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Shattering Stereotypes
I RAN MY FIRST half-marathon in San Francisco. When I woke up on race day, my stomach was churning with both fear and excitement. Getting ready in front of the mirror that morning, I repeated my mantra: You are an athlete. You are a champion who has put in the training time. You belong here.
When I arrived at the race location and caught my first glimpse of the start line for the 30th Annual Kaiser Permanente Half Marathon and 5K, I felt even more determined. This was the beginning of one of the most demanding days of my life, and I was filled with excitement and growing confidence. As I approached the desk to pick up my race package, I caught the eye of the young man behind the table. He asked my name and without hesitation reached for the 5K race package. He assumed I was participating in the (much) shorter race.
This moment speaks volumes about how people perceive those of us with larger bodies and why many of us feel that we don’t fit in. My body size communicated to him that I was not physically capable of running the event’s longer race. This happens at most events I participate in: someone might make an out-of-line comment or show surprise or express an assumption about what my body is capable of. The same thing happens when I tell people that I am a personal trainer and I own a fitness business.
“I am here to run the half-marathon,” I said sharply. “Oh,” he said, quickly fumbling for my race package in the other box. I took my number and the event-branded race shirt that was three sizes too small and joined my husband.
The little voice inside cheering me on had been reduced to a whisper. As we stood silently waiting for the race to begin, I couldn’t help feeling defeated. I had trained for months and run hundreds of miles, and yet this encounter left me feeling like an impostor. I had felt this before—like I didn’t fit in.
Unfortunately, this feeling of sitting on the sidelines can be common among women of size who participate in races; perhaps you have felt this way too. Throughout my career as a trainer, women have shared stories of fitness classes, races, and high school gym classes where their potential was repeatedly overlooked because of their size. As humans, we crave acceptance. And these memories of rejection linger and hold us back.
Identity Threat and Stereotypes
DR. BRENDA MAJOR is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Major’s research focuses on how people cope with prejudice and discrimination. She confirms what I’ve noted from teaching fitness to plus-size women: the fear of judgment is real and often warranted.
“Evidence around stigma, discrimination, and negative attitudes is incredibly strong,” says Major, “and people are aware of these judgments by others. In my primary discipline—social psychology—I’ve studied ‘social identity threat’ at length, which is an awareness that other people are judging you and seeing you negatively on the basis of the identities you have, in this case being fat, which is a severely devalued identity in America. As a result, many of us internalize these judgments as our own. We not only feel negatively judged by others, but we judge ourselves. There’s this very strong and real fear that you are going to be negatively evaluated and excluded.”
Major’s findings explain a lot about why many people find fitness unapproachable. When we feel judged by others, our fear and anxiety grows. For this reason, many of us find fitness endeavors intimidating and out of reach.
Though we may not have the power to change others’ judgments, we can change this dynamic—the key lies in our response. If you are feeling judged, you can take control of the situation. Often when people judge others, it’s because of their own feelings of inadequacy. Know that their judgments are their issues, not yours. It can be difficult to do this, but take pride in your sense of self and try to stay confident and true to your athletic dreams.
Experts say that the way we confront bias and discrimination often depends on the situation and the personality type of the individual being judged. Research shows that bias toward and discrimination against people who are fat most often comes from physicians and family members. If you feel you can, take a stand against them. It doesn’t have to be confrontational or abrasive. For example, if a family member is harping on you to lose weight you could say, “I appreciate your concern for my health, but I am working on my health in a way that works for me.” Rehearse your response and advocate for yourself. And if that fails, step away. Although we can never escape all bias, especially from our family members, when it comes to judgments about our weight, we can remove ourselves from harmful situations. Find people who support you, and avoid those who don’t.
It may also help to practice compassion toward people who judge you. Holding on to resentment and anger will only hurt you. Creating a toolbox of skills and strategies to cope with bias toward those who are fat has helped me understand the knee-jerk reaction of that young man behind the table on race day. His action was fueled by a culture that has one narrative about bodies and health. Eventually, I felt only compassion for him. How could I blame him for his assumptions about me?
