The Art of Lying to Yourself

I've had a pretty rough weekend. Even though I spent most of it as an emotional wreck, I learned some very valuable lessons about myself and people around me.
First, the story.
I joined this sorority group on campus mainly because I was already friends with a few of the girls and I was hoping to expand my horizons. With that in mind I coughed up $61 to go to the group's formal this past Saturday night. As a broke college kid, $61 is a large sum of money for me but I thought "Hey I'll be hanging out with friends and we'll dance and eat good food and have tons and tons of fun." I was wrong. I danced to some 90s classics (Barbie Girl anyone?), and I ate great food because the Statler is a four star hotel so their food is most definitely on point. The problem arose with the "fun." Initially I had fun. But as the night wore on I realized that I felt so out of place there. On top of that I was being continuously reminded of moments in my life which I would rather forget permanently. When it was all said and done, I was in a gorgeous dress, with my hair and makeup done beautifully (thanks Rachel) sitting in the corner of the room crying my pretty little brown eyes out. The worst part was that everyone else was so wrapped up in themselves and their dates that it took a while for anyone to notice. And when someone did notice it was only one person. The rest of my so-called "sisters" were nowhere to be found. At the end of the night I asked our president to cool it with the drama. This resulted in me getting yelled at in front of the waiters, the DJ and some of the girls and their dates. I was humiliated after semi-recovering from a meltdown.

Essentially I rethought my place in the organization and determined that I didn't belong there anymore. I learned that I can't force myself to fit into a group and I should stop lying to myself and sugar coating stuff. It's time I learned exactly what I expect from myself instead of trying to fit into what other people expect from me. That might sound like a common sense type of thing but for me I've spent most of my life pleasing one person or another and I lost myself somewhere in the mix. Now I need to learn how to be me, and in some ways that's the hardest thing to learn.