[Esp./Eng.] NO te dejes; Dile, "¡NO!" a la violencia. || Do NOT leave; say, ‘NO!’ to violence.
If you are English, you can go directly to the English version 👉 HERE
NO te dejes; Dile, "¡NO!" a la violencia
Lo que observo más allá de la imagen
Pues mira, es una chica, ¿sabes? Muy de cerca, que te mira así, ¡directo a los ojos! La cara le ocupa casi toda la foto, vamos. Y jo, los ojos, es lo que más te llama, ¿no? Son grandes, oscuros… y tiene todo el maquillaje hecho un cristo por debajo, como si se hubiera pegado una buena llorera y se le hubiera corrido todo el rímel o el lápiz por las mejillas. Las cejas, eso sí, las lleva bien pintaditas.
Y luego, la movida es que la parte de abajo de la cara, de la nariz para abajo, pues la tiene tapada con un cacho de papel blanco que sujeta con las dos manos. Y en el papel, ¡hala!, una sonrisa dibujada, de esas bien grandes, hecha como con un rotu negro y gordo. Si te fijas en las manos, las uñas las lleva pintadas de oscuro, negro diría yo. Y va con una camiseta gris, así normalita, ¿sabes? El fondo, pues oscuro, como difuminado, para que ella y el papel se vean más, supongo. La luz, yo qué sé, como que le da de frente, y por eso se le ve la piel más blanquita y canta un montón el contraste del maquillaje corrido con el dibujo ese.
Pero vamos, lo que te deja loco perdido, sin duda, es el choque ese entre la sonrisa del papel, que se supone que es alegría o que todo va bien, y la penita o el agobio que se le ve en los ojos y en el maquillaje. Es que no pega ni con cola, dios.
Lo que me hace sentir la Imagen
Uf, amiga(o), es que esta foto te da un vuelco en el estómago, ¿a que sí? Te deja con una cosa rara en el cuerpo, como que hay algo ahí que no… que no cuadra, vamos.
😘Maltrato y una Angustia que no se ve: Mira, lo primerito que se me pasa por la cabeza es una tristeza y un agobio que te mueres. Ese maquillaje así, a lo loco, es que te grita “¡he llorado!”, “¡me duele algo!”. Y si lo juntas con la sonrisa esa de palo, pues la foto te está diciendo, casi a gritos, que la chavala está escondiendo un marrón de los gordos.
🥲Humillación y Guardárselo Todo: Esa sonrisa de papel es una careta, ni más ni menos. El hecho de sostenerla es como si estuviera aplastando lo que siente de verdad. Y eso, claro, te puede hacer sentir humillada, como que no puedes ser tú misma, que tienes que negar lo que te pasa por dentro. Es la imagen perfecta de tener que “estar bien” cuando por dentro estás hecha pedazos.
🤐Abuso y la Fachada de que “Todo está Normal”: Cuando hay abuso, muchas veces las víctimas crean como escudos para sobrevivir, y uno de esos es hacer como si todo estuviera normal. La sonrisa de papel podría ser esa fachada que se monta para aguantar en un sitio horrible, para que no le hagan más daño, o porque le han hecho creer que lo que siente no importa o que si se muestra vulnerable, es peor.
🫥El Mensaje Oculto sobre la Presión Social y Cómo Estamos de la Cabeza: Pero mira, más allá del maltrato de una persona a otra, la foto también le da un palo a esa manía que tiene la sociedad de exigirnos estar felices todo el rato. Vivimos en un mundo que muchas veces ve mal la tristeza o ser vulnerable. El mensaje que no se dice, pero se siente, es muy fuerte: no es oro todo lo que reluce, y detrás de muchas sonrisas “para la galería” puede haber una batalla interna tremenda. Es como un llamado a mirar más allá de lo que se ve, a ser más buena gente y a aceptar todas las emociones, no solo las alegres. Nos recuerda lo importante que es cuidar nuestra salud mental y que, a veces, lo más valiente es decir “no estoy bien”.
La foto me hace preguntarme: “¿Qué habrá pasado en la vida de esta chica? ¿Qué dolor está intentando esconder con esa sonrisa a la fuerza?”. Es como la frase de “al mal tiempo, buena cara”, pero llevada a un punto que duele.
