7. Following My Heart & Standing My Ground

[NOTE: All the posts in this series have been written - they're either on my USB, or in my notebook, but between a dodgy internet connection, a suddenly hectic social life and a week of staying up late watching DVDs, they haven't been posted regularly. Ooops. They will however be posted eventually, because I've gone to all the trouble of writing them in the first place. :)]

At the beginning of this year, I was engaged and…, well, suffice to say that I am now neither married nor engaged. I called the whole thing off back in April because I knew in my heart that we weren’t right for each other, even though on paper it seemed great. It took a lot of guts, especially as we had been engaged for a few months, but I followed my heart and it really paid off. I am sooo grateful that I didn’t marry him, for both our sakes.

It really showed me the importance of following my heart, and standing my ground when I do. There have been a few other areas in my life where everyone keeps telling me that I don’t need to change/grow/improve, that I’m fine just the way I am, but my heart’s whispered otherwise. Areas including my weight (“You don’t need to lose weight!”), uni (“You’re smart! You’ll be fine, you shouldn’t work so hard.”) and my general lifestyle (“It’s normal for someone your age to stay up half the night and sleep all morning!”). Yeah, right. This year I’ve started to listen to my little ticker, rather than other peoples’ thoughts and I’ve had to really stand my ground to do so.

Honestly, I don’t think you can really follow your heart without also standing your ground. In order to do the former, you need to be able to say ‘no’, to walk away, to go against the flow and do your own thing, however hard it may be. I think that I’ve grown by recognising this and doing it more. In the past, I have always focused on following my heart, but then I live by other peoples’ schedules. This year I’ve learnt to say ‘no’ and I’ve come to realise that most people don’t have a problem with that. Those that do are simply not on the same wavelength as me, and that’s ok – it really doesn’t matter.