Bikini Bridge is the new Thigh Gap

One of the purposes of my blog is to educate my bloggers and enforce a healthy body image.

Sometime last year I blogged about the thigh gap.  This desperation to be thinner than our bodies support runs rampant in our young ladies' lives.  And now there's a new culprit:

The Bikini Bridge.

What is a bikini bridge?  Urban Dictionary defines it as the following (bold my own emphasis):  

1. when a girl in a bikini lies down and her hip bones protrude well past their flat stomach causing their bikini bottom to stretch across and gap is formed for a beautiful view of their vaginal front also referred to as hood.

When I see a bikini bridge It makes my whole day better!

2.  An incredibly sexy phenomenon wherein bikini bottoms are suspended between the two hip bones, causing a space between the bikini and the lower abdomen. This potential view into the unknown can be further accentuated by a third structural element contributing to the bridge-effect, the mound.

Here's a visual for you:

Let me start by saying that when you are a certain size, there is a natural curvature to a woman's body that can cause her hip bones to pop a little.  The thigh gap is finally getting a bad name, however, it has been replaced with the "bikini bridge."  Now girls are looking to starve themselves to have their hip bones protrude.  The more that their bikinis don't touch their abdominal and go from hip bone to hip it is more desirable.  

Why is a skeletal figure considered beautiful?  The submitted descriptions of the bikini bridge on Urban Dictionary are very positive.  I can imagine that men like it, because they can peek right on down to your who-haw!  (That's Texan for vagina.)  There are now tumblrs devoted to bikini bridges, and most websites that I visited found this new phenomenon to be sexy and hot.

Believe it or not, the bikini bridge was started as an internet hoax.  Riding on the coattails of the thigh gap, a 4chan user decided to start a new body trend and this is what they came up with.  They created memes and propaganda to promote this new body "ideal."  And guess what?  The experiment worked.

All it took for our female youth to distort their view of a beautiful or covet an unobtainable body was to see one promoted online.  It shows how great of an influencer the internet is on our younger generations.  If we bombarde our girls with these images and tell them it's beautiful (whether we actually believe it ourselves or not), they will strive for that "perfection."  

My question is why do the images of curvier, more natural women not catch on?  Why does real not become a trend?  Why do we rebuke what is natural in favor for unnatural?  Our cultures define what is beautiful.  Is our culture so thin obsessed that any image of gaps on a woman's body is beautiful? How do we change that?  Why is it that something that was intended to be a joke has turned into an actual trend?  

What a long bridge we've crossed from our ancestors.

At the vanity, 1600-1650

#bikinibridge 

Beauty Starts in the Heart

As I continue to review some wise words written by those whose lives were exemplary in my eyes, I grow and learn more.

I have learned that when you start to think and do things differently it hurts.  To accept that you want to make a change in your life means to accept that you are willing to suffer.

It also means you will feel like a hypocrite.

Nearly every woman can identify with a lack of confidence for any myriad of reasons.  I have an exercise for you to try.

Get one of your best female friends, one that you trust with all your heart.  Have them sit across from you and stare you right in the eye and state, "You are beautiful.  Do you believe me?  Do you?"  Then bring the words to your mouth.  "Yes, I believe you.  I am beautiful."

For most women, it won't be words but tears that will come first.  Then when you get to the point where you can say the words, they will be alien and foreign.  Most of all, they won't be the truth, and you will feel like a liar.

Then put your shoulders back, lift your head, and smile.  It is scientifically proven that your self body language has a direct correlation to your confidence.  The disdain you feel from this exercise may be too much.

Hold on.

This is it.  This is the the suffering.  This is the change you are making.  With every birth is labor.  Put an effort in your looks, your posture, your smile.

You see, my dear blog readers, as I write this I feel like the largest of hypocrites.  I, like all humans, have my own hang-ups that hurt.  This is the path I am choosing to take.  I have made a choice to change now, and so I have committed myself to suffering.  I will take the difficult path for the bigger reward.

So I invite you to join me.  Let's spend our days focused on positive thoughts, beautiful smiles, and clean posture.  Let's build our confidence through our body...our very own enemy.  And when you're ready to give in, let's all hold each other accountable.  Let's always be able to look each other in the eye and say,

You're Beautiful.

I'm Beautiful.

Finding Self Worth

Hello my wonderful Blog readers!

I apologize for the hiatus...as you know, sometimes life gets too busy!

