In ourselves we trust

Q: What helps you keep the faith?

Kinnari’s Dialogue

How often have you been in situations that were challenging and trusted in yourself to get through? In September of 2022 I had just returned from walking the Camino in Spain and wrote a post about letting go to grow.

Back then I was working on letting go of limiting beliefs - particularly that my body wasn’t strong enough. One reader (thanks Pooja M) commented on that post “Can’t tell you how many times the thought of ‘what is it time to let go of’ has come to my mind. Deep down we always usually know what that is. More times than not it’s that fear. For me at least. Question is fear of what?? And how to build the confidence to deal with that fear.”

Is it the fear of the unknown? Is it the fear of not being able to cope? to survive? Or is it the lack of conviction that you will be able to make it through the transition?

A few months after writing that post the miraculous happened - I got pregnant. I was thankful but also fearful - I didn’t know anyone else that had gotten pregnant and had a baby at my age. How was my body going to cope? Was it going to be able to create a healthy baby? It took me a while to understand and locate the fear in my body, to name it, and even longer to let it go. And the thing that helped (besides the baby growing) was the work I had been doing for years - developing that faith in myself, and in the universe.

I can think of many other times where I’ve had to believe in myself to pull through. Each one of us has encountered many moments where the present was somewhat bleak and the future uncertain. Hard as it might be, the only way forward in such moments is to have faith and to practice courage. 

This past year I have had many of those moments. For the first few months after the baby arrived, my body was gutted and I wasn’t sleeping much. I wondered how I was going to get through, whether it was all too much. I doubted that I could return to my former self. It took a lot of work - mental and physical - to overcome that. I had to have a lot of confidence in myself during those sleepless nights and weak moments. In these last few months however, I’ve finally started to feel strong again.

This summer coming back from maternity leave to a post-layoffs, different Google, to a new role and a new team - I had to trust that it would work out. It took me several months to build relationships with new product folks based out of Zurich and even now, though the scope of work remains a bit uncertain, I seem to have found my footing once again.

In September, leaving San Francisco after twenty years and moving to the suburbs required letting go of a way of life. I was optimistic that my husband and I would figure it out. However, letting go doesn’t happen all at once. It happens in waves. I found myself melancholic on my drive to San Francisco yesterday - realizing how much I missed the wildness of Golden Gate Park and Ocean Beach and the joy of walking to a coffee shop for my cappuccino.

A serene moment during my walk in Golden Gate park

It’s never easy once these decisions for transition are made. That question of “Is it going to work out?” can pop up again and again. On most days, I can catch the doubt when it shows up and counter it with - Yes, yes it will. I will figure it out. I have faith in myself, in my partner, in my community, in the Universe, in the Divine to send help when I most need it.

This year, Diwali and Halloween arrived on the same day - a unique and beautiful overlap that invites us to carry light through darkness and face our fears with strength. Next week I cast my vote for the first time as an US citizen. My Diwali wish this year is that light prevails over darkness - and my fellow citizens choose wisely.

“The issues before us as a nation and as humans ask for our mindful loving awareness, our best intention, and our courage.

A wise society is possible.

Let us all participate in its creation.”

- Jack Kornfield

Mitali’s Dialogue

I moved the furniture in my living room again. With the fall season here, why not change things up? As I wrote back in August after my summer travels, I was starting to feel the pull for a new adventure and wondering how to initiate change. For me that starts by letting go of something that works and taking a leap of faith to explore something new. 

This is how I approached my twenty-year career in tech. After two years in a role, I would start to get antsy and feel the need for change. No matter how well I was doing in my current role, around the twenty four month mark, I would find myself raising my hand for a new opportunity. At Google my willingness to take risks and jump into nascent initiatives gave me the opportunity to work with Android app developers in 2008, retailers in 2010, kid’s brands in 2012 and various partners for Google Assistant in 2015. Looking back I can now see my pattern for forcing change. 

I thrived on being a beginner each time - forging new relationships within the company, learning a new industry, defining new business models, and building new partnerships with companies. I found the challenge of starting over energizing. Maybe it's because I moved countries growing up and was used to figuring my way through new situations. I had an innate trust that something better was ahead and so I felt no qualms about giving up on something that I was good at. In 2017 I landed myself in a senior HR role after having a successful decade-long run in Partnerships. That was the biggest risk I had taken at that point in my career. I did it because I believed that new opportunities awaited me on the other side of the discomfort.  

Leaving Google in 2019 was an even bigger risk. It was the start of forging a new identity for myself. For years my identity was defined by my external accomplishments and now that I didn't have those, I had to keep the faith that something new would open up for me. In the absence of a work identity, I found myself defined by the roles I played in my family - mother, wife, daughter, sister, aunty. 

My moment of letting go of being an adult

Five years later, I am attempting to shift my identity again. As I toy with new identities - writer, entrepreneur, community builder - I wonder if these are even the right ones. I don't fit the definitions of these labels - I haven’t published a book nor have I started a VC-backed business and I am an introvert. But it's fun to try these on for fit, just like playing a character in a play or playing dress up for Halloween. 

Maybe these aren't the new identities I will fully take on. But I trust that in loosening the grip on my current ones, the new ones will start to emerge. 

Because what use are these titles?
They are but external expressions of myself -
ways in which I am of service
to the people I love.

I don't need these titles
to just be love
in my own home,
in my own body.

I am free,
swooping and soaring 
Without abandon in the sky like a bird
I am curious,
falling headfirst into rabbit holes 
as I chase down ideas and thoughts as they appear in my head
I am joy,
choosing to find moments of calm and fun 
in a day interrupted by chaos and worry.

Today I choose to call myself
by names of how I want to be
and not by the things I do.