Powerful Beyond Measure

This past weekend I had the opportunity to spend some time with some amazing teenage girls and young women. One of the most touching parts of the weekend was when we sat in a circle and identified two things that we loved about ourselves. The answers ranged from being able to make people laugh, making good grades and confidence to butts, freckles and legs. As each female gave her response, it was like a light was moving around the circle.

Still, as we went around the circle, one of the young adults said, "I like my body...and I feel bad about saying that, but I do. I really like my body."

It seems like that's a common reaction out in the real world. Why do women feel bad about celebrating our beauty? We call women bitches and snobs when they - even humbly - say that they feel beautiful. We're "haters" when we see other women accomplish great things. We allow jealousy, doubt and fear to eclipse our own greatness.

Don't we realize that we are all powerful beyond measure? Half of this world is held up by the hands of women! Our bodies have nourished mankind. We can push melons through an aperture that's the size of a pea! No man can do that.

I'm making a promise to myself: that I won't feel bad when I celebrate my belief I'm a good listener, gifted when it comes to working with youth, smart, and patient with everyone I come across. I'm determined to reach my dreams, and believe I'm worth people's time. On top of that, I like the way I smile, and I think my petite body, nose and ears are really cute...like really cute. :-)

When women recognize their captivating beauty both inside and out, men who doubt us don't stand a chance!

Plain Jane

Plain Jane. Girl Next Door. They pretty much mean the same thing. It's that girl that you're friends with but don't necessarily drool over. You're comfortable with Plain Jane. You hang out with her, go to the mall, watch movies together. But she's not the hottie you talk to with your buddies if you're a guy or the girl you secretly envy if you're a girl.


I've plugged myself into the category of this "Girl Next Door" type, so when CW came out with a show called Plain Jane with the premise of making over an ordinary girl so that she can tell her crush about her feelings for him, I couldn't help but watch.

To make a long story short, the girl Cristen had a crush on her guy friend Ty for six years but was always considered to be just a friend and "one of the guys." Enter beautiful woman with a British accent for the role of "fairy godmother" who critiques Cristen's "Plain Jane" ways from her clothing to her bedding and even takes Cristen to a burlesque club. After asking Cristen about her thoughts on the performance, Cristen says "Well, that's nice...for her." She is then instructed to make up her own burlesque routine to help build confidence and learn how to be sexy. One of my favorite parts of the show came when the pair was shopping for new clothes and the Plain Jane said "Can't you celebrate curves under a sweatshirt?"

Truthfully, I kept on asking myself..."Why should she have to change for this man like this? Won't he be falling for the made up version of this girl and not the person she is inside?" Don't get me wrong. I totally believe in dressing up every now and then, playing with my hair and experimenting with makeup to look pretty for the right man. But I would also want him to fall in love with me for the person I am inside, not the magic I can do with a flatiron and makeup brushes. My heart sunk a little bit when Cristen looked in the mirror and said "Wow...I don't look like myself." The thing is, I thought she was so cute even before the transformation.

Granted, she got the guy in the end and they stuck together. But I have to wonder...what will he think when he sees what she went through to get his attention? Will he be impressed? Flattered? A little creeped out? Who knows?

In my case, I just want to know that I won't have to pull out the glittery eyeshadow and high heels to keep a man happy. And I would want him to know that when the makeup comes off, I'm still the same Melissa that he was attracted to in the beginning.

And the big question remains the same:  Will there ever be a Plain Joe show where men are made over so they can reveal their feelings for a girl? Or is it just girls who need to change their image to reel in the guys they want?

True Beauty

I caught a few snippets of the 2010 Miss USA Pageant, and I noticed something. The two hosts identified these 51 gorgeous women by the states they represented. So, I can't even tell you the name of the woman who was crowned at the end. I can only refer to her as "Michigan." She wasn't even Miss Michigan. She was just "Michigan."

I'm sure that "Michgan," will now be known as "USA," (and maybe then "Universe") but I can't help but wonder how much it sucks to be addressed not by your name, but by the entity that you represent. Then it got me thinking about labels. Just as Michigan wore (literally) the label of her state, many of our outer attributes label us.

Just recently I was placed in a position where I was able to interact with many people, and before I got to speak to them and learn their names and parts of their personal stories, I referred to them by what they looked like. So, I could say I spent the weekend with "plaid shirt girl," "blue-eyed couple," "linebacker" and an assortment of other characters who I labeled based on their attire or physical features. But as I actually got to know these people, I was able to remove those labels and replace them with actual identities.

On the flip side, I recently scanned the magazine covers at the grocery store and noticed that Jessica Simpson decided to go makeup-less on the cover of Marie Claire and many other celebrities including Kim Kardashian and the women of The Today Show decided to challenge themselves and go on the job without makeup. In doing so, they took off their labels that say they have to be airbrushed, and look good all the time and they looked like real people rather than just the images that are plastered across TV screens and billboards.

All this makes me realize that you can't judge people by what they look like on the outside, especially if you don't know who they truly are on the inside. But when you're willing to peel back those labels, you can find something that is truly beautiful. And in regards to my own experiences, I've decided that it's not wise to judge a person from a mile away until I've walked that mile with them. If I can actually do that, it will truly be beautiful.

On Being a Lady

It's possible to be smart and beautiful.

A while back, I blogged about the Ten Things Every Woman Should Do. I still stick to what I said, but I've begun to think more and more that there is a clear difference between being a woman and being a lady. Being a woman is biological, but being a lady is behavioral.

Not too long ago, I was listening in on a conversation about girls today and how too often they feel like they have to dress provocatively, have perfect bodies and hair down to there in order to get a boy's attention. We can easily blame this on the boys who salivate at the low cut shirts and napkin-sized skirts. We can even blame it on the media which splashes impossible-to-achieve images of "beauty" on billboards and television screens. We can blame it on big businesses that believe that sex sells. But the truth is that "sex sells...if you buy it."

There's an awful lot of talk about feminism and the sexual revolution and women being able to take control of their own bodies. No need to limit yourself to one man, ladies. Be sexy! Date around! You're free! You're in charge of what you do to your body. But then again, how many times have I heard about women giving in to men and then complaining about men not calling or how difficult it is to please them once the spark is gone? How often do women cry when a man cheats on them with a hotter, younger woman? Once he leaves, who has the control then?

I'm sure that some women will come back and say that they can find another man once the flavor of the week leaves. But I say that the true control is in taking charge of yourself and not needing a man to fulfill you. That business of feminism and being in control of your body is true, just not in the way that it's most commonly portrayed. I think that women have more control when they assert their confidence in themselves inside and out. Women have more control when they spend their time the way they want to rather than waiting on a man to tell them what to read, what to watch, what to like and what to wear.

I hear statistics all the time about how the cosmetic industry is constantly growing and how more and more women are getting plastic surgery to change the way they look. Young girls aspire to be famous whether they have the talent to do something meaningful in the entertainment industry or not.

I'm not gonna lie. I like to look nice, too. I wear makeup and match my clothes. But despite that, I don't ever want to be known as being "sexy" or "hot." I'd rather be smart, classy, interesting, kind, generous. Being sexy is transient. Being clever will last however long you want it to last. I'm sure that there are girls out there shaking their heads now, saying that I'll never get a man if I'm not willing to show some skin, but really...if you're always out there showing skin, that's what the man's gonna get because frankly, that's all that he wants. But if you're able to carry a conversation and truly be caring and compassionate and a man sticks around, then he's tagged you not as the girl he wants to take home, but the girl he wants to take home to mom.