Being Positive Is WORK

I'm going to be honest real quick, being the girl that said yes this summer was way more fun than the girl that wants to be both fearlessly authentic AND positive this year. It's work to keep myself positive this year even though I have always called myself the happy girl.

But somehow being the positive one means more than starting each day sending my Snapchat friends list a reason to smile while keeping the streaks. 

Being the positive one means embracing the parts of my life that I don't necessarily enjoy and taking a positive spin on them to help me keep going. My professor says to "embrace the suck" but that phrase just doesn't sit well with me. 

So I have learned to take what life throws at me and run with it. 

These things have many different names so I will start with a few and if you have questions, that's what the comment button is for. 

First of all, I am becoming more body positive in 2020. And yes, I am taking some ownership of that term for those of us on the smaller side with confidence. You see, I have been working on my confidence ever since my breakup in September 2018. When Joey dumped me, I started working on my "revenge abs" to try and get him to run back to me instead of into the arms of someone new (even though he wasn't that kind of guy.) Spoiler alert- that didn't work at all. 

Anyway, I realized recently that I can't do things just to impress other people or get anyone's attention. Sure, this came about with a Joey concept, but it has rung true for my whole life. I have always wanted to be the favorite student or the girl with the best relationship with her superior. I mean, let's be honest, I have my fourth-grade teacher and my elementary school guidance counselor as Facebook friends and I thought this deserved an award of some sort.

So I have been hitting the rec for myself lately and it has felt amazing. I go to the Rec to run on MWF since I don't really have classes. Then just yesterday I didn't set a schedule for my workout and wanted to see what I could do and hit five miles. I have never been more proud of myself. 

So yes, I have been letting myself workout for myself and not the voices in my head that wanted to die when they saw a higher number than usual on the scale. I am working out for my own endorphins and my own physical well-being. And I love it. 

In the past, I have hated going to the gym because I hated the "that skinny bitch" looks from girls that are there to look like me one day. I didn't understand why they didn't want me there, but now I know it comes from a place of anger, jealousy and ignorance. I may have ran 5 miles (47:00), but I don't think I could do a push-up or a pull-up to save my life. So it works out. We can co-exist. And I'm allowed to be proud of my body, especially now that my metabolism is slowing down and I actually have to work for it.

I don't have to feel bad for looking for the non-existant XS size marker because stores don't want others to feel bad. I can feel a bit excluded. And I can be happy to wear my size 2 jeans because, honestly, I'm a little sad my 00s don't fit anymore.

Sure, many of you won't see a difference worth worrying about but the day the photo on the left popped up on my Timehop, I was legitimately pissed I had grown since I took it freshman year of college. 

But the thing is, I am learning to be positive about my body in so many ways. I am positive and confident because I have taught myself those skills. I am also teaching myself to take care of my face even more than before. 

I have had acne since like the first day of seventh grade. I have tried all the home remedies. I have done the Proactive treatments and debated Accutane but I am seriously afraid of it. So now I am on two prescriptions. One pill that I believe is causing me to gain weight and one cream. They're working, slowly but surely. But I am also helping myself by drinking a shit ton of water, wearing moisturizer all the time and doing a face mask at least twice a week. Some people call this self-care. At this point, I am considering it part of my proper hygiene. Because if I am going to be stressed by classes and current and future jobs, I have to help my face adjust to all of it.

And sometimes that means throwing on a little makeup to boost my confidence just enough. I used to think makeup was just meant to impress someone else. But in reality, a bit of concealer and a fun eye shadow can help me feel like a million bucks and when that happens, nobody can stand in my way.

Because I am an RA. And sometimes that just sucks. But I am working on letting my positivity shine through there as well. On Smith 8, I am a positive RA most when I am ready for my girls and know what's coming. However, I'm an RA and I rarely know what's coming. 

For those of you that know me well, you know I absolutely hate talking while going to the bathroom. I hate the whole idea of it. So when my resident walked in the other night as I was brushing my teeth and said, "I was hoping to see you here," I was not so positive. Moments like these and moments with staff meetings and other less than enjoyable things are what make me more negative about my job. But I am looking at it with a positive light more and more because I know I will miss my girls when I graduate in May.

I am also aware that I am not in the dorm helping them as often as I could be. 

For example, I am also finding my positivity shine through at my part-time job at OMT. OMT took me in when AH closed last August. I will admit adjusting to both the different way of doing things and having an hourly job in college at all has been a lot to swallow. But I am pushing myself to dress up for work, wear a little makeup to ooze confidence and continually learn more about the store so I can understand everything a little better each week since I am still technically the new girl in a family business. 

This can be a hard situation to mold into, especially coming from AH where I was part of the core group, but just today one of my coworkers told a customer I was basically family, so I'll take it. Even if she was lying. 

Overall, though, I am getting better and finding the sunshine in the world. I have not had any serious bats with my usual seasonal depression this year, so I am thanking God for that. I am also well on my way to finding a church group, one baby step at a time. So things are good in the hood. I just have to keep smiling. 

Thanks for reading!

Christa