Self Love
By: Joud Almanie (she/her)
From princess movies to idols
From cultural ideologies to personal opinions
We are told to conform like a bird in a flock
And it’s unusual for a dissimilar bird to stick out and project
In the sky
Apart from its fellow birds in the flock
As newborns,
We’re a clean slate
Waiting for knowledge to be acquired from our surroundings
Waiting to be inspired in order to feed our insatiable quest for learning
What we don’t see coming our way,
Is that as we grow
We tend to use our surroundings in a comparative way
The feeling of a need to be one and the same
as the encompassing birds
Haunts us
We pick apart and analyze ourselves to the point where many of us
End up
Letting any beauty in the narrative slip away
Only seeing what needs to be fixed to conform to the flock
To be one of the beautiful doves spreading its wings
Exploring the endless and vast blue
Having a place in the flock
Surviving
Living and prospering
We fail to think
Of how alluring and refreshing
Seeing a different bird in the atmosphere would be
We’d call it exotic
We’d appreciate all of its different colors
Its different characteristics
The different environment it arose from
And how it affected it to become the beautiful bird we see before us
So why don’t we think of ourselves that way?
Why don’t we start loving the way millions of years of evolution
Chances and coincidences and luck of circumstances
That led to us becoming the person we see in the mirror
Why don’t we start appreciating all the struggles we’ve faced
The battles we’ve won and the battles we’re training to win
The knowledge we’ve acquired thus far
And the knowledge we’re about to uncover
Why don’t we appreciate our colors
Unique to us
The fingerprint unique to us
The shape unique to us
Our bodies that work non-stop to keep us alive
Why don’t we appreciate waking up in the morning
An opportunity to love the person we have become
An opportunity to smile at someone
An opportunity to smile at yourself
To pat yourself on the back for being here today
An opportunity to pick up a new skill
To fix something
To let go of something
Find a blank page in the messy book
And write the life we want to have
A life that includes loving who we are
It may take a day
A month
A year
A decade
It may feel like a rocking ship
A never-ending drought
An invisible war
But flowers are sure to grow
Waves of epiphany will come
Rain will pour
And you will reach the destination.
By Joud Almanie- sending all the love in the universe to you
because you deserve it
From cultural ideologies to personal opinions
We are told to conform like a bird in a flock
And it’s unusual for a dissimilar bird to stick out and project
In the sky
Apart from its fellow birds in the flock
As newborns,
We’re a clean slate
Waiting for knowledge to be acquired from our surroundings
Waiting to be inspired in order to feed our insatiable quest for learning
What we don’t see coming our way,
Is that as we grow
We tend to use our surroundings in a comparative way
The feeling of a need to be one and the same
as the encompassing birds
Haunts us
We pick apart and analyze ourselves to the point where many of us
End up
Letting any beauty in the narrative slip away
Only seeing what needs to be fixed to conform to the flock
To be one of the beautiful doves spreading its wings
Exploring the endless and vast blue
Having a place in the flock
Surviving
Living and prospering
We fail to think
Of how alluring and refreshing
Seeing a different bird in the atmosphere would be
We’d call it exotic
We’d appreciate all of its different colors
Its different characteristics
The different environment it arose from
And how it affected it to become the beautiful bird we see before us
So why don’t we think of ourselves that way?
Why don’t we start loving the way millions of years of evolution
Chances and coincidences and luck of circumstances
That led to us becoming the person we see in the mirror
Why don’t we start appreciating all the struggles we’ve faced
The battles we’ve won and the battles we’re training to win
The knowledge we’ve acquired thus far
And the knowledge we’re about to uncover
Why don’t we appreciate our colors
Unique to us
The fingerprint unique to us
The shape unique to us
Our bodies that work non-stop to keep us alive
Why don’t we appreciate waking up in the morning
An opportunity to love the person we have become
An opportunity to smile at someone
An opportunity to smile at yourself
To pat yourself on the back for being here today
An opportunity to pick up a new skill
To fix something
To let go of something
Find a blank page in the messy book
And write the life we want to have
A life that includes loving who we are
It may take a day
A month
A year
A decade
It may feel like a rocking ship
A never-ending drought
An invisible war
But flowers are sure to grow
Waves of epiphany will come
Rain will pour
And you will reach the destination.
By Joud Almanie- sending all the love in the universe to you
because you deserve it
I'm a senior in high school and environmental activist who adores writing, learning languages, and exploring the endless bound of philosophy.