Author: Marie Hansen

Looking Back, Moving Forward

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

I have been debating which holiday I’d say is my favorite. Growing up, it was the whole Christmas season, starting from Thanksgiving. In the past few years, I’ve found a renewed appreciation for Halloween. But New Year’s is hard to beat. I’m a sucker for a fresh start, and what’s fresher than a new calendar year?

In the past, I’ve set goals or even made vision boards for the new year. But slowly, something has been shifting. I started a vision board in 2022 but only filled in one corner. Last year, I bought a poster board but never started working on it (and eventually tossed the poster). This year, inspired by an author I really admire, I decided to try something new and use the new year as a moment to look back before stepping forward.

Michelle Elman is an author and life coach whose work was highly influential on me last year, as you can see in my letters to you from March and June! I read two of her books, listened to all of her podcast episodes, and subscribed to her new Substack newsletter, Growth Spurts. In the first installment of her newsletter this year, she explained that uses the new year as an opportunity to pause and do a yearly review, to reflect and praise herself for all she accomplished in the prior year.

I loved that idea, and before she even published this second post where she detailed how she does her yearly review, I decided to do my own version. I’m a diligent calendar-keeper, and like most people these days I have plenty of photos stored on my phone, so I used those tools to my advantage. I set aside some time to go through my calendar and photos month-by-month and just . . . remember. Take time to soak in everything that happened in 2023.

It felt really good. A lot better than making a vision board, honestly. To be fair, 2023 was a particularly exciting and eventful year for me. But it’s also true that, had I made a vision board last January, there would have been plenty of goals that went unaccomplished. So, had I measured the “success” of last year against how I thought it was supposed to go, it would have come up as a failure. But if I take it in as it actually played out . . . I feel incredibly grateful for everything I got to experience last year.

And I think that hints at why vision boards have become less and less appealing to me over time. While they are supposed to be motivational, they’re really just my ghost self in collage form. A record of all the things I think I should be and do, which ignores the core truth: all I want in life is to enjoy it, as much as possible, while finding ways to care for others. I don’t need to end each year with a laundry list of accomplishments to do either of those things.

Looking back over last year also gave me a practical sense of perspective that has already made this year feel better. As I was perusing last year’s calendar, I remembered one particular week when I wasn’t feeling well . . . and when I flipped to it, I was surprised to see how many work hours I’d logged there. It’s hard to imagine that they were very productive. Don’t get me wrong, I do believe there’s a time and place for behavioral activation—challenging yourself to get busy to help yourself feel better. But I also think I often cross the line into pushing myself harder than I deserve without taking a moment to assess what’s in my best interest. It made me realize that when I look forward, I often think I should be doing more, but when I look back, I often wish I’d seen in the moment that doing less is okay. That I’m allowed to prioritize my well-being—or even just my own enjoyment!—over checking off tasks and accomplishments.

There were probably plenty of other lessons to be gleaned from last year’s calendar and photos, but that was the one I needed most right now. It landed like an epiphany, like Oh, this is one of those times. I’m really happy, but I am also busy. And so tired. There are plenty of *productive* things that I’m just not able to do right now. But when I look back on this year, as I flip through the January and February calendar and photos, I don’t want to remember working myself to the bone (or more likely tears, as I did too often last year). I want to remember that I put myself first when I needed it most. And so that’s what I’m doing. It may not win me any vision-board-worthy accomplishments, but I’m glad to be looking out for the real me—not the ghost me—for once.

And I’m grateful to last year me for showing me the way.

xoxo

Marie

P.S. You can read Michelle’s newsletters on yearly reviews here:

Jess Weiner—a cultural expert and creative whose work I am constantly inspired by—wrote about her “yes, and” approach to New Year’s here, which I think is very similar in spirit to Michelle’s approach!

From the Archives: “Rise and Shine!”

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment
Making space for the girl who wrote in a purple notebook with glitter pencils . . . (“Actionist” is a term coined by Jess Weiner. I added the “a” for my own personal flair.)

Hello, dear internet friends,

Whew. The end of the year is here, and I am tired. While I’ve always been a fan of New Year’s and setting goals for the future—there are some big things I hope to accomplish and share with you in 2024!—as the calendar turns over, I also hope to give myself a restful pause before diving into what’s to come. A moment to appreciate where I’m at now—and how far I’ve traveled to get here.

One of my goals for the future of this site is make space for other girls and women to share their perspectives and wisdom. I’d also like to bring some of my old work out of the archives, a la Taylor Swift’s vault tracks. As I mentioned in my October announcement, the heart and spirit of Fab Gal Media comes from the blog I started as a teen, when I began to write and dream about helping other girls like me. While that original blog has fallen into disrepair, what I wrote still shines. I’m proud of the work I did back then, and I’d like to give some of that writing a second life by dusting it off and sharing it with you here.

