When I was 8 I wanted to be a writer. I’d write short stories and give them to people. I once wrote one for my great gramma and gave it to her at the grocery store. I’d also write and ask my teacher to read over my stories and proofread them. I had a good second grade teacher (thanks, Mrs. Delozier) as she humored me and would tell me what I could do to improve my stories. When I hit 6th grade grade, my English teacher (that’s you, Miss Conway), really encouraged me to write. We had to do journal entries. I never minded doing it. One time it was about our swimming trip to the high school for gym class. I hated it. I didn’t hold back on my thoughts on how I thought it went. Miss Conway applauded me for not holding back. At the end of the year she gave us all a journal with a note inside. The note she wrote to me talked about how she always enjoyed my writing and how full of expression I was. She believed in my writing, and thought I could go far with it. I’m ashamed to say a lot of things came in my way and I just stopped writing. I got older and it felt more like a dream than something realistic. I once read about how we shouldn’t negative talk the things we enjoy doing. The article said about what would you say to yourself now that had you said to your 8 year old self would have broken your heart. My thoughts were if I had told myself at 8 that you’d never make anything of your writing, it’d have hurt. I tell myself now that no one wants to read what I write and I’ll never get anywhere with it. 8 year old me would have been devastated at those words. Luckily, I was encouraged back then or I probably wouldn’t have decided to pick it back up now in life. I guess the moral of this entire rant is if you wouldn’t have said something to your younger self, don’t say it to yourself now. If you wouldn’t have made young you feel defeated by the negative comments, don’t feed into those negative thoughts as an adult. You’re capable of going somewhere, anywhere, in life. The choice is completely yours. I did a lot of negative talk and self doubt. I ended up having a strong support system in my choice to try writing and blogging again (that would be you, Brittany). I hope whatever it is your heart is telling you to do, you go for it. Don’t let self doubt stop you from being the best you that you can be.
Are You the Best Version of Yourself Today?
