People will have no reason to remind you about what they’ve done for you if they felt appreciated by you.
This popular meme encourages a selfish view of life and convinces us that we’re victims of manipulation rather than giving us reason to question if/how we may have wronged someone, or taken them for granted.
If this meme were true, then every parent who sacrifices their own joys and advancement in life for the benefit of their children will have no right to feel betrayed if they’re neglected by their children later in life.
It’s become fashionable to write people off just because we’re not getting what we need or want from them.
The fact that we feel entitled regardless of what they’re going through is often ignored.
But the circle of life is such that what we judge others about today, will meet us as a test under very different circumstances tomorrow.
When you write people off because of what they complain about regarding feeling hurt or betrayed by your actions towards them, you will remember them when someone you are convinced will always have your back turns around and walks away from you because they want something from life that they can’t get from you.
When someone says ‘after all I’ve done…’, step back, dismount your high horse, and consider why they may be feeling betrayed or used instead of getting defensive and assuming that they’re toxic.
How you respond to someone in their moment of duress is a reflection of who you are, and what you need from them.
That’s why abandoning family ties, cutting off parents, demanding divorce, and breaking social bonds has grown to define our self-care routine.
When we stop needing others, they become optional while we think it’s our right to live our best life regardless of their contribution towards getting us through our worst times when they could have been living their best life.
Be careful what advice you take from the Internet.
You could end up living your best life, alone.
#hope #expectation #sincerity #selfworth #selfawareness #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #lifecoaching #zaidismail #theegosystem #ownyourlife #narcissisticabuse #narcissist
Tag: mentalhealth
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Mental health myth – Social contracts
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The Illusion of Control: Unraveling the Quest for Peace
Peace is not the absence of drama, nor is it the avoidance of life. Yet, I find myself bemused by so many who believe that avoidance is a sustainable way to find peace, or happiness. It isn’t. Avoidance is merely a delay of the inevitable.
Inevitability has always been such a complicated subject. Otherwise seen as fate, destiny, karma, or even manifestation, we convince ourselves that our failings and sometimes even our successes are a result of such larger-than-life forces at play in our lives. I think that’s how we satisfy our ego when we find it difficult to accept that we’re out of control.
The myth of control offers a temporary comfort. Predictability assures those who have grown weary of change. That weariness is the threat that I have been fending off for some time now. Sometimes I embrace it deliberately hoping that it will find space within me, but it never does. If anything, it leaves me restless. As restless as I once was when I realised that there was no gentle hand to show me the ropes of life. Of course, that realisation came long after I had already sunk my teeth into creating a life out of the dreary reality that surrounded me.
Why I felt a need to create something better than what I had rather than finding peace within those circumstances is what occupies my mind on most days when I have space to reflect. It’s the same struggle that brings so many to my door looking for answers about the ravages of the obliviousness of others, the worst being our obliviousness to the impact that we have well beyond our range of visibility.
Peace is lost in those moments when we peer ahead instead of glancing around at our immediate vicinity. What lies ahead in the distance is hope and aspiration. What confronts us immediately is the probability of achieving any of it. Most wish away what they see around them because they’re so desperate for that mirage that they behold in their mind’s eye. Some find a meaningful pursuit between where they’re at and what they wish to reach, and they appear purposeful and resolute as a result. But there is a group who see a little more than that. They see what surrounds them, they see what is in the distance, they see the path between the two, but they also see the impact that they have on those who have rights over them. Choosing how to expend themselves between those demands then becomes the source of what robs them of their peace.
I resonate most with the latter group. The group that feels responsible when others feel free of obligation. The group that sees but is not seen. That hears but is rarely heard. That understands but is misunderstood. And though that may appear self-indulgent, if not smacking with self-pity, it isn’t. It simply is the reality presented by the evidence of a life of resolve to figure out how it all works. Sometimes I consider if perhaps that is the purpose of life, but then I also realise that if it were, what would be the point of advancement if the only endeavour is to understand the here and now?
