Being unapologetically you

Do you ever find yourself holding back in front of certain people? Maybe you don't laugh as hard or speak up in conversation. Maybe you find yourself looking in the mirror before you present yourself. Do you ever ask yourself why you do that? and why those certain people? Why does their opinion matter so much to you that you feel like you need to hold back who you truly are in front of them? Wouldn't it feel better to just be you?

I still occasionally find myself in these situations but I will say it is far less often than before. As I get older, I am making more of a conscious effort to stop worrying about what other people think of me and just be myself. I love to laugh even though I am loud. I love to speak my mind even when others don't agree. But there are some people who I come across that I find myself hiding those pieces of me. Why?

In the end, it is a me problem and not them. Looking deeper into why I feel this way has a whole lot more to do with my ego than theirs. Taking the time to recognize this behavior is the only way for you to improve upon it. It can be really scary to let others see your most truest inner thoughts. Yet here I am, exposing myself on the internet. I am pushing myself to do this because I know that it is the only way for people to truly understand my message and what I am trying to accomplish and that is relatability. When we relate to one another, we bond on a deeper level.

We all have inner thoughts. Sometimes, they may seem so far off than what we think others are thinking until we gain enough courage one day to say it to someone. Then we find out that they too have had those very same thoughts. We are all too scared to share because we are afraid of judgement. It's normal. At the same time, it is something we can overcome. I will say, the more I stick to my true self, especially around others, the better I feel over all throughout the entire day.

If you don't already have someone in your life that you can be completely yourself with, I highly recommend finding someone to build that kind of bond with. You won't regret it.

How High Is The Pedestal?

As we grow up, we view the people around us as role models. Whether they like it or not. Everything they do in our presence, we observe and learn. When you are little, you don't know any better than what is around you. What is your normal, may be world altering for someone to get to know later in life.

This realization is one I started to struggle with in my early teens. What I thought was normal, turn out to be pretty fucked up to my friends. When I started to get to know other families and how they lived their lives, I started to realize that the things the people in my family did, weren't the same.

These weren't minuscule things like my family goes out to dinner every Christmas Eve and someone else's family goes to their grandmothers house. I am talking more like your drunk aunt calls your dad a fat ass at the poker table and a huge family brawl breaks out and you end up in the hospital on Christmas Eve night with a different aunt who broke her arm going down the icy stairs as she angrily tried to leave the family fight.

I'm talking alcohol everywhere, aunts popping pills in the bedroom and your cousin shooting up somewhere...God only only knows. But when this is the normal you grow up with, you don't realize that other families are actually doing some of that cheesy stuff you see in the movies. In my early twenties, I smoked pot with my aunts and uncles in the basement with my siblings and cousins one holiday night. I thought it was cool and funny even though at that point, I knew it wasn't the norm. But I didn't care. I wanted to have fun with my family.

The thing about my family, they are funny as hell and they know how to have a good time. The problem is, they don't always know when to stop. When I talk about my family, I am including myself. The most important thing I have learned about my family is that they are people who make mistakes. Sometimes they learn the first time, and sometimes it takes years. Sometimes they will have your back and sometimes they will shut the door in your face. But the biggest realization I could divulge to you is that what I have really learned is that they are people. Humans. They are not perfect. They do not have all the answers. They are learning as they go. Just like the rest of us.

Even though my parents are my parents, I found myself putting them very high up on this pedestal with expectations of them being people they are not. To no fault of their own. They are just people. They made a family, they raised their kids. They brought us around their families who were doing the same thing.

So yeah, I may have seen and experienced more than the average person. For a while, I really let it take me down some dark paths. I have made extremely poor choices thinking that it was okay. I have lived and learned and most importantly, I have recognized that everyone around me, including my parents, are all just trying to live our lives and figure it out as we go. No one should be placed higher up than someone else. No one is perfect. All we can do is learn from each other. Then we get to make the choices we see fit.

You cannot and should not play the blame game. It won't get you to where you want to be. Instead, learn to reflect on who you are as a person and who you want to be.

Survive The Night

Let me just start by saying, if you have not read a Riley Sager book yet, What are you actually doing? His writing flows in a way that makes time fly so fast and before you know it you are deep in the book and can't sleep (In a good way!).

This book in particular takes place mostly in a car yet, I found myself deeply involved in the story and rooting for Charlie the whole time. This girl is in a relationship that she wants out of and in desperate need to get away from her college campus where a serial killer has been killing classmates. Charlie decides to go to the college message board to see if she can find a way out, this is when she meets Josh. He is the answer to her plans until they get into the car. As they begin learning about each other on this dreadfully long road trip, Charlie begins to notice discrepancies in Josh's story. She begins to get really nervous so she asks him to pull over for a bathroom break. They stop at a diner off the highway and that is when Charlie begins to feel she is in great danger. She tries to reach out to her boyfriend. But things don't go quite as planned.

When Charlie confronts Josh on his story, he says all the right things and Charlie begins to question herself. Is Josh really harmful or is she just in her head? Something doesn't feel right but what is it?

This story has a twist you will never see coming!