This is part II of “Strong is my Victory over the Skinny Word” rant.

** And another disclaimer at the bottom of the page***



I inhabit a community that celebrates getting and being strong. It’s a radical departure from inhabiting a world that idolizes eliminating oneself to the body size of Skinny.

My Community proclaims that our goals are building strength, getting fit and being healthy. We don’t care about scale weight, we care about building muscle and pushing daily to our personal best!

We don’t crow about the weight we lose. We ecstatically post the amount of weight we ADD – to our squats, lifts, presses, cleans and jerks.

And some of us celebrate the growing of bigger body parts as a good thing.

How cool is that?

Here’s my problem.

My Community is Completely Full of Shit.

Every time I open my Facebook page or popular pages that celebrate “Strong” or Google CrossFit Women or go to Pinterest, I am bombarded with a stream of pictures of muscled women scrawled with motivational sayings. You know the ones.

Why the hell is every single “motivational” picture an image of a woman who is SkinnyStrong – a muscular chick with like 8% bodyfat and a killer six pack?

Why is every message proclaiming that it’s about being STRONG, and assuring me that it’s all about my determination to do better, be my best yes I can – pasted on some chick who is clearly a fitness model, a figure competitor, or belongs to that elusive 1% of women who have THAT kind of body?

And why is our supposed new breed of CrossFit women, you know, the ones who reject the focus on the body image thing to redefine the whole Strong is Beautiful thing, posting them?

I Am Not That Kind of Strong. I am RealStrong.

See, I am strong. I have worked hard to get stronger and am still at it. I am healthy, fit, and I’m hot. Yes, I just said that.

And guess what? I don’t have abs. I am not perfectly proportioned or perfectly lean. I’m not perfect in any way. You can see real parts of me jiggle!

This is My World of RealStrong

Moreover, I know a shit ton of people who embody strong, fierce, successful, and over the top awesome who may not have the muscles I do, (I was a tomboy, I’ve had muscles all my life) but they can kick my ass in seventeen different categories.

Most important, I know people who embody what to me is the true meaning of Strong. Maybe they are cancer survivors training their hearts out, maybe they lost 200 pounds to be healthy for themselves and their kids.



Or maybe they are people like you and me pushing to our maximum capacity every day, redefining our personal limits, exceeding our goals, outshining our own expectations –

– and are outrageously sexy just because of that. Not because of abs and body proportions. But because of a lifestyle of Strong that is all about attitude, achievement, health and sharing it.

This is the RealStrong Challenge.

We are living at a time when we who love strong are changing the world. So let’s do that. Really Change the World.

Step off of the unconscious bandwagon of promoting SkinnyStrong is the New Perfect and THINK. I just said that. THINK.

What does Strong really mean to you? Who is Strong? And Create it. Yes You. Create a different kind of Strong with me. I’m calling it RealStrong.

RealStrong is Passion, Dedication, Relentlessness and Positive Energy.

RealStrong is seen in the eyes, the smile and shines from the soul.

Not the abs.



It is me. It is you. And Grandma.

(RealStrong is also totally equal opportunity and happily includes people with killer abs and 8% bodyfat).

The Call to Action



If this speaks to you in that motivational way – even for a second before you leave and go to your nonfacebooky real world – take a minute, go to the RealStrong Page on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest and like them. Share this and all those pages with everyone you know and start creating our RealStrong world.

RealStrong Facebook Page. Like It.

Post pictures of yourself, of real people you know, and say something uncool like – that fat chick over there motivates me because she is hammering that workout!

That chick over there, yeah, thunder thighs over there, just deadlifted 300 lbs. She happens to have 3 kids. That is HOT.



Make RealStrong the sexiest, bestest positive thing ever for people like you and me who shine our strength from our hearts, want to share that, and are saying NO to the SkinnyStrong is the New Perfect bullshit that repeats the body image crap we say we have overcome.

But obviously haven’t.



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**Disclaimer. I am not saying that SkinnyStrong women have it easy, do not work hard or are not a representation of Strong. Some of my best friends are SkinnyStrong (for real!) and they motivate and empower me through their dedication. What I’m saying, if it was unclear in the rant, is that I don’t get why our community is using only one bodytype – SkinnyStrong – to represent the beauty of strong, in the same way the rest of the world uses Skinny to represent beautiful. We are better than that.