What Being a Girl Means to Me

Writing Girlhood blogs doesn’t come from a random topic generator — these are our personal experiences that others can relate to seek belonging and a sense of community.

Scrolling through advice submissions, girl’s stories, and emails makes me realize that being a girl is awesome.

And in a way, it’s bittersweet, knowing that each girl is dealing with a similar issue in one way or another. Joining together and creating a resource that allows for the circulation of stories and advice has not only been helpful to girls all over the world, but has been helpful to me: because it’s shown me that I’m not alone in my various experiences and challenges.

When I was around 10, I played wallball at recess. Even though I thought I was good, the group I was playing against were all guys, and because of this, I immediately thought I didn’t stand a chance.

Yes, they were the same height as me at the time, and not any better, but I simply assumed that I was going to embarrass myself because of my gender. However, when I started playing (and beating them), I realized that being a girl is not something I should be ashamed of. 

Because when you’re a girl, you can do anything a guy can do, but look bada** while doing it. 

Girls can be mean, and dealing with the tribulations of growing up, we sometimes pin against one another because of drama, boys or insecurity.

But whenever I begin to dislike a girl, I just think of them getting ready for school, buying a new sweatshirt they love, ordering a cute drink to make their day a little better, or screaming Taylor Swift songs with her friends. And I realize that it’s impossible to hate somebody that is so much like me.

We are all girls here. We are all in the same boat.

- Mia Sugimoto <3