"Love yourself instead of abusing yourself"
About this Quote
In the mouth of a supermodel, "Love yourself instead of abusing yourself" lands less like a greeting-card mantra and more like a blunt intervention. Kurkova comes from an industry built on surveillance: mirrors, measurements, backstage scrutiny, and the constant suggestion that the body is a project forever behind schedule. In that context, "abusing yourself" isn’t metaphorical hand-wringing; it’s the daily micro-violence of self-talk, restriction framed as virtue, and the quiet competition to disappear.
The line works because it refuses to romanticize self-improvement. "Instead of" sets up a clean moral swap: the default mode for many people isn’t neutral self-regard, it’s self-punishment masquerading as discipline. Kurkova’s phrasing names that ugliness without dressing it up in wellness language. Abuse is a hard word; it forces the listener to consider whether their routines (dieting, "earning" food, punishing workouts, obsessive comparison) are care or coercion.
There’s also a savvy cultural read here. The 2010s-and-beyond beauty economy sells "self-love" as a product, while social media algorithms keep feeding people their own perceived failures. Kurkova’s sentence cuts across that contradiction: you don’t buy your way into self-acceptance, you choose to stop treating yourself like an enemy. Coming from someone whose job is literally to be looked at, it’s a reminder that the harshest gaze often isn’t the public’s - it’s the one we internalize and rehearse alone.
The line works because it refuses to romanticize self-improvement. "Instead of" sets up a clean moral swap: the default mode for many people isn’t neutral self-regard, it’s self-punishment masquerading as discipline. Kurkova’s phrasing names that ugliness without dressing it up in wellness language. Abuse is a hard word; it forces the listener to consider whether their routines (dieting, "earning" food, punishing workouts, obsessive comparison) are care or coercion.
There’s also a savvy cultural read here. The 2010s-and-beyond beauty economy sells "self-love" as a product, while social media algorithms keep feeding people their own perceived failures. Kurkova’s sentence cuts across that contradiction: you don’t buy your way into self-acceptance, you choose to stop treating yourself like an enemy. Coming from someone whose job is literally to be looked at, it’s a reminder that the harshest gaze often isn’t the public’s - it’s the one we internalize and rehearse alone.
Quote Details
| Topic | Self-Love |
|---|
More Quotes by Karolina
Add to List
