Feeling Stuck: It's just a feeling!

South Of Lebanon, The woods

It was one of the best experiences of my life, a speeding non-stop train filled with excitement of stepping into the unknown with a great will and a heart filled with love, with friends hand in hand. Lessons in everyday, inspiration in every corner, and love in every touch. And all of a sudden that train had to stop. And I had to go back home.

Coming back home to Lebanon after being in India for 6-months. The moment we stepped into the airport, Fatima and I shared nothing but few words of “this way”, “I’m going to bring some water”, “I think it’s this gate”, “What time is it?, “I think it’s time”, “Let’s go”.

The whole return journey was a mourning journey; it felt like I was heading to a funeral. The plane landed after an 8 hours flight, and a transit form Mumbai to Sharja, and from Sharja to Lebanon. I looked at Fatima and said words that I barely had the energy to believe in anymore, with all what’s left from my beating heart, “we are here in a mission and we are here to make a difference”, she smiled back and we pushed our language carts. Main exit: Our parents were there, fully dressed up with their beautiful smiles and flowers in their hands. In split seconds we found ourselves in our mothers’ embrace, shooting us with kisses of flames and tears of joy. It was really amazing seeing my family again. I waved to Fatima and her family, and rode the car heading home. Everything seemed the same yet so different. Only God knew what was going inside. Reached home, felt so relaxed yet tensed. I miss home, yet my heart is still not with me. My comfortable warm bed was there, and our living room was awaiting. I rushed to the bathroom, to take a shower change my clothes and freshen up. I locked the door, sat on the floor in the corner and wept like a toddler, lost and confused, only wondering how is it going to be for me from that moment on. I gathered myself, took my shower, and went straight to bed. Days passed, seeing my old friends and the rest of my relatives, faces that I always knew looked so strange and so different, I felt like I don’t belong here anymore, I felt like my wings were chopped, I felt “trapped”.

That struggle went up and down for a month, living my life virtually chatting with my friends in India, always talking how much we've missed each other, almost all day long behind my laptop or on my phone, and when I am out with my friends or family I just couldn’t wait to get back home and have some internet connection. I wasn’t present at all with any of my family members or friends. 

Every morning I woke up with an anxious beating heart, terrified from the free time that I had, were my demons played singing the poem of "You're worthless, it's the end for you, you're stuck, you've got nothing". A constant battle, a fear of solitude, a fear of being free and not being occupied, a fear of silence and quiet, because then! I'll had to face myself, and be with myself, I had to rethink what I want and what really matters, and where am I heading for. Being blind from the fact that after such an experience, my soul was craving calmness, solitude, settlement, and free time. I bumped into one of Paulo Coelho's writings:

Solitude:

For those who are not frightened by the solitude that reveals all mysteries, everything will have a different taste.

In solitude, they will discover the love that might otherwise arrive unnoticed. In solitude, they will understand and respect the love that left them.

In solitude, they will be able to decide whether it is worth asking that lost love to come back or if they should simply let it go and set off along a new path.

In solitude, they will learn that saying ‘No’ does not always show a lack of generosity and that saying ‘Yes’ is not always a virtue.

And those who are alone at this moment, need never be frightened by the words of the devil: ‘You’re wasting your time.’
Or by the chief demon’s even more potent words: ‘No one cares about you.’

The Divine Energy is listening to us when we speak to other people, but also when we are still and silent and able to accept solitude as a blessing.

And in that moment, Its light illumines everything around us and helps us to see that we are necessary, and that our presence on Earth makes a huge difference to Its work.

And slowly as time passed I started to understand why I was in such a phase, and I had to face myself with the questions that I was avoiding for a long while.

That calmness had a lesson behind it, a lesson of needed appreciation and rebuilt faith. Appreciating what once was, and faith in what's coming.

And at the end of the month I reached to a point where it was “it” for me. It’s not how I want to spend my couple of months in here, not this way, I am leaving soon, and I need to make the best out of it. Accepting the fact that it was a painful month and that I missed my friends, accepting the fact that I am back to the “real world”, and accepting the fact that it’s all needed and part of the process for me to ingest everything and let it sink in. But from now on, I am going to be present, and I’ll open my eyes to the fact that the extraordinary also exists in the very ordinary. And yes it did. I decided that happiness is indeed a choice, I choose to be happy with what I am in, realizing that after every up there is a definite down, a down for us to feel gratefulness, for us to count our blessings, and for us to recharge, transform and grow stronger. I slowly started cutting down the hours I spent online, slowly merging into reality, slowly engaging with the real life, being there for my family and my friends. I was sick of being encircled with all of the negative thoughts, with all of the destructive ones, with that feeling of worthlessness. Forgetting how much you matter to the people that love you and care about you, not only do you hurt yourself, but also you hurt them.

After all of these thoughts, home started to change, started to look more liberating, started to look wider, and more beautiful, full of mysteries waiting to be discovered, full with hearts that supported mine. Never felt that relaxed or comfortable before.

Fellow, it’s a luxury these days, to have couple of months for yourself, no university, no work, no commitments, and no responsibilities, just you and your free time, for you to reflect and to spend the rest of the remaining days with the ones you love. To explore yourself and to look deep within, to ask and wonder what is it that I want? And how to achieve it? “It’s the point fix” the pause before the take off.

And I did find a way to step out of my mind. It’s a fast paced world we’re living in, try to cut down your exposure to fast information and engagement in many lives that only makes you drained and unfocused. So I slowly started disconnecting from the virtual world, I deactivated my Facebook account, after being extremely hesitant, but it gave such a liberating feeling I have missed for a long while. I started to engage in the little to do stuff in life that made such a huge difference, my talks were more face to face than virtual ones, my eager to connect physically grew, and my passion to explore more grew, my creativity grew. I created more time to do the things that I loved the most, such as reading, drawing and writing, being more out there with real people than in with virtual ones and it felt so much more liberating. I am leaving Lebanon in less than two months, and my aim is to be present here as much as I can, to recharge myself, and spread those wings again.

You also can do it, the hardest step is the first one, and later on all shall come on time.

As Buddah said, “A situation is neutral it’s up to us to decide if it’s positive or negative”

It's always a struggle and we never stay in one state, but it's in our hands to decide to stand up after falling back. Where am I now? I am in the grey zone, in a split road, two closed doors, not knowing what's lying behind the other, but I'll hold on to that faith and my heart will always lead me to the place I meant to be in, and do what I am meant to do.

And remember, “Happiness IS a choice”, and I choose to be happy.