My Glowing Up Journey - Part 1

When I was in uni one of my close friends and I would look through my old secondary school and JC photos with and laugh. We are close and self-deprecating humour is my kind of thing, but it was always interesting to see, even then, how much I had evolved looks-wise from my teens to my early-twenties. I thought I would write about that entire journey today.

I took close to a year to put this entry together because I felt it was important to put the entire journey into context. My issues with my own body image and self esteem were not born out of a vaccuum. I didn't one day wake up and decided I hated what I saw in the mirror out of nowhere. This entry is put into two parts because I felt the mental journey of "glowing up" is far, far more important than the physical glow up itself. 

When people teach girls they should crave and beg for others to love them

When I was a girl, every adult felt entitled to have an opinion on how I looked. Traditional Chinese families preferred to have sons, and daughters were a consolation prize because "you can dress her up to be as pretty as you" and then "she may marry a rich man in future". Daughters were prized show ponies to be marketed, to fill the role of entertainment and decoration in the family, then sold to the highest bidders in her adulthood. 

Disclaimer: I'm not saying my family saw me this way; I had a generally good upbringing. I'm saying this was the typical mindset of how girl children were seen in traditional Chinese families and many families were tainted by this view to varying extents.

Back in the day, the end goal of girlhood was to be appealing enough to marry well and become a wife. That goal was forced onto every girl upon birth against our will and every choice we made in life had to revolve around that objective. We have obviously come a long way as a society since then, but the emotional damage dealt to girls of my generation continued to stick with us to this day.

Why do so many millenial women claim to be tomboys when they were girls? It was because the definition of being a feminine girl was so goddamn narrow, that you'd be hard pressed to find one who wasn't a tomboy. Being a girl meant being quiet, obedient, introverted and submissive, wearing clothes that restrict your movement and pouring undue amounts of energy and effort into our hair. Being a boy, however? You could be literally everything else, just not that.

Most body shaming for girls began at home. For reference these were some of the insults about my appearance I had received throughout my life, starting when I was as young as 5:

1. I am too skinny

2. I am too fat

3. I am too muscular

4. I have cellulite (for context, I have been the same weight since I was 19; and received comments number 1-4 all at once)

5. I am too tall

6. I am too short

7. My skin is too dark

8. My skin is bad

9. I have dark eye circles

10. My eyebrows are too bushy

11. I have very long leg hair

12. I have poor fashion sense (this was more when I was younger, because I refused to dressed up to perform for others)

I recall a time when it was my birthday and my extended family (on my mum's side) pooled together a present for me. It was a pink dress, and they bought it for me because "I could not possibly continue refusing to wear dresses as I was growing up". I was probably 5 or 6 then. A birthday present was meant to be for me to celebrate my milestones and make me happy, and yet they purposely got me something they knew I would dislike and used it as a tool to project their own wants onto me. I didn't ask for any presents, so it is not like I was being an entitled child complaining that I didn't get exactly what I wanted. They didn't even have to do anything overboard or complicated for me in any way, they just had to NOT do it. 

I never wore that dress once and it only made me double down on my ugliness and lack of effort in my femininity to spite them. 

"You can wear that dress to hell, Eddie"

I overcompensated by being androgenous and ugly on purpose to spite them for my entire childhood. They eventually gave up, and I manage to lie and low and tide through.

Nothing could quite prepare you to be hit by the sneak (but harsh) preview into the way the social world works- beauty was capital, without which, many doors to you would be closed. At least back then, that was what my low self-esteem led me to believe. 

Puberty was not my friend, so I ballooned into a greasy mess in my teens thanks to my sedentary lifestyle. To clarify, there is nothing wrong with this and it is a normal process of growing up. However, back then took a toll on my self-esteem. It was made worse when I grew up around popular, pretty and sporty girls, and the pecking order in your social life is decided (somewhat) by that. I spent a good part of my teenage years being bitter and my self-esteem was in the trenches. Granted, it wasn't just because of my looks, there was a lot more that went into that mix, such as my studies and accomplishments, which were not going well either at that time. Throw complicated things like having guys in your school, watching everyone around you get into relationships while you are rotting like a potato wondering if you will ever measure up, and it was a recipe for disaster.

I went through so much hurt and anger that I didn't have to in my earlier years. My looks and body were my own prison. People around me called every other girl around me "pretty" while criticisng everything about my appearance. I didn't want to change my outer appearance to something that wasn't true to myself, yet I resented not being accepted for it. 