La Anécdota Detrás de Todo
Elena llevaba años con esa sonrisa de papel pegada a la cara. Al principio, era finita, casi ni se notaba, un detallito para calmar las broncas en casa, para que las palabras feas de su pareja no le quemaran tanto, para decirse a sí misma que “no era para tanto”. Pero con el tiempo, el papel se fue haciendo más gordo, la sonrisa más tiesa, escondiendo las lágrimas que le caían sin parar por las mejillas cada noche, dejando manchas de rímel y tristeza en la almohada y en el alma.
El mundo solo veía la sonrisa. En el trabajo, todos la llamaban “Elena, la alegría de la huerta”. Sus amigos (los poquitos que le quedaban, porque poco a poco la habían ido aislando) admiraban su “aguante”. Pero nadie le miraba a los ojos, esos agujeros negros donde se ahogaban sus gritos mudos. La humillación de tener que sonreír mientras por dentro se rompía en mil pedazos era un peso que no la dejaba respirar. Se sentía como una actriz en una película de terror donde solo ella sabía el final.
Un día, mientras se miraba al espejo con la sonrisa de papel puesta, una lágrima, más cabezota que las demás, se le escapó y fue a caer justo en el borde del dibujo, emborronando la tinta negra. Por primera vez en mucho tiempo, Elena se vio de verdad. Vio la mancha, el fallo en la fachada perfecta. Y en esa mancha, vio una rendija de luz.
Esa noche, no se molestó en dibujar una sonrisa nueva. Dejó que las lágrimas corrieran a su aire. Al día siguiente, fue a trabajar sin la máscara. La gente la miró raro. “¿Estás bien, Elena?”, le preguntó alguien, preocupado de verdad. Y por primera vez, en vez de sacar una alegría que no sentía, susurró: “No, no lo estoy. Pero voy a estarlo”.
Ese fue el primer paso. Dejar caer el papel. Luego vino el hablar, el pedir ayuda, el ponerle nombre al maltrato y a la humillación que había aguantado. Fue un camino duro, con miedos y ganas de tirar la toalla, pero cada lágrima que derramaba sin esconderla era un ladrillo menos en la pared que la tenía presa.
¿Y qué aprendemos de esta historia, amiga(o)? Pues que la liberación de Elena no llegó cuando dejó de sentir dolor, sino cuando se dio permiso para sentirlo y para que otros lo vieran. Entendió que su valor no estaba en sonreír siempre a la fuerza, sino en la valentía de ser ella misma, con sus cosas buenas y sus cosas malas. La verdadera fortaleza no es esconder las heridas detrás de una máscara sonriente, sino tener el coraje de mirarlas de frente, de permitirse ser vulnerable para poder curarse y, al final, elegir un camino donde la sonrisa no sea una obligación, sino algo que le salga del corazón, libre y de verdad. A veces, la sonrisa más bonita es la que aparece después de la tormenta, porque esa sí que es auténtica.
Cómo participar, aún estás a tiempo…
Una imagen vale más que mil palabras
Portada de la iniciativa.
CRÉDITOS:
Imagen tomada de la iniciativa, cortesía de UNAPLASH
🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆
Dedicado a todos aquellos que contribuyen, día a día, a hacer de este planeta un mundo mejor.
Do NOT leave; say, ‘NO!’ to violence
What I see beyond the image
Well, look, it's a girl, you know, very close up, looking at you like this, straight into your eyes! Her face takes up almost the whole photo, come on. And ho, the eyes, that's what strikes you the most, isn't it? They're big, dark... and all her make-up is a mess underneath, as if she'd had a good cry and all the mascara or pencil had run down her cheeks. Her eyebrows, though, are well painted.
And then, the thing is that the lower part of her face, from the nose down, is covered with a piece of white paper that she holds with both hands. And on the paper, aha, a big, big smile, made like with a fat, black rotu. If you look at his hands, his nails are painted dark, black I'd say. And he's wearing a grey T-shirt, a normal T-shirt, you know? The background, well, it's dark, like blurred, so that she and the paper are more visible, I suppose. The light, I don't know, it kind of hits her from the front, and that's why her skin looks whiter and the contrast between the smudged make-up and the drawing is really striking.
