"Drink plenty of water", "Eat
less carbs and fat, but more fruit and veg"; "Sleep more - exercise
more", "Dress in layers when it is cold and wet outside" ... this type
of advice is the most banal, the kind we all know because we've heard it
endless times, some of us probably since childhood.
And yet it is (largely) just
this kind of most banal advice I found in the electronic pages of "The
Feelgood Factory on Looking Gorgeous", the book out of the "Infinite
Ideas" series I finished reading some time last week.
Every now and then, there were
some make-up tips or other (more or less) useful bits of advice such as
exercises for a better posture sprinkled across the chapters, but
honestly, they are hardly worth downloading this book, let alone reading
it - even though it was for free.
Maybe some women nod
enthusiastically when they read sentences such as "We know the bust size
of every Hollywood actress and soap star on the box" - sorry, I'm not
one of them.
And what about advising women
to touch the people they are talking to on the arm, while flashing
smiles at them, making sure those smiles wrinkle your eyes so that its
fakeness is not instantly obvious? What does it reveal about an
author's* self-perception as a woman when each and every tip comes with
the label "to make yourself attractive to men", "to look your best so
that men will notice you"?
Of course I want to be
attractive, and of course I want to look my best according to each
situation - a different kind of look for, say, when I'm out running with
my friend than to what I wear to the office where I want the visual
impression of me match the skill and experience I have acquired in my
line of work.
But believe it or not, I am
not constantly wondering what impression I am making on men, and when I
eat or drink, it is not with a constantly nagging voice in my head,
telling me that this is unhealthy and will go straight to my hips.
Some of us actually do like
themselves, you know, and are not permanently trying to optimize their
looks - in spite of me really, really liking nice clothes, especially
dresses.
On the whole, I found the
advice given here way too banal (beauty "secrets"? I didn't come across any) and what the author obviously expects to
be the average woman's motivation for wanting to look and feel good
surprisingly shallow.
I enjoyed previously read books from the "Infinite Ideas" series. This one was disappointing. Entirely my own fault, of course - what else did I expect from a book of that title? And I could have simply stopped reading as soon as I realized which way this was heading. Why I still continued until the end of this (fortunately short) book is anyone's guess, mine including.
* The book was co-authored by several women, led by Elisabeth Wilson.
Thanks for warning me off this! I'm sure I wouldn't enjoy reading it either!
ReplyDeleteIt was plain stupid of me to download it in the first place, really.
DeleteNope, it's not going on my reading list... But somehow we always tend to feel a little bit tempted by promises of quick-fixex, don't we?? At least enough to cast at glance at them if they turn up in the magazine we're flickering through, or on a website, or... ;)
ReplyDeleteYou got it right, Monica :-)
Delete