As I was going through blogs on my old site a while ago, I came across one of my favorite lines I’ve ever written: “You were born to stand out . . . and if you let yourself, you won’t have to worry about finding your place because you will always be in it.” So good! It feels weird to be so boldly proud of something I wrote—I am understandably and unfortunately my own worst critic—but I wrote that so long ago, the words feel like they belong to someone else. I was seventeen and just starting college, and it was the end of sorority rush week. In hindsight, I wish I’d journaled or kept more notes about rush. It was fascinating to observe (and disorienting to experience). Each day was like an audition, but as opposed to trying out for a sports team or theatre production—where you’re ostensibly being assessed as objectively as possible on a skill you’ve refined—at rush, it felt like you were being judged simply on whether you were cool or likable enough to become one of them. (If I remember correctly, the sorority houses did openly share a rubric of the qualities they were considering in each candidate. But that didn’t change how it felt.) As I finished that week, I was grappling with the challenges of fitting in—and the power to be found in standing out as your true self. And that inspired this blog:

Friday, August 22, 2008
Rise and Shine!

Happy Friday, Fab Gals!

I don’t know how many of you have started school yet, but the first week is always hard, isn’t it? Especially if you’re new there, which is the case for me. Being in a new environment and not knowing anyone very well can be really intimidating, especially when you are just trying to make a good impression and find where you fit in. That’s how I have been spending my week – trying to find my group.

It’s really funny how, when we’re trying to make new friends, we spend our time seeing how we match up. Do they look like me? Have the same interests? Same personality? When you’re trying so hard to fit in, it can be easy to get caught up trying to be like the people you want to impress. It seems natural that if you can seem cool and be “one of them,” things will be good, because you’ll have your place.

Something you should know about me: I am a little different. Not in a freaky way, like I wear cat pajamas to school or whatever, but I am definitely my own person. We Fab Gals, we’re born to stand out, you know? And this whole week, I have been trying to push myself into place, to fit into this group or that one, and truthfully, I haven’t been all that happy, because I haven’t really gotten to be myself.

Like I said, when we think about groups of people, we think about how they are the same. But think about one person, someone you really admire. Don’t you think about what’s unique about them? Those things that make you different, those are the things that make you impressive. That, and having respect for yourself and everyone else. Being yourself means not everyone is going to like you. That’s just the way it goes. It’s like what Coco Chanel said, “In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.” You were born to stand out, FG, and if you let yourself, you won’t have to worry about finding your place because you will always be in it.

I hope school is going alright for you, and that you get your chance to stand out. If you need me, remember that I can always be reached here, by email . . . or at The Fab Gal Myspace.

xoxo

The Fab Gal

I still agree wholeheartedly with what I wrote back then. (Except for the part about cat pajamas. Not sure why that was my metric for being “freaky.” Sounds like something from a Disney Channel show or teen movie—both of which heavily influenced my worldview growing up!) Embracing what makes you unique beats squeezing yourself to fit in any day. But what I’d like to add is a reminder that you will get so many chances throughout your lifetime to tweak or even redefine what it means to be you. In the context of growing up, and school settings where people divide themselves into groups, deciding who you are—and getting others to see you how you want to be seen—can feel both intensely important and excruciatingly rigid. As if there is a singular, unchanging you that you need to excavate and polish up for all to see. But every new chapter gives you a chance to grow. Change. Evolve. Find your place, outgrow it, and build a new foundation for yourself with the pieces that fit best, leaving the rest behind.

And that’s freeing to realize, but also scary. I think it’s easier to believe that once you’ve found yourself, the search is over. It isn’t. The search is life. I never could have anticipated all the versions of me I would become and shed to get to who I am today. But as I step into the new year, I am saying a silent “thank you” to each one for bringing me to the best chapter of my life yet.

I hope that 2024 brings you the steadiness of embracing who you are (and who you’ve been) . . . and readiness to step into who you’ve yet to become.

xoxo

Marie

In the News: “Authentic” is the Word of the Year

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment
Thanks, Merriam-Webster!

Hello, dear internet friends,

This past month has been—to put it mildly—one of the busiest and fullest of my life so far. In the best way possible. While I haven’t had much time to write, I came across an interesting little news item that made me think of you, so I thought I’d share it here.

It probably comes as no surprise that I consider myself a bit of a word nerd. I find etymology fascinating, and I spend a lot of time on Merriam-Webster’s website. (In fact, I have looked up words 2,405 times since I set up my account!) In addition to of course providing dictionary definitions, they do a lot of fun things on their site. On their home page, you can see the top words currently being looked up, which is always interesting and sometimes very timely to what’s in the news and on people’s minds that day. And at the end of every year, they choose a Word of the Year that represents both what readers frequently looked up and what was happening in our culture. They announced this week that 2023’s Word of the Year is “authentic.”

When I heard that’s what they chose, I thought, Of course! A perfect choice. Last fall when I was working on my book’s chapter on social media and celebrities, I was struck by how often the concept of being authentic—or “real,” or “relatable”—came up in what I was reading, consuming, and observing. The app BeReal blew up on the premise that it’s parameters would encourage users to, well, be real with what they post. In interview profiles, social media stars like Charli D’Amelio or Emma Chamberlain are often hailed for their relatability or authenticity. Indeed, Merriam-Webster highlighted similar points in their announcement. Of course, I think authenticity is a lovely thing to strive for in the way we present ourselves and live our lives. I also think that seeking it out in social media or the celebrities we follow is a matter of looking for the right thing in the wrong places. As Merriam-Webster pointed out, in our culture that puts a premium on content creators who seem authentic, “‘authenticity’ has become a performance.”

