How many times have you heard someone say they “love” something about your appearance?

“OMG I love your shoes!”

“I love your hair!”

“I love your shirt!”

“I love your outfit!”

The list goes on and on.

But do we really love those things?

“Love you”, “love your shoes”, “love your hair”, like the "you" they love is only the external you, not what's inside.

As a society, it has been ingrained in young girls’ minds that when someone “loves” something about the way they look, followed by a half-hearted “love you!” that their appearance is what makes them loved. Not only is this damaging to the psyche of our generation, but it also perpetuates the outdated idea that women a supposed to be “attractive” and that is what makes them lovable.

It is so much easier for us to compliment others appearances. It is our societal norm to compliment what we see, rather than how someone makes us feel.

How often do you hear someone complimenting another’s personality?

“Your laugh is so contagious!”

“You are so quick-witted and intelligent!”

“You have so much confidence; is is so inspiring!”

Girls are taught from a young age to suppress parts of our personality in order to highlight our appearance, since our looks are what people say they “love”. This is why 53 percent of 13-year-old girls have issues with the way their body looks. This is why 40-60 percent of elementary age girls are scared of getting “too fat”. This is why eating disorders are an outright epidemic in our nation’s girls. In our society, it is more important and for women to be “cute” and “sexy” than to be strong, brave, and intelligent. This needs to change.

There’s nothing wrong with telling someone you like something about their appearance if you truly mean it. Complimenting someone can have a huge, positive impact on their self-confidence. However, we often get wrapped up in solely what someone looks like, without ever considering the positive attributes of their personality. We need to stray away from surface-level conversations and compliments, and really acknowledge people for their true worth.

Here is a list of compliments that don't have to do with someone's appearance. I encourage you to give at least one of these compliments each week. It’s kind of uncomfortable complimenting someone’s personality at first because we’re not used to it; that’s not what we have grown up to do. However, once you start to compliment people’s personalities on a regular basis, it won’t feel as weird to you anymore because you retrain your brain to accept this as a norm.

Even though these compliments may initially feel weird to say, they will matter much more to the person receiving them than if you just compliment their outfit. Little by little, we can change the way we perceive one another and finally rid our society of the constant objectification of women. It is time for us girls to be viewed as intelligent, strong, brave,

and beautiful. Beautiful not just because of our looks, but because of what’s inside, too.