My Tiny Kitchen

If you’ve never gone apartment hunting in New York City before, lucky you.

Never in my life did I think I’d be so thankful for basic features like windows and closets, which are in short supply in many NYC apartments. A washer/dryer in the building? It’s like winning the lottery. Having one in your actual apartment? Fuggedaboutit! (p.s. I still have yet to hear an actual New Yorker say this).

Luckily, I’ve actually had some pretty good fortune in this area. My current studio is in a location I love, right by Central Park and lots of great restaurants. It even has a cool little reading nook that you have to climb a ladder to access. There’s only one part of it I really find lacking, and that’s the kitchen.

I hesitate to even use the term kitchen, because of how sparse it is. There’s my fridge, and next to that is the sink, and next to that is the stove and…that’s it. That’s right, that’s my whole kitchen. I don’t even have a counter, just a wooden board to precariously balance over my sink or stove if I need to do any food prep.

Actual footage of me trying to make food in my kitchen

I decided to overlook it, because I liked everything else about the apartment. I also didn’t cook a lot and got a lot of my meals through work, so I figured I’d barely be using it anyway. Then, of course, the pandemic came along, and while everyone else was stress-baking bread and cooking up other delectable recipes, I was trying to figure out a way to use my sink and stove at the same time.

I worried that my kitchen (or lack of) would be a constant source of frustration, but—in that wonderful way humans do—I adapted. I just sort of got used to not having that much space and learned to work around it. I counted my good graces; I was still lucky enough to have a microwave, an oven, and most miraculous of all, a dishwasher. I decided to get resourceful and transformed an old ladder shelf into make-shift storage for my cooking tools. I put a bedside table next to the stove and used it to balance my cutting board when I needed more space.

Whenever I tell others about my tiny kitchen, I always end up concluding with, “Wherever I live after this, my next kitchen is going to seem gigantic compared to this one. I won’t even know what to do with all that extra space!”

In a lot of ways, learning to navigate cooking in this apartment has felt like the times I’ve had to navigate life during its most challenging moments. Take this pandemic, for example.

While others had roommates or partners or family to spend all that time at home with, I was alone. Luckily, my introverted nature prepared me for most of the emotional struggles, but that didn’t mean I didn’t get bored or find myself craving human connection.

Like I’d done with my kitchen, I forced myself to think of the positives of the situation. I still had my health and a job. I had access to food, running water, Netflix. People who lived through past pandemics definitely didn’t have access to all those things. After I took a moment to count my blessings, I decided it was time to get resourceful. With all my extra time, I caught up with friends on video chat, I turned my living room into my own fitness studio, I used my free time to write, cook more, learn how to knit, and even bought a ukulele (that last one was an impulse buy).

If you’ve been following this blog, you know there were also other struggles during this time. I figured, if I could overcome all of that and learn how to enjoy being on my own, generate my own happiness from within, and never get bored in my own company, then everything that comes after this pandemic will just feel like the cherry on top of the sundae.

We let hard times bring us down, but maybe what we really need to do is treat them like a challenge or a training period. It’s like athletes playing practice games before a real game or a writer crumpling up dozens of terrible drafts before creating something beautiful.

Living good lives and being happy, that’s something we need to practice. If you can get it right when everything’s going wrong, you’ll never again worry about what life’s going to throw at you next. You’ve been through the worst, and you handled it. You’ll handle whatever comes next, too.

Confessions of a Social Media Manager

So here’s something people are always surprised to learn about me: I’m not the biggest fan of social media.

Okay, there are some caveats to this, but you would think someone who’d chosen to make a career out of social media would be a more avid user.

The thing is, when I started working in social media back in 2013, it was a different thing entirely. Facebook wasn’t this corrupt entity, just a way to see what was going on in your friends’ lives. People weren’t getting canceled on Twitter, and YouTube stars weren’t releasing apologies over controversies every week. I’m pretty sure social media still wasn’t perfect then, but it definitely wasn’t the beast it’s become now.

