Go Fish

Life has been pretty miserable for the past few years. A large dose of self sabotage didn’t help — a bout of bad health and a lack of gainful career prospects were just the icing on the cake — and it created a cancerous cocktail that left me in one of my own personal nightmare situations. Namely where I am right now — 30 years old, depressed, broke and living at home with my mother.

Now, I really don’t want this to be a sympathy story. But the truth is, I was a bit of a misery guts. I gave up the will to try and live for a few bad years. I lost the will to fight: to dream, to play, to aim towards anything. I just wanted nothing. All I wanted was to disappear. But alas, no giant black hole ever appeared to swallow me up, and by default, I had to start pulling myself together.

And pull myself together, slowly and painfully, is what I did. Jogging and replacing the midnight uber eats with greek salad helped. As did guided meditations in the morning instead of YouTube binges and creating regimented and disciplined sleep hygiene patterns. But though I have come leaps and bounds, it still hits me — I’m empty, depressed and lacking… a life. And I mean that in all senses of the word: I have no meaningful work, there is no one I want to date (but also because I feel absolutely undateable — well maybe not undateable, I just don’t feel like a catch), and I have no clue where to live.

But on a recent day out in London, where even smidges of my former humanity returned to me — I remembered that it’s not only ok to not have any of those things figured out yet — but that acquiring those things is really similar to the process of fishing.

Before you think i’ve gone completely nuts, let me explain. The fisherman turns up in the morning prepared to go fish. He doesn’t know if it’s going to be a success — he doesn’t know what he will catch, if anything at all — but he does have an intention to fish, backed up by years of experience, knowledge, instinct and intuition — as well as a generous helping of blind faith in it all. Most of all he sits there patiently — not rushing the process, but allowing the fish to come to him.

That’s what I have to do with these areas in my life — go fishing for them. Instead of trying to force them to happen, or be in a rush cause I feel so behind and lacking in my life. I also have to focus more on the intention, and to ensure that they are genuine intentions that align with who I am. So — I want love — feel that love, know that love — and put it out into the universe and see what comes back. I can’t force it — but then it would be wrong if I did, wouldn’t it?

Like so many who have been through traumatic experiences, as well as a breakdown — I am a control freak. But squeezing the chance, the life, the space out of everything in the name of control isn’t a life — nevermind a sure way to not allow things to manifest. This was so evident to me on a recent mini quest. One of my favourite authors Elizabeth Grant of ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ fame talks about mini quests — a coping mechanism she developed during her divorce — where in the midst of despair and hopelessness, she would put out intentions to the universe and go on mini quests in search of manifesting them to remind her to have faith in it all again.

I needed my own mini quest — I also needed to feel free. I put aside a day last week where I would just wonder around with no plan, and see where it takes me and experience some freedom — a much needed respite after a few bad years of feeling trapped. The night before, my anxiety was already rising — what would I do? Should I just head to Shoreditch because at least I know it so well? I told my brain to stop stressing and worrying and that it would all work out.

The big day of no plan freedom came, and although my brain was swirling with anxious thoughts — one true intention naturally arose about what I wanted to do with my day. I wanted to find something small, and special to eat. Again my mind was already pushing towards what I knew — a famous burrito chain, a ramen joint — but no — I wanted to expand my horizons and find something that I didn’t already know.

With a summery outfit on to make the most of the mini-heatwave warming up London, I found myself on the Elizabeth line headed towards Old Compton Street. Even as I walked down the road I had been down more than two hundred times before, my mind was wondering whether I should go to the pizza place I’d been to last year with my friend Jo’lene, or to the Lina Stores where I used to pop for pasta and panini’s in my last work. But I waited slightly longer in the uncomfortability of not-knowing when out of thin air it popped into my head. A genuine idea. I should go to the small Italian deli that I read about years ago in Conde Nast Traveller that apparently does the best Italian sandwiches in London. I had always wanted to go but had never been.

After a quick google search, I had hunted it down. I Camisa and Sons, standing with it’s old sign, windows filled with fresh Italian breads. I went in, and started to enjoy my next adventure of asking the lady which fillings she recommended, and trying on what fits — to build my sandwich of dreams. It ended up being one with fresh parma ham, rocket, olive oil, and a creamy blue cheese with a name I had never heard of. It was delicious. And perfect. And unexpected. But most of all — the Universe had delivered what I had genuinely asked for. I just had to trust, and surrender to the process.

Now it wasn’t easy, and there is still a lot of mystery involved — and I still can’t explain fully how it happened — but it did, and I felt compelled to write about it. All I have to do now is have bravery to go fish and surrender in all parts of my life to feel like I can get back on track. So here we are Universe — please reveal to me where I should live, what I should be doing with my life, and most importantly of all — a great big, fat slice of actual love. Thanks.