Why I Broke Up With Tinder

I just need to clear my mind, clear the endless space running through this place. I’ve been living life in rewind lately, memories racing and filled with regret. My friends tell me that I haven’t been myself but for the sake of honesty, I cannot remember the last time I was myself. I don’t even know if I ever really know who I was. I feel like I’ve just been showing the parts of my self the world wants to see. I keep so much of myself hidden and frankly I am damn tired of hiding. I never fully understood the whole “finding yourself” thing until this past year. If I really want to find myself, I need to be brutally honest with my failures and mistakes and I need to make peace with the ghosts of my past.

I deleted Tinder about two months ago. I had it for over a year and for those who know me, they know that I pride myself on the amount of matches I had. My girlfriends and I would compete with each other to see who would get the most matches and for a long time, I was in the lead. I thought it was fun, to portray myself as this carefree girl but again, I don’t think I am as carefree as I thought. It was fun to be chased. I would have several different boys I would be talking to every day and several dates a week. But I kept going from one to another. I would get bored or they would decide that they didnt want me. But I was okay with that. On to the next swipe right. I would thrive off the validation and attention from boys whose names I no longer remember and whose beds have been long cold. 

I would smile and laugh and flirt my way through but after, I would feel so low, it was like I wasn’t feeling anything at all. I would ditch my friends to go meet up with a different boy. At the height of it all, I was seeing five different guys within a month. My friends were worried. I stopped going out with them. I would ignore their texts or pretend I was sleeping when they knocked on my door. I was in the middle of a terrible self loathing and there was a point where I no longer wanted to live. I could never act on it but there were several times where I truly wondered who would miss me. I came home from one of these dates around 3am at the end of March to find two of my closest friends sitting outside my dorm, crying. I didn’t realize that they were crying for me. The conversation that followed would break my heart completely, leaving the pieces shattered on the floor. But they had to break me so i could learn to fix myself. Because they were right. I deserved better than what I was getting and I was being someone I never wanted to be. I was being someone that I hope and pray to God that my future daughter never becomes. I was settling for late night “wyd” texts and boys I would never normally socialize with.

In my friend group, I am the life of the party. I’ve been told I’m obnoxious and I really have always thrived off of attention. Even in kindergarten, my teacher wrote on my report card that I am a people pleaser and would do anything for attention and praise from my peers and man was she right. I never saw it as a problem until recently. Because I have been so fixated on getting attention and being the girl that everyone likes, I never really figured out who I am. 

There’s a stereotype that girls on Tinder are looking for self-validation and as embarrassing as this is to say, I will admit, that at least for me, it’s true. I’ve always thought I was a pretty confident person but there is something about getting match after match after match and heart eyes emoji and dates on Saturday nights that makes me feel so good, for awhile at least. But I now know that I was using Tinder as a distraction, to make me feel something when all I’ve been feeling is nothing.

A boy told me once that I am undateable. That I am just a good time. Something fun to be had until something better comes along. He was right. He was right in the sense that I have always dated boys who have never seen me as a priority. I have always been the backup plan, the option until someone better than me arrives. It’s just as much their fault, as it is mine. Because I have never really respected myself enough to let go of boys who refuse to see my worth. 

I deleted Tinder because I no longer want to be seen as an option; just another girl in your long list of matches. I deleted Tinder because I need to learn to respect myself, to love myself, to find myself. I can’t do any of that while being this beautiful, carefree girl that everyone else sees. I deleted Tinder because in my experience, those boys were not boys I should have been dating and lets be real, most boys on there are college aged just looking for their new slam piece for a few months until they get tired or bored or busy or find somebody new. And I don’t know about you but I am sick and tired of this damn hookup culture. I was a part of it but now I’m done with it.

I am still learning. I am still growing. I am still hopeful that one day I will find someone who will see me as a priority and will actually treat me well. Until then, I am unfinished. He was right. I am undateable. I am undateable because I am realizing my value. I am finding my voice. I no longer ask someone to stay with me even after they say they’re done. I deleted over 100 c0ntacts and pictures of boys who are no longer a part of my life. I won’t lie, deleting a few of them was difficult but it needed to be done. I am starting over, a fresh plate, a clean slate. I am working on myself, for myself, by myself. Because one day, I will meet my game changer, if I haven’t already and I want to be ready. I want to be dateable.

xoxo

Katie

 

And She Will Be Loved

“I don’t mind spending every day, out on your corner in the pouring rain, look for the girl with the broken smile, ask her if she wants to stay awhile and she will be loved.”

