Being A Woman

Do you know what never ceases to amaze me? That women - funny, beautiful, interesting women rarely label themselves or see themselves when they hear those words. They are riddled with insecurities about their bodies, about their skin, about the size of their feet, their hair, how tall they are, if they smell, if their boobs or bum are big or sexy enough, should they wax their bikini line, are their teeth white enough, are their legs and arms chunky, do they need to shave their legs and armpits. The list is endless.

And the funniest thing of all? We look back at pictures of ourselves from the past and think how thin we looked, how young we looked, how pretty we looked back then. Except, when you really think back, at that time those thoughts were never there. We weren't content back then. We were striving for more, equally as insecure as we are now.

Because we think that if we lose that little bit of extra weight, if we wax our bodies senseless, if we sign up to every beauty treatment under the sun - that we are somehow bettering ourselves, that we will somehow feel better. But the harsh truth is that we will never be satisfied with the version of ourselves in the present. This living, breathing self that we have to find new ways to change, such is our dissatisfaction with our own reflections. Meanwhile that nostalgic picture from five years ago sits on a pedestal, silently judging the us in the present. Whispering, you used to look so much better than you do now.

So if being a woman means we have to put ourselves through this kind of self-torture cycle, directly and indirectly caused by society, maybe it’s time for us to start loving the versions of ourselves in the present rather than constantly looking backwards. Rather than striving to constantly improve ourselves or change how we look, maybe we should start picking out our assets and not our flaws when looking in the mirror, and celebrating them.