#poitivity

Oh my sweet sweet child, please listen very carefully

You are not always going to look the way you do now, people constantly change, even after they reach adulthood!

I grew up not caring really what I looked like, I was me and had better things to worry about (like how many frogs I could catch and fit into one bucket) It wasn't until my "flaws" were pointed out to me that I started to be more conscious of how I looked and began to make more of an effort to appear a certain way

It wasn't until I was around 14-15 that I felt disgusted with the way I looked. I had no curves at all, my hair was always a mess, my teeth were too big, I was too loud, to "boyish" etc. Then at around 16-17 I started to get severe acne. Cistic breakouts, hyper pigmentation, scarring, it all hit at once. And with my already low self esteem I snowballed fast. (This is also around the time that I was hit really hard with social anxiety/generalized anxiety and depression)

It got to the point where some days I would have anxiety attacks even if a member of my family just looked at me, I tried my best to use makeup to cover up, to wear clothes that were flattering and as feminine as possible (yay for gender crisises and overcompensation) Once my depression hit the worst, I suddenly stopped caring, about not only my appearance but just...everything. It got bad, and it took having a complete breakdown in front of my dad to finally accept the fact that I needed help.

I was on medication for about four years, and have officially been off of them for around six months (my depression isn't "cured" I'm just in a more stable place to cope with it now)

But we've gotten a little sidetracked, back to self esteem

So I finally realized that some days when I looked in the mirror I was happy with what I saw and felt attractive, while the next day I might think I look absolutely awful and hate everything about my reflection. But my appearance couldn't completely change in one day, right? So it had to be a trick of the mind. I started to pay less attention to what I thought of myself, and more attention to the things I saw in other people

She had pretty freckles, the gap in his tooth was endearing, they had super unique features etc. the more I focused on other people, the more I realized that others found things about me that they liked as well, it helped to step out of my own head and realize that 1: I wasn't always going to like how I looked, and that was okay

And 2: being confident and loving yourself doesn't have to just be about looks. Looks change, people grow older, they change their hair, they might get scars or glasses or braces or anything, but who they are as a person, that doesn't really change

So I focused on spreading positivity, I would try to compliment others as much as possible, even if I was nervous or felt awkward, I could always tell that it brightened their day, and making other people happy has a contagious effect

I would look at myself in the mirror, acknowledge the parts of myself that were "flawed" and speak words of affirmation to myself, I would smile, and laugh and make funny faces at my reflection, and it helped me understand that when we see ourselves, we're only seeing a single image, others get to see the whole movie. Think of it this way, you can take a good picture of yourself, and you can take a really bad picture, some days you see the good picture, others you see the bad, but everyone else sees the full length film

I am a work in progress, I will acknowledge the good with the bad, and in the end it doesn't matter what I look like, it matters how I affect and influence other people