Yazzy from the Block: Learning to Love My Complicated Mess

There will always be someone ahead of you; there will always be someone behind you. That will always be the case. But right here, right now: this is where you are. And it might not be exactly where you want it to be, but it just is what it is. We have to deal with it, and learn to love our complicated mess.

Me? I’m figuring shit out as I go.

As I walk through the city I try to remind myself why I came to London.

After all, aliljoy didn’t start because life was joyful and smelling of roses. It started because life is fucking hard. Turns out finding joy ain’t all that easy.

On this particularly soggy morning, with my hot drink in hand (always a hot drink in hand), on my way to one of my many jobs, I began to feel a chill of fear about my life.

Here I am, living my life in the best way I can, trying to build my career, juggling a multitude of jobs along side my writing – making just enough to make ends meet, single, little financial security, living in a dodgy neighbourhood, masquerading in what feels like a multitude of roles in the walking  live action drama/comedy that constitutes my life-movie. Fuck.

Why do I always feel like I’m under-achieving?

No matter how far I come I can’t help but feel swallowed my the magnitude of my ambitions. I’ve still got so far to go…

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A few months back…

I walked through the front door of my shared house – it had been a hard week and I was at a tipping point. 

I did the only thing I could do – I burst in tears.

My housemates jumped up and wrapped their arms around me. We had all been there in recent months. We had all been facing disappointments and challenges with the realisation that life was a big fuckin’ complicated mess.

Then my housemate piped up and said the words I needed to hear:

‘Yaz, look how far you’ve come!’ 

I shoved a cookie my mouth.

‘I hate my life.’ I said chewing and crying at the same time.  ‘It’s a fucking joke. I’m sick of poverty. I’m exhausted. And impatient. AND hungry, both literally and figuratively…’ I reached for another cookie. ‘All the drug dealers in the area make me feel like I’m in the fucking hood.’

I was feeling very sorry for myself and it was all very dramatic.

‘Hey,’ said my housemate ‘what about Jenny?’

‘Jenny?’

‘Jenny from the Block. Jennifer Lopez. She did it and she was from the Bronx. You’re Yazzy, Yazzy from the block, well, Langham Road, but you know what I’m saying…’

That night I thought about it… She was right. I was YAZZY FROM THE BLOCK!

If Jenny could do it, then there was still hope for me! Okay, she did have Puff Daddy but that’s not the point.

Suddenly, I realised that my fears, tears and pain weren’t a symptom of failure. 

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I was crying because I was having a shit day preceding a couple of shit years. But I still had PASSION. I still had a DREAM. I still CARED.

There’s this quote from Norman Cousins:

‘The tragedy in life is in what dies inside a man while he lives – the death of genuine feeling, the death of inspired response, the awareness that makes it possible to feel the pain or the glory of other men in yourself.’ 

I love this quote because it teaches that the pain doesn’t kill you. The loss doesn’t kill you. The regret doesn’t kill you. The grind of life doesn’t kill you. It’s the inability to give a toss anymore that’s the real killer.

I felt broken that night a few months back. But it wasn’t the first time, nor would it be the last. Sometimes we all feel a bit broken by the challenges by life. What I did learn was that my brokenness wasn’t the end of me. 

Sometimes things in life don’t go to plan – it’s like the ol’ GPS stops working. But you know what? As long as our hearts are still beating for something, it’s not over.

There’s that cliche: home is where the heart is. I think it’s true in a way, but I like to think of my heart as more of a compass –  because sometimes it’s the only thing that leads us to wherever it is we are supposed to be.

Have a great week peeps!

x

If you enjoyed this article, why not check out ‘The Q-Word: When ‘Never Give Up’ Isn’t the Best Advice’?

Tags: ambition bad day dreams Joy London twenty something problems

Categories: From the Heart Mirror Mirror: Self Improvement Yazmin Joy