The Body Is a Temple, and I Am It’s Priest
Image Courtesy: The Substance (2024)
The glimmer of the TV screen echoes the shine of a bright, youthful face. Her hair is swept back with rings of velcro rollers; her lips are wet to the touch, smothered in a pink-tinted mask. It’s 9 PM: she rewards herself with a few more minutes before bedtime. Her future is shaped through a disciplined regimen; in order to attach value to her actions, she uses words like “balanced” to describe her lifestyle.
While she might have been sold a tale of beauty, everything feels like the product of
something else– a commodity that can be quantified, marketed, and distributed. That has become the reality assumed for many of us, where our roles are nearly pre-determined. Due to this, the modern woman is stripped of the reality destined for her and made to believe that acting to fit a part will absolve her from its becoming. Soon, there are two bodies, each utilized, but with differing levels of enthusiasm. When we get to play the part of perfection, it becomes our sole aspirational assertion; once we discover that we are, in fact, imperfect, the subconscious desire manifests a failure as sweet as its blossoming. And so the accessible comforts of modern livelihood will corrupt her soul as she continues to give while reaping insufficient reward. When jealousy is no longer enough, resentment builds like bile in the throat. We will never achieve what is promised.
Image Courtesy: The Substance (2024)
Celebrity culture plays a large role in the ways we perform. To many, there are a few celebrities that stick out; a few that feel close to something we could become. And whether they vlog, walk the runway, or perform on our screens, the lifestyles of these select
few promises an unreasonable attainability. We orbit around an absolute certainty that will never come, in the same way we spend money in casinos or time with the wrong people. Some part of us knows what it means to live, which is why we both fear and worship it so. Pious, but in all the ways we shouldn't be.
The issue in question is not what you are, but what you wish to become. She who succumbs to the perceptions, opinions, and desires of others suffers a subconscious rejection of her own womanhood. The idea of a grandiose reality where we serve as the pinnacle of all we were made to be relies on a capitalistic integrity that will never fully allow itself to reign. We might achieve perfection for a second, but shortly after it will elapse.
Image Courtesy: I, Tonya (2017)
The loose principle of perfection makes women both the victim and the assailant. After all, it is American Beauty. You could separate yourself from the force of its power, but why would you? There’s nothing perceivably threatening about your own consciousness. And momentarily, everything feels clearer than ever. On the bathroom floor, skin peels away. Social identity dissolves and leaves the physical as one last remnant of sensation.
There is a necessity within our desire to appeal; in our desire to rub our faces till they turn irritated all over. Attitude is temporary, but beauty is forever.
Strike Out,
Writer: Sarah Weber
Editor: Daniela Mendoza
Graphic Designer:
Tallahassee