I’ve been picking myself apart all day. From the moment I woke up this morning. My hair is too frizzy. My skin isn’t perfect. I don’t like the shape of my nose. Actually, I hate the shape of my body in general. Especially this one roll of fat I can’t seem to make disappear. I hate the way that I can feel it against my waistband when I sit down. To top it all off, I can’t get my lipstick right.

I wish I could look in the mirror and not see everything that’s wrong with me. I don’t even need to look in the mirror and feel pretty. I just want to look in the mirror without judgement. Without critiquing literally everything. Without building a checklist of everything that is wrong with me.

I wish that I didn’t feel defined by my frizzy hair and that one roll of fat that I can’t make disappear. I wish that instead, I defined myself by my personality traits. By my compassion for instance. But I have this weird belief that if I define myself by good things, I’m going to come across as conceited. And humbleness is a trait that I value.

This is why I have trouble accepting complements.

I’m terrified that if I accept a complement, I’ll be a bad person. I have this perception that no one likes someone who knows that they’re attractive, or smart, or kind, or wonderful in any way. People who are aware of their good qualities are classified as “having a big head” or as “cocky.” And I’m not technically wrong, people who are very self-confident are often given this labels.

However, I’ve confused correlation with causation. These people are not considered cocky because of their self-confidence. Instead, they’re considered cocky because of the way in which they interact with other people- they assume that they’re better.

So, I’ve decided that I need to stop equating the ideas of confidence and conceit. I need to stop fearing the concept of conceit so much that I constantly tear myself down in order to prevent any possibility of becoming conceited. Because, odds are, I’m not going to magically turn into this awful conceited monster. Instead, I might just hate myself a little less and accept myself a little more.

-X