So I Went Out By Myself Last Night

I’m reading The Alchemist. It’s a wonderful book. I’ve learned a lot about what it means to follow my “personal legend”.

So when I was driving home last night, I realized that unlike most nights, I didn’t want to go home and go to bed. I wanted to hear music. And I wanted to dance. That was my personal legend. For the night, at least.

It was Thursday. There were tons of places I could go on a Thursday. “But I’m alone,” I thought. “I can’t go alone.”

You’re probably reading this thinking, yes you can. And yes, I can. But being able to do something and actually having the courage to are two different things. We can run for President. We can go skydiving. We can shave our heads bald if we wish. But will we? Do we?

I drove around thinking about whether I had it in me to go to a party by myself. I had seen other girls do it. There were a few that I always saw when I was out and they were alone. But they didn’t seem lonely. They came, they had a drink, they danced. If they could do it, couldn’t I?

I parked my car in my driveway and left my purse in my car. I knew that if I left it in there and decided to stay home, I would have to go and get it, which is the halfway mark to going out entirely.

So I left my purse. I set up a trap for myself to get me to do what I wanted to do.

I went upstairs, changed into some jeans, tied my hair up and looked myself in the mirror as the Rocky theme song played from a magical speaker in the air. And then I got in my car and drove.

I can’t tell you why I had the thoughts I had while I was driving. But I can tell you what they were and perhaps you can relate.

Do I dance? Like, by myself?

How much should I be in my phone?

Do I buy myself a drink?

Do I look for other losers like me and try and make a coalition?

What time should I leave?

And what will I do with my hands?

When I entered the party, the music gave me a warm welcome and I knew I made the right choice. I walked over to the bar, I ordered a drink and I watched the sports recaps of the week. I sat there and said hello to a few people that I had known. And then I danced. Not in the middle. And not too far out. I just rocked back and forth all night long to the music that brought me there. And it was one of the best nights I’ve ever had.

We live in a society that praises independence while simultaneously discouraging us from being alone. Our culture praises cliques and the grouping of individuals together, even if it is founded upon shallow relationships and hollow principles. The dichotomy is so confusing that it’s awkward and challenging to be in our own company in public, despite our willingness, and even our desire to.

But by reading The Alchemist, I am learning to unconcern myself with those voices, those thoughts and those ideas, and instead listen to the desires of my heart and of my soul.

So last night, when I said and when I felt, “I want to hear some music,” it was louder than the “but you’re alone,” and the “you can’t go alone,” which I also said and felt.

You can feel a bunch of things. But you only have to pick one.

The thing is, I was so close to staying home. I was so close to settling. I was so close to letting the fears that have been pushed onto me by a series of cultural institutions and the ways of social media that I almost opted out of doing what I desired.

But I didn’t.

I even found the answers to my menacing thoughts.

Yes you dance. By yourself.

Don’t go in your phone. And I didn’t.

Yes, buy yourself a drink. But just one, you’re driving.

They’re not losers. Don’t look for them. And don’t make a coalition.

Leave when you feel content. Leave when you feel you got what you desired.

That’s a tough one. Act natural?

There’s a quote that is often repeated in The Alchemist and it reads, “When you want something, the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

I think that deep down inside we all know what we want. But I also think that there are a lot of things that get in the way and confuse us and trick us into thinking maybe we want something else. And despite knowing, we second-guess, for one reason or another. It’s not a terrible thing to second-guess, to think, to analyze and to consider. But it is a terrible thing to let those things get in the way of what you really desire.

So know. Second-guess. Analyze. And consider.

But follow your intuition. It only ever leads us to beautiful places.

Places that we belong. 

The Life Lesson I Learned at My First Hindu Wedding

This weekend, my boyfriend and I attended a Hindu wedding ceremony.

On Friday night, we went to the Vedic ceremony at the Hindu Sabha Temple. The room was full of circular tables for the guests to sit at and witness the marriage of the bride and groom.

