The Truth about Truths: Embracing and Navigating Contradiction in and Beyond Recovery
Something I learned in therapy was that two things can be true at the same time. It can be that the way someone else views something may completely contradict the way you see it, but ultimately both views are true because both of you are experiencing it. This two truths concept also applies to thoughts and beliefs we host within ourselves.
A lot of the therapy I underwent for my eating disorder recovery focused on identifying and embracing these kinds of insistent contradictions.
For example, one truth I held steadfastly was, “I don’t want an eating disorder.” And another equally real truth I had was “I am scared to give up my eating disorder.”
The key to being able to navigate both truths is to embrace them both— NOT set them up in conflict to one another. The first step is as simple and as subtle as word choice when speaking or even thinking about them.
We tend to use “but” when comparing two things that seem to contradict one another:
“I don’t want an eating disorder BUT I am scared to give it up.”
However, something changes when you replace that “but” for “and”:
“I don’t want an eating disorder, AND I am afraid to give it up.”
The latter validates both perceptions but does NOT so planitively put one above the other.
“But” infers that the fear is stronger than the will to live without an ED. “And” allows the possibility to be afraid, but do it anyways.
There is a story about a warrior and his meeting with fear, taught by Pema Chodron. The ultimate revelation the young warrior comes away with from this meeting is that bravery is NOT the absence of fear; It is feeling the fear, BELIEVING it, with every cell in your body, and facing it anyways.
It is not: “I want to, BUT I am afraid.” It is: “I want to, AND I am afraid.”
Unlike the former, which almost immediately dismisses any action, the latter births the opportunity for both truths to coexist, and for the fear to be conquered.
I am not currently in therapy, and I’m not really “recovering” anymore, but I am still living in this place of navigating two truths.
A big one right now that I hold is: “I am so grateful to have made it this far in my recovery, AND I am sometimes nostalgic for the identity my eating disorder gave me.”
Another is: “I am proud of my body, and I love being healthy AND I often think I would be happier if I lost weight.”
Sometimes these truths are even more specific to a moment. Take this past week for example, when I took a spontaneous trip to a family cottage for some r&r by the lake. I was having repeating thoughts of “I really want to get a good sweat from a workout AND I want to relax and do nothing.”
And on a similar train: “I feel guilty and not hungry for dinner from eating so many appetizers on the dock AND I am still looking forward to eating more at dinner.”
It’s hard, honestly, navigating these two often equally compelling voices. Ultimately, the healthier one always drowns out the one I know instinctively is rooted in my ED neural pathways. That’s what makes it uncomfortable. Continuing to eat, and rest, and attempt to feel happy and at ease in my skin, and to NOT fixate on what I eat or how much I weigh, while simultaneously living with this feeling that I “should” be doing a lot of the things that I used to do (a lot of things that a lot of people without EDs do: opting for “healthier” options, watching what they eat, having a strict workout regime, etc.)
Sometimes, it feels like I’m driving backwards on the highway, trying to live up to the healthier truth.
Even though I am pretty good at this point at doing the right things for my mental and physical health, there are still moments when it seems like the wrong thing.
Restricting and exercise were always a quick fix for any larger stressor in my life.
Fighting with my family? Don’t eat dinner.
Feeling sad or lonely that I didn’t have plans on a friday night? Go for a run.
Realizing how lonely I am, feeling disconnected from all my friends? Try even harder to change my body, thinking if I looked the way I thought I “should” look, I would be more likable, more loveable, and regain those kinds of connections I had thwarted.
None of these quick fixes ever really fixed anything, obviously. They only led me further into my eating disorder and farther from the kind of connection and happiness I was seeking.
So I do realistically and rationally understand that attempting to change my body, or start actively controlling my food or exercise is NOT the answer to any of my concerns today. But (or and, as I should say), I still have fleeting thoughts that these behaviours will.
I’m writing this blog post right now to remind myself of this ultimate truth: two things can be totally contradictory and still coexist equally as truths. Feelings are real, and valid, but they do NOT need to dictate our actions. We can feel the fear, believe it, and face it anyways.
