If I could've seen myself now… only then, maybe things would have been different. Maybe I would have been as a happy as I am now, only then. Maybe if I was able to form into the new person that I am now, then I would have been different then. By then I am referring to high school, and now is right now. In this moment right now I can honestly say I am the happiest I have ever been. I really hope you are too.

High school is hard. It is filled with highs and lows, and times that most all of us would just much rather forget. It is a learning experience socially, and for many that is hard. Drama floods the halls, and cliques form at the speed of light. People fall in love, but then those same hearts are broken. Every year this same cycle repeats. Every year by the end of the school year we hear over and over and over again, “I'm done” ,“I can’t do this anymore”, and most of all “I just want to get out of here.” I went through all of it. I was part of the drama, the cliques, the “happily ever after” falling in love, and then the horrid heartbreak that follows. I’m not going to sugar coat it, it can be awful. But it is not everything. That drama is not everything. Those cliques are not everything. He is not your everything. And that is okay.

So this is my then. I spent high school constantly worried about the opinions people had of me. So worried I would be judged. When the reality is no one really cares. No one cares if your hair is in a bun or that you are wearing sweats. No one is going to care if you graduate with honors or high honors. As long as you are making yourself happy, you are doing it right. Often we get so caught up in the challenges that come with high school that we loose sight of the bigger picture. At some point in life you are going to get caught up in the petty girl drama over something as dumb as who gets to go with who to homecoming, you will be the one excluded from the clique that you just wished you could be apart of, or you will think you have found the one. Now when it doesn't work, don't hate them. Wish them the best, and try to stay in touch. After all at one point they were “your everything.” However, I realize how hard it is to just brush by all of this in the moment. It really can feel like your world is collapsing when these things occur. It hurts. It hurts to hear “you aren't the girl for me.” It hurts to be told “you aren't cool enough.” These experiences hurt. They hurt me.

However that was my then, and this is my now, and lord do I wish I could've seen myself now, only then. I am not here to tell you that everything changes the minute you get to college, it doesn’t. However, I have been able to use it as way to move on. I have moved on from the drama that I thought I was always going to care about. I have moved on from the cliques. I moved on from who I thought was my everything. I have found myself.. I realized that the things in high school that I always thought were the biggest issues are really so small, and they rarely ever should play into our happiness. If I could have seen myself now, only then I would have known how to drop the drama, cliques, and even get over a relationship faster. So to myself then, look at yourself now. You are happy, thriving, and on your path to success. Those experiences that seemed like everything haven't effected you now. I only wish you would have known that then.