Who am I anyway?

By the time a girl reaches the age of three, she is already becoming keenly aware of what it means to be feminine in our society. The messages reinforcing gender stereotypes are sometimes blatant, but other times they are much more subtle. The media is one major source of these messages, but even loving families reinforce gender norms at times without realizing it. When we spend energy adjusting our behavior to fit into a stereotype, we lose our authenticity. And sometimes we lose our dreams.  This is true for everyone. hat this means for girls and women is that we unconsciously take on tremendous pressure to be someone less than our real selves. We aspire to be prettier. To be thinner. To be less bossy and opinionated. We try to be really nice.

The rules that we learn about femininity revolve around appearance and sensitivity toward others. While boys are rewarded for taking charge, being smart and assertive, girls are encouraged to be considerate, helpful and caring. While these are all good qualities, focusing solely on perceiving the needs of others stifles the ability to develop a strong identity of our own. We get so good at pleasing others, we forget to form our own opinions and challenge ourselves to expand our thinking. Or we are just afraid to express our thoughts confidently. We don't raise our hands with a question. We hedge our statements. This lack of confidence in our own identity and what we have to offer has tremendous consequences. It changes how we see our place in the world, who we trust, goals we set and what we aspire to achieve.  

The first step toward confidence in our identity and achieving worthwhile goals is to notice all of the gender bias messaging that we are absorbing. These messages are playing into our perceptions of who we should be, and detracting from our potential for authenticity. We need to develop a critical filter when we observe movies, commercials, friends, celebrities, etc. Please, please, please view Miss Representation. It will blow your mind. These sources cannot, and should not, have authority over our identity. Truly, there are no two people alike. It sounds corny, but it is unequivocally true. Social learning theory asserts that we observe and imitate what we see in others who we identify as similar to ourselves. However, the first step is to notice the behavior, and from there we can decide if it is truly consistent with our authentic identity. Accepting these messages is not inevitable. You can do better than that. Choose the real you. You can be confident about that.