Hopefully this reminder might render itself useful for you too.
What are some conflicting or contrasting beliefs that you hold? How might replacing that “but” with “and” alter your perception of how to navigate them? Often the right path is the hardest one to take.
Don’t sell yourself short by opting for the road that feels easiest in the moment, but ultimately never gets you to the place you wanted to get to in the first place.
Embrace the “and.” Do the hard thing. And in the moments where you fall victim to the contradiction, have the self-compassion and grace to pick yourself back up and carry on, because life is too short to live in debt to your own regrets anyways.
Love and light,
Jae
ADHD and Me
I’ve been struggling lately. Not so much with food or eating disorder things. More with life in general. Like I am a step behind in everything I need and want to do, without any tangible obstacles in my way, and I still cant seem to get them done.
From keeping my classroom organized, to tidying my condo, to writing this blog post. I NEVER seem to be able to carry out the act of completing any of these things until some external pressure has me backed into a corner (like parent-teacher interviews forcing me to organize my teaching desk).
It’s making me feel as if I am wasting precious time, the very thing that motivated me so strongly to overcome my eating disorder’s compulsions and routines.
Now I have this extra energy and unscheduled time, and instead of using it to the fullest, I still feel stuck to something. And not just one thing, but a thousand little things, pulling me in a thousand different directions ultimately keeping me stuck in one place, vibrating awkwardly rather than making any actual strides.
These feelings are NOT new. Its just without all the eating disorder struggles consuming most of my brainspace, they have taken up more prominent residence in my life.
It’s not just that I feel unproductive. Yeah, it’s annoying that my room is messier than I want it to be, that I can’t seem to remember where I put a giftcard I was gifted for the life of me, that this blog post I started a month ago I still haven’t finished.
But it’s impacting the way other people see me, and the way I see myself.
Take Superbowl weekend. We decided to throw a little party at my parents’ house, inviting my siblings and a few friends to watch the game half time show and eat lots of food. I decided to try to recreate the quinoa onion rings from Fresh, knowing how obsessed my boyfriend is with them, and also helped prepare a Tex Mex feast of nachos, enchiladas and BYO burrito bowls.
There was a bunch of us in the kitchen working with and around each other, navigating counter space and cutting boards, commandeering the SONOS speakers, trying to time everything so that it was all piping hot and ready to go for the start of the game.
Of course, in typical Prosen-family-style, the food was ready just seconds before Rhianna strode onto the stage at half time. But pretty much all of us only cared to see that part of the game anyways. So perfect timing!
I plated the onion rings, from their paper towel lined drinking dish onto something more serving worthy, quickly ran a cloth over the counter, rushed to put some spice bottles away and dashed downstairs.
I felt like I was being pulled so many ways-- my siblings and boyfriend downstairs, waiting for me to join them, my aunts attempting to navigate the kitchen and also wanting to catch up with me, and my pole standing there in the middle of it all, staring me down for not having used it all day, despite that being one of the first things on my to do list.
But I was able to exhale, with that final onion ring scooped onto the platter. It was halftime, dinner was done, and we could all be downstairs to eat and enjoy together. I had even managed to sneak in a couple ayeshas as things were cooking.
It was only the next day I was subjected to a different perspective. According to my mother, I dashed downstairs without a glance behind me, leaving a whirlwind of greasy surfaces, unwashed dishes, and dirty floors in my wake. She was genuinely hurt by it, feeling like I had intentionally thought to assign her the task of cleaner.
It’s so selfish, when you do these things. Like you just expect other people to clean up after you. As if its only your time and what you have to do that matters and not mine.
And that devastated me. Was I really that selfish?
It did cross my mind that I should tidy up my mess-- thats why I wiped the counter and put away the things I used. But did I think to check the floors, or the other areas of the kitchen? Maybe for a second. But I was really just consumed by this urgency to get out of there as fast as I could with the food so that it could be enjoyed by everyone while it was hot and at its best. It didn’t even cross my mind at that moment what the state of the rest of the kitchen was in, or when it would be addressed.