Whenever I get started on a social media rant, I always feel like I should be holding a cane and waving it emphatically at any youths in the vicinity. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to say anything you haven’t heard before on the topic. Social media kills our attention spans, makes us more self-conscious, increases anxiety…sure, we know all this already.

It also lets us connect with people all around the world, feel like we’re part of a global community, express our creativity, increase awareness around important issues, do social good with a few keystrokes.

Social media isn’t inherently a good or bad thing in itself. It’s all in the way we use it, and one of the ways in which social media contributes most to our unhappiness is the reference points it provides.

Reference points are important, because they affect how we perceive our own happiness and quality of life. If you compare yourself to a coworker, your life probably won’t look too bad in comparison. If you compare yourself to Taylor Swift, that’s a different story. The problem is, social media presents us with nothing but unrealistic reference points. Scroll through your Instagram feed and you’ll see a bunch of teenage influencers sipping champagne on a yacht, ordinary meals styled to look impeccable with the perfect lighting, girls made up with professional makeup and nary a pore to be found. (This is not actually what my feed looks like btw).

Even your friends only post the best or most photogenic moments of their lives making it seem like everyone’s constantly having the most amazing time. I’ve actually worked with a few influencers at past jobs. It was amazing to scroll through their social media where they’d accumulated thousands of followers. They’d post pictures of themselves wearing glamorous outfits, flouncing around the city without a care in the world. If you didn’t know them in real life, you’d think they spent all their time going on amazing vacations, eating the best foods, and lounging around their penthouse apartments in expensive gowns. I did know them in real life, and real life was a much a different story.

At their day jobs, they didn’t dress up or come in with full faces of makeup. Most of them spent 40 hours a week being stressed out by terrible bosses, underpaid, and unsatisfied with their work. Maybe the rest of their lives were just as glamorous as it was on their Instagrams, but the part that wasn’t glamorous sure didn’t feature in any of their pictures.

Since learning the truth, I now tend to look at most influencers’ posts with a skeptical eye. I know that behind every perfect picture there’s a less than imperfect story, and that’s okay! We’re all imperfect, and if you want to portray a different story on social media, that’s okay too. It’s just important for all the rest of us to remember that what we’re seeing is in fact just that: a story.

There are times when I get frustrated with the people in my own life. Friends and family who will make me wait to take a bite of my meal until they get a great picture or who have their heads bowed down towards their phones the whole time we’re on vacation. I won’t pretend I haven’t been occasionally guilty of doing the same. When I visited Notre Dame in Paris a few years ago, everyone inside the cathedral had their devices out even though there were multiple signs informing visitors this was not allowed. When the news of it catching on fire broke out, I was so grateful for the time I’d been allowed to spend there, and even more grateful that I remembered every detail of the experience so vividly because I’d stubbornly refused to take my phone out.

I guess the whole point of this rambling rant is that social media can be a fun way to pass the time and, in many ways, a great tool. However, it’s up to us to make sure we’re using it in a way that benefits us instead of letting it run the way we live our lives. Lately, my social feeds have been filled with nothing more than pictures of dogs, happy quotes, posts about obscure interests, and cooking videos. That change alone was enough to reduce my daily anxiety considerably.

I’m not trying to tell you how to spend your time on the internet. I’m just saying, a few extra cute animals on your feed couldn’t hurt.

The Hedonic Treadmill

Think about the last time you wanted something. Really wanted something. The thing you were convinced would make you happy once you had it. Was it a new iPhone? A high-paying job? A relationship?

Now think about what happened after you got it. Did it make you happy? if yes, did it still make you happy after a fews day? A month? a year? Do you still sit around each day thinking about how happy that thing makes you even now?

Or like the vast majority of people, did you just sort of get used to it, find something new to chase after and convince yourself that this was the thing that would actually make you happy? If so, it sounds like you’ve found yourself on the hedonic treadmill.

