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Writer's pictureHannah Kuhn

Lessons from Barbie

Updated: Jul 26, 2023

There's a fine line between being enough without being too much.


Recently I saw the new blockbuster movie, 'Barbie.' I'll be honest, I was not planning on seeing it. While I loved Barbie, and played with her way too long (don't ask), the previews made it look confusing, and I didn't want to see it.


At first.


Don't worry, no spoilers. But 'Barbie' was not what I was expecting. I don't cry in movies... nope, not at the end of Titanic, Lord of the Rings, and I have no interest in seeing Marley and Me (I know, my friends call me heartless), but I cried while watching 'Barbie.'


America Ferrera plays a mom who reminisces on her past with Barbie. By complicated turn of events, America ends up talking to Barbie about the harsh but true reality about what it means to be a woman today.


I've watched this monologue three times since seeing this movie because Greta Gerwig hit the nail right on the head. In fact she hit is so square on, that it brought me to tears every time.


I've often wondered if my great grandma felt the same impossible pressures that I feel today. The pressures to be a "boss lady" career woman, while also being the best mother. We're told that thanks to the efforts before us, we can be whatever we want to be, unless it's something simple like a stay at home mother or a writer... then we're putting Jane Addams and Dorothy Day to shame.


We're marketed to be skinny but contradictorily told to be healthy. We're shamed for letting men objectify us, but that's all advertisements make us to be. Women are supposed to be soft, quiet and submissive, but also confident and not a doormat.


Except what a joke, because nobody likes a girl who's actually confident in herself because then we're told she intimidates men and makes other women look bad.


There's a fine line, and I mean fine, between being enough without being too much.

The pressure to find and stay on that line is what causes anxiety, depression, OCD, eating disorders, and more because I'll tell you the fatal but freeing secret that I discovered.


There is no line.


There's no line that you need to reach in order to be enough, therefore there is no line you could potentially cross that makes you too much-- it doesn't exist! There is no line because there is no unit of measurement nor scale on earth to measure your worth or value.


When you accept Jesus as your personal Savior and friend, your worth and your value is fixed. Like a fixed rate, it can't go up or down. Colossians 2:9-10 says "For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is head over every power and authority."


No one's comment, amount of money, societal status, job, degree, marital status, quantity of friends, or societal influence can add or take away from your worth. And any temptation to believe so is the enemy trying to steal your joy.


This is not an original quote, but it holds true, to both men and women: You are enough (just as you are) and you are not too much.

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