The BoF Podcast | Finding A Sense of Belonging in Beauty

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Background:

For Schuyler Bailar, an activist, creator and the primary brazenly transgender NCAA Division I swimmer within the US, discovering a way of belonging hasn’t at all times been straightforward. Bailar realised being accepted by society wasn’t as essential as accepting himself.

“Belonging shouldn’t be one thing that’s going to be given to me. It’s one thing that I’ve to search out by myself,” mentioned Bailar at The Enterprise of Magnificence World Discussion board 2023.

This week on The BoF Podcast, Bailar opens up about his personal experiences with the pressures to adapt to Eurocentric and cisgender magnificence beliefs as a biracial, transgender man, how he found his path to self-acceptance and why he desires others to have the ability to do the identical.

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Key Insights:

• From an early age, Bailar was conscious about the unfavorable position the wonder trade and society as an entire can play in shaping a person’s notion of belonging and self-worth, a deep sense that was formed by the experiences of his mom as a Korean immigrant rising up within the US. “She tried very laborious to suit no matter it was that might make her really feel included, which a variety of the time meant bending in the direction of whiteness, bending in the direction of assimilation,” mentioned Bailar.
• Earlier than he transitioned, Bailar tried to adapt to society’s cisgender expectations of how ladies ought to look, which in the end led him additional away from his true self. “I attempted so laborious to be what society anticipated of me. What society informed me I used to be: a girl,” mentioned Bailar. “I used to be attempting so laborious to determine the right way to be this lady, and but I used to be depressing.”
• At his first collegiate swim apply at Harvard College, Bailar mentioned he felt hesitant and scared standing earlier than his teammates in a Speedo, however he discovered the braveness to proceed swimming. “I stood alongside all my teammates, none of whom had been transgender like me, feeling not stunning, feeling misshapen, feeling unusual, feeling bizarre, feeling not man sufficient. However I dove in… and I swam with them anyway,” mentioned Bailar.
• Since graduating, Bailar has turned his consideration to activism, and works to problem society’s magnificence requirements. “What I would like from the world is for us to have the ability to dive right into a magnificence that originates at each single particular person in order that no person has to cease being themselves, in order that no person has to point out up and alter who they’re with the intention to really feel like they belong,” mentioned Bailar.

Further Assets: