I didn't watch the Super Bowl at all, but I have been seeing a commercial that was debuted during the Super Bowl and it definitely caught my attention. This commercial feautures pictures of young girls while also displaying their thoughts about their beauty. One says "wishes she were blonde." Another, "Thinks she is fat." These are girls who don't look old enough to have this sort of worry, but sadly we live in a day where they very much do have these worries starting younger and younger.
Dove has started a new section in their Campaign for Real Beauty that they originally started in 2004. The original campaign was aimed at showing positive images of women of all shapes and sizes. This time their focus is on the women of tomorrow. The new campaign is being called "the dove self esteem fund" and focuses on raising the self esteem of girls around the world. They have a workbook for mothers and daughters to do together that can be downloaded on their website. They will be working with the Girl Scouts uniquely ME program as well.
I have personally known the effects of a low self esteem starting from a very young age. Trust me, it's not something that tends to just get better as you get older. It's not something that girls just grow out of. It takes a positive influence in their lives to help them see the truth about themselves. For some women, it is something they never overcome.
I grew up overweight and poor. Not a great combination. For those of you who are going to write this off as me complaining about my childhood, hear me out. My childhood has a lot to do with who I am today. Good, bad, and the ugly. My parents never told me I was ugly, but they didn't make me feel good about myself either. In fact very few people around me did. It wasn't until I met my husband that I began to see the real beauty in me. It has taken almost 7 years for me to get comfortable with me and I'm not even all the way there. I have no regrets because life may have sucked, but it made me who I am today and it made me the woman that my husband saw as beautiful. It made me the woman he fell in love with. I'm one of the lucky ones.
If we can give these young girls this positive influx of "real beauty" at a young age and help them see the beauty in themselves, then maybe we can prevent them from a future of bad choices in their search to find their beauty and worth. I'm not saying this is going to make all of the bad things go away in their lives, but it's a starting point isn't it?
This is not all a pitch to get you to donate to what dove is doing or go out and buy their products. There is so much more that you can do. If you are a parent, make sure your daughter knows her beauty and worth. Make sure that she knows that even if she did have that blonde hair she wanted, she wouldn't be any more special that she already is. Let us work on building a generation of women who know that real beauty is not about being a supermodel, but being happy with ourselves. About being healthy and knowing that we are more than what we look like.
I know I have focused strictly on the female aspect of it all and I know that young men have issues of their own, but I don't know anything about them. I had two sisters and very little contact with the male cousins I have. I have a son now, so give me a few years and I'll be glad to talk about what we can do for them. Right now I'll leave that to someone who knows what they are talking about.
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