Its not the first time I’ve been called out for my whirling dervish messiness. My first house I shared with roommates, I was horrified the first time my friend sat down with me and gently broke it to me that I was “messy.”
I thought I was being so careful to clean up after myself, everytime I used any kind of common area. My students at school have even asked me what my desk is “such a mess.” And it’s really only at that moment I see my stacks of papers and notebooks as a mess and not in tentatively organized stacks of “to-do nows” and “to-do-laters.”
I’m struggling with this because its more than just being a “messy” person. It’s more that the mess is a symptom of a greater, underlying issue: attention and hyperfixation.
An issue I am only beginning to wrap my head around. I was actually diagnosed with ADD (now categorized as ADHD on the DH-5 scale) when I was in grade 4 when my teacher noticed my difficulty in transitioning from task to task.
However, I managed to do well in school, and I was not bouncing off walls the way most people assumes people (boys) with ADHD tend to behave, so no one gave much thought to this diagnosis: not any doctor, my parents, and not me.
It was only recently, as I have gotten to know more people living with ADHD, that I have come to understand some of the myths and misconceptions that exist around it.
As one a video by How to ADHD put it, ADHD is less of an inability to pay attention and more of an imbalance of attention.
It’s not that I, like other “ADHDers” cannot focus on anything. It’s that we have difficulty training our attention on something that is not giving us an immediate hit of dopamine to our apparently, under-dopaminated cortexes.
My lack of ability to tidy and organize spaces is because my brain is so heavily fixated on something else, whether its a pole class I am about to run out the door for, an upcoming trip I am planning, and less healthily, anxiety regarding some eating disorder thought permeating.
That one fixation consumes all my attention, appearing in screaming colour, with all other tasks and thoughts muted and black and white in the background.
I don’t like living this way, at the mercy of whatever thought is giving me that hit of dopamine, limiting my ability to comprehend and act in a way that acknowledges the big picture of whats going on around me.
So I am taking steps to figure out how to function with this ADHD that I am finially acknowledging.
I could write so much more about what I am already learning, but this blog post is long enough. Hopefully, I will manage to have trained my attention to write more posts on this ADHD discovery journey as I go.
Have you ever suspected you might have ADHD? Have you ever held any of the same beliefs I did about how it manifests?
Stay tuned to see how this chaotic brain of mine is working to sort itself out.
Til next time,
Jae
10 More Things I Learned During Covid Isolation
This is a continuation from my last post, where I talk about my experience of having Covid just before Christmas.
I tried to narrow what I learned from 10 days on my own to 10 items, but I failed miserably. So here are 10 more things isolation taught me.
To read the first 10 learnings from my experience with Covid click here.
10 (more) things I learned in Covid Isolation
It’s a good time to make a photobook whilst in quarantine.
Photobook creation websites like Photobook Canada (which I used) have some pretty amazing programs to create truly unique and professional books. 10 days honestly flew by just learning how to use the different features, and create a photo cookbook of all my Nana’s recipes that I was sure my mom would love. Honestly, hours went by without a thought dedicated to this very consuming project.
It takes a f***ing long time to put together a photobook.
Spoiler: It took me so long to make the photobook that it did not arrive in time for Christmas. On the final day of my isolation, I actually kind of wished I had another day or two to finish working on it in peace.
Sometimes exercise feels unproductive.
Don’t get me wrong, I will always feel a high after finishing a workout, whether its a HIIT workout, a challenging pole class, or a long walk. But when you have a 100 page document (or photo cookbook) to edit and a fast approaching deadline, sweating for the sake of sweating or leaving your house to walk the same route for an hour only to arrive back where you started feels rather redundant. For that reason, as well as for the sake of my immune system that was currently being attacked by virus particles, I took a pretty big step back from exercise during my isolation. And I felt pretty accomplished by the end of it.
I own too few pairs of pajamas.