Which sounds bleak, but I actually think the fact that “authentic” was looked up significantly more this year is a positive sign. Merriam-Webster may not be able to tell us how to be “true to [our] own personality, spirit, or character,” but getting curious about what it really means to be authentic is a good place to start. First in the dictionary, and then in our own lives.

xoxo

Marie

Introducing Fab Gal Media

~ Marie Hansen ~ 1 Comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

As you can tell by the title, this month brings about a big change! Girl Presence is now Fab Gal Media, living at fabgal.com. It’s more than a simple shift in name and location. It’s an exciting step into the future—that brings the best of my past along for the ride.

I started the Girl Presence blog in 2015 as a place to reflect on the good, bad, and in-between of “girl culture,” as I called it. In the past three years, I’ve committed to writing you a monthly letter about something that’s been on my mind, and I’ve really enjoyed the ritual (and challenge!) of it. I’ve written some things I’m really proud of and dug into challenging topics, from the cultural impact of cosmetic procedures to dealing with my “ghost” self. The monthly letters will continue, but this transition will open doors for more creative opportunities and, eventually, more voices. This website is now one facet of Fab Gal Media, LLC, the media organization I’ve founded that aspires to empower teen girls to take charge of their own stories. Offline, that will include the publication of my very first book (!!). Online, that means a transition from this blog that only features my voice to a platform that makes space for a variety of perspectives on growing up, from girls and women across the age spectrum. It will take a while to bring those visions to life, but I can’t wait for you to see—and be part of—that bigger picture. 

As much as this transition is about moving forward, I’m excited to bring along a past version of myself. When I was thinking about a new name to grow into, I found myself pulled back to the blog I started at seventeen. Under the pseudonym “The Fab Gal,” I wrote about self-confidence, pop culture, and what I was learning as I made my way towards adulthood. (The letter format, the anonymity, and maybe even the name itself were inspired by the Gossip Girl series, which I was devouring that summer. Funny, as I was striving for something much more positive and uplifting than spilling the secrets of teen socialites in New York!) The more I thought about it, the more I knew I wanted the company and website name to honor what I started way back when. Writing is how I found my voice and began to believe in the power I held to shape my own story—in life and in writing. Which is what I want most for you. And if you need help finding your power—or really, remembering that it’s been in your hands all along—I hope that Fab Gal Media can help.

I’m so excited to continue to grow this space. To stay in touch, sign up for our email newsletter (hit “Follow” on the bottom bar if you’re reading this on mobile) or follow @fabgalmedia on Instagram. More platforms to come!

xoxo

Marie

Good to Know: The Jed Foundation’s Mental Health Resource Center

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

This month’s letter is going to be relatively short and sweet. I’m saying that as a declaration of intention to myself as much as anything. I sat down to write to you on Friday and reached almost two pages without getting to the heart of what I wanted to share. It’s been one of those time periods where my brain feels like alphabet soup—the words are in there, but they are so hard to assemble.

What I wanted to share with you is simple: I recently came across a website that I was excited to find, and I thought it might be of value to you too. I was looking for a mental health website I could include in the book I’ve written when I came across The Jed Foundation. They’re a nonprofit dedicated to supporting the mental and emotional well-being of teens and young adults. They engage in this mission through a variety of programs, including partnerships with high schools and colleges or universities to strengthen their supports for students. They also feature a Mental Health Resource Center on their website.

When I was trying to find a mental health reference for my book, I found that websites for reputable organizations and agencies often primarily provided information on mental health disorders, listing symptoms and outlining options for treatment. Of course, that information is important. There’s still a lot of stigma and misunderstanding regarding mental health conditions, so it’s crucial for accurate information to be widely accessible. However, as much as we’ve progressed in our culture towards being open to discussing mental health, I feel like it’s still often viewed in a binary way. As if mental or emotional health is only a “thing” for people with a diagnosable condition. But just like everyone has their own physical health—and makes choices every day that can hinder or support it—everyone has mental health as well. Everyone can experience a variety of emotions, including challenging or uncomfortable ones, and we can all benefit from learning how to work with (and through) them.

What I appreciate about The Jed Foundation’s Mental Health Resource Center is that, in addition to providing information about a variety of common mental health conditions, they also have plenty of articles that could benefit anyone looking to improve their emotional well-being. There were many I came across that made me think, Man, I wish I’d had this when I was younger! I thought “Can I Be Anxious Without Having an Anxiety Disorder?” provided some simple, valuable perspective. (I personally find it helpful to remind myself that anxious feelings can be fleeting—and totally normal.) There’s an entire section on dealing with social media stress, including social comparison—a topic I’m very passionate about!

