For the Girl Who Struggles with Self-Esteem...

Let's face it, everyone in the world goes through this.
The constant ups and downs of self image like a current being forced back and forth from the tide by a storm.

Some days you feel incredible!
The flattering pants coupled with the new bodysuit, which seems to hide all of those imperfections flawlessly.
The day trip to Ulta where you spent more money than you made but couldn't wait to get home and give yourself a make over.
Or even when you're sitting at the bar, cafe, student union, class, work, where you just feel so on top of the world!
As if you are the absolute badass you watched in all those movies and somehow, today, you managed to embody her.

And some days you'll feel significantly less than incredible.
The days where you woke up late for work, grabbed those wrinkled jeans from the dirty clothes hamper and ran out the door.
The days you forgot to brush your hair and figured you could comb your fingers through it cause you know, no ones gonna notice.
Or better yet, when you THINK you look amazing and you genuinely start to embody it, but you walk past that store front and see all your imperfections gleaming back at you.
That mirror who shows you every reason why you are less today.

The constant battle.
The merry-go-round of do I actually look like the badass who lives in my head or is this another way I've deluded myself into getting through the day.

Self-esteem has always, and I mean, ALWAYS been my biggest struggle with myself.
Over indulging at Ulta, telling myself that I can look like those women who are most definitely photoshopped.
And here's the thing, sometimes I FEEL like the photoshopped women, the women who walk like they're floating on a cloud and refuse to take shit from anyone, who know their worth, who don't allow opinions of others to cloud their self-esteem... And some days, I just don't. And on those days, I carry on anyways.

For The Girl Who is finally okay with herself...

I hope that the people I love will always love me. I hope that the relationships that I’ve built: the friendships, the coworkers, the family, the acquaintances, I hope they thrive. I hope that everyone that I love is understanding of the fact that I love them, and doesn’t ever forget that I love them. I hope that I continue to do my best each and every day showing appreciation to the people I care about. I hope that I will nourish those relationships and put my best effort in them.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I can tell you what I really want to tell you.

If tomorrow morning, everyone that I know and love in the world wakes up and decides that they don’t love me anymore and no longer want me as a part of their lives, I am okay with that.

Would it hurt? God, yes. It would hurt so much. I would grieve the loss of those relationships. I would feel the ache, the dull pain in my chest, and I would cry and my body would feel weak. I would feel my feelings, and I would let them go. But I would be okay.

It’s a pretty intimidating feeling, if I’m being honest. My entire life has been based on the need of approval from others. It’s been based off the notion that I am not worthy if no one else is telling me so, that if I am told I’m wrong or unhelpful or ugly or shameful, that must be true. So I spent my life changing myself for the sake of others. I dressed a certain way, acted differently, pretended to be interested in things that bored me. I wanted the people I loved to love me, regardless of what that meant for my mental health. I would’ve done anything for the approval.

I have lived a pretty decent life. I had a two parent household growing up that was full of a lot of love. We didn’t live in the fanciest homes or drive the most luxurious cars. But there was never a lack of love, and I remember that feeling very well. When I gave birth to my daughter, I remember thinking to myself “she will always be surrounded in love, even if that’s all I can give her.” I set this goal and have maintained, as a result of the love I had from my parents.

I feel the need to mention my upbringing because I don’t want there to be a misconception about what led me to be this approval-seeking person I grew into. There were hardships, of course. There were outside circumstances that left me in shambles, experiences I had that I thought would break me. Some people have looked at the roads I’ve traveled and wondered how I made it along. All I can tell you is that I did, though sometimes in pretty bad shape. I trudged. We all did, in one way or another.

My mid twenties hit me like a ton of bricks. I am not here to claim that I know anything – I don’t know shit about shit. I can only imagine what hardships and healing I’ll undergo in my thirties. But my twenties have been a learning experience for me, and for the first time, I’m beginning to feel a sense of comfort I haven’t had before. My hopes are that this feeling will only grow as I age and become more comfortable with who I am.

