You know, I'm just going to start writing here without reading previous posts first. If I repeat something, well so be it! And that's the thing... so what? I think that's the biggest thing that I have learned through all of this. When I was a kid all I heard (with my kid ears, obviously... I get it now but I didn't then), all I heard from Mom was that I was too fat and all I heard from Dad was that I was too slow, too clutzy, too in the way... basically, what I heard was that I was not good enough. And I believed it. It didn't make much of a difference first. I mean, I remember believing it but I think I questioned it back then. At some point, though, I stopped questioning it. It just was. I believed it and I found confirmation everywhere (because I constantly looked for confirmation). *the funny thing is that I just realized that I only believed the confirmation of the bad stuff, not the good stuff*
What I wish I knew back then was that I could say "so??". So what if I'm too fat? Does that make me less of a person? NO! I thought that it did. NO! So what if I'm slow, if I'm a clutz, if I do everything wrong? So what? They made me so paranoid about everything that I did so I never did anything right. How could I? When I wanted to quit piano and skating and swimming and skiing and everything else, why did no one tell me that it was okay to not be the best? It is okay to just do things because you love doing them. How many things did I cheat myself of? So many, so many. And, if I could have said "so?", then maybe I wouldn't have been fat, maybe I wouldn't have quit all of those things, maybe it was okay to try and fail. Because then you just try again. And again. And again if you need to. You get better. Maybe sometimes you don't get better and you suck and you end up playing Jingle Bells for the rest of your life. And you enjoy it because you loved playing it.
Omigod, I'm getting better. I can't believe that I figured it out! I can't tell you how hard I am crying right now. I FIGURED IT OUT!!!! Don't you understand what that means? I remember being about 9 and not playing Red Rover with my friends because I didn't think I was good enough. It started back then, before that. Everything that I did I had to do right or I did not do them. And I didn't do SO MANY THINGS! Oh, so many.
But I'm doing them now. I'm doing them and I am falling down all over the place and I am having so much fun! God, I cannot believe how happy I am to have figured all of this out. It will take time, a life-time, but I will do better. Or maybe I will just fall down... because that's okay.
