We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle - 18. “BEAUTY”: How did we get trapped in this cage, and how do we break free?

Episode Date: August 17, 2021

1. Why are we conditioned to spend so much of our precious time and energy on our appearance? 2. Why is it that when men put work into the world, the world asks if his work is worthy—but when women put work into the world, the world asks if she’s worthy?  3. Why is half the population’s face allowed to exist as is, while the rest of our faces “need” to be covered in concealers, colors, botox, etc., etc....? 4. How is it that the ultimate way to insult a woman is to say that she’s “let herself go”? 5. The better “beauty” standard for women that is liberating Glennon right now.

Hi, everybody. Thanks for coming back to We Can Do Hard Things. We Recorded this episode before this latest onslaught of pain in the world. Our hearts are breaking for the people of Afghanistan and Haiti. We started our nonprofit together rising a decade ago, and so many of you have joined us in turning our collective heartbreak and fury and hope into effective service for people in crisis all over the world. Together, we've raised over $30 million of life-saving, world-changing aid. The day after the most recent Haiti earthquake, we committed $250,000 to Haiti, and through Friday, every penny that Together Rising receives will be deployed to provide urgent relief there. We're currently also vetting the most responsible ways to serve in Afghanistan, and we'll have

ways to help there to share with you soon. We know that being a citizen of this world in pain is hard, but we can and will do hard things. We will never allow the fact that we cannot fix it all to keep us from doing what we can. We will keep showing up for ourselves, for each other, for the world. Thank you for standing with us. You can give a togetherrising.org slash give. And you can follow all of the Together Rising stories at Together Rising on Instagram. And I continue to believe the best people are free.

Hi, everybody. Welcome back to We Can Do Hard Things. I just want to jump in because I am so freaking excited about this conversation you're about to hear. It has lit a fire inside of me. and I hope it does for you too. It's about beauty. It's about the ideas of beauty that keep us stuck and keep us caged and keep us feeling like we are not enough.

And it's about how to see that for what it is. And reclaim the idea of beauty not as something that we have to be in order to earn worthiness, but as something that we get to fill ourselves up with every single day. Let's get started. Hello. Hello, Glennon Doyle. I am sitting in my pantry right now. And I'm really looking forward to this conversation with you about beauty

because it feels like a conversation we've been having for many low, so many. decades. And I want to start by kind of describing what I've been thinking about as my relationship to this idea of beauty, whatever the hell, this idea of beauty is that's planted in us young and that some of us spend our lives chasing to earn worthiness, right? So I was thinking a lot about myself as a kid and thinking about, you know, when you're a kid, you kind of learn, you just start to learn how to be human and how other people relate to you and how to make people happy and how to be pleasing and how to make your way in the world. And one of the ways I learned very early to make my way in the world was that I was a really cute kid. Yep. I was a very cute

kid. I matched the look of what a cute kid looks like, right? I like long ringlets and, you know, and I remember that cuteness earning me praise and approval from grownups. I could see it on their faces. I could see them kind of open up to me. I could see them like reach down and pat me on the head, all the touching, all the, you know, they would light up. And so I learned, oh, this is like a currency. Now, obviously I wouldn't have had that language as a kid, but I did understand that, which meant adolescence was unbelievably painful to me. Like when I think about when a lot of my eating disorder started and all of the pain came for me right around 10-11 when I started to lose all that adorableness, right?

When I, you know, got serious acne and I got started to gain weight and my hair went all wiry. And like I just, I could, sister, like, I remember feeling you. Oh, I really only remember feelings as a kid. But I remember going from the world adoring me to the world kind of like looking away from me. Right. A little girl becoming fully human instead of a doll and becoming greasy and oily and chunky and frizzy and zitty and. that humanness, it's like girls aren't allowed to become human. It felt like a fall from grace, right? Like I had lost all of my currency and I had no idea how to get it back and I feel like I spent

and sometimes still spend my life trying to get back to that, well, whatever the beauty standard is that allows us to all be adored. And that, it's so interesting because if you hadn't had that experience. Because many, many people go through the awkward middle school adolescent period. But it's interesting that yours is the juxtaposition with the adored cute kid. And sometimes I wonder if folks are better off who never had the first period, right? Because if you're learning that your value is in that, if you're learning that the warmth of the world and the adoration of world comes from that and that's your, that is where you find your value. And then you lose it. It's this destabilizing force where you know that you are actually worth less than you were before.

