I like myself with conditions attached

I am enough as long as I conform

I like myself more now. I like the way my eyeshadow glitters, my white mini skirt, the gel manicure I got abroad. I like the way I am presented and I can look at pictures without fixating on every flaw. I feel confident and smart and interesting and I tell myself that life is improving. Everything is getting better because I don’t look how I did before. I like myself with conditions attached.

I look at photos from my teenage years, at 16 with bright, frizzy orange hair that was meant to be blonde. I spend hours ruminating over the girl who didn’t fit the beauty standard, who didn’t care if her shirt was slightly creased or her outfit mismatched. The girl who experimented with her personal style, who had no fear about anything in the entire world. I find myself resenting everything about her.

At 19, I started university. My skin was at its worst and at the time I didn’t care. My grades were good and I had friends who liked me and everything was falling into place. I was good enough and I faced the world without question — I took up the necessary space and I felt I deserved to.

At 20, something changed. The transition was swift. I spent more time watching what I posted online, ensuring that I was presentable enough. I bought the viral lipstick that everybody was raving about and I found myself caring about the blemishes and imperfections. Girls who I thought were prettier than me becoming a threat, every post a personal slight against me. I didn't know who I was beyond my physicality, and I didn’t think it was possible to be liked without embodying the beauty standard. A reality I thought was simply unachievable for me. So what was going to become of me now?

I began to wear more makeup, learning how to conform. I didn’t have an identity without it. I began to receive more compliments and I wondered why I didn't do this before — why I didn’t have an extensive routine and put more effort in. I started to pick apart who I was in my past, hating on the girl who existed before society’s cruel and ever-changing expectations. I resented myself for wasting years not changing sooner and I would have done anything to turn back time, telling myself to be different. I didn’t know how to exist without abiding by the rules of the game.

My happiness has become contingent.

I am deserving of love as long as I keep up the pretences. If the makeup stays on and I am the same size and I wear all of my pretty clothes then I am somebody. My friends will stick around and I will find somebody who cares about me, because I look better and I have become more palatable. Being attractive has become a means to survive, without it you fade into the background and society says you don’t matter anymore. I want a future so I must conform.

If somebody likes me I wonder if they would like the girl I was before, if I am only funny now because I wear foundation and concealer and dark red lipstick. I wonder why the world is so obsessed with appearances, how I have become so taken in, why they can’t see anything else. I want them to see my resilience, my passion for literature, my love for travel and adventure. But it is an impossible task, so I too start to see myself one-dimensionally. Because if everyone around me only notices the way I look, there is no point caring about anything else.

Everything goes back to the way I look.

Going beyond it all.

I am writing this whilst in Singapore, in my university dorm on an international exchange. I have spent the past few days traipsing around Hong Kong, buying bookmarks and overpriced hot chocolate and taking pictures of monasteries, laughing about anything and everything. I have taken the metro around Taipei and experienced a panoramic view of the entire city, learning about Chinese history and seeing how emperors used to live.

I know how lucky I am to be here. I know that five years ago I wouldn’t even be able fathom what I’m doing right now, living away on a study abroad program and travelling all around Asia. I am trying to view my life holistically, to admire and appreciate everything I have achieved on my 21 years on this Earth. I have made new friends and memories and there is still so much more to come.

I tell myself that none of this came into being because of my appearance. Yet it has still enriched my life, changed it for the better. As I write this I realise how many amazing experiences I have had that aren’t related to my physicality, and I am trying to rewire my brain. To place value on other things, and to understand that there is so much more to life.

I am trying to change.

To accepting ourselves as we are,

Zahra <3