Sharing another collaborative post with y’all today, this one focusing on maintaining joy in your life!
If you’re on the lookout for a little more self confidence, look no further! When it comes to body image, a lot of us don’t have what we would consider a good one, and that’s okay as we can work on it. We see perfect forms in the media all the time, whether they be male or female, and we immediately compare ourselves to them. However, this seemingly knee-jerk reaction is something we can unlearn!
We all need a little more self confidence, and there’s some easy ways to get it! There’s a lot that goes into making yourself happy, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to enjoy the things we do to get there! Help yourself be happy with a few of these little tips or tricks, and try practicing them daily to get yourself into more bigger and better habits.
Learn to Be Inspired
Watching TV and reading magazines exposes us to a lot of negative viewpoints about people’s bodies and what they choose to do with them. It’s not always like this of course, but remember that even those articles we read online, praising a woman’s fashion sense as a style icon, can work against us and make us feel even worse.
When you see someone you admire, don’t let yourself feel down that you don’t look like that. Instead, use their image, as a reason to propel yourself forward. Go after those goals you dream about when you’re laying awake at night, as you know it can be done by people like you!
A little self-improvement when the fancy takes is the best way into a routine. Go jogging in the morning if you feel the sudden need to, or a good swim in the afternoon.
List Off Everything You Love About You
If you feel that you have a lower self esteem, those little handwritten notes that ‘you can do this’ aren’t really phrases that are going to get you up and ready for action, unless you like the reminder! Instead, you’re going to need to be more specific with yourself.
Make a list of everything you admire about yourself, whether it be in the looks department with your hair or your eyes, or with your skills and personality. Write down everything you know you can do and do well, and provide yourself with plenty of examples. Remember a time you felt really proud of what you accomplished? Write it down, and leave your list in a prominent place for you to see whenever a blue feeling rolls around.
Try a Nighttime Routine
A nighttime routine means you might need to spend a little more effort on yourself when the evening rolls around, instead of just flopping down into bed and falling asleep with your face in the pillow! There’s plenty you can do to try and revitalise yourself, alongside having a good kip, and that means you should try to set up some new habits.
Try using lotions to rub into your skin, as a little pampering never hurt anyone! If you like the way your skin feels, then you’re going to instantly feel better about yourself a few minutes later. You can even tick off that mental checklist of all the things you need to do to make yourself feel better.
Nighttime routines not only make us feel better in our bodies, but they also help us sleep better, which helps better memory formation and those sneaky undereye bags. Sounds like an absolute dream! So if you want to follow one of the previous steps of remembering those good times when we’re feeling down, this is the one for you! Use sites such as http://www.sleep.org/ for more tips, and to help get yourself a schedule and try to keep to it. This way you’ll better train your internal clock for bedtime, and get a consistent amount of sleep every night because of it.
Pamper Yourself with a Few Cosmetics
A lot of the time, cosmetics come in the form of makeup and hair conditioner, misting sprays and perfumes. They make us feel and look good, especially for ourselves! Put on a little blush, or smell sexy with a drop of perfume of cologne, and pose for yourself and yourself alone. Take a few photos of you looking good in an outfit, or do away with it all and give your skin a good break from the look of the daily grind.
If the mirror seems to be a little daunting to look into naturally, you can do something for that as well. If you want something a little more heavy duty to target specific areas you feel uncomfortable with, such as underarm hair or skin, then look around for solutions to these. Use sites such as http://www.dore.sg/underarm-whitening/ to consider your options, and take a step into a new life that helps you be you without any of the extraneous worrying!
Either way, be sure to use these products to help yourself feel better about your look until you don’t have to fake it anymore. Got eyebrows that you think aren’t thick enough? Just pop out an eyebrow pencil and do away with any clear patches. Want to define your already gorgeous eyes? Break out the eyeliner and define the waterline. Makeup accentuates the areas of our face that are already in tip top condition, and that makes it something to be used for a little more confidence in our daily lives.
Try Out a New Wardrobe
Your style often helps makeup you, on top of everything inbuilt you have that helps you to shine! All you need to do to give yourself a boost sometimes is to open up your wardrobe and give all your outfits a spin for a couple of hours, as you can get truly creative with combos you never would have thought to use before. Mix that scarf with that skirt, try out those thigh high boots with a cute pair of shorts, and you can pretend you’re living a city lifestyle, waltzing down the sidewalk.
It might even be time to try out a new wardrobe! If you think you’re not giving yourself the respect you deserve, remember that everyone looks good when they’re dressed up, no matter their body shape, so go with a few new styles if you can afford it. If you have a little money set aside for a rainy day, whether that be for the physical terms or because you feel a little rainy, use a little of it to revitalise your wardrobe. Sometimes, our skin isn’t the only thing that needs that!
Take your friends along so you have lots of love and laughs every time you try out a new look, as friends will be complimentary and honest when they need to be. Then, to make things go a little easier, try to make it a habit of everyday to set out an outfit before you go to bed, and then you can spend a little more time on hair or makeup the next morning. That, or get a few extra minutes in bed!
Give a Little and Help a Lot
Charity is something we all like to do, and are preached at to do as children and by guilt tripping television commercials. When it comes to helping our confidence, we mainly want to feel like good people who do things to help the planet and the people on it. Often, we can help the people we see in our own lives when they’re down on their luck, as no one ever lost anything by giving! With this in mind, give a homeless person a few coins on your way to work, or a free coffee when you have a sticker or card for one.
To get into the sciency part of it: it’s said being generous is psychologically programmed to make you feel better. Reward centres in the brain are raring to go and like to fire whenever you do something good, and don’t fire as strongly when something is dishonest! Adopt an animal overseas, or even foster or volunteer with puppies and kittens at a local shelter. People always need a helping hand when it comes to animals, so you can be sure to find a place, and maybe yourself at the same time!
Looking good and feeling good are two separate things, when you really think about it. When it comes to feeling good in ourselves, and using our image to make ourselves better people, we can be best friends to ourselves or our own worst enemies. If you need a little help to feel happy, then get the help you want! Try out new things every day if you see something you like, and don’t be afraid to use outside sources for your own confidence. After all, there’s nothing wrong with giving yourself a little makeover in the mirror at night and pressing those lipsticked lips to the surface!
This post was a collaborative effort – please check out my disclosure policy page for more details.