So good at helping others, not so great when it comes to helping myself.

Words from a good friend of mine that I just could not let go. Why is it that we are so good, so eager to help others all the while we may be crumbling inside ourselves?

How is it that we are even capable of helping others when we are broken inside? We know all the answers yet we only address them outwards.

I asked myself – When I talk to others about their struggles, do I feel like my struggles are worse? Often I feel I can relate or I feel that I am actually better off – If I felt I was worse off, I could not justify trying to offer a good solution, after all. So if I am better off, why is it that I am so afraid of applying the same answers to myself? I went further and looked through the times when I did admit to myself that I am going through a tough phase and tried to resolve it and realised that it can be done through that very same advice and thought process I use with everyone else. That the hardest part is actually opening up that shell and admitting to yourself that you may need to take some of your own medicine.

With that in mind, I recently decided to start sharing some of my own struggles, albeit reluctantly. That is because I am, at the same time, trying to reach out to people to help them achieve a happy lifestyle. I am trying to paint a picture of a healthy way of living through mindset, diet and workouts which makes me wonder: “What will people make of this, when they see the ugly side? When they see that I crash too and I am not always the happy, bouncy, feel-good positive self that I show to the world?”

These thoughts have been powerful enough to ensure very few of “the mind” made it through up until now. The stories were written but never told. Thus, I continued painting my happy picture but I came to a point where I found no more bright colours. I reluctantly let some darker colours on the canvas and realised, they made the picture so much better. It became REAL. It was a fantasy before but now I could relate to it.

I realised that it is much easier to help others when you let them know that you are human too. That you are dealing with shit too but that does not stop you living, trying your best, finding new challenges and achieving your goals.

Show a photo of a fitness model to someone who isn’t as fit as they would like to be. They will most likely feel that they can never achieve this. But show them a before&after transformation of the same model to show that this person, too, has come a long way and they might start thinking: “Yeah, maybe I can do this!”

So let’s show each other our scars and tell each other our stories. Let’s paint the real picture, shadows and all. Let’s show all of our human sides because they are what makes us unique. It is the struggles that shape us and the way we overcome them that lets us grow.