Do you ever have some moments to yourself when you wish you could tell the younger version of yourself certain things? If you answered no, I don’t think I believe you. I will believe that there are people that consider certain things that happen to them as “meant to be” or “life lessons” and live with “no regrets” (I have to insert a “no ragrets” here and if you understand this movie reference, let’s be friends!), but I am more than positive that they would still take the chance if they could to tell the younger version of his or herself a thing or two that could have made life a little bit easier. So I thought I would take a few moments to jot down a few things that I wish I could have told myself growing up through the 1990’s and 2000’s. I paired this photo with it because it happens to be an awesome photo that I have not shared yet. It also looks kind of like my boyfriend is talking some sense into me, which could have been the case of this freezing hike I did not want to go on, but again, it is a nice photo. Photo credit goes to my sister for taking it with her film camera.
1. The teenage girl that wasted away endless hours (read: days, months, years?) sitting in front of a computer screen on Neopets is not a nerd or geek in any shape or form. Even if you are considered a nerd or geek, it is not a bad thing at all, and you should be pretty damn proud of the skills you picked up over time, since this started your basic knowledge of HTML. Hello to the world of web design! Sure, you lost your ability to tan really nicely over the years and somehow only got even more pale, but the computer skills that you will learn and start your career off of will make it all worthwhile.
2. You like country music, embrace it! It doesn’t matter if you do not share common musical interests with your friends when you are younger because one day you will meet people that can blast country music around town and enjoy it just as much as you. Don’t worry though, you will learn to love pretty much almost every genre of music, even rap. You will even be able to enjoy rapping along to some rap songs too, trust me. It may leave some people really surprised or speechless, but you will even enjoy that part of it too. You will discover more music that you love through television shows (basically just all of One Tree Hill music). You will combine your love of country with bigger loves of general pop music, but also love a lot of the indie rock, acoustic sort of stuff, and an undeniable love of certain classic rock tracks. Trust me, you will get there. There will even be a band called One Direction that you will roll your eyes at for quite a while, but eventually you will give in and become a fan – it’s inevitable.
3. I think it is really cool that you decided to start entering the world of makeup in elementary/middle school (I can remember grade 8 being the start of eye liner at least), but the biggest thing that should have been a habit to start young was skin care. Washing off your makeup at the end of the day is so incredibly important, but also properly cleansing and moisturizing your face. The basics that are needed to start your skin off on the right foot for the rest of your life. Acne happens, it will eventually fade out as time goes on. Eczema is a bigger issue you will have to eventually face – hand moisturizer is your friend.
4. When you are told to avoid certain foods, AVOID THEM. When you are told not to eat so much so quickly, LISTEN. This may be within recent years, but highly important advice you need to abide by. These food issues will combine with the stress of life and land you with hard to control anxiety. Still trying to work this one out, but trying not to stress so much and assume the worse will happen every single time is a good place to start.
5. You have an amazing support system of friends and family that will stick by you. It does not matter if you lose touch with some of your friends and talk sparingly, for the most part they are there when you need them the most. They are also there to be awesome, because that’s exactly what they are. You will become quite the independent woman, and an introverted one at that, but keep these people close because you need them in your life. Through the roller coaster highs and lows of all of your school years, love and heartbreak, work life, and more… they’ve got your back, and most of them will usually break out into song and dance with you when the perfect song comes on. You’ll meet the love of your life and you will be happy, even if you are actually just talking about poop. That’s right, poop… that’s love.
6. Jump on the tea bandwagon sooner please. I know that you are late to the hot drink party, but tea is fantastic and maybe would help curb your coffee addiction you develop throughout your university years and the years to follow. Tea is your friend.
7. You are going to be put through hell and back when it comes to your work life. Between the highest stress levels of your life, living the commuting life, unpaid internships, and working conditions that you just know are plain wrong, you have the strength and will power within you to survive it all. Even if you work through months with maybe only one day of rest per month, you can see that I have still survived that. This is where your addiction with coffee really took over your life. Again, black tea would have been a better option. Remember all those smoothies you had with multiple espresso shots in them? Yeah…
8. Your celebrity crush on Jared Padalecki will never go away. He will be your first crush and continue being your crush, because well, look at him. I would also like to note that Ian Harding will enter this list and stay there. You will eventually own clothing pieces with their faces on them, good job. Your girl crushes will be Hilarie Burton and Emma Stone because you will basically just want to be them.
9. Public speaking is not your cup of tea at all. It is a skill that you were not great at when you are younger or older. That is something you will grow to accept and quit being so hard on yourself about, but you will use your thoughts and words in another creative project or two. You will have a short story project in high school that will inspire you to keep writing and you will eventually find yourself with a novel of sorts. Letting other people read it is a terrifying thought, but once in a while you will let someone read it if they really want to. Also, one day you still start blogging and actually stick to it.
10. Whatever you do with your hair, just never dye it black. You can dye it all the shades of red, but just not black. That is a thing that happened.
Well, that is all I have at the moment for things I would tell the younger version of myself. I think it is a pretty solid list that would come as great advice and maybe help things go by a little bit smoother. Things happen for a reason though, and I am glad at where I am today.
[signoff]
