Teaching little girls to love their physical selves
A lot of us have complicated relationships with our bodies, myself included. Even at my skinniest, I never felt that I was good enough. This all-common feeling is something that can only be attributed to years of exposure to impossible beauty standards. I had the pleasure of making a new friend recently who’s inspiring me to love my body more and is working on letting the next generation of Filipino girls have a better foundation with this mindset.
Tanya Maria Aguila is a certified yoga and Pilates educator. She’s the founder of One Life Studio, the only chain of boutique physical therapy and Pilates studios in the Philippines. Tanya is also a first-time mom. The arrival of her daughter Laura was quite the blessing their family prayed for for years. Now that she’s here, Tanya sees raising her as her next big adventure and something she wants to do well.
“On my seventh month of pregnancy, we were really focusing on finishing the nursery. There was a big book sale and my husband reminded me it was time to get our daughter’s first books,” Tanya shared. She wanted books that would help Laura grow up with a positive relationship with her body. “There were no such books available locally and the ones I saw on Amazon were focused on fitness. I didn’t find anything on accepting the whole body in any shape, size, or form.”
Pressed for a solution, Aguila wrote Me and My Body herself one evening as her husband slept. She later called a friend, illustrator Gerald Co, who’s also a father to two girls, to work on the layout and visuals. When Laura arrived, she was the first tester for the book and Tanya was thrilled she loved it. “We were particular about the colors. We wanted it to be a book that would really appeal to children five and below,” she said.
The book features a little girl in pastel hues, talking about the things that make her body different and why there’s much to love. These affirmations, found in the pages Tanya wrote, don’t just appeal to little girls but even grown-up women who need a reminder every now and then. “Loving your body is a continuous journey,” Tanya admitted that what kept her sane after giving birth was not giving in to the pressure of bouncing back, no matter how difficult it was, thanks to social media. She also mentioned how the journey to love one’s body isn’t linear. Sometimes, you’ll find yourself back to square one. These cycles, she said, are all normal. “My belief is that it will never really be over. That voice in your head that always talks to you about your insecurities will always be there,” she said. “You can learn to—not exactly tune it out—but change the conversations you have with that voice in your head. As time passes, you’ll learn to be smarter with the way you deal with that voice.” Tanya added that, after all, if we want to change the conversation, we must start with ourselves.
‘My belief is that it will never really be over. That voice in your head that always talks to you about your insecurities will always be there.’
Me and My Body is Tanya’s gift to Laura as she turns one next week and her gift to other Filipino girls growing up in the age of social media. “I want Laura to grow up happy, confident, and courageous enough to make choices for herself. Choices that come from a happy place,” Tanya said. The book is available at MeandMyBodyBook.com. Part of the proceeds goes to Mano Amiga, an NGO providing quality education to children in need.
Hearing Filipino on the international stage
Something that gives me grief is when I meet Filipino children who cannot speak a word of our national language. I’m no mother so I know it shouldn’t be my place to evangelize on this sort of thing. What do I know about actually raising kids? I feel like we can’t really claim, however, that we love our country when we prefer to raise the next generation ashamed of our own language and culture.
Whereas European parents speak in their own language to their kids while encouraging them to be multilingual, generations of Filipinos have been made to speak anything but Filipino. “I feel like my child will be confused,” a Filipino mom married to a German told me about their newborn. “I think I will teach her English then her dad can do the German side.” Thankfully, she later changed her mind. A psychologist once told me that it’s sad how some parents underestimate their kids. Children are able to absorb multiple languages so much better at a young age.
I also couldn’t help but compare this mindset to that of a Japanese friend married to an Austrian. She speaks to their daughter in Japanese, the dad speaks in German, and they use English as their family language. At six, the child is fluent in all three.
It’s so refreshing to hear tennis star Alex Eala give a speech in Filipino when she won at the US Open. I’m no tennis fan but I found myself glued to the video, quite chuffed over what I was hearing. I feel like it made her victory even more meaningful. Finally, people can see that it’s perfectly fine—and quite beautiful—to hear our own language on the international stage. Maybe our beauty queens can follow suit, employing interpreters just like a lot of the representatives who come from non-English speaking countries. It diminishes pressure, allowing for better answers, and letting the world hear how expressive Filipino can be. I think it’s time we get rid of preferring English over Filipino as a status symbol. Just a thought.