When you grow up you change, that's a given. New experiences shape how you are in that next chapter of your life. I've been thinking and maybe my adult self is just made up of lots of mini-mes of my past. Weird thought I know but I promise it makes sense in my head. What if that 5 year old Leaha is inside my head somewhere just itching to make up a dance routine to that cheesy pop song or swing as high as she can on that swing set? What if 16 year old Leaha is there still a hopeless romantic and not knowing what being hurt feels like? What if she's the reason why I'm always the one to give way too many second chances? When I think of the past and the parts of my life that ultimately got me here I think of them as if another person lived through that. In a flashback I don't necessarily see my face, I think of my 15 or 16 year old self as a separate being. A person who I think of now and again and wonder if she's judging my choices now. That voice in my head, almost certainly, the voice of reason, that screams at me whenever I begin to get close to the wrong guy or even when I reach for that extra slice of pizza, that's her. 16 year old me, wanting for better. Ultimately, the person I am now wins, and I'm not sure I always like that.
I recently watched a video on Carrie Hope Fletchers YouTube channel which prompted this little, messy chain of thoughts. She put it perfectly. She explained how she feels like her 16 year old self is still existing in the year she's from. She's there judging every mistake and routing for every success, ready to high five the present version of herself from some alternate universe. Somehow, in a weird and impossible way, I kinda feel the same.
I spent the last year feeling like I was two people, two similar people, with differences that only someone who truly knew me would recognise. Half the time I was at university, making new friends and falling in love with a new city. The other half I would be 'normal Leaha'. Living in a town I know like the back of my hand, with friends that know me like theirs. Neither versions of myself were better, nore fake. Neither felt more like me. I still had the same insecurities, I still looked the same. University Leaha slips about when I'm at home, like when I meet new people I'm more confident, I remember what it felt like to be that nervous wreck meeting my flat mates for the first time. Likewise home Leaha makes many appearances when I'm around my university friends, those who I feel most comfortable around have seen my weird traits more than I'm sure they welcome. Those two people exist separately and their lives barely cross, I'm the only link.
I love that I have diaries and memories in a box of the past. Yes, we all have memories, but can you really remember what it felt like on that first date with your first boyfriend? Can you really remember the excitement that Christmas when you got that camera? I'm not old and I'm certainly not wise but I've coped with a few trials so far. I almost laugh out loud at 16 year old year as I read how she had another argument with that boy. But at that time, for that little girl that was consuming. That was a battle. Thanks to her getting through that, present me could now solve that problem in a heart beat and 16 year old me would high five her for it. If you don't have a diary of a box to keep all of those special keep sakes, make one. I promise you there is nothing more therapeutic when you're having a bad day to open a page to a happy place, to a happy you, and re-live it. It's also helpful for those days when your hating on a person, when someone close to you has upset you in someway. I found myself looking through my memory box the other day and stumbling across a necklace that someone who was one special to me bought. I thought back to the time when that necklace hardly ever left my neck, to a time when that was my favourite possession. I thought it would make me sad to see it sitting lonely, back in the box it was gifted in. In reality it made me feel happy and thankful that, although bittersweet, I have those memories. (I wouldn't however advice looking through bits like this unless you are truly ready to move on from that person or chapter.) Admittedly 16 year old me was probably screaming at me to still be mad from somewhere inside, but she just hasn't learnt to forgive just yet.
This has been an odd blog post. This corner of the Internet is the place where I rant and rave about makeup and beauty bits but I was in the mood for an old school style post. I hope you don't mind. I also hope you don't think I'm crazy, I'm very aware I'm not Hannah Montana and I know I only really have one life and I'm one person. Nevertheless maybe this has made a small amount of sense?
Be the best person you can be in the present because they're going to make up those voices in your head when you're grey.