My boyfriend and I stood at the back of the room, carefully contemplating which table to occupy. I saw one table that was empty and offered a great view because it was close to the front. I pointed to it and we headed over.

We sat down, and the ceremony began shortly after. But as a first-timer, I was so excited to see the ceremony that we moved a few seats over to get a better view. When I moved, I heard some huffing and puffing going on behind me. I turned my head to see that I was now in the way of a little girl’s view. The girl, about 11, gave me a series of dirty looks, making it obvious that she was annoyed with me.

At first, I felt bad for impeding her ability to see, but as she continued to huff and puff, obviously trying to make a point, I was reminded of a book I read in grade eight.

The book was called The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens by Sean Covey. One of the seven habits that stuck with me throughout the years was how to be proactive instead of reactive. Essentially, had she had read the book, she would have known that in this case, rather than huffing and puffing and readying herself to blow a house down, she should’ve simply got up and switched seats.

With this reminder, I was able to watch the bride and groom perform the rites and marry each other-guilt free. My boyfriend and I even joked about it; every time we shifted in our seats we looked at each other, as if we feared for our lives and listened for her loud, exhaustive sighs.

The second night of the wedding was the reception. It took place in a beautiful banquet hall. After dinner and a few speeches, the DJ asked the crowd if we were ready to party, to which everyone in the room replied a roaring yes. But when the music started, I was reminded of just how much my boyfriend hates dancing.

Despite being ready to fly over to the dance floor, my date needed a couple drinks in his system before busting his moves. I learned very early on in our relationship that this is just how he is.

I was annoyed. I sat there wondering when on earth he was going to be ready, because I sure was.

“Go dance,” he suggested. I rolled my eyes. “By myself?” I shot back.

Just as I was about to huff and puff, I remembered the little girl from the night before. Just as fast as I was able to diagnose the problem of her being reactive instead of proactive, I was able to realize that I was being reactive, too.

I asked myself, “Are you upset that Renaldo isn’t dancing? Or are you upset because you’re not dancing?”

Boom.

The issue the first night was that the little girl’s view had been blocked. Rather than get up and move to one of the many empty seats, she made a commotion to get our attention and hope that we would pity her and unblock her view.

The issue the second night was that I was ready to dance and my partner wasn’t. And so I too, sat there, getting ready to huff and puff, hoping he’d feel bad for me and get up and dance. But what type of dancing would that be?

On that second night, I headed over to the dance floor. I didn’t know anyone, but I knew how to dance. So I did. And after a few more drinks, he came and joined me and we danced together.

So many times, our emotions cloud our ability to identify the real issue. We’re unable to see what it is that’s really bothering us. And more importantly, we’re unable to see that the solution lies within us, and certainly within our control.

In both cases, the solution, and the lesson, was the same.

Sometimes, all you have to do is get up and move.

The Unexpected Lesson I Learned at My First Rave

This past weekend, I learned a very valuable lesson about perspective. And accountability.

It came at an unexpected time, in an even more unexpected place: Beach Club Fest 2015.

Thousands of Toronto’s hottest party animals descended on Muzik Nightclub Saturday afternoon for an all-day, all-night party. Women wearing bikinis and stilettos walked past muscular, shirtless men.

There I was in the midst of it all, wondering what I had been doing there. I had never been into electronic dance music, but when my two friends insisted I would have a good time, I felt compelled to accept the invite.

I lay there in my yellow bikini under a tree, taking in the sun. I realized a long time ago that I have an abnormal obsession and love for the feeling of the sun on my skin, and not for the tan. I just love feeling the warmth of the sun on me. So much so that whenever the sun got trapped in the big tree ahead of me, my smile turned upside down.

I had been laying there for about half an hour when I realized that the sun was diminishing. It was moving very gradually away from me and was almost completely hidden behind the tree.

