I've been really excited write about this touchy subject. It affects women everywhere at any age and is the center of most women's insecurities. I'm talking about society's definition of what it means to be beautiful and let's be honest it's everywhere. On T.V.' s, computers, magazines,billboards, it's even spreading to our food! I don't care how good the model looks on my cereal box, as long as my cereal is fresh then I'm happy. It's on every women's mind every second of the day whether you're counting calories so you can fit in that little black dress or touching up makeup to keep up the illusion of a flawless face. It's an epidemic a disease and we're the primary carriers spreading it across the country like the plague.
Society is filled with misconceptions of what the perfect woman should look and act like and hasn't changed since what seems like the stone ages, and to make matters even worse social media and technology has become a huge part of society today. It's become strong enough to shut down businesses (R.I.P. Blockbuster) and has somehow managed to threaten the existence of books a staple in society since the beginning of time is now an endangered species. So when this mold was created (semi-unintentionally) by celebrities, models, commercials, etc, it stuck around like glue. Let's take a moment and think about what your definition of the "ideal woman" would be. Is she tall and skinny, curvy or toned with perfect hair and glowing skin, is she a glamorous celebrity, or none of the above? Now take a second again and pretend you're a man (yes you read that correctly) you're given two women to choose from to take out on a date. One, is the always stunning and hilarious Rebel Wilson, the other the extremely talented and beautiful Nicole Scherzinger. You could only pick one to take out, so who would you choose? If you said Nicole than congratulations you just proved my point but if you picked Rebel than let's just say I wish there we're less hypothetical guys and more real guys in the world like you, but let's face it most guys will choose Nicole scherzinger for her perfect body, looks , talent, and.... money. It's the same situation for when a women that looks like let's say Nicole goes for a job interview against another women who looks like let's say Rebel. They're both equally qualified for this job based off of experience and the deciding factor comes down to first appearances, Nicole would probably get the job based off of looks alone. As wrong and superficial as it may sound it happens more than you know, it's happened to people I know and to people I barely even talk too. I know some of you reading this disagree with me and that is absolutely fine, but in my opinion we live in a society that bases everything off of first appearances or more like first glances and that itself can create insecurities in women of every age and that's one thing you can't deny.So what if we don't fit this mold of what's considered to be "beautiful"? What if we don't have perfect glowing skin or a Victoria's Secret body. What if we're not blonde bombshells and believe that being sexy doesn't include walking outside in shirts that could be a bra? What does that make us? Ugly or different, an outcast to society or a role model to young girls? To society we could be all of the above. You see, you have true genuine people who will accept you for who you are but then you have people who will judge you based off of what you wear or how you present yourself and don't even try to get to know the person behind the skin disease instead they see someone who looks or acts a little different and all the sudden you're a freak show. But in a world with a population of over 7 billion people you can't expect us all to be perfect. We all have flaws and we shouldn't be punished for something perfectly normal for a person to have, and you shouldn't punish yourself just because you look a certain way or because you prefer to listen to Backstreet boys instead of One Direction. Sure you're different but that's what makes us human no one's perfect so why are we trying so hard to be? By now I'm sure you understand how society depicts women through social media, but what we have yet to cover goes far beyond appearances. What am I talking about? I'm talking about jobs. Yes jobs.Women are well known for dominating the world of fashion and makeup. Some branch off to become teachers or nurses but when a woman breaks what's considered the new norm people make it seem like the universe was thrown off it's natural balance or the world is coming to an end. With this new era of women empowerment it's becoming more obvious that these gender roles have started to die off. To me one of the most inspiring sights to see is a woman working in a predominately male job space and still holding her own. I went over to pay our local firefighters a visit for the holidays and after hours of extremely detailed stories derived from their own experiences we sat down for our own version of a thanksgiving feast a day before thanksgiving. It was beautiful although we all were squished around a relatively small table for a relatively big group of people. As we ate, I couldn't help but realize the amount of women working in that house were almost but not quite equal to men .Whether they we're firefighters, paramedics, or just working behind the scenes the number of females there was a lot bigger than what I expected to see. It acme to me as a bit of a shock because normally when I think firefighter I naturally think of these hot guys in uniform off to save the day (Guilty I know.) but in a way I wasn't surprised with the gender distribution going on here. Now more than ever women are taking opportunities that would've never been given or even offered to them because of their gender. And to see women go off in the military or volunteering as a firefighter and sacrificing their lives for ours is groundbreaking and the most inspiring sight to see. These women are people I look up too and hope my future children will too and hopefully not these celebrities people showcase as being the perfect role model even though I think that's unavoidable. Women aren't just showing up more in these professions but everywhere you can think of. Either as photographers or D.J.'s, some have even branched out into corporate offices taking spots usually only offered to men. I personally would've never guessed that would happen just by looking through what women we're put through in the past. Writing this post hit really close to home because if you don't fit this mold of what society has created of being "beautiful" then you risk the chance of being bullied or if you do decide to work in a predominately male job space you risk being hazed by male employees or coworkers. Surprisingly a lot of people throughout the world go through these situations on a daily basis and they can lead to a catastrophic ending that could've been prevented in the first place. I also wanted to touch base on a few modern day problems that the average woman faces everyday so people can start to understand what other people go through and can sort of put yourself in their shoes. I wanted to show girls this mold isn't permanent, we can change how society perceives the average the average woman but it all begins with YOU. If you believe all these comparisons that society's laid out for you on a silver platter, how can you prove to people you're beautiful the way you are if you don't believe it yourself? I know trying to believe it is hard especially if you're trying to find someone in this materialistic world you can relate too can be even harder. Especially if you try to do it all alone, that's why were here. To provide a non-biased site centered around you the way you are no matter how weird or different you maybe. Here all the judgement from the outside world fades away and is replaced with strength, encouragement, and love. We are human beings every single one of us we maybe different on the outside but in the inside we're all the same. And it's time to embrace that and were here to show you how. So now that the deep cheesy part is over don't forget to follow @beauty_breaking on twitter and tweet us your stories under the hashtag #breakthemold. Remember when you begin to love yourself everything else just falls into place.