Pretty much all I wore the entire 10 days I was isolating. And the few days I was sick and without test results before that. I even started walking my dog in my PJ’s, just throwing on my boots and coat. How many days did I go wearing the same pajama bottoms? I will take the answer of that to my grave.
Bras are overrated.
See above. The closest thing I came to a bra were the sports bras I would wear for pole. And sometimes they doubled as a shirt paired with my PJ bottoms for the rest of the day. I had surprisingly very little laundry to do after those 10 days quarantined at home.
Even introverts succumb to loneliness at some point.
While I am not a through and through introvert (hello Leo), I definitely have an introverted side along with my streak of independence. For most of quarantine, I was pretty content with my puzzles, a hallmark Christmas movie, and my pole. However, there were times where I really and truly felt like an outsider to the rest of the world. I would see instagram stories and posts of friends getting together for christmas parties, work events, or even just coffee dates and that’s when loneliness would hit. In those moments, I would even consider giving up my PJ pants for some human interaction.
A bit of dancing everyday keeps sadness at bay.
While I didn’t do much in terms of “working out,” most days I did end up finding my way to my pole, fuelled by my Spotify playlist of a few good songs in a row. I just moved and grooved and spun myself around, for as long or as little as I was feeing, and inevitably, I came out of those dance sessions with a little happiness boost. Well worth the slight feeling of out of breathness after (which did thankfully go away after my 5th or 6th day in isolation).
Even dogs need space.
For 10 days, it was just me and my 13 year old husky/shepherd Jaeda. I am a cuddler. Jaeda less so. Craving some form of interaction and affection, I often looked to Jaeda for a good cuddle session. She would always oblige for awhile, but after 10 or so minutes had past of me skootching into her bed with her, she would look sideways at me, give a little groan, and heave her old bones off of her cushy bed to lay on the floor in another room alone. It could be said that perhaps Jaeda fared isolation even better than I did.
Thank God for Facetime.
In the moments I didn’t even have the affection of my dog to quell my feelings of loneliness, Facetime was always there to give me to the kind of human connection only eye contact, facial expression, and a familiar voice can offer. To all the beloved friends who called to check in on me, or answered my calls where I had very little new and exciting to share, you know who you are, and you are appreciated.
There are some hidden gem christmas movies on Netflix.
I watched more Christmas movies this year than I have in the past three years combined, thanks to Covid. As someone who is not all that fond of rewatching movies, especially those of the Hallmark variety, I was pleasantly surprised to find several new ones that were more than decent. At the top of my list were Lovehard, Let it Snow, A Knight for Christmas, A California Christmas and Klaus.
So there we have it. 10 Learnings from 10 days in Isolation. In the end, not all that miserable, and in many ways, rewarding. But would I willingly do it again? Probably not. I prefer my puzzles with a side of conversation. And I am running out of pajamas.
Have you had to isolate for covid? How did you kill the time?
Happy New Year,
Jordan xoxo
The Fear of Being “Ordinary” (and why being average is perfectly enough)
“Shoot for the moon. For even if you fail, you will still land among the stars.”
This was the poster that greeted me on my first day in my Grade 4 classroom. It was hung by my kind and enthusiastic teacher, who wanted nothing more than to inspire and motivate her students to live up to their potential; the message essentially being to do better, we must aim for nothing less than the best.
As innocent this message may seem, it stems from a “never enough” mentality that is destructively pervasive in our culture. A mentality that being ordinary is not enough, and that in order to be “good” we must be special.
We must do whatever it takes to be extraordinary.
Throughout our lives, many of us have fallen victim to this mentality of self-deciprecation. We learn to view '“average,” “normal,” and “ordinary” as lacking. We fear that falling into the category of “average” is settling for a lesser identity, or accepting a loss of power.
When we hear the word “ordinary,” it is loaded with negative connotations of monotony, or boredom, or the mundane. When at is essence, ordinary is a very neutral term— and who is to say, not a positive one?
For a long time, I considered being “ordinary” a failure to live up to my potential.