The hedonic treadmill, or hedonic adaptation, is the idea that we tend to return to stable levels of happiness, even after a major change in our lives. That’s why there are lottery winners who find themselves no happier than before they won millions, and amputees who are no less happy than they were before they lost a limb. It doesn’t matter if at the time they thought what was happening to them was the greatest thing ever or the worst. Humans adapt, they start taking things for granted, they find themselves with new things that bring them happiness and new sets of problems.

On the one hand, this is great news. Not getting into the college of your choice, not getting that promotion you wanted, not ending up with the person you were convinced was the one…none of those individual things are going to affect your long-term happiness. I know it feels like the worst thing ever, but guess what? Scientific research shows that people are really bad at predicting how happy or unhappy something is going to make them.

But wait, what about the good things? Does that mean nothing’s actually going to make you truly happy? It turns out, there are a few ways you can increase how much happiness you get out of the good things.

For starters, you can take some time each day to practice gratitude. I’ve done this practice off and on over the years, but I’ve only really gotten serious about dedicating time to it in the last few weeks. I spend about ten minutes writing about a few things in my journal that I really appreciate. It can be something good that happened that day or it can be something or someone that’s been there all along. Sometimes, I’ll find myself writing about things I never even think about, like the fact that I have two working eyes that let me appreciate all the beauty in the world or that I have running water in my apartment. It makes me feel fortunate for all the good things in my life, even on days when things aren’t going my way.

Another thing you can do is practice savoring. If you’ve ever seen a Korean variety show, one staple is the cast being presented with some kind of food. It doesn’t matter if it’s home-cooked kimchi fried rice or a meal prepared by a world-class chef. The cast will ooh and ahh over it, making noises of exaggerated contentment and smiling with each bite. It’s the reason why I always find myself ordering Korean takeout after watching these shows. They’re so good at enjoying something simple, that it makes me want to experience the same sort of joy. Try it the next time you find yourself eating something delicious, having a really good conversation with friends, traveling somewhere amazing. Be present in the moment, and really engage all of your senses. Savor every moment and keep reminding yourself how lucky you are to enjoy the moment.

But one of the absolutely best things you can do is to change what you actually value. Prioritize experiences over possessions. What are the moments from your past that still make you smile after all these years? I bet it’s that time you baked cookies with your family, rocked out at an amazing concert, watched cheesy romcoms with your best friend. I’m willing to bet one of those memories was not the day you bought your AirPods.

All my life, I had the mindset that once all the things on my checklist were completed, I would be perfectly happy and find myself wanting for nothing else. I did check some of those things off, but then I would find new things to add to the list making it impossible to truly ever make it to the end of the list.

I think the most important lesson of the hedonic treadmill is this: you don’t need to wait for everything to align perfectly in your life. Happiness isn’t some distant thing that will always be just out of reach. Hop off the treadmill. When you stop running, you’ll find the thing you’ve been chasing all these years has been within reach the whole time.

Little Talks

Growing up, I was painfully shy. A friend in high school told me she thought I was snobby the first time we met, because I refused to make eye contact with her. Snobby? Moi??

To someone who was so lacking in confidence, the idea that high school me would think she was better than anyone was laughable. Striking up conversations with strangers was terrifying, even making small talk with acquaintances was a nightmare situation I did my best to avoid.

I don’t know when exactly it happened, but over the years things started to change. I realized, one day, that I could go on a date without getting nervous, answer questions in a job interview without my head going blank.

Though, even now, I wouldn’t say I’m quite on the opposite end of the scale. There are still situations that make me sweat through my best blouse: public speaking, karaoke, looking like the tin man come to life in a dance class.

In the longest study ever done on the topic, researchers discovered the one thing that most accurately predicted future happiness: the quality of our relationships.

It doesn’t matter if you’re rich or poor, young or old, the people who are happiest are the ones who have the most fulfilling relationships in their lives. In fact, their relationships impact all other areas of their lives, including their physical health and how many years they’ll live.