This song is my anthem. Honestly. Isn’t it crazy how sometimes lyrics can explain parts of ourselves so much better than we can? Broken smile. Broken is a funny word. It’s as if saying we just couldn’t take it anymore. Bad things happen and we let the past beat us, break us, shatter us. But what if we aren’t broken? What if, what if, the things that are happening to us, aren’t breaking us, but shaping us? 

And maybe brokenness is just an idea. Something that our minds made up to justify why we are the way we are. Maybe it’s just something to say when we hear those lines. You know, the ones where people say, “Oh she has trust issues. She doesn’t let anyone in, she doesn’t let anyone near enough to see who she really is. She holds her fears and dreams and hopes and failures close to her heart. You won’t see that part of her. “Well why not?” Because she’s broken.” And I think we use that as an excuse to not get to close to people. The perception of brokenness is what keeps people from breaking down those barriers and building bridges to those who need us. 

Broken smile. An oxymoron really. When we think broken, we think sad, depressed, giving up. But when you hear smile, you think of happy things. Broken smile. When I hear broken smile, I think of someone who refuses to give up. Someone who has had some bad things happen but still believes in the good of the world. See, that’s the thing about life. Some dang terrible things will happen to us at some point and we can let those things define us or we can embrace it; let the bad baggage shape you and then go out and show the world just how fierce you really are.

And she will be loved. This has been engraved into our brains ever since we were little. That boy who is being mean to you? It’s because he likes you, in elementary speak anyways. Middle school brought out the great “do you like him or do you like-like him” debate. And then high school introduced the L-word to us. We thought our high school relationships were the end-all-be-all and that he really was “the one” even though we truly didn’t understand what “the one” meant or was. And now that we’re a little bit older and a little bit smarter, I think we are finally starting to understand love and the kind of love to let in our lives.

“My heart is full, my door is always open, come any time you want.”

I think the thing that gets me the most about this song is how it shows just how much people can really love someone. I don’t know about you but I’m not standing out on the corner in the pouring rain for just anybody. But that’s the thing. What we do and give and how we act and treat the people we love isn’t exactly how we treat everyone else. And that’s okay. You don’t need to give everyone a piece of you. Don’t burn yourself up just to give everyone else light.

“Please don’t try so hard to say goodbye.”

Don’t. Don’t say goodbye at all. That person who is there for you unconditionally; and you know who I am talking about; let them in. Open your doors and windows and let their light brighten your entire being. You see, the thing about people, the thing about the kind of people that this song is talking about, is no matter how alone you feel, no matter how unloved you feel, there is always going to be someone there for you. And if you feel like you don’t have the person, just know you will. Because maybe you just haven’t meet that person yet. But you will. Darling, you will. You will be loved. 

Taking My Armor Off

I’d like to tell you a story, if that’s okay. Three years ago, there was a girl and it was her junior year of high school. She was in a honors history class with about 15 other students. This girl was quiet, a thoughtful, introverted type. People thought she was rude and mean and made fun of her for those reasons but they didn’t know about the battles she was fighting. During class one day, the teacher assigned an independent project that the students would have to present. Little did the teacher know, that the girl who sat in the second seat on the right by the window suffered from depression and anxiety. Panic attacks that would occur when this girl had to speak in public. You see, this girl stuttered and had speech problems when she was younger and was made fun of for it. She was smart, brilliant to some people even, but she didn’t show it because she was so quiet. Instead of working on the project like she was supposed to, this girl would just lay in bed. “I’ll do it tomorrow, she said, but for now I need to escape the world. I’m tired of living in it you see.”

