A new city in a new country.
A red dress, in a pink restaurant.
A well-planned vacation, along with captions for Instagram.
A beautiful Valentine’s Day with my own self.
Poetic.
Self-enabling.
Dreamy.
That’s how I planned my Valentine’s. But life… yet again… reminded me that it always comes with surprises. It proved, once more, that you cannot seek peace in control.
It placed a huge, shiny mirror in front of me and said, “You’ve come far, but you still have a long way to go.”
While showing me how strong I’ve become, it also showed me how fragile I am.
Still.
When I was spiraling for more than a day, I genuinely thought I might end up writing a book about it. The number of thoughts was uncountable. Every emotion showed up. Constantly. Continuously.
Now that I am calm again, sitting in my safe space, it all looks simple. Life just took my digital toolbox away from me. In a new land. In an unknown city.
I was stranded. Helpless. Clueless. Eyes full of tears.
And yes, looking back, I know, I was still lucky. It was just a phone. Not my passport. Not my wallet. Not my documents. I was not robbed violently. It was “just” a stolen phone. Apparently, very common these days.
But for someone who has never lost a phone, who has always travelled fearlessly, who plans nothing but is always careful, who believes she is prepared…
It hit hard.
For someone who had not let anything come close to her for more than a year, other than kindness, reality shook her. For someone who is always prepared, realizing that no amount of preparation is ever enough, was a hard pill to swallow.
The spiraling mind works in miraculous ways, doesn’t it? To give you a glance, let me write down some of the uncomfortable questions that popped up:
- Am I documenting while travelling? Or am I travelling for documenting?
- Why and when did I start suppressing my anger?
- Everyone has their rights and wrongs. But by choosing “let everyone be whatever they are,” did I slowly lose my spine?
- I am proud of not caring about the world and becoming my own world. But did I become that same world for myself, constantly expecting myself to be better, more disciplined, happier, more productive? Am I judging myself in the name of growth?
Oh, the list goes on. It wasn’t just questions. There were on-the-spot realizations, too:
- My presence is appreciated. My absence is rarely felt.
- The digital world has connected us so efficiently that real human connection now feels like “too much effort.”
- The world has adapted to the digital age so much that finding an address without someone “searching” it for you feels almost impossible.
- Not everything that happens has a deeper reason behind it.
That list goes on, too. While I am extremely grateful to have experienced immense kindness from strangers, people who helped me get back safely, a gentle human I had met just a day ago who helped me with bookings (we are talking about real money here), I am also stepping out of my comfort zone to acknowledge something else.
There are bad people out there.
Thieves.
Random negativity spreaders.
Racists.
And wow, the world is really a crazy place to be in. But I did not start writing this to rant about the world. As someone whose prized possession is the ability to turn chaos into writing, I am trying to use the same skill to analyze what actually happened in that crazy messy panicked brain of mine.
Why did I spiral into those thoughts? I am the same person who once wrote, “You are not responsible for your thoughts, but you are definitely responsible for your actions.”
So here I am, sitting with the thoughts.
Not judging them.
Not dramatizing them.
Just dissecting them!
Referring back to all the psychology books I have read. All the therapy sessions I have attended. All the frameworks I once underlined.
I do believe in therapy. But I also believe therapy is the class you attend. It is the homework and the practice that create change. So, this is me doing my homework. And yes, I am doing it in the open.
Because if I can share lessons of survival, moments of happiness, and dreams of romance, why not a dissection of vulnerability?
The Dissection: Why the Spiral?
Let’s start with the most basic; it was just a phone. But here is the catch – my brain tells me my phone wasn’t just an object. It was an extension of my nervous system. Losing it was not a logistical inconvenience; it was an injury to my sense of direction and social safety.
I realized my Ego planned that dreamy Valentine’s Day. It wanted a monument to my independence. When the plan shattered, the Ego felt attacked. I wasn’t crying over the phone. I was mourning the image of the girl who had it all figured out.
Somewhere along the way, I became the strict governor of my own world. I expected myself to be better. Disciplined. Happy. Even in crisis.
I judged my helplessness as a character flaw. I was angry at my tears because they weren’t “productive.” But the homework is learning to be comfortably unprepared. It is acknowledging the “bad people”, the thieves, the racists, not as a rant, but as a psychological necessity. To ignore the shadow is to let it grow.
I am accepting that I still have a long way to go. Because I am still learning to balance my spine with my softness. I am learning that I can be the woman who knows all the frameworks and still be the girl crying in a new city.
Both are me. The strength and the fragility. The wisdom and the spiral.
I would be lying if I said I reached the roots of that spiral. But I am proud that I didn’t run from it. I chose to sit in every circle of it.
Above all, I am proud of the girl who asked for help. The chest rose a little higher for the girl who called someone and simply cried. Who got puffy eyes after a long time!
Who said, “I need someone right now.”
Who cursed her ex as part of the process.
Who wept like a child and whispered,
“I am tired of being strong.”
“I want to be babied.”
“I just want to be a panda.”
“Adopt me.”
“I am ready to be a housewife in a house full of maids.”
For the woman I am becoming, I know what she will choose. But I am undeniably proud of the girl who had the courage to say those words out loud. Not to a partner. Not to a boyfriend. But to the people she trusted.
And most importantly, the girl who felt everything without becoming numb, without detaching, without dissociating.
And she tells me that I don’t have it all figured out, and that too is enough!
Afterword: The Library in the Rubble
When the spiral began, I didn’t just fall into a vacuum; I fell back onto the shelves of every book I had ever underlined. I realized that knowledge is a dormant seed until the storm provides the water. In the quiet of my safe space, these are the frameworks that helped me make sense of the mess:
- On the Extended Mind: I understood why the loss felt like a physical injury. My phone was what David Eagleman describes as part of our “live-wired” brain – a peripheral nervous system I had grown to depend on for my very sense of direction.
- On the Ego’s Narrative: I saw the “Strict Governor” for who she was. Ryan Holiday warned me that Ego is the Enemy, and here it was, mourning a “dreamy” image of independence rather than the actual loss of a device.
- On the Courage to be Messy: I thought about the “inner child” and the Limbic System. I realized that my desire to be “babied” or to “be a panda” wasn’t a failure of character, but a necessary protest from a brain that had been forced to be “strong” for too long. As Thomas Lewis suggests in A General Theory of Love, we are biologically wired for connection and regulation. Crying to someone I trusted wasn’t weakness; it was a survival mechanism.
- On Radical Acceptance: I had to face the uncomfortable truth from Mark Manson that sometimes, the world is just indifferent. There is no “manifesting” a thief away. There is only one way to respond once the map is gone.
- On the Shadow: By acknowledging the “bad people,” the racists, and the thieves, I was doing the work of Jungian psychology – refusing to repress the dark parts of reality. To ignore the shadow is to let it grow.
This experience taught me that therapy isn’t just a session; it’s the ability to hold your own hand when the world turns “crazy.” It’s the practice of being Humanly Intelligent, not just Emotionally Intelligent.
I am still a work in progress. But at least now, I know that even when I am lost, I am still the author of the story!
Travels and Tales! 