I'm feeling a bit interactive today.

For a couple of weeks I was feeling a bit down, but here in the past week I have suddenly become hyper aware of feeling good. Like I said in the last post, your happiness comes from within, not from without. Did I say that? I think I said something similar anyways.

I've been feeling self amused. VERY self amused. I've been redirecting everything to be my fault, but my fault in a positive way. I've been also thinking a lot more before immediately opening my mouth. I also deleted all access to social media on my phone (only I recently got instagram back because I have a friend that I love to support on there, plus the story thing is very good for self amusement.)

I honestly never even look at my likes or anything. This is something I've become proud of lately. See, before, I used to care SOO MUCH about how many likes and stuff I received on social media. I remember feeling so dang terrible when I got no more than 3 likes on certain things. Things I thought were very likable. It made me feel a bit inadequate to the norms of life. Maybe my taste was a little bland or maybe a little too exotic. Either way, I began to learn to dislike myself all because I based how MY likes are not much to be valued in other's eyes.

I found this to be a problem...a problem I tended to overlook. And it went on for awhile. I eventually got this app called snapchat...I hated this app before I downloaded it for many personal reasons, but I did it to be connected to a certain friend. I began to actually enjoy the filters and the way the camera made my face seem so much prettier than before. But I also began noticing more flaws about myself. My nose is a bit crooked and my left eye is a bit sloppy and what's up with my eyebrows? I started wearing far more makeup than usual and tweaking these areas I didn't notice to be as much of a problem as before...I even took these problems into account when it came to taking regular photos. I didn't enjoy when people took photos of me. But I did start to make a habit of positioning my face just right for a photo. So...I did start to look a little better in pictures.

In the end, I was so fed up with caring about all these stupid things that make me feel so ugly and undervalued. Of course these apps weren't the only contributing factors, I was already having a terrible time with myself and loving myself and forgiving myself because this past year made me fall into a hurtling depression that I fought hard to overcome EVERYDAY. Talk about exhausting...
I would say things to myself like "I am annoying" "no one actually likes me" "I am simple and uninteresting" "I am the reason everything failed" "I am broken" "I can never recover from this" etc. I cried almost every night.
And to feel better I would write all the things I'm grateful for, hang around the people I who made me feel positive, took up a lot of exercising, getting more involved in my hobbies and interest, and taking pictures of everything that made me happy.

Then, back in March, it hit me. I needed to get my crap together and I needed to do it in the most cold turkey way possible. I deleted contacts from snapchat so I had no reason to get back on. I deleted snapchat from my phone.
I deleted Facebook and only get on with my laptop to look at notifications to keep up with my close friends and look at the first couple of post which I personalized to be God related and inspirational quotes.
I deleted Tumblr.
I focused Twitter only on meteorology to stay up-to-date on latest weather stuff.
I deleted instagram to get rid of the need to post pictures. Only I got that one back after I became super un-addicted to social media. I got it back because I love sharing pictures that make me happy and interacting with my friends on there. I think of it more of a self amusement platform with friends more than a social platform. It's like all the social media platforms in one but you can choose your favorite parts. For me, that's posting pictures of what I love and being crazy on my story with my BFFs. Because it's about me enjoying my life and friends. Not anyone else.

And I've become far happier without any of the rest. I feel a far less need to be accepted because I notice everyone else around me and focus on God, me, my interest, and my friends. The things that make me happy. And more importantly, I look in the mirror and say "You are amazing and your friends love you" "You live a fulfilling life just right for you" "You don't need to change" "You didn't do anything wrong, the situation wasn't right" "You are forgiven".

Even this blog is because I've always wanted to do a public blog but cared so much that people would not care about what I have to say. Now I don't care if anyone likes it or reads it, and I post my thoughts publicly, and I feel good about it. I like doing this!