Growing up, I was told that nobody likes someone who’s vain, self-centered, and narcissistic. But I don’t recall anybody actually ever explaining what it meant to be all these things. All I knew was if I cared too much about what I looked like, I was “fast”. But, simultaneously, I was also supposed to be put together and presentable at all times. This resulted in me stealing quick glances in the mirror as if knowing what I looked like was some sort of contraband.
Now, of course, when selfies started trending I was baffled that people were willingly taking pictures of themselves and posting them for the world to see how “self-involved” they were. And don’t even get me started on the people who had the guts to do it in public, I was worried they were going to break the simulation.
I was questioning everything I thought I knew about the line between being conceited and confident. Because if all these people were taking pictures of themselves then they must all be self-centered, right? But if all these people decided that being self-centered wasn’t necessarily a bad thing then why do I still feel embarrassed anytime someone catches me glancing at myself when I walk past a window?
It wasn’t until the awakening of my social consciousness that I realized that this had a little bit more to do with how black girls are raised than I would’ve liked it to.
Somehow, in a society where Black girls are already viewed as grown adults in children’s bodies, one of the worst things a Black girl can be is “fast”. Everything we do is critiqued so heavily (from people outside as well as inside our own community) that we’ve inevitably been conditioned to critique ourselves in the same ways if not worse.
That’s why an action as simple as taking a picture of myself is more important than some might think. I mean, we can’t all just wake up one day and decide to abandon all the behavioral patterns we’ve developed over the years, no matter how toxic they may be. Major life changes like that require baby steps.
And my first baby step is not being afraid to take pictures of myself when I feel good because I’m scared of what other people might think about me.
Of course, progress, just like any other challenge in life, takes time and patience. But that change won’t always be immediately noticeable to everybody else in the world, as long as I can see a positive difference in myself it makes the sudden eviction from my comfort zone slightly worth it. That’s what my selfies mean to me.