There have been a lot of ups and downs in my life as of recently.  What a beautiful roller coaster life can be.  But with every dip, the peaks teach a new lesson to prepare you for the next.

About once a year, I dig out a book of mine that was written by one of my college professors Dr. Willard Tate.  He passed away from cancer several years back, but he lived a long, full life.  He traveled as an inspirational speaker in his later years.  The thing about Dr. Tate was that he was a simple yet wise man.  This book that I read on an annual basis is called "Learning to Love."  I recently read this book again, which got me thinking as usual.

In my own life, I have witnessed others struggling with a sense of self worth.  For all of us, the world tells us that there are three standards by which we qualify as worthy: achievement, intelligence, and appearance.

Achievement

As a woman, I don't know about you, but I often feel as though we are expected to make great achievements, without achieving too much.  We are told that a man's fragile ego cannot accept a woman that he considers more successful than him.

Or there's the world of the gold diggers.  Or the false perception of one.  Women are not expected to want a man who can provide for a family, because that would base her love on his achievements, which may or may not be true.

If we struggle with our own personal achievements, we lower our own self-worth.  We don't find ourselves worthy for a man.  However, this affliction is probably more commonly felt by men.

Just can't win scenario unlocked: Level One.

Intelligence

Now let's be honest...this is the most hypocritical category for women.

When we are young, we are taught to be dumb is to be popular and cool.  I remember often holding my tongue or purposefully saying things with a valley girl voice to try to fit in.  Intelligence equals an easy target for bullies when we are young.  Then suddenly in our late twenties the world changes its mind.  Suddenly we're supposed to transition into amazing brilliant women.

I've been stuck in the in-between world of intelligence in my own life.  When I was in elementary school, I would consistently receive 95s and 100s on my tests.  So they tested me for advanced learning.  Guess what?  I failed.  By three points.  With the insistence of my teacher they put me in the advanced "Gifted and Talented" class.  That's right.  At a young age, we are separated into our sectors. Unfortunately, my "intelligence" lies in writing, reading, and creativity; and the advanced classes focused on math, logic, and science.  I bounced back and forth with my self worth regarding my intelligence: in regular class I was the smartest, but in advanced classes I was the dumbest.

Make up your mind, world!  Do you want us smart or dumb?

Just can't win scenario unlocked: Level Two.

Appearance

This is it, ladies.  This is the big one for us.

As women we are taught that we can forgo the intelligence and achievement as long as we have the appearance category in spades.  What a deal!!  Men require all three, but we can get away with one.  But what a devastating one thing that can be.

At what cost do we work to maintain that worthiness?  Especially if we feel as though we can't reach a respectable self-worth through our intelligence or achievement?  In fact, how often is it taught that a dumb but pretty girl is more desirable?  Or that a woman only needs to conquer a man as her sole achievement?

As Dr. Tate writes in his book, "...how do you suppose the story would have read if she had been Sleeping Ugly?...the whole point of the story was that she was beautiful.  Otherwise, the prince would have let her sleep forever."

And yet, the more attractive a woman, the more negative feedback she receives from fellow women.  An extremely attractive woman is not expected to be a highly intelligent scientist or business woman.  In fact, it is more difficult for an extremely attractive woman to be taken seriously in the business world.  Aren't they supposed to be simply a trophy?  Why should they try to accomplish more?  Leave that to the women who lack in appearance.

As one of my favorite songwriters, Ani DiFranco, sang, "God help you if you are an ugly girl.  Of course too pretty is also your doom.  Everyone harbors a secret hatred for the prettiest girl in the room."

Just can't win scenario unlocked: Level Three.

So where am I going with all of this?  As long as you spend your time working to achieve your self-worth based on the standards of the world or a certain society, you will never win.  You will always lose at some point in your life.

Your self-worth is greater than anything of this world.  You were created perfect in every way.  PERFECT.

"Your Self Worth is a gift."

Because you are created in God's image, you don't have to earn anything, you already have it.  Any other way of gaining worthiness is unreliable and always changing.  Through God's unconditional love and grace you have a worth that no one can ever take from you.  You can lose a job, have a learning disability, or be an amputee.  Despite all of that, you have a soul that is far more valuable and lives eternally.  Shouldn't you be more focused on your soul's worth since it will be around far longer?

Try this to help you adjust to this idea: write on a small notecard that you can put in your purse or pocket I am a child of God.  Read it all throughout the day.  When you feel unworthy or low.  Reach for that card.  Eventually your conscious mind will learn what your innate subconscious was created to know this whole time.