“Your flaws are beautiful.”

I am unaffected by this phrase. Not because I don’t necessarily think it’s true, I mean I appreciate the meaning behind it and that someone out there wants me to lie to me about how beautiful I am and not allow me to think of myself, or any part of myself, as ugly.

But I know some parts of me are ugly. I live in a world where I know that the jiggle in my legs, or the acne on my forehead, or the scars on my skin are ugly.

And I find all these body positive works of art that randomly pop on my Instagram explore page to be odd to read. Almost hard to read in some cases. I accept the meaning and thought behind it, but I don’t always agree with it. And there’s an abyss of different categories of body positive. From stretch marks, to height, to freckles.
But I don’t really care too much about that kind of stuff. I don’t care that I’m only 5’1 or that I have stretch marks from literally growing into a mature body from being an infant. I believe that you’re either going to find me to be beautiful or ugly, or somewhere in between.

And don’t get me wrong, I still want to be body positive, but not body positive in a way that points out my flaws, simply because that’s mean. I want to be body positive in a ways where I can live equally in a face full of makeup and without any.

No matter what, you’ve got a body that exists. It’s most likely not flawless, and it may not be beautiful, but it should be allowed to exist and not be punished for being ugly. Your body doesn’t deserve to be judged regardless. If anything, you should be judged on how good of a person you are rather than the appearance of your body.

And body types are stupid. I hate hearing about the different shapes one body can be (pear, square, hourglass, tree, airplane, etc.). If I could get rid of one thing in the body positive community, it’d be body types because the reality is that everyone has a different type of body. And you can’t dress for your body type because your definition of an hourglass figure isn’t the same as the next persons.

You might not be beautiful, but who cares? You are not your body. You are the experiences you’ve lived through, the poems you’ve written, the concerts you’ve been too. You are a funny, or smart, or kind person. You are not a pear, or an hourglass, or a square.

And I’m glad that people find happiness and strength from body-positivity, but I’m just sick of it, you know? I know my flaws aren’t beautiful (or maybe I’m just mean) and I’m okay with it.

I know some people think that once you convince yourself that your body is beautiful, you’ll start to love it, but I don’t think it works that way. I think that once you start to love yourself and accept yourself for your flaws that aren’t always beautiful, then you’ll start to find everything beautiful, including your body. Love does that to people. Loving yourself and then finding yourself and everything around you to be beautiful is a one way equation, but I could be wrong. I mean, I am bad at math.

So, go be ugly, who cares. Experience beautiful things; like your first concert or the first time you fall in love or eating a whole loaf of good bread. I know I’m ugly, but I’m learning to accept it.