Narratives. We all have one or multiple. These belief systems we create for ourselves spun from societal constructs and trauma meant to protect us from the things that hurt. I have two. 1. I deserve, and should expect nothing more than, abuse and shame because it is a language I am well acquainted with and know exactly how to handle. 2. Men are monsters.
I do not like my body, but I am learning to. I don’t say this by way of pining for sympathy. I say this because it is the harsh truth of the grating self criticism I experience on a daily basis. The first time someone told me I’m fat I was 10 years old. I now wonder if it’s okay to be a size 28 in jeans and love pasta and beer as much as I do. I cry when I don’t fit into a pair of pants from 2 years ago and pinch my skin constantly, hoping someday I’m half the size of the girls on my Instagram feed. Or maybe someday I’ll just disappear altogether. Lucky me.
Trying to navigate relationships when you’re filled with unbridled self hatred is another demon. Unfortunately, some of the men I’ve chosen to be romantically involved with happen to feed off of the shrinking act I’m trying to perfect. If your sole desire is to make yourself small, they will make sure it happens. Over the past year, I have become all of these unrecognizable pieces. I’ve lost parts of myself I don’t know if I can get back. I know they can not be returned to me and I will not receive an apology. I want to make the wise decision and say that time and introspection will heal me, but anger has taken place of liberation more often than not.
So, how did all this lead to me running around naked in a creek/abandoned structure you ask? Well, I suppose this is the beginning of my journey not only to find radical self love, but to find forgiveness and trust. Throughout the process of these photos, I was given a safe space to be honest and vulnerable. For the first time in two years, maybe more, someone was looking at me for everything that I am and I didn’t want to crawl out of my skin. I didn’t have a panic attack. Here is this person who just wants to love people for exactly what they are with no expectations or complicated desires. This person who just wants to watch humanity unfold and match that vulnerability with his own. And I found forgiveness and trust in that.
I need more people to be this soft and kind. I need to be reminded that people are still good because I lose sight of that and I am so tired of being angry. There are so many aspects of our society that I want to completely dismantle. All of these standards we feel forced to live up to don’t just lead to a body image problem we’ll get over eventually. If your self loathing runs deep enough you’ll put yourself in situations that externalize that hate. I don’t want to do that anymore. I have too many scars and the heartbreak is exhausting.
I feel like I’m letting go of a breath I’ve been holding for 22 years. There are no guidelines I have to follow. The standards I have felt so controlled by aren’t real. People can still be kind, soft and well-intentioned. At the end of the day, it is only you in all of your vulnerability and flaws. You, in all of your beautiful flesh and bone and love and truth. So here it is. This is my truth.
There’s something there, in the sky. Outstretched over the boulders rough and organic, boldly contrasting with the Joshua trees, and as I look out I think, there, there it is. In the quiet that settles over everything and drenches the rocks with its stillness. A feeling I’m reaching for but can’t quite make sense of just yet.
I am waiting, as Sven and Dejan photograph Maya and Roza curved up into the rocks. This space feels like both a haven and an otherworldly place. Eventually I’ll give it a try, but not yet.
Right now I’m just getting used to things.
Back in college I took a figure drawing class to get better at drawing people, so what we were doing didn’t exactly feel out of the ordinary. At times it felt like being part of a Renaissance painting, like we were celebrating the diversity of the human spirit and grace in its form.
Is it scary to lose all of your worries and be naked in front of people you don’t know? I’m the wrong person to ask.
I mean, I won’t try to get too flourishy with where I’m going. Climbing on those rocks is rough, and I have to credit Maya for handling it so gracefully. The rocks look smooth, but that’s granite, and each amorphous surface is riddled with small jabs and sharp edges. Your skin invariably digs into it while you climb and situate yourself, and I came home the following evening with cuts and scrapes on my legs. But with a happy kind of relief, because at the same time I took home something far greater and more valuable, and I’m still holding onto it.
So let’s get back to the body. We’ve got our own quirks and rough edges, like those rocks. Humor and introspection and a lot of heart. And no one is stranger to the world of advertisements constantly shaping us or trying to help us find the perfect look, the perfect style, and some of it we own for ourselves, and some of it we’re encouraged to do for others.