Yes. And when you're, and that's why even the positive, I think some people think, well, if you're saying positive things about little girl's looks or anyone's looks, then that's fine. And it's not. Because when you over and overall, oh, you're pretty, you're pretty, you do. then you learn that that is important. Do you learn that that is important to your parents? It's like freaking purity culture where like, you know, if you're, if you're, as a woman, if your worth is in never having had sex, then what about when you become a sexual being? You lose all of that worthiness.

The beauty and the purity culture are the same bullshit. It's a veiled threat. Yes. Yes. of or compliment on how you look is really, I interpret as a veiled threat of don't, don't lose that, don't not do that anymore because the praise you're getting right now will be easily and swiftly withdrawn. Yes.

Yes. Positive or negative, it's still saying your worth isn't how you appear. Either good job or bad job. But we're paying close attention. Right. Yeah. The council is monastic. monitoring carefully. That's right. And the idea that there is a council and it gets to monitor and comment is so crazy making. The fact like when you really look at it, when you think about the fact that people can just walk around all day commenting on women's appearance, the entitlement that the world has to just say whatever the hell they want to say about women at any time. Right. Right. Well, it's communal property. It's like when you're pregnant and just random strangers feel like they can approach you and put their actual

hands on your actual body because you've somehow become like a part of communal property. For me, that was my first year of college when I went away to school and it was a really tough transition for me to go to school and I gained probably 20 pounds. It was and I came back and I remember that summer and I remember just. ice faces and just kind of looks of pity and, um, and, and the direct comments. And I remember walking through the mall and some guy said to me, you used to be so pretty just as I was walking through the mall. And then, and then my good friend from high school sat, sat me down and said, and said, you just really need to not let yourself go.

And that was my moment of understanding that myself was the way that I appeared. That that letting myself go was letting my body not be what people wanted it to be. Yeah, because I'm sure all those people, wow. It's so interesting that idea that like the ultimate insult we can offer a woman is to let herself go. And that's because what women are told to do constantly is control themselves, right? Like you cannot trust your desire, you cannot trust your skin, you cannot trust your hair,

not trust your appetite. You cannot try. You have to keep a tight rain on all of those things. So success is control yourself. Do not trust yourself. Control every bit of yourself. Failure is letting yourself be. Letting yourself go. That kind of freedom is intolerable. Right. And there's a there's we control ourselves for good reason. I mean, because when you think about a woman and what she does in the world, it does, I mean, never mind that I had gone to college, adjusted to a brand new world, and gotten straight A's. No one was interested in talking about that. That was not relevant if I didn't also look the way I was supposed to look. And that gets replicated a thousand times over every, in all aspects of life. So you, you all, anything you do in your family, in your work, in whatever it is that you

devote yourself to becomes completely invalidated, you can't be secure in that because the world always has this nuclear option. We're always living under threat of that all of that becomes invalidated by she's fat and ugly. That's right. It's just no matter how secure we get, we're always subject to that insecurity. And that is completely outside of our control. and that is intentional. Because the whole idea of beauty is all about currency and control. I mean, it's just, if you look, it's just not, it's not an opinion. It is correct that when you look at, oh, and we should get into this, because when you look

at every society, it's just as you, as women gain security and independence and gaining currency, that's actually within their control. The backlash is to put us back in a place of constant insecurity in which our power is not based on what we can achieve and build ourselves and keep ourselves, but it is based on external perceptions that are totally out of our control. Right. So you're a successful business person. You're a successful mother. You're a successful human. You're doing your, you're making a life. You're out there. It doesn't matter because the nuclear your option is always, yeah, but your fat, but you're ugly. And it's like this way of putting women back into this cage. And that's just for the average woman trying to go about her life.

Forget it if you are a woman, I mean, when you look at women who are running for office, women who are in the media, any woman whose ideas are threatening or whose power is threatening, they are 90% of the time, the comments about them are about their appearance. Oh, absolutely. I mean, I've always thought, when men put work out into the world, the world asks, is this man's work worthy? Okay. And when a woman puts work out into the world, the world asks, is this woman worthy

of even putting out work? So all of the attention and response and feedback doesn't even go to the work. I see this all the time. It goes to the woman. We look at her appearance. We look at her relationships. We look at her personality. We look at all of the things.

