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I pink, therefore I am. By Sarah Van Ness.

By on February 20, 2014

By Sarah Van Ness.

I have a confession to make. Here goes…I like pink. A lot. I have pink handbags, pink ink pens, pink clothes, pink flip flops. Lot and lots of pink. I also enjoy glitter. A lot. Pink and glitter. And sparkles. Lots of sparkles. To top it off, I also get called “cute” a lot. To most of you, this may seem like a great thing. What’s not to love about cute? I mean, I get it. I’m “fun sized” (otherwise known as short), I’ve got my mom’s button nose, and a bouncy hair cut. Heck, I wanted to be Mary Lou Retton until I was 13! But, all these facts aside, until recently it made me nuts when “cute” and I were in the same sentence. After all, I’m intelligent, college educated, well read. I didn’t want to be a thirty-something woman who was known as the cute, glittery lady with the pink purses. I wanted to be taken seriously. I wanted to be sexy, alluring, intimidating; those stereotypical “strong” characteristics we all know and love.
In my mind, I was not “woman” enough. I wasn’t a take charge, bull by the horns kinda gal. I was just Me. Funny, cute, and quirky. And in all honesty, I was ashamed of who I was. I had amassed this list of reasons why who I was meant I was flawed. These reasons included:

*Only girls under age 10 should giggle freely (problem here is I giggle all the time)
*Pink equaled silly, childish, non-sophisticated
* Cute was a word to describe baby ducklings and toddler sweaters, not a grown woman
* Glitter was for princesses or Third Graders (I was neither)

Since I was convinced I needed to change to be “womanly”, I considered all of the following as options for a successful transition to “real” womanhood:
*Only wearing black (then I realized I would look like a pint sized Morticia Addams)
*Refusal to laugh (This was a physical impossibility for me)
*I could ix-nay the glitter (BORING!!!)
*I could get very, very irritable if anyone said the word cute (but, wouldn’t that be rude?)

Then, one day it hit me. None of it was going to work. I just couldn’t pull it off. Why? Because I would be a fraud, completely inauthentic, totally not myself!

Could it be that being a woman really means living in authenticity, being true to myself, honoring my oddities instead of hating them?

What if cute was actually a compliment? Hmm…maybe I was onto something. I’d always viewed my quirks as things that set me apart in a bad way. They made me laughable, or childish, or small. But what if the truth is that my quirks are the things that make me who I am, original, unique? What would life feel like if every time I wore pink, I released the shame and just let my happiness come through unabashed and unapologetic? So, I stopped being tied to my preconceived, limiting beliefs about the rights and wrongs of who I was. I started accepting me.
Yes, it’s true. I am not a super serious, by the book, take no prisoners sexy beast. I’m not a screen siren. I’m not Wonder Woman. But doesn’t the world have enough of those? I think there might be room for a spunky, vertically challenged, glitter-loving, pink-wearing, fun having, CUTE woman. And I am just right for that job!
My most womanly qualities are in those perceived “flaws” I fought against for so long. My laughter makes people smile, maybe even brightens up their mood if they are having a bad day. My “cuteness” makes me approachable and easy to talk to. And my proclivity for pink? Well, that just makes me Sarah. It’s something that sets me apart, makes me unique, my calling card. From now on, I am going to love and accept who I am fully. I am going to appreciate the diversity that women of all shapes, sizes, voices, and styles bring to the world. I am going to stop putting limits on who gets taken seriously and I am going to get on with the business of being me, glitter and all. Oh, and by the way, would you get on with the business of being you too? I mean, the time we’re spending trying to be someone else is keeping the true women we are hidden. It’s time to come out of the shadows. It’s time to be ourselves. Not who we think we’re supposed to be. Not what we think we’re supposed to look like or sound like, but women, authentic and strong, quirky and real! Let’s be authentic originals together! I think the world is ready to see us shine.

 

Sarah Van NessSarah Van Ness is an Oracle Card Practitioner who has done readings for clients around the world from Canada to Australia, Trinidad and Tobago to the Midwest USA. Her passion is helping women reach their full potential and uses Oracle Readings to empower and enrich her clients’ lives in a witty, light, and gentle way. Sarah is an avid writer who is hard at work on her first book. She is also a student at the S.W.A.T. Institute, currently pursuing her certification as a Personal Empowerment Coach. She resides in Liberty, Missouri with her husband, Chris, and their three children.

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