Embracing Change: A Year-Long Journey After Blowing Shit Up
At the end of many yoga classes, yogis sit upright, legs crossed, eyes closed, listening to the teacher close the class with, "The light within me sees and honors the light within you."
But what does that mean? Only up until recently, I could only see the beauty in the words, but now I have felt it. Once felt, unable to un-feel it. It explains so much of my last year. It's like how birds can see a broader spectrum of light than humans can; through their eyes, the world is more vibrant. I feel a deeper level of connection with people, each interaction having more shades of color. With this newly discovered depth to human connection, it helped me through my year of newness and defining a sense of purpose forward.
Over the past year, I have distanced myself from a familiar identity, shedding an old armor I created to prove myself to my parents, family, and my own stories. I ventured into new environments, yet a subtle echo always questioned my sense of belonging. Embracing the vulnerability of stepping into unknown territories has been a recurring theme. From starting a new position as an associate at a dental office, to enrolling in the 10-month Wayfinder Life Coach Training with Dr. Martha Beck, to defining my role as a board member for an animal shelter. Each new beginning felt like the first day of school again, uncertain of how or if I would fit in. However, unlike years ago when I attended a new school in a foreign country with a different language, I am now more grounded. Grounded by the experiences I have accumulated, the falls from which I learned to rise. Approaching life with curious openness, I am learning to accept all parts of myself—the good, bad, and ugly—which has allowed me to see the goodness in strangers and the unfamiliar through a new lens.
But it had not always been this way. Far from it. I had wandered so far off from the feeling of home; the feeling of freedom and peace. In the final year of being at my old office, I felt caged when I showed up to work. Each morning I sat in the parking lot dreading the steps I'd take into the next 9 hours. When I wasn’t working, I was actively trying to figure out why I felt so constricted in a box I designed and built myself. I couldn’t rationalize it; it made no logical sense to leave a thriving practice, a good reputation, and trusting relationships. But secretly, that’s all I wanted. Whenever I daydreamed of leaving, I would feel like a child again, daring to do something that I was told I shouldn’t. The daydreams made me feel alive and full of possibilities. For months, my internal dialogue struggled to reason myself to stay the safe course and the known. And each time, I would feel disappointed because I basically told myself that this is the rest of my life, don’t dream bigger, don’t go outside of the lines; this is what good little girls do. Obviously, I gave my reasonable self the middle finger and broke the rules anyway. (It’s been over a year and I am so happy I did, no regrets!) The courage to say "fuck it" was driven by my own frustration, stress-induced chronic hives from leading a life that I had outgrown, and curiosity about what might happen if I hit the red nuclear button.
To press that alluring red button, I needed hope and courage. In the beginning, I borrowed it from Instagram. Squares of beautiful art with quotes of wisdom kept me steady while I teeter-tottered on the stagnant present and the awaiting possibilities. I also borrowed hope from a part of myself that I had been neglecting to listen to. It's the essential self, as Dr. Martha Beck coins in her Finding Your Own North Star. The self we are born as that guides us to our truest alignment in life; the self that gets buried and silenced by years of social conditioning. The conditioning is not necessarily wrong; they are the added layers to keep us safe and accepted in order for us to succeed in the circles we walk through. However, if left unchecked, the social self becomes dominant and, in my case, steered me away from what truly mattered. The discovery of the two different selves couldn't have come at a better time for me at that moment. As I learned to read the compass of where my North Star was pointing, it became less an internal argument with reason and more of walking the path toward what was meant to be all along. With a mischievous smile in my heart, I pressed the button. Boom.
The interesting thing about blowing things up in life is that of all the people who are watching, there's someone who also has their finger on the trigger. Like me, they were teeter-tottering, they were borrowing hope and courage. One of the most inspiring experiences this past year has been to watch a friend blossom. To see her go from whispering her desired life to demanding it as if it is a right. It has been an honor to witness her story unfold as she reclaims the silenced parts of herself. Unbeknownst to us at the time, we saw each other's struggle through the darkness and held our own light to illuminate the path for the other. With a friend, a fellow disrupter who also yearns to discover the answer to, "what's next?" we move forward together with curiosity and mischief.
She asked me in the beginning, "What should I do?" and before I could even reason, I replied, "I think you know." The world stood still for a moment, the background voices in the tea shop faded, and I witnessed the spark of the beginning to the rest of her life when she held my gaze and nodded. Then began the quiet murmurs of the precious "what ifs" to the crescendoing doubts and all the messy in-betweens until the dust settled. I realized that what was asked of me for the coming months was simply to listen, to hold space so that she can dream, to ask questions that provoked explorations of possibilities. I will never forget that moment, the powerful shift that happened right before my eyes when she nodded, an acknowledgment that it's time.
That moment reignited a spark in me. A desire to help others when they too have strayed far from themselves. I want to offer what I wish I had when I was stumbling through my own darkness: a light to help me get in touch with my own guiding star, a steady source of hope and courage amidst the turbulent, contradicting feelings of how to move forward. This feeling of wanting to be of service became clearer as I am going through my Wayfinder Life Coach Training. It is a systematic way of discovering why we are stuck (career, relationships, health struggles, etc.) and developing holistic strategies to take action toward alignment with our truest self, toward joy, toward home.
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Beautifully written, Jessica, and so inspiring! Thank you