With Taylor Swift and her glamourous squad splashed across glossy magazine pages and clogging our Instagram feeds, its easy to discount the idea of a “girl gang” as something ornamental instead of essential. As a woman who hangs out mostly with guys due to the sport I’m involved in, it was easy for me to discount it. I could talk with the boys, keep up with them, and still go home to binge on Scandal and Gilmore Girls in peace. But then I found my girl gang, and it changed me more in three months than I ever thought possible.
The women I’ve surrounded myself with this year are fearless. They speak bluntly, not only of their successes, but also of their failures and fears – the class that’s close to tanking their GPA, the toxic boy they keep coming back to, their hopes and dreams, their struggles with money and stress, and the good days that make a bad week a little brighter. They have problems. Failures. Shortcomings. And they not only know it or accept it. They embrace it. Where one falters, the other holds her up. They are women I can call at two in the morning crying. They are the women who listen gently, but give advice firmly. They are the women grab coffee on short notice. The women I can drag to the mall for an honest opinion. The women who make each other smile through tears. Who buy each other groceries because payday is still two weeks away, and with only coffee and oatmeal in the kitchen, it would have been a long two weeks. They are the women who find no fault in my tears, or in my passiveness, or even my selfishness on days when I need to take care of myself before others.
Because of my girl gang, I am emboldened. But it is not their fearlessness that rubbed off on me. I still fear failure like a monster under my bed. But their love and unconditional support has given me the security to take bold risks. They have taught me the importance of saying “no”. The times I’ve fought with them, they have given me the space I needed to stand my ground without consequence to our friendship. When I fail at something, they pick me up and dust me off. I would not be as strong as I am today without the women I’ve surrounded myself with. So yes, girl gangs take goofy pictures to post to Instagram. Yes, we shop and snapchat each other our outfits and build one another’s self-worth. But the girl gang is not a vapid little cadre of girls stroking one another’s egos. Its an essential part of my growth as a young woman, of giving myself the power to take risks and accept failure. My girl gang has radically changed my perspective because the girl gang? The girl gang is a support system that I know has my back unconditionally.