waking up on purpose

In Make The Cup of Coffee I discussed using optimism as a tool and not just a way of thinking, in Stuck and Don’t Know What To Do I go over being stuck in a difficult situation or headspace and how to fight against it. These essays lead me into my next point, waking up on purpose. The coffee is an analogy to choosing one thing that supports your wellbeing, to help you feel unstuck. For me, it was literally making a cup of coffee. It got me out of bed. It became routine, something I looked forward to. Even trying new flavor combinations. It is that serious. I understand how minuscule it may appear, however the action of doing something that directly poured into my body was devotional rather than staying trapped under my covers ruminating.

In an attempt to unstick myself, I challenged other parts of my routine to support that one. What can I do before I make my daily glass and what can I do after?

When I am under high amounts of stress, my main focus is taking care of my internal state. I wanted to become more present and tender to my physical body, so I started going to the gym. I practice yoga, but I needed something more vigorous. I did not start going to the gym to reach any physical goals, although I knew eventually I wanted to. I went because somewhere along the way I learned that I do better when I wake up earlier in the day and well, I needed something to do. All I needed was to be able to wake up early enough and do a full hour in the gym with ease. So I kept at it, no matter how difficult it was. If I woke up and did not want to go I would tell myself: Well this is the type of day you’re going to have… or Is this what you think you deserve? I tell you that’ll get my ass up every time. I did not decide to wake up at 5 am because I heard it was good, I chose that time because I constantly woke up early and could not fall back asleep. I felt so frustrated by the fact and chose to use it to my advantage instead of continuing to spend the first few hours of my day in a bad mood. I wake up early because I know now it’s what my body wants.

This is what that looks like: I wake up at 5 am and just sit quietly for a little bit. I don’t scroll and I don’t check any texts.  As I begin getting ready for the gym I put on a devotional or a YouTube video. I head to the gym, I go for an hour and a half. I come home collect myself, eat and make my coffee. I dedicate a few hours to my writing and then a few hours to my work.

You can sit and write a daily routine with time stamps and all but know, no matter how motivated you are to do so you will not just be able to wake up the next day before the break of dawn with a burst of energy to do all the things you say you want to do. Holding such an unrealistic expectation for yourself not only reassures any feelings of insecurity but it does not realistically support where you are at in your journey. You are setting yourself up for a period of self deprecation.

I do not recommend you to make a list, or write a routine, or wake up at 5 in the morning. I encourage you to observe yourself, listen to what your body is asking you for and learn what supports your growth. What do you do that eases your stress or releases pent up energy? If nothing, then try new things. What do you want your life to look like? What small things can you do to make it happen? What habits or beliefs stop you from doing the little things? Have the courage to challenge any negative belief you have over yourself, build the strength to let go of what keeps you small. These are real questions I’ve had to ask myself. Be brutally honest, this is for you and nobody else.

Waking up on purpose means deciding, from the moment you wake up, to choose yourself. It does not have to be perfect or all at once. Just enough to carry yourself through the day without leaving yourself behind.

stuck and don’t know what to do

You know when you are going through something so heavy you run to google in hopes there’s an article somewhere telling you exactly what you need to do. You find nothing so you add “reddit” at the end of your search bar. Even then depending on your situation, the answers are broad or too unrealistic for you to do. Or you see quotes about everything you need is already within you. That’s bullshit. You want to know how to find it within you, you want to know what can you do right now to dissipate the discomfort. Whether it's fear of making the wrong choice, feeling overwhelmed because there are too many directions pulling at you. Whether it's grief, mourning a life you knew before and not knowing what it looks like next. Or the next move isn't even yours to make. Or you're just exhausted.

I’ve shared before that I am strict with myself.  When I say strict, I don’t mean hard. I am strict in how I take care of myself. Which means carrying myself through hard times not beating myself through them. I’ve tried everything. I’ve devoted my life to spirituality, I’ve spoken to professionals, I’ve gone as far as to changing my major in college to engulf myself in studying the human brain. I’ve viewed my problems from an emotional viewpoint, logical, scientific, analytical. I’ve gone lengths to find the answers and at the end of the day with all of the knowledge I accumulated, I still felt as if I did not know what to do. The root of this feeling was not that I did not know, it was that I did not feel confident enough in my ability to successfully challenge my circumstances. I will say it again: it was not a knowledge issue, it was a confidence issue. I had an answer for everything. When I began viewing it from that standpoint, I could challenge myself by literally asking “Well do you believe you’re incapable?” I can’t even picture myself answering yes.

