It's a phrase that I have heard so much from enterprenuers: "Don't think, just jump in! And figure it out later...."
And, in certain situations, it's an accurate statement but for something that has more significance, it can be a challenge.
My therapist told me this week that with trauma, we may have a harder time digging into the past when we try to jump all into the pool. She said, "Well, the thing is, we sometimes jump head first before we even see that there is a pool. We just hope there is a pool to jump into. It's ok to scout out where the pool is and then put our toe in slowly. We do not need to just jump."
:Insert visual of one of those home videos of someone jumping from a roof top and into a pool: Don't worry, I will spare you the visual... You already get it.
And that has been on my heart since Wednesday.
Too many times, I have closed my eyes, held my breath, said a prayer, and jumped... And you know what, I usually landed on top of thorns and got cut. And only a handful of times did I land safely in the water.
But my therapist also said something else a couple months ago that I just remembered.. I gave her the short story of everything I went through and how situations were growing up... And she said, "Danisha, it sounds like you never really learned how to have relationships. You learned to be quiet, take orders, and then overtime you learned to use your voice."
And she is right... On all of it.
In my entrepreneur life, there are so many times that I have had to just jump in and figure it out later, not because it was a wrong decision but due to the fact that I could not see the outcome but I knew it was the right direction.
But I started doing this same thing with friendships, in my career, in my school journey, in conversations, and even in my healing journey. I even did this online a couple of times... AND the internet is not a place that you want to jump into blindly, especially when we share with our wounds on our sleeve.
Recently, there was a time that a wound was hit and the way I responded back was "all in, head first without visual of the pool" and it left me in a messy middle for about a year. I felt it.... The person on the receiving end felt it, and I was
too embarassed and hurt to see that what I did was this....
And a little of this
And a whole lotta this
And all I needed to do was this
I needed to take a moment, see the pool, and then see where to jump in. The response on the other side would have been smooth... And I would not have landed on rocks or the ground.
So, I want to hear from you. Where do you need to first see the pool and then jump in? AND where do you need to give yourself grace?
We will mess up and we will get back up to try again. We are allowed to heal but we do not have to walk around holding our wounds on our sleeve. Grace and healing are on the other side.
Love muchly,
Danisha.
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