I no longer live in fear of the ways that people will hurt me. I no longer live in fear that every person that I love will leave me, or hurt me, or break my trust. Not because they won’t; people will most assuredly hurt me for as long as I live. As humans we are going to hurt others, and hopefully we do our best to make the hurt as minimal as possible and take responsibility for it right away. I know that people will hurt me, and leave me, and break my trust. But I’m not afraid of that anymore.

I’m not afraid of it anymore because I no longer require your approval. I no longer need someone to tell me that I’m beautiful or worthy or smart or funny or whatevercomplimentyoucancomeupwith. I know that I am those things, and I know that if I’m not any of the things that I want to be, that I can be. I am capable of being the best possible version of myself. It’s taken me a little while to understand that the best possible version of myself doesn’t look like the version that other people want me to be, rather it looks like the girl who allows herself her own thoughts and feelings and interests. It looks like the girl who takes care of herself first, and still does what she can to help others. It looks like the girl who indulges in the nerdy things and still does her makeup, who likes to eat healthy dinners and cake for dessert, and who isn't afraid of letting people see all of the oppositions that live within her. I am finally 'okay' with who I am.  

People's actions are rarely a reflection of you, and most often a reflection of themselves. If you can honestly say that you are meeting every relationship in your life with honesty and compassion, if you are doing your part, if you are nourishing the relationship, and someone decides to hurt you anyways, that is not your fault, and is not a reflection of who you are as a person. Some people will do things that will make you feel as though you're responsible for them, and it's important to know that you are not now, and will never be responsible for the actions of others. Keep your side of the street clean, and sleep every night knowing you're doing your best. 

And for the girl who hasn't gotten there quite yet... 

The one who is still afraid, who isn't yet comfortable, who isn't quite okay with herself yet, that's fine, too. 

There's no timeline for your growth or your healing. There's no deadline you have to meet, no goal to be obtained in a certain frame of time. You're going to get there, even though it's going to suck along the way. I'm having a good day, a good week, a good month. But there will be days that I will need to come back and read this for myself. That I will need to remind myself that I am all of the things I wrote about today, that I have this strength, that I am not afraid. There will be days that I don't feel strong and I do feel scared. And those days are okay, too.

For the Girl Who didn't have children

As you get older, you maintain longer relationships, put down roots, find yourself. The more solid you are in this world, the more people expect of you. As a woman, the biggest expectation that is imposed on you is bearing children. You have a vagina, you must bring offspring into the world. 

Here's the problem with this logic, you have no idea what that woman has been through. She may have a disorder that prevents children, her partner may be sterile, she could have been born infertile… hell, SHE COULD NOT HAVE A UTERUS at all. She could also hate kids, or not want to bring another child into this messed up, insane world. None of this matters as she has made an informed decision to not have a child one way or the other.

When you ask a woman if she has a child, and she says "No" that *should* be the end of that conversation, but it is rarely as simple as that. Personally I get asked all sorts of questions about why I don't have children. It's never enough to say that I just don't. It always ends up with me saying "it just wasn't in the cards for us", "my husband had cancer, it's a long story, you're a piece of shit for making me answer this" or some combination of the two. 

Don't tell me that adopting is still an option. No, fucking, shit. I'm not stupid. I know all about adoption and surrogacy. I've done a ton of research and reading into my options, if I ever wish to explore them. I don't need your help, if I ever do you'll be the first to know. 

Women, your body is your business including what goes in, or comes out of it. There are plenty of children in this world that need us. Be an amazing aunt, a kick-ass sister, a bitchin best friend, or a cool mom. Or don't. That's good too.

For The Girl Who is tired of being miserable...

Do you know how exhausting it is to be so constantly stressing over every single tiny problem in your life?

I have zero healthy coping mechanisms. I have no idea how to deal with the problems that I face. I have no ability to feel my feelings and let them go. I get in my head, I hold on to my feelings, I let them fester. I let them grow from a tiny, insignificant issue, to an insurmountable problem with no possible way to overcome.

