Just the usual ranting
Thursday evening. I watched FOX's The Swan last night and I'm not sure what I think. For one thing, the majority of the show is spent going over the (numerous) surgical and cosmetic procedures the "ducklings" will undergo, with nearly no time spent on the psychological counseling and lifestyle coaching they are (purportedly) receiving as well. If you're going to change a woman's appearance so drastically that she doesn't recognize herself in the mirror afterwards, you'd darned well better be preparing her mentally for what that kind of change means and how to deal with it. Additionally, the girls just looked, well, overdone at the end of the show. I know they're supposed to be transformed into beauty queens, but they actually sort of reminded me more of drag queens because they were just so over the top. Perhaps that's what happens when you try to make a swan out of a duckling instead of just helping her become a healthier, happier duckling?
So, in addition to my philosophical musings on beauty in our society, I have also been doing some quality thinking about my own situation. While I watched these two women, who were not hideous by any means at the start of the program, pimping themselves for a new outer person, I started thinking about how easy, really, it would be for me to take myself from the place I am (where I'm not happy) to a healthier place. All that I have to do is eat less and exercise more. Simple. I'm here (fat, unhealthy, feeling lethargic and discouraged) and I want to be there (thinner, healthier, having some energy and some hope), and it's really so very, very easy to get there. I've done it before. I remember, very clearly, how it felt to watch and feel the pounds and inches melt off of me. Running on the treadmill, feeling light and strong, and laughing at the sheer joy of being able to move that way. What will it take to get me started? What will keep me doing it once I start? How will I start deconstructing my ideas of "happy", "healthy", and "thin"? What would make me happy (because we all know that being thin isn't the answer to that question)? Don't have the answers yet, but I really think that compiling all of the questions is a good first step.
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