But come on, what makes you crazy, without a doubt, is the clash between the smile on the paper, which is supposed to be joy or that everything is going well, and the sadness or the burden that you can see in her eyes and in the make-up. It just doesn't fit, God.
What the Image Makes Me Feel
Ugh, my friend, this photo makes your stomach turn, doesn't it? It leaves you with a strange feeling in your body, like there's something there that doesn't... that doesn't add up, come on.
😘 Mistreatment and an anguish that can't be seen: Look, the first thing that comes to my mind is a sadness and an overwhelming feeling that makes you die. That make-up like that, in a crazy way, screams ‘I've cried’, ‘I'm in pain! And if you put it together with that wooden smile, then the photo is telling you, almost shouting, that the girl is hiding a big brown one.
🥲 Humiliation and keeping it all to herself: That paper smile is a mask, no more, no less. Holding it up is as if you're squashing what you really feel. And that, of course, can make you feel humiliated, like you can't be yourself, like you have to deny what's going on inside. It's the perfect image of having to ‘be okay’ when inside you're in pieces.
🤐 Abuse and the Facade that ‘Everything is Normal’: When there is abuse, many times victims create shields to survive, and one of those is to pretend that everything is normal. The paper smile could be that facade that you put up to endure in a horrible place, so that you don't get hurt anymore, or because you have been led to believe that what you feel doesn't matter or that if you show vulnerability, it's worse.
🫥 The Hidden Message about Social Pressure and How We're in Over Our Heads: But look, beyond one person's mistreatment of another, the photo also takes a swipe at society's mania for demanding that we be happy all the time. We live in a world that often frowns on sadness or being vulnerable. The message that is not said, but felt, is very strong: all that glitters is not gold, and behind many smiles ‘for the gallery’ there can be a tremendous internal battle. It is like a call to look beyond what is seen, to be more good people and to accept all emotions, not only the happy ones. It reminds us how important it is to take care of our mental health and that sometimes the bravest thing to do is to say ‘I'm not well’.
The photo makes me wonder: ‘What has happened in this girl's life, what pain is she trying to hide with that forced smile? It's like the phrase ‘in bad weather, good luck’, but taken to a point that hurts.
The Anecdote Behind It All
Elena had had that paper smile plastered on her face for years. At first, it was thin, almost unnoticeable, a little detail to calm down the fights at home, so that her partner's ugly words wouldn't burn her so much, to tell herself that ‘it wasn't that bad’. But as time went by, the paper grew fatter, the smile stiffer, hiding the tears that fell endlessly down her cheeks every night, leaving stains of mascara and sadness on her pillow and in her soul.
The world only saw the smile. At work, everyone called her ‘Elena, the joy of the garden’. Her friends (the few she had left, because little by little they had isolated her) admired her ‘stamina’. But no one would look into her eyes, those black holes where her mute screams were drowned out. The humiliation of having to smile while inside she was breaking into a thousand pieces was a weight that wouldn't let her breathe. She felt like an actress in a horror movie where only she knew the ending.
One day, while she was looking at herself in the mirror with her paper smile on, a tear, stubbier than the others, escaped and fell right on the edge of the drawing, smudging the black ink. For the first time in a long time, Elena really saw herself. She saw the smudge, the flaw in the perfect facade. And in that smudge, she saw a slit of light.
That night, he didn't bother to put on a new smile. He let the tears run their course. The next day, she went to work without her mask. People looked at her funny. ‘Are you okay, Elena?’ someone asked her, genuinely concerned. And for the first time, instead of bringing out a joy she didn't feel, she whispered, ‘No, I'm not. But I'm going to be.
That was the first step. Dropping the paper. Then came the talking, the asking for help, the naming of the abuse and humiliation she had endured. It was a hard road, with fears and the desire to throw in the towel, but every tear she shed without hiding it was one less brick in the wall that held her prisoner.
And what do we learn from this story, my friend? Elena's liberation did not come when she stopped feeling pain, but when she gave herself permission to feel it and for others to see it. She understood that her courage was not in smiling all the time, but in the courage to be herself, with her good things and her bad things. True strength is not hiding her wounds behind a smiling mask, but having the courage to look them in the face, to allow herself to be vulnerable in order to heal and, in the end, to choose a path where smiling is not an obligation, but something that comes from the heart, free and true. Sometimes, the most beautiful smile is the one that appears after the storm, because that one is authentic.
