Wendover Project 2015, Paul Butler

Candid photo by, Nic Adams

Some experiences take a long time to fully process. I've been wanting to write about this art project I was fortunate enough to participate in in September of 2015. I've wanted to write about it many times. I'm still not sure I have adequate words to describe how this one day last Fall impacted my life.

Paul Butler is an artist out of Ogden, Utah. A friend tagged me in his Facebook post asking for models to drive out to the Salt Flats by Wendover, Nevada and let themselves be painted and photographed. He has a vision of helping women to see beauty in their being beyond what society shows us. To quote Paul, "Our bodies are beautiful - no measures or scales are necessary - we exist - we are beautiful." After scrolling through the photographs and articles of past year's projects I was sold. I asked for my name to be added to the list of models. Besides Paul, and his assistant, everyone involved was female. The painters, the helpers, the additional photographers. No men were allowed on 'set.'

I had never been involved in a large scale photo shoot and project like this before. I had no idea what to expect. There was a lot of standing around, getting lost, not being able to hear (That is a personal issue as I have slight hearing loss in one of my ears.), being hungry and thirsty, sweating from places I literally had never felt sweat drip from before, laughing, chatting, and being naked. It was a long day and I would do it again in a heartbeat. Why? The lessons I learned about myself and human bodies in general changed my life forever. 

We first took photographs clothed. Easy. I love being photographed. We then went back to the main staging area and were asked to disrobe. That's when I became a little hesitant. If you can believe it I wasn't sure what the right way to disrobe was. I'm laughing at myself right now remembering that. Should I take my top off first because breasts aren't as private as vaginas? Should I undress slowly so that nobody thought I thought too highly of myself by ripping my clothes off and daring to be totally comfortable in my bare skin? I snuck quick looks around me to make sure I was "doing it right." I really hope you're laughing right now. The point was to get naked, stay naked, and be photographed naked to show beauty and confidence in every body, and here I was trying to make sure I was doing naked right.

Candid photo by, Nic Adams

What I realized in those moments of undressing was that I wasn't as secure in my own skin as I thought I was. I signed up for this. I knew I was safe. Fact of the matter was that I had never been that exposed in front of anyone in my life. I had been naked before. I had been naked in front of friends and lovers. This was different. This is where I'm afraid my words are going to fail me. This was something bigger than me. I wasn't going to get sex out of this. I wasn't with my best friends who were going to put clothes on immediately. This was being truly naked, in nature, with strangers. This was a powerful lesson.

The clothing we wear day to day is a kind of glamour, armor, costume, mirage, message. I had never realized how important and comforting clothing was to me until that point. Until that moment I had not considered my clothing that big of a statement of my life. From my perspective I'm a pretty classic jeans and t-shirt kind of girl. In the summer I can be found in a tank top, shorts and flip flops almost exclusively. Dressing up and wearing makeup are very low on my list of fun things, unless they involve cosplay. As I stood there in my bare skin I realized that nobody knew anything about me. Nobody knew I was laid back and relaxed. The way I dress is much more intentional than I had understood. I want to be approachable. I do not want people to think, by my clothing, that I'm stuck up or think I'm better than them. There I was without that message and I didn't know what to do.

Soon I realized that I had covered my body with religious garments for most of my adult life and that that clothing also sent a message to others. By choosing clothing that covered my body in certain ways, I was not just sending the message to God that I was keeping my covenants with him, I was sending a message to those I encountered that I was 'good'. "Look at me. I cover my body this way and that means I'm nice, clean, healthy, righteous, safe, a good mom and wife, etc." "I'm one of you" or possibly, "I'm different than you."

There was also the message I was sending myself. In order to be 'good' I had to cover my body. The promise was that my body would remain covered by the religious garments twenty-four hours a day. They were not to be removed (there are exceptions). I had not fully realized until that moment that what I had internalized was that my body needed to stay hidden in order to be 'good.' That if my shoulders, stomach, or upper thighs, etc. were showing that I was not 'good.' In order to be in good standing with God I must cover my body. If my body was uncovered I was not in good standing with God and everyone knew it just by looking at me.

Clothing says a lot. We may think we're laid back and not caught up in trends. That may be true. Our clothing choices, whether intricate and labor intensive or sweats and a ponytail, still represent who we are to the world. Whether we want to admit it or not, we make judgements about people based on the way they choose to present themselves. People judge me based on the way I present myself. I've always known that and hated it, however, the true power of clothing did not resonate with me until that day.

I quickly got over my initial, "Am I naked in the right way," concerns and then focused my anxiety on not looking at anyone. Of course I was curious. I absolutely wanted to know what other women really look like. I did not want to be staring at everyone's vaginas and breasts though. I either looked at their foreheads, past them, or at the ground. I was so afraid of being a pervert that I intentionally made myself unapproachable. Again, I really hope you're laughing at this. I am.

The first couple of shots were everyone in a line with paper bags over our heads and then with masks on. No paint. Just our naked bodies. I did not get to talk to Paul Butler about why he had us do this. Someone mentioned that it was to take our faces away. Most of us are comfortable with our faces being beautiful, even if that means applying makeup daily. This way the focus was on our bodies. I loved the idea. What was amazing is that when those shots were done I had lost all inhibitions about being naked myself and everyone else being naked. From the moment the masks were taken away I rarely thought about accidentally staring someone in the vagina. I just was. They just were. Done. That easy.