I can so I will. Enough of that I cannot. There are enough opposing forces in the world for you to not at least be a friend to yourself. You can either succeed or learn what not to do. You will fail. That is also evidence. If you do nothing then you have no evidence to show yourself that you are capable of doing in the first place. You are reaffirming the belief that you are incapable. That's all you need to build your confidence. Evidence that you can. The search feels productive but it is its own form of avoidance. You are moving but not forward.

When I first began sharing my writing, all I had was an idea and my laptop. I wanted my poetry to all read elusive. There were plenty Instagram accounts that shared poetry so I studied them to figure out my own layout. Picture, poem, picture poem. I knew I wanted them to stand out from the classic typography posts, I got creative with graphic design; a hobby I picked up when I was younger. Now I had something to use this skill for. All of the Youtube videos I watched about branding yourself as a writer mentioned having a website so I made a Wordpress. Eventually I learned coding and brand building to create a distinctive look for my brand. It took a lot of changing directions until I found one that made me feel the most fulfilled. When it was time for me to face myself, the biggest obstacle in life we face, I was steadfast. This is because my sadness became difficult to hide, I did not like the reality of those I loved viewing me as weary or too angry. I was never supposed to be that person. Before I could afford therapy I watched Youtube videos and read books like Set Boundaries, Find Peace by Nedra Glover Tawwab and Forgiving What You Can’t Forget by Lysa TerKeurst. I even changed my major. I couldn’t ask the people around me, they were too comfortable or it was too much. I felt stuck because I was terribly attached to those who kept me in this fawn state. This took me years of letting go and learning new things. You have to know what you deserve and fight for it ruthlessly. No one else will do it for you. You will have to let go.

Each time you move anyway you are building the only proof that ever mattered. That you can. The scariest thing is looking up years from now and realizing you never moved. You already know what to do.

the hermit

I would rather be judged by my means of isolation than my emotions. One I’ve learned to manage, the other I’ve learned to live in.  I’ve spent a lot of time learning how to carry myself and today isolation is what remains. It is my means of recalibration. The irony of it all is that I would prefer to be a bit more open. I don’t believe it is the “correct” way to be but it is the way that I am. I have been challenging that fact. I believe in being open enough to experience life and to let others experience you. If I am being brutally honest, my reclusion has become more of a challenge to work around than it is a helpful tool. So I would tell the next person, writer, or artist to not fall into themselves as much. There are a lot of problems that you can encounter interacting with people. You can be hurt, lied to, or you could be rejected. Sure. You can also make the best core memories and meet the people that are meant to be in your life. For the most part, that is the main way the right people will find you, showing yourself. I don’t believe that life is meant to be experienced alone.

---

Spending all of your time in isolation when overdone can seriously begin to negatively impact your overall state of being. Your mental health will decline, as will your social skills. The way you begin to show up for yourself starts to change. You believe you are adapting to your solitude, but what you’re really doing is restricting yourself from experiencing life fully. You start to adjust small daily tasks in order to fit into this lifestyle of seclusion. It takes more effort to figure out how to do what you need to do all while avoiding things or places that may well make you physically ill. It takes way more out of you to avoid than it is to conquer your discomfort. Isolation becomes debilitating when overdone. There is a certain freedom that comes with not needing any external validation orrisk picking up patterns of codependency.Not worrying about whether or not you are able to go someplace because you prefer to go alone. Not needing to check in with anyone before making a decision. Or simply choosing what trip you want to go on. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being an introvert, as long as you don’t tuck yourself away from the world completely.

There is such a thing as being too reclusive , when it begins to interfere with the overall state of your life. When you begin keeping yourself from any type of opportunities of growth or you stop yourself from doing things that expose you to new people and things.  I’m not telling you that you shouldn’t be an introvert, I’m telling you that you should absolutely not succumb to your solitude.

No matter how good it feels, isolation is not a solid foundation or path towards stability and growth.

I do not believe in having to be an extroverted person if it isn’t you, attempting to play a role you have no business playing you will ultimately fall on your face. Do not get caught up in trying to be something you’re not solely because you know it’s what people respond to. Be yourself. If you are quiet, awkward, or introverted know that there is nothing to correct. However, you should push yourself out of your comfort zone, you should allow people to experience you, and try new things. I am speaking to you as an excessively quiet person, you need to give yourself the space to grow. You can still honor your introversion.

