You are here to Live your Life, not fix your Life
No seriously, what if you really don’t need fixing? I was one of those people that hated the way my voice sounds when I talk. I used to be ashamed of my accent, I didn’t like that I couldn’t speak english fluently like Americans.
I was made fun of under the disguise of “I just want to correct your english, Its not Wata (referring to Water), it is Wa-errrr” she said in American way of saying water.
I wanted to speak english fluidly like I have water in my mouth. What a stress it was.. trying to undo my tongue of over 20 years on this planet. I made my tongue and every sound that came out of it wrong. What if you and all of your MESS including your physical features that makes you cringe when you look in the mirror..Is just right? And doesn’t need fixing?
It was during the pandemic for the first time in my life I realized that THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH ME AND I NEED TO STOP TRYING TO FIX MYSELF AND YOU SHOULD TOO….
And no sweetie, you are not alone. Before now, I had this belief that was like a parasite…operating in the background of my life, sucking my joy, draining my mental energy. The belief was; something was wrong with me (the way I think, the way I am, everything) that I am not normal, that trauma is wrong, that I need to change myself…and then I embarked on the mission of self-improvement and self-help. I Bought self-help books I believed would fix my brokenness, I watched self-help gurus I thought they knew it all. They can fix me….I am broken….
It would take a couple more years before I had the awakening that there are people who would pay handsomely for this Mess I was trying to wash off. I would come to find out that my African accent is Gold. Sweetheart, I can do a really good voice over acting, and when I saw the movie Black Panther and the woman king, nobody could tell me nothing… It was clear, there is a mighty space for me. Oh I LOVE MY VOICE SO MUCH NOW, I FREAKING LOVE MY ACCENT.
The belief that something was wrong with me provided me with evidence… I’d think to myself like this;
*look you don’t make a lot of friends
because you are wrong for liking to be alone
*you don’t last in relationships because your trauma is wrong…your past is wrong and you will recreate your terrible childhood, you should run.
*you cant be successful in your career remember your trauma is wrong and so it will prevent you from seeing anything to fruition and you will always have to start from scratch.
*you can’t sleep because your trauma needs to be fixed…until you fix it, you will continue to have anxiety attacks and nightmares.
*you have to work hard for money because you are wrong, you need to prove yourself to your family, remember they thought you will not amount to anything, you have to redeem your wrong past.
*you can’t just relax, there is work to do on yourself, you are too happy right now something bad will soon steal your joy until you fix yourself.
*Why are you resting, you should be healing yourself right now, remember there is something broken inside you that needs to heal.
My mind screams at me, sometimes loudly, sometimes quietly…FIX YOURSELF, CHANGE YOURSELF, YOU ARE BROKEN.
And maybe your mind screams at you too…You over-analyze your inability to succeed in your workplace, you over analyze why your friend did not call you back or why you were not invited for that hang out with the girls or with the guys, you over-analyze why you did not get promoted at your job or why you don’t have a job, You over-analyze why you can’t find anyone to be in a relationship with, You over-analyze why you are always the odd one out at social events or gathering, or like me, you over-analyze why you are alone and don’t really have friends.
But what if we choose to understand why we are the way we are and why we do things the way we do, would that make a difference?… what if everything we analyze and make wrong about ourselves is actually putting us at an advantage? I will get to that later and it will open your eyes even more…because truthfully sweetie…you are not broken, you never were.
Here’s how I realized what was going on inside me…
One day, I was thinking about my life and how I wasn’t where I wanted to be yet, I felt sad and I was tired of fighting sadness, so I decided to make peace with sadness and my situation. I decided to face the painful feeling of sadness and let it be, I didn’t try to change it to happiness, I didn’t run from it, I allowed myself to feel sad fully without judgment. I accepted that it is okay that I am not where I would like to be yet and everything is as it is. And I felt this internal peaceI haven’t felt in a long time. I felt a weight lifted off my body and I slept so well like a baby.
Then the next day, my mind was at it again, the usual rants of being peaceful for too long like there is something wrong with PEACE..then I ran to my self-help book…the title of the book was “THE COMPLETION PROCESS by teal swan”
I’m not trying to make the author wrong here but there were this feeling and question that came up when I picked up the book….it felt like something inside me didn’t like that I was about to read a book to complete me or fix me.
Then I said to myself…the completion process, what am I really trying to complete about myself? Am I not whole and complete already as I am? Was I not born whole and complete? I remember the quote “you are whole and complete” and I knew that quote intellectually but I never truly believed it in my core.
