Confessions of a College Sophomore

I’m not worth it.

I will be the first to admit that I have hardly any confidence in myself. You won’t see me bragging about my looks, my intelligence, or that I should be on The Bachelorette because everyone instantly falls in love with me.

As a sophomore at the University of Idaho, I have younger students following me, looking to me for guidance. I always welcome their questions and try to take away their fears. Yet I find myself wondering, how can I do this when I value myself at next to nothing?

Like many people in the world, I put on a brave face and pretend I love myself more than I actually do. After this many years, I can fake confidence to the point where everyone believes it, except for myself. My mind is always bogged down with questions: Do I believe myself when I look in the mirror, face made up and wearing trendy clothes, that I am beautiful? Do I believe myself when I go to Old Navy and try on that adorable, form fitting dress that shows off my hips, chest, and rear, that I am beautiful? Do I really and truly believe that I am beautiful?

The answer I often find myself slinking back to is, Not really.

I’ve known about this quality – or lack of quality – in myself for many years now, and I haven’t been able to change it. It’s been hiding away in the back of my mind, coming forward at the most inopportune times to remind me of its presence. It’s the little voice telling me to back away, keep my mouth shut, and that I’m not worth it.

For years, my lack of self-confidence has been a debilitating disease that I carry with me every day, covered up and protected from the world, and in return it slowly sucks me down. Hindering me every day, it keeps me from believing the age old phrase, “You can do anything as long as you believe in yourself.”

But lately I’ve been feeling that enough is enough.

Why shouldn’t I see the beauty in myself that my mother and sister and best friend see? Why shouldn’t I tell myself I can change the world? Why shouldn’t I have self-confidence?

Self-confidence isn’t something that can be turned on like a light or suddenly discovered through soul searching and excavation. It isn’t as easy as wishing it to come true. Confidence must be built and gained. Once you’ve tasted the glory that is self-confidence, you can never let it go.

Hold on to it. Keep it safe. Treasure it.
Treasure yourself.
You are worth it. No matter the little voice says.

Sex is messy, life is messy: HBO’s “Girls”

Hannah Blankenship

Like everyone and their mother, I have anticipated the arrival of HBO’s newest show “Girls” since it was announced.

Twenty five year-old Lena Dunham (from 2010’s “Tiny Furniture”) wrote and stars in the half-hour comedy/drama series, with Hollywood heavyweight Judd Apatow producing. The show is about four 20-somethings trying to figure out their lives in New York City. If that sounds like the second coming of “Sex and the City,” it is—kind of. Yes, the plot sounds identical, but as Dunham has said, the unglamorous demographic is one we haven’t seen on television before.

And the demographic isn’t the only thing new on the show.  From the language the characters use to their challenges to their tattoos to their awkward sexual encounters, the show is refreshingly real. Hannah’s sex scene in the first episode is cringe-worthy (ABC News called it “borderline date rape on a dirty futon”) but it is refreshingly far from the normally romanticized and male-driven sex scenes we’re used to. Dunham recently told CBS:

“I often said that I I’ve felt a little unfairly duped by the sex I see on television. I’m not saying this is every girl’s sexual experience, but I am saying that sex isn’t always glamorous, painful, it’s embarrassing, it’s complicated and I really wanted to see scenes where girls weren’t wearing negligees and sighing.”

Dunham’s “sex is messy” principle spills into other aspects of the show through the lives of the characters. Instead of dealing with a $40,000 shoe bill a la “Sex and the City,” Dunham’s character Hannah must find a job when her parents cut her off financially and figure out an undefined relationship with Adam, her sort-of boyfriend.

Her friends are also struggling with both big and everyday issues that young women of my generation can relate to: unintended pregnancy, job hunting, unrequited love, communicating with the opposite sex in the twenty-first century, slang, interning and more. According to one reviewer writing for Mother Jones, the next two episodes will address other taboo issues, including “passionless sex, STIs, casual abortions, boring boyfriends, gay boyfriends, drugs, money woes, body image.”

Body rEvolution

In honor of National Women’s History Month, Body rEvolution invited students to participate in their newest activism/art project. The intent was to develop a multimedia presentation about students’ perception of eating disorders, media representation of the body and other concerns related to body image.

Hooray for real girls

Shaina Craner

I have been overly conscious of the way I look since I was 6 years old. One of my classmates moo-ed at me when I didn’t fit in the costume for our holiday concert. That kind of thing sticks with a girl.

Despite my long journey through social awareness and self-enlightenment since then, I have always been somewhat flaky on issues of aesthetics. It is difficult not to be hypocritical when it comes to “beauty.” I use quotes here because, despite the hype, beauty is an innately subjective phenomenon.  I’ve envied size 0’s and size 16’s. The point, though—and what I plan to explain in a shamelessly self-indulgent, inner monologue kind of way—is that I have envied them.

And you probably have too, my lovely readers. If you tell me you haven’t, you are either lying, in denial, or you didn’t grow up in the world that I did. Or you are self-assured in a way that most females would kill to be. In which case, good for you. Let’s talk sometime.

Centuries ago, it was the bigger gals who were regarded as the most beautiful. Throughout the years the standards warped. Heavy changed to curvy, and curvy changed to slender—to the slight and almost skeletal build of today’s models, with the obvious giant boob stipulation.

Body shaming hurts girls: Opinion

Erin Fenner

I think my confusion started when I was in fifth grade and a friend told me my fingers looked funny. I looked at my fingers, and then hers. I couldn’t see how they were different. Then, the friend pointed out they were just “weird” shaped.

My friend’s body analyses were usually more rigorously applied to strangers and celebrities. These conversations were shared as if it was gossip – as if it is a dirty secret that some celebrities have cellulite.

When I was in elementary school I thought this behavior was something my friends would grow out of, but it is something American culture has grown in to.

The women* we see in media must fit a rigid standard of beauty – generally white (or Anglo features), large breasts, small waist and skin that never hints at blemishes. Freckles are evil – and frizzy or ethnic hair doesn’t exist in the media world. Average models are thinner than 98% of women in the U.S.

This alone seems to provide reason why 81% of 10-year-olds want to be thinner. But, this society doesn’t just hold up an unattainable standard – it even condemns those who do fit the standard for not being perfect absolute. If an actress jiggles in a swimsuit she must be prepared to see a spread in a magazine literally magnifying her imperfections.