Posted on January 18, 2022

"The desire to change was meaningless if I couldn’t find a way to make the change happen."

—Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

The past two years have been particularly interesting to my personal growth. I left home, moved to another country, got immersed in the pandemic with no family around—including physical separation with my partner for almost a year and a half. Even though it wasn’t easy, they were the perfect conditions for introspection; to figure out what I am, what I like, what I want.

This search, however, hadn’t been what I expected. Not because I didn’t find answers, but because I was lacking a way to materialize them, to put them into action. The desire to be—more so than change as it wasn’t a change of direction but of speed—was falling short on finding ways to make it happen. I guess I was waiting for the perfect conditions, for that exact moment when I knew I was ready to start the new pace I desired, which obviously never came.

Luckily, all of that stillness came to an end. About a month ago, I started reading a couple of books that helped me realize the—probably cliché, but still true—phrase: it’s not about the goal, it’s about the process. I shifted my mindset of waiting for that perfect scenario to defining the plan I need to follow to take me in the direction I want to go, at the speed I want to go, and just trust the process to get there. Thus, one day at a time, I’ve been focusing on the one step I need to take—knowing that it will be very fruitful at the end—, because I want to, and because I can.