All of these projects, she explains, help her to define her purpose and to encourage others to seek value in their own intellect.
She has also volunteered her time as an ambassador for Unicef and most recently launched a Facebook series called Don't Me, which features conversations amongst a diverse group of young thought leaders about society's most prominent issues. In early 2014, Zilber put that superpower to use when she founded the TwoMinuteTimes - a weekly political newsletter aimed at engaging young people in current events.
"I would spend my time delving into those topics and becoming so well versed in these areas of the world that I recognized I have a superpower that basically every other high school girl in my school didn’t have, and for me that gave me the confidence to believe that I had something really special." I was really lonely and when every high school girl was going off to a party on a Saturday night that I wasn’t invited to, I would spend that time doing something that brought me joy and that was reading UN memorandums on the Middle East and reading about the Iran Nuclear Deal and reading what foreign policy experts have to say about what’s happening in Saudi Arabia or what’s happening between Israel and Palestine," she recalls. "I went through a period in high school where I really felt like I had no friends. There’s a lot of pressure on the way that I look." I do find myself thinking I have to look a certain way or people are really quickly going to notice that I look different. "On the other end, it can be really hurtful. I’m beautiful, people think I’m beautiful, I don’t need to be thinking these things about myself,'" she explains. "On one end it’s honestly really amazing because when I sit there and I look at myself and I’m like, I hate everything about myself, in those moments I look through my comments and I’m like 'Ok I’m literally losing my mind. When it comes to body image in particular, she admits that comments about her appearance can be "double-edged." But that doesn’t mean that they’re not ever there."
So when I fall into those patterns I know how to get myself out of them. "I’ve learned the skills to take myself out of negative patterns of thinking. But I’m not gonna sit here and lie and say it’s perfect," she explains. I have a much better relationship with my body and with food than I did four years ago. "As someone who has suffered from an eating disorder in the past and who has kind of always had a dysfunctional relationship with food from a very young age, I think it’s an ongoing battle.
Update your settings here to see it.Īt a quick glance, it makes sense that the California native, whose mom Christina Zilber is the founder of Jouer Cosmetics, is subject to a lot of praise of her looks, as commenters call her the "prettiest person to ever exist." After dealing with bullying at school and disordered eating throughout her life, however, Zilber explains that she has a more complicated relationship with her body and physical appearance than one may think. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences.