How I Knew Enough Was Enough

You know those ugly cries - the ones where you feel like you can barely breathe? When your whole body literally quakes? The ones where you wake up both of your parents because they think someone is legitimately being murdered? No? Okay. That one might just be me. I'll bet they were happy they had me home for Christmas...

But you do know those ugly cries. When you've cried so hard that it looks as though you're having an allergic reaction to a bee sting. We have all been there. When life has just thrown too much sh*t your way and, well, you just snap.

So, there I was, in my parent's house in the middle of December, crying like a six-year-old.

But had life thrown too much sh*t my way? Or was I just failing to learn my lessons and to avoid making the same mistakes? Was I remaining complacent and refusing to grow? Was I staying firmly wedged in the same comfortable cycles I'd created for myself, simply because they're comfortable?

I have lived a life of patterns and cycles without even realising it. I would fling myself from one highly intense situation to the next, thriving in the chaos, revelling in the drama. I would allow people to hurt me. I would miss opportunities for my own growth, out of fear of failure. I would have no clear boundaries or discipline of my actions. I would prioritise just about everything and everyone over myself. I was out of control. But, it felt comfortable to me. So comfortable, in fact, that I refused to budge. 'This is just how it is.' I would tell myself. 'This is just what I attract'.

But that night, the night of the ugly cry, changed my life. Enough was enough. I was sick of being a victim to a world I had created. I was sick of blindly following the same patterns over and over again. I was sick of, well, feeling f*cking sick.

For the record, I'm not suggesting that I am solely responsible for the pain in my life. Not by a long shot. To put it plainly, people can be total a**holes. But, if I had adjusted my boundaries, realised my self-worth and prioritised my future and my happiness above all else, I'd bet a handsome sum that I'd have been able to avoid a lot of these situations. (I don't actually have a 'handsome sum', but, you get the picture). It's okay to blame the world for some of the sh*t that happens to you, but growth occurs when you look to yourself for how you could have responded better.

I realised that night that, this isn't just how it is. This isn't just what I attract. What my life is, and what my energy attracts, is a choice. It always has been. I can choose to create a negative or a positive energy around me. I can choose who enters my world. I can create whatever life I so desire. I should have always been and should always be my first priority.

But, y'know, in order to grow, we have to make these mistakes. And that's okay! Everything that I have done up until this very second has moulded me into the person I am today, and, I have to say, I actually really like this person (at last). I have learned so much about myself, about people and about the world; I feel ready to start breaking my cycles and becoming a better version of myself.

The problem with self-realisation is that you can't rush the process. No matter how hard you try. If I was able to travel back in time, grab my twenty-year-old self by the shoulders and try to shovel this information into her brain, she'd have resisted. Probably would've told me to f*ck off. I've always had a way with words. You cannot hope to help yourself until you're ready, it just won't happen.

I mean, look at me, I blew the dust off of a Self Help Book my parents gave to me in, I think, 2017, a week ago. A week ago! But, I mean, c'mon, a fresher at university wasn't gonna spend her nights unlocking her unmet emotional needs now, was she?

The Power of the Ugly Cry is truly immense. It forced me to take a step back and look at my life through a fresh, albeit watery, pair of eyes.

How was I standing in the way of my own growth?

How was I contributing to my own pain?

Why was I letting people disrupt my energy?

Why was I shying away from opportunity and clinging to toxicity?

How can I become stronger to deal with the world better?

Praise be to the Ugly Cry! Though I couldn't see it at the time, that night was probably the best thing that has happened to me in a long time. (Sorry again to everyone in a five mile radius that I inevitably woke up, though).

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