When I was younger, social media platforms easily became a public journal of my life. I thought living my life as an ‘open book’ showed others that I had nothing to hide. It was an action I took to tell my young-teenage-self that I was not ashamed of my thoughts, my feelings and actions. Naive to some extent, yet, some time in the past decade I have stopped sharing and I have become extremely critical of myself and also those around me. I was excited about the idea of writing again in order to share my recovery journey (and constant struggle) with my most recent loss. However, it has taken me forever to finally post. I was stuck on revising my writings, rethinking topics and second guessing whether the amount of information I was disclosing was too much.
“How did I become so critical of myself?”
“When did I develop this need to be seen as intelligent and strong?”
“Why did it bother me so much when/if others judged me?”
I forgot about the difficulty and stress that comes from being transparent with others about my thoughts, feelings and actions. In the past decade, I have only shared it with a selective few. One of these individuals was a boy I’ve come to love for 10 years and he was often critical of how I presented myself to others. So now that I am finally set free from his views, I come face to face with my first challenge. Sharing with you my heart and my experiences with brokenness is the beginning of my journey to becoming ‘the strong woman’.
I hope my journey will help you redefine your views on strength as well and perhaps when you hit your ‘rock bottom’ you will come to realize that we are all more similar than we are different.
In true therapist fashion, I would like to breakdown my current understanding of a “strong” person into two parts:
- Someone who is taking the steps and action with the intention of bettering themselves (emotionally, physically, mentally and spiritually).
- These steps and actions must respect what our body, mind and heart needs in order to move forward.
My perception of you has always been that of a strong, intelligent, driven and determined woman…I am saddened that I didn’t know of your inner struggle. I hope you are able to once again become confident in who you are and every day become a little bit stronger than you were yesterday!
Thank you for sharing Doris. You are such a beautiful person inside and out, I am so lucky to call you a friend ❤️
Keep writing!
Glad to have stumbled upon your path in your journey to becoming a stronger person, knowing that my definition of a strong person aligns with yours. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and true self with us which I find very inspiring. Your reference to “rock buttom” reminds me of thisvery inspiring video. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did:
https://www.facebook.com/goalcast/videos/1585909778152873/