Assignment 19 - Stephanie Bailey

“Don’t live your life for anybody but yourself.” – Momma Bailey. This was said to me during a time at which I ignored it as one of those cheesy sayings a mom is supposed to tell their child but freshman year, it rolled back around and hit hard. I used to be the people pleaser who wanted everyone to love her and think she has it all put together. I quickly learned, thanks to the cut-throat nature of high school social hierarchy, that I could no longer make everyone happy and attempting to do so was, in turn, making me miserable. My inability to be friends with everyone crushed me for a couple of months and I was in a really low place in life. It was at my lowest point that I remembered this piece of advice from my mom and I understood its true meaning for the first time in my life. I slowly got to a place where I was happy with myself and could start showing people who I really was and find friends through being myself and nobody else. I have finally found my friend group and I love where I am in life. Homework is, of course, always stressful but I work through it with the help of my new life-long friends and my new found self- confidence.