But tomorrow would come and she still didn’t do it. Before she knew it, the day she was supposed to present was here and she had little work to show for it. After lunch and before class started, she went to the counselor’s office and started to cry. She talked about how she was stressed and unhappy and wasted close to 30 minutes speaking these words that she didn’t think were true just so she didn’t have to see the disappointment of her teacher and face the affirmation of being a failure, like she always thought she was. The counselor called the teacher and got this girl an extension on the project. When her new date came, the girl still didn’t have the project done. You see, it was hard for her to focus. It was so dang difficult for this girl to muster up the strength to do a simple project.

She walked into her teacher’s classroom and started her presentation. She only had the first few slides done. But this girl was good at faking emotions and she put those acting skills to use. When the empty slides came up, she pretended to freak out, saying “my whole project was here I don’t know what happened.” The teacher looked at her with pity in her eyes as the girl started to cry. The room was silent except for the sounds of her ugly crying, red faced and shaking as she said, “I just have a lot going on at home, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” The teacher waited until she was done crying before giving her another week to finish the project. She never did finish the project and got a 50. You see, that girl was me.

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You know what you have to do. You have a list of things you need to accomplish, assignments that need to be handed in, chores that need to be done. But you can’t. You physically can’t. When you’re depressed, the simplest things take all the strength you can give and there comes a point when you just check out. You’re done. All you want is to lay in bed, covered by blankets in total darkness. You want to be shielded from the world. A few hours of this goes by and then you realize that all that you needed to do didn’t get done and you start to freak out. You think, “Oh my god, I didn’t do my homework or clean my room. My teachers and parents are going to be so disappointed in me.” But then after you settle down, you sink back to your depressed state because what’s one more day? One more week?

I spent so much time in middle and high school trying to make everyone else happy in me. My teachers. My peers. My parents. I needed the affirmation that I wasn’t as terrible as I thought I was. I had those days where I was the perfect daughter or the perfect student. I got all my homework done and cleaned my room and helped out around the house and I was ideal on the good days. But then the dark days would come and it was all I could do to get out of bed and go to school. And sometimes the days would be so bad that I could physically feel it. I would get these terrible headaches and stomach aches. I remember in fifth grade when my class started to fight over some plant cell and animal project and I ended up freaking out, kicking chairs and desks and yelling at everyone to stop fighting. Middle school brought out the worst in me. I was mean to all my friends and lost them. I spread rumors and hurt people. One time in sixth grade, I locked a girl in the bathroom and made her bark like a dog before I let her out. I took pride in people’s pain. Better them than me right? My parents and teachers would make me see a guidance counselor but how could I tell them what was going on with me when I didn’t even understand it myself? 

By the time we graduated eighth grade, I had a terrible reputation. No friends and karma was coming back around to me. Middle school brought out the worst in my behavior but high school brought out the worst in my depression. I was quiet. I was hoping to become invisible but my mistakes in middle school brought repercussions in high school. I was now the one being made fun of. Name calling and mean jokes and dirty stares. I didn’t let it show that it bothered me. I’d laugh and roll my eyes or smile and say “thanks” all while breaking on the inside. The more people who tell you you’re ugly, that you’re not good enough, smart enough, athletic enough, the more you start to believe it. I did my best in school but when I got home, I’d lay in bed. My bed was my safe haven, comfortable and cozy and I could let out all my emotions that I’d been holding in. There were a few times that people were close enough to see that there was something wrong, those teachers who did pay attention or my coaches or those senior girls who seem to have known but no one rarely said anything. There were a few times when “friends” or teachers would say something to the counselor and I’d have to go down there and talk. My motto back then was deny and lie. They will only see what you choose to show them. I could talk myself out of those situations. “Oh there’s nothing wrong. Those girls are just starting trouble and those teachers don’t really care.” I lied so much and so often that I began to believe in those lies.

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I am a people pleaser and in my desperation to make everyone else around me happy, I never learned how to make myself happy. I was so caught up in trying to be everything to everyone else that I became nothing to myself. I couldn’t see how special I was or how I really was good enough, pretty enough, smart enough, athletic enough. I let the lies become my best friend. I know now that not everyone is going to agree with what you do or say. Some of the people who should support you and believe in you, won’t. It hurts but you have to know that the affirmations of others do not define your worth. You can’t change the opinions of others and the sooner you realize that, the better off you’ll be. Now my motto is honesty. I’m honest about my past & sharing it with everyone who reads this because there is nothing I love more than when someone comments or emails me and tells me I’ve inspired them. I’ve learned that sometimes you have to say no to people. You can’t be everything to everyone because you will lose yourself. I still have those dark days but I know it gets better. It really does get better. I look back now and I wish I could thank those girls and teachers for noticing something. They were ready to help me but I wasn’t ready to accept help.

