Part II: Navigating Your Own Kayak

I feel as if I often struggle with trust. Trust in myself, others and that things will work out. I can identify where this comes from. I want to be able to trust the waters. That way I can go with the flow and not be thrown off my path. It hurts to land on “rocks”. 

Thanks for this series ❤️

@GlenM Now I am on calm waters finally 😌😁

@GlenM

@GlenM

😊🌅 Navigating my blue Kayak of wisdom  

• Where in the river do you find yourself right now: calm waters or rapids?
It's a time to do what I love; the waters are calm, allowing me to explore learning about music, coding, books, and healthy eating. This calm season is the result of being working, I feel grateful by the flow of my river.

• Check‑in: Right now, my river feels like…

It feels like a haven of rest and reflection, where I can validate my efforts and notice my progress.

• Think of a recent challenge. What might it be trying to teach you?

When learning code, the lesson of a "rock" is to understand that I cannot comprehend many blocks of information at once, but gradually, like navigating at a pace.

• List one obstacle (challenge) and rename it “teacher.”

 “My obstacle: try to do many things → My teacher:  teaches me to focus on one activity at a time.

• What “Mr. 8” moment has interrupted your plans recently?

Feeling a bit sick with a cough and having to take more breaks than usual

• Write a sentence:

I didn't plan to get sick, but it taught me to take care of my body and focus on eating better to recover."

• What situation or feeling keeps “trapping” you emotionally?

Not having enough time to do everything I want.

• Can you remember a moment when life “lifted you” through hardship?

Yes, I remember, it was when I lost my job and had to learn HTML/CSS code, and the learning curve was steep at first.

• What new options or perspectives have opened up since then?

After learning that structural and design language, I was able to teach the same thing, so I raised the level a lot because one thing is learning to do something and another level is teaching other people.

• What would it look like to trust the current a little more this week?

Trusting the flow of the current will involve conducting brief experiments with the Strudel platform to create rhythm sequences and enjoy making music. This means embracing the new programming landscape and using simple commands to observe small but useful results.

• Complete the sentence:

“Today I am grateful for the current that helped me overcome pessimism and depression.”

Part 2, final Reflections:

• What was the key idea that caught your attention in this part?

It was the realization that the higher the level of consciousness, the more power I gain and the less effort I will exert. That's like enjoying hope in advance.

How could understanding it impact your life for the better?

Trust that processes are part of the journey and that mistakes are part of learning rather than a punishment

• What “rock” or challenge do you choose to see as your teacher this week?

I choose to see "the rock" of acceptance, because I cannot multiply myself into several people and achieve many goals simultaneously, also including rest, otherwise I may get an episode of aura migraine from being in front of the monitor for too long.

☯️🚣🏻☯️

@GlenM

• I feel strange like I'm in calm waters but the water is so low and calm that my kayak is stuck in the rocky bed of the river… I really feel strange and confused because at the same time bad things do keep happening, it's almost as if I don't trust my eyes anymore, the sun reflecting on this very shallow water is bliding me and burning my skin and yet I can't move, its too shallow.
  
  
• I'm struggling with myself, I feel like I lost consistency and determination in my life, like my life is already done for… I'm too late for anything that I want to happen. Even if this isn't true, I can't see to go over it. My Thesis is my biggest rock, my getting to drive again is my biggest rock, my having to work is my biggest rock... My day-dreams have become better than whatever I feel like I can achieve. Day-dreaming is quicker and way easier than the struggle to get there in real life.
  
  
• I think too big, too fast, I'm scared that what I'll write or need to write in my Thesis will be ridiculed because I can't help to think different and try out different paths. I think my rock is trying to teach me to stop thinking too much, to stop day-dream so much, to start doing even if so much time as past I can still ride the bike, even if others will make fun of me, I mustn't care, I must still do it.
  
  
• My rock: Adulthood - My teacher: Adulthood, activities to reach my independence
  
  
• My mother belief in her feeble sensations and not on facts, not on what her eyes actually see or experience she has an issue with anything that implies me doing something "masculine" which makes me feel like an adult, like driving, travelling, walking freely on a mountain trail, as so many other paranoid women of my mother's generation, I meet from time to time, the Mr.8 generation, who lost their critical thinking. They live in their heads, in that one bad news they hear about every now and then, who knows where, and don't weight reality for what it is, in this part of the world. If I do tell them something happend that someone approached me in a weird way while walking in town in my rugged old mountain wear, they still tell me I shouldn't have dressed sexy when I didn't, and that I should pratically have a boyfriend just to protect me or always follow me...I lived for 15 years here as many other of my friends of the same gender, walking freely at any hour of the night even alone and we've been fine. I don't get it, why one bad thing should stop me, why should I be in a cage when actually lots of bad things do happen in the cage aswell, my Mr.8 has been being knocked down by some of these older women's comments towards my path to independence or just my life choices.
  
  
• I didn't plan for my four relationship to end, but it taught me not to be married to the idea of relationship, not to accept something I didn't really feel like love and respect because I looked down on myself and didn't think I could do better. I saw my parents' constant hate for eachother as something normal. I understood that I can do better than them, even if that means to choose a single life.
  
  
• My dad's bad influence on my brothers growing up, I feel like I could have raised them myself better if I would've known as an older sibling. I just left and left them in their own despair. I hate my town of origin, I should've asked them to move somewhere else immediately. I hate my mother for accepting such a situation but I also see why because my uncles weren't that different to my father and that town in the end...but I still feel bad for her not knowing better with the money that we had, we could have had way better. She was the clever one in the family when I was small. I hate that I'm probably the same, stuck the same way.
  
  
• 1- feeling of hate
  2- accepting and raising us in that closed-minded small town enviroument as foreigners when there were so many better choices to be made for the money and job my dad had working overseas.
  3- I didn't know better at the time, I was too young, I have no power over my parents and their way of raising my brothers. 
  
