I realized that a huge problem in society today is a lack of self- love. People are constantly comparing themselves to models, celebrities, people on the internet and even their own friends. According to Psychology Today 85% of people world-wide struggle with self-love. I wondered why is it such a big problem? I decided to interview some students with my main purpose being to see what affects them the most–is it how they see themselves or how others see them? 

We are much more judgmental and critical with ourselves than others for the reason being that we struggle with self-love. One of the main reasons that we do that, is not because we want to, but because of what we see. 

Why does it matter?

Crismarie Priego, an 8th grader at WMS, said she believes that the reason we struggle is, “Because of social media.” Why is that? Let’s say that we are just scrolling through Tik Tok, or Instagram and we start staring at a picture of an influencer who has our ‘dream body’, your dream hair and features. Later on we find ourselves doubting our beauty, doubting if we are actually worthy. In extreme cases, people even get cosmetic surgery to look like the filters or people on social media. All of those thoughts are influenced by the same social media and what your eyes see, your mind tricks you into thinking, doubting, and being critical with yourself which affects your mental health. 

What are the pros?

Even though struggling with self-love messes with our mental health, the reality is, we all go through this and it is completely normal. We are never alone in this because many people go through the same thing, especially those who seem to have it all put together and praise themselves constantly.

Social media is a huge reason for why we don’t love ourselves, but another reason is because, as humans, we always want reassurance from others.  We want to receive so much love and affection from others to feel loved, and when we don’t receive that reassurance, we suffer.  Eventually, we stop relying on other people’s affection and start to accept who we really are–we start to slowly love ourselves and be nicer to ourselves. 

Arjan Kaur, an 8th grader at WMS, said, “Don’t worry about what other people say, focus on yourself and just be yourself.” Although focusing on yourself may seem selfish, it would actually help to accept ourselves and find grace in us. 

What are the cons? 

Self-love plays a big role in love. What is love though? Love is a beautiful thing, it feels like a mixture of joy, comfort, and deep connection with someone. It is something that should happen naturally, not forced. However, a lot of the times it goes the wrong way. What does this have to do with self-love? 

Let me tell you a story. There was a 14 year old girl who was dating a boy who was everything to her. It’s like in a movie, everything blurs and all the focus goes to one person. The relationship was good, they were both happy. However, the girl struggled with loving herself and started relying too much on the boy and expected too much from him. What the girl wanted was out of reach from what the boy could provide. She began to close herself off, she became more distant. Eventually the boy ended the relationship. 

The girl was destroyed, she felt as if her only source of love was gone. This relationship went the wrong way for one big reason, which is because the girl relied too much on the boy. This is caused because the girl struggled with self-love, she relied too much on one person, and she lost that person. It is important to love ourselves and to find our worth so our mentality is stronger. 

If we don’t learn to love ourselves, it is harder to maintain a healthy relationship, it is not impossible, but it is harder. Why? When you know your worth, when you love yourself, you have a better idea of what love is and what love should feel like rather than just wanting to be in a relationship to feel love that might not even be real. When you know your worth, you know how you should be treated and create fair boundaries between you and the other person.

What affects us more?

Priego, expressed that “both what other people think  of me and how I see myself affect me a lot.” So then, what affects us the most? People’s words are very powerful, their opinions and comments about us affect us, but should that define our worth? A lot of the time, we let people’s words define who we are and how much we are worth. We believe everything we are told, whether it comes from the internet, or from our family or friends. It is up to us if we want to give any importance to those words or not.  It may not seem like it, but we always have a choice.

Every person thinks differently and has their own opinions. So there isn’t an exact answer for this question. However, it is possible to see what affects the majority of people. So I asked students here at WMS what affects them more–the opinions of others or how they see themselves. After interviewing over 20 students from each grade, I have come to a conclusion that the perception of other students is that others get affected more by what others say. 

But in reality, the students say that they get affected more by how they see themselves than how others see them. Many of the students said that they are more self-conscious and their thoughts feel more personal and stronger. For example, a 7th grader said that people treat themselves worse than others because “maybe they don’t like how they look or they hate themselves.”  

What does it have to do with our life?

More than 720,000 people including adults and teenagers die of suicide around the world for many reasons. One of the big reasons that teenagers commit suicide is lack of self-love.

Many people might not take suicide seriously and many people often bully others by bringing them down and telling them that they don’t belong here. Suicide is also misunderstood as calling for attention so they dismiss the signs. 

You might say, why should it matter to me anyway? Well, think about your friends, your family, your classmates. Absolutely anyone could be struggling with self-love and be thinking about putting their pain and suffering to an end without anyone to tell them that they are not alone, and committing is not the best option. 

This is why it is so important to check on your friends and family, because even the most funny and energetic people could be struggling and hiding their true thoughts and feelings. A lot of the times we believe we are alone, we go through so much whether at school or at home, that we end up closing ourselves off from everyone and refuse to accept help.

Let’s all practice self-love because it will make the world a better place.