“If you look closely at a tree you’ll notice it’s knots and dead branches, just like our bodies. What we learn is that beauty and imperfection go together wonderfully.”
~Matthew Fox
Tag Archives: self-love
“Hair is an accessory. Not a defining trait.”
“Hair is just an accessory. Not a defining trait. I don’t have to have hair to be beautiful. My hair doesn’t justify who I am. Beauty comes from within. A beautiful heart and soul makes a beautiful person. So through my life’s journey, I have learned to love all the things about me that I once thought imperfect.”
~Nketia, 62
#IAmNotMyHair #MoreThanMyHair #baldandbeautiful #naturalbeauty #beauty #beautywithin #hair #cancer #alopecia #solidarity #documentary #coffeetablebook #selflove
Natalie’s View of Beauty
For the past few years I’ve been seeking to learn more about my family’s stories, wondering and questioning about their personal thoughts and characteristics. Including those in the midst of transition.
Although little-by-little I am connecting the dots, one thing that have become distinctively clear to me is my yearning to know the stories of people. Given my own experience with beauty, it’s a topic I tend to focus on but in general understanding the view points and backgrounds of others is incredibly intriguing to me.
Through the process I’ve learned that although our deepest personal experiences shape how we see ourselves and others, we are ALL in the process of learning. We are all on this journey called life simply doing our best to figure things out.
As I continue to work on I Am More Than My Hair and film interview segments, I am also capturing footage of various individuals asking one question.
“What is beauty?”
Natalie tells us her view.
Interested in an interview? Contact me via my website.
I couldn’t stop with the interview. I had to take her picture too.
Always Remember…
This sweet baby was just 7 weeks when I took her picture. She is now 5 years old. This was the only picture I was able to take with her looking into the camera. Her mama was behind her ducking down and holding her up while she was wobbling and looking around.
I love the purity of babies. That’s before they are affected by the craziness of the world. Beautiful she is and I hope she will always be reminded.
Visit Feminine Transitions Facebook page for more inspirational memes.
Connected
“The thing I’m most passionate about in life is music. There are so many different types of music that includes singing and instruments. Music makes me happy and want to dance.”
~Zoe, 11
Zoe is my oldest niece, now 16. When she was a baby I played music (I’ve always loved music) hoping she would stop crying…and she did as she would stop and listen to it. I’ve never seen a baby do that before. She always connected with music and danced to EVERYTHING. I would play CDs in my room and Zoe and my 2nd oldest niece would dance non stop. We were obviously connected by genes, but in music there was another relation. To my amazement she memorized the words in songs before the age of two (it started off as a toddler mumble then actual words as grew older). Although we may not hang out as often as when she was younger (those darn teenage years) I’ll always have these memories and we will forever be connected.
#FeminineTransitions #naturallybeautiful #naturalbeauty #selflove #giveyourselflove #allnatural #DontPhotoshopMe #memories #music #dance #BellHooks
I’m Featured In The Huffington Post!
Last week I received an email from an editor at HuffPost Women. She asked if I would be open for an interview about Feminine Transitions photo series. I thought to myself, “But of course!” After the Huffington Post article “Unretouched Portraits Illustrate 19 Bare, Bold And Beautiful Women” went live, I received a handful of emails and phone calls from other media outlets requesting an interview for their website. I am so grateful for this unexpected opportunity!
I would love to share a few of the articles with you. You can read Cosmopolitan, Daily Mail, and even IASK, a Chinese news source. You can also read the interviews on the media page of my website. Feel free to leave a comment in the response section after you’ve read it.
My Encounter with Beauty…Reflected Through My Lens
I vividly remember questioning beauty at the age of 10. There weren’t any examples of little brown girls that looked like me on TV, magazines and definitely not on billboards. As I went through the early stages of puberty my body, as well as my mind, went through the transitions.
At the time, and for the first time, I questioned beauty. I wondered if I fit the picture of “pretty. As I was going through these changes an encounter with my aunty lead me to believe I truly wasn’t beautiful. It lead me to doubt my worth.
My aunty looked me directly in my eyes, as my face was full with pimples and discoloration, and said to me with her distinct Trinidadian accent, “You’re getting ugly.” Although my father made it a point to always tell me that I was beautiful, on that day my father’s words had no significance.
I allowed those three words to make me lose sight of loving myself unconditionally. My confidence crumbled in a few seconds.
Eventually, and as I went through adolescence, my father’s positive affirmations became constant reminders of my worth. Then I began to understand what the true meaning of beauty…and I was her.
Once I became a mother I found myself consistently reassuring my child of who they are and made a point to create a space of feeling comfortable in their own skin. I came to the realization that I do this with my children because I didn’t want them to be negatively impacted by outside influences as I was.
I do however recognize that they cannot completely avoid this reality. School and family can be the biggest influence of our own self-perception. Positive or negative. Regardless, I have faith that with the support of my husband and myself, our children can and will overcome self-doubt.
Through this journey I recognized I created projects that in some way are a reflection of my personal experience. In some way I believe I am speaking to the little girl inside me that was affected as a child. I unconsciously focus my photography to represent raw and unaltered (without Photoshop) beauty.