My friends had suggested moving to the pool where there was more sun. But I insisted on staying where we were. I knew that after a short while, the sun would be back in the open sky and I would feel that warmth again.

Another half hour passed and the sun was still hiding behind the tree. While it had indeed moved, it still had a long way to go before it was out in the clear sky again. Fed up, my friends said, “Stephanie, there is sun at the pool, we just have to move there.”

The idea of getting up, gathering all my belongings, and trying to find comfort at the pool seemed daunting. But I wanted the warmth of the sun more than I wanted to stay where I was. And so I picked myself up, gathered my belongings, and walked over to the pool.

When we got to the pool, I couldn’t believe how warm it was there. The sun was directly on me! People were dancing. Heck, I was dancing. There were beach balls everywhere. But more importantly, there was sun. There wasn’t a cloud-or a tree-in sight.

I was crushed that I hadn’t moved here earlier. I could’ve been feeling the comfort of the sun all this time. Mid-dance move I asked myself what had been stopping me the whole time I was laying by the tree.

Truthfully, I just didn’t want to move. I was comfortable. I knew the sun was going to come back in due time. I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want to do anything. I was being lazy. I just wanted to lay there and feel the sun.

Then it hit me.

Constantly, easily, and unforgivingly do we make excuses for ourselves to stay in whatever situation we might be in at the time. We get comfortable, we tell ourselves it will happen later, or next time, when really, those are grounds for it, whatever it might be, to not happen at all.

How could I have possibly laid there under that tree for almost an hour waiting for the sun to come back when there was sun elsewhere the entire time? It’s like I was standing in a dark room complaining there was no light and there had been a switch in front of me the whole time. All I had to do was reach for it.

That tree had represented every piece of adversity I had ever faced. It represented the word no. It represented every excuse I had ever made for myself, and every excuse I made for others.

We get so familiar with the darkness that we forget what the warmth of light feels like. We forget how to remind ourselves to look elsewhere when our current circumstance isn't good enough for us. We forget what good enough is.

It is so easy to stumble across mediocrity, unhappiness, or complacency. It’s so easy to fall into a rut and decorate it and call it home. But just because it’s easy doesn’t mean it’s okay.

This weekend I learned that in life, there is only so much sunlight before the darkness comes. And you’re going to want as much of it as you can get, not only because it feels good but because you deserve it. You have to be willing to get up and move sometimes.

As I stood there on the side of the pool, looking all around me and feeling kissed by the sun, I learned two very valuable lessons. The first is that if you want it, whatever it might be, you have to go after it. The second is that the music of life really isn't so bad once you start dancing.

Trying To Move On? Read This.

Once, in an anti-smoking ad, producers sent kids to the streets on a smoke break.

They smoked faked cigarettes around adults that were on a smoke break as well. Nearly every single adult was bewildered by what they were seeing, and told them to stop. When the kids asked why they should stop, the adults said, “Because it’s bad for you.” And the kids responded, “Then why do you do it?”

Now that is a good ad. It gets the message across clearly and very effectively, but more importantly, it illustrates a very familiar human concept:

That many things are easier said than done.

Not swearing in fits of rage, not eating food we know is bad for us but tastes so, so good, and lastly, walking away from something we know is bad for us.

One thing I’ve been hearing about since my entrance into womanhood, and a thing that I have certainly experienced for myself at one time or another, is how hard it can be to move on from someone that does us no good whatsoever.

The tough part of this whole thing is that once someone enters into your life, it is next to impossible to imagine a life without them. Not everyone can be so easily dismissed.

What if the smoker never picked up the first cigarette?

A lot of people think that moving on is the part where you’re just over someone. You’re over their ways, your over their words, and you’re just so fed up. But that, simply, is just being over someone.

Moving on is different because you get to a place where you genuinely wish the best for this person. It might even mean smiling at them finding love with someone other than you. But most of all, it’s being at peace.  Peace with the past, peace with the present, and peace within yourself.

How does one find peace?

