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  • Toronto Girl Reveals Criticizing Society Is Why She Has To Look Like This

    Toronto Girl Reveals Criticizing Society Is Why She Has To Look Like This

    I can’t count how many times I’ve scrolled through social media, only to see someone post about becoming “the best version” of themselves. Almost always, that so-called best version is simply the thinnest version. It’s as if the entire world has silently agreed that shrinking your body automatically means improving your soul. And I can’t help but ask myself: why? Why is the best me supposed to be the smallest me?

    I remember the first time I noticed this pattern. A friend posted a transformation photo—two side-by-side images. On the left, she was smiling, laughing, a little fuller. On the right, she was serious, thin, and captioned it: Finally, the best version of me. Thousands of likes, endless comments praising her discipline, her glow, her success. I wanted to be happy for her, but deep down, I felt uneasy. Was the older photo, the one where she looked joyful, somehow less “best”? Did the world really value her existence more because she took up less space?

    Over the years, I started noticing how deeply this belief had sunk into our culture. Compliments disguised as encouragement—“You look so good, did you lose weight?”—as if the only direction of progress is down. Health magazines, influencers, even casual conversations always circling back to the same message: smaller equals better. I began to wonder if anyone even remembered that “best” can mean so much more. Best could mean happiest, healthiest, kindest, strongest, or most at peace. But somewhere along the way, society blurred the line and equated best with thinness.

    For me, the danger wasn’t just in the outside voices. It was in how those voices became my own. Every time I looked in the mirror, I didn’t ask myself if I looked happy, if I looked rested, if I looked like I was taking care of myself. Instead, I asked: Do I look smaller yet? The question haunted me. It made me chase diets I didn’t enjoy, workouts I hated, numbers on a scale that defined whether I was “good” or “bad” that day. My entire worth shrank alongside the meals I skipped.

    But life has a way of breaking illusions. There came a morning when I realized I was tired of living like a half-version of myself. I was tired of measuring my best self in inches and pounds. My best self, I decided, is the version that laughs loudly without covering her mouth, that eats cake on her birthday without guilt, that has enough energy to go on long walks because she loves them, not because she’s counting calories. My best self is compassionate, creative, resilient. She might fit into a smaller dress one year and a bigger one the next, but her value doesn’t fluctuate with her size.

    And yet, I still wrestle with the question: why does society demand that our best version be our thinnest version? Maybe it’s because it’s easier to measure waistlines than to measure kindness. It’s easier to count calories than to count the ways we grow as human beings. But the truth is, the best version of me—and of anyone—isn’t a body at all. It’s a soul, a heart, a life being lived fully.

  • This Canadian Woman’s IT Career Is Disappointing, Here’s Why

    This Canadian Woman’s IT Career Is Disappointing, Here’s Why

    I sometimes think I’ve made a terrible mistake. On paper, my life looks perfectly respectable: I have a university degree, I work at a modern IT company, and my position is technically stable. People would probably say I should be grateful. But the truth is, every morning when I sit down at my desk, surrounded by glowing monitors, jargon-filled meetings, and colleagues who thrive in this fast, digital environment, I feel like an imposter. I don’t belong in this world, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t convince myself otherwise.

    I don’t work on the technical side. My job is non-technical—administrative, organizational, supportive. Still, in a place like this, even those roles seem soaked in the tech culture. Everyone speaks in acronyms I don’t understand, they get excited about frameworks and systems I’ve never heard of, and they move through this world like it’s second nature. Meanwhile, I smile, nod, and pretend. I tell myself, act like you know what you’re doing, because if I stop pretending, I’ll drown.

    The pretending has become exhausting. I put on this professional mask every day, trying to look like I fit in, trying to sound like I understand, trying to act like I’m motivated by the same goals. But inside, I’m disconnected. I don’t want to climb the ladder, I don’t want to lead projects or chase some flashy career path. What I want is something simple, something ordinary—like working in a bookstore, where the smell of paper fills the air, or in a boutique, where human interaction feels genuine. I imagine myself behind a counter, arranging books on a shelf, or folding clothes, greeting customers with a smile. A small, stable, honest job that doesn’t require me to pretend to be someone I’m not.

    And yet, the fear holds me back. I worry about what people would say if I left this “respectable” job for something so modest. Would they think I wasted my education? Would they laugh at me for stepping down from an office with glass walls to a shop with fluorescent lights? Sometimes, I hear the judgment in my own head, echoing the expectations of society: You should be more ambitious. You should want more. You should make the most of your degree. Those voices make me feel trapped, as if I’m carrying a burden that isn’t even mine.