While many people assume that fat automatically equals unfit, a growing number of highly respected researchers and agencies say otherwise. Dr. Steven Blair is a renowned exercise researcher at the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina. His research shows that excess weight is not “the enemy.” Not getting enough exercise and being cardiovascularly unfit are much greater contributors to poor health than any extra pounds can be. Blair stands firmly by his research showing that fit, fat people outlive thin, unfit people. The National Cancer Institute also backed this finding, reporting that physical activity is associated with greater longevity among persons in all BMI groups: those normal weight, and those considered fat.
Although many studies demonstrate that a fit body can come in a range of sizes, many people can’t see beyond the stereotypes. Larger bodies seldom appear in advertisements for gyms or in fitness magazines. When we do see a fat body in the media, it often accompanies an article about the latest demonizing obesity study and shows the person from only the shoulders down, dehumanizing the person. Athletes like me who fall outside of the athletic norm often feel we don’t fit in because we’ve been told, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, that we don’t.
Changing our fitness experience means surrounding ourselves with positive influences and finding teams of people who leave stereotypes at the door. And because we seldom see athletes of size in our daily visual landscape, it’s up to you and me to change the perceptions out there.
THERE ARE A number of things we can all do to shatter stereotypes surrounding people of size and show society a new version of the plus-size woman:
1.Sign up for a 5K walk or run. Being seen participating in sporting events makes a powerful statement: plus-size does not mean inactive, unfit, or unhealthy. The more people like you and me who are seen at such events, the more our participation will be perceived as normal.
2.Perhaps you have a bucket list but felt you needed to be thinner or more fit to do these things you’ve always wanted to do. Jump out of a plane? Do an obstacle mud race? I always wanted to hike to the bottom of the Grand Canyon—so I did! Today is a gift and tomorrow is not guaranteed, so start ticking off the boxes.
3.Don’t wait for someday—live your life on your terms today. Maybe going to the beach is something you’ve been waiting to do when you are thinner? Everyone deserves to swim and enjoy the beach. I love the saying, “If you have a body and you go to the beach, you have a beach body!” You can rock a bathing suit. Buy one that makes you feel good and then strut your stuff. There is more than one type of bathing suit body. (See the gear section of this book for great retailers in swimwear.)
4.Wear what you want. Try something that is out of your comfort zone but that you’ve always wanted to wear: bold prints, fitted clothing, and horizontal stripes come to mind. Bodies of size do not need to be all covered up, draped in black, or restricted to plain clothing. Wear what makes you feel good.
5.Accept yourself. Abandoning diet culture and rocking the body you have shatters the stereotype that all big women are on a mission to become thin. And, in case you haven’t heard, you don’t have to be on that mission anymore.
THERE IS A misconception that people like us are crying into our pillows every night wishing we could lose weight and find happiness. But your weight should not determine your happiness. Live your happiest life now, not when you are thinner. Show yourself and the world that big girls rule their lives.
Sarah Robles, Olympic weightlifter, Team USA 2012 and 2016:
“I think limits are only put on us by ourselves. People can say or feel any way about us and place caps on our abilities, but we are the ones who choose how we react and if we put those limits on ourselves. To be limitless is the ultimate freedom to choose our destiny. Had I put caps on what I could do or who I could be, I wouldn’t be living the amazing life I am. I get to do what I love with people I love and help others because I chose a limitless path, one very few have traversed.”
Stacey Williams exemplifies this idea. A plus-size athlete from Dallas, Texas, she started her athletic journey as an unhealthy and unhappy woman.
“I didn’t know where to start,” she says. “I felt so intimidated to change my life but I desperately wanted to change. Going to the gym just felt too scary because I thought people would laugh at me. No one at the gym looked like me; everyone looked like they were already fit.”
