Stay Beautiful

"Oh, how beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how beautiful!"

Song of Songs 4:1

Prepare for more sappy words of encouragement. 

I've mentioned before that I'm doing my senior project on photography. I love it! It's a challenge and a fun way to meet new people. {I love people.} 

Since starting my project, I've been noticing pictures in a different way than before. I've been paying especially close attention to the pictures of famous actors, actresses, and models on the covers of magazines. 

You know what I noticed? They always look perfect. They don't have acne. Their hair is voluminous (a great word). Their make-up is killer. And they definitely don't have that extra layer of plumpness hanging around their stomach.

Let's all be honest. At some point, we have all felt bad or wished we could change something about our bodies. But why? It's because we set our standards high and compare ourselves to those people on the front of magazines (you may have even done it subconsciously... trippy).

Well, here's a secret. [Actually, you probably already know this, but just play along because I'm trying to be encouraging and such]. They're fake. They have a team of people who work on them for hours to help them achieve that "perfect look". Before that, they've spent days, weeks, and months in the gym with personal trainers and at home watching what they eat. To top it all off, after their picture is taken, people go in with fancy editing software to touch up the imperfections they couldn't fix (those things that happen naturally to your body like wrinkles and creases). {I'm not saying every model, actor, or actress is like that, but in general, that seems to be the case.}

I've been doing a lot of research on the pressure teenagers feel to fit in with the standards, because that's what I decided to write my research paper about. It was easy for me to see how true all of it was, because, well, I'm a teenager, and I'm living it!

Short Story About Myself (that relates to this topic): I never really concerned myself with what I ate. I was always active enough with various sports to the point where I really didn't care. Last spring, something changed. I don't know what it was, but everything just hit me. I started worrying about what I ate and really watching things a lot more. Let me tell you, that sucked. I was constantly concerned with eating too much. I worked out all the time, too. I was probably doing abut 200 crunches a day. It was pretty bad. I wasn't anorexic or bulimic, but I was overly obsessed with my diet. Since then, I've gone back to eating normally, but it's been harder for me to control cravings and not feel guilty after eating a lot.

With all that being said, however, I've come to realize how essential it is to be happy with yourself. There's nothing wrong with setting goals and trying to be better; it becomes a problem when you make yourself feel bad and obsess over it.

It's so easy for us to feel bad about the way we look and to feel pressured to look a certain way. 

So, here's my advice:

1. Don't worry about everyone else.
2. Love yourself! (how cliche)
3. Accept your beauty.
4. [insert other corny statements that are completely true, and incredibly hard to accept]

Seriously, though, it's hard sometimes feeling like you're beautiful, especially when you're surrounded by so many other beautiful people. But, you have to stop looking for faults in yourself. Stop focusing on negative things.

As Taylor Swift once said...

P.S. I have mad respect for you if you actually read this whole thing. A lot of it was written for my own, personal encouragement, but I hope you got something out of it, too (even if it was girly, sappy, and cliche).