Mind Over Mirror

Don’t get me wrong, as a 15 year old girl I still struggle with my weight and my body shape. It’s not easy loving yourself, but every girl should learn how to. It's like what Zendaya once said "Nobody is ugly, that doesn't exist. I say, take the time to get to know who you are, take the time to love yourself and everything will be alright."

When I was younger, maybe nine or ten, my grandma told me that if you look yourself in the mirror and tell yourself you are skinny or beautiful you start to believe it; you become it. At that age I thought it was ridiculous to believe something to reality. But, now, as I grow older and wiser a little every day, I find that it’s not so ridiculous as I anticipated.

How I learned to appreciate and love myself? Well, frankly, I’m not so sure. It sort of just happened. Everyone has a different way of learning, and my way of learning is studying very hard. I know of some kids who learn solely from visualizing. I know of self-taught kids, and sometimes that’s because the teachers aren’t the very best, either. I am grateful for having amazing teachers, like my grandma. I learned from her, and it might have been five years later but I studied myself and learned there’s so much beauty in me that I somehow overlooked.

I’m not going to sugar-coat it, you’ll come across people who frown upon your beauty and your knowledge of your beauty. They call it pride, and pride is taught as a sin. Well, every once in a while you should definitely be proud of who you are, and all day every day you should love yourself. All day. Every day.

I know this because I experienced hatred towards myself, and I sulked in that pool of hatred for a long time. It was hard climbing out of that pool, and it took time for myself to dry. Now that I know to never jump back in, I get reactions that I wish people wouldn’t vocalize. But, hey, that’s life. And the next lesson is to learn not to focus and live off of those terrible reactions that try to tear you back down.

My whole life I wore things that I never felt comfortable in and now that I know who I am, now that I feel beautiful and know that I am beautiful, I get weird looks from people who don’t understand. Sometimes those looks are from family and close friends.

Yes, it might feel silly at times to acknowledge your beauty. It might feel silly at times to look in your mirror and think “Man, she’s good looking.” It might feel silly at times to wear clothes that make you feel beautiful. I promise you, I’ve felt silly doing all those things. But I can say this with full confidence: once you learn how to love yourself and acknowledge your undeniable beauty, your self-confidence will skyrocket.

The definition of beauty is a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight. And never in my life have I ever come across a person who was not beautiful.

I once told my dad that I didn't believe that there was such a thing as a physical flaw. Sure, God made us all the same. We all have legs, or we all have arms, or we all have heads on our shoulders. But one little thing that makes us who we are, that separates us from the crowd is what makes us beautiful. Men and women, they're all just beautiful. And what makes it even more amazing, is that they're beautiful in their own way.

I've seen girls with moles on their faces and necks. And, guess what? They were beautiful. I've seen men and women without an arm, without legs, without hair. They were so beautiful.

This is why I tend to do things that people wouldn't. I do things that are different and it catches the eye. Sometimes the looks I get are negative, and you'll definitely get those looks. Other times I'll get the looks that make me feel warm and fuzzy inside. See, you don't have to look and be like everyone else to be considered beautiful. You don't need confirmation from anyone that you are drop-dead gorgeous. The only person you need to listen to is yourself. I'm not trying to control you, or anything, but you should tell yourself that you look flawless, because you are.

Believing something that's so complicated to understand can sometimes be really hard. That's why you learn. That's why we go to school, to church . . . to Google. Understanding comes from learning and being taught. A mirror does nothing but show you your reflection, and in some ways a reflection can be entirely different from who you really are. A mirror teaches nothing. You teach yourself your own beauty.

I say this all the time to my friends, and my classmates have picked up on it. So, look yourself in the mirror and say “You are hotter than a hot tamale. You are flawless like my dreams. You are a snack, a full meal, a Big Mac from McDonalds. Damn, (insert name), you are beautiful.”

‘Mind over matter’ is long gone. It’s mind over mirror now. Take that learning technique and use it to learn about yourself.