#NoFilter: Izzie Rodgers on Her Journey to Self-Love
The skin and body positive advocate talks to us about her relationship with beauty, how she journeyed towards self-love, and what she wishes to see more of in the community today
Amassing over 215k and 93.4k followers on Instagram and TikTok respectively, London-based skin and body positive advocate Izzie Rodgers has flipped the script on what it means to be beautiful. Although we get to see Rodgers at her happiest with no filters, acne-prone skin, belly rolls, and all the things that make us human, that hasn’t always been the case for the self-loving guru.
“My relationship with my body, skin and mind has evolved massively over the years,” says Rodgers. “Up until the last few years, my life was surrounded by a lot of self-hatred. I struggled with body image issues since I was little, always feeling like I was bigger and uglier than everyone else. So when I got acne at 20 years old, I had no self-love behind me to get through it. I struggled to even open my front door to the postman when this was at its worst.”
She continues: “As soon as I started my Instagram [account], it was a slow ascent to happiness and acceptance. Now looking back, I can’t believe I ever hated myself so much.” Now, Rodgers encourages others to have a healthy relationship with their body and mind, as well as embrace their insecurities and imperfections.
We spoke to the creator about raw beauty, her community, and why it’s important for many to continue seeing skin and body positivity in the beauty industry today.
Was there a catalyst that prompted you to make skin and body positivity content on social media?
My mental health was the catalyst for posting. I wouldn’t leave the house because I knew I was being a fraud editing my photos to remove my acne when I knew there was no edit button for real-life interactions. I decided to take a makeup-free selfie to let everyone know what I was going through. Unfortunately, I couldn’t post it and kept the photo on my phone for months. My mental health got so bad that my boyfriend had to end up posting it for me. It remains the best thing he’s ever done for me.
How do you curate your content? Do you post about specific topics based on how you’re feeling that day?
I tend to post what I would have wanted to see during my worst moments, and this is at the core of all my posts. In terms of day-to-day, my posts are a mix of reflections on what’s currently happening in my life and things I just know will lift people up, like foundation-free makeup looks.
Why do you think it’s important for people to see more “raw beauty” on social media?
Because beauty is raw. Beauty, to me, isn’t polished things and polished people. It’s uniqueness and creativity, and I want the young people who follow me to know that and believe that they can fit into the beauty category regardless.
Things that people find truly beautiful in life are never someone’s looks.
You’ve built quite a big community on social media. What’s the most memorable comment you’ve received from one of your followers?
I got sent a direct message from a young girl letting me know that I helped her start going to school again. She stopped going out of fear when she developed acne but said that seeing someone beautiful with acne helped her believe it was possible. That was the sweetest, most uplifting message I’ve ever received and I remember it fondly.
Besides engaging with your community online, how else do you practise self-love in your own time?
I like to practise detaching from my physical body. I imagine myself, my personality, and all the essential things that make up the real me sitting inside a shell — the shell being my body. And for some reason, what I look like has less importance than the real me that sits inside this shell.
Most women grow up being held to conventional beauty standards. How would you advise them to let go of their insecurities and start their journey to self-love instead?
Holding yourself to conventional beauty standards will help you in absolutely no way. What we find “beautiful” is ever-changing and so are you, so trying to keep up with it would be like chasing after something on a treadmill.
The pattern is always the same. We hate ourselves until we get old enough to realise that life is so much more, and we look back at our younger body and love it. If the pattern is always the same, we should learn from it and realise that life is so much more now.
Do you think the beauty industry is changing for the better? If not, what would you like to see more of in this space?
It’s definitely changing, I don’t think I would be getting as much work if it wasn’t. Brands are more open to showing people that maybe don’t fit that stereotypical beauty standard and what that does for viewers is incredible. There is more work to do though. I feel like the acceptance currently stays within the safe walls of social media, so It would be great to see it branch out more and not just be this little social media movement.
