There is a culture that all young people are part of. I am not talking about our alleged laziness, or entitlement; I am not speaking of the collegiate hookup and party culture. I am talking about the Millennial tendency to self deprecate.

I was standing in a dressing room surrounded by other girls. Every single one of us looked up and down in the mirror and listed things we dislike about ourselves: I am so fat, my arms are weird looking, I wish I had your legs, I will never look older than fifteen, I hate myself. We stood around, blatantly ignoring the positive things about ourselves.

Somewhere along the road it became acceptable and common to openly hate on yourself and taboo to compliment and taut the things you are proud of. How many times a day do you respond to "You look nice!" with a "Oh stop, I look horrible." I am guilty of this as well.

It is okay, and actually awesome, to be proud of the way you look and the things you do! If you spent an hour on your makeup and it gets complimented, it is okay to accept that compliment. If you feel confident in an ability or how you did on a test, it is okay to say so. This type of attitude is not overconfident or cocky, it is not something to be critiqued or judged- it is admirable.

At some point, we will altogether lose the ability to feel good about ourselves. The acknowledgment and dismissal of our most wonderful and positive attributes will soon fall by the wayside and we will stop seeing the positive at all. The world will be filled with women standing in mirrors critiquing themselves.

So, I implore all of you in this new year to see the wonderful things you have to offer. This is about more than accepting and praising others, it will take praising yourself.

I will be the first to say: You are beautiful and wonderful. You are the center of someone's world and you deserve the best.