Everything I Learned In 18 Years | Teen Ink

Everything I Learned In 18 Years

April 12, 2017
By KarlieDanielle BRONZE, Manila, Arkansas
KarlieDanielle BRONZE, Manila, Arkansas
3 articles 0 photos 2 comments

There is a lot of events that can happen in eighteen years good and bad. We have learned so much in eighteen years the basic being walking talking and how to be in society. We’ve found things that we absolutely loved followed by the thinks we just despise. Threw my eighteen year life I have moved a total of 8 times. Went through all time lows and unbelievable highs. Learned from people even if that meant they hurt me. Life is going by second by second make sure you don’t miss it.
For the longest time, I chose my friends on how they looked and their level of popularity. Which I know is totally awful and I beg everyone to never to do that. I think everybody goes through this phase. I did for years until someone I thought was my real friends really wasn’t. She showed all the signs that she didn’t give two cents about me but I continued to follow her like a puppy follows a bone. It took her to completely throw me under the bus and treat me like trash to realize she had never really cared about me in the first place. It hit me like a wall even though she had been treating me like this for months. She only had time for me when there was no one else around. I was her second choice well actually probably her tenth. Never ever let anyone treat you like that! If you are not someone's first choice whether that befriend boyfriend you need to go really you need to run. You deserve someone that will treat with respect even if that means there super honest. I would rather I have someone let me know they hate than pretend like they are in love with me.
I think it is crazy how magazines and book tell us to be are self and try to teach us how to love ourselves. When on the front cover is a photoshopped picture of an ideal girl. Its like they are telling you to go ahead be yourself but not too much. Being in high school is one of the hardest places to be yourself. You're surrounded by robot people who are on their phones watching every move you make waiting for you to mess up. I know this because I have been the mean girl just waiting for my enemies to step out of the mold so I could bash her and tell her to be more like anyone else. There are a million kids in the world that have a choice of college or the workforce or just what ever they feel like they want to do for the rest of their life. They have literally no idea what they want because most of them have not been there self since they can remember and if you don’t know yourself then when you get out of school you won’t know what to do with yourself. This was one of the hardest lessons to learn and I have a very special friend to thank for teaching me this lesson. She did her own thing no one ever dictated what she did. She honestly just didn’t give a crap. There was a beauty in that, with every outfit she wore or opinions she spoke it was truly genie and in the world that had been living in that was exactly what I needed.
Don’t ever do anything your not ready to do! You probably automatically think I’m talking about sex which is an important one but it could really be anything. It can be something as simple as cussing. I remember when I was in sixth grade and everybody would cuss saying words like what the hell and s***. I felt like I needed to start using those words to fit in or to not look like a good girl. After that when something surprising happened or something hurt me I would say s*** even though crap was the first thing to hit my mind. I know this probably sounds stupid and it sounds like it not a big deal at all but is was for me. You shouldn’t have to have a potty mouth to think your cool or to try to fit in. One of the bigger ones people are not ready for is sex. I know 50 plus girls who were not ready but took the plug anyways. There is a pressure pretty early in life that if you're not sleeping with someone that means no one wants you or many mean rumors start to fly around about you. Don’t feel like you have to if you're not ready maybe your are ready right now or maybe you won’t be ready to your 30 that's okay.
For god sakes speak up! Tell people what is in your mind whether good or bad. I sat for years in a corner never saying how I felt or what i thought and it only hurt me in the end. I don’t have a problem really telling my friends what is on my mind but when it comes to my family its a totally different story. I scribal up and can't get a word in and end up falling into the trap of being and fake and not honest. Tear your walls down and tell that special person how you really feel. By the time I got the guts to tell someone how I felt it was already too late. That is the worst feeling in the world know that you had a chance and you blew it.
I have learned a lot in my eighteen years and its kinda of scary that there is a lot more learning to do. The last eighteen years have made me cry from laughter then cry so hard from sadness. I’ve been threw hard time where I didn’t know if my parents would have enough money to pay the bills or times we have enough money to have nice things and take action. The biggest thing I have learned is that life goes up and down and when you are down remember that it is going to get better. When you are up remember where you came from and who you are and the people that have been there since day one.



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