I’m exhausted in ways that I feel are detrimental to my health. I wake up every morning feeling like I haven’t slept at all, because my brain has kept me up all night long replaying my problems like a bad movie on a loop in a cheap theater. Throughout my day I’m constantly waiting for what can go wrong. Every text I receive, I expect bad news. Every phone call I get, I’m waiting to be met with grief or fear or anger on the other end. I’m tired of holding frozen spoons to my eyes every morning to remove the bags that have formed from spending the previous day crying.  I’m constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. I’m pushing away people I love, I’m not allowing myself to receive love because everyone always leaves so why wouldn’t these people leave too?

It’s fucking ridiculous.

(and then I’ve got to flip it around on myself)

--

Do you even KNOW how much you have to be grateful for? Quit living in your lavish home of self pity of which the walls are painted with every bad word everyone has ever said to you. Tear out the floorboards of your discontent, break the windows of your fears, rip out the drywall that holds your defects so tight the wood is cracked and splintering from the pressure.

You wake up afraid, you go to work afraid, you get home afraid, you eat dinner afraid. You live in a constant state of fear. But every night when you go to bed, you feel in your bones that everything is going to be okay. Why are you doing this to yourself? Where is your trust, your faith? Stop allowing these incessant thoughts to ruin your days and suck the happiness out of your life. The only person in control of your emotions is YOU. Start taking control.

--

At the end of it all…

Bad days are okay. They’re normal. Healthy, even. But if every day is bad, if every event feels like a chore, if you have to gag down every meal, if you have to suffer through every conversation, something is wrong. Do something about it. Stop living your life afraid and fucking do something about it.

For The Girl Who is tired of defending herself...

I want to start off by saying one thing:

The way other people view you is not your problem.

Most, if not all of us, have been there: a bad relationship ended, a fair-weather friend was called out, abusive family members have come to light, and all of the sudden, somehow WE are the bad guy.

The people who hurt us, typically (not always) the antagonist in these situations, will tell partial stories. They’ll tell the version where you said this horrible, can-never-be-forgiven thing, and leave out the hours they spent berating you before you lost all sense of reality and starting spewing vile out of your mouth like a kinked hose that’s just found release.

These toxic individuals have a way of turning everything around to make themselves look like a victim. Regardless of the original issue, people with these types of personality traits are extremely self absorbed and frequently say negative and damaging things about someone else in order to make themselves feel validated. They will make up lies, they will twist your words, they will turn context of anything and everything to better suit their case.

Merriam-Webster defines narcissism as displaying egoism: a doctrine that individual self-interest is the actual motive of all conscious action. I don’t like using words like narcissist lightly; this is an actual personality disorder that people tend to throw around. This can cause invalidation to people who are truly diagnosed narcissistic, in the same way that using terms like “I’m OCD about this” or “I’m feeling bipolar today” can cause general confusion on what the disorders really look like.

However, I do feel that there are people who, while may not have been diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, can exhibit extreme symptoms and signs of the disorder.

I like to call these people manipulators.

Not always in the sense that they are manipulating their friends or loved ones into doing bad things, but more in the sense that they are constantly manipulating their surroundings to better benefit their agenda. They can do these things with ease: manipulate others into believing that they were wronged in some way, never truly acknowledging their part in any situation.

The end result of these situations looks ugly. It looks like people’s names being tarnished on the belief that the Manipulator was being truthful about what happened. It looks like losing people who said they loved you, it looks like your friends turning your back on you, it looks like people avoiding you in public places for fear of being seen with you.

Initial reaction when these things happen to you is feeling like you need to defend yourself. Get your story out there. I did NOT do that, I did NOT behave like that. But, does it really matter? If these people you thought loved you, if these “friends” you thought you had were really your friends, would they have believed the stories to begin with? The truth is that their minds are already made up, and nothing you can say will change their minds about what they believe to be true. Defending yourself, exhausting your mind and well-being to try and defend actions that don’t require defense, is only going to end you emotionally drained and feeling helpless.

YOU
DON’T
OWE
ANYONE
AN
EXPLANATION.

