Today Is: What Rules? Day

After a scarring incident occurred in fifth grade, me and several of my girlfriends swore we would never eat nor touch blueberries ever again. I can remember being offered blueberry flavored foods and turning them down because "I don't like blueberries" remember! I was with a girlfriend one day when she ordered a Blueberry scone, I watched with dissatisfaction as she broke the scone up into small bite size pieces, savoring every blueberry flavored bite. Being the sweet woman that she is, she offered to break me off a piece of her "deliciously claimed" scone; what moments before repulsed me all of a sudden was tempting me to reach out to her opened hand and indulge in the blue baked goodness. I was torn, blueberries were never to be eaten again, it was a rule I had created for myself, but how could I pass on a baked good; bread is my staple! Before I realized what I was doing I had reached across and took her offering, quickly shoving it into my mouth as if my brain would catch up with my hand and drop the scone before I could enjoy in the sweet taste of wrongfulness. As soon as I swallowed I had this overwhelming guilt come over me. What is this I thought? (Lord knows it wasn't because of the carb/caloric intake) No, I felt guilty about breaking the rule that I had created for myself. You don't eat blueberries because they repulse you because of the traumatizing event that happened when you were 10, don't you remember? I was in a mind war. The left side of my brain was thinking very analytically and thouroughly; 'You swore to never eat blueberries again'; but my right sided brain was thinking outside of the box and questioning this rule. (My right sided brain has never been one for rules or in-the-box thinking.) I wish I could say then and there was the last time I ever created such ridiculous rules for myself but I cannot; it wasn't until many blueberries later that I realized how ridiculous this was. I had literrally stopped eating something that was so good for me because of a strict rule I had layed upon myself, this started me thinking. How many of these rules have I created in order to keep myself from doing something that may be out of my comfort zone or challenge me in a way that I'm not ready for? How many rules have I followed because that's what the social norm is or what seems to be "the cool thing to do". I came to the realization that the rules that I was creating for myself were silly and unecessary so now I break rules all the time, but that's only because I don't have rules. I can never follow the rules when they're there so I just choose not to create rules for my life; instead I live the way that I choose to live for me and no one else.