BREATHE!

Breathe! is an illustrated book with no text about a girl who tries to feel good about herself and feel comfortable being with herself and tries to love herself, but she doesn’t know how, she’s never been told how. So, she tries to fit in the standards of society following what advertising and marketing tells her, what’s going to help her to feel better about herself. She tries but she fails, she struggles. The aim on this book is to show that self-acceptance is something that we must find by ourselves inside of us. The map that she follows represents what most people say or do to feel better and relax, but those environments can be stressful. Even if for some people it’s easy to do some activities like yoga or mediation to feel better, there’s a lot of work to do before that and to feel completely good with oneself. ​ The butterfly represents her own voice, she forgets she’s there and that she can decide to follow or not. And the moment that everything changes, and she feels better it’s when she finally listens to her and stop following what society says to her, she knows what she wants. What I want to communicate through this book it’s that it’s ok to feel like we don’t belong somewhere or to have some grey days, we must embrace those negative feelings to fine the positive ones, we don’t have to ignore them. Self-acceptance and self-love have been exploited by brands to sell us products, but at the end of the day we should be the ones to decide what to do for us and to find or own way.