Sunday, July 23, 2006

Pride

Recently, Brian and I finally watched Real Woman Have Curves. It's a movie that came out several years ago. Here's the plot: Ana, an cute but overweight Mexican American girl is graduating at the top of the upper class school she gets bused into. Her mother, an overbearing, condescending, manipulative, demanding stereotype doesn't want her to go to college. Instead, she wants her to work as a seamstress in their family shop, lose weight, get married, and have some kids. Ana rages against what her mother wants by eating her weight in tres leches cake, giving her virginity to a boy she decides she won't see again, and going to college in New York.

It's supposed to be empowering for girls or something. I was neither empowered, nor impressed. In fact, I was depressed. (Except for her going to college...that was good.)

Pride is a horribly debilitating thing. I wanted to scream at the TV. I wanted to take Ana out for coffee and explain to her that it's much harder to do the right thing for the right reasons DESPITE everyone else wanting you to do the right things for misguided reasons. She wanted to prove to her mother that her worth was not based on her looks or her virginity. I wanted to tell her that she was right. Her worth isn't based on those things, but because she IS worthy, she should guard them.

For so many years, lots of people wanted me to lose weight. I always rejected it. Like Ana, I was out to prove that I could be overweight and still be successful, get dates with hot guys (I got to marry one!), and be popular. Now that I'm older, I realize that while people's motivations (or methods) weren't always what I needed at the time, I was wrong. I was wrong to stay overweight for the sake of pride. It kills me when people look at me with satisfaction because "I finally listened" and am on my way to not having to shop in the plus department anymore. I want to tell them, yeah, I'm not doing this because of you and your rude comments, I'm doing it because I care about myself.

Today, I had to deal with my pride. It's an aweful thing when your pride get's hurt. My natural reaction is to see what I can do to build it back up. Unfortunately, my only defensive reactions would have hurt me more than anyone else. If I didn't want to suffer, I'd have to continue to do the right thing despite anyone else's opinion.

Pride is such a powerful thing that even when you realize that you need to change in your life, it can keep you from inviting it in for fear that it will be seen as weakness. I guess that's why being a Christian is hard. Christianity requires us ask for help and admit that we can't on our own.

1 comment:

E. Michelle said...

I hear you... and am proud of you.