When we stop trying to make other people like us, it’s like being freed from prison. As parents, we can teach our children to do this.
Timestamps:
00:00 Mother notices that daughter is skipping meals and talks to her about her need for approval.
02:45 Teen boys aren't unconditionally interested in a girl's happiness.
05:16 Parents need to ask their daughters this question.
07:33 Mom talks to her about weight, beauty, and selling yourself for approval.
Transcript:
A mother had the courage and faith to learn how to love and teach her daughter, Josie.
The Need for Approval
She noticed that Josie spent a lot of time perfecting her physical appearance, and gradually she noticed that when mealtime arrived, Josie often said she was in a hurry to go out the door, or, “I ate something earlier.”
Mom talked to her about it, and after the usual denial, Jose admitted that often she starved herself so she could “look good.”
Mom was prepared for this conversation, so she immediately asked, “Look good for who?”
Josie stammered because she wasn’t entirely sure. “Well, it’s just what people do. Girls talk about how other girls look all the time, and they talk about how guys look, and guys look at us.”
Mom: And you like it when people look at you?
Josie paused again, so Mom helped. “You like it if they approve of your appearance, but the downside of that is that you have to ALWAYS be wondering if they DO approve of how you look, and you have to be working to look good. You believe you have to be thin, starve yourself, have perfect hair and makeup, and all that. Yes?”
Josie looked at Mom like, “Well, duh, like, where have you been all your life?”
“Now, an important question: Why? Why do you like other girls to see that you look ‘good’? You like their approval, yes?”
“Yeah.”
A Girl’s Need for Approval and Guys
“How about guys? You like their approval too?”
“Yes.”
“Here’s where you couldn’t possibly know what’s happening. You can’t read their minds, so you don’t know what guys are thinking when they look at you. Impossible, you’ve never been a teenage guy, and you can’t sit around with them in the locker room when they talk about girls. With me so far?”
“Uh-huh.” Josie was intrigued but cautious about where this was going.
Mom said, “You’ve seen Greg on videos lots of times. Would you trust that he knows what boys and men are thinking when they look at girls?”
“Yes.”
“Here’s what he wrote to teenage girls but also to their parents:
There is not a single sixteen-year-old guy on the face of the planet who looks at a pretty girl and thinks, “Wow, I am so unconditionally interested in her happiness.” That means that no sixteen-year-old guy is capable of loving a teenage girl. Oh, there might be one somewhere living in a cave in Tibet, but I haven’t met him. Girls are seriously ignorant about the thoughts and intentions of boys, and someone needs to teach them.
When boys are attracted to a girl without a deep knowledge of their emotional and spiritual qualities—which is always the case—exactly what are they attracted to? The geometric symmetry of their bodies? Their hair follicles? Their bone structure?
No, they’re attracted to them sexually. Now, I do not mean to imply that every boy is actively interested in having sex with every “attractive” girl—although that’s not far from the truth—but I am saying that the attraction is not mathematical or architectural. Absurd. It’s a sexual attraction.
What does that mean for girls who are working so hard to be attractive and get a guy’s approval? It means that they’re exerting great effort and concentration on becoming the objects of sexual fantasy or even being used sexually, and those are not especially elevated goals, emotionally or spiritually.
Girls need their mothers—or fathers—to ask a very specific question: “Do you want to be used as a sexual object, either physically or in fantasy?” It’s a simple question that VERY few women have actually considered.
Some women have no reason to suppose that they’ll ever be more than sexual objects, so they’re content to answer “yes” to that question, but most girls do have a hope of being more in life than an object.
Most girls who understand the thoughts and desires of boys are far less eager to look sexually attractive. Parents need to remind their girls of this question and possible outcomes, so that girls don’t follow a path that NEVER ends well.
The Fluctuating Fantasy of the Perfect Weight
Now, what if a girl simply wants to look reasonably pretty, just for fun? Then we come to the subject of weight, as exemplified by Josie above. In the past couple of decades it has become quite fashionable for women to appear as though they are starving to death. This unnatural and often unhealthy goal causes a lot of emotional problems.
Josie’s mother showed her pictures of movie stars from fifty years ago, and Josie saw that the women at that time did not appear to have been raised in prison camps. They were healthy looking, with a shine to their skin and “meat on their bones.” They were still physically fit, just not thin to the point of being scary.
Then Mom showed her the paintings of Peter Paul Rubens from the 1600s, who depicted women from his day in all their perfection. By today’s standards, they were plump, what we might call plus-sized. And they’re GORGEOUS without being emaciated. No skinny jeans for these chicks, and yet you can’t take your eyes off them.
Mom and Josie studied the history of fashion together—just a brief overview—and they learned that “beauty” in fashion has been completely arbitrary over the years. What is beautiful now would have been considered outrageous or bizarre in past ages, and what they wore in some periods would be viewed similarly in our time.
The Real Effect of the Need for Approval
Mom said, “You’re beautiful, kid. I mean it. And if you try to change your appearance to be attractive, two things will happen: (1) You’ll be selling yourself as an object, and (2) you’ll be changing who you are to conform to a totally arbitrary fashion. Is it worth it?”
Josie realized that she didn’t want to be a slave to fashion or other people. She and Mom talked about this subject on many occasions, and gradually Josie cared less and less about her weight.
The more loved she felt, the less “nervous eating” she did, so eventually she settled at a weight she felt comfortable with—fit but not skinny.
For the first time she enjoyed being in her body without torturing it. This attitude gave her increased confidence in unrelated things as well, so that her overall level of happiness noticeably elevated.
When we stop trying to make other people like us, and get their approval, it’s like being freed from prison. As parents we can teach our children to do this.
