Some of the greatest mistakes in life are made in the teenage years including irreversible changes to the body.  They come from fear, fear of being not enough, or too much.   Too much body weight, too big a nose, not enough height, etc.  These fears create damage to the face or body which can be carried for the rest of one’s life. Think again.  Better yet, think beyond the inevitable comparisons children make that so often do harm to themselves and others. They don’t mean to.

When you were in the first grade, you learned about opposites:  short-tall, fat-skinny, etc. These words of comparison later hurt when describing another, e.g. “Sherry is short.  Josh is fat.”   They were not meant to hurt but to differentiate.  How brilliant in nature that we are not all exactly the same. How exceedingly boring that would be. Think of your ability to recognize your friend’s voice on the phone.  Think of a mother penguin’s ability to distinguish her baby penguin’s “squawk, squawk” among the thousands of baby penguins as she returns from searching for food to keep her baby alive.   You are just different enough to fit perfectly on this planet.  YOU ARE ENOUGH. 

These three words must become your mantra for the rest of your life until you have all the information you need to make those important decisions.  Knowledge is power and smart people make fewer mistakes.

A friend of mine has a very cute nose but it does not fit her face.  Her face is stronger and bolder than this new nose. Had she waited past the age of nineteen when her nose was fixed, and had she looked for a better doctor or had visually assimilated all aspects of her face and also armed herself with knowledge that she was not her nose, the fear she had as a teenager would not have become a permanent mark to distort her image.

Big lesson:   “I AM ENOUGH.”  Repeat these three words over and over to yourself when anyone or any situation has put you in a state of fear.  Don’t destroy anything about yourself or another while you are feeling insecure. Say to yourself, “I am not afraid.”  Most fear situations are pure nonsense anyway.  Move your mental attention to safer ground.  Do not hang there.  Four big “no-no’s”:

                        1.  Do NOT commit murder

                        2.  Do NOT commit suicide

                        3.  Do NOT commit incest

                        4.  Do NOT be afraid