Unfortunately, more than one in five Americans report feelings of loneliness (and that was before the pandemic). As a lifelong introvert, I can definitely say I’ve spent a lot of time experiencing such feelings myself. I find myself envious of people I perceive to have more fulfilling social lives, wondering constantly how I can connect with more people.

I think this is a problem a lot of people in their 20s and 30s deal with. After you leave college, how do you make friends? Sure, you’ll probably make a few friends at work and you might get friendly with your roommates, but it’s certainly not as easy as when you were in school.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot, particularly because this is something I want to work on next year. As I’ve continued to study the psychology behind happiness, I’ve seen the importance of social connections emphasized over and over again.

Sure, I have my wonderful family. I have some great best friends. I have my writing group. Yet, I still feel like my social calendar is relatively empty each week.

All big changes start with a bunch of little changes, so I decided to challenge myself. I don’t need to become best friends with everyone I meet, I just need to connect with them for a moment. So, I decided to ask everyone I came into contact with today how their day was going.

Such a small thing, right? Earlier today, I had a a checkup at the fertility clinic where I’ll be doing my egg freezing, so I asked the receptionist, the nurse who drew my blood, the doctor. Everyone’s smile grew a little when they heard the question. Some of them told me about their days, some said it was good and then politely asked me the same question.

But my absolute favorite interaction? The one I had with my Uber driver.

Like most people, I’ll usually just give the driver a friendly greeting and then busy myself on my phone or by staring with my eyes glazed over out the window. Not today! And I’m so glad I asked, because the driver absolutely lit up when he heard the question. He said, “It’s so nice of you to ask. Nobody ever asks me anything like that. Thank you for being so sweet.”

We ended up talking about his life in Jamaica before moving to the city, his pet cockatoo who he had to give away over the summer, his mother who passed away a few years ago.

The conversation was fascinating, and it was fun! The drive passed by in a flash—certainly preferable to sitting in lonely silence—and when he dropped me off, the driver thanked me again for chatting and wished me a wonderful week ahead.

Okay, so the Uber driver and I probably won’t end up becoming best friends, but this is how friendships start, relationships develop. With something as simple as an ordinary question. And even if it doesn’t go anywhere, the happy glow from a great conversation (and your bravery in initiating it) will stay with you and the other person for hours to come.

From now on, I’m going to keep asking strangers how their day is going. I challenge you to do the same. I think we’ll all be pleasantly surprised by the big things that can come from these little actions.

The Missing Piece Meets The Big O

One of the first guided meditations I listened to after taking up the practice was about relationships.

I remember listening to the guide’s calm voice as she explained the plot of a popular picture book. As I listened, and then later read the book for myself, I was struck by the simplicity of the story and the powerful message behind it.

The book in question was Shel Silverstein’s, The Missing Piece Meets the Big O, and it goes like this:

Once upon a time, there was a missing piece.

The missing piece spent all its time waiting for someone to come find it and take it away. There were many that came along. Some did not fit at all. Some seemed like a good fit at first, but then the missing piece grew and they didn’t fit together anymore.

One day, the missing piece met someone new, that didn’t look like anyone it had met before. It didn’t have any space for a missing piece.

The missing piece told the Big O that it could not roll because it was a triangle and it had sharp edges, and the Big O told it that edges could be worn off and shapes change. The Big O left, and the missing piece found itself all alone.

But then, slowly, it began to move.

Eventually, the missing piece shaved off all its sharp edges and began to roll. It found the Big O and together, they rolled alongside each other.

The full book, which takes no longer than a minute or two to read, is filled with even more beautifully subtle messages about healthy relationships. It should be required reading for all children and adults.

It made me think about my own relationships and what I seek out in them. Back when I first listened to this meditation, I still had this idea that having a partner would be the thing that “completed me.” I depended on men to supply: my happiness, emotional support, my sense of self-worth, a social life.

