Missing the "28" deadline

I grew up believing that by 28 I would have met the love of my life, have founded the company of my dreams, and will have enough money to travel the world when I need to.

None of the above happened. I missed the deadline. 

Indeed, similarly to many other women, I had marriage deadlines. And to many of the people in my networks, I had achievement deadlines.

And when I missed it, I hit the “28” life crisis, or what I eventually realized would be my “28” life rebirth.

The trigger: a break up

I dated a fine man for 3 years. As 28 was looming, I started getting hints that this may not be it. 

Questioning why I was in it, made it clear that there was more fear than love.

The plan to be married by 28 made it so painful to let go, but triggered the fall from grace.

I questioned my beliefs about love. And finally let go of them.

I let go of my belief that the man I dream of is too perfect and therefore does not exist. That settling is the way to go as you grow older. That I have few years left.

With pain came a realization, that I should not be seeking love, that love will seek me. 

Love does not have a deadline, or a form or expectations. It just is.

And so I today enjoy being single and alone, where my own company is enough.

What came next: My career

They say everything is interconnected, and they are right. My career choices have been driven by mostly insecurities and limiting beliefs about what is possible. As a result I was making choices based on what others thought.

I worked at a big corporation as my first job, and gave up my acceptance to LSE to do what I was passionate about at the time: International Political Economy. I wanted to start making money, to prove that I can to my family.

 I applied to Stanford because I wanted to prove to my smart competitive consultants, that I am smart. 

I never had literally asked myself what is it that I really wanted to do with my life. 

I was following the "success path". 

When I chose to join the Customer service team at Airbnb, (Airbnb was small then and there), it was the first time I made a career choice from the heart. 

It was not easy, especially when I was asked by some of my classmates why would I get an MBA and work in Customer Service. And that I had no background in it anyways.

I knew then (I was 26), that I would not make it big by 28, if I took this route.

But I chose to restart. And start doing more of what I am passionate about, which is crafting offline experiences. 

Which I do in some extent at Airbnb and after 6 PM. I created the Pause & Shine experiences, workshops that connect people to their passions and to one another.

  

The money  

 I failed according to the deadline to make enough money to live the lifestyle I wanted.

This “failure” drove me to revisit the lifestyle that I wanted and strip down what did not matter.

I did not need a designer bag every season to impress my Lebanese girlfriends.

I learnt to cook, and I created a beautiful home where I host more often than I go out to fancy restaurants.

Most importantly, I am making peace with my relationship with money. I let go of the belief that I will never be rich, and instead I started focusing on doing more of what I love and believing that the rest will follow.

A reflection process:

 Letting go of a deadline has been in retrospect the hardest thing that happened to me personally.

Nonetheless, the journey of living true to myself is worth all the pains that come with it.

Do you have a deadline and you feel it is limiting you?

Get started with facing your deadlines!

Write down what deadlines you have in these three categories and who set them (Family, friends, society, fears, you)

Money

Career

Love

Take each deadline and write down the beliefs that underline it. For example a love deadline can stem from a belief that you will not find love at a certain age.

What would you do without these deadlines? What would you change about your life?

For example, you would stop focusing on the project that gets you the promotion, and focus more on working on the project that you are interested in.

Now commit to doing one of the changes in the next week, and observe how you feel. 

Photos credit Celeste Noche

Speaking about Love and Scaling Operations at Airbnb

I got the chance to speak at the first User Conference in San Francisco about scaling Customer Operations from 10s of people to 100s. I also managed to give some tips on love relationships. If you happen to watch it feel free to let me know what you think.

20 things i learnt, 27 years later

Beginning of 2013, i listed everything I learnt during my time on this earth thus far. I am happy to share them with you, and get your thoughts.

1- Many beliefs we carry with us are limiting and wrong

2- It is okay to make mistakes and fail. The goal of life is not winning, but it is being and loving

3- While we all have fears, it is important to be aware of them and pinpoint when they drive our decisions (read more on this topic)

4- The way i perceive myself is not the way people perceive me, in fact at times it is the complete opposite

5- Self-love is at the basis of happiness, if you do not love and forgive yourself, you will not be able to do so with others, and you will not survive the storm

6- Being happy, is not easy, in fact it takes work, and is a long journey. So learn to appreciate every part of it

7- There is no such thing as impossible, everything is literally possible

8- There is no such thing as bad people, all people are good. Some people are just insecure and afraid

