How To End Up A Butterfly

What's that you say? You're dating this guy and he's a really good person, and oh yeah, he doesn't have a job, and oh yeah, he's got a couple kids, and oh yeah, he drinks too much, and oh yeah, he has a criminal record, and oh, you love him so much! Errrr, WHAT?

Are you insane? Wake the hell up! I beg of you. I can't take it anymore. I can't stand to bear witness to yet one more beautiful, young, smart (that's debatable if this scenario resembles you) young woman spend the best years of her life with her head securely stuck in her butt. I don't get it. It's 2010 and two years ago we nearly elected a woman president, yet there are still too many girls who avoid responsibility for their own lives and turn their backs on opportunities that didn't exist for their mothers and grandmothers. Opportunities that still don't exist for millions of women around the world.

There may be a hundred explanations for this phenomenon, but in the end they are only excuses. This life, this body, this YOU gets one spin around this marble, and the time you spend spinning between 18 and 30 will come and go in the blink of an eye.

We were all there once, exactly where you are now. I was too... (sigh). And in the end the mistakes we made cost us the one thing we can never recuperate. Time. Time wasted in bad relationships. Time wasted trying to fill the voids of our childhood with crap that would only rub us raw and deepen the hole. Then, when we finally wake up, we spend time trying to repair the damage we've done to ourselves by making stupid choices and mistakes. Sure, now that we're past all that and trying to reconcile all that wasted time, we say that we had to make all those mistakes to become who we are. Really? Did we? Why do so many women "find themselves" in their 40's and 50's rather than their 20's and 30's? Why do so many of us have to screw things up so badly for ourselves in our early adulthood we spend a decade or two trying to dig out? Why can't we be self-reflective and honest with ourselves earlier in our lives? We have the power. We are capable. Even if you're poor or uneducated you still have the ability to be honest with yourself and live your life accordingly. We know when we're doing something profoundly stupid and risky. We all possess the basic instinct to know when we're doing something that isn't good for us. So maybe it's time for these young women to start paying attention to their gut. To take two minutes and step back and reflect about why they're doing what they're doing.

Okay, my head's exploding. More anon.