We must embrace who we are

"The first thing I would advise them to do is to breathe. I want them to breathe and relax. Understand that this is a part of a lifetime journey. Look back at yourself. That person is not gone. This is a shell we are in. This is a body and situations happen. You know, I had my daughter, now I look at it like wow, my body is my badge of honor. I went through that and yes, a lot of us have a lot of battle scars. Things that we can’t get over. But we must. We must embrace who we are. Each stage of our life has to be embraced. You have to understand that you are not going to be twenty with tight skin. Skin doesn’t do that. Skin droops and it sags. Be realistic about what you are looking at and love yourself. Please look in the mirror. Please tell yourself how you feel. I believe in visualizing and everything that you say is basically a prayer to the universe and speak it, talk it, talk to people. Talk to your girlfriends. Talk to your family. Talk to your husband. Talk to them. Tell them what you are feeling. You are not alone. There is a whole community of us that need to get better and if we can just stick together and stand together and communicate I think we can, but you are not alone and you are loved and valuable. "

Kelly Park - interviewed on Blogher.org

Podcast of the interview.

Kelly Park was a participant on How to Look Good Naked. Hosted by Carson Kressley of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" the show is basically like "self-esteem through better fashion" boot camp for women who are unhappy with their bodies and looks. Miraculously, the motif of the show is not extreme surgery or diets. The basic message is one of self-acceptance and learning to work, and to love what you've got.

I can't begin to tell you how exciting that is.

In my life, I had to go through all the stages - from self-harm, to self-hate to self-acceptance, until finally after several years of painful shyness and discomfort, I began actually loving and cherishing the body I have. More importantly I had to do it more or less alone, although definitely in the presence of my friends and loved ones. The weird divide between what I felt about myself internally, versus the need to be social and to have some sort of public persona was so stressful and sad. I basically wore tee-shirts, jeans, hoodies and runners for about 9 years, not by choice necessarily, but because every other outfit in the world made me want to die of shame.

For the first time I appreciate the true value of these make-over/life management shows. I'll admit I have been dismissive of them since the season where I skeptically watched Queer Eye for the Straight Guy with Jane for a few weeks. Now I think get it, reality tv/make-over shows are staged, somewhat de-stigmatized moments of collective personal therapy. It kinda makes sense, people spend more time relating to television then they do any other media, why not get your emotional/ psychological health from that venue as well. I am not even being sarcastic. "How to look Good Naked" is doing more good for more people's self- esteem I'd imagine, than any book or meeting group will ever do.

A show that makes that process of learning self- acceptance/love public, even if it does use all those tropes of reality TV like whirlwind transformations and expensive haircuts, is still awesome. And besides, I'll be the first to admit drastic hair change is usually step one in a drastic personal transformation.

I can't get the whole episode from the intertubes, but there are two clips available here.