- Kat
Take a Chance on Mind Over Matter
Are you loving what you do, and doing what you love?
Are you often happy to get to work, or does everything feel like you are going on auto-pilot each and every day?
This is how I like to answer that question:
You are on the right path when work doesn't feel like work. You know you are heading in the right direction when work feels like fun, despite having a busy (and at times hectic) schedule.
Intrinsic motivation is the key factor that overcomes any other source of extrinsic motivation. With the elements of motivation, inspiration, and a commitment to your own authenticity, no one can ever stop you from living towards your desired world that has the changes you wish to see. On my hardest days, I try to remember this. My perseverance has facilitated my direction. Over the past few weeks, experiencing in-person college gave me a brutal realization:
The hard truth of living how you want to live is that no one will ever believe, trust, or choose you in the way that you must do so for yourself.
(Important Note: In the lens of disability, neurodivergence, and severe mental disorders - I want to note that I encourage you to believe, trust, and choose yourself to the best of your abilities. Do not ever push or force anything that you possibly cannot do. I emphasize this statement in regards to your mindset and perspective, above all else. If there is some chemical imbalance where you cannot do a specific task, I recommend that you go easy on yourself, surround yourself with understanding and supportive people, and continue to educate those who simply do not know about your level of functioning. Accept what you can do and what you can change, while also accepting the things you cannot change.)
Excessive self-reliance or lack of dependability on others is not what I am trying to convey with this truth. Nor am I trying to express how you don’t need anyone to live a good life. In fact, true and authentic human connection is essential for our survival.
For it is love, trust, and hope from our external interactions that further fuel us to live more fully.
What I mean to say, is that you already have everything you need. You already have everything within you that you seek. Your strongest desires, your longings and deep wishes, your dreams and aspirations… they are able to be fulfilled with your future self. Through your own acceptance, flexibility, and compassion.
Throughout this past month, returning to the dynamics of in-person functioning has definitely evoked my wondrous cycles of pondering and reflection. Recurring thoughts that arose in my mind included:
People can only understand what is said to them at their level of perception. Your own level of perception may be misunderstood by others, and that's okay.
Consequently, we all have different perceptions of growth, based on our previous experiences, situations, and circumstances. Therefore, it is important to be open-minded, flexible, and considerate of other intersectionalities and communities we are not a part of.
We are all on our own path, all at different times. People come and go all the time. And that in and of itself is simultaneously sad and beautiful, all at once.
People change. As you approach a life towards your own authenticity, that may not be the same as another person’s path towards their integrity. Or vice versa.
As I stated before but want to mention it again: You must be there for yourself in the way that no one else can. You have to be your main priority, or else it will feel easy to fall into the traps of hopelessness, misery, and/or anxiousness.
Lastly, problems will continue to show up until it has taught you what you need to know. Once you have recovered or healed enough towards a stable point for internal moderation, maintenance, and balance of emotion with rationality--especially at your most turbulent triggers--you will experience calmness amidst the chaos. You will feel light, balanced, and capable, instead of the contrary.
This past month, I got accepted into a hip hop dance team at my college (exciting because I have never danced up until quarantine!), got interviewed to be in the school newspaper (for my fellowship and the topic of nutrition with mental health!), and have been (and currently) planning the biggest event of the quarter (read till the end of this post for that project I am excited to announce!).
For me, inspiration often stems from novelty.
Inject novelty into routine, to revive excitement and to invigorate your core.
New opportunities will continue to come up when you shift your attention to the borders beyond your comfort zone.
All of those experiences outside of comfort will manifest as your personal lessons when you explore their underlying, subtle meanings. And all of those lessons will serve your path towards the people meant for you, and more circumstances that encourage the energy you are placing your attention on.
Now, pay attention to your attention. That level of perception is your awareness. Do you see that you have control over your awareness?
It is your control over your own awareness that beautifully creates your attention.
Hence, your awareness catalyzes your attention. Your attention will serve you when you choose aligned energies over mismatched ones you try to fit.
By having every action and decision filled with mindful intention, you may watch each day unfold with better outcomes you wish.
By placing your attention on your own intentional attention, the life you want to live will fully blossom with the people who support your own unique and special path of growth.
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For my future blog posts, I am starting off a series of song recommendations that I will integrate into my topics of writing. I thought this would be a fun way not only to connect more with you all that read my posts, but also because I am a huge music lover and am always open to expanding my horizons with songs of (mostly) all genres!
Today’s Song Recommendation: Chance by Hayley Kiyoko
Hayley wrote the song based on the idea that you will never have a chance on anyone, if you don’t take a chance for yourself. If you never go for any opportunities, then you will never know if you would have missed or made them. Along with being an amazing sapphic song, it is also a valuable piece of art that illustrates how confidence will take you far, into places you never even knew existed.
By taking a chance on yourself, you take a chance for others.
Backtrack towards the beginning of this year: if I had not taken a chance on myself to switch my major to a completely new different field of work (nutrition to psychology), if I did not believe in myself with the application to my mental health club of My State of Mind, and if I did not let my heart, passion, and devotion to service guide me towards the direction as a disability rights advocate, then practically (almost) none of of my studies, activities, and/or events would be the same as I am doing right now. I don’t know if I would have been as happy if I had not challenged myself to think outside of my comfort zone, despite the prominent fear of uncertainty I faced at the time.
In retrospect, the pandemic helped me discover what I really wanted out of my life. It has expanded my work for service towards like-minded and ambitious individuals who want to socially impact their communities for the better, too.
That being said, I want to share how thrilled I am for the biggest event I have been working on with the rest of My State of Mind, my mental health university club and branch of the non-profit global organization. Here is our mental health advocacy conference, titled:
MIND OVER MATTER
We will be focusing on three themes: Educating on Mental Illness and How to be an Ally, Defining and Accessing Therapy, and Caring for Your Mental Health and Well-Being!
The conference will be just 2 weeks from now: November 13, from 11 AM to 3:30 PM. Along with the rest of the United Nations Millennium Fellows (read more about this fellowship I am a part of here), it has been such a fulfilling and rewarding experience to get this event up and running.
I am so honored and pleased to be a part of the creation for this conference, and club, and wonderful people, and everything about mental health advocacy.
And for my future work, I am incredibly ecstatic to be amplifying inclusion and diversity through the lens of disability rights advocacy as well.
By taking a chance on myself, I was able to become the person I am now.
Now, it’s your turn. Please take a chance on yourself, by reframing everything as Mind Over Matter.
Your focus is your reality.
Perspective is your power.
And awareness is your freedom.
- Kat <3
~ Plan to fully live. ~