Hi👋🏽 I’m Kat. I help navigate difficult conversations and teach women how to negotiate on their own terms. Welcome to my version of a newsletter where I’ll be reminding you how to be kinder to yourself. You may listen (above) or read (below). You’re doing great, sweetie. Remember you’re all you have. So welcome and thanks for being here.✨
This past week was the first time in over a year when I finally started seeing a hint of New York normalcy. I coincidentally happen to have made plans to meet up with friends the same day the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) lifted COVID-19 restrictions. It’s as if my subconscious somehow knew it was coming.
In the past year, many of my fellow city dwellers left New York City in droves. I have friends who opted to stay isolated in their Hamptons or Catskills vacation homes since this all began. Others stayed in suburbia. I have a few friends who return to their city dwellings mid-pandemic only to leave again. In the last few months, I've heard the same refrain from friends, “I am NOT going back” bemoaning that New York City will not be the same. Ever. They may be right. But also wrong. Because New York has been through some of the worst times before and it always bounced back. Different each time around yet always the same. Like a survivor that adapts and thrives with every transformation.
Although I remained mostly in NY this past year, I did venture off to the ‘burbs a few weeks here and there to visit the parentals. Yet not once I share the lamentations of my friends who have had the urge to escape. Sure I have had momentary lapses, but no more than usual under pre-COVID days where new scenery couldn’t hurt from time to time. There are people who left the city due to changes in their financial situations. Some need their family’s support - mentally and emotionally. But then there are those who have been so contemptuous about city life. I am SO happy I escaped the city. I just don’t know how I’d survive the city right now if I stayed. Ugh, no one wants to be crammed in New York anymore.
Here’s what I learned throughout the pandemic: Acquiring more space does exactly just that, you get to have more space. But more of anything doesn’t equate to more of something else. More space, or similarly presumed more money, doesn’t mean more contentment. Or more joy. Or more happiness. We’ve all fallen victims to these assumptions. If only. If only I… Get promoted. Get married. Have kids. Have a bigger house. Find a boyfriend. Lose weight. Life will be better. Sweeter. And I’ll be happier. Never have I seen the prevalence of these statements more than I have these last few months.
I noticed that one's need to escape is less about physically fleeing their environment but more from the desire of something deeper. There is a quote attributed to FDR that goes, “Men are not prisoners of fate but only prisoners of their minds.” I learned this past year that escaping the city unfortunately doesn’t release you from the crisis taking place in your own head. And for a lot of people, no matter how far we may run, we will always be plagued by the same fears and imprisoned by the same obsessive thoughts.
I recall a frequently cited study about the human happiness quotient. The gist is simply that winning the lottery won’t make us any happier. It explains the concept of hedonic treadmill where we fickle humans quickly return to our baseline level of happiness despite major events or life transitions – positive or negative. Of course this is not about the once impoverished and now finally have the funds to pay rent or feed their family. That’s a story about survival. What we’re talking about is the impulse to live a different life because of pure dissatisfaction of our own. The longing to be something else or the desire to escape from one's current reality only to find that no reality will ever be good enough. What this means is if your baseline is a miserable piece of shit then no amount of major winning streaks will make you not a miserable piece of shit. Maybe a little less miserable but still the same piece of shit. Based on this theory, there are no permanent gains in happiness if one experiences fleeting euphoria caused by external stimuli instead of seeking deeper fulfillment of our most basic human needs.
There’s a subset of friends who are just as satisfied staying in their studio apartments riding out the pandemic solo. It sounds odd af for a lot of people. Call it delusional, denial or defeat, but is it really so hard to grasp that finding a sense of calmed satisfaction amidst chaos starts within each of us? Those bizarre subset of folks who found a deep sense of pleasure and purpose in just being didn’t win the lottery nor did they leave the city for greener pastures. They learned to be content by acknowledging that there is nowhere else in the world they need to be than where they are right now.
As for me, I don’t think it matters much where I spend most of my time these days. I am happy that I am healthy and so are my loved ones. The only thing that matters is that I am able to spend most days with some peace of mind. I’m still waiting for that moment for the city and I to finally part ways. But so far, not once have the thought crossed my mind. Maybe I’m just so still incredibly in love with this city that I don’t want to leave it during its time of need. Or maybe I don’t have a good enough reason to leave. Perhaps I finally learned to harness my inner peace like those blissful oddballs even in the midst of all the grief. Whatever the reason be, I remain happily right here in New York until further notice. Despite one hell of a year, there’s nowhere else I would rather be than here.
Kat✨
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