You do yourself a huge disservice by keeping yourself from the world. There are a lot of common areas to explore, where you are surrounded by people who understand the unspoken rules of an introversion. Making it not only easy for you to try new things, but meet new people in a way that doesn’t feel forceful. You’re not surrounded by extroverts. People can be genuinely odd and I promise you, being a little awkward is not the worst thing to be.

There are certain things you simply cannot grow from until you expose yourself to them. If I am too caught up in irrational what-ifs, the only way to know if any of it is true is to put myself in that situation. 99.9% of the time, the irrational thoughts I had did not happen at all. I’ve tried everything and exposure is the only thing that works. Fear is just a feeling. The brutal honesty of it is all of the life you wish to experience is waiting for you to get there, it can’t walk to your front door. It’s physically impossible to.

This is my advice to you as a hermit. I fear if too many people go this far, there’s a lot of life they will miss. There’s a lot of life the world would miss. Instead of trying to make my life as insular as possible, I have had to take an axe to a cement wall in order to allow things into the world I’ve built. I’m learning the two cannot coexist and something has got to give. Do not take it as far as me.

Make the cup of coffee

I can usually tell I'm not doing well by the small things I stop doing first. Routine is often the first thing I lose and the last thing I get back. I've learned that endurance often looks like maintenance.

I have always considered myself an optimist. Not because I believe life is gentle, but because I don't believe the human standard of living is suffering. This is my solution to mental turmoil, not worldly issues such as famine or systemic harm. I am speaking to the battle of the mind. We are not here to suffer. By not confusing intensity with permanence, I am able to maintain a crumb of optimism. Though time has, by definition, made me a realist, I do not claim that title. I believe in the best whether the odds are in my favor or not. If I fail, it is because I was meant for something more. If something fails, it is because it was not meant to be. There is a lesson here for me.

None of that changes whether it hurts. I hold that perspective and still get bruised. It does not justify a wrong or dismiss the severity of a situation. Shifting my perspective to optimism is a form of resistance. It is discipline. I feel, but instead of allowing my mind to drift, I remain grounded. If there is something I can do, I sit myself up and do it. If there is nothing, then the only thing left to do is take care of myself.

Pain is an unfortunate constant. Every high we experience has a low to match, and there is no avoiding it. The only difference in each instance is what we do while we are there. This is a truth I have had to teach myself. If you know pain well, then you have spent enough time with it to have studied your patterns, triggers, and limits.

Use that knowledge to your advantage. Do not let it intimidate you. Those moments are shaping the world your future self is living in. When you notice yourself falling into a feeling, rather than conceding to it, brace yourself for impact. Your brain is similar to a muscle that needs to be trained. The goal is not to avoid emotion, but to keep your mind and body regulated while you are experiencing it. There is no way around it, only different ways of holding it. If you notice your space tends to become cluttered during difficult periods, do one small thing to keep it in order. Just one.

Make your bed. Sweep the floor. If you notice you usually skip your morning coffee because you cannot get out of bed, make the cup of coffee and bring it to bed with you. If you notice you are no longer doing the things that nourish you, that is precisely the time to do them. A single action no matter how small acts as a reminder to your brain.

When you practice this, you are creating safety through routine, allowing emotions to move without overtaking you. The initial impact of an emotion feels definite.

Permanent. Gut-wrenching. Each time you return to it, it can feel as though it is happening for the first time again. Remind yourself it isn't. What you need in that moment is evidence of safety. Do not run away from an emotion. Look at it directly. If it makes you want to cry, cry. If you are carrying anger, find a healthy way to move it through your body. Feel what you feel. Sometimes you do not need to extract a lesson. You just need to experience it. What I am saying is that when your mind is vulnerable, your physical body becomes your anchor, and sometimes it works the other way around.

I am not speaking as an observer of pain. I understand it well enough to recognize the urgency of what I am trying to say. If you do nothing, you will get stuck. If you are there now, you must remind yourself that you are not meant to stay there. If you believe you are alone, after reading this, accept that you are not. It is easier to build the habit of showing up than it is to build the habit of shifting your perspective. Even that requires reason. The reason here is not conditional. It's the simple fact that you're human.

Optimism is not the denial of pain. It is the choice to carry yourself through it. If I call it self love, it would leave room for conditions. This is not that. This is preservation, a means of survival