When you looked in the mirror this morning, who did you see? What did you say? Did your daughter, granddaughter or maybe your niece hear you?
Did she hear you say, “I look fat” or “I hate my nose”?
As early as age one, children start mimicking their parents by holding toy telephones to their ears, cooking in play kitchens and pushing plastic mowers around the yard. Our daughters might not always look up to us, but they do look to us to see how we act and react in different situations.
If you call yourself overweight, what does your daughter think you say about her body type? If you think your nose is too big, what message does that send her about her nose – the one that everyone says she got from you?
These comments regularly influence the young girls in our lives and are contributing to many appalling statistics, such as:
- 20 million women in the United States suffer from a clinically significant eating disorder at some time in their life
- According to the American Heart Association childhood obesity is now the number one health concern among parents in the U.S (topping drug abuse and smoking)
- ABC News reports more than 11,000 girls age 13 to 19 had their breasts enlarged last year
- 81 percent of ten-year-old girls are afraid of being fat and have dieted at least once.
- 46 percent of 9-11 year-olds are “sometimes” or “very often” on diets, and 82 percent of their families are “sometimes” or “very often” on diets
Scary statistics! Why are such young, beautiful girls binging, purging and going under the knife?
Because they don’t feel like they’re pretty enough.
Daughters are priceless possessions. I know. I have two of them. I look at them every day and marvel at their beauty—inside and out. There are plenty of people and media sources that will make my daughters and yours and me and you feel less than perfect. Let’s take a stand to not only combat those negative messages, but to build our daughters up to understand that they’re just right, exactly how they are.
For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago. Eph 2:10 NLT
Your daughter is God’s masterpiece. But helping your daughter feel good about herself starts with you. That means, you have to embrace that you, too are God’s masterpiece, not His rough draft, or sketch, or doodle, but a perfect piece of art skillfully and painstakingly created, and that He now wants to show off to the world. By demonstrating the fact that we know God created us and He created us beautifully our daughters will be able to more boldly embrace their own true beauty.
5 Ways To Embrace Your True Beauty {So Your Daughter Can Too}
1. Be grateful for how God made you. If you have some wrinkles, shout praises for the laughter that has etched them on your face. If you have curly hair, stop fighting it with a straightener and rock your spirals.
2. Live healthy. Buy fruits and veggies instead of chips at the grocery store and set them out as snacks for your family. Take a walk or bike ride today to get your heart pumping and invite your daughter along. You’ll feel healthier, think more clearly, and be amazed by the topics that come up while just you and her are outside, soothed by the rhythm of footsteps or the whir of wheels.
3. Eliminate the words “fat” or “diet” from your vocabulary. If the girls in your life don’t hear them, they’ll be less likely to think them or use them to describe themselves.
4. Throw away your scale. The numbers on the scale do not measure you or your value or your worth. If you model that for your daughter, then, she too, can realize pounds do not define her.
5. Train yourself to smile when you walk past the mirror. It will take some getting used to, but it will become a habit. And your daughter just might start smiling at herself more too.
Laura L. Smith writes real stories for real girls. She is the author of several popular faith-based fiction books, including the Status Updates series and the False Reflection series. As a mother, blogger and sought-out speaker, she emphasizes the importance of embracing true beauty and longs to help others discover their true reflection in Christ.
