Youthful Life: X

"It's not that I dislike many people. It's just that I don't like many people." Bryant Gumbel No one likes to be dislike d. It's sewn into our DNA that we just have a general disposition and a need to be liked. We want people to want us. We want them to like us, get excited when we're around, love us. We spend so much of our time devoted to getting people to like us. We shouldn't have to convince, beg, or plead with people for them to like us. We don't owe anyone ourselves. We don't have to give the entirety of who we are, or pretend to be someone else in a futile search for the approval of others. If we have to persuade someone to accept, tolerate, value us then maybe those people truly are undeserving of all that we are. And, and, and, we ourselves do not have to like anyone if we don't want to. "Like" should an enthused, jovial, and benign feeling we have for another person whether friendly or romantic. We get to reserve t...

“Nothing will work unless you do.” Maya Angelou Failure is a natural part of life but it's something that I have spent much of my life trying to avoid. For someone who spouts that he's invested in constantly learning and growing, I have not been challenged as of late. Then I was wrangled into working out. My biggest defense tactics have always been avoidance and humor, and this new endeavor had me deploying both. I have never worked out a day in my life. I have always been kind of scrawny and oddly disproportionate all over with the abnormal wingspan, massive feet, and exaggerated facial features. It has taken me pretty much the duration of my life to even to begin to be comfortable with my skin, let alone the rest of body in all its oddly shaped lackluster glory. Working out absolutely terrified me. I was self-conscious, constantly uncomfortable, and most of all felt stupid for not knowing anything that everyone else seemed to already now how to do. What kind of 24 ye...

" I discovered that my insecurities and my flaws were things that I actually need to embrace, and I let them become my superpowers." Skylar Grey Is it just me or does anyone else sabotage their relationships before they have the chance to become anything meaningful? I don't really know why I'm like this, or maybe I do, but just have never had the gumption to actually say it out loud. Deep down, I don't think I deserve love for a multitude of reasons but mainly because I have so much fear of being unlovable that it actually manifests itself in me trying to embody that. What I mean to say is whenever I meet someone that I have the potential to like I find something about them, whether it be a character trait, quirk, or something else about them, and I fixate on it. It's often a minute detail but the way my mind goes into overdrive essentially hyperbolizing the thing I've latched on it is truly a wonder of the most dastardly proportions. It could be an...

Truth - Self-esteem has to come for yourself. Too many times we look to others to determine our value and self-worth. It makes absolutely no sense. The key words in those hyphenated compound words is the "self" portion meaning us. We must be the ones to determine how we feel about ourselves, our bodies, our minds, our hearts, and our souls. No one else can do so. It has to be us. We have to decide for ourselves how will be embrace who we are, how we are, and why we are. It is time today, and every single day to write our own stories and be proud of our narratives. We are authors. "Self-love is the source of all our other loves" Pierre Corneille We are authors of our own life stories. Why then would we let anyone else be the protagonist in our stories? Our first-person adventures detail our experiences, hardships, and successes. Others may try to pen a few lines of our dialogue but we script our own soliloquys. Supporting characters may try to co-opt our sto...