30 Days of 30

So. Today, I have been 30 for 30 days. It’s been an interesting 30 days. A lot of shifts, and I just want to make note of it. I guess, in a way, I need to remind myself that I am learning, I am growing, I am venturing off into a direction I haven’t yet been in. Sometimes I don’t give myself the credit I deserve, but since so much has happened in just my first 30 days of 30, I figured this would be a good space in time to reckon with who I’m becoming. 

The first, and biggest happening has been forcefully looking face to face at my poor boundary-setting. It was specifically around my birthday that I noticed on my own. My boundaries are not well intact in some of my friendships. I struggle to advocate for myself in spaces that I’ve made myself feel inferior in. I have a tendency to allow others to make me uncomfortable because that seems better than confrontation. 

I “go with the flow” and ignore my needs in some moments. I just go with it, even when “it” is the last thing I really want to do. I’d already come to this thought a few days after my birthday, just from noticing, but then I finally decided to crack open a book I’d been “waiting” to read for months. It’s called Set Boundaries, Find Peace. You may have heard of it. 

I put it on my list over a year ago, then I finally bought it a couple of months ago. I’d just been…avoiding it. Something in me didn’t feel ready. It was the perfect time when I was though. After I’d just gotten to a place of honesty with myself about the spaces that I fall short in valuing my needs over others’, Nedra Glover Tawwab (the author) finally gave me the word I was looking for. I have some porous boundaries. 

More than anything, I’ve always hated being uncomfortable and I’ve always associated calling people out (or in) when they did something “wrong” to me as uncomfortable, or worse, awkward. So, even if I was uncomfortable, I’d decide it’s better than the ultimate discomfort that is telling someone I don’t like what they’re doing. 

Now that I am aware of this, though, I know how important it is that I bypass those uncomfortable moments for what will ultimately be my most comfortable, my bliss. I’ve been practicing the last couple of weeks. Saying no when I don’t feel interested or like I have the bandwidth. Holding people accountable for agreements they’ve made with me. Setting boundaries! Look at me! 

In this time, I also got a glimpse of a deep inner thought, one that I never really hear, but is always there dictating how I show up in a lot of spaces. This thought is that I am not smart. Writing that out, seeing those words, it makes me really sad, but it mostly makes me pity the version of me who was dictated by that inner nonsense. 

It’s been one of my biggest insecurities. When I was a kid, the adults in my life immediately made the connection that I was smart. I learned to read as quickly as I could because I Loved books, and I started writing really well at a very young age. And let’s face it, elementary is just that: elementary, so even the subjects that I would later find to not be my best were not slipping me up. I went through all of elementary and junior high being praised for being smart. 

Finally, in high school, I found myself around people who were like me, who were smart, but they had something I didn’t. Something I still don’t really have to this day. Motivation. They were motivated to do well, succeed. I wasn’t. Not in any way. Of course, this is much clearer in retrospect, because then, when my grades finally started to slip and I can sense my own carelessness, I thought it only meant one thing: I wasn’t smart. 

All these years later, I kept that thought. I wouldn’t say it ever, but now with this awareness I’ve gained, I can see it. I see it in the way I act around people who I believe are smarter than me. I see it in how defensive I get because I feel so little, or how I’ll retreat altogether, and just become a shell of myself in some peoples’ presence. Now, I see it so clearly. 

I know I lack what we generally think of as “motivation” simply because of my major depressive disorder. It’s not me. I’m not bad or dumb. I am worthy, I just have to work with my own flow, I’m not motivated in the same ways as my peers, but I still do amazing work. I still coexist with amazing and brilliant people, and I am still Loved and valued by them. That’s what I have to keep in mind. 

I’ve also spent the last two years trying to learn who I can be as a partner. Now, 30 days after 30, I’m thankful for those 2 years. Even though I didn’t quite get the outcome I was looking for, I still learned how to be the best partner to myself. I know how valuable that will be to someone else when the time permits, and in the meantime, I’m so thankful to finally genuinely Love my company and companionship. 

The only other shift in my new found 30s is my sex drive. Nobody told me I’d be this horny, oh my goodness. I’m thankful though, that arousal gives me a reason to offer myself pleasure. I am finding new ways to make Love to me. 

Well, this is awkward now. That seems like as good a place as any to wrap this up. Here’s to the next 30 moments, days, years, and beyond.