The Journey Begins with You
The quest is over! You are what you're looking for in life.
Every year, after my birthday, I take a moment to reflect on my journey in life. I'll look back as far as my teenage years — It's a time in my life when I began to notice life occurrences that impacted me. Sometimes I take a look down memory lane and come across moments in my life that make me laugh. I think, wow when I'm with my people (mostly family), I'm pretty funny. Then other memories sneak into my view that produces tears. My self-esteem was low, almost non-existent, which impacted every decision I made. Even when we think that we're not making a decision, we are. We've nonverbally decided to do nothing, which is still deciding to do something. The lack of confidence took the lead in how I moved in my life. Being invited to dinner with friends but not showing up. Going to industry events, but too afraid to spark a conversation. Wanting to travel and live life, but too afraid to leave home. The common denominator that kept me in a cycle of not living in my greatness was fear.
Greatness lives within all of us. It's sometimes buried by the dirt — the circumstances of life. As a teenager, I could feel the fear and anxiety that came with putting myself out there. I had a hard time believing that I could do anything. But, as I got older each year, the fear seeped into my being and became an unconscious habit that I lived with until now. Fear was so embedded into who I was that I couldn't figure out the root of what was wrong with me. The only solution I could think of was that I needed something life-changing to happen, I thought it would be in my career, and so the quest began. I decided to pour everything I had into my career. All in hopes that I would feel better about myself; I was so focused that I made sure no one or nothing would take time away from what I wanted to achieve, including (self)care. Being focused had proven itself to be the right decision. I experienced many moments of success within my career, but I never took the time to recognize it, which kept the cycle in rotation of feeling unfulfilled. At the time, I couldn't see that having that much external focus created internal neglect. I became numb to the wins and took notice of every loss. Only highlighting the losses created an imbalance in how I focused but also created a war within me. Soon the inevitable happened — all those wins slowly disappeared.
Back to square one, the search was on, but this time everything felt different. I felt like I was in a space of limbo, and there was nothing around me that I could grab onto to save me — no career, no new ideas, no new opportunities — nothing. I couldn't figure out how to get out of the dark space I had found myself in. Four years went by of me being in the dark. A duration like that will deplete you of your light and energy, and that's exactly what happened to me. I thought I understood, but I guess I didn't, that as your journey in life progresses, there is a need for you to evolve with it. It's like graduating to the next grade, but life doesn't wait until you're ready — it keeps moving forward. One thing about me is that I am a seeker. Whatever I am searching for, I won't stop until I find it. I had applied that to my work, but now it was time for me to apply that to myself.
One thing about time is that it will always reveal things. My time in darkness made me recognize that my career wouldn't help me change how I felt about myself. Facing that was tough. It was tough because I turned my career into my foundation and measurement of self-worth, and once things had changed, I felt lost without it. That's when I knew that I needed me.
And so,
A new journey begins, but it's beginning with me. Not my career, not a new idea, not in external opportunities — only me. I am grateful that I came to this realization in the way that I did. All those ups and downs, trying to figure it out, and moments of nothingness created a concrete change within me. I am my biggest opportunity, and you are yours! Nothing outside of myself can make me feel fulfilled or subside that void within me but me.
Internal work will lead to external opportunities. Building a relationship with self is an ongoing journey — it never stops. Each elevation in our lives requires an elevated version of us, which takes us to prioritize ourselves daily. Our mind, body, and soul depend on that focus to evolve peacefully. As you take your journey to evolve with yourself, remember to be kind, give yourself grace, and be purposely you!
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