Stacey started exercising at home using fitness DVDs. “It was the only way I could exercise and feel comfortable doing it. I just didn’t have the confidence to do it in public.”
Because of her size, Stacey didn’t feel that she belonged in a conventional gym. So she started walking on her own in her neighborhood. At first she walked ten minutes a day. She gradually worked up to twenty minutes a day and then thirty. Six months later she was walking one to two hours each day and had never felt stronger.
Stacey built her strength and her confidence up enough to join a walking group at a local club in her neighborhood; now she is training for a half-marathon walk.
I wish all gyms were welcoming places for everyone, regardless of size, but by getting out there and getting involved in fitness, wherever you feel comfortable, your participation shatters all the stereotypes that big women face.
How the Media Play a Role in Creating Stereotypes
ALTHOUGH STATISTICALLY, APPROXIMATELY 67 percent of North American women are a size 14 or larger,1 we don’t see ourselves represented in the media. Plus-size women are an invisible majority. When we don’t see ourselves, many of us conclude that we don’t belong.
By the time she is twelve, the average American girl has seen over 77,000 commercials. American teenagers consume ten hours and forty-five minutes of media every day through the Internet, television, music, movies, and magazines. What does this mean for young women? During this vital stage of life they are highly impressionable, and the impression they get isn’t good. Young girls are bombarded with images of tall, very thin girls with tanned skin and blonde hair, and if they don’t recognize themselves in these images it opens the door to feelings of failure. Our communities and families do not always provide girls their first role models; in many cases mass media have taken over. By the time they’re teenagers, if girls cannot see their likeness in this onslaught of messaging, they may begin to feel isolated and abnormal. These feelings are built on a foundation of never measuring up, failing to achieve an ideal, and not being good enough.
Until recently, mass media have rarely presented larger women in a positive way. Negative stories about larger bodies are fodder for headlines.
•“Lawyer Sues Airline for Having to Sit Next to Obese Passenger” (The Independent, September 23, 2016)
•“Obesity Rates Reach Historic Highs in Most U.S. States” (NBC News, September 4, 2014)
•“Teen Tennis Player Brings Weight to French Open” (Daily Mail, September 7, 2012)
Many publications celebrate one image of fitness rather than championing diversity in size among athletes. Not surprisingly, the population at large doesn’t associate health and athletics with larger bodies. We’ve become so used to seeing very thin bodies as the norm that it’s distorted our ideas of what is average. It’s why people like comedian Amy Schumer are labeled “plus-size” by the media when Schumer at most is a size 10.
The average size of most models featured on the cover of fitness magazines is size 2 to 4. This means that major fitness magazines do not represent nearly 70 percent of North American women; the exclusion is a social injustice.
Things are changing. I see it every day; the mere fact that this book has been published is another push back against the oppression of larger women. The fitness industry is becoming more inclusive and body positive. It has no choice: people are demanding it.
In August 2015, for the first time in its history, Women’s Running magazine made the bold move of featuring plus-size athlete Erica Schenk on its cover. In the photo, young and vibrant Schenk runs confidently down a park path looking like an experienced runner in her running tights and rose-colored athletic tank top. Her big body looks powerful as she gazes into the distance. She runs with a smile, exuding freedom. She looks like a natural-born athlete.
On the Today show, Women’s Running editor-in-chief Jessica Sebor spoke about her motive behind the cover. “There’s a stereotype that all runners are skinny,” Sebor said. “And that’s just not the case. Runners come in all shapes and sizes. You can go to any race finish line, from a 5K to a marathon, and see that. It was important for us to celebrate that.”
Sport England completed a survey of women between the ages of fourteen and forty and found that two million fewer British women play sports than British men. But 75 percent of those women want to be active but aren’t out of fear of judgment.
