Little girl. No one could have prepared you for the pain you would experience. Even in all the truths your mother and father gave you, there’s no way they could have protected you from the fall.
They couldn’t prepare you for the fight of your life. You thought you were fighting to find yourself, you’re really fighting to continue to believe in yourself.
You’re fighting to know your innocence was not taken away even though you felt it, you’re fighting to know it’s okay to not have the smartest thing to say, but to know it is still worth saying. Fists clenched, lump in throat, voice shaking and all. You say it, not because you need approval, but you need to be you, and you recognize the world needs to know your truth.
You’re fighting to still smile even if the smile isn’t perfect or convincing. You’re fighting to not look at other girls with envy, the way they walk, talk, their feminity, and compare yourself and see the opposite of beauty. You’re fighting to not want to be like them, to accept and be happy with being like you.
You’re fighting to feel the smartest, tallest, prettiest girl you know in a world that says you aren’t enough, don’t do enough, want too much, and you’re not worth the fight. You’re fighting to stay in formation with the world on your back and nobody else to lean on. And when the weight gets too heavy and you reach out your hand, the world to tells you you’re a burden, but you’re carrying everyone else’s.
You’re fighting to remind yourself you are not a burden, and this world’s expectations were never meant to be lived up to. Because you’re not your sister, or your mother, or some character in a book, or some girl on television, or some airbrushed model in the cover of a fashion magazine, those are flat images. You are just you. Three dimensional, complex, creating your own definitions, making decisions, some good, bad, confused, and ugly, yet they all make up this beautifully flawed version of you, exactly as God intended to.
So forgive yourself. Forgive yourself for not knowing how to speak up, not knowing what tomorrow holds. Forgive yourself for protecting yourself and how you feel because no one ever told you it was safe to be you. Forgive yourself for taking a little too long to get ready because you needed to get your mind ready for the day. At least you made it through another day.
Forgive yourself for beating yourself up yesterday when your own mind and body weren’t so kind to you. Forgive yourself for taking so long to be honest with yourself. Forgive yourself for loving too hard, caring too much, getting lost, choosing the wrong thing despite knowing the right thing, as long as you do the thing that’s true to you.
Forgive yourself, because in all that you’ve got to fight for, you’re going to have to first fight for you. It’s the only way you’ll make it through.
Little girl, forgive yourself. ❤️
This Girl's Worth 