Given our limitations in seeing new people through social restrictions due to the pandemic and, with it, new beauties, it is natural that our concept of what is “beautiful” changes, even if minimally.
In addition to our concept of beauty having changed, our relationship with our own appearance has also changed, whether for better or worse. Generally speaking, many people claim to have begun to care less about what others think about their own beauty.
However, as we’ve always known, the way beauty has been and is socially imposed is toxic and harms the mental health of many people.
The exposure and acclaim of bodies, skins, hair and faces that are not real causes a lot of body distortion among people who do not feel represented by the models that society shows. And with good reason! – since the beauty industry is not only toxic to consumers, but to those who are part of it as workers. An example of this are the many cases of eating disorders among the supermodels on the runways.
On the other hand, we also have people who learned to like themselves during the pandemic. Of course, the many changes we’ve made to ourselves – from cutting the famous TikTok bangs, the Curtain Bangs, to more radical changes like dyeing our hair an electrifying red or shaving our heads – influence how we see ourselves, positively or negatively.
The fact that some people are learning to like their appearance more is also due to the many days stuck at home, so we went through a journey of self-knowledge and this in itself helps in self-esteem, but in the search for such knowledge it is natural to seek support materials related to the theme, such as videos, profiles that talk about it on social networks, books, and others.
We know that the journey of self-love is long and very difficult and generic expressions like “love yourself before you love others” and “self-love is important” don’t help at all, as liking yourself is a unique and individual trajectory and something to be resolved with itself.
However, we have set aside some tips that can be useful if you are one of the people who started to feel worse about their beauty during the pandemic:
1. Follow real beauties from real bodies.
‘The body positive’ movement is very important to feel represented. There are people exhibiting and extolling many “imperfections” that are very strong insecurities for many people. People with acne, vitiligo, yellow teeth, fat bodies, thin bodies, midsize, crooked teeth, asymmetrical faces and everything you can imagine!
Although representativeness within the movement exists, it is important to recognize that we will not always be okay with ourselves.
There will be days when we’ll be feeling down and there will be days when we’ll feel beautiful! But liking yourself involves the gap between extremes. It’s about accepting and respecting yourself.
2. Surround yourself with people who “make it look easy” to love yourself.
The surrounding people influence us a lot. Choose to have those around you who don’t feel crushed to be up to standard 100% of the time. Be with people who cheer you up and who like to talk about the same things as you.
3. Don’t look at strangers with a critical eye.
We often feel that the people who see us are judging us by our appearance. But sometimes we think that way precisely because it’s how we see other people.
For example, we’ve definitely had situations where we’d go out on the street, look at someone and think, “Wow, look at that girl’s hair. It’s awful!” Because we act like this, we end up mirroring the behavior of others on our own. And remember: the pattern doesn’t exist!
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The article above was edited by Marina Ponchio.
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