Stray katz n kidz

kd58
February 6th
Female
Australia



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Thursday, February 28, 2008

Self-image brainwashing

I've spent a lot of time lately, just thinking about how brain-washed we are when in it comes to self-image.

From the day we are born, the brainwashing begins. Pink for girls; blue for boys; dolls for girls; trucks for boys........... Then there are the Fairytales that are read to us from a very early age; Good = Beautiful; Bad = Ugly

Think about it..... In pretty much every fairytale there is a "beautiful" princess and a "handsome" prince; there is an "ugly" stepmom or step-sisters and an "evil" and equally "ugly" bad man in some form or another. And, ultimately, the good and beautiful win out over the bad and ugly.

Is it any wonder we grow up believing if we don't have a beautiful face and perfect figure, then we will not be seen as "good" and no-one will love us or like us; so we spend the rest of our life trying, striving for even, what we perceive to be perfection.

However, it is a goal that few (if any) will ever attain and the truth is, external beauty and a perfect body (whatever that is) does not make a beautiful person. It IS what's inside that counts. The rest is just a facade.

I'm sure we have all come across a "beautiful" or "handsome" person at some time, that turns out to be so ugly on the inside you find yourself wondering how you ever saw them as beautiful in the first place.

Sure, we generally need to find someone physically attractive before we take the time to get to know them, but what do we measure attractiveness by? Is it an internal guage of measure, or the one that society has set during it's 'brainwashing' of us.

Body image is so overrated that many people cannot get past it.....be it their own body or someone else's. The truth is though, most people do not have a "perfect" body or face, yet we still seek it, not only in ourself, but when seeking a partner.

Moreover, I keep coming back to the same question - What is "perfect"? If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then there is no true definition of beauty, nor can there be such a thing as perfect. Perfect to me, means without flaw........and does a person exsist that is flawless? I think not; yet we still try desperately to find it or achieve it.

I wonder if I will live long enough to see the day when children are taught to love and respect others, regardless of their appearance, skin color, religion and so on. A time when how one looks is less important than how one behaves. When little girls don't grow up thinking that starving themselves will make them beautiful and worthy of love, and little boys will know that sharing their innermost fears and tears does not make them any less a person.

Perhaps if we all lost our ability to see with our eyes, and had it replaced by the ability to see with our hearts, the external wrapping would cease to be important.

I know I'm not "perfect" and frankly, I don't want to be. I am happy in the skin I'm in; yep, flaws and all, and given the opportunity to change my face or body for one more beautiful, I'd have to say "no thank-you".

The fact is that even if I had a gorgeous face and a body to die for, I'd still be me on the inside, and that's what makes me who I am..........and I happen to like who I am.

Currently listening to:
Lips of an Angel
By Hinder

Posted at 09:33 pm by kd58
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Wednesday, February 27, 2008

An old family tradition, improved

In truth, this old family tradition was more about Stray-kids than cats. No one in the family was actually that keen on cats; until me that is.

When I was a kid myself (back in the "old days") I remember there always being people, other than family, living at my Nan & Pop's house. Now I realise this in itself is not that unusual; lots of people take in boarders. It was different though, cause the boarders were always friends of my uncle, or cousin, or some other member of the family, and they were usually youngish (early 20's or so. Again, nothing terribly unusual about that either, but the thing that always struck me was these boarders always felt so much more at home with my family than their own.

Then I noticed the same thing seemed to be happening at home too. My two older sisters would bring home their teenage friends from school, as most kids do. The difference was though, a lot of the time they didn't go home. We just kinda "collected" stray kids whose homelife was less than satisfactory, and showed them the love and kindness they never got from their own families.

Don't think for one minute that I'm trying to make out that my family is perfect, or any better off than the next family. We were just an average working class family; Mum, Dad and four kids (all girls), living in a very small 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom house. Somehow I always knew that my family was different though. We may not have had much money, and both my Mum and Dad worked full time to support us, so us girls had to pull our weight around the house. For such a long time, I can recall wearing my older sisters' "hand-me-downs" or clothes that my Mum made for me. She was a pretty accomplished machinist in her day, and we may not have had the most up-to-date clothes, but we were always clean and well presented. We may not have eaten steak very often, but we never went hungry, and it was never a big deal for Mum to set an extra place at the table.

So what was it that made our house so appealing? What did we have that most of our friends didn't?

We had a home. Not just a house. It was a home filled with love and compassion and there was never a shortage of hugs, kisses, laughter and conversation. The other thing I realised, many years later, was that people always felt comfortable at our house; comfortable in the knowledge that they wouldn't be judged, just accepted for who they were. There was always a bed, a meal and a hot shower, for the friends that couldn't get that at home. My parents became Mum and Dad to all our friends, and I was often told by my friends how lucky I was to have such a wonderful family. They were so right!

Posted at 08:35 pm by kd58
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