It’s important to remember that if you did hurt someone, if you did wrong them, you have to take responsibility for that. You can’t write off your own actions just because the person that you hurt is now, in turn, trying to hurt you. We have to handle our own wrongdoings with tact and make them right. None of this is to say that we don’t have to admit when we’re wrong or have been dishonest. But if you’ve walked the path of someone who has truly had their name drug through the mud, made out to be the villain, or treated with such intense disrespect that it physically hurts you to hear the awful things that people believe about you…

I get it.

I know it hurts. 

I know the pain of people believing you’re evil, or mean, or hateful.

Do not stoop to their level.

Don’t bother trying to defend yourself. Your actions do not require defense. People will believe whatever is convenient for them to believe, and not necessarily what the truth is. Don’t allow yourself to get sucked into their bullshit and try to play the blame game. Do what you know is best for you. Take care of your mental health, don’t engage, and if anyone has something to say, tell them to go fuck themselves.

For The Girl Who feels like she isn’t strong enough...

Can you remember the last time you sat, alone with yourself, in a time of hardship, and said “I can do this”? Can you remember the last time you knew, without a shadow of a doubt that you were going to be okay? You’ve got this. You can take care of it. You can battle whatever demons are swirling in your mind, whatever storm is brewing outside, whatever is plaguing your heart. Can you remember the last time you sat in those feelings and knew within JUST your own power that you were going to overcome?

I can’t.

It’s not that I’ve never done it; I have. I’ve been thrown to the wolves, covered in blood, and fought my way out. I’ve been chewed up and spit out and left for dead. But never, not one time, have I ever felt like I would be able to survive.

The scenario varies. A breakup. Loss of a loved one. Loss of a job. Financial burden. Parental struggle. Addiction. Abuse. When we’re faced with these situations we feel overwhelmed. Like there’s no way we can possibly come back from this, we’ve met our match. This’ll be the one that kills us.

It never has. At least, not yet.

But that doesn’t mean it’s an easy road and it surely doesn’t mean that we’re going to feel strong and empowered and tough. Most of the time, we feel weak.

We feel like shit.

It’s not until we come out the other side that we realize we can continue to fight, and by that point, the fight’s already over. When we find ourselves stuck in what feels like an endless pit of quicksand, the hopelessness begins to set in. Our fight or flight instinct goes into overdrive and chooses for us how we’ll respond. The interesting thing about this instincts, is that neither of these options feel like they’re going to fucking get us anywhere.

When Fight kicks in, we feel run-down. It’s exhausting. It feels like we’re being dragged out to sea and trying to crawl our way past the riptide to get out. Fight is scary and brutal and hard. It is a big, daunting task that seems as though can only be won by some Amazonian Warrior type. Like if we can’t strangle the problem with our bare hands, we can’t possibly get through it. Some things we have to fight alone, and for some we can enlist an army. No matter what, blood will be shed.

Flight is a different kind of challenge. Flight makes us feel small. Flight makes us start wars we don’t even want a part in. It makes us hurt people and abandon our loved ones because we’ve carefully constructed this Wall of Fear made out of the idea that there’s no possible way anyone is going to be good to us. Flight is lonely. Flight is afraid.

When we experience Fight, we stand in the water, knee-deep, and let the waves crash into us, dragging us under and pulling us out to sea. We resurface hundreds of miles from where we know, and butterfly-stroke our way back to safety. We cry, we bleed, we fear, and we eventually get back to shore, after the battle of our lives.

When we experience Flight, we take off from the beach in a dead sprint in the middle of the night before high tide comes. We self-preserve. We say to our problems that there’s no goddamn way you’ll be able to hurt me because you’ll never get close enough. We run. 

These instincts are meant to save our lives. Please remember that the situations in which we have to Fight or Flight are those which are carefully created in a lab of a mad scientist to hurt us in ways we couldn’t even imagine up to this point. We fight for survival. We fight to learn what it’s like to be alive, to put our life at risk for the reward of saving it. We fight because it feels better to have bloody knuckles and busted lips, than to let our pain kill us. On the contrary, Flight carries us to a new land where we can breathe and not inhale the smoke from the fire burning around us. Flight helps us understand that sometimes walking away from a situation is the best we can do to save ourselves. Sometimes we have to change our pace and try again. Flight is an escape, and that escape will sometimes lead us back to the Fight we were trying so hard to avoid in the first place. What we don’t often realize is that by the time we’ve reached this impasse, the worst part is already over. The blow has been received. The hurt we feel has already occurred. Now it’s time to decide how we’re going to heal.

