Advice you wish you could give everyone.

I saw this question once on Humans of New York and this woman responded in a way that has stayed with me for all these years. This is what she said:

“When a wave comes, go deep. There’s three things you can do when life sends a wave at you. You can run from it, but then it’s going to catch up and knock you down. You can also fall back on your ego and try to stand your ground, but then it’s still going to clobber you. Or you can use it as an opportunity to go deep, and transform yourself to match the circumstances. And that’s how you get through the wave.”

Because I think visually, this immediately resonated with me. Growing up in the Caribbean, I learnt to swim in the ocean. When a wave comes at you, you have to dive deep under it. Sometimes that wave is going to crash right on top of you. But if you dive deep enough, the turbulence and force will pass over you and you will come out ok after it’s gone.  Having been through a great deal of turbulence in my life, the only way I’ve ever been able to get through it is by diving into myself to find the resilience and strength to come out on the other side without being destroyed. This is the only way.

Things you’ve learned you wish you knew earlier.

That minding my own business is very freeing.

That establishing boundaries needs to be done early on. In a friendship, in a relationship, whatever.

To stop taking the world personally.

That people don’t think about you. They think about what you think about them.

That I should never go against what my gut tells me.

That I should assume positive intent. This is very new to me. I like it a lot. Most people really aren’t out to fuck me up.