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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Hi, I'm Francesca Rudkin and welcome to season six of our New Zealand Herald podcast, The Little Things.
And I'm Louise Eyrie. As you may well know, in this podcast, we talk to experts and find out a lot of the little things you need to know to improve different areas of your life. We cut through all the confusion and overload of information and we help simplify life and sort out the helpful from the BS.
We're going to talk about something today that I think we've actually mentioned on the podcast already this year, and that's how sort of taken aback we are about the size of women these days.
I think we might have mentioned after the Oscars and awards ceremonies, Lou, women in public have always been required to look a certain way for their careers, but possibly in relation to the rise in weight loss drugs, it looks as if extreme thinness is back and that we're sort of sinking into this unhealthy territory again, which is really concerning.
I think it's to the prevalence of the people who always felt size inclusive who are also losing weight. Are we losing even those role models and that inclusivity? Who knows? I mean, it's interesting. I don't know about you. I couldn't help but see stuff about the Met Gala.
Quite apart from all of the Amazon Jeff Bezos stuff, it was actually, as our guest described it, she described it as gluttony dressed as glamour. And again, the skinny thing. I mean, they are teeny tiny. Who described it as that? Oh, sorry. Taryn Brumfitt, the woman we're speaking to today. Oh, okay. And she doesn't mince words.
And she wasn't actually necessarily referring to the size of the people there, but I guess... It was on her Instagram and it was a bit of an aha moment for me because she was walking through the bush and juxtaposing the bush walk with images from the Met Gala. And I had a bit of an aha moment.
I sort of thought, when I'm out in the hills with you, Francesca, all alone, I really appreciate what my body can do. I never think about how it looks. I could be Snow White with a smartwatch out there. But in everyday life, I can sometimes be offended by my own reflection. Do you ever feel that way?
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Chapter 2: How do societal beauty standards affect body image?
So then there's a remembrance of the fact that you're actually out there running the streets. And so I guess it is more about how we feel and how bodies move and what they can do for us. But we are not immune to this. No.
No, it doesn't matter how we age and what our concerns are about our body and how much we let go. We've got to admit we're still conscious of it, right, of our body image. Short of just living out there in the bush. It's hard to ignore. And look, at the same time, we're all trying to be very much live and let live about it. We don't judge.
You know, you stay in your lane, you drink your water, you mind your own business. Take GLP-1 or don't. Do whatever keeps you upright and vaguely functional. You know, we've all got different circumstances and stories to tell and metabolisms and things like that. So we sort of stand back. But we are talking about it today because people do care about how they feel in their bodies.
And we are still... conscious at this particular age and stage of the redistribution of padding, should we say. And we also have daughters and sons who we adore and we want them to grow up with really good perspective on body image and Interestingly, we're not born with neuroses about our bodies, and that's something that we're going to talk to Taryn about today.
It's a long and profitable project society has conjured up to impose upon us. So can we really ignore all that noise and expectations and maybe help the next generation ignore it too? Or are we just pretending that we can rise above it? Let's see if our guest today can go some way to answering this for us.
Taryn Brumford is an award-winning filmmaker, best-selling author, internationally sought-after keynote speaker. She is the co-executive director of the Embrace Collective, founder of the Body Image Movement, and director of the inspiring documentaries Embrace and Embrace Kids.
Named Australian of the Year in 2023 and awarded an honorary doctorate from Flinders University in 2024, she is a fiercely passionate advocate for social change and her message has reached more than 200 million people around the world. Welcome, Taryn. We're thrilled to speak with you today. Thank you for having me.
Taryn, it was 2013 when you posted what was essentially a reverse on the traditional before and after photo, and it went global, completely viral, 100 million people, and got an enormous response. All this time later, can you share with us what you think resonated so strongly with Women Everywhere?
Yeah, I think for such a long time we normalised how we felt about our bodies and we carried these stories, which were really traumatic for lots of us, for a very long time. And I think the photograph that went viral that sort of started this whole movement was an invitation and an opportunity for people to share how they felt too and
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Chapter 3: How can we teach children about healthy body image?
