On a Cloud

When I was younger, I used to be a non-confrontational type of person. I often felt misunderstood as a child whenever I expressed myself. Everything I said or did was often taken the wrong way. Because of that experience, I learned to keep things to myself. It led to me letting other people have their way and not speaking up for myself. I wallowed in the problems instead of facing them. I let those problems control my life instead of moving forward and away from them. It was very stressful.

As I got older, I began to realize that I needed to be able to speak up for myself. There are times when you must stand up for yourself because no one else will. That made me more confident about speaking my mind and being my support system. I began to push myself to face my problems instead of allowing them to control me. I began to move forward instead of backing away. 

There were some caveats to that way of thinking. Being too confident sometimes meant I was charging forward without thinking. Those times often lead to regrets and mistakes you cannot take back. I let my emotions get the better of me. I defended myself without knowing who or what I was defending myself from. I let my emotions do the thinking, which is not always a good idea. There’s nothing wrong with standing up for yourself or facing your problems. But you have to know exactly where you stand before forging ahead. Otherwise, it’s a case of the blind leading the blind. It’s not going to get you anywhere good.  

Now that I look back on my past decisions (and outbursts), I’ve learned to find a balance. There is nothing wrong with defending yourself. There is nothing wrong with facing your problems, demons, or fears. But I have also learned that there is nothing wrong with stepping back. It's OK to walk away until you are ready to face your problems.  

Sometimes we can let our emotions get away from us. During those times we do not exactly do what is best for our given situation. We don’t realize that we need to regroup and reassess before making the next move. We don’t realize that sometimes, not making the next move is a move in itself.  

There are situations when it is better to walk away and leave things at that. There are times when we do need to face things, but we need to stop and think about things first. There are also times when we need to remember that we don’t need to overthink things too. As I mentioned earlier, there needs to be the right balance when it comes to this. 

I have been thinking a lot about this topic these days. I have been having issues with finding that balance. I have at some point acted too rash about something. It did not work out that well for me. As a result, I decided to take a step back and reassess things. Now I am wondering if I am overthinking things. Would it make me a coward to walk away from my problems? Will I going to make another mistake if I don’t take the time to think things through? Or am I wasting time by not doing anything about it? Or am I being a drama queen and not realizing that this should not be a problem at all? 

Adulting is hard. Making decisions that can change your life is a scary thing to think about. No matter what happens from it, good or bad, you would have to live with it. You would have to take responsibility for your actions (or inaction, whatever the case may be). You would have to be accountable for whatever you decide. 

I am aware that being human, we all make mistakes. Deciding on what to do is hard but I need to remind myself that all I can do is make a decision and stand by it. There is no perfect way to handle these things except to do what you think is the right decision and hope for the best. If it doesn’t work out, then I suppose that makes it a lesson learned. The important thing is to keep that balance and to be self-aware about what you are doing. 

I'm sure some people are struggling with facing their problems like me. If you are like me trying to find that balance in this world of adulting, I hope you know that you are not alone. I’m pretty sure we all face the same issues, we’re all dealing with it in different ways. Whatever we decide for ourselves, we need to remember to learn from the experience. We need to keep moving forward. Go where life takes you. The mistake is not always a dead end, it could be a detour. A detour that could take us to where we’re meant to be as long as we are open to it.  

Adulting is hard, and facing our problems is even harder. Both of those are true. But at the end of the day, I know in my heart that no matter what, life is worth facing them.