It seems like it is more difficult than ever to feel good about yourself and your body. With gorgeous models with seemingly perfect bodies plastered over all forms of media, it can feel like you will never match up to how you are supposed to look. However, it is important to remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Everyone is beautiful in his or her own way, so here are five tips to help you feel just as beautiful as you are.
Enjoy Your Look
The first step in learning to love how you look is to look how you want. While you might hear some people say to stay away from makeup and fancy clothes when learning to love and accept yourself, there is nothing wrong with wearing what makes you feel good. If it helps boost your self-esteem, then more power to you. Wear it and rock it. Whether you like wearing lipstick, dresses, sweaters, or false eyelashes, let yourself do that, as long as you are using eyelash extension safety and sanitation.
Do Not Rely Solely on Makeup
As a caveat to the point above, even though you should not feel ashamed to look how you want, relying on external factors to make yourself feel good at all times can be harmful. You do not want to reach a point where you think that you are only beautiful because of your clothes and makeup. Be sure to have days when you go all-natural to show yourself that you can be beautiful without the extra stuff. Makeup is a good tool for boosting self-esteem, but occasionally leaving it behind can be just as effective.
Feel Good on the Inside
While it might be tempting to stop after making your exterior beautiful, a big part of seeing yourself positively comes from how you feel on the inside. Find time every day to stop and find one positive aspect about yourself. This can be a physical trait or an internal one. It does not matter what you choose as long as it makes you realize something positive about yourself. Does your hair look good from a certain angle? Are you proud of yourself for helping someone with a difficult task? Let yourself feel good about how you look and the things you have done.
Get Active
Exercising and staying active can provide both physical and mental benefits. Obviously, exercising keeps your body fit and healthy, which is one way that many people have found to feel good about themselves physically, but exercise is scientifically proven to have mental benefits as well. For one, exercise helps you relieve yourself of excess aggression, which will make you feel better overall. Exercise has also been shown to directly correlate to having more confidence. No matter how you look at it, exercising provides benefits for many aspects of life.
Smile
Smiling can work wonders for your mental health. Smiling makes you seem more approachable from the outside. Other people will likely have a more positive opinion of you if you keep a pleasant smile on your face. Since people are biologically programmed to respond to positive body language, smiling will not only help other people be more friendly with you, but if you look at yourself smiling in the mirror, that can have a positive effect on yourself. People who smile more tend to feel happier in general, so smiling is a great way to boost your self-esteem.
Finding ways to keep yourself happy with how you look is no easy task. If none of these tips or others that you can find seem to be working for you, consider seeing a doctor or psychologist about your issues, as it is always possible that you are depressed or have a different mental struggle, which can sometimes be treated with a combination of therapy and medication. However, try these strategies out first, and hopefully, you will be able to love yourself for who you are.