But on the flip side, I think there's going to be a lot of people that are thinking... oh, gosh, it's been a decade and I still feel this way. I hope that's a real catalyst for change, that it's like I'm done. This is like I'm 40X or I'm 50 this or it's like we've got to reach this critical moment where we just go enough is enough.
I like that. There's a lot in the world to worry about, isn't there, Taryn? And I'm going to cross that off my list. So thank you for that. But you're so right. I was thinking, I love the honesty which people, which women often talk about how they really truly feel about their bodies. And I was having a think about kind of where I'm at. And you mentioned there as you age, things sort of change.
And it occurred to me that when I was younger, I was conscious of how my body looked generally for other people. You're looking for acceptance. You're looking for belonging. You might be looking for a partner. You're conscious of sort of putting yourself out there. And the expectations were other people. It was for other people. Now I'm in my early 50s.
I want my body to get me on a really good hike or a trail run. And I want to fit in that skirt because I love that skirt and it makes me feel good to wear that skirt. And that's about as far as it goes. It's no longer about other people or pleasing someone else or fitting into somebody else's expectation of me.
There is a little bit of, I don't really give a flying hoot anymore, but there is still consideration to what I want my body to be able to do now.
Yeah, and I think listening to you talk about wanting to hike and wanting to do things with your body, I think that is a great focus. And I think what you mentioned before about trying to fit in, it's that whole comparisonitis thing. we forget that as human beings we're wired to compare.
It's part of who we are and it was very helpful, you know, way back when in ancient times when we were just trying to fit in or we were sizing up the other tribe, you know, working out where the dangers were. Like that comparison as part of our brain was helpful. It's just not so much in 2026 because we're using that part of our brain to compare how we think we look
to how we think somebody else looks. And even conceptually, you can take that further. There's a great quote by a man called Steve Furtick, and he says, don't compare your behind the scenes with everyone else's highlight reel. And because we're online and we're looking at pictures, we're like, oh, they've got a better husband or they've got better behaved kids. I've done that one before.
Or, you know, they've got a better life. They go on better holidays and most damaging, oh, they've got a better body or I want their body. So, again, I think we've just got to... apply the principles and the framework that we use often is around self-compassion and being kind to ourselves and treating ourselves like we treat our friends.
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Chapter 4: What personal experiences led Taryn to advocate for body positivity?
But in 2020, I, you know, after being with my first husband for like 19 years, we separated. And then all of a sudden I found myself dating and the possibility of another man seeing my naked body after I had my kids. And I was like, hang on. I'm not sure how I feel about this. I've got feelings on this. And I had to unpack that. And I think this is the thing, right?
There's always going to be something new to deal with. And it's not always good. You know, there's always going to be a challenge. There's always going to be something that happens to you in your life experience as a human that makes you question like, oh, how do I feel about my body in this moment? But that's okay. I think if we can just have a better foundation to work from and
So it's not just constantly talking negatively about our bodies and feeling crap about our bodies. If we can build that foundation of functionality over appearance and how do I feel as opposed to how I look, it helps in those moments when things get a bit wobbly. Excuse the pun.
You're listening to The Little Things. And today on the podcast, our guest is Taryn Brumford, founder of the Body Image Movement and passionate advocate for social change when it comes to embracing ourselves just as we are. We'll be back after the break.
welcome back. We were talking before the break about the different times of our lives where things kind of change for us and you know, we're midlife and that is a big focus of our conversations that we have on this podcast and
I guess, you know, perimenopause, weight shift, skin changes, they all collide with our body narratives and sometimes with things that we haven't even resolved before perimenopause. And I certainly know, I went to a conference in Edinburgh in 2022 And I looked back on the photos and went, I don't even recognize myself. And I hadn't even really noticed it. And I felt retrospectively bad.
I didn't feel bad in the time. But I think that is happening to a lot of women our age, is that their bodies are changing in ways that are unfamiliar to them. Has that come up in your work?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
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Chapter 5: What role does social media play in shaping body image perceptions?
