We Within

We feel emotions every day, sometimes more intensely than others, but at times we over-identify with them to the point they end up controlling us. If the emotions are pleasant, it feels like a wonderful rush. But if they are unpleasant, we do everything we can to avoid feeling them. The problem with this approach is that the more we distract ourselves from the unpleasant emotion, the stronger it gets. When we push it down to hide it, it’s like we’re shoving a million things in a bag until, eventually, the bag breaks. The emotion always comes back in one way or another until we’re forced to work through it. So, what can we do to avoid this impending disaster? Manage our emotions regularly. We need to remember we are not our emotions. Our emotions live in us and not the other way around. The following tools are excellent not just to acknowledge this rationally but also to experience it.   1. Turn the emotion into something tangible. Think of the emotion you want to work with an...

I have been working in tourism for four years. It wasn't by choice but by chance; one of those places life leads you to. I found it fun at first and I absolutely adore my coworkers but three years in I started feeling completely burned out. One year later, my body has forced me to take anxiety leave.  Last year I wrote a piece about my (pre-pandemic) days at work. At a time when so many people are questioning their life choices and trying to be truer to themselves, I want to add my voice through this piece in the hope to reach someone who needs to hear this: What if there's nothing wrong with you? What if your life is simply not in alignment with who you are? I don't have all the answers. I believe each of us is in charge of figuring out our own answers in life. But I hope the following piece will stir something in you and inspire you to find yours. A day in the life of a sensitive introvert working at a tourist attraction: I start my day journaling about how I want my day...

Last week I wrote about multipotentiality and how some of us enjoy pursuing different projects and interests rather than focusing on just one. That post made me think of my own relationship with commitment and today I want to talk about this. Commitment in itself is a great thing. It’s how we get things done, how we grow and build new habits, how our relationships flourish… Yes, we all know its benefits. But I find it’s equally important to know when it’s time to break a commitment. And it’s a very simple formula: We break a commitment when it no longer feels right. When it starts draining us instead of filling us up. When there’s no meaning or purpose left in the activity or the relationship we committed to. We break a commitment when it no longer feels in alignment with who we are. I have practised this many times in my life whenever I felt I needed to go in a different direction. Many people don’t understand, and I don’t expect them to. It’s not something I can explain beyond the w...

Today I tried something new: a forest bath, or shinrin-yoku . This is a Japanese concept that consists of immersing yourself in nature in a mindful way , using all your senses to be fully present in the moment. This practice was developed in Japan in the 80s and is becoming increasingly popular around the world, as societies everywhere feel a strong need to cope with stress, anxiety and other ailments of our time. Nature heals . It helps us pause, breathe and relax. It has a positive effect on our body, mind and spirit. But when I decided to do this forest bath activity, I wasn’t sure how different it would be from just being in nature. It turned out being was the key. I saw the difference between us and other people walking or cycling on the same path as us. I even saw a difference between some members of my group and others, and between my own self in memories of past hikes and the self who was there this morning. It all came down to one thing: Being in my body, quieting the mind, e...

Are you a bee flying from flower to flower? I recently came across the term multipotentialite , also known as multipod or generalist , among other names. It’s roughly defined as someone with many interests and creative pursuits , as opposed to a specialist , which is someone who specialises in one particular interest. [Click here to watch Emilie Wapnick’s TED Talk about this topic and here to dive deeper into it]. At first, I wasn’t sure this term applied to me. Sure, I have many interests, but I’ve often thought of myself as a person in search of her one true calling, trying out one thing after another and never feeling fully content. I would get bored of all my pursuits and give them up so, surely, that would mean they were the wrong choice! That is a common sentiment between multipotentialites. Our society promotes specialists. It is built on this mentality. You pick something and stick with it for the rest of your life until you become an expert. I see the logic in it, but this...

Lately, I've had many conversations with people about what depression is like. Those who haven't gone through it find it very difficult to understand how it actually feels, and they struggle to figure out how to help a loved one who's suffering from it. Let me say it outright: It's very difficult to help someone with depression. So if you're giving yourself a hard time because you don't know how to support someone, give yourself some love instead. It takes time. The best way I've found to describe what depression feels like is through a metaphor: It's like eating something and not being able to taste it (sometimes literally), or like looking at a colourful image and not being able to see the colours. You know the flavours and colours are there... but you just can't taste or see them.  But today I was looking through my files and I found a text I wrote years ago when I was starting to come out of a depression. So I thought of sharing it to help people...

A year ago I started feeling something was off in my life but I didn’t know what change I needed to make. Then I read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way and I realised two things: 1. I need to express myself creatively. When I don’t, I enter a spiral of existentialist depression. 2. My creativity was completely depleted. I know I’m not the only one. We all are creative beings , and by that I mean we feel a need to express ourselves in one way or another, to try new things, explore, experiment and play. For some of us, this need is particularly strong. We did it when we were children, but as we grow up life starts demanding things from us and before we realise it, there’s no time and energy left for our creative endeavours. And then we feel empty. That book opened my eyes and reconnected me with a longing I didn’t know I felt. I took photos sometimes and wrote occasionally but I didn’t feel the passion I used to feel in the past. I wasn’t feeling much of anything. So, how was I supposed...