I am comfortable being unconventional.

I’ve been using that as a mantra of sorts lately. Self reflection has taken me back in time and helped connect me to my present in some really fantastic ways. It’s led to a peace and acceptance that I’m reveling in.

I’ve always felt different, not like other people…like I move through the world in a way all my own. I’ve spent my life dancing to the music nobody likes. (Back in the day, when all my friends were into Madonna, I thought Neil Diamond was awesome.) I have never, ever felt “normal”. In part, this is because I’ve spent my life defining normal as being like every one else.

I recently read an interview in Darling magazine with musician Melissa Helser and a quote of hers stuck with me: “Give in to the significance of your normal.” Yes, MY normal. A normal just like me and just for me. The unique collection of thoughts, actions, qualities, and characteristics that make me, me. I was looking at normal the wrong way. Normal isn’t a broad definition. It’s not one size fits all. It’s individual and evolves, changes depending on where we are on our life path. We’re always normal. Every single one of us on this planet is normal. (Side note: normal does not equal morally upstanding or good.)

How much time and worry do we devote to living what we think normal should be? Over the course of a lifetime, how many days are spent comparing ourselves to someone else’s normal? How much significance do we give their normal while minimizing the importance of our own?

Maybe when we find ourselves unhappy, unsatisfied, unbalanced, it’s because we’re not letting our own normal hold its weight. Go ahead…take a deep breath…let go and give in. Make friends with your normal. Get to know it. Take it out for coffee or go for a hike. Feel how important it is for you to be your normal. Above all, delight in your normal. Find the joy in it. Let it make you smile.

Then take it one step further and let the world know how normal you are.