Perfect

The saddest souls I have ever seen were those inside people who have successfully made themselves perfect. They work harder than everyone else. They don't have weaknesses. They never ask for help. They are beautiful, well spoken, and funny. They never turn down a new challenge and make it all seem easy. They have material wealth to show their success. They are intelligent and humble. They are always there to help others. They are talented beyond belief. They never fail.

Here's the thing: no one is perfect. Being perfect will kill you; believe me, I have tried. So when you take the time to look closely at these people, you see this deep saddness. When you look even deeper you see someone who loathes themselves. They don't take care of anything in the inside because they have to work so hard on the outside to keep it all up. They are terrified of being caught and found out that they are frauds, imposters. They have a hard time letting people in because they need that empty space to fall apart and can't keep up the facade twenty-four hours, seven days a week. They are hypersensitive to criticism and never hear the compliments. Their biggest fear is this imminent failure that they know will eventually come to pass. That is when everything will crash to the ground and people will find out that they are no longer perfect. To them, that is death. Because they believe that they truly don't deserve to be loved unless they are perfect.

They best thing that ever happened to me is that crash. I no longer had to be continually strong. I crashed (a few times), and I realized that people still loved me. In fact, I think they love me more. At least they loved me for who I really am. I think the saddness keeps people away because they so desperately want to help. They want you to know it is okay to be vulnerable and flawed. It is okay to want to be happy. There are some people who are disappointed, but they aren't truly the ones who care about you. They just care about what you have to offer.