I feel things deeply and I mean extremely, on one side that can be a strength and on the other side it can be a weakness. Most of my worry comes from that.
This is the greatest hurdle I’m handling. I’m slowly teaching myself how to regulate.
Radical acceptance is something I am learning to embrace. Through that I am able to maturely sit with my most uncomfortable emotions and self regulate.
All my other weaknesses actually spring from my extreme emotions. It’s basically the elephant in the room😅.
The past one year has been an eye opener. It is said time and again how crucial self love is. Until you become entirely deliberate about it, you’ll never just get to the core of it.
I got back home to myself. I have become aware of the person I am. As simple as it sounds, it hasn’t been an easy task. One thing I’ve learnt is that, growth is a very essential process yet very uncomfortable.
Through growth, I’ve learnt to be in a healthy relationship with myself. The benefits up to this point have been profound.
I am a better person..not perfect. I love how I am able to catch myself. I love how intentional I am with myself and everyone else around me.
So for me I would say, self love has had a very positive impact on me.
Calm. Clean. Organized. It is mind-blowing how fast the city has grown. It is my constant reminder that there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. That we are allowed to dream again and again. That no matter how hard we fall, we can always rise again.
I understand that confidence is not linear. I’m gonna go ahead and expose myself a little here.
Last year, a time like this I had such bad acne. Before that, I never would understand the dent acne could leave on someone’s self esteem.
You know I was like” how? It is just acne, and acne should be normal” until it was my turn.
I kid you not, I made it a prayer item, the acne. It killed everything in me. Sadly, it also came with shame.
I dreaded the question “what did you do to your face?” Such a dumb question.
Everyday I would look at my pictures from before and beat myself up a little for not appreciating myself a tiny bit more.
I made a promise to myself, once the acne cleared I was going to appreciate myself more. One-year down, the acne did clear. Though my face isn’t yet back to it’s clear state but it’s waaaaay better from what it was last year. I am grateful for that.
But I feel like the acne went away with a part of me. I never look at myself the same.
I post on YouTube sometimes. Today I was in a whole mood of shooting a video, but one look at my face and I just turned off the camera.
Such days are inevitable I know, but I wish we never had such days.
And it’s on such days when my East African forehead decides to exaggerate.
I promise, nothing really. I think recovering from depending entirely on external validation has taught me not to worry about what people think or say about me.
As long as I’m out here spreading love and respecting everyone else’s boundaries, what they say should be the least of my concerns.
What is something others do that sparks your admiration?
“Val I want to tell you something, but don’t take it the wrong way.” That’s how most of the people around me start their conversation with me.
I have everyone around me walking on egg shells because of my intense emotion.
I feel everything. I feel even those things that don’t deserve any emotion. Wearing my heart on my sleeves like this, isn’t something I am proud of about myself.
I love how everyone around me is able to filter their emotions. They know what to take to the heart and what not to.
It is so humiliating carrying around these emotions at my big age.
It’s even worse when it comes out as playing victim.
It’s 11:57 pm. I got a new hairdo today. My eyes are heavy, but I can’t sleep. It’s uncomfortable. I’m trying to figure out a sleeping style that will not involve my head ( that doesn’t make sense I know). I am entirely braced for a long night.
Okay for a minute I have been distracted and now I’ve lost my train of thought.
12:04 pm the next day. Yes this is how much I got distracted.
I managed to sleep perfectly. I don’t know how I did that.
Everything I wanted to write about this totally escaped my mind 😅.
Shadow to my light. 