That’s the problem with most of us. We want to help others but we don’t want to help ourselves and what we fail to realize is that we can’t be something to someone if we still think we’re nothing. We are too prideful, too busy to stop and realize that the things we want to help people with are the same things we struggle with. I’ve learned that the only way to help others is to open yourself up like a book so others can read. No one is going to believe the words you say if you don’t believe those words.

And here I am, taking my armor off just so you can know I believe in you. That dream you have, chase it. You are not your struggles. You are not your depression. You are not your anxiety. You have more worth than the number of friends you have and the grades on your assignments. These things do not define you. YOU define you. You are worthy. You are enough. You are beautiful and special. Don’t let the hurtful words others say to you make your heart hard. Just love them. Love everyone regardless of how they treat you. Be kind no matter how people treat you. And if you feel like you don’t have anyone in your corner, you have me. I’ve been there. I know. Maybe you should try to take your armor off too. And what happens when you take take your armor off, when you truly open yourself up to the world, it may surprise you.

kb.

We Blame Society Yet We Are Society

Every 18 minutes in America, someone commits suicide. Someone makes the choice to end their life, the life that God gave them every 18 minutes. In the time it takes you to wake up and get ready for the day, someone has died. In the time it takes you to drive to work or school, someone else has died. In one day, 85 people, boys and girls, men and women of all ages, all races, all religions, all walks of life, commits suicide. It’s become a sad epidemic that is only notably mentioned when it’s a celebrity or a rare instance when it makes the news. People make the promise to be better, to not be mean to others, to not judge others but no one sticks to that promise. Society says every life is valuable but the only lives society seems to value are the famous, the pretty, the rich, the popular. 

It’s sad when a 17 year old girl kills herself because her parents don’t approve of her choices. It’s sad when a 15 year old boy decides to end his life because it’s better than dealing with the kids at school who call him a faggot. It’s sad when a veteran kills themselves after surviving a war but they can’t survive the war in their mind because they don’t have proper help. It’s sad how we, as a society, don’t see the value of someone’s life until they’re gone. We constantly say, “Oh it would’ve gotten better. They should have fought harder, they should have tried harder. They should have told someone. Don’t they know they were loved? Suicide is selfish. What about all the people who will miss them?”

You know what is selfish? Making people feel like the only option they have to escape their daily torment is ending their lives. And do they know they were loved? I don’t know. How many times have you stopped to tell someone that God loves them and that you love them? How many times have you stopped and sat with someone and just listened to them? How many times have you told someone that they’re worthy? How many times have you told someone that, while I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, it will get better and you have to hold on that hope and faith that it will get better? How many times have we told someone that we are always there for them whenever they need us, no matter the time or day? Unfortunately, not often enough. We are too caught up in our lives, our own struggles and joys, to even pay attention to those who may be hurting around us.

We say we’ll be better, that we’ll watch our words and this only lasts until the media circus around the most recent suicide dies down and then we’re back to our old ways until the next one. We have to end the cycle and it starts with us. We live in a world full of judgement. We call that girl wearing a bikini a ho but the girl who doesn’t want to show her body a prude. You take pictures with a guy and you’re a slut but you take pictures with one of your girlfriends and you’re a lesbian. The girl who raises her hand in class to answer all the questions does so because the only way she will get to college is to do well in school yet you call her a teacher’s pet. The boy who always falls asleep in fourth period you call him lazy but he was up till midnight working to keep his family off the streets. The boy who dresses well you call him gay but the boy who wears whatever he can find at the thrift store because that’s all his family can afford is trashy. We make fun of the tall girl, the short girl. The girl who is skinny no matter what she eats and the girl who can’t lose weight no matter how much she diets. We make fun of those guys who are “too muscular” but lifting is what makes them feel good and we tease the guys who can’t get muscle because heaven forbid we date a guy who doesn’t have a six-pack. We make fun of those who are smart for being “nerdy’ and those who are athletic are just being “dumb jocks whose glory days will end the day they graduate high school.” Those kids who have braces and glasses and acne we call ugly yet they can’t choose how they look. We ridicule people for things they have no control over. We make fun of those girls who put tons of selfies on Instagram because 100 likes is the only way she feels validated. We let our self-worth become defined by followers and likes and anyone who has “less” than us aren’t as cool as us. We body shame and slut shame and shame people for their families and backgrounds and choices and yet we wonder why we live in a world where it seems like no one loves themselves.

