Being skinny and beautiful or natural and loving yourself vs. living your dream or settling for baby makes three

Please play

James Blunt - You're Beautiful

&

Aesop Rock - 9-5ers Anthem

from the top of my page.

I read a few articles yesterday, two of them in particular caught my attention. The first from The Religion of Thinness blog by Michelle Lelwica. She writes about our cultures devotion to being thin. This particular article was about how it effects us existentially. Some things she points out in the beginning of the article really make sense and also makes this post of mine relate to the one I posted yesterday.

• Why do so many smart, educated, and beautiful women buy into the false promise of the slender ideal?
• Indeed, most of them would decide to stop thinking about their weight in a heartbeat... if they could.
• They are fully aware that the models and celebrities on magazines have been airbrushed.
• They also know that their happiness doesn't depend on being skinny.
• This still isn't enough to protect them from the feeling that their bodies are inadequate.

The reason, the article states, is that we are fulfilling our purpose in life by focusing on being thin and beautiful. By being thin and beautiful we are noticed, accepted, and adored, therefore we win. But do we really? Lelwica states that,

"...the myth addresses the part of us that wants to find and feel meaning in our lives. It speaks to the part of us that needs a sense of purpose, a purpose that inspires us even as it gives us a sense of security, virtue, acceptance, and love."

Thats not to say that we are thinking about it everyday, "ok, my purpose today is to workout for an hour, do yoga, not eat over 1100 calories, and make a minimum of five guys notice me." Most of the time it doesn't even faze us what our actions are a reaction of. Like my post yesterday I believe that we fill our void by buying excess amounts of expensive things, it places us in our rank in the work. I believe the same about this issue, young women and girls try to fill the void of acceptance by being what the media preaches. If the media preaches it then it's the way to go. Just like we have to have the latest and coolest of everything, the media told us so. Even though I preach to each their own and say that if that's how they want to live then that's fine. They are aware that they only get one life and they can live it however they want to. It's just sad, that's all.

The other article I read is from Live Your Ideal Life blog by Andrea Owen. She is writing about the feminist generation (the generation before me and thereafter) how we can't really have it all. Kind of the backfire for us. We have grown up being told we can be anything that we want to and have any position in the corporate world. Equal with men at last! Well, as that might be somewhat true we are still heald back and pressure is heavy. Yes, we can be whatever we want to be, except be it all. Women today are facing a difficult decision between what they have always wanted to be or giving that up to be a mom. It's very hard to find the right balance. Some women feel guilty for going to school or work for 40+ hours a week when they have kids believing that they aren't being a good enough parent. On the flip side though, there are a lot of parents who don't feel guilty and instead just shell out money to their kids to keep them entertained. This might fill the void of feeling like they don't show their kids enough love, but what good or morals is it teaching them to just getting money all the time?

This again applies to the question and quest of filling our main void of purpose in life. As women we are naturally more caring and nurturing. There fore we already naturally fit the job description of being a parent. Being born as female already has high standards and expectations. Being born female and raised in todays world is almost like living the answer to a trick question. If I grow up and do what I want without having kids then I'm extremely selfish and not a good model for young girls who only have motherhood as their destiny to look up to. I hold the capability to make life and it almost shunned upon that I don't use that to my advantage. On the other hand, if I grow up just to raise a family then I didn't try hard enough, gave up on my dreams, and just settled for what I got, therefore I'm not a good model for young independent women to look up to. I hold the capability to be CEO of a company or to be anything else I wanted and didn't use that to my advantage.

So what do you do? If you feel like you're supposed to have kids, do you have them just to please your family and/or society? What if you don't feel like that is your purpose but you don't know what you want to do? Do you settle for baby makes three until you figure out your real purpose, then learn that you can't fulfill it until maybe your kids are in high school or college? Will you then feel too old to do what you love when you're kids are out of the house? I don't have kids and personally don't want any, at least not now, I'm always told I'll change my mind later. We'll see. I have two dogs and a boyfriend and I already find it hard to juggle. I can't imagine being a photographer while having kids. I get annoyed enough having dogs in my studio or having to skip going out taking photographs because I have to go home and let the dogs out. I simply wouldn't be able to do what I love, or at least not very often at all if I was a mom. There are some pretty powerful women out there though who can do everything, but I'm sure they too get exhausted and temperament every once in awhile too.

"My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute."

- Ayn Rand