And its a shame (and quite f***ed up really) to walk around carrying this fear of ordinary. Ordinary is synonymous with average. And average quite literally means “the norm”-- the category most people and endeavours fall into (duh).
By rebuking and fighting anything that falls in this category of average- whether it be our average job, average body, average grade, or average skill or ability at a sport or art or hobby- you are ultimately leaving yourself with very little chance to be happy.
This pursuit of the extraordinary is NOT something for which we can really blame ourselves. It is something that is pervasive in our society, birthed in the same seeds that planted the American Dream, and the unquenchable thirst for “more” and “better” that consumes and drives our modern lives.
Its these seeds planted in you with the best intentions and love when you were little, with parents and loving adults promising you that “you can be whatever you want to be,” and that “no dream is too big.”
You take one dance class and they assure you that you were on your way to become a prima ballerina. You take a liking to your family dog and they start setting aside a fund for vet school. You sing and you dance and you are told you can grow up to be a famous performer, that all you have to do is “try,” and to “believe in yourself.”
Unfortunately, the biggest dreams often require much more than that.
I grew up with these messages. And I never questioned it, or even thought it strange. Still today, I will find myself making the same grandiose statements to the kids that I teach: “Oh wow, percy, look at that beautiful drawing! You are going to have a painting in a gallery one day!” and Aliza, you can be an olympic gymnast!”
Of course, encouraging kids to try hard and “dream big” is important to build their sense of worth and self-confidence. But what about when they are 18, and not admitted to art school? Or 25 and they only job they can get is some entry level accounting work, far from the “pursue your passion” speech they had been spoon-fed ever since they were being spoon-fed?
And who knows, maybe Aliza will be an olympic gymnast, and Percy a famous artist. But chances are, they will not. But that does NOT mean they will not find happy, meaningful, and rewarding lives.
The truth is, the majority of people in our society are working average jobs, making average wages, in so called “ordinary” fields or professions. I am sure Karen did NOT dream of growing up to be a retail manager for a tile company. And while these kinds of jobs are likely NOT anyone’s true passion or life calling, they are doing work integral to the functioning of our society.
And who is to say that people that are working these mediocre or average jobs, are living lives that are any less fulfilling or meaningful or joyful, than someone working in a so-called “noble” profession.
For myself, this fixation on the extraordinary kept me in a long season of tire spinning— wanting to do everything, but nothing seemed enough. I was rooted to the spot, unable to take a step in any direction afraid of stumbling into a career that was anything less than my “calling.”
I did not want to settle for anything less than the glamorous dreams I had birthed unto me as a kid. Respectively, I dreamed I would grow up to become a vet, a gymnast, an olympic snowboarder, a best-selling author, a broadway star, a professional horseback rider/trainer. and a plant-based chef/food blogger.
Notice what each of these dreams have in common: the element of fame, and of top-tierdom, of being the best.
It wasn’t even so much as choosing which of these paths to purse that caused me so much angst, but the very true possibility that whatever I did, that I would not be able to do well enough to achieve the level of fame or recognition that I so valued. I wanted my name to be known, whatever I did. I wanted to turn heads when I walked into a room. I wanted to be anything but ordinary. Because to be ordinary, to have an average, unknown existence, felt worse than failure.
This has been a big obstacle for me in recovery too. Contrary to widespread perceptions of eating disorders, I never saw myself as fat, or even overweight. I never considered myself to be ugly. Even when I was in the depths of ED, avoiding mirrors and hiding from my appearance, I still innately understood that on the spectrum of ugly to beautiful, or fat to thin, that in both categories I was at least “average.”
But that didn’t stop me from feeling loathing towards my body. I did not want to be average. I wanted to be thin, uniquely so. I wanted bones. And then I wanted to be the fittest. I wanted washboard abs and veiny arms, and rock hard limbs. I wanted to turn heads. And in that pursuit of extraordinary, I spent years iron-fisting my body to be my masterpiece.
If I were to get all psychological about it now, I could say that all the fear and uncertainty and pressure I was feeling about what I would do with my life, I channeled into my feelings about my body.
