Move on

 I've been reading Healing The Invisible Wound by Dr Ahmad Rostam, Dr Rozanizam and Dr Alizi Alias. This would be my second time reading the book because of its mutual understanding of what I've been facing. From moving on to how to go through trauma. It is a really good book to read, start until end. I bought it at PBAKL 2 months ago, but sadly, I wasn't able to attend their meet & greet as I was occupied with life. However, PBAKL'23 was great -- I get to see Hilal Asyraf again and bought his books and let him signed each one of them.

Enough PBAKL'23. I am here to write the things that I learned from the said book. I might share each topic in its own post -- but as of now, I'm going to focus on topic one : move on. I am someone who is not suitable when talking about moving on as I've been lingering and stuck in the past and let that conquered my mental well-being. I had wished to move on so much, but that isn't easy -- in fact, it's difficult for me.

They say to move on, we must first forget the past. We are told to not linger and to just cast the memories away, and I thought so too. I grew up to believe that when something bad happened in the past, in order to move on, I need to put it aside and forget about them. That was my belief for years and I followed it. I put my past in the back of my mind and go through life without having to acknowledge them and that made life bearable. It was okay for a few years, you know; I was happy, I had fun in life, I don't have to go through that heartbreak again. So, how was moving on for me? I didn't move on; instead I just cast it aside, and suddenly the pain from the past came crawling back in me. It was terrible.

As years go by, life became lower and lower. It began to take its toll on my mental health as the memories came back to haunt me. I thought I did the right thing by forgetting about them. Forgetting about the hurt. So, what is moving on for me? I never shed a tear when I put them aside. I was so strongly against crying over spilt milk, so I suppressed myself from crying and suppressed all that needs to be suppressed. I told myself that all I need to do is to just forget about them.

Years go by, and things became harder and harder; then in retrospection, I began to realize the fault that I'm doing : not be in peace with the past and thus making it hard to move on. That was my mistake, and this mistake prolonged until now. The past controlled me in the end and I fell into a deeper depression than before. Even now, I am still not in peace with my past and only now I am trying to not forget the past, but rather to acknowledge it. By acknowledging them, I will find ways to seal some closure and finally move on.

Moving on sounds so easy, but it is not. It requires strong self-will and determination. It's not pushing it aside, but rather to accept that it happened and seek ways to deal with them and not let them conquer you in any way. In the process there will be tears shed and it is okay to cry at times. Crying is a form of release and it either make things feel better or worse, but either way, do not suppress yourself from crying if you needed a cry. For years I told myself that crying is for the weak, but only this past few years I began telling myself that crying is also for the strong-willed. Crying is okay and crying is humane. There is nothing wrong with crying; only just that don't let it make you mope life to a point that you begin to hate life all in all. As I am a woman, people see us crying as normal for we are wired to be more emotional than men; this created a view that men shouldn't cry. That's wrong. There is nothing wrong in crying (don't mope though!) be it for a man or a woman. We are humans, that is why we can cry. Allah created us like that, to be able to be vulnerable and sometime only then we are reminded of Him wholeheartedly.

People often tell me to 'man up' when I began to talk about my past. Like I said above, people would tell me to just forget the past and move on. That statement is very general and can be used in many ways. This book talked about toxic positivity. I am no expert in understanding toxic positivity, but in many case, we may or may not experience one or two forms of toxic positivity. This toxicity is actually invalidating our emotions and thus creates the feeling of untrustworthiness from others. To them, the statements like "Think of Allah, it'll all be better", "You're not praying hard enough, that's why", or "This is kifarah for your sins. Pray more, zikir more." are suitable for comforting a person, but it actually makes the person feel guilt and begin blaming themselves with thoughts that they're actually doing something wrong. That is not how we want to approach people. We don't invalidate people's emotions but instead, we validate them and acknowledge their pain and emotions.

There are so many things we can learn from moving on and toxic positivity. We can learn that each one of us are unique and our differences actually is able to create a harmonious community. We all suffer sadness, loneliness and guilt once in a while; all we have to learn is how to not let them control us. Moving on doesn't mean we have to forget, but instead, moving on is accepting that that thing happened and acknowledge them rather than to cast them aside. We need to actually understand our situation and assess them accordingly. There are so many other good ways to approach someone who's sad. We don't tell them to just muster up and give only positive vibes, or to tell them they're sinful for not trying hard enough in life. We validate their emotions, we don't deny them. We walk through the emotions together and this will enable us to move on together.

So, let's learn together and move on together. Moving on is possible.