Haters Who? Never Heard of 'Em

Trying to be a bold woman is not the easiest thing on the planet. Going through school, I was taught to be different and to let your voice be heard… these teachers didn’t explain how demanding it really is to speak out and put yourself in a light that maybe is not the most “common.” ​Throughout the past year or so, I have struggled with body image issues.. “I’m too skinny,” “I’m too fat,” “My boobs/ass are too big,” “My boobs/ass are too small,” yadda yadda yadda. After a lot of thinking, evaluating, RE-evaluating, and writing…

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 I realized FUCK THAT.

I was so caught up in being insecure to realize how fucking amazing I was.

So I decided to just say fuck it. Not only was I writing my little mini journal articles (on google drive where no one but my boyfriend and ex boss could see), but I decided to take my voice to social media. 
I started off with a little risky post of me topless and with a message on my back talking about imperfections. My main goal was to make sure the world knew that even the most confident looking people can have insecurities and even the most “Perfect” people have their own imperfections. This post received a lot of positive feedback… reposts, lots of likes and a ton of comments. I felt like I was on top of the world, honestly. I had all of these girls messaging me telling them that I inspire them and all that… and let me tell you, I felt empowered as fuck.

So little by little I started making more posts similar to this… with inspirational type captions and reposting quotes on my story. I was receiving a lot of awesome feedback honestly!

I remember thinking to myself, “wow.. This having a voice thing is a lot easier than I thought.” I was getting positive feedback and a shit ton of support… so why not bump it up a notch. 

What screams “body positivity” more than some REAL skin and some REAL statements? So… I decided to use my journalism project as an excuse to express these real women. I gathered a bunch of quotes from all different types of girls (black, white, italian, hispanic, thick, thin, etc.). I got big booties, little booties, small boobies, large boobies… every type of body that I could think of… and I asked each of them to tell me about their insecurities. With the insecurity quotes as my opener, I decided to start and write individually about the insecurities they had and how the media played a role in each and every one of them. 

When I posted all of this, I got some insanely great feedback! Not only were people reposting them, but I was receiving private messages encouraging me to keep going with what I was doing. It felt great, honestly. I felt that even if I could reach one soul, one insecure girl (or guy), that I reached my goal.

However, with all this positivity came a shit ton of negativity too. OF course you are gonna have those people who find a way to sexualize these posts in the worst way possible. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with being a sexual being.. However, when the whole point of the post was to focus on the imperfections, I was kind of annoyed that these dumbasses had  to find a fucking way to make these women as objects. 
But whatever… that isn’t even the worst part.

Going back to work, I felt the energy shift from everyone. 
“Thirsty for attention”
“Slutty”
“An excuse to post nudes”

I even got the comment from my friends grandmother that I “used to be such a smart girl until she started dressing like a slut.. What happened to her.. She used to be so successful?” 

Since when did success rely on the amount of skin that was covered.. Since when did me showing my stomach amount to me being unsuccessful? Success is not determined by the way you dress. For me, I am insanely successful in my eyes. I have a steady job, my own car, apartment, and a path for myself. Just because I enjoy showing some lil booty or some lil tiddy, doesn’t mean that I am unsuccessful.. Or worse… unintelligent. IN FACT, I am about to be a FIRST GEN college graduate… not that I have to explain myself.

Pardon my mini rant… I just wanted to show that hate affects all of us in some way or another. I ALSO wanted to show that even the people who seem to have the most confidence and support also have their haters and people trying to bring them down. 

The older I am getting and the more ballsy I am getting about expressing myself, the more I realize that I have a shit ton of people who envy my success and more importantly, hate on my moves. 
Normally, this would have bothered me as the people-pleaser that I used to be… however… now, I can honestly say IDGAF. Y’all can hate if you wanna but here I am… making moves, testing limits, and growing more and more every single fucking day. So for everyone out their who is struggling with their haters.. Fuck em.