Beauty and Body Image

Beauty and body image is a huge issue for many teenage girls as well as adult women. Ali Mansfield shares her heart on how this can be overcome.

Many years ago I was a teenager and now having a teenage daughter of my own, I’m passionate about speaking positively to her about her body image.

I was listening to a podcast about beauty and body image and I wanted to share some of the information I heard to help girls who are reading this post today. Young or mature, it’s important to speak kindly about our body image.

Did you know that according to a study, 1 in 7 girls believe they are not good enough and don’t measure up to enough in some way. That’s 70% of our girls – that’s a big percentage and we can do something to change that.

By the age of 12 our children have seen around 77,500 adverts.  77,500 advertisements trying to sell you something and make you believe you need to have what they are trying to sell you and many of these ads are about body image.

We see women on front pages of magazines, girls on billboards – all beautiful girls on display for all to see. These adverts subtly tell our girls what they should look like, but these girls and women do not exist.

Photo shopped. Air brushed, computer generated…fake unrealistic pictures. These ads are so clever because they make us feel that we need a certain type of body shape, makeup to look perfect…there is no such thing as perfect.

Do we really want our girls thinking this? Do we really need these ads to dictate to our young girls what they should look like?

Is image important… Many people say image isn’t and in the world senses it’s not because we can never be what the work is telling us to be… but did you know that the Bible talks about image? It’s written that we are made in the image of God… So what does that mean? The Word says that God is surrounded by the beauty of holiness. It also says that we are fearfully and wonderfully made, chosen by love and cherished for who we are. That image does count and I know which I’d like to focus on.

Only yesterday I found out a young girl called Holly Dais, who is 12 years old, that I used to teach, learnt to play the piano during Lockdown and discovered she can write songs too. Her first song is called beauty and the lyrics go like this…

A song about Beauty and Body Image

Beauty comes from the inside
So just walk away with pride
They don’t see what we see
Believe me there just filled with jealousy – because you’re not afraid to be
But they don’t know that beauty fades
So who you are just shouldn’t change,
be good to you and do not change
So lean on me and i’ll take your pain and who you are is what remains,
coz who you are just shouldn’t change
Be true to you and do not change

How wonderful is that? Words of affirmation from a 12-year-old!

Other great advocates for our girls are Philippa Hannah and Lily Jo. Take a listen to their inspirational music which tells our girls they are awesome. Phillppa Hannah even has a daily devotional book for girls written on the importance of who they are and not what we look like.

Girls, no matter what you look like, your body size, acne or stretch marks, know you are wonderfully made and created with the beauty of holiness.

So….Get out there and smile your smile because you rock!

For further reading, see Ali’s post on Friendship