As I scrolled through Instagram the other night, wishing for sleep to overcome my tired body, I noticed a post from Vanity Fair, with Demi Lovato's latest movement in media. She recently decided to undergo a photo shoot where she wore no clothing, and no makeup. She as well, requested no Photoshop be performed on the photos taken. As an artist myself, I find this as a really beautiful and bold movement by such a significant figure in our pop culture. To be able to expose the beauty of the human body, unclothed and unaltered, with no hesitation is truly a beautiful statement in itself, but what struck me as the most shocking, was the comments that followed the post of one of her nude pictures, which were very tastefully done, that seemed to unearth my faith in human compassion. The comments varied from "gross," "really trying to get press for that album" to comments that completely embraced her courage and willingness to share and expose the most intimate and vulnerable side of the human body. Society has created an un-achievable definition for women of what "beauty" is, and looking at women specifically, this has caused a tailspin of eating disorders, and lack of self-confidence, to putting ourselves through torture and rigorous routines of makeup every morning and making sure no hair is out of place. This piece that Lovato decided to do is very commendable. I cannot think of a single woman whose biggest dream is to feel confident in her own skin. By women conforming to this need to put on a face that is not true to us, we are accepting the definition of beauty pushed on us by society, which is simply non-sustainable. There is only so much we can do to alter our bodies before we even know what beauty means to ourselves.
Some have said that "strong is the new skinny" and a paradigm shift really should be implemented into society. We as women do not need to spend hours in front of the mirror making sure each hair is perfect, or our eyeliner is on just right, I think rather that we should spend more time worrying about how beautiful we are as individuals in the skin we have been given. If there is an embracing of the inner beauty we have, perhaps, society would not say "you are not perfect, buy this product" or the one that clutters the feed of my Instagram is "skinny bunny tea" which is a detox to make you look like the latest Victoria's Secret Angel, or at least it claims to do as such. I have to give full congratulations to Lovato for taking this notion and bravery to come from the absolute rock bottom of eating disorders, physical and emotional abuse from her inner psyche, to being able to expose her body in such a way that causes those of us with our own insecurities to scrutinize. This lack of humanity that I discovered against her, and not just her, but people we interact with every day on the most rudimentary scale is terrifying. Just because we are a size 10 or a size 0, does not make us any less beautiful than the next. This notion of lack of compassion to the person standing in front of us or reflecting back at us in the mirror is horrifying. We don't just ridicule our fellow humans for not conforming to the anorexia movement, but we ridicule each other by the clothes which we wear. The costume we put on everyday no more defines us than does the amount of makeup we put on every morning.
As a woman who has fought my own inner demons of self-image, and lack of self-confidence, I have to say that I am encouraged to see this being made a public issue and the taboo reversed. The kindness that we share towards other people reflects the ways in which we view our own inner beings. There was a saying that I ran across once that makes the utmost sense "we can point a finger, but there is always three pointing back". Lovato, to me, has absolutely challenged this idea of those three fingers pointing back at ourselves, and makes us stop and realize that no matter the demons that we are battling, we are still beautiful human beings. For a woman of Lovato's stature to be brave enough and confident enough in the current state of her body, that she is willing to put a photo spread of her absolute truest, rawest beauty in a magazine that reaches millions of doorsteps every month is commendable. It makes me wonder if we were as repulsed by the falseness of our facades and the ways which we ridicule each other as we are by the natural beauty in ourselves and others if this paradigm would not completely reverse itself.
I encourage readers to view the bravery of this photoshoot and question our own definitions of what beauty means to us personally.
