This school year, my life has changed drastically: new home, new school, new routine, new friends; everything is NEW. Because of that, I feel like I've grown as a person to, which is awesome. However, something strange has been happening to me the past couple of weeks. I dream about past memories that I am not so fond of every night. This has caused me to think about those bad memories all day, putting me in a rut the past couple of weeks.

I thought I dealt with this past a long time ago and I thought I moved past it, so why is my past creeping into my new chapter of life?

Then, I had a couple realizations. One, putting your past in a small little box and pretending to forget about it all IS NOT dealing with your past. Your subconscious still knows your past exists, like I found out these past couple of weeks. And two, in order to start a new chapter of life, you must understand your past chapters. Like a book, the current chapter you start reading makes no sense unless you read and comprehend the chapters before.

So how does one deal with their past in order to move forward in life? Good questions, still trying to figure that out. For me personally, talking about my struggles with people that knew me in that period of time and also know me well now is something that has helped me, because those people knew what I was going through then and know how much I've grown as well. Something else that has helped me is journaling, I like to write down my highs and lows of the day, and I also like reading old journal entries I wrote, because it reminds me all the prayers God has answered and reaffirms my growth as a person. And lastly, I am learning to accept my struggles are not weaknesses, but strengths. A quote that has stuck with me is "a flower must grow through dirt in order to bloom." The dirt and crap in your life is just as important as the bloom. Forgetting that the dirt exists in my life is not helping me bloom.

Learning to bloom and learning to understand the past chapters of my life in order to thrive in my new chapter is not easy, but I am getting there. If you're struggling with this too, I hope you know you're not alone.