Luckily, I’ve come a long way since then. I know, now, the importance of being your own, complete person. You can want a relationship, but you shouldn’t ever need one.

Sometimes, I still feel like that little triangle. There are days when my progress feels so slow or I take about ten steps backwards, and I’m certain I’ll never find myself rolling along on my own.

But the important thing is that I’m moving forward. Maybe that’s all we really need to do: take it one step, one day at a time, until there comes a time when we stop to look at our lives and realize we’re not missing any pieces at all.

Starting Over

One of my favorite quotes is attributed to F. Scott Fitzgerald:

“I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again.”

Like most inspirational Internet quotes that end up getting commodified on Etsy and pinned to dozens of Pinterests boards, it’s also likely misattributed. But regardless of who said it, I think of these words often.

Since I was in middle school, there’s one thing I’ve dreaming of: being a published author. I was a voracious reader growing up, and I wrote little stories here and there as a child. In 7th grade, I started writing a cheesy romantic novel with a close friend. We would stay up late at night, our faces illuminated by the glow of our laptops, as we took turns typing our story into an AIM chat window (oh dear, did I just date myself?).

It didn’t take me long to recognize that this thing that had started out as a fun pastime had become much more for me.

In high school, I started writing a new novel with a different friend. I had high hopes going in this time, because like me, she was also passionate about writing. We spent the next few years working on a manuscript, plotting out the next three books that would come in the series. I knew everything about the characters we’d created—their hopes, their fears, their aspirations. I loved that story, and I still do, but unfortunately it didn’t work out. While she was a talented writer, my friend was flaky, often missing the deadlines we set for ourselves, her investment in the novel fading as we entered our college years.

When it was clear that the project was officially dead, I found myself asking, What now?

The thought of writing a novel all by myself was exhilarating: getting to make all the decisions by myself, not having to navigate around someone else’s schedule or whims. It was also terrifying. I had never written a novel by myself and besides, I was so, so tired. I’d put so much time and love into crafting that story. I didn’t know if I had the energy to do it all again.

It turned out I did. I spent the next six to seven years working on my first solo manuscript. I wrote draft after draft, sometimes going months without writing due to the fatigue of simultaneously working 40 hours a week with an additional four hours of commuting each day.

Eventually, I moved to New York. I joined a critique group, and for the first time ever, I showed my work to real writers. I learned so much from them, first and foremost, that I had a lot more to learn.

One winter, we decided to take a break from our usual projects and work our way through a book of craft exercises. That was the first time in years that I’d written anything other than my project, which I just couldn’t seem to get to work. I was shocked by what I produced, and so was my writing group. I realized when I wasn’t constrained by a project I’d started writing in college, by a questionable foundation riddled with problems stemming from inexperience, I could apply everything I’d learned over the years and actually write something that was kind of…good.

A few months later, I submitted my entire manuscript to my group for review. They confirmed to me what I’d already known: it just wasn’t working.

So there I found myself with another decision to make: keep trying to make this thing I’d put so much time into work or start over again. I heard F. Scott Fitzgerald’s (or whoever said it’s) quote echo in my head. Did I really have the strength to do this again? I did.

I could feel an immediate difference as I started writing. I was able to implement all the knowledge I’d gained over the years, avoid the early mistakes I’d made in my previous projects. My writing group had overwhelming praise to offer for each chapter I submitted.

It’s been about a year and a half since I started working on that project. Yesterday, I submitted the second draft of the full manuscript to my writing group for their review.

In the past, the idea of starting over or putting my work out there for others to critique was terrifying. I always felt so drained, and asking me to give more was like trying to pour from an empty cup.

One way I handled those fears was by putting things off. The longer I went without showing anyone my writing, the longer I could believe that everything was just dandy. Of course, all I really ended up doing was wasting months I could have been using to improve my craft.

