Coming Alive Again
Welcome back
Have you ever emerged, blinking in the sunlight, on the other side of a rut — unaware of how long you’d even been in there? Or achieved something soul-soaring for the first time after a hellish time, and suddenly thought to yourself, this is what it means to be alive?
Welcome back, my friend. I hope you weren’t stranded there for too long.
Lessons at 36,000 feet
For a short plane journey yesterday, I had downloaded Brené Brown’s The Call to Courage as a delicious little prelude to three whole glorious days off work. Travelling alone, wrapped up in my cozy pashmina and cradling a paper cup of tinny airplane tea (tropics be damned — snug habits die hard!), I hung on her words; a moving, edifying escape.
I’ve seen The Call to Courage before, and still love it. If you haven’t discovered it already, the Netflix doco is well worth a watch. In a nutshell, it’s about choosing courage over comfort, if you want to feel that you are maxing out life’s potential! She highlights the uncomfortable link between courage and vulnerability, which she describes as “having the courage to show up when you can’t control the outcome.”
It’s a lot to unpack, but she parcels it up with the Teddy Roosevelt quote:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
[Citizenship in a Republic speech, Theodore Roosevelt, 1910. Bold highlight my own.]
Although it’s a quote I know well (someone cited it in a journalistic interview I did years ago and I remember sitting up and internally whispering wow. I’m listening…!), and I’ve seen the doco before, a new and different theme leapt out this time and smacked me between the eyes.
Brené emphasises how those who roll up their sleeves and get in the arena — the risk takers, the doers; the ones that open themselves up to the highest highs and/or excruciating vulnerability, are GOING to fail. It’s not ‘what if’. It’s ‘when’.
We will fail guys. It will hurt. We should still do the thing anyway. Lightbulb moment.
That dirty word
The thing is, that failure and shame are so inextricably linked. This is the most painful problem, and possibly the one gargantuan lesson here, if you’re going to come out the other side intact, is that shame doesn’t have to be let in.
The calm before the storm
Four years ago, I failed monumentally. I failed in my judgment of character, and in one of the most important decisions we get to make.
I was 32, and loved my life! I had a high-flying job working for a global news station in Singapore, with sun-soaked, snatched weekends roaming the jungles, beaches and underwater world of southeast Asia, and a half-life in my beloved Germany — with visits at all the best times (Christmas markets! Autumn forests!). I was in the shape of my life, surrounded by an incredible support network of bright, capable and fearless co-adventurer friends, and in love. I married a German man who was a little older than me.
What goes up…
As ludicrous as it sounds, even with the benefit of years of painstaking forensic work on this now, the wedding day itself was a spectacular wrecking ball. As if a switch had been tripped, the man turned out to be bizarrely deceitful and within the space of a single day, became someone I could not recognise. He had gotten his prize, and the mask fell off. You wouldn’t have thought it possible to be inconsolably distraught at one of the most blissful honeymoon retreats in Mauritius, but… there I was (thank God for the barman), a frightened mix of tears, rum, sand and utter confusion.
I stayed with him for a further nine long months. I wanted to make sure I’d tried everything to ‘fix’ or at the very least, understand, what had happened — couple’s counselling, relaxing breaks away, many, many patient conversations. Nothing worked; this human turned out just not to be the person I fell in love with — actually not someone I would even have liked, had I seen his true colours from the beginning. Looking back on this period, it really was nuts. He was trying to pressure me to have children, while simultaneously being alarmingly volatile. I will never fully understand what happened.
I eventually fled to Thailand (longtime haven!) to find peace to think about what I had to do. Battled with one of the biggest decisions I’d ever made, and decided it was time to call it. This was not how I wanted the rest of my life to be. It was not what I had signed up for, and to be entirely honest, no-one deserves this. Against my pleas, he followed me to Thailand. I explained my decision, kindly but very firmly (while internally disintegrating in a puddle of grief). We went our separate ways in Koh Samui airport, and I never saw him again.
