Body image has become extremely important in today’s day and age with the rush of celebrity content on social media. Nowadays famous celebrities are in a race to look more perfect than others and some have even invested in cosmetic surgeries to make their bodies look more exotic. The thin body figures of the five most famous celebrities make them admired for their body image. Their influence easily affects youngsters, creating an expectation or standard in their minds regarding how one should look. Some become extremely conscious of their imperfections and start to judge themselves according to this perceived scale.
Many of them start to feel low and have dipping self-esteem when they think they are adding some body weight. They keep consciously checking how they look and in what ways they can enhance their body image to look more perfect. Instagram is one such place where celebrity culture is rampant. The filters that many celebrities use along with editing their photos, so their body looks perfect and slim are quite popular using software such as Photoshop. Youngsters attach their self-esteem to their body image, and they start to see any imperfection as a huge problem. As a result, they start to see themselves in a negative light and start to take steps to get their body weight down. Some develop eating disorders in this way, whereas most of them have depressed moods and behaviors.
To overcome such problems people, need to keep in mind these points such that they do not become prey to such problems, and it does not cast a huge barrier in their lives.
Media literacy
It is extremely important to be aware of how celebrities manipulate these images every day. It will be easier for them to generate money if they realise that the photos they see on a regular basis are made up to appear immaculate so that others will admire the celebrities and them.
Keep social media in its place
When we see anything on social media, we need to step away and understand what we are feeling regarding that image. Knowing why we are drawn to particular celebrities with ideal bodies is important, and the fact that we don’t look or act like them shouldn’t affect how we feel about ourselves. Thus, you need to step away from the impact of social media and understand the role it plays in building perceptions around how you think for yourself.
End the shaming cycle
Negative self-talk is extremely detrimental to our mental well-being. We need to catch ourselves, whenever we tend to do certain actions, such as calling ourselves and putting labels on us for not achieving a certain expectation we have of ourselves. We put a lot of burden on ourselves by putting obligations on ourselves for not fulfilling certain expectations.
Put cognitive dissonance to work
Cognitive dissonance occurs when you hold negative beliefs about something that deviates from your normal thought process. It causes you to have negative thoughts about your body image which can cause you to feel low and have problems with your self-esteem. Tackling the cognitive dissonance that you do to yourself may help you understand the negative thought patterns and help you tackle the negative belief system around your body image.
These steps are extremely important to carry on in today’s celebrity culture and the influence of social media in our lives. We need to have positive thoughts about ourselves and think about ourselves more realistically than having virtual beliefs and actions surrounding ourselves. The more we become prey to celebrity worship the more we are going to hate ourselves and getting out of this cycle becomes more difficult than on. Following such steps helps one keep sane in this ruthless culture of excessive competition you will find outside. When one starts to see themselves in positively they tend to start thinking of the outside world in much more harmony, as we build stronger and healthier relations with people which are more meaningful and positive.
