One of my biggest challenges during the initial months of my sabbatical was breaking through my personal bubble. The dystopia and utopia that my mind had brilliantly created for every scenario. A place where I was either the protagonist or the antagonist.
The challenge was transitioning from being the lead whose actions were always justified to being held accountable.
It was realizing that it wasn’t that I didn’t want to flourish. That “me” was always there and was fighting through all these years. But as life happened, I found myself in a series of toxic situations and the “me” could no longer compete.
It helped me move from blaming a particular situation or people to doing an honest self-audit. I was asking myself,
Has this been the first time? No
Have similar people or situations shown up in your life before? Yes
Realizing the exhaustion and defeat I felt wasn’t just because of the particular situation or people but the result of toxic patterns repeated over time. It was like a a heavy weight being lifted off my shoulders. Having that realization was an enormous relief because it meant I could fix it.
The first realization and a rather painful one was to realize I no longer had the habits and mindset of the 21-year-old me. I used to be a disciplined kid especially when it came to health or pursuing my personal interests. Cut to now, I was no longer that person.
It’s like someone who loves to sing versus a singer. The first needs passion and the second needs practice.
In my utopian world, I was still a disciplined kid. In reality, I was living on the credit earned by the 21 yr old Mahima.
I was not allowing myself to accept that being an adult was hard. Doing a good job at work, doing household chores, and taking care of myself while being on my own in a foreign country with no family, was hard. It seemed as if I called it the way it felt, I would come off as weak.
Even at 23, I was so desperate to become the self-sufficient independent woman who had it all together, that I was not ready to at least acknowledge that it was hard.
Not to say I didn’t indulge. I did. I would travel, go hiking, and even shopping every time I could. I enjoyed it but it served more as a temporary respite than something that really fuelled my soul. I forgot that the mindset that I so admired, was a result of the habits and beliefs I developed over time.
Earlier as a kid or even in college, if there were things I wanted to do but they didn’t make sense to my friends or peers, I didn’t care. When I got into graduate school in NYC, it was a dream come true. I didn't know anyone who had done it before me, so there was never a template to follow. Again, I didn't care and I took the plunge.
But nothing prepared me for what I was about to face next. The coursework was demanding and the pressure to find a job, especially as an immigrant, was enormous. I graduated with a great job offer from a great company but I lost myself in the process.
After joining the workforce, the real challenges of adulthood came crashing in. I was in constant pursuit of being my idolized version, never accepting who I “really” was at that point in time. Not realizing that accepting was the only way to go from point A to B.
And sadly I discounted the value of a support system. The one thing we take for granted in our student life. As an adult, I was too proud to admit that I needed one.
I started relating with people who still talked about their “glory days”. The thought of becoming that person scared me. So I would attempt to make better habits but was failing consistently.
In all my previous journals or self-notes, I would write all of the ten things I wanted to achieve by the end of the month, making ten promises to myself, only to eventually break them. Robin Sharma, who wrote one of my favourite books, The Monk who sold his Ferrari, said in an interview [1]
“We lose self-respect from the promises that we make to ourselves that we break...”
So the first thing to do in my self-healing journey was to stop identifying myself as the 21-year-old Mahima I once was. And say out loud who I was today. That meant everything that made me who I was today — My mindset, my habits, and my beliefs.
I started writing the following in my journal:
(Instead of "No cheat meals, eat healthy every day")
I was fairly healthy this week with only three cheat meals. Let’s try to be consistent and reduce cheat days to two.
(Instead of "Meditate every day")
I was able to stop a negative spiral of thoughts today. I am grateful for that.
(Instead of "Go travel to these “checklist” places")
I explored a new neighborhood in my own city on foot for 2 hours and discovered an amazing coffee shop.
It’s definitely easier said than done. Even though I have chosen to spend this time on personal growth, I catch myself doing the same mistakes.
That’s where journaling and having a daily check-in with yourself comes into play. I am trying to catch myself before it can repeat.
Before targeting to be my true self for the rest of the world, the first step is to be truly unabashedly true to myself.
To have the courage to look at me in the mirror, and ask “do I like her?”
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