**Trigger Warning: This article contains discussion of body image.**
As women, we are often taught to be critical of our bodies. We nit-pick and obsess over the slightest “imperfections”—those things about us that don’t adhere to the media’s impossible standards. This causes women and girls to have low self-confidence and body image. And guess what? All of us at Her Campus Kenyon have had enough.
One of the best ways to combat this issue is to focus on what we love about our bodies, not what society tells us we should dislike. Maybe then, we can accept and learn to love those features that make us unique.
So, HCK has banded together to write this article—a little dose of body positivity. All of us on staff has written down one thing that we love about bodies. We hope that this will make more women, especially college women, feel comfortable with openly loving their bodies.
Inês Forjaz de Lacerda:
I’m a pretty avid KAC-goer, and one of my biggest motivators is the strength and muscle I’m building in my body. I love the ache after an intense gym session and knowing that all my hard work is paying off, that I’m getting fitter, faster, stronger. All of this has helped me learn that I don’t have to be “small” and restrict myself in order to be feminine. It’s time for women to stop being afraid of taking up space.
Lexi Bollis:
I love how my body allows me to connect with other people. Whether it’s through ballroom dancing with my partner, giving a friend a hug, singing, or exchanging a high five on Middle Path, I am taking charge of my body and using it in a way that makes me happy. On a more concrete level, I love my big brown eyes. Everyone says they’re my most striking feature! As a result, I’m a bit of a mascara junkie, because I love making my already-long eyelashes pop even more.
Lindy Wittenberg:
I love that I can use my body to get more in shape! I’m building up better leg muscle by biking a the KAC with hopefully will get me more in shape, and I love that doing this helps my body become just a little bit stronger every time I go KAC-ing (or climb up three flights of stairs to get to my dorm)!
Rebecca Frank:
Some of my favorite things about my body are the amazing things I can do with it. I completed the Couch to 5K program this summer and I am still in awe of my body’s ability to become trained from barely being able to run for more than a minute to being capable of running for 3 miles without stopping! In terms of a more physical trait, I’m gonna say that I love my curly hair. That’s a big deal for me since I’ve spent many, many years hating my hair and wishing it were straight and “easier to deal with,” as I perceived everyone else’s to be. But over time (and with much encouragement from my fellow curly-haired mom), I’ve grown to embrace my curls and how they set me apart from everyone else—I wouldn’t be the same me without them!
Faith Masterson:
My curves are my favorite thing about my body. I was a fencer (sword-fighter) for 12 years, so I’ve always had a muscular body. An old boyfriend once called me “voluptuous” and at first I was shocked. Once I looked up the definition, I have loved every curve of my body. Even on the bad days, take pleasure in acknowledging just how f*cking beautiful you are.
Lena Mazel:
Though I have struggled with appreciating my body in the past, I feel grateful for this simple fact: it’s still here. In fact, we can all celebrate this. No matter your appearance or ability, your body has kept you alive. In terms of physical features, I also love my hair. Even though it’s naturally huge, it connects me to my complex heritage (and one of my favorite characters, Hermione Granger).
Juviand Rivera:
My body will probably never be magazine-cover ready, but my body is worth more than something for people to look at. It allows me to engage with my surrounding environment- I can walk or bike to class, I can dance at parties, I can run at the KAC and give Lexi a big hug. I am grateful that my body is healthy and able. As long as your body is strong enough to let you live life to the fullest, the way it looks shouldn’t prevent you from appreciating how wonderful it is.
Melissa Layton:
I love my freckles. In middle and high school, I didn’t really like how they covered my body. They never appeared on the flawless faces of magazine models, and eventually I just came to think of freckles as unattractive. But lately, I’ve come to like the natural patterns they add to my skin and the way they fade during the winter, only to re-emerge suddenly when exposed to the summer sun!
Lily Alig:
I love being small. I’ve always been petite and, though people point it out constantly, I still thoroughly enjoy being of below average size. I like my small feet because they’re adorable, and I like that my hands are actually totally normal size and kind of don’t match. Never being able to reach the top shelf is annoying, but it’s handleable and it gives me an excuse to climb onto every kitchen counter. My body is little and powerful and I enjoy it immensely.
Paige Ballard:
I know that the way I treat my body isn’t the best—I hate exercise and have a massive sweet tooth. But I love that my body can still do everything I really need it to. I can walk and hike and skip and climb the stairs, even if I end up a little out of breath.
