The Art of Self Loyalty: Standing Up for Young Girls

Last week I wrote about self loyalty. I quoted Pascal Mercier: [Self loyalty is] not a feeling… but a will, a decision, a partisanship of the soul. … The duty not to run away from yourself…The willingness to stand for yourself even if you do not like yourself. The problem, as already outlined, is we are not taught to do this. Rather, there is an outward focus that supports our departure from inner partisanship. Nowhere is this more apparent, it seems, than with young girls.

A new study from the Canadian Women’s Foundation found that [g]irls between the ages of nine and 16 face body shaming and lack of confidence at more than double the rate of young boys. One-in-five Canadians (21 per cent) know a girl who says she’s fat and an almost equal amount (18 per cent) know one who says she’s on a diet. Moreover, 17 per cent of Canadians know a girl who thinks she is ugly, compared to only 7 per cent of Canadians who know a boy that feels this way.

The first time I felt ashamed of my body was in Brownies. I was nine years old. I remember looking in the mirror and thinking I looked like a sack of potatoes tied in the middle. I even spoke it aloud.  No one disputed it. It began a long journey of diets and over exercising.

Forty three years ago I unknowingly abandoned myself. Not feeling good in who I was—most likely a reaction to the family situation—and not understanding why I felt that way, I did what only seemed natural: I compared myself to others and found a lack.  Ironically, it wasn’t TV stars or magazine starlets that struck me as the paragon of perfection but the line drawings of the willowy girls in my Brownie handbook. I wasn’t like them, an impossible feat in anyone’s guidelines, and therefore was wrong, inadequate; a failure.

Four decades later I can still hear the echoes of those inner struggles. Oh, I know how to manage them and they no longer control my life but when feeling stressed or at a loss they can, even now, make enough noise to make me wonder, if only for a moment, if I am good enough. And while I feel vulnerable in stating those thoughts, I also know that I am not alone in feeling this way.   

So how can we support young girls to stand up for themselves, have inner loyalty, and not abandon self as I did back then? 

The Canadian Women’s Foundation offers the following Top 7 Dos and DONTs for parents in what they call nurturing resilience.  I call it fostering self loyalty but hey, as long as the message gets out.

1.    DON’T bite your tongue.
If people say things you disagree with or treat you in a disrespectful way, speak up. She [your daughter or any young woman] needs to know it’s okay to stand up for herself, even at the risk of hurting someone’s feelings or causing disagreement.

2.    DON’T talk about how fat you look.
Never criticize your appearance in front of her or make negative comments about the way she or other females look. Let her know you value people’s inner qualities - like curiosity and courage - more than outward appearance.

3.    DON’T put yourself down.
Never make jokes about how incompetent you are, or make light of your own skills and abilities. She will learn to minimize her own accomplishments and may lower her future ambitions.

4.    DO let her lead.
When choosing school or social activities, ask her opinion and provide genuine choice. Rather than saying, “Do you want to take dance or singing?” ask open-ended questions like, “What interests you these days?”

5.    DO let her take risks.
Assuming her physical or mental health isn’t at stake, try not to be over-protective. Don’t rob her of the chance to be accountable for her own decisions and to learn from her own mistakes. If she fails, congratulate her for trying but don’t rescue her.

6.    DO validate her experience.
If she has ‘negative’ feelings or is having problems with her friends, don’t say “It’s not that bad” or try to cheer her up. Listen with respect, acknowledge that things sound difficult, and ask if there is anything you can do. Don’t pressure her to talk when she doesn’t want to. Instead, find lighthearted ways to strengthen your connection with her, like going for a walk or bike ride. If she is having problems with friends, encourage her to think more critically about the situation; suggest she pretend she is watching the conflict on TV or in a movie; what motivations and solutions does she see? If she is in genuine distress, get outside help.

7.    DO provide fair and consistent structure.
Presented in the spirit of love and caring, rules help young people feel protected and connected. Adolescents are less likely to engage in problem behaviours when adults know what they’re doing, and who they’re with. Set clear expectations for behaviour related to attending school, doing homework, sharing chores, and abiding by curfews.

 And, I would be amiss if I didn’t mention my good friend, Carla Webb and her program, Empowered byHorses. Yes, I am biased, but I think she does excellent work in empowering young girls to be, and to appreciate, who they are.

Bread Chronicles IV - Coming Home

Loyalty. We use this word in terms of friends, family, country, even jobs but rarely do we use it in terms of self. It goes along with duty and honour, respect and love. As a girl guide I remember promising to do “my duty to God, the Queen and my country”.  Our Southern neighbours pledge allegiance to a flag while we, as Canadians, stand on guard for our "home and native land". But who stands for us? To whom, if not ourselves, should we be most loyal?

I just finished Night Train to Lisbon by Pascal Mercier. It is an excellent read and, as most good books do, got me reflecting upon different aspects of my life. Although this is not a new hobby, I am nothing if not a belly button gazer, Mercier’s words brought this question of loyalty to light.

[Loyalty is] not a feeling… but a will, a decision, a partisanship of the soul. … The duty not to run away from yourself. Neither in idea nor in fact. The willingness to stand for yourself even if you do not like yourself.

