Stefanie Schröder

First off, I can’t speak for anyone else. I’m not saying this will happen to or work for any of you, this is just what I’ve realized about myself but if you end up relating and it helps you then that is amazing and makes me very happy :)

Basically I’ve had a giant mental shift. I’ve never thought this way which is crazy cuz now that I’ve lived it for six months it seems so basic and idk why I waited so long to put it into practice.

I was a sad person for 13 years, since 2005. As soon as I became consciously aware of my feelings, I saw all the darkness in life and I was not scared of it. It seemed fake to pretend it wasn’t there and it definitely wasn’t something I could conquer so I just embraced it. I loved sad songs, I didn’t believe in love and I didn’t trust anyone. I felt comfortably hopeless.

My life used to be something that was happening to me. It’s weird cuz I never wanted to see myself that way. There were things like my career or my looks that I took full control of and because of that, I told myself I was in charge of my destiny and I really believed it. That made things more frustrating because I was still unsatisfied. If I was “in control”, why wasn’t I where I wanted to be? Why wasn’t anything enough for me? Why wasn’t I happy?

Waking up from the haze I’d been in for the past 13 years was the most painful, shameful thing I’ve ever experienced. I kicked and screamed and cried the whole way through it. December 5th, 2017, Christina had a harsh talk with me. It was not a pretty conversation. She was fed up with my attitude, how incredibly distant I was from my family and most of all she was concerned for where my life was heading. I listened and processed slowly. I didn’t react at first. I knew what she was saying was mostly true. I had very few friends, I wasn’t close with hardly anyone, I was very caught up in my image and hid myself from the world at all costs. I had become a hollow person and I knew I didn’t like it.

But all last year I’d been telling myself I was setting myself free. I was doing what I wanted to do. I was following my desires. Focusing on looking the way I wanted to look, growing my social media, talking to whatever guys I wanted to talk to, “living the life”. But when it was laid out in front of me I couldn’t deny it. I was empty inside and living like a lost high schooler at the age of 24. I couldn’t ignore it. I couldn’t avoid it. I had to take action.

I went home and journaled. I wrote pages and pages trying to process everything I just realized. I was image obsessed. I was shallow. I was obsessed with worldly things. My sharp intelligent mind was going to waste. I was spending so much time on guys who didn’t value me, weren’t realistic to date and would never bring any sort of peace or stability to my life. I was never going to be in a healthy relationship if I stayed on that path. I didn’t believe in love and I definitely didn’t believe it was something I could ever have. I was hiding myself. I wasn’t living like a real person. I know I’ve told this story in bits and pieces but I’m deeper into it now and reaping the rewards so I wanted to share them with you guys.

Christina basically said WAKE UP LISA. Your life is happening right now and you’re steering it in a crap direction. No more playing the victim when you’re the one doing this to yourself. You’re putting yourself in dumb situations and then wondering why you’re unhappy. You have to change if you want your life to change.

I was like whoa. Okay. I hate hearing that but I can’t deny it’s true.

I wrote down all the things I wanted to START doing and all the things I needed to STOP doing. It wasn’t my actions that needed to change so much as my mindset. I gave myself a mental makeover. Changing my hair was not unhealthy. Relying on it to keep my life exciting was. Talking to guys was not damaging. Wasting my time on unrealistic people who would never be there for me was. Wearing makeup was not a problem. Hiding behind my image and only wanting people to see me as “pretty and exciting” was.

I wanted to be a “real person”. In my mind, I think that actually means a complete person. Everyone is a real person but you have to let the world see you as that in order to reap the benefits. Before, I would only be around people when I was in the mood to be funny or entertaining or when I was all made up and wanted everyone to see how pretty I looked. To change that, I started leaving the house in more chill outfits with no makeup and stopped putting on a wacko show every time I met new people. If I didn’t have anything interesting to bring up, I’d just stay in the conversation and talk about “boring normal stuff” hahaha.

I realized I tried to always place myself above everyone in a room, like “oh I’m cooler than her, prettier than her, more successful than her, more interesting than her” or whatever I could think of because in reality, I felt like I was beneath everyone and I was trying to make myself feel better. Once I realized that, I had great compassion for myself and would say “okay, you’re not beneath these people. You have just as much to offer as anyone else. People want to get to know you, even if you don’t have some crazy story to get their attention.” And then I’d push myself to go talk to a group and what do you know! They’d talk to me without rejecting me, my biggest fear.

