Selfie Esteem Boosting Experiment

"Of all of our inventions for mass communication, pictures still speak the most universally understood language."

-Walt Disney

First "leather jacket" selfie. I took it at my church, next to a crucifix.

Skinny. Geek. Skeleton. Wimp. Pencil Boy. Nerd. Dork. Chicken Legs.


I don't save many older pictures of myself.


When you are constantly mocked and degraded for being a skinny beanpole wimpazoid on your way up through school, you don't like to be reminded of what you used to look like. Especially when, for the most part, you still look like that. During the summer months, when I am forced to wear shorts, I look at my pipe-cleaner legs and knock knees and think that I must look like a walking tom turkey. I hate going out on date nights with my wife during summer months because I hate the way I look. Whenever I go out somewhere in shorts, I hear voices in my head from my younger days ready to insult me, ready to taunt me, ready to push me into a locker or spit on me.


During the winter and cooler months, I thrive fashion-wise because I can hide the things that I hate about my body. Long pants can hide my hideous legs. wearing a long sleeve shirt can hide my pathetic forearms. When it's time to go outside, I eschew the sweater, the fleece, or the parka. I'm a rocker. I spent my whole childhood wearing boring crap my mom bought me. There is only one thing I allow myself to wear: the leather jacket!

Me in one of my favorites, a brown distressed leather I bought at a thrift shop in Montreal, Quebec.

It makes me feel powerful, noticeable, attractive (yes, I am happily married. I love my wife and I want to look my best for her. I still want to impress her. However, does that mean I have to wear potato sacks and burlap when I am not with her?), larger than life, and like a rock and roll star. It gives me a shot of confidence even on my lowest days.


I recently revived my dormant Instagram account because I found a better way to take selfies with my phone: using a timer. I am horrible at taking them. I don't see how people hold their phone with one hand and snap a picture with the other and still have time to look all prim and proper for their photo. I always look like I am trying to wring my phone by it's neck. I also refuse to buy a selfie stick...just, no.


Yet, with the timer, I found I can take a perfect selfie. That gave me an idea.


Since my self-esteem is perennially in the dumper because I am not Ryan Reynolds or Tom Hiddleston or Chris Hemsworth and sometimes I even amaze myself that I was ever able to be blessed to be married to a beautiful woman and have a beautiful daughter, I decided to take daily motivational selfies of me in my leather jacket collection. It's to remind myself that I am no longer the loser I was in school and that I am somebody who is not a bad looking guy.

Rocking a soft brown trench I bought at a flea market

Since I have started, I have noticed a slight upsurge in my self-esteem, and I really enjoy it when others like them too. It gives me a really nice shot in the arm that does serve as motivation throughout the day. You might call it vain or prideful, but for someone who was terminally teased for years about his looks, it does help me with my anxiety and my self-confidence. Would you rather I felt good about myself or wallowed in depression?


Yesterday, I even got my former supervisor, who is a friend of mine, in on the act because we both noticed we wore the same style jacket. So, she took one with me! Little moments like that during the day make me smile, and it is always good to catch up with a friend whom you do not get to see very often since they moved to a new office.

My friend Lizette and I outside of our building. Great minds think alike!

While I once found the selfie a form of photography that was for the vain and the well coordinated and the trendy (and in some cases I still think that), I now understand why people do them. When you feel good on the inside, it radiates to the outside and vice versa. You want to remember the moment and maybe share it with others. They say if you feel good about yourself, it also rubs off on others. People can feel it as well as see it.


So, from now on, the leather selfies will continue because it makes my morale improve.