Dear Younger Me

Dear younger me,

I’ve watched you move through this life with such absorption while I scrutinized every characteristic of your demeanour. The way you squint your nose when you read your books, or how you hum random melodies when you feel uncomfortable. How you always tap your fingers to the drum beat of any song your ears capture, or when you get lost in your thoughts, floating in your senseless daydreams. The way you people watch with such empathy and embrace the little joys they bring to you, creating personas from your observations.

I also see the way you fear being vulnerable around the people who wish to see the real you and how you rid yourself of any opportunity to do so, in fear of exposing your scars. The way you refuse the love you deserve and instead run to the type of love that leaves you fragmented once again, left on your own to put yourself back together.

And every time I see that your smile fades a little more as your heart grows a little darker, slowly giving up on the belief of your self-worth.

I see you; I see you more than you know.

I wish you could see yourself the way I do. You seek your worth in the eyes of others, but you are blinded by the false thoughts you subconsciously construct in that overthinking mind of yours. You have created these filters that trick you and prevent you from seeing the truth.

Can’t you see that your beauty resonates within before it can shine and share its light on the outside? Why keep it in the dark and suffocate yourself with these false hallucinations?

We surf these waves of uncertainty and we create comfort in them, wrapped up in our distractions, with no recollection of how we eventually became “okay” with all this turbulence.

Then suddenly we find ourselves drowning in these false realities we have created, too deep to reach for the top, too tired to keep swimming and too defeated to fight for air.

So, we let ourselves sink to the bottom, accepting the loss while replaying every regretful moment where we thought we could or should have done things differently.

We get lost in the fog of our thoughts, walking through the mist searching for a way out and then without even realizing it, we walk right back into the dark clouds. We are creatures of habit, hiding in the abyss of our worries and pains as we become immune to the misery we inflict on ourselves. Too afraid to ask for help yet always at the service of others to fill your sense of worth, but it ends up leaving you dry and hollow.

We all want to be validated, seen, and heard by others, but we ignore the most important part, our own self-validation. If you cannot be genuine with yourself then how can you be genuine with others?

Insecurities stem from feeling less than or not enough. The moment we feel different from society in a negative way, we plant these new seeds of insecurities, and we water them by believing they are true. We feed them and grow them until they eventually become our truth. A truth that all began with a lying seed that we chose to water day after day, giving it permission to take over. Eventually, it has grown so big with so many leaves of uncertainty, that now it is all that we can see.

I wish I could have taught you this at an earlier stage in your life, but I also understand that it is through your experiences and your journeys that you will learn best. Always remember to follow your instincts, as that is me guiding you silently.

Remember your worth, cut down those trees of doubts and insecurities. It's time to take your power back. Spread light to your heart before you do others, then the light and love you will share with them will become more powerful than it ever was.

We live in a world that is filled with filters and lies, as we are all walking around with a disguise. Tired of hearing the cries from the unwanted goodbyes, saddened by the wars we despise and wish would demise. Whether it’s with yourself or other allies, they will both leave you a victim of chastise.

xox