aware

{10.03.2017}

It’s the boy in the back of the class with the scars on his wrists. It’s the girl with the scars on her hips, carefully placed just below the tanline that her bikini left so that they don’t show in the locker room.

It’s the words that people say. It’s the words we hear daily, the things we know are happening but we choose to ignore them because we want to pretend that everything is okay and good, as if everyone’s happy and there isn’t a single person crying themselves to sleep at night.

Everything’s fine, right?

No.

We have to know that this is an issue. If we’re aware, we have to know that our peers, our co-workers, our acquaintances, they’re hurting themselves because of the hurtful actions and words of other individuals.

Can you, any of you, can you completely and honestly say that you’ve never been hurt by something that someone said to you?

That’s my point. That’s my point exactly. You can’t. Everyone, no matter your age, gender, race, no discrimination correlated, has at some point been affected by something that someone else said.

We need to think, before we speak. We need to realize that people take things personally. Apologies such as ‘I didn’t mean that’ and ‘I’m sorry’ are just band-aids for a bullet wound. It doesn’t fix anything. You slap some neosporin and a band-aid on a little scratch and call it good, everything’s better, right? But a real wound is a stab to the heart and let me tell you something... it hurts every single time you breathe.

I’ve had people take advantage of my kindness, insult me, and treat me like trash with zero respect. And then they try to come back into my life and act as if nothing happened. They say ‘I’m sorry,’ and expect everything to be fine. And then they try to frost it with ‘I’ll make it up to you; I’ll show you.’ I’ve known someone that I would have taken a bullet for and they would have done the same for me, yet now they let someone else in their life control everyone they talk to and one day that’s going to hurt someone. I’ve known girls that act reckless and don’t keep friends because they can’t treat them right...but they come back and apologize and act like everything’s fine again. So many people do that. They treat their “friends” without respect and expect that they can fix it all with an apology.

It’s as if their goal is to make it look like a strawberry cupcake with frosting and extra sprinkles, as if that’s appealing in any sort of way. And it’s not.

Honestly, it’s so overdue and old that it’s rotten, it’s disgusting, and it’s spoiled, the kind that makes you sick.

The prevalence of these issues makes me sick. I’ve known girls that felt worthless and depressed, I’ve known people that have been told to kill themselves. We all know someone who’s tried, maybe you even knew someone who succeeded.

Those people? Innocent, beautiful hearts. Truly. But society is so mean. There’s this standard that teenagers, high schoolers especially, feel as if they have to meet, and it’s insane. It’s so messed up and it’s so, so negative.

We have to be aware of this. We have to know it’s happening all around us. No matter how much you trick yourself into believing that everything’s fine and great, the fact of the matter is that there are masses of depression and there are people that are dying because others can’t bring themselves to simply be nice, to accept people for who they are, or even to be decent.

We have to look out for ourselves, but we also have to look out for the others around us.

Now let me ask you something. In this equation of a...totem pole, per say. Where do you stand? Are you at the top, knocking people down, or helping people up? Or are you at the bottom, either pulling them down with you or trying to climb up when you just keep getting kicked back down?

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. No matter where you are on this totem pole, you can help someone else. If you’re at the top, pull them up. if you’re at the bottom, it’s always easier when there is more than one person...help someone else and they will help you. Look out for others, and you’ll find that someone has your back when you need it. Simply being nice, having a true heart, really pays off in the end.