How Reconnecting To Joy Helped Me Stop My Unbecoming Process

It’s February 20th, 2019.

It’s my birthday and I am anxiously waiting for the professor's assistant to call my name and invite me into the exam room.

It’s one of the most difficult exams of my MA program and I am overly scared to fail.

I really want to succeed. Progressing fast in my study path will lead me to a better qualification and will give me credit to finally get into the career I want.

After 20 minutes I am out. Drained but happy. Happy but drained. The exam went very well and I have just achieved an important milestone in my study path.

It’s my birthday and I would love to go celebrating, but… I need to head to work.

While I run to the U-Bahn station, I check my phone and I am already met with endless notifications.

My to-do list is long, I need to finish organizing that workshop for that side project, and get in touch with that friend, and contact that venue for the event, and update my workplace about next week’s schedule and finish that task at work before the end of the week.

While waiting for my train, I take a moment to pause. I wish I could simply enjoy the day of my birthday without hustling here and there and getting worried about things that, after all, don’t bring me any joy.

It’s March and then April 2019.

I am still working in a 20-hour job that makes me feel small and out of place. It’s a boring job that doesn’t feel right for my passions and skills.

I am studying full-time and rushing through the program to finish early and get my MA degree as soon as possible.

I spend my spare time working on community and entrepreneurial projects that don’t feel aligned with what I truly want.

I am obsessively trying to understand how to create the job I love, one way or another, to pivot a few things here and there, coming up with ideas and solutions that I have no time to implement.

I am trying to get a promotion at work, hoping to go back to the HR department and get into a diversity & inclusion role, there.

I try coaching, therapy, networking strategies. I am trying to nail my Linkedin profile, thinking of how I could maybe fit an internship in my schedule with that organization I like and could boost my CV for a future job in the field I love.

I am restless, frustrated, obsessed with optimizing my time and my energies to become a more desirable professional profile in the market. I am hopeless and stuck in a situation that doesn’t allow me to move in the direction I want to move.

If I dare to be honest with myself, I am not even sure where I want to move towards.

I realize that I no longer have energy for any other projects, work, plans, collaboration.

I am burned out.

I no longer know who I am and what I want.

Everything I am trying to achieve is leading me anywhere except from towards joy and self-confidence.

I am losing myself in a process that was supposed to help me become the best version of myself and instead is leading me to UNBECOME who I am.

If I stop and look at it from above, there is no space for joy, growth and excitement in my life.

There is only hustling, restlessness and stress.

One night I text my sister to vent about another frustrating day at work.

I feel anxious because my life is not going anywhere. I want a change, I want to get out of a life stage that doesn’t feel right.

She texts me back with one message: Marg, you don’t do things because of the things themselves. You do things because you love them and because they bring you joy. If what you do doesn’t bring you any joy, then you need to find what feels good and go for it.

Suddenly things start to feel clearer.

I ask myself: what if I dare to prioritize joy? What makes me truly happy? What would I do if I had to follow my definition of career, success and lifestyle?

* * *

In the following months, many things happened that helped me, not without obstacles, to reconnect with what I really wanted and — above all — with myself.

In April, after being denied the chance of promotion and a change of role at work for the umpteenth time, I decided to quit.

Without a real plan B, but with the awareness that I had to do something to get back to a place that felt good.

Although I just had made a big step towards a happier stage in my life, the restlessness, tiredness and anxiety of having to create a career that was proof of market standards was still there.

All summer I was traveling around Europe, doing courses and summer schools, attending conferences, all experiences that I thought would make me more credible for a career that I didn’t even know what it should look like.

I was teaching German, looking for another job, another volunteering opportunity abroad, fighting with the Agentur für Arbeit for unemployment support, looking for a way to remain independent, but intentional about not falling into the mistakes of the past months.

I was in the middle of a big shift, but again under great stress.

After yet another rejection for a position that was not what I wanted anyway, I decided to put everything on hold and return to Italy for a month.

My body and mind were communicating to me this urgent need to return to a home that could assure me tranquillity, simplicity, a break, love, a return to things that feel “real”.

I traveled solo from Berlin to my hometown in Italy, passing through Salzburg and it was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made for myself.

It was also a moment where, after a long time, I dared to follow my intuition again and to radically prioritize my needs.

The feeling of making a decision for my health and self-care felt tremendously good.

In August, I traveled slowly, by train, enjoying the view of nature.

In Salzburg, I had a few days to go hiking and strolling around this small, cozy city surrounded by breathless landscapes.

I spent some time by myself, clearing my head and my heart.

I reunited with my family after months, their love was at most healing.

I had time to work on a big University assignment and to apply for other jobs, from a place of safety and serenity.

I went to the beach, I visited friends, I had coffees with them, I saw my sister, I spent so much time immersing myself in small but beautiful moments that were filled with joy.

I enjoyed the calmness of a small town.

I enjoyed the food, nature, the slower rhythms of a provincial lifestyle.

After a few weeks, I flew to Sardinia to meet Laura and her family there for a week and we had the most amazing time together.

I wrote, listened to music, took a big distance to that urgency of becoming (UNbecoming), I slowly let go that urgency of turning myself into someone that I could not recognize anymore.

My true values surfaced naturally and helped me reassess my priorities.

They became louder and more visible and started to compose a new vision for my life.

Before going back to Berlin, I flew to Rome to celebrate a dear friend’s graduation day.

We had a few amazing days strolling around the cittá eterna, under a beautifully soothing sun, feeling alive, feeling together, feeling the joy.

During that month I founded FairForce and realized how I wanted to build my own job on my own terms and conditions.

During that month, I received 5 job offers, one of which from one of the biggest startups in Berlin.

During that month, I have accepted my new and better job.

During that month, I completed my last assignment for my MA program.

In a state of joy and simplicity, I was able to reconnect with my inner strength and truth. I was able to realize which were the things that truly, deeply matter to me and how I wanted them to be present in my life and to hold a higher priority.

When I came back to Berlin, I came back as a new person, with a completely different awareness about myself and the life I wanted.

I was clear-minded and fully intentional in making space for a new way to approach my growth.

By the end of 2019, I was working in a new job, building my business, prioritizing rest and self-care, dedicating myself to things I loved, planning a vacation for Christmas to return to where I had the loveliest time.

Through the experience of joy, I received a unique opportunity to reconnect to myself, to stop the horrendous unbecoming process and align with my TRUE inner vision for myself and my life.

And from a place of joy, I was able to thrive in a way that I had never experienced before.

Having a loving home to return to in difficult times is a privilege that I don’t want to give for granted. Having the time to take a break and leave Berlin for some time is also a privilege that I want to acknowledge and show immense gratitude for.

However, joy is not only in big travels and family times.

Joy is whatever allows us to feel like we are coming home to ourselves.

It is a different experience for everyone and it will look different for each of us.

What is true for everyone is that we find liberation by reconnecting to the things that make us happy.