Lizzo Voices That She Has 'Nothing to Hide' About Her Body — Says 'There's No Shame Anymore'

Apr 27, 2021 by apost team

The body positivity movement has been growing stronger as each year passes. The roots of the movement began growing in the late 1960s, but the internet and especially social media gave followers of this movement a great platform to share their vision and goals as per Very Well Mind. Today, body positivity encompasses a large number of people and promotes the message that "all bodies are beautiful."

One of the biggest and loudest supporters of this movement is the singer and musician who is professionally known as Lizzo. Lizzo's incredible music speaks for itself, but her outspoken support for the body positivity movement and her transparency as she deals with the challenges of being a larger person on social media has found a lot of supporters and followers as well. More than 10 million people follow her life on her Instagram account, which is a substantial number. 

In an interview in April 2021, Lizzo expressed to her followers that she does not feel any shame about her body and that she doesn't wish to hide herself to please other people anymore. She practices what she preaches and has no qualms about sharing unedited photos of her body on her social media. Ahead of her interview, Lizzo took to her Instagram to share unfiltered, nude photos of herself while hitting home the message of accepting one's body no matter what. The award-winning artist has found a way to not just make a difference in people's lives through her music but also through advocating for the body positivity movement. 

Lizzo, 32, whose real name is Melissa Viviane Jefferson, was born in Michigan, Detriot, and told ELLE in an interview that she fell in love with music when she was very young. She went on to study music performance at the University of Houston before moving to Minneapolis, where she spent some of the most formative years of her early career as she created the all-female rap/R&B groups "The Chalice" and "GRRRL PRTY."

In 2019, she began getting recognized by the big leagues for her contribution to music, and ever since, has found a major spot in the music industry. Her list of awards and nominations speaks for itself — Lizzo is a truly gifted artist. 

Along with her music, Lizzo has also become one of the brightest faces of body positivity of today. Her messages of self-love, particularly, resonate with a wide audience. "I take self-love very seriously. And I take it seriously because when I was younger," she told ELLE in 2019. "...I didn’t love who I was... because I was told I wasn’t lovable by the media, by [people at] school, by not seeing myself in beauty ads, by not seeing myself in television...by lack of representation. My self-hatred got so bad that I was fantasizing about being other people." 

Today, Lizzo is doing better and continuing to spread her message of body positivity. In an interview for Dove's Self-Esteem campaign, PEOPLE reported that she said, "As most people know I did an interview about "What's Underneath Project" years ago and I took off all my clothes." 

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She added, "I took my wig off and talked about the things I loved about myself. I was like, if anybody wants to see how I really look, all they got to do is go to YouTube." This experience had a major impact on Lizzo.

"From then on, I was like, I have nothing to hide. There's no shame anymore. I just post myself. It's like, you take me as I am. You don't have to love me," she continued. 

Lizzo also added that her need for self-love came from the need to survive. "I'm going to continue to live in this body and survive in this body and be happy and actually enjoy life, I need to find a way to like myself. I was body negative for a long time."

She also saw that there was a need to change what was thought of as "normal." Said the artist, "Most people are taught that body negativity is normal, right? Then I became body positive, which is the opposite of that. It's disruptive. I believe everything I say about my body. But to push this conversation forward, we need to normalize it."

Lizzo continues to push the same message to all of her followers as often as she can. She also emphasized that being body positive does not mean always making it a political statement. "It's just my body." she elaborated. "When you see it, keep it pushing. Keep that same energy that you keep with all the other bodies you see. That's what body normative really means to me." 

Do you agree with Lizzo's body positivity message? Tell us what you think and be sure to share this with your friends as well.