A year ago, I started my journey of circumnavigating the world. I did this as an attempt to change my life thinking I could turn a new leaf, especially in the career aspect. I started this blog as a new creative project to help me gain experience in social media and content creation. Although the psychological changes from that epic adventure are still sinking in, things in life are not exactly where I would like them to be.

Coming back, I thought that everything would be more put together and stable by now; and yet things are still open-ended. This uncertainty is unsettling, and the resulting feelings of aimlessness and ineffectiveness permeate throughout. In this blog, the initial aim was to document growth, because life isn’t linear; it’s more of a spiral. As we grow, we often return to the same points in life on new levels–hence, Coming Full Spiral. But growth here has been happening at a snail’s pace, a very slow spiral. And instead of documenting my personal growth lately, I had been posting recipes, self-care stuff, and general lifestyle things.

Kindness towards others and self-care are values I do my best to live by. And while I’m really good at being kind to others, I’m going to be real with you-—I have not been very kind to myself as of late. While I was in therapy, I had to learn to eradicate the word “should” from usage. And yet, these emotions stem from self-criticism that my life should be stable and grounded, that I should make oodles of money by now. Some friends recently gave reminders to be more gentle and kinder towards myself, because this self-criticism may be the culprit of why things have been working against me lately.

One friend said that whenever he has negative thoughts about himself, he tries to stop and ask if he would treat others that way. He wouldn’t, and it helps give the perspective to stop. We actually had a workshop about that at Burning Man five years ago. We had to face our workshop partner and tell our self-criticisms to their face, like we were berating them. I had to apologize in advance. It’s not as bad now, but this is a weird spot in life. But I like my friend’s idea. It is a very good perspective to keep in mind.

So, I have tried to ease up a little. Another friend said that when she stopped caring too much, things just flowed easier because there was less resistance in the mind. When you let go, she said, things tend to fall into place easier. When you’re not as concerned with getting ahead, you get there when you do. All of that energy spent from attachment gets redirected towards what does matter. Trust in the universe, they say…but goodness, this “gentle surrender” is deceptively easy.

From what I understand, this non-attachment (not to be confused with being emotionally detached) involves distancing oneself as to not be entangled in desire. When the mind is entangled, it can be murky, so it can feel off-center. It can feel like treading water at times.

There are many things I learned from this worldwide journey. Traveling can truly empower someone, let alone make a dent in whatever emotional disorders they live with. Now the understanding that life is actually one big overhaul needs to sink in. Intellectually, I know this. In order to fully understand, it must also be emotionally accepted and embraced.

Growth is two steps forward and one step back. A year later, I’ve come back to the same point, and this time it’s on a different level. And what else would help is being kinder to myself. Because when you are better to yourself, then everyone around you benefits.