I hope that you have your own separate beliefs; different from your parents, your significant other, your best friends etc. Your beliefs should be yours, but it's great to have similarities and differences with others. I feel like so often in this society of social media and news headlines everywhere, everyone just supports the same things because they don't want to offend anyone. They just do this thing called: "Going with the flow."

It's 2018 and people can get offended by so much so easily. Yes, there are so many topics that can stir up heated discussions, but those conversations don't have to be fueled with anger and bias.

I want to be able to stand on the two ends of the spectrum. I want to see the pros and the cons of both sides of a problem or situation that I might see as controversial. We often end up going to people who are like-minded so that we can be fueled by the beliefs that we already support. But being open-minded and thoughtful about active ideas and reforms causes you to be able to understand something you might have been ignorant about.

I'm not telling you to just go and love something you hate. I'm asking you to consider what the opposing team has to deal with and what they support. There are so many things that we miss when all we do is push a certain ideal or people group to the side. We should be curious about things that challenge us.

Why do they challenge us? What are the challenges? Who believes in these challenges? When did we adopt the belief about the challenges?

I don't want to give you things to believe, just things to consider in this ever-changing world.

When people say, "Don't take my word for it," they mean that you have to make your own opinion about that particular thing. They don't want you to just take their opinion. For example, if someone says that a certain food restaurant had terrible salads and follows with "don't take my word for it," it means that their personal experience wasn't the best. Then you should make your own decision about whether the salads were really terrible. Everyone has different beliefs and opinions and there is so much importance in having your own beliefs and opinions.

Individuality is so important, and I feel like so often people just do what others do just so they can "fit in." But this society is everything and anything but "fitting in." We want to stand out from our peers. Take projects: People don't want their project to look the same as anyone else's so they put their individualism on display.

Our individualism is shown in the way we think and what we believe about people. What we believe about the world and the way we act. In the clothes we wear and the people we love. We should be able to decipher between what we believe and what others want us to believe.