An Opinion is just an Opinion...

An Opinion is just an Opinion...

This really spoke to me today. A reminder that another person doesn't have the right to inflict their opinion on me either. They are allowed to have one. I am allowed to make the choice to believe it or not. Just because they think it and may believe it, does not mean I do. I know myself better than most and am more in tune with my body than most people I know.

Not to mention I know I am Brave and Fearless. Bravery for when I'm afraid I do it anyway. Fearless for the leaps I need to take in life.

Remember, other people have a right to their opinion. You have the right to believe it or not. Ask yourself "Is it true?" Really dive into your heart and you will find the answer.

This is from my friend Isabel Abbot

"To judge another who is in a situation you have never been in and lives an experience you do not know is to enact violence.

We don't get to tell someone they are broken. 

We don't get to tell someone they are healed.

(I would interject...We don't get to tell someone they are afraid)

We don't get to hold our own values as universal truths and demand another share our condemnation of them for not meeting a standard or set of assumptions they never agreed to.

You may not condemn me for being queer because I hold no shame for it and know no wrongness in it so your statements speak only of your beliefs and not my personhood. 

You may not condemn me for being a slut because I hold no judgment for my sexuality or ways of living in this body and I love myself fiercely for every bed entered and left. 

You may not condemn me for being having been homeless or for how I parent or for the ways I find to live with the violence done against me because it implies your own perception are trustworthy and reliable and a thing we share. We likely do not.

I refuse to my own word against myself. 

And so there is no need to pick up another's hurled insults and hold on as if they have meaning. 

Perhaps the salve to the violence that is this kind of judgment is not acceptance or agreement or sameness, but compassion. To suffer with. To care. 

Life is so fucking hard. And so fucking beautiful. And we are here. 

May we walk and stay in love."