Misfit. Survivor. Leader. | Dima Ghawi - 902

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in the globe. I may not fit in in a specific geography. So that's how it started.

by being part of the bigger picture, bigger community. So in my situation, I felt as I was growing up in the Middle East, I was losing who I am, even though I was so young, because I had to fit in with what was the expectations and to follow and to obey, and because that was what was expected of me. And since I was growing up, I didn't have an identity. I didn't have a sense of self. I was part of the family. Any behavior I did reflected on the family. If I did well in school,

great for the family. If I did a mistake for the family. So it was absolutely terrible because I never made a choice for me as dema, as an individual. It was always the fear and the worry about how it is going to be perceived by others. And when I came to the US, I sense the same thing as well. Where it is let's say, in a corporate environment, I am part of the bigger picture. Everything I did reflected on the bigger picture, so bigger like the culture

work culture. So that's why I feel I am a misfit. I don't fit anywhere. I love it. It gave me the chance to discover my advantage. It gave me the chance to be able to discover who I am and not to try to conform just to be accepted by others and yes, there are consequences, but I'm okay with them.

never glue it back. It will always be seen as broken. And then she said, and who would want a broken vase? That's the one we throw in the trash. So I was five years old. I didn't understand what that meant. I didn't understand why my grandmother was so serious, and what is the meaning of a crack on the vase? And why why is she even telling me the story? But she was preparing me. She was preparing me to the expectations of the society that I have to be perfect.

I have to worry about how I am being perceived by others. I have to do what I'm being told. Otherwise I would be thrown away and I would not be good enough. And that turned out to be my life.

This is how I moved that to the US. And I was absolutely following the expectations of the vase. I was doing what was expected of me, how I was raised and what I was taught. But then that marriage turned out to be abusive, and I was so scared to leave. I was scared to even consider it, because even when I called my mom in Jordan and I told her, I'm not happy, like I'm so depressed. Imagine, I was early twenties, alone in the US, extremely depressed,

not having an identity. But so when I told my mom, she said, oh, like, just have have kids, have kids, and then and then everything is going to be okay. Isn't that hilarious? Yeah? Like, is it bad marriage? Bring more kids to it. So so that was the moment where I started to question everything, to question the stories I was taught. And that's when I started remembering the metaphor. So even though I was living with it, the image

of the vase started coming back to me. And I remember one day I was so depressed I couldn't even get out of bed. I was staring at the ceiling for hours and hours because I was feeling so hopeless. So I wanted to I wanted somebody to tell me what to do with my life. So I called my mom in Jordan. It was the middle of the week, and part of the marriage, I was not allowed to

call my mom in the middle of the week. I was only allowed to call her fifteen minutes a week on a Saturday, and he had to be next to me, so I couldn't just talk to my mom. But that day I broke the rules. I bought a I had with me a phone card at that time, I used to buy them, and I called my mom and I couldn't get her, Like the phone just kept drinking, ringing, ringing. I couldn't get to my mom. So I called. I dial to speak to my best friend and I couldn't get her. I dial to speak to my uncle. I

couldn't get him. And I was at the lowest point in my life, just hoping that somebody would tell me what am I supposed to do? How am I supposed to live my life? At that time, I was twenty four and at that moment, I even though I was feeling so terrible, I was on the floor crying. But I believe now it was the best thing ever, because that was the moment that made me realize that I have a choice. I can choose to continue to live

to satisfy everybody around me and keep losing myself. And the worst part is to move the vase story and these other stories forward to the next generation and expect the same thing from them. Can you imagine how horrible that would be, or my other choice is to choose me, And just the idea that I have a choice, just the concept that was like a brand new concept in my life. That's when, as if a little crack in the vase was created, because that was like a whole

new thing. I wasn't ready to leave or any of that, but just the idea was so empowering, and that's when I realized that I need to focus on my education. I need to be able to make money and be financially independent. There's a phrase in Arabic that says when jehan ud lam, and that means knowledge is light and ignorance is darkness. So imagine I was raised in a way in the darkness. The more I was kept ignorant, the more I was kept with fear and insecurities and

