We’ve seen the ads of half-naked teenagers advertising clothing. I often wonder if those models baring so much get the irony of those ads. I wonder if they stop to think about how little they’re wearing and how and why some view those ads – and them.
It isn’t just teens exposing more of themselves; older women are also taking off more and more clothing, wearing tighter and tighter clothing, claiming to feel freer and freer because of it. They claim this makes them sexy while it leaves others wondering about their definition of freedom and their definition of sexy.
Unfortunately, this misuse of freedom and sexiness doesn’t end with teens and older women. Young girls mimic wardrobes and actions so we see middle school and even elementary school girls dressing seductively, and why wouldn’t they?
Children get the Message About Dressing Sexy & It’s Not Beautiful
Toys and movies give children seductively dressed role models. Take, for example, the Disney princesses. While there is a new found strength in many of today’s princesses, that strength is somewhat dependent on their sex appeal. Would the Little Mermaid be as entrancing if she wore a one piece swimsuit rather than those skimpy clam shells? Would Pocahontas be as admirable wearing her winter duds rather than a short leather skirt and an off the shoulder top?
We’ve given our children mixed messages. While eliminating gender identity, striving to make males and females one sexless entity, we also give our girls the misconstrued idea that they need to reveal their bodies to be sexy, strong, and loved and we’ve given our boys the misconstrued idea that they need to take advantage of sex to be respected.
We’ve forgotten that there is real beauty in waiting: in waiting to reveal your body, in waiting to entice another, in waiting to act on strong, Good, natural desires. We’ve forgotten that there is a difference between being cheap and trashy sexy and beautifully sexy.
A Case of Do As I Say, Not As I Do.
While we tell our children they can do anything, be anything, go anywhere, what we say is different from how we act. We tell our girls there is no glass ceiling but fail to dress them for success instead giving them the idea that less is more when it comes to clothing. We give them the idea that their worth comes from having a body others gawk over.
At the same time, offering a contrasting message, we eliminate labels such as “girls toys” and “girls departments.” We give girls the message that the only way they can get ahead is to deny and oppress their femininity.
We mistakenly think that by trying to make girls the same as boys, we eliminate natural and society-imposed barriers that sometimes exist. In actuality, imposed unisexism pushes girls to find other ways to express their innate desire to be beautifully feminine. This comes out in revealing clothing that emphasizes a girls’ body over her mind – the exact opposite of what the elimination of gender labels says it intends to do.
Pornography takes the mainstream even farther. While we say we are against porn, we have redefined porn to mean hardcore. What was once considered porn is now acceptable in movie theaters, in women’s novels, dinner conversations, card games, and in our children’s classrooms. There seem to be no limits to what is acceptable, driving us to seek edgier and edgier material.
We’ve given our girls mixed messages in the entertainment we offer, in our own styles and the styles we purchase for them, and even in the education we condone by our failure to investigate the message inside their classrooms. We’ve given girls the mixed message that to be successful they need to deny their femininity and dress scantily at the same time.
We’ve given our boys the idea that scantily clad girls are the norm and that modest girls are prudes to be avoided.
The result is not empowering. It is cheap, trashy, and decidedly not sexy.
And we wonder why we have violence, disillusioned, disengaged, disconnected kids.
And we wonder why, as adults, we cannot find lasting, committed, loving relationships.
The messages we deliver through our actions do not give just our children that wrong idea. As adults, we believe the message ourselves. We have mistaken cheap and trashy sexy for beautifully sexy.
We have forgotten that beauty, real beauty, is never cheap or trashy and that there is nothing sexier than real beauty. We’ve forgotten that there is beauty in the anticipation, in revealing yourself to one person, in living modestly. We’ve forgotten beautiful sexy exists and therefore we don’t realize it is attainable.
If you are dating after divorce, it is likely that your confidence had been shattered at some point and that you want to feel attractive, desirable, and beautiful again. It may seem like the quickest way to achieve this is through today’s styles, but your dress is vitally important to feeling sexy long-term.
You want to dress in a way that gets you the right kind of attention, not in the way that gets you short-term attention but leaves you feeling battered, used, confused, and incapable later. You’ve been there, done that. This time, try another way and be willing to wait.
You don’t need a man for right now. You need a Good man who’ll Love and honor you, a man who’ll stick around.
You need to give your children, boys and girls, the message that they are worth waiting for because you are worth waiting for.
This man is seldom found among the gawkers. He is worth waiting for. Be beautifully sexy for him, sexy made more beautiful for its modesty. He will appreciate your putting time in to look good for him while also appreciating your not showing off for his buddies to drool over.
If you are dating after divorce, it is more important than ever for yourself, for your children, and for your future spouse, that you define what is beautifully sexy and then live it!
You can be beautifully sexy!
Please join me next Friday for part II, What Is Beautifully Sexy? Thank you!
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