WHEN TO SEE A THERAPIST VS. ASTROLOGER, GETTING OUT OF A DATING RUT, & MORE Qs
Thank you to everyone who submitted their existential life questions for today's newsletter. Unfortunately, I couldn't get to all of them because my brain is still not operating at full capacity after battling the flu. Below, you can read my thoughts on getting out of your own way to getting back into the dating game and what to do when you hate your new job, let's get into it, shall we?
How do you know when you need to see a therapist vs an astrologer?
Therapy is like playing the long game— most mental health issues are not quick fixes. It's a worthy investment that has helped me find stability and self-compassion in our increasingly uncertain, confusing, and anxiety-inducing world. It's been integral to my healing journey, but it's not the whole story.
Astrology, tarot, and other spiritual practices have given me a more profound knowing and affirmation of who I know myself to be. It's a type of validation you simply won't get in therapy. It helps me feel connected to something so much larger than myself. I think it's likely very similar to those who have a deep connection to God and their faith and that feeling that they were put on this earth for a reason.
In practice, I find these spiritual healing modalities most helpful when I'm at a crossroads, and I have worked to understand my feelings and fears coming into the equation. I consider all my options, the pros and the cons, and I just want confirmation that my intuition is indeed correct. Personally, it can be hard for me to hear intuition through anxious or intrusive thoughts. So, I like to see it as astrology or tarot helping you choose a path, but therapy helps you continue walking that path every day.
I might love being single too much. Thoughts on getting out of a rut and back out there?
Are you in a rut, or are you just enjoying being single and the peace that can come with that? Dating can stir up so much anxiety these days that being single is a peaceful state for me. No one is there to stress you out; you're not looking at your phone, wondering why this guy hasn't texted, or wondering if that guy will ghost you eventually.
But that can also morph into avoidance of not wanting to put yourself out there. I've experienced that over the years, especially during the beginning of my healing journey, and feeling like I needed to be fully healed before I could date. In reality, I did a disservice by avoiding dating because I was denying myself a fundamental part of knowing myself—through the lens of our relationships with others. As I've gotten back into the dating game over the last two years, I feel like my personal growth gets expedited when I'm dating because I'm confronted with triggers and parts of myself that I don't like—and we can find healing in relationships with the right partner.
When I look back on my 20s and even early 30s, I wish I had pushed myself to date more and not taken things soooo seriously. Dating should and can be fun. We don't have to be dating for marriage; it's just an opportunity to have new experiences, meet new people, sharpen our intimate relational skills, get to know ourselves on a deeper level, and understand what we want from a relationship even better. And doing that while you're in this mindset could be beneficial.
Even if you don't feel like getting back on apps, can you start with small steps like getting in some good socializing time and doing activities where you are able to meet new people? Block out time in your calendar if you have to. Try talking to a stranger when you're in line at your coffee shop or waiting for the self-checkout at the grocery store—or my favorite is smiling at an attractive stranger when I pass them on the street. I'm all for creating more IRL experiences that could lead to meeting new people even while on dating apps.
Another great way to get your head back in the game is to take Matchmaker Maria's Agape Intensive, I took it in the summer of 2022. It's the perfect crash course for exploring what we want out of dating, how to prioritize compatibility, and how we select partners. Hearing from other women who had similar dating experiences was helpful, and it helped me feel less alone. All in all, it made me excited to date again—so much so that I spontaneously decided to head to NYC just a few hours after the third and final session was over to meet friends at a bar during the World Cup final.
How do you balance the urge to self-improve (and be comfortable trying) with accepting your worst bits?
Well, first of all, accepting our worst bits is part of the never-ending work. Every day, we have to find a way to befriend the parts of ourselves that we don't like. It's uncomfortable. We want to banish those parts; we want to make them go away; we hope if we learn enough about our “issues,” we can heal them away. Therapy and meditation help me build compassion and acceptance for who I really am.
On the other hand, my desire for self-transformation is integral to who I am. Astrology helped me understand that. I think that's the same for most of my generation (those born between 1983-1995 who have Pluto in Scorpio). We strive for regeneration, for transcendence into our highest selves. But I have been to that extreme, on a mission to fix myself; I read all the books, and I was doing all the therapy. Then I realized my problems, or the things that I didn't like about myself, weren't going away despite all my knowledge. There was nothing to fix. I just had to accept that this is who I am.