But this thought will have to wait, time to start the bread process. I want to add sprouted Kamut kernels to this new batch so I start the process today for bread that I will make in two days. 

 

Day One: Soak a cup of kernels in water for 8 hours or so. After soaking, rinse and spread onto a damp dishtowel. Do not layer the kernels too thick, maybe four at the most. Cover with the second half of the towel, sprinkle with water and let sit at room temperature for a day and a half. The important thing is to keep the kernels moist but not too moist in that they mold. On that note, do not put them in too warm of a place, but not too cold either. In other words, a place where Goldilocks would be most content. Eight hours before I estimate my sprouts to be ready, I will replenish my starter. 

Okay, back to loyalty: A few days ago I met up with an old acquaintance. I hadn’t seen this person in several years. Back then the relationship had been unequal and my decision to split a reflection of a fierce need for self care. I planned this meeting for several reasons but underlying each was an agenda: I wanted to show how much I had grown; that my need for this person’s approval had diminished and that I was thoroughly my own person. It almost panned out. 

I won’t go into detail but the meeting ended just in time for my self-recriminations to begin. My centred state of being; my “matured” self and sense of containment couldn’t last the full encounter. The old way of being leaked through the last half of our time together and my inner critic stepped in to strip me bare. On the way home I flayed myself with alternating lashes of self pitying regret and piercing anger then tried to self soothe by imagining another meeting where I would do it right. The reprove lasted twenty-four hours before the truth rang out and the warmth of my humanity returned.  

Speaking of truth, something screwed up with the bread starter I replenished this morning. With good plans to make bread now, this evening as I write this mini melodrama, I find she hasn’t risen. At best she looks like a barely fluffed pillow. Not enough. So, I push my bread making plans forward, re-knead and set the starter aside overnight. Meanwhile, I check in on my kamut kernels. I guess starter and kernels signed a non-growth pact: they both needed more time to show their stuff. Hmmm, I guess that could also be said for me.

During that long day after my waylaid visit one could say that I abandoned myself. And, while I am certainly well aware of how that feels this time was different. I was keenly aware through most of it that I was doing myself a disservice; that my self-loyalty had faltered. It was like this calm voice wafting over waves of disillusionment inviting me to slow down, take it easy; be kind to myself. I pendulumed  between the salve of this truth and floundering around in cold black waters but finally the swinging stopped. I gathered myself onto dry land, stood by my side, and took solace.

In respect for my process I reflected on what happened and why. I figured out what needed changing and what called for compassionate understanding; gave space for the sadness but also the joy in recovering so fast, and then finished up with a metaphoric hug. In short, I made the decision to get back into partnership with the person I should be most loyal to—me.

Day Three: My kamut kernels have sprouted a ¼” tail. I rinse and set aside. The starter has also grown to double its size with the re-knead and extra leavening time. I mix these ingredients with my usual pumpkin, sesame and flax seeds; millet; corn meal; oil and molasses, knead and set aside for the first rise (3 hours). The only problem is, due to last night’s delay, I won’t have time to bake today. Instead, about 90 minutes into the second rise, I’ll cover with plastic wrap and pop into the fridge for a slow, cold finish. Tomorrow, I bake.

Personal growth, the long journey back home as it were, takes times. And, like my starter and nascent sprouts, sometimes that timing doesn’t follow a preset schedule. We get stymied in our progress and frustrated at seemingly child-like regressions; we find ourselves embarrassed and even in pain. What alleviates these deviations—these detours along the road—is a loyalty to self.  As Mercier writes, self loyalty is “the willingness to stand for yourself even if you do not like yourself.” 

And that, I believe, is how we know we have come home.

For previous Bread Chronicles, scroll down to the introduction on October 5, The Ferment.

The Short Story: Why Borges Rules

I recently read an article by Russell Smith on the literary form known as the contemporary short story. He called it the “unloved genre”. The article was in recognition of Alice Munro’s Nobel Prize in literature but I found myself nodding with many of his points on why the form has a somewhat difficult reputation. Novels, for instance, allow the reader time and space to acclimatize, learn the author’s language and get to know the characters in a slow leisurely way. Short stories deny this privilege. They demand intimacy before real knowledge and then, while holding you by the scruff of your neck begging for more, tell you there is no real reward for this honour: life is still the same.

Short stories, at least the kind that appear in literary mags, remind me of those melancholic times of youth where change was so fiercely desired but paradoxically feared. Although not true for me today, back then, the tension of holding the space between those two opposing forces left me emotionally paralyzed. When Thoreau wrote: Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them; I imagine he had just read a short story.

That said, I have total respect for those who can write with such clarity and, at times, brutal honesty in 20,000 words or less. Kudos also for those who can sit down and savour them. I tend to speed through short stories in order to get the whole process over with as quick as possible.

The one short story writer I absolutely adore, however, is Jorge Luis Borges. His Labyrinth collection is a favourite with The Immortal being on top of the list. Each time I read it, and I have read it many times, I reach deeper into my soul and pull out yet another facet I didn’t know existed. His surrealism invokes a simultaneous stepping in and out of my life. I get dizzy reading Borges. Best, he invites inner change rather than passively demanding it and helps me celebrate the universal mystery with a slightly off balance wonder.

Yeah, despite how I appreciate and respect Alice Munro, give me Borges any day.