I know they say don’t put all your eggs in one basket, but sometimes you really do have to just trust. Where else do you put your eggs, you’d just keep them for yourself forever with no benefit? I am one of those people that trusts, believes and has faith, and it most certainly has burned me but I refuse to give up because it has also gotten me a lot of positive things as well. Everything worth doing has a level of risk, and skepticism and cynicism is just no way to live. I’d rather have put my eggs into the wrong basket than to never have tried at all. In December, I decided to give up my job at the best place I’ve ever worked. There was not a single thing I didn’t love about being there, except the physical location of it tying me down. In that same vein, I dropped a bunch of other jobs, because if I needed the flexibility then I needed to be all in. I don’t do things half-way. One of my colleagues was sad I was leaving but said “I know you are chasing something really important and following your heart and you need to do that.” I could say now that I did it for nothing, but I don’t think that’s true. I would never have forgiven myself if I hadn’t been all in and taken the chance and given everything I have fully. I’d rather give my everything and not have it work out than have held something back. If something doesn’t go as planned, I look toward myself, what did I do wrong and what could I have changed. I’m learning to give myself compassion instead of self-blame. I come back to the fact that I trust my heart and my Guru, plus I did what I knew how to do at the time with my skills and abilities then. There are some things that we cannot change, they are etched into Hukam and there is a reason they exist. Why do we carry so much shame and heavy feelings, as if it is about our inherent worthiness and lack of effort, when the outcome wasn’t in our hands in the first place? We make things about ourselves when they aren’t, they are simply the action of the Universal life force, whether it is a temporary detour or a permanent one.
Each happening gives us an opportunity for growth. Shuffling the jobs actually did give me more flexibility to breathe and explore. It is fulfilling its original function in a new way that I wouldn’t have otherwise realized. When we learn new ways of being, they become so integrated it is hard to imagine life the way it was before. I was attached to places and situations that were draining me because they were unsafe. It is so odd that letting go of that job was actually what I needed, because I realized all of the things that are holding me down and restricting me and was able to finally start to cut those off. With each decision made, it has been a burden lifted. When we are collectivists, we grow up constantly thinking about other people and what they need, what is the greater good, the greater need. We start to give up parts of ourselves too. The greater need can actually only truly be met when our internal compass feels like it is no longer trapped. When we truly feel connected, free, whole, safe, peaceful and at ease. It takes a while sometimes to put a positive direction to a situation that you didn’t want in the first place. Sometimes it takes years to realize what gift came out of a situation. To do so immediately would not acknowledge the pain and nature of the process itself. When we grow, sometimes that growth is so dramatic that it is irreversible and irrevocable, it is a true gift of a new way of being integrated into the One.
Not everyone's safety net is the same if they fall (hence the dog photo (reference https://i.pinimg.com/originals/7e/47/45/7e474561622586c012867c78f4ad8787.jpg). I recently was going over this topic and an outside observer said, "do you realize you don't really have the same net other people do?" That net directly correlates to how big we jump, how many risks we are willing to take. I always thought that as brown families, we are lucky to have a larger safety net, that if we go somewhere we have this understanding that these are "our people" and they will look out for us. It's our own type of net that other people don't have. Our families are large and not just our immediate families. Now I understand that although my net exists, it has not been strong enough to catch me at times, and I have fallen through and landed hard. During this conversation I started to learn more about the intricacies of this "net" that people have. For someone who has been betrayed many times, trusting is not the same as trusting when you've been supported your whole life. Dreaming, when your dreams has been broken, is not the same as dreaming when all your dreams have come true up until now. Another example would be the backpacking in Europe situation- the ability to go places unplanned, without a care on a whim, with financial backing. I've always had to plan because there's many things I could not take for granted to be true, that other people can because of who they are and who I am. I'm a celiac, lactose-intolerant vegetarian, I don't just blindly travel up North and just assume there is food for me to eat. I don't assume I will be accommodated wherever I go, I can't just have the luxury of assuming things to be true that others might. I can't just choose a random place to live and have it work out... travelling safely as a female is different. I know these things only now because of sticky situations and lived experience. For others, it might be that they can't travel to India, our homeland without worrying about whether they are safe, they might have to take extra considerations. This "net" might include whether or not you have friends to support you when you collapse, and whether you have a shoulder to cry on. It can include cultural things like whether you are able to talk about your problem without deep shame or whether there is so much stigma you might not be able to share it. This is not just a matter of topics of "privilege", a net is so much more than that. Even having faith- the ability to trust in a higher purpose and power has it's own net that catches us when we fall, and not everyone has that.
After that conversation I realized my ability to take a leap and live to the intensity I live considering the kind of net I have, and the fact that I have previously fallen right through with no safety is a remarkable act of courage. I've had such a hard time "seeing myself" like other people see me, and I feel like this really has started to allow me to see myself in a different way from within. Our ability to see ourselves and validate our own experience is in itself a part of the net and I didn't even used to have that to hold onto. I didn't know such an extensive concept of safety, and a safety net existed. It allows us to understand where we are and how to build ourselves stronger nets so that we can go out and allow ourselves to be caught if we fall, and to rise up again. I wonder about our parents' generation and their safety nets. Perhaps the cultural communities in the villages gave them some benefits, but I know that many of them also had some very deep gaps and struggles which is why they wanted our generation secure futures in these western countries, and to choose more secure jobs as well.
As much as life is bursting inwardly, I am still patiently awaiting to see what direction God takes me. So much changes and yet nothing changes all at once. I think God gives us what we need for our next stage of life, so we are ready and to be the best most whole versions of ourselves. We keep getting more lessons as we walk toward our ultimate awakening. Things work themselves out in mysterious ways, and the people, places and things that are coming to us will come in their own time when things are shuffled in a different way. When things become unstuck they flow more freely and naturally. There are many paths in the same direction, it doesn’t have to be in a certain way. Sometimes the longer route is the better one because we learned something that we needed to truly be able to succeed. All I know is that I'm learning the things I need to learn to feel fulfilled, whole, safe and at ease. Here's a painting I made recently:
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