There’s also a couple articles about simply feeling “weird” or “off,” which is how I I think I would have described difficult feelings I didn’t understand when I was younger . . . and honestly, I still do sometimes today. The checklist of questions in this article provides great starting place for when you’re having an off day and and want to help yourself feel better. I’m going to bookmark it for myself to come back to! It reminded me of what I reflected upon a few months ago – difficult feelings can be uncomfortable, but if we’re open to them, they can also be incredibly informative. Guiding us towards learning something new, taking better care of ourselves, and asking for help when we need it.

xoxo

Marie

My Dream Library: The Unstoppable Bridget Bloom by Allison L. Bitz

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

In the past month, I found myself in a small-talk conversation where someone asked me to tell them something interesting about Lincoln, Nebraska, the place I live and grew up in. It was one of those social situations where I felt both grateful for the effort they were making and like I was taking a pop quiz that I would probably fail. (That says more about me than them, I recognize.) The first thing I could think to blurt out was that supermodel Ashley Graham is from Lincoln, but that wasn’t really what they were looking for. So, I ended up talking about Runzas, Nebraska’s iconic fast-food . . . bread pocket? They are very hard to describe, as I learned in that moment. And while they are delicious, especially when eaten in the football stadium that becomes Nebraska’s third largest city on game day, they have very little bearing on my experience of living here. What I wish I had said instead is that Lincoln is a great place to be a writer and a reader.

Case in point: one of my mentors from school founded an amazing writing community called Larksong Writers Place that hosts all kinds of incredible events. In June, I attended an online reading by local author Allison L. Bitz, who recently published her debut YA novel, The Unstoppable Bridget Bloom. Bridget Bloom is a high-spirited, capital-P Performer. She can sing and she knows it. We join her as she’s starting her first year at a boarding school with a top-notch music program in hopes of kicking off her musical career—Broadway, here she comes! (She’s also not at all opposed to falling in love with Duke, the YouTube-famous singer-songwriter who just so happens to go to the same school.) But of course, her name-in-lights plan is immediately foiled upon her arrival to campus. Turns out, her music theory test scores were low—like, way low—preventing her admission to the music program. So, she can stay at the school, but she can’t take the stage. Also, the music program’s dean challenges Bridget to work on her humility. To prove herself in this regard, Bridget decides to not do the one thing that lights her up the most. She’s not going to sing. At least, not anywhere she can be heard.

That premise alone would have been enough to draw me in—I would love to see it adapted for a candy-colored Netflix miniseries!—but I was also intrigued when I learned that Bitz is a therapist in addition to being an author. I imagined that her work and worldview might shape her writing in an interesting, impactful way. The media we consume, even when it’s just for fun or an escape from the real world, has the power to influence our perspectives. On the positive side, fiction gives us a chance to create or experience the world we dream of living in. After hearing Bitz speak and finishing the book, it’s clear she took the opportunity to build such a world for Bridget—and by extension, her readers—very seriously.

During the reading I attended, Bitz shared how one small anecdote of Bridget’s was a direct rewrite of a scene from her own youth. (She also explains it in an Author’s Note at the back of the book.) In high school, Bitz earned the opportunity to be drum majorette for her school’s marching band. However, the majorette dress that had been passed down for years was a size eight . . . and Bitz needed a size eighteen. A makeshift solution was eventually reached, but not without Bitz’s success being overshadowed by shame that came from the side-eye given by peers and adults alike.

So, she wrote something different for Bridget. Just a few pages in, Bridget decorates her dorm room with the gorgeous mermaid costume that one of her dads made for her starring role in her school’s production of The Little Mermaid. Like Bitz, Bridget’s small-town Nebraska school had only one size of costume, and it was too small for her. But her dad jumped in to create the custom costume she deserved, and Bridget commanded the stage feeling good in her fins.

I was so moved by that and many other choices Bitz made throughout the book. The LGBTQ+ characters—Bridget included—aren’t forced to come out to readers or other characters in the book. They aren’t defined solely by their orientation, and their relationships and experiences are shared organically within the story. Of course, stories about exploring or coming into one’s identity are of great value, but straight characters (and real people) never have to label or preface their attractions, and LGBTQ+ characters (and real people) deserve the same freedom and flexibility.

And while the major plotlines were picture-perfect (seriously, Netflix, get on this!), what excited me most was a relatively minor one. (Wading into light spoiler territory here!)  There’s a secondary character who Bridget consistently reacted to in a way that made me think, Dang, Bridget, that’s kind of harsh! While I trusted the story, I couldn’t predict how—or if—that conflict would be resolved. It made me reflect on how protagonists aren’t always expected—or I should say, written—to experience those around them with the same amount of empathy and room for complexity that they’re given. And it’s not that main characters can’t change their perspectives or behavior . . . it’s just that, when they do, it’s often ultimately in service of themselves and what they want the most.  Whatever has been driving them from the very first page.

However, this character wasn’t blocking Bridget from either of her two biggest motivators: the stage and romance. Bridget could go on not liking them, and it wouldn’t affect any of the major plot points. Still, Bridget learns to see this person in a new light and treat them differently, not because it serves her but because it’s the right thing to do. That got me celebrating Bridget more than the happiest of endings ever could.