Then it went to men. I stopped replying to people’s stories, stopped going to so many concerts, stopped reaching out when I was in LA to see people I’d never be with. It honestly wasn’t that hard because I wasn’t actually close with any of them. There wasn’t a real emotional connection to let go of with most people. I didn’t realize how much space all these tiny conversations, texts and comments were taking up. I had to make room in my life for love to come in.

It’s funny cuz all these things I realized were things I already understood. These aren’t groundbreaking realizations, I knew what I needed to do I just never put it into practice. That’s been the biggest game changer for me: SELF AWARENESS. Realizing IN THE MOMENT that I’m pushing people away or feeling terrified or giving up way too soon and then I stop and force myself to try harder or try again. So many times we know what we need to do, we just have to actually bring ourselves to do it.

I am the happiest I’ve ever been and the best part is it’s not by chance. I understand what’s happening in my mind and when I start to slip and feel frustrated or empty, I know what I need to do to get back on track. I still cry, I still get upset and bad things still happen. I can’t get rid of that and I don’t want to! Life isn’t a before and after where once you “fix everything”, you’re good to go. I’ll always have ups and downs but I’m learning how to deal with them and find solutions whereas before I would’ve rolled over and told myself it’s hopeless. I’m learning just how many things I can try before I can really say I gave it my best effort.

Effort is the key. You have to put in effort. You will not be in a healthy relationship if you keep treating people like crap. You will not make friends if you never open up to anyone. You will not get your dream job if you never apply for the position. And sometimes you need to apply to many different places, you can’t give up after your first rejection. Make sense? That’s where I caught myself getting stuck, the place where I would give up too soon and say I’ve reached a destination when really I’ve got so many more places I could try.

It doesn’t matter what people see you doing, it’s how you feel when no one’s around that counts. It’s not how your life looks to other people, it’s how it FEELS on the INSIDE that’s really important. The person in the outfit is what matters, not the image they’re trying to get across. We can spend years trying to convince people we’re “getting it together” or figuring it out or that we’re okay when we’re not or that we’re super cool and fun and interesting and that’s all folks! But when you go to sleep at night, how empty is your heart? How much do you want to be done with this loneliness? How badly do you want to just feel okay?

Sometimes we can’t change it, I know some people are in crazy tough situations and they have tried everything and I can’t speak to that nor would I ever want to try and fix that when I haven’t been there myself, I give you SO MUCH CREDIT if your day to day life is just a struggle and a battle with no end in sight. I send you all my love and strength and support and you will always have that from me and I encourage you to always reach out for the help you need!!! You are not alone!! ❤️

But if you’re like me and you actually haven’t tried everything… if you’re like me and you secretly just don’t know where to start… if you’re like me and you actually HAVE been lazy but you’ve been telling yourself there’s no point in trying because you can’t change anything and this is just the way your life is…….. I’m here to tell you it doesn’t have to be like this.

I thought I was stuck and I actually wasn’t. I thought I was a permanently sad person and I actually am not at all. I thought I was powerless and I am definitely not. All it took was another look at my life from a different angle to realize there was more I could try. There was more to do. There was more time in a day and more good people around me than I allowed myself to realize. I was holding myself down and I don’t want to do that anymore.

So I encourage you to write down all the things you want to change. Write down everything you want to stop doing and all the things you want to start doing. Hang it up! Keep it in your sight! Be aware of yourself as you go through the day and realize when you’re giving up on things too early. Realize when you’re feeling scared but you actually do need to try. Realize when your feelings are wrong and it’s actually not time to quit yet. Again, not all of you are in this boat and I’m not speaking to anyone that really is trying so hard. This is for the people who know deep, deep down they’ve got a lot more to give. Dig into that and start giving and living. You do not have to live like this anymore.

Love you all so much and hope this helps someone as much as it helped me. I want you all to be happy and I know that doesn’t come easily and it doesn’t last forever but I hope one day you wake up and realize your life has become more happy than it is sad. Your struggles happen between the fun times and when you’ve dealt with the problems, the good times resume. It is truly an incredible place to be and I thank God for it every day and I hope you all get there sooner or later.

Love you guys and hope you never give up 💙