Before getting in the shower one night recently, I looked at myself in the mirror and thought, with a tinge of disgust, "Oh god, I look like that one statue..." This is the statue I was referring to:

This is a statue of Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty. When this hit me, I felt ashamed of the way I had been trained to think, and immediately looked at the same thought- "Oh my god, I look like that one statue"- with enthusiasm and positivity. Who cares if my tummy rolls up when I bend over? That doesn't mean I don't look like a goddess! Once upon a time, figures far fuller than my own were honored and adored as a symbol of beauty and fertility.

Marilyn Monroe is a famous sex-symbol from the 1950's who was admired not in spite of but because of her confidence in her body that she was beautifully unashamed of. Since then, beauty standards have changed, but her role as a beauty icon has not.

Societal expectations are constantly evolving all around us, and women are literally dying to keep up. The thin, airbrushed models that I see in magazines are beautiful. But that does not negate the beauty of any other bodies. Angelina Jolie being thin and beautiful does not mean that Marilyn Monroe is fat or unattractive. People so often want to focus on the fat/thin dichotomy, but it's an illusion that will ultimately harm us all.

For decades now, some level of thinness has been revered as the ideal body type. But lately, I have seen plus-sized women embracing their size as being sexy and beautiful and that is wonderful. But occasionally, lines are crossed and body positivity becomes skinny shaming, and naturally thin women fight back with statements along the lines of "don't hate me for being skinny if I can't hate you for being fat," which, of course, is also very much not the answer. In reality, the answer is something along the lines of "literally quit shaming people for their bodies period."

Our bodies are not who we are. The size of your thighs does not indicate the size of your heart. Your number of chins says nothing about the depth of your mind. You have a body, but you are a person. And not just any person. You are a picture of a greek goddess. You are an image of beauty but more than that you are an image of love. No one can look at you and know based on your body how caring and intelligent you are. That's up to you to show them.