You spent an entire portion of your life thinking everything was the way it was supposed to be. You were smiling. You loved. You were loved. You were experiencing. You felt safe. Everything was simple. You were doing everything the way you thought you should have.

You followed the rules, played by the books. Your family was proud of you. Day in, day out. There was endless constancy in your life. It was a good thing, wasn't it? I mean, you hate change. You fear it. You continue living mediocrely, just to protect yourself from the possibility of an awful life.

Were you mistreated? No.

Were you hurt? I don't think so.

Were you happy? You thought you were.

You settled.

Never settle.

What happened?

You woke up one day and something was different. You know exactly what day this was. It was visible. It was tangible. It was obvious.Though, apparently, only obvious to you.

Was it enough? No. It wasn't enough.

You felt it. I know you did. But, I also know you weren't able to act on it. You were hanging on by a thread. There was a single petal left to the once eternal rose.

That petal, too, fell.

And now what?

The funny thing about settling is that you have no idea that you're doing it until you no longer are. It wasn't until you experienced a real smile did you understand that all of the preceding ones were as forced as everything else at the time. You realize that simplicity isn't everything. Sometimes it's worth taking a risk if there's even a small chance of the type of euphoria you now know exists.

So what have you learned from this?

Just because everything was okay doesn't mean you don't deserve more. Just because they put their all into it, doesn't mean that their all isn't lesser than that of someone else. Follow your gut feeling. If you wake up one day and the normalcy of every other day has shattered beneath your feet, don't brush it off. You don't need a reason. You are human. You feel. Don't dare settle ever, again. You're worth way more than you know.