worry about perfection, the more I was being controlled. But I needed knowledge and that was my only condition when we got married. So that's like from the beginning, since I met him, I said I wanted to be the first educated woman in my family, and he agreed, and thank goodness he agreed, because of course he has full power over my life. But he agreed and by getting the education and graduating and getting my diploma, that also created another crack in the vase because now I have

my education, and knowledge is power, knowledge is light. And then around that time, his business wasn't doing well and usually he would not let me work because like again the control, but he needed help. He needed help financially and even with simple little things of paying utility bills, and he allowed me to work and it was such a blessing. So even though he was self serving his need, but at the same time, it reflected positively on me because it was I was able to find a job.

I was working minimum wage as a teller, just ten hours a week, but that gave me some financial ability where I was making money. And then years later I got a better job, I started making more money, and that created another crack in the vase. So when we talk about my life and this vase, once I discovered that I have a choice, and by the way, I love on your website because you talk about the choice too, and I wrote it down. You have a choice of

fighting or fleeing. And I fought, but I didn't fight by fighting physically or verbally. I fought by connecting internally getting my education, becoming financially independent, and then I escaped. By escaping that was not accepted by my family. That entire community in Jordan disowned me, and my father DI decided to have me killed because if a woman and it's still happening.

I wish I can do that too. They were working hard to get promotion, and I knew that eventually I would not be allowed to work. They had dreams, maybe to work on their masters or to start a business, and I knew I would not be allowed to do that. So even though I had glimpses of things that I would hope I could do, I knew I wasn't allowed to in the future. So I had to block it. And that increased the depression that I was experiencing. So it's like a horrible cycle that was going on.

did it take to in that state? Strive and get out of there and actually reach for possibility and make change.

questioning the depression. The depression was an amazing teacher because it was teaching me that I did not fit in in that environment and I deserve something better. Of course, at that time, I cannot say yay, I'm depressed. It was terrible. It was horrible. But now when I look back, I don't think I would have done what I ended up doing, which is escape, if I did not have that depression. So questioning the norm and then also start

start analyzing, what are the phases in your life? What are the stories that you've been told that have shaped you and shaped your decisions or maybe shaped your choices, but at the same time, think about the goals of the future. In my situation, what I wanted part of the goal was that I wanted to work on my

master's and I wasn't allowed to do that. So all I started doing was envisioning myself with a cap and gown and I was walking to get my like my diploma for my masters, so that every time things got so bad, I would keep imagining that day. So imagine what the vase is, Imagine the dream of what you're trying to achieve, and start listening to the voice and our heads. Because most of the time we're not telling

ourselves good things. So maybe what's wrong with me? I am not good enough, I'm going to fail, I'm going to regret this decision. All of these voices were in my head constantly, so it's a matter maybe write them down. Write down all these negative things that we tell ourselves, and then on a second column, write down what do

you want to start telling yourself. Recently, I hired a coach and she's been helping me with this because this is something that I'm still dealing with until today that when the shame and the negative programming start in our life early on, even though we become in our forties, fifties, sixties, it's still playing in our head and it's still continue to make us small and push us down. So these

are some of the things that I did. But in my situation, it wasn't just that I sat down and I said, Okay, what is my base, what are my thoughts, what is my vision? I just needed to get out because I just I knew I would not be able to survive in that environment anymore. And it's just sometimes when we make big decisions like this, the universe starts lining up for us. In my situation, I started meeting people that were helping me, my team and my team members.

They discovered about what was going on and they started totally supporting me. So it's amazing how the community comes to us when we are in such a law and law place. But that's the time where we need to accept the help, which was so difficult for me to open ourselves and put our ego aside and be okay to accept as much help as we can.

conversations or breaking ties, or realizing that even walking away from non helpful situations or sometimes even toxic situations can still hurt or feel scary to us. How did you cope through those types of situations?

and to them I was not good enough. And it was extremely painful because to me it wasn't as at that time I was twenty five by the time I escaped, it was twenty five. It wasn't in a place where I would tell myself I made the right decision and they're wrong. I started blaming myself and thinking why did I do that? And I started getting all kinds of sense of shame and regret, initially because who would want

to be thrown away like that? So yeah, so to me it was I guess my community made it easy, and they're all like, we're done, we don't want to deal with you. But for anybody that is listening to this and they're worried about the people's reaction, my advice to you is put yourself first. Listen to your intuition.

