Peace

Peace is an artform that takes time and effort to master. It’s a journey, not simply a destination.

It's very easy to tell someone to stay calm but it's not so easy to do that when your heart is beating so fast you feel like it's going to explode. When there are so many external factors pulling you in different directions that you don’t know who to be, what to do or where to go. You feel like you have no control over your experience of life and everything just happens to you without your consent. All those emotions swirling around can easily lead down the path of anxiety, fear, etc.

This was my life for a huge part of my high school years and even now I have moments like this when I don't allow myself to exhale and release everything that's weighing on me. In high school, it came to a point where the slightest things started to bother me and I was constantly anxious. I had to go to the guidance counsellor for her to teach me to be calm and be able to live life in a way that best benefits me and not fear what my peers would say. That single session impacted the person I was. I stopped caring so much about what my peers would say. All because I became comfortable with who I am and I didn’t try to stay in the little box my peers tried to put me in. I’m different and I love that about me.

Self acceptance has been at the root of my road to finding peace. It’s as though by trying to be something I’m not, I was going against the natural flow of my life, hence all the riptides of anxiety. Now that I’m going with the flow, it’s a lot calmer and easy to an extent.

Sadly, peace is not one of those things where once you have it, it’s there for life, although I do wish it was. You need to maintain composure at all times, which the people in my life have helped me with knowingly and unknowingly. The moment I catch my heartrate start to increase whilst I’m in a particular situation, I make sure to remove myself. It’s okay to leave whenever I sense that a particular situation is going to take me backwards in my personal development. I’ve come too far to let a single non event have that colossal effect on me. I know, it may seem a bit selfish at times but you have to be selfish to protect your peace.

We all find peace in different places and different ways. But when you do, it makes it easier to handle what life brings you because your heart and spirit are centred, you are self-assured and you value your tranquillity over the opinions of others.