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Did you see the photos of Gwyneth Paltrow celebrating her 50th birthday? One picture is of Gwyneth nude, spraypainted gold and looking fantastic. There is a second photograph of Gwyneth wearing a little bikini and jumping through the air looking very happy, apparently not a single concession made by her aging body to the gravitational forces of the earth.
Paltrow wrote an essay to go with the photo about turning 50 and how she is finally starting to accept her humanity.
“I accept the marks and the loosening skin, the wrinkles. I accept my body and let go of the need to be perfect, look perfect, defy gravity, defy logic, defy humanity. I accept my humanity.”
And the world went mad because instead of listening to what Paltrow was saying they just saw the pictures of her body, which do seem to look perfect, defy gravity, and defy logic. Gwyneth doesn’t have wrinkles or loose skin, we cried.
But Gwyneth is not the enemy.
Gwyneth never pretends that she doesn’t spend half the week working out, that she doesn’t eat a strict diet, she’s open about how hard she works to look the way she does. The ‘enemies’ are the ones who pretend it’s natural to have the body or the face of a 20-year-old at the age of 50.
To age as a woman in this world really has become a kind of personal failure, a black mark, something to be denied, outrun, planed away and filled in. Paltrow has said when she sees photos of her younger self she just sees a lost girl and she would never want to go back and be the person she was in her 20s.
“I’ve earned my life. I’ve earned my wrinkles. I have been through so many highs and lows, and there’s a sweetness that starts to emerge from that, from having lived, from being wise, from being humble, from loving and losing and all of this stuff.”
In 2019, she asked the question, “What does it mean to get wrinkles and get closer to menopause? What happens to your identity as a woman if you’re not fuckable and beautiful?”
I think that’s what our desperation to stay young is rooted in, a desire to be seen as still desirable as a woman, because that’s what we’ve been told is the most valuable aspect of ourselves. As if how we look was the only thing we had to offer to the world. But we seem to have become more enslaved to this idea than ever, forgetting that we have different things to offer, different ways of being, different pleasures to enjoy than just looking young and beautiful.
Paltrow said she freaked out when she turned 30 and then 40, but at 50 she is accepting herself. I wonder how I might mark turning 50. I hope I will make it that far, first of all, but I think it might be the first milestone where I actually have a second to reflect on it.
When I turned 30, I had a great new job, a new place to live that I loved, great friends and I was feeling positive about my life so the idea of turning 30 didn’t ruffle me at all. When I turned 40, I was so busy with my young family that I didn’t even have time to think about what it might mean, although in retrospect it was around then that I started trying to write the novel I had always wanted to write, so subconsciously at least I think I was aware time was moving on. Somehow though, I don’t think I’ll celebrate turning 50 by spray-painting my body gold or donning a bikini.
Of course, if I hit the gym between now and then, I reserve the right to do so, but I think I’ll probably just be grateful to still be here, to still be able to enjoy my family and my life and my work.
Despite all the giving out about her, I like Gwyneth’s approach to ageing, which is to try to be as healthy and as fit as she can so that she can enjoy her life as much and for as long as she can. That simple message gets a little lost in the nude photos of the perfect body.
There is an extreme state of societal denial around the ageing of women, from the Kardashians to J-Lo. J-Lo looks the same as, or perhaps even better than, when she was engaged to Ben Affleck first time around. If we convince ourselves we have to look as good, as beautiful, as sexually attractive as a 20-something woman to be worthy of being alive in this world, then we’re onto a loser. Time catches up with everyone.
This is not about shaming women who do botox or who want to look younger or better. It’s more about the pressure and expectation that every woman should. The preoccupation with youth is an unnatural and cruel distraction from the real pleasures life has to offer. The sooner we reconnect with and accept the truth that everyone grows old, the more liberated and enjoyable our lives as women will be.
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