On Keeping Promises to Myself
About eight months ago, I quit my job and took a six-month “sabbatical,” as I called it. In many ways, I was very broken at the beginning of this sabbatical. I had gotten sick while traveling and I never fully cured during my time on the road. Once I returned from traveling, my health continued to decline and it took me several months to hit a breaking point and realize how truly sick I was. That was April 2017 and I spent two years trying to balance work and healing before throwing in the towel and leaving my job.
So I quit in April 2019 to take the time I needed to heal my body. What I wasn’t anticipating was that repairing my body would require I repair parts of my mind and soul as well. During my sabbatical, I healed in ways that I was not expecting nor knew that I needed. About 6 weeks ago, I returned to the working world and I have grown and developed even more in doing so. I feel alive and healthy again; maybe even more so than at any other point in my life.
There is so much to unpack from the past few years, so many stories/lessons/reflections. I know this will naturally unfold in future posts, but for today, I want to reflect and celebrate the act of keeping promises to myself.
Today marks me keeping a promise to myself for 30 days straight!
For 30 days, I promised myself that I would complete my morning routine (moving my body for at least 10 minutes, meditating, and journaling), and for 30 days, I kept that promise.
In my 32 years of life, I have not once been able to keep a daily promise to myself for this amount of time. Heck, I have only been able to stick with it for two weeks maximum, and that has been a handful of times. This pattern is not as simple as or being lazy or unmotivated, but as complex and impactful as a pattern of betraying and undervaluing myself. It lead to me not trusting myself and my own word. When I was unable to trust myself, that flowed into so many parts of my life but I was unconscious to the impact. It caused me to rely on others to help me handle my emotions, such as needing to reach out and speak to others when I was frustrated or angry or excited about a situation – any time an emotion felt too big and that I couldn’t contain it within my body and needed to get rid of it, I HAD to communicate it to someone before I could move on with my day. Or when I felt something intuitively, I felt that I couldn’t make a decision until I had asked for others’ opinions/talked through all the pros and cons/researched it thoroughly. I would delay the decision by hours/days/weeks and have it running through my head that whole time because I didn’t trust my decision or felt fearful of the consequences of my choice.
Learning to trust myself = knowing that, no matter what, I can take care of myself in all of these situations. Big emotions? I can sit with them and feel them because they are valid. I trust that, once I feel them and allow myself to experience them, then I will be able to make the right decision in handling the situation. Feeling something intuitively? I trust my gut more and more. I trust that I don’t make rash decisions, but ones that are moving me towards being a happier and healthier human. I trust that, whatever the consequences or another’s reaction to my decision, I will continue to take care of myself and handle the aftermath with growth and healing.
It’s not a perfect world and I do not feel level-headed trust and clarity at all times. There are limitless ways to evolve in this area so it is something that I expand in constantly. But as I have learned to trust myself, more and more challenging situations have arisen, and I have met them all. I have faced them, cried so many tears, written and prayed for clarity, open wounds and spent time mending them, meditated to quiet my mind, danced and yoga-ed to get into my body, and paused to take hundreds of deep breathes to steady myself. This trust is a muscle and I consistently witness its growing strength.
Now all of this ties back into today’s post on a blog that I have not touched in over three years. When I first figured out how sick my body was post-travel adventures, I had promised myself that I would return to this blog and would continue writing. At that point, I did not feel like myself and had lost all interest in the activities that brought me joy and made me feel like “me” – traveling, dancing, connecting with others, and above all else, writing. Three years ago, I knew that when I felt inspired to write again, that would be an outward expression of my internal world, of me returning to myself, of me coming back alive. And so I made that promise and have been diligently and patiently waiting for this post to flow to me, for today.
Which also makes today’s post a personal celebration – to the adventures and lessons I have lived, the trials and obstacles I have survived, and the unknown and limitless future that is to come! A celebration of the promises I have kept for the past 30 days and to the past three years. A celebration because maybe I have been keeping promises this whole time and not giving myself proper recognition. A celebration of finally seeing myself and my capabilities and learning to trust in both of those – because that feels really big in my life right now. A celebration because that is one of the best ways to take care of myself and it feels damn good!
I am not sure what I am going to be sharing here going forward –probably some of my health journey, probably some vulnerable stuff, definitely travel posts as they come up, and a little bit of all my other interests. All I know is that when I feel inspired, here is where you where you will find me J Welcome to my little nook of the internet – it feels good to be back.
Until next post,
LE
P.S. Shoutout to The Holistic Psychologist and the life-changing work that she is doing via social media! This post would not have been possible without the insights and tools that she has introduced into my life – including daily self-promises and Future Self Journaling, both of which I do each morning. I recommend following her on Instagram and signing up for her email list!