The best, and sometimes the only way to find peace, is to give it time. It is the most dramatic and cliché saying and suggestion, but that’s because it is deeply rooted in truth.

In many ways, a broken heart is like a wound. Sometimes it’s so deep and so internal you don’t even know it’s there. But after a while, the pain becomes unbearable, and you finally realize it. It then turns into a scar or a cut, and while it can be so present for the first little while, time passes and it slowly starts to fade away...

And even after it’s almost fully gone, you’ll see the little mark, the little difference between who you were then and who you are now.

Don’t be afraid to be changed by your experiences. Don’t apologize for being more careful. And don’t apologize for the steps you took to grow. You are the result of your life experiences.

But being bitter about the past is perhaps one of the most toxic ways to be. It disables us from truly basking in the greatness that is our present, even if it doesn’t feel so great at times, or ever. Because greatness doesn’t come from what we have. It doesn’t come from our luxuries or our ability to fulfill our materialistic desires.

Instead, greatness comes from being at peace. It comes from knowing that even if you were stripped of all that you had, you would still be at peace because of the greatness that lives within you.

So, if the greatness lies within us, why are we so caught up with people who only seem to take it away?

Simple.

We have not realized our greatness yet.

And to you, I say that you are worth the discovery of your greatness. And you’re certainly worth the discovery of your peace. You do not need to exhaust yourself with the process of trying to extract blood from a stone or assign meaning to things you know will mean nothing in the end.

You’re better than empty words and broken promises and repeated mistakes.

The good news is that you can still love a person and get over them, and you can still love someone and move on. But hate fits nowhere. Because all hate means is that a part of you is angry at the person, the situation, or yourself. And frankly, all three things go hand in hand.

Fill yourself with love. Look for love and light in everything that you do and everyone that you meet. Smile when you want to frown and be thankful when you feel there is nothing left.

I know it sounds like the most abstract and indirect route to getting to the place you know you need to arrive at, but there really is no final destination. Just a journey. And you ought to keep an eye out for the beautiful things you’ll see along the way.

So what if the smoker never picked up the first cigarette?

They would not have learned the beautiful lesson in finding the strength within themselves to conquer something they once felt they couldn’t.

Why I Had to Grow Up Even Though I'm in My Twenties

I always detest it when people say cheerfully, “Change is good!”

I mean, change is very subjective. How can we possibly assume that all change is good?

Personally, there are a lot of changes going on in my life right now, and yesterday my head nearly popped off and rolled itself around on the ground at all the madness.

Firstly, my parents have decided to put our house up for sale and move us into an apartment.  They say home ownership is becoming too costly, they’re getting older and mowing the lawn and plowing the snow is not as easy as it looks.

Secondly, one of my sisters and I are on the outs. The last time we had a dispute it lasted three years, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this one followed suit.

Lastly, I’ll be attending a new campus this coming September. After spending the last four years familiarizing myself with the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, I’m afraid of petty things; where I will park my car, whether I’ll find the washrooms easily or have an accident in the hallway, and whether the doors are push, or pull.

While all of these changes seem manageable, for some reason they seem to have been interfering with my life a lot lately.

Yesterday, to avoid my head popping off, I decided to go to my old elementary school to take a walk around one of my favorite neighborhoods in the city. The houses that fill the tree-lined streets are just beautiful. They’ve got big bay windows with beautiful panes and decorative doors, and long front porches that I would love to sit and drink tea on.

But when I turned into the parking lot, I saw my old school being bulldozed. As I exited my car and looked at the pile of concrete that had once been the place I made amazing memories, I had to answer one question about my resistance to all the changes going on.

What’s the real problem?

As I began walking, one foot in front of the other, step by step, I realized that the problem wasn’t that I was going to have to make small talk with people I did not know in the elevator until I got to my floor. I realized that it wasn’t about the fact that my sister didn’t care to speak to me, or that I would have to face the possibility of the door not opening if I leaned on it.

