Body Confidence – It’s not a competition Ladies!

Due to recent dramas within the fitness supplement industry (I really won’t give the subject any more exposure than it already has) something suddenly dawned on me. A beautiful, slender model stood before my eyes; perfectly healthy and perfectly happy. Yet the endless comments calling her anorexic, to go and eat a burger or simply just “Too skinny, gross” were actually astounding.

Followers of my Instagram will know I’m no stranger to comments like the above myself and whilst I’ve always adopted the attitude of “Expect but don’t accept” it is unfortunately still rife. Sometimes I think it happens to all body shapes, no matter how big or small. And then I try to think of a marketing campaign that ever celebrated a size 6 model for being small and beautiful. If I’m wrong feel free to put me in my place right now, if not I’ll continue.

Whilst I absolutely love the celebration of plus size women I can’t help feel that anything under size 10 has now become a dirty word. When did it become a competition? When did it become OK to shame someones body in order to feel better about your own? And when did being a under a size 10 become “disgusting”?

Rather than simply celebrating a size for being a size what we really need to do is educate each other and women everywhere on what Body confidence, healthy bodies and also just general manners are. As someone who has suffered with confidence issues I thought a few from my own experiences might be a good place to start.

You can’t live a positive life with a negative mind

This is almost my mantra for life. How are you supposed to surround yourself with positivity if your mind is constantly thinking negatively. Turn those poisonous thoughts of “I can’t” that infiltrate your mind at its most crucial points to “I’ll try”. And no I’m not talking just about weightloss because thats not everyones struggle.

Whether it’s a new job you want to go for, a career change, a lifestyle or a fitness goal of sorts, thinking its a possibility is the first step to making it a reality.

Be You.

The most detrimental thing a person can do to their confidence, is try to be someone that they are not. Everyone of us is beautifully unique, but in a world full of influential and inspirational people, it’s easy to lose sight of who we are whilst feeling inspired by someone else. The most important thing to consider in this, is that people aren’t foolish and they can usually tell when something isn’t kosher and it’s pretty hard to keep up too. A good idea is to build on the factors of who you are that you feel are your strengths, are you a born leader? Do you enjoy looking after people? Are you fiercely aspirational? Honing those qualities and factors of your personality are a great way to define yourself in a world thats constantly trying change you.

Natural Beauty

Whilst I believe the ability to bare your natural beauty is something that comes with age, you’re never too young to take care of the natural beauty you were born with. Because I hate to break it to you, you are so much more beautiful under there than you realise so try to go make-up free once and a while to get used to the idea and also to be able to start seeing just how beautiful you naturally are. Make up is wonderful and it’s no news to you all that I wear it too but over the last few years I’ve worn it less and less, even going as far as blogging bare faced or even just with a touch of bronzer and a nourishing lip balm as I did in the shots above. There was a time where I’d sleep in my make up for fear of people seeing how hideous I thought I was. It wasn’t until I started teaching myself to love myself naturally, that I started to enjoy wearing less and less. You do not need a full face of make up to be beautiful, I’m just telling in case no body ever told you, you will realise when you’re ready!

Goals

That’s one thing to come out of 2014 that I absolutely adore, seeing #Goals under peoples pictures never fails to make me smile because quite frankly having Goals is good for you. But you don’t want to set your sights too high too early so be realistic with what you want to achieve and take baby steps towards them.

Also don’t be afraid to give yourself a BIG PUBLIC pat on the back when you do achieve them, it’s funny when people think I post pictures of my fitness achievements “for attention” Hell I’m just letting you all know how awesome I feel at the time for setting a goal and achieving it, because I need BIG PUBLIC pats on the back too you know?

Look after yourself & your environment

I can’t say this one works for everyone but looking after my body and surrounding myself with a clean & tidy home does wonders for how I feel about myself and my life as a whole. There’s nothing like feeling as if you have your sh*t together to make you really feel positively about life. I like to think of it as the matching underwear of life, because when you’re underwear matches you’re life really is on track.

All images shot on the Olympus Pen E-PL7 & the 45mm Lens by Carly Rowena

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