Thought I'd just post this here, as a personal reminder to stay steadfast on this path of learning to know myself and thence the world, and thence God.
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Somewhat in relation to this, on a happy Sunday afternoon when I was having one of my book clubs with my cousins, we ended up not really discussing the book (because it did not fly with most of us, haha) and celebrated the new year, sitting at Hvala for yummy matcha and cakes, and then lounging in a nice spot outdoors. (Also, an official yay to gatherings of 8 people!) One of us had brought out a cool game that had sorta-truth-or-dare questions, and we went around digging deeper into each others' lives and personalities (not that we haven't known each other for literal years, but you know).
At one point, that was really strange in retrospect for me, was A looking at me, all-perceptive, head cocked to one side, and making this announcement about how I was different now, and his words: "you're like ready to love now". Which of course got an outburst of laughter from everyone, me included. But internally, I was like whaaaaat. There was further probing of me, at which point I learnt that I had given off very closed-off vibes, and I had to explain that I had since sorted out a lot of my anger. I really have, which explains my fairly recent posts circa end-2020 about having shifted something core inside me. (How this came to be is probably an accumulation of many, many little things that included self-love, love, prayer, and forgiveness, and reading, and learning, and reparenting.) It just stunned me that A had read something of that in my body language; really, the question card was only innocently asking, "What does my body language say right now?" Haha, and we went down a rabbit hole with our discussions.
My cousin asked again, "Do you think you're at your peak now, like you're the best you've ever been?" I honestly was just taken aback by his questions (but seriously, A does have some skill, controversial or not). I hesitated to say yes, although my inner self had already agreed. I said I hope so! only because my logical mind was tempering instinct and tried to rationalise that I can't possibly say this about every aspect of my life or know this with absolute certainty (my weight hasn't been the best for instance, but I'm working on it!) But I have sorted out a lot of crap and understood a lot of things about my self that have helped me face the world (hence the resonance with the video clip about self-knowledge), without anger at every lack of ideal, without an outlash at every real or perceived injustice.
A had hit it spot on again when he said, you have let go of the judgments that people make. I have, in most cases; they are exhausting, and draining, and rage-inducing. People seem to think that people have to badmouth you for judgments to be made; nu-uh. They are simply made and seep into the actions they take towards you and the world. They're still all there, the social issues of the world, the prejudices that surround our lives; but... I hope to address it with more of the love, and less of the anger.
Indeed, I am ready to love. Insyallah!