As cliche as it is true, the lack of control and powerless I felt over the greater meaning of my existence, was compensated by exerting control where I could— controlling my food, and my body. But this is tangential, so I will leave this for another post.
In essence, an “average body” was something I dreaded and feared. Even being told that I was approaching a “normal” weight, I felt like a failure.
I felt like I was sliding down the rungs of a ladder I had given years of my life and all of my strength to climb. I was letting myself go, and slipping back into the throes of mediocrity.
I felt silly, and narcissistic, admitting to this realization, but it was truly how it felt. Allowing myself to settle at an “average” weight really did feel like I was giving up.
This is not unique thinking. I am NOT the one lone human who feels dissatisfied with a perfectly good and “normal” body. Countless studies have reported a surprising percentage of the population, all genders and ages (although especially young women) suffer from negative body image, and desire to change or “fix” their appearance.
Once again, we can thank the glamorized body ideals that pervade our society. With every photoshopped, face-tuned, airbrushed image posted to a feed, what is extraordinary is presented as a standard to which we perpetually struggle to live up to.
There was lots bundled into the pile of kindling that ignited my eating disorder, but a significant piece was the unattainable ideal of what I should (could) look like -- I just needed to try.
It takes a lot of work, a lot of time, and a lot of therapy to rewire the belief that the extraordinary is achievable simply through try. And even more to come to accept the ordinary, the normal, the “what is” as just as worthy and meaningful.
I am now in a very average position in my life; I am paying an average rent, living in a perfectly average house, working a very average, but rewarding job as a teacher; I am at an average weight, in an ordinary body, that is beautifully healthy and functioning. I bake sourdough bread that is far from perfect, but tasty. I take pole classes with fellow students and instructors that keep me humble about how much I still have to learn. And I love every minute of it.
I am coming to realize that the worst part of being “ordinary” is holding on to the belief that you shouldn’t be.
As soon as you can let that go, and embrace what is for exactly how it is, happiness and meaning and purpose just start pooling at your feet, as if a hose has just been unkinked and freed to flow.
There is a fine line between self-acceptance and self-improvement. I may never be a vet or an olympic snowboarder or a broadway singer. I will never look like a Victoria secret angel, or be 5’8 with long legs and a short torso.
But I can be perfectly happy and fulfilled working towards being the best version of average me, teaching and writing and riding and snowboarding for the joy of it, laughing over my mistakes and failures, and making connections with other people who are equally as human-- NOT allowing my insecurities and shame to isolate me.
This is self-acceptance. To be okay and happy exactly as you are, and where you are, grateful for you in all its ordinary excellence.
And once you do that, you might start to notice where meaning and happiness truly reside— and be free from the unattainable ideals of perfection.
Growing versus Growing Up (Thoughts after 27 Years around the Sun)
This week I turned 27. It’s not a big milestone birthday, but in that way it almost feels more weighted. 27 is significant in how seamlessly I now classify as someone in their “late twenties.” There is little novelty and pomp around this birthday, the way it was around 21 or 25. Turning 27, I am not old by any means, but I am no longer “new” to adulthood. I am all grown up.
Except not really.
In a lot of ways, I feel brand new to this adult existence.
In terms of the place I am at and what I have accomplished so far in life, I am still young. I have friends who are the same age and yet not young in the same way, settled with partners sharing bedrooms, lives, mortgages, and even families. Friends with jobs that have benefits and yearly incomes, who talk about market prices in the city vs. the surrounding areas, and go furniture shopping not out of necessity but by choice.
It’s not that I feel unaccomplished or wish I was at that point in my life. If anything, I wish that I could remain in the fresh-out-of-school, finding-yourself-stage for a little while longer. I feel like I’m not done with my days of being untethered.
And I don’t mean in terms of relationships. I mean untethered to a single path or direction or vision of my life and way it is being shaped.
I got off to a late start in my adult life.
