The beginning of this year was rough for me. I had broken off my long term relationship and just got fired. I was also living with someone who wasn’t very nice at all and I was alone in a foreign country. The collection of nasty things happening at the same time led me down a horrible spiral of depression and anxiety. I genuinely thought I would never get out of there. But it was when recognised two essential things about myself that I began to realise that ofcourse, I was struggling. The first thing was I was a pushover. I let people walk all over me for fear that they would hate me. The second thing was, I was silencing myself to make other people comfortable around me. And you know what? Some people I had tried very hard for hated me anyway, so I had failed in the idea of “Be nice, don’t get in anyone’s way and be quiet.” Here are 5 illuminating lessons I learned to draw myself out of the abyss and stop giving a damn what other people think:
1. Find your voice, do not apologise for it and do not allow yourself to be silenced.
This is essential. The only way to start wholly living your truth is knowing what you stand for and knowing what you don’t. The truth about people is that they will respect you even if you stand for an opposing view point from them. At least you stand for something. You do not need to silence your voice and yourself for anyone. No one deserves to be made comfortable by your silence. Your existence is not meant to make someone else comfortable.
2. Travel and see how big the world really is.
I personally swear by this one. Travel is an amazing healer in regards to lots of things. For me, traveling healed my whole heart from the sense of sadness and betrayal I was feeling. It reminded me how many people are out there, it allowed me to be anonymous and feel really good about it and how to be far more independent and brave and try new things. This helped me recognise something else, people make connections and then forget.
3. Read this awesome fact about the human brain.
The average human has between 50,000-70,000 thoughts per a day. Which means about 38-45 thoughts per minute. So even if someone is annoyed at you for something you have done, their brains are working so fast, they’ve already forgotten about you and are onto something else within minutes. Now ask yourself is someone whose considered you for minutes really worth wasting hours of precious time worrying about?
4. Meditate on gratitude.
No seriously. Meditate. I do it everyday. I’m assisted by an app called Calm when it comes to my meditations and I really enjoy guided meditations, but meditation doesn’t usually take more than getting up, stretching, sitting yourself comfortably down and thinking about all the good things in your life. The truth is, the only person you need liking you is you. And you don’t really need anyone else in your life because people are so temporary anyway. When you are grateful for your life and you think about it everyday, you don’t need to give a damn what other people think. You’re living your truth. 
