“You don’t owe prettiness to anyone. Not to your boyfriend/spouse/partner, not to your co-workers, especially not to random men on the street. You don’t owe it to your mother, you don’t owe it to your children, you don’t owe it to civilization in general. Prettiness is not a rent you pay for occupying a space marked ‘female.’” —Erin McKean

Ask yourself if you would say the same thing about a man. These pernicious stereotypes are largely saved for women, and when we badmouth other women for expressing their sexuality, we feed into the narrative that women have no agency over their own bodies. Whatever women choose to do with their sex lives, it’s never your business.

Think about what you are implying the other girls “are like” when you say this. If you are reinforcing stereotypes that women are “bitchy” or “full of drama” and that you are the exception, darling, you are not. Stereotypes sit at the bottom of a pyramid, and they fuel the bigger problems at the top, like gendered violence towards women (it sounds

Your character is not to be judged by the mistakes you make—but by your ability to hold yourself accountable, interrogate your actions, and come back with the correct behavior.

Once you heal your insecurities, get to the root of where they originate, and identify the parts of yourself that you’re ashamed of, you reframe your perspective and open the door to a wonderful thing called empathy.

I stepped out of my comfort zone and got a taste of what my life could look like if I truly renounced the need to be liked.

If you’re constantly accessing the same media delivered by the same people, how are you ever going to open your mind to other people’s perspectives?

Some people go their entire lives without ever questioning their identity, attempting to deconstruct patterns, or end cycles of inherited trauma, because they’re too focused on surviving. It’s easier to live by the narrative that has been supplied since birth because they don’t have time to think about evolving. Having time to unpack and evaluate

A shift in perspective has the power to flip the world as you know it upside down. But wouldn’t you rather see the world clearly than walk through life oblivious to all that you are complicit in and enabling?