I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and had an amazing time with friends and family. But I just wanted to give you guys some encouragement from my heart and I want y'all to see yourselves through my eyes.

I didn’t want to separate myself from these people and activities. I mean, I spent four years of my life building the skills and the relationships in high school. It was like quitting cold turkey. The withdrawal from band and the people in it was significantly harder than I ever imagined. I missed the people I was really close with, and I even missed some of the bickering I did with some people. But that period of missing ended. I still miss the people and no one could replace them, but I started to make new friends and found new people to bicker with. I guess the one thing that really stayed consent between the transition of high school and college was the need to be accepted and to be liked. I’ve had several people tell me that I’m likable and that I’m relatable. I just don’t know. I don’t see myself like this. Sometime I think it’s because I have so many flaws and I’m not really ashamed of most of them. Maybe I am ashamed, but I know I have them and I’m pretty open about having flaws. I’m not perfect. I know that I don’t do well in groups larger than four or five. I don’t tolerate immaturity. I’m pretty blunt and I say what I think. Everyone else calls it honesty. Not that I’m not being honest…but I have a really mean way of being honest. So why do people see me as likable? I’m not really sure. Maybe it is because I tell it how it is. Maybe it’s just because I’m slowly allowing myself to love who I am. I am who I am. God created me to have the personality traits that I have. When I finally stopped wishing I could be funny or outgoing I became a happier person. I mean there are still things that I need to improve on as a person, but when I stopped trying to fit society’s mold of how I should be and started to accept God’s mold of how I should be, I might have become this likable person that most people want to be around. I became relatable because I was able to accept my flaws and be okay with the fact that exist because despite the fact that I don’t look like the cover a magazine, I’m starting to see myself through my friends’ and family’s eyes. I’m starting to see myself through God’s eyes. I am beautiful and I am worth it. That’s my biggest hope and prayer for all of you. I want all of you to see yourself through my eyes…through God’s eyes. You are all beautiful people with such a purpose that only you fulfill here. You are worth everything.

So please, if you ever feel like you aren’t worth it or that you don’t matter. Talk to someone. If that’s someone is me then I will be there. I know how that feels. It’s a lonely feeling to not feel wanted or important. It’s even lonelier when you let it eat at your heart when nine times out of ten, it’s a misunderstanding. So all of you, pretty please look at yourself through forgiving and graceful eyes. Because no matter how badly you think you messed up or how ugly you feel, there is still some good left in you. Even in your darkest hour, your rock bottom, there is good this world, there is good in the situation and there is good in you.