Being a part of our society makes it so hard to be ourselves. Regardless of how easy this may seem; it is actually extremely hard for most. For myself almost my entire life has been spent being what everyone else wanted which made me very unhappy. It causes you to lose a lot of self confidence and feel almost like an alien. Not until the past year could I say that I have truly just been myself.

Since we are constantly being told what is acceptable or unacceptable, it seems nearly impossible to just be you. Making the decision to just follow my own path and be my own person regardless of what others thought of me was the absolute best thing I could have ever done for myself. I always found myself basically dressing the part of what a basic high school teenage girl would be and I always felt very out of character and somewhat empty. Feeling like I was missing something, I decided to stop caring so much about what others thought of me. Now of course no one can get rid of that entirely, but releasing some of that constant need for acceptance was pretty freeing. I realize that a lot more things are being accepted, but its still extremely hard to not have that obligation to be like everyone else.

You probably think that by being yourself you would be out-casted or “weird”. Whether you are a carbon copy of everyone else or a unique individual, this may still happen. The idea with that is don’t live your life to please people who really aren’t worth pleasing or that have no actual effect on your life. We have very little time in life so spending it trying to be exactly like everyone else is pretty wasteful if you ask me. Those who step outside of the box and choose to be different and think individually are usually the ones that do amazing things with their lives.

At the end of it all the best favor you could ever do for yourself is to try and be the best you that you can possibly be. Follow all of your dreams and find self acceptance. Cut yourself some slack and don’t be so hard on yourself. Always forgive others and especially yourself. Live life in a way that makes others gaze in awe. Love all of those around you and this also includes yourself. Spread positivity in any way that you can. Rather than everyone tearing each other down it’d be cool to build each other up and encourage each others differences. Embracing yourself is possibly the hardest thing ever, but it isn’t impossible. Just takes a little courage, but it could make for a much better life.