Based on their findings, in January 2015, Sport England launched the highly successful “This Girl Can” campaign, which beautifully showcased size diversity in fitness and sport to inspire women to “wiggle, jiggle, move, and prove that judgment is a barrier that can be overcome.” Using regular women in the campaign, they posted large ads throughout Britain showing women working out in all their “un-Photoshopped” glory. Like Women’s Running, Sport England’s campaign became an international news sensation.
When we show diversity, we get diversity. Sport England reported that since celebrating the first birthday of the “This Girl Can” campaign, women of all shapes, sizes, ages, and ethnicities are getting active in greater numbers. A study showed that 2.8 million British women have increased their physical activity since viewing the groundbreaking campaign. “This Girl Can” has sparked conversations in 110 countries worldwide, and more than 540,000 women and girls have joined their online community. The campaign’s popularity keeps growing and the videos and images have been viewed more than 40 million times through various social media.
Could this be the start of a new wave in media and advertising? Positive representation of diversely sized athletes is the key to the future of women of size in sports. When we see ourselves pictured in magazines, on television, and in advertisements, we feel invited, inspired, and motivated to join in.
Visual imagery strongly drives human thought patterns, and it currently excludes plus-size women in a big way. Media that depicts women of size is essential to changing the image of plus-size women. But there’s good news: we can create change and dictate what we want through what we choose to consume. Long ago, I decided to strip down my media consumption and avoid unhealthy images and messages of women. I removed media that portrayed women inaccurately from my newsfeed, bookmarks, and magazine racks. I started following body-positive leaders and brands that were spreading a new, positive message for women and girls. I stopped buying overly Photoshopped fashion and fitness magazines and started to invite only positive imagery into my sightline. I took control. Now, I dictate what I see. It’s not possible to hide everything that doesn’t speak to you, but if we refuse to buy in to exclusionary messaging, brands and media will be forced to change their strategies.
If we work together, we can create change. Take the healthy media pledge with me! Use the hashtag #healthymediapledge and share it with your sisters, mother, daughters, and friends.
I pledge to ditch negative media from my news feed, email inbox, and magazine stack. I will no longer consume media that doesn’t celebrate who I am. #healthymediapledge
How Athletic Branding Impacts Stereotypes
CONVENTIONAL ATHLETIC BRANDS don’t design their products for a diverse range of body sizes. Major brands steer clear of larger-bodied representatives, deepening the misconception that bigger bodies can’t be athletic or healthy.
At the height of the 2012 Summer Olympics and Nike’s “Find Your Greatness” campaign, the activewear brand released a commercial called “The Jogger.” The commercial featured a 232-pound twelve-year-old boy named Nathan Sorrell. The ad was nicknamed “Fat Boy Running” on social media.
The commercial was powerful in its simplicity, showing uncut footage of Sorrell jogging down a long, empty road, breathing hard but persevering. A calm voice narrated: “Greatness. It’s just something we made up. Somehow we’ve come to believe that greatness is a gift reserved for a chosen few. For prodigies. For superstars. And the rest of us can only stand by watching. You can forget that. Greatness is not some rare DNA strand. It’s not some precious thing. Greatness is no more unique to us than breathing. We’re all capable of it. All of us.”
The ad struck a chord with millions of people. Even though Nike wasn’t an official Olympic sponsor, the spot stole the show—as did young Nathan.
Despite its popularity—the video has 1.7 million views on YouTube—this campaign remains one of the very few instances where a larger body has been associated with a major athletic brand. Clearly the numbers show we want more! We need more examples of diversity in size from brand names. We must continue to celebrate magazines, companies, and campaigns that bravely step away from misleading cultural norms and include all shapes and sizes in their messaging and mission.
Only we can drive that change. Brands respond to trends, commerce, and demand, so it’s up to us—you and me—to take a stand against brands that represent only one ideal body size. Join me in changing athletic brand culture to include body size diversity.
Use the hashtag #brandmysize with pictures of yourself and other women of size on your social feeds.
