the forehead (pre-expression lines) I was beginning to worry about…
the haircut (circa 1992) I have returned to…
I caught a few minutes of What Not to Wear today and was struck by an exchange between Carmindy, the make-up artist, and the woman who was the focus of the episode. Carmindy walked in and said, “what do you see in the mirror?” And the woman answered, “my nose.” “What about it,” Carmindy gently pressed. “It’s huge.” “You are looking at yourself the wrong way,” Carmindy insisted. “When I look at you, I see your bright blue eyes and your beautiful smile.”
It’s funny how we fixate on things over time. One of my deliberate moves as an adult is to step away from the mirror. Stay there too long and you can become consummed by what you see. And I have no desire to be consumed by me. So when I noticed about a month ago that I was spending time looking at my forehead wrinkles in the mirror, I decided that there had to be an intervention. An intervention that started with a B. Nope, not botox. Bangs. I was a little nervous sitting in my girl Laura’s chair. Afterall, how are bangs going to work on a curly girl? Would I have to wear my hair straight every day and lose a lot of time just because I am taming my forehead obsession? Turns out, the answer is no. I can wear my hair curly or straight– I just need to make sure that I blow dry my bangs. When I wear my hair curly now, I have the exact same hairstyle that I had in high school. Actually, when I wear it straight, I have the exact same hairstyle as high school, too. Which is fine. And I can’t recall the last time I caught sight of any forehead wrinkles in the mirror.
But I brought up the idea of fixating to talk about the idea of self-objectification and not my bangs. Self-objectification is when a person takes a third person perspective of the self, viewing one’s body as an object. If we are self-objectifying, we see ourselves as we PERCEIVE others see us or we create an image of ourselves to please someone else’s gaze (of course, we are interpretting what we believe will be pleasing to another’s gaze). Stepping outside this gaze of ourselves is critical. But it isn’t easy to retrain our eye because first we must retrain our mind.
I just read a fascinating piece by Caroline Heldman from the spring 2008 issue of Ms. Magazine on the notion of this out-of-body image and wanted to share it with you. What are your thoughts?
Ack! Rosie, I think I recognize those windows from a fraternity house! Too funny. Well, I bet you look great with bangs circa 2008. I am growing my hair out and wearing hairbands which reveal all of my forehead. I have some scars on my forehead, actually I have tiny scars on a lot of my face, but it doesn’t matter. My headbands are cute, so they provide distraction. LOL!
FW, I think you’re right! And I’ve seen the headband photos and they are darn cute! Actually, a headband was my go to technique yesterday when I didn’t feel like even drying my bangs. I never wore them as a kid and now I love them! Wear you headbands with pride!