T here are headlines everywhere loudly proclaiming that “curves are back.” They never left us! We girls, with round womanly bodies, have been here all along; some of us reveling in our womanliness, while some of us try to starve ourselves to fit into somebody else's idea of the perfect woman.

For far too long, the media has had immense power over the way we think about ourselves and our bodies. Alas, the rest of the world is beginning to catch on that the average, real woman comes with a size 14 and fuller body and that real beauty isn't one-size fits all. It's about time someone redefined the concept of beauty - by moving away from the myth that every woman must be "thin, 5'10" and a size 2" - and promoting the reality that beauty comes in all colors, size and shapes, thus allowing real women to celebrate who they are.

In a study done by Dove, only 2% of women in the world think that they are beautiful. Those shocking statistics only confirm that most women are struggling to measure up to the ridiculous beauty bar before us - resulting in low self-esteem and a host of other issues that plague women. For far too long, we've been brainwashed by the media trying to fit us into these tiny slots of the definition of beauty--which so few of us ever come close to. According to Dove, those models we see telling us to be more beautiful have 10% less body fat than your average woman.

A Step in The Right Direction Empowers Women

The media, including corporations like Dove, is now celebrating real women in their commercials, showing that the little imperfections are what makes us unique and taking the focus away from the plastic concept of beauty. Dove’s campaign for "Real Beauty" seems to promote a more down-to-earth standard of beauty and the way women bodies are viewed. Recently Dove started airing "pro-age" commercials for the "mature" woman. Most women welcome this sudden interest as long as the end result is that women stop thinking of themselves as less than and start seeing that they are more than enough.

These campaigns, in print and television, show regular women as they are in the flesh, stripped down to their bare selves, revealing curves and imperfections and not air-brushed to the pristine artificialness that graces the glossy magazines or flashes across your television screen just long enough to tell you that you don't measure up. The women seem comfortable in their own skin and radiate self-acceptance. The message seems to be that we are more than our age and bodies and the way we look and that we should embrace ourselves.

Despite criticism that these ads garner Dove huge profits, it is a step in the right direction as women who've been left out in the past see themselves reflected in the women in these ads. Those women are the closest we've seen of the real woman with curves in a long time. We see ourselves - our mothers, our daughters, our sisters and that is a beautiful thing. By receiving the message that every woman has her own beauty, maybe we will start to believe in the power of our own beauty.

"I might not buy the product, but it gives me confidence to see women like me strutting their stuff up there," says Regina, a thirty-something with curves. "It's redefining how we view beauty. For the longest time, there were hardly any African American girls like me with their curves."

The Other Side of The Coin

Most women find it empowering to see and hear these women own their beauty and feel comfortable enough with their bodies to reveal themselves to the world. But on the other side of the coin, it is a telling and troubling sign of how damaged the woman spirit has become by the many women who are embarrassed and even disgusted by these commercials.

Women say that they hear comments like, “I can't believe she thinks she looks good," or "she doesn't look good enough to be in a commercial." And the younger girls, who're starving themselves to be a size 2, cringe when they see these commercials with comments like: "Can you believe it? They look like my mother." "She's way too fat to be showing it off like that." Unconsciously, we all do it, don't we? Without even thinking about it, we expect women in commercials to be glossy and artificial, and we're sometimes taken back when we see real women.

"I was in a room of people when those commercials starting airing and the reaction ranged from embarrassment to outright laughter and ridicule from the men and some women,” says Diana, 42. “I found the reaction of the women to be awful. But maybe it's like those sanitary napkin commercials; they're embarrassing in the presence of men, or maybe they were uncomfortable because they aren't comfortable with their own bodies."

Cultural Expectations and Body Image

But the truth of the matter is that we're used to seeing, thin, workout bodies splashing across our screens and between the pages of the latest fashion magazine. Women are so used to the stereo-types thrown at us that we've forgotten what real women look like. The laughter and uncomfortable vibes coming from those women is because they don't want to see themselves reflected back at them. We're so used to the negative thoughts that we have about our own bodies, it's hard to see women like us celebrating what we consider flawed or imperfect. We're used to hiding our round tummies and protruding behinds because we've been told that a little bit extra is ugly and disgusting. It will take more recognizable bodies to undo the way we see ourselves.

"To reclaim the body requires the body, many bodies, to challenge the traditional, narrow, oppressive view (of nudity, women, and their connection) in its unwarranted supremacy," says Paul Rapoport , publisher of Body and Spirit: The Century Project, a book of photographs celebrating women's bodies as they really are.

Never mind that in many cultures a more rounded women is revered and celebrated, and those women do not have the body image issues that plague the Western World. North Americans are caught up in the "thin is powerful and more desirable" mantra that eats away at the self-esteem of those not fitting into the limited stereo-types. Most of us think negatively about our bodies from the moment we wake up, and some of us even despise our bodies, to the point where we starve ourselves into being bulimic, anorexic or on the other extreme, we work out excessively. Girls as young as seven are on diets and talk about not liking their bodies. Negative body image has become the norm for today's woman; it has become a part of our psyche.

Women are expected to meet certain cultural expectations, including beauty, and when we fail our self-esteem plummets. In the book, I thought it was Just me: Women Reclaiming Power and Courage in a Culture of Shame, Dr. Brene Brown says, "there are broad social expectations for women around the issue of appearance. We are expected to be young, beautiful, sexy.etc."

Reclaiming The Body and Taking Back The PowerRedefining Beauty

And to reverse the cultural brainwashing, we need to redefine beauty with images of real women, as with more images that celebrate "yes, we are the norm," women will hopefully stop beating themselves up because they can’t reach the unattainable, whose bar gets raised higher every year. Young girls need to see those images as the norm if they are to have high self-esteem and not fall into the "you're not good enough as you are" thinking that exists today and get used to the message that no matter the body that we were blessed with, we should learn to love it. Granted for some it isn't easy to reach that point - where they can easily love their bodies - because body image is tied in with how we see ourselves, how we are viewed and what we think is expected of us.

The message needs to go from dying to be thin to not only accepting the body that you have, but also taking care of it by eating right and doing a moderate amount of exercise to keep it strong and healthy. By stopping the comparisons, blocking out the negative media messages and learning to embrace ourselves, we define who we are and not let the media define who we should be.

"Practicing to love myself, I have good and bad days, but I find if I think more positively, on certain days I feel unstoppable," says Lynette, 46.

Taking back the power over our bodies and psyches, and redefining beauty starts in the mind. By thinking and feeling lovely on the inside and realizing through recognizable and realistic images that we are alright as we are, we will be able to build up resilience to negative messages and repair the woman spirit. In James Allen's As A Man Thinketh, written some 107 years ago, he says, "strong, pure, and happy thoughts build up the body in vigor and grace. The body is a delicate and plastic instrument, which responds readily to the thoughts by which it is impressed, and habits of thought will produce their own effects, good or bad, upon it."

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