Back to school.
I just started fourth grade. I was on the playground, at recess. “Mrs. K,” my teacher from third grade, was supervising, making sure no one fell off the monkey bars or beat up another kid.
She spotted me and greeted me. I felt special. Here was a grownup talking to me. I had respect for this teacher. Maybe now, as a fourth grader, I reasoned, I was finally mature enough to engage in conversation with an adult.
I was nine years old. I was finally “worthy.”
“Sheryle, you’re slimmer. Are you dieting?”
I felt flattered. I felt seen.
I guess, over the summer, I had a growth spurt.
I was an overweight child. I knew from being told, at age seven, that I was “fat.” I
had been on diets with my mother already at this age. We had, as our goal to be at our “right weight.”
At age nine, I was self-conscious about being at a “wrong weight.”
So, this interaction with Mrs. K felt validating, transformative. I felt I received a grownup stamp of approval. I was now worth something.
Because of how I looked.
“You shall have no other gods before Me.”
Exodus 20:3
“Sheryle, you’re slimmer. Are you dieting?”
I know my third- grade teacher meant no harm by speaking these words. Perhaps, she honestly thought she was complimenting me and building my self-esteem.
Her words were out of ignorance, not malice.
However, those words still had harm built into them.
She didn’t know the disordered eating reality I was already learning at that young age. She didn’t know how I was made to feel less than because of my supposedly fat child body. (I wasn’t “fat.” I learned, years later, that I was merely a child growing, with the awkwardness that comes with that growth).
And, from a place of faith, she certainly wasn’t thinking that she was influencing idolatry.
But that’s what body image, dieting, and being a certain aesthetic are: idolatry.
She first let me know my image, one that was “slimmer,” was approved of.
“Better than” what I was before, I guess, as that third grader.
“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of (YAH) God.”
Romans 12:2
She didn’t know that, as that new fourth grade student, I needed abundant reinforcement and lessons about seeing myself through The Most High’s Eyes, not anyone else’s eyes, especially the diet industry.
More importantly, I didn’t know I needed those lessons.
I could have avoided so much pain, and so many years of self-hate, had I been told, encouraged, and read for myself…
“I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well.”
Psalm 139:14
But, in that back-to-school moment, as that nine-year-old, I believed the grownup teacher.
I trusted that she would only tell me what was right.
So surely, me being “slimmer,” was good, even “better,” than who I was before.
Dangerous.
Do you see the dangerous teachable moment, whether anyone is aware of it?
“But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be thrown into the sea.”
Mark 9:42
Scripture, here, may seem to be severe overkill. In that moment, I knew Mrs. K didn’t actively attempt to kill me.
It was slower, more gradual and more passive than that.
She didn’t plant the eating disorder seed. That was already sprouting from my family environment. It would take a decade before I was at a two-digit weight, emaciated, and punishing myself with up to six hours of exercise a day.
It was years later, when one eating disorder morphed into another one.
She didn’t know; she didn’t intend that to happen.
Ignorance, not malice.
“My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.”
James 3:1
But this IS the caution, not just for schoolteachers, or even ministers of the Gospel, but for all of us. Adults, yes, but influencers and teachers have no age limit.
It is about influence.
We can build. We can harm, by how we show up and relate to others.
Childhood is referred to as “the formative years” for a reason. There is forming occurring. We are growing and changing.
And with “back-to-school,” this can be quite an obvious transformation process.
Kids come back from the summer having, for instance, grown six inches, getting braces, or getting braces removed from their teeth. Some kids lose weight; some “fill out.”
Whatever those changes are, there needs to be an awareness of how impressionable these young minds and hearts are.
As the influencer, be you teacher, coach, pastor, parent, or friend, please know your value system comes across to those around you. What you esteem as “good” or “bad,” “preferred,” or “rejected,” IS being taught to eyes and ears paying attention to you.
You hold sway.
Please make sure that the sway builds up, not tears down.
“…‘It is inevitable that stumbling blocks will come, but woe to the one through whom they come! It would be better for him to have a millstone hung around his neck and to be thrown into the sea than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.’”
Luke 17:1-2
What can you and I do?
Don’t call attention to body size and shape.
No matter how extreme the changes you may see in them are.
Be mindful that the person has heard, more than likely, how they look “wrong.” Don’t add TO that. Don’t “compliment,” either. That prioritizes value through image. That can add pressure to wrongly conform, like through a crash diet.
You may think and feel what you do about a person’s appearance. Don’t translate that into a “good or bad” estimation, speaking it to them.
Relate to them as the individual they are.
One thing Mrs. K did correctly?
She called me by my name.
“…‘I have called you by your name; You are Mine.’”
Isaiah 43:1
People love to hear their names. It’s about acknowledgement.
So, acknowledge.
Learn and call someone by their name. It signals “yes, I see you as you, not what you look like or what you do.”
Be mindful of our own thoughts.
Self-examination is spiritual.
Our thoughts, yes, influence others, for positive or negative.
But they also influence us.
“For as he thinks in his heart, so is he…”
Proverbs 23:7
What are we believing, saying to ourselves?
Is it causing harm? Is it helpful? Is it true?
We carry influence on others, yes.
But we also influence ourselves. And eventually, we go in the direction of our influencing thoughts. Is that where we want to go?
So, perhaps, we are saying words to ourselves like “fat” and “slim,” with value estimation attached to them.
What is that doing to and for us?
It’s doing something.
Is it glorifying to Our Creator?
“Back-to-school” season is not just about getting new clothes and school supplies for the kids.