I’m not here to tell you that either instinct is wrong. Fight is rewarding, yes, but it’s also miserable. Flight may feel like the easy way out, but we all find different means of protecting ourselves.

Neither option feels good. Neither makes you feel like the bad bitch you wish you were in the face of adversity. But at the end of it all, when we’ve got no other options left, they help us survive.

For The Girl Who walked away...

It's okay to stop feeling like you owe everyone an explanation.

Sometimes, the decisions we make are going to impact other people. Sometimes they are going to change someone's life. Sometimes they are going to hurt. That doesn't mean we are making the wrong decision.

Marriage is forever. That's what we're taught, right? If you've made the decision - you've committed your life to someone - that's your journey. There's no turning back. You can't change your mind. No matter how much your head hurts in the morning because you went to sleep crying. No matter how much your lips bleed from biting them all day long. No matter how much your bones ache from being pushed around. No matter how big the hole in your heart gets because all you want is to be truly, deeply loved. No matter how many lies you've been told; secrets you've been sworn to keep, no matter how many times you hide them away in a time capsule that's set to self destruct on the next entry... you've made this bed. Now lie in it.

I'm here to tell you that it's bullshit. This idea that our generation "gives up on everything" so you'd better stick it out... ~or else~ 

You'll be another statistic!

Fuck. The. Statistics.

There is not a single soul in this world that's allowed to tell you that you should be miserable for the sake of not perpetuating divorce. The cycle is endless. We stay in miserable relationships, have kids in miserable situations, raise them in miserable conditions, and teach them that misery is their only option. That it's better to "see things through" than to make yourself happy. It's wrong. They're wrong.

I wish I could put you inside of my brain for a moment: take you to all the nights I spent crying on my kitchen floor. The nights I spent scrolling through my phone, trying to think of someone that I could call that would skyrocket me to the next right move. Who could wave a magic wand and fix all the ugly things in my life. The desperation. Begging something, anything, to show me what I was supposed to do next. What the right move was to make. 

It's okay to walk away, but it won't be easy. There will be days, months, and maybe even years that you'll spend wondering if you did things the right way. Wondering if you jumped the gun. If you filed for divorce too quickly, if you started dating too soon. If you moved to the right neighborhood. If you gave yourself the time you needed to heal before you had to put on that tough bitch exterior that you've grown into so well. The truth is, there is no "right way" to get divorced. If things had gone the way they were planned, you wouldn't be in this situation to begin with. But we adjust. We learn how to breathe when we feel like our lungs are deflated. We learn how to wipe tears in a public bathroom and return to the event we're at without letting anyone know we're hurting. Sometimes we need to reach out, sometimes we need the solitude. Sometimes we need to feel the grief, the pain, the fear. Sometimes we feel those shitty, fucked up feelings even if we were the ones to make the decision to leave, and god damnit, we're allowed to.

We don't owe anyone an explanation for the decisions we make. People are going to wonder, they're going to talk and they're going to gossip. You'll hear stories about yourself you'd never heard before, hear experiences you supposedly had that you never knew about. They'll talk shit. You'll lose friends. People you thought loved you will no longer be there. It won't be easy. But you aren't alone. There's a world of us out there. People who are just as red-eyed and snot-nosed as you are, who can't catch their breath, who wake up with the onset of a panic attack, who cry for no reason at all. 

Taking care of yourself can be ugly. It's not all about bubble baths and yoga and herbal tea. It's not all about lunch dates with your best friends and girls' trips. Sometimes it looks like not showering for a week because your insides feel so dirty, you think the outsides should match. Sometimes it looks like not eating a healthy meal, not talking to anyone, not putting your phone down to meditate, not turning off the video games to take a walk.

But, we carry on. We trudge through the mud and we come out on the other side - emerging like a warrior from battle. A little broken, a little bruised, a little tougher, a little stronger. We put on our war paint, we keep our head up, we don't feed into the bullshit, and we remember, above all else, that we survived.

