My friends

I have a special group of friends that have come together over the years. My six best friends are like my family in so many ways. We've come together in a weird way, really, with the group growing and shrinking as we adopt and accept people who need it. We've kind of always been the group of misfits throughout high school. I'm the first person to want to make friends with someone who seems lonely or out of place with the people they're spending time with. From year seven to year 12, if you want to sit with our group and become a part of it, we're willing to let you. Maybe, if I hadn't have met these people in high school I wouldn't be friends with a lot of them.

But I did meet them in high school and they are the best of friends to me. Most of us have done our growing up from children to young adults together and that gives us a tie that can't easily be broken. We understand each other in a way that not many can. When it feels like most people our age are acting a lot more grown up than I feel, I know I can go to them and be immature, make noises and pull faces at each other like it's what anyone and everyone does. We can be mature, we just choose not to be when we spend time together because we can be ourselves and relax together. At the same time, we can stay up all night talking about the meaning of life, how people are stupid in this world or random crushes we may have. That isn't something you can just do with anyone, it's a special bond that allows that and I'm so glad to have it right now.

Yesterday I left a little bit of what has bonded us together for so many years: our high school/sixth form. We left behind the comfortable rhythm of going in each day knowing that we would see one another and be able to talk about whatever we felt like. We left the place that brought us together and gave us a way to catch up. We're all very similar in that we don't really like doing much outside of the internet and so we don't see each other outside of school, partly because we don't need to. We get our time together in school.

Now that I know we can't get that it's very weird. I've always known that I could come back to that comfort of seeing my friends in September and knowing more or less what to expect. Now that's gone and we need to form a friendship in a different context. This summer needs to be one of friendship and coming together as often as we can to catch up and create our group outside of school. As we move away to Uni it will become a friendship based online but, when we can, our friendship needs to be in real life. This summer we have the opportunity to make that real life friendship exist in the real world outside of school.

Change

I've been thinking a lot about change, the ways people change, what kinds of change are necessary and the differences between good and bad change. As humans, I think we are always changing or at least striving to change something about ourselves. Change is the only constant in our lives. The most important change, I think, is the changes you make in yourself. They're the most necessary changes in my mind.

So often it seems that most people want to change something physical about themselves, whether it's bad skin or weight or hair colour. It's natural; we all have things we don't like about ourselves at times, it's part of being a person. I think the most important change, though, is the change inside. This is the change we don't hear about as much as a change to the outside of a person. The physical change, the change to make yourself look a certain way  is the one that's talked about most, that seems to be valued most by society.

I think the change that we all need to focus on is the change within rather than the change on the outside. It's our thoughts that need to change above all else. If you can't accept something about your looks then you can change it quite easily for the most part. I think that you need to do it for the right reasons, though. I think that you need to accept that looking a certain way is okay, your physical looks are how they are, you can't physically change them that much. That's why I think it's important to work at changing the thoughts you have first. Acceptance of yourself as you are first of all is what needs to come first of all.

Previously I've held the attitude that acceptance should occur rather than change. I was very clear in my mind that people should accept themselves and that should be it. I've realised now that the acceptance just needs to come first. If you can accept that you are a certain way and that's okay, but still want to change something about it for your own personal happiness then that is something that needs to change. People change no matter what, it's the form of the change that matters. Change needs to happen for a person's mental heath, nothing else.

I don't fit.

I just don't fit with a group of people. I fit with one or to people as pairs, I can have a perfectly good time with just one other person, maybe two. Put me in a group bigger than that though and I just don't fit in. Everyone has someone else that they fit better with. Everyone has a shared background of liking a certain thing that either I've never liked or only just like. Everyone just has better connections with other people.

Even when I've felt like I fit in a little but I still had a difference. In the StarKid fandom and the brilliant family I gained from it I had a difference: I had never really been obsessed with Harry Potter. I liked it, but I wasn't exactly a fan, I'd not even seen the films. So, even though I did feel a sense of belonging, I still didn't have the same experiences. I wasn't similar to the rest of them; I didn't know one of their deepest loves as well as I felt I ought to in order to be fully with them.

I've had friendship groups where, for a short time, I've felt complete belonging but eventually I always find myself feeling distant from them. There is always someone who my friend would prefer to spend time with, it is always as if I am a third wheel whenever someone else is there.

Maybe I'm just over sensitive, maybe it's something everyone feels, I don't know.

Love is worth it

Love is worth everything. Love for your peers, love for your family and especially love for yourself. It's worth it. The message of loving isn't out there enough, it's something that is just taken for granted: it is expected that we will receive love as children and that will be enough. But so often it's not, so often people don't get the love they deserve. It's a problem but it's a problem that is often dealt with in time.

What's more of a problem in my eyes though is the lack of love we all have for ourselves. It's just not something we are taught to want when really it should be something we are taught we need for good health. People just don't value it, if you show any signs of liking yourself then you're seen as not a very nice person, it's just the message that's given to us.

