Written By Alaura Lovelight, Vocal Performance and Confidence Coach, and Creator of Unseen to Young Queen Teen Girls Course
I distinctly remember the snickering and quiet laughter of the senior boys while I walked ahead in line during gym class on that awful day. I already despised gym class for all of it’s uncomfortableness. The locker room. The changing. The awkward co-edness mixture of nerds and jocks.
I didn’t know my time of the month had come…
Photo Courtesy of https://middleearthnj.org/2014/11/10/4-things-parents-should-do-when-your-tween-feels-left-out/
I didn’t know my time of the month had come, and had left a perfectly noticeable bright red stain on the seam of my pants… Mortifying is an understatement. Straight out of a movie scene type embarrassing. A friend of mine sweetly pulled me to the side and gently told me. I rushed ahead to the front of the line to tell the gym teacher I needed to go to the locker room right away. I sat in the bathroom stall, pants around my ankles with tears in my eyes. There it was, that big red stain for all to see. As if I wasn’t already uncomfortable enough at the age of 15. I was an overweight, shy, awkward choir nerd who loved music. I wasn’t invited to parties, I wasn’t asked to dances, I wasn’t included at school. In that moment my heart sank and I thought, ugh, I’m that girl. Im the loser, the nerd, the outcast, the girl who gets laughed at...
That day felt about a million miles away today as I looked at myself in the mirror in my cute new bikini on a hot June day. I smiled as I casually glanced at my reflection in the mirror. I did a little twist back and forth and thought to myself, “jeez, when did I get so fkn fabulous?!“
“Jeez, when did I get so fkn fabulous”
The transformation from uncomfortable teen to fk’n fabulous wasn’t overnight by any means, but it feels like it was. Like the flip of a switch. I slowly began to realize how much worrying about what other people thought served me no purpose and only stole my joy. About how not wearing clothes because I wasn’t a perfect size only made me hot and uncomfortable and no one else actually cared. About how doing things that brought me joy far outweighed not doing them for fear of what people would think. And then one day I woke up, like a butterfly out of a chrysalis, in all my new self love, bikini glory.
It dawned on me in the mirror today that, for the first time, maybe ever, I felt like my truest self. Not because now I have the perfect body, or better hair or anything like that, but because I was finally free of those self deprecating concerns for what others thought. I believe that feeling of peace and calm and self assurance feels like a breath of fresh air because it’s so purely our real true nature. All those bull sh*t manufactured made up standards are so outside of the pure energy that we come from.
The way I see it, I had two options, and so do you. You can go to the mirror right now, stare yourself down and tell that self conscious scared part of you how fk’n fabulous you really are. Or if you feel like it’s going to take more than a fierce pep talk, sit down and make a list of all the ways you can love on the parts of you that you don’t love right now. If you don’t love your body, find ways to heal that. Exercise, drink more water, do some yoga. If you don’t love your job, brainstorm ways to make money doing things that you love and start to act on them. If you don’t love your look, change it. Change your hair, get your nails done, get a nice shave etc.
YOU are in control and YOU have the power…
YOU are in control and YOU have the power. For a long time I gave that power away and it was an endless drain of living for everyone else. Take a look at why you are actually living the way you do, doing the things you do, wearing the clothes you do. Is it for the half-ass fake approval of somebody else, or is it bringing you pure happiness and joy? Because if it’s not for the pure, happiness and joy, its not serving your life, and you will wake up one day and say what the heck, why the hell am I living my life for others approval. And it will feel so ridiculous.
I stood in the mirror today in my bikini and my eyes welled, but this time it wasn’t because I was the girl who got laughed at. It was because I wished I could have poured love into that teen girl, hugged her tight and told her, “Girl, don’t you cry one tear over that. They don’t matter. You matter. Someday you’ll realize that what the think has nothing to do with you, and when you do, you’re going to be so fk’n fabulous”
Alaura Lovelight is a vocal performance and confidence coach based out of New York City. As a recording artist, she has performed for over 100,000 people nationwide and is also the creator of Unseen to Young Queen, a teen girls transformation through music course. Sign up for her free weekly confidence tips via her website and to learn more about her teen girls course!