I have noticed something a bit sinister as I’ve been watching Youtube fitness transformation videos recently. While an array of motivations for aforementioned fitness goals are listed, there is always one that the creator overwhelmingly feels the need to downplay: vanity. I would click on video after video of body transformations and glow ups, but the common denominator between all of these videos was this tendency to feel the need to justify their desire to improve their appearance. Things like “I think it is important to stress the fact that I did not do any of this for weight loss, I just wanted to get stronger, or I just wanted to feel better, or I wanted to challenge myself. If this is actually the case, then more power to you, but I noticed that even people who did lose weight solely because they wanted to be thinner felt that their motivations were invalid and that people in the comments would judge them if they admitted this.
How did we get to this point? As a culture that is hyper aware of the dangers of eating disorders, depression, and low self esteem, a little caution is warranted when documenting your experience and giving advice. However, we have strayed a bit away from caution to outright condemning self improvement. Sometimes people in the body acceptance movement even shame others for simply being attractive, such as what happened to Emily Ratajkowski on Instagram last week. Just eleven days after giving birth to her son, she posted her post-baby body on Instagram, displaying a surprisingly completely flat stomach. This caused an uproar in the comment section, with angry commenters insisting that it is inappropriate to post photos like that after having a child, because it promotes unrealistic body standards. An Australian actress even called her out in a video, shaming her for, well, existing as an attractive female woman in public, because it “makes other women feel bad about themselves.” When did other people’s insecurities become others’ responsibility? Needing others to display trigger warnings for merely existing is not healthy, it is outright toxic. People seem to think shaming women who look good is acceptable, because it is “punching up”. Ratajkowski’s post seems to have since been taken down.
There are many avenues to take on the journey of self improvement. People want to improve their mental and physical health, social skills, emotional wellbeing, work ethic, career, and their overall appearance. However, self acceptance stifles us and prevents us from reaching these goals. Empty platitudes such as “you are enough”, “just be yourself”, and “everyone is beautiful” have seldom actually done anything to improve people’s quality of life. Appropriate self criticism and judgement is the ultimate form of self love. Demanding more from yourself is a way of demonstrating self respect and agency. You are responsible for your life and no one else is going to save you from it. While the body acceptance movement has made people feel more comfortable with themselves, it has also created this negative connotation with self improvement. Instead of encouraging people to improve their quality of life, they are enabled to continue feeling miserable, because they are being told that people should just accept you the way you are. It demands that others find you attractive without being attractive. It is a form of self delusion.
While we can remove stigma surrounding mental illness, that does not change the fact that managing mental illness is your responsibility. While we can shame women for looking better than us after having a baby, it does not improve our own self esteem, nor does it make us look any better. Taking up a new exercise routine, losing weight, clearing your skin, learning how to socialize, or improving your mental health are all valid forms of self love. I do not accept myself as I am, but as the person that I could be if I continually work on myself.