We look forward to seeing you on the greens!
Together we are making a difference in the lives of today’s youth living with diabetes.
For as long as humanity has existed, stories have been deeply intertwined into our blood. Be it stories of triumph, defeat, romance, sadness, or cautionary tales, we are inseparable from them.
Our stories have power; “The pen is mightier than the sword”, they all say. Our stories are inspiring, such as the many tech garage start-ups, and ultimately, our stories can influence our reality. Notably, many of our stories are not works of fiction or about other people; our expressive stories are about our own lives.
As Diabetics, we are especially prone to our stories. In my own life, I have told many stories based on my interpretations of events. The stories I told had real power over my life. Whether I am a good storyteller or just really gullible, I would live my stories as if they were permanent aspects of my life and not mere transient stories.
I would tell myself stories of perfection. Maybe, if I could constantly keep my blood sugar in control through harsh ratios, bolusing, and obsessive control, I would be Normal again. I saw plenty of evidence to back this up as I would stay within range as I harshly controlled my blood sugar – great! But, unannounced to me, my diabetes just stood there unfaltering, an immovable object against the unreachable and spiralling unstoppable force that is perfection. These two forces created a cutting friction that fell upon my well-being, distracting me from what matters. This would go on for years as I was in pursuit of all of the stories I and others told about Normality, but I never stopped to consider what Normal is to me.
This story would last years until, slowly, the weather changed.
Overcoming years of any debilitating mindset is a challenge, as we make ourselves “comfy” hiding behind our coping mechanisms. However, we alone can reach the summit of our mountains and free ourselves.
Like many articles, I wish to highlight the importance of maintaining a healthy diet, exercise routines, support systems, therapy, mentors, and other such activities. However, a house is strong both on the outside with its walls and on the inside with its framing. We need to address our mental health, too! An all-encompassing chronic illness needs an all-encompassing solution!!
In my story, addressing my mental health became a crucial part of the process that I wish to share to help aid others on their own journeys. Below, I have listed some simple actions that can powerfully transform your life.
For myself, understanding how my perfection arises and how it affects me helped me to name and describe emotions associated with my perfection. Simply stilling yourself and mindfully attending to the thoughts and feelings that arise allows you to gather crucial information about yourself that can help bring an identity to your challenge.
Note: Mindfulness is incredibly important to help you overcome your challenges; please see the bottom of this blog for further information.
In my process of understanding my need for perfection, I discovered:
Already, we can form a mental identity of what this challenge is, but there is no limit to how much information we can collect! After this process, we must bring a name forward. I would try to look at the “general” direction that all of these thoughts point to; it was like reading a treasure map.
In the process of understanding my thought process, a lot of weight lifted off my back, and I could now do something meaningful about my challenge. Nowadays, we are lucky; I could search for “how to deal with perfectionism” and instantly find thousands of decent articles on how to deal with perfectionism. Next, I would search through them and see what would work best for me. The more specific, the better; there might even be articles that address Diabetes and Perfectionism or Diabetes and x and y-. Oftentimes, our problems are a mess of interweaving vines!
After knowing comes acceptance; in my case, my perfectionism is an outdated coping mechanism that I used to try to deal with a chronic illness. However, the baton must be passed on in the great relay race of life so the racers can rest, allowing a healthier racer to continue.
At the bottom of the pit, I found myself.
In my story, acceptance was initially scary and exposing. I had stripped myself down of my trusty and comfy coping mechanism(s), and I was left face to face with my challenges themselves. Fortunately, no one is truly alone while climbing their mountain, for thousands have summited similar mountains [hundreds] of years before. For a few years I have been deeply invested in reading what I like to call “Practical philosophy” or “Philosophy.” Be it Stoicism, Sufism, or Buddhism, all of these realms have thoughts to add to your journey. So pick up a book and a pen and get reading! In the words of Mawlana Rumi:
Please read the full version here.
After our lovely chat, we went for a walk:
“Don’t complain about autumn. Walk with grief like a good friend. Listen to what he says. Sometimes the cold and dark of a cave give the opening we most want.” ~ Mawlana Rumi [Translated by Coleman Barks]
I slowly and slowly started to befriend my diabetes, and the seeds of acceptance were sowed; in reality, my diabetes is a part of me, and I should be chummy with it!
“Is this the condition that I feared?” ~ Seneca
For much of your life, you may have spent it at war with yourself; do allow Yourself to overcome yourself. You must welcome a growth mindset and see everything as an opportunity for betterment. You must understand your roots and where you come from and be compassionate with yourself. It must come from within:
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~ Mawlana Rumi
Through these simple but transformative methods, I could take control of the pen and hold myself wholesomely as fate spilt the ink. I am coming upon my seventh year of diabetes; it can take time; I tell myself two things:
“Strive to improve yourself 1% each day.” ~ James Clear
“Easy choices, hard life. Hard choices, easy life.” ~ Jerzy Gregorek
After all of the work on myself, I come back to face my original question, “What is normal?”
“The sense of self”
I am normal in my own words, I am normal because of who I am, diabetic or not. If we look out to the world we see people summiting mountains cursing themself of their superficial abnormalities. Yet, if we look with an appreciative glance within ourselves and others, we are all normal, we all hold a pen that dictates.
The stories that we dictate have great power, don’t they? We can find so much evidence to back them up, can’t we? The wonderful thing is that Our stories are just that – stories. In our human nature, we perceive transient judgments as permanent facts about ourselves. We can shape, transform, and empower our lives through the stories we tell about our life’s events. Always remember, the ability to empower comes from within; do not hold your transient stories too close and decide –
“You are the sky. Everything else – it’s just the weather.” ~ Pema Chödrön
How To Hold a Cockroach: A book for those who are free and don’t know it ~ Matthew Maxwell
“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry, because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering. These are noble pursuits, necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman. “O me, O life, of the questions of these recurring. Of the endless trains of the faithless. Of cities filled with the foolish. What good, amid these, O me, O Life? Answer: That you are here. That life exists an identity. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.” That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?” ~ Dead Poet’s Society
“Feel So Different” ~ Shuhada’ Sadaqat / Sinéad O’Connor
The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation ~ Thich Nhat Hahn
“Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally.” ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn
The Essential Rumi ~ Mawlana Rumi – Translated by Coleman Barks
The Masnavi ~ Mawlana Rumi
Photo credit: Kieran (author)