Kiana's Way to Women Empowerment

Tag: mindfulness

  • Putting Yourself First

    Putting Yourself First

    My early 20’s have taught me that I’m not ready to share my love and/or life with someone else yet. 

    I recently broke up with someone whom I thought I was going to marry. But as time went on the relationship started to feel more like a chore. I didn’t crave time with them. Thinking about our future together felt like work. I’d find myself asking about their day when in all honesty I couldn’t have given a damn. 

    But I didn’t know why. I loved my partner, and on paper they were great. They lived on their own, had a great job, did most of what I asked for out of our relationship. Yet I still wasn’t fully fulfilled, but on the other hand, still couldn’t leave them. 

    That’s when I realized it’s because leaving them would mean I would be alone. I would have no significant other looking out for me, showering me in love, or caring for me; and without them I would have to do that for myself, all on my own. 

    Which while in that relationship I didn’t think was possible. I didn’t think that I would be able to be content with my own love and care for myself. While in actuality, I am so much more than content. 

    I am fulfilled. 

    All of the things that were provided for me through my relationship feel infinitely better when I provide them for myself. I want flowers? I get them. I want to be taken out on a date? I plan it and take myself out. But most importantly I continue to show up for myself in ways that my partner could never have. 

    I, unfairly, expected a lot of effort, stability and independence out of my partner, and having those expectations is what made it tiring for me to continue the relationship. Now that I’m no longer with them, I recognize that what I needed was more effort, stability and independence out of myself. Since recognizing these needs and having all of this new free time, I’m able to give all of my effort to do these things and create habits that help contribute to those factors of my life. I see this as a form of self-care and self-love, realizing what I needed out of myself and actually creating a plan to work towards it. 

    Self-love and care is not just face masks and sweet treats. It is also recognizing your deep, internal feelings and facing them head-on. Ask yourself why you feel this way, what is causing it, and what you can do about it. The ultimate form of self-care is taking those next steps towards true happiness. Self-care can sometimes be walking away. It won’t feel like your usual self-care. It will hurt. But your future self will thank you for looking out for yourself, and will reward you with what you really need and what you’ve been searching for. 

    Trust your gut, it is never wrong. 

    Be willing and ready to put in the work. 

    And reveal your highest self. 

  • Journaling

    Journaling

    Before you begin reading, grab some paper and a writing tool. As reading, follow along with the questions and jot down your thoughts for every one. Draw them, write them, whatever helps you contextualize your thoughts. 

    Now sit in front of a mirror. When you look at yourself, who do you want to see? When you walk into a room of strangers what do you want their first impression of you to be like? 

    Think of the adjectives and write them down. Make them authentic. Don’t write something down because you think society would want you that way. What do YOU truly want to be? Without judgement from absolutely everyone in your life. Yes, even your family and loved ones. Pretend their judgement doesn’t exist. What do you want to be doing that makes everyday the best day ever?

    But stay realistic now, this is still life and we still need to work for things. Make the dream reasonable. We can always create so many bigger dreams, but starting out why would we not do ourselves the favor and make it genuinely attainable. Be honest with yourself. Also, keep in the back of your mind that money makes the world go round. I know it can be difficult not to lean into the “I’m just a girl” kind of society we are in right now. But we need to be making some sort of income in this dream life if we want to be responsible for our own course.

    And before you start to overthink about your ‘purpose’ or what you are supposed to provide to the world. Don’t. Providing for yourself is already difficult enough, so your existence of being a good person should be abundant enough to society. But let this also be a chance to recognize what you are good at and coin off those skills. 

    Start small, maybe you have a job in retail. Do you enjoy helping and serving people? Can you converse easily and confidently? Or do you work in food service and work well in a fast paced environment? Or work easily with others? These are all basic skills that we can build on in different ways in order to make a living.

    Time to get critical. What are you doing to not work towards those goals? Be truthful with yourself. For some of our reasoning we might not even realize we are doing it, so really give it thought. But also hold yourself accountable for your actions, or lack thereof. 

    Now hopefully you have written down the things you want to be, some ideas on how to become those things, and have recognized why you haven’t been applying yourself to those ideas. Sit with that. Make a change. You know the problem and you have all of the materials in the world to help you fix it. So will you continue to wait for it to change, or will you take action and control of your life. Things don’t come on their own and if we want something to change we have to be brave to take the steps towards it and believe that we can create change. Believing in yourself is just as important as taking initiative. 

    I hope this has helped you with the tough question of, why are you here? As humans we cannot be so hard on ourselves and our purpose of life. We must realize in order to help take care of our world we must first take care of ourselves. As you’re going over these questions I want you to remember the purpose of life is to feel fulfilled in yourself. Not for what you do or provide to others, what how do you provide to yourself? And what keeps you content?

    In the meantime, if you are new to journaling I encourage you to check out this article with 25 starter/everyday journaling prompts to get you started on your journey. 25 useful journaling prompts for beginners- Marth Brook


    I would also encourage you to read this article on the lifelong mental health benefits of journaling. How Journaling Can Help You in Hard Time – Greater Good Berkeley