My journey of loving myself

In May 2021, about two years ago, I knew something inside me was falling apart, but didn’t know what was happening to me. I felt there was a black wall in front of me, and didn’t know the way-out. I was working as a student advisor in web design bootcamp after experiencing managing sales teams. I started my first professional career in sales at a big Japanese company after graduation, but left the company to others. I was learning UX design with an online bootcamp for myself hoping to change my career to UX designer. I was surrounded by really good people at work, and there were friends and family who cheer me up. But I felt like I was trapped in a cage that was created and built by me. My tears came out in the middle of meeting with my boss with no reason, and I didn’t feel like I enjoyed things I used to enjoy.

Yes, it was a huge burnout. I had suffered burnouts once in a while but this time it hit me really hard. Taking days off and not talking to anyone but watching movies with margarita pizza didn’t help at all. Then I realized it was burnout from what I had hold to myself for the past many years. Job, career, relationships and etc were definitely part of causes of the burnout, but main cause that made me suffer the most was that I kept ignoring my suffered/sad/angry feelings, locked all of in boxes where I can’t find so that I didn’t have to think of that again. Before I knew it, I became a person who hated me the most and told me that I’m bad and not worth. I was 27 years old, so I kept hurting myself non-stop for more than 20 years.

Looking back now, I cannot believe how happy I am now compared to myself two years ago. Life has its ups and downs, but I’m sure I can go on because I have my best supporter now, myself.

What follows are the main events that happened for the past two years.

1. Took time off
2. Created a self-documentary for myself
3. Bought a car and did solo road trip in Hokkaido
4. Moved to Hokkaido and lived in a farm there for about a year
5. Traveled to Spain and Sweden
6. Started working as a UX designer
7. Moved to a bay area in Kanagawa

In this post, I would like to focus my stories on the events, No.1 and No.2.

So the very first thing I did after burnout was to take some time off. I think it was a good decision for me because I really needed to take rest. Then l booked a plane ticket to Sapporo, Hokkaido. I had to get away from anywhere but my apartment. I picked Hokkaido because that’s where I had wanted to go back. I visited there when I was little to see my grand grand parents but never had chance to go back since they passed away.

The weather was chilly and I had to wear layers of clothes in late May. I had Sapporo ramen, soup curry, and soba. I visited touristy places and watched two movies at a local movie theater. I felt a little better but something dark was still inside me. Looking back now, I guess I was trying to find a way out from the dark place I was in. I felt like I was trapped in an antlion and couldn’t get out.

That was when a miracle happened. I was randomly browsing and searching for a way to relocate to Hokkaido, and found a program called “My michi” (Michi means a path or road in Japanese). The program is designed for young people who want to find a path for themselves. The only requirement for joining the program was to do an interview, decide and plan for my own personal project, and move to a town called Kamishihoro in Hokkaido for about a month. Before I knew it, I was contacting a person by email, and set up an interview.

On the zoom interview I was talking about myself and the situation I was in to the two people from the program. I was crying and telling them that I want to change and don’t want to keep hurting myself, and they were listening and nodding. They told me that they would be happy to have me in the program, and I decided to join the program. I think my life would’ve been different if I hadn’t met them.

Before the program started, I had 1on1 sessions with the organizer. After some sessions, I was gradually figuring out that there was misinterpretations about myself.

I’m not important. I’m no worth. I’m not good enough. I’m a bad person. I’m the one who can get hurt, so other people can be happy.

I was the one who was bullying and hurting myself the whole time, and deprioritized my feelings. I was the one who made myself unhappy by telling me that I’m not worth and important. I was holding the misinterpretations about myself for too long. This was why I felt like I was trapped in somewhere I couldn’t get out.

After realizing all the awful things I did to myself, there were two choices. Face it or just drop it and keep bullying myself.

I picked the option of facing it, and made promise to myself that I would try to forgive myself and love myself, no matter how hard the journey would be. Never ever give up. That was when I started to write my feelings and interaction with myself on my diary. I don’t know how many times I cried and apologized myself for not being there for me and support me in the process.

For my personal project in the program, I decided to create a self-documentary for myself. I know it was a crazy idea but I wanted to make something for myself that can remind me of the journey of forgiving and loving myself. I had no experience of learning about creating documentary, writing screen play or editing film, but I thought that was the best way I could think of to give a present I can give to myself. The organizer was fully supporting me the whole time in the process before and after the program.

After the program started, I took time to focus on listening and understanding my inner voice, thoughts and feelings. I tried putting them into words in my journal and sharing them with the organizer. One day, he taught me what it is to forgive myself.

Forgiving yourself is to pick up your old selves.

He told me that we all lock our true feelings like sadness in boxes to forget what happened because sometimes it’s too hard for us to even think about it.

I realized that I had locked my old selves together with sad feelings. Then I decided to pick up my old selves by facing sad and even traumatic memories. One of them was:

When I was little, my mom was abusive to me and told me that she doesn’t want to see my face. She left my sister and me after having a baby with her new husband. I was sad because I believed that I was the bad one who made her to leave us.

Facing this misinterpretation made me realized that I did NOT do anything bad or wrong. And that was the moment I picked up the 8 years old myself and promised her that I would never hurt her again and would hold her hand to make her to feel safe. I felt like I was hugging her with big arms, and I was crying big happy tears.

The process of facing myself wasn’t easy for me to do it all alone, and people who I met through program really helped me go through it.

After facing myself and clarifying misinterpretations of myself, I have completed my documentary called “Chiisana watashi”. It means “Little me”. I did it. The documentary was screened and uploaded to Youtube to share it hoping to share some positivity to people. I created the 16 min documentary for myself but I liked the fact that many people who watched it told me that it cheered them up.

The journey of forgiving myself wasn’t easy, but loving myself and the feeling of being surrounded by the best supporters who are my old selves was the happiest thing that has ever happened to me.

True smile comes from many tears.

- Risako Tanaka