I pledge to buy only athletic apparel from brands that not only cater to my size but also show women of my size in their marketing and advertising. #brandmysize
How Advertising Impacts Stereotypes
“ADVERTISING IS MUCH more than ads. It sells values, images, concepts of love, sexuality and success and perhaps most important, normalcy. To a great extent it tells us who we are and who we should be,” says Jean Kilbourne, renowned lecturer whose work is the focus of the documentary Killing Us Softly: Advertising’s Image of Women.
But there is hope: behind closed doors at advertising agencies around the world, the percentage of female creative directors is growing (from 3 percent to 11 percent in the last three years), an increase that has the potential to change the face of advertising. When more women are shaping media, they are likely to expand how women are represented, with more diversity and accuracy.
Jean Batthany, a creative director at one of the world’s leading advertising agencies, is pushing for gender equality in the advertising world. “Women make up only 11 percent of creative directors in the United States,” she says. “Yet women make, on average, 85 percent of purchase decisions in the home. The hope is that if more women are leading the creative charge, the messages and images can and will be even more representative and persuasive to women. And that’s just good business.”
Batthany continues, “With men as the majority, women are viewed and portrayed through the male gaze. More specifically, it’s the idea that films and advertisements were created to please a heterosexual male audience.”
In most advertising, plus-size women are invisible; we simply don’t exist. Batthany sees things slowly changing, however; some advertisers are now coming to the table to talk not only about their products but also about their social mission.
“I definitely feel a shift as of late. This year there was lots of buzz when a Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue featured a plus-size model for the first time. Truth be told, it was a paid ad for Swimsuits for All featuring drop-dead gorgeous and sexy-as-hell plus-model Ashley Graham, and it got people talking!”
APPROXIMATELY 108 MILLION American women are size 14 or larger, and yet they remain virtually invisible in advertising and media. Though diversity in representation is on the rise, seeing a plus-size woman portrayed positively or shown in a position of power in advertisements is still rare.
Batthany says that although the Internet leads to faster change, cultural shifts take time. “Knowing the power of mass media, I am constantly reminding my two extremely self-conscious teenage daughters that the images they are exposed to are not real. They are retouched, edited, manipulated. It takes a village of hairstylists, makeup artists, wardrobe stylists, lighting specialists, cinematographers, photographers, and editors to get that one seemingly perfect shot. I have seen first-hand how self-esteem can be damaged by not fitting ‘the norm.’ Body hating, body shaming, eating disorders, and depression feel like they are at epidemic levels.”
“The good news,” she says, “is there definitely seems to be a movement toward redefining what is beautiful. And I am a firm believer in the adage ‘you cannot be what you do not see.’”
Together, let’s push to see more, so we can all be more. If companies and advertisers are hit in the pocketbook, they will be forced to make the change. Take the pledge and join me in creating important social change.
I pledge to eliminate or reduce my purchases of products from brands with harmful advertising messages or advertisers that alter the bodies and appearance of women in their advertisements. I pledge to use my purchasing power to support brands that promote healthy bodies and include women of all shapes and sizes in their messages.
How the Diet Industry Impacts Stereotypes
IF YOU ARE like me, you’ve probably tried to diet many times to conform to the ideal body type portrayed by the media. Disliking your body or feeling shame about it can prevent you from realizing your dreams and your fitness goals. The weight-loss industry offers empty promises of a new you and a better life. In the checkout line at most grocery stores magazine headlines tempt female shoppers to try the latest gimmick:
•“Look Hotter Naked” (Cosmopolitan, February 2016)
•“Better than Lap Band, Lose 25 lbs. in 8 Weeks” (Woman’s World, January 2014)
•“Your Dream Body in Just 2 Weeks” (Shape, January 2016)
Don’t buy in! We all know from experience that these “solutions” don’t solve any of our problems.
