What made me the way that I am?
Moving to the south has brought up a lot of questions… like how far away from the shore do
I have to look to spot a whale? What time to alligators wake up? Is it really safe to surf… the ocean isn’t going to eat me? You call this a left turn lane?? (I’m looking at you, Florida!) And just how warm would I actually be in a wetsuit?
And these questions make me giggle. I can’t wait to find all the answers. But today, it’s a different question on my mind, and this one is about you… Ready?
What is it that allows you, dear reader, to lift your eyelids and raise your head each morning?
What does it take to peel your body from the bed beneath you and set your feet upon the world once again?
For some people, this happens in a jolt. They leap up, whether in a stress or on a note of glee, and greet the day ahead of them.
For others, it happens in a dreamy flutter of lids. A thought of gratitude, a mindful prayer. They might feel the sensation of their body, from their toes through the thick muscles of the thighs, all the way to the warmth of their hair on the base of their neck and piled at their crown.
And then, there are those who are tired from fighting a battle all alone in a sea of people. (Or maybe they are truly alone, in the state of the world today.)
I’ve been each of these wakers throughout my life. Which are you today?
Side note: All of the links in this article go to a blog post I wrote during that time in my life. Click the ones you want to know the story behind, and they’ll open in a new window for you. :)
From the crippling anxiety, mood swings from hell, and constant state of panic that came from being on Prednisone to treat a freak incident with my immune system back in 2019. My last summer in Idaho was a painful existence. I hardly slept, I was in constant anxiety. I felt like my bones were made of glass and every noise and light and thought hit my consciousness like nails on a chalk board. There was no peace, no break, even in sleep. In those days, I jolted up and dragged myself to a shower to drown out the noise and feeling a while longer.
Those nights, I sat in the chipped claw foot tub which rested its rusty feet on a rotting apartment floor, and tried to talk myself out of suicide again and again. I fell to the ground and cried in the streets, hiding my head in my arms, because facing people was literally painful for me, and I was trying to get over it by forcing myself out into the busy downtown streets below my home.
Then, I moved to the Oregon coast in my RV alone, without my (now ex) husband. I started writing Raped, Not Ruined and learning about Ayurveda. I embraced the healing, I found peace. My first day alone in Oregon was my first day free from Prednisone, after two months of being weaned off, a fraction of a dose at a time to prevent withdrawals from shutting down my kidneys, or something like that.
I was alone then, with my three pups and my cat. I woke in a happy haze, stretched and felt my body, felt grateful before I even opened my eyes at 4:30am, fumbling to turn my alarm off with a sleepy giggle. I sat up and exhaled, opening my eyes intentionally as my feet touched the cold RV floor, and contentedly tiptoed along the cool linoleum floor to turn on the heater and start the water for my tea. I lived for my creative work and it healed me, one day at a time.
But before I woke in either of these ways, I lived a life where I never wanted to wake up at all. I wished I could just stop existing.
Back in my old life, the one before I started my business (and even for a little while after, as my new life was just beginning to take shape), I struggled with depression and frequent suicidal thoughts. I felt very strongly, or else I felt numb and hopeless. I’d wake, disappointed that the sun was already up, too tired to move. The light felt too bright, my limbs didn’t want to move. I was tired.
I would sleep another hour, or four, crawling out of bed in the late afternoon.
I didn’t feel hungry. I didn’t feel anything most of the time then. And that’s what I want to talk about today… because I haven’t thought about that time in so long, and back then, I had no idea this life I’m living today was possible.
If you feel numb, if you feel stuck, if you’ve lost the purpose and point, I want you to know you’re not as alone as you feel.
I want you to know there’s more to life.
There’s more to your life.
I want you to know you are living your life right now. You are living. I know it might not feel like it, but you are. And the world needs you, and you need you, and you can do things that your future self will thank you and love you for to no end. And it’s okay to be tired and numb even as you do it.
And I want you to know that right now, today, tomorrow… you don’t have to do a single thing. And emotional doing is just as much work as physical doing, even if the people around you don’t recognize that right now.
(That’s what I wish I could go back and tell myself. I needed rest. I was so tired, but even when I slept, I was beating myself up about all the big dreams and possibilities I should have been chasing and working toward in my head. I was tallying up all the people I’d let down with my decisions or stressing about how to not disappoint anyone with a current decision. I was agonizing over all the people following my dreams might hurt or make uncomfortable. I didn’t seem to “do” anything, but I was spending a ton of emotional energy and I needed to rest and allow myself to not do any work. Not even emotional work. So… you don’t have to do anything today, I just want you to know that.)
I’ve Been Thinking A Lot Lately About What Drives Me, What Makes Me “So Different” From People Who Grew Up Like I Did…
People tell me every single day that I’m special, I’m brave, I’m unique… and it makes me really uncomfortable, because I don’t think that’s true. I think I’m very blessed and privileged. I think I’ve been loved deeply and thoroughly. I’ve been appreciated and acknowledged and seen and treated as a human being by so many in my life.
