Blog 15
Transitions, Cycles, Old Lessons
We are in the middle of October which can inspire feelings of change and remind us of the essential cycles in life. Sometimes we forget in the summer months that the warmth, greenery, and lighter days don’t last forever. The leaves quickly turn to saturated yellows, fiery reds, and golden browns, before being released back into the earth. October is one of, if not my favorite month of the year, but it can feel at times that it is moving so quickly. I wait excitedly, like a young child going to get ice cream, for this time of year. Warm and soothing apple cider, delicious, fresh pumpkin bread, crisp air, warm afternoons that smell incredible. I feel some years that I have this iron grip on the season, not wanting it to end, but it feels as if it just slips out of my fingers like trying to hold onto water. This will cause an internal panic as I realize how fast the days are slipping away, and I don’t know if I have enjoyed them “enough.”
It is a funny thing we do as humans. We get the things we want and then we panic about losing them, which steals our joy away from finally having them. There is also the societal aspect. The zeitgeist of the day is to never waste time, and enjoy every moment. So on top of not feeling one hundred percent, now there is this heavy weight of guilt that we are not enjoying something that is supposed to make us happy.
As the month drifts by, a low level depression hits me. The realization that it is already almost over and I spent much of it anxious, tired, and scattered.
So how did I get here?
If you have been following me and my brand for some time now, you will know that I have been learning about and trying to integrate the concept of abundance into my life. Part of that journey was also cutting out any jobs, people, or work that dragged me down. I was trying out an experiment. I wanted to see what would happen if I looked at my life with an extremely discerning eye.
“This client is rude”
Chop.
“This company does not pay me enough?”
Chop.
“This work feels soul sucking?”
Chop.
And I mean a lot got put on the chopping block. I walked into this year with an interesting sort of clarity. It was more than clarity. It was a change to not only how I lived my life, but what I could even tolerate. Something in me said I literally cannot continue spending my time on things that drained me. It felt physically impossible. I would receive a text asking if I was available for something I no longer felt aligned with me and before my mind had time to process, my finger typed and sent “No.”
By doing this, I never thought I would have, let’s say, too much abundance? This sounds ridiculous, but maybe my fear of what my abundance would lead to, came true in a way. Too much for me to handle. Let me explain….
I cut out probably 90% of what I would call the “crap.” My life felt officially decluttered, despite some minor jobs I was keeping around that still held a small amount of value in my life and career.
Well I would say, the abundance mindset worked incredibly well. I was flooded with work in September and October. I have never felt so secure in my network. It was the first year that most of my work came directly to me, instead of having to seek it out myself. Because I was so entangled in my abundance mindset, and thinking more means more (happiness, joy, fulfillment), I said yes to every exciting opportunity.
“Want to go to Pennsylvania for two weddings and stay overnight in a hotel?”
Yes!
“Want to do three overnights as a background actor in a movie?”
Sounds cool!
“Want to go to Washington DC to film a luxury wedding with your boyfriend?”
Heck yeah!
A lot of exciting jobs and opportunities were coming in. And I am someone that gets almost manicly excited. My calm outer demeanor hides my inner fiery self well. My mind will be zooming at 100mph before it registers in my body what the decisions I am making are. I will start saying yes to everything that sounds interesting, cool, or novel. I will buy three online courses on the current topic I am learning about. I will agree to every vacation or traveling opportunity that comes my way. Which is exactly what happened this month.
Not only was I working a ton, but my anniversary with my boyfriend was in September. We packed up our car and loaded in our tuxedo cat and 90 pound yellow lab to head to the beautiful Catskill Mountains for two days.
And before that, we moved to a new apartment, in a new neighbourhood at the beginning of August.
So looking back, I can clearly see the chaos. But, I think as many of us creatives and business owners can do, I, or some part of me completely blocked it out. As in, I had no clue why I felt tired, ungrounded, stressed, anxious, and emotional.
As business owners, I believe this is why a lot of us are business owners. One, because sometimes we have this irrational optimism and excitement because we do have to be a bit delusional to start a new business.. Two, we are excellent at blocking our emotions and feelings in general..
You need some amount of detachment as a business owner. A lot of times you are just throwing yourself into crazy situations, and you cannot just sit there and overanalyze them because then the opportunity is already gone. Or you may completely scare yourself out of it.
We are excellent at blocking financial stress, social stress, burnout, and instability. Because at times, you have to or else you may collapse on the floor from fear, confusion, and fatigue.
But it still hits us.
I could feel the mini alarms ringing in my head a couple of weeks ago, but I would tell myself that I just had to push through this period. Or I would look at all this abundance I finally had in my life, and so I felt that I just needed to enjoy it!
