I remember it all so clearly, like it was yesterday, when it all started.
You never know.
One day, you could wake up and become the victim.
It's sad to think that there are people out there
Who feed on this and continue to spread it
Like an atrocious, flesh-eating virus.
You need an antidote.
But it seems hard to find when you have this weight on your shoulders
That's bringing you down
Literally.
I had to be lifted up from the cold, rough ground just to keep on walking.
Oh, I remember that night.
It was chilly.
Not freezing, but chilly.
There they were again,
Talking about me
Like I'm some hot gossip you found on a magazine at the store.
I couldn't understand why they chose me.
Why they decided to take their time and do this.
What more I couldn't understand and handle was,
What was the reason that they continued to do it?
Was there really something wrong with me
That they had the need to say those things about me?
And why wouldn't they stop
And see what it's doing to me.
That it was breaking me into bits and pieces.
They watched me crumble, in my own little haven.
They watched me tear at my soul for hours and hours in a day
Just to examine what was wrong with me
What made them hate me so much?
What made them want to put me under some microscopical lense
And magnify each and tiny detail of my life
And share it with the rest of the world?
Why?
I felt so exposed
I had no barrier against them
They knew all of what I do and say
And I knew of a source of the reason they knew so much.
It was a friend of mine.
Whom I trusted with my deepest, darkest secrets
But one day, it was broken.
Shattered to pieces and I couldn't piece it back together again.
I blamed myself
I doubted myself
And my morals and my being
Laid in front of me, as if ready to be scuffed away
And thrown in the trash
As how they depicted me to be.
Trash.
I felt sorry for myself.
I choked on all my words of uplifiting
And couldn't bring myself up again.
It was too much.
I couldn't breathe and I couldn't swim back up the ocean of tears I was drowning in.
But one day, I was told by someone much wiser than me
"You must ignore it."
I was distraught by the fact that I was told to
Simply be ignorant to the fact that
My world was falling to pieces.
"You don't understand," I replied.
They won't stop.
And that's the thing.
They wouldn't.
They refused to.
But then,
A thought popped in my head and told me
"The more you pay attention to this
The more it will hurt you.
You must walk away and turn your back
And never look at it again.
You must keep going forward
And for that, you will be free."
So from that day on,
I never looked back on it.
I finally released myself from the chains they locked me in.
I was able to breathe again.
Ignorance is truly bliss.
Their words may still be ringing across their world
But they're no longer in mine.
I've looked ahead for a brighter future,
A happier me.
And the words they spread,
All the lies and nonsense,
They can't hurt me anymore.
I've lifted myself off of that cold, rough ground that night,
And told myself,
"This is me. I am who I am.
And I'm perfectly fine with that."
And soon enough,
The whispers I heard every night and day,
Of how worthless my being was,
Finally faded away.
Like some long lost forgotten memory.
And now, the path I decided to take that night,
Has brought me bountiful blessings
And I can truly say
I'm the happiest I've ever been
I've gain the strength to push away those things
And last, but not least...
I am at peace with myself.
And now, you know my story.
