When I was a kid I once told my parents that my brain hurts. My panicked mum asked me why and I replied "cause I have so many thoughts inside and so many things to say".
I don't remember what those thoughts were about. I don't even remember saying it. What could a 4 year old kid probably been thinking about? No idea...
This "brain on fire" accompanied me for a long, long, looong time. I am a control freak, I want everything to be done perfectly (by me), I like planning, I enjoy order in my life. However this pile of thoughts ended up to many (like MANY) psychosomatic outbursts. Quite logical I guess.
This is when I realised that all that pressure has a negative impact on me. This is also when I realised that you cannot always do everything perfectly. That there is no need to do everything perfectly and that you cannot plan everything cause life is full of surprises none of which is up to you.
It took me a while to work on it. I would lie if I told you that from one day to another I completely transformed myself, my life and changed my routines. But I did improve my way of thinking and I managed to relax a bit more.. At that point that millstone around my neck magically disappeared. I started feeling free.
Meditation helped a lot on that. Exercise and reading as well.. And by reading I don't mean those "1,2,3 steps to become a better you" books the so called "self improvement" ones. I hate those cause they address to readers as if they are total idiots. Anyways, I found out that if you want to leave toxicity behind in order to improve your self, you always find a way to do it.
I feel like today I am a much better version of me than I was 2 years ago and I am really happy about it -慰f course there is still space for improvement.. The only thing I haven't changed -and I don't plan to change- is my need for neatness. Not because I couldn't, just because I didn't want to. After all there is no point changing completely who we are, right? :P
