Feeling Special

I was asked recently if I just wanted to see my name on something to "feel special". Considering I was running on 46 minutes of sleep at the time, it wasn't a fair statement to make to me, but it made me think.

What is wrong with wanting to feel special?

I think we can all agree that it is okay to feel special once in awhile. We've all enjoyed our name in lights at one time or another...but more than that, appreciation (or at the very least validation) can go a long way to soothing someone's hurt feelings and make them feel better.

Is it hard to say to someone "Thank you"?

Now if you want to feel special all the time, there can be an issue there, but to be appreciated once in awhile, especially after a long and exhausting day, perfectly okay.

One thing I've struggled with in my childhood and adulthood has been trying hard not to act like I think I am special. I will hold back on good news or hold back a comment and even sometimes dumb myself down just so that people don't think I have an ego I don't have. I will jokingly say I'm kind of a big deal or whatever, but in reality, I need appreciation and approval as much as the next person.

One example of this is my grades and education. I am proud of my accomplishments and I will share them on my facebook or whatever, but I don't make a big deal of it. I don't think I've ever thrown a party for my accomplishments. I've gone out to dinner with friends and I've had a cookout..okay maybe that's a slight party. I kind of feel all the time that I have to say "No its no big deal really" when it kind of is. When I was younger, my sisters struggled educationally so I would downplay my A as not a big deal to my own detriment.

My sisters think school and education has always come easy to me. They haven't seen me skip lunch to study and sneaking out to the living room after my parents went to sleep to study my math one last time before a test. They've not seen me delete entire paragraphs of writing and start it over. Why? Because in an effort to make it look like it didn't matter, I hid how hard I worked for it. So that I could shrug and say No big deal.

Regardless of how hard I worked for it, it would have been okay to feel just a little bit special for getting an A.

So, wherever you are, show your appreciation for people and be genuine. It is okay to make someone feel special once in awhile. It is okay to say Thank you.

Most importantly...it is okay to feel special once in awhile. Celebrate you. You are the only you there is :)