I am Me.

In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me.

Everything that comes out of me is authentically mine,
because I alone chose it.

I own everything about me: my body, my feelings,
my mouth, my voice, all my actions,
whether they be to others or myself.

I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears.

I own my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes.

Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me.

By so doing, I can love me and be friendly with all my parts.

I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me,
and other aspects that I do not know,
but as long as I am friendly and loving to myself,
I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions
to the puzzles and ways to find out more about me.

However I look and sound, whatever I say and do,
and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time
is authentically me.

If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought, and felt
turn out to be unfitting, I can discard that which is unfitting,
keep the rest, and invent something new for that which I discarded.

I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do. I have the tools to survive,
to be close to others, to be productive, and to make sense
and order out of the world of people and things outside of me.

I own me, and therefore, I can engineer me.

I am me, and I am Okay.
Psychologist Virginia Satir

It was a huge step forward when I began taking responsibility for myself without pointing to external factors of why I am the way I am or do what I do. No matter how much influence someone or something has over me, the majority of every choice is mine. In realizing no factor on this earth has influence over me unless I allow it was the beginning of freedom.

How ironic it is now to realize it was my own excuses and reasons I needed to be freed from. When external justifications no longer answered the “whys” of my thoughts and behavior, only one explanation remained; “ME”. I will be always grateful for the insight that connected my past, present and future; that allowed me to finally feel whole.

I’ve figured out now that it was never them
that made me feel that way.
It was just me, all along.
Maggie Stiefvater