self help

i don’t know who needs to hear this, but…

maybe just i need to hear this

maybe because it’s my birthday weekend and i am waxing a bit philosophical but i believe i have let other people define me for way too long. like it’s one thing to be aware of it as i have been for a long time but it’s another thing to change the patterns that keep letting it happen.

in so many big and little ways, i have let people over the years tell me what i should think or feel or how i should dress or how i should talk. i remember i had one boyfriend in college who even criticized the way i ate an ice cream cone and i remember thinking, ‘wow he must really know more than me about how to eat an ice cream cone.’ that is how much of a recovering canadian/catholic/codependent people pleaser i have been for way too long.

but you know what? there is a way out of it. one fucking hard but real way. and that is by admitting it. without shame. i have been shamed into NOT admitting this one too many times, too, BTW. but recently, after reading whitney cummings’ memoir — which is fucking awesome — i am reminded of an amazing thing she learned from my other favorite person in the world, phil stutz. and that is that when you are willing to talk about the things that you’re ashamed oft, they lose their power.