Keepin it real. Keepin it together.

I haven’t posted on here too many personal reflections about my experiences so far in Tanzania, partly because when everything you do and experience is so new it can be easier to simply stay on intake (rather than reflection) mode, and partly because I’m still trying to feel out my comfort level with posting on the internet my personal ruminations.

That said; disclaimer aside…diving in.

By the end of last week I’d been in Morogoro for almost three weeks. Enough time to get moved into my house, know my way to the office/market/town, learn a little bit of Swahili…begin to picture what it’ll be like to live here. I’d had a lot of small victories that mean a great deal when you’re learning your way around a new country (mailing a letter, finding a place to buy fruit) and moments of excited contentment (taking in the awesome view of the mountains on my walk home every day).

But by Friday evening some of the loneliness of being in an unfamiliar place, coupled with some of the angst that comes with navigating a new professional, as well as cultural, situation began to set in and I could feel myself spiraling towards that chaotic and uneasy place called panic. This was mostly related to work, but when you don’t know how to do things like take out your garbage, your life can meld into one emotional roller-coaster where the boundaries between your personal and professional selves get thin, if not non-existent.

The thing about being in a new country is that you loose the cultural, personal, social and professional accoutrements that we all look to to tell us who we are and why we’re ok. The great thing about being somewhere for a year, is that I’ll have the chance to build those again in TZ, but for right now they’re sparse. Fortunately, amidst my emotional flailing about, I remembered something that had been central to my time in Nigeria: above all else, remember who you are and keep a hold on that.

That might sound cheesy, or self-helpy, or whatever, but in a new city/country/job/continent it can be very easy to loose your self-confidence…the things you knew how to do, the situations you knew how to handle, the tasks you could complete, are all different now and it can be a short and slippery road into questioning whether or not you can do this. So for me, remembering who I am, why I moved to Tanzania, what I hope to get out of this year and what I think I can contribute is central to not just feeling good about myself, but keepin it together in general.

So, after lying in bed not being able to go to sleep for like the 20^th time in the last few weeks, I decided to get up. I grabbed my computer and wrote out a two page list of concrete and proactive things that I can do to feel successful in my job and life in TZ. If there is one thing I know about myself it’s that feeling alone + feeling overwhelmed is absolutely guaranteed to produce a kind of wide-eyed terror in me that is as incapacitating as it is unnecessary. The reality is that nobody wants me to do anything but thrive during this year and it’s silly to waste my time and energy feeling overwhelmed and scared when there are people who can and will help me.

After an hour or so, I had a list in hand of small steps I can take to feel professionally productive, as well as emotionally sane. And better still, coming up with a plan helped me remind myself why I felt like I could do this, and do it well. I doubt one list will alleviate all of the jitters and questioning that’s bound to come with any new job and new life. But a brightly colored, bolded text set of reminders about how and why you’re a competent person…well, it can’t hurt.

I closed my computer, flipped off the lights, and the best part of all…fell right to sleep.