In today’s society, many teens have found it difficult to love who they are. Teens think that they should look a certain way to please everyone. For example, many teens tend to judge their physical appearance by scoring their weight, figure, and all body parts. This becomes a huge problem for teens figuring out who they really are and how to love themselves going forward. 

Physical health has affected many teens by making them want to change themselves, leading teens to take drastic measures that they don’t need to take. Many teens stop eating what they used to eat and start to eat less and less in order to lose weight, along with working out an unhealthy amount. Mental health has affected teens by making them think that they need to look a certain way to be good enough. It gets into teens’ heads and could lead them into depression, self doubt, and having insecurities. 

Social media has a huge impact on self-love. On social media many teens tend to compare themselves to pictures that are posted. They compare themselves to pictures from body builders or models. This is a huge problem because the more teens compare themselves and look at pictures that aren’t real and are edited, the more they want to change how they look. 

DailyMail journalist Jonathan Chadwick wrote about a study finding that teenagers who dislike their physical appearance are up to three times more likely to be depressed than adults.  The UK researchers measured body dissatisfaction at the age of 14 and depression at 18 of about 3,753 young adults born in the west of England.

Self love is very important for every teen because it makes you feel good about yourself and makes you realize that it’s your body and no one else’s and you don’t need to change for anyone. 

Here are some tips on self love: 

• Take a break from social media. 
• Read a book
• Take time to think about good things about your body
• Don’t compare yourself with others (your body is beautiful just the way it is)
• Eat what you desire