I am so excited to share these stories with you! 7 people sent in their stories of learning more about themselves, accepting who they are, and embracing their weird. I hope they encourage and inspire you as much as they have encouraged and inspired me! I love how the journeys are so different. No matter YOUR story, I hope that you may also learn the strengths you have as a unique individual and learn to love the AMAZING person you are!
Trigger Warning: anorexia & suicide are briefly mentioned in the 2nd story.
I’ve been a gamer since I was a kid, but I only became a weird one when I went to high school (from age 12 to 18 in the Netherlands). Girls were talking about clothes and makeup, boys were talking about sports. No one was talking about games, or books. Then I saw someone reading Harry Potter, and we bonded. I joined the chess club because I had been doing that in elementary school too, and found more friends. Then I heard boys talking about games they played. I jumped in and shared my experiences, but they dismissed it. I didn’t understand it. Now I do. Later when my interest in Japan, anime, and jpop grew, it became harder to find like-minded people. Then there was the local version of MySpace or Facebook. I shared anime pictures and my favourite songs and found two new friends.
The internet had helped me find my mutuals, even now I find people with the same interests (like fountain pens) and we become friends. Still, I had the most problems finding a gaming group who didn’t dismiss me just because I was female, and that was the thing that took up most of my days. I nearly quit gaming when I graduated, thinking it wasn’t giving me what I needed, but when I became chronically ill, I had to be honest with myself. I couldn’t deny that being a gamer was part of me and not accepting that affected me mentally.
I am a gamer, and I’m proud of it. Even though I don’t play as much as I did before, it’s still part of my identity.
Tessa Hastjarjanto – Narratess blog
I have found great freedom in disappointing everyone. I was a very neurotic child, and, yeah, that’s sad and all and poor dear and boohoo, but the pressure of being highly neurotic and the fear of failure forced me to try very hard to be undeniably better than everyone else at everything. I was the preacher’s eldest, and I was perfect. Then the homosexuality happened. There was a boy that gave me a kiss at a Christian conference, and I was 15 and done for. Up until then, I had nothing that I loved or wanted or worked towards, and yet here was a cute boy. Still, three years later, I went to a Christian college to appease my parents. Fortunately, by this time, I had figured out that I was bisexual so I could at least date women during this time with little repercussion. As far as I was concerned, I had figured out a navigation strategy. The balance kept. I tried, and tried, and tried until I went overboard. I skipped meals, ran compulsively to force myself to be skinny. I dated girls and kissed boys. I thought I’d become perfect.
It seems like the stupidest thing, but what broke my spirit was breaking my foot. I couldn’t run anymore. I started gaining weight and it felt like losing anorexic control of the part meant that I’d lost control of the whole. I wasn’t doing well before, but when I broke my foot, I fell apart. I hate that it wasn’t something bigger that broke me, but there’s something about physical pain. It’s learning just how much of a robot your body is. Things can be dialed up and down, things can be broken, and no matter how much mental will you have, you live in a meat stick and it hates you. I tried to die. Fortunately, I didn’t. Fortunately, I got the opportunity to realize that I wasn’t ok.
It teaches you a lot, letting other people direct your life. You learn a lot by seeing exactly what destroys you—what you won’t stand people doing to you. When I did come out, not only as bisexual but as genderqueer (a separate kerfuffle for another day) I knew I was going to lose every human relationship I had before the age of 20. I had many people, who once upon a time said they loved me, write me painful things on a daily basis. By this time, however, I’d found out I had a personality. I’m stupid and dark and loud and like angry music and old men in alleyways. That, after so long of being a tin man, was precious. I’ve gotten to the point of being arrogant in defense of the freedom I thought I’d never have. Even now, I have plenty of people who don’t like me, and, to be honest, their complaints are all valid. The worst part of growing up is figuring out that the reasons why people bullied you are true, and the best part is that I couldn’t care less. If someone else feels the need to shoot me down, I know it at least won’t be me, and I am the one with the most pointe blanc access to myself. To end this on a good note, I was wrong. I lost most of everyone who loved me until age 20. I have my brother and my sister and Anna freakin Reel, and that’s about all the human interaction I can stomach, so I feel a lucky chap these days.
Antonio Gomez – The Killer Coven music
I was the kid who didn’t really know how to be a kid. In my first year of school, I told my Mum that I spent the break times mostly walking around on my own—she didn’t believe me until she walked past the school one lunch time and saw me doing just that. I just didn’t get the rules of childhood. Adults were far less confusing and I remember looking forward to the day when I wouldn’t be a child any more.