So many times I said "if I believed that I was a wonderful person then I'd be the most big headed person in the world" because it's what I genuinely believed. I thought no one wanted to be friends with someone who thought they were actually good. After a while I realised that it was something I deserved because it's something everyone deserves.

I intend to do everything I possibly can do to spread this knowledge to as many people as possible.

2013

So it's officially a new year and, like every other year, there's been no change on the actual year passing. I have decided, though, that I want to take this chance to actually lay out some life goals. Like new year's resolutions. but more permanent. In my last blog I listed a few goals, but I need to write them down properly, explaining everything (more to myself than anyone else) to be able to make a conscious effort to work on them.

  1. Live in the present more and worry less. 

I'm a worrier, it's in my genes. But worrying about the future too much has cost me a lot of happiness this year. I know it'll be hard, I'm a human so I'm naturally set in my ways. I know I need to at least try because it's just not worth it.

  2. Be more creative. 

Creativity is good. I have my wreck this journal, countless notebooks and this blog where I can be as creative as I want in as many ways as I want. I need to use these tools as much as I can to help me be more creative and grow as a person with it.

  3. Read as much as I can.

School and the internet got in the way of me reading for pleasure and I really miss it. Lately, I've started doing it more and it makes me happier. Happiness is the goal so I need to carry that on into the future.

  4. Try to stop the negative thoughts.

I know I can't control my thoughts as much as I'd like to but I can at least try to stop the thoughts that I know are poisonous before they get to me and cause harm. Your thoughts determine what you put out in the world and I want to out positivity out there above all else.

  5. Be kind to people.

You never know how kindness can affect someone. Maybe it won't have any effect, maybe it'll have a big effect, maybe somewhere in between but, even if it has no effect whatsoever, kindness is always worth it.

  6. Take responsibility for my feelings.

I need to remember that, as much as other people can change emotions, they are not responsible for them. My emotions are mine, no one else's and if I blame other people for them, good or bad, then it will just bring more sadness into the world.

  7. Voice my opinions more.

If someone says something I don't like I want to be able to have the courage to disagree with them and tell them so. I shouldn't let people get away with being mean about someone or something I love.

  8. Work hard.

I'm really proud of the work ethic I've developed this year and I want to keep it up when it's needed.

  9. Learn to appreciate the rest time I have.

If I value it then it will be better for me. If I don't value it then I don't feel like I've had it and therefore it isn't any good for me, as I need it to be.

  10. Use music properly.

Yeah, I value music to a point now, but I want to value it more. I want to let it guide and help me in life. I just need to listen and that's what I intend to do this year.

So those are the goals of the journey of 2013, I'll let you know how they go!

The New Year

In many ways, 2012 has felt like an extension, maybe the closure of 2011 and not much more. It doesn't feel like 2012 has brought much in the way of life changing events for me. 2011 was the best year of my life so far. A lot happened and I had a lot of good times, it was without a doubt my happiest year. 2012 was alright. Honestly, it wasn't monumental. It wasn't a great year and, especially recently, I went through some rough times with my emotions. All in all, however, it was okay. It wasn't a bad year, 2011 was just better in comparison.

It's hard to distinguish the past two years from each other because, in many ways, they've just run into one. School carried on almost exactly the same, my friendships either became weaker or stayed the same and my life just generally plodded a long at the same place. all in all, though, it's not been a bad year. When I look back on it, I see that there were quite a few good things about 2012 and that is the best I can hope for.

But now I know that 2013 will be different. A lot will change. But that's okay, it's needed. It'll be scary and it'll be hard but it'll be okay. I know I just have to be present and try to be the best me I can be and I'll be okay.

Good things about 2012:

• I celebrated my first first anniversary with the person I love the most in the world
• I started to search for inspiration
• I tried to help people
• My confidence increased
• I achieved good enough grades
• I worked my butt off for those grades
• I received offers from all 5 of the Universities I applied for
• Glow* started
• I got a great job
• I met 3 of the best people I know in person for the first time

Goals for 2013:

• Love more
• Live in the present more
• Worry about the future less
• Write as much as possible
• Read more

Things are good

I'm good. Right now I am good.

For the past few months I have been the opposite of good. I don't know what went wrong, I just was't happy and I wasn't dealing with it very well. Sadness just arrived in my life with no apparent reason and no warning. It was a rough few months, I constantly felt like I was about to fall apart.

Then, suddenly, this past week or so I began to feel something I hadn't really been able to fully feel for a while: happiness. I just remember sitting there on the bus feeling happy just being there for the first time I can remember in a while. I've been able to hold onto that feeling. It arrived as unexpectedly as it went.

I don't know why I was given this journey, I don't know the cause or the intention, I just know that I was given it. As hard as it was, I know that it was necessary. I might not fully understand what I've learnt from it but I know I've learnt something. I am stronger than I was, I get stronger every day.

I think I lost myself a bit in the past few months but, in the words of Taylor Swift, "I don't know if you know who you are until you lose who you are". I still don't know myself but I'm getting there. I do think that losing yourself is what lets you find yourself. I probably need to lose myself a few more times before I can properly find myself and that's okay.