It’s not the 90’s. you’re not a model.

You are not Gigi Hadid. 

It’s time to embrace that.

As a woman who grew up in the ‘90s/early ‘00s, I’m so incredibly familiar with having body image issues. There’s literally a scene in Mean Girls where they show that there are millions of ways a woman can have the wrong kind of body part, remember? 

“God, my hips are huge.” 

“I hate my calves.” 

“I’ve got man shoulders.” 

Weird coincidence, I had thought all three of those before I was 17. 

So getting comfortable on camera was an uphill battle. And I wasn’t even going to be seen by that many people. 

But here’s the thing. Some people think that by jumping on camera and putting a video on social media that they’re submitting themselves in front of a panel of beauty judges. 

And while some 90s/00s trends are making a comeback, including the concerning ultra-thin trends, that doesn’t mean you will feel them on your personal posts.  

The people who will see your video are not expecting to see Bella Hadid. So you shouldn’t feel that you have to look like Bella Hadid. 

Your video is being posted under your name, not hers. And if you’re not a beauty influencer, viewers won’t expect to see beauty content when they see you. They’re expecting to see a regular person. 

Regular people sometimes have wrinkles. They break out. They prop their phone up while working to shoot a quick video that isn’t a perfect studio-shot set-up. 

When people on the other side of the phone see the real you, they can relate more to you. Forget “celebrities, they’re just like us.” How about “real people, they’re just like us.” 

But practice makes perfect. Try to post yourself once. See what happens. And when you’re not bombarded with comments on your personal appearance, try it again. And again. And again. 

NOTE: social media trolls are real. And women are subjected to an imbalanced amount of criticism of their looks online – that’s real. Sometimes shitty people will find you, but in a decade of social media experience, I’ve found that it usually happens in specific industries, and you probably already know if you’re in one. That’s why I say “try.”