Come ɑnd pɑɾticipɑte becɑuse γou still hɑve, time…
A Pictuɾe Is Woɾth A Thousɑnd Woɾds
Cover of the initiative.
CREDITS:
Image taken from the initiative, courtesy of UNAPLASH
🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆
I am dedicated to all those who contribute daily to make our planet ɑ a better world.
Cómo participar, aún estás a tiempo…
Una imagen vale más que mil palabras
Portada de la iniciativa.
CRÉDITOS:
Imagen tomada de la iniciativa, cortesía de UNAPLASH
Dedicado a todos aquellos que contribuyen, día a día, a hacer de este planeta un mundo mejor.
Do NOT leave; say, ‘NO!’ to violence
What I see beyond the image
Well, look, it's a girl, you know, very close up, looking at you like this, straight into your eyes! Her face takes up almost the whole photo, come on. And ho, the eyes, that's what strikes you the most, isn't it? They're big, dark... and all her make-up is a mess underneath, as if she'd had a good cry and all the mascara or pencil had run down her cheeks. Her eyebrows, though, are well painted.
And then, the thing is that the lower part of her face, from the nose down, is covered with a piece of white paper that she holds with both hands. And on the paper, aha, a big, big smile, made like with a fat, black rotu. If you look at his hands, his nails are painted dark, black I'd say. And he's wearing a grey T-shirt, a normal T-shirt, you know? The background, well, it's dark, like blurred, so that she and the paper are more visible, I suppose. The light, I don't know, it kind of hits her from the front, and that's why her skin looks whiter and the contrast between the smudged make-up and the drawing is really striking.
But come on, what makes you crazy, without a doubt, is the clash between the smile on the paper, which is supposed to be joy or that everything is going well, and the sadness or the burden that you can see in her eyes and in the make-up. It just doesn't fit, God.
What the Image Makes Me Feel
Ugh, my friend, this photo makes your stomach turn, doesn't it? It leaves you with a strange feeling in your body, like there's something there that doesn't... that doesn't add up, come on.
😘 Mistreatment and an anguish that can't be seen: Look, the first thing that comes to my mind is a sadness and an overwhelming feeling that makes you die. That make-up like that, in a crazy way, screams ‘I've cried’, ‘I'm in pain! And if you put it together with that wooden smile, then the photo is telling you, almost shouting, that the girl is hiding a big brown one.
🥲 Humiliation and keeping it all to herself: That paper smile is a mask, no more, no less. Holding it up is as if you're squashing what you really feel. And that, of course, can make you feel humiliated, like you can't be yourself, like you have to deny what's going on inside. It's the perfect image of having to ‘be okay’ when inside you're in pieces.
🤐 Abuse and the Facade that ‘Everything is Normal’: When there is abuse, many times victims create shields to survive, and one of those is to pretend that everything is normal. The paper smile could be that facade that you put up to endure in a horrible place, so that you don't get hurt anymore, or because you have been led to believe that what you feel doesn't matter or that if you show vulnerability, it's worse.
🫥 The Hidden Message about Social Pressure and How We're in Over Our Heads: But look, beyond one person's mistreatment of another, the photo also takes a swipe at society's mania for demanding that we be happy all the time. We live in a world that often frowns on sadness or being vulnerable. The message that is not said, but felt, is very strong: all that glitters is not gold, and behind many smiles ‘for the gallery’ there can be a tremendous internal battle. It is like a call to look beyond what is seen, to be more good people and to accept all emotions, not only the happy ones. It reminds us how important it is to take care of our mental health and that sometimes the bravest thing to do is to say ‘I'm not well’.
The photo makes me wonder: ‘What has happened in this girl's life, what pain is she trying to hide with that forced smile? It's like the phrase ‘in bad weather, good luck’, but taken to a point that hurts.
The Anecdote Behind It All
Elena had had that paper smile plastered on her face for years. At first, it was thin, almost unnoticeable, a little detail to calm down the fights at home, so that her partner's ugly words wouldn't burn her so much, to tell herself that ‘it wasn't that bad’. But as time went by, the paper grew fatter, the smile stiffer, hiding the tears that fell endlessly down her cheeks every night, leaving stains of mascara and sadness on her pillow and in her soul.
