043. Yet To Discover

The power of the mind is not a joke.

I believe we spend much of our lives convincing ourselves of one thing or the other. I recently noticed that I had gone the longest I had ever gone without looking at my reflection and seeing an ugly person. By enough standards, I would like to believe that I would be considered an attractive person. However, if you find yourself looking constantly looking at others or yourself, at some point, you might look in the mirror and only see what you lack.

I have gone from periods when I look at myself and see the most beautiful person who has ever lived, only to wake up convinced otherwise. Without changing my hair, makeup or clothes, I would simply look in the mirror and hate the face that was looking back at me. Spend the day feeling less than even though I would look exactly the same as I did the day before. Of course, with a loss of confidence in myself, I would carry myself in a way that would surely change the way I presented myself to the world. At the end of the day, feeling so unfortunate, I would fall asleep hoping I could wake up as a beautiful person.

Feeling ugly is one of the examples where I can easily draw from to illustrate the mind's ability to redefine what is true. On those days I was feeling ugly, there was nothing that anyone could say to convince me otherwise. On the days when I felt like a goddess gracing the mere mortals with my existence, nothing could be said to convince me otherwise. In truth, I don't think I have had any such day where I feel so elevated in my sense of beauty as to imagine I am either the most beautiful person in the world or, a goddess sent to this realm to bless those who gaze upon me with my sheer beauty. I mean, it does sound nice so, I guess why not.

I good percentage of this aspect of my journey started when I tasked myself with listing out my past successes and failures, not as judgments of character but as data collected through life. From each of the data points, the next activity was to analyse what worked and what didn't, delve deeper and understand the whys.

At first, I tried not to beat myself up too much for how far back I had to go to draw success. I felt as though I had spent my late teens and early 20's just collecting failures. Not judging myself was the true challenge. When I got through it, what I noticed was the absence of a key ingredient that had led to all the successes.  

In comparison, the failures were few. I had somehow convinced myself of this large volume of failings. When I looked at the list, there was simply fewer times where I had the opportunity to fail. Thinking about it now, I realise, majority if the failures were in my mind, all of the things I had not tried - ideas never given the time of day. I had tried less and I failed less but, I felt the failure of all the ideas that were never put to paper. With my focus on a all the tasks, real or otherwise, the scope of failure was that much more exaggerated.

In my early teen years, I was much more explorative. There was more to fail at, but when success struck, it was easy to forget all the failures and pour my energy in the few successes. Somewhere along the way, my belief in who I could be changed. My want to try, my want to aspire, traded for an echo. My belief in self was replaced with a sense of inadequacy. My 'I will be___' changed into 'well, maybe'. Doubt crept in, and every move made in doubt, was supported by a failure, creating justification to believe in the doubt.  

Being a creative, society loves to remind you of the struggles you are going to face along the away. Over time, you begin to internalise these struggles and make them your own. They manifest in their own way, into your language, your thoughts, and eventually, you find yourself a starving artist repeating the same tales you fought to ignore but now, they're your excuses for why you haven't made it yet.  

This year, I decided I wanted to be hyper conscious of the words I allowed to leave my mouth. Trying not to think about something can be quite tough but, having a thought to default to when one you no longer want to entertain arises can protect you from harmful, even deadly, spirals.

If there is something I do not know but could benefit from knowing, my response is, 'I am yet to discover'. If there is something that falls outside of my skill set but I could benefit from learning, then I allow myself to say, 'I am yet to learn'. There is much I do not know but, there is nothing I cannot do. If you want to, all can be learnt. 

Watch your thoughts, be mindful of the disabilities your words are creating. You are capable, all you have to do is want to be.

There was something I intrinsically knew in my early teens, then somewhere along the way, I let my faith in that knowledge faulter. What I knew then, and will remind myself daily is that, if I put my mind to it, I am capable of anything.

Dear reader, halfway through the week already…where does the time go? Imagine we had a four-day work week, we would be looking at our last workday tomorrow. Alas, we are yet to effect that change.

I have done my best today and I am excited to get back to it tomorrow as we continue to do all we can.