Hello World Part 1 (100 Day Photo Challenge!)

Day 18: A Photo of You 10 Years Ago

10 years ago was a very hard time for me.  I was going through so many changes and I didn't understand any of it.  I was awkwardly shy, didn't have any good friends, and just about to attend a new school.  There were many other changes going on as well (such as I had "graduated" from my Primary class at church and was now going to attend Young Women's, my dad had been very sick, my body was changing, and in general more was expected of me)  but I am only going to focus on three of them. 

All three of the changes I am about to go into depth on didn't happen overnight.  It was a slow and sometimes painful process.  Life has a funny way of going on even when we want it to stop.  I was forced with choices, I made some good choices and some bad ones, but I was forced to choose.

Awkwardly shy.  I hated when people called me shy.  I just wanted to yell at them and tell them I was not shy, I was just quiet.  Something always held me back.  Today I can see, even though I don't want to admit it still, that I was a very shy girl.  I clung to my parents, I never wanted to be the center of attention, and I hated going out in public unless my mom or dad was right by my side.  To be honest, I was afraid of the world, I was afraid of everything.

But I have good news.  Somewhere along the way I decided that life shouldn't be lived in fear.  I decided that I could be just like those people who I admired and only dreamed of being.  When I look at the girl I was 10 years ago I can't help but see all the change I was about to face.  All the choices, all the "scary" things I would never even dream of doing.  Do I have my fears still?  Yes.  Am I still kind of shy?  Hate to admit it but, yes (although I would prefer to call myself quiet).  Do I fear some of the things I feared back then?  Yes.  Do I let that hold me back?  No. 

10 years ago I didn't have very many good friends.  I was so quiet (shy) and so afraid of things that I just fell into a group of friends who took me in.  We were all really young so of course we couldn't do anything really bad (luckily).  But I was at that age where I was about to decide and make choices that could have stay with me the rest of my life.  Even though it was hard to break the ties with my "friends"  I did it.  Today I only associate with one of the girls from our group.  That "association" we have is (sad to say) a Facebook association.  We are friends on Facebook, I read her status updates, look at her pictures, and occasionally "talk" to her.  As for the other girls?  I don't know where they are.  They took different paths, they made different choices. 

I was just about to attend a different school.  I was right about to leave the school I loved and move on to the next stage in life.  I was going to take 7 classes each day.  SEVEN!  Instead of just one.  I would have to find my way around a BIG school with FOUR flights of stairs and a LOT more people.  I was scared, I was nervous, and I felt lost.  But guess what.  I did it.  I made it through.

When I look at that girl in the picture my mind is taken back to all those changes.  If you would have asked that girl if I would ever go to Chicago by myself, or work with people who have disabilities, or decide to move away from my family...I can guarantee that girl would have said no.  Actually, she probably wouldn't have even said no.  She would have simply shook her head back and forth. 

I am not that little girl anymore but, I am a better person because I was that little girl at one time.  Instead of looking back and regretting the way I was, I look back and celebrate how far I've come since then.  I still have a long way to go before I become the person I want to become but change doesn't happen over night.  It comes one small bit at a time.  It happens ever so slowly, sometimes we don't even realize it has taken place until we look back and remember who we once were and who we are now.

“Every passing minute is another chance to turn it all around.”

Cameron Crowe

 Change takes time but you can do it.  You can start today, right now.