Until recently, I was convinced that there was no way I could ever teach teenage girls. Little bitty kiddies? Fine. Teenage boys? Sure. But something about the cattiness of teenage girls never ceased to irk me, and I resolved within myself to avoid spending lots of time with them unless I was authorized to punch them in the chest.
You think I’m playing?
Anyway, a somewhat recent experience seemed to confirm a suspicion that has been growing in me for almost a year now.
I believe I have discovered the secret to why so many women have such a hard time getting along with each other!
*Drum roll please*
We don’t know how to disarm each other.
Think about it. Women tend to carry around baggage…
What, you think you’re the exception? I don’t know, maybe you are.
9 times out of 10, when we see another woman for the first time, we need only about 20 milliseconds to decide if we are going to like her or not. We immediately assess the following:
-What she looks like (Is she prettier than me?)
-What she’s wearing (Does she dress better than me?)
-The look on her face (Does she think she’s better than me?)
If we perceive a “yes” to any of the questions above, we immediately go on the defensive. We have our proverbial “arms up” ready to defend ourselves at the first sign of a stank look, or a condescending roll of the eye.
But what if we didn’t do that? What if instead, we tried something different? I’m not saying I have found the ultimate solution, but I do think I have identified the problem.
Ask me how I know.
I taught a seminar for teen girls last summer. It was really spontaneous and random; I was sort of thrown up there at the last minute to fill in for somebody. You should have seen the looks on their faces. The class had already separated into three cliques: one group consisted of the boy crazy, gum popping, giggly girls. The second group was the moody, texting, whispering girls. In the last group huddled the silent, listen-to-the-teacher-because-my-mom-will-kill-me-if-she-finds-out-I-acted-up-in-class-even-though-I-really-don’t-want-to-be-here girls.
Got that mental picture?
So there I was, a 23 year old commissioned to “reach the young people”. From my immediate assessment of the class, they had the exact same problems that grown women do- they just hadn’t learned to mask it yet.
I grabbed some blank paper and a few pencils and passed it out to the girls. “I want you all to draw me a picture of the perfect girl. Ask each other questions and talk about what she might look like.”
It was as though someone turned the “on” switch in the class. All of the girls united against this fictional perfect girl. Here were some of their (slightly censored) responses:
“She has long pretty hair!”
“Eyes like an Asian girl!”
“Light skin.”
“She can be tall, but not too tall.”
“She would only wear designer clothes, shoes, and bags!”
“She would have braces!” ß(Huh?)
Anyway, after we discussed how she would look, I asked them what they would think if they saw this girl walking down the street. How would she act? The response was unanimous:
“SHE WOULD BE STUCK UP.”
Jackpot. When I asked them why, they had no answer. She just…would be stuck up.
Let’s cut some corners and end this post-
I showed the girls two pictures of me. The first showed me when I fit some of the characteristics of their perfect girl. The second showed me the day I decided to chop all of my hair off and wear it natural. As I stood before them, I had on my typical gear: almost no makeup, humongous afro, watermelon earrings, and other colorful accessories.
I tried to explain to those young women what I am trying to explain to you: the perfect girl is not the one who meets some specific beauty criteria and “has it all together”. That girl doesn’t exist. The perfect girl is the one who wears her skin proud, and walks around with sunshine on her face knowing that she has nothing to prove, nothing to be but her beautiful self, and that no one is comparable to her because no one is her. But here’s the catch-this applies to ALL the women you see. If you believe in your fellow female’s awesomeness as hard as you believe in your own, your world opens up!
But I urge you to try. Clichés last so long because there are simple truths in them that just do not go away.
I leave you with this-
· Wear your whole skin like you know it belongs to you.
· Wear sunshine on your face when you walk around. Smile! Keep your face open and bright, and don’t be afraid to look at people and smile as you pass them.
Above all, learn to disarm the women around you. How, you ask?
Lay your own defensive weapons down…my sister, it’s your turn to be the perfect girl.
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| Just a few of my favorite "perfect girls" |
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