DIARY: WEEK 44

17:21:00

"I am homesick for a place, I am not sure even exists. One where my heart is full. My body loved and my soul understood."

This weekend I returned to this place. To one of my absolute favourite towns and especially to some of my absolute favourite people: I went back to Malmö.

When I decided to move to Sweden to study I have never ever thought I would find what I have been looking for for such a long time. That I would find a town that is so lively, so vivid, so young and wild and filled to the brim with amazing, interesting, funny people from all over the world.

I have been extremely happy in Malmö for the last year, but until this visit I did not notice how much I miss it. I have never had such an amazing group of friends with whom I can jump from discussions about religion or migration policies to boys to nail polish and feel absolutely comfortable in every topic.

I have been a little down the last month, not quite myself, not as excited about life as I used to be. But my trip made me realize why: Because I miss this network of girls, lifting each other up, being there for one another and this kind of meaningful conversations.

Friendships are so important in life, the people you surround yourself with have such a huge impact on your life and if you find people who actually make you a better version of yourself by simply loving and motivating you, never ever let them go.

I feel like I have charged my batteries, like I want to work on myself more and achieve my goals and all of this without hearing one word of disapproval of my choices this weekend, but simply because the ladies who are my friends here in Malmö are such amazing, brave, great personalities that I would like to match their ambition and kindness.

It´s this kind of motivation that you should look for in your relationships, this kind of lifting each other up and praising each other. Sadly girls often enter a weird kind of competition not only with girls they dislike, but also in their friendships. We are taught through a variety of media channels that girls are usually bitches, that we are supposed to be in a constant competition and comparison with other women. The sentence "I am not like other girls!" has become such a normal thing to say that it´s scary. In movies we see the sweet outsider who just can´t be friends with anyone else than boys, since girls are all stuck up bitches. The popular girls in teen movies normally are just fake friends and actually hate each other. You are usually supposed to hate the other girls. In our heads "girly" is usually connected to bitchiness, weakness and back stabbing and the first thought when you see another girl is very seldom: "She looks great" but most of the time she wears too much make up, her skirt is too short or she looks like a hobo.

I think the most important thing we can unlearn while we grow up is this toxic attitude of talking other women down, of comparing ourselves to every girl we see on the street and to get rid of the notion that we are constantly competing. Instead we should focus on lifting each other up, on being content with who we are. We should realize that we as women get enough shit from society on a daily basis anyways, that we get told by commercials, movies and magazines that we are NOT GOOD ENOUGH every single day. One of the first steps we can do to overcome this bullshit is to stop adding to it. By supporting other women, by making them strong. Because honestly being surrounded by loving, uplifting other women changes your world and it can change you. I have just forgotten how wonderful that kind of friendship feels.

So please ladies from tomorrow on: compliment another woman at least once a day, build great friendships that have their foundation in mutual reinforcement and not in a stupid competitive comparison.

Accept yourself as the goddess that you are and see every other woman as one too. Help other spread their wings instead of cutting them. Blowing out someone´s candle won´t make yours shine any brighter.