Birthday Journal 1 (08/23/2023)(one day late)

I am 23 years old now.

Starting this year, I told myself that I would do a yearly journal on my birthday to reassess how far I have come and to reevaluate if I am going down the path I want to.
It feels disappointing and embarrassing because I am 23 years old and I have 3 semesters left to graduate with my bachelors' degree while most of my peers from high school have already graduated in 2022. In my defense, I took an extra year to figure out what major I wanted and what I wanted to do with my life ranging from marketing, doctor, nurse, economist, political science, and now human resources. I also lost one and a half year due to my basic military training and my one year deployment. On one hand, I am glad I got to explore a lot, meet a lot of interesting people from different walks of life. On the other hand, my competitive ass still feels salty about falling behind others.
One of my major accomplishments is having a close friend group which I can confidently say will last me for the rest of my life hopefully. Another accomplishment I hope works out is finding my correct career path of working in human resources. Other than that, I have a lot to work on everything else ranging from fitness, my physical appearance, and social life.
Even though I have accomplished a lot, I keep telling myself to stop getting complacent. In my mind, I still see myself as a loser. The same loser and idiot from middle school and high school who wouldn't amount to anything. I keep telling myself that if I succeed enough then one day, all my peers from the past will see that I am not worthless after all.
However, the truth is that I never wanted to get validation from my peers. I only wanted to get the validation from myself. I lost belief and respect for myself so much that I wanted to destroy my identity as Biraj Gurung. I saw myself as unredeemable. I fantasied about changing my name, faking my personality to be something better. All I ever wanted to do was to look myself in the mirror and believe that I was enough. But I can't even do that, not with where I am at.

Here is to Biraj for surviving for 23 years.

Happy Birthday Biraj.