By: Amelia-Rose Williams
I first started dating when I was fourteen years old. Growing up, trying to come up with my own definition of love was hard. I struggled a lot with my self-image. To make matters worse, the area I grew up in wasnât the best for âexperimentingâ. It was really hard to make connections with people who I felt already had such a large disparity between the two of us.
As Iâm slowly growing out of my adolescence, Iâm beginning to start to develop a proper understanding of what love truly looks like. Admittedly, I grew jealous of the fact that many of my peers found love so quickly. It hurt not being able to easily form connections like that.
However, I realized that Iâm a deeply complex individual who, unfortunately, carries a lot of baggage, and not just anyone can swoop into my life and be able to understand and balance that alongside me. After coming to that realization, I was like, âIâm a lot more complicated than I thought and that deserves a special kind of attention to detail that not everyone can see/understandâ.Â
Itâs hard because you always think of yourself as not being âgood enoughâ, âpretty enoughâ, or constantly nitpicking things that donât even matter. In the end, you realize that there is only so much about yourself that you can change. Not to mention, you shouldnât change yourself just for another person’s approval.Â
Thinking of it that way made me feel a lot better about myself and made me analyze my situation a lot better. After all was said and done, Iâve come to realize that I need to look for someone who checks these boxes, and I shouldnât ever settle for less or compare myself to people who arenât walking the same path of life as I am.Â