The thing is, all those things I was afraid of, the mistakes I feared making…they’re the reason I was able to write a novel I’m so proud of now. As in life, making mistakes is the only way to grow and living carefully doesn’t protect you from making them. It only keeps you from becoming a better version of you.

So make mistakes. Make them early, and make them often.

One day, I hope I’ll get to walk into a bookstore and see a book with my name on the shelf. When I look at it, I’ll see all the failed novels that came before it. And I will be so, so happy, because to me, it will be a testament that I had the courage to start all over again.

The Other Woman

There is a woman.

She’s the sort of woman everyone loves to be around. She is charming and funny and kind. She has interesting hobbies and aspirations. She is well-traveled and can speak knowledgeably about any number of fascinating topics.

She’s a great listener. She’s the kind of person who maintains eye contact with you and gives you an encouraging smile even when someone else cuts you off or talks over you. She makes you feel heard—really heard—hanging onto your every word as if it’s the most interesting thing anyone’s ever said. You leave every interaction with her feeling like you just had the best conversation ever.

She is disciplined. She works out regularly and has a great time doing it. It doesn’t matter if she’s in her living room following a fitness video or in a studio surrounded by dozens of other people. She is confident and leaves every workout sweaty and satisfied. Her fridge is filled with healthy meals she’s prepared herself, along with a few not-so-healthy snacks, because she also isn’t afraid to indulge.

She doesn’t let anything get her down. Flat tire? Rude people on the subway? She’ll still walk into the office with a smile on her face. She’ll make a joke about all the things that went wrong. She isn’t the kind of person who would mope around her apartment, even if it is gloomy, even if it is winter, even if there is a pandemic going on. She’d deck out her studio with holiday decorations and twinkly lights. She’d put on a jazzy Christmas playlist while cooking dinner, and then settle into bed with a cup of cocoa to watch a cheesy Netflix movie. She’d laugh out loud even if she was alone.

When it comes to dating, she doesn’t sweat it. She makes her needs known, but after that, whatever happens happens. When she gets rejected, she handles it with so much grace the other person starts to second-guess their decision. When she meets someone she likes, she makes them feel like they’re her whole world without actually letting them take over her world.

She’s one of those rare millennials that doesn’t turn down invitations, doesn’t need to be coaxed into leaving the comfort of her apartment. Of course, she loves her quiet nights in, but her days are filled with all kinds of fun activities and events. Meetings with other people who share her hobbies, gatherings with friends, opportunities to give back and spread acts of kindness.

She isn’t any sort of rare beauty, but she shines in that special way that happy people do. She isn’t afraid to approach that cute guy at the bar or strike up a conversation with the person standing behind her in line. She doesn’t second-guess herself or worry what strangers will think about her.

She goes after all her dreams, even if they’re hard, even if they’re scary. Especially if they’re scary. She encourages her friends to do the same. She’s the voice saying you can do it in a sea of naysayers. She believes in the beauty of her dreams, and she wants everyone around her to feel the same.

She isn’t much different from me. She isn’t smarter, more successful, more beautiful. But she does love herself in a way I’m still learning to.

She is the woman in my head, the one I look to for guidance in all the hardest moments of my life. What would she do? I wonder. Sometimes I’m brave enough to follow her lead, sometimes I’m not.

A few years ago, I didn’t look anything like that woman. I still don’t look like her in every way, but I’m closer than I was before. Maybe, if I keep working at it, one day I’ll look at her and I won’t see any difference at all.

Shhh

I had something of a revelation recently.

The more I learn about the psychology of happiness, the more I realize how much of our current happiness is influenced by the things that happened in the past. I had a relatively boring upbringing (much to the chagrin of this wannabe writer), so I always figured I’d escaped relatively unscathed. I have friends who were affected by parents’ divorces, distant family members, traumatic incidents, while the worst thing I’d ever experienced were some hormone-driven argument while I was going through puberty.

I don’t blame my parents for any of the decisions they made. After all, they were doing the best they could with the knowledge they had, and they did a pretty great job if I do say so myself. Still, nobody’s perfect.

