What do you see when you look in the mirror? Do you like it? If you do, was there a time you didn’t? I think it goes without saying that most of us could name at least one time or another they didn’t. More so for the females then the males I would presume. I admit that for as long as I can remember back, I could find something I didn’t like when I looked in the mirror. I was very aware that as a teen I did not look much like the girls in Seventeen or YM (remember that one?) magazines, the two I remember having subscriptions to in the middle school years. When I page through one of those magazines (or even those directed at an older 20 something female demographic) today I almost always cringe. I think of the young girls who are impressionable and take a lot of stock in what is said and the images in those glossy pages. When I was a teen, I had no idea about Photoshop, airbrushing and image alterations that any casual user of photo imaging software will tell you is easy as pie. No wonder my skin wasn’t smooth and freakishly free of pores, my legs had an actual shape, and my hair wasn’t sun kissed year round. I was and am a real person, not an altered image in a magazine.
If you have ever used Adobe Photoshop, you know that you can apply filters to your images. So now I have my “Photoshop filter” on alert whenever I look at an ad or magazine, knowing full well that what I am looking at has been altered. It’s not necessarily always a bad thing though. Photos need to be manipulated and edited, but when body parts go missing and things look like a cartoon it’s getting a little dicey.
But what about the mirror? Are you able to use your “filter” when you see yourself? Looking for the good things instead of zeroing in on your less liked features? It has taken me a long time to be able to do this. I can’t say that I am not guilty of having those days where I just feel off and focus on the bad things. It happens and it still will, but how you deal with it and move on from it is most important.
In the past few months I have become much more comfortable in my skin and what I see in the mirror. I am not sure it it’s age related wisdom (heh) or where I am at fitness wise, or both. Since increasing my running mileage, I am amazed and thankful my body lets me do the things I do – including lifting. But there is more to it. Being able to do the things I love, whether it be running, biking, lifting, golfing, walking, disc golfing, yoga, etc. with my friends and family is what life is all about to me. I am thankful that when I look in the mirror I see someone who can do all these things. Does the tee box at hole 18 care if I am a size zero? Nah. Do my running shoes not work if my arms aren’t stick thin? Nope.
Use your own filter when you look in the mirror. The filter that allows you to see you in your best light possible.
Love the idea of using my OWN filter instead of relying on society's! :)
ReplyDelete"Do my running shoes not work if my arms aren't stick thin? Nope."
ReplyDeleteLove that! Kudos on such a great post!
Beautiful post! And we need to make the use of Photoshop more understood so growing girls can see that the images are not reality. I like using filters on how we view ourselves too. But to filter to focus on the positive things our bodies can do and who we are.
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