The cool girl isn't real.
This was the revelation I had around 25. My perception of what it meant to be a "cool girl" was mostly derived from movies and looked something like this:
She doesn't have a lot of emotional needs in a relationship. She's breezy and a bit of a commitment phobe.
She doesn't care if she gets married. I've just never been the type of girl who has thought about my wedding day! Comes out of her mouth as her boyfriend desperately tries to figure out what type of ring she'd like.
She's easy going and low key, effortlessly able to have a beer with her boyfriend's brother or speak French with his mom.
She looks good in a baseball cap, but, when she takes it off, her blowout remains in tact.
You get the idea.
Here's the thing: you might be the girl I just described, in which case I am (certainly!) not saying you don't exist. But, if you are that girl, there is a good chance you see qualities in other women that, at some point in your life, you've tried to emulate.
Because we never actually think of ourselves as the cool, beautiful, confident, worthy girl. We think everyone else has got it down, wishing we could be more _______, in order to align with an archetype we've created.
When it finally hit me that every girl, everywhere, has something she wishes she could change about herself, I found freedom.
There was a time when my head was on a swivel stick, looking around, trying to figure out what all these other girls were doing that made them seem so much more effortless than me. And then, one day, I finally understood it:
They were being themselves.
I know. It sounds cheesy. This could definitely be in a card you got from your grandma on the first day of kindergarten. But, is there anything wrong with repeating the sage wisdom we pass down to young, impressionable minds? I don't think so!
With every letter bundle for The Letter Project, I mail the below postcard. I thought, on this lovely Friday, I'd pass along the same encouragement to ALL of you cool girls out there. Keep shining, friends.
