A letter to myself, today

Landing in Palermo

When I was recently at home, I went looking for some photos on an old hard drive. I don’t have so many photos from back then, not compared to now, when my phone is constantly at my fingers. From those years, I only have pictures from special occasions, many posed, meant to capture the memory of that day.

I found a photo from a high school dance, maybe I was fifteen or sixteen. I was surprised to see myself. I was just a kid.

And yet my memories from those years include being sad, a lot. And being very hard on myself. I was living with anxiety, but I didn’t know that at the time. I didn’t know that everyone didn’t feel worried all the time. I thought they just all were handling it better than me. In those years, I felt so alone, navigating my inner and outer worlds and not knowing what was the right choice to make, not knowing who to follow, but more importantly, not having the confidence in myself to walk my own path instead. I felt invisible, left out. About anything important I was totally closed off, I didn’t feel that I could really trust anyone. I lived in a little anxious bubble, scared of the world seeing me for who I really was. I was scared to tell people about the dreams I had because I was afraid they would laugh at me, confirming how I really felt inside, that I would not be able to amount to anything.

I can’t know how many opportunities I missed, for friendships, for scholastics, due to these anxieties. How many converstations did I not begin because I was intimidated, how many applications did I not make because I felt as though it was beyond me?

What I do know is that I can’t go back in time. But I can learn from this realization.

Because as much as I have seen and done in the years since then, as much as I have been working to heal, to move forward, and to live despite having fears, there is still a part of me that feels the same way. That feels left out of the world passing me by, that feels self-conscious, that feels like a failure. That feels like I am missing out on all these opportunities. Someone who sometimes still feels very alone.

I don’t want to, in another ten, fifteen years, look back on a photo of myself from today, and only see this sadness. I don’t want to see how beautiful everything and everyone was around me, and how I didn’t appreciate them because I could only focus on what I felt was missing. I don’t want to see the opportunities I missed because I was too scared to begin. I don’t want to see all the dreams I never bothered to go after because I was afraid of how long it would take to achieve them. I don’t want to see the time I wasted being sad, and anxious, and angry, when I could have just tried to be patient and hopeful that things would eventually come together in the end. Maybe not in the way that I thought they would. Maybe even better then I ever could have imagined.

We can’t go back in time. But we can start from today, where we are, right now. We can keep moving forward, and we can believe that things will be better tomorrow. If I could go back in time, I would tell my younger self that the world is bigger than you can imagine. That you are going to meet so many new people who will love you, and appreciate you, and see you for the dreamer, for the friend, for the kind soul that you are. They will see this about you and believe in you even before you do. And as I tell my younger self that, I am also telling myself that today. To keep going. To get up, to get out, to keep trying. Even though it seems like there is a long way to go. Look at how far you have come; how can you say that your dreams are out of reach?

love,

greer