Personal Narrative: America's Next Top Model

Before I was born, my parents used to call me goblin. This was because I ended up being born around an hour after Halloween night, and at the time i was expected to be born right on Halloween. Since then it has been 14 years and I am now a freshman at Turpin high school. I have an awesome family that consists of four people. It’s me, my younger brother Michael, and my parents. Michael is an eighth grader at Nagel, and just recently turned 13. My parents work together in their own company where they recruit people for jobs. Also, the two families (the Kotts & Meeks) that live on either side of my house are pretty much like my second family. I am closest with Elizabeth, who is 17, and Sara who is 16. I love to go on different

When they say that ordinary people are going to want to become models they make it sound like it’s a bad thing. In reality that is a good thing, the more models the more business. The more models that we have the more clothing and products that companies get to advertise. Also due to that models are meant to be skinny we don’t have many models left, and the models that are modeling as an now many are in serious danger for having eating disorders.

My previous year at North had both ups and downs, and I guess some “uglies”, which included making so many new friends to losing a financial literacy contest that my teammates and I had worked very hard on.

The August 2011 issue of French Vogue sparked outrage for its photos of a ten-year old little girl wearing gold dress with a see-through bodice, stilettos and heavy makeup. This picture propped cries of “how young is too young” to model? (Cartwright)

I brought my good friend and older sister to my favorite live show since I was 8, America’s Got Talent. Every Tuesday and Wednesday, we would sit my living room, yelling at the flatscreen at our favorite acts and stuffing our mouths with buttered popcorn. My sister had only scored the tickets that morning, so it was kind of a hassle to get ready and leave the house as soon as possible. We stood in the line for an hour or so. The blue sky was shielded with dark clouds; the air was still damp and thick. Across the street was a model in a photoshoot. She would step off the sidewalk while looking behind her, then step back up to do it again. We watched her do it a good 35 times. A little further down was a few guys dumping counterfeit designer

Growing up, I was never certain about what I wanted to be when I was older. My naïve and influential mind was attracted to any suggestion of an occupation that came my way. It was like I was at a clothing store trying on different outfits in attempts to see what fit me best. When I was 8 years old, my dream job was becoming an actress and I convinced my mom to sign me up for Barbizon, an international modeling and acting school. For months, I attended the classes and learned about etiquette, self-confidence, and even how to apply makeup. However, I slowly began to realize that the likelihood of me becoming famous was one in a million and I eventually outgrew my childhood dream of acting in Disney and Nickelodeon shows. When I was 12 years old,

About me: I’ve lived in South Florida all of my life, specifically going back and forth between Miami-Dade county and Broward County. My Mom emigrated from Nicaragua and my dad was raised by North Carolinians which makes for very interesting holiday meals-for Christmas we had Vigorón and Sweet Potato Casserole. I can be persistent if I really, really want something; my mom wouldn't allow me to get a dog so I spent a year taking care of a plush toy in the fifth grade. The good news is that she finally allowed me to adopt Bella, my maltese-a disclaimer: I was eleven-named after the Twilight series (if I had gotten her a year later, I might have named her Katniss, which would be sort of awkward for a dog). I’m still deciding what I want to “be”.

Everyday girls are forced to be faced with the media’s image of the “perfect” body. The perfect image that the media portrays is an unrealistic version of how it thinks girls should look starting even at age five. Everyday girls are forced into thinking they aren’t “perfect” or “beautiful” enough and they have to do all these things to be the way the media wants them to be or makes them think that they need to be.

One of the biggest turning points in my life was when I got my first job. I wasn’t even old enough to drive yet when I was first hired at the Middletown Sportsmen’s Club. I remember the anxiety and excitement that came along with it. I was so scared that I would mess something up when I first started and I remember my dad saying to me “don’t worry about because everyone makes mistakes especially when they are doing something that is new to them.” This was one of my first responsibility that takes place in the adult world. I developed many new skills that I would’ve never known it wasn’t for this job. I learned to handle myself in a polite manner in front of adults and I also learned about work equipment such as how to run a tractor and a bobcat. Getting this job was very life changing for me. I found that after working for several months I was starting to get more mature and responsible.

Have you ever cared what you have looked like? From not having your eyebrows on fleek to not having your lips look like Kylie Jenner’s lips? Does anyone ever look in the mirror and say my stomach is to big or my thighs are to big, or my breasts are not big enough or my face is so ugly? The way we look at ourselves is called self perception, and with too much negative thought, it can be dangerous. The way we perceive ourselves, all depends on the media. As social media is the newest thing in the 21st century, it is with us 24/7 everywhere we go. The media shows people that have unrealistic body type appearances, we as the society see this and automatically think that this is the way that ‘normal’ people should look like. If teenagers see unrealistic

Exposure to media can not only cause body dissatisfaction, but body dissatisfaction can also cause one to be more applicable to expose oneself to certain types of media that feed that dissatisfaction, such as searching up pictures of the ideal figure one might wish for. (Aubrey, 2006). Body dissatisfaction and self-esteem are also both affected by how an individual compares themselves to images that are found on social media. The comparison often comes from a negative place of judgment and criticism. When one starts to compare themselves in a negative way, they are only reacting to the situation. “If you start to use your time constructively to work on yourself, your goals, and your relationships, chances are you will not even have the time to waste on the glorification of others’ lives” (Tory). It is one of the options therapists have to offer. If were to begin to notice one they are comparing themselves in a negative way, they should shift to something they are grateful. There are other ways one can help themselves by avoiding negativity that founded throughout social media. For example, if someone were viewing others lifestyles and felt envious towards them, they should figure out how one can use those photos as inspiration. If one is genuinely seeking validation from others but wants to stop but they cannot, Amy Grosso, Ph.D., a counselor with

Being able to accomplish your dream as early as a child will probably be the biggest accomplishment in your life. Likewise, for children with a dream of becoming a model who walk down the runways, it meant the whole world to get offered from modelling agencies. That is to say they have succeed the first step to become a model and be overwhelm with this fact. On

I couldn’t agree with you more. In today’s society it is very difficult for an adolescent to have a positive self image when the media is indirectly telling them something different. I was born in the 60’s, and I would have to say growing up then was a lot easier then now. The media is constantly put images of girls with perfect slim body, over sized silicone breasts, and butt injected images everywhere and calling it beautiful. Then you have poor Suzi an adolescent weighing 90 pound, or Linda who weighs 140 pounds looking in the same mirror at themselves wondering why they fat and why they do not look like the girls in these magazines. True self image can occupy the mind of an adolescent child to the point of obsession which can lead

In this day and age, the epidemic of these so called ‘beauty’ standards is only getting worse and worse. Because of photo modification, low self esteem in regular everyday people is starting to become something that is nearly considered normal. Today, 42% of girls from age 5-8 want to be skinnier, 52% of girls aged 9 to 13 feel better when they are dieting and by the age of 17, 78% of girls are unhappy with their own bodies. Think about

My self-esteem, my friends, my confidence, my love for myself, it was all gone. I had nothing, everything was gone. People would say, “I hate