Ada grew up in a little family of three kids, they were a typical Middle class family, they had enough to keep them going from day to day.
Ada’s parents were very well devoted to their religion and one thing have been the mantra of the home -Follow peace with all men.
Ada lived her childhood and tween years on this principle, she’d been taken advantage of severally just because she wants to follow peace.
Sadly, she’d grown up with the wrong interpretation of what the statement actually means.
Ada is 15 now, a senior secondary school student and lives in the boarding house.
She’s been known to be so peaceful, she wants to be friends with everyone. Some of her school mates told her she acts like a pest and doesn’t have a voice of her own but Ada ignores them and continues with her “Peace Ministry”.
She believed that people should give of themselves, even when they don’t feel like it just to maintain peace. And that’s very Okay, to an extent.
Bad friends started exploiting her. They’d intentionally ask for stuff Ada held Close to her heart. They’d come around and ask for her toys, her beads and all the girly stuff Ada loved and our peaceful Ada always gave it out to them.
They knew how to make her feel bad for not giving them what they asked, if she gave a No. And Ada would once again remember their Family mantra- follow peace, don’t give people reason to hate you.
But the truth is, there are still people who hate you for absolutely no reason.
At a time, she became very good friends with Lina. Lina was the new girl in class and she looked very collected and calm and quickly became friends with Ada.
At a point, clashes began to occur and they both had quarrels, Lina had said things that weren’t true about Ada and somehow she heard it.
She confronted Lina who never felt bad about what she did. Ada was so angry and broken. Her image had been tainted. It took her over 8days to get over it.
And when she finally did, she went back to Lina because she believed she had to be friends with everyone, but she got snubbed.
She felt bad and cried. Unconsciously, she had built her confidence on how much she’s able to please people and be friends with them. So whenever she gets hurt by a Friend or someone leaves her she gets bruised and she hates herself for not being friendly enough.
Are you like Ada?
I once was like her, I wanted to be everyone’s friend. I wanted people to love me and to never leave.
I needed so much validation and I got hurt most of the time, I depended on people’s good actions towards me to become happy.
Until I Began to find myself, my strength, my uniqueness and my personal love. Then I began to break through to enjoy me.
If you’re like Ada or the old me, you need to understand that you can’t please everyone.
Everybody cannot be your friend, it’s not just possible, even Jesus was hated. No matter how much you love the world, they’ll always be people who hate you for no reason.
So you have to be at peace with yourself first. You have to love yourself First. You have to be your own best friend first.
You also have to understand that not everyone can be your friend. It’s not possible. There are different seasons and phases of life for different people. Your bestie of two years may leave you next month. It’s very Okay.
It’s can be soul shattering, I know. But not everyone will stay with us forever and we have to accept that. Even God at some point had to let go of Lucifer.
Learn to let go, especially toxic people. Begging them to stay will only mean you want to harm yourself.
Yet, even when loving yourself and letting bad people go, be sure never to hurt anyone. Just let them go. That’s what it means to follow peace with all men.
Again, I say to you: Love yourself first.
Myteensgist 
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