I started this series of book recommendations to highlight books I wish I’d had as a teen (which really means ones that I’m glad teens—and readers of all ages—have access to today). It would have meant a lot to me that Bridget gets to exist happily in her body as it is. It would have been so valuable to see LGBTQ+ characters similarly thriving as their full selves, in peace and in command of their own stories. The icing on top would be rooting for a protagonist that breaks the curse of “main character syndrome” and learns see others with greater empathy. I also must say I’d have loved knowing I lived in the same community as a super-cool YA author . . . before her novel became a smash Netflix series! (Okay, I’ll stop trying to manifest that now.)

The Unstoppable Bridget Bloom is available for purchase at Bookshop, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and more. You can learn more about Allison L. Bitz at her website—her next novel will be out in the fall next year!

xoxo

Marie

Sparkle & Female Agency: Barbie, Reviving Ophelia, and the Land Beyond “Good Enough”

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

I had a different topic in mind for the blog this month, but the Barbie movie so thoroughly knocked my socks plastic pumps off, I just had to write to you about it. I saw the film on Sunday night, and it is dazzlingly delightful, surprisingly weird (in the best way!), and full of nods to Barbie’s history and idiosyncrasies—the outfits tailored for every occasion! The arched feet! I also found my own story reflected back to me in ways I never could have anticipated.

I was still lit up with excitement over the movie when I logged onto Facebook Monday morning and saw a post by one of my favorite authors, Mary Pipher. She shared that she’d been doing interviews because Barbie‘s director and co-writer, Greta Gerwig, had cited Pipher’s book Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls as an influence for the movie. In fact, Gerwig told Vogue that Reviving Ophelia was a key point of inspiration for Barbie‘s narrative arc, or the journey that the dolls take throughout the movie.

That is—for starters—a wild bit of trivia. Pipher is an author and psychologist who lives in the same Midwestern city as me. Reviving Ophelia, her bestselling cultural and psychological examination of the challenges that teen girls face, was first published almost thirty years ago. On the surface level, a link between such a book and a hot pink movie about a plastic doll is surprising, to say the least. But finding out that such a link existed was particularly mind-bending for me because Pipher’s book holds such personal significance. I first read it when I was fifteen and beginning to grapple with my own body image and disordered eating struggles. Pipher’s writing crossed an unspoken barrier and acutely articulated what I was going through in a way I’d never experienced before. I wouldn’t be who I am as a reader, writer, and human being without that book.

I also wouldn’t be fully me without Barbie. The center of my childhood world was the handcrafted dollhouse where I spent countless hours with Barbie and my real-life friends. Barbie’s slogan is “You can be anything,” and honestly, we were everything. Everything I dreamed of someday being. A mom. A pop star. A teacher. Barbie’s ability to endlessly transform is what makes her so magical. Holding Barbie in your hands gives you the tangible power to live out every story you’ve ever dreamed of. I can still feel the electricity in my fingertips.

As I grew older, Barbie started to look less like endless potential and more like unrealistic expectations. Another haunting example of the beauty standard that dismantled my sense of possibility, made my world small and centered on punishing my body into a shape and size that I believed would make me worthy of living out spectacular stories. (Spoiler alert: that “perfect” body was an illusion I could never reach.) When I was in college and part of a body image and eating disorders education group on campus, a set of statistics about the unreality of Barbie’s body floated around. How her measurements would be unsustainable in real life. How she’d have no room for a full set of organs and have to walk on all fours. (It appears that the “Get Real Barbie” campaign I am remembering was started by the South Shore Eating Disorders Collaborative, though I can’t locate their original work.) While those stats are certainly jarring, they don’t sting as much as the truth: I don’t remember life before understanding that a beauty ideal existed. One that Barbie perfectly embodied in her beyond-human curves.

Had I been paying attention, I would have known that these contradictions were central to not only conversations surrounding the Barbie movie, but also the film’s creation and presentation. I mean, the trailer explicitly states that the movie is both for those that “love” Barbie and those that “hate” her. However, I decided to avoid trailers and articles about the movie before seeing it, so I could experience it without (too many) preconceived notions about what it would be. I’m so glad I did, and if you still haven’t seen it, I’d encourage you to do the same—or at least keep an open mind! I’m about to dip into spoiler territory here, so this is your cue to step out and come back after you’ve seen it.

While I thoroughly enjoyed the movie in the moment, I’ve had just as much fun turning it over in my mind in the days since, marveling over what Gerwig (and everyone else involved!) was able to accomplish. While the Reviving Ophelia connection surprised me at first, looking back I can see how clearly the spirit of the book is reflected in the heart of the movie. In the Vogue profile, Gerwig highlighted the key theme of the book that inspired her: how girls live life at full volume until they are toppled by the pressures of adolescence. They shrink into feeling “not good enough.” In the movie’s pivotal monologue, one the human (non-doll) characters rails against all the ways women are set up to fail in the battle to be seen as good enough.

The ghost of “good enough” has haunted me throughout my lifetime. Overcoming that phantom of perfection feels like my central battle as both a writer and a human being. It also sits at the core of “Stereotypical” Barbie’s hero’s journey throughout the film. She is given the consciousness (and flat feet) to experience the pain and imperfection of being human. The unraveling consequences nearly destroy her, but with a little help from her friends, she overcomes. And she chooses to live on as the imperfect human version of herself. It’s her most beautiful makeover, her most glorious transformation yet . . . and it happened in part because of a book that also transformed me. Like, what?! It really doesn’t get any more wild than that.

