What I Know For Sure: Who You Are

I am on the other side of the world as I type this, feeling a lot like Carrie Bradshaw {then again, no, more like George Clooney} as the week draws to a close and I am anticipating coming home. It had been good, and then it had been great / fantastic / awesome / insert amazing adjective here.

I kind of do this a lot while in front of the laptop.

After two rounds of What I Know For Sure posts, I didn't think I could wheedle out some more insightful, blog-worthy posts out into the world.

Insights are lot like sleep.

If I chase it and force myself to think, it never comes, and I just fall into an agitated state --- and become really, really cranky. If I begin to go out of my comfort zone, I am exposed to a multitude of new experiences and just like love, you fall slowly --- and then all the way.

1. You never know what makes you happy until you come from a sad place.

It hit me as I was walking into the cold, bone-tingling air of downtown Toronto on a spring day. Over the past weeks, I've knowingly plunged myself onto situations that were considerably uncomfortable to me, in the spirit of getting out of my comfort zone. Surely, it WAS uncomfortable, and I was thriving and I thought "Ha! I can do this!". Or so I thought. When I returned to my comfort zone, a whooshing rush of happiness and comfort and knowing I belonged there came over me, and I realized it was what made me happy and it was what comforted me on so many levels. It was all so surprising and I couldn't stop exclaiming how I didn't even know I was sad. I was so joyous I almost cried on my cocktail upon realizing this.

2. It's possible to want so little. Being away from home for a few days led me to wheedle out the things {and yes, people} I know I don't need and want in my life. It's possible. And it leads to acceptance and most of all, that feeling of abundance.

3. Know what you do, and kick ass. I'd been reading The Everygirl's feature on Abby Larson of Style Me Pretty while in the car from Scarborough and in between freeways and exits, I was so astounded of how this one piece of advice resonated so much. Sometimes, {and I do this}, we tend to extend ourselves and become the jack or jill of all trades. In the process of this, the quality of our jobs/talents suffer and end up being mediocre on all things. It happens to me every now and then. And then I remembered, that I already know what I want and what I am great at. I gotta stop trying to do so many things all at once. {So I can stop making myself sad, too!}

Two pieces of advice. First, know what you do and do it well. In the words of Haile McCollum, the lovely lady who bought my invitation business. I have lived by those words and they have proven time and time again to be true. It’s so tempting to jump on the nearest style train, to do what’s working for someone else. But ultimately, that isn’t necessarily what will work for you. Know what YOU do and do it really, really well. Don’t try to be everyone. Don’t try to be everything. Simply know what you do and kick ass doing it.

And second, as Oprah said, always sign your own checks. Always be incredibly intimate with every part of the process…from the writing to the coding and development, from the marketing and social media elements to the dollars spent on supplies. This is YOUR business. Know it. Every last part of it.

4. All the cultural differences. Being in a multi-cultural family and a multi-nationality environment at all fronts, and having read a bunch of books about cultural differences made me think I knew a lot about other nationalities and how to interact with them. As it turns out, there's just so much to learn and infuse into daily actions. No one tells me these things so I'll be happy to share that in this blog: it's nice to be prepared and know which actions are kind and rude to other nationalities.

5. But then again, be you. At a conference, in an effort to 'belong,' and blend into the crowd, I tapered all my outfits into just black or white and never the ones that were too loud. This was how I found out folks from the Toronto office were reading this blog {hello there, guys!} because someone said what I was wearing {a full on, stiff, pant suit} was a new side of me because they've seen my normal outfits and it was nothing like a pant suit. And then I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I had tried very hard to maintain a blog and be serious at work but I just keep acting silly and colorful at work and I get serious in this blog anyway so. What the heck. I am just going to keep it real and keep on acting as myself.

What would Tara do?

6. There will always be this person who will make you feel insecure about yourself without even having to lift a finger. Not sure why I'm even admitting that here, in this blog, but to that I say, desiderata. And whatever it is, it shall pass --- You and I are children of the universe after all.

7. The abs don't build themselves. Work it.

8. You can't be right all the time but you can be kind. I've gotten over the need to be right all the time but it's become a personal advocacy, a mission statement and an aspiration, if you will, to just be kind. It's pretty hard but it should get me to better places than being always right.

9. Travel at every chance you get. Traveling {especially on work purposes} come with much responsibility {I am a very grateful girl} but nothing enriches a person like traveling. In fact, I kind of like my traveling self the best. She's oddly wiser with money, goes with the flow, her eyes are always peeled for the next possible adventure, her lips ready to make the next best scintillating conversation. So travel at every chance, whether it be a vacation, a call of duty or to see a loved one.