 

Because of the homophobia and transphobia that was rampant in the 1990s, people around me were quick to label me as "man in a woman's body", "something wrong", "needs a doctor". All of that just because I was literally a normal girl who had a simple preference for wearing pants and having short hair, who didn't like being told what to wear to please my family. I ended up believing them, and started struggling with a gay panic during my secondary school life (I was from a girls' school so it was not like I had any healthy point of reference as to what sexual attraction was). Not that my sexual orientation mattered at that time in my life because I was a student and I was supposed to be GROWING. And let us be clear, even if I was LGBTQ, I would have deserved love and acceptance as all LGBTQ people do.

I spent a lot of time hating myself and being fearful of the mirror in my teens. I remember always being afraid of looking at myself in pictures (I still do now, even decades later) and getting suspicious when good-looking guys are friendly to me. I only spent 2 years of my teens in a co-ed school, so trying to get guys' attention was pretty low on my list of priorities. Yet, I still wanted the validation of my female peers. 

I just wanted to be "cool"

I experimented with so many styles just so I could look, not even pretty- I just wanted to look cool. I wanted to look like I hung out with friends on a weekend instead at home, chronically online. I did it all- the side swept fringe, low pinafore belt, etc. It was rather cringey come to think of it but I forgive my younger self. After all, it was a good journey in self-discovery and I did figure out what styles and colours suited me or did not. My fashion sense was something like what you see below during my teens.

This article is seriously hilarious and I tried some of these even but hey if you love it, do you!

A Shift in Mindset

It is perhaps not very nice for me to say this, but when Covid-19 hit in 2020, it was when I started seeing my peers getting divorced one by one. I don't mean this in a derogatory way by the way. I respect anyone who has the courage to call it quits rather than suffer in a marriage that hurts them. 

However, it was the one thing that made me realise just how bad married women had it. It was like a switch flipped. Because the pandemic forced everyone to stay home, it became obvious how much more married women had to do than their husbands in the home, on top of having a full time job. Domestic violence increased. Yes, this had always been a problem before, it's only the problem became too jarring to ignore after 2020.

 Turkish Artist Vahit Tuna built a mural of 440 high heels in Central Istanbul, one for every victim of domestic or sexual violence. 440 is the number of victims in 2018 alone, not all-time.

What does this have to do with being pretty? It struck me that whether intentionally or not, I (and many girls) were essentially raised... to this end. I am supposed to waste my money wearing pink dresses, being quiet and demure, wasting time on my hair, my shoes and nails, killing my real self on the inside and turning into something that appeals to the mass market...so guys will like me and I can have a husband, a fairytale wedding and a happily ever after. But why are so many women unhappy after the wedding? Why did 440 Turkish women die from domestic violence in 2018? I am supposed to want 3 kids, preferably all of them sons... yet the statistics show that the leading cause of death in pregnant women in the US is homicide by an intimate partner.

By no means am I saying it is wrong for women to want marriage and children. I have many friends who are happily married with children, and their husbands cherish and love them as they deserve. I am simply doing a cold statistical calculation of where your hypothetical daughter's life may end up if you stubbornly choose to force her into a narrow beauty standard from a young age, to raise her to crave male validation, before she even understands what is going on.

This just begs the question, has society been raising our daughters wrong all this while? 

Let's break down this whole "girls must be pretty" bullshit right from the start, shall we?

1. "Men are valued for resources, women are valued for beauty"... is an unhealthy transactional type of relationship. It is an artifical system, seen in no other animal species, that only exists because patriarchy was invented.

The whole concept of women being valued for our youth and beauty only was born because of capitalism and patriachy. What this really boils down to at the end of day is this- "Patriarchy took away all of the resources in the world, concentrated them in the hands of men, and for women to access it they would have to be sexually desirable to men." This system is not only not "natural", it is detrimental to the growth of society.

A very common excuse we keep hearing from people who want to prop the patriachy up, is that men are naturally visual, so female beauty is essential if mankind was to reproduce.

Firstly, cavemen died at 25 from infectious diseases, ate raw meat, are expected to fight mammoths and they erm, passed motion in the grass. You want to model your life choices after them?

Secondly, let's say I humour you and we go with that argument that what we find attractive is based on evolution and coded in our DNA by nature. Let's say we are all driven by animalistic instincts deep down. This means... 

That your argument is actually completely and utterly wrong, because nature works in the complete opposite way. 

