I have always grown up looking at magazines. I loved just hanging out and skimming through them, reading articles and catching up on the latest trends. But this bred a huge insecurity in me. I wanted to be a model, all growing up because I wanted to be those girls on the cover of the magazine. I literally wanted to be that. Little did I know comparing myself to those computer fixed images would throw my entire self esteem off.
I realized in college how much I really did compare myself, and how bad looking at the magazines made me feel. I had an unrealistic expectation on myself to be perfect in the physical. I wanted my body to be super skinny with a thigh gap and I wanted to wear those specific clothes, I wanted other people to think I was beautiful because of what I looked like. Because I had this unrealistic expectation on myself, I unknowingly put that on other people. If other girls didn't look like the models in the magazines then they had work to do on their bodies too. I can be very judgmental and critical in my head.
God is uprooting the foundation of me wanting to be perfect in every aspect of my life but this was only part of the foundation he was breaking and replacing. This realization that I don't need to look like those magazine girls is so freeing! I am starting to feel comfortable in my own skin even after having 2 babies and now growing baby number 3. In my other pregnancies I didn't look forward to my body stretching and changing but this pregnancy I can say that I am just letting it all hang out!!! My belly is already popping out with that little baby inside and I don't care what people think! I used to compare myself to other pregnant ladies and how far along they were and how big their bellies were. I am 12 weeks along and I am rockin' that beer belly pooch!!!
I was so afraid to have a 3rd baby because I wanted my body to change into a six pack with solid legs, not a big ol belly but now I see differently, my perspective has changed. God told me there is DESTINY inside me. This baby has an incredible destiny and who am I to be selfish and not let my body grow so that this next baby can change the world one day?
I really hope any women or young girls reading this will come to the conclusion that media does not have the final say on what beauty is. The media has literally ruined the word beauty and contorted it into something that is not attainable. It's all messed up! Every ad, every magazine, every commercial has been touched and re-touched and re-edited to look "perfect". Those models don't really look like that, there is no possible way for us women to look like the girls on the magazines unless we have some sort of disorder. It really is so hard to step out of the perspective and look at magazines differently. But, if you want a perspective shift, if you want to see yourself as beautiful, ask God to shift it! He will! He changed my perspective, he renewed my mind! I am 27 years old and I just started to see differently! Save yourself the insecurity and lies and ask God to change the way you see yourself and the women of this world!
Seriously, you are beautiful! But you have to believe it!!!!
here are some unrealistic covers, if you want to see a whole lot more just google "magazine covers photoshop"
