Scrolling less than five minutes on Instagram and you’ll find yourself seeing one fabulous body after another. But what if I told you that seeing all of those seemingly perfect bodies can possibly have an effect on you. The pressure to be perfect on Instagram can lead you to develop negative body image issues. Meaning, when we see ourselves in the mirror instead of loving ourselves flaws and all we are dissecting each flaw with the goal of obtaining unachievable perfection.

Before social media, active and passive body-shaming had been limited to social circles, television, and magazines. But with social media being apart of our daily lives it’s easy to fall into a harmful mindset of obsessing over someone else’s body image. Having negative body image issues can shatter your self-esteem and self-confidence. But fear not, if you find yourself not seeing yourself in a positive light here are some things you can do to overcome it and start loving your body flaws and all.

Love Yourself

The first step in conquering the publicly induced body image consciousness is respecting oneself. If one is unconditionally in love with oneself no one can possibly shatter one’s self-esteem and self-confidence. It is very true that often individuals are subjected to harsh comments of fat-shaming or catcalled for being too skinny. But one must remember that an individual sitting behind a screen and commenting on a picture cannot necessarily define the person concerned. This is something easier said than done, I know. That is exactly why we live in a world of filtered truths and angled profiles, but sadly none teaches us to love ourselves in the way we are. All shapes and sizes are beautiful.

Look Inside Yourself

We live in an age where we try to find the meaning of life in the validation of others and especially on social media. But we often forget that all the answers that we are seeking are inside us. We must practice looking inside ourselves to find our validations. We must remember that we must not seek happiness in the opinions or appreciations or insults of others. All that matters at the end is our self-scrutiny of our faults and flaws. This is because no one knows us more than we ourselves.

Learn To Respect Heterogeneity

Before criticizing others because of inflicting body image issues on ourselves we must first try to unlearn the societal fake standards. Then we must accept the heterogeneity of every human being. We all are different in our outward appearances. There are no specific standards that one has to meet to be so-called “perfect”. We all are perfect in exactly the way we are. First, we have to accept this by ourselves.

Educate Others About Body Positivity

One of the chief ways to get rid of body image issues is by educating others about it. We must make an attempt to make others understand about body shaming and shaming in general in social media. This is the best we can do to reduce the judgemental issues that break the self-esteem of individuals. Often these body-shaming issues take the shape of cyberbullying and cybercrimes in worst cases. So take an initiative to educate others about educating others about shaming others in social media and internet mediums.

We must acknowledge the fact that body-shaming is something that actually affects the mental health of an individual. Often due to constant shaming and bullying the victimized individuals sink into chronic depression. There are instances when the victims resort to drugs or other severe medicines to achieve a certain size or look in a certain way. This is detrimental for everyone because as a society we all are failing to create a human-friendly space. A space that is devoid of judgments and in order for this to happen it needs to start with the real society around us.