We ARE Beautiful.

I'm going to be really honest about something that's kind of personal. I don't often try to use this blog to talk about my inner most feelings because, well, I feel weird about that. But tonight I will (for a good cause).

I don't think I've ever felt that I was a pretty girl. Stop rolling your eyes. I'm NOT looking for any sort of compliment here. What I mean is, I don't think I'm unfortunate looking by any means but I've always been really insecure about my looks. And by always, I mean since I can remember. I was a goofy, freckle faced, red head with the whitest legs in the world as a little girl. And my freckles were splotchy, at best and I had a huge gap between my teeth. I was a sight to behold.

Through the years, I became less splotchy and got the gap fixed. And I'm not insecure about much in life but for some reason I have never felt that I measured up to "pretty" girl standards. I'm critical of myself more than anyone. High school and college were awesome and I had great friends and my share of boyfriends. But I always felt like the least pretty one of all my friends. I was always the funny one. Never the pretty one. Which is fine, of course. But I always wondered what it was like to be the pretty one.

Through my twenties and now into my thirties, I've really grown into myself. Like I said, I'm a pretty confident person about most things and I've come to realize that I'm who I am and that's okay. But for some reason to this day, I am highly critical about my looks. I could leave my house feeling confident and pretty and then I see someone that looks cute and immediately second guess my hair, my outfit and my makeup. I don't want this to sound like this consumes me, because it doesn't. I can own this feeling and reason it out. Because I'm not gonna be a super model or a size 2. Ever. And that's totally fine. Because what I'm lacking in looks, I make up for in my big personality. haha.

So the reason I'm writing this little confessional is because I was reading a magazine this weekend and found this article about Operation Beautiful. I was really inspired by this because this girl started a movement by posting a post it on the mirror in a public bathroom saying "You are beautiful" and posted it on her blog. Fast forward to now, women all over are leaving inspiring notes to strangers in public places about how beautiful we all are. Amazing! Can you imagine finding a note like this posted somewhere on a day that you don't feel your best? Wouldn't that make your day? I would love it if I found a note like this. So I've decided that I'm going to start doing this randomly in public places. Because it may make a difference to someone. And I'm going to order the book too. And I think the first note I'm going to write is going to hang in my very own bathroom. :)

Happy Monday beautiful people...xoxo