About a week ago, I woke up and caught a glimpse of myself while getting dressed. I saw changes that I hadn't been intentionally tracking but the kind I wanted to see regardless. So, like any good 20 something with every social media platform at my disposal, I had to post about it. And you can bet your ass that I also posted a picture on Instagram, posed in the mirror in a carefully selected posture, I was pretty proud of that picture.
I debated it heavily though. On one side, there's the humility of it; feeling like a total narcissist and knowing exactly what people are going to think of you when they see you posted a douchey-underwear-mirror pic. I know what they think because it's exactly what I thought. It was judgmental things sprinkled with a little bit of bitterness and jealousy. My brain whispering "look, they can do it, why can't you?"
On the other side, those thoughts are exactly why it was important that I did post.
Before there was an iPhone and Snapchat in our faces all the time, I knew all the Fat Girl Tricks. Wear clothing too big to cover your stomach. Wear absolutely nothing that would draw attention to myself. Buy everything, from swimsuits to homecoming dresses, in black. I looked and felt bad enough in real life, God forbid I saw myself tagged in a photo. I hated standing next to my skinny friends in those photos. The concept of liking the way you look, being so content like that, enough so that you could post a picture to show off was and still is a foreign concept to me.
Recently though, I've been getting there. It's hard for those of us who don't like the way we look. Not just bad-hair-day don't like how we look. I'm talking broken, distorted views and disgusted by the way we look. We're our toughest critics. No one is as mean to us as we are to ourselves (not anymore at least). I see beautiful women on Twitter and Instagram all day. Some I know and some I don't. Ads and friends and models. Both guys and girls retweeting these perfect bodies, attaching heart eye emoji's to an ideal I'm not sure is even possible with the hashtag #goals.
Scroll. Skinny. Scroll. Toned. Scroll. Tiny waist and poking collar bones. Scroll. Bikini. Scroll. Lingerie. Scroll. #Goals.
It's everywhere. It's hard for us who don't like the way we look.
But I'm exhausted. We're exhausted.
I'm tired of looking at these pictures and articles and feeling hopeless. Feeling anger. Feeling jealousy. These pictures on social media are in my thoughts during every lap, every rep, every meal I prep, every french fry I deny myself. They're actually helping me make the changes I wish I would've made earlier. They're helping me to be my own #goals and possibly someone else's someday--far in the future because I still have so far to go.
I haven't decided yet if this is a good thing or not, healthy or not. But for now, it's working. I'm seeing the changes I want and for now--that's enough.
