Whenever I encounter the question "what advice would you give to your younger self?" I often struggle to find words. There are many things I would love to say to my younger self, but I am also conscious that I am who (and where) I am in the world today, because of that person.
Still, I am often coming up with much belated answers to that question long after it has been asked of me. So here are a few of the lessons I would (and continue to) tell myself - at least from where I stand today, but who knows how that will shift and change in the future. I'm sure I will be adding to this list for a long time.
One
It will take a while and a lot of unlearning, but let go of this vague notion of "success" as the only marker of a life well lived. No one can define success for you, that's up to you to determine and life is always much more beautifully complicated than one word can capture. The word success often carries connotations of making an impact, standing out, having to do something great and grand to be remembered by. But success doesn't solely live in standing out on planet of over 7.5 billion people, in fact success often lives in the smaller, plainer every day details. Sometimes success is just making it through the day when you're not sure you can. Don't be so focused on the grand idea of changing the world that you don't see all the ways in which your life truly matters just by being here. Your success is lived in each day, in the lives you touch, in your passions, and the ways in which you move through the world. This is, and always has been, enough.
Two
The spirit of your adolescence is going to run into the realism of your mid-to-late twenties and there will be a grief process that occurs as you come to terms with fighting for "the principle of things" and the reality of directing your energy where it is most useful. It is hard to turn away from running your head into a brick wall as you try to create change. You will need to learn to hold a dialectic here - you are too small to change the biggest systems in the world, but you are also a part of bigger communities that can create change. How can you best direct your energy to the things that matter to you, while appreciating your smallness? Where is your energy best spent and how can you help the most people in the ways that matter to you even if those ways are less lofty than the natural arrogance of your adolescence might have hoped? Smaller does not mean less noble, it is just a different way of spending energy and tuning into where you - as one small part of the universe - can make the most difference and feel the most fulfilled.
Three
Nursing will save your life again and again. Always come back to it. For a long time you will think that you want to pursue medicine, and part of you does. Nursing will seem like a stepping stone and this perspective is a relic of the patriarchal society that we live in. Nursing is not less than medicine nor is it a stepping stone, it is actually the best fit for your values. People think that you save lives when you're nursing, and you do, but the truth is that it has saved you in so many ways. Nursing is your lighthouse on a distant shore. It is your north star. It is your why.
Four
For a long time you are going to deeply misunderstand what spirituality means and that it is a part of all of us. This makes sense as the pain of religion in your early years left a deep well of anger that will take a long time to work through. Spirituality is not the same thing as religion, although religion can be a part of it. When you shut off attention to this dimension of your own wellness and being, you neglect part of your own healing. You will find your place of connection in nature, your passions, and in the lives of those you love and are lucky to cross paths with.
Five
Mental illness is going to take a great deal from you and you have the choice to make your own meaning from your experiences, though you are never required too (some things just hurt.) Making your own meaning is hard work, but it is also a way to find empowerment. Your experiences of loss can become a skill in the work that you do with other human beings. It can open your eyes to the world in a different way than you might have otherwise seen it. It can offer you a path that you might not have taken and relationships with others that you might not have met.
Six
Similarly, finding your own language for your journey is going to be one of the most powerful pieces in your healing process. Growing up with mental illness and thus, developing some sense of an identity as a patient through your younger years has shaped the world into looking like its walls are built from the DSM. They are not. This is a framework for classifying disorders, it is not a judge, jury, and sentence. It does not have to define you or what you are capable of. Your definitions for yourself are what matter. They will come in fleeting moments and it will take a long time to build them up into something solid that you can hold onto. You are still learning this, you are still crawling out from under the shadow of professional opinions (which are only information, they are not the whole world.) Do not be crushed by them. Take what is useful, leave what is not. Your healing is not a nice neat narrative, but it is still a story worth telling.
Seven
For a long time you will think that you are cold to the world, indifferent; that you do not need others and self-sufficiency is the marker of success. In truth you are a deeply sensitive person, highly attuned to the nuances and energy of the world around you. It is frightening to lean into this understanding of yourself, but you cannot survive without facing this truth of your nature. You are a part of the world and it will take time to grow your roots into a solid sense of yourself. The waves that are thrown at you, that feel so overwhelming that you lose your footing with each blow, will ease once you find this place of calm. But you can only achieve this by first reckoning with yourself and the fact that you feel the world deeply. This is not a weakness, it can be a strength.
Eight
You don't know how to trust your instincts, but sometimes you have to trust your instincts. It will be a hard lesson you keep learning, but sometimes you cannot, and should not, make everything work. Some people just cannot know each other and standing firm to your boundaries is not a failure on your part no matter how many times that is used as a weapon against you. You are not "giving up on relationships" when you decide that you will no longer allow your boundaries to be repeatedly disrespected, crossed, or violated. I wish that I could tell you to care less - depend less on certain opinions, but it is a long and difficult process to try and trust in your own capacity. I am not quite there yet either, that sense of myself is shaky, but it's what I need to find to truly heal. Until then, there is always a risk of being pulled under by the weight of others opinions, but keep your heart open as best you can because most relationships are not like this and if you close yourself to everything, you confirm to your body and mind that the threat still exists in places it doesn't. You will make monsters out of shadows. You will lose out on love and chances to heal. It is a risk to remain open, but the risk of remaining "a tight bud," closed to the world, is greater. You have survived everything you have been faced with so far, remind yourself of this often.
Nine
Sometimes hope will only be the smallest flame that flickers in the corners of your heart. It will take everything you have to huddle down close to that flame, to cradle it in your hands, and to keep it from going out. If that's all you have strength to do at times in your life, it's more than enough. It won't always be this dark and precarious, but I know in the moment it is hard to imagine anything outside of the pressing despair that clings like a fog around you. As long as you are alive, there is a chance for change.
Ten
"You cannot fix people, you can only love them." Your drive to save everyone around you comes from your own fear of not being capable and never wanting another soul to feel that way. But we cannot protect people from life and if we shelter them so fervently, we never allow them to learn to trust themselves and their own capabilities. Do not hold things so tightly that you crush them in your hands. People will suffer, they will fall, and they will need help getting back up again, but you cannot let your own inner sense of insufficiency seep into, and influence, the relationships you have with those you love. Let others learn their capability. Let yourself keep learning your own capability too.
I will leave it there for now.
- S.
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