That there is more to life than figuring it out is clear. What more there is to life, however, remains a slowly unravelling secret that will hopefully avail itself before I have exhausted my breaths in the pursuit of everything intended to unlock that greater purpose. Nonetheless, in its pursuit I have found joys and depths that have enamoured me in my journey that most view with confusion at best, or disdain at worst, neither of which has given me cause to alter my trajectory.
In that has been my greatest liberation and my greatest test, the combination of which leaves me eternally perplexed. Peace is still a distance away.
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Struggles and Triumphs: A Personal Journey to Finding Joy and Fulfillment
Life. With each passing moment, I question more than before about ever experiencing true joy. A fulfilling joy. One that is shared, not just fleeting. Joy that isn’t prompted nor courted, but spontaneously spawned in moments that I choose. Not the joy that I choose. The moments that I choose because those moments matter. Such moments must be filled with joy if its gravity is to be liberating rather than oppressive.
I often find myself convinced that such joy will remain elusive for the entirety of my lifetime. My efforts towards securing it have resulted in a brutal education that I now wish to share with others so that they may be educated in kinder tones than I was.
Purging the contents of my mental clutter is not as therapeutic as it once was. There is much comfort to be drawn from anonymity. However, there is much suppression of the spirit when living a life of anonymity. At some point, I was foolhardy enough to surrender my anonymity in favour of authenticity. I still mull over the wisdom of that choice.
After abandoning anonymity probably some ten years ago or so, I had to assume a more responsible posture in my writing. As romantic as it may be to speak from the heart in unbridled musings, there is a line that I never wished to cross. That line is the point at which my musings may expose the flaws or undermine the dignity of others regardless of their treatment of me. If I hope to have my dignity honoured, I must do my best to honour the dignity of those whose paths cross with my own.
Holding myself true to this principle has tested my resolve near to breaking point. But if I give in, I would lose myself to the same stench of life that I lament in the spaces that skirt my own. The seething entitlement that is born from ingratitude causes my temper to wretch and writhe threatening to release spittle with every word that escapes my spasmed lips. But I cannot lose myself to such vulgarity, there is enough of it within that took safe harbour during moments when I was too young to realise what accommodations I offered for the misery of others.
Swimming against the stream is tiring, and the only solace it offers is that I am able to swim. Reflecting on my state when I launched my reinvention in 2018, I realise that it was the absolute drudgery of my life in corporate and an unfulfilling relationship that catapulted my exit from that life, embracing with fervour the promise of creating a new one. I’m trying desperately to reconnect with such conviction now without having to slip to the bottom of that slope first before finding it.
Cryptic thoughts, eyestrain, and caffeine is all I find. Ephemeral joys and encouraging progress is what keeps me from surrendering, although I can’t say with certainty that I would surrender in its absence either. I can barely say anything with certainty these days except for what lacks in joy and fulfilment. The writer’s block that has plagued me for so long is not because I can’t find enough to write about. It is because I can’t find reason to believe that it will be received with tenderness, or appreciation.
Swimming upstream is inspiring for those who observe the feat, but is soul destroying for those who go the distance alone. If there is one lesson I learnt well but still ignore for the most part, it is the lesson of knowing with certainty that being a voice for the oppressed is the loneliest place in the world because once the message has been received, the oppressed resume the worship of their masters while the lone voice that provoked the change that heralded their relief becomes socially awkward for those who hover in its orbit.
I don’t think there is such a thing as insanity. I think there is only poor communication and incorrect assumption. Between the two, the crazy halos of hell are visited upon our lives in ways that leave us gasping for air and scratching the walls of horror for relief. Assumption, is therefore the bastard child of hope that aspires to be accepted by the distracted. That’s how a life of torment is created.
I don’t try very hard to be understood anymore. I don’t try very hard at all.
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Respect is not earned
The old saying of ‘respect is earned’ robs you of self respect and replaces it with entitlement.
How we treat others is a reflection of who we are, not who they are.
Our ability to self regulate our offering of respect to those who may treat us badly is a reflection of how much we need them to treat us well before we feel good about who we are.
In other words, the less grounded we are in who we are, the more likely it is that others will impact our moods, our temper, and our overall emotional wellbeing.
Trust, on the other hand, is earned through consistency of effort about what’s important.