And we decide we attack her, not even the work. And I think it's settled and people don't even realize they're doing it. I mean, when you, when anyone indicates through, it's kind of an audacious thing to walk around just. looking what you look like. It's so bold. And daring to use your voice. And if you say anything controversial or anything powerful, I mean, it's just when you indicate through your words or through your appearance that you are actually having

priorities that are other than pleasing men. Yes. Other than kicking your own ass to look hot, then the people who want to maintain those traditional gender roles in which all of your time. and all of your priorities are looking hot, punish you. Yeah. I mean, that's how I feel now about, like, what's inspiring to me and what's not. It's like not, you know, people, I think what we put up these, one of the ways we keep women trapped in this body and beauty standard is that we put out examples and ideals, right, in the form of human beings.

Like, look at this woman, like, feel like crap because you don't look like this woman. And, you know, there is the kind of human woman you see where it is apparent that most of their time and energy is spent on beauty, right? You can see it in the appearance. And that is okay and a choice and understandable because, my God, this world does offer pretty privilege to people. and it is understandable that some women are just wanting to play the game. I get that. I do that. But there's this other kind of woman who's emerging more and more now who you can see doesn't spend all of their time trying to conform to a beauty standard.

Right. You can see through their body and their clothes and their face and whatever that they have some different priorities that often look like they include joy. and like savoring things and, you know, being the subject of their life instead of the object of everyone else's lives, like caring more about their gaze at the world than the world's gaze at them. And that is so inspiring to me right now. When I see a woman who doesn't look like she's kicking her own ass to get the pretty privilege that the world offers. Well, she's not participating in the standard. And what's so interesting to me, like just look at the beauty standard. The actual word standard means an idea that is used to measure in comparative evaluations.

Okay. It's an idea and to be used in comparative evaluations. So in order to evaluate women against one another, it is, it doesn't even exist as a thing. It's just an idea. It's a bad idea. I mean, beauty. and I really want to talk about this, but beauty is a made up thing. It is not fixed. It is not universal. It is very much related to whatever political, economic situation of a culture is,

which we should talk about. But, but so it's just this idea that is very intentionally placed. But I just feel like running around and screaming like, we're in Oz, okay? And I want to scream, there is no wizard. It's just an old man pulling knobs. Like if we all decided not to participate in the standard, it would go away because there would be no comparative analysis. If every woman just decided, I'm going to stop trying to fix what isn't broken because nothing about me is broken and we all set it down, there would actually not be a beauty standard because it only exists because we're all striving to meet it. Yeah, it's so good. And also, so the reason to not participate is number one, so it goes away. And so we break that bondage, that like,

that terrible job that we keep passing down to other generations. But also, because you can't win it. like there's no winning it. So I experienced this when I first started dating Abby. Somebody sent me, one of my friends, sent me this link to all of these horrible things that people were saying about me. Okay, we have to just, I mean, that cannot. What is that about? What is this thing about where people report to you, things that people say bad about you? And it's in the reporting of it, they're saying, I don't agree with it.

But I mean, it's as if they're bringing a huge pile of dog shit and laying it on your front porch and saying, I also don't like the smell of this dog shit. But it's still on your front porch. And you weren't going out looking for it. That's exactly right. People need to stop doing that. Just please stop. I mean, it's a little bit. It's comparable people to the beauty standard.

All right? It's like I didn't know I had a problem until you told me I was shit. And now I'm upset. So thank you. This show is brought to you by Alma. When I first tried to find a therapist, it felt like a scavenger hunt with no map, pages of names, long wait lists, voicemails that never got returned. I remember thinking if this is what it takes just to talk to someone, no wonder people

give up. So when I found Alma, it felt like someone finally turned the lights on. Alma, ALMA, is this beautifully simple. simple way to find licensed in-network therapists without all the runaround. You can browse without even making an account and you can filter for what actually matters. The therapist's approach, background, specialty, lived experience, whatever helps you feel understood. Nearly everyone who finds a therapist through Alma, 97% say they felt genuinely seen and heard. Better with people. Better with Alma. Visit hello alma.com.

We Can to schedule a free consultation today. That's hello-a-l-m-a-com slash W-E-C-A-N. For your child, as the school year continues, patterns start to emerge. You can see what's clicking and where a little extra reinforcement could help. That's where I-X-L steps in, giving kids targeted practice so they can strengthen those areas early and keep moving forward with confidence. I-X-L is an award-winning online learning platform that supports math, language arts, science, and social studies from pre-K through 12th grade.