The world only saw the smile. At work, everyone called her ‘Elena, the joy of the garden’. Her friends (the few she had left, because little by little they had isolated her) admired her ‘stamina’. But no one would look into her eyes, those black holes where her mute screams were drowned out. The humiliation of having to smile while inside she was breaking into a thousand pieces was a weight that wouldn't let her breathe. She felt like an actress in a horror movie where only she knew the ending.
One day, while she was looking at herself in the mirror with her paper smile on, a tear, stubbier than the others, escaped and fell right on the edge of the drawing, smudging the black ink. For the first time in a long time, Elena really saw herself. She saw the smudge, the flaw in the perfect facade. And in that smudge, she saw a slit of light.
That night, he didn't bother to put on a new smile. He let the tears run their course. The next day, she went to work without her mask. People looked at her funny. ‘Are you okay, Elena?’ someone asked her, genuinely concerned. And for the first time, instead of bringing out a joy she didn't feel, she whispered, ‘No, I'm not. But I'm going to be.
That was the first step. Dropping the paper. Then came the talking, the asking for help, the naming of the abuse and humiliation she had endured. It was a hard road, with fears and the desire to throw in the towel, but every tear she shed without hiding it was one less brick in the wall that held her prisoner.
And what do we learn from this story, my friend? Elena's liberation did not come when she stopped feeling pain, but when she gave herself permission to feel it and for others to see it. She understood that her courage was not in smiling all the time, but in the courage to be herself, with her good things and her bad things. True strength is not hiding her wounds behind a smiling mask, but having the courage to look them in the face, to allow herself to be vulnerable in order to heal and, in the end, to choose a path where smiling is not an obligation, but something that comes from the heart, free and true. Sometimes, the most beautiful smile is the one that appears after the storm, because that one is authentic.
Come ɑnd pɑɾticipɑte becɑuse γou still hɑve, time…
A Pictuɾe Is Woɾth A Thousɑnd Woɾds
Cover of the initiative.
CREDITS:
Image taken from the initiative, courtesy of UNAPLASH
🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆
I am dedicated to all those who contribute daily to make our planet ɑ a better world.
Dedicado a todos aquellos que contribuyen, día a día, a hacer de este planeta un mundo mejor.
Do NOT leave; say, ‘NO!’ to violence
What I see beyond the image
Well, look, it's a girl, you know, very close up, looking at you like this, straight into your eyes! Her face takes up almost the whole photo, come on. And ho, the eyes, that's what strikes you the most, isn't it? They're big, dark... and all her make-up is a mess underneath, as if she'd had a good cry and all the mascara or pencil had run down her cheeks. Her eyebrows, though, are well painted.
And then, the thing is that the lower part of her face, from the nose down, is covered with a piece of white paper that she holds with both hands. And on the paper, aha, a big, big smile, made like with a fat, black rotu. If you look at his hands, his nails are painted dark, black I'd say. And he's wearing a grey T-shirt, a normal T-shirt, you know? The background, well, it's dark, like blurred, so that she and the paper are more visible, I suppose. The light, I don't know, it kind of hits her from the front, and that's why her skin looks whiter and the contrast between the smudged make-up and the drawing is really striking.
But come on, what makes you crazy, without a doubt, is the clash between the smile on the paper, which is supposed to be joy or that everything is going well, and the sadness or the burden that you can see in her eyes and in the make-up. It just doesn't fit, God.
What the Image Makes Me Feel
Ugh, my friend, this photo makes your stomach turn, doesn't it? It leaves you with a strange feeling in your body, like there's something there that doesn't... that doesn't add up, come on.
😘 Mistreatment and an anguish that can't be seen: Look, the first thing that comes to my mind is a sadness and an overwhelming feeling that makes you die. That make-up like that, in a crazy way, screams ‘I've cried’, ‘I'm in pain! And if you put it together with that wooden smile, then the photo is telling you, almost shouting, that the girl is hiding a big brown one.
🥲 Humiliation and keeping it all to herself: That paper smile is a mask, no more, no less. Holding it up is as if you're squashing what you really feel. And that, of course, can make you feel humiliated, like you can't be yourself, like you have to deny what's going on inside. It's the perfect image of having to ‘be okay’ when inside you're in pieces.
