And What Do You Get if You Win???

Keep your eye on the prize - great motivational words.  Why is it that we seem to be more determined to work on things that may not have a prize in sight?  What is the prize for worrying about what everyone else thinks?  What is the prize for keeping up an appearance? And another important question, who made you the judge anyway?  

What do I get if my outfit is more trendy? My car is newer?  My house is nicer?  Will they write that on my headstone when I am long gone?  Is that what someone will remember about me?  I hope that I have offered this world more and that the best thing someone can say about when giving my eulogy isn't "she really had a nice car", if that is the only imprint I can leave, I need a do-over immediately.

 We have this weird twisted way of turning everything into a contest based solely on the fact that we are beyond concerned with what everyone thinks.  IT DOESN'T MATTER what everyone thinks - hardest lesson I have ever learned in my life.  Want to hear a secret?  It doesn't matter what you wear or drive, where you live or what you do - if people want to talk about you, they're going to find something to talk about or they're going to make something up, its inevitable - gossip will always be just that...gossip. 

So quit stressing if you are in Wal-Mart dressed in sweats with no make-up (is there any other to go?  If I was all cleaned up and said I was going to Wal-Mart my husband would ask me where I was really going, ha) just go get your shop on.  Who cares if your house is messy and a friend stops by unannounced - enjoy the visit and the fact that someone wanted to take time out to stop and see you. And here's a tip, a real friend will not leave your house and make a comment to another friend about the hurricane they just exited.  Wear last summer's fashion and own the room when you walk into it, confidence never goes out of style.  Advertise the fact that your favorite article of clothing just happened to come from the discount store or yard sale and how cheap it was when you made said purchase.  Embrace the few pounds you may be packing around from winter, who gets to decide that Barbie was the perfect woman anyway?  Barbie is boring.  

We worry so much about what others think, we make our own lives a story, almost like we are playing a character. How much do you want to bet that over half the status updates we see on Facebook are somewhat fictional?  I'm not saying that Jane Doe is lying when she posts -
          
          "What a wonderful day for my children to play outside and eat dinner on the deck"

I am just simply implying that seven out of ten times that is the edited version put out there because that is how we want to be perceived.  Be honest, when you read that status you want to be envious, the perfect family time, right?  Who knew June Clever still existed and all that jazz. Now, if we weren't worried about perception the post would read -

          "Sending the kids outside to play; because I may pull my turning grey hair out if I don't get
           just five minutes of silence.  We are eating outside tonight because my kitchen table isn't
           visible due to the stacks of mail and whatever else the husband and kids have thrown on it"

We even put on an act for the internet because we are so fixated on what people will think, how we will be perceived, when in the end - it's not going to have mattered anyway, there is no trophy for everyone liking you and always thinking you are the most put together. Plus, I guarantee some people could take the most innocent Facebook status and make it into a huge scandal anyway, I am talking like "Days of our Lives" drama, from a simple sentence, it happens.  The next time you have phone in hand posting your status and you are composing the perfect status, stop, take a chance, be a rebel and post what you're really thinking.  It can be freeing.

Hard truth - people are either going to like you or they're not, simple as that. You cannot control what people think. It has nothing to do with you going out of the house without make-up on, the fact that you are not carrying a brand name purse, if your car is expensive and your house a mansion or a doublewide. Would these things make you treat a person differently, they shouldn't.  People put so much effort into keeping up an appearance and doing things for show while there is no prize in the end and I can just about guarantee you didn't escape the rumor mill either. So all that effort and energy you put into this appearance you've created.....wasted.



I will repeat it - HARDEST LESSON I have ever learned!  Life becomes much simpler when you focus on you and quit worrying about if your outfit is as nice as all the others in the room with you or you look as intelligent and just be you, that is who you were destined to be anyway.  Rock your crazy like it is going out of style because being normal is boring.  And when this thing called life is looked back on you will realize that, the people who really care, who really love you and want to be in your life don't care and don't compare you to others, they see you, the real you, not the façade you have created in fear of what others think. Seems like we get a better prize to just be ourselves and drop the act, we get those who love us unconditionally.