What I love is how seamlessly it fits alongside what's already happening in the classroom. Your child can practice the same skills they're learning at school, which makes it easier to keep up, feel prepared, and really understand the material. I-Excel is used in 96 of the top 100 school districts in the U.S. Make an impact on your child's learning. Get I-Exel now. And we can do hard things listeners can get an exclusive 20% off I-XL membership when they sign up today at www.

www. Ixl.com slash we can. Visit Ixel.com slash we can to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price. Anyway, yes, so I started reading these freaking things people were saying and the overall feeling of it. And I know you remember these days, sister, was she's ugly, she's old. she's shouldn't be with Abby. It was just very terrible mean things. Okay.

So I, it was, how shall we say, triggering to me. It was a bit triggering to me. And I, first subconsciously and then just because I don't know how to do anything with moderation, I spent the next months just, I don't know how to, just transforming myself into a, what I now see as like, like perhaps I could have been on the. real housewives. Like I just, I froze my face. I bleached my hair more. I added extension. I did eyelashes. I did all of the things, which I understand now, I give myself, I feel sad for myself because it is like I was putting on armor. Right? Like I felt deeply like, oh, I'm coming,

this is a time when I'm going to be more exposed because of Abby, because of all the things. And I am a public woman in the world and now I cannot be human because because of the nuclear option because no matter what I do, they can say, but if I make myself plastic, if I make myself into a Barbie, if I do the thing where I match the ideal, then I'm safe. Right. And so I did that. And I turned myself into as close as a Barbie as a 5 foot 2, 45 year old woman. And I got pretty close.

And then this article was written and came out and somebody sent it to me about how the only reason that I had any success with my books is because I was blonde and pretty and thin. Okay. Because I was palatable to the world because I matched the beauty standard. So see what happened. there is that at first I was not allowed to be out in the world as a human woman because I was too ugly and old. And then when I went the other direction, I was not allowed to be out in the world and have any success because I was too pretty and young looking. So, no, you were allowed to have success, but your success became not based on anything from inside of you. It became based on

your beauty. So, so anything that you build, if you're able to build it to break through, then your breaking through is attributed to your looks. Yes. And there is there, to be fair, there is some truth in that. I mean, the fact, there is, um, pretty privilege. It is a very specifically white supremacist structure of beauty. Yes. And aside, everybody go to get, One drop, Yaba Blay, Dr. Yabablay talks about this so beautifully. Sorry, go ahead, sister. Yes, everyone read Dr. Yerba Blay. I mean, and in our everyday lives, women who are deemed attractive get more job offers. They earn 20% more than what 20% more dollars for the same work as women who are deemed average looking. But then it's this double bind that you're talking about

because then women who are deemed too beautiful, they are perceived as not worthy of trust and they are perceived as being deserving of getting fired. So you have exactly like a two inch window. You have to be pretty enough, but not too pretty because then your success is attributed to your beauty and people don't trust you and you need to get fired. So it's it's all. all just. It's horseshit. And like, if this is confusing to you, if this has been a burden on your life, if you spend a lot of time feeling not good enough or not beautiful enough or not, that's not

because you're crazy, right? That's not because you have any deficiency in yourself. That's not because you're not meeting a standard. It's because the world is designed this way to do this to you so that you spend your one wild and precious life, not creating, not feeling, not loving, not whatever, but chasing this uncatchable what we call dirty pink bunny, right? That is correct. That is correct. And that is what it is for me, I think it is crazy that we all think we are crazy. Like this is what I want every person to understand is that they, when they, when they, when they take polls of America, the number one most often cited goal.

of any goal in a woman's life is to lose weight. Okay. That is her number one goal. It is not economic independence. It is not job security and advancement. It is not some goal for justice or deeper, more fulfilling relationships. It is to lose weight. Okay. When we think about, you have to go back historically and see, like in the 19, in the, in the 1910s, okay, women started joining the workforce for the first time because of World War I, right? They needed us because all the men were at war. We came into the workforce, got more independence. In the 1920s, women earned the right to vote. Okay, it is not a coincidence that just as women won more independence and started making their way into these forbidden territories, into elected office,

into universities, into professions, that that is exactly the time when the standard of female beauty as thinness started to prevail in America. Okay? That requirement, just as we are becoming a threat to power, is the ideal female body books like a malnourished pre-adolescent girl. Mm-hmm. Who is utterly non-threatening. Mm.

It is, it's intentional. And it, and it, and it totally depends. I just feel like we wake up. We think that is pretty. Oz, you know, the wizard told us. And so we should keep doing this. The wizard is trying to, trying to establish and reestablish norms that work for the power structure. That's right.

