You Don’t Always Need Rainbows to Feel Good - Try A Balanced Mindset
Today’s post is a reflection of the encounters I have had over the last couple of months since I started my leave. In a strange twist of fate, people from the past started reaching back out to me again to connect.
The people include those I met and worked with in the past, those whom I have not spoken to for ages and those whom I have always wished I could find time to connect more with.
Taking time to self-reflect. That concept has been lost to me for the last 3.5 years or so since I started working in the bank that I’m now transitioning out of. This post is not about my experience in the bank, so I’ll leave it as that. This post is more on the importance of self-love, self-care and just cherishing the present and learning to move forward into the future.
I know many have chosen to go into all sorts of coaching - life, relationships, love, career, health and so on especially after the pandemic, in response to people who have suddenly become more conscious about how they want to live their lives and thus created a demand, and now what looks like a booming industry. It seems to also be a self reflection of the takeaways these coaches have uncovered of themselves that they hope can help others.
I’m not in the coaching profession nor am I intending to go into it but I just wanted to share my own honest observations and personal take-aways based on my encounters since end Jan.
Many of us have become too caught up in our own little world and that world is largely our work that we do for at least 8-12 hours a day. Once we don’t have a job, we lose our identity as a person.
Some of us have also become numbed to the problems our families have raised to us, almost becoming deaf to them and therefore merely hearing and not truly listening.
Many have also been so obsessed with keeping healthy due to fears of death from Covid health scares that we forgot how to let loose a little and enjoy the pleasures that food can bring.
Some are equally obsessed with money - earning as much as possible and saving as much as possible for fear as well of being caught off-guard on a rainy day and ironically, gotten into family issues and disputes over money, causing much unhappiness.
At the other end of the spectrum, we have those of us who have been obsessed with just eating, drinking, spending and just splurging on ways to ‘fix’ ourselves because we are always feeling ‘incomplete’.
The lessons I learnt, whether you agree with it or not are as such:
no one can make you feel complete so long as you keep entrapping yourself in this vicious cycle of feeling incomplete due to low self esteem
one is incapable of loving another person so long as one still doesn’t know the concept of self-love
self love is not just defined by how you treat yourself but also how you allow others to treat you
we are not defined by our job titles, companies we work for, salary we earn, residential address, schools we used to go to, schools our kids go to, cars we drive or don’t drive, holiday destinations, brands we love, amount of money we have in the bank, educational certifications, awards, accolades, etc, etc
while making a living is important, we should make money work for us and not the other way around
principles of integrity, compassion and determination are priceless and without them, we are nothing but an empty shell
although everyone values different things, think about what you want others to say about you during your eulogy or be written on your tombstone that would make you feel like you have lived a meaningful life
live a little, let loose a little, love courageously, eat moderately, drink moderately, splurge selectively, save sufficiently and work for passion, not just money; live a balanced life
cherish the people you have in your life so long as they are supportive of your self-love, self-esteem, dreams, happiness, success and never make you feel like you are not enough
whenever you think or feel like everything is against you or its too much to deal with, remember that we are all just a part of a much bigger universe that is going through the same, if not much worse situation than you
And that’s all I wanted to share in terms of my own learnings from the encounters I had. Hopefully it’s useful for you as well.
About the Author
Mad About Marketing Consulting
Ally for CMOs, Heads of Marketing and C-Suites to work with you and your marketing teams to maximize your marketing potential with strategic transformation for better business and marketing outcomes.
