Marriage Material? I’d Rather Be Brandi Material.

I was looking through some of my old journals the other day (I know, right, journals! That’s so “pre-blog”!). All I can say is…I am so glad I wrote that stuff in a private book and locked it away because that mess is embarrassing! I mean, pages and pages of, “I’m done with him”, “I’m going to give him another chance”, I’m done with him”, “I’m going to give him another chance”. Reading through those entries as an adult, I was like, “Come on girl, get it together!” The great thing about being able to go back and see where I’ve been is being able to see how far I’ve come.

When I was writing those journal entries, I was a young (very young) woman who was still not really sure who I was. I didn’t know, didn’t REALLY know, what my worth was. I remember feeling sad that I wasn’t the type of girl that guys seemed to be into. I was a big dreamer, and was actually following my dream of becoming an actress. I moved from North Carolina to Philadelphia for a prestigious acting apprenticeship, and was working (acting) six to seven days per week. After the apprenticeship came other acting jobs that kept me busy Tuesday through Sunday in the evenings, and money jobs that kept me busy the rest of the time. I wasn’t pressed about being rich and famous, I just wanted to be happy. And I was happy! I was following my dream, and that was fulfilling to me.

For some men, my being happy wasn’t enough. I needed to get a “real” job, start settling down, you know, be the type of woman that a man would want to marry. I started to question my life choices, started trying to change myself into a woman that was “marriage material”. It didn’t really work. I hated being fake, pretending I cared about things like stocks and bonds and rental property and cooking! I wasn’t really good faking it, anyway. The “real” Brandi always came back out, and I would revert back to my “dreamer” ways…going to auditions, teaching acting to a group of kids…stuff like that!

Knowing what I know now, I’m so glad I was never able to really commit to changing. I would have been unhappy, he would have been unhappy, and chances are, we wouldn’t have lasted anyway! I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to really grow into myself, to turn into the Brandi that God had planned. Everyday I’m learning more about myself, discovering strength and talents that I didn’t know existed, but that are directly resulted from some of the experiences that I’ve had as the “big dreamer” that I described a couple of paragraphs ago. I’m not acting anymore (because I’ve found things that I actually love more than being on stage!), but I’m still following my dreams, and seeking, even more than fame and fortune, happiness.

Am I marriage material, yet? Maybe. Maybe not. But I’m not focusing on that. I’m focusing on being “Brandi material”…100% authentic, 100% happy, 100% me.