For most of my life leading up to high school, and even part of high school as well, I found myself living my life for other people. Caring too much about what they expect from me, if they like me, even how they perceived me. This put a lot of stress on me because most of the people I surrounded myself with had families that were wealthier than mine. I remember I would always feel bad about my clothes and I would beg my parents to buy me things that we could hardly afford. This made me extremely embarrassed of my family at one point. Reflecting back on this time in my life is so weird because I was completely oblivious at how damaging it was. The only thing I was worried about was fitting in, even if it meant separating myself from my own family. I would try so hard to be who I thought that other people wanted me to be.
At some point during my sophomore year, the pressure became too much and everything started falling apart for me. I had a lot of family stress going on and I was having problems with my boyfriend at the time. This was a really low point in my life and it showed me who was actually there for me. It was like a wakeup call that I desperately needed. It was the first time I truly questioned my morals, goals, beliefs, etc. I had to break down everything to figure out what I actually cared about and not what I had been brainwashed to care about.
During this process, I began to read a lot more. I would save quotes that matched my beliefs, write down my feelings, draw, paint, deconstruct things, and try to put them back together in a different way. I was just trying to create anything that reflected how I really wanted to be seen. I started realizing that I was wasting so much of my time trying to impress people that didn’t even really care about me. In fact, they were rooting for me to fail more often than they wanted to see me win. It changed the way I thought about everything. Most days I would sit in my room alone for as long as I could but I cannot express how much I appreciate the people who were patient with me during this time. Once you stop thinking that everyone owes you something, it makes you more grateful for the ones who support you even when they don’t owe it to you.
From then on, everything I did was for myself. I dressed for myself, I did things I liked to do, I spent more time with my family and I realized how special they are to me. There were people who would tell me that I looked like I was doing so good and I was. I felt better than I ever have. It was like a giant weight was lifted off of me. This entire process was over the course of months. It felt like forever. There were many nights that I spent crying and thought that things would never get better but it turns out, if you invest some time into yourself then things will do better.
Self-growth is a never-ending process. I catch myself falling back into my old ways sometimes because it is easy to forget what is important in life if you are not constantly reminding yourself. I try not to get too down about it, but instead, make more time to self reflect and remember what I stand for. My advice to you is to always stay true to yourself. In a world where everyone’s personal life is at our fingertips, don’t get caught up in it. The only thing that matters is that you are happy. Anything that gets in the way of that isn’t worth stressing over.