Stress.
We are pretty much all familiar with some form of it. Whether it’s coming from our partner, family, friends, work, financial, or school. But when we are younger, we tend to bounce back pretty quickly because we have other things going on. At least that’s how it was with me.
The balance shifted and it all changed for me when I graduated from school and actually started ‘adulting’. I began working my first job basically the day after graduating and put so much pressure on myself to be the best. I felt like I needed to prove my worth to the world!
In the beginning I could go for long hours. Heck, I remember arriving to the office around 7AM and leaving at 7PM. Not to get overtime mind you. Just to show my worth. On the weekends I was able to unplug, recover, and bounce back. But this didn’t last long. I started taking more on, putting more pressure on myself, and started having to deal with a significant amount of toxic relationships in my life. It’s like everything hit me at once.
I went on for a few years like this. Drained. Crying myself to sleep many times. Losing myself and who I was. Forgetting why I was in this path of nutrition. Started to feel like an impostor. Worst of all, my self-worth was hitting rock bottom. You know it’s bad when it affects you to the point where you manifest physical symptoms.
I still remember as if it were the other day. I started to feel all day long waves of nausea where I felt I would throw up, although I thankfully never did. Even at night time. It wasn’t food poisoning and this went on for days. So I started getting concerned and went to check in with a gastrointestinal doctor. End result, there was nothing physically wrong with me. Everything came back fine. I felt like I was going crazy! It was like my body was rejecting my lifestyle.
Stress was physically manifesting itself and I was too busy to listen.
Due to the circumstances at the time, I couldn’t leave my situation without serious consequences. So I took on meditation. That was my first time — what did I have to lose, right? I would meditate every single day for many months. And although I chose to continue on a path that was harming me because it’s what I had to do, I learned three important lessons:
- To have patience since things don’t happen on my time.
- The importance of learning to breath properly.
- To reconnect with my body.
My morning meditation sessions are what saved me. They helped bring me back to myself. They helped me remember who I was before my priority became to try to ‘make it’ and before my goal was to get to a 6 figure salary. Because I now know that being successful to me, is being in balance and connection with myself, the world around me, and even nature. Meditation brought back light, love, and kindness into my life. And most importantly, I learned so much about myself because I reconnected with myself, my intuition, my inner strength. It empowered the heck out of me!
A few years later, I was finally able to make the leap and start a life that was in alignment with my heart. Stress is still a part of my day-to-day and fear and anxiety still wants to make a daily cameo. But I know that when it manifests, it’s time to put what I am doing aside and turn my focus inward, breath, to be patient, kind and accepting with myself.
Every day is a new journey and every day I have to remind myself of these lessons. But everything that I went through, is what set me up for who I am today. Not professionally speaking, but as a person. It’s like getting a second chance at living. To do things differently for my body and my mind.
