No truer words have ever been spoken, in my opinion.
This boutique thing is a side gig for me. I'm a full time teacher by day. I try each and everyday to teach my students the value of themselves. I also make sure to take every opportunity, good or bad, and turn it into a learning experience.
For instance, right now we are working on some creative writing skills. Our task for this week has been to write a "how to survive 6th grade" guide. In all my writing lessons, I make sure to model how and what the writing process should look like. I chose to write my survival guide on high school life. Seeing as though these kids will be in the big kid hallway next year, I figured I'd give them some pointers. Number 6 on my list was keep your circle small.
I had a lot of confused looks. "What does that mean, Mrs. Stevens?" I figured they'd know what that meant, I was not prepared to have a discussion about what exactly that entails. I told them that people will come and go in your life, but the ones that really & truly matter will be there through thick and thin. And when those people do show up, love them hard!
I would say, for the most part in high school, I kept my circle small. However, that didn't stop me from wanting to be friends with everyone and worry about what everyone was thinking about me. I truly believe that when you do find your tribe, you, in turn, find yourself.
When you find your tribe, it means that you are comfortable in all aspects of your life. Your decisions, your emotions, your actions etc. and when you have completely "found" yourself, you are able to pick out who gets to stay in your circle. Now, I'm not saying I don't have lots & lots of people in my life that mean the world to me, and vice versa, but there's only a handful of people that know every secret, every worry, every thought.
We've all been there. We have thought we found members of our tribe only to be taught (probably in a hard way) that those people are not part of our tribe. I have burned a lot of bridges in my day. Most of them had to do with immaturity. Or maybe all of them did? I'm a work in progress. I struggle with inner demons every day of my life, as I'm sure all of us do. My middle daughter said something to someone yesterday that she shouldn't have and it killed her all night. I told her to apologize, that that's all she could do at that point. Owning up to your wrong doings was #7 on my list.
I can honestly say that in this stage of my life, my tribal members are forever and lifelong members! I am lucky that, at almost 40, I have the people I do in my life. They get me through the bad days. They laugh with me & cry with me. And I really hope they think the same of me. I don't know what I'd do without them.
- find your tribe. love them hard.
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