In the past week, I set a new Intervention rule for Lily based on her situation. In the feedback of the last Intervention, I knew that she would feel anxious in the process of taking pictures with her native camera, so I will chat with her in the process to encourage her and help her divert attention from her facial features. But to try to accept what you really are and maintain a state of self-confidence. I have made changes in two main areas. The first is that I will make phone calls with her every day. During this process, I will encourage her to use my filter taking selfies, and then listen to her feelings. I hope she is in a relaxed state during this process. The second is that I reduced the activity cycle to one week because I don’t want her to be stressed. Although the duration is reduced, I will communicate with her for at least 30 minutes every day. After I told Lily about this proposal, she agreed. Although she still has some doubts about the effect of this event, she is happy to talk to me about her feelings because she doesn’t know who can talk about it except me.
Day 1:
On the first day of the chat, Lily was a little cautious. I first started talking to her about my own feelings of social appearance anxiety and the reason why I wanted to do this topic. I hope my story can give her some confidence because I have also struggled with self-doubt and social appearance anxiety. Although I no longer fall into this mood most of the time now, it still happens sometimes. Lily said that she was surprised that I would feel this way because she always sees me confidently. She asked me how this feeling is different from before. My answer is like you have a protective suit, but this power comes from your heart and not from other things. I think that people using beauty cameras are like people seeking this kind of protective clothing from the outside, but this is just an illusion.
After I said my feelings, Lily began to open her heart and communicate with me gradually. Lily told me that at first she just used filters to adjust the brightness of the images so that her skin would look more delicate. But with the App’s update, the beauty Camera has added new functions that can change the size of people’s facial features. During that time, it was very popular on social media to share different tips to use beauty cameras to make people’s facial features more refined. And Lily also start to use a beauty camera from time and she said she would use different parameters in different situations to change the size of her features. Sometimes the eyes are bigger, sometimes the nose is smaller.
During the chat, I encouraged Lily to use my filter to take selfies. I asked her to try to observe her face carefully and don’t apply any template to her face. And after she took a selfie, Lily said she didn’t want to share these photos with me, but she was willing to try to accept herself in these photos. I asked Lily what do you think of the photo? Lily said she didn’t have the courage to look at the photo. She described this feeling as if she had handed in annoying homework and didn’t want to check it.
We talked for an hour and Lily said she liked this kind of chat. I am not sure whether this Intervention can achieve the results I expected, but I think I have not been refused to continue the call, which is a good start.
Day 2
In today’s call, Lily told me that she has been thinking about the standard of beauty since the last chat. She said that she didn’t care who set this standard, and she was wondering whether she had applied this standard to her face. She said that in the last selfie, I encouraged her to observe her face carefully, which is very difficult for her because she always imagined her face as another appearance, the one she imagined. Lily said that this discovery made her feel that her brain would automatically turn into a beauty camera to beautify her appearance when she took pictures. She thinks this is the reason why she can’t accept herself in the native camera. (I think this description is very interesting.)
I told her that I was very happy that she was thinking about it. It was an interesting observation. I shared with her the book from Émile Coué, “The Power Of Positive Autosuggestion”, which is also from my literature review. I told her that long-term positive psychological cues will subtly change her brain’s thinking, thereby changing her behavior.
I encourage her to keep hinting to her brain during the process of taking pictures, “Go and accept who you are.” Although I didn’t see the photo, Lily told me that she didn’t want to look at the screen before. During today’s selfie, Lily took her favorite pose and took the photo while looking at the camera. She feels that today’s experience is a challenge for her.
I’m so excited about this!
Day 3
At the beginning of today’s chat, Lily told me that she would often feel that people on the road were observing her. This feeling made her very uncomfortable and lacking self-confidence. I asked her when does this usually happens? She said the feeling is usually very strong when she is without makeup. I am full of curiosity about this answer because I was just thinking that the beauty camera aggravates people’s social appearance anxiety, whether makeup is also a factor?
I asked Lily which has more influence on her, the beauty camera or the makeup? Lily told me that it is difficult to distinguish. In terms of her feelings, the beauty camera is more displayed on the Internet, such as to friends who have not met for a long time or netizens who have never met. But makeup is to show a better state in real life. Lily told me that this is like a matryoshka doll. Under the beauty camera, she will feel that she does not look good with makeup and feel anxious. But with makeup, she will feel that she is not good-looking without makeup. In short, she just can’t accept who she is.
Lily was too busy to read the book I recommended. So in the process of taking pictures today, I chose some clips to read to her to encourage her. She told me that she didn’t resist this process anymore, but it was definitely not enjoyable.
I think today’s call is very meaningful to me because I have discovered that makeup may also be a factor in causing facial anxiety. And I also enjoy talking to Lily because she always has a lot of interesting metaphors
Day 4
Lily and I did not talk a lot today because she has a lot of work to deal with. She hoped that I could continue to read the content of the book to her while taking pictures, which was like a positive psychological suggestion to her.
She told me that she always cares about how others think of her looks. I also assigned her a small task to write down five reasons why she cares about others’ opinions about her appearance. I hope that in the next chat I can have an in-depth chat about these five questions.
Day 5
1: I think my appearance will affect whether I am popular in the group.
2: I enjoy being watched
3: I think a good-looking appearance can make life easier, and everyone will be more tolerant of me.
Lily only gave me these three answers. Why are these answers all about other people’s opinions and feelings instead of Lily’s own? I am very confused about these answers. I asked Lily what about her feelings? Lily did not know how to answer, she said she had never thought about this question.
We continued today’s selfie and I encouraged her to think about word self-esteem and self-confidence, to pay attention to her own feelings instead of other people’s.
Day 6
Lily told me today that she had never thought about self-esteem before. She only knows that if she wants to be more popular in the group, she must become more beautiful. Then she heard someone say that becoming more confident will make people more beautiful. This is the reason that why she is willing to participate in my activities. This is no doubt that I hope everyone who participates in my Intervention can become more confident and no longer be troubled by social appearance anxiety. But the problem is self-confidence is something you feel inside.
However, in these days of chatting, from Lily’s feelings, she hopes that the confidence she can learn from my activities is more like a skill. This skill is just like the beauty camera or makeup I talked about before. It is another way to make Lily more beautiful, rather than self-confidence or self-esteem.
In today’s selfie, I shared these views with Lily. I encouraged her to rethink the meaning of this event, to think about the relationship between this event and self-confidence and self-esteem.
Day 7
Today is the last chat, I feel very nervous because I don’t know how Lily will think about the question I left in the last chat.
Lily told me that in this society, many ideas have been formed before she realized it. In the past, she was thinking about how to try to cater to these ideas. It feels like students have to remember every knowledge point in the face of an exam. She said she checked the definition of self-esteem and self-confidence. “Self-esteem refers to whether you appreciate and value yourself. Your self-esteem develops and changes as a result of your life experiences and interactions with other people. Self-confidence is your belief in yourself and your abilities.” Lily said she couldn’t answer whether my Intervention was effective for her because she did not become confident at the end of the event. This is because her understanding of the concept of “confidence” is different from mine and I was trying to teach her something she hadn’t thought about. But knowing the definition of self-confidence and self-esteem is important to her, Lily told me.
We ended our last selfie.