And it isn't even, it, it, so the beauty, the idea of beauty is a tool of oppression. I'm just saying that standards or beauty are not static. It's not an untamed idea. It's a taming. It's a conditioning. It's why when anyone ever says to me, I don't know if you have this thought, but when someone says, you're pretty, what that means to me is it doesn't feel like a deep, true compliment to me. I always feel a little bit of shame in it because what that means to me is I see what you've done there.

You have kicked your own ass to match very closely the beauty standard that's been put out for us in this particular culture in this particular time. Well done. And another way to say that is very good. you are meeting the function we require of women in this society. So it makes me feel just obedient. It makes me feel like, oh, you're a good little soldier for the patriarchy. Good job. That's why I feel so empowered by and inspired by.

And I feel like a fire lights inside of me when I see a woman who looks like they are doing work in the world this way. that way, but like they're not being a good little soldier. And I feel like it's just important to acknowledge it because I'm talking about all of this. I mean, I know I was a women studies major. I know all this stuff. And it still completely screws me up 100 times a day. Like I just, it is, I feel like it's important. I just collective acknowledgement that we have been, it's like we're in one of those like cults,

but we're all inside of it. And so we can't see it. And I just think we're not going to solve this problem. The universe of the world is not going to opt out to the beauty standard and make it obsolete, although we could and we should try. But just acknowledging that we are in a beauty cult and it's so hard for us to see. And we live in a culture where we have been reared from the very beginning that this is our universally, God, Put it into the world. And so we should have some compassion for ourselves, truly. Absolutely. But like we should give a mantra over and over again. Like the world says this is what's beautiful. And then we just try to claim over and over again, what's beautiful is not, is caring less.

And it has a, and calling it out when we see it. I mean, all of this has a very, it's a personal impact to our life the way that they are. Like women being being called out for their beauty makes them not run for office. As we are desperately trying to control our faces and our bodies, we are losing utter control of our bodies. Amen. Say that. Retweet.

Say it again. Say it more. I mean, all of the legislation in Texas, in Mississippi, in every, I mean, we literally have lost control of our bodies while we're spending our lives obsessing about controlling our bodies. That's right. That's right. That's right. Let's come back with some hard questions. If you're a business owner who knows nothing about AI and feels really out of the loop, you're not alone.

In today's data-driven world, you really need to understand your customers. And NetSuite can deliver those insights with zero fuss. No more waiting. With NetSuite, you can integrate AI into your operations today. NetSuite is the number one AI cloud ERP, trusted by over 43,000 businesses. It brings your financials, inventory, commerce, HR, and CRM into one single source of truth. And now with NetSuite AI connector, you can use the AI of your choice and connect it to your actual business data. So you can finally ask every question you've ever had, who are key customers, what's our cash on hand, what's trending in our inventory, and you can automate all those manual processes no one wants to do. Right now, get our free business guide, demystifying AI at net suite.com slash hard things. The guide is free to you at net suite.com slash hard things.

NetSuite.com slash hard things. This time of year, I am always looking for my sweaters. Luckily, Quince has all of the staple sweaters covered from soft Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like designer pieces without the markup to 100% silk tops and skirts for easy dressing up. to perfectly cut denim for everyday wear. I can't tell you how much I'm loving my quince cashmere sweater in this gorgeous oatmeal color.

It's become the thing I grab almost every day. It's held up beautifully. It still feels soft. And it honestly looks way more expensive than it is. You know how frugal I am. And I've started picking up a few quince pieces for home too. They have travel bags and sheets. Their sheets are awesome.

10 out of 10. Refresh your wardrobe with quince. Don't wait. Go to quince.com slash hard things for free shipping on your order and 360. day returns. Now available in Canada, too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com slash hard things to get free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash hard things. Okay, hard questions. Our first is a write-in. Actually, this was a bunch of people on Instagram asked us, sister, Amanda, to talk about makeup. What are our makeup takes? I have to say, I've had every take under the sun about makeup. I started

wearing a lot of makeup in adolescence when I became very, very zitty. So I used to just cover my face with whatever it is, foundation. And then I wore a lot of makeup my whole life. I mean, up until probably five years ago, every day, foundation, eye shadow, mascara, all of it, all of it, every single day. Okay. And then I started feeling like, what am I doing? I think I just, when you start looking at like, are the guys doing it, right? Which is not always a good way to analyze feminist issues, but it is almost always.