Every once in a while, I'll still find myself veering into that territory, obsessing over an emotional issue, reading books, and listening to podcasts in search of answers to something that is actually about my feelings. We can't think or learn our way out of feeling something. That behavior usually leaves me exhausted, frustrated, and in tears. This is why I also take breaks from therapy, my psychology books, and all of that because while I love to learn, sometimes I need space to simply exist, and that's okay.
I'm 32, an ambitious and successful careerist. I have hobbies and friends, but decided to move back home due to mental health. Also single. How do I feel OK and still hopeful about myself and my future? Not what I thought life would be at 32.
Kudos to you for making a decision to put your mental health first. It's okay to give yourself permission to take a needed pause and re-prioritize your life.
I imagine you might still feel bad because you have this idea: as a 32-year-old woman, you should be in a particular place in your life that is very different from where you are right now. A 32-year-old woman should have certain things and reach certain milestones to validate her existence as a 32-year-old.
Unfortunately, there's no magic formula to rush to the part where you feel good again. You're going through an adjustment period. There is something to learn about ourselves in these moments where our circumstances are challenged or we have some kind of “setback”. Picking the path of least resistance looks like, telling yourself that it's okay that this chapter looks different than the one you imagined. You are doing what's right for you at this moment—and that's important. But it won't be like this forever. Life is not going to pass you by; you don't need anyone else to validate your decisions or your existence as a 32-year-old woman who is single and living at home. Use this downtime to be present, take care of yourself, and I promise one day you will likely look back on this time and be thankful for it, and know that it was just what you needed to get back to a place where you can thrive.
Also I'll leave you with this incredible Pema Chodron quote that my friend read to me on the phone last night: “Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery and for joy.”
How do you deal with bouts of no motivation? Have been feeling unmotivated for months.
When I feel unmotivated, I think it's my body's way of saying that I don't have enough balance between work and play. I'm probably lacking creative time and inspiration—and that's really important for someone who has to be creative for their job. So, I try to give myself more downtime to simply exist, to explore, be creative, and do the things that really light me up. Maybe I'm writing just for fun, watching a movie, coloring in my coloring book, using Pinterest to find some new inspiration images and putting together a board, or looking through coffee table books. Instagram and TikTok are also my favorite places to browse for inspiration, and I will collect videos and content I like in a saved board. I also love talking to friends who are creatives, especially in different ways than me, and hearing what they are working on or what they've been doing to sustain their motivation. A great first step though is always to consider what you can do to inject a little joy into your life.
How do you grapple with the balance between I deserve happiness and love and good things and abundance and wealth while acknowledging the reality of life and how unfair it is? And keeping the faith that these things will come when you've maybe had trouble bringing in some of those things despite your best efforts.
Well, I'm a Black woman living in America, I have a daily reminder of how things are unfair for people like me even if nothing bad is happening to me directly—it feels like it when I see what happens to others.
So, I am acutely aware of the ways in which I am blessed. I deeply believe in myself, despite living in a world that doesn't want me to, my purpose, and what I'm on this earth to do. I've been fortunate enough to build this incredible platform, and I'm trying to make a difference in the ways that my platform and my voice will enable me to do so. But just existing as Black women who prioritizes enjoying her life every moment she can feels is it's own little revolution. I'm not going to kid myself to think that I have the power to stop all the ills of the world. This world was never designed to be fair.
I trust that things will work out for my greatest good as long as I'm putting in the work. I can't fully explain it— I just know it. Of course, I have doubts; that's normal, but that is a temporary state of being. My baseline is knowing that I can and will make the most out of this one life I've been given. There is no other way for me to see it. Even when I don't get the things that I want, and that happens ALL the time, I trust that it's not my time, or it's just not for me, and there's something more aligned coming my way. So far, this mentality has gotten me pretty far.
How would you handle starting a new job and hating it? Job hop or stay put?
I would stay put for a bit unless I felt I was in a harmful environment. I would also continue to look for new jobs and see what's out there. You will have to prepare a good answer for future employers who will inevitably ask why you're leaving your current job so soon, but depending on the issues, like company culture, for example—I think you can use this to explain what you really look for in a company. Much like dating, the focus can't just be solely on whether they like you—it's also an opportunity for you to gather information to know whether you really want to be a part of this company.