And I want people who see my body in this photo, specifically people who’ve felt uncomfortable with their image in any way, shape or form to feel like it’s okay for them to just fuck the standard and be comfortable and happy as they are.
I’m fine with style as an art form for self-expression. But I’m not exactly a small size in the fashion world, and I’m straddling the border between “normal” and “plus” sizes. I’m American of Lebanese heritage, and it seems like in both cultures, we have an issue with body image. And then on top of that, I have PCOS, which makes it next to impossible for me to lose any weight, but easy to gain weight. Then in all of this, for me to be considered beautiful, I’m expected to be next to hairless with flawless skin, hourglass curves if curves are present, and then a bunch of other things I don’t want to list out.
Is it scary to lose all of your worries and be naked in front of people you don’t know? I’m the wrong person to ask. I look at all of this as a form of art, of embracing how beautiful we all are. I am thankful that there are people who can capture and frame this beauty in a way that helps others see it and understand as well. I like being out in the open and feeling the breeze on my skin in this desert, but I would probably feel different if I had all these eyes on me, scrutinizing me, making their own assessments in real time. But that’s not something I have to worry about out here. We’re searching for spots where we can harmonize with nature, and Maya is helping Sven and Dejan pose us into ways that achieve a balanced aesthetic. We’re exploring and discovering and finding tons of ways to capture expression of the soul.
We’re exploring and discovering and finding tons of ways to capture expression of the soul.
Some companies are trying to get smarter about the whole approach to body image and want us to treat their product as an accessory for self-expression instead of a tool for status and social acceptance. But still, it’s not perfect. It just seems like socially, this world is kind of a harsh place to just be yourself.
And I see enough of it in my own life. I think I invariably struggle with accepting the idea that I could have any level of potential attractiveness because I hear it from not just one, but two different cultures. I have enough curve in the ‘wrong’ ways that I’m not considered attractive. So if people find me cute, it’s usually because of my personality or my humor.
And I see it when I visit my family overseas because Lebanon—still heavily influenced by the French presence and occupation at the turn of the century—values Western standards for beauty over what we physically attain. Women are expected to be narrow and fit to that ideal, when for some of us, that’s completely unrealistic just because we weren’t built like that. The women in my family mostly seem to grow wider as they grow older. I see women my age starve themselves and go through diets and it’s too painful. How are we supposed to be thin and skinny and then just fan out? Where’s the middle ground?
So for me, this is an act of rebellion to all of that. It’s a big //fuck you// to everyone.
So for me, this is an act of rebellion to all of that. It’s a big //fuck you// to everyone. This is what I’m choosing to do with my body. It’s mine and it’s existed in this weird in-between space for as long as I can remember. And it’s not even body positivity. Fuck the idea that I’d need to embrace it for its “weirdness” in spite of not fitting within a standard. Fuck the standard. Eliminate it, do away with it altogether. Everyone is beautiful. I want people to see this photo and think, wow, that’s all beautiful. Everything about this is evocative. There’s connection and community and each of these people are beautiful in their own way. They’re all connected and all harmonized with the beauty of nature. And I want people who see my body in this photo, specifically people who’ve felt uncomfortable with their image in any way, shape or form to feel like it’s okay for them to just fuck the standard and be comfortable and happy as they are.
It’s a lifetime of pain we’ve all accrued and to that I say, drop it.
It’s a lifetime of pain we’ve all accrued and to that I say, drop it.
Drop it on the heads of the companies who elect to play with our emotions in order to market their products.
Leave it in the room for family and friends to chew on when they politely drop hints about dieting for the purposes of attaining a specific figure, whether they’re hoping to themselves or hoping you will. (Health is a conversation independent of looks.)
Unpack it and let it sit in the air as the sun rises, let the light spilling over the landscape transmute it into kaleidoscopic jeweled refractions in ambers and amethyst and vermilion, let it be dissolved into the light and be blown about in the desert wind as it’s reduced to dustmotes scattered, release this burden from your shoulders, take this heaviness from your heart and fashion it into the foundations for a temple holding room for yourself and others in a place of empathy and understanding and hope.
Drop it and let it go, and breathe.