Except when I did get older, I learned that adults are only less confusing from the perspective of a child. And that there a whole load more rules that an adult will tolerate a child not knowing, but you’re really supposed to learn them eventually.
And so I got quiet. Even quieter than I was before! Because after putting my foot in it a certain number of times, I told myself than it was better to say nothing at all.
But, despite my silence, my head was full of questions. My friends would be making small talk about the weather at the weekend and I’m thinking to myself ‘are we really all ok with living in a world where we’re miserable five days of the week?’ Or my colleague might be moaning about her vindictive sister and I’m thinking ‘do you really believe this story you’re telling yourself about her motivations?’
I tried my best to keep the questions in. But the weight of trying to be someone who I’m not got too much for me and was probably one of many contributing factors to my getting ill.
And in the long, slow process of rebuilding my life from that illness, I decided to stop pretending to be someone I’m not. It’s a work in progress—I still hate the feeling that I have said something wrong AGAIN and the fear of it sometimes keeps me quiet. But I opened my mind and heart to the possibility that the world needed me to be who I actually am.
The turning point in my journey was the realisation that my ability to see straight to the truth of a situation, to hold the silence for people, and to ask perceptive and challenging questions all equipped me very well for being a life coach. The weird ways that my brain works is actually one of the gifts that I give my clients—after all, changing your perspective really can change your life. Some days I can’t believe that people now pay me to ask them the types of questions that I tried to silence for so long. But most days what I can’t believe is that it took me so long to realise that my questions are my gold dust.
Alice Southern – The Introvert Library
As of the time of this writing, I firmly believe that most of us are caught up in a tide of glib normality. We’re all constantly yearning for public adoration and affirmation for one reason or another. Nothing’s wrong with that at all, I’m not going to lie to you and tell you that I don’t like being “liked” and accepted. We are all mostly human, barring some lizard-folk among us. With that said, I would like to preface everything I say here with the following statement: “You do you.” I don’t want anyone to feel attacked or ashamed for what they do and how they portray themselves in online and in public.
I believe everyone is deeply influenced by their formative years. I’m fairly certain this opinion is scientifically backed but don’t quote me on that. How you’re raised and what sort of environment you were immersed in is the mold that defines what direction you’ll take with your personality. The more I observe my friends’ familial relationships, the more I realized the minute details in how my family dealt with me growing up.
I did have my bouts of wanting to “fit in” but it always felt tiring. It was more satisfying to follow my own way, move with the breeze, fly my own plane. Whether you march to the beat of your own drum or not, people will form their own opinions of you. So, why bother creating a version of yourself that’s not real? Why waste the energy? Be yourself. Being weird is great, normal is boring and boredom is a disease. Nobody likes diseases.
Zach “Poying55” Benedicto – Twitter page
I started to learn to be myself once I moved away for college and was on my own for the first time. I didn’t have anyone to answer to and no one to question my decisions, but instead learn about my experiences through me. I began to grow more confident and content with having freedom to do as I pleased.
The journey was not what I expected to say the least. I missed my family more than I thought I would, and I wasn’t as true to myself as I could have been. I should have been less hard on myself and I still struggle with that everyday. It’s gotten better over the last few years, but I still have a ways to go. I struggle to not blame myself for things that have nothing to do with me.
Once I started embracing myself, I felt more free. I had more choices and less guilt for doing and feeling what I wanted. It affected me positively once I started letting people in and let my guard down, to allow people to see who I really am instead of trying to be “better” than what I think I am. I have more friends and family now than I did almost four years ago and I know I am not the same person I was four years ago. I found myself and am slowly growing into a person I would like to be.
I am surrounded by love and positivity, which I didn’t think I would be fortunate enough to experience this early in my life. I explored my passions such as writing (my blog ) and they will continue to grow with me. I’ve tried new things like cooking and graphic design and discovered I really love cooking and designing! My work flowed once my confidence grew and it’s still a working progress since I’m in a different industry and position. It’s been a learning experience, but as I’m getting older, I’m learning I am more capable than what I allowed myself to believe. My relationships have changed for the better with my family, and friends since getting to know myself more. They’ve shown nothing but support and continue to make feel grateful to have such amazing people cheering me on. I’ve become more vocal about my feelings to my family and friends and that has had a positive impact on all relationships.
I became happier with who I am and I learned that I need to let go of what others think and say and focus on me. What makes me happy and what do I want to do, instead of thinking about what other people are going to think? My boyfriend has been a huge part of this journey since he has done nothing but support and encourage me to try and help me achieve my goals.
Deanna Stilwell – DeannaStilwell blog
Growing up as the youngest of four children, I had a lot of fun learning from my parents and older siblings. However, I always felt that I was a bit different from them in certain ways. In fact, I felt a bit different from a lot of people. I didn’t necessarily feel special or extraordinary—just different.
