There’s a version of this story where I figured it all out later in life. Where there was one big moment, one turning point, one day everything changed.
That’s not my story.
I knew early. Even as a teenager, there was something in me that trusted herself. Not loudly. Not perfectly. But steadily. Like a quiet compass that never stopped pointing in the right direction.
I was polite. Always. Kindness was never something I had to learn — it came naturally, and I meant it. But polite never meant I was going to ignore what I felt inside.
Because here’s what I understood even then — being kind to others doesn’t mean being unkind to yourself.
So, I went with my gut. Even when it was scary. Even when the easier thing would have been to follow someone else’s direction, take someone else’s path, trust someone else’s opinion over my own.
Sometimes I got it wrong. There were mistakes. Real ones. Ones that stung.
But they were mine. And that mattered more than I can explain.
Because a mistake you made on your own terms teaches you something. A safe choice you made to please someone else just keeps you small.
I wasn’t willing to stay small.
I think about the women who come to my pop-up table and stop when they see I Choose Me. Something shifts in their face. Sometimes they laugh. Sometimes their eyes fill up. Sometimes they just nod — slowly, like they’ve been waiting for someone to say it out loud.
Because somewhere along the way someone told them to be smaller. To wait. To ask permission first. To put themselves last and call it strength.
It isn’t strength. It’s a habit. And habits can be broken.
Choosing yourself doesn’t mean you stop caring for others. It means you finally put yourself on the list.
It means you trust the quiet voice that’s been with you all along — the one that knows, even when you pretend not to hear it.
You don’t have to be loud about it. You don’t need an announcement.
Just a decision. Made quietly. On your own terms.
I Choose Me — and I always have.
That’s not selfish. That’s how it was always supposed to be.
— Mary Ann, Founder of Daisy-Bella
