I met up with a few of my lovely friends yesterday for lunch and a few drinks (aka pretended we were 18 again and devoured a few Wetherspoons pitchers). We were catching up as well as reminiscing.
Up popped the memory of me having a TOTAL MELTDOWN whenever I saw a bad picture of myself, which is most tbh. Don’t let the blog fool you, they are often 5 I have chosen out of 50.
Back when I was in my late teens a terrible picture of me viewed instantaneously from the club photographer, (itching to print me a horrendous keyring) would send me spiralling. Night over, mood defeated.
In fact, it’s likely that I would scurry over to the deliciously fluorescent-lit bathroom and start prodding my face. I would spend far too long staring at my distorted face, making wishes to some higher power that one day I would wake up and look like Alexa Chung.
Ah, how I longed for the analogue days where you didn’t find out how drunk you looked until a few weeks later at Boots photo collection point.
Shockingly, I have managed to kick this habit. Nowadays. I can spend whole nights out or go on holiday, see a bad photo and think “Gosh I look shit there.” Then move on.
How has this came to be?
From one insecure obsessive mirror checking gal to possibly another, I can admit it came unsuprisingly through more of what i so strongly despised.
The phrase what makes you bad makes you better certainly applies to me here.
Through starting this blog and getting more photos taken of myself in the last few years than a lifetime, I have come to know my face and body a lot more.
Through exposure, eventually came increased acceptance.
As well as learning which angles are better for me, I have also now witnessed the dimensions of my large nose 1000 times. I know fine well the way my face scrumples up at any sunlight, smirk at my shit posture and the list just goes on.
All the ‘negatives’, although I shouldn’t see them that way (the next part of the journey is learning to love those too), are just me I guess.
I know some might find it hugely vain to get that many photos taken (although I always want the photo to be more about the outfit or setting than the person wearing it).
I found it super embarrasing for a while that I started posting photos of just me, I dreaded telling real life family and friends my instagram handle or even my blog domain, even though I’m very proud of what small success they’ve both had.
But at the end of the day, if you can’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love someboy else?
And if you don’t quote Rupaul in at least every other blog post or sentence really, who is missing out? Probably you.
In summary, learn your face and you might begin to accept it or at least be more self-aware.
If this fails and you still squirm inside at a particularly bad shot, I always go by the mantra: if I was having a good time and I look happy, then that’s all that matters. AKA me looking shit should not spoil the great moment this photo was capturing.
One size does not fit all and this advice will not work for everyone, I’m just one gal sharing her experience to hopefully benefit at least one other.
emilyrosejacko.com 