I’m noticing a pattern. I love it. The process sucks, but the outcome is beautiful.
Lesson learnt: we break down to be able to stand up stronger.
Pattern
Life is all about patterns and I am huge on finding patterns. One of the patterns I have noticed is that breakdowns are my version of “caterpillar emerging from the cocoon”.
The truth is that emerging from the cocoon is really hard work. It is stressful, uncomfortable and sometimes painful. But the outcome of opening your wings and soaring have been so rewarding and beautiful.
My “emerging from cocoon” is when pressure is built up so much that I cry. This cry isn’t from happy tears, but stressful tears. Tears of acknowledging the pressure, stress and strength to carry on. It takes a while to get there.
Then, every single time without fail, I always emerge from that crying session stronger, faster, better. I feel like emerging from the cocoon is nature’s way of levelling up in this game called life.
Things never get easier. You just get better at managing it. — Smoothie K.
That is true. After each crying session, I just magically am equipped with the skills to handle everything the world throws at me! I know it’s not a superhero montage of skills improvement — I believe it’s the little baby steps everyday that created this. And my crying and breaking down is my body’s way of consolidating these steps to be a big step. That big step usually means new skills.
Break Down
That being said, it does not discount the fact that the breaking down part is VERY VERY VERY hard! This happens maybe 4-6 times a year. The war-like mindset was all about moving forward, growth, accelerating, sprinting. During that period, I’m so focused on so many things and the tradeoff is my emotional health. I get too exhausted to build more empathy and to care about things outside the scope of what the war-like mindset has. It is exhausting. It is stressful. I always find it quite challenging to relax and destress.
After all, when you go to war, you don’t take a weekend off to walk around the park in the country you are fighting in. You just finish the battle and then the other things can follow. In the same way, each sprint is a war session. And crying is me knowing the session ended, the battle is finished (because I choose to) and go for a walk.
I want to break down more often, and let soft Lisa take the lead sometimes.
Stand Up
Standing up is always the easiest. Somehow, my body just knows how to manage the next step. I guess my body has anticipated it and it naturally solves for it when I have the right resources in place.
When it is time to stand up again, all the fog in my head clears up immediately and I see the next steps. Huge growth during this period and huge marginal increases with every step of the way.
Maybe this is it. This is just the pattern. I feel like I’ve cracked the code to life.
Life is doing many tiny little sprints. During this period, it is a war-zone. We work on it every single day, baby steps, 1% improvement. Then when it gets too stressful, we break down, decompress and use those skills to upgrade ourselves for the next war-zone.
That is growth. That is progress. That is how we get 38x growth each year, which compounds with every passing second.
I love my life. It is not the easiest life, but it is mine and I actively choose it every single day. What a joy!
Love,
L