ways a good way to analyze the most issues. So the question being like, okay, wait, this makeup thing, are the guys doing it? And then you start thinking about like what, this is so weird that half the population, their face is cool. They're good, right? Their face is okay. Their face is fit for public consumption. But the other half women, their face is, I guess, so like inadequate or jacked up or ugly or not fit for public consumption that they have to plaster and cover themselves every morning with colors. Isn't that weird when you actually think about it? It's so weird. I would just be like looking at the guys like, what? What? Yours is so great? Like I feel like the boldness to just walk around showing your face without all these

bottles. Your raggedy, raggedy face is acceptable to the world, but the rest of the But, it's fascinating, isn't it? I mean, it's, it's just one set of faces, just the world must adapt to accept. And then the other set of faces, the faces must adapt for the world to accept. Exactly. It's so weird. So there's Chad over there, just hanging out with his face hanging out, right? Just his face all over his face.

He got an hour this morning that I didn't get. He got like $100 this morning that I didn't get because of all. all of these various bottles that I'm constantly convinced are going to change my life, I guess. I don't know. And I remember holding up this bottle of concealer. Okay, so there's like this stuff that you dab that someone convinced me along the line that I had to not only do the foundation, but I had to dab this white liquid underneath my eyeballs so that the lines or dark circles under my eyes from tiredness would not show to the world. Okay, that's important. So, One day I was looking at this concealer and I was like, what the hell? So now as a woman, I have to

hold up, you know, 80% of the sky. So I'm effing tired. I'm tired because I'm working so hard. But now my job in the morning is to cover up that tiredness so that I don't inconvenience the world that I'm saving constantly by showing the world that I am tired from having to save it. I'm protecting the world from my experience of that world. Yes, yes. You're saving the world from the evidence of the fact that you were saving the world. So that they don't have to be like, oh, that's not sweet. I don't like to look at that.

So the world doesn't say, oh, Glennon, you look so tired today, which people like to say. So I find makeup baffling and confusing when I had this, you know, Chad's face versus my face, concealer, no concealer. I promised myself, I had this experiment or I was going to

wear no makeup forever. And then I decided that that hurt my feelings. Oh, that's when you decided that

tinted moisturizer wasn't makeup? No, it's medicine. Medicine. Tinted. Tinted moisturizer is medicine. It's medicinal.

So I now wear tinted moisturizer on my face, which is really just foundation. And I also use an eyebrow brush, an eyebrow pencil because I had a very unfortunate over-tweezing tragedy in the early 90s.

So I have a hole in my eyebrow, which I find unacceptable. So anyway, that's where I am in the place. But I just want to say overall that I think it's freaking weird that women have to, are suggested that we cover our faces with crap and men are not called. Men are not so called. Well, I mean, as you know, I have purchased two sets of makeup in my life, one for my first wedding and the second for my second wedding. Yes. That's right. So I better stay married because I think that three sets of makeup in a lifetime is probably a bridge too far for me.

It's just interesting to me because some people love makeup. I mean, I will watch an IG makeup tutorial for seven. minutes. I will watch people watching makeup to do. I don't know how to do any of it, but there is something so fat. So there's nothing inherently wrong with makeup. It's just the fact that we've stumbled into that it's an expectation of us and not of other people. Exactly. Is also an intentional thing. Yeah. So like when people are saying, well, I just like makeup. I do too. I just like makeup. But I am aware that I have been conditioned. Yes. To like makeup. It's not. like I was born.

Like, I just can't wait to paint my face. Right? Okay. So now we have a call in, sister. Ooh. Hi. My name is Sarah. So I just had my first child, a daughter, almost a year ago now.

And as she's growing up, I've noticed that in the toddler section, in a girl's section that stores, every shirt is like, girls are smart. Girls can do anything. Girls can do this. And I've been struggling with the idea that girls shouldn't have to plaster, that they are awesome and smart and strong on all of their clothing to prove to the world. But at the same time, understanding that maybe seeing it there and reading it on clothes and wearing it will instill these ideas of them. So I was just kind of curious on the thoughts on how to approach dressing my daughter to help her understand that she is going to be strong. and smart and that she can do anything she sets her mind to.

So that's my question and or topic idea, because there's nothing I want more in this world than to raise a strong woman who will challenge the world with her thought and grace. So thank you so much for your podcast. We love listening every day. I'll talk today. I love these people. I know I say that every time.

