Video and transcript from Nma Emeh’s talk at Control the Room 2022
Control the Room 2022 was an absolute success! We hosted our annual facilitator summit alongside our partner MURAL. Our wonderful connection between the live event and the virtual world, hosted by Mark Tippin, Director of Strategic Next Practices, Mark facilitated “Mind Shift” sessions, where he guided our attendees through a dialog about how everyone was impacted by the talks. He engaged both in-person and virtual attendees through our various activities in our conference mural. It was inspiring to have so many people joining in different ways and everyone getting the chance to communicate.
We also partnered with SAFE this year to support and honor a lost colleague, Jenni Robertson. The dedication of this summit comes after losing a coworker, mother, and friend to family violence and Voltage Control has pledged to work with SAFE to stop family violence for everyone. We wanted to take a moment and look back on all of the moments of insight, knowledge, and growth we all took part in over the course of the summit.
This year’s summit theme was SHIFTS, and as we move into 2022 we have seen shifts in the way we work, the way we connect, and the way we honor one another.
This year we hosted 18 facilitators in a hybrid space. We were live in-person, on Zoom, and even created our own Control the Room VR space, and we must say the event, even with a few technical issues, turned out to be a hub of idea sharing and growing with each other.
Each speaker delivered a 20-minute lightning session, and each session was filled with a sense of community, play, and story-telling.
I Feel Good! It Is All About Body Image Positivity
I was an 11 pound baby. Any chance of me ever being skinny went out the door the moment I came out. And so that’s when I had that shift in my mindset. I decided I’m going to embrace who I am and embrace it to the fullest. So I decided I was going to approach it in three ways and embrace who God had designed me to be.
Nma Emeh
Faith. Family and Friends. Fashion. One of the toughest day-to-day activities that we all face is looking in the mirror and appreciating what is in front of us. Nma battled with a negative self-image, but there were three things that pulled her out of that negative space. Faith, embracing how God designed her to be. Family and friends, who could be wonderfully supportive, but who also have the tendency to be the first to point out faults. Fashion, ‘Fashion gave me a reason to be me.’ The mindset reset is triggered by the song: Put on Your Sunday Clothes from the musical “Hello, Dolly.”. Put on your best and feel your best! A loving reminder from King David ‘You are not a mistake, and that your soul should know very well.’ Psalm 139:13-14
Watch Nma Emeh speak on how ‘ I Feel Good! It Is All About Body Image Positivity’:
Find what it is that you want to use to express yourself. For me it was fashion. For you could be fitness. I have some friend that until they go to the gym, they just don’t feel like themselves. I cannot relate to that, but that’s okay. To each their own. For others, it is giving back. Finding a charity event and giving back, stepping out of yourself or it could be fun. What do you like to do for fun? Whatever it is that’s going to give you that opportunity to build that self confidence, self-esteem so that you can give back to the world the best version of you.
Nma Emeh
Nma Emeh:
Thank you. Thank you, Doug. Do you ever spend more time focusing on your physical appearance that you don’t like or more than what you do like about your body? Do you often compare your physical appearance to that of others, perhaps a public figure, a celebrity, a social media influencer? I know I do. Do you sometimes feel like your physical appearance is keeping you or preventing you from participating in activities, social events like a family reunion, maybe your high school reunion or to be specific, maybe a pool or a beach party? That beach party that they required you to wear a swimsuit and a swim trunk, but you just couldn’t bring yourself to get out of bed and put that on and walk out that door. That’s me. Do you ever feel like your physical appearance is stopping you from living out that purpose that God designed you to be? And as a result, you’re not living out your full Life.
Nma Emeh:
And lastly, let me ask you, has your physical appearance become such a significant contributor to how you see your self worth or evaluate your self worth? If you answered yes to any of these questions or at least if any of these questions resonated with you, I’m here to tell you, you’re not alone. We all got issues. Okay.
