{"id":47204,"date":"2022-06-26T09:48:23","date_gmt":"2022-06-26T09:48:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/?p=47204"},"modified":"2022-06-26T09:48:30","modified_gmt":"2022-06-26T09:48:30","slug":"remembering-the-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/2022\/06\/26\/remembering-the-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering the change."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Picture this:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I used to be a nervous wreck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nervous and jittery and uncomfortable and extremely self-conscious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t pretty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I didn\u2019t trust people, I didn\u2019t trust myself, and the world looked very dangerous and really unfriendly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My life was wobbly and dark.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why I\u2019m telling you this?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, I totally forgot about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I just realized that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For decades I was socially awkward, shy, cynical, and easily frustrated, and that turned out to be the perfect breeding ground for alcoholism, depression, and wanting to be on my own all the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Curtains closed, bottles open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It sucked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It almost killed me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet I never really think about that guy, that life, again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Isn\u2019t that weird?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Isn\u2019t that totally off the charts?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Isn\u2019t that beyond amazing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not just this utter lack of confidence and optimism that paralyzed me most of my life, but also this huge change, this profound U-turn, AND the fact that I never think about it anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019d think that I\u2019d remember it all the time, wringing my hands in utter gratitude, counting my blessings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thank you, thank you, thank you!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\u2026 no.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s what often happens when we change: we hardly notice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because our consciousness changes with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everything changes with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I started being very present, so the past has lost its grip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can only compare the life we live right now with our memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I still know how I wanted to stay out of sight all the time, I know how I spent weeks in a dark house while Summer was blazing outside, I know how unreliable and unforgiving I was, and I know how I blamed the world for my lack of aliveness and courage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like I said: it wasn\u2019t pretty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are a million bad things I can still remember about those long years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the feeling of being defeated is gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s no longer there, the experience of hostility, discomfort, and no joy whatsoever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Literally gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know how it used to be, I can picture myself there, but the feeling has faded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a big, big, BIG change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amazing, isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

—<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Photo by @jonecohen, for Unsplash)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Picture this: I used to be a nervous wreck. Nervous and jittery and uncomfortable and extremely self-conscious. It wasn\u2019t pretty. I didn\u2019t trust people, I didn\u2019t trust myself, and the world looked very dangerous and really unfriendly. My life was wobbly and dark. Why I\u2019m telling you this? Well, I totally forgot about it. And […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47205,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":""},"categories":[99,102,97,117,100,105,116,113,107,103,112],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47204"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47206,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47204\/revisions\/47206"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marnix.nl\/homepage\/welkom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}