I realized that the problem was that I was going to have to grow up. And I mean really grow up.

Through all of this, my partner has repeatedly told me that I need to let things go.

“But how?” I sobbed to him with tears and boogers streaming down my face.

This was the question I would have to answer if I wanted to enter the next phase of my life with grace and dignity. I would be 23 years old in exactly 8 months and I had a lot of changes to make.

As I continued to walk, I felt the sun on my skin. Even though it was setting, it was still bright enough for me to feel the warmth of it touch me. And it felt really good. The warmer it felt, the more I was able to really understand the root of my emotions.

As I walked, I realized that I wasn’t upset we were selling the house. I knew it would be so much less of a burden on my parents. I had thought about this idea a hundred times over, more concerned with their well-being than waiting on an elevator. I realized that instead, I was upset that they hadn’t asked me about how I felt about it.

This was a good sign. It meant that, sure, I was an adult now, and wanted to be a part of our family’s decision-making instead of just dragged along in whatever worked best. Despite them being the parents and not really having to run anything by me at all, I wasn’t (contrary to popular belief) just a little kid anymore.

I was upset because I didn’t have a say.

When it came to my sister, I don’t think I was upset because she wasn’t speaking to me. I was upset about the circumstances surrounding the issue; the lack of closure. While explaining this to my partner, I told him, “I like there to be periods at the end of my sentences, not just ink that fades away.”

Truthfully, there was no period at the end of this sentence. There was no closure, no finishing statement. It was just one of those things that would hang in a cloud until someone decided to clear the air.

I walked back towards my car, parked in the lot of my old school. I stared again at the pile of concrete. I had flashbacks of recess, track-and-field day, and running long jump. I looked over to the two baseball diamonds I played slo-pitch on. The grass was growing over the gravel, what a shame.

Then I thought about how sad I had been to hear of this place getting bulldozed. When really, what did it matter? I didn’t go there anymore. It was no longer my school. It was just the school I had gone to at one point in my life.

It was then that I realized that I was too focused on the institutions where my memories took place, my house, my school, rather than the actual memories themselves. I was so fixed on cherishing the home of my moments that I almost forgot that the moments would have happened anyway.

As I walked back to my car, I hoped that my new school would have a parking lot just like this one. And I hoped that I would even be lucky enough to get a spot. I felt the fear of starting at a new place start to fade, and the excitement start to grow.

Maybe it wasn’t the fact that it was a new school, but that it was the last of two years that I would be a student. And truthfully, I loved being a student. I loved learning, I loved doing tests, I loved doing assignments, I loved reading. I loved the student life.

When I got home that night, I talked to my parents. I asked them if I could help in the search for our new place; townhouse, apartment, or shack. Surely, as long as I got to live with them, I would be fine.

And when I woke up in the morning, I apologized to my sister. It wasn’t about who was right or wrong, it was about the fact that I didn’t want to be the one who didn’t try to make it work.

And then I googled my new school. There is a parking lot. It looks just like the one my old school had. I even located the washrooms on the map. Couldn’t find any information about the doors, though.

I can’t say I always detest people who say cheerfully, “Change is good!” But maybe I can say I envy them. Because they don’t have to go soul-searching for answers to questions other people are too afraid to find out. They can rest assured that it isn’t about the change, it’s about the process.

And if there is one thing I know for sure, it’s that in life, we have to do one thing, and one thing only; trust the process.

Perhaps the reason change is so scary is because we become content with where we’re at, afraid that it won’t get any better than this. We’re afraid of who we’ll meet, whether they’ll be better than who we have in our lives already, and if the grass really is greener on the other side.

Why not just water our own?

But the refusal to believe that yes, there is better out there, illustrates a complacency that many of us, you and I included, are simply too good for.

So I can't face these upcoming changes with resistance. Instead, I can welcome them, walk with them, one foot in front of the other.

Step by step.