Balance + Tea With Alice Salon 59

Peta Thames

I happen to be in London mid June, if that happened to coincide with your timing I'd love to attend a live salon.

I would definitely try to make a London Salon.

Best wishes Alice. I loved your show when you visited Adelaide; it was the first time that I've seen you live (and Andrew too). Safe travels.

Will Thompson

I can't go to the Good Ship show for Other Commitment Reasons, but would try to make it to a live salon, childcare permitting!

I doubt we'd be able to do a London Salon being in Brum. I know a hundred miles is nothing to an Australian but it's half a country to us. We are heading to Edinburgh on August and will see you there

I'll add that if you do decide to continue with your UK tour, my wife and I will try to make the London show with Laura Davis. We're having a 2-week holiday in the UK (our first real travel since the Before Time), and that's our last night before we fly home to Colorado.

My wife, a high school teacher, took a semester off with our first child, and a full year with the second (because infant *and* toddler...). It's fortunate that (most) public school teachers in the US can do this without losing their jobs, assuming they have financial support from other sources (me and her parents, in this case). If you can afford it, and it will make your life easier, do what you need to do to stay sane and healthy. Can't really speak to standards of beauty. I'm mostly blind and only have a vague idea what anyone looks like if I didn't know them when my vision was better. You do have a very lovely voice, though.

Interestingly, mask times have been pretty great as they remove that anxiety of being in front of others. It puts up a physical barrier that negates needing to wear the false mask that I’ve had to carry around most of my life. It’s great to hide behind that thing.

The only photos I’m in are the ones my wife takes when we’re out together. It’s not that I want those photos or want to be in them, but it makes her happy and that’s enough for me to suffer through. In this, I realize that I hide from other people because it’s a place of safety. Do I owe anybody beauty? Absolutely not. Do I want to avoid judgement from everyone because my sense of self-worth is something that’s swirled around in the toilet bowl for year? Absolutely so. And that’s why I hide and who I hide from is everyone.

I think that all of us, to some extent want to feel as though we are attractive to others. Where it gets interesting is how that want intersects with the level of effort we are willing to put into doing that. I have never felt the level of effort worth it because I never felt as though it would change anything. Sounds a bit like a damaged psyche, I know, years of bullying will do that to a person (quelle surprise). What that’s lead to is, instead of changing for others, to hiding away so as to not be judged. Hiding away is something that happens in all kinds of places. For example, I’m not a selfie taker. I tell people that it’s because I feel it’s narcissistic, which it may be to some extent, but it’s more truthful to say that I don’t want to see myself or have others do so. It’s why I don’t have my picture on any social media platforms and why I don’t have a webcam enabled for work meetings. It’s why, on those rare occasions I attend a Salon, I fight with myself to turn on my camera, because sometimes you just not let the negativity win.

Before getting into that, I just want to acknowledge the media portrayal of beauty and how damaging that is and how eastern cultures have done a wonderful job of damaging people and creating an unhealthy obsession with looks which causes body dysmorphia in people and contributes to the problems of things like anorexia. As has always been the case for me, when I look in the mirror, I don’t see somebody attractive or at least someone that fits the mould of attractive. I’m fortunate my wife perceives me differently. At this point, I’m a few pounds overweight (after losing a bunch trying to resolve stomach issues), have a quality solar panel going on rather than a thatched roof, and a permanent look of tiredness. Could I, or should I, change any of these things? Not likely.

Patreon appears to be accepting my comments and then removing them. That's quite lovely. I'm breaking my response into multiple replies to see if that posts. This is a bit rambling and may seem semi-coherent. Not apologizing, just warning the reader… For me, I consider the question of “owing beauty” from another angle – who do you hide from?

Mike Machin

I would try to get to London for an IRL - would need a bit of notice to organise.

I would attend a live salon but probably only if it was in the same hemisphere that my body is usually in.

Good question though I need to do a lot of work on body positivity. I guess for me it comes from wanting to be desirable enough to attract someone to me beyond my personality. There are some things I do for me (trying to be somewhat fit) but mainly it's external validation. And of course it's not directly for anyone.. It's presumed external validation.

I would certainly be up for an in-person salon in London, but I am biased because I live here

I would also try to be in london when the in person salon was! But planning on seeing you in Edinburgh anyway :) Going to probably existentially wonder who I owe beauty to all day... like I pretty much only 'try' in terms of the shop bought type beauty when it's a special occasion but I do think my underlying self esteem is probably affected by that (i.e. I presume no one thinks I look good unless putting in the effort we are conditioned to think we need)... who knows who it's for, being 'better' at it would probably make me feel like I was living more 'normal' and less 'slight outsider'