Melissa A. Fabello, a body-positive activist, sexuality scholar, and managing editor at Everyday Feminism, is critical of how plus-size women are perceived and treated in our weight loss–driven culture. “Currently, what’s on trend is for women to be thin but curvy, but not fat curvy. As we create narrower and narrower beauty standards, we create more and more disdain for anyone who falls, really, on either side of that ideal. However, the way that we look at ultra-thin bodies versus ultra-lush bodies is very different. We understand ultra-thin bodies as the embodiment of the constructs of ‘control’ and ‘willpower’ that diet culture sells us. And we understand fat bodies as the exact opposite—as a manifestation of sloth and gluttony.”
The annual revenue of the U.S. weight-loss industry—including diet books, diet drugs, and weight-loss surgeries—is 20 billion dollars. This staggering figure reveals how much desperation women feel; we will do anything to attain the feminine ideal, and marketers sell us on their unproven solution: weight loss.
We aren’t defective; the system is defective.
Jillian Camarena-Williams, Olympic shot-putter, Team USA 2008 and 2012:
“’Healthy’ means taking care of your body both physically and mentally. Too many people want to lose weight or change their body. I once did a Dexa scan, a scan that tells you your body composition. If I had 0 percent body fat I would still have weighed 170 lbs. That is still not a small girl. I knew I was taking care of my body, exercising, eating healthfully, and my body felt good. I may not have been my ‘ideal’ weight, but my body was healthy and functioning properly and that was all I could do!”
When I realized that my weight didn’t have to be a barrier to my happiness, I let go of chasing thinness. Ironically, this made me happier. I abandoned dieting and decided to pursue my athletic dreams in the body I had. My fitness goals were no longer about burning calories but about challenging myself, persevering, and achieving victory through the goals I set for myself.
How to Be the Change and Shatter Stereotypes
WHILE NOT ALWAYS easy, adhering to the following principles will help you ignore the influence of biased media. These suggestions have worked for me on my journey to athleticism and self-love:
CONSUME AND SHARE MEDIA THAT ACCURATELY DEPICT WOMEN IN A RANGE OF SIZES
DIVERSE IMAGES OF women are starting to appear more frequently, as we’ve seen with Erica Schenk’s cover of Women’s Running and the “This Girl Can” campaign. Other examples include the July 2015 cover of ESPN The Magazine, featuring plus-size Olympian Amanda Bingson in the nude. In 2016, for the first time in the magazine’s history, Sports Illustrated featured a plus-size model, Ashley Graham, on its cover, and the iconic brand Nike included diversity in their Brahaus Collection advertising by featuring plus-size model Paloma Elsesser. When you see images and stories like these, share the hell out of them on your social networks. Start conversations about size diversity in sports. Get to know the game-changers who are out there leading the way—it can change the way you think about your own body and athleticism. But in order to do that, you need to know where to find them. With that in mind, here are seven places to find body-positive and size-friendly media:
1.My Name Is Jessamyn
Jessamyn Stanley is a yoga teacher, body-positive advocate, and writer from Durham, North Carolina. Stanley has gathered a significant following documenting her yoga journey on Tumblr and Instagram.
2.Body Positive Athletes
According to their website, “Body Positive Athletes is a community of people who believe that the term ‘athletic’ defines a lifestyle and not a body shape or size. We represent people from all walks of life—coaches, athletes, trainers, and people who simply enjoy pursuing a healthy lifestyle. We have a common goal of celebrating the function of the body and the diversity of physiques in sport.”
bodypositiveathletes.wordpress.com
3.FabUplus Magazine
FabUplus Magazine is the long-awaited voice of the plus-size community. As North America’s first body-positive health, fitness, and lifestyle magazine with weight neutral content dedicated to women with curves, FabUplus is breaking traditional media rules by showcasing women of size and encouraging women to be confident.
