Open Letter To My Future Self

<![CDATA[<p style="text-align:auto"></p><figure><img src="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/84c03e_ba66a685247442ffadb132adbc10e174~mv2.png/v1/fit/w_808,h_415,al_c,q_80/file.png" width="808" height="415" title="Image"></figure><p style="text-align:center"><span style="color:#000000">Photo from </span><u><a href="http://oxfordstudent/" target="_blank">Oxford Student</a></u></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">Dear future me,</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">First off, I believe I have been too hard on you, and I owe you an apology. As you know, I have always had such high hopes for you. Hopes that served us well throughout the years.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">But, if the past years have taught me nothing else, it is that the plans and expectations we have for our lives are the stuff of God’s amusement. And while I do not regret my high hopes for you and still hold on to them, what I do regret is this unfair disappointment and frustration my unrealistic, rigid, and inflexible expectations have caused you.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">You don’t deserve that. I have so much respect for your journey and your progress during these trying times.</p><p style="text-align:auto">This progress, along with your resilience and fight, is what deserves to be recognized, not your shortcomings.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">Therefore, I promise to relinquish the rigid picture I had in my head of who you will be. And instead, I will carry my belief in you with me and work towards my hopes that I have more influence over. These are the hopes I have for us.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">Future me, I hope I have done right by you and that I have not betrayed my needs and dreams for others.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope that you are still kind, that you have learned how to wield your power and stop letting others convince you to be ashamed of it.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you know who you are, and you stopped letting people tell you who you can be.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you are brave and strong enough to be vulnerable.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you do not look back at me with eyes of disappointment and regret.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you are strong and independent, not because you have to be but because you want to.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you kept your circle small and are a blessing to the ones you trust.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you are still close with your family.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you found balance and peace in yourself and in people that pour into you just as much as you do into them.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you did not stop loving generously but instead focused your efforts on deserving confidants.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you are comfortable with winning without applause.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you keep your humble soul.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope it gets less lonely.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope when it comes to connections and friends, there is more quality over quantity.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you are adaptable but not to the point where you bend your morals and principles.</p><p style="text-align:auto">I hope you preserved your light and that you have fought for yourself unapologetically.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">Future me, do not forget about me. Do not forget about the journey. How difficult it was. Remember it so that when you make it, you can make a difference.</p><p style="text-align:auto">And I hope you can give others the same gift of trust and compassion to find their way.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">Who you will be may not look like what I imagined it, but I know you are with trust and compassion. Therefore, with my efforts every day towards these hopes, whoever you will be, I suspect I will be proud.</p>]]>