But as I kept pushing, the symptoms worsened. To the point that the world became a foggy unreal place, and my mind latched onto existential loops.
I knew what this sign was this time. Extreme burnout.
Sometimes we think our mental health just heals and we never experience anxiety, depression, derealization, or depersonalization again. But I read something that clicked for me. It is not a “healing journey” like how you heal a broken bone. It is more like a thermostat that goes up and down in relation to your stress levels. Your reaction to it is a better signifier of how “healed” you are as opposed to how often or intense the experience is.
The fact that I could recognize where it was coming from, was a huge step for me.
We think that lessons only come around once in our lives. What I am learning is that the same lessons appear in our lives to be reviewed with a different perspective many times, maybe even our entire lives.. We may have thought we solved this problem or learned this lesson, but then it appears again, and we are back to figuring it out. But we have a little more insight this time.
I knew that moving apartments would cause stress as my home is practically an extension of my identity, and my safe haven in the world. And I know I can struggle with derealization and existentialism when my body is pushed too hard. I know these things intellectually, but what was in review this time around, is do I know them somatically?
I can say those things to myself day in and day out, but if my life doesn’t change to reflect those truths, then the lessons are far from integrated. I had to sit with these truths. Yes, I had come far, but there is still learning to be done.
My mind is like a racehorse, constantly going at full speed, churning with ideas. I would relate my body more to a turtle. A hard outer shell, but slow moving, can get easily overwhelmed and likes to pop back into its safe shell that it calls home.
I finally took three days to actually adjust and rest in my new space, now that the adrenaline from the move had left my system. There were a lot of feelings of disorientation, confusion over my identity, being out of place, grief, and fear. These are things that needed to be felt with this transition though. Although it was an amazing, and upgraded transition, I couldn’t neglect the difficult emotions that came with being uprooted, especially as a person who is such a homebody.
I also grieved for the month of October. I had all these magical plans and visions in mind before the month hit. There was a feeling of loss over how I expected to experience it, and how I did experience it.
There are certainly a lot of transitions happening currently. Those of the season, moving apartments, mindset shifts. But just as the fall season can teach us, abundance is also about letting go. Releasing past experiences and expectations like the trees lose their leaves. Or as if the negative experiences are like the rotten apples that never get eaten. Although they seem like a waste, they nourish the earth in a different way. How bad experiences, like bad apples, can deepen our understanding of ourselves and what we need, which still nourishes us. They are not a complete waste. Sometimes we don’t even need to see the value in it. Sometimes it is just trusting that it had some purpose and it doesn’t have to spoil the rest of the season for us. Abundance isn’t always saying yes to every exciting opportunity. Because that can actually lead us away from true abundance. I am finding the concept is much closer to nourishment, than overwhelm.
As we come out of the Libra season of balance, we can refocus and work on finding that balance of the archetype in our lives now. The first part of October was definitely a bit rocky. It did not fit my expectations. But it taught me a lesson. Not a new lesson. It forced me to look at a lesson that has come around many times for review in my life.
“Is saying yes to everything and everyone really nourishing my soul?”
We think we want to experience everything. Especially if we own a business. I am learning, I don’t think that is it. At least not for all of us. What if simplicity was better? What if abundance wasn’t more things, jobs, places, opportunities, but a deeper connection to what we already love? It doesn’t negate the fact that upgrading our life and opportunities are positive things. But I think in today’s world, there is this extreme, anxiety-inducing pressure to do and experience everything. Where it seems to actually be disconnecting many of us more. Especially if we already have an excitable or overactive mind. So what if that view is becoming outdated, and there is a better way for us to live?
Maybe we don’t have to see every corner of the earth, try every new restaurant, meet a new person every single day, and try every new trend. Maybe we lost something by trying to do everything. When we try to experience all the big things, we forget the beauty and joy of simplicity. The morning routine that provides us so much safety and comfort, the same person who warms our heart every time we see them, our favorite meals that we eat every week and feel so nourished by. I think in this time of so much pressure to live large, we lose a connection to something deeper. Thinking our lives are incomplete unless they are full with plans makes us blind to what we already have access to by just being alive.
As I heal my nervous system from a big move, a chaotic work schedule, additional emotional load, and excessive travel, I am reviewing my ideas of abundance again. Although I was flooded with many things that I attribute to abundance, it is important to realize how I integrate them. As business owners, it is so difficult to not get excited when everything we want finally floods in. But part of abundance is also realizing, those opportunities will come around again. So we can ease our mind about having to take on everything. Just like this October will come around again next year if it wasn’t how I envisioned it this year. Lessons repeat, seasons repeat, opportunities that are meant for us repeat. Everything comes back around; the job, the opportunity, the person, the season. When we come to realize the cyclical nature of everything, then we have understood the true abundance in the universe.
