How To Save Your Own Life: Be Your Own Warrior

It’s exhausting to live your life for someone else. To twist and contort. To dull and minimize. To bend, and bend, and bend on the verge of breaking just to fit what you think someone else wants you to be, only to have to start all over again when the next set of eyes decide they don’t like what they see.

And, we are all guilty of it, aren’t we? We all want to feel like we belong. We want to feel wanted. We want to feel like we matter. But, sometimes, we break our own hearts by not giving ourselves the love we’ve been looking for from others.

We spend our time and energy trying to appease people, trying not to make people feel uncomfortable with our successes or failures. We try to fit in a nice, tidy, labeled box because it just makes things easier.

But, that’s not how life works. And, that’s not how human beings work.

So, this is how you take your life back. You stop investing all of your emotions into what others think of you. You start caring more about what you think of yourself. You build upon your weaknesses and highlight your strengths. You accept your flaws and you embrace that it is all part of who you are.

Next, you stop apologizing. For being yourself, for having dreams, for having your own beliefs. For making mistakes and for having off days. You stop apologizing for taking risks that others think are impractical. You stop feeling guilty for going against the grain or living your life in a way others may not understand. You are allowed to be human. You are allowed to feel insecure or unsure. You’re allowed to change your mind and try new things. As long as you never lose your heart in your pursuits, you shouldn’t feel bad about figuring out what is going to be the best choice for you.

Mostly, you need to learn to love yourself.

You need to be able to see the beauty of the struggle you have fought your way through and the potential of the woman you can become. You need to accept where you are while you’re moving closer to who you want to be. You need to stop seeing only the negative parts of yourself and see the messy, imperfect person that you are. Because you deserve love. You deserve forgiveness. Take a chance on yourself.

It’s going to be a challenge. It’s going to require commitment. We often don’t want to take the time on ourselves that we reserve for other people, but we really should. So, take the time to learn yourself: your heart, your hopes, your dreams, your flaws. Your fears, your goals, your best and worst memories.

Take the time to be aware of your feelings, of your emotional processes. Take the time to love your life and the person you are. This is how you move forward. This is how you save yourself. Because you don’t need a warrior. You ARE the warrior.