🤐 Abuse and the Facade that ‘Everything is Normal’: When there is abuse, many times victims create shields to survive, and one of those is to pretend that everything is normal. The paper smile could be that facade that you put up to endure in a horrible place, so that you don't get hurt anymore, or because you have been led to believe that what you feel doesn't matter or that if you show vulnerability, it's worse.
🫥 The Hidden Message about Social Pressure and How We're in Over Our Heads: But look, beyond one person's mistreatment of another, the photo also takes a swipe at society's mania for demanding that we be happy all the time. We live in a world that often frowns on sadness or being vulnerable. The message that is not said, but felt, is very strong: all that glitters is not gold, and behind many smiles ‘for the gallery’ there can be a tremendous internal battle. It is like a call to look beyond what is seen, to be more good people and to accept all emotions, not only the happy ones. It reminds us how important it is to take care of our mental health and that sometimes the bravest thing to do is to say ‘I'm not well’.
The photo makes me wonder: ‘What has happened in this girl's life, what pain is she trying to hide with that forced smile? It's like the phrase ‘in bad weather, good luck’, but taken to a point that hurts.
The Anecdote Behind It All
Elena had had that paper smile plastered on her face for years. At first, it was thin, almost unnoticeable, a little detail to calm down the fights at home, so that her partner's ugly words wouldn't burn her so much, to tell herself that ‘it wasn't that bad’. But as time went by, the paper grew fatter, the smile stiffer, hiding the tears that fell endlessly down her cheeks every night, leaving stains of mascara and sadness on her pillow and in her soul.
The world only saw the smile. At work, everyone called her ‘Elena, the joy of the garden’. Her friends (the few she had left, because little by little they had isolated her) admired her ‘stamina’. But no one would look into her eyes, those black holes where her mute screams were drowned out. The humiliation of having to smile while inside she was breaking into a thousand pieces was a weight that wouldn't let her breathe. She felt like an actress in a horror movie where only she knew the ending.
One day, while she was looking at herself in the mirror with her paper smile on, a tear, stubbier than the others, escaped and fell right on the edge of the drawing, smudging the black ink. For the first time in a long time, Elena really saw herself. She saw the smudge, the flaw in the perfect facade. And in that smudge, she saw a slit of light.
That night, he didn't bother to put on a new smile. He let the tears run their course. The next day, she went to work without her mask. People looked at her funny. ‘Are you okay, Elena?’ someone asked her, genuinely concerned. And for the first time, instead of bringing out a joy she didn't feel, she whispered, ‘No, I'm not. But I'm going to be.
That was the first step. Dropping the paper. Then came the talking, the asking for help, the naming of the abuse and humiliation she had endured. It was a hard road, with fears and the desire to throw in the towel, but every tear she shed without hiding it was one less brick in the wall that held her prisoner.
And what do we learn from this story, my friend? Elena's liberation did not come when she stopped feeling pain, but when she gave herself permission to feel it and for others to see it. She understood that her courage was not in smiling all the time, but in the courage to be herself, with her good things and her bad things. True strength is not hiding her wounds behind a smiling mask, but having the courage to look them in the face, to allow herself to be vulnerable in order to heal and, in the end, to choose a path where smiling is not an obligation, but something that comes from the heart, free and true. Sometimes, the most beautiful smile is the one that appears after the storm, because that one is authentic.
Come ɑnd pɑɾticipɑte becɑuse γou still hɑve, time…
A Pictuɾe Is Woɾth A Thousɑnd Woɾds
Cover of the initiative.
CREDITS:
Image taken from the initiative, courtesy of UNAPLASH
🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆****🔆
I am dedicated to all those who contribute daily to make our planet ɑ a better world.
Come ɑnd pɑɾticipɑte becɑuse γou still hɑve, time…
A Pictuɾe Is Woɾth A Thousɑnd Woɾds
Cover of the initiative.
CREDITS:
Image taken from the initiative, courtesy of UNAPLASH
I am dedicated to all those who contribute daily to make our planet ɑ a better world.
You captured the image so nicely, there's an inner battle that she keeps hiding with a smile and sometimes we wonder how many people go through this trauma but keep the fake smiles around