The Power in Staying True to Youself

Taylor Ranney

Professor Mary Louise Hill

English 200

September 26, 2016

                                                The Power in Staying True to Yourself

No matter the circumstance, I believe in always staying true to myself no matter what life decides to throw my way. This belief is something I stand very true to, and have stood true to, for the past few years, anyway. There have been several circumstances where I have come to realize that staying true to me is the best thing I could possibly do.

 Throughout my early years of school I was never really one to fit in with a certain crowd, just always that person to mesh with almost everyone no matter what they were socially ‘labeled’ as. During that time I was always just being myself, being around people who were good for me.

When I eventually got into high school, my freshman year, my mentality unfortunately started to change, and I started to try to change myself, and not for the better either. I thought that being skinny, pretty and becoming a cheerleader was the only way I’d ever have someone, besides my friends, like me. So I started wearing more makeup, changed how I dressed, started to try to lose some weight and I even tried out for cheerleading and actually made the team just so I could ‘fit in’. With this being said, I know this wasn’t who I was, yet I still kept trying to be someone I wasn’t. Thinking in this mentality only brought toxic people into my life. For instance, an upperclassman started showing ‘interest’ in me and I thought it was the coolest thing as a freshman to have someone older than me interested in me.

Well, I thought completely wrong. This boy dragged me down into one of the lowest points in my life. He used me at my own expense, and would only talk to me if he wanted something that benefitted him. Eventually, about a year later, I learned that I didn’t need that toxic person in my life, and that I didn’t need to be who I was pretending to be all along, I just needed to be myself and stop trying to please others.

I think hitting this low point in my life actually helped me out in the long run. I learned to realize that not everyone will like me for who I am, and to me, that’s completely okay. Other people liking you is a bonus, you liking yourself is the real prize. I learned to just be myself. Don’t change to fit in and don’t change your ways because that whole time it truly didn’t feel right pretending to be someone I wasn’t.

Staying true to yourself is possibly one of the best things you can do for yourself, and this now means a lot to me as a person. So, about a year ago I decided I needed to give myself a reminder every day to just be myself, so I got a tattoo on my ribs of a quote reminding me to do so every time I look at it. The quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson reads “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” These are words to live by and this is one of my favorite quotes because it reminds you to always just be yourself in this world no matter who or what tries to change you. If you remain true to yourself, I feel that you will ultimately live a happier life.