Your Everyday Girl

The other day, I was in a department store looking for a gift for a friend. I was frantically looking through various items while talking to my sister on the phone to get her opinion. My mission was to send photos of items to my sister and follow up with a brief call to debate which items were best as gifts.

My sister has a good eye for quality, and because of her, we avoid purchasing crappy material. I swear everytime I buy clothing, I have to get rid of it in a few months because it looks cute but lacks longevity. Anyway, we ended our call, and I thought to myself, “Onwards! To the next store!” because I’m on a mission, and I have to keep up the momentum. As I was walking towards the escalator, I saw this young and petite girl browsing through some of the ties in the men’s section. She said to her friend aloud, “Sometimes, I wish I could wear a tie.”

I looked at her and said, “So, what’s stopping you?” I think she had to take a moment to think about that. Sadly, I couldn’t wait for a response, like I said earlier, I was on a mission.

Oftentimes, we have a desire to do something, but a fear of acting on it. Something as simple as wearing a silly tie with your outfit of the day can actually be scary. This is mostly because we are afraid of what others will think. Most times, we chicken out from trying because we’re afraid of how others will perceive us.

2024 has been a year full of surprises for me. One of the biggest surprises was when I did this crazy thing and asked a guy out who works in the same building as me. It took every ounce of my courage to ask him out. I thought he was cute and he seemed normal, so I gave it a shot. It was a no for him, but strangely enough, it ended up being a win for me. If I hadn’t even tried, how would I have known what his answer would be? I was nervous to ask, but I did it because I didn’t want to live with regrets.

Yes, I may have felt like a loser getting rejected in the middle of a busy lobby. Once he rejected me, I speed-walked towards the elevator, thankful it was readily available at my entrance. It’s as if the elevator, my savior, knew to wait for me. In hindsight, I feel pretty cool about trying. I was truly worried about what my friends would think (how could I not tell them about this?), but they were so positive about it. Growth and resilience are derived from rejection, failure, mistakes, and all those difficult challenges we face in life, so hearing that “no” was worth it indeed.

If you constantly feed your fears, then you’ll never want to take risks. So if you want to wear a tie, then go for it. If you want to try out a new hobby, go for it. If you want to ask someone out…you get the idea. If you don’t succeed in the way you had hoped, then don’t fault yourself for trying. At least now you can move forward, knowing you tried.

Your everyday girl,

Sara