Five Things I'd Tell My 15 Year Old Self

Or, What I Didn't Do Back Then, Like Stopping To Smell The Freaking Roses. This week Cara and I are making lists, back to the future style! Let's be honest, 15 is a terrible, superawkward age so any little bit of advice would've totally helped, amiright? Of course I am. But that's what life's for: to embarrass teach us these things along the way so we can grow into (hopefully) better, wiser people. And so we can laugh at what clueless idiots we were at the time. You should hear some of my dad's freshman stories, haha. So, some of my own self-advice, a million years later...

1. Eat the sandwich, have dinner with our family, enjoy that dessert. In less than two years’ time you’ll be wishing you could eat like everyone else, and you’ll miss it. And it won’t get easier. So just EAT THE DAMN SANDWICH. Maybe make it a burger. And dark chocolate, because you’ll probably miss that the most.

2. Getting your heart broken is laaaame, especially for the first time, especially when you already had a really jaded view of guys to begin with. Just lean into the hurt, cry your eyes out, paint, play those records til you fall asleep at night. Not to sound like everyone else in the world who “just doesn’t UNDERSTAAAND” your teenage soul, but it will pass, and it does get better (the pain anyway; do guys get better? mmm debatable), but I know right now it hurts like hell. In a few months you won’t even BELIEVE how little this matters, and how far removed from this situation you’ll be, because hello you’re brilliant and gorgeous and have better things to do with your life than mope over some dude.

3. Way to be motivated, but calm the eff down. You’re pushing yourself too hard in school, training so hard in crosscountry…where does it END?! Do work but for Pete’s sake (you don’t know Pete but he’s this really nice, unassuming guy, so for HIS SAKE), have some FUN. Take a deep breath, onetwothreepeaceful, and make time for some friend hangs, shows, parties, whatever. Breakups and other traumatic highschool things will be much easier to weather with some great gal pals by your side, and you might actually make some decent memories in the process. Otherwise highschool turns into that black hole (kinda like junior high) that you never want to remember ever, EVER again. Ahem.

4. Join theater, pick up a camera, you're way cooler than you think you are, don't pull fire alarms for fun. That’s it. Ok, maybe the fire alarms were really funny, and Lord knows everyone was relieved to get outta class for 30 minutes. Actually that was pretty awesome. High five!

5. Trust and grow in Christ with everything in you. You’re gearing up for the biggest fight of your life- fighting FOR your life…and you don’t even know it yet. :hugsbabygrrrl:

Just for fun, what're some things you'd tell a younger you?