The shame swamp
I was not prepared for the shame. I was undeniably a perfectionist, happily putting my all into carving out my very best shapes in terms of life experiences, family, work. I have a conscience that nags me pretty easily and am flawed through and through like the rest of us, but I can honestly say in this scenario, my conscience was clear — I had given this man my everything. I loved him to bits. And I’d never misjudged anything so badly in my life.
[I realised, much, much later, that there had been small red (maybe orange?) flags that I’d overlooked even early on, partly because we are all conscious of the narrative that ‘no-one is perfect’, and because I thought I could ‘love away’ some insecurities in him. More fool me. I have little tolerance for such characteristics now. You need to do your work on yourself. We all do. We can support but we can’t repair.]
Perfectionists, in their eagerness to do well, and to please, fall very hard. I felt so betrayed and incredulous that someone’s character could turn so drastically on a dime. The failure felt so public, so raw. So many friends and family had just seen me trustingly and naively pledge my future to Dr. Jekyll, and wake up with Mr. Hyde. ‘What was she thinking?’ I knew they were saying. ‘How could she have been so stupid? How can someone not see that coming?’ ‘Did you hear about Lexie?’
I was torn between angrily pleading with myself that it shouldn’t bloody matter what anyone else was thinking, it’s my life, and going round and round the houses trying to piece together what on earth had just happened — how had I let it happen? It wasn’t just others’ judgments I feared, I was ashamed of myself. I was ashamed of the promises I’d made before God, and had had to break. I’d say I’m a pretty analytical, think-it-all-through kind of character, and I’d only ever intended to do this once. I’d been sure. I began to entirely distrust my judgement.
Would your works like a few more spanners?
In a morosely comedic way, misfortunes tend to come along like buses. Getting divorced in my early thirties absolutely knocked me for six. Totally unrelated, I had resigned from my job on ethical grounds. My best friend (rock climbing and scuba buddy, and confidante extraordinaire!) had left Singapore to return to her native USA, and I missed her rock solid presence like crazy.
I went back to the UK for two weeks to regroup — fleeing to the parental haven, and burying myself in clearing out all of my childhood belongings from the attic.
This turned out to be a week’s endeavour, and was, oddly, maybe one of the best things I could have done at the time. A strange catharsis comes from sifting through your earliest trinkets, toys and trophies — the things you thought were the most important in a very tiny, sheltered world at one time. Nothing reminds you of the fearless little warrior you were when you were six, believing you could do or be absolutely anything, than finding your judo Barbies (oh yes, my mum hand-sewed outfits for them) or earnest interview cassette recordings with family when you wanted to be a journalist. Scraggly, over-loved teddies and painted stones and feathers you thought were magical at the time. Diaries laying out all your dreams, drawings, notes to grandparents long gone. This is comfort land central. I laughed and cried at the memories of all the formative adventures. My parents would walk through and find me in a puddle of tears. “Are you thinking about him again?” they’d whisper patiently. “No, I just found my homemade burglar alarm,” (a tiny buzzer, 9V battery, and a pressure sensor) I laugh-cried. “Do you remember how cool I thought this was, and how I thought it could actually protect us?”
Reality calls
Two weeks of hiding out went by far too quickly, and it was time to go home to Singapore and face the music. I had another job lined up, a prestigious one I wasn’t even sure I was capable of, and had no idea how I’d landed, especially in this state. I bought an expensive suit for the first time in my life, and miserably booked a flight back to reality.
My mum came with me. I’d travelled the world independently since I was 18, staying out of the UK more often than I was in it. But sometimes when the bottom falls out of your world, there’s nothing like your mum to hold your hand. I’d a new life to set up. I had to pack up the joint flat, try and find someone to take it over (crazy difficult in Singapore) and find a smaller one. I viewed flat after flat in an absolute daze, trying to imagine my new life and desperately trying not to think about all the heady dreams I’d lost. Eventually I found a tiny studio, so small it even had a pull-out kitchen/wardrobe combo. The new salary would mean I could afford more, but this was perfect — a cozy bolt-hole I was sure not to rattle around in.
