Dear That Girl,

Release the shame. It’s okay that your life hasn’t panned out exactly the way you wrote out when you were 13 years old. It’s okay that you’re reconciling your mental health and using that knowledge to help others. That you’re talking about things that make others uncomfortable and bringing them to light.

It’s okay that you strive for mental wellness and fight through challenges, while also look to the mental toughness of your immigrant background that coincides with the hiding away of mental struggles and feel out of place with it. It’s okay that your plan to have everything that you desired by 30 justttt doesn’t look like what was on paper at all. But in fact, it’s better in most ways.

Your life is laced with wisdom, experience, love, and yes… even pain. And yet, it tells the story of how far you’ve come and all the beautiful things that are on the way. So release the shame of what you thought you wanted my love, and embrace or shift what it is if it’s no longer for you.

With love,

Stephanie