It’s been one year and one month since my last blog post, “Perspective of the Day.” While my writing style changed up a bit, my sentiments remain. I seek contentment through my everyday interactions, yet I’m still human, imperfect, and I have days where positivity escapes me. There are days when I feel like I’ve consumed too much of everyone else’s lives and not enough of my own. I tap through the videos, the photos, the tweets, the snaps, only to feel like I haven’t done enough. It seems natural to compare yourself to the people you connect with, but it’s not always healthy.
I’ve given myself permission to share frames of my life with my circle. I’ve also given myself permission to be selfish, at times. I love helping others, but I know I often agree to too much. I start putting everything and everyone else above myself. My bedtime disappears and 4:00AM rolls around and I’m still up. I get home exhausted, drained, happy, yet hollow because I put my own ambitions on hold. I see my friends running solo, self-sufficient, and successful. I wonder if they’re doing it alone.
But for me, it always comes back to, “what makes me happy?” I’m happiest when I’m helping people. If I can teach or inspire someone in whatever small way possible, that’s what I want to do. When I compare myself to other people I often fail to recognize that my intentions and ambitions are different and always have been. I’ve never been in this just for me. I don’t want my life, my work, or my words to be a selfish endeavor.
This reflection places me back in a positive perspective because I remind myself of why my achievements look a little different from those around me. I seek out ways of connecting people. When I plan my projects, I’m often the most annoying person in the building because I think, rethink, and refine each element of the project, including meaning. I ask questions and I stress over perfecting minor details that most people never notice. But why? I think I’m like this, in part, because I see the way people react when I present them with a depiction of how I see them, whether it’s through photography or through writing.
On my best days, I see the best in everyone. On my worst days, I see the worst in myself. But the truth is, the moment I doubt myself, and vocalize it, I’m surprised by the reassurance I receive each time. It’s happened enough times for me not to be surprised when it happens again, but the love and support is always there, always strong, and still surprising. The hardest part was detaching myself from my pride to admit that I felt low and that I couldn’t see anything within myself to appreciate.
We absorb much of what we see, but there’s a question of whether we retain it. I realized, looking back on the “posts I’ve liked,” that I didn’t recall “liking” many of them. The action became instinctive. It was no longer a glance or a gaze, it was a thoughtless habit. I realized that while I didn’t remember seeing these posts, they still had an impact on me. I sat there, watching the news, sipping my tea, scrolling my feed, and thinking, “look at these places where I could be.” But, in the words of my favorite band, The Neighbourhood: “happiness is figurative. I’m happy ‘cause of me, doesn’t matter where I’m living.”
Sujaya Devi 