Growing up in a media advanced society impacts the complexity of social norms and standards. Men and especially women for decades have been compared to the artificial ethics of beauty composited on the basis of media.

According to "Mirasol", 15 percent of Americans suffer from eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia. To put that into retrospective, 1 in 200 women suffer from anorexia disorder, and 3 in 100 women suffer bulimia nervosa disorder.

Being a young woman myself, I am one in this statistic.

And now, one of my missions in life is to promote self-awareness, self-love, and self-respect in empowering women everywhere to appreciate and cherish the individual God made her be.

Understanding and remaining apprehensive about who you are is vital in remaining confident, as we have such a bad tendency to be hard on ourselves. For whatever reason, it's so easy to scout out the negatives we see in ourselves. Whether it's the way your sides buckle into a shirt or the shape of your curves in a pair of jeans, we have this intoxicating habit of just ravishing ourselves.

Have we ever considered this: what if just didn't? Instead of picking on the way your short hair doesn't drape your shoulders or acknowledging that your shoulders look "too broad" to be wearing a blouse, what if you took the time and acknowledged the way your cheekbones align upwards when you smile, giving a bubbly expression. Or check out how good your ass looks in those jeans you spent a fortune on.

Something that still remains absurd to me is that we learn about near everything EXCEPT how to love ourselves.

The National Eating Disorder Association established a program entitled "The Body Project." The dissonance-based project focalizes on body appreciation and educates young adults on body appreciation intervention courses through the reinforcement of exercises and open group discussion, which was originally backed by two decades of research and evaluation data at Standford University.

I had participated in a couple of this organization's intervention classes hosted on my campus. Each session is about two hours, and this organization is sentimental and incredibly empowering with so much to take out of it.

I feel like since the adolescence of junior high, children become exposed to the various insecurities capable of enduring in our bodies. At a young age, we learn about suicide, eating disorders, and the importance of body stability. They provide us the hotlines of who to call in specific scenarios given necessary, but never did I truly feel that I, nor any of my classmates, were provided guidance in how to avoid in becoming absorbed inside the body stereotypes.

This program implemented a notion of empowerment within me. Through this, I met a variety of women and became exposed to the different pairs of shoes walked in. More importantly, it created a deeper and humbling appreciation I have for others. I've always been an individual who found beauty in all I encounter, but participating in these open and vulnerable discussions flourished the essence in these individuals in a much more compelling manner than I could have ever imagined.

A noteworthy emblem I took out of this was that it is normal to feel abnormal. All of us have a trait, (or a few) about us that we wish was different. But let me say this, you are the only critic of yourself, and you are the hardest on yourself. Don't be. Embrace your curves; they're sexy as hell. Love that your long legs got you through that tough workout and appreciate all of your imperfections that make you a human being. Appreciate that you are who you are. You do not need blemishing. You do not need to be airbrushed. Photoshop is unnecessary, and photoshop is fake.

You, you beautiful soul, do not need any editing.

There's a quote by Dr. Seuss that I tell myself every day of my life: "be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." Keep doing you. Set your goals, keep those ambitions aligned, and don't let your tiara slip.

Keep doing you, because you're pretty stellar.

For more information on The Body Project, visit their official website:

http://www.bodyprojectsupport.org