In this video, I share a story from my teenage years that I’ve been revisiting as part of my own journey with my inner teen. It’s a story about attraction, rejection, shame, and what happens when the people around you make you feel responsible for how they perceive you. Looking back, I realize how much confusion I could have avoided if someone had simply explained a few things to me about femininity, magnetism, and other people’s intentions. It got me thinking about how many of us are walking around with stories about ourselves that were actually written by other people. So, after you watch the video, I invite you to spend a little time with your own younger self. What did you experience that you didn’t understand at the time? What did you need someone to tell you? And what might change if you gave yourself that understanding today?
Journal Prompts: An Adventure With Your Inner Teen
Your first encounters with your own magnetism
When did you first become aware that your appearance, presence, or femininity attracted attention from other people? How did the people around you respond to that attention? What did those experiences teach you about being seen?
The stories you inherited
Can you remember an experience when someone treated you as though you were responsible for their attraction, discomfort, jealousy, or behavior? What did you begin believing about yourself because of that experience? Looking back, which parts of that story actually belonged to you, and which belonged to someone else’s perception of you?
The education you never received
What do you wish someone had explained to you about femininity, attraction, sexuality, and other people’s intentions when you were younger? What questions did your younger self have that nobody answered? If you could sit beside your younger self today, what would you want them to understand about themselves and the people around them?