4.“This Girl Can” Campaign
“This Girl Can” is a national campaign developed by Sport England alongside a wide range of partnership organizations. It’s a celebration of active women throughout England who are doing their thing no matter how well they do it, how they look, or even how red their faces get.
5.The Militant Baker
The Militant Baker is a popular blog authored by Jes Baker. Baker covers a mixture of subjects ranging from the delightful to the very uncomfortable. Her topics include the hazardous journey of body acceptance, how to take boudoir photos, and general empowerment. Baker’s wit and humor can also be found in her book, Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls.
6.Adios Barbie
Since the dawn of the web (or at least since 1998), feminist site adiosbarbie.com has been on a mission to broaden the discussion of body image to include race, gender, sexual orientation, dis/ability, age, and size.
7.About-Face
About-Face is an educational website whose vision is for women and girls to lead full lives, unconstrained by preoccupations with appearance and body image. It also aims for gender-balanced and gender-neutral media representation. The website offers tools and workshops to create change for women and girls.
BE THE MEDIA!
IN THE SOCIAL media era, we all have a platform to share our views. Jes Baker became a well-known body-positive advocate when she rebutted Abercrombie & Fitch’s CEO, Mike Jeffries, who had publicly stated that his company only makes clothes for smaller women (as he called them, “cool kids”); they intentionally do not sell larger sizes. Baker, a plus-size woman, took striking photos of herself posing with a conventionally hot male model and used them to create the “Attractive & Fat” campaign, which played on the branding and typography used in Abercrombie & Fitch’s advertising. This campaign landed Baker on the Today show, and her story was covered by most international media outlets. Baker is proof that if no one is doing it for you, you can definitely make a statement on your own terms.
FIND SUPPORTIVE HEALTH AND FITNESS ENVIRONMENTS
FINDING YOUR FIT in fitness is an important component of your continued success. Look for gyms, leaders, and trainers who support body-positive training, and who are not hyper-focused on weight loss. In my own experience, the people who believed in my goals without casting judgment or asking me to change my body became essential to my journey. These types of people and environments are usually behind the doors of gyms that represent you and me. Look for gyms that embody who you are in their marketing. Ask yourself these questions: Does their website show a range of sizes, ages, and ethnicities? Are they giving you the unspoken invitation to join the gym in their marketing by demonstrating that their services are for you? Gyms that do represent you have carefully thought this through and have emphasized inclusiveness in their messaging. This communicates a lot before you’ve even walked in the door. This gym is ready for you.
PARTICIPATE IN ATHLETICS IN YOUR COMMUNITY
I KNOW HOW hard it is, at first, to show up for the race or the dance class. But when you do, you represent size diversity and send an important message to the others present. Many people have never seen people with larger bodies kicking ass in athletics. Your appearance tells a new story that is revolutionary. You will feel empowered, and others will be encouraged.
Recently I spoke to a large group of plus-size women on the topic of athleticism at every size. When I brought up the subject of participation and how representing size diversity can influence others to join in, a woman proudly put her hand up and told me that a while ago she very reluctantly started dance classes. She was doing the type of dance that you see on Dancing with the Stars and was getting quite good at it. That soon progressed into local competitions; all the while she was having a ball doing it (no pun intended). She said someone would often approach her after the competition and tell her how much she had inspired them to get active. Seeing is believing in yourself, and until we see bigger bodies in fitness media and advertising, it really is up to you and me to spread the word and be the change.
CREATE A SPACE OF NO NEGATIVE BODY TALK
WOMEN OFTEN DEFLECT compliments by saying something negative about themselves. I have been guilty of this too. Someone might say, “Your hair looks great today,” and often my reaction would be something like, “Really? I haven’t washed it or styled it in two days.” Turning a positive comment into something negative was habitual for me until I became more self-aware.
