DO YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE?

Who are you? It’s such a simple question, yet it can stir up so much frenzy and trigger meltdowns.

I ask you this because for so many years I felt so utterly inadequate as a person that I was quick to grab hold of any sort of identity other than me… be it healthy or not. I wanted to have something other than myself take front and center of my life so that I could hide behind it. It was never, “Hi, I’m Brittany!” It was, “Hi, I’m a tennis player or a horseback rider or an honor student or… an anorexic/ the girl with an eating disorder.” But at the time, this was easier than actually looking at myself, my pain and my utterly terrible feelings of loneliness. If I couldn’t bear to look at myself then there was no way I could let anyone else see the real me. I hid behind my achievements. But the pressure to keep up an image that was external and out of my control came at an unrealistic and deadly price.

It’s so common for everyone to identify themselves with something. Whether it be a school, a job, a team, a social group, a relationship, a sport or hobby. None of this is wrong. None of this is bad! But I need you to be able to separate yourself from these externals. Because what if they go away? Then who are you? Then what do you identify with? Learn to be confident in you alone and then everything else in your life will seem like a bonus.

So, can you tell me… who are you? ~Britt