    But in my heart, I know the truth. The IT world is not for everyone. It’s certainly not for me. And maybe that’s okay. Maybe there’s a quiet kind of courage in admitting you don’t want the glamorous path, in choosing peace of mind over prestige. Still, I hesitate, caught between the life I think I should want and the life I actually long for. Every day feels like a balancing act between my mask and my reality, and I wonder how long I can keep pretending before something inside me finally gives way.

  • American Unlucky In Love, He Bonded Mother And Daughter

    American Unlucky In Love, He Bonded Mother And Daughter

    I never thought life could surprise me in such a twisted way. For months I had been seeing a woman—my former colleague, a woman in her mature years. She wasn’t the kind of person most men would consider as a casual “fling,” but to me, she was fascinating. She carried herself with grace, had experience, and radiated a kind of confidence that younger women often lacked. Whenever she needed me, I was there. At first, it was just an arrangement, something light and without strings, but slowly, I started to grow fond of her. I liked how she understood me without me having to explain myself, how she looked at me as if she could see through all my masks.

    Still, I knew that this wasn’t a love that could last forever. Deep down, I wanted something more—something stable. Not long ago, I met a girl who shook up my world. She was younger, full of energy, and she made me feel as if I was starting all over again. We connected quickly, and within weeks, I felt something I hadn’t in years: hope. I wanted to believe this was the beginning of a real relationship, something that might turn into a future. For the first time, I found myself imagining what it would be like to be in love again.

    That’s why I was nervous the night she invited me to meet her parents. It felt like an important step, a test of whether this was truly going somewhere. I remember dressing carefully, rehearsing polite answers in my head, trying to calm my nerves. As I walked into her family’s home, I carried with me all the hope of a man ready to begin a new chapter. I couldn’t have known that life had prepared a cruel joke for me.

    When her mother entered the room, carrying a tray of glasses, my breath caught in my throat. My heart slammed against my ribs as if I had been punched. There she was—my combination. The woman I had been spending my nights with, the one I thought I understood so well, the one I thought existed in a separate corner of my life. She froze too, her eyes widening in the same shock that paralyzed me. In that instant, time stood still.

    I felt the ground tilt beneath me. My girlfriend, unaware of the history between us, smiled brightly as she introduced us: “This is my mom.” I thought I might collapse right there, the room spinning with the weight of an impossible reality. The mother I had been entangled with, the daughter I was falling for—two lives crashing into each other with no warning.

  • A British Couple Whose Wife is Unhappy With Her Husband’s Behavior

    A British Couple Whose Wife is Unhappy With Her Husband’s Behavior

    When I first noticed it, I told myself not to overreact. After all, people glance. It’s human nature, isn’t it? That’s what I had always been told—that a wandering eye doesn’t mean anything, that it’s harmless. But over time, the glances weren’t just quick, passing flickers. They lingered. His eyes didn’t just move across a crowded room; they stopped, settled, absorbed. And when I stood there, pregnant, heavier than I once was, swollen in body and fragile in spirit, I could feel every second of his attention landing on someone else.

    At first, I tried to swallow it down. I told myself I was being hormonal, that my insecurities were amplified by the changes in my body. But the truth is, pregnancy didn’t steal my ability to see reality. My eyes were clear, and they told me one undeniable fact: his gaze was too often fixed where it didn’t belong. And every time it happened, it felt like a tiny betrayal, a cut that wasn’t deep enough to bleed, but sharp enough to ache.

    One evening, I couldn’t hold it in any longer. We were out together, sitting side by side, and I caught him staring—again. The weight of it pressed against my chest, and the words came out before I could stop them. “Do you realize how much you stare at other women when I’m right here?”

    His response wasn’t what I had hoped for. He didn’t look embarrassed, or even guilty. Instead, he smirked, shrugged, and twisted the situation until I was the problem. He told me I was imagining things. He told me I was insecure, hormonal, making mountains out of nothing. He said every man looks, that it’s natural, and that I was being dramatic. And with every word, I felt my reality being stolen from me, replaced with the suggestion that I was crazy.

    Gaslighting—that’s the word people use. And in that moment, I finally understood how dangerous it is. Because when someone you love tells you that what you saw with your own eyes isn’t real, it makes you question yourself in the cruelest way. I wanted to believe him, I wanted to trust his words more than I trusted my own instincts. But deep down, a stubborn truth pulsed in me: I knew what I saw. And I knew how it made me feel.