So then I said…what if I just truly believe that I am actually whole and complete? What if there is actually nothing wrong with me? What if the thought that something is wrong with me is an illusion and not true?
After asking myself these questions, I sighed a big sigh of relief… I heard that little still voice inside of me saying that I am tired of trying to fix myself. What if everything I experienced in my life, including my past that I thought was wrong, actually happened to serve me for the better? including the traumatic and painful experiences?…the things I made wrong about myself, I started to question them.
what if all of those experiences happened to show me my true self?
What if I don’t really like to make a lot of friends because it serves me, keeps me focused, and keeps my life drama-free?
What if the trauma serves me? What if it was a tool to enable me to realize myself and express myself. The trauma led me to create a youtube channel at a time where I just talk about things and share my life. The trauma led me to writing, and acting.
My overly emotional self and hypersensitivity allowed me to have compassion for myself and others. Trauma made me know how to discern what I want vs what others want for me…trauma made me live my life for me, it made me aware of my intentions…because of trauma I ask myself before doing anything, am I doing this for me or am I trying to please the other person? It made me live my life on my own terms, it made me aware of how I’m being treated by others, even how I’ve been treating myself plus how to forgive, trauma made me see people for who they really are…trauma heightened my senses so much that I could sense when someone else’s intention towards me is dangerous without them even saying a word. It made me connect with the emotional compass that guides me through life. Without trauma, I wouldn’t be writing this in this way. It made me understand the human experience in a way I never did before.
I started to see the beauty in my supposed flaws and it started to make sense.
You probably have seen a nerdy guy or girl on glasses who is always reserved, you know…someone like Mark Zuckerberg. I watched his documentary or should I say a movie on Netflix “the social network”. And he did not succeed in the dating world, his girlfriend left him…probably judged himself too. However, Facebook was born out of that situation. And well, you know the rest…who he is today. So do you agree with me that his nerdy-ness served him? I bet you do.
Your supposed flaws or inabilities are serving you right now…maybe it’s not crystal clear to you yet, you don’t see the purpose of why you got fired at your job yet or why you did not get that promotion after working for that company for years…what if you were only there to soak all that experience and use that to start your own business?
What if he or she broke up with you because they were only there to teach you something about yourself so that you can be better for the right person?
what if, like me, you don’t make a lot of friends because it’s keeping you focused on your goals? no friend is distracting you from working on your dream goals, pulling you to go to the club and drink your life away, or no friend is calling you to gossip about someone else or gossiping you to someone else, draining your energy and you can actually enjoy the two or three friends in your circle that mean well.
Listen, I felt immense relief and psychological freedom realizing that my life is not meant to be FIXED, my life is meant to be LIVED. You can imagine the amount of energy we spend trying to fix ourselves…chasing the next thing..and the next thing…and how we miss out on the simple things to enjoy about our inabilities (also known as our strengths) and living in the moment.
Every summary of our human experience was and is never right or wrong….Making it right or wrong is judgment. My past (growing up in an abusive home) happened as it did to serve me…Is it fair? No. If I had the choice of who I wanted to be my parents, I probably would’ve avoided my childhood experience. I probably would’ve opted for nicer, friendly, loving parents. But it was not my call. However, looking at the big picture, it actually served me for the better. Everything that I have gone through shaped my personality and my perspective. And there is nothing wrong with that.
When I tell you this awareness blew me away!! Totally! Even made me realize that because there is nothing wrong with me, there is nothing to defend, nothing to protect, nothing to fear, and there is nothing to lose. This totally dissolved my defense and coping mechanisms I created to protect and defend myself because I thought I needed to since I had believed my trauma was wrong and that I shouldn’t feel the emotions that come with it, so defend, fight or run away from anything or anyone that makes me feel it or reminds me of it because it is wrong and I am wrong for having gone through trauma, I am wrong for feeling it.
Before this realization, my defense mechanism in relationships was to run at the slightest discomfort or fight. I looked for the exit, any possible exit to break up with whoever I dated. I was always the one to break up. And even in marriage…I am married now, and there were times when I thought about divorce for minor things. I would run away from my few closest friends sometimes and just ghost or when they don’t call, I would literally analyze why my friend hasn’t called me…could it be something wrong with me? does she not like talking to me?…this belief that something is wrong with me made me overthink everything, and made me shrink into this shell of protection/defense….because again, my mind is looking for evidence that I am wrong.