Maybe this is something you can relate to if you come from a South Asian background. Maybe you can relate even if you don’t. Growing up, whenever anything “negative” happened in our family, we were told to keep it a secret. When someone lost a job, when someone was suffering from health issues, when someone was going through a hard time in their life, it was something that stayed in the family.

When grandparents died, I sometimes didn’t find out until days later. When my dad got laid off, my sister and I were told after several months. My parents’ intentions were good. They didn’t want to us to worry, they thought they could protect us from all the bad things. It didn’t matter how much time they let pass, my sister and I would still be hurt by the news, stung that they could keep something so important from us. We constantly wondered what else they were keeping from us.

When it came to our own issues, the intentions were different. My parents were scared that others would judge us or revel in our misfortune. When I was diagnosed with infertility issues, my mother admonished me when she found out I had confided the news to some close friends.

In the end, it didn’t really matter what my parents’ intentions were, because it all just served to make me view the negative events in my life as shameful. Losing my job was shameful, getting dumped was shameful, being told I might not be able to have children was shameful.

Part of me thinks that’s why I’m always striving so hard for everything in my life to be “perfect.” Anything that goes wrong, even if I have no control over it, is a dark secret that would only draw the judgement of others if they were to find out. When I find myself in these periods of life when everything doesn’t line up, my unhappiness is heightened until I find my way to a place where things look a little better from the outside.

Whenever I go against my parents’ wishes and tell my friends the secrets I’ve been so carefully guarding, it feels like a little act of rebellion. It’s exhilarating and freeing, and always comes as a surprise. My friends and loved one never judge me, only offer their support and kind words. And yet, the instincts have been ingrained so deeply inside of me that I still feel like I’m doing something wrong whenever I do it.

I don’t want to live my life with shame anymore. It’s not shameful to get laid-off or get your heart broken or to discover your body isn’t doing what it’s supposed to do. These are things that everyone experiences. It’s all just part of the motions of life. If someone judges you for these things, that’s a reflection on them, not you.

So I’m making a promise to myself. The next time I find myself hurting, I won’t keep it to myself. I’ll reach out all the people who care about me, because as it turns out, the only thing that can combat shame is love.

The First Date

When I got dumped last year, the transition back into dating wasn’t exactly the most fun time in my life. Men would ghost me, stop responding, act flaky—and this was all before even meeting. I managed to schedule a date with a foot doctor, who even picked the place and time for our date, and then called me while I was waiting for him at the bar to tell me he wouldn’t be coming. I was pretty much ready to throw in the towel, so when I chatted with a random guy a few days later to set up another date, I was prepared for it to go terribly or for him to stand me up. It ended up being one of the best first dates of my life. We continued to date for the next 14 months. until he told me he didn’t want to see me anymore last Sunday.

Today, exactly one week to the hour that I had The Talk with my ex, I went on my first date with someone else. And it was actually kind of nice?

I did question whether I should hold off on dating, but to be honest I was ready to jump back into things pretty quickly. I’m glad I did, because there’s this huge worry that I think plagues everyone when you start dating again after things end with someone you really liked. You worry you’ll never meet someone who will make you feel the same way, that there’s no one in the whole wide world who is as attractive, charming, kind, funny, as the person you lost. Deep down you know you’re being ridiculous, but the problem with dating is that the jerky, emotion-driven side of your brain takes over and that little guy does not listen to logic.

Anyway, back to the date. I tried to go in with as little expectations as possible, because high expectations have screwed me over time and time again. We met at Central Park, and spent the next few hours walking and chatting. He was nice and funny, and we had a good time together. At the end of the date, we ended up going to Trader Joe’s because we both had to buy groceries. That part of the date was kind of awkward because we would both see each other randomly around the store while shopping, but it felt weird to acknowledge the other person. So yeah, maybe not the most romantic ending but hey, for a date in the winter during a pandemic, I’d say it was a good time overall. The most promising sign was that I didn’t think of my ex even once while I was out today.

