The Hidden Struggles Behind My Straight-A Smile

I was a master pretender, a super slick chameleon.

I got straight As and graduated in the top 5% of my high school class with a 4.4 GPA, went to state for speech, mock trial, and softball, got confirmed Catholic, made good tip money working part-time as a server, and was chosen as Student Of The Month my senior year.

Little did most people know that in high school I was stoned nearly all the time (even in said Student Of The Month newspaper photo 🤦‍♀️), smoking meth on the weekend, and dubbed Beer-Bong Queen by the college friends I’d party with on weeknights then head to AP class at my high school the next morning.

To my family, teachers, and teammates, I played the role everyone wanted me to be: the Good Girl.

To my friends, I played the role everyone wanted me to be: the Rebel Party Girl.

The outer me pretended to have it all together. The inner me was a f**king mess – confused, insecure, feeling unworthy and unlovable.

But I kept striving for outer perfection.

This continued in my 20s and 30s. I wore masks in every group I was with, trying to be who I thought they wanted me to be, so that they would love and accept me.

Meanwhile, I was SO FAR from loving and accepting myself.

And all the pretending made me lonely. As an adult, I had only surface-level friendships because I didn’t share who I really was. Because I didn’t KNOW who I really was!

Many of us get caught up in this pretending cycle. We pursue careers, positions, relationships, and goals we think will make us happy.

But we end up burnt out, resentful, and unfulfilled.

It’s at this point that we have the opportunity to come back to ourselves. To do some detective work and identify where we got disconnected from our authentic self and why we believe the lie “I’m not enough” or some other form of it.

This work can hurt. It can be painful, and it takes courage. But the reward is priceless: peace, freedom, and joy.

The thing is, until life knocks us to our knees, most people elect to ignore the call and keep pretending.

But not you.

Why?

First of all, because you are reading these words right now and they are landing in your heart. (Don’t pretend you can’t feel it. That’s just more pretending.)

Secondly, because I’ve got you. I’ve crawled my way out of many rock bottoms and life keeps making me peel back the layers of my masks and pretending and conditioning.

There’s nothing I haven’t seen or heard that would shock me into not loving and accepting you.

Nothing.

Because I see your beauty. I see your bravery. I see your light that our world so desperately needs more of.

And I know that if I can move through feelings like this, so can you.

To our unraveling.

Love, your coach,
 

💜Sara