Letter to my fourteen year old self

First letter to my fourteen year old self:

I look at your picture with those hazel eyes that twinkle and sparkle dampened spirits to renewed hopes. Young and innocent; a spitting image of what I once was. Looking at this picture is like staring at a mirror with time travel features, a moment I reel in. Your teenage mind, clean of the corruption of images of delinquency and flashes of truancy but instead has naïve dreams that have not been gunned down by the gravity of reality. Since this is my first letter to you, I’ll try keeping it short –

I know that you don’t hurt like I do, even though we look the same (you are better looking than I am), We share the same dreams, both fulfilled and unfulfilled and that’s how I recognize you.

I envy your freedom,

Yearn your innocence with a sense of nostalgia

Miss your freedom to be innocent…

Endless opportunities and the beauty in your youth

Sitting back here on this old bed whose dreams we share, I can’t help but flashback to the time I was you. Reminiscing about you is a memory I celebrate and every-time I stare at this picture, it’s like I am going through old belongings and reading old scraps of poems I would scribble during break time and prep recess. Here is some advice from your twenty four year old self:

Seek motivation;

Yearn wisdom;

Obtain understanding;

Chose reason over emotion;

Think in the heat of an argument;

Celebrate the first rains;

Write a letter to paranoia;

Realize the power of conversations;

Realize that ‘old house’ is your home;

Appreciate your taste in music;

Realize your greatest strength lies in these words;

Realize that it’s this silence that your thoughts are so violent;

Wait for the gentle breeze... and listen to it.

Please remember, my dear fourteen year old self:

Pursue truth

Advance knowledge

Calculate danger

Anticipate love

Install faith

Always believe

Be earnest.

Don’t forget, my dear fourteen year old self:

Be earnest;

Yes honest;

Contemplate righteousness

Hurt less

Hateless

Be earnest

I’m Ernest you are me... so don’t give up on we.

Twenty four year old self.

***Inspired by Miss Tsitsi Hazel* **