I don’t think what makes me special is that I am braver and more loving and special than anyone else. I think it’s that I believe I have a beautiful soul (that we all do), and that I’m capable of letting it shine and making a positive impact in the world.
Belief is such a powerful thing… And there are a lot of ways to grow beliefs.
For most people in America today, beliefs are engrained through our upbringing. We learn from our parents and peers and community leaders what is appropriate, what is acceptable, what is expected, and we’re cataloguing tons of information about what it means to be a human being before we even speak our first words as babies.
I think that’s the easiest way to come to believe something. It’s engrained in us, as social animals our minds naturally just accept what comes our way as far as standards and expectations.
So, when you take a baby who has already learned about the world by watching and absorbing with their brilliant sponge of a brain, and you introduce them to words… and daycare… and then school… and we’re learning from each other as children, we’re entering that social arena with an idea of who we are in the world already and what is “normal.” How we should be treated, how it’s acceptable to treat others, etc. and that will influence how we show up in our new social circles. And then as kids, the way other kids respond to us being how we are will influence who we choose to become. We carry lessons about who we are and where we fit into the world into our adulthood not even aware that we’ve learned them.
I hear a lot that I’m really wise for my age, which is what has me thinking about this.
I’ve always loved school, but I don’t think book smarts and wisdom are the same thing by any means. This compliment is one I am grateful to feel is true, but I still don’t go getting a big head about it because this wisdom isn’t some skill I’ve achieved. It’s not like I did anything about it, I just wanted to unlearn what was programmed into me and choose my beliefs for myself, and I think that’s what made the difference. It’s not all that radical. We all love to be rebels in our own way, almost everyone goes through a phase of rebellion and rejecting things that are trendy or “overrated” in an attempt to differentiate ourselves, right?
Anyway, my point is that I was surrounded by people who wanted me to believe that I mattered, was special, and would make the world a brighter and more beautiful place.
It’s not always easy for me to believe in myself. I struggle almost every day. But I realize that, for someone who wasn’t constantly fed the belief that they will be a light in the world, it must be infinitely harder to show up in the world in that way.
I’m very lucky that my innate light and ability to create a positive impact is partially engrained by my upbringing, and that I don’t have to build all of this self belief from scratch, you know?
I think if more people realized how beliefs impact our realities, they would have more grace and understanding for themselves and honor where they are as such an incredible accomplishment and beautiful gift, rather than comparing it to anyone else.
At fourteen years old, I read Don Miguel Ruiz’s The Four Agreements for the first time, and I think that was when my path really started to become unique.
I started to change my beliefs.
I wanted to change my beliefs because I’d grown up around drugs and alcohol, in a world where lies were second nature, witnessed several divorces and abusive relationships from my parents, witnessed the adulthood trauma that comes with that kind of lifestyle, and took care of my young siblings. But… before the world got dark on me as a kid, I had time with a grandpa who adored me, and a new teen mom who loved her baby more than the whole world. I knew that what I was living in at 14 years old wasn’t the whole truth about the world, and I wanted to know how to see the world like my untraumatized friends did, or at least understand it as the free and fun place that they did. I wanted a glimpse at the world from a different angle of the world. I felt like I was from the edge of society, and I wanted to know what the other edges looked like, too.
So I read the book, and I learned a lot!
I Implemented It Religiously, Teaching Myself To Live By The Four Agreements:
Be impeccable with your word.
The author explained that when you are always honest, you never have to keep track of lies or worry about what is going to come out of your mouth. You just naturally tell the truth. What. a. relief.Don’t take anything personally.
This means when someone says something hurtful, you don’t take it to heart. And… when someone gives you a compliment, you don’t let that go to your head, either. You recognize that we are all seeing the world through our own lenses, and that the only “true” experience is this moment right here happening before you. And… your truth and someone else’s are likely entirely different, even in the exact same place at the exact same moment. So, nothing is personal anymore. There’s no need to attach to insults or compliments or ideas.Don’t make assumptions.
Always do your best.
Because if you always do your best, you never have to worry. You’ve done your best, it may change from day to day what that best looks like, but you’ve done your best in every moment, so you have nothing to worry about. And you know that you will do your best tomorrow, because you always do your best, and so you don’t have to worry about tomorrow either. You’re able to be fully present in the moment, free of worry. It’s a beautiful thing.
I didn’t know it at fourteen, but what I was seeking was peace, and I was chasing sparks of curiosity in order to find it.
I was looking for a sense of peace and grounded, constant, divine love inside of myself. I was looking for faith, for magic, for something to rely on in a world that felt unstable and ever-changing. Now, I call this something that I found A Spark.
It was that longing of my soul that lead me to that first book, to seeking peace before I even knew I was seeking peace. And when I followed it for the first time (or… for the first time I noticed, anyway!)… it was the beginning of a lifetime mission. Now, my whole life is following the spark.
That spark led me to write Seventy Times Seven Times, a personal analysis essay for my English class at sixteen years old, in which I explored concepts from Elie Wiesel’s Kristallnacht (a Holocaust survival story everyone should read at least once), Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, The Crucible (which I loathe, to this day, but I get it too. MY NAME, he said!), and Catholocism (which I was exploring at the time), while defining myself as a person and striving to answer the question: Who am I?
