Be fully yourself, even if it seems like you may not fit in, be fully you. I realize that is easier said than done, at least for me. There is nothing I want more than to feel accepted and loved by the people around me. I love the people I am with and want to connect with them deeply, but often that has ended up looking like me trying to fit. I begin to force myself to act and look a certain way that will align with that group, and I am often very good at it.

I am often afraid to fully be me because I will be different. I may not fit in anymore, or have as much in common with the people around me. They may misunderstand me or I may lose whatever connection I had with them. Connection, and feeling loved and accepted, has always been something I have desired more than anything. And in an effort to achieve that I often, without even thinking, begin to try to act like the group around me. The problem with that is I often lose myself in the process and I hide behind the fronts I put up. I become afraid of saying and expressing how I truly feel inside.

I have done this more times than I can count. I got so tired of it and I was relieved to not have many friends for a while. Now I am suddenly finding myself surrounded by an amazing group of friends again, but I have to remind myself to keep just being me even if I’m different. It’s scary and I start feeling this pressure again to act like them and be like them so I will fit in. I am so afraid of not being accepted and understood and just feeling like the oddball outcast. But, the amazing thing is, so far, these friends have accepted me for me, they have proved my fears to be only fears. There is nothing like being loved for you and not based on what you say or do or believe.

Right now, it is still really hard to trust that they, or anyone, would really love me for me. I have to continually fight this urge to hide my feelings and just be what I think they want. For so many years all the groups I was with I would often share so little of how I truly felt inside. I would be happy and joyful all the time laughing or being all spiritual because that is what they wanted or at least what I thought they wanted. And they loved me for those fronts I put up for them. Maybe at first, I did really feel that way. I was really joyful and spiritual and whatever, but I don’t always feel that way. My feelings change and grow, but I knew they loved what I had given them before, so I was afraid to be anything different, afraid that it would hurt them and hurt our relationship. So, then it just became an act, while I felt like I was dying inside.

We want love and acceptance and often we do crazy things to get it. For me, that was being who they wanted me to be rather than being true to myself. They may have liked it, but it really hurt to know that I was being so fake and that they didn’t know the real me.

As hard as it is, we need to be ourselves, no matter how weird or ugly it looks. And the people who do love us for who we are will be friends that are true and worthwhile. Those who can’t accept us are not true friends anyway. I know I can no longer destroy myself inside just to fit in, it has caused me too much pain.

It may be hard, maybe you have pretended to be someone you’re not for so long that you have forgotten what it even looks like to be yourself. I get it. Give yourself a hug today and know that it’s okay, it’s okay to be you. It’s not wrong or ugly or sinful or whatever you want to call it to be you, you are amazing. People may have hurt you and told you otherwise, people may have loved your facades more than they loved you. It’s painful, it’s scary, but it is the most healing and beautiful thing to begin to be you and stop pretending. You may lose friends who only loved the pretend you but I promise you will gain true and beautiful and lasting friendships of people who love the real you. Be you and keep being you because you are amazing and worth it as you are.