Merci Miglino - Speaker, Trainer, Coach, Author From Doormat to Diva!

Doormat to Diva Program Review
A Review from 'Catholic New York'

By Mary DeTurris Poust

My neighbor recently invited me to join her for a program called “From Doormat to Diva.” With a title like that, how could I resist? Although I don’t see myself as a doormat, I am certainly a far cry from anything resembling a diva. If you could take one look at my wardrobe, you’d know what I mean.

Chances are you know what I mean anyway. How many women out there have been trained to think more of others and less of themselves? How many can’t say “No” to anyone for any reason? How many are guided more by what others think than by what makes them happy? Come on, put those hands up. I know you’re out there.

My training began at a young age. The lessons were passed on not through words but through actions that spoke volumes to my impressionable young mind. My mother never bought anything for herself. Half the time she returned the beautiful Christmas gifts my father gave her and used the money for groceries, school supplies, or gas for the kiddy car service she drove every day. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to spend money; it was that she didn’t want to spend money on herself.

I recently came face to face with an updated but equally distressing version of this story. Ever since Olivia was born almost three years ago, I have told her on a regular basis that she is beautiful. I even call her “Beauty” much of the time. In the past few weeks, however, she has she taken to crossing her arms and declaring, “I’m not beautiful.” It makes me cringe to hear her say out loud what I’ve been hearing in my head all my life. Like my mother before me, I am unknowingly teaching my daughter, through my actions, to think of herself as “less than.”

So many of use have been taught to believe that there is something shameful in taking care of ourselves, let alone loving ourselves. We take on a doormat identity, as if it’s noble or holy to think less of ourselves. But that’s not the way to holiness. That’s the way to a kind of upside-down narcissism that leaves little energy for experiencing all the wonderful things that God wants for us.

Merci Miglino, the creator of “From Doormat to Diva,” looked out at the women attending her presentation and said, “Don’t wear Payless Shoes.” I leaned over to my neighbor and whispered that I was, at that very moment, wearing a pair of Payless Shoes that had clearly outlasted the life expectancy of anything preceded by the word “payless.” Merci wasn’t making a fashion statement; she was making an attitude statement, and I knew what she meant. If everything you give yourself is of the payless variety – from shoes to self-image -- eventually you become a kind of payless person. You start thinking you’re not worth very much.

Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” So, obviously, he assumed we would love ourselves, not with an I’m-better-than-you-are kind of love but with the kind of love that reflects the fact that we are created in God’s image. Let’s hear that again: We are created in God’s image. How, then, can we be so cavalier about criticizing the miracle of our own lives, even if we can’t fit into size five jeans?

Being a diva doesn’t mean demanding that our refrigerators be stocked with expensive champagne and caviar. It means recognizing God’s divine presence within us. It means finally understanding that if we can’t love ourselves even a little, it’s awfully hard to love anyone else at all.