How Learning to Love My Body in a Bikini Helped Me Make a Movie
I didn't go into film because I was told I couldn't make it as a queer, fat, woman. Here's how proving that wrong changed everything in my career.
Dear friend,
There is a direct correlation for me between learning to confidently wear a bikini at the beach and making my new movie.
Learning to love the skin I’m in has been a complete game changer for every aspect of my career.
Stepping into the power of my body, learning to love myself as I am as a queer fat woman, and writing queer fat women in a positive light, all made it so I learned to trust other things about myself, including my own voice.
Having the confidence to walk on the beach in a bikini and feel good, no matter what my size, helped me have the confidence to go to law school, to walk into meetings with celebrities, to start my own company, and to know that I’m a badass who belongs in any room.
And then when I started dating people because I was confident in my body, and interacting with people when I was confident in my body, I realized that all those haters were wrong all the time:
You do not have to be thin to find love and success in life.
There are plus-size women out there killing it every single day in every single industry.
I remember seeing Melissa McCarthy in Spy and thinking: oh my God, this is what I needed my whole life.
The more I’m out here in my bathing suit, unapologetically being me and telling my stories, the more other people can be as well.
And then suddenly, if the culture can be wrong about fat bodies, what else can they be wrong about?
The naysayers who said I could never make it as a writer, that my queerness was wrong, that I would never find love, that no one would ever like me if I was neurodiverse, that I would never be able to make it as an artist.
I’ve proven all of them wrong.
But one of the first things I had to prove wrong was this idea that fat bodies are bad bodies.
Empowering, Empathetic, and Entertaining Stories
As I’m out here making stories about queer fat women finding love and joy, I’m actively changing the narrative so we can all see ourselves in the happily ever after that we deserve.
Seeing my book Because Fat Girl in airports across the nation and bookstores all over, on the shelves of people who love it, lines of people waiting to have me sign their book because they related so much with the characters — it helped me to realize how badly we need stories like mine.
So if you like stories of queer fat women, if you just like diverse stories in general, if you want to feel great in your body because of the narratives I’m telling — check out my novel Because Fat Girl and my upcoming movie, No Animals Harmed.
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And also follow along on Instagram and YouTube where I’m sharing what I’ve learned about moviemaking and what I know about publishing — everything within a queer, body positive lens — so you can go out there and do it yourself too.
Because the world needs our stories now more than ever.
With love and creativity,
Lauren
P.S. Want to help queer stories out in the world? Check out the amazing incentives we have for those who pre-order and help fund my new movie No Animals Harmed.