WE BLAME SOCIETY YET WE ARE SOCIETY AND THE ONLY WAY TO CHANGE SOCIETY IS TO CHANGE OURSELVES. It is up to US to end this cycle. Every day we have a choice. We have the choice to go out and put something positive in the world or something negative. We have the choice to be nice or be mean, to judge someone or accept them, even though you don’t agree with their personal choices. We have the choice to hate someone or love them. We have the choice to let people know how much we appreciate them and how much we really do care about them. We have the choice to just listen to someone talk because sometimes that is what people really need. Someone to listen and then hug them when they’re done. The world needs more love, more positivity, more acceptance, more God. Can you imagine what it would be like if God told people, “I’m not gonna love you. I’m not gonna love because you don’t wear designer clothes. You’re too smart, too athletic, too skinny, too fat. You aren’t modest enough and you are too prudish. You don’t have a large enough social media following and you’ve made some pretty terrible choices. You’re gay, you’re straight and I’m just deciding that you’re not going to get my love for no other reason than these.”

Do you hear how ridiculous that sounds? Every single time we make those mean comments to someone, that is exactly what we are telling them. We are telling them that their personal choices and some things that they can’t even control are the basis for whether or not they get our love. Mark 12:31 says, “Love your neighbor as yourself, there is no greater commandment than these.” We don’t want people making fun of us right? We don’t want people judging us off our looks and circumstances which we can’t control right? So why are we continuously doing the things we wouldn’t want done to us to others? We need to love everyone just like we love ourselves and it is because Jesus loves us that we can love others and ourselves.

We must be the change we wish to see in the world. Sure we can talk and talk and talk about how much we want to change the world but we need to ACT. We need to be the kind of people this world needs and it’s up to us to show everyone what love is really like. You don’t have to agree with every single thing a person does, we don’t need to compromise convictions to be compassionate. What we need is to unconditionally love everyone like God loves us. Compliment someone genuinely. Let someone know that they aren’t alone. Sit with someone and listen to what they have to say. Be compassionate. Be loving. Be kind. Always. You never know what kind of battles someone is fighting.

You are worthy. You are loved. You are fierce. You are strong. You are brave. You are beautiful. You are enough just as you are. You don’t need to change a thing. God made you the way you are for a reason. Never forget that. God loves you and I love you.

kb.

Another Year, Lots Of New Dreams

2014 is over. I still can’t believe it. And when I look back at how far I’ve come this past year, I’m even more amazed. This time last year, I was in the midst of a depression that took me whole, it swallowed me up and didn’t allow me to enjoy life. It took every part of me to get out of bed and go to work. I didn’t socialize with friends and had minimal interaction with my family. I had no idea what I wanted out of life and honestly saw no point in living. I was never suicidal; I just didn’t want to live any more. But 2014 brought a lot of changes to my life. I got saved on February 19, 2014, 5 days after my 19th birthday and my life started to come together. I started going to church and a Bible study group every week with a group of amazing ladies. I learned how to love myself. I learned how to forgive. I started this blog as a way to put all my thoughts together, I thought it would be a good way to heal and move on but this is so much more than that.

I have found my reason to live. My calling. My gift. What I was meant to do. And I can’t help but think that God put me in all those situations so I could sit here and tell you that it gets better. I am proof that it gets better. And I know that it’s hard to believe. I used to laugh and roll my eyes when people told me it would get better because I thought they had no idea what they were talking about. But darling look at the words I write just so you can read. This is all for you. There aren’t always going to be good days. You are going to have some flat out terrible days. There are going to be days when all you want to do is cry but then there will be days where you laugh. And there are going to be days when you’re a social butterfly and days when you won’t want to talk to anyone. And that’s okay.