Sometimes when it gets ugly, we just need to embrace it. Feel it. Sometimes self-care looks like indulging yourself in the things we're told are bad for us. Sometimes it looks like knowing that it's okay to be fucking sad, and not every day is going to be the day we do our best. Not being "okay" isn't anything to feel shameful of. We'll get there. Someday.

I can tell you about the sunshine. I can tell you about how it'll get better and how everything you ever wanted will someday be laid at your feet, and you'll be completely happy and content with life. But the fact is, there's a lot of fucking shipwrecks along the way. Stay the course. Weather the storm. Stop avoiding the pain and letting people tell you that everyday the best day of your life. Pain is how we grow. Don't become stagnant on your quest to better your life with facades of joy. Feel it. 

For The Girl Who wasn't ready for her post-baby body...

Written by Anonymous

You look at it every day. Your eyes fixated on every stretch mark, every roll, and god forbid there’s loose skin. That post baby body you just were NOT ready for. The body that makes you question why someone finds you attractive, prevents you from wearing tight clothes, and may even make you terrified of having more kids and doing further “damage”. I struggle to look upon my body positively every day. Sometimes suffering anxiety attacks thinking about what I’m going to wear in public that will help me look less fat. Often followed with depression because nothing I tried on hid the rolls or smoothed the curves enough to meet my expectations.

I’ve read the mom blogs, watched the inspirational videos, and those women leave me in awe of their strength and their want to help other moms not feel alone in the changes their body went through. But at the end of it I’m still left with the same question: How can I love my post baby body the way they love theirs? It’s taken me 4 years and a simple comment from my four-year-old to find an answer. I don’t have to love all of my post baby body yet. I can work on loving it one step at a time.

I know some people will tell you, “diet and exercise could fix most of the issues you see.” Yes, exercise and dieting are great, and I try to implement them in my life when I can, but what about the issues they can’t fix? Exercise won’t fix the amount of extra skin or the separation of the muscles some women are blessed with. For most women, thousands of dollars for surgery is not an option either. You work yourself to exhaustion at the gym and get headaches counting calories just to be discouraged when you find out there’s only so much of “the body you knew” that you can get back. This is when it’s important to remember you don’t have to love all of your post baby body yet.

I gave birth to a healthy 9 pound 10-ounce baby boy (Holy sh*t!). Naturally my body changed to be the best and safest place it could be for my son to grow. I will forever be impressed with the way my body knew what it needed to do. Without hesitation I would endure every stretchmark, extra pound, and cesarean scar all over again to ensure he came out as healthy as cold be. But there I was, almost 4 years later, still not in love with the body I see in the mirror. * insert long, exasperated sigh here*

While organizing some cabinets in my kitchen earlier this week my son sat down next to me and said “Mom, I like your stripes.” Puzzled I looked down to see him pointing at the stretch marks on my left hip. Sarcastically I replied to him “You gave those to mommy when you grew in my tummy.” He giggled. My son giggled with Joy because in his mind my “stripes” were a gift from him. That moment made me realize just how negatively I view myself and how easy it would be to compliment myself more if only I changed my perspective. 

Don’t get me wrong, I will probably never be fully in love with my body. But when I look at it with the perspective my son has, I’m able to appreciate it more and resent it less. He doesn’t compare my body to the way it looked 5 years ago (and honestly neither does anyone else in my life). To him, my body is just my body. Instead of focusing on the fact that my boobs are covered in stretch marks I can now be impressed with what the girls went through and that, even though it’s not much, they kept some of the volume from when I was pregnant. My thighs are bigger but they’re better at catching my phone if I drop it while I’m sitting on the toilet.  I can appreciate the increased volume my already big butt was given (I know my boyfriend does) and know that even if my stomach sags now it’s already broken in for the next baby. I can look at my body with an increased sense of humor and positivity, making jokes but lifting myself up at the same time.

