Back again for another weekly Blog and as always I have been reflecting on how my theme for the year ‘Passionately Failing Towards Success’ has been going. It has been a challenging week and I felt overwhelmed by life. I had surgery earlier this week and as a result, I have been feeling extremely tired, in a bit of pain but on medication. I started university last week so balancing studies is something new. It has been a lot of trying to orientate myself around the workload and processing all the readings and information which feels beyond my capacity at the moment. I am trying to grow my business which is huge work and have wondered if I can do it when funds are slow coming in and the workload seems mammoth. This week has been centered around evaluating things in my life at present and prioritizing what I can do even when it seems as if time is very limited.
One of my biggest priorities amongst my busy life was to spend more quality time with my daughter and be more engaged in her life. I realized a month ago that I was so busy that I wasn’t spending as much time with her and that didn’t seem right! So, I made it my top priority. I can happily say that although my time feels extremely spread out, I have managed to allocate and spend more quality time with my child. I have absolutely loved it and I have seen some great changes in the last 2 weeks from doing this. She also told me how much she enjoys hanging out and that she loves our time together. I cannot tell you how much it brings me joy.
Last week’s Blog talked about how I divided my time and it has definitely helped a lot; especially with everything going on. I haven’t been able to stick to the schedule religiously due to needing more sleep and I have had other priorities creeping in. However, it has been a good reference point for me to stay on track by allocating time for everything. This week, I also made a few decisions to let go of projects and goals in order for me to stay sane, stay on course towards achieving my goals and not burn myself out.
For this week's Blog, it was suggested to me that I talk about why I am not afraid to fail. Well, to start with, I am definitely afraid of failing but my whole life has only ever felt like a constant failing process. So it has gotten me used to it. I didn’t realise how many people avoid trying new things or starting up initiatives or business ideas because they were afraid to fail. I just assumed that failing was a part of the process because that was my experience. I have failed more times than I can count the successes. And my success always felt short-lived. I guess the biggest reason why my life has gotten me to where I am is that I kept trying, kept failing over and over and I just never gave up.
I have always had a burning urge to be someone greater than I am, doing equally great work in the world. I have tried with all my heart to become that woman I knew I could be but I have always felt so far off from the mark. Wondering if all the hard work that I put in over the years would ever pay off? I also ask myself if I will ever be recognised for achieving something worthwhile in this lifetime. It wasn’t until the start of this year, for the first time in my life, that I realised I was getting close to seeing the woman I was destined to be. It was the first time I started to clearly see the potential of my life and I realised that everything I had previously done was actually creating the life I have today. After all the hours, tears, struggles, questioning, hesitations, prayers I put in over the last decades I was finally learning to believe in myself regardless of my many failures. I have learnt that it is my many failures that have offered me my biggest lessons in my self growth journey. Especially when so many people throughout my whole life have disregarded me and undervalued my abilities. So, when people lacked faith in me and what I am capable of, it has never fazed me because I learned from a very young age to be my biggest supporter. Many family members and the world judged me harshly because of my weight as if it should dictate my worth. People thinking I was dumb because I learnt differently. People treated me differently because I was brought up with my grandparents, and so on. This was why I had to find my own strength to go on despite not always having the support I needed. I was lucky to have my older brother to share my journey with - he has always believed in me and has always been my biggest cheerleader.
Not being scared to fail and not needing anyone else to believe in me has definitely helped my growth as a person. It has been a process and a journey putting myself out there & putting the work that I do out into the world. Sometimes for judgment & scrutiny. However, it has been freeing to finally be me and learn to be honest and stand up for myself with those around me; especially within the creative and business circle - taking on bigger opportunities, growing my business, working on my new solo show, working on my health and studying to increase my knowledge and opportunities in life.
One area that I always have to keep in check is my old habits of wanting to hide. I hid behind my weight and now I can’t. I hid behind other people and now I am a Boss. I hid behind a cast on stage and now I do solo shows. The more I grow, the more I am unable to hide and that has been scary. I can feel myself starting to self sabotage my progress because my life is starting to take flight. It is success that scares me more than failure. Because success means more is required of me and expectations are much higher. However, I don’t want to hide anymore. I want to shine. Brightly. Therefore, I have to learn to be ok with that. I know that even if I fail, I will never give up, so eventually, I will make it to my destination.
Not being afraid to fail has helped me not to worry about other people's opinions. Those opinions that once used to hinder me no longer have any effect. Failing has taught me my biggest lessons and those are to improve what I do and do it even better next time. Failure has taught me how far I can go and how to go farther the next time. Failure has taught me that mistakes are a part of the process and I can learn from them. When you are willing to fail, then, you are truly willing to grow and go to the next level. I am definitely willing to fail even bigger this year because I know, it will help me to become the woman I am destined to be.
Photography Credit: Puutanga Waitoa
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