You and I, we are perfectly imperfectly whole and complete. And our only job is to believe this. OUR ONLY JOB IS TO BELIEVE WE ARE WHOLE AND COMPLETE. I wish you would read that again, and again, and again until it digests.
You don’t need fixing…the self-help industry capitalize on making you feel wrong so that you can buy their book, go to their seminar or pay for some type of program to fix your brokenness…brokenness that does not exist. Now don’t get me wrong, some genuinely want to support your personal growth, and there is nothing wrong with paying for their time. But beware of those who sell to you first by making you feel wrong. You can sense when someone is offering you understanding vs when someone is offering you judgment.
You can simply ask yourself…I’m I offered understanding or I’m I being judged?
When you are being judged, it makes you feel disempowered in a way, you may not catch this when these self-help gurus up their sales game on you. However, if you can attune to your emotions, you will realize that you actually don’t feel good about what they are offering because it makes you feel helpless, broken, and disempowered. I write this to offer you understanding so that instead of living your life from a place of judgment, you can see yourself through the lens of understanding and compassion. Instead of judging what you think are your flaws, you understand them and recognize that they are there to serve you.
Grief, pain, sadness, disappointments, and its cousins are all part of life. The fact that you may have experienced grief, pain, or disappointment of some sort does not translate to you being a broken person.
These are natural occurrences, and natural emotions that we experience as humans. IT IS PART OF BEING HUMAN.
And when you accept that NOTHING HUMAN IS ALIEN FROM YOU it makes life easier and you can process your emotions as they come and move forward.
To be honest with you, One thing I really struggled with is accepting a loss. Especially during covid, I lost my business. Other people lost their jobs, and worse some people lost their loved ones. I can now say that I digest loss easier than before. I don’t know what led me to this book ( the five things we cannot change and the happiness we find by embracing them by David Richo); I am grateful that I was able to find this book. If you are struggling with a loss of any kind, grief, letting go, being in the moment, or acceptance in general, read this book…it will help you understand the reality of what you are experiencing so that you can process it and move forward with life… I recommend this book because it does not judge, it offers to understand…you will not regret it! Link to get the book here https://amzn.to/2SEzRbF
Once we believe the truth that we are whole, and it will take some time for our mind to fully grasp the depth of this truth since we have spent years believing otherwise; but once we do, we truly live because then we release all that energy we were putting into making ourselves wrong, we free up that energy and now we have more energy to live life fully the way we want and everything else falls into place as they are meant to be.
And then we don’t need to work too hard, we don’t need to hustle for money, hustle for love, hustle for people…opportunities come, and then we don’t need to control anything or control others, the right people show up, and then we don’t need to change people, they serve their purpose in our lives and others come, and then we don’t need to be sick, our vital life force takes care of our body because we freed up our energy. Then we truly live.
There is nothing wrong with you, there is nothing to fix about you, you are not broken, you are just being served by the experiences you had and continue to have for as long as you live. Your experiences are not wrong, they happen to serve you. And going forward, everything is as it is meant to be, you are where you are right now because you are where you are meant to be right here and now at this moment, and that’s okay….and everything is purposeful, the process is the destination, and the new choices we will make in the next moment and the moment after that and so on, we will make them because they will serve us for the better.
I want to leave you with the note I wrote to myself when I was feeling down.
“There is a part of you that is whole, complete, unshaken, untouched, unscratched, that is witnessing all that has ever happened and is ever happening in your life…including your trauma, your painful past that sometimes lurks into your present moments.
And this part of you knows the bigger picture. When you feel attacked, when you feel traumatized, when you are afraid…know that there is a part of you that is still. It’s always there in the background of everything you feel.
This part of you represents unconditional love. It is the ever-loving presence of the universe, your higher self, always and readily available for your beck and call. When it’s all too much for your little mind to handle, lean into this loving part of you…step into the bigger circle and look at the bigger picture….
you will see that everything is purposeful including the trauma and the pain you feel…it is not your weakness, it is your absolute strength. You can only see this big picture in your true state…the state of stillness…stillness is your essence. You connect with this state of stillness when you are authentically being yourself.
In stillness, there is nothing to fear, nothing to protect, and nothing to lose…you will find that there is no problem, only your perspectives & how you perceive life…it shapes your reality.
All that has happened in your life has happened FOR you and you always have the choice to use it for your expansion and the expansion of all that is connected to you.
Remember you love, and you are light! You are whole and complete.”
Permit yourself to truly live. YOU ARE WHOLE AND COMPLETE.
