement.

Love it.

So, not off to a good start with the NaBloWriMo thing. But here is my first post and I will do my best to post for the rest of the month (fingers crossed). Here's my reason for not posting for the first three days of the month:

I'm up in Sydney visiting my dear family. The weather here is cool but the humidity is creeping in again already. Unlike Canberra where as soon as the sun goes away, it's cold again.

On to other things, like what I really want to post about today.

Positive body image. It's one thing that I've always been fairly good at maintaining. Mostly thanks to my Mum, who never allowed me to diet, and always encouraged me to maintain healthy habits for just that - my health.

Of course, I always have those bad days - everyone does. This morning for example, and yesterday. For some reason, just looking in the mirror, wearing outfits that normally make me feel good about myself, I felt... (now, I really hate the connotations of this word) fat.

The sad thing is, I know I'm not fat. I know I'm curvy, in a good way, a way that I usually like and am definitely not large. But for some reason, I was feeling bleugh.

Now, writing this at the end of the day, I feel better about myself. I just kept thinking to myself - you are a healthy, active individual, and skinny does not equal healthy all the time, curves are gorgeous. Out and about this afternoon I caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window and felt happy with what I saw.

My point to all this... I have friends who have terrible self esteem about their body, or admit that they know they are hot, yet are constantly striving for 'perfection'. This is an issue that applies to many women and men. The statistics are more concentrated on young women, but it affects people of any gender and demographic.

I also want to emphasise that just because I am saying that big is beautiful, I am not saying that thin is ugly. All sizes are beautiful. I think people many people would lead happier and much healthier lifestyles if they accepted who they are, and grew to love what they saw in the mirror.

The Body Positive is an American organisation run by a good friend of mine. The aim of it is to reach people and educate them on how to love and care for your body without striving for the One idea of what people should look like that is seen so often in the media.

As a last note, I feel I need to explain my feelings towards the word 'fat'. The word, especially in Western societies, brings to mind ugliness. Some people are bigger than others. This is okay, but the words I think should be used are big or curvy. They do not imply the same thing as 'fat'.

Part of my problem is watching my friends use the word as if firing a bullet charged with hate towards themselves, their mouths twisted. Big and curvy are words that conjure beauty in my mind.

Finally, if anything I have said in this post offends anyone, I apologise. I do not apologise for my opinions, but only if they become misconstrued.

Kindness

I was talking with a workmate yesterday about people who are nice/smile and how much we liked serving them.

At work I try to talk to everyone with a smile, and those who bring a smile to me always make me feel better. Most of the people I work with are the same way (at least when dealing with customers).

Then there are the people who are grumpy and no matter how much I smile and try to be good natured about their complaints, just won't back down with their bad mood. People should realise that just because something annoys you, it doesn't mean you now have an excuse to take it out on those who are trying to help you.

I know I probably can't talk, but I've realised in the past few days that kindness really does make a difference.

You (this means me, you, everyone) smile at someone, you make them feel good. They smile back, they make you feel good. And vice versa.

This could keep going until you both explode in a shower of kindness (or Sprite).

Anyway, I should try to smile more and be kinder. So should you.