  
• When each one of my past bad relationships ended.
  
  
• I could choose to be the multi-cultural and multi-venture being that I am by experiencing all kinds of activities like the dancing of the simple folks (folk-dancing) or art based or nature based tracks instead of just the gym or unique communities instead of only attraction spots or of friends from all kind of looks and provenance and tendencies... be proud and excited of african, asian and the infinite of cultures surrounding us that my past partners couldn't understand even if foreigners like I was or supposelly into culture and education like I was...they always were so scared of what was so different that I even wonder why they accepted me in the first place...but such bad relationships made me realize how many things that are actually great everyday experiences we stop doing or avoid even without knowing to appease who is with us. I realized the luck to have such a freedom and opportunities.
  
  
• to not let that bad feeling or fear stop me from doing my Thesis or any other of the activities that someone I can't do anymore since I stopped…to accept such a feeling, not fighting it or trying to avoid it at all costs for my day-dreaming escapisim. To be in the river instead of the clouds thinking of a shore that is way to hard to paddle towards. To spend my energy and time in my own life and not the one of a film.
  
  
• Today I'm grateful for the current that carried me through the day from when I woke up and walked in my favourite mountain path to when I set down writing about my feelings and thoughts on the way of the river.
  
  
• final thoughts: 
  1. not to fight my feelings and try to relax while feeling them, not to try always to feel good and only good. To accept also the bad feelings. 
  
  2. the teacher: writing down my thesis

@GlenM 

• List one rock (challenge) and rename it as a “teacher"  - One of my rock is pain and now its a teacher
• I didn’t plan for failure, but it taught me resilience.
• Try the “forgiveness ladder”: 1) Name the feeling - Shame. 2) Recall the earliest memory it connects to - repulsion to female appearance based comments 3) Write one line of compassion for your younger self - "Just because they call it  curiosity and innocence doesnt make it normal. Something in their life made them think this was normal but it wasnt. They are someone that is capable of growth and learning as much as myself. You are forgiven."

@GlenM

Part 2: Closing Reflections: 

• What was one key insight that stood out to you in this part? How can understanding it impact your life for the better?

Challenges although painful are the teacher. The more difficult situations were are exposed to then that makes use want to strive for resilience and healthy coping tools. 

• What’s one “rock” or challenge you’re choosing to see as your teacher this week? My rock turned into my challenge is time. As time is the essence usually in why certain situations go well or slope down. 

These are all great questions - enjoying the content. Very well done guys for the hard-work put together!

• I’ve been on rapids the last several years. 
• Challenges showing up were: getting into a controlling relationship, lack of physical/mental safety for me and children, reliving memories of similar things in childhood, gaslighting, trauma bond, loneliness.
• Right now, river feels calmer, sometimes fall backwards due to loneliness.
• Might be trying to teach me to trust myself more, be assertive, manage triggers.
• What situation or feeling keeps “hooking” you emotionally? Feeling rejected or not loved as I am.
• “forgiveness ladder”: 1) feeling: rejection 2) earliest memory: various from parents 3) compassion: My value doesn’t stem from any human.
• I leveled up when I put myself through college, living on my own, successful job without help.
• New perspectives: I have unique things to offer others.
• Trusting the current looks like not being afraid of people and their reactions.

@GlenM

Right now, my river feels like calm waters. Recent challenges taught me that I have much more strength and can overcome much more than I ever thought I could. My past "rocks" have been amazing teachers, they were difficult to handle but gifted me valuable life lessons. 

Right now I don’t feel like I’m too far from the shore & I’m hitting sharp rocks - if I perhaps had a rowing partner, or maybe face them one at a time, I might not struggle as hard. However I’m slowly accepting the reality that I’m on my own and I need to better manage the rocky rapids even if the task seems insurmountable. Financial challenges, Relationship challenges & Mental Health challenges threaten my kayaks integrity. I think the general consensus of the sharpest rocks ahead of me relates to my independent responsibility for myself. When I paddle towards my responsibilities and goals, the difficulty is eased.

My Rock—->Irresponsibility to Self

My Teacher—->Past Irresponsibility to Self

My “Mr.8” problem is beginning an apprenticeship because you need the job to go to school, but you need to go to school to get the job. And employers act really weird when you tell them you want to do both at the same time, like it’s the first time they’ve heard of such a thing and they hope you’re schooling doesn’t interfere with your work. Mind you you’re getting education to be better at your work in the first place. I didn’t plan on this happening, but it’s a lesson in tenacity & finding creative solutions for problems.

-Forgiveness Ladder-

This feeling reminds me of past instances of confusion, disappointment, inadequacy, injustice & abandonment from trying so hard to make my career change work, but the path to my goals is more akin to finding the fountain of youth in the Amazon rainforest. This reminds me of difficult moments in my past that confused me, so my mother and step dad would do it for me and/or tell me that I wasn’t smart enough to do it myself, so I would give up. I want to tell my younger self that they can do anything and I would teach my younger self how to do the things side by side so I wouldn’t have to learn alone.

I feel like this experience right now is leveling me up through struggle. I’m becoming more aware of my needs & expectations year over year then adapting through struggles to meet those needs & expectations. I now have new perspectives of how bad poverty can truly become & what it’s like to have to feed a family of three on seventy-five dollars a week.

To trust the current a little more this week, I’m going to focus more on mindfully taking part in the tasks I need to do, and relying on the current to track my overall progress instead of letting it overwhelm & frustrate me.

“Today I’m grateful that the current carried me through yesterday.”

All the tools to properly navigate are within us, we just need to find them. Since I know that they exist I have no excuse to give up.

This week I’m using school & my job search as the Rock & my teacher.