Stop Comparing …

I constantly find myself asking the question, ‘why not me?’ … I look around and people I grew up seem to have their whole lives together. They’re either getting married, having kids, and excelling in their careers. I want to be striving too, but sometimes I feel I’m really not. Hell I can’t even get a guy to commit to me. People say I’m pretty and a great catch, but for some reason I can’t seem to get a relationship. Honestly that’s all I want. I want a boyfriend, I want someone who I can call my best friend. When is it my turn? Why can’t I have that? I feel I have grown. I no longer feel I am that shy little girl, but still I can’t seem to have what other people have. I watch people my age getting engaged and I can’t help but feel a little jealous. I want that. I want someone to love me like that. I want to be able to love someone like that. I want a. healthy relationship. I never had one. The only two real relationships I’ve had were completely toxic.

I know I need to stop comparing myself to others, it isn’t doing me any good. But social media doesn’t make it very easy. It causes so much anxiety in us. You see the “good” in peoples lives. But you have to rememberer they aren’t posting the “bad”. No one is publicly displaying the ongoing problems they are experiencing. So it may look life someone is having the best life online, when in actuality they’re having the most miserable time of their lives. That’s what I have to constantly tell myself. That things are never as it seems. That there’s always something hidden. Don’t assume. The phrase “assuming makes an ass of you and me” is ever so true, it really does.

I need to look at the positives. I have an amazing dog who loves me unconditionally. I have a job. I have a roof over my head. There are things to bee grateful for. But because of our time invested in social media, we get blinded.

Every day I am working on just being me. Not caring what other people think of me. My path is my path. Just because it hasn’t happened to me yet, doesn’t mean it won't. No one is better than me.

Confidence In Yourself = Freedom In Life

Confidence. How does one become confident? In my experience it means owning who are, and not letting anyone tell you otherwise. I struggled with this definition for a very long time. By definition, it is ‘the feeling of self assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s own abilities or qualities.’ Honestly speaking, I feel it takes a great deal of self discipline to achieve. In comparison to 8 years ago I feel I have grown quite a bit in this area. However some days I feel I haven’t at all. Sometimes I still feel like I am this scarred little girl. Sometimes I feel I’ll never grow out of it.With all the self development courses I’ve done over the years, I feel I am not as ‘developed’ as I should be. I still let my anxiety rule of my life, I let it control me and honestly I don’t know if i’m ever going to be able to have a control over it. I feel so small. I feel people think of me of this little girl and I honestly don’t know how to break away from it. I don’t think my young looking appearance really helps with that. I am 27 years old and people still think I’m seventeen or eighteen. I want to look my age and I don’t know what to do differently. I dress how other 27 year old dress, I do things that other 27 year olds do, but somehow it still doesn't work. I know people say it’s a good thing to look young, but sometimes it doesn’t always feel that way.

People say I’m still young, but I don’t feel so young. I’m 3 years away from 30, I thought I’d be a lot further in my life, As a kid you think you’ll be well put together by this age, but boy was I wrong. As a kid, one typically thinks by their twenties, they’d have everything put together. I mean my mom had me at twenty-four. I can’t imagine having a child at age twenty-four. My life was so not put together. For one, I was living with my abusive ex, two I got suspended from school, and three I was a barista at Starbucks, struggling to pay rent. It’s funny though I could have had that opportunity. From age 22-24 I’ve had three abortions. Sometimes I fear that those were my chances to have kids. I fear that when I’m actually ready to have kids, there will be too many complications. I’ve heard that the more you go through abortions, it’s a greater possibility. But back then I was no where near ready to have kids, I didn’t know who I was and how can you have a kid when you don’t even know who you are? I think that’s why people typically have problems with their parents growing up. For me, I feel because my mom had me young, she wasn’t able to figure herself out first. My mom is good-hearted person. She’s always wanting to lend a hand, and be a support to someone. But when it comes to self-love, she struggled. Growing up my mom struggled with her identity. I always found it backwards growing up, when I was sitting at home, my mom was the one out partying. I mean she would always provide food for me, but me eating alone with my cat was my typical evening after school. I don’t have any siblings so at times that definitely made things more lonely. Growing up I was the lone wolf, and breaking away from that has been one of the most challenging things. Of course I feel alone, I felt alone for almost my entire childhood, it’s comfortable. But sometimes I imagine what would life be like if my mom had me at a later age. Would my mom have more confidence in herself? I believe the lack of confidence in my mom is what caused all of the hurt in our relationship. She lacked confidence in herself which caused her to do certain things. So maybe it’s not always a bad thing to have a baby later on in life. In order to nurture another human being, you have to own who you are.

I hope that one day I’ll feel the confident person I aspire to be. I feel I am not far off, and I believe I am capable of great things. I just need to work on those self loathing days, it’s not helping me or anyone else for that matter.