The Tightrope of Happiness: Recent Episodes
Arran Patel
Arran is happy, content & hopeful of what the 2023 brings.
He has cut his Tightrope of Trauma & Survival - now celebrating the mechanisms & beautiful humans that have brought him sobriety, closure & healing.
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On my journey of healing, I have had to build healthy boundaries.
I have been completely honest with those in my life. In order to maintain lasting connections with those closest to me, this has been necessary. Thankfully, honesty is the best policy, and my friends are truly caring & understanding.
After enduring a breakup, I have used that experience to motivate me to work on myself. I find that everything happens for a reason & sometimes it’s good to reflect and think about what happened and understand the reasons of the both of us. It can sometimes feel lonely and it previously felt easier to jump straight back into dating or hooking up. I am now okay with just having a quiet weekend.
Another boundary is to realise my self-worth and to not be a people pleaser. It is easy to always say yes, but I often end up cancelling plans and I feel guilty. Moving forward, I will only say yes if it aligns with these new boundaries.
Healing takes time & it feels difficult to remove my attachment with my former self, but each step taken is progress.
Labels I once used on my self to fuel my ego have lost their purpose. I no longer lead a life where validation just fuels my ego.
I am prioritising happiness.
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In the past, I never allowed myself to feel proud or to let myself feel happy. I held onto the past & carried my trauma for over a decade, and it was controlling every aspect of my life.
Since I have moved on from it, I feel lighter but have been finding each day difficult. It takes a lot of energy for me to get out of bed and be productive each day. After losing a lot of weight, I have been reforming my relationship with food for a few months after a period of bulimia & I’m now eating three meals a day once again.
I am trying to love myself, instead of picking it apart. I have been unfollowing accounts on Instagram and other social media platforms that claim to be body positive but promote an unrealistic ideal body type. I stopped believing in all this New Year New Me & fad diet bullshit and focused on eating a sustainable, balanced diet where I can have the things I love in moderation.
Today, I feel cosy with who I am, comfortable in my skin as Beyoncé sings on Cozy from her latest album Renaissance. I took a step back, reflected & spent time with my parents. I stopped requiring external validation to feel happy in my own body. It can be difficult especially when we live in a society where people get excited by the number of likes they get on a picture.
I can wake up each day and see myself gaining weight in the mirror and realise it is a good thing.
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Commitment is essential. I have been on this journey of healing for over three years. Each step taken is better than to not take any step at all. Healing is not a destination.
I keep finding new facets of myself that seem shiny and new. I have been confronting versions of myself that I previously tried to forget. We are all prisms – countless facets of our self exist for different people in our lives. The person we are for our families, colleagues, friends and lovers. I had to befriend my inner critics & remove those people in my surroundings that triggered me. I was a people pleaser. I was constantly entering situations that led to multiple paths of self-destructive behaviours like binge drinking, occasional recreational drug use, serial dating and hooking up to feel less lonely. However, I realised I was stuck in this vicious cycle and took steps to stop this. I permanently deleted Grindr – that was the first step. The account and the app.
Be Kind. Be Mindful. Look inward and find facets of yourself that seem shiny & new.
Be Proud of each step you take on your journey of healing. Feel beautiful.
For my whole life, Leicester has been a home to me.
I am very lucky to be born into the family I was born into. As a child, I was physically & verbally bullied at school because I was different. However, I always felt like I belonged at home. I felt safe and loved by my parents and siblings. This suddenly changed when I was 15 in 2011. My trauma turned my home into a house.
I struggled with the concept of belonging as a gay man. As a gay British-Indian man, I never felt like I fitted in. It can be very difficult for any queer person of colour to fit in, especially when there isn’t a role model of the same background for you to look up to.
It’s normal to hook up but I didn’t feel comfortable doing that. I wanted to get to know someone before doing that, but I was often unmatched or blocked when I said no. It became soul destroying. I just gave up, instead of looking for a man to save me. I looked inward and saved myself.
For a long time, I thought that home would be in the arms of a man. Now, I am at home when I am with the people that I love like my family and my closest friends who form part of my Chosen Family.
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I shall be away for a long while to revitalise & recuperate. Stream Off The Grid by Alina Baraz, featuring Khalid.
Why am I going away? I am going away because I never rest. I am trying to be patient with myself. . I am trying to focus on the positives.
I need to slow down sometimes. I have to persuade myself that I deserve to feel genuinely good, in my mind and body. I have a voice and I deserve to use it for good.
I’ll be back on 17 January. Hope the next few weeks provide happiness, love and good vibes to you.
If you’re feeling a bit rough, have some orange juice or a ginger shot. It always restores the life in me after a long night.
It’s easy to be stuck in a mindset of surviving but by doing that, I limited myself for a long time. By waking up each day and being excited for what the day holds, I changed the channel in my mind.
I wake up each day at 7am, have a glass of water, listen to my favourite music & journal. For many years, I used to wake up, go straight on social media and reply to messages on dating applications.
My sister always said if you stop consuming something for two weeks, the craving for it will go away. I no longer crave alcohol. In the UK, you often get shamed for being sober because alcohol is an integral component to being social. I’ve had former friends call sober people boring. I have found a sense of calm and peace without consuming alcohol. To wake up without hangovers, is my idea of bliss. I thought about how much time I have wasted in my bed with a hangover over the years. It is mind boggling.
Be Mindful of your alcohol consumption. Think about how much money you’d save if you tried Dry January.
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Happy New Year!
I clinked my last flute of champagne when the clock struck midnight, 17 hours ago. I have been working on myself to become completely sober from today. It’s not Dry January, it’s a dry life moving forward for me.
I would like each tomorrow to be one of positivity, hope and good health. I wrote down eleven goals for 2023 last night. Three that I wish to share are:
- To Be Kind & Practice Mindfulness Daily
- To Be Sober
- To Stay Grounded & Present in Every Moment
I have had to lose friends which feels worse than a break up from a boyfriend. However, friendships can be temporary, I have to keep in mind that I have to do difficult things to keep walking my tightrope of happiness.
My surroundings are my loving family and the beautiful people that form part of my Chosen Family.
Pura Vida.
Each day I spend some time reflecting. The word of the day is Imperfections.
I am not perfect. I have many imperfections. I’ve been spending time consciously trying and change my belief systems.
I used to gain validation from damaging external sources, now I try to look for that validation within myself.
I’m trying to be more mindful of my friends and provide more support to them. It’s easy to forget that each person in your life has their own problems. I often try to message weekly to check in on those closest to me.
I spent years prioritising finding a boyfriend and neglected those friends that I should of cherished more.
Life is too short to not reconnect with those that once brought you joy in the past.
I am becoming more patient & present. Listening selflessly has helped me maintain the relationships with the ones I hold dear in my life.
By healing my emotional history, I have become more open to offering love and compassion to others.
Sending love to you all. Hope you are keeping warm. Have a great Thursday.
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Arran begins the Tightrope of Happiness by letting go of his past feelings associated with heartbreak.
Him refers to his past ex-boyfriends but this episode draws inspiration from stories he has heard from friends and others.