How often do you look in the mirror and pick out every little thing that you don’t like about yourself? Once a month, once a week, every day?
Our bodies are such a key part of our identities. We project our sense of self through the decisions we make to our hair, clothes, makeup, tattoos, and the list goes on — and in a world where physical appearances are used to make so many assumptions about who we are as people, it’s no wonder we are so fixated on having the perfect body.
But guess what? Not all of us have abs like Cameron Diaz, boobs like Kim Kardashian and an arse like Jennifer Lopez. And not all of us want to.
And that is perfectly OKAY.
Which is exactly the message behind my favourite body image campaign of 2015, the Love the Mirror campaign.
Its message is simple:
“Love your body and what you see… just as you are now. Not later. Not after. Now.”
The campaign is spearheaded by blogger Jes Baker, who teamed up with photographer Jade Beall to bring the campaign to life.
Together, the duo photographed 29 ordinary people who were asked to wear to the photo shoot whatever they felt most confident in. The subjects’ various choices were inspiring — demonstrates that true beauty is not just about conforming to a stereotype, it is a fluid concept that varies from person to person.
The images are all captioned with each person’s answer to the question, “why is loving the mirror so important?” — and their answers are both equal parts inspiring and raw.
Look through the gallery bellow to see all 29 people, and their 29 reasons to #lovethemirror:
As this campaign reminds us, we are who we are — and life is too short to be endlessly wishing for something we can never have.
But what we can have is self-acceptance and self-love. And we can get that right now.
Just go look in the mirror and repeat this phrase: “I love the mirror.” And mean it.
Why is loving the mirror important to you?