I'll stop. But I just, every time I listen to one of these questions, I'm like, the people who listen to this podcast, this podcast are so my kind of people. Like I just want to sit with that woman and talk about all of these things for an hour. Speaking of your kind of people, I love at the end, she said, talk to you later. It reminds me of like how you always say at the end, whatever you used to say at the end. Remember when you got on your, you're so used to saying at the end of every call and you got off the first line with the publisher of your first book.

And at the end of the call, the first time you met then, you say, okay, I love you. Bye. Oh my God. I said, I love you to like 10 fancy ass. I love you. It was the most hilarious, awkward thing. Love you by. And they just look like, uh, uh, anyway, talk to you soon, friend. Talk to you soon. I love it. Well, I just, I want you to answer this one because you do such a, I think you do a really cool job of this with Alice, your daughter. Um, I am with this collar in terms of I think it's weird. All of these t-shirts. Every time I see. a little girl wearing a t-shirt that says, girls can do anything,

I just think, but she didn't know they couldn't until you put that t-shirt on her, right? Like, when you're saying something positive, there's often a negative implied. Like, when someone's wearing a shirt that says, save the earth, what that makes me understand is the earth is in trouble.

Right? So, so, I, you know, if you apply the, like, are the boys, is there a bunch of boys t-shirts that say, boys are smart? boys can do anything. No, because it's already implied that they can. Right. So to me, it's like it's giving girls an extra job. Like now I'm part of this effort to make this thing I'm wearing true as opposed to like trying to bring them into the world not even knowing

that there's anyone who thinks that they can't do anything when they're that young. Yeah, I think I'm agnostic on the shirts. because I just feel like if people have, I mean, it's a, it's a little bit. There's some, I could see how people would get value and encouragement from that. I see both sides of that. I mean, if you're in many cases seeing, you know, seeing a Black Lives Matter sign is important because you're showing that you are allied with that message and that value. So I see, I see it either way.

I think for me, we don't, it is just, I mean, it's not going to solve anything, certainly. So I think it's just for what we do in our house, it's ironic to be answering this question about Alice's clothes. Because when Alice walks out into the world, I'm pretty sure that people feel like no one loves her. Because she wears whatever the hell she wants. And it is obvious. But I think we just focus less on clothes at all, like not giving them a power at all. And we really try not to comment on clothes or body or beauty, negative or positive. But we do do a lot of other things.

We will read a book and notice the pronouns. we will change them to she just to have that be the case. You know, Alice will ask, why do they, why do they say he here? That doesn't. She says, why asks that all the time. We, I think it's just little things, you know, what, what do you think they're trying to say about girls and boys in that? She came home the other day.

And she was like, oh, my gosh, something at school. Joshua is so confused. And I was like, what, what is it? He thinks there are boy colors and girl colors. Oh, bless her. And so she, so we talk about a lot of these things so that, so she thinks other people are confused about things. Amen. And, and I think we just try to see this. I mean, it's easy to focus on a mantra that everyone can get behind. But I think just interpreting. the world and noticing things and talking about those that don't relate to clothes and body and beauty are the way we try to do it. And like everything, it's we can obsess about what our kids are wearing. But I think they also watch us, right? I mean, I noticed the clothes thing kind of early on as a speaker. I used to think that I had to have like a fancy costume on stage. Like I'd put on fancy clothes, right, on stage. And I'd put on, like, cool shoes and like a designer dress and

whatever. And then I'd speak. And then what I'd notice, because I used to do these hugging lines, which now post-COVID feels so weird. But anyway, 50% of what women would say to me in those lines was, I love that dress or I love those shoes, or I love the, or where did you get the whatever? And it was driving me bonkers for a little while. And then I realized, oh, no, no, no. that's what I'm asking them to do. By putting all of this focus on what I'm wearing, I am requesting that of them. I'm saying to them, this is what I want you to notice. This is what I want you to talk about.

And because of that, with most of these women, I might have 10 seconds for our entire lives. And I have set this up so that during those 10 seconds where we are connecting, that's what they're asking me. And when I figure that out, that's when I switched to my like uniform of jeans, sweaters or tank tops and just because when I stopped doing that, nobody, people would say things like in those lines, people would start saying things like, oh, I loved what you said about or thank you for talking about. And nobody would be like, I really like that gray cardigan. Right. I really like that black tank top. You wear eight days a week. Right. I mean, I do. I wear, I'm wearing my pajamas right now, so I'm not wearing right now. But I wear.

