Lite-Bright

Welcome to the History of Insecurity 101.

Once upon a time, I played dress-up and Barbies way beyond the point of when it was no longer cool to do such things with your young life.

Which apparently for everyone else was age ten, and for me, age twelve.

Finally, one of my friends posed a middle-school style intervention on me. Which is to say she called me out on it in front of all our friends. 

Stricken with embarrassment, I put all of my Barbies into a box and sealed them away. I boxed all of my dress-up clothes and moved on to cool things. Like slumber parties and talking about boys.

Which in turn led to feeling insecure about boys.

Which led to feeling insecure about how I looked.

Which led to wondering what I was supposed to look like.

Which led to reading Cosmo for life advice and beauty guidance.

Which in turn led to the discovery that I, no matter how hard I tried, would never reach that Size 2, C-cup, 5'3", straight-haired, manicured, poreless woman who, according to Cosmo, haunts the day-dreams of any boy over the age of eighteen.

I can wish for days that I had stayed a kid. Unoccupied by thoughts of face fat, or thigh gaps, or dress measurements.

Or I could dress up the way they tell me. Put together a kaleidoscope disguise of perfume, makeup, clothes layered by a professional stylist, skirt cut up to there, shirt down to there, stilletto, stillatto, potato, potawto.

I could be that bubblegum, princess, LA pop-queen if I just tried a little harder or ate a little smarter.

Or I could stop for a second and think.

And maybe...

 Just maybe...

 Finally come to the realization...

that the most powerful weapon...

that I have at my disposal...

Is me.

Exactly the way I am.

 
Ladies, take it from a girl who's tried nearly everything. No matter how much weight you lose, you're not going to change your eye color from brown to blue. Your bone-structure is not going to adapt to make your hips become any narrower. Your hair will not become straight and silky by starving yourself. 

There are certain things about yourself that you cannot change... Well, maybe through major and painful and risky surgery, but why??

I have looked at a mirror so hard I thought I might go cross-eyed, but it did nothing to change the fact that I am gloriously unique. And thank the LORD for it!!

This... well, rant... isn't to say you shouldn't wear makeup. It isn't to say you shouldn't play dress-up or do your hair. 

Because I myself love a little sparkle and color.

But don't do with a mindset that you aren't enough. Don't to it because you think the boys will like you better. Don't use it like a primer to blend in. 

Someone told me once that compliments from strangers are often a result of confident energy.

In other words, if you feel good about yourself, you give off sweet vibes that make people recognize! It's not the clothes, it's not the makeup, it's the fact that your confidence shines so darn bright that you have to hand out sunglasses to people who choose to hang out with you for too long.

 So, eat, drink, laugh, burp, dance, snort, repeat.

But please, for the love of Ellen, Tyra, Emma and Sophia, be you. Be marvelously you. Be gloriously, blindingly, ecstatically, and dumbfoundingly different. 

They're gonna take notice, Love.

Love, 

Chloe