Going on a self-care journey can be the most isolating thing. While you work on the inner challenges you face, life also continues to push your levels of comfort by throwing all kinds of situations at you.
But through these hardships, it’s important to remember that the work you do within yourself today will serve you towards your ultimate purpose in the long run. You will heal parts of you that can make it easier to have healthier relationships, better communication, even tackle new projects such as a side hustle or business.
That’s exactly what I did. When I was on a journey to healing my inner world, I knew deep down that I had a bigger vision for myself. The process felt painful and I admit that I experiences some nights in the past where I felt defeated and needed a good cry.
The healing journey is a difficult one when you make the realization that in order to grow you might need to change environment, you might need to see some people you love a little less because they aren’t a positive impact on you, you might need to deconstruct your own belief system about your worth.
The process is definitely no walk in the park.
So let’s unpack those three points:
- Your Environment
Your environment can be all sorts of things from the online virtual space to the physical space you share with others. Going on a transformational self-care journey might require an evaluation of your surroundings. What information are you constantly taking in on a daily basis? What messages are you seeing on your news feed, on your social media, etc. These things have an impact on the energy you take up each day. At the same time, you should ask yourself what does my room look like? What does my house look like. Are you living in clutter? The space you live in could be an indication of how you are living deep inside of yourself. Not everyone might agree with this statement but a cluttered space can indicate a cluttered mind.
Next, let’s look at the places that you visit. Are these environments conducive to growth or do they make you feel some type of way about yourself? I would go as far as evaluating your job/workplace. Does it empower you; do you feel valued or are you constantly being put down? These things matter and they are worth addressing. Now I am not saying you should quit your job immediately in order to advance your inner healing but you could start putting together a strategy. Find a game plan that makes sense to you and your current situation to get you to where you truly want to be.
- The people in your life
This one is a bit of a sticky one because sometimes the people we need to take a step back from are the ones we love the most. Jim Rohn, a self-made millionaire and author, once said: “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” These days, in all honesty, I spend most of my time with colleagues and (virtually) with YouTube creators that speak about financial freedom and creating businesses. At some point in my early adulthood, I had made the ultimate decision to move out of my family home where I previously lived with six siblings. Yes, I come from a big family.
What I realized early on from living at home with my family is that my mindset and way of thinking wasn’t always aligned with everyone else. And perhaps I am the complicated one but I wanted to be in a different environment and take in different interactions with people that better aligned with my ultimate visions. For me, removing myself from certain environments and people made a huge difference in my pursuit of inner healing.
- Your beliefs systems
This point is not about your overarching religious beliefs or any other spiritual practices. Rather this point is about the beliefs you have about yourself. Being a woman of colour, growing up I had the same message reinforced in my brain time and time again. Society was telling me that I wasn’t worth choosing, I wasn’t worth being listened to, I wasn’t pretty enough and too dark for men to be attracted to. As a young adult, I still held on to a lot of those limiting beliefs and acted accordingly. For a long time, I didn’t know how to step out of my comfort zone to pursue bigger dreams because I still held on to those things as a core truth. But here is the thing, as much as negative beliefs can corner you forever, positive ones can propel you miles ahead towards your goals. It wasn’t until I dismantled the negative beliefs I had and replaced them with positives one that I saw a shift within me.
This last point alone is transformational across all areas of your life whether it be beliefs about finances, working out or achieving academic success. You are capable of changing your thoughts and internal belief systems. But I will not lie to you and say that this is an easy task in fact it was the most difficult process I’ve had to go through in life. But there are exercises that can help. For me it was taking care of my hair with my products while repeating an affirmation over and over again. Every. Single. Day.
In conclusion, the process of inner healing is not an easy one. It is quite difficult. But the process can be softened while on the journey if you choose the right environments conducive to growth and positives change, let go of people that may not serve you well (or limit contact with them) and practice new sets of beliefs towards yourself.