The pursuit of perfection is so ingrained in us that we say things about ourselves that we would never say to another woman. When people compliment you, accept the compliment with a smile. When negative thoughts enter your mind, push them out with something positive. With love and kindness, call others out on their own negative self-talk. An example might be when a friend says “I look terrible today,” to respond by saying, “No you don’t. We can’t always look amazing and we are more than our looks. Words really matter, so be kind to yourself!” Avoid gossiping about others, too. Often our criticism of others is a reflection of how we feel about ourselves. Women need to support each other more and champion what makes each of us unique. Start doing this today, in all areas of your life.
Here is the strategy that helped me change my thought patterns. Have you ever been in a department store to return an item and observed the cashier calling over the manager to override the transaction? I want you to be the manager of your mind. I want you to override your negative self-talk. Have you heard the saying, “Fake it till you make it”? You might have to fake it at first. As soon as a negative thought comes into your mind, like “Man, I look fat in these shorts, why did I leave the house looking like this”—that is when you call in the manager for an override.
When you override, you deflect and retort with something more positive. “These shorts are great and show off my strong legs” is an example, but say whatever feels authentically positive about yourself. Over time you’ll train your brain and the override will be needed less and less until your thinking is mostly positive. It takes time, but it works. Take control; you are your mind’s manager.
REJECT WEIGHT-LOSS CULTURE AND PERFECTIONISM
WE NEED TO quit trying to attain what society deems the perfect body and instead create our own ideals based on what feels good to us. All bodies are good bodies, and most of us just don’t have the same genetics as the models we see in magazines. In fact, only a very small number of women do. We need to embrace and celebrate who we are, as we are.
Melissa A. Fabello speaks to this beautifully: “I think that perfectionism is dangerous—and I say this as a recovering perfectionist! I think that we’ve created an environment in which we expect ‘the best’ from people, but we define what is ‘best’ for them. We don’t allow people to be their happiest, healthiest selves. Instead, we impose a one-size-fits-all cultural standard of ‘ideal’ on them, and we reinforce that by celebrating those who reach it and denigrating those who can’t.”
RECOGNIZE YOUR OWN AND OUR COLLECTIVE POWER
ALICE WALKER, AUTHOR of The Color Purple, eloquently describes the potential power of a collective group: “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.”
We do have the power to create change. We have the power to stand up and say that women of size can be athletes, leaders, and advocates. We can love our bodies and be valued women, regardless of our size. We are worthy.
When we demand that publications, companies, and advertisers reflect our ideals in their messages, they will do so. After all, these businesses are driven by the market; they give us what we want! Let’s want something that benefits us. Because magazine editors now know that there’s a substantial audience that, until recently, has been ignored, we’re beginning to see plus-size women becoming cover girls. The fashion industry can no longer overlook the buying power of millions of plus-size women and have started to step up and deliver larger sizes at many mainstream retailers.
Awareness gives us the power to change and the ability to kick open the door to living limitlessly. And together, through efforts large and small, we can shatter stereotypes and change the world.
TAKE THE BODY POSITIVE PLEDGE
TAKING THE BODY positive pledge is a great way to commit to your new way of thinking. It takes time to unlearn everything that you have learned, so let’s get started now. We are bombarded by images and messages telling us that we don’t belong. We must stop believing this and fight to be respected and included as we are. Let’s make it official:
I promise to love and respect my body every day. I recognize that not every moment will include body love, but I am committed to changing my thought patterns and inviting body love and self-acceptance into my life.
Through this process I vow to (to the best of my ability):
•Start my morning with affirmations about something I love about myself.
•Refrain from negative self-talk.
•Live my life to its fullest in the body I have now.
•Say “yes” more than “no” to things that scare me.
•Refrain from thinking or saying negative things about myself or other people.
•Ditch negative media.
•Surround myself with positive people who only elevate me.
•Accept compliments graciously.
On the days when this seems impossible, I will be kind to myself and keep in mind that this is a journey. Things don’t change overnight. Tomorrow is a new day. It’s time to shatter the stereotypes in my life and be the change.
