Marisa Donnelly

Get a book and dive into it, whatever type of book it is. Really read the words, let them resonate in your skull. Contemplate what they mean, imagine yourself as the character.

You will miss me as the leaves change
and the swings rest still,
untouched.

I wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you, but I did. Layer by layer.

For starters: How about Discount-Movie-Theater-And-Chill?

1. Actually make plans.

This is the misconception about strong women: that we are difficult to love.

Something relatively simple happens, like finding $20, or getting the best parking spot in the lot, or a 25 cent raise, and you can’t wait to share it…but you get a lump in your throat because you just can’t anymore.

In a single second you can cross a street, you can whisper ‘I love you,’ you can take off in an airplane, you can feel your stomach drop, you can smile, or you can watch someone you love take his last breath.

I want you to know one thing—you are not alone.

You believed in me. Me—in my brand new dress pants and pressed shirt and clean cardigan and matching flats, but a nervous hint in my steps—you trusted me.

You love these little guys. Not because they are your own and you have to, but because it comes naturally. You don’t have to love them, but you do.

This is what you need to know about me: I’ll love the hell out of you. I’ll care for you. But I’ll be damned if you think I’m the woman that will sit silently next to you that will do everything for you, pick up after you, be your mother. That’s not me.

You teach her that it is not her body that makes her who she is, but her mind, her soul, the way she carries herself, the way she laughs, the way she loves, the way she listens.

Stage #1: I’m a boss.

You are not the words this person says. Remind yourself of that daily, until you believe it.

You are continually looking for ways to be even more self-sufficient, to carve your own life path, to do what you want. But you also love. And love terribly, beautifully, fully.

But this is what you do when you are broken. You pick yourself up, piece by piece. You re-learn the strongest parts of yourself and fight until you break through.

To be selfish means to know who you are as a person and what you need. It means taking the time to do things that you want to do. It means not changing your plans, your thoughts, your words, your actions, yourself for the sake of someone else.