I have 30 black tank tops. They're all from the same store. I wear them every day because I don't have to think about it's a uniform. Again, what are the guys doing? Why do they have their, you know, four outfits, whereas women have 49,000 different choices. It's because it's to keep our minds occupied on what we're wearing and what we're looking like instead of what we're looking at. Okay. we are going to move on to our next right thing.

It's a new year and instead of trying to reinvent myself, I've been asking a simpler question. What would actually support me right now? And honestly, a big part of that answer is my home. I want my space to feel calmer, more functional and a little more like a place that can reflect my goals and energy for this year, which is why I've been turning two way Fair. It's truly a one-stop shop for everything your home needs this season. What surprised me most was how easy it was to find exactly what I wanted in my style and within my budget, whether you're organizing kids' rooms, upgrading your work from home setup, tackling clutter, or just trying to

make weeknight dinners easy. Wayfair really does have everything. Your home doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to support the life you're living right now. Get organized, refreshed, and and back on track this new year for way less. Head to wayfair.com right now to shop all things home. That's W-A-Y-F-A-R.com. Wayfair. Every style, every home. Have you ever hit a point at work where everything just feels heavy?

Not just a bad week, but the kind of burnout where you're staring at your laptop thinking, I can't keep doing it like this. You're not alone. Strawberry.comme is career coaching that helps you get to the real root of your burnout, whether it's workload, boundaries, a tough manager, or feeling disconnected from the work you used to love. Our coaches help you untangle what's draining you, build boundaries that actually stick, redesign your day-to-day so it energizes you, and create a plan so burnout doesn't sneak back. And with a new year starting, it's the perfect moment

to rethink how you want to feel. You can get matched with a coach in just a few minutes, and sessions are flexible, private, and built around the reality of your life. Go to Strawberry strawberry dot me slash we can do hard things and try a coaching session for 50% off. Strawberry. Because your career should feel good again. All right. We've got a next right thing for all of you today. And, you know, we started this conversation by talking about the word beauty.

And I think a lot I wrote in Love Warrior about the word beautiful. You know, I'm a words person. And I started thinking hard about the word beautiful. and what you realize about that word when you think hard about it or not too hard is that it means full of beauty. Right? Beautiful means full of beauty. We have switched that concept to mean beauty on the outside, covered with beauty,

appearing beautiful. But the word means filled on the inside with beauty. Right? it's this idea that a beautiful home or a beautiful person or a beautiful relationship or a woman is a is a is a person who has so much beauty on the inside of them who has taken the time to know what beauty is and it and is so filled up with it that that you can see it radiating out right I was um out really early the other morning I don't think I even told you this yet, sister, but I was out early walking the dogs at like, I don't know, 545.

And there was this woman walking down the street. And it was just the two of us. And she looked like maybe she was, I don't know, 65 or something. But she had a full wetsuit on, no shoes, just her hair was wet. And she was carrying a surfboard on her own by herself walking back up from the beach, which means she had already been out by herself surfing. And she just looked so effing beautiful that I had to stop and stare. Like here is a woman who has figured out what beauty is to her and found a way to get it before most people are even up in the morning. And it had nothing to do with other people looking at her.

She was alone. And she was radiating. So our next right thing this week is let's figure out something that is beauty to us and then figure out a way to get it, to get filled with it this week. And if this is hard for us because we are used to being the object instead of the subject of our lives, right? We are used to being, trying to figure out how to. be wanted, not figuring out what we want, right? So this is a switch. And one tip I have that I do

sometimes is to always go back to my senses, okay, to figure out what I want or what I think is beautiful. What do I want to touch? What do I want to feel? Okay, what feels good to me? What do I want to see? What is beauty to me to see to fill up visually? What do I want to smell? Right? And I'm not. What breathing in? What is breathing in beauty to me? What do I want to taste? Right? What's filling up that way? And also, what do I want to think about? What is beauty to me that I can take into my mind? You know, we do so much of our, we are what we consume, right? And we do so much of our consumption, whether it's online or we unintentionally. Right? But one of the things I love about reading books is like you make a choice. Now, this is what I want to fill my mind with. This is beauty to me. So this week, let's think about going back to our senses, finding what is beauty to us and how will I fill up with it this week. And when life gets hard this week, don't you forget, we love you and we can do hard things. Bye-bye.

We Can Do Hard Things is produced in partnership with Cadence 13 Studios. Be sure to rate, review, and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey, or wherever you get your podcasts. Especially be sure to rate and review the podcast if you really liked it. If you didn't, don't worry about it. It's fine.