Day 3: A Beautiful Heart

                                                                        

It's day three and I'm shocked I still am keeping up with this, but here we are. What I have been thinking about a lot today is how our society pushes the importance of one's physical appearance. Those that are deemed as most beautiful or desirable are placed on a pedestal - all for physical features that are wholly out of their control. And social media has only made this superficial way of thinking that much worse. Our feeds are flooded with individuals deemed as desirable, leaving us wondering ways we can change to look like them. We genuinely begin to feel the need to start dressing, talking, and looking like the person we see on the screen - if she is desirable, then if I do the same things I will be too, type of mentality. 

I understand that I keep saying "We" when I really just mean myself. It's just easier to write it in the plural and if this page ever finds someone else it might make whatever I end up writing more relatable. Anyways...

This constant influx of beautiful celebrities and influencers often causes us to begin to nitpick every part of our bodies, ultimately leaving us with very little we actually claim to like about ourselves. I'll openly admit the fact that for awhile I would stand in front of the mirror and struggle to find a physical feature of mine that I actually liked - I claimed my nose was too big, my hair was too flat, my stomach was not toned, the list goes on. I got in my head that once I was able to fix these outward issues, then I would be just like those girls I saw on social media - I, too, would be desirable. Writing this I see how crazy and almost sad this sounds, but it was my real mentality. And, I've said this before, but if I am not honest then who am I helping? 

I would bottle up these insecurities and go about my day silently comparing myself to everyone - my friends, my older sister, people I followed on social media. I would pick out features of theirs that I admired and then simultaneously begin to resent myself for not looking like that. And in this process, I began to forget the fact that there were physical features of my own that were admirable - I, instead, chose to simply focus on the things that I didn't have. You know, the exact thing you are told not to do. 

This mentality was at its peak about 13 months ago (the time in my life that I wrote about yesterday). At first I would continually wish that this time in my life didn't happen, but now that I am almost completely out of it, I kind of am grateful for it. Because looking back on it and just the way my mentality has changed, I can see how different my entire outlook has become. Because hypothetically, yes I could get a nose job, I could get my hair done, I could outsource all of these physical changes. But who is to say that would actually make me happy? The thrill of the nose job would die down quick, my hair would fall back to its natural state, and I would be right back to where I started - all because these are temporary fixes to physical features, when the real issue was my inner self and overall mentality. 

In short, time will go on and all these physical features in my 20s will change with age - its just a fact of life. And I have grown to be okay with that. I mean obviously I want to keep up with my physical health and all that, it just isn't the only thing that matters to me anymore. 

I, like many others, want to be remembered or loved for something about themselves. But, unlike 13 months ago, I don't care if that something is my physical appearance - honestly, I kind of hope that it isn't.  I want to be remembered for how I treated people, how I made them feel. I hope I make people feel loved and wanted and accepted for who they are. I hope I am someone people go to for advice because they know I would never judge them. That's what I want to be remembered for. And, yes, I definitely have days where I mull over things about my physical appearance because who doesn't. But, I think in changing this mentality I'll actually grow to not only love my inner self more, but my outer self as well.