The power of being grateful
Look at life in awe of all of its possibilities
When I found out that I got an offer letter to study in Australia, I was delighted. It was an opportunity to move out of my home, infact my home country for the first time. I still remember the bitter sweet feeling of parting ways from home, although there was a pain of leaving, I couldn’t wait for this next phase in my life. I vividly remember landing in Brisbane and looking at the city in wonder of all that was waiting for me.
The move was a hard shift, I went from having a group of friends around me everyday to living with people who don’t even talk to each other on regular basis. I went from being cared for all of my needs to dragging myself out of the bed to feed myself. I went from calling my mom to turn off the lights to serving food and cleaning tables. I went from being surrounded with love and acceptance to hatred, jealousy and selfishness. I was ruthlessly dragged out of my comfort zone, and my life took a completely 180. No matter how tough it was, I tried really hard, I did not give up a single day; I always dressed up and showed up.
I missed the comfort of home more than ever. I did not realise when I started resenting everything I had. Life only got worse, I complained every single day about the things that I badly wanted not long ago. I convinced myself that maybe that’s how student life is and that graduation may change things, but that was a punch in the gut too. Graduation worries are one thing, but graduating during a pandemic is another. I started to believe this whole moving out experience was not meant for me. In two years I lost so many parts of myself that I just wanted to go back to my familiar as soon as I can.
Again, ofcourse, I couldn’t immediately do that because of the pandemic, but I decided to leave when the flights opened. Now that I knew I was leaving, I was relieved, I didn’t care about what was happening to me. I stopped complaining about things not working out and started living my life as it was. And yes, you guessed it right, things started to change. Suddenly everything started to fall into place. My life was finally working out, I started meeting great people who brought so much calm and peace into my life. I was enjoying the joy of doing my own chores. I was glad that I had a job that was helping me pay my bills in a pandemic.
So what really changed?
Not my life, just me.
I started accepting my present, and when I did, great things started to happen. I couldn’t be more thankful for all that life was bringing to me. That’s when I paused and looked back at the last two and half years of my life. All the people I met, all the experiences I had felt like they were conspired to experience this exact moment. It felt like I was a main character of a movie. Every setback made me value everything I overlooked and took for granted. If this is not the greatest love story to a better version of myself, I don’t know what is. When I stepped back and looked at my whole life, I was fascinated with all the plots. And in that moment all I felt was immense gratitude, for every single experience: the good, bad and the ugly.
