PERMISSION TO ACCEPT MYSELF
Down the slippery slope I would go every time the broken tape recorder played in my head of all that I had lost. That day, when I had only S$16 in my bank account and even contemplating a fleeting moment of unsafe thoughts, I asked myself “what do I still have?”.
What was a rhetorical cry of despair unintentionally brought on gratitude as the mind answered the question literally. I did still have much: Family, friends, experience, connections – and most of all, values.
Studies have found that feelings of appreciation release dopamine and serotonin, the brain’s “feel good” chemicals. Some suggest that the brain cannot respond to gratitude and depression at the same time. I don’t think so from my personal experience – I began a gratitude jar and committed to writing a daily one-liner about something I was thankful for, no matter how insignificant. As the jar began to fill up, the tape recorder slowly faded out until it stopped playing altogether. I still keep the daily practice of gratitude (minus the jar) today.
Whilst I used to support charities with the occasional cheque in the past, I began to volunteer and serve earnestly in different capacities, including initiating community projects and social enterprises. This includes Hush TeaBar, which brings silent tea sessions led by deaf facilitators to workplaces, launched exactly 10 years ago this month. It was “self-serving” initially as this allowed me to feel useful despite all that brokenness but I soon found that this was my “ikigai” all along.
Sadness is not much valued in our culture; we are always in such a hurry to get over it. Yet without sadness, would happiness have any meaning?
Perhaps, the biggest upside of being down for me was the awakening that I need not be happy and okay every moment of the day. I can choose to be human instead with the smorgasbord of emotions that is available to me – to feel and understand, to accept and regulate.
My personal well-being model called EGO (with a healthy dose of irony and pun intended) reflects this: Managing Energy (not time) to keep my tank full and not pour from an empty cup; practising Gratitude so I always feel enough to serve and contribute; and taking Ownership of my well-being by letting go of who I think I’m supposed to be and accept who I truly am.
Japanese writer Haruki Murakami once said: “When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in”.
By embracing my depression with its debilitating pain, seeking help with the searing shame and taking helpful actions, I came out of the perfect storm embracing other parts of myself that I’d rejected and missed for too long.
Maybe life is not always a problem to be solved in being up or down; maybe it is about living the mystery at every point through the ongoing narrative of good, bad and ugly moments that is the fullness of me. There is no shame in that.
Anthea Ong is a former Nominated Member of Parliament, social entrepreneur (Hush TeaBar, WorkWell Leaders, A Good Space, SG Mental Health Matters), ICF Professional Certified Coach and author. She is working on her next book, The Upsides of Being Down, an anthology of stories of well-known and ordinary people living and thriving with, and through, mental health conditions.