Barbie isn’t perfect. Her slate of complexities—in my own life or her broader history—has not been wiped clean. But I am so, so grateful for this movie, this spectacle of sparkle and female agency (to steal part of a line from Will Ferrell’s character) that made space for all of it. The pink perfection and the messy missteps. I believe this movie can be for anybody—the record-setting box office numbers seem to confirm this—but so many aspects of it feel so intensely personal to me that I can’t believe it really exists. A life-in-plastic fever dream.

I still believe that, at her core, Barbie represents the power of possibility. Thanks to this movie—and Gerwig, and Pipher, and so many others—she reached that beautiful, unruly terrain beyond “perfect” or “good enough.” And you know what? If Barbie can do it, so can I.

xoxo

Marie

Embracing Envy (& Other So-Called “Bad” Feelings)

~ Marie Hansen ~ 1 Comment
Each color has its place in the rainbow—as with all feelings in life.

Hello, dear internet friends,

Summer is officially here (in the northern hemisphere, that is!). For me, full-on summer busyness is starting . .  . well, basically right now. One of my favorite things about this season, whether I’m filling hours while traveling or spending quiet days at home, is having time to explore fictional worlds—or the ideas of very real people!—by reading a book or listening to a podcast. I hope to bring you a couple book recommendations in the next month or two, but for today, I wanted to share a podcast episode that resonated with me.  

In the last month, I’ve been listening to the podcast Dominant Stories by Jess Weiner. Jess’s work has long been influential on my life and career, as is well-documented throughout this blog! In this podcast, she speaks with different creators in each episode to break down different types of “dominant stories,” or narratives that we build into our lives that keep us stuck in place. In one episode, she interviews therapist and author Lori Gottlieb. At one point in the conversation, Lori calls attention to the fact that people tend to label emotions as “positive” or “negative.” Happiness is positive, but anger or envy are negative, right? Lori emphatically disagrees: “No! I always say, like, follow your envy. It tells you what you want. It tells you something about desire.”

That statement sent me back a number of years to the moment I came to see envy in a new (positive) light. I was eighteen and admitting to my dad that I felt jealous of someone I knew who was socially way more successful than me, at least in my mind. (For starters, she had a boyfriend. I’d never had one and felt woefully behind in that area of life.) He pointed out that what I was feeling wasn’t jealousy but envy. The distinction he made—at least as I remember it!—was that envy means wanting something similar to what someone else has, whereas jealousy is wanting exactly what the other person has. The difference between wanting a boyfriend versus wanting their boyfriend.

I googled “envy vs jealousy” to check if I was characterizing the distinction correctly. As it turns out, there are varied opinions on what, if any, meaningful differences exist between the two! Merriam-Webster said that “envious” and “jealous” are largely interchangeable (aside from “jealous” having an additional meaning in romantic contexts). On Psychology Today, a social psychologist explained that there is a key difference between the two emotions, but it’s different than what I thought. (He wrote that “jealousy is when something we have is threatened by a third person.”) A Reader’s Digest writer suggested that a difference exists in their intensity. (Jealousy runs deeper, she noted.)

While the various takes on the topic fascinated me, I’ve gone off on a bit of a tangent here; it doesn’t actually matter if they are semantically or psychologically different in any agreed-upon way. What matters is that once I believed in a distinction between the two, I realized my feeling—my envy—wasn’t about the person it was seemingly directed towards. It was about me. It was about what I wanted in life and currently felt I was lacking.

I saw envy in a new light. It wasn’t a “bad” feeling. It was an informative one, just as Lori says.

Continuing on in the podcast, Lori demonstrates how other “negative” feelings can be instructive, and she sums it up really beautifully: “Our feelings are like a compass—they tell us what direction to go in, and if we don’t pay attention to them, it’s like walking around with a faulty GPS; you have no idea where you’re going.” I love that. As I mentioned a few months ago, I’ve also been re-listening to author and life coach Michelle Elman’s podcast In All Honesty, and she shares the perspective that “bad” feelings are useful when we know how to work with them. In this episode on anger, she explains that emotions themselves aren’t negative, but sometimes our reactions to them can be. It doesn’t help if we avoid engaging with what we feel; in this episode on emotions, she shares her belief that feelings will keep coming back until we process them and learn what they’re trying to teach us. Just wanted to highlight her work because it has been very influential on me lately—and now you have a bonus podcast recommendation!

While I long ago made peace with envy, there are other emotions I struggle to sit with. Sometimes it’s really hard to sort through what they’re trying to say, because the surface-level answer isn’t always the right one. Using envy as an example, I have many times felt desire for what someone else has based solely on what I see of their lives on social media. But it’s not that I really wanted a body/career/social life just like them. Or I did, but only because I thought those things would make me happy. I wasn’t fully content in my own life, so I sought out solutions in the shiny pictures of others. Anxiety can be similarly deceptive. Mine often tells me to deal with this imminent problem it’s just discovered at once!! But rarely—if ever? probably never—is anything it presents as urgent as it claims. An indirect approach, when I can muster one, is almost always more helpful. Exercise. Get a good night’s sleep. See if there was any truth at all beneath the alarm bells tomorrow.