Male animals have to be beautiful to be able to attract a female mate to propagate their genes, among other things like being able to build a nest, dance, bring food to the female and protect the tribe. The females in contrast are fat, ugly, brown/grey and shitty. Male animals are also brightly coloured for an evolutionary reason- to be prime pickings for predators while providing cover for the females who have to nurse and feed the offspring. It makes logical sense to me, because female animals (including human females) undergo a lot of risks, spend a lot of their life force and energy to bear and raise offspring, therefore the male animals should prove that their genes are worth passing down, and that raising offspring with them is worth it. 

Male animals in nature compared to their female counterparts

Women competing between each other to gain the affection of a man so she can have the privilege of cooking and cleaning for him, taking his last name and to have to endure nine gruelling months of pregnancy is therefore against nature. 

It has also been scientifically proven that between men and women, women are the visual creatures. We can literally see more colours (source) and we have wider peripheral vision. Women make up 60% of image consultants in the US (image consultants are people who tell you what style looks good on you and they do colour analysts) We can appreciate beautifully decorated houses, beautiful clothes/colours/jewellery, beauty in nature, natural beauty in men etc. (Of course, this is a generalisation which is not always accurate, and a lot of this also boils down to nature vs nurture.)

Somebody who can only appreciate beauty when it is forced in their face with loads of makeup, revealing clothes, plastic surgery and only when it is a very specific type of beauty made mainstream by pop culture, is therefore NOT visual. It's like a person who claims to be a coffee connoisseur but can only appreciate coffee when it is full of sugar and whipped cream, or someone who claims to be an expert is food but only can eat food that is full of salt, oil and MSG. 

Lastly, for society to "continue to propagate", said society will need to prioritise the needs of children, and by extension, the needs of mothers who literally use their bodies to FEED their young. For society to be strong, it needs to build communities that will take turns watching the vulnerable young, NOT a nuclear family where the housewife takes on childcare alone. (Children during pre-historic times were cared for by the whole tribe/village). A society will also need to prioritise the physical and mental well-being of  mothers so that the children can be properly fed. A patriarchal society that centres the needs of the man in a nuclear family is therefore anti-child, anti-evolution and anti-thetical to a strong society.

Humans are an evolved species and we move much more differently than animals. Modern relationships are about much more than just sexual objectification and money; they are also about chemistry, emotional connection and compatibility in lifestyles and values. This whole "sex in exchange for money" conversation is getting tired and modern men and women are rightfully sick of it by now. It reeks of transactional relationship, which we all know by now is not healthy.

Look around you. In developed societies where women have earning power, and women start picking the men they would have really picked on their own volition rather than the one who would keep them from starving, who do they pick? They pick based on emotional connection, character and alignment in values, at least, more so now than in the past. Men and women of all income levels, looks, education levels and social backgrounds are able to find themselves in happy relationships. 

Beauty is extremely subjective. Dating is also a very personal decision. It is not one-size-fits all. Just because a woman is pretty does not mean a man will treat her well. Conversely, a woman may not meet conventional beauty standards, but there are many women like that in happy marriages.

2. People won't treat you better just because you are pretty.

Think about the most beautiful woman you in know in Hollywood. Beyonce? Marilyn Monroe? Princess Diana? Did being beautiful stop the men in their lives from mistreating them?

In 200 pounds beauty, the female lead lost weight and had invasive surgery to fit Korean beauty standards, and still went back to the toxic guy who used her for her talents to milk money out of her, and watches p0rn in her presence. Just begs the question what is the point of all that glowing up if your self-esteem is still going to be as low as before. Right?

Parents who groom their daughters to be pretty above all else are instilling a limiting belief in her since young which will ultimately set her up for extreme failure in life. "He likes her because she is prettier! If you don't wear a dress he won't like you!" and "Don't become 30 years old and cannot get married!" and "Good men are hard to come by!" They feed her toxic ideas about men, that men are shallow, self-serving and "cannot control themselves" and if they want marriage they should cater to such men's preferences.

 

Often, they also fail to teach their daughters that relationships are subjective, beauty is subjective, and to be comfortable with the fact that not everyone will like them or be a good match for them. They kill her self-worth before she even knows what that is. The parents also fail to teach them to look out for red flags, and to love and know themselves so that they can filter in men who are truly a good match for themselves. Most importantly, they fail to teach her survival outside the confines of what a man wants. 

