I have officially decided to stop apologizing for being me.

Now, you might feel like apologizing for being yourself is a silly concept, but just think about it for a moment.

How many times have you apologized in the past week, and what was the reason you were saying sorry?

Did you apologize for speaking your mind on an issue that really matters to you? Or how about when your hand accidentally touched someone when you were getting on the subway?

Did you say sorry for crying because something bothered you? Or, maybe you apologized for not being good enough for someone?

Would you expect someone else to apologize to you for these things? For me, the answer is no.

So, why do you feel like you need to say sorry?

The word apology is defined as “a written or spoken expression of one’s regret, remorse, or sorrow for having insulted, failed, injured, or wronged another.”

In my experience, many of things that I tend to apologize for are things that don’t even warrant an apology. In fact, these things are often just me being me. Behaviors like this while seemingly insignificant at first can easily become unhealthy and fuel any level of self hatred someone may already have.

For me, I think the biggest part of myself that I tend to apologize for is how sensitive and emotional I can be, and I know I’m not alone in this feeling.

Friends tell us to vent to them, and then we apologize to them for taking up their time.

Loved ones hurt and betray us, and we apologize to them about something they did to us.

We apologize because society thinks that our bodies aren’t beautiful enough, whether it’s because we’re too muscular, too “fat”, too “skinny”, or too anything.

We apologize for letting our emotions be affected because of being overwhelmed by stress. However, none of this is anything that at all warrants an apology.

In fact, when we apologize for these things it makes us seem like we aren’t strong. It shows people that we can’t accept ourselves completely, so, in turn they won’t accept us either. Before any person can love and accept you, you have to love and accept yourself, not apologize for existing.

I’ve learned that in order to love myself fully and completely I need to stop apologizing for just being myself. We need to embrace all aspects of ourselves instead of being sorry about them. These parts are not “wrong” or “bad”, they just exist and make us who we are, whether it be something about our physical person or something internal. I’ve decided to embrace the fact that I’m an emotional person, and I shouldn’t apologize for it. It doesn’t mean that I’m weak or less than anyone else, it just means that I’m strong enough to express that part of me.

We have all been created as the beautiful, unique people we are for a reason, and I will never again say sorry for being me.