Candid photo by, Nic Adams

I caught glimpses of all kinds of bodies. Cellulite, scars, insulin pumps, bruises, bones, skinny bodies, fat bodies, short bodies, tall bodies. Bodies. That's all they were. Bodies. And then, they became more. They became people. As I talked to the women around me they became nurses, teachers, students, bankers, people. They were people. Simple, complex, people. By taking away the messages of their clothing people were able to tell me who they were without as many preconceived notions. Obviously there was still hair, makeup, tattoos, piercing, etc. Those are second nature to me. Maybe not to others but they can write their own blog post.

I walked away from this project counting down the days until the next one and wishing we could completely cut clothing out of our lives. The experience was freeing not only for my self image but for my feelings towards other's bodies. I then remembered that sweat and sitting are a major part of life and decided that I like clothing, I just wish we had more widely accepted opportunities to bare our bodies and learn to love the human form in all its varieties. I have a greater appreciation of women and their bodies. I finally saw for myself, on a bigger scale, that naked bodies aren't necessarily sexual. They can be if we want them to be. If we don't, they can simply be the fleshy vessel that our souls walk around in. They can even be art.

Find Paul Butler here: https://www.facebook.com/paulbutlerphotographyworldwide/

Raw

Raw, by Alisa May
Acrylic on Canvas, 16x20

"You need to grow thicker skin." Oh, the amount of times I've heard that. It's just about the most insensitive, yet necessary, advice out there. I don't take issue with the message, at least not the way I've come to incorporate it in my life. It's vital to survival in this world. The delivery is usually done harshly and without validating what the other person is going through emotionally. Asking someone to deny or hide what they are experiencing can be harmful and demoralizing.

The message has come in different packages throughout my life. When I was a kid playing in the neighborhood and got tackled by the boys during touch football, because I was a girl, I was told, "Stop crying. If you're going to play with the boys you're going to get hurt." I knew at the time that I was being singled out. I didn't understand why, I just knew that they weren't tacking each other, only me. I could have used some constructive advice on how to deal with the situation. That did not happen.

When I tried out to be a cheerleader in eighth grade, and the then current cheerleaders were pointing at me and laughing during tryouts because I was missing my two front teeth, the woman in charge said that she knew those girls and there's no way they would have been doing that. She was not present when it happened. No adults were. I was asking for an opportunity to try out again for her, instead of the girls that were making fun of me. I received the message loud and clear. It was all in my head and I needed to get over it because she wasn't going to do anything about it.

Slowly I learned what I needed to do to survive emotionally in specific situations as they arose. For instance, I stopped playing in the neighborhood and spent most of my time inside with my grandma. When my teeth became an issue, I blocked out the name calling. "Toothless," was the taunters favorite. I learned to stop my facial and body reactions when someone called it in the school hallways. Then, when I became a cheerleader in High School and our Varsity Football players would sit in front of me in the stands at away games and point and laugh, I would smile and cheer like they weren't making fun of me. These emotional band aids helped for those situations. I wasn't learning actual healthy coping skills that I could apply broadly, just small fixes for incredibly specific circumstances. Those fixes included hiding myself or denying my emotions to make sure others did not hurt me.

As an adult I've encountered some incredibly unhealthy people. Even within my family. When I spoke to an elder in my family about sexual assault from another family member, I was told to forgive the person and that I should have no problems being around them myself, or allowing my children to be around them. Similar message from my childhood. Different delivery. As though setting boundaries to protect myself and my children was being too emotional about the situation. "Toughen up. That was a long time ago."

Then, as I was recovering from Domestic Violence, I was told by many people to have, "thicker skin." "Stop letting that person get to you." Recovering from Domestic Violence (and Sexual Assault/Trauma of any kind) is a topic for another post. For now, I'll just say that it's not as easy as just "getting over it." It takes focused, concerted effort for long periods of time to truly recover from the booby traps and lies they embed in the psyche. As I tried to force myself not to react to continuing abuse, I started beating myself up for not being able to just let the actions and words, "roll off my back."

It's those feelings of inadequacy and rawness that inspired this piece. I often wondered how I could have thicker skin when I barely felt like I had skin at all. I felt completely exposed. Mind, body, and soul. Like every nerve, muscle, organ, cell was right out there for anyone to contaminate and hurt. In order to fake having thicker skin I tried to be emotionless. That was a disaster. I ended up making myself physically ill. By trying to board up my deep emotional well I was denying my true emotional self.

I am incredibly fortunate to have a therapist who has extensive knowledge and practice both with survivors and perpetrators. She helped me understand that it wasn't about not feeling. Emotions come and go. Emotions have their own path. My body, mind and soul are going to react. That reaction is not "bad." It is not anything other than a natural reaction. How I choose to move forward with that reaction is what I have control over. This was the key I needed to unlock long term healing and understanding. I'm not weak for having a PTSD episode from a trigger. That is not weakness, it is a built in safety mechanism from our early ancestors. I am not weak for crying when I'm hurt. It's how I choose to use that natural reaction in my life that will either harm me, or others, or help me heal.

So, now when I hear, "Toughen up," or "Grow thicker skin," or "Just let it roll of your back," or, "You should be over this by now," or, "Why is this still affecting you," I change the meaning of those statements to something healthier for me. In fact, those statements only helped push me further into shame and anxiety. Now, I know that I will react. I will react in a major way sometimes. I don't have to act on that natural reaction or assign blame or harm to it. I can let it run it's course and use my many coping skills to stay as healthy as possible while it's trying to protect me from further harm. Ain't no thang. Just a chemical reaction in my body. I ain't worried about it.

Sometimes I will be raw. Sometimes I will have thick skin. I will always be me.

How do you allow your emotions to work in your life for a healthier you?