Step up, babe.

To the girl up alone at 3 am. To the girl who lives in denial. To the girl who won't be objectified. To the girl who is tangled up inside.

I sit here. Against my better judgement that tells me to sleep. I sit here. Knowing I trusted too easily. I sit here. Trying to squeeze larger tears out if only to make myself feel better.

To the girl who doesn't fuss with her feelings. To the girl too pained to move and ask for help. To the girl who has contemplated suicide.

To the girl who has been rejected one too many times. Because that's it, isn't it? You thought that maybe you were at least average in attractiveness but today was the day you realized that the most you are is a sex toy for guys who don't have prettier girls at their disposal. You realize that you're not anybody's number one. That you're not just second best, you are the least.

To the girl who is crying because of a guy. To the girl scratching her face in denial. To the girl who is tired of competing with girls who easily fall into the arms of guys. To the girl who is tired of waiting. To the girl who knows deep inside she is not pretty enough, not good enough, not flirtatious enough, too clingy, too soft, too hard.

Who cares what they think.

You ARE pretty enough. You ARE strong enough. And if he hugs you when you're alone but goes for a prettier girl as soon as she arrives, completely neglecting you, he's just not worth it. You are beautiful. You are strong.

And there is a guy out there who has you at the top of his love list. And guess what: there is no number 2.

Dear Reader

To the soul not really in the mood for Christmas right now. To the soul begging for attention. To my own soul. Here, dear reader is a narcissistic rant. Read on if you want to participate in a pity party and feel free to relate to whatever I'm saying. I'm in a mixture of Jane Eyre quotes and Perks of Being a Wallflower and reality and weird games and confusion and loyalty to God and being bound by humanity, the nakedness of me.

I am tired of seeking attention and yet I know, perhaps it is not to be found. I am tired of being me. I am tired of being alive. I hate being alone. When I'm with people, there is at least the motivation of impressing them, the motivation of receiving and giving love. Hugs, kisses, eye contact, acceptance. Though it rarely if ever happens, there is always the hope that someone will probe deeper. For you see dear Reader, my heart is akin to the surface of Mars, there is barely any oxygen there right now and there is barely any gravity to my feelings and I do things with a motivation that is an alloy of integrity and hidden agendas. And I feel weak, dear Reader. Do you?

You know the quote from the book The Perks of Being a Wallflower (I told you that was on my mind!)?

It’s great that you can listen and be a shoulder to someone, but what about when someone doesn’t need a shoulder. What if they need the arms or something like that? You can’t just sit there and put everybody’s lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can’t. You have to do things.”

See I wrote that on my wall (literally and metaphorically) because I know that I am passive and that I don't initiate love enough. But honestly I feel like I need arms right now, dear Reader. But I know that if everyone were to act like me then no one would receive love and we would all close ourselves off, hinting that we need arms but never going to get it. In the context of that story, she was not just urging him to be the initiator, she was also urging him to go get what he wants. See, I believe the arms are both for comfort and to be comforted. We're all lonely. Sometimes pursuing our selfish desires with an inkling of sincerity and do way more good than simply closing off and simply listening, being a wallflower that hears all and speaks nothing.

So dear Reader, will you promise me something? Or don't promise; just do this: if you want a hug, go get it. But make sure there's at least an inkling of sincerity in it or you're simply objectifying the other person for your own good. And if you see me, come hug me! Or maybe I'll come hug you. It really doesn't matter.

Let's be prepared to give arms, not just ears.

I love you, dear Reader.

Compass

We're all born with an untainted compass--a compass that points to our true north, that points to the knowledge that we are precious and loved. But think of a piece of metal that is put over a flame and pounded. It is shaped by every hit. Everything we experience affects our compass and it soon changes. Small, barely traceable hits in succession usually shape our beliefs. The teenage girl who is constantly called a slut, the little boy who hates his own name because of the way his abusive father utters it-- our beliefs are usually shaped by successive blows on our compass-- which deviates from our true north.

But it's not the successive blows that I want to write about today-- God knows that is a topic worthy of discussion--no, I will talk about the hard blows, the paradigm shifting blows, the blows that come all at once and move us, change us, for the worse or for the better.

These blows don't come too often, they come when we're drastically pulled out of our comfort zones, when our cornerstones or the very roots that support us are pulled away and we are left to look at what's left. We are left to bask in the nakedness and emptiness of who we are. And we see exactly what role that particular root played in our life's system. For some, it may be the loss of a spouse, seeing the invisible roles that they played in your life-- the sock they picked up every night, the kiss that kept you going through the endless boring meetings at a job you don't even like but do anyway.  Or it could be going off to college, your entire support system, physically, mentally and emotionally pulled away and you're left with yourself, your plain ol' raw self to deal with.

And at these shifts, the worst sort of compass that fluctuates is your moral compass. You see how segments of your reasoning were purely based on that person or that place, and you rethink why you live the way you do. And you rethink the way you see life, the role that friends and family play, the role they should play.

And that's okay.

It's okay that your head is in a million places and you're not even sure what you believe anymore. The strings that truly hold you together when everything is pulled away need to brought out into the open and untangled. Sometimes, the song you're really singing is different from the one you think you hear. It's only when the notes are explicitly written out can you see what you're really made of. And then and only then can you rewrite the melody. There's no point in thinking you're a nice, little knitted scarf on the inside when honestly you're a mess of tangled wool, thinking its a scarf. And now I am rambling and I hope something came through here. Don't deny yourself the chance to look in the mirror. Because then and only then can you see what you really look like.

Let the blows come.