Embrace, encourage, accept

Yesterday afternoon I was invited to a screening of Embrace.

At the time of receiving the invite I had no idea what the movie was about so I did what most people would do and asked Google.

A funny, touching, at times gut wrenching but above all, life changing documentary – Embrace is Taryn Brumfitt’s story. How she went from a body hater to a body lover. From being devastated by her perceived ugliness to proudly posing nude for the whole world to see.

I watched the trailer, turned to my boss (who is a man) and said “Yeah, I guess that’s something I’d watch”. He looked confused (because he sits across the room from me so had no idea what I was on about) so I explained that I’d been invited to a screening of a movie and I’d just watched the trailer. I told him that Embrace was a documentary about women and how they hated their bodies and the movie was an attempt to encourage us (women folk) to be more accepting of ourselves.

I then said

“Although I think that’s a young woman’s problem. Once you get to my age, you’re just pretty chuffed that your body still works … “

But – Is it an age thing?

There was a time in my life where I wasn’t happy with the body I was in and perhaps the weirdest thing of all to admit is that I was perhaps the least happy when I was at my very smallest. It’s taken a long time for me to get to the stage where I’m far more grateful for what this body can do than what it looks like in a pair of jeans and without a doubt moving away from a sport that is all about aesthetics to one that was performance based had a lot to do with getting to this point.

So perhaps age has nothing to do with it, perhaps it has to do more with who you choose to surround yourself with?

I know that the women around me (both single and coupled up) do not bemoan their bodies for what they look like.  However it’s not uncommon for them to discuss creaking joints and how much longer it takes us to feel “normal” upon rising for the day (although it’s nothing a little caffeine can’t fix though).  They do however celebrate all the things that their bodies can do, whether that be running fast, running far, lifting shit off the ground and putting it down repeatedly or climbing mountains.

The women I know are pretty bad arse!

Embrace screens at 6.30pm next Wednesday at St Lukes.

The showing only goes ahead if 55 seats are sold so it would be awesome if any of you who haven’t seen it grab a ticket using this link.

Note – you’ll only get charged if the threshold number is reached. At this point, you are only providing payment details to reserve a seat/s and yes there will be ice cream available! (I know this because I asked) 😉 .

Till next time