Envy is one of the seven sins. From doe-eyed little girls to clear eyed women who have been subjected to the toxic standards imposed on women by society. The incessant need to be perfect pokes and prods their brains. If they are not skinny or too skinny. If they have acne. If they’re thighs are too big. If their nose is too big. If they’re lips are too small.  Girls see women bikini clad, with glowing skin and luscious hair on social media. Not knowing it’s a filter. Its edited.

Celebrities, actresses and even influencers present the most beautiful version of themselves. In society there is this destructive circle that must break. Girls stare at the luminescent screen of their phone to see a women on Instagram in a tight black dress with the perfect hourglass figure. Men like and comment saying she should be skinnier but to you she is perfect. And every time you look in the mirror its like an invisible shadow is cast over you and your mind plagued with thoughts that your not good enough. But the most scary thing is that the women you saw is doing the same thing. Sucking her stomach in when standing in the mirror. Salty tears dripping down her rose cheeks. Women are trying to claw to this impossible goal of the perfect body and weight. But it does not exist. There is no such thing as perfect. Beauty is simply subjective to the viewers gaze.

Snapping a picture for Instagram is something everyone does. You think you look pretty and your thumb hovers over the post icon. But then you see your stomach looks unflattering, that there is a spot on your cheek, that your make-up looks too heavy. Every thought kicks you down and down and down. Until your thumb moves to the bin icon. Why have women lost their confidence? Why do girls become anorexic? Why do they have anxiety? When your young, you wear what you want and feel confident and beautiful. But slowly as you grow up society devours your confidence and suddenly you find that your trapped in a body that you find ugly. Insecurity. But when must we realise that there is no picture for the definition of beautiful. That it exists in hundreds, thousands and millions of ways.

Barbie. The world deemed the unofficial  ‘perfect’ women. She is impossibly tall, unrealistically skinny, blonde. But Barbie is plastic and not real and not perfect. The new Barbie movie shows how there is not just one perfect blue-eyed and blonde haired Barbie. That the ideal woman does not exist. Women exist with different colours, weights, eye colours and heights. A  quote from there is ‘I'm just so tired of watching myself and every single other woman tie herself into knots so that people will like us.’ You do not need to conform to society’s expectations of what a women should look and be like. You are you and that is and will always be enough. Who would have thought that Barbie would be a feminist icon ?