So people who feel good in their bodies, they're more likely to move their bodies, eat fruit and veg, wear sunscreen, have a stable weight, and they're less likely to smoke and drink and vape and take illicit drugs and all the things. So when I talk about this whole piece around it's so good for you to embrace your body. It's good for your mental health. It's good for your physical well-being.
It's good for more representation of women in leadership roles. There's not a reason we wouldn't want to embrace, and it's really important.
I was thinking about that earlier, actually, about the messaging around, even with the weight loss drugs, they're really clever at working in that health angle, and for some people that is really important, but not for the entire population, right? And the other thing I just thought about then was you're talking about a stable weight.
And I think it's taken me, oh gosh, from probably 48 to what I am 54 now to go, oh, I probably won't be 65 kilos again unless I do something that I don't want to do to be there. And my new stable weight is 72 kilos. And it doesn't hold me back from doing anything. You know, those extra few kilos don't make a damn bit of difference. In fact, they're probably quite helpful sometimes.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's right. And I think that's, you know, again, honouring the body and the way that the body changes. And if the metric was, am I healthy or unhealthy based on a number on a scale, that's a real slippery slope for people.
Similarly, I mean, I'm in the largest body I've probably been in, but, you know, I'm doing six chin-ups and I'm hiking and I'm running and I'm doing and my four kids have to keep up with me. Like, that's my metric. I feel really good in my body. But A couple of decades ago, if I'd looked at the scales and used that as my metric, I would have felt very lousy about that number.
And I think that's, again, the possibility that we all have is how to reconsider the metrics of health for us. When do we feel good? And we live in this world now where there's so much information on that. I mean, even that's a It can be paralyzing sometimes just if I'm saying, do this, don't do this. It's like, how do you keep up?
But I think it's a nice reminder that nobody knows our bodies the way we know our bodies and our intuition is king. Like we've just got to listen to ourselves.
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Chapter 6: How can we shift the focus from appearance to functionality?
Yeah, I mean, I think it comes down to the conversation around constantly trying to pepper into everyday normal conversations in the home around diversity and how that we all come in different shapes and sizes and abilities of bodies. I think the more that we can layer that in from a very young age is really important.
I think never talking negatively about your body or anyone else's bodies is like, if that was one thing I could get everyone to do, that would be the thing because I think that's actually the fastest way to change because when young people don't hear us talking negatively about our bodies, they're more likely to develop a positive relationship with theirs.
And it's also role modelling positive behaviour. So it's not saying mean things about yourself in front of your child. They're watching, they're absorbing, like they're little sponges. So if you're going for the run because you ate the chocolate cake, It's not too much of a hop, skip and a jump to them going, oh, okay, so if I eat cake, that's bad. I need to punish myself.
And then all of a sudden we've got a dysfunctional relationship, not just with food, but with exercise. I was just talking about this recently, just this whole thing Exercise is something that we have to do. I think that's such a crime.
I think it's like moving our bodies every day is like the best part of our days, or it could be if we just reconsider our relationship with movement, that it's about how we feel as opposed to doing something because we want to look a particular way.
But, yes, I mean, pornography and how young people are feeling in their bodies and how they want to change their bodies, I just think we need to continue to say that that representation of what we see is unrealistic and it's not a true representation of who we all are. I mean, I included a wall, we called it, you know, internally the wall of vulva in the Embrace film and I'll never forget that
In a cinema, one of the screenings I went to, a woman came up to me and she was, I don't know, I want to put her to about 75, 80 years of age. And she was crying. And I thought, my brain immediately went, she's going to talk to me about her grandchild that's got an eating disorder. But instead, she said to me,
When I saw all of those images of the women's, she called it vaginas, even though they're vulvas, she said the vaginas, it was the first time in my life that I felt normal. And she was crying and I was just like, oh, my gosh, you have carried shame around your body your entire life and it took you to see the diversity of all the shapes and sizes to make you feel better.
Like it actually broke my heart a little bit just to think of that was her relationship with her body was that and it took seeing it to change it.
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