“My best friend, we used to compare our breasts, and she called mine footballs because
they were long and pendulous. So, no, I didn’t like the shape of my breasts.”
~ Marsia
(The Breast Archives)
We all do this. All girls look around and try to figure out where they fit in, what kind of
body is normal, which type of breasts are the best.
We try to look at our breasts through
other people’s eyes. Am I pretty? Do I look good?
It’s very easy for someone else to say, “Don’t do that. You’re the perfect version of you.”
But it’s not so easy to believe it.
Our breasts are the most public, private part of our
bodies. They see the world with us! When we look in a mirror we see our hair, our face…
and our breasts.
We’re taught to believe that there’s one ideal breast shape (round) and one ideal breast
size (large-ish). But that’s simply untrue.
If you can look at your body with love and
appreciation, if you can tell your football, or lemon, or pancake breasts that they’re
exactly what they’re supposed to be; if you can love who you are, right this minute, you
will plant a unique seed of love.
~ Meagan Murphy
Ms. Murphy is the producer of The Breast Archives (to be released this fall). She brings 20+ years of experience in film and broadcast, including 12 years with PBS. Meagan earned a Communicator’s Award for her work with teens and a Medical Journalism Fellowship. She also completed a 2-year women’s mystery school.
"I believe lasting social change can be generated through storytelling and film. When we share our stories with courage and daring we help create a world where everyone is seen. My journey with The Breast Archives documentary project has awakened and inspired me to develop a concept called 'sensual feminism,' which is empowerment that’s derived from the integration of the sensual self with our day-to-day psyche.
Check out The Breast Archives on Facebook. See some clips from the documentary here.
“Comparison is an act of violence against the self.”
~ Iyanla Vanzant
Art by Ivan Lubennikov and Akseli Gallen-Kallela
I suspect that when girls and women look at their breasts through other people’s eyes and ask, Am I pretty? Do I look good? often what they are wondering is, Are my breasts loveable? Do they make me loveable? Am I loveable? I know what it feels like to love a woman. When a man loves a woman, everything about her is a miracle. A man doesn’t love a woman because of her lips, but loving her he is astonished to find that she has lips–not just any lips, but THESE lips–and the thought or touch of them fills him with wonder and joy. It is the same with breasts. All breasts are loveable. All breasts are perfect. Nothing can compare with the fact that they are yours.