With my appearance
Wearing the right things
Having a certain hairstyle
And a big one: being thin enough.
The media spews this message over and over again,
(but so do we)
until one day, I eventually realized:
I am enough. I (merely) am.
(I do not have to be beautiful. Embracing ideas like "you're beautiful JUST the way you are" didn't work either, because it meant that to be worthy you had to be beautiful. But you know what? I truly, honestly just am. I have a face. I have a body. I do not need to be perceived as "beautiful" even to feel whole. Existing outside this need to live up to an expectation, even a "positive" expectation feels really good.)
Same with grades, oh boy, grades.
This one's kind of ingrained in our minds.
We get socially rewarded, at least with teachers,
for getting good marks, being on good behaviour.
Doing what they want, and expect of you.
For those of you like me
who didn't stop in high school, didn't stop in undergrad,
and yet again, still in school, in academia
no longer chasing marks but now hooked on to
the treadmill of working around the clock.
When the scholarship that helps you live a tad bit above the poverty line
meant you toiled away at number of lines
that measure how many publications, how many posters,
how many projects you were juggling,
how many hours you didn't sleep,
how many coffees you've had til you have jittery hands.
#AcademicTwitter has voices supporting mental health
but just as many voices chalking up talks about self-care as
"weak, not enough dedication, whining."
I felt guilty going to bed at 10pm when I knew
yet others competing for similar funding packages are toiling until the AM.
You have no idea the number of emails I have answered while on the loo 💩,
thinking that if I didn't squeeze one last ounce of productivity
that I wasn't dedicated enough, producing enough, researching enough.
But I am enough. I have my strengths and my weaknesses,
and my strengths (*shocking*) emerge best
when I give myself that time to rest.
It will take automation and robots a long time
before being able to simulate my strength in curiosity,
in synthesizing information and seeing the bigger picture,
in bulldozing forward with evermore questions.
My weaknesses in enduring "yet another email"
can easily be replaced by automated, templated work,
so why am I wasting my human juice on busy work?
I am enough; I do not need to have the most # of publications,
# of conference presentations,
the most $$ funding.
I am, by doing what I love.
And now, as I'm older, I feel the pressure to
earn more, to own more.
Hustle mindset. Dream big. Own more.
"Don't settle for where you are, keep fighting".
I have a main hustle (school),
but also a side hustle (small sticker business).
Grow your business, focus on your end goal.
Social media: have a ratio, grow a following.
1k ➡ 5k ➡ 10k* ➡ 50k ➡ 100k
*at 10k followers on insta you can start
adding links 🔗 to your story so that
people viewing your story can BUY more,
so you EARN more, be more, grow, hustle.
The people who sell a hustle mindset
speak ACTIVATING words,
so it's easy to start running, sprinting even,
with a vague goal ➡ to be like them? to be richer? to retire sooner?
I was drawn to this mindset because the promise of
financial security
(buzzwords: MULTIPLE INCOME STREAMS, SIDE HUSTLE, INVESTING AND WATCHING YOUR MONEY GROW, AMAZON DROPSHIP),
where financial security (and independence) for the longest time was related
to my personal safety, having grown up in an abusive, controlling household.
Having extra money doesn't make me feel good,
it merely makes me feel safe.
And unlike before where I saved up $$ like
it was the lifeline and no amount of money was enough
because I never knew what financial abuse brought next,
here I sit, typing away one evening, realizing that
This is enough. I am enough.
I have the basics (the emergency funding, ongoing steady income despite lockdown)
--this is a privilege of having accessed resources that taught me financial security when my financially abusive parents did not.
I don't need to buy a condo (ofc it'd be nice, yes)
when small touches upcycled from items destined for the landfill
upgrade my well-designed basement apartment into
a humble & safe abode 🏡.
And this is acceptance.
This is a stage that we allude to but no one spends any time on.
Because it doesn't sell.
It sells to negatively portray a flaw, to push a product to "fix" that flaw.
It sells to promote a "positive expectation", to push people to move forward.
It does not sell to ask someone to stop and fully perceive who they are
and to sit in that.
Do you know what I mean?
To wholly perceive?
I didn't know before 2020 and honestly about 88% of the time I don't feel this either.
But I can only describe this experience as truly living in the present.
👀 Where you are seeing and really taking in your surroundings, not in an automatic way, but in an intentional way, with overt attention absorbing every piece of information.
The way that a ballpoint pen leaves a small bald spot in the middle as you write (that you wouldn't notice otherwise).
The way your mug casts a shadow over your laptop keys
The way dust collects on your goddamn table so fast and you can notice the blindspots that you don't entirely clean
👂 Where the next sense that pops up (for me at least) is hearing,
The quiet silence, almost ringing
The wifi router making that dzzzz-dz-dzzzzzdzdzz-dzdzzzz-dz noise
The way that typing noises sound like tappity tippity tip tap pap tippititopity
👃 And once these two best senses kick in my breathing becomes smoother, as I take in larger breaths, in & out and notice
The smell of the baked fries I so desperately burnt to a crisp still lingering in the air
I smell the Japanese Cherry Blossom lotion wafting through the air
[and if I concentrate too hard] I smell the soil and the ground smell, the smell of nature, as I live underground
✋ At which point I shift my attention away to another sense, and realize that in these moments, I feel the sense of mindfulness and grounding, that I'm in touch with the PRESENT moment, that yes there are things to worry about in the future (EXAM SOON) and things to regret from the past (THAT THING I SAID THAT ONE TIME) but now is not the moment as I feel
My butt cheeks against the chair
That part of my spine that endures my weight against gravity ALL DAY and probably will be the EXACT spot that will hurt in the future
My hair, with loose strands against my neck
The cold against my bare skin as the hot summer day has dissipated into a slightly cooler night, which translates to actually pretty damn cold when you live in a basemeent
👅 And finally, taste.
(i have 3L of bagged milk so I've been drinking it like water don't @ me)
This, I realized was mindfulness, yes. { concept of grounding }
But I think even the concept of mindfulness has been packaged a little.
To me,
this is living.
Rather than surviving.
I, for a hot second, automatically linked "(small sticker business)" to my shop, because, capitalism,
until I realize that same pressure to promote, to sell, to stick in even that last tiny reminder
comes from the sense that I feel that the small business is not enough, that I need more, that I'm chasing something that I don't even know what I'm chasing.
👀⏳
So it takes time.
& we wait.