Before I get started I would really appreciate if you guys would consider donating to my Dry July campaign. I’m giving up grog for one month to support an array of Australian cancer charities via the Dry July Foundation. Please donate here if you can (donations can be as little as $2 and it’s all tax deductible). Thank you all oh so much! x
I’ve always been for therapy. Well, sort of. Naturally I’ve had my fair dose of it being a millennial of a certain background. In fact, I did it on and off for ten years, between ages 18 and 28, not to mention I’m about to start a new round with an aforementioned psychologist who specialises in writers (as we are our own breed of neurotic).
The reason I initially started in therapy was that I was such a terrible blusher. My beetroot red face was constantly crippling my confidence. In fact my level of self-consciousness around it back then now seems ludicrous - nowadays I just own the fact I wear my heart on my sleeve and my moods on my visage. (Just as well I feel this way now, my complexion is so white that I’m virtually see-through, there’s not much I can do about turning pink!)
So I went to therapy about this. And honestly it didn’t help a bit. Partly because I wasn’t really seeing the right person - I was going to some random free counsellor via my university - and partly because it just didn’t. As I said I eventually (mostly) got over this hindrance on my own. But when therapy really cranked up for me was when I had a terrible accident age 19, and in it I had to relocate back to Christchurch from Wellington (where I’d only just moved), have life-threatening surgeries, live in a spinal unit for a while and learn how to walk again.
It was an indisputably severe situation which called for urgent care that went beyond rehabilitating my body. With that I started seeing a proper psychologist and she was great! Firstly I really liked her - she was pretty, chic, friendly and had a buttery English accent which made every session with her full of ease. She also taught me the basis of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, which does help. I worked out a bit of stuff with her in her rooms, and was genuinely sad to say goodbye to her when I made my way back up North.
But since then, and a few other therapists later, about 18 months ago, I decided to dig deeper. I was absolutely at rock bottom (even worse than when I had broken my back in said teenage accident). Everything had seemingly imploded in my adult life and I needed to do something about it.
At that point I had already treated myself to a few months of wallowing. I had let myself cry for everything I had lost and eat pizza (hot or cold) for every meal. That’s until I looked in the mirror and literally said aloud, “enough!” That was not who I am. So I put down my monotonous slice of cheesy bread, washed my face and walked up the street to the beautiful park near my new flat.
I sat there with my laptop and found To Be Magnetic online, a neural reprogramming website, and signed up. I started doing their work religiously and uncovered damaging truths from my past and dormant memories that had been playing out in my real life, then reworking them.
I read the Artists Way and began my morning pages practise. At the advice of basically ever self-help guide ever I ended several longterm friendships that were not right anymore, not because the other person was bad (OK some of them were really bad) but because we were no longer on the same wave length and the friendship wasn’t good for anyone.
I reconnected with my witchy side and learnt the basics of reading astrology charts and tarot, using both of these skills to help navigate my next moves. I meditated more. I cleared out my wardrobe. I started growing my punchy platinum bob out to my natural honey-ash, in a bid to shed myself of any mask.
I even did Landmark Forum (FKA EST), which was honestly kind of fucked up, but also pretty incredible - my strength being I had the basis of the TBM practise and my witchy side to guide my way through its extremes.
I also really reviewed the truth about who I was/am (I even asked a few select friends and family to tell me what they disliked about me most - naturally the family members got back to me immediately with their notes). I combed through all of my negative attributes and did my best to figure out why I can be jealous or controlling or selfish or self-loathing or just plain old emotional.
I did all of this with gusto, as though I was studying via correspondence and had regular deadlines I could only get to alone. I didn’t get dogmatic about one particular modality either - everything I did played a part in sorting me out.
At the end of all of this work I reached my goal(s). I got a book deal without an agent and I went back to Italy for an extended period of time. I achieved all of this plus I met someone new (who’s WAY better than the before bloke), ended up travelling for 8 months and now I’m moving to Los Angeles by way of Sydney. I don’t think my teary, pizza-inhaling self could have predicted this.
What I’m trying to say is all of this deeper healing stuff is so worth it and it works. Once you change your insides, your outsides follow. It’s also fucking hard (I missed out describing all of the other subsequent rock bottoms I had along the way) but once you’ve worked through the rubbish that’s constricting your core, you can kind of do anything.
I recently spoke to Australian beauty entrepreneur Poppy King. She’s been generous enough to give me the odd mentoring session and also contribute a small “breakout box” to my upcoming non-fiction book. She and I chatted self-development as we spoke the other day, and she left me with a phrase that’s since lingered, which is, “It’s all an inside job.”
I’m not saying you need to do exactly as I did (I also wouldn’t do To Be Magnetic or Landmark Forum if you are suffering from mental illness and/or are on medication) BUT, I really encourage you to get started with your own healing journey. Yes, moaning to expensive therapists can help, but actually taking the reigns of your own life helps a hell of a lot more.
I’m still working on myself, by the way. I still have big goals I’m yet to get to - some of which currently seem impossible to reach. I still cry a lot (although I don’t eat pizza anymore because of my recently discovered food intolerances, all uncovered from a parallel health journey I’ve been on). I still journal every morning ala The Artists Way, and will be sitting down with said writer’s pysch soon to prep for the potential perils of launching a book. All of this is to say, right now I do feel I’ve done the ground work to make the next lot of magic happen.
So, what are you going to do? Remember it’s all ultimately up to you.