Lately, I’ve started exercising a bit more in hopes of getting rid of my dizziness due to low blood pressure and just in general achieving a lifestyle that will decrease my chances of various diseases as I get older. A little exercise is a big thing for me, because I find it tremendously boring. To motivate myself, I’ve tried to find a good routine that I can do from home and some motivational and educational photos and articles relating to exercise.
One thing that bothered me as I looked around was how the media seems to think that it’s more acceptable to show off unrealistically gorgeous, undressed and big breasted models that are toned instead of regular unrealistically gorgeous, undressed, big breasted skinny models. I guess the idea is that the toned models are supposed to be a “healthier” ideal for girls and women and therefore won’t cause as much body issues and is seen as less vain/objectifying…? It’s just the same thing with a different coat of paint. It’s still a woman with body type that a few of us can hope to achieve and puts far too much focus on becoming more attractive to men rather than improving your health, or god forbid, strength. Because don’t even start me on the ridiculous things I’ve heard about women who dare to gain more muscles than what is considered feminine.
In the end it all comes down to representing more body shapes and focusing more on health and sports. I think the obsession with beauty and the fixation on one specific body type is unhealthy for both genders. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be beautiful, but something is clearly wrong when people worry far more about being attractive than their health or excellence. Holley Mangold is a good example of a woman who is physically strong and has excelled in sports but whose looks doesn’t conform to the ideal that is pushed at us, but it’s not her image or anyone that resemblance her that I find in articles about female fitness.
So that’s my 2 cents. For those of you that are interested, here are two pages that I’ve used to put together my work-out routine.
poisoningpigeons 