Raise your hand if you have looked in the mirror and said “Wow I’m so ugly, my hair looks gross, or some other degrading self-comment. You probably don’t really mean it, but you still took the time to think it.

Or you are scrolling through your Instagram feed and you see classmates, coworkers, and friends snapping selfies and group shots with witty captions. The comments are filled with fire and heart eye emojis and comment like “so hot” and “babe” or the worst of all “get ugly please you are making us look bad”.

I have a question for you readers. What do you think you are missing? Do you wish you were skinnier or curvier? Have stick straight hair or hair that could hold a curl for more than two seconds. Longer legs, smaller feet, prettier eyes, straighter teeth, more muscle, I could go on and on.

Let’s say that every girl looked exactly the same. Perfect body, perfect hair, perfect smile. Everyone looked like the girl they dreamed of being some day. Would you still love yourself? The only thing that makes us different is our personalities. Would we still want to be somebody else?

Being insecure is part of being human. There is always we want to change about ourselves and part of that comes from admiring others and seeing the beauty they can’t see and wanting it. I have yet to meet a girl who said “I just really love how I look and am so happy with the person I am” and genuinely meant it. If you have met her, please tell me who she is and how I can get in contact with her. She has the secret that we girls need to get back some self-confidence.

I despise the fact that I look in the mirror and see things that I want to change. I mostly feel this way because to most people, I am that ideal girl. I am skinny and can eat pretty much anything I want. I have straight blonde hair that I can roll out of bed and have it look exactly the same as it did when I went to bed. I’ve been told I have “legs for days” and am so lucky to be able to wear all the best shoes with my size 6 feet.

Before you roll your eyes and say how could I possibly have a complaint, hear me out. I can tell you that having people tell me to eat “before I wither away” or give me looks when I decide to work out and think “ I wonder if she’s anorexic, I can see her ribs” is extremely hurtful and can do just as much damage to one’s self-esteem as saying someone is overweight (when I’m sure they probably are not). Also my hair grows out of my head that way, my legs take forever to shave and they make ugly shoes for size 6’s too, because the cute ones always go first.

Self love and self confidence has on one giant roadblock. Fear. Fear that we will be judged if we changed and judged if we don’t. We always want the opposite and are NEVER good enough. Why? Why? WHY? Who did this to us? Here’s the kicker. It’s you.

Anybody who told you to change or pointed out the flaws you know you have you let get under your skin and hurt you and you let them. If nobody told you this, I’m telling you now. Nobody has the right to ridicule how you look. Not your parents, not your significant other, not your friends, not your enemies, not even the strangers at the gym. If you are at the gym, that’s awesome. If not, that’s fine too. Nobody told you that your life will depend on appearance, you told yourself. You said “ I see something that on me that I’m missing or have too much of that someone else doesn’t have. This must mean I’m not enough”. Meanwhile that same person is saying the same thing about someone else, who is saying it about someone else. It’s a vicious cycle and it’s costing people their happiness and in some cases their lives. This is a painful reality and it needs to slow down.

I go back to the question I asked before: If we all looked the same, would you still love yourself? The answer may be uncertain, but erasing the battle on appearance and adding some self-love in its place is half the battle.

In reality we won’t all look the same because everyone’s ideal person is different based on their own perception. It’s the age old “It’s what’s on the inside that matters…” It may sound like crap but its true. It’s ok if you don’t believe it now, but I believe it for you and I will hold onto it for you until you are ready to take it back. You are sparkling in my eyes and I hope that you will see yourself that way too. I’m a work in progress too, so lets embrace the challenge and see where it takes us.

Until next time,
Lily