If you're having a sense that you're not in the right place, if you are having a sense that you're not surrounded with the right people that are uplifting you, that believe in you, then why should we even worry about what they think? Right?

was defined by my father. That's why I was.

They have a purpose so I can influence people from all around the world, give them a sense of hope, and also give them the empowerment to realize that they have the ability to shatter the vase and it's okay. So that's who I am today and I absolutely love it.

My uncle, I have a wonderful uncle in the US, and he helped us. I think he was one of very few people. My uncle in the US my aunt in Canada were the only two that helped us, and they would even send money to support us. So the reason I'm sharing this there was so much stuff that was going on I could not handle it. So I blocked all my emotions, my anger, my frustration, all of this, and I called that I blocked it all in a big, invisible black box because I needed to survive. I needed

so I started working so hard. I was working day and night so I would be able to pay the bills. We were living in a one bedroom apartment in a very unsafe area, and for like initially, we didn't even have furniture until my manager discovered and she gave us a love seat that her dead dog used to love to sit on, and so it had all the dead dog hair. So we had to keep cleaning and a little TV. That's all we had. And we lived like

this because we couldn't afford any of that. So I was working, work and working, and I called it ambitious, like I am so ambitious, I'm going to work. Really, what I was doing is I was escaping from the because I knew I could not handle them. So many years later, so let me count seven years later, I got very sick and I had fever for ten days straight and ended in the hospital. And even though it sounds terrible, I believe it was the best thing ever

because I was forced to stop like stop. I wasn't able to work and to just keep myself occupied and frame it as a positive thing. I was on a short term disability for a month and a half and I was laying on the couch unable to move because the fever attacked my liver, like whatever was going on attacked my liver. And I am so grateful that that happened, because that's when I started reflecting about the emotions that

I was hiding. And I started reflecting related to this anger and the fear of survival, and the regret and the shame because I was still living with all of that. And that's when I decided that I need to start seeking healers and asking for help and asking for some experts to help me this identify these terrible emotions and get them out of me. There's a book called Buried

Emotions Never Die, and that's what happened to me. I was trying to bury all of these emotions, and even though I thought they were all buried, what once in a while this little or big, big, black, invisible box which it would open up and all these horrible emotions would come out. So I was forced for the first time to go through deep healing. And I went through this healing for ten years, and sometimes I would have

like two or three sessions a week. One of those sessions it was three hours to just help me look at my father's picture. I could not look at his picture, so we took three hours for me to just be able to look at his picture. So after ten years, I felt I was in a good place, but there's always things that come up. So because I did all of the healing and the forgiveness, that was the hardest thing. Not just forgiving my dad and forgiving my ex husband

and the community. The hardest part was forgiving myself because many times we're blaming ourselves, like I was blaming myself about what was happening and the divide that happened in like in my own family, what happened to my mom, what happened to my sister. So I had to forgive myself and that was really difficult. But then I was because I was able to release all of these things, I started feeling lighter, I started feeling happier. I started

getting promoted for some reason. It was strange because I became more confident. I wasn't doing work because I was escaping. I was doing my work because I was passionate about what I was doing. I was able to speak up in meetings instead of instead of hiding myself all the time. So that's what happened, and the journey never ended. So I wrote the book my breaking basis, and because I went through ten years of healing, I was in a better place to write it. But it was still difficult.