The first day at my new job rolled around. I felt sick and hadn’t slept at all. How was I going to pretend in any way shape or form after such fresh distress that I was cool, calm, collected and ready to take up a senior role at an investment firm?
I put on the new suit and heels and it felt like war paint. My mum told me she’d no doubt I’d pull it together — somehow I always did. (I wonder who I get it from.) Excellent pep talk. Off I trundled to the fanciest office I’d ever experienced, on the 46th floor of a CBD skyscraper, watching myself go like some out-of-body experience.
Somehow work happened. I smiled and schmoozed and was on my best behaviour. Nobody knew a thing. I fudged a story about why I was moving house the same week.
During my first week in the new office, my mum basically set up my new apartment — receiving furniture deliveries, and we’d unpack and slot everything into its new home in the evenings.
My mum’s three-week visit flew by and she had to head back to the UK to take care of the rest of the flock. As I closed the door behind her, I turned around and stared in surreal awe at my new status quo. One of those moments you either laugh, cry, or both. Admittedly I did a lot of the latter. I’d lost a husband (strange word — didn’t really even get to use it!), gained a new neighbourhood, home and job, all within a remarkably short space of time. Well. That was one HELL of a plot twist, I thought. Bloody hell! Well, the next chapter is all yours for the writing. Time to rebuild. Activate rebuild mode!
It takes a village
And rebuild I did. I went travelling and diving with friends, trained hard. Worked my butt off at the new job. Went to cooking classes. I met a few other people who, I was amazed, had been through similar experiences, even at younger ages than me. I reached out to a personal trainer friend I didn’t know too well, who had gotten married the summer before and then mysteriously ended the fledgling marriage very soon afterward. She took the time to write me the longest, kindest letter explaining her story, which spoke volumes to me. She was someone I admired, and I didn’t think any less of her at all, in fact I was in awe of her courage. My new home became an awesome little haven and my time felt constructive. I even tentatively dipped a toe in the dating pool again (God help me haha, but they’re not all monsters!).
‘Wow, I think I’ve emerged relatively unscathed’ I remember thinking, a few months down the line. I’ve just been through a tornado that almost ripped me apart, but somehow the storm has set me down on my feet on the other side! I remember confiding in a friend about the odd set-back, and him saying ‘you’ve got this; you’re one of the strongest people I know,’ which I’m pretty sure made my mouth make an inadvertent, surprised O shape before I made a joke and poked him in the ribs. But his confidence in my strength was incredibly reassuring. I actually seemed to be okay!?
The real storm
Oh, how wrong I was.
It was about to get a whole lot more interesting. A short while later, the global pandemic hit. Singapore, close relation to China, got swept up pretty early on. This is a blog post, not the Odyssey, so I’ll keep this part short. 13 ‘homes’, and stints in 6 different countries later, I was not in a good place. Compared to the whole being deceived into marriage debacle, this was the really painful bit. (Although I appreciate that one probably fed into the other.) More time alone with my thoughts than I’d ever have thought possible (or safe), my closest people being very far away, and some epically depressing developing country stints (where Covid-induced poverty hit incredibly hard), the return to a country I really didn’t recognise as my own; and most importantly the implosion of my parents’ marriage (would rather not write about that here), put me in a very dark place.
I can usually laugh my way through discomfort. I couldn’t. I was totally lost at sea, and very alone. I had nothing left to give, and I realise that feeling like I’m contributing is probably what usually keeps me afloat.
I remember calling a friend who works at the U.N. and is one of the most casually exceptional intellects I know. I was not in a good mental state. She told me she was having panic attacks and struggling also. I remember thinking Christ if she’s not okay, this is some real shit. But I was also hugely comforted — it is okay not to be okay sometimes.
I’ll fast-forward a bit, because no-one likes a wallower. We all have awful pandemic stories to tell and mine isn’t special. In fact parts of it are as f$&*ing mundane as they come. I worked, threw weights about like a demon, and trail ran in all of the six countries, until the world resembled something normal again. The limitations, restrictions and mental torment we suffered through during the pandemic will no doubt leave scars for years to come.
