Sometimes people have it in their heads that they need to be good at everything. They supposedly need to have the best grades, be a sports superstar, and have the perfect social life with the “best” group of friends. I have seen people tear themselves into pieces over the insignificant things in their lives when they aren’t meeting the overly ambitious standards, and honestly, they should not have any reason to. I know what you are thinking; I probably sound ridiculous. Honestly, it really is OK not to be perfect all the time. Do you want to know why?

You are who you are and that is perfect enough.

Yes, cue the eyerolls and the exasperated sighs. You all have heard that before. Most of you have probably heard this so many times from those “talks” with your mom about how you will eventually turn from an ugly duckling to a beautiful swan or something cliché like that. Trust me, I am not here to tell you that you are perfect and you don’t realize it just yet. We have to be realistic here; it is physically impossible for anyone to be perfect all the time. We all want to believe that we are super human and that we can handle everything that comes our way, but that is just too much work for our bodies to handle.

Sometimes, you aren’t going to get the best grades. You may excel in one class, but then things may not click in another. That’s completely normal. It’s pointless to wallow about a grade when you are the one who is controlling the amount of work you put into the class. If you are being lazy and not putting in effort you should expect your grade to be where it is. However, there are those classes where things may never just click. You may put in every ounce of effort that you can find in your brain, but then things still flop. Your grade may suffer from this, but you should never worry about the things that are difficult to change. Sometimes, you just have to roll with it and realize that not everything is in your control. You should try your hardest to prevent negative outcomes, but sometimes even the most diligent human can struggle with that. Your grades may bomb from time to time, but that is just a part of life and serves as an opportunity for you to learn from your mistakes.

Sometimes, you may not be the best at sports. Things may not click in your brain as fast as the people you play against. While they are nailing all their serves, hitting all home runs, and winning all of their matches, you may be hitting the ball way out or smacking someone else in the head with it when you dare to attempt to serve the ball. This is probably frustrating for you; I feel you on that. You probably feel like you have landed on planet Mars or something. The people around you probably look at you like you have antennas growing out of ears since you seem like an alien to them. You can try to watch all of the “How to” videos that you want, try to imagine that you are some famous athlete to fake some confidence, or even put in 100% effort, but sometimes people are just naturally better at sports. Honestly just try your best, and if you lose, who cares? It’s just a stupid game and your future doesn’t depend on it.

Sometimes, people are just plain not going to like you either. You may not ever fully understand what you did for them to act this way towards you. They may get irritated by your best qualities, like your optimism, your humor, or how you care too much about the well-being of others. You may wonder what you did to make them feel this way. You give every ounce of effort you have to get them to like you, but that is still not enough. People may judge you for what you look like, who you hang out with, or even the petty things like how you talk and how you dress. They may judge you because you are not as competitive as they are, or even just because you are different from them. These people do not have the right to put you down because you are not some carbon-copy of the perfect human that they are looking for.

Everybody has their qualities that make them imperfectly perfect.

There are people out there who try to attack you for these qualities because they found something that can push your buttons. Everyone these days have it in their heads that they have to be great at everything. When there are those people who excel at multiple things, others will try to find things to bring that person back down to their level. They feel insecure about themselves, so they try to play off their insecurities on to other people. This may eventually hurt you a lot in the process. You may sense their frustrations with you when you aren’t doing things “right,” or they may plainly tell you that you suck. You know in your head that you do suck, but their words ingrain this in your head more and make you feel terrible. Sometimes, there are some people out there who really need to see others fail in order to make themselves feel better.

You can’t let these people win. Don’t give them the satisfaction from their put-downs that truly do hurt on the inside. They want to see a reaction out you, so don’t give them the reaction that they want. Stand up for yourself; don’t let them win. Don’t surround yourself with these kinds of people either. I know it can suck when the people who make you feel frustrated about the most beautiful qualities of yourself are people who you consider to be your “friends”, but really are these people your friends if they don’t accept all of the little things about you?

If you see someone else struggling with their insecurities, be sure to help them out. No matter how much people hate to admit it, everyone has struggled with something about themselves before. You are qualified to give that person un-solicited advice whether they like it or not. Just like you, they are probably not going to want to admit to their faults. They are going to want to believe that they are either perfect in their own way or that their “imperfect” quality is a detriment to their life. Be there for that person, share your stories with them to help them realize that everybody makes mistakes, and everybody has those days.

Finally, remember that your life is not like a novel or a movie script. Things are not all written out for you by some mysterious writer who controls you like a puppet. You get to choose how you live your life, and you also don’t have to put up with people’s crap if you don’t want to. Don’t fret when things don’t go your way when you try your best to make things right. Life is like a Choose-Your-Own Adventure book. Not only do you control your own life, but you get to be that dynamic hero or heroine who is full of flaws, conflict, and spunk. You are able to embrace your imperfections and ignore the people who try to bring you down. Besides, who wants to be that static nobody who has no substance, uniqueness, or anything special about them?