Lessons learned

The other day, I was listening to my daughter tell a story about something that had happened at school. It wasn't exactly a "good" story, if you know what I mean.

More along the lines of a scene from "Mean girls."

Anyway, while she was telling the story, I was thinking to myself what kind of life lesson she could take away from this story. I hate to admit it but sometimes in the midst of meanness, it's hard to find some kind of lesson in the middle of it. So with that being said I decided to look back into my own teen years and see if I could lump that experience into one that I may have experienced.

As I traveled back in time (in my head, of course), it wasn't really all that difficult to compare then with now.

Did that make sense?

What I am trying to say is girls were mean in the 80's just like they are in 2010. As a matter of fact, they are pretty much the same. People will talk about you, especially the ones who know nothing about you. People will judge you by what you wear, again, usually the same group that doesn't know you but also the ones who do know you, and like you, or at least say they do. Those are probably the one's that hurt the most.

Those are also the ones that are the hardest to understand, even now as an adult, you may still come across people like that. I guess the trick is not to let them get to you.

There was a time in my young life that I really wanted everyone to like me. I don't really know why but I did, and if they didn't I would inevitably try to figure out why. As I got older that got better, in fact I may have went to the opposite end of the spectrum with not caring what anyone thought about me.

But wisdom does come with age I suppose, because I have learned that some people just will not like you, no matter how much we may want them too, and people will still talk about us, even the ones that want us to think they like us.

So what I hope Baby Girl will learn from this little experience is that she is not defined by what these girls see or don't see. She is a beautiful child of God. A God who loves her more than she knows now, but I hope will one day begin to understand just how much he wants for her. And that with his help she will continue to grow.

I also hope that she will see what it feels like to be on the receiving end of this situation just so that she won't be the one who is being the mean girl.

What life lessons did you learn as a teen?