Though I was very social (my sincere apologies to all my teachers who couldn’t seat me next to anyone I wouldn’t talk to), I also had an insatiable desire to retreat into my imagination as I pretended to be a mother or a world traveler or a character from a book I had read. I somehow managed to complete my homework, but I struggled to stay organized or create routines. I wrote poetry and journal entries about my thoughts and feelings, and I analyzed every conversation I ever had to find the deeper meaning in everything. I always wanted to know who I really, truly was. And I wanted to know and understand others just as deeply.
One day, when I was 13 years old, my dad brought home a book called Please Understand Me II by David Keirsey. It was all about personality types and temperaments, and it even included a questionnaire to determine one’s own. Everyone in my family completed it, and then we sat around the dinner table discussing our results for hours.
In this process, I learned that I have the personality preferences of ENFP (Extraversion, Intuition, Feeling, and Perceiving). I am the only Extravert in my family of six and one of only two Perceivers. It made me realize that there wasn’t anything “wrong” with me in comparison to my parents or siblings—or anyone else, for that matter. It normalized everything and gave us neutral words to discuss our similarities and differences.
It wasn’t that I was doing anything wrong; I was just doing things differently. And the same was true for them.
Suddenly, I didn’t have to think of myself as a chaotic, disorganized chatterbox. I was just a person who loved people and was excited for all the possibilities that life has to offer!
These days, as an MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) Certified Practitioner, I’ve been lucky enough to help share my passion for personality typology with everyone from college freshmen discovering and embracing their true selves to working professionals seeking to better understand and communicate with their coworkers.
Sometimes I wish I could go back and tell my younger self: Don’t worry, you don’t need to know exactly who you are just yet. In fact, creating and discovering who you are will be one of your greatest joys in life—just behind helping others do the same.
But if I hadn’t felt a little “weird” and wanted an answer as to why, then I never would’ve found so much solace in one of the greatest tools that has helped me develop self-love, compassion, and understanding. If I hadn’t worked so hard to embrace the things that make me who I am, then I might not be nearly as passionate about helping others love themselves, too. And I wouldn’t trade that for the world.
Caitlin Hawekotte – Writing & Coaching website
There are times in life when all you can think of are your defects, how weird you are, even how unworthy you are. Most of these thoughts come out of nowhere. But usually, those words include past judgmental situations when you felt that way. At some point in my life, I got really stuck and I didn’t know what I wanted to do in my life. I was always copying other people’s goals because I wasn’t able to create my own. Thankfully over the years, I’ve learned to stop myself every time I start to think about others instead of myself. I’ve learned that people will always have an opinion about me and the way I do certain things. But that doesn’t have to stop me from being myself. It was not right and it definitely didn’t feel okay.
When I started implementing some uplifting self-esteem habits, everything started to change. My life started to have sense again. I moved out of my home town and went to my dreamed university. I’ve met the most amazing people in the world and I finally made friends that support me and love me the way I am. I can be weird, funny, responsible, a nerd in front of them and I feel good about myself. My grades went up and I finally decided what I was really passionate about. I changed my blog’s niche and created something that I know will help people eventually. And even if I don’t have everything I want yet, I’m working hard to achieve my goals. And I know that I can do it because I believe in myself.
The moment you start to see yourself as someone worthy and loved, you start ignoring other people’s judgmental opinions and hate. Everything changes. You start to feel fulfillment in your heart. And you feel so proud of yourself. I’ve always said that it’s okay to be afraid, but at some point in our lives, we all need to get out of our comfort zone and confront all those things or even people that make us feel unworthy. I invite you to be yourself, be weird, be a nerd, be a geek, be whoever you want to be, but be YOU. There is no one like you, and you should be proud of that. Stop hiding those things you enjoy doing. It’s okay if those things do not fit in with what society thinks is normal. Ignore that, and be HAPPY. Remember that you have the power to change your life, you just have to believe that you can.
Amanda Romero – Smart Girly Mindset blog
Thank you so much again to everyone who shared their story!
If you’d like to read more posts from this series:
- How to Bravely Be Yourself in a Sea of Same
- Andy’s E.P.I.C. Story – an interview
- “W” is for Weird – guest post from Leeann
- A Healthier Alternative to Self-Esteem – guest post from Laura
Comment Below
What’s YOUR story? Where are you at in your journey of learning to “embrace your weird”? What have you learned along the way? Comment below!
Damn, this post is so empowering! Thanks a lot for putting all these stories together (and a big thank you to everyone who shared themselves)! Being ourselves is the door to mental health! <3