Happy New Year luvs’! Hope you had an amazing time celebrating and are ready to kick 2017! (I know, I know, it’s already been a while since New Year’s Eve haha) Let’s start the year with this unusual, yet -I hope- interesting article. *wink*
I have been thinking a lot about a specific topic those past few months and took my time to cogitate before slowly writing my feelings about it.
I’ve not talked about this in my NYC posts, but when I was living the New Yorker life last year, something stroke my mind: I could be 100% myself without feeling judged. It may sound stupid, but I can assure you that I really had this amazing feeling of… freedom?!
In NYC, even if people notice you and certainly make an opinion about you -and they absolutely have the right to do so-, they just let you be and continue on their way; no one ever makes you feel bad about who you are. I know that it’s not the only place where it’s like that, but if I’m talking about it today, it’s overall because I really appreciated this atmosphere and state of mind, which really helped me to understand a lot of things and better accept myself. And that’s what I want to talk about today.
Being able to be yourself, feel good and confident is obviously amazing! And as much as this feeling can depend on others people, like I saw in NYC -thanks to New Yorkers’ great state of mind-, it depends even more on your own self.
The very first thing to understand and always remember is: “whatever you do in life, do it for yourself first”. Indeed, pleasing everybody is not possible; firstly because everyone is different and love different things and secondly because if people want to criticize, they will always find a way to do it. You may not like the idea, but really, you can’t satisfy everybody. However, you can satisfy yourself and that’s what you should focus on.
“What is beauty?” Have you ever wondered? It’s so subjective, that it’s hard to define… Have you ever thought about what does too tall or too short mean? What does too fat and too skinny mean (for someone with a healthy body mass index “BMI”)? What does too small or too big mouth, eyes, cheeks, nose, ears, breast, waist, thighs, arms and so on mean? Difficult to answer with no comparison point, right?! And as long as I know, it has never been written how the “perfect” body and face are supposed to look like. We are all different and that’s absolutely normal.
Unfortunately, due to our current society, we tend to believe that we have to look a certain way in order to be beautiful and appreciable, while, at the same time, tastes, trends, ideals and beauty criteria in general are endlessly evolving. Think about it: some years ago, the trend was to over plucked eyebrows. Today it’s to thick eyebrows. Before, freckles were given no importance. Today, they are to the point that we even draw them with makeup. Plump lips?! Became an obsession a few years ago. And so on. It’s the principle of trends; it comes and goes. But, since we didn’t think about all those trends before they appeared, now that we are aware of them, does it mean that we have to follow them? Does it mean that we have to change or to feel bad if we don’t fit them? Are we supposed to let them have an influence on our self-esteem? Absolutely not! The fact that everything is changing all the time is a proof that we can’t keep up. We can’t change each time something evolves. And we shouldn’t even try. Maybe that our flaws are tomorrow’s trend, who knows?! And even if it doesn’t, why should we blame our body? As long as it’s alive and functional, we can only be thankful for it. What’s more, appearance is really not the main and only thing contributing to making us appreciable and making us who we are. Our behavior and personality do.
So, to everyone who is reading me right now: never forget that the outside is just the vitrine. What really counts is more profound. You don’t need to change your body for others, what you need first is to change your vision of beauty to a more positive and realistic one. Try to accept yourself for who you are and to embrace your flaws first. You’re the only one living in your body and as long as you don’t try to accept yourself, you can change as many things as you want, you won’t be happier. You first have to go beyond other’s judgements and to find yourself. Then, if you still have any complex, I’m not saying you shouldn’t want to change anything on you, but before doing so, be sure you’re doing it for yourself.
If you have understood all of this and if you are capable of ignoring people’s weak opinions, you’ll finally be able to be yourself, feel good and confident in your own skin. You’ll be happy as you are, as well as appreciated and loved for who you are by people who really care for you and love you; and there’s truly nothing more rewarding than that!
On that note, I hope my opinion and vision on this topic will help you to find yourself. Let me know in the comments! *wink*
Lots of luv’
Pauline Matter
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