Nma Emeh:
According to study done by Ipsos in 2018, over almost 80% of American adults have confirmed that they do have some sort of dissatisfaction with their body image, women being that predominant group. As if that wasn’t bad enough when you take that down to our kids level, girls in particular, over 50% of girls at the age of 13 have expressed some kind of dissatisfaction with your body. And that number grows significantly to almost 80% by the age of 17. If that isn’t a problem, I don’t don’t know what is. I’m sure each of you know some little girl in that age range, your niece, your daughter, your next door neighbor. This needs to be addressed. That’s why mental health experts across the world agree that body image is a leading cause of social and mental health conditions, such as anxiety, depression, eating disorders, low self-esteem, low self confidence and suicide just to name a few.
Nma Emeh:
So what is body image? All of us have heard of it. What are some things that come to mind when you hear the word body image? You can feel free to throw out words. You can steal from my image. What are some things that come to your mind when you hear of body image, anyone?
Speaker 2:
Mirror.
Nma Emeh:
Mirror. Nice.
Speaker 3:
Instagram.
Nma Emeh:
Instagram. Love it.
Speaker 5:
Heart.
Nma Emeh:
Hearts. Yes. Yes.
Speaker 5:
Body parts.
Nma Emeh:
Body parts. Absolutely.
Speaker 6:
Your own size.
Nma Emeh:
Size. Yes it is. It’s all of that. You see the definition of body image is it’s the perception that a person has about their physical appearance and the thoughts and emotions that ensue as a result of that perception. You could have both a positive or a negative body image. It’s also influenced by both internal and external factors. Internal being our feelings, our emotions, our thoughts. External being social media, in fact, all forms of media, your family, and your friends.
Nma Emeh:
My own story with body image started at a very young age. I want to introduce you guys to my grandma, grandma Lucy. You see grandma Lucy and I were very close. My parents had my most of my siblings here in America. I come from a family of seven kids. Six of them were born in America and I was born in Nigeria. So when my parents relocated back to Nigeria in the late ’70s, grandma Lucy felt like she had pretty much missed out on being a grandma to her first set of grandkids. So my parents had me for grandma Lucy and grandma Lucy loved me with every single ounce of her body, every muscle in her body so much so that if you zoom in a little closer, you can see grandma Lucy flexing every ounce in her tiny biceps to hold me up.
Nma Emeh:
Why? Because I was a whopping 11 pound baby, 11 pounds, yes. I was that child that the doctor said told my mom, if you have anymore, you’re not going to make it. And so my size became one of the things that defined me, the main thing that defined me. I got tired of being described by my body, how big I was and growing up in Nigeria, if anybody knows any Nigerians, please raise your hand. You will know that Nigerians have no filters. We say things as they are good or bad. And over the years, I started to resent the fact that I was constantly being defined by my body. I knew that there was so much more to me, but why my body was a constant topic of discussion was just not acceptable.
Nma Emeh:
So I tried all the different diets. I tried to lose weight, join the gym, did everything every normal person does here in America and it didn’t work or I got tired. I would have success, but it wouldn’t last. Until one day I realized, you know what? This is not going to change. Why should it change? I was designed this way. I was an 11 pound baby. Any chance of me ever being skinny went out the door the moment I came out. And so that’s when I had that shift in my mindset. I decided I’m going to embrace who I am and embrace it to the fullest. So I decided I was going to approach it in three ways and embrace who God had designed me to be.
Nma Emeh:
The first being faith. I decided that every morning I’m going to wake up and intentionally do a mindset reset. For me, it was through faith. I wake up every morning I open my Bible and I find scripture. I’m a big believer also in self affirmation, positive thinking. Next, I was intentional about finding family and friends. Intentional about what I let them speak into my life. Some of the best compliments have come from family and friends. Some of the most hurtful have come from that same group. The thing about it, one of the reasons why grandma Lucy and I were very close is because she had a specific name she used to call me, or should I say phrase? She used to say [foreign language 00:09:38] is my first name in Igbo, which is my language [foreign language 00:09:46] means beauty. And every time she saw me, she would always say [foreign language 00:09:51] which means [foreign language 00:09:54] is beautiful.