I like being out in the nature, away from everyone and spending a good afternoon/evening/morning with my friends. And I like being out here, but I also like the process of accepting my body as poetry. So here it is. This is my beautiful, poetic body and I’m happy as fuck with it. I like my curves and my stretch marks and my thunder thighs and my tiny ankles and I like just being here, watching the sun set as we pull a last set of poses together before it gets too dark. The three of us are on some boulders we spotted from a distance. Maya’s above, elevated on a boulder and reaching up for the stars, and Roza is below, also climbing upwards. And I’m in the middle, connecting us as we appear to be ascending to the celestial world above. There’s an element of collaboration, and a dash of sisterhood, and a hell of a lot of hope.
Anyone who says that relationships are difficult, are basically admitting that they aren’t willing to take the time and energy to understand and appreciate the complexities. When you commit to an individual human soul, who is free to do whatever they want, you obviously have to give up a part of yourself as a burning sacrifice to Hera, but the only way to remain happy in a relationship is to also be an individual human soul who is free to do whatever you want, while giving up enough of the selfishness to make someone else your priority, because that should be the only thing you truly want. Therein lies the rub, in the words of the great whiny prince.
Societal and religious expectation on relationships has given us stringent rules and regulations to follow, and clearly marked borders that cannot be crossed without severe emotional punishment, and in some of the darker areas of the world, physical punishment, even death. This box that most relationships are having a difficult time flailing around in is based around one thing: possession, which is what modern marriage is: a certificate of ownership written up by the lawyers of patriarchy. This possession is cleverly disguised as love by those in the system, but Love, as has been written about since this featherless biped figured out a way to communicate by wording, is not in any way possessive.
Love just loves. There should be only one rule and guideline: just love. This true and genuine love exists outside the box, and has only one grey area, which should already be at the core of every individual’s ethical structure: Primum non nocere, first, do no harm. If you can just love someone, and your every action is based around doing no harm, then you have the formula for a long and happy relationship. Relationships are NOT difficult; it is we who are difficult; our insecurities, our fears, our issues, our traumas, our perceptions, our interpretations, our expectations, our laundry lists of self that we try to cram into relationships instead of confronting, is what makes things seem difficult.
This particular featherless biped that found me is absolute chaos; she is a sailless ship, tossing and turning in the tumultuous seas of existence; but I happen to be a fucking light house. We compliment each other so beautifully that we really don’t have any other option but to span time together. So, here’s to the most beautiful creature on the planet, my favorite place, my greatest Muse, and all round giant energy ball of heart and compassion. A year ago we made an official commitment to each other, but I feel like we were committed to figuring out how to make this work the moment we first went out to shoot five years ago, when she had no idea what she was doing, and I had no idea what to do with her energy, but we both just looked at each other, saw each other, and kind of blindsidedly said, “…..oh.”
Mark the winds, and Mark the skies,
Ocean's ebb, and ocean's flow,
Sun and moon but set to rise,
Round and round the seasons go.
Why then ask of silly Man
To oppose great Nature's plan?
We'll be constant while we can--
You can be no more, you know.
Happy one official year of the ebb and flow, Love, ad infinitum.
I need life to be a love letter. I need life to be a beautiful melody that follows you around. I need life to be an embrace that makes you feel safe, and a glance that warms your heart. I need life to be a work of art that you can’t help but stare at and you’re not really sure why, as if the art is taking you in, celebrating how beautiful you are. I need to feel the wonder of it all, and float naked in the placid lakes of this amazing human experience. I need to see and feel more that I am driven by a higher source to capture, because everyone needs to celebrate this.
I need to be surrounded by people who deeply glow for each other, and the inseparable self. I need to be more beautiful for the ones who love me, and especially for the ones who have to deal with me, so that those who must deal can learn to love.
Most of all, I need to live in a world full of human beings capable of seeing past what they are conditioned to believe, exist beyond all the stupid shit that we are told is important, and embrace the beautiful reality that only we can create. I need to stop reading Henry Miller. My feet are tangled and tripping over themselves feeling for the next steps to take after your muse tells you that you need a muse. I fear there is not enough beauty in the wide world, but I want the world to be that beauty. I have been shooting into the sun a lot lately. I suppose that’s where I’m at, optically choking on the relentlessly blinding flair of the shattered fragments of flailing souls.
“It is to you that I am singing. I wish that I could sing better, more melodiously, but then perhaps you would have never consented to listen to me. You have heard the others sing and they have left you cold. They sang too beautifully, or not beautifully enough.”
