Notifications (2) they'll come back when they learn to love themselves

Unread Message (3) The Biggest Takeaway

I wasn't sure what to talk about first.

Should I start big and talk about common issues like severe acne? Or should I walk along a less well-known path to include the things I wish I knew about sex, or speak about my rare health issue that I know other girls who have it are either being misdiagnosed or are too scared to speak up about it?

I asked myself: what would I want my daughter to know first?

Considering she would be young, I thought I'd start off with one of my earliest memories of comparison to other women.

At the age of nine, I thought I wasn't pretty because boys didn't like me.

At the age of 21, I still struggle with this age-old question, "Am I pretty?" because I think people aren't interested in me. It's even escalated to, "Am I pretty enough?"

I get it. We live in a world where we're preaching self-love and we're chanting the "strong, independent woman who don't need anyone" mantra and hashtagging girlboss across every platform.

Yet saying those empowering words is much easier said than done.

I sense a dramatic eyeroll coming on but hear me out.

I grew up as the girl who boys didn't notice, so you can imagine it's really hard to be all, "I'm fucking awesome and I matter and people care about me and I love me," if no one even notices I'm alive.

I'm sure there are girls out there like me who weren't the "It" girl that all the boys had a massive crush on, girls who were the last one picked, always below the radar. The girls who, if they stood out, stood out for face-reddening, pant-shitting reasons (hello first period story and that one time I walked into the glass door while everyone watched).

Bluntly put, I thought no one wanted to date me because I wasn't pretty like the other girls (sometimes I blamed it for not being white – shoutout to my white-washed childhood).

I didn't have a boyfriend in elementary or high school (particularly because no one ever asked me) and it wasn't until university when some idiot was stupid enough to date me (my Betta fish lasted longer than him). I didn't get asked to go to prom and I blamed so many of my physical features – even my skin colour – never thinking once that maybe there wasn't anything wrong with me.

Where did all this self-hatred and judgement come from?

It's taken me 21 years to finally look back at what I've normalised day to day – the thoughts that reappear in my head, the things I say and do without thinking, and my beliefs and values I've taken from my parents and friends – and start to question it. Why am I thinking this way? Why do I keep acting like that?

The patterns we picked up as children replay themselves like stories in our head, and overtime, those patterns start to become the norm. We stop questioning them because "that's the way it's always been," and then 15 years later, we're wondering why we're afraid to spend our money or why we have dominance or commitment issues or why we stigmatize certain people.

We inherit generational or cultural traits that overpower our senses and sometimes, they redirect us away from what we actually desire or from what feels right.

Why am I stingy and make an immediate beeline for the clearance section in any clothing store? Because my parents would always drive us an extra mile away to purchase a pack of blueberries that were 30 cents cheaper than the blueberries at the grocery store we were already at.

Imagine you walked across the same muddy trail every day. You'd notice your footprints from yesterday are still there, so to make it easier, you'd follow the existing footprints. Overtime, as you walk within the same path, small pebbles and sand fill your footprints and your imprints harden. Now, you don't want to step outside of the path you made in the trail because it'd mean more resistance and it'd be harder to walk through. Wouldn't you just rather stick to the path you've always been on?

Most of the time, that's the easier thing to do.

But what if the reason you were on that path wasn't because of what you wanted? What if someone else had set you on that path long ago, and you've just been walking it for so long that you forgot why you were on it in the first place?

Your parents influenced you at a young age to pursue a certain career and now you're deep into $100K of student debt, enrolled in a medical school, and are surrounded by people who you feel are ten times smarter than you.

You were raised to "be tough" and "work hard" due to your culture, so you take responsibility for everything. But when someone fucks up, you blame yourself immediately, and are ashamed you let everything "fall apart."

You hated disappointing your parents so you can never say "No" to people because you're afraid of disappointing them too.

By following this path that wasn't even set by you in the first place, you ask the question: where the fuck does it lead?

If someone picked your course, are you okay with them picking your ending too?

This story is about me peeling back the reasons for my insecurities and rewriting the stories I thought were my own, so that what I do every day is aligned with what is true to me, not to what was true for my parents, for my cultural roots, or for the standards of society.

I'm writing to you as your best friend next door. As you walk with me and unravel the truths and horrors of my life and witness the beginning of my transformation, I want you to look at and unravel your own daily habits too.

If I had to narrow down and pick one thing for you to take away from this book – if for some reason you just skim all these pages, or you don't bother to pay attention because half of your brain is thinking about what's for lunch – remember this:

Start to question why you do things. Question your daily habits: the clothes you wear, your natural tendencies, and your common sayings. Ask whether they are rooted in a place of insecurity or an opportunity for growth. Ultimately, ask: "Why?"

Ask yourself whether you do it because of other people's expectations? Society's? Your family's? Are you okay with this? Is this how you want to continue living your life? Are you open to receiving something better, something that's designed by you and meant for you?

Once you start asking yourself questions, you will find your "why" behind your daily actions, your attitude towards certain things, your reactions, and your deep insecurities that have haunted you for years.

Small or big life transformations start with being aware that something needs to change. That's what the start of this book will help you discover. Once you've figured out what needs to change, it's about slowly opening up about it and becoming vulnerable. It's taking responsibility for your life and that you create your own reality. It's asking yourself what habits you want to change, now that you realize that those habits came from a place of insecurity. Release the shame that you allowed yourself to be led by something that wasn't true to you. Let go of the blame.

You will find gratitude toward these revelations and your awareness will be heightened. Slowly, you will learn how to change and slowly, you will shift into the life you want. Not a life written by others, but a life written by you. This means believing that you deserve and already have abundance (through manifestation) and creating healthy habits (mindset, nutrition, fitness, self-care etc.). Soon, you do what you love everyday and figure out how to do that through intentional action.

Others' expectations are strongly connected to how you value yourself and how you measure your worth. You need to recognize this misalignment and change your ways to align with your true expectations. Live the life you want. Live, speak, and act your truth, not some else's.