What’s Updates Vol. 6

If I’m being completely honest, this past week wasn’t one of my proudest moments. As you know from last week’s What’s Update, I moved apartments…again. I had written in that post that I’d be fully attached to my new place by the time I write this What’s Update. Unfortunately, I can’t say that’s the case.

These four walls haven’t exactly been the easiest to adjust to. But man oh man, I’m trying. I’ve oscillated between “get me out of here!” and “it’s not so bad” more times than I can count. I never realized how much I appreciate a screened window, let alone a closed window you can actually see out of. Come nightfall when the opaque windows must close due to mosquito hour, I feel like I’m in a jail cell, complete with echoing walls and bad lighting. The ant infestation, that’s slowly advancing to my bedspace, isn’t helping either nor is the fact that I have one fork to my name and recently broke one of my two plastic(!) cups in the kitchen.

I don’t share all of this for sympathy or even to out myself as an occasional complainer. I share this because sometimes life is less than comfortable. And sometimes that’s exactly what you need to stretch and grow beyond the comforts you’ve relied upon.

The funny thing is I chose this. I chose cheap over comfortable. I chose Oaxaca over living at home with my parents. I chose penniless over rich with a job I don’t like. This uncomfortable moment I find myself in is temporary. That I know. Even if its expiration date I do not.

All in all, this past week of adjusting to my six-legged housemates and echo chamber of blank white walls was a lesson in finding comfort in the discomfort. Did I do it perfectly? No way! But I’m learning. I’m learning to embrace where I am on the path, whatever it may throw at me.

I’m even learning that some of my comforts weren’t just preferences, they were fears I was refusing to face. For example, dealing with any insect, let alone an infestation of them, is my worst nightmare. I’d sooner pack up and move to another apartment than coexist with an army of insects. And if I’m being completely honest, my insect fear has even caused me to rule out certain places on the planet where I could see myself living (Bali for one) based on the probability of what insects I might have to face on a daily basis.

My point is that fear has the potential to shrink your world. It’s limiting. Of course we all know this, but for some reason, for me, it took this apartment and what it’s forcing me to face to really let that reality sink in. I’m uncomfortable and yet I’m here. This is what my money can buy right now. And I’m grateful that I had money to buy even this.

And really it’s not so bad. It’s more good than bad if I can see it that way. Not because this is my ideal home situation or one I want to repeat, but because in this temporary moment, I get to neutralize a fear of mine and translate this lesson to all of the other fears I’m still carrying. I get to open my world just a little bit bigger.

Fear not,
Amber

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