Universe, We're All Beautiful. Show Us.

Well, I have a wonderful neighbor named Sharon who survived cancer and over a year of painful treatments. One of the things that got her through it was subscribing to every fashion magazine in exsistence and letting her eyes wander over the lipsticks and hairstyles and other things of no consequence, just to look at something pretty, just to be somewhere else. She is in remission but still has all these subscriptions, and when she's done looking at the magazines, she leaves them on my doorstep.

Now, I'm a speed reader, plus your average issue of Lucky is more or less a photo montage with about 500 words in the entire magazine, all of which are at a sixth grade reading level or below. It takes me twenty minutes to finish one, but those twenty minutes are candy-colored mindless bliss compared to the rest of my life, and it's an old unbreakable habit for someone who started reading Seventeen at age 11.

This month's In Style, which Sharon dropped off last night, is mostly about finding your personal style. One of the articles had interviews with various fashion designers on the subject. Remember, fashion designers meet all kinds of women, but they meet many women in the upper echelons of the 'rich-beautiful-thin' bracket.

So I was especially stunned to read this quote from one of the designers: "I don't know one woman who likes her body. Not a single one."

Ladies. Universe. I know there are bigger problems. But we're in the society we're in, and it happens to be one where our bodies block the exits and don't let us walk out the door into the world for some dancing in the streets. So think about this. Not one woman likes her body the way it is. Isn't that horrendous? All those people whose bodies you've wished you had -- not happy either. It's a giant trap.

Ladies. Universe. I know this is not that simple, and even less simple for anyone whose body and mind are particularly locked in a struggle with eachother, whether that is an eating disorder, fear of being attractive, an absolute belief you are ugly, or just your average battle with your weight.

Let's operate from the assumption that you are beautiful right now, as you are, as you showed up, as you have become. You are beautiful. You are beautiful. I know you are. And I am too. What happens next?

Universe, your turn.