Jacki C King

This past weekend our Genesis meeting intro-ed our talk on body image and this was one of three videos I showed to the girls from the Dove Campaign. Sometimes it seems like I am a broken record to teen girls about how they don’t have to look like the typical Seventeen model to be pretty, or that she doesn’t have to be the popular girl that gets all of the guys to be considered beautiful, but just as I am a broken record to them,I also am a broken record to myself.

I was talking with a mom a couple weeks ago about this issue. She was telling me that she didn’t want her student to recognize what the opposite sex looks for and that she doesn’t want her to be self conscious about a certain aspect of her body. My response was that even if she wasn’t self conscious about that particular part of her image, that she would find something to pick herself apart on. Although my answer seemed rather pessimistic and harsh, the reality of it from young to old is that we live with struggles of trying to live up to something we will never be.

I read in Radiant Magazine that “according to The Park Nicollet health Services Eating Disorders Institute in Minneapolis that Between 2003 and the first half of 2007 the percentage of patients int heir mid thirties or older jumped from 9 percent to 35 percent.” They attribute this to shows like Desperate Housewives and are now opening up a part of the institute specifically for women over 35. (Radiant Mag. Fall ‘07)

So I wonder if there is really an end to feeling like you could be skinner, prettier, wealthier. I know personally even with how much Josh pours into me with words of affirmation and telling me how beautiful I am, I still fall into the trap of comparison to an airbrushed model who lives the glamorous lifestyle with tons and tons of clothes.

It seems to be a problem that we tend to throw on the younger generations, when on almost every news station in town they are promoting some kind of lift, injection, or cutting off some kind of excess. So I result it back to the need to be complete. We were created complete and we messed it up, and because of our sin we long with uncontentious thoughts and battles.

So how to fight the battle…I think much like guys have to guard their minds because of how they are made to be visual creatures, we as women must guard our minds with what T.V. shows we watch, what magazines we buy, and how often we are in the Word. We have to guard our hearts from the earthly things and set our mind on the heavenly things, and until we grab hold of our thought process and how God views us, we are stuck in the fight of being thinner, prettier, and better than the rest, and that is a battle that can take a lifetime.