Dug Up from the Drafts: Accepting Who We Are...and Aren't

Hello, dear readers,

I don't know about you, but I hate having drafts floating around my "Posts" box. Until just now, I had five of them polluting my Blogger profile, so I knew I had to take action.

Three of these blogs were promptly deleted, as they were incomplete and irrelevant or merely contained a title and no content. This is the first of the two that survived. Apparently, in one of my first few posts, I promised you that I'd be writing a self-esteem series. I now believe the reason for that was because the creation of this blog coincided with the beginning of a very difficult time in my life. I was doing this for myself more than anything, to reinforce what I knew was true but didn't fully believe. Not that there's anything wrong with self-esteem posts! I just don't actually plan to do a series on the subject unless I feel particularly inspired. In any case, here is the first in my previously planned self-esteem series posts. This is very brief and unfinished, but I think the last sentence is conclusive enough for what it's worth. I changed the font just now to make the separation between past and present painfully obvious. Enjoy this snippet from January 23, 2011:



For those of you who read my very first posts, you may remember that I promised a self-esteem series. Well, I'm finally getting to it! I hope you enjoy.




Let's all take a deep breath and admit it: We've all been guilty of looking at celebrities in magazines, the girl a few seats away on the train, or even our best friend and wondering, Why can't I look like that? Why am I not as skinny, fashionable, pretty? Why does everything always seem to work out for her and not me?


I'm bringing this up because I think it's important to recognize that part of building a healthy self-esteem and self-image is realizing who we aren't in order to focus on who we are.


Who we aren't? you ask. Why would we need to dwell on that? Well, we don't, and that's exactly the point. Let me explain: Focusing on someone else and wishing you could be like them actually prevents you from improving yourself. Becoming the best "you" possible is what you should be striving for.


It's absolutely fine to be inspired by other people, but it's important to recognize that we can each only be one person and no one else.



That's all I wrote. It's short, simple, and to the point, I suppose. Granted, I planned to finish this at some point but was apparently never motivated enough to do so.

I hope you liked this little blast from the past. I'll be posting the second of my drafts sometime this week. I did actually update and complete that one a few days ago. This one remains unchanged.

Wishing you a great week,

xEsther