I created a year-long plan to keep me focused on achieving my personal goals. I'm setting my focus on loving my body.

To be completely honest, this was a very hard piece for me. I almost convinced myself to not make a post about this; I was embarrassed and surprised by what I learned about myself. But withholding my journey from you all would defeat the purpose of the type of influence I want to be. And I realized that I'm being really dramatic, but that's another story for another day.

Each week I would answer questions targeted towards my opinion of my body and wrote my answers in my journal. I'm going to share some of my answers with you, word-for-word, typos and all. I would scan my journal entries for you to see but my handwriting looks like chicken scratch 💀

Anyway, let's get started:

So, what don't I like about my body?

- I hate this stomach fat
- back rolls — ugh
- my thumb is [messed] up
- my upper lip covers my smile
- my face and these acne/acne scars
- I hate my fat (stomach, back, arms, face) because it's a physical show of my weight gain. I see how I used to look & compare it to now.

My ideal body would be how I was around my junior/senior year of high school — thin but thick in the right areas; flat stomach, minimal pudge; defined back. I feel ugly. I remember when I got that blue romper and was in love. When I wore it, I was shy but when I saw pics of myself in it, I cringed. I was sad. I pinpointed all my flaws. It makes me less confident — I hate that energy so I want to change it . . .

Yup. I have a lot of insecurities with just my body alone. In fact, the photo above is a few months old and 9/10 I may be sucking in a bit 😣

It took me 20 minutes to find that photo because I hardly take body photos. I didn't realize how bad it was until I actually sat down and reflected on my body. As I wrote, I just kept thinking: "Am I really that disappointed in my body?"

The answer is no. When I think back to high school, I had a much longer list of "faults." For example, I literally HATED my skin tone and I honestly did not begin to accept my skin tone until my freshman year of college. It took nearly 18 years for me to realize this is simply a part of who I am and God made me this way. This is my body. If I want to be more confident, I have to embrace every aspect of my being and love it with everything I've got.

So one week, I made a list of things I loved about my body such as my lips (size and shape and softness), my butt size — no more no less — my proportions (without the extra fat), my skin tone, my eyes, my height (for the most part)

The list continues on. I noticed that there are way too many areas that I love about myself for me to be so engulfed by what I dislike. So I started to look at my body every night. Just stare and observe it in its natural naked state. I know this may sound weird or a little too much information but hear me out! I was doing more than staring but actually seeing my body.

I realized I had created this warped image of my body. I wasn't as big as I felt. I wasn't as ugly as I thought. I was just seeing myself in a funhouse mirror. I'm not sure if that inaccurate image was created because I compared myself to society's definition of body goals or my lack of self-love or both, but what matters is that I'm finally taking steps to move away from that negativity.

It's been an interesting month so far, and I still have to actively practice loving my body as the year goes on. But as long as your mind is set on the goal, you can achieve whatever you want.