Everyone comes in a different shape and size, being skinny is thought of as the preferred size. Growing up I always thought a part of being happy meant you had to have the perfect skinny body. I now realize that this is an age old correlation that does not equal causation; being skinny doesn’t cause you to be happy and vice versa. Happiness is possible for any body type, not just one type.

Just the other day I was trying on clothes in a store when I heard two girls in the dressing room next to me discussing their bodies. They were saying things like I wish I had your flat stomach and I wish I had your skinny legs, but not once did they say they wanted to be happy. It was almost like there happiness depended on being “skinny” or having the “perfect” body.

For years I have struggled with trying to reach society’s perfect image of how my body should look. I thought by being a size 0 I would have 100 percent happiness. This year however I decided instead of trying to get skinny I would try to be happy. Being happy is a choice everybody can make. When I started the year I wasn’t sure if absolute happiness was possible, but now I know it is. I have never been happier than I am now. There are still days I look in the mirror and wish that I was just a little skinnier. It would be nice to be a little skinnier, but I wouldn't trade being skinny for how happy I am in my life right now. Do not get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with being skinny and there are plenty of skinny people in the world that are perfectly happy, but there happiness is not linked to their physique

I wish for a world where I hear more people say I want to be happy, rather than I want to be skinny. If that were to happen imagine how much of a better world we would live in! When you are happy you do not want to be mean to others because that puts negativity in your life. This would make our world a more kind and pure place that everyone would love to live in.

With society deeming one body type as superior, it can be hard to accept yourself and be truly happy if you do not have the “perfect” body. No matter what kind of shape you are in, your happiness should not be determined by you your size. If you want to be happy all you have to do is to choose to be happy. If my words don’t convince you to choose happiness then listen to Queen Bey herself who says, “Happiness comes from you. No one else can make you happy. You make you happy.”