“Everyone perceives themselves differently.”

I usually start a blog post with some kind of relevant lyric from an artist, but today I’m giving it a title that’s a quote I live by, almost religiously.

Look at yourself in the mirror, what do you see? Most likely, you’ll concentrate on your appearance at first. You’ll notice your flaws, the round cheeks that looks like you’ve had a severe dental operation, the way your eyes aren’t rounded and big and beautiful, they aren’t even big enough to fit your rounded face. You’ll notice the black bags under your eyes, your long nose, maybe you’ll see that your hair isn’t even cut the way you want it to be. The fringe doesn’t go the way you want it to, you’ve got a cowlick in the most unattractive place, it’s got no volume and looks frail and weak. Perhaps you’ll pick up on your blemished skin, filled with scarring, freckles, spots and you’ll think to yourself “it doesn’t even look alright from a distance.”

Go deeper. You’ll see that you’re just annoying, you’re not even funny unless it’s making a fool out of yourself. You’re constantly building defense mechanisms to save yourself the trouble of getting offended, thinking to yourself that if you make fun of your weight that you can’t get offended if other people will. You’ll treat it as acceptance, but when you really think about it, you’re just as unhappy as you started off to be. You’re jealous, overbearing and clingy, even when you try not to be. But that’s just it, you try too hard to be someone – something – that other people want you to be. You try to be a person that people want to interact with and be around.

Stop, you see flaws in yourself that only you can see. And you can only see them because you concentrate on them. The scarring on your face isn’t unattractive, it makes you human. The black bags under your eyes doesn’t make you unattractive it makes you human. You’re not annoying, everyone just has their own lives going on around them. Maybe they’ve got jobs, they’re in some sort of education, they’re reading or book or just simply lazing around and not wanting to speak to anyone much today. You get those days too, right? Sure, everyone does.

Everyone perceives themselves differently. A person might walk into your life and place you so high on a pedestal that they can barely even see you anymore, but you’ll never accept that. You’ll never take their kind words of being beautiful. Why? Because you’re human. 

Everyone has their own insecurities. Sure, some flaws are easily changeable. It may not seem it at the time, but sit yourself down and ask yourself how it’s affecting you. Would it be easier for that jealous, overbearing and clingy version of yourself to simply disappear, so that you can concentrate on being happy and comfortable? More than likely. Take a step back, concentrate on yourself and do some you-time. Read a book, watch a movie or even sit there in absolute silence whilst staring at the four walls around you and realise what it is in your life that you want the most.

When you let your insecurities become you, is when you start to fall into a downhill spiral of self-loathing. Get up, get out and realise that hey, you’re not that terrible of a person anyway.

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