Was that confusing to read? Let me write it again without all the annotations and titles for my non-literary readers. I love you guys, thanks for putting up with my literary weirdness and still soaking up my work. Here it is, concise-ified!
That spark led me to write Seventy Times Seven times, a personal analysis essay in which I attempted to answer the question: Who am I?
I didn’t know it when I started the essay, but I was learning about forgiveness at that point in my life. After implementing The Four Agreements, I’d become infinitely curious about writing my beliefs! I always had one or two I was working on, and at the time when that personal analysis essay was assigned, I was challenging societal beliefs around what makes a person a monster. In the process, I accidentally learned about forgiveness, and forgave my mom for being an alcoholic and exposing me to an abusive stepfather. It was the beginning of my coming to realize that we are all humans who don’t quite know what we’re doing or what the right order for our priorities are. I later came to realize we are all just trying to do our best with what we have in any given moment.
And from that little wisp, that spark of curiosity around what might be another way to perceive the monsters of society (abusers, rapists, and addicts are who that included to me subconsciously at the time) led to learn about forgiveness, which lead me to learn more about compassionate living, which brought me into the world of non-violence where I started learning about leadership philosophy Gandhi, Mother Theresa, Rosa Parks, and Martin Luther King had in common.
By the time I was 22 years old, I’d continued following the wisps along with my career path I’d planned in accordance with what society said was right to do. I was earning a business degree online and working full-time in a hospital as an administrative assistant for $16/hour. But when my cystic fibrosis flared up, I lost my job and ended up in the hospital.
Furious that I worked for a hospital and they couldn’t accommodate my chronic illness, I turned to the resources I had in search of a solution. I’d been studying herbalism, non-violent leadership, breaking free of limiting beliefs and changing my thought patterns, overcoming limitations, and healing in therapy all that time. I was still an avid writer, and I’d been running a blog (this blog, before it became a part of my business!) for years. The job I had felt soul-sucking and I lived for the moments I could sit with my plants and writing and books. I felt alone in the world, I wanted to share what I was learning. I wanted to know I wasn’t the only one experiencing a life like I was. It felt like I was the only one outside of the matrix, you know? Wasn’t there anyone else who could see the code and who wanted to play with it in order to put out a positive impact from their own existence? Didn’t anyone else know there was so much more to life than what they told us about in school and television shows?
And that’s when I learned about coaching and started my business.
ALL that to say…
There’s so much to the world that you don’t see right now, and it’s accessible to you.
I’m not going to tell you the secret is to just think positive or to be happy all the time. That’s not it.
But the sparks are everywhere. They’re all around you and they love you. They’re in the little things that light you up. That smell that makes you tilt your head back, close your eyes, and sigh from your throat every single time you encounter it.
That book that gives you a Mona Lisa smile, that secret look of knowing, understanding, like “yes, you. I see you, I love your secrets."
That song that makes your shoulders move in figure-eights, if only when nobody is looking.
Your favorite pen, even. (What is it that makes you love that one so much?)
We all have these quirks and obsessions and strange curiosities…
and those are your spark, my friend!
Maybe it’s your love for cats, the way you feel when you see a baby bird. How much you love feeding squirrels, or the joy of walking into that familiar coffeeshop. (I know, I know, pandemic, I’m sorry! But you know the feeling, don’t you! That’s the point.)
You might not know your big dream, your huge purpose, or even the exact mission you’re on in the world, but I bet you know there’s more. I bet you know you are more than this life you’re in right now. And that’s what’s eating you and making you feel so heavy, so tired, and so bored, isn’t it?
You are not alone. And you’re not wrong. There IS more.
Follow your wisps and trust them to be enough. Get curious, go down the rabbit hole. Tell somebody about it. And just see what happens.
I didn’t get here because I’m braver or wiser or more special than anyone. I got here because I couldn’t stop following the sparks, the wisps. Intuition, divine guidance, soul, whatever you want to call it, that’s what it is, if you ask me.
When you feel curious, that’s the universe interacting with you.
That’s your purpose winking at you, inviting you to follow.
Your job is to take the invitation, not to find a reason why you can’t.
Follow your spark.
It’s waiting for you.
Written for you with love from South Carolina,
Jessica Bird
P.S. I talked a lot about depression, anxiety, and other serious issues in this article. I want you to know that I am not a medical professional, I am not a mental health expert by any stretch of the imagination. I am a woman who has been there, and that is the end of my qualifications on this front.
If you are struggling, if you are thinking of harming yourself or others in any way, I want to say I love you, and that you have nothing to feel ashamed of. And I want to invite you to give the hotlines a call, because they really are helpful. They are kind and compassionate, they are trained in this, and they are not judging you, okay? If you need help, just try. You can choose not to give them any information. You don’t have to give them details. You don’t have to know what to say. They have dealt with this before, and they are here to help you. If you are struggling, please get help. This world needs your light. You are more precious than you know.
Here is the National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 800-273-8255
And here is a website you can visit for additional resources and information: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
