Dove Real Beauty Sketches by Grace Barbettini

I know this video has been posted quite a lot recently, but it is too powerful not to share again.

Dove Real Beauty Sketches 

"The Dove Real Beauty Sketches" campaign, is meant to encourage women to reassess how they see themselves.

We all have that one thing about ourselves that we personally dislike. Whether it be our eye shape, nose, teeth, freckles, hair, etc., we unknowingly magnify it. This video shows how our self-image perception is always mangled, only viewing the bad parts about ourselves and never seeing the beautiful parts. We have this tendency to think that it is worse than it actually is, and then we begin to believe it. 

Maybe someone made fun of one of your features, maybe you have a scar, or maybe you've just never felt pretty. You have the power to change that. You don't have to view yourself with a self-loathing perspective.

Next time you hear yourself saying "I wish I had a different this... or a better that...or I don't like my...." Just stop. 

Don't do it.
Instead, tell yourself "You are beautiful." And don't let yourself think "Yeah right" afterwards. Don't go there. Even if you don't believe it right away, don't stop telling yourself. Have confidence in who you are, and over time you just might begin to see a change.

Oftentimes we keep fighting who we naturally are, trying to be something we're not. Always wishing we had this, and that, instead of what we do have. But really, are we getting anywhere with that mentality? I used to wish that I had straight hair so bad. Like, really, really, really bad. I absolutely hated my curls. Finally, I just gave up. I realized that even if I can straighten my hair, genetically, it's never going to change. Why keep fighting? Why be unhappy, striving to get it straight, when instead, I could be happy if I accepted my hair the way it was? Over time, I learned to embrace it, and now I actually like my hair. Of course I still have those days where I think  "Man, it'd be so much easier to have straight hair right about now." but, then I remember that the grass is always greener on the other side. So, the next time you think along those lines, just forget the rest, don't think about "the others".

 Love what you have.

I came upon this quote the other day and it just hit me like a ton of bricks.

"The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself."
— Anna Quindlen

I think one of the most amazing and wonderful things about embracing yourself for who you are is that you become a freer person in life. What are we when we're self-conscious, embarrassed, and afraid of how we look? We're worried. Worrying what everyone's going to think, worrying that we look weird, worrying that we might not fit in.

And guess what? If we accept our personalities, traits, and bodies that God gave us,  we let go of those worries. We don't have to fret about the others anymore. And what does that leave us with?

A person who is free.  

I wish that everyone could be able to have the opportunity that the women in the video had.
Because I think that we would all be greatly surprised if we were able to view ourselves through a different pair of eyes.