Trust cannot be negotiated or contracted.
If we have reason to doubt someone showing up for us, we won’t trust that they will.
That reason is sometimes because of them being unreliable, but is also often because of how someone else in the past may have disappointed us or betrayed our trust when we needed a similar thing from them. Like comfort, support, or just being there for us.
If we go through life trusting recklessly while withholding respect to those who, in our eyes, don’t deserve it, we will find ourselves reeling from betrayal long after it has passed while disrespecting those who don’t understand our pain.
Problem is, even we won’t understand our pain, so we’ll never be able to communicate it in ways that will allow those close to us to understand why we’re raging.
It all starts with self respect and self worth.
Without that, you will need others to treat you well before you treat yourself well.
Own your life.
#hope #expectation #sincerity #selfworth #selfawareness #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #lifecoaching #zaidismail #theegosystem #ownyourlife #narcissisticabuse #narcissist #rage #anger #angermanagement #marriage #divorce -
An overdue brain dump
Haste is from Satan, and clemency is from Allah. These words have plagued my thoughts in recent months. The feeling of compulsion to take action because of the frustration of revisited and avoidable contentions becomes difficult to subdue when the desperation for peace and ease scratches inside my chest, threatening to suffocate the enthusiasm out of me.
Words like cacophony and incessant ring in my ears as if desperately colluding to express the noise that rattles around my being. It’s a bundle of colourful and flowery expressions that offer no relief, but only more clutter. With every expression is a need for reception. If not received meaningfully, it negates any need for expressing it at all.
Life continues to teach in ways that destroy any traditional norms of imparting wisdom. Those who seek but understand not what is required to acquire, are often dealt the most brutal blows that test their convictions in ways that threaten to unseat their character. This has been me for the longest time.
The relief from corporate drudgery lasted for some few years before the weightiness returned when the themes showed up in my personal spaces once more. However, my capacity to navigate it was much improved and my opportunity for finding solace in my own quiet spaces is irreplaceable. The decision to leave corporate continues to resonate as a resounding moment of inspired wisdom. The path has not been easy, nor comfortable in any way, but the fruits of such labour have been enormously rewarding beyond even the scope of the entirety of my achievements in corporate.
It’s hard to imagine how the peak of my 25+ year career doesn’t compare to the most mediocre of achievements in my new journey, when by comparison in material terms, there is none. In material terms, corporate wins every day of the week. But in terms of life, it fails dismally at every turn.
The imposter in me has triumphed more often than it should, which has left me debilitated and doubting on matters that I have no basis of comparison against which to determine its feasibility or its futility. Perhaps that is what troubles me most about this new path. It is unfamiliar and lacks in substantial support from those around me. I am therefore my own sounding board, my own echo chamber, and my own critic. I’m usually brutal in all regards.
Nonetheless, receding demands that I fight my nature. That is a fight that I have always lost, so I know better than to even try. Inevitably, I lose the fight and then blaze a path of inspired destruction of everything that I believe needs to be destroyed for me to rise above the drudgery of duty and servitude.
Duty and servitude is only such when it is out of obligation rather than purpose. Purpose is lost when we focus on fulfilling responsibilities and obligations while claiming our rights. A right claimed is never enjoyed. The contamination of the motivation behind the one who fulfils it through obligation denies me the sweetness of its fulfilment. That, in a nutshell, in a cocoon of complexity, in a little ravage of reality, is the struggle of life itself.
To be purposeful through mindful subscription is the greatest challenge that we face as humans. We are too easily distracted by what we need, and therefore lost faith and trust in the natural consequence of living purposefully, and with grace. But grace is lost when dignity is traded for social admiration. Thus, we trade our souls for the promise of peace, only to discover that we lost both in the transaction with our demons.
I sometimes scroll back to old ramblings from more than a decade ago to determine if I have grown or changed, or perhaps lost my way since. Surprisingly, I keep discovering sentiments and observations contained in my writings that serve as a reminder of where I’m at, not knowing whether that is a reflection of the absence of growth, or the confirmation of the distillation of wisdom in those moments that offer a timeless insight into my state of being.