Look for the legends
Side story: on a stint passing through Greece for a couple of weeks as it was the only viable ‘orange country’ on my way back to a ‘green country’ (eye roll and PTSD triggers), I met a girl my age who was also travelling alone — on her way back to the UK because her father had just died. We bonded over raiding the closed gym for dumbbells to squirrel away in our hotel rooms, and comparing Greek wilderness trail running routes, for the old sanity retainment. My mind boggled at how together she had things, even though she’d just suffered loss. Isn’t it incredible how even in the midst of utter mayhem we meet these beacons of light that stand above the crowd and point the way? I’m not sure she’ll ever know how kick-ass/inspiring she was, or how my destroyed nerves needed to see such calm and together-ness at that point!
Soaring again
This post has been a while in the making… But somehow, surprisingly, beautifully, I am now FLYING! Flying high as a kite on all the promise and hope of a fulfilled life bursting with good things — if I take the time to seek them out. It has snuck up on me so gradually that I didn’t even notice it happening. But that six year-old warrior? She’s back!
It’s all of our story
I’ve crossed paths with a great many new people recently, as I’m currently staying (remote working) in a fitness-obsessed area in Thailand, which attracts all manner of fascinating people from different corners of the globe. I keep hearing different variations on a theme in so many people’s stories. Why are they here in Phuket? They somehow seem to have lost their joie de vivre, feel like they’re just going through the motions, and want to wake up and feel again.
There’s a pattern in almost all of their stories.
One foot in front of the other, until it feels good again
Movement is all of our best ally.
In this little slice of Thailand, we are all out here to train our socks off, and the dopamine, endorphins and sheer bloody sweat and feel-good exhaustion that comes from sport are ridiculous uppers.
But honestly, it doesn’t matter how you move! From my mum back home in Scotland doing long beach walks, to watching champion UFC fighters sweat their balls off preparing for their next competition here, being outside and moving surely make up at least 50% of the key to feeling. Mens sana in corpore sano. It’s cathartic.
I read about an older woman a while ago who suffered loss and was inconsolable. She set out walking — one foot in front of the other — because it was the only thing that dulled the pain. She walked the entire length of Britain, laser-focused, and with a simple goal, to just keep going; rain or shine, move. The passing time, repetitive movement and kind people she met along the way were basically the perfect recipe for getting perspective and realising that life wasn’t over and still contained beautiful touches. She walked herself better. I think about her surprisingly often. ‘One foot in front of the other’ became a mantra for a while. Hey, progress is progress!
Conquering a physical challenge is a win — sometimes a masochistic through-suffering-to-triumph type victory, sometimes just a straight up feel-good game or more chilled leisure activity. Any which way that works for you, these bodies were born to move!
Finding purpose
Fulfilling work then seems to be everyone’s Holy Grail. Phuket is a place that quite often attracts people who are at a life/work crossroads, but everyone I talk to here craves a meaningful job, and are generally scraping together dreams or plans to make it happen. On four out of five days, I can tick that box, which is not bad (I still work for the Singaporean company, writing about ethical investments intended to better the world. Sans suit. And get to live in the jungle. For me this is priceless!)
A side branch of this, for me at least, is a creative outlet. If you are someone who loves singing… or art, graphic design, dance, making videos, writing — whatever it is, and you neglect it, you’re doing yourself a disservice. I wrote (somewhat mechanically) through the pandemic, because I have to for work, but I’ve only just picked up writing for myself again, and it feels GLORIOUS. My other love is music, and I just feel more alive and more ME when I am singing or playing in a band. I’m working on that part. Unhelpfully, these things that are guaranteed to lift us up, are the things we least feel like doing when we’re in a dark place (because creativity needs soul, and the soul is shattered). But creativity grows quickly if you feed it just a little bit! And the feel-good reverberations — why you fell in love with it in the first place — come flooding back. If it’s a part of you when you’re happiest, don’t forget what it means to you.
Human connections of the best kind
The game changer for me — and I also see it in one way or another in most others’ aspirations — is finding that ultra-sweet spot between truly happy alone time, and fulfilling social time, or meaningful connections. There was a time after the restrictions were lifted when I abhorred spending time alone, and would pack my schedule chock full so as not to spend any time with my thoughts.
