I'm Just Like You!

I get up every day and go through the motions of life whether that be working or running errands or getting my hair done.  Isn't that picture great by the way? LOL  I have a husband, children, and dogs. I love road trips with the kids and have a love for trees, specifically the California Redwoods. I have a dysfunctional family and wouldn't trade them for anyone else's.  I love hard, wear my heart on my sleeve and sarcasm is my best friend. Maybe I'm just like you.  

Most of us go through life struggling to fit in, to be liked, to find rewarding relationships and careers.  We meet some amazing people and some we wish we would have never crossed paths with. We make wrong decisions and are very hard on ourselves, are we not?  We are our own worst critics.

I can tell you from personal experience that I lost myself along this path of life many times.  I put my time and energy into other things and especially other people who were not worthy of my time. I loved others more than I loved myself which is a damn shame but hindsight is always 20/20.

Here's what I know: I am beautiful. I am worthy. I love myself.  It has taken me more than half, more like most, of my life to get to this place.  To be able to say that I love myself and mean it sometimes remains an internal struggle. There may never come a time when I can say that every day and believe it but you know what?  I'm going to keep going through the motions.  I'm going to keep looking at myself in the mirror and finding things that I like.

I don't know where this lack of self love has come from. I know my upbringing was not traditional but then who's is and what does that mean exactly?  I was molested at a very young age and still carry that load (even while much lighter it has, and likely will never, completely go away) with me. I was picked on in school for my weight and lived through an abusive relationship as an adult.  I was creating my own hell for some of the years whether I knew it or not.  And now, I am happy, healthy, and healing which is a statement my daughter started telling herself and well, I have followed suit.

It takes a conscious effort to be happy.  Anything can change your mood if you let it.  You wake up happy and by the time you've gotten to work you're in a crappy mood because so and so was driving like an asshole.  Or maybe you spilled your coffee and now you are lacking your caffeine fix.  It's not the end of the world, is it?  People drive like assholes all the time.  Hell, I know I've been one of them on occasion and I would imagine we all.  I've spilled things before. Guess what? I lived. Gah! Don't let the little things or even the big things get you so worked up.  It is a much better day when you choose to be positive and happy.

Choose to see the good in yourself as you would in others.  Stop the shaming, the blaming, and the downright nasty conversations you have with yourself.  Have the damn candy if you want it!  Don't tell yourself you don't deserve it or you're fat or whatever other horrible things you say.  What if I wanted a piece of candy?  Would you say those things to me?  I didn't think so.  Be nice to yourself as if you were talking to someone else. 

I write these blog posts to heal the scars that my mind wants to hang on to and perceive as negative. I have a belief system perhaps different from others but it works for me.  I believe that everything, yes everything, happens for a reason.  I may never know what the reasoning is for some of my life events but I do know I wouldn't be the independent, resilient woman I am without all of them.