Ask yourself, when you dress your girls in pretty dresses and tell them that everyone will find them pretty if they XXXXX, ask yourself if you also teach her to ask the right questions. "Do I even like this dress? Is it ok if people don't think I am pretty? Am I clever, funny or can sing very well?" So that when she grows up, she is able to think through:

 

- Does this man I am dating have the same values as I do?

- Do we have the same goals?

- Does he have good character?

- What does he do for me? Does he add value to my life? 

Any man worth dating will be asking those questions of her too, because he will also want a relationship that is long-lasting and fulfilling for him. Dating isn't only about whether men find her pretty enough to want to pay for dinner.

What will improve our quality of life, and help us get the respect we deserve? Self-love, high self-esteem and firm boundaries and principles- that's the answer.

I always say it is better for a girl to be wise than to be pretty. A wise girl will know how to navigate the world, earn (and keep) her own money, and she will have knowledge and experience that make her interesting. With her wealth, she can choose to invest in beauty products and fashion. At this point, if she chooses, she can entertain the idea of men and dating on her own terms, else she is good on her own too.

A pretty girl who does not have the intelligence to use her beauty to her advantage, will only end up attracting users and abusers who want to show her off like a trophy. Even if she does attract a rich man, they may not always benefit financially in a marriage. Women (especially those from less privileged backgrounds) usually lose out if things go south, and at that point, without skills relevant to the workforce, how will she fend for herself?

 

If men give you problems, it is not because you are not pretty enough, it is because they do not respect you enough. 

If misogynistic men who will never respect any woman anyway give you problems, it is because they are not afraid of you enough.

 

Nothing to do with looks. Always remember this.

 

3.  "A life centred in male validation is colourless and empty." - New York Times best selling author Drew Afualo

 

There's a very famous term of women who put down other women for the attention of men; "pickmes".

 

I do know many women who have lost friendships or even found themselves hurt because who they thought were their best friends ended up throwing them under the bus for a man. For the pickmes, it is almost never worth it.

 

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A rich man would compliment a lady's beauty often because he is well-mannered and gentlemanly, not because she is special. It is a reflection of his good upbringing more than her beauty literally. Dignity is as, if not more, important to these men when choosing their wives. This automatically disqualifies any pickme who would get into an ugly fight with other women for his affections.

 

There is a famous Tiktoker called JustPearlyThings who shills for the worst men on the planet. She invites feminists onto her podcast just to tear them down, and spews the most vile rhetoric about other women. She is close to 30 and still single (which is bad according to her), and the misogynistic men she tries so hard to impress have actually made videos stating why they would not date her. It is actually very sad.

 

Pickme-ism first stems from a limiting belief (see point 2). They feel like the number of eligible men on this planet is limited and therefore to get one, they must be cutthroat, malicious and tear every woman in the room down. Other women are competition to them (whether real or imagined), so they automatically hate you if you dress better or if guys talk to you. Strangely enough, they also hate you if you are not conventionally pretty (case in point, me). I have a theory as to why, more below. 

It also stems from an inferiority complex, which makes pickmes look to men as true leaders and companions, rather than them other pesky women who don't know their place.

 

Pickmes tend to have a very difficult dating experience, because when they fly head first towards any group of men willing to bestow them crumbs of validation while elbowing other women in their way, they demonstrate a lack of class and self-respect. The eligible men, ironically, stay away from women like that, not because they are not pretty but because they are toxic. The only men left willing to entertain such women are hence the misogynistic types, who appreciate a woman who gives them attention for free (at first).

 

However, as time goes by, these misogynistic men start thinking whether there is something wrong with these women. After all, other women, the well-adjusted, good natured and self-respecting types, shun these men like the plague. Why would the pickme want to hang out with them? The end-state is that even the misogynistic men don't want them. So what really ends up happening is that in order to cling on to what little male validation they can get, these pickmes lower their standards even more. They start supporting rapists, abusers, and publicly advocate for taking away women's rights. 

You would think that pickmes would be very happy that women are preferring to stay single or if women do not bother dressing for the male gaze anymore, because this means less competition for the pickme, but for some perplexing reason this makes them mad too. 

