You are not perfect. You have imperfect sides of you that you are not proud of. You feel so imperfect that you sometimes hide that side of you that you feel is ugly.
As a woman you should know that building your self confidence is a journey. You have to accept yourself fully before you can confidently put your whole imperfect self on display for this very critical world.
As a girl, I hated my legs. They were so thin and filled with black spots. It affected my self esteem and confidence. I stayed away from people because they would look at my legs as if I had leprosy. But with time, the spots cleared. I never believed I would wear shorts and short gowns in my life. I have accepted my thin legs.
I have stretch marks on my arms and I hate it. I hate people asking me if it was caused by creams. Rolls eyes. I wear clothes that hide that part of my body I don’t like. I use ori (shea butter) and vitamin E oil on them whenever I remember.
When I became too fat that I couldn’t walk up a flight of stairs without gasping for breath, I went back to the gym. I was laughed at work. People told me I was wasting my time. Whenever I was eating, they would tell me to stop eating so that I would lose weight.
Today, the same people have registered in the different gyms so that they can be like me. Laughs. One day, one of them used me as a good example to talk to my other colleagues to start exercising. He said I have set the pace for all of them to follow.
I don’t like my teeth because it’s not straight and white. Sometimes, I avoid laughing too much because of how people will quickly remind me that I have brown teeth. But these days, I don’t care anymore. I laugh until I can no longer do so.
My point is that as women, we should all accept we are not perfect but if we can change anything about our imperfect sides, we should go for it and not allow people discourage us.
Many women are not confident about their bodies. Some don’t like their heights, others hate their small breasts while some hate their larger than life boobs. Some hate their flat bums while others sometimes question God for blessing them with huge, embarrassing backsides. For a number of people, it’s their set of teeth that does not let them smile and laugh as much as they want. Some can’t wear some designs because of their big stomachs. The list is endless.
In my opinion, self confidence is a journey and not a destination as a lot of people make it sound. It is a walk, a process, and a long self awareness journey. Being comfortable in your own skin does not mean putting up a facade or ignoring or burying your imperfections. It means accepting them.
Accepting that you are not perfect is the first step to being a confident woman. Be comfortable in your skin but don’t flaunt those parts of you that you are yet to be confident about, if you do so, you might get backlash from some insensitive and mean people that might drive you to depression. Come to terms that no one is perfect and embrace the fact that you are not perfect either.
If you have to improve parts of your body that you are not happy about, do so. You have to feel better about your body do things that will make you embrace your imperfections better but do not go to the extreme. You don’t have to convince other people that you are beautiful, you should revel in your imperfections and enjoy your life.
Do you. Sit down, ask yourself how you would love to look. Then work on yourself to achieve that or something close without hurting yourself. It could take you two months, two years, ten years, to be confident in your body, but I tell you, that journey is worth every single minute as long as you are not only doing it for the validation of others.