I could stop there and leave the impression that I’ve mostly got every confounding emotion mastered, but that’s not really true. Lately, my challenge has been that when I feel overwhelmed—understandably so; I’ve got a lot going on this year!—I crumple into an emotion that I don’t have a good name for yet. It exists somewhere on the frustration-to-anger spectrum, but neither of those terms fit quite right. Since I don’t know what to call it or do with it, I can get easily overtaken and either fold into tears or get amped up in irritation over anything remotely provoking. Often inanimate objects. (I see you, laundry pile!!)

And that’s a vulnerable thing to admit—I’m considering deleting what I’ve written even as I continue—because it’s hard to admit to not knowing. It’s hard to not feel “in control” sometimes, because I have always thought of myself as someone who’s good at keeping things in order. And also, I’m inarguably an adult at this point. Aren’t I supposed to have a full handle on this feelings stuff by now? But control is the wrong goal. I see now that the aim should be understanding, using my feelings as an emotional compass, like Lori said. There’s power to be found in bringing to light the emotions we’d rather sweep under the rug. Power in asking questions, stepping into unfinished sentences, and making room for things that are ready to be spoken, even if we don’t have the words just yet.

Not just power, but growth. Which often requires overcoming challenges. And what is a “challenge” but a “problem” that’s been given a purpose? Just like with feelings. They’re not so bad if you can put them to good work.

xoxo

Marie

Why I’ve (Mostly) Stopped Wearing Foundation

~ Marie Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, dear internet friends,

Last month, I reflected on how powerful our actions can be in shifting our moods, and how I’ve come to think the same approach can be applied to any negative self-beliefs we may hold. For me, that has meant challenging my (too high) standards of productivity by choosing rest. Lately, I’ve been thinking about how a similar strategy could be used to improve one’s body image or relationship to their appearance.

I would like to devote more space on this site to body image, because I understand how impactful it can be on someone’s day-to-day life when they’re deep in struggle with it. I wouldn’t be a writer without having been there myself! But when I’m selecting my monthly topic, body image doesn’t often jump to mind, in part because it’s not as personally pressing for me as it used to be. That’s not to say I’m perfectly “healed” or never have negative thoughts or feelings about my appearance, but they don’t swallow me whole like they used to. I prioritize existing in my body and taking care of it, instead of judging or “fixing” how it looks on the outside.

Over many years, I have totally transformed my life in that regard. But how did I do it? By changing my behavior. By making new choices, over and over again, until they became habits—ways of life that positively impact me on a daily basis, with little conscious effort on my part.

A few years ago, I made a decision that was relatively small in the scheme of body-image-related changes I’ve made, but ultimately very impactful. I decided to stop wearing foundation on a regular basis. Well, not just foundation—makeup in general. Oddly enough, this decision came not long after having decided to become the type of person with a “daily makeup routine.” I had assembled a little cosmetics kit with all the “must-haves” I’d learned about from beauty YouTubers: foundation, of course, but also primer, blush, highlighter, mascara… the works. And I planned to layer it all on my face. Every single day. Even when I was just going to work with the same small group of people I saw every weekday, who had all seen me without makeup an uncountable number of times.

But why? I couldn’t tell you. When I look back at middle and high school, my motivations for changing my appearance are very obvious. I thought being capital-P Popular would make me happy, and I believed I needed to look a certain way to be Popular. But I didn’t have any similar motivations when I set out to put on a full face of makeup every day. I got on well with my coworkers. I was in a relatively new relationship, but I already knew that I did not have to look or be any particular way to impress my boyfriend. I was in the midst of a transition—stepping into a new role at work and reorienting my life around my writing goals—and I think the unsettling, unsatisfying truth is that beauty culture had so ingrained itself in my brain that I believed that new chapter in my life would be even better if I went through it with a painted face.

Of course, I was wrong. I quickly realized that all I got from regularly wearing makeup was a growing dissatisfaction with how my face looked without it. So I stopped. I knew I had to.

Now, when I say this happened a few years ago, I’m talking about pre-pandemic 2020. My decision to stop wearing makeup quickly became the furthest thing from my mind. I didn’t spend much time evaluating my choice or what I hoped to get from it, other than feeling less bad about my actual face. Had I looked deeper and been honest with myself, I would have seen that the impulse to see beauty (in its culturally sanctioned, narrowly defined form) in the mirror was still there. A quick look into my Ulta account confirms this; in September 2020, I purchased a rather comprehensive (and expensive) skincare routine. Who needs makeup when you have *flawless* skin, am I right?

No, that’s not right. But the fact that I can both recognize that beauty-culture logic in my own thinking and choose to act differently shows how far I’ve come in the last three years. I don’t have it all figured out. I still hear some self-criticism over my not-so-“perfect” skin when I look in the mirror. But I am also choosing every day to act from a place of self-acceptance—mostly not covering my skin, and not spending excessive time and money trying to “fix” what isn’t broken. Taking this moment to sit back and let that sink in… I am really proud of myself for that.