9- Things change... all the time

10- Persistence + consistency pay off. Building habits is essential to living the life we want

11- We are responsible for our happiness, no one or nothing can make us happy

12- Meditate more, for your answers come from within

13- Vulnerability is power

14- You can do it on your own. Oftentimes, you will find yourself alone, and that is a wonderful thing

15- The times when you simply let go, and give up control are when things turn out for the best, hence my mantra: trust and believe

16- Patience is an under-stated virtue worth cultivating

17- Make sure you do what you are passionate about, even if you can't do it full time, even if it is an hour a week

18- You cannot change anyone, people need to want to change for themselves

19- I learnt there is not "one" person for me, there are many

20- I learnt to embrace sadness and depression, the same way you embrace joy and happiness, for they are the times when you feel most connected to your soul

Photo credit Celeste Noche 

It starts with Love

What if I told you all your decisions are driven by emotions? 

You would probably laugh at me. But before you do, think about the last decision you made. 
Mine was ordering a banana pie at Mission Beach cafe, last night. 

There goes the process.

My instinct wanted to devour the pie, my mind followed suit and created a whole logic for why it is okay for me to have fatty food at night: " you worked out today, you had a light lunch, you deserve it".

My decision was nowhere near rational. But what is reason anyway?

Senses + reason = understanding.

With our senses, we gather information, and thanks to our rational ability,we connect the pieces to form an understanding of how the world functions. We also refer to our past experiences to further our understanding of our world.

But reason only sets the destination.

It is emotion that drives us to action. The feeling, that sometimes you do not even recognize. 

While that could explain why the world works in a crazy way (think wars, economic crisis, romantic love), the good news is that we can make the world crazier in a good way, by basing our decisions on love rather than fear.

There two major source of emotions are Love & Fear.

For fear, is when you make a decision, such as not helping a colleague who you are competitive with, or staying in a relationship that is not working, or you emotionally eat a jar of Nutella.

Fears come from our deeply rooted insecurities and most times we are unaware that they are the ones calling the shots. 

For love, is when you make a decision from a place of generosity and authenticity. When i decide to give feedback to one of my employees, I check in with myself to ensure that why i am doing is precisely to make them better at what they do. That it is not anger based.

An easy tool to make more love-based decisions.

We make a lot of decisions in our day. Set yourself a challenge. for 7 days, you will ask yourself before making any decision this simple question: 

"is my decision coming out of a place of love or fear?"

You do not need to do anything about it, but by just creating that awareness, you will start digging deeper into what is driving and most importantly the why what is driving you.

After all, every emotion has its reason, so yes we are coming full circle.

The year I fell in love

The End

Sometime in August I found myself sinking into another cycle of self hate and tears.

This time it was different. This time I knew I had enough and wanted to change and choose a happy life.

Up until this year, I thought life was about suffering, that a moment of happiness is followed by a moment of misery. I had also decided I was not capable of being happy.

After a complicated relationship and a tough breakup, I found myself on my own with my fears. Friends and family helped me but it was not what was going to get me out of this misery. I was left with myself. For the first time I faced my fears.

And what I found was a shivering adorable little curly hair girl, crying in the corner. That little girl was me. All she wanted was a big hug and for me to forgive her for all what she's done wrong.

And I did, I am, and I will forgive her everyday, give her a big hug everyday and take care of her as my little child.

Why?

If I did not love her I can't truly love others, I can't forgive others, I can't achieve the Immense dreams I have, I can't maintain healthy relationships, and most important I can't be happy.

How?

Three ways to self-love I learnt:
1- Forgiveness: every day I write down something or someone including yours truly,  I forgive.
2- Compassion: realizing that its never about me, I started questioning whenever I judge someone reminding myself we all have a story, a reason. I use my meditation practice to cultivate compassion. (More on this in my next blogpost).
3- Gratitude: every day I write down three things I am grateful for. I even started doing gratitude circles with my friends, a practice I learnt at one of the retreats I went to.

My self-love journey has just started, and I am looking forward to the many ways to enrich it, develop it and maintain it. This includes, wellness retreats, reading, travel, reflection, creation and most importantly surrounding myself with inspiring people.

Now it's your turn. Are you in love with yourself? Here is a simple challenge: 

Every day for 30 seconds, take a look at the kid inside of you: make sure she is warm, smiling and most importantly loved.