I spent the majority of my teens and early twenties with an eating disorder, which caused me to miss out on the kinds of connections and memories that can only come from spontaneous nights out that end drunk ordering pizza to someone’s apartment. And then entering recovery, I essentially surrendered my independence to my family and treatment team in order to get better.
So while all my friends were moving out and starting careers, I was on temporary leave, living in my childhood bedroom, on a strict recovery meal plan enforced and implemented by my parents. While other 24 year olds were updating their CVs and planning travel adventures, I was completing a daily meal log to be reviewed and approved by my therapist and dietician.
After two years of family-based treatment, I was finally healthy enough to step into my independence and grow into the next chapter of my life. So at 25, I moved out of my parents’ house for the first time and landed myself in a house full of roommates. I was doing things for the first time on my own, like shopping and paying for groceries, making rent each month, and washing my sheets. It was a learning curve, and a little unnerving.
I felt like an 18-year old off to my first year of college. Instead I was 25, with a new teaching contract with the Toronto school board, a masters degree, and a meal log.
I am only now at 27 starting to feel like I have found a bit of a rhythm in this adultness of life. I no longer go into whirls of anxiety over grocery shopping, or the idea of budgeting for household items like paper towel and toilet paper.
I pay my rent each month automatically a day before its due, and I recently took on my own phone bill too (thanks dad). I like coming home to my house of four roommates, flopping onto the couch with a glass of wine and lamenting about that guy I liked who turned out to be an asshole. I like having a contract teaching a certain grade at a certain school, with a definite start and end, because I like the idea that there is something different that comes after.
I still follow DJs and entertainment groups on instagram, because I am still holding out for another summer of music festivals and events, which I only got to taste in my eating disorder, and put on hold in my recovery.
Now I want to sink my teeth in.
However, I also feel the pull of solid ground beneath my feet, to find one centre of gravity. I’ve spent years floating, orbiting erratically, attached to many things but never something solid enough to keep me flying.
And this groundedness will NOT come from chasing highs at music festivals, a new fitness goal, or a living arrangement.
This groundedness will be found when I surrender to the process of accepting myself as I am, where I am, and where I am going.
I am 27. I am no lo longer a little girl, an angsty teen or a university student still “figuring it out.” I am a woman, strong and independent, who has been through enough of life to know what is worth pursuing and what to let go of in that greater pursuit.
I don’t need to force myself into a mold, or meet a certain deadline.
I don’t need to manipulate my body to look a certain way. Equating beauty to worth is unsustainable happiness. For even if I managed to get my body close to the standard I may have in my head, it will only be a short matter of time before gravity and the the sun take their toll and kick off the natural aging process that our society demonizes. And so, at 27, I am grateful for the health and youth of my body as it is right now.
I will live this year and the ones going forward without restricting myself in any way.
I am shifting the narrative-- rather than making my body my masterpiece, I will focus on making my life my masterpiece instead. My body is simply the instrument that will get me there.
A few years ago, I had no vision or understanding of my life beyond the moment I was in. Each day felt like a mountain I needed to scale, and it felt impossible to picture anything realistic beyond that. But now, the path I am travelling is infinitely less steep. I can see a little further ahead of me, and I can start to map it out a little.
I don’t need to pin down the exact route, or even specific destination, but I can at least choose a direction, and commit to the journey to get there.
I do not have any big concrete goals for this year, especially with all the external uncertainty at present (thanks covid!).
I am not expecting a permanent teaching job to come within my grasp, I am not planning some extravagant travel adventure, or even changing my relationship status.
I am not opposed to any of these things happening this year, but if they don’t, I will NOT feel like I’ve failed in any way.
Rather than make goals for the year, I am shifting my focus to the way I live every day. If I can go to bed every night feeling like I did the best I could to make the most of each moment that day, I’ll be making this year a smashing success. It’s the little steps, NOT the big leaps, to which I’m devoting my attention.
Ultimately, my goal for 27 is to make every day count.
I’m living for the journey, relishing the good parts of everyday, not postponing celebration for some elusive destination.