I don’t know where things will go. I told him I would send him my phone number on the app where we met so we could text. I’m not the best at reading interest in other people, but whether or not it goes anywhere, I’m really glad I put myself back out there. This date reminded me that I can feel something for other people, and that dating in general can be fun and not this horrible, draining thing, especially when you don’t invest all your emotions in someone even before meeting them.

In the past, I’d probably stop dating other people altogether and pin all my hopes on this one guy working out. Luckily, I’m a little more experienced and wiser now, so I’ll keep putting myself out there and trying to connect with others. If this continues to go somewhere, great! If it doesn’t, all I’ll have invested is a few hours in the park.

For the first time in my life, I’m dating for the enjoyment of it, rather than the fear of being alone. It’s a great feeling, and I can’t wait to see what the future has in store for me.

Rewiring Your Brain

In Christine Hassler’s book Expectation Hangover, the author explains:

Repetitive thoughts form what are called neural nets in our brain, which are clusters of chemically connected or functionally associated neurons. What that means is that if you think the same thought or type of thought over and over, it forms an actual physical cluster of neurons in your brain. Over time these neural nets create “grooves” in your brain that your thoughts gravitate toward. For instance, if you repeatedly think, “I’m not good enough,” you create a neural net around that limiting pattern of thought. Once the neural net is formed, it becomes habitual to think in the direction of “I’m not good enough.” Thus you will tend to see things that occur in your life through the lens of “I’m not good enough.

This idea of neural nets fascinated me, and it also offered me great comfort. If the brain can be trained to think negative thoughts, that means it can also be trained to do the opposite.

In fact, the author went on to make this very point, revealing a technique called self-directed neuroplasticity. There are a few ways you can rewire the brain, and it starts by imagining your runaway thoughts as a wild horse. It’s much easier to control this horse when you’re riding it and maneuvering the reins. One way of getting the horse/your thoughts under control is by saying “whoa” to yourself whenever you feel your mind drifting into territory you don’t want it go. This helps you bring yourself back to the present moment. Another similar technique is carrying a childhood picture of yourself in your wallet or on your phone. Anytime you feel negative thoughts starting to rise up, pull up that picture and imagine saying those negative things to the little boy or girl staring back at you. It’s much harder to be mean to sweet baby you with those big eyes and chubby cheeks, isn’t it?

It’s important to rein in these harmful ideas, because what you think about yourself sets the course for your life. I spent many years thinking I wasn’t good enough and dealing with a total lack of self-confidence. I thought I was lucky to receive any attention from men, so I chose people who were unavailable—men who had just gotten out of serious relationships or who lived all the way across the country. When they rejected me, it only served to validate my beliefs. Now that I’ve learned to love myself more and reject these ideas, I added a note to my dating profile making it clear that I’m not looking up for hookups or casual dating but to connect with someone in a meaningful way in the hopes of it leading to a long-term relationship. I plan on asking dates about their intentions early on, communicating my wants and needs often, and not investing in people before they invest in me. I imagine my dating experience will be much different this time around.

After learning about this bit of neuroscience, I’m not as surprised to find myself constantly trapped in negative thought cycles. I always thought there wasn’t much harm in lingering in these thoughts, but now I know better. Now I’m determined to rewire my brain so positive thinking becomes more natural to me.

I know my life isn’t a movie or anything, but this morning I woke up to gloomy, downcast weather. Rather than letting it get me down, I tried thinking about how thankful I was to be alive, to exist in this world, to have this rainy weather so I could appreciate the coziness of my apartment. And I kid you not, just like that the sky cleared up.

Okay, it wasn’t an instant thing or anything but it was supposed to rain all day, and instead the sun came out and shone brighter than it had in weeks. I don’t usually believe in signs, but in the interest of being a more positive thinker, I’m interpreting this one as a sign that I’m headed in the right direction.