Feeling: determined
Listening to: humming Laschia ch'io pianga... damn Celtic Woman CDs at work
Reading/Watching: study, study, study

At the beginning of the month I found a cool blog in which a woman challenged every female reader to make a list of at least five things they liked about themselves. Her words, as posted here:

We're conditioned, particularly as women, to be self-deprecating, to not take up space, to not revel in our bodies and ourselves. We can get 150 comments in a thread about when we realized that we were aware our bodies weren't up to snuff; let's see how many we can generate praising ourselves.

Your mission: list at least five things you love about your body and yourself. Five is the floor; you can always do more. And no self-deprecation! No offsetting a compliment with a dig.

So here are mine, without pausing to think about how narcissistic this feels.

1) I love my voice. It's strong, and flexible, it feels good and confident in my throat, and it can mimic a thousand accents or pitches. Tonight, in the car on my way home, I sang Rusalka's Song to the Moon (Dvorak) for the hell of it, just to remind myself why I love singing. It's because of one thing: I love my voice.

2) I love my curls. It's the first thing a friend can mention to describe me. It's the thing about me that receives the most comment from strangers. I've had my hair straightened (professionally) before, and people are always telling me how great it looks that way, and that I should do that all the time, but here's the thing: my curls make me into me. You may as well suggest I get plastic surgery, or become 5'1". It might look better, but it wouldn't be me.

3) I love my butt. It's squishy and round, it fills a pair of jeans and it does its job well. 'Nuff said.

4) I love my lips. They're very expressive, they don't need a lot of makeup or plumping, and they're useful for kissing, singing, and speaking: all activities I enjoy.

5) I love my hands. My mother used to say she thought they were graceful, and even though they're not, really, they can still play the piano. They can still type veryveryfast. They're well-proportioned, they don't have eczema like some of my unfortunate family members' do, and even though the nails are freakishly tiny, they make my fingertips look dainty.

I'm out. At first I thought this would be no problem, finding five things I like about myself without equivocation, but it was very hard to eke out the last three. I know some of my friends would have an even harder time, because they just never try to see themselves as others see them. It shouldn't be so very, very hard to compliment ourselves, ladies. Give this a try.

...And as the woman who came up with this idea says, if men wish to do it, they are of course welcome. But I personally challenge all the wonderful women who I know read this blog to follow suit and write their five things. This whole month has been dedicated to the exploitation celebration of love, but we usually forget one big detail: in order to love and be loved, you have to believe you're worthy of it.

Comments? 0 so far...
Not a Diaryland member? Sign the Guestbook.