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Purge.

 

There is something about this word that I used to love so much. It tastes so exotic in my mouth.

 

It sounds so posh.

 

So unique.

 

So different.

 

Little did I know that I’d be using this word so much when I needed to redesign my life.

 

Purge means getting “rid of someone or something” and in my case, getting rid of both.

 

When I thought that hitting the lowest low was the worst thing that could happen, it actually is the best for giving me the chance to start from scratch.

 

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To redesign a life that I want, I must start from a clean slate.

 

 

I only have one simple wish.

 

I only want to be happy.

 

But I didn’t know that happiness isn’t a one size fits all thing.

 

Everyone has a different definition and when I was asked what will make me happy; I couldn’t answer immediately.

 

I didn’t even know what makes me happy. I didn’t even know who I really was.

 

It took me three years to shed unwanted layers of myself that I didn’t like.

 

It took me three years to figure out but before I did, I had to go through severe feeling of hopelessness, pain and despair.

 

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Defining happiness felt like a task similar to how I would be eating an elephant. The answer was to eat it piece by piece according to one of the books I have read.

 

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In my case, I needed to re-frame my mindset and remove all the negative things that has been stored there since I was young and like the old adage “it’s hard to teach new tricks to an old dog” goes, it was indeed hard to teach myself new ones too.

 

I needed to unlearn what society taught me to create my own.

 

I started by going through all that I know and all that I feel to finally be able to purge everything that’s making me feel miserable and I am telling you: it is not easy.

 

But I couldn’t just ignore all the things that make me feel stuck.

 

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For three years, I stick to answering all the questions that I have been asking myself to be able to feel the peace that I was looking for the longest time.

 

Related Article: What Motivates You?

 

Excuses

 

The first thing I removed from my life was my excuses.

 

I was not happy with my job so I left even if I was not sure where I will get money to support myself and later on, my family even if I am still single and childless. It’s our culture. 

 

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I was not happy with my self so I invented a new one even if I was so close to turning 30.

 

I sat with myself and cornered my excuses face to face to tell him that I am breaking up with him.

 

That this time, I was more than willing to set myself free.

 

Don’t believe what they tell you. Age is just a number. You can always turn back and start living the life that you have always wanted.

 

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You just have to get rid of all the excuses that you are convincing yourself to believe.

 

Learning to beat excuses is hard but it will definitely be worth it.

 

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People Pleasing

 

It’s not easy to disappoint people especially if these people are family. I didn’t mind my friends. They’re my friends for a reason. I just got tired of seeking permission on how to live my life.

 

Saying yes to all and putting other people’s needs first left me with so much hate for myself and my life that I couldn’t tolerate it even for just another day.

 

I had to learn how to be direct in saying what I really mean to say even if the stakes of hurting them are high.

 

I quit always trying to explain and wanting to be understood.

 

This taught me how to draw a line that would clearly distance me from everyone who wants to suck my energy.

 

I now guard this line very well and only allow people to cross it if they show me that having the access to cross that line doesn’t give them any right to tell me what should make me feel good or not.

 

Negative Self Talk

 

I have always been far from my country’s epitome of beauty so I made sure that I’d be funny and brave enough to be the one to make fun of myself. That way, nobody will offend me if they decide to humiliate me by highlighting my flaws.

 

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I trashed talk myself, other people laughed, I died inside every single time but people laughed and they seemed to like me so I felt it was worth it.

 

I kept doing it.

 

Trash talking and body-shaming someone to make other people laugh is such a huge industry in my country.

 

Comedians do this all the time and people actually pay them to trash talk and shame someone in front of everyone.

 

This has been the reason why I never had confidence. I always end up sabotaging myself and my happiness by telling myself that I am not worthy of any special thing in this world because I am just a plus size clown.

 

Related Article: 5 Easy Steps To A Healthy Self-Image

 

It would have made a huge difference if my mom was never the first person to call my attention about my weight. She didn’t know that her constant reminder of how horrible I looked like and that I should lose weight to be liked, left me with zero regards for myself.

 

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I know she did that to protect me from the outside world but to be honest, it was my very first experience on how harsh the world is to people who don’t look a certain way.

 

I know she meant well but it is not what one says, it’s how one says it.

 

Reversing this is not an easy job.

 

This seemed like a curse etched within my soul and worse than a last song syndrome on repeat and on shuffle in my head. I know. I am a highly sensitive person.

 

If I didn’t start my journey to personal development, I highly doubt this negative self image will melt away.

 

Positive affirmations are so effective. I realized how powerful words are and this changed the script I used when I talk to myself.

 

I became very selective in the words that I use to myself. I refused to believe all my negative thoughts. I am good enough and deserving to be alive and happy.

 

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Negative People

 

It is so easy to spot negative people.

 

Complaining is their sport and gossiping is their hobby.

 

Their mission in life is to poison your thoughts and kill good vibes.

 

They are more dangerous than cancer and terrorism.

 

They have this contagious energy that sucks the life of a person trying to live in peace.

 

I noticed a different surge of energy flowing inside me when I became super choosy in who I speak with.

 

Protecting my energy became my priority.

