Can creativity help improve our body image?
That’s the question I asked myself the other month. They say it’s good for your health, improves your moods etc, so can it help improve our opinions of our own bodies? I’m on a quest to find out in my own personal challenge.
Lessons from Week One
I ended week one realising that I covered my body because I am ashamed of it. I didn’t love it, I wasn’t nice to it. I didn’t cover it up because modesty was a key part of who I am. It was all down to shame. And that was huge for me, a real break through.
Head held high, I marched into this second week buzzing with a fresh energy and perspective. I decided this week I would celebrate my body, celebrate all that it does and all that it offers, but then something happened. A seismic shift in my journey.
I ran out of images.
I just froze, complete mental blank. Slowly, as I melted and breathed into the task, words came to me instead, and I wrote those down. First came the words, I am fearfully and wonderfully made, a passage from the Bible. Words that are framed on my children’s walls so they grow up knowing how worthy, loved, and fully formed they are just as they are, yet these are words I’ve not been saying to myself. As I began writing these words down another sentence came to me, I am more than my body.
I am more than my body
My youngest was born with an upper limb difference, it is a small part of who they are. They are not defined by their missing hand, they are so much more than what makes them visually different to others around them.
If their limb difference doesn’t define them, why am letting a bit of cellulite or flabby skin define me? Why am I putting so much thought, concern and time of day on something that is ultimately meaningless, because my worth doesn’t lie in how I look, it lies in who I am. I am a child of God, I am fearfully and wonderfully made, I am caring, thoughtful, I care passionately about the environment, I am creative, I am stronger than I ever give myself credit for, I love deeply, and I really enjoy eating halloumi, like really enjoy it. I think it might actually be a core part of who I am.
And who are you?
Only you can answer that.
Something about this topic is clinging to me like a cleaver. I’m changing the script again, it isn’t time to celebrate my body, it’s time to be kind and respectful to my body, the thing I actually need to celebrate is me, and who I’m made to be.
Week two hasn’t been easy, it hasn’t ended easy either. Read on to find out how my week has been.
Week Two
How it went
Week Two started off hopeful, and with a new mind set. My body is worth celebrating. That is what I set off to do. Day One saw me writing this message down to remind myself. Day two and I was repeating the pattern of last week, but this time the sketch was positive and full of celebration. I picked my legs because they’re another body part I dislike about myself, short and stumpy, full of cellulite and knobbly knees. They also never tan. Utter milk bottles. And almost always covered in bruises because of gardening, messing around with the kids, dancing (I famously once gave myself whiplash whilst dancing along to the Step Up soundtrack), and just general life. Time to change my attitude towards them.
Day three and something changed. I couldn’t think of another body part and my mind froze. Slowly words arrived and I wrote those down instead. Whilst sprucing up ‘I am Fearfully and Wonderfully Made’ I suddenly realised that I am more than my body. Why am I putting so much worth and value on my body? Even if I am celebrating it, why am I letting how I look consume so much head space when there is so much more to me than my outward appearance?
Day four was a real struggle. I wrote down notes, I sketched, I doodled, my mind had so much it was trying to unpack. Mindlessly I ended up doodling a figure, naked except for a piece of fabric draped over them, and on that fabric were words of all the things that person is. Covering the body with what really is valuable. I think it was my way of needing to let go. It wasn’t the best thing I’ve ever drawn, but it wasn’t about that, it was about the process.
Day five, confidently striding into the day, I sat down to begin exploring what this new phase would look like. Where do I go from here? Again, I started with a list, with a doodle, but just as I was about to begin I was haunted by the memory of the morning.
You see, I went to the dentist. Due to some way my teeth formed in the womb I’ve got brown stains over my front teeth, which seem to be getting darker with age. And so I’ve bit the bullet and I’m getting them whitened. Funny situation considering the challenge I’m in at the moment! The dentist took some ‘before’ pictures, he asked me to smile and I physically winced and squirmed. I’m always behind the camera, not in front, photos of me smiling make me uncomfortable, it’s not because I don’t like my smile, I actually love my smile, my lips are one of my favourite body features. It is the rest of my face whilst smiling that I don’t like. The shape changes, the nose gets wider, the cheeks go strange, the eyes squinty and the dreaded double chin. I just don’t feel as if I look like me when I smile. I don’t recognise the photo to the person I see in the mirror. It’s why you’ll often see photos of me with my eye brows raised up, my lips pressed together or I’m pulling a face. All distraction techniques so you don’t see the real smiling Lindsay. The only way to find one is if you take a photo without me knowing.
So I’m sat in the chair, doing full a ‘big smile’ whilst he snaps away with his huge camera, ring light on the lens and everything, feeling like I want to reach out and delete what ever he’s just taken because it’s going to look hideous. Whilst my stomach churned at the memory of this I realised I have a long, long way to go. There is a whole root system that’s dug itself into soil that’s not healthy and I need to transplant somewhere else.
I stopped making the list, I stopped doodling, found a lesser spotted picture of me genuinely smiling and drew that. I celebrated that. Not because of how it looked but because the reason I’m smiling is because I love to laugh. When there isn’t a camera on me I couldn’t give two hoots about how my face looks, I laugh freely and I smile as wide as the cheshire cat. So on Day five I celebrated laughter, and made a note that I’ve got a long way to go, and that’s okay, I’ll get there.
I am grateful for this challenge, and grateful for the gift of creativity to explore it all in. It’s helping me to transform my mind and become aware of things around me far more than any self help book or inspirational Instagram account ever has.
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