For I Was Born to Be a King

[darkauthor26]

The first three chapters of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens are all about dealing with yourself personally. They're about your perceptions of yourself and others, what you center your world around, and how you build and maintain positive relationships with the people around you.

Some Baby Steps for the first two chapters are, "The next time you look in the mirror say something positive about yourself"; "Think of a limiting paradigm you might have of yourself, such as 'I'm not outgoing.' Now, do something today that totally contradicts that paradigm"; and "When you have nothing to do, what is it that occupies your thoughts? Remember, whatever is most important to you will become your paradigm or life-center".

I haven't followed any of these today. I've read farther than I've blogged, and definitely farther than what I've committed to. But I'm going to make it a point to read a chapter and then write an entry about how I'm going to follow the steps and help build the habits.

For the first step, I looked myself in the mirror a couple of days ago and said, "You're pretty. Definitely prettier than MacKenzi's ex" and made myself smile and say it like I believed it. It bothers me than everyone and their Grandmother seems to cream themselves over her ex's looks. It makes me feel like a downgrade, which is silly because I'm definitely not a downgrade; and if I'm dating someone who thinks that I'm a downgrade because I'm not as pretty as an ex then it's a relationship I should walk away from. But MacKenzi doesn't think that; she thinks I'm an upgrade. It's other people's attitudes that makes me feel small, and their attitudes aren't the ones that matter.

MacKenzi loves me. She thinks I'm smart, funny, clever, pretty, sexy, beautiful, lively, kind, loving, compassionate, loyal and supportive. And I am. Sexy, of course, is subjective as is pretty, but it's her opinion that counts. And even on my own, when I'm not being insecure, I can look in the mirror and say, "I'm beautiful and handsome." Handsome, of course, because I would look killer awesome in a tux, and I look killer awesome in mens' style dress shirts already. ;)

There's also much more that goes into being attractive than looks. Someone can be physically beautiful and soulless inside, and they will never be as attractive as the person who is perhaps less physically beautiful but is confident and kind. I just need to relax, chill out and believe in myself. I clean up excellently when I choose to. I just need to be more confident in myself in general.

Second one: limiting paradigm. I don't think I'm good at school. I've thought about this one seriously and come to the conclusion that I'm not good at school because I don't think I am, and I don't put enough effort into my classes. I can't really do something contradictory to that at the moment since classes are all wrapping up, BUT I've made it a goal to get straight A's next semester.

Finally, what occupies my thoughts when I have nothing to do is MacKenzi; of our future, specifically. Of moving down over the summer and spending the rest of college together. Of moving back to Massachusetts and getting married. Of adopting kids and a dog and a Maine Coon cat.

I want all these things, and that's what I'm working towards. The book says that we should be Principle centered; that we should let our principles guide us in our decisions. I agree with that. But I'm a little confused on where the line is drawn between being centered around what you believe in and being centered around someone else. I don't think I'm obsessed with MacKenzi. If she has a bad day, I feel bad because I don't like to see her sad. But my day isn't ruined if her day is or if she wants to spend time with her friends. And I think that's okay; I'm confident that she would hate it if she ended up ruining my day because she had a bad one. I know I would hate it if I ruined hers because mine was bad. Sometimes she wants to hang out with friends when I want to spend time talking to her, but I'm capable of entertaining myself for a few hours more while I wait for her to get back.

And I have no problem telling her if I think she's doing something morally wrong or against my beliefs. We've actually fought about that before, and once we realized where the other was coming from, we were able to discuss it. It turned out that we had actually agreed all along, and we got side tracked into arguing about something different than we had originally been. And she has no problem telling me when she thinks I'm doing something wrong.

So I think we're both doing well on that front. :)