At the beginning of my senior year of high school before coming to Florida State, I wrote a letter to myself. The purpose of the letter was to come back a year later to see the many ways in which my life and my point of view on the things had changed. I didn’t know it at the time, but college would change the way I thought about myself and the relationships I made with the people around me for the better.
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“Why is it that I feel like I need to gain validation from the eyes of men who objectify me? I feel like I need their comments and I need their attention to feel good about myself. I blame them for the way I feel but it’s no use because it doesn’t fix the problem. I am the one who needs fixing and I need to learn to love myself before anyone or anything else. Not to mention, when I finally get their attention, as soon as I feel it, it gets old and I just move on to the next best thing. So, I’m forced to ask myself, ‘When will this incessant torture cycle end?”
“I wear makeup because I care about how others perceive me but walk in the streets of my hometown as if I don’t care what anyone else thinks. I would be lying if I said I didn’t care what they thought about me. Specifically, what my hair looks like, the clothes I wear, the things I say, the people I’m with. I can’t even post a picture on Instagram without almost deleting it because I’m afraid the caption isn’t good enough or it seems like I’m trying too hard. These people I call my friends are the mirror on the wall I stare into for validation. My reflection manipulated by their stringent comments and opinions.”
As you can see, my priorities were not consistent with the person I truly wanted to be. I used to care so much about who I was seen with. I was led to believe that attractive people only made friends with other attractive people, so I needed to always look my best and act my best to maintain this false sense of confidence. But as time went on, the harsh realities of life set in and I made friends with bad, manipulative people. I was abused by the people I tried to keep close to me, both mentally and physically. Everything I did was not for me but for them and it took leaving it all behind and moving to a new place to finally realize I was more than the image I was keeping up for them.
Despite all of this, as I look back on this time in my life, I am glad to be where I am today. I have met people who support me and appreciate all I have to offer, and I am pursuing my passion for writing because it’s my choice, not because someone else told me how I should be living my life. If you take away anything from this article, I hope it’s that it’s not selfish to do the things you want to do and be who you ought to be. In the society we are living in today, it takes courage and strength to be an individual and not be bothered by the expectations of the world.
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