Disclaimer: This is a Potentially Offensive Article… I almost didn’t post it… read only if you are willing to get real and do what it takes to help your daughter have a strong self esteem~ it starts with you~ Mom!
In my previous article Beauty Within Radiates Outward, we talked about how important it is to be aware of our appearance, but not to let it own our hearts.
“Should we care about our appearance? I think we should… I think that to a certain degree (not entirely), but to a certain degree, how we are doing inside is reflected in how we take care of ourselves, and how we care for our relationships.” By all means, if you didn’t read the first article, please do so, so that you get the full picture of meaning here. This week I am posting all week on this topic… our appearance and our relationships.
The relationship I want to focus on is the relationship we have with our daughters. Moms “potentially” have the single most influential impact on the way their daughters dress, groom, and take care of themselves, but also how they feel on the inside. Their self~worth! I know that professionals claim that peers have the most influence over the way a girl dresses, her self-esteem, etc…
My personal opinion is, if they do, than us mother’s need to rise up and take back our jurisdiction in the family.
When God choose us to be our daughter’s Mother, He chose us to be the main womanly influence in their life. One of our roles is to teach our daughters how to be a women in appearance, inward self thoughts, and inner beauty (spirit). That requires time together and it requires purposeful mentorship. If our daughters are spending most of their time with their young, immature friends (where they will receive poor advice usually), or other women (aka, teachers, friends moms’, etc…) then likely you should expect they will have their ideologies of womanhood formed by those influencers, should you not? If not, then I would assume you are spending hours detoxifying your daughter and then re~teaching her…
Unfortunately today, most mother’s don’t have the vision of teaching hygiene, grooming, appropriate attire; they assume all girls go through an “awkward” stage. Or that all young girls go through a season of figuring out their identity. My guess is that many don’t have the kind of relationship with their daughters where they would come to them for advice on these things. My oldest daughter is almost twelve and we have a very open relationship… but it didn’t just happen. I worked at it from the time she was very young. I never “avoided” questions about bodies or changes, I never avoided teaching on sex. I have taken on the responsibility of teaching my daughter what eating disorders are, the kinds of abuse that exist, etc… She is aware! Warned! (Every daughter has a different level of maturity… discretion and discernment has to be used on the parents part on when is an appropriate time to educate and inform their daughters on these topics.) As far as “awkward” stage goes, I don’t think we should expect our daughters to go through this… not if we are willing to help them, and not if we have a healthy relationship with our daughter and can talk openly about these things.
I am not suggesting we teach our daughters how to do their hair so they can be the cutest… not at all. I am suggesting we help them so they can do it quickly, efficiently, and confidently, in a way that makes them feel good. If you don’t shower for a couple days and have a rats nest in your hair… do you feel good? (Ok so I know that is extreme, but you get my point.) I am just suggesting though that if we help them get a handle on the hair (for example), then they won’t waste time fumbling it up… we don’t do that with math or cooking… we give directions… why would getting ready for the day be left up to them when they haven’t been taught… we just assume that since we had to figure it out, it was “good” for us… No… I think I wasted way too much time and still looked awkward for way too long… my time could have better been spent growing in my spiritual identity… let’s take the superficial burden off our daughters and teach them the basics so we can spend more time teaching what is most important… who they are in Christ.
Come back tomorrow for probing questions to Mothers on this topic!
Let’s get “Courageous,”
Angie
