I hate bathing suits. I hate wearing bathing suits. I hate thinking about bathing suits. And even typing the word "bathing suit" makes me cringe because I had a steak last night and that's not exactly getting ready for bikini season. And I know I'm not alone on this agonizing feeling of dread over bathing suits.

We're at the great and also horrifying time of year where summer is so close we can taste it. Everyone is ready to leave school behind for a few months and go to the beach, take cute pictures for Instagram, and all that good stuff. And I'm excited too. I can't wait to pack in another semester with (hopefully) good grades, but there's a small part of me that has this huge anxiety over how I'll look when I go on vacation.

I grew up living near the beach, so I went there often. And every time, I couldn’t help but look at the other girls there and compare myself to them. They were seemingly flawless and I knew that I wasn’t. I got an uneasy feeling that everyone else was staring at me, judging me even, because I didn’t look like what I thought was ideal.

I refused to wear bathing suits whenever I went to the beach. I didn’t like wearing shorts or cute tank tops either. I felt so uncomfortable throughout summer because I couldn’t hide under my sweater and coats anymore. In my head, summer wasn’t the season of fun and sunshine, it was one of anxiety.

And it makes me so sad that many of us feel the same. But it is so important that we stop this constant comparing. It sounds pretty basic and I know it’s much easier said than done, but learning to appreciate and feel comfortable in our own bodies will make at least a small part of life easier.

We should go to the beach and rock our bathing suits or shorts or sarongs or whatever it is we all want to wear. There's a point in all of our lives where we will compare ourselves to someone else and that’ll suck, but we can’t let it get in the way of our lives. So go to the beach or the pool this summer and slay like always. We can still dread shopping for swimsuits, that’s part of the fun of it all, but never underestimate how amazing you are all the time.