Just because it gets better doesn’t mean that everything will always be amazing. But it’s okay. It’s okay as long as you wake up, every single day, and look in the mirror and tell yourself “I don’t care what the world throws at me today. I will try my hardest and do the best I can with what’s given to me. I don’t care how bad today is because I will try to put something good out there. Tell yourself that 5 times, 20 times, 100 times, however long it takes you to believe it. Let those words light a fire in your soul and then you walk outside and show this world what you’re made of.

This all brings me to the point of this post. New Year’s Resolutions. We’ve all made them and at some point, broken them. And then there are the people who refuse to even entertain the idea of making a resolution because they won’t stick to them or don’t believe in the whole New Year, New You thing. I agree to disagree. Yes, you don’t need a new year to decide to be a better person. You can wake up and decide that anytime. And then there’s the whole broken resolution thing. If you want something bad enough, you’ll have the willpower, the strength, the faith to go out there and get it. See, I can tell that I’m a different person today than I was at the end of 2013 but I know that I have a ways to go to get to where I want to be and I’m human enough to admit that. I decided that instead of just making a list of resolutions that I’d probably shove in my desk or purse and forget about it, I’d post it. On my blog. For the world to see. New Year, New Me right? Here we go.

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1. Run every day

Okay this isn’t going to be me going on some crazy health kick but I started running over the summer again and really enjoyed it. It was relaxing and got rid of some extra energy I had. But then fall came and I let the excuses build up and I stopped. But I don’t have time for excuses anymore. I want to run at least a mile a day.

2. Drink more water 

Something else I tried over the summer was drinking lots of water. At one point I was drinking 120 ounces a day and I could really see the benefits. I felt better & my skin was clearer. I want to try and get back to that point. Good thing I have an abundance of water bottles.

3. Don’t pay attention to negative people

I have a bad habit of listening to people and I let their opinions of my life consume my mind. I spend too much time worrying about what other people think. I think well will they like this post? Will they like what I have to say? The first few months after I started my blog, I didn’t tell a soul. About 3 months ago, I took the plunge and shared one of my posts on Facebook and almost everyone loved it. It’s now common for people at church or people I barely know to tell me they love my blog. My point is, there are always going to be people who don’t like what you do. They aren’t going to like what you say or how you act or what you wear, no matter how many times you try to convince them to believe in you. Just because the people who are close to you should believe in you, doesn’t mean they will. But the positive comments and reactions I get far outweigh those few negative comments and that is something I’m starting to realize and believe and it’s something I want to continue to remind myself throughout the years to come.

4. Stop picking my nails. 

This may seem silly to some people but whenever I’m nervous or upset or stressed about something, I have a really bad habit of ripping my nails off. It’s gotten worse this past year because I can’t wear nail polish at work so I rarely have my nails done. I used to polish them to try and limit this habit and it worked for a while. I’m going to do my best to kick this bad habit this year.

5. Travel More.

I’m not going to sit here and write all the places I want to go to, that’s a whole notha post but rather, I literally just want to see more than what this small town has. Within the next few months, I’ll move away from home, to a different state with the opportunity to travel abroad and I WILL take advantage of every single chance I have to go to different countries. I’ve said it before but life is not meant to be lived in the same place doing the same thing with the same people. I want to have friends all over the world and I want to have my passport filled with different countries and I want to have memories that you could only ever read in books or see in movies.

6. Blog More!

I’m not going to sit here and tell you how many days a month I’ll update because I don’t know. I am a perfectionist and I won’t ever blog for the sake of blogging. I’ll only ever write something I truly believe in and I’m not going to put something that’s not fully done or up to par just because I haven’t updated. Quality over quantity. I will update a few times a month and continue with my weekly Trail Mix.

That’s it for my resolutions. Short and sweet. Leave me your thoughts below and what your resolutions are, if you have any.

Happy New Year!!

kb.