One night, a stranger in a bar asked me: "How do you define a successful youth?"
He answered first — good grades, good at sports, helps around the house, doesn't talk back. The checklist we're all taught to perform.
I answered differently. I talked about kids who understand their feelings, who learn to regulate and communicate them. Kids with a strong foundation of morals and safety — so they're less likely to fold to peer pressure. Kids who are kind, who consider what others are going through — even their bullies.
And I watched that one conversation start to shift something in him — and in his wife and kid's lives too. We dug into why he'd never once considered emotions, or the emotional safety he never had. Why "success" was never about how you feel, only what you achieve.
This is the proof that your whole life can change in an instant. For him, a new perspective. For me — newfound comfort being authentically me, alone in a male-dominated bar, saying some emotional woo woo stuff and not giving the fear of being disliked a second glance.
That was a true Good Girl Detox. This is mine — and I'm sharing it so you can find yours too.
Content warning: this episode touches on childhood emotional neglect and family dynamics. Discretion advised.