Watching my dog sleep today, really got me thinking. She looked so at ease, and comfortable, that I had to wonder why can’t humans be that happy in their own skin.

Sometimes, it just seems to me like we love to complicate our lives. We look everyday for more and more ways in which we make ourselves feel like we belong, like we fit a certain pattern. We don’t feel comfortable unless we achieve this goal. But, why do we have be like others? Why not just be ourselves?

This behavior starts very early in the life of a person. Ever since we’re kids we aim to be the cool ones in school, to have the nicest toys and games. Later in life, we want to have a perfect body and the most expensive clothes, cars, houses. It seems like our toys just get bigger with age.

In modern society, you have to meet all those conditions, in order to have a certain status. Media, through television and magazines, program our brains to follow a path in order to be considered successful in life. If we can’t reach it, we use social media to project into the world a perfect image of a perfect life we live, when behind closed doors, things are much different.

We seem to be willing to do pretty much anything to get to that level. People get themselves in debt in order to maintain the appearance of that status. Some get loans to buy things they don’t really need, just to be like others, and show that they can have a certain lifestyle as well. But what if you can’t? Is it so important to alter the quality of your life, in long term, just to impress others?

Media pollutes the brains of teenagers, by publishing modified images of perfect bodies which don’t really exist. This guided society in a place where ‘normal’ is putting on a mask, before going out in the world. We use make up, lotions, creams, expensive clothes and painful heels, covering our skin in chemicals, in order to achieve the ultimate beauty goal, dictated by the lies published in the right places.

What strikes me most is the use of medicine out of pure vanity, and altering our bodies just to fit in the patterns dictated by the new type of society. Some people put themselves through so much unnecessary pain and in the end, you have to ask yourself, for who you do all of this? Oh, yes, you do it for yourself. Is the outside going to change who you really are inside? The ‘wrapper’ is going to get old and wrinkly anyway. Is it worth the pain and falseness? Wouldn’t it be so much better if we would just act and look natural?

Why can’t we be sincere about our feelings and emotions? Why always hide what’s really going on inside us? What are we trying to prove and to who? It seems like we live in a world where we encourage and promote everything that’s fake, and discourage what’s sincere and natural.

The real value of each and single one of us comes from what makes us unique. Who would want to live in a place where we are all the same, and pretend to be something we are not? Some act so well, even they forget who they really are.

What a world would be, if we would all quit imitating and just be ourselves…