Just like us non-famous folk, celebrities are no strangers to feeling overwhelmed by doubts about their looks. Many of them come out on a regular basis to talk about the need for body positivity, finding ways to love who you are, no matter how your physical body looks, and try to work against the many (often unrealistic) expectations people put on themselves and others when it comes to so-called beauty standards. Now, model Ashley Graham is celebrating self-love after her own body positivity comments went viral on TikTok.
Here's what happened. A few days ago, Ashley Graham, who became the first size 16 model to grace the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, posted a video to TikTok of her showing off what she believes to be the best parts of her body and dubbed it the "self-love challenge." Even if you're not a user of the social media platform, you'll probably know that people on TikTok enjoy a challenge more than anything, and now that thousands have responded to Graham's call to let everyone in on what they love about their own bodies, she's celebrating their posts on Instagram. Take a look!
Awww! It's clear that Ashley Graham was really touched by the number of people who not only took the "self-love challenge," but everyone who did it by using the audio from her original video to express all of the things that make their bodies strong, sexy, and important, as well as their favorite body part and what they would never change about their bodies. And, if you scroll through some of the responses that Graham re-posted, you can see that a wide variety of folks came through with some nice things to say about themselves, and that Graham appreciated all of it.
While there were a lot of responses which featured legs, boobs, butts, and arms among the body parts which got the spotlight (along with several men focusing on...exactly what you'd expect them to), there were a lot of other answers as well. Some people are very proud of their jiggly bellies, gray hair, hearts, brains, eyes, smiles and even their ears:
@trinitybaileywest
It's good to see so many folks embraced Ashley Graham's challenge. Pretty much everyone has received a lot of messages, both direct and indirect, about how we're supposed to look for one reason or another, and it can be very difficult to relax into however you look if family, supposed friends or society as a whole is saying you should be different and do everything in your power to change how you look.
Graham makes plenty of attempts to get people to love their bodies just how they are. She, and others like Lizzo and Kelly Clarkson, have talked a lot about shutting down body shamers, while also sometimes posting photos of themselves that are either un-retouched, or simply show parts which are typically seen as being in less than desirable states. Hopefully, the continued efforts of Ashley Graham and those like her, as well as millions of non-famous people, will truly begin to take root and help us all see that everyone is beautiful.
