The Version of You Built For This

I post videos, write poetry, and blog articles. I started this because I want to help someone else out there and it helps me too. My videos and articles help my future self on the hard days remember the good days and the strength from the lessons learnt. It’s a living archive of survival and lessons learnt. A place where I leave breadcrumbs for me and for anyone else walking through the dark trying to find their footing again.

I lost everything, and I remember scouring YouTube to try to find a how to video for coping with losing everything and I managed to find one (most of the videos I found were related to coping with loss of a loved one and grief). The lady who made the video spoke more on what had brought her to lose everything and she offered encouragement. I needed more. I needed guidance or steps, and I needed something to hope for. Something to help me get out of my panicked state and just get moving. I wanted to find someone who had overcome and could share what they learnt, but I was also craving someone to walk with me as I was going through things. Someone that would share their journey as they were experiencing it as well. Someone to take my hand and walk with me and guide the way when I couldn’t see the path ahead.  Someone to look up to. I was reeling and devastated. I was struggling and I was in a dark place. Numb and overwhelmed all at once. Shell-shocked. Alone. Isolated. So, I promised myself, that once I found my footing again that I would become the person that I needed when I was in that dire moment for someone who will need it one day.  So, I did. I couldn’t find a roadmap, so I started building one. Not from the peak of the mountaintop after the victory, but from the middle of the climb, while my hands and soul were still trembling.

And I knew that one day, those videos would be for me again, to get me through the rough times again. And today is the day. I’m so glad I made those videos and wrote these articles. Future me can aspire to past me. Who said time travel wasn’t possible? I create videos for the future and greet my past self all the time when I watch them back. It’s an ongoing conversation and encouragement pre-emptively made for the day the message is needed. And the message hits differently in times of distress. Sometimes strength is something you borrow from a version of you who already survived the hard thing. If you’ve made it through before, there is still a version of you that knows how to survive this too.

When I was younger, I had a big imagination. I lived in different worlds. I believed in magic. Anything was possible. Ask a kid what they want to be when they grow up, most will either not know or they will have something somewhat realistic, like a real profession; a vet, an astronaut, a ballerina, something plausible and rooted in the real world. Had you asked me, I would have said a mermaid, Inspector Gadget, MacGyver, a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, but mermaid consistently. And I used to believe in mermaids, that maybe they could exist perhaps they were even bloodthirsty monsters. I used to believe in dragons and fairies too, well into my twenties. Anything could be possible. The universe is so big, there are so many baffling mysteries, legends and myths. It was such a lovely idea. Back then, imagination came naturally. I didn’t need evidence to believe in something better. I just…believed.

The moon and the stars always felt so special to me too. I still wish on stars and look to the Heavens when I’m praying and wishing for things. It just feels nice, and it reminds me that not everything has to be figured out to be held with hope and wonder.

Life can be so challenging and deflating. I wish it wasn’t. Coping and navigating traumatic events or situations causes personas to be born and to fade away. Different versions of yourself appear to carry you through the event, deliver you and then fade away. You are changed, permanently altered. And it continues as many times as is necessary, especially if you carry a searing rage. At least, that has been my experience. Usually, I rely on that heat to get me through. It births a version of me that is determined, gritty, action-oriented. But today, I’m completely drained and spent. There is nothing left in the tank. My rage is drowned by exhaustion and sadness.  I’m learning that not every season of survival looks like fire. Some seasons look like stillness and trying to breathe without giving up.

I heard something the other day that was meant to offer encouragement. Something to the effect of “You’ve become the person that could save your younger self when you needed it.”, and I remember thinking but how can I save me now? I always find a way, I take action, I pivot, change, adapt. I’m endlessly curious, perseverant, passionate, and I refuse to let this be the end of my story. I’m not a quitter. But as I’m writing these qualities that is the healthy version of my rage, I have turned it into dedicated passion and that resource is currently MIA. How do I move forward during burnout? Today is day one, so I need time to process and make plans and try taking some steps and see what works. It’s time for re-invention again. Right now, my job is simple: rest where I can, be gentle where I can, and trust that even this version of me, the tired and spent one, is still a version built for survival.

I love that part, by the way, after all the crap, despair, tears, stress, worry, and all the bullshit. I love the part when I’m ok, and planning a new me, new habits, new environment, new life. It’s full of hope and possibility. Full of imagination. Kind of like when I was a kid and I used to dream and wish. It feels like that. Anything is possible when you’re re-imagining a new start. Re-invention has always begun in my imagination before it ever shows up in my life. I see it and feel it there first. Then slowly, I grow into it and let it take shape in reality.

This time I’m going to rely on the younger me. The one full of hope, wonder and imagination. I think it’s the little girl that will save me this time. Maybe strength right now doesn’t look like force. Maybe it looks like wonder. Like letting possibility exist again before I know how I’ll get there.

Whatever you’re going through. Hang in there. You’re not alone, case in point. If you’re in your own version of “day one”, you’re not behind. You’re at the beginning of a rebuild, even if all you did today was make it through. That counts! And this space is where we rebuild, one step at a time. I’ll be here, walking it too.