the magic after rock bottom
2024 has been one of the most challenging years of my life, but I finally found its magic. After the lay-offs in 2023, I delved into what I called an Eat, Pray, Love era - a time focused on self-discovery and healing. As 2024 started, I seemed to have everything I wanted - moving back to Dublin, the only place outside of Lisbon I ever felt at home, with very supportive close friends and what little Mariana would call a “dream job”. The word I defined for the year was “focus”. It was supposed to be the year of LESS - less travelling, less networking, less projects, more peace. Instead, it was the year I discovered that rock bottom has a basement, and while focus was still the vision, “the only way is through” became my guiding star.
In January, I moved back to Dublin. No one can prepare you to go back to a place where you were happy, having all the external factors that made you happy changed. I struggled to make myself at ease (and it was damn cold), and would wake up crying, pondering whether I’d made the right choice but trusting my journey.
Work started becoming more and more challenging, and I stopped being able to sleep. I had a “mentor” at that time telling me that everyone struggles, but that I should go to meeting rooms to cry. I kept jumping from panic zone to growth zone, and would call my distant close friends almost every day crying because I didn’t know what else to do. I always take everything with a pinch of sarcasm, so it’s quite hilarious to look back at it now - almost like a telenovela.
My close relationships started getting affected, and in the midst of it all, I had a close friendship breakup, to put it that way, that felt like a hurricane. I had huge impulses to quit, stop, book flights, but decided to keep still because I felt like I needed to go through all the grieving and pain. That’s when I went back to Buddhism, started going every day to the temple and was meditating 4 hours every day, as well as pursuing a breathwork course. Those would be the only 4 hours I’d look forward to, but I couldn’t sit still and would start sobbing mid-sessions. My monk told me to do Yoga instead (where I could focus on movement) and I swapped practices.
Parallel things started happening, and I got handed the hardest challenge of my professional life, which I will never ever ever accept again, where I felt like I had to fight, but felt very alone. When I thought I was already at my bottom, I found out rock bottom has a basement, and things WENT SOUTH rapidly. I started working 16-18 hours a day, had daily panic attacks, one thing led to another (obviously) and my health started getting affected - I had an agonizing rash and a stronger panic attack took me straight to the hospital. I still couldn’t stop. I felt confused, numb, exhausted.
In all this I was still able to find some magic, and that’s where we end in October. Closing this chapter is a mental shift. I know the year hasn’t ended, but this chapter has, and the future is bright. I found a side of myself I didn’t know existed, with an internal fire so strong I was willing to break everything, but instead I still kept my values straight and won.
The second part, and the one I’m mostly grateful for, is my support system, the people around me. I got a huge reminder that whatever happens, I’ll never be alone. I had friends checking up on me every day. When my brain stopped functioning and I couldn’t get out of bed, I had friends coming to my house to drag me out, sending me daily wellness checks and calling me just so that I could cry. That’s something I will never take for granted, and will treasure as my most precious gift.
Being shaken in so many different directions and having to take life minute by minute because everything seems like too much will make you question yourself to a deeper level of existence. It’ll make you question your choices, your worth, and your value through and through. Sometimes we have to be put in fire to decide to switch what doesn’t serve us and come to the realization that maybe there’s a better life out there for us, a life free of ego, a life of love (vs. fear). What does that mean? For me, it means living authentically, with compassion for myself and others, and letting go of the need to control everything because if a wall is so tick you are wasting so much energy trying to break it, maybe it simply isn’t the right wall. When we’re so aligned with ourselves that we forget we’re breathing, that’s when we start flowing with life. “All’s Well That Ends Well”
That’s it.