    It wasn’t about the women he looked at. It wasn’t about their beauty, their curves, their youth. It was about me, sitting right there, carrying his child, aching in ways he could never fully understand, and feeling invisible in his presence. It was about respect—or rather, the lack of it. If all men look, then fine, let them look. But a man who loves his woman should know when to turn his gaze back, when to remember who is sitting beside him, when to protect her heart instead of piercing it.

    That night, I cried alone. Not loud, messy sobs, but quiet tears that slipped silently down my face while he slept peacefully next to me. The kind of tears that come from a place of exhaustion rather than rage. Because it wasn’t just about his eyes anymore—it was about the way he tried to make me doubt myself, the way he brushed off my pain like it was inconvenient noise.

    As the days passed, I realized something. I could no longer excuse it as “just looking.” It had become a wound in our relationship, one he refused to acknowledge. And maybe, just maybe, the bigger wound was the way he made me feel like a stranger to my own emotions. He wanted me to believe I was crazy, when all I was asking for was respect.

    And so I decided: I would no longer apologize for what I saw. I would no longer shrink myself into silence to keep him comfortable. I was carrying life inside me, and with it, a new strength I hadn’t known before. My self-confidence might be bruised, but my vision was clear. And if he couldn’t see me—truly see me—then one day, I would have to decide whether his presence was worth my invisibility.

    Because I may be pregnant, insecure at times, unsure of my body’s changes—but I am not blind. And I deserve a love that looks back at me, even when the whole world walks by.

  • Americans Can Be Terrible Friends, Here’s Why

    Americans Can Be Terrible Friends, Here’s Why

    For years, I thought I had built a circle of friends that would last a lifetime. We had shared moments of laughter, countless nights filled with stories, and the kind of casual comfort that made it easy to believe nothing would ever change. But slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, shadows began to creep into the light. The smiles felt sharper, the laughter carried a tinge of cruelty, and conversations turned into competitions for who could mock or belittle someone else the most. It was subtle at first, but then it grew. Like a tide, the negativity rose higher with every gathering, until it felt impossible to escape.

    At first, I convinced myself that it was normal. After all, everyone complains. Everyone vents. But what I didn’t realize was that venting had become their way of life. No story was shared unless it was poisoned with envy. No success could be celebrated unless it was followed by a cutting remark or a whispered suspicion. Sitting among them began to feel less like friendship and more like drowning, pulled under by currents of bitterness I had no desire to swim in.

    It wasn’t just strangers or distant acquaintances they targeted. It was each other. If one friend wasn’t present, they became the subject of ridicule. If someone had achieved something new—a promotion, a new car, a relationship—it was torn apart with speculation, jealousy, or backhanded compliments. And when it was my turn, when life happened to bring me something good, I felt the stares tighten like a rope. Smiles that didn’t reach the eyes, questions laced with doubt, and subtle remarks that made my happiness feel like a crime.

    The more I listened, the more I began to see the truth: this wasn’t friendship. This was a toxic ritual disguised as companionship. It drained me. It made me second-guess myself, my achievements, even my own worth. I would walk away from these gatherings feeling smaller, emptier, as though their words had carved pieces out of me. For years, I had ignored it, convincing myself that the history we shared was stronger than the present reality. But history cannot carry you forward when the present is suffocating you.

    There came a day when I sat among them, their voices rising in yet another wave of gossip and venom, and I realized I felt nothing but disgust. Their words blurred into one endless tide of envy, like static in the air. It wasn’t even anger anymore—it was exhaustion. I was tired of swimming against their bitterness, tired of watching them feed off each other’s negativity like it was oxygen. I looked around at faces I had once cherished, and all I could see were masks—beautiful on the surface, but corroded underneath.

    That night, I made a quiet promise to myself. I wouldn’t fight them, argue with them, or try to change them. I would simply walk away. I would choose silence over their noise, solitude over their poisoned company. It was not an easy decision—years of shared memories tied me to them like chains. But sometimes, even chains must be broken. And as I stepped away, I felt something I hadn’t felt in years: peace.

    Friendship should never feel like drowning. It should lift you, steady you, and bring warmth when the world is cold. I had forgotten that truth, but now I remembered. And though I left behind familiar faces, I carried with me something far more valuable—my own clarity, my own clarity, my own freedom.