New Old-Habits

It's safe to say that 2020 is one of the most depressing years all time, at least that's the impression I get from social medias and some conversations with people around me - and this isn't only because of COVID-19 which definitely limit our free wills. Happiness or gratitude suddenly become the things that we need to look for, because it doesn't happen just-like-that anymore. So, instead of waiting for good things to happen, we are forced to create or look for them.

"What makes you happy?"

...was the question I hope I could answer with a list of activities. After realizing that it I could not begin with anything, the question reformulates itself into...

"What used to make you happy?"

Maybe that's the question I should start with. 

Of course I (or we all) am not always this gloomy. We were all once those kids whose good moods could be triggered simply by cotton candies or playgrounds. The cotton candies now have turned into carb diets and the playgrounds into work places. When did this happen? When did my thoughts start to shift? Was it puberty?

I feel like I am not in the right state of mind, as if I am being kicked out from my own system. On the second thoughts, maybe I wasn't being kicked out at all, maybe I got out voluntarily. Simply because I know I don't belong there. 

In the hope of finding the right state of mind, the right place and system for myself, I tried to re-create, refresh my old habits, because the good habits that make us who we are, are the habits we should never leave, and also maybe are the system we belong to. Also, let's take this as my attempt to make this year don't pass in vain.

1. Read... and read

I have realized quite a while ago that I don't read as much anymore. I am still in love with words and beautiful sentences, but I always let my racing minds control over myself that it is not anymore possible to absorb even a word that I read. After a while, I left reading books just like I left other good things that could potentially make me happy. 

It was hard at first to get myself sit on the sofa and just read (and actually "read"), but just like any other habit, you just have to bring yourself to it... before you can really do it. Persistence wins over time. 

2. Write, draw, color

Because the feelings that are left unexpressed are the feelings that could eat you up. To write, to draw, to color used to be my media to express my feelings, to balance the system inside of me. 

3. Nature

When I was a kid, my father often took me and my brothers to the nearest lake just to see the ducks and feed them, or to a farm to see goats and feed them. He also often took us biking. My brothers and I used to call the biking as "looking for an alternative road", because we never actually think of which road we would be taking, we would just ride and ride and at the end we would see that even the unfamiliar roads would bring us back to the right track. Little did I know, my father did it intentionally, so that we got to know where we actually are, in order to prevent ourselves from getting lost. 

I realized that I didn't know much about where I live the first time I decided to go biking few months ago. The only road that I am familiar with was only the road to the hospital where I work, the city where I need to do monthly errands, and some restaurants. How unfortunate it is to live day by day knowing that the world was small when it never was. 

4. Music

I always knew that Music would is healing, but yet I ignore it anyway. I missed listening to music and get lost until it feels weird when I take off my headphones to get back to reality. What should you do when you miss doing something? Right, you do it. 

5. Talk to friends

Somewhere in this gloominess, I slowly pull myself back to live in an almost total isolation. Sadly, that wasn't at all a conscious isolation which usually ends in a spiritual epiphany, but more like an isolation full of hopelessness and negativity. This is where I realized how priceful it is to have at least a friend. 

I wasn't, unfortunately, one of the lucky ones who could effortlessly get the old friends back in one WhatsApp chat. But with some help from the universe, I finally got the courage to "get them back" and actually keep them. For real this time. And that makes me feel good.

6. Selling and buying old clothes

This is not exactly an old habit, but just a habit I started this year. It is mad how fast fashion industry growing, isn't it? It is not equal a bad thing, but the mentality that people develop along with it, the mentality to want something new everyday and throwing away what they already have, is a bad thing. The idea of Re-Use is one of the idea that could help slowing down this madness. Through an online app, I started to buy old clothes (only when I need one) and sell the old ones of mine that are still wearable. It just feels good to be able to give old clothes "new life" and thus reducing fabric waste.  

7. Barbie!

I used to think to myself, why do adults don't buy Barbie when they have so much money? This was a real question which kept me busy for some time back when I was a kid. This question ended with a decision that I would buy a lot of Barbies with my first salary ever! 

Then, years after my first salary, I still haven't bought any Barbie. In fact, I even forgot that I even thought to buy one.

So, in order to satisfy the little child inside of me, I decided to buy a Barbie last week. It was actually more like a reality check, just to see if it makes any sense at all. Amazon has a return fiture anyway right? But then, as I opened the package, I can feel a smile pulling on my face as I saw a beautiful Barbie smiling back at me. I hope I would always be able to let at least a little part of me be a child. Forever.

After all, it wasn't that bad of a year, huh?