Living In NYC To Heal: 3 Months That Changed My Life
Living in NYC to heal?
I feel like you barely you hear the word heal and NYC in the same sentence. But on April 16th, I saw the text message “Love you girl” and burst into tears. I was messing around on my phone and had run into an old text message from a girl I met in NYC that included a photo of both us and those three words below it. I was in such an emotionally vulnerable place because I had left a place that had become a home for me and was now living in a very different environment that, to be 100% honest, did not feel the greatest.
The past three months I had been living in NYC and to say that it was a healing experience would be an understatement. I am still reminiscing on the beautiful relationships I built there and cherish them in my heart. If you know me personally you know I have always loved this city. My love for this city is so deep that my friend who I barely talk to facetimed me when he was in the city last year because when he thinks of NYC he thinks of me due to my deep love for it. If NYC was a man in real life, I would be in a deep committed relationship with him.
I sometimes wonder why I am so obsessed with this smelly and loud city. Is it because I lived in one of the borough (a borough that I shall not name because y’all will make fun of me for it) when I was a little kid? Or maybe it’s because of the energy, the hustle bustle, constant diversity, trillion events going on and what not? I saw a threads that said “NYC is the main character of America” and I couldn’t agree more. The city is main character energy and everybody – including myself – thinks we are the main character while living there which makes me love it even more.
"If NYC was a man in real life, I would be in a deep committed relationship with him"
I am so in denial that I am back in Minnesota, that my instagram bio says my location is ‘NYC/MN’ because I strongly believe I am going to find a way to have my life in 2 places at once constantly. Okay, I am sure you get the point that I am obsessed because I’ve already written three paragraphs professing my love. There is actually a really long backstory explaining the significance behind NYC being a safe haven for me – an escape from the chaos of my life. Living in NYC to heal was not a new idea to me. This city has always a place of healing when life seemed chaotic which sounds ironic since NYC is such a chaotic city.
I don’t really know why I am writing this as my first blog post except to say that when I was breaking down about being far from NYC I turned to writing again. I have always hated journaling which is ironic because simultaneously I have also loved being a writer. However, in a weird way the pain I felt about leaving a city I loved forced me to pick my pen up –or dare I say laptop keyboard –again because writing has always been my way of escape. It’s funny how we run away from pain but oftentimes the pain is what we need in our lives to birth something new and for me this new thing I am birthing is this blog.
A few days after writing this post, I opened instagram and saw a recent post on Pastor Anthony Mitchell Phillips page where he posted a snippet of his sermon that said “Sometimes God will engineer transitions in your life albeit painful sometimes to push you down roads you otherwise would not choose for yourself”. Well dang. To keep it 100 I really was trying to write this first blog without mentioning something very dear to me but the older I get, the harder it is for me not to talk about it. But it would be impossible for me to talk about this NYC experience without talking about God. Living in NYC to heal could not have happened without Jesus. Point Black Period and a rant for another day.
My hesitancy to share isn’t because I am ashamed but because I don’t want to be categorized as a “Christian influencer”. I remember when artists would say “I am not a Christian artist” and was confused but the older I get the more I understand because often that phrase keeps people boxed in to producing certain content, leads to certain assumptions or expectations to show up in a certain way even though I am madddd imperfect and will be the first person to admit my own flaws.
I am also honestly not a fan of most faith based content online because often times – although not all the times- it can be either very judgemental or prosperity gospel filled with half truths so I am very picky about what I consume and engage with. I say all that to say I am not here to make faith based content per say but in the art of making this page about being my authentic self, my faith naturally oozes into what I do so I can’t not talk about this significant part of my life. One day I will dive in deeper on the wild testimonies but for now I wanted to share that quote because it was certainly not a coincidence that I saw that a couple days after writing this post.
What’s even funnier is that when I was 18 years old I wanted to start a blog so it’s wild to think that 9 years later the desire is creeping up again but as I shared in my instagram video, NYC awakened a part of me that I had laid dormant. I attended so many artists’ events and in future posts, I plan on sharing some reviews and thoughts on events that I attended in case you are also interested in tapping into art spaces in NYC or also might feel inspired to start your own. I loved speaking with others at these events who were also working on their crafts because it pushed me to stop putting myself in a box and instead step forward to do the thing I am thinking of doing.
Because during this 3 month trip, I learned two main things. Number one – that I am extroverted? My friends have said that I am but emotionally thriving in a city environment that was very extroverted, made me realize “oh, I need people around me to feel more energy”. Okay that was a tangent but felt like a necessarily random point. Secondly I learned that just because someone isn’t doing what you are thinking of doing doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t do it. In fact, since someone hasn’t done what you are thinking of doing before probably means you should do that thing.
For many years the biggest culprit behind me not doing something was one thing — me. I would think, “Well XYZ didn’t do it, so why should I?” However, living in NYC to heal made me realize — nah I should do the thing that maybe nobody has created yet because that is essentially the whole point of being an artist –to create something out of nothing.
Meeting with so many artists & creatives the past few months also forced me to re-think about what I am building and creating. I’ve written things about racism and healing but I haven’t necessarily had my own space to use my gifts and talents for myself. Therefore, after further reflection, I decided that I wanted to build communities of love and healing for others — including myself. Of course I want my writing to help and encourage people but like I said in my about page, I also miss just writing to write. Writing not just for social change but for myself and this is what my blog is so cheers to me building for myself by creating this blog and hopefully from this place of personal healing and reflection you can also be blessed.