All joking aside I know there will be days when it’s easier to hate on our bodies than to point out the things we love about them. Our Bodies have gone through hell and back to produce the miracles that are our children, yet we’ll judge ourselves. We’ll put on the sweat pants and baggy shirt in an effort to hide from the world. Those are the days I will try. Try to remember how much my son likes my stripes, how many times my boyfriend has called me beautiful, and how many times I’ve felt sexy all by myself and dared to shake my ass to a catchy song. The world already judges us harshly and compares us to others (the same way it would have compared and judged us in our pre-baby bodies). I think that’s earned us some self-love and acknowledgement that, like all things, we’re a work in progress. We are working on appreciating the incredible things our bodies are capable of and loving them even if they’re not as toned as they once were. 

I wasn’t ready for my post baby body but ready or not this is what my body became. It will be an uphill battle that we won’t win every day. Today I’m able to say my body is beautiful; loose skin, extra weight and all. Tomorrow I’ll work on finding one more thing to love about it even if I find ten things I don’t. It’s one of those day by day, step by step, easier said than done kind of things. And I hope by reading this you’re one step closer to loving your body too, even if it’s only a stretchmark at a time.

For the Girl Who is lost...

Let's face it, 

one of my biggest obstacles in life has been "discovering who I am"

I am 24 with no real sense of direction on which way I'm going. 

Some days I want to be an artist,

a painter 

a writer

a poet

a dancer

with the image of sitting in a well lit studio or café swirling through my head, sipping on that oh so perfect latte watching crowds roll through with painted smiles on their faces, feeling immensely inspired. 

Some days I want to be the girl who travels,

you know the one...

the girl who basks in every new adventure, a different place each week, the one who makes life seem so easy and carefree 

and BEAUTIFUL

And some days I want to be sunshine, 

the girl who glows and emanates beauty, who smiles like the sun actually shines out of her ass, who is just so breath taking and wonderful as a human that you pull in every which direction just to know her. 

Each day a new me, a new image, a new mask. 

But the hard part? Deciding which version is the inner me, the actual person that resides in this body and not just the façade. 

No, this goes deeper than that. This goes further than just self discovery. This is a deep sea dive into the struggle and fight of each inner working, each part that represents the "me" that I am. 

This goes to the emotional war, the seperation against each version of me that exists in the world, in the eyes of friends, and the image of myself living in my brain.

In the beginning you'll feel like a false prophet, shouting words that aren't truly yours, leading a trove of people to an idea you created, hoping they'll take it as truth.

Until eventually, you yourself believe in the false face.

This goes to the everyday battle
The person you once were
The person you wish to be
And which path you'll travel to get there

This goes to the anxiety you feel, as you start to age while your arms flail hoping to catch even the slightest bit of who you are. Where your insecurity creeps in hounding on you for not yet figuring it out, for failing not only yourself but the world.

This goes for that slight moment of clarity, as you start to discover the pieces of yourself that didn't before exist. The ones that fall into the right places while your fears subside and your inner pendulum settles, revealing exactly who you are supposed to be; all the things you've dreamt of all along.

This goes for the girl who wants to be everything at once, who takes a piece of each person, each day, and holds on

This goes for the girl who is just like me.

For the Girl who reads this...

I didn't start this blog with the intent to inspire. 
I started this with the intent to navigate my own life, to feel less alone. 

I always struggled with understanding my place in the world and who I set out to be. 
Like all humans, I found comfort in being able to talk out my inner struggles with close friends. 
However,  I started to feel like reaching out wasn't enough anymore. 
That navigating my life and emotions was a burden to those I unloaded on. 
And The place that I once found comfort in was now clouded with doubt, guilt. 
Guilt that I had placed the people I loved into the position of hearing my bullshit and yet also doubt that they cared to hear it anymore. 
Even though I knew they loved me, I couldn't shake the feeling that my journey to self discovery was now a burden. Just an annoying buzzing they were obligated to listen to because I am me. 

I want For the Girl to be for every person who has felt the way I do. 
A place to find comfort when you find that you've now become a burden.
A place to find that it's okay to cry
And to smile
And to laugh
A place to know you aren't alone
A place that you, like so many of us, can feel at home.