Muzzle the Scale: Empowerment is Not a Number

The title of this week's blog was inspired by the work of Geneen Roth, author of Women Food and God.

"You're sailing along in life, feeling pretty good about everything, even your body. No, it isn't perfect, but it is yours and it's doing what it's supposed to do - mowing the lawn, ironing your skirt, playing baseball with the kids. Then you get on the scale. You weigh more than you thought you did, and within a nanosecond, the scary voice in your mind begins to rant: 'You're fat, you're a failure, you don't deserve to feel good about anything!' Suddenly everything that was right before you stepped on the scale is wrong."

What's wrong with this picture? The number on the scale says how much you weigh but not who you are, where you stand, what you achieve, how you love - or even, how good you look. Perhaps these are the benchmarks that matter. When you think of phenomenal women, I doubt the scale is a relevant tool of assessment at all. I doubt they are putting their life on hold weighting for the scale to reflect a lower number before living their life to the fullest.

What makes some women phenomenal? How do some women manage to get it all done? Anais Nin said, "Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."

Ulla Popken is proud to put the spotlight on inspirational women through our new video blog series called Living It U.P. These phenomenal women are role models who help each of us muzzle the scale!

In our first video, The Sky's the Limit, meet model Julie Henderson and our first Living It U.P. phenomenal woman, Yvonne Baldwin. Very inspiring! Thank you, Yvonne!

If you know a special woman, like Yvonne, who is Living It U.P. , please nominate her, by March 14, 2011. Nominations can be made for someone else or yourself. The next selection will be made in April. We will shoot the video in May and post it on this site in June. In the meantime, please share your personal stories of inspiration with us, right here, at Talking It U.P.

Babe