There was always this undercurrent of anxiety, anticipation of disappointment and insecurity in the first 6 days of the year.
Without fail, as soon as the calendar entered 1st Jan, I felt like I needed to brace myself and watch out for danger.
You may wonder what’s so scary and dire.
Well, they are the days leading up to my birthday.
The memories of my birth-day mostly,
I didn’t have friends through out school years and I was the only person who didn’t get any gift from any classmates on my birthday.
My mother told me the piano lesson was more important and it was no way for me to skip one and had a cake at home.
I was reminded verbally each year that my mom went through great pain to give birth to me and it was only right that I made my family’s expectations my priority and spent my life repaying the pain my mom suffered for me.
Really not exaggerating. This was really the thought frame I grew up with.
What’s worst,
The angst I went through didn’t help me to answer the question, “If I was not loved, why was I born?”
You can’t blame a young girl to validate love in such narrow perspective, can you?
You see,
Even when later into my adulthood, I had made friends (many of them) and I was celebrated in more occasions than I could count beyond my birth-days, that emotional tag was still very much present.
In my early 20s, I would go out of my ways remind my friends not to say happy birthday to me or plan anything for me.
Well, my belief of how much I deserved love was that low. I couldn’t bring myself to ask them to celebrate for me so I pre-empted to save myself from disappointment.
Then, I would be even more disappointed when my friends followed my request.
I was too young to catch my own twisted understand about love.
Then, into late 20s till now,
Though I did not a celebration of birthday to confirm the love and joy I had in life, that trigger was solidly tagged in my system.
2024 has been a year of reclaiming for myself.
The most significant one was finally to meet myself with my supernatural gifts.
The most surprising one was to see myself as a romantic. (read about it here.)
“Reclaiming” is such a big word used in personal development world.
What’s it really?
Why does it matter?
Reclaiming is simply a process to initiate your own definitions and actively create new thought frames and energetic tags towards all possible human experiences.
We were all born a blank sheet.
Not a cliche but a scientific fact. A baby has no formed intellectual consciousness nor subconsciousness. (Let’s not get into the soul knowing for now.)
We learned how to feel and perceive all things around us and in life with complicated emotions after we were born.
Majority of humans operate heavily in the frames they learned and acquired in the first 7 years of their lives.
Imagine,
I am going 41 and my emotions were still controlled by some events happened when I was 7 or 8!!!!
Sometime last December,
My sister told me she got something for my birthday already.
And my dad turned 70. We went out of our way to order a cake and celebrated for him.
(Celebrating birthday hadn’t been not a thing in my family.)
Oh I could still feel the bliss when I saw my dad overwhelmed by loving emotions.
When I caught myself being in my usual birthday distress on 1st Jan, I decided this is the year to reclaim what birthday for myself.
I wanted to create something that would last for myself as well as for others.
I wanted it to mean something particularly for me.
When all intentions are set, the Universe orchestrates.
I set the intention to hire a mentor who are in her full awaken power to guide me through the process of laying foundation for bringing my supernatural and intellectual combination out in the highest possible way.
A spiritual mentor I’ve come into knowing open a 5-part program through the year which was designed to layer the foundation of full embodiment of soul expression.
My own spiritual evolutions is the most important thing to me. It’s the core of how I understand my purpose and the northern start of creating my life.
So, I signed up, paying a amount which made my mind nervous.
I set up monthly donation to 2 philanthropic organizations I’ve been paying attention to and wanted to be part of it, starting with monetary contribution.
Donation and volunteer in philanthropic cause are also my family legacy. It’s a philosophy of life traced back to generations.
It’s also an act to really step into the abundance reality.
When I was in corporate and made very good money, I was always insecure with money. I made donation here and there but was always with fear that I didn’t have enough to share (!!!).
I terminated all donations when I quit corporate because I believed I had even less!
Well, I didn’t go in one day worrying not having a place to live or a meal to filled myself in the past 5 years. I might not rebuild my financial capacity back to the level of my corporate days but I certainly had more than enough.
Now, with this act for myself as celebration of my birthday, at least once a month, since I track my finance daily and regularly, I would be reminded that I am never in lack, which is something to be grateful for.
You see, by reclaiming “birthday”, I am also setting up multiple thought frames for myself.
It’s the beginning of the year.
You may have goals and resolutions.
I would invite you to take a look at them as examine,
“What do I want to reclaim for myself this year?”
“Are these supporting me to do so?”
In a modern world when “authenticity” became a marketing catchphrase, reclaiming is how you can really understand who you truly are and how the true you can create and lead.
I would to know what you would like to reclaim this year.
Be love and be loved,
Shuang-Min