I said I’ve “mostly” stopped using foundation, because I got my makeup professionally done for a major event last year and will do so once again this year. I haven’t decided if those choices are contradictory to my beliefs or not that big a deal (probably both). And I haven’t rejected all kinds of makeup. After writing this piece last year about the Jackson Pollock manicure, I bought myself some just-for-fun makeup. Eyeliner with these very fun stamps in the shapes of butterflies, hearts, and smiley faces, as well a variety of glittery products. I’m still experimenting with them and how they make me feel. By no means do I think we need to fully reject the fact that we have physical forms that we can present to world however we choose. But it’s all too easy to fall into a pattern of making choices that don’t really serve us, that are based in a value system we wouldn’t subscribe to if we felt empowered enough to challenge it.

I understand that in the face of a multibillion-dollar industry, my decisions about makeup may seem tiny, but I also believe that we often underestimate our sphere of influence. You never know who in your orbit may be inspired or even subconsciously influenced by the actions you take. I hope that you can find the power to explore what choices are best for you, but I also want you to take to heart the potential your choices have for being a ripple of good in this world.

It can be hard to go against the grain. I find it easier to do when I realize I’m not just doing it for me, but for all of us.

xoxo

Marie

One Small Step

~ Marie Hansen ~ 4 Comments

Hello, dear internet friends,

It’s a gray, rainy day as I write this. The kind of day that makes you want to curl up with a blanket on the couch and zone out with a book or TV show. Admittedly, I’m feeling extra-inclined to succumb to the sofa because that’s where I’ve been all week. I’ve been feeling under the weather, and for me, the hardest part of being sick is usually not the day (or days) I feel the worst—when it very much makes sense to snuggle up and do nothing—it’s the transitional period at the end. When I’m feeling better enough that I know it’s time to resume some of my normal activities, but I still haven’t recovered my usual level of energy. There’s an inertia to being sick that I find very hard to break. But the only way to do it… is to do it. Get dressed, have some coffee, and—to whatever degree is reasonable, given the circumstances—start acting like I’m feeling better. That’s what I’m doing right now, and I have to admit, while I’m not feeling 100% recovered yet, I’m feeling better than I would have predicted when I woke up this morning.

A couple months ago, I wrote about my “ghost” self, or the so-called “perfect” version of me that I have often measured myself against in my mind. Ever since then, I have been thinking about how we can reduce the shadow such comparisons cast over our lives, and two words have kept repeating in my mind: “behavioral activation.” To note, behavioral activation is a psychology concept—specifically, a treatment approach that can be utilized in therapy; you can learn more about it here—and I am not a therapist. But what it means to me is that the actions we choose can have a profoundly positive impact on our mood. Emotions can be incredibly sticky; patterns of thought, even more so. It can also feel really hard to choose a behavior that seems contrary to our current mood state. But doing so can often have an outsized positive impact, at least in my experience. No matter how down I’m feeling, mo matter how swamped in a negative thought cycle I am, if I have plans to hang out with friends or family, I never cancel. I don’t like to break commitments I’ve made, but I also know that spending time with those I care about always makes me feel better. I don’t even need to bring up what’s on my mind. In fact, I think it’s generally better that I don’t, unless of course the explicit purpose of getting together was seeking support. Getting out of my head and focused on those around me is enough to lift my spirits. It may not solve the underlying problem—if one even exists—but it certainly puts me in a better mindset for dealing with it later.

So, a little positive action can help transform a bad mood. It can help with getting through those lingering last days of sickness. Could it even help with defeating our ghosts, with overcoming the voices that tell us we’re not good enough? Because you can’t easily think your way out of those challenges, at least in my experience. I logically understand how unhelpful and, more importantly, unkind it is to compare myself to some idealized version of me. I know that I haven’t gained anything from the comparison. In fact, I think there have been many times I was so stuck on being just like her, I lost the opportunity to come up with real, creative solutions for overcoming challenges and achieving my goals. I was too fixated on following the “perfect” path she laid out. I know all of that, but still, she’s hard to get rid of. She does a very good impression of me, and sometimes, I mistake her thoughts for my own.

The last couple months have given me an interesting opportunity to contend with my ghost self in new ways. At this point in my life, she’s mostly eased up about how I look, but she’s wildly more productive than me. And in the last couple months, I haven’t been able to be as productive—certainly not as much as her, but not even as much as I typically would be. I need to work slower. Do less. Take breaks. And what that’s made me realize is that not only do I not need to “earn” breaks or a slower pace, I don’t even need to fully convince myself that I deserve those things. I just need to give them to myself. I just need to take the action that I know is right for me, in the actual life I am really living. And I truly believe that if I can keep doing that, keep making the choices that are best for me even if they don’t look “perfect,” over time my ghost self will dissipate. She’s already looking a bit fainter to me.

It’s great when we can change our minds from the inside out. But sometimes, it’s a whole lot easier to act first and let our beliefs follow.

If any sort of negative self-belief has been haunting you lately, I hope you can think of one small step, one tiny action you can take this next month that would contradict it. Little by little, we can make big changes that way.

xoxo

Marie