Jenna Wendler:
It has been a struggle to come to the point where I can say this, but I love my body for what it is: it’s mine. I can do what I want with it, and I try to treat it as best as I can. I have learned to enjoy working up a sweat, whether through ballroom dancing or working out in my room. I also love sweets and eating things that make me happy, whether or not they’re considered healthy. I am grateful for what I have, especially for my hourglass figure and my naturally small waist. Dressing nicely is one of my passions, and it makes me feel really good! I try to think that every sidewalk is a catwalk. So strut. We all deserve to take up space, to be present and to feel good.
Emily Stegner:
Although it embarrassed me when I was younger, I’ve grown to love the way I blush. It happens when I’m embarrassed, when I’m laughing too hard, and even if I feel like people are paying too much attention to me. And for some reason when people see me blush, they enjoy pointing it out to me, as if I couldn’t feel my own face growing warmer and warmer. All these things used to bother me, but I’ve accepted it as part of who I am. My friends who I have known for a long time are fond of my bright red face and like to examine exactly where the comes out on my face and neck. Because my friends were able to look on this part of myself with affection, I was able to accept my blushing not as a flaw, but as something extra special that makes me, me.
Hannah Hippen:
For as long as I can remember, I’ve had a complicated relationship with my body. I’ve always been shorter than the ideal body, had uneven skin, irregular proportions, stubby fingers; I’ve always had little things that make my body different. It’s taken me a long time to learn that having a body that isn’t identical to someone else’s is not a fate worse than death. My self-esteem was low, too low to live with, for a long time. My body dysmorphia and disordered eating consumed my life for years… and some days still does.
It isn’t always easy to love my body, but I love the fact that my body is a tool that can help me make my internal world into a part of the external world I share with everyone else. My body can create art, write words, give love and share the ideas my mind contains. I love that my body is useful for things that go beyond looks or health or exercise or strength, and simply is a human body that interacts with other bodies and the souls inside them. I do not always love my body, but I try to always love my inner soul. I can use my body to put pieces of my soul in the outside world and discover the souls surrounding me.
Erica Rabito:
Although I still sometimes think it’s a little strange, I have a dimple on my right cheek that I’ve slowly come to love. It looks sort of out of place because I don’t have a matching dimple on my left cheek, but it shows up when I’m really happy or excited, so now I look at it as just another way to show my happiness in a really cute, genuine way. It also makes me think of Shirley Temple, which only adds to its cuteness.
Ari Tooch:
I used to hate how my body was built. It’s the kind of thing that I’ve grown to accept that no matter how much I could theoretically work out and eat healthy, my legs would still be short and my face would still be round. I used to hate standing next to my naturally thin friends who could eat a whole box of pizza and still be a size 0, while I could just stare at a slice and feel myself gaining 10 lbs. But I’ve learned to love my body, learned to really accept the way that I look, and maybe I’m not runway beautiful, but I’m me and I’m happy being in my body.
Claire Smith:
I have had a very hard time being positive about my body since I got diagnosed with celiac. I always thought of it as my friend and then it suddenly was the exact opposite. I channeled a lot of this into fitness particularly this summer. I took kickboxing and was able to get myself into the best shape of my life. I love that my body lets me get into shape when I want to be and I love that I can now punch and kick a weighted bag all the way across the room and back.
Becca Pachl:
In the last year, I spent six months on crutches, aced my senior finals while battling the flu, and now I am fighting a terrible illness (and winning) while tackling Kenyon courses. My body is a fighting machine, and just simply reminding myself how tough my body is makes me so proud to be in it.
Jenna Bouquot:
I love my smile. It allows me to express my happiness. It enables me to communicate my passions, my dreams, and sometimes my frustrations. It helps me to make funny faces when joking with my friends, and I can use it to enjoy food that will nourish the rest of my body as well.
Hannah Bryan:
Life is always full of changes, but my body is a constant. There may be things that I don’t always appreciate about the way I look, but I appreciate that it has been with me through everything and has kept going no matter what. I am proud of its strength and resilience.
Hannah Anain:
I love how my body connects me to my family. I love it when people tell me I look like my sister or my mom, or that I have my dad’s smile or my grandma’s eyes or my aunt’s build. I haven’t always loved my body, but I appreciate the fact that I can see the my loved ones every time I look in the mirror. I’ve always loved the quote Sierra Demulder quote, “your body is the house you grew up in. How dare you try to burn it to the ground.” I find this very relevant because I would never burn down my childhood home, but it also causes me to think about my body as the home that will be with me wherever I go in life, and in that form my family will always be with me.
We hope that reading our responses has sparked a little bit of body positivity for you as well. What do you love about your body? Let us know in the comments or through our social media channels!
Featured Image Credit: Her Campus
All other images are from each writer’s personal Facebook