Body ShamingShining

Did you ever stop and think about how often we have seen people talking about one’s appearance? I have heard many times in my personal experience. Sometimes, it’s in a positive sense but sometimes it seems like a criticism. Many people in the society, especially women, have been through these so-called societal norms across the world. The widespread phenomenon of receiving the feedback from society when our bodies don’t meet the unrealistic beauty standards. I personally feel that we spend most of our time in self-critical thoughts, despising our body and comparing ourselves unfavorably to others. I, personally have faced lot of criticism from many people around towards body appearance and weight aspects. Probably, this is one of the reasons which has pushed me in writing this blog. But whatever I pen down here in my blog is just my perspective and my personal experiences towards it.

Body shaming has been the most used term for this. But I rephrase it as Body Shining or Body Positivity for myself. For me, personally, shaming seems a bit negative and I feel why should one feel negative about themselves in any way. As a child and a youngster, I was very slim and fit person in the normal societal language and am no more the same. But why should this bother someone, when I am fine with however I am. In my perspective, am still fit and active, might not be physically but definitely mentally and emotionally. I always have been confused about why people only think about being fit and active physically and don’t focus on mental fitness and activeness. Don’t you agree with me if I say this is equally important, or to be more precise, being strong, fit and active mentally is much more important than being strong physically?

There have been many personal experiences in life for me, just like many other women in the society. I have been through many situations when people around me had criticized me for my body appearance. The terms like “Oh! You are too thin, you need to put a bit of weight and become more stronger”, “OMG! You have put on so much of weight, how would you even manage to do anything in your daily life”, “It would have been so good if you were a bit taller”, “Oh! You are so tall; you look equal to those boys” are the common ones we can hear people talking about others. Some people think that it is just for fun. But pause there for a second and place yourself in that position and think if you would ever be able to take it as a fun if someone criticized you that way. It would be difficult for any of us to see ourselves in that position. But if we really empathize with the situation of the other person, we will understand the pain and emotional stress one goes through in such situations. I, personally feel, this is intended more towards women but still don’t understand why? One who has the mindset of criticizing others in this way will anyways do it. We cannot control the actions and comments of others, but we can stop ourselves from entering the vivacious cycle of body shaming.

“The next time you start criticizing yourself, take a split-second pause, step back and ask yourself where it’s coming from”, said Jenny Weinar, a Philadelphia – based social worker and therapist. She asks people to focus on whose voice we hear and says that voice could be of someone specific in our lives. Regan Chastain, a Los-Angeles-based fat activist who holds the Guinness World Record for heaviest woman to complete a marathon, spent a long time feeling angry at her body. Then, she realized she hadn’t spent a minute being grateful for its powers. At that point, she listed off everything she could think of that her body did for her. Going forward, every time she experienced a negative thought about her body, she replaced it with something from her gratitude list. This story of hers had inspired me personally to a great extent. I feel our mind would act as we tune it. If we focus more on positive, it will lead us towards positivity and vice versa. Since I had learned of this story, I had started following the same and I realized that there are so many positive things about myself for which I can really be proud of. I strongly believe the proverb, “Count your blessings, not your troubles”.