Self-Love in Letters To My Friends

This past year has not been easy for anyone. It is so much easier to feel alone when you are forced to be at home or do remote learning. Some of the friends that I’ve talked to have expressed they have been struggling, and it is really hard seeing them like this. I decided that if I could not see them in person, the best I could do was mail them something! So, this past Thanksgiving, I got the addresses of about twenty of my friends and set out to write each person a handwritten letter. It took me a while, but after two weeks or so I was able to get everything into envelopes and stamped. 

I ended up mailing them out on Thanksgiving day, so they arrived a little late, but the sentiment was there. The week after, I started to get messages from my friends that warmed my heart. All the time I spent trying to make sure the letters were perfect and get them out was worth it. Seeing their reactions and responses to my letters made my day. I really wanted to make sure my friends felt loved and appreciated, and I hope that message got through. 

So often we just assume that our friends know how much they mean to us, but some people just need a reminder. Part of the reason why I wanted to write all these letters to my friends was that sometimes I have trouble finding my place in other people’s lives. My brain tends to convince me that people don’t care about me, which I know is not true- I have amazing friends- but I think it’s because I often put up this bubbly and positive front. I am definitely a very optimistic and happy-go-lucky person, but I also struggle a lot and cover that up by overcompensating or ignoring the issues at hand, so it’s no wonder that people just assume that everything is fine. 

I feel lonely more often than I would like to admit. I want to think of myself as this capable and strong young woman, but like every teenage protagonist in a coming of age movie, there also seems to be a lot of angst in my life. There have been nights where I’ve cried myself to sleep wondering if I was a bad person if the people in my life were better off without me- but the next morning I would wake up and post a picture of my coffee like nothing was wrong. 

There is this part of me that is hopelessly hopeful, a part of me that believes so strongly that things will get better because they have to. So when I’m acting like I have my life together on social media, I’m not purposely lying or misleading people. I am simply hiding the part of my life that isn’t so ~ aesthetically pleasing ~ and I know some people out there would agree. While post-cry selfies have become a personality trait for some people, the real cries are the ones that no one can see- the ones where you’re too busy trying to catch your breath to capture a photo. 

I know the importance of reminding people just how much they mean to you. You never, ever, know what is happening in other people's lives and in their heads. Anyone that knows me knows that I am a fan of social media, but even I understand how misleading it can be. If you only knew me based on my social media presence, you wouldn’t know me at all. People are so complex and so are their feelings, but there is one simple thing we have in common as humans and that is wanting to feel loved. We all want to be appreciated and needed, and in case you forgot today, this is your reminder that someone out there is thinking about you.

Someone out there is thinking about the time you held open the door for them when you let them borrow your pen, the time you made them laugh… trust me, you mean so much more than what your brain tells you sometimes. The most life-changing thing I ever learned was that you are not your thoughts, you are just observing them. They do not define you. 

If no one is writing you a letter, write one to yourself because you deserve it! With that being said, I am going to end this article with one of my favorite quotes, “You deserve the love you keep trying to give everyone else.”