I’m Workin’ My Way Back To You, Babe…

With A Burnin’ Love Inside

For as long as I can remember, I have felt inadequate.

And unfortunately, for most of my life, I let the attention (or inattention) and praise (and complaints) of strangers outweigh my own beliefs and so- I have struggled with loving myself as I am because I have been basing my worth on what others think or feel about me.

…Which I DO NOT RECOMMEND TO ANYONE!

Because of my low self-esteem, I have changed things about myself in order to feel “more pretty”, “more smart”, “more interesting”, and anything I could come up with in order to satisfy and impress others.

This has led me to:

• Shaving my eyebrows off and painting them every time I go out (because I was bullied every day when I was 7 years-old for having “ugly eyebrows”).
• Bleaching my dark black hair blonde multiple times in my life in order to feel cuter.
• Wearing contacts instead of glasses because people thought I looked ugly with glasses.
• Shaving my leg hair and arm hair to fit in with the majority of girls who do that to look aesthetically more pleasing to look at (even though it’s annoying to shave).
• Shaving my face weekly because hair grows around my mouth and on my chin.
• Educating myself in what other people liked despite them not putting in the effort to do the same.
• Pushing myself to go to school even when I didn’t feel stable- because I wanted to be like everybody else. I didn’t like being an outsider.
• Feeling like a loser when I couldn’t do what people my age where doing.
• Hiding my true feelings from “friends” who would roast me and make fun of me when I was 19 years-old… because I wanted friends more than I wanted to be honest.

And so on and so forth…

And honestly, although I don’t look like the 7-year-old that got bullied heavily anymore…

I still feel like that 7-year-old.

I still struggle with feeling like I’m enough.

But I don’t want to live this way anymore.

I don’t want to please others and/or satisfy other people anymore with changing aspects of myself that make me me.

I don’t want to let other people’s opinions about me hurt me.

I want to remember that I am doing my best.

I want to remember that I went through a lot.

And only I know how that has affected me.

Only I know what it took to get through that.

And no one else gets to influence my feelings about me anymore.

As of today,

I am beautiful because I believe I am.

I am strong because I have proven that time and time again.

I am worthy of being loved by myself and I always have been.

It’s okay if I made mistakes in the past, what matters is that I am learning.

And I’m going to continue workin’ my way back to me.

Because that’s always been my destiny.

And I’m gonna do it with a burnin’ love inside!