7 Things To Stop Letting Control You Once & For All

If you've spent any time on Instagram, you've seen these gorgeous, flawless girls holding a bouquet made of hundreds of roses. Or a girl carrying 50 balloons. Or that chick with the huge teddy bear that takes up the entire room. It looks cool and, gee, these girls must be special; but who TF has that kind of money?

There's nothing wrong with that life. Good for them! But that doesn't mean it isn't a tad uncommon. If you don't get 4,000 roses for your birthday, don't fret. It doesn't make you any less special or your life any less Instagram-worthy. Go ahead. Post that picture of the new book bae gave you. Sh*t. I know that's what I did on my birthday. #NoRegrets

For. The. Love. Of. God. Why does this matter so much? Some girls can post a picture of their foot and get 5,000 likes. Others post pictures under the Eiffel Tower, and no one cares. So, what does it all mean? Absolutely nothing.

We've gotten to this place where we define our sense of self-worth on what other people think of us — except it's gone digital. Now it's calculated by how many likes or comments or video views we get. We document every moment of our lives waiting for people, sometimes total strangers, to validate them. And if they don't, some people will actually delete said posts, confirming a sad truth: we only think those memories are valuable if they're popular on social media.

Do you remember a time before social media really existed and we didn't go searching for people's approval? Probably not, because that is how much this culture dominates us now. Don't let it dominate you. You can't be defined by the number of likes you get.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you're eating a donut, you're eating it because you enjoy it, correct? You're not eating it for it's nutritional value. If that's the case, why obsess over how many calories are in it? If you're going to eat a donut, eat a motherf*cking donut and enjoy every bite. Don't insult the donut by trying to calculate how much fat is in it. One donut will not make you gain weight. And even if it did, hell, be proud. Tell people, "Yeah, I gained weight from donuts, and they were damn good, too."

If you're going to torture yourself over the treats you enjoy, you might as well not eat them at all. In that case, I'll take them.

In some way, shape, or form, all of us get rejected on a regular basis. Whether it's last week's date who has no interest in seeing you again or the cashier in the speedy lane of the grocery store telling you that lane has a 10 item maximum and you've got 13 (so GTFO and go to another lane), we all face rejection — more than you probably even realize.

Rejection is simply someone saying no; and when you think about it, how strange is that? Not very strange — because the answer can't always be yes. If we all said yes all the time, the world would be a crazy place, and the speedy lane at the grocery store would probably take much longer to get through.

Being rejected doesn't necessarily say anything about you; it speaks of the preferences of the person who did the rejecting. And they, like everyone, are entitled to their own thoughts and opinions. Don't let someone rejecting you rain on your whole parade. It will happen again, and that's totally fine.

While in the pursuit of finding true love, some of us let it consume us entirely. All day, every day, our minds are taken over by thoughts of that person we just went out with, what they thought of us, if they liked us, if they'll call, when, calling them first, not coming across as too desperate, and round and round we go. Our culture tends to think that being in a relationship is the ideal — the standard — and being single means something is lacking. Something must be wrong. What are you doing (or not doing) that nobody wants you?!

What do our love lives say about us as people? Nothing. It's the reason that there are horrible people who get married and wonderful people who are single. Don't stop yourself from being happy just because you don't like your relationship status. You might not like to hear this, but I'm going to say it anyway: if you think your life won't be "complete" until you find the one, you're in for a disappointment, because you need to feel complete all on your own.

I'm horribly guilty of letting money control me, and I know I'm not alone in the chase for financial success. This can be a slippery slope, though; because once you reach the goal you had set, do you really think you'll be satisfied, or will you want more? When is it actually enough? It was Jim Carrey who famously said, "I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it's not the answer," and there's something we can all learn here: while money can give us stability, security, and choices, it still doesn't guarantee happiness. That is what we should chase — happiness.