 

My theory is that pickmes imagine themselves to be a top player at a poker table at the casino. They maybe lose 7 out of 10 times they play, compared to the average player who loses 9 times out of 10. In reality, the casino (patriarchy) has the highest earnings and profits off of every player including her, and she has really lost the most money of all the players because she has been at the table for years compared to those who had the good sense to quit. She's good at individual matches for the immediate term but she loses in the long run, but don't let facts get in the way of her fantasies. Her superior status and "winnings" depend on other players coming into the casino and continuing to play against her so that she continues to come out on top. Hence, women not participating in this figurative casino ruins this for her, because how can a pickme "win" if she cannot even find enough players to play with her? 

Competing with a pickme is just a race to the bottom, so just befriend the female-identified women.

 

4. The people who make you hate yourself are often trying to sell you something.

 

Literal industries were built to thrive off of your insecurities. The makeup, cosmetic surgery, slimming industries have been in existence since centuries ago. They get sales by telling you you have (non)-problems you normally wouldn't think about, like acne scars, cellulite, stretch marks, then make you pay a fortune to fix it. 

The Slim10 pills that infamously killed someone in 2002

For those of you who have bought some form of beauty treatment package you will definitely know how much they try to hard sell you. When I still did facial treatments, 9 times out of 10 I would get a facial therapist who would spend the entire 2 hour session hard selling me some of their other packages. Sometimes, they would come in mid-treatment with the product and ask "you want this to make your treatment today more effective? Only $699" and I almost had to fight with arms and legs for them to not put it on my face (and charge me extra). 

 

I don't do facials anymore because the skincare tips I got were good enough for me to self-sustain. If beauty, makeup and skincare is your kind of thing because you are genuinely interested in just taking care of yourself, I personally feel it should be self-sustainable and centred on health rather than "looking pretty". More about this in Part 2.

 

5.  It is true that women age like milk, because milk turns into cheese, yogurt and other delicious variants and it can take place under a variety of conditions.

 

Remember how our parents used to warn us about the woman next door who is 30 and cannot get married? That we better dress up as girls if not become like her?

 

 

50 year old Shu Qi and 44 year old Fan Bing Bing

The patriarchy has some strange obsession with women who are 30 years old. They are starting to sound like obsessed fans at this point. Never mind, let me just tear apart their arguments. We are apparently value-less because i) our looks deterioriate, when the clock strikes midnight on our 30th birthday, apparently ii) we are less fertile.

 

Firstly, how a person physically changes when they age is a function of that specific individual's genetics and life choices, and has little to do with gender.

 

Men are biologically pre-dispositioned to have thicker skin and store more collagen. They also have less percentage body fat and more muscle mass, meaning they have a natural advantage when it comes to preserving their youthful looks. However, that advantage is not going take them far if they eat junk, don't exercise, abuse alcohol, don't wear sunscreen, don't moisturise, and wash their hair, face and body with their self-declared 6-functions-in-1 handsoap. 

 

On the contrary, many women are socialised to take care of our appearance from a young age. We eat healthy, groom ourselves and do skincare, so that pays off big time for us when we reach 30 or even 40 and 50. It is not uncommon to see 60 year old women look as young as 40 these days. Women "age like milk"? Sure, tell that to 60 year old Halle Berry!

 

So, this is highly subjective. Besides, so what if a 60 year old doesn't look 40? He or she might have wrinkles and grey hair but they could be happy retirees playing with their grandkids everyday or playing chess with their friends at the community centre. Who are we to say they did not "age well"?

 

Secondly, let us debunk the myth about women losing our fertility after 30. It is not that it is untrue, it is that it is disingenuous.

 

The creeps who say this often follow up with the claim that women's peak reproductive years are between 16-25. It is intellectually dishonest because medical studies show that women have the highest conception rates from their late teens until 35, but between 27 to 35, fertility only dips slightly, and she is still in her peak fertility. 

 

Aditionally, you cannot only look at conception rates alone to determine if a woman is fit to have children. You also have to look at the effects it will have on the mother's body and on the baby. According to the World Health Organisation, "Adolescent mothers (aged 10–19 years) face higher risks of eclampsia, puerperal endometritis and systemic infections than women aged 20–24 years, and babies of adolescent mothers face higher risks of low birth weight, preterm birth and severe neonatal condition." Teenage mothers have higher rates of mortality than adult women, not to mention teenage mothers are often not in the right headspace and are not financially capable of raising a child. 

A lot of people don't want to mention this, but the age of the father plays a part in the health of a child too. Medical studies show that on average sperm count and quality declines at 45, and not only can cause birth defects but also increase the risk of miscarriage. 

