On actually healing

Day 1. 

Sometimes the universe smiles / sometimes it smirks.

The alignment of fated stars this past week have opened windows of opportunities that have been dancing in my head for a while. I’ve been pondering and praying for a sign, a roadmap, a guidance, in any concrete mode, that would resonate with my career’s future. It somehow arrived in the form of a friendship 3 years in the making, a leadership course of which I had absolutely no investment, and a group of driven creative entrepreneurs. Multiple motivational sessions over several hangouts resulted in a literal personalised career roadmap, as well as new friends who are more than willing to pour their belief in me. Needless to say, I ended up succumbing to the floor during Isha’ the day after our hangouts out of sheer gratefulness. Because if this isn’t a sign from the universe that I’m meant to keep going, I don’t know what else I could say.

This last point also unearthed some suppressed emotions within me. There are still traces of fear, shame, and impostor syndrome cackling in some compartmentalised closet at the back of my mind. I recognise them as residues from the whole stalking experience. I blamed myself for putting my passion out there, leading it to being disgusting tarnished; I was cornered to succumb to the sensational indignity of appealing to the public for help, begging for the thing I couldn’t provide for myself, which was security and independence. I took the experience as a hint that I do not deserve to be so happy or successful. Hiding from these emotions I’ve shrouded myself in so many layers of brave faces since July 2023, slowly peeling them away over the years, and this hesitancy, this lack of confidence, feels like the final, bloodied gauze that’s sticking to my skin. 

Let it be noted that I understand the realities and the rationalities of the stalking event. In my lowest points I had friends who organised themselves into a rotational guardianship on both sides of the world to ensure my okay ness. I had a platform to amplify the cause, which impacted the society at large. My case was the first one that made it to court, paving the way for others. We had the national media, the ministries, and organisations mobilising to make sure I received justice. In the grand scheme of personal narrative, I am a winner, I had the power, and I changed the/my world for the better. This is monumental on so many scales, yet there’s a part of me that is so completely disturbed by the experience, I’ve sought to alienate myself from it. In a ‘yes that happened to her, but I don’t know her’ colloquial way.  

It’s October 2025 and maybe it’s time I strip off this last bandage layered over this wound, and wholeheartedly acknowledge how it’s changed me. It’s time I celebrate the fact that it happened, the fact that I got through it, and give myself the pats that I deserve. It’s one of those life reminders that rebirth requires death, that time is a portal to reach our higher selves, and that ultimately, if there’s anything that this past week’s taught me: the universe really, really wants me to succeed into the best version of myself.