Nma Emeh:
But much of my life, I didn’t feel worthy of that name and it seemed like she knew it. So every time she saw me, that was always what she called me. [foreign language 00:10:07]. I also decided that I wanted to find a way to express myself so that the world would know that I exist. And I’m here for a purpose and fashion gave me that permission to be authentically me. Can’t you tell? So I started designing my own clothes. I don’t make them, but I design them and fashion allows me to express how I feel and what I want and how I feel when I walk into a room and what I want to give to the world.
Nma Emeh:
One of the things that I used to love growing up was a movie called Hello, Dolly! I don’t know if you guys know that movie by Barbra Streisand. Now, if you know, it has a lot of musicals, a lot of singing and everything, but there was this one song that always resonated with me. And it was Put on Your Sunday clothes. In Nigeria, Sunday clothes are the clothes that you wear to church obviously. They were your best clothes. They were the nicest clothes. They were the clothes that you wear to make an impression. And so I wanted to invite you guys to stand up and let’s sing the song. Now I’ll tell you I don’t have a Jennifer Hudson’s voice, but this song pretty much became part of the soundtrack for my life. And I believe when you read the words or at least sing the words, you’ll understand.
Nma Emeh:
It says, put on your Sunday clothes when you feel down and out. Strut down the street and have your picture took. Dressed like a dream your spirit seem to turn about. That Sunday shine is a certain sign. That you feel as fine as you look.
Nma Emeh:
Awesome. All right. I think we did Jennifer Hudson proud, right? So this became the soundtrack for my life. I knew that dressing up was one way to really step into that confidence that I needed to get out of the bed every day. Dressing up gave me the self-esteem to go to work every morning. And over time, that became my signature thing. So today I want to talk about the shifts that we can make to gain that more body-positive mindset. It starts with the right mentality. Mindset reset is important. You know why? Because it forces us to let go of our past failures and visualize more positive outcomes. For me, it is scripture. For you it could be inspirational words. It could be prayer. It could be meditation, but you have to start with the right mentality every day.
Nma Emeh:
Secondly, be intentional. As facilitators, as leaders, we have the unique opportunity of speaking truth to people’s life. Not everybody has that opportunity. I’ll tell you a story. In Nigeria, I went to a boarding school, in secondary school it was standard in Nigeria to go to boarding school. So I went to an all-girls boarding school and everything was controlled by a bell. We were controlled by a bell. A bell told us when to wake up, went to go to bed, went to eat, went to sleep. And so this one morning I woke up and I woke up late, I rushed, dressed up. The matrons were coming to lock the dormitory so I ran out and I went to class. And as soon as I got into class, one of my classmates, she looked at me and she’s like, “[foreign language 00:14:29], what’s wrong with you? Wear your earrings. Come on, come on, go, go, go you look so ugly without your earrings on.” That one comment has taken me over 30 years to recover.
Nma Emeh:
In your role as a leader or facilitator your comments, your feedback can either build or break somebody down. You have a unique opportunity to speak truth, to be authentic and to have those words last for 30 plus years, good and bad. Be fair, no comparison, don’t look at social media and compare yourself. What we see on social media is a facade. We all know that. I know exactly how to angle a camera so I look 30 pounds lighter. And then you throw in some lighting and some other apps and everything. And then you have the perfect picture. That’s what we see on social media every day, right? What’s the point? I believe it was Theodore Roosevelt that said that comparison is the thief of all joy.
Nma Emeh:
And then lastly, be authentically you. Find what it is that you want to use to express yourself. For me it was fashion. For you could be fitness. I have some friend that until they go to the gym, they just don’t feel like themselves. I cannot relate to that, but that’s okay. To each their own. For others, it is giving back. Finding a charity event and giving back, stepping out of yourself or it could be fun. What do you like to do for fun? Whatever it is that’s going to give you that opportunity to build that self-confidence, self-esteem so that you can give back to the world the best version of you.
Nma Emeh:
And then lastly, I want to leave you with one of my favorite verses by King David. It says, “For You formed my inward parts, You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Your works and that my soul knows very well.” You are enough. God did not make any mistake with any of us. You are not a mistake and that your soul should know very well. Thank you.
