As a woman belonging to society, I started shaving at age nine.

As a woman belonging to society, I started wearing makeup at age 11.

As a woman belonging to society, I started dressing "like a woman" at age 13.

As a woman belonging to society, I started hating my proportionate body at age 15.

As a woman belonging to myself, I quit living in societal expectations at age 17.

Change is not beneficial unless it is being done for oneself. Repeatedly, some parents encourage their daughters to never change for a man, but when did it become acceptable for girls to shift themselves into a person of different looks and ideals for a community? Why are women still being held to principles of a hundred of years ago in the 21st century? Why do I still feel as if there is a certain way I should act "as a woman?"

I was not born liking the color pink, yet the day I am born I was given a pink hat and taken home to a room painted pink, with many dresses and dolls in pink. But from the time I was born to the car ride home, did newborn me voice that I liked the color pink, dresses or dolls? I didn't. It is assumptions like these that need to be diminished. When it is instilled in the youth that we should act according to the status quo, then those who don't apply get the idea that there is something wrong with them. There is nothing wrong with not living up to someone else's opinions. The only opinion that matters is your own and while we encourage this statement, society does not defend it.

As women, we are entitled to express ourselves freely, and if someone else cares to object, there no longer is a reason to because we are no longer listening. Makeup, hair, clothes do not define us — we define ourselves. Our works, our passions, our loves define who we are, and that is what we carry ourselves with, not the expectations passed down to us.