 

Dead-End Relationships

 

Like negative people to cut off from your life, it is time to cut ties with people who don’t invite personal growth.

 

The guy who only sees you when it is convenient for him?

 

The girlfriend who talks ill behind your back?

 

That colleague who just always want to gossip?

 

All of them are just waste of time.

 

Trust me. Your alone time spent improving yourself will pay off later on. I know because this blog will not exist had I not enjoyed my time alone and did constant self check and life audit.

 

Ungratefulness and Complaining

 

Facebook and Instagram don’t mean anything to my blog because I hardly get views from them. But I love them because that is where I post my daily gratitude.

 

Instagram is like my mini photo gallery and my Facebook is for posts to remind myself of what I must do often or what I don’t want to become.

 

At first it was just to challenge myself but later on, it became a part of my morning routine and I noticed how my mindset dramatically shifted.

 

When I focused my attention to finding even just one beautiful thing that I am thankful for that day, I started ignoring the not-so-beautiful things that I potentially could rant about until it became a daily habit.

 

Finding what is beautiful became a part of my morning routine.

 

Jealousy and Comparing myself to others

 

When I hit the rock bottom, I was in such pain that I couldn’t even bother to look at other people’s joys, successes and activities.

 

I kept looking inside me for possible answers to all of my questions because for the longest time that I was doing what other people are doing, it just failed to spark joy within me.

 

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I started embracing my quirks, my uniqueness and the fact that we all have our own time zones.

 

Instead of secretly checking other people’s beautiful garden, I started attending to mine and I took my time and boy, it’s therapeutic.

 

I don’t see the need to rush things anymore and I don’t need to be like everybody else.

 

I have learned to grow through what I am going through. I realized that the best gift that I have ever received is my life and no one can be me.

 

I want to be able to use this one life differently.

 

The same with you. No one can be you. Being you is your superpower.

 

Clutter

 

I noticed a huge difference in the way I behave when my surroundings are clean compared to when it looked as if a super typhoon just plowed it.

 

I can think clearly when everything is organized and there is nice flow of positive energy.

 

A messy space makes me feel stressed and scattered.

 

It even saves me time if I know where my stuff are that’s why I became a minimalist.

 

I don’t have any qualms about throwing or giving away anything that I strongly feel that doesn’t bring me bliss anymore and I think thrice about acquiring anything.

 

The lesser I own, the freer I feel.

 

Related Article: 16 Things I No Longer Buy Since Becoming a Minimalist

 

Perfectionism

 

Few months before I forced a closure to my Malaysia life, I desperately told my mother that I wanted to be a writer.

 

I honestly didn’t know where that came from and where I will get all the words for whatever it is that I wanted to write about.

 

I also didn’t know what to write about.

 

I even doubted my capability to write this blog in English. In my head, I am just a poor third world village girl who doesn’t have English as her mother tongue.

 

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I must also stress that I am a perfectionist and I want to learn everything first about grammar and the technical side of things before I launch this blog but I let everything go and rolled with the punches.

 

Clueless blogging didn’t just made me cry, it literally knocked me out a lot of times but because “done is better than being perfect, I let it go.

 

I even refused to go back my old posts. I wanted everything raw. I wanted to see my progress. This blog is a journey.

 

Related Article: 10 Things I’ve Learned After One Month of Blogging.

 

I am finding more joy in seeing these little progresses I am making everyday.

 

I let my need to control everything go.

 

Nothing and no one is perfect and if everything is perfect, it’s boring. There would be nothing new to learn and nothing more to do.

 

The Need to Get Everything in an Instant

 

I am used to getting everything fast so the same applied to my need to be happy but all I could ever afford to get was a shallow kind of happiness.

 

I love rushing everything thinking that I work better under pressure.

 

I realized there is difference between simple joys and shallow happiness.

 

I refused to understand that happiness, like success and life, is a process that can’t be done overnight.

 

It required growth and hard work which I was not prepared for but it’s sweeter because I know that it’s not handed to me. I take pride and pleasure in knowing that I can stand on my own no matter how long it will take me.

 

Slowing down is the best thing that I did for myself.

 

Fear of Failure

 

I have hit rock bottom.

 

I experienced being broke.

 

I became homeless overseas.

 

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My heart was broken a lot of times.

 

My family is not happy with my decision to quit my job to find what it is that truly makes me happy…

 

I am only left with these questions:

 

What will I still lose?

 

What do I still fear?

 

What can I still not do?

 

Related Article: Things to Remember When You are About to Give Up

 

I only have a lot to gain. If anything, I found the courage to slow down, be true to myself, chase my most impossible dreams and do what really will make me feel happy. And the start was to intentionally eliminate all these toxic things from my vocabulary.

 

In order to protect my mental health and to prevent my depression from relapsing, I am more ruthless when it comes to making sure that my boarders are properly guarded.

 

Sometimes guilt still hits me but since I know how unhappiness feels like, I make sure to not go back to how it was before.

 

Life is meant to be played forward.

 

 

Read next:

70 Good Habits to Drastically Improve Life

10 Ways To Stop Yourself From Being a Slave To Your Emotions

 

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