I decided to take the leap and go back on Instagram – which definitely shocked a lot of my close friends who knew my reasoning for staying off social media. I initially detoxed from Instagram about six months ago (I think) for my own mental health. My last relationship showed me just how insecure and jealous I can get, and how deep my trust issues ran with this person. I would overanalyze every interaction he made (and apparently all of his friends just happen to be models), and never believed him when he tried to convince me otherwise. It was a very toxic cycle and social media perpetuated it.

I’m trying to learn how to embrace my own beauty and confidence as well as others’ and I hope I’m able to tame the green monster this time around. I know what I’m doing is a potential danger to my mental health, but I’m hoping this time, I’ve grown and it won’t be an issue any longer. I’m hoping my mental breakdown the other day and new perspective has changed something.

I’m mainly using Instagram as a platform for mental health. The idea of this account is, “If I bare my soul to you, will you still think I’m pretty?” This concept came to me because of what social media is essentially: displaying the best parts of your life, allowing people to compare their lives to one another. We always tell each other that social media only shows the best of peoples’ lives, but still get discouraged, jealous, and disappointed from looking at our feeds. People don’t see what happens behind the scenes.

I want to break that barrier and use it to advocate that every person – no matter how they may look on the outside – goes through their own struggles. There is always more to a person than their body or how happy their life may look.

Social media has such great potential for art, self-expression, genuine connections, and good causes, but we’ve all turned it into this “Who has a better life” contest. Comparison is the thief of joy and social media, particularly Instagram, has been nothing but a platform for comparisons. It can be used for more than just posting pretty pictures.

Part of this leap into Instagram is also about connecting my blog and the physical me. While baring my soul is relatively easy for me, baring my body is outside of my comfort zone. I never enjoyed being the center of attention, especially when it came to my body. I’ve always been confident about how my body looked, but I’ve always held that sacred to me. I never liked to make things about how I looked. It probably stems from some childhood trauma about how my mother always praised me for how petite I am, even though that was just all genetics. But I also do stand for the fact that there’s more to a person than how they look. It’s their soul that matters. Link to my Instagram is below.

• Instagram

A few opportunities that came up for me yesterday was going to Orange County Pride for the first time – and also first time going to a Pride ever – and being able to join in on a photoshoot. I asked a dear friend of mine to let me tag along with him for most of the day yesterday because I just needed to be surrounded with good energy and take my mind off things, and those events were on his itinerary. The photographer graciously let me join in spontaneously and I’m hoping I made a good impression so that maybe there will be future opportunities for photoshoots. I wouldn’t consider myself a model, but this photoshoot did push me out of my comfort zone a bit and it made me feel good about myself so that I am interested in future opportunities. The particular shot below was my idea, and I’m proud of myself for speaking out to suggest it. Normally, I’d just hold my tongue since I’m not a professional and my mindset is that I wouldn’t know any better than a professional. In this instance, I guess this was more of making a reference to an idea of how to utilize the stairwell for photos. I believe the photographer was also very happy with this set of photos too.

Not being used to modeling, I didn’t really know how to pose during this shoot, but the photographer was very patient, sweet, and this was a very casual shoot anyway – he was mainly just testing his new equipment. I really enjoyed when I would do some sort of pose and he would express how much he loved the look. It definitely helped with my confidence.

I always knew I was fortunate to have a nice figure, but I also want to use this opportunity to display my scars – literally. When people think about a model, they usually think flawless skin and drop-dead gorgeous. I want to use my scars to change up that idea. My scars tell a story of what I’ve gone through, and a picture is worth a thousand words – so let my scars in my photos speak.

I’m also using this opportunity to show the side of me that no one usually sees – which is why I’m using a variation of my name for my page, “Len.” This nickname actually came from my childhood friend who I consider my brother (we even have the same last name), who has been the only person to ever call me Len. If you’ve been following my blog for some time, you know that everything I do is with a purpose and typically comes from a personal reason. This is just another example. Because he’s been the only person to call me Len, that gives me the opportunity to use it as a novel idea for this side of me. So thanks, Vin.

Before I sign off for the night, I also just want to say that I’m really proud of myself for doing something physical today. Of course, it only happened because it was spontaneous. I ended dancing a little bit today to a song that resonated with me (video on my Instagram).

Some reminders for myself:

• Be conscious of how much time you are using on Instagram.
• Don’t dwell on other pages for too long.
• Be conscious of if/when you are comparing yourself to others.
• Set limits for yourself on app usage.
• Set break limits every 20 minutes.
• By all means, DO NOT DOOM SCROLL.

To everyone that has been following my journey, I’m sorry that it’s been mainly negative up until now. My purpose is advocating for mental health and while that entails showing the raw behind-the-scenes, I know that exposure to constant negativity is taxing. I can still advocate for mental health and tell my story without constantly harboring on how it affected my life negatively – or can I? I guess we’ll see. A friend of mine described this as a “rebirth” and “mental breakthrough” rather than a mental breakdown, and I think that’s so much more fitting.

With all that’s been said, I now bid adieu.