In 1967 a mysterious student attended class at Oregon State University for two months enveloped in a big black bag with only his bare feet showing. Professor Charles Goetzinger’s experiment was to observe how the students’ feelings about the black bag would change over time. At first, the students treated the black bag with hostility, which evolved into curiosity and eventually friendship. By simply presenting the black bag over and over again to the students, their attitudes about the bag were changed.
Consider your feelings about yourself in photos to be your version of the black bag. The way you feel about yourself in raw, unfiltered, non-selfie photos at this moment, is the black bag sitting at the back of your room. You might be feeling shame, frustration, fear, dissatisfaction, and even a little hostility toward them and consequently toward yourself. And if so, that’s a perfectly good place to start. It’s exactly how I felt and why I decided that confronting this fear and myself through the camera for thirty days would provide a solution.
I know you’ve searched for a way around your own version of the black bag, wearing masks, avoiding the camera all together, or simply trying to control the outcome in order to bypass your uncomfortable feelings around it. I also know you are exhausted from your efforts, still searching for a foundational shift and long-term solution to how you feel about your image. It’s not enough to simply want a change though; it’s important for us to see how the transformation is possible for us. It doesn’t work to simply observe what has worked well for others. For you to see the possibility of transformation, you need to start with seeing the truth of who you are first then act according to that truth.
This action involves consistent, deliberate engagement with the camera lens. By familiarizing myself with these other angles through a regular self-portrait practice, I was essentially retraining my brain to accept and even appreciate this different perspective.
The good news? You can do the same.
Thank you for reading this excerpt from my forthcoming book You Are Golden. How to take up space and stop deleting yourself. For Good Girls, Over-thinkers, and Perfectionists! I’m excited to share more with you over the coming months.