Learning to Let Myself Be Happy

By: Kassidy Peterson

To anyone who may read this:

I am not a blogger. I don't broadcast my thoughts and feelings to the world. I keep things hidden and I bottle my feelings up and I don't know how to share. But I'm learning. I'm working on improving myself and learning to let myself be happy, no matter what. I'm learning to communicate like an adult and it is long overdue. 

Writing has always come naturally to me. I may not be able to talk to strangers, but the written word has a way of making me feel safer and more hidden. I don't have to look someone in the eye and say: "That's offensive to me," or "I love you," or "Why don't you care?" There's so much that I feel unable to say in my everyday life that I feel I can here. This is my space, my own sanctuary where I can broadcast anything I feel without a fear of rejection or getting hurt in person. 

I'm learning so much every day. I'm in college and obviously learning about what I'm studying, but I mean so much more than that. I got married last September and it's been the craziest, most exciting and terrifying journey of my life. We've only been married four months with many, many more to come but the beginning has just been a whirlwind and I've loved every minute of it, the good and the not so good. I'm learning that life is about so much more than I had ever thought it could be. I'm learning that people truly care for me. I'm learning that I'm not alone in the world as I had let myself believe. And I'm learning that I have worth, and purpose, and value in this life far greater than what I had imagined for myself. 

This blog is called Patience becuase I need to learn it and live it. I may have learned a lot recently and throughout my lifetime, but I still have so much more to learn. I still have so much growth and strength that I need to develop in my life. I have so much I want to accomplish and I have so many goals. I need to learn that patience is the key to everything that I want out of my life. I have always been such a "go, go, go" kind of person that I never truly appreciated what was happening around me and what I had. I'm always rushing from one project to the next. Always pushing myself to do more, do better, and to work harder. I really struggled with anxiety and depression for a long time in my adolescence because I never felt that I was good enough becuase even when I did well, I always needed to do better than my best. 

Now I know I am good enough. My best is all I can do, and it's usually more than what's expected of me. No one's perfect, and just about everyone in the world can recognize that. I have so much I want to work on, but I know that I am doing my best in life right now, and it's definitely good enough for me. I'm acing school, I'm succeeding in my marriage, we're financially stable, my husband and I are working on our goals together, and for the first time in a long time, I'm genuinely happy. I have so much to be grateful for and I'm so glad I can recognize my blessings now. I'm working on my hobby of photography. I absolutely love it and I'm doing pretty well at it. I've never had a real hobby before venturing into photography and it's so empowering to have something that I love and can spend my free time enjoying. It makes me feel like I have something I can do outside of just doing school and it really is a great outlet for me to express myself creatively.

 I love where my life is going right now and I'm so glad I can now recognize my strengths and weaknesses without hating myself for the areas I'm lacking in. I'll continue to blog as I continue to learn and grow. It's so wonderful to know that I can be happy without conditions or limits. It's so liberating to feel happiness without restraint.