Dear Swastika,
During 11th grade I was in love with a boy who didn’t reciprocate the same feeling I had for him. This feeling of rejection affected my studies. My parents had huge expectations from me because I was always good in my studies. But I barely managed to pass my high school. Now when I look back, I regret wasting my time on that boy and ruining my studies. I have disappointed my parents. They still want me to do well in my higher studies but I don’t have any motivation in me to do anything good in terms of studies. I can’t get back the confidence to pull back my concentration to prepare for college. I have tried a lot to change my life around but it still feels like I’m not making any progress. I don’t want to throw my life away like this.
 – Ritika

Just for a moment, let me put you in a different scenario. Imagine that you are a highly motivated athlete. You’ve won several medals in, let’s say, marathon. Your parents are really proud of you and you are also very happy with your accomplishments. But one morning, as you run on the streets to practice for an upcoming South Asian Marathon event, a motorbike crashes into you and injures your right leg.   

There are couple things that I want to explain by comparing this scenario and your real life situation. First, accidents happen. Some accidents are physical and some accident are emotional. No one knowingly walks into an accident. With best intentions and high hopes, we walk our journey. But as we walk, there are some unforeseen and sometimes unfortunate circumstances waiting for us around the corner. When a motor bike hits you, you can blame the driver. Unfortunately, all of us blame our own selves when emotional accidents happen. You were young and you fell in love. You felt rejected and you lost your zeal towards life and studies. None of this was your fault. 

Second, when someone is physically hurt, the first thing they do is run to the hospital and try to take care of their wounds. Unfortunately, when someone is emotionally hurt, they keep trying to drag themselves into the arena and push themselves to run. When they can’t run, they get caught in the vicious cycle of guilt and self loathing. Recognize that the sense of being rejected is as bad as being hit by a motor bike. Losing your self confidence is as paralyzing as losing a limb. You can’t snap out of a leg injury and you can’t snap out of a heart break. You can’t cure your leg by changing into a pair of new pants and you can’t cure your emotional damage by changing your life around. What is injured is the thing that needs to be directly cured.  

Go back and find a closure to your relationship. Let him know what you felt and how you felt (without expecting him to come back to you). Talk to him and other friends you trust about your fear of rejection and how this has deeply affected you. Go back and touch where it hurts the most. Only when it begins to hurt, you know that it is starting to heal. 
Meanwhile, remember that life might never be the same again. What is lost might not be re-gained. But your life will continue to be beautiful in different ways. Do the best that you can without trying to push yourself to being who you once were. You were a good student once, and you might or might not have that back, but open yourself to the possibility that instead, you might become a better human being, perhaps get better at arts and literature, or gain a completely different set of skills and expertise. The limitless possibilities and potential of life doesn’t cease with one physical or emotional accident. 

Swastika Shrestha is the co-founder and head of  training and support at Teach for Nepal. She has several years of experience training and mentoring youth leaders. She can be reached at swastika@teachfornepal.org.

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