the “selfie” contradiction.

“Let today be the day you love yourself enough to no longer just dream of a better life; let it be the day you act upon it”.

Almost everybody can say that they know what a “selfie” is. It is even in the dictionary as of recently. You flip your camera on your iPhone, get the perfect angle and you snap the perfect selfie. Even Kim Kardashian has a tutorial on how to take a perfect selfie, (not a very helpful one, might I add). I can admit that I take hundreds of “selfies”, and I love every aspect of it. Maybe sometimes a selfie can make someone appear conceded, or quite the opposite. I believe there are two types of people who take selfies.

The first one being the confident people. The people who are proud of who they are and want to show the world just how much they love themselves! This is not a bad thing either, if you have something to be proud of, then by all means show it to the world. Then there are the people who look into the mirror and do not like what they see. They narrow in on all the little things they would change about their face and how “ugly” they look. They then proceed to take a selfie, but not because they love what they see, they do it so other people can love what they see. It is a vicious circle of feeling down, putting on some makeup, looking in the mirror in disappointment, and then snapping the shot. Once they’ve decided on which one is the least ugly, they post it. They wait to see how many people like it, or comment, or how many people don’t do either of those things at all. They wait for the reassurance of other people to tell them that they look just fine.

I have a question for you. How can you take a selfie when you don’t even like what you see in the mirror. This is not to say that people are ugly, it is to say that everybody should embody the beauty they already have. This is my point, when you are feeling bad about yourself, down about your looks or your weight, it shows, right there on your face. People constantly feel down about themselves and then take a picture, little do they know that the picture is never going to be what you want it to be, unless you love the person in the picture.

I learned early on to embrace myself.  Life is way too short to waste time comparing yourself to others, when you may embody great qualities that other people wish they had. Would you take a picture of a piece of artwork you didn’t like? You are the artwork, you are the canvas, find the beauty in yourself. Take the time to realize the many great qualities you have. Make a list if that helps, write down all the things you love about yourself, and theres no harm in writing a list about things you’d like to change. There is always room to be better, but before you can work on being better you have to recognize the great person you already are.

With that said, I have one last tip for your selfie game. The moment that you look in the mirror and say ” damn, I look good” is the moment that your selfies are about to get a lot better. It’s not going to be that fake smile that you think “improves” your look, or the eyeliner that makes your eyes look further apart. It’s going to be the glow you have because you already love the way you look before you got all those likes. The likes will come in, don’t you worry, many people are good at seeing through the fake, and when someone gets a glimpse of that genuine “i’m happy the way I am smile” they are going to wish they could like that picture twice. Nothing is more attractive on a person than a genuine love for themselves, now go out there and put the self in selfie. It is just like they say, if you want to find truth, be yourself. If you want to find love, love yourself, and everything else will fall right into place.

This post is dedicated to my wonderful teacher Dr. Zina Mowszowicz-Suissa.