“Where there is no struggle, there is no strength.”  – Oprah Winfrey

Growing up my mom used to say, “Carrie, you never do anything easy the easy way, do you?”

Nope. Never have. Probably never will.

I have lived overseas and married a man from another country. I had my own apartment and a full time job at seventeen while I was still in high school. I put myself through college and law school.

At the same time I have struggled with why I do the things I do when everyone else seems to be doing things differently and their lives seem to be so simple.

Or, are they?

What is Normal?

What if everyone you know is getting married and suddenly you wonder WTH is wrong with me? Why am I not married? Why don’t I have kids? Why don’t I have a boyfriend who is posting funny memes back and forth on Facebook with me?

Then, I ask myself why I keep setting values based on what society says you should have or what you should be.

What if some of us weren’t meant to get married, have a house with a white picket fence, two kids and a dog?

What if some of us have a path that doesn’t follow along traditional lines?

What if you stop comparing your life journey to someone else? What if what you want, and need doesn’t look like what other people want and need and that’s okay?

For Example:

I’m going to be brutally honest here. I really love my boyfriend. Some days I think he is the best thing that ever happened to me, but many days I wonder if he was sent up from hell to torture me.

This man is the most difficult, complex, frustrating, emotionally simple man I know. At the same time, he is the most kind, easy-going, funny, generous, positive human I’ve ever met who has the most insane ability to cope with trauma. I admire that.

I want to be someone who can get through the day without letting the outside world bother me. I want to master my emotions in a way that enables me to take life every day and accept what it has to offer instead of focusing on what isn’t or what could be or what might have been.

I want to feel safe in a world that has always felt unsafe.

This is why I’m with him.  It isn’t easy.  He isn’t easy. But, neither am I.

I have come to realize that every time I compare myself to everyone else and to what the internet is telling me I should have or how I should be in my life and relationship I become absolutely, quantifiably, miserable.

Maybe life is hard sometimes and maybe that’s okay.

What do YOU want?

Maybe your job is to inspire like Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald or keep it all together for the better good of the country like Jackie Kennedy did.

Maybe you don’t want to be the female CEO of Facebook who can juggle a full-time job, kids and a husband. Maybe you want to get married and have kids. Maybe you don’t. Maybe you’re into polyamory or swinging or BDSM.

The only way to find peace with yourself is to accept WHO you are and what YOU want. Be certain that these things may change in time and that’s totally okay. I’m guessing what you want at twenty won’t be the same as what you want at forty.

You can only do your best now with what you have today.

Could I have a guy who treats me better objectively? Could I have a guy who is more interested in relationships than in his military calling?  Yes, I could have anything I choose. But for today, for now I choose him. I choose this life.

Once you choose you path, then sit with it and be okay with it, because you aren’t going anywhere until you’re ready and being upset with yourself for not being somewhere else is only going to piss you of.  All the frustration you keep inside because you aren’t where you think you should be won’t get you there any faster.

All things come to an end whether through death or circumstances and you don’t know which it will be, but it will come.

Who is meant to judge your path in life? No one. That also means you shouldn’t judge your own path. You’re doing the best you can. Give it a rest. Keep trying. Keep learning. Keep moving forward. You’re exactly where you are supposed to be.