Finding Myself

May was a blur! I subbed yoga classes like crazy, just about figured out my master's thesis AND my dissertation topics, and have been trying to catch up with friends. This past month, I feel like I've attended many birthday parties, pool parties, and grill-outs, attended a 2 day stats intensive workshop, finally make it to B-Scene at the Blanton, somehow lucked out and scored cheap tickets to the MGMT concert.

This month, my goals are to write up my master's thesis (hah!), submit a Symposium for SPSP, finish my presentation for Israel, and sell my furniture and get ready to move out of my apartment.Somehow in there I'm also planning a pretty crazy birthday party for one of my best friends.

I've been learning a lot of lessons about life and friendships lately though. Lucky for me I've made some of the best friends I've ever had in Austin. Friends who know me inside and out, who love me, rebuke me, encourage me, and help me find myself and be true to myself. I've learned that there IS something to the self-fulfilling prophecy - that to a large degree, you create the environment you are in. That if I stop being so worried about how others see me and whether they accept me, and just go through life assuming as if I already am, chances are people who treat me that way. I've just witnessed so many people so sensitive to rejection that they actually act in such a way that turn people away. People treat you the way you want to be treated. As simple as that truth is, it's been blowing me away. I've carried this into my professional life and found that it's made a huge difference in the way I'm able to network and build connections.

Now I'm not saying that there aren't limitations to this - obviously there are or everyone would be able to overcome any circumstance they are born into (which is just not true). But just this little insight has been very freeing for me. It frees to me to simply be secure and confident in who I am in all areas of my life!