You don’t need to pretend like it’s Halloween 365 days a year. You don’t need to pretend that you’re a unicorn, a stone mountain, or a vicious dragon. I get it; it’s sometimes nice pretending to be someone you aren’t for a little bit, but when you do this every day, every year, you start to lose that person who is underneath all those walls. You start to turn into a victim of the conniving Medusa- frozen in a mound of stone, not able to burst free with the bouncing energy that you are most known for.

Everyone enjoys seeing you in your everyday clothes.

You know that we are both a fan of film. If you happened to become a big movie star, landing gigs starring opposite Chris Evans, Ryan Reynolds, or Ryan Gosling, I would hope that you would get to at least star in a biopic about you as yourself. I can imagine lines and lines of people rounding the sides of movie theaters just waiting to get into a showing of a movie about the real you.

Some strangers may come only because your name is big, and they want to see you star opposite of their favorite movie stars of today, but there’s plenty of other people out there who want to see this film purely to see you.

They want to see you act as your true, uncensored self. They want to see the parts of your life that shaped you into being who you are. They want to hear about your inner-struggles and how you overcame them. These people truly care about your life story and want to learn from you. They want to see how you have handled life with grace and risen to become the strong woman you are today. You may not believe it, but the number of people that would come to see your movie because they care so much about you would fill multiple showings, over multiple days.

What I need to tell you, Girl Behind the Mask, is that you need to throw the mask away every once and awhile and let your true self fly free. I would be a hypocrite if I didn’t say that sometimes, I believe that a mask over your true self can save a lot of hurt caused by the wrong people can inflict upon you. A mask serves a barrier that makes the pain not hurt as much.

However, hiding behind a mask makes it harder to realize how many people care about your well-being, how many people’s lives are affected by your acts of kindness, and how many people you truly make happy. A mask ruins your sense of vision, not allowing you take in the beauties of the world. This doesn’t allow you to take in all of the little signs of love and care that the people around you show you daily.

You may question people’s intentions behind their actions quite frequently, as you are not sure who you can trust, but please, understand that you don’t need to question when people tell you that you are kind, you are strong, and that you matter. These are qualities inside yourself that no person can ever take from you.

This might sound like a lot of crap, Girl Behind the Mask, but just please listen to me when I tell you that one, two, three, or four people who were awful towards you shouldn’t dictate how you live your life, controlling your happiness. You have an army of at least 70-80 true people (trust me, I know) who will behind you always, ensuring that you are living your best life. I am always going to be leading that army no matter how far I have to march for you.

Girl Behind the Mask, I love you so much. Please, just remember to love yourself. You deserve that.

The Girl In Front of Your Mask