The Confidence Dilemma

Have you ever picked up an Elle/Cosmo/Healthy Fitness for Women/Vogue/Seventeen magazine article about how to pull off blah blah look and realized that the consistent number 1 advice is: Look Confident and feel comfortable in what you’re wearing. 

It’s such a simple and true advice that we tend to ignore 99.9% of the time. I have seen women wearing things that, if I were to have seen in a store, I would have found hideous. I have also seen people pull together colors and jewelry, and makeup and hair that generally should not go together..but looks great on them! And the only secret they have is that they wear what they have with confidence.

Yet when I look at myself in the mirror to get ready..confidence is the last thing I assess. First comes the new mountain of a zit on my chin. Then comes thoughts about how I shouldn’t have eaten the entire cup of icecream the night before. Then it’s how the makeup just isn’t going together. Then it’s my hair. And finally, at the end of it all, the last thought is always “Well..this is as good as it is ever going to get” and walking out scowling at the mirror.

It’s like we KNOW what it takes to make ourselves look beautiful: Confidence. If it wasn’t for confidence, the fugly Crocs would never have become popular! Neither would have baby doll shirts. We spend so much money buying these essentially “self help” magazines to tell us how to look beautiful all the while knowing that we ourselves hold the key to our own beauty: confidence.

So here’s me giving myself the one advice in life that I know rings true: No matter if you wake up realizing you’ve gained 10 pounds since last week, or that your teeth are yellowing, or that your hair needs a trim, or that your eyes look too small—just smile and walk like you love the skin you’re in. It’ll make the day that much more bearable.

Self-esteem is just too interesting of a concept to let go…