For women, health is a touchy subject because we have always connected eating right and exercising to dieting and body image. The problem is that we sometimes forget that there is a difference between wanting to be healthy for yourself and wanting to be thin for appearance purposes. Have you ever seen one of you girlfriends eating a salad and immediately assumed that she is on a diet or vice versa? Did you ever stop to think that maybe she is eating her veggies because she has decided that she wants to live a longer, healthier life?
This stuff is tricky, I know. Every day girls hear, watch or read mixed messages about how and what their bodies should look like. Although this age of fashion and media has become more reluctant to welcome and praise women with curves, I can still flip through Vogue without finding one plus (or should I say normal?) sized model. In music we are listening to Beyonce’s “Pretty Hurts” and Meghan Trainor’s “All About That Bass.” These songs make a point to say that looking like the stick-thin figures in a magazine is not realistic. Meghan Trainor even goes on to say that she loves her body and that every girl should know that “every inch of (them) is perfect” no matter what size they are. However, Nicki Minaj’s latest hit “Anaconda” flips the stereotype that being thinner is better by basically bashing on girls who don’t have her same curvy features. Yes, she does make the important point that it is a great thing to have a big butt and that she is proud of hers, but she also makes the girls with smaller figures feel unaccepted by singing “F*** the skinny b******.” With all of the mixed messages, many women may feel overwhelmed because they do not understand who they should be and what they should look like. This confusion over body image can eventually bury the more important idea of striving just to be healthy.
We shouldn’t criticize our friends for choosing a side of broccoli over fries only because we think they are dieting and trying to lose weight. That’s like saying you ordered fries instead veggies because you don’t care about your health. Just as trends in media change, so do our ideas about what should be considered healthy. But because it seems as if women are now competing over which of the various body types are “better,” we can get lost in a mess of dieting or plastic surgery and forget the simple thought of striving to be healthy.
Here are some questions many of us wonder about daily: Is it better to be “thick” or skinny? Should we aim to look more like an hourglass or runway model? How about we STOP relating every single thing we put in our mouths to how it will make us “look” and focus more on how it will make us “feel.” LET’S STOP assuming that eating “healthy” must be associated with losing weight. No matter your body type or jeans size, it is perfectly okay to like fresher and nutritious foods because you know they are better for your heart and overall health. Ladies, being thin is not better than being curvy, and being curvy is not better than being thin. Each one of us is different and that is what makes every individual beautiful. So, LET’S START celebrating our bodies more and remember that the image of “good health” should not be tied to any one specific body type.