And it's still so hard to be who you are, but you've come this far and you're broken...

This is something I've been wanting to write for a while, but I haven't...had the words. Until now.

I've been thinking a lot this summer about change.  Specifically, how much I've changed...in the past 4 years, the past year, the past 4 months.  

This summer has been really...different for me.  It was nothing that I expected, but it was, I think, a lot of things that I needed.  There was a time this summer when I was the lowest I've ever been.  I felt sad and hopeless and really, painfully alone.  I've never felt like that before.  I completely broke down...to my core.  Down to the foundation.  And when I got there, I stayed.  I didn't move.  I just sat still and surrounded myself by my complete and utter melancholy.  Despite all the people trying to give me comfort and support, I felt like I had no one.  No one could possibly understand.  No one could make it better.  I was empty.  

It's interesting, I think, how sometimes your worst moments can also be your best.  It wasn't until I was down there, at the bottom of my breakdown, feeling like no one cared about me and like no one could help, that I realized just how many people do care about me.  I'm usually a pretty closed off person.  I don't let people in to see my emotions.  But this time I did.  I let myself be completely vulnerable and exposed.  And it helped me to keep moving.  I started to build myself back up, brick by brick.  And as I sifted through the rubble of what was my life, I found pieces of the person I used to be.  It was like a restoration.  I kept the parts that worked and that were strong and good, but I left behind the pieces that I thought were bringing me down and tried to make something new and better in their place.  I'm a work in progress though.  Along the way, I've had my pitfalls.  I've lost a few bricks here and there, and I still am and probably still will for a while, but I'm getting there.  I'm moving forward, building up.  

I had a conversation recently about the person I am now, as I'm about to be a sophomore in college,  compared to the person I was at the start of my sophomore year in high school.  And it's strange...because...while my immediate response was to say that I'm a completely different person, the more I think about it, the more I realize that those two people are a lot more alike than I thought.  A lot has happened in the past 4 years.  I've had a lot of successes but also a lot of failures.  I've made and lost friends.  I had my first relationship...and my second, and my third.  I've had my first real heartbreak, and I've recovered from it - well, am recovering.  I've learned how to be myself and I've learned who I am.  I've also learned that I'm constantly changing and having to rediscover who I am...and I've learned to love the discovery.  I've cried myself to sleep.  I've cried until I had no tears left.  But I've also laughed until I cried.  I've moved out and back in.  I've learned to let go.  I've learned to live.  

And yet, through all of this, I find myself in a very familiar position.  I'm at a place of uncertainty.  I'm still not completely sure of what I'm doing.  I'm still getting used to this new part of my life.  I'm caught between two worlds: the home I've known forever and the new home I'm still trying to make for myself.  

I said at one point during high school that sohpomores really have no place.  You're not a freshman, so you don't get the free pass of being new, but you're also not an upperclassmen, so you don't really get the privilege of acting like you know what you're doing and like you own the place.  That might have been a little harsh, but what I'm trying to get at is the fact that at this point in my life, it feels a little bit like I'm in limbo.  I'm still trying to let go of my past and my old life while also figuring out my new life and my new place.  I'm stuck.

It's not a bad feeling though, necessarily.  It's kind of...exciting.  It's a chance for me to have a new start and figure out who I really want to be and what I want from life.  It's an adventure :)

Change is a funny thing. 

I wrote something a while back about ghosts...about how they remind you of who you were and show you who you are.  I want to add something to that now.  

At the time that I wrote that, the "ghosts" were reminding me of who I had been and helping me realize who I am, but now, I think they're guiding me to who I'm going to become.  (I know this sounds super hippie-trippy, but just go with me.)  

I'm constantly changing.  It never stops.  

But, I think what's different now is that I've finally figured out how to keep up :)