As I write this from an idyllic solo trip to Cambodia, I realise that this wound has well and truly healed. I really value my alone time, and think it’s important to check in with even the occasional uncomfortable thoughts, rather than trying to bury them away.
When I’m in a group or a couple, I tend to feel that their happiness is at least partly my responsibility, and love to keep my outlook upbeat, sunny and positive. (When I’m around people who are like this, it really is contagious — these people light me up!) When I’m alone, I’m no less sunny… but it’s become more important to me to have time to process my thoughts and file things away thoughtfully.
That said, I love spending time with interesting people. I LOVE learning of their stories, and what makes them tick. The fact that this was taken away from us in the pandemic made us all realise how richer life is for the abundance of great company life offers us. I talk a lot more to strangers here than I ever have before. It’s a stupidly easy way of opening yourself up to more inspiration that you could have imagined. Humans are inherently social, and hitting upon a deep connection with another is a pretty electrifying experience. I think at the end of the day, hanging with people you admire and vibe off makes you a better, happier person. We aren’t little islands that can bring everything we need for ourselves!
Choosing my tribe
I do find — again a common pattern in recent chats — that I’m more careful about who I spend ‘quality’ time with, and how. I work a demanding full-time job, try to train every day, and have a few precious hours to check in with my people!
There’s a saying that you’re the average of the five people you spend most of your time with… it’s not a bad rule of thumb. I find I’m now more discerning with my time and am definitely drawn to people who share an optimistic world-outlook. Honestly, I think it’s the only way we’re getting through this ride sane! People who can appreciate the little things, and find the silver linings; find goodness or humour in the tough places. Which is not to say I’d ever not find time for a friend going through a rough patch, no-one eats sunshine for breakfast all the time. But the eternal melancholics and the innately self-centred wallowers… Lordy, life is way too short. My values in friendships and relationships morphed. I’ve done a LOOOT of thinking about what constitutes a good person. I think a revelation for me is that I don’t need to try to help fix things for everyone, and that traumatic life experiences are no excuse, ultimately, for long-term poor behaviour.
Come on down to the arena
Back to Brené, and daring to get in the arena. She kindly hammered home that many failures lie ahead. It’s ominous. It’s going to hurt, it’s going to embarrass. And I enjoy falling flat on my face as much as the next girl.
But what sort of a life is it if you don’t try, and get to feel the adventures — the good, the bad, and the ugly? For all the nightmares I’ve experienced over the past four years, while I would never want to relive them, they’ve conditioned an armadillo-thick skin that keeps me safe, and have hopefully knocked some sense into me. The highs (of which there have been many, many more than the lows!) have been incredible, and the knocks make me me. I know I’m more understanding of people with messy stories, and I have the time to listen to them.
This has not been an easy write (hi, vulnerability), because a lot of my more recent friends don’t know anything about this chapter, and I was unsure about publishing it. But it might just help someone else. (And if I don’t, Brené definitely will!) I also think it’s important we don’t hide behind the glossy façade of social media. There is power in sharing gritty reality, because it dispels the myth that anything less than a fairytale ending leads to happiness.
If there’s one takeaway, please please don’t ever be scared of daring to save yourself — or others — from something damaging… because of the ramifications of shame. There is no shame in walking away from misery or abuse. On the contrary, there is dignity, grace, and powerful self-esteem that will sit with you quietly and steadfastly when you need it (caveat: wait it out, these things just might not make themselves known until a little later).
I’m happier in my skin than ever before (the small stuff isn’t worth sweating), more grateful, and quite simply, content. I trust myself to handle hardship, and know I can withstand a sizable storm — struggling for sure, but not breaking. I worked bloody hard to get here. And as I head off alone into Siem Reap for the evening, for that, I am exceptionally grateful.
“Failure can become our most powerful path to learning if we’re willing to choose courage over comfort.” — Brené Brown.
Armour up guys. It’s a wild ride.
