60 Day Challenge: Day 7: A letter to someone who has hurt you recently.

You let me down.

I wish I could say you know who you are when I say you've disappointed me. But I'm sure that you don't.

What you did and what you said really made me doubt how good you are. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of people admire you. I admired you. Now I'm not so sure.

You try to keep what you've done hidden. I don't know why. Is it because you think hiding what you've done will make it go away? Is it because you don't think it was wrong? Is it because you don't want people to look see that maybe you're not as great as they think you are?

You've given me a burden that I don't care to shoulder. Where's the greatness in that?

I hope deep down I'll find a way to get over it. I hope that I'll find a way to tell you what I'm thinking now. I hope I'll find a way to tell you that you've disappointed me because I expected you to be better.

For now I'll carry this burden knowing that you don't deserve the relief I'm providing by doing so.

60 Day Challenge: Day 6: The reason you believe you’re happy.

I don't think I would have been able to post this blog post a couple of months ago, primarily because I wasn't convinced that I was happy. But I am.

Here's why:

For the longest time, I never wanted to stick up for myself when I was criticized and I never felt the need to be the center of attention, and I believed that this was because I thought I had really low self esteem and practically zero self confidence.

I told a couple of friends and this is what they told me:

My best friend, Pam, said "You're fabulous. It's ok for you to celebrate that. It's when you feel the need to invite other people to the party* that you become egotistical. You're not like that. You celebrate yourself and you're humble."

Another friend of mine said, "The reason why you don't stick up for yourself and the reason why you have no need to seek attention is because you already know you're great. You don't have to prove it to anyone. You don't have to be critical of anyone else because you feel no need to pull anyone else down."

I can't say enough how much those two comments meant to me. Learning how to accept the way that others positively perceive me has made me more perceptive to others. I've learned how to accept their love and have learned how to better give love in return. This has made me happy.

*In sharing this, I am not inviting anyone to this party of self-celebration. I'm just telling my readers about the gala.

60 Day Challenge: Day 5: Talk about a scary experience.

 

When I first got my own room, a simple clock radio sat on my dresser. I used it solely as a timepiece. In the middle of the night, I would often open one eye to see the fluorescent numbers that told me it was too early to get up.

One night, I was awakened by the sound of static...really loud static. I got up and turned it off. I returned to my bed and pulled the sheets over my head, hoping it wouldn't happen again. Ten minutes later, it came on again. I was terrified. Actually, terrified doesn't do justice to the fear that I experienced. I was so scared I ran to my sister's room down the hall in tears. I stayed there until the morning.

In hindsight, it was really stupid to be afraid of an alarm clock, but of course, it was more than just the alarm clock. I had watched some TV show about ghosts not long before that night, and there were cases where ghosts would haunt houses and move things around. In one case, a house was set on fire. I guess that I was convinced that there was some supernatural power in my room that night. But in reality, the alarm was just put on inadvertently and in the process, the volume was turned up.

While I laugh now, I still have a slight aversion to alarm clocks and refuse to use them.