Am I saying older couples should not have kids? Definitely not, because it still depends on the general health of that specific individual. Fertility is a conversation between someone and their doctor and having kids requires a lot of planning. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

 

Back to the question- so how did the age bracket 16-25 come about? If I have to hazard a guess, it is because 16 is the legal age of consent for girls in many countries, so 16 is as low as these creeps can legally get. 25 is the age when a person's prefrontal cortex is fully developed, so they are less likely to be groomed to fall for manipulative tactics. I personally feel that there is never a good reason someone much older tries to date anyone below the age of 25. I am 33, and anyone younger than 27 is just a child to me. 

 

Today, I can look back at all and marvel at how far I have come in undoing all the toxicity that was fed to me for the past 33 years.  

When I started thinking critically about all the bullshit I had been fed when I was young and cross-referencing it with reality, it is much easier to ignore 

The Limiting Belief > Need a man to validate your worth > Must be pretty > Slamdunk all other women! > Quickly nab any man you can find pipeline is extremely harmful to girls. It, ironically, will prevent her from finding the loving relationship she deserves. She will most likely end up both friendless and marriageless.

I truly feel that whatever you believe, will become your reality. If you believe that your value lies only in your looks and beauty, that will be your reality; you will only find people who value that. If you have toxic views about men, and believe they are all shallow and sex-crazed, then you will not believe it is possible to find a man who loves you for everything you really are. You will settle for a shallow and sex-crazed man then find yourself gatekeeping him 20-30 years into your marriage. 

 

However, if you have an abundance mindset and believe there is more to you than just looks and how men perceive you, then you will start attracting relationships that are right for you. If one guy doesn't find you attractive, it simply means he is self-selecting out of your pool and there will always be someone out there who is truly a match for you. 

 

I am at a point in my life where romanic relationships frankly do not add anything of value to me, but men still provide me with camaraderie, community, interesting professional exchanges and fun - something I already get from my male colleagues. I don't see a need for romance. Men who value you beyond your looks- they exist.

 

Don't forget that "not dating" is an option too. In fact, I'd go as far as saying compared to trying to find a rich man to marry to live a comfortable life, it is way easier to just make a comfortable wage by yourself and live life on your own terms. 

 

Think about it, which is easier? (I'm comparing being single vs participating in the transactional relationship we have been brainwashed to want, not comparing it with a healthy loving marriage)

- Trying to make your own millions, or finding a millionaire to marry who is ALSO emotionally available, decent in character, whom you are attracted to and is aligned with you in terms of goals and values?

-  Saving up to buy your own diamond ring, or waiting for a man to buy you one on his timeline?

- Paying $100 for fine dining with your bestie, or saving $100 today by having a man pay for fine dining on a date but you pay way more in opportunity cost later (lost job opportunities, loss in freedom and independence, health risks in pregnancy etc) after marrying him?

- Working a 9-5 and getting to knock off for real and relax once you get home, or working two shifts and only being paid for one, doing a disproportionate amount of domestic labour?

- Working for a corporate company that has clear cut Key Performance Indicators or trying to keep a marriage alive when it can be subjected to the whims and fancies and changing preferences of a man?

- Working for a boss who is legally bound by labour laws to pay you a fair wage and give you humane working hours and conditions, or for a husband who can choose to pay you nothing if you don't keep him happy?

- Working for a company which, if they terminate you, gives you experience and skills that help you seek a new job, or a marriage that can bring you unhappiness and years of legal trouble if it terminates?

When you decide that there is something you dislike about the way you look, and want to pour in mental capacity and resources to enhance/change your looks as a result, I think it is important to understand that you were likely influenced by many societal messages and experiences while you were growing up. These things go way back to your childhood, and wire your brain without you knowing it. It is important to be aware of the patriarchal/capitalist backdrop of it, and ask yourself: in the absence of this noise, will it make me happy to change my appearance? Will I look into the mirror and feel genuine joy even if no one sees me?

I always believe that life would be easier if you played to your strengths. Because I grew up frequenly being devalued for my looks, I learned very quickly 

Find out what your life principles are, then everything else will fall into place.

It took me over 10 years to finally understand this, but I am more interested in how good I feel than how good I look. Feeling good comes from the inside, and I derive that feeling from being healthy, fit . Once I decided that those were my core principles, everything else I do is thus aligned to that. 

This part of the journey is important because if you don't know what you are "glowing up" for, then you will be bleeding a lot of money only to still be as dissatisfied as before.