The day when the merits of my contemplations will be determined is still a distant way off, at least from my current vantage point. But, if I have learnt anything these past five decades and a bit, it is that vantage points change more regularly than the seasons, and with it what seemed unattainable before is soon taken for granted, and what seemed obvious before suddenly appears deeply cryptic. It is therefore foolhardy and somewhat arrogant to assume that any single moment in time is a moment of absolute realisation, absolute connection, or absolute truth.
As long as I breathe, I evolve. Not as a body, but as a being. And theories of evolution hold absolutely no answers in such evolution.
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No Thanks!
When you get bad service from a restaurant, you won’t go back there if they show no remorse or accountability for how they treated you. That’s boycotting.
Boycotting products or people who enable harm on others is no different.
It’s a choice that reflects who we claim to be and what we want to be associated with.
The lower our self-worth, the less attention we pay to what we stand for and the more we focus on what others think of us.
That’s when image and tokens of success become more important than values or principles.
It’s never a decision that affects only you.
It influences everyone who may look to you as a role model, or a leader, a parent, or an inspiration.
More than this, it shapes what you contribute towards the peace and dignity that the world offers us, versus being part of the degradation of the human condition.
Boycotting is about what you are comfortable being associated with as a moral, ethical, religious, spiritual, and humanitarian standpoint.
It’s not about politics or privilege.
It’s about self-worth.
You are part of a village, whether you accept it or not.
Your actions and your choices affect others in the same way that you may be bitter or unhappy about the choices of others that have negatively affected you.
If you are unaware of the impact that you have, there is a very high probability that you are harming others without realising it, or intending to do so.
Who are you?
What do you stand for?
Before you answer, look to an innocent being that may depend on you to show up for them, and then consider how your answer will affect them.
#accountability #free #nothanks #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #narcissist #narcissisticabuse #humanity #palestine #israel #gaza #lifecoaching #zaidismail #istandwithpalestine
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Don’t forget the human
Did you know that there is zero science to support the above beliefs about what we call mental health?
Instead, there is research that confirms that new neural pathways are formed in response to new information or new experiences. It’s called neuroplasticity.
Other research confirms that the physical gesture of a smile, regardless of your emotional disposition, releases feel-good hormones into your brain which uplifts your mood. Try it. Smile at yourself in the mirror without having any reason to smile.
When we try to rationalise life through the lens of science, we discover technically fascinating facts about the functioning of the human body, but we lose sight of the human in that body.
Feelings of anxiety, depression, rage and more, including observing others to behave in a narcissistic or bipolar manner is very real.
But it’s critical to understand that it is simply what we observe regarding their response to very real emotional experiences for them.
Depression is the absence of hope, anxiety is the fear of not being able to cope with potential outcomes that we are facing, and emotional duress about the stressors of life is what we call mental illness.
We describe what we experience in others or in ourselves as bipolar, or narcissistic behaviour, not because that is who we/they are, but because that’s how we experience that part of life.
It doesn’t mean that we’re not dealing with very real fears or duress that causes us to behave in that way.
However, when we label behaviour, we lose sight of the legitimate human experience behind that behaviour.
No one ever behaves badly when they feel appreciated, significant, or understood.
Bad behaviour or emotional duress simply means that as a human, we’re struggling to reconcile the experiences of life with our efforts to create a good life for ourselves, or others.
Medication, affirmations, supplements, and deliberate exercises to cope with such emotional duress will only ever provide interim relief.
If we don’t resolve the root cause of that duress, those interim measures become lifelong chronic crutches.
#mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #lifecoaching #zaidismail #theegosystem #ownyourlife #narc -
The magic of accountability
Many people struggle with authenticity and finding a healthy balance in relationships because they are unaware of the impact of how they show up for themselves and for others. That lack of self-awareness is in a very huge way impacted by how we hold ourselves accountable for who we are.
In this interview with Haafidha Rayhaanah, I unpack the little known dynamics of the far reaching consequences of accountability in our relationship with ourselves, and with those around us.
Remember, without accountability, you have absolutely nothing of substance in your relationship with anyone, including with life itself. Give yourself a fair chance to unlearn what has been holding you back for so long.
