Website Wednesday: Must See Inspirational Self-Portrait Websites

The theme of Week 4 on the Love Project is Self-Portraits. Check out these Websites for inspiration:

Blogs:
Love Project Participant MVP:

GirlNutkin in the BA: Week 4 on self-portrait

Lovely girlnutkin (aka Shirley Rivera) left a post and a self-portrait of herself at her father's gravesite, remembering and acknowledging the self-love he instilled in her. What a wonderful tribute! I was especially moved by this (in fact I'm sitting here in Starbucks with tears in my eyes) since I lost my father recently and also am so grateful for the love he showed me. So this month, I hope we can all learn to love ourselves, and also remember to thank those beautiful people in our lives that loved and accepted us unconditionally, giving us that precious self-esteem and confidence in ourselves.

Haley's Halo Self Portrait - a funny look at a self-portrait drawing. This Haley is obviously an angel/devil type. I'm gonna have to get her a copy of The Laptop Dancer Diaries.

Cool Sites:

5 Photo-A-Day videos
The True Love Project
Portrait Photos - A site which shows really beautiful self-portraits.
Portraits of Love - A site which sends family portraits to deployed soldiers around the globe.
Creative Self-Portraits on Flickr
Katharina Fösel's photostream

How to:

How to take a great self-protrait - Tips about taking great self-portraits. EBook available.
Expressing oneself with self-portraits - Article that explores the history of self-portraits.

Photography:

Make money with Portrait Photography!
Building a Successful Photography Business

Modeling:

The Bikini Model Program
The Official Fitness Model Program

It starts with self-love and accepting our imperfections

I found a new site about "mid-life" dating and relationships today along with a recent blog post about the definition of love: Dating over 40: What is love?

Coach Ronnie quotes Rabbi Schnitzer on two points that I found particularly insightful:

* Love is not being "stirred" by perfection... that is admiration. Love is accepting and embracing imperfection.

* Love starts with self-love.

Putting these together, this means we need to start by accepting ourselves -- not just the stuff we're proud about, but even our flaws.

I know I had long heard the advice about "loving yourself first" and then you'll find love, but I didn't really "get it." I imagined it meant I had to go around giving myself "positive affirmations" all the time. Luckily, I had a wonderful childhood and I felt like my self-esteem was fine, so I really didn't feel the need to write myself little sticky-notes to remind myself of how great I was. I understand that most people aren't so lucky, and it takes a long time for people to feel good about who they are, but I really didn't feel like I had that problem.

However, I think there's a second-half to this "self-love" exercise. It's not just about recognizing your strengths, but accepting your weaknesses. Even though I had confidence in what I was "good at," I was embarrassed to admit my imperfections to others. For example, I'm really bad at keeping up on what's going on in the world. So, if someone would start discussing a topic that I wasn't aware of, I'd keep my mouth shut, rather than risk the embarrassment of ignorance.

These days, I admit to what I don't know. I'm often met with a surprised, "OMG! You didn't know THAT?" but I just thank the person for cluing me in. In fact, I usually quiz them for more data, telling them that they need to teach me all there is about whatever it is, so I don't make the same dumb mistake in front of someone else. They feel good about teaching me something, I feel good about learning, and we're both happy.

Likewise, when someone else risks showing me their imperfections, I usually feel closer to them. I can relate much more easily to someone who is imperfect and not afraid to admit to it, than someone who only wants to tell me about how great they are. I love confidence, but not arrogance.

I think the key is we need to have confidence in ourselves -- both our strengths and weaknesses. I had confidence in my strengths but was insecure about my weaknesses. We're not usually "confident" about our weaknesses. But if we accept our weaknesses -- admit to our imperfections and do what we can to improve -- we become much more "real."

So, if we do all this self-love stuff, will we really "fall in love" with someone else? Maybe. Maybe not. The thing is, it won't matter nearly as much. We'll be content with ourselves. We won't need someone else to "validate" us. We are the only person who will be with us forever, so we'll have most definitely found a love partner for life.