Through my photography I gave birth to photo books that celebrate the natural beauty of women and girls. The first being Feminine Transitions and my current project I Am More Than My Hair. In the near future my hope is to also create documentaries that reflect the same concept in a video format.
It’s a start on creating positive change and it’s a blessing for me to be a deliverer of a healing revolution.
Kiva Zip | A and C Books, LLC
Kiva Zip | A and C Books, LLC.
I’m only 5 contributors away from my loan going public on Kiva Zip. This means, my campaign will go live on the site for the public to see once I reach my goal of 5 more contributors. I’d really appreciate it if you could contribute as little as $5 to my loan!
This loan is important because it will allow me to expand my message of social change to an audience of over 30,000 at the Green Festival in Los Angeles, CA. I am also connecting with several Women’s Studies Programs to inquire about being a guest speaker their classrooms. In case you lost the link, here it is again: https://zip.kiva.org/loans/5380/i/u0hr
This is a loan, not a donation, so your money will be returned as I pay back my loan. Your support means a lot to me! Hope that you can help with a loan of $5 (or more) and share this with your network!
If you prefer sponsorship opportunities, visit my Speaker Sponsor profile here.
Thank you!
Resilience
When my mom suffered a stroke at the age of 25 I was only 2. I honestly do not have any memories of her without it. One thing I say about my mom is she is resilient. Her stroke left her paralyzed on the left side of her body yet she still drove, cooked our family traditional Trinidadian food (not a quick process), ironed our clothes and walked very fast without her cane (especially when coming after us for something we did wrong). Seeing my moms determination really didn’t give me a choice but to develop the same character. She had no excuses and neither do I. I give thanks for my mom for showing me true strength.
Daddy, Tell Me I’m Beautiful
Growing up, my household was far from perfect. As a matter of fact, my family fit the category of dysfunctional. My parents experienced certain challenges in the childhood causing them to be a product of their environment.
It wasn’t until I get older that I appreciated, despite my father circumstances due to his upbringing, that he planted a seed of self-assurance within me which I believe helped me throughout my life. My father also encouraged me to honor my feelings, always seemed to understand and relate to my intuition/spiritual experiences, told me that I must tolerate nothing less than respect and wholeheartedly love who I am…Unapologitically me.
Let me take you back…
I remember as a little girl, putting a towel on my head and feeling, in that moment, that I a had beautiful long hair. It felt good. (I know some of you reading this now did the same. It was one of those things that many little brown girls did.)
Although my dad would let me be in that moment, he would gently tell me my hair is thick and beautiful and go on saying that many women wished they had hair like mine.
In all honestly, despite my fathers had good intention, I didn’t feel as pretty as he told me. It was difficult seeing myself pretty when I didn’t witness little girls that looked like me on high platforms. Although my father pumped “beautiful” in my head, the media, my classroom and society in general was a impact on my self-esteem.
At the age of 11 and feeling a boost of self-confidence, my Aunty told me something that crumbled my self-love. While transitioning through puberty, and a face full of pimples, she looked me in the middle of my eyes and said, with her distinct Trinidadian accent, “Yuh gettin ugly.” I wrote about it in the introduction of my book, Feminine Transitions.
Though that one statement affected me for a few years, because of my fathers influence I grew out of that perception.
If I had not the significant voice at home to assure me of my beauty, there is no doubt that my journey self-awareness would have been much more challenging.
My fathers words, assuring me that I was beautiful just as I am (speaking completely against any enhancements, including make-up, chemical changes to my hair, and medical alterations) stuck with me, even throughout my adult life.
I clearly remember when I started getting attention from boys, and feeling nonchalant when they complimented me. Of course it felt good and I appreciate it, but in all truth their flattery didn’t phase me. It never went to my head. Why? I already knew it because I’ve been praised for as long as I can remember by the most important male figure in my life…my dad.
Can you imagine the walking confidence of a woman that was always told, by her dad as a little girl, that she is beautiful?
I was that little girl…one of them as I am sure we are many. Unfortunately, our stories are not told. Society tends to get too caught up with what we lack… fatherless daughters and sons…
I pay respect to the fathers doing their job!
(Oprah, I’m feeling this topic on Lifeclass coming. Let’s make it happen.)
I truly believe that if we had more dads telling their daughters (and son’s lets not forget them) they are beautiful just as they are, we will build generations of radiating confidence. Maybe even better relationships as people wouldn’t feel the need to cover up who they really are.
As Michael Baisden said, “Stop introducing your representative and introduce yourself.” That’s well said Michael.
The same goes for mom’s and their daughters. If our children do not hear it from us, they will simply seek approval elsewhere.
The reality is my dad and I do not have the best father daughter relationship. It simply is what it is. Regardless, I give Jack his jacket. He has instilled something within me that is powerful beyond measure. Certainty.
To my dad…thank you!
Daddy’s…tell your daughter she is beautiful. You will awaken her soul.
Did your daddy tell you that you were beautiful? Is there a difference in a womans’ love for self who grew up with a father as compared to one who did not? To dig a little deeper, when a father often tells his little girl that she is beautiful, does she develop a more positive self-esteem than the little girl who was never told this by her father? Please share your experience.
*Posted originally at The Girl God blog http://thegirlgod.blogspot.com/2014/05/daddy-tell-me-im-beautiful-by-alyscia.html
Alyscia Cunningham 