Life lessons may be the cliche thing you realize after you make a mistake, like overestimating the amount of room you have to turn into a parking spot. Or, it may be the realization that your mom was right after all. Life lessons come in a variety of sorts, like the mystery flavor of Dum Dums, you honestly have no idea what flavor it's going to be until you open it and have to eat it. It makes you excited but terrified all at once.

Living life with a mental illness, regardless of the diagnosis, is a lot like getting a whole bag of mystery flavored Dum Dums. You never really know what each minute will hold let alone each day. Waking up is like slowly unraveling the wrapper not knowing if today will be a good day, a bad day, just an okay day, or anything in between. But, regardless of the kind of day you have, there are always things to take away from them.

I've learned many things from dealing with my illness over the years.

Nobody is perfect, and trying to be won't change that.

I constantly find myself trying to be the person that has it all together, that is perfect, that can do it all, that can be the perfect student, friend, sister etc. Trying to be perfect is an unrealistic goal. I am always reminding myself that I am human and that being human means an abundance of imperfections that you have to learn to be okay with. No matter how much you try, nobody can be perfect.

Every day is a blessing.

Even the bad days are too. Every day is an opportunity to grow, and every bad day strengthens you, just like every good day helps you. We have to experience bad days in order to appreciate the good. I've learned that bad days happen and that's okay.

It's okay not to be okay.

In this society, we are taught to leave all of our baggage on the inside whenever we go out. We are taught that we always have to appear okay. Our automatic answer to "How are you?" is always "Good" or "Fine" regardless of how we're really doing. There are going to be times where you are not good or fine or okay, and that's okay. You do not always have to be okay and gave it all together. Let yourself cry, let yourself fall apart, just do not stay there. You don't have to have it all together all the time.

Life is precious.

Life is random, you never know what card you're going to be dealt next, so you have to take life as it comes at you, one day at a time. Embrace every part of your life, own your story because nobody else has lived it. Life is a gift and I don't intend on wasting it. Live everyday with hope and realize that life is the ultimate gift and what you do with it will help shape this world.