I was I Sometimes I would write for half an hour and then I would need three hours of sleep. And what was even harder was audible because I recorded the whole story, and that was that was intense because I was hearing my story and I had to deal with all the emotions. So it never ends, and I'm still going through therapy and healing and all kinds of stuff. But it's okay. And anybody who looks at these things and say I don't need healing, I believe we all

need it. It's not easy being human in our world. We all had something that happened in our childhood. We all had something, if not childhood, something that happened when we're a teenage that keeps making us think that there's something wrong with us. And trust me, there's nothing wrong with us. We just need to clean it up.

about how they're going to perceive me. And I hired many editors and creative like creative coaches and all kinds of people that helped me with this book. So even though it's just like you look at it at it as a book, it did take a village. So many people were involved in it, and I would keep asking them, I would say, like, I don't know if the reader

would even care about the story. I don't know if I would if I would come across as like as the bad person, the bad character, And the messages kept coming up, dema, the reader is going to love you, which I'm so grateful for. I like to be loved. But at this at the same time, anytime I would ask would anyone care about the story, the messages that I kept the receiving was yes. Because we all have a vase, we all have something that is stopping us.

We are we are all dealing with the sense that we have to be perfect, or the fear of shame. And so when I realized that there's a purpose behind the story, that's when I totally put my heart and soul to get the book out.

boxing and getting into my body. It was kind of like, oh, here's this box, you should open it. And then subsequent from that, I mean, it's taken a decade of realizing that shame was a thing and it was driving a lot of things, and I've worked on it a lot, and I had an experience late last year, went to the Himalayas on a beautiful retreat with a group. We did some deep work there and we were told to figure out what we wanted to leave on the mountain.

So obviously I was like a pack of shame with me, and it's coming and I'm leaving it there. And I had the most profound experience where I burned shame on the mountain and in the moment before burning it, I thanked shame for those not knowing what its purpose was, believing and trusting and being grateful for it. And I was like, obviously, I've carried this for a reason, but

I no longer need it. And I came back and just pondered this idea of I've tried to purge myself of this shame for so long, and it feels like it doesn't shift, but then it shifts in a heartbeat. But it's kind of like also it's been shifting the whole time. It's like that idea of doing the work and thinking it's not working, and then you know, it's like becoming an overnight success taking ten years. That was a long question, wasn't it was that even a question? Anyway?

not do that, there's something wrong with me. I am not good enough and I'm going to be thrown away. So I believe that's where the seed of the shame in my life. And it's so interesting that it stayed with me even though I truly did the right thing by escaping. How for many many years, I was feeling internally shameful. I felt that there's just something wrong with me. Why can't I just deal with the situation like everybody else?

So maybe we need to all reflect and go back and figure out where where did where did it originate? What is the voice of shame in our head? And then that's where we can go back and identify the vase that is associated with all of that. But every body I interact with, we're all dealing with this shame, regardless of what culture we're living in.

my head is rising from the shards. So you have the shards of the broken vase, and we can either keep them broken on the floor and maybe feel like a victim or feel that we're broken, or we can build something beautiful from them based on how we want

our life to look like. So that is what the book is, and it's going to include a lot of messages related to my healing journey and what I had to do with that, and also it's going to include information about the healthy feminine and how many times we lose the healthy feminine and we turn into being a toxic feminine just to survive. So that is that's part of the book number two, and I have been talking to two directors to turning Breaking Vases into a movie.

So the journey is, it's taking time. It's not as fast as I would like it to be. But this is a big part because I believe that I want this message to be with people all around the world, regardless of their culture, regardless of their language. It is something that applies to everyone. So this is far. These

are two of the things I'm working on. I'm working also on creating retreats to come and for us to come together and support each other as we are shattering these vases in our lives, and also doing an online leadership program to bring all the leadership messages that start with self discovery, start with what are we telling ourselves? Why do we think we're not good enough? And build ourselves as leaders. So there's just so much stuff going on and I love it.

she bought beautiful gifts for other people. But she had to get her way by lying, manipulating, trying to act like someone that she's not truly who she was, just to be accepted and just to be loved and to get things the way she wanted them. So many times and I see it all all over where we're being hurt, let's say as a child or our feminine side, our beautiful, flowing feminine side gets hurt, and what we end up doing in order to survive, we start masking who we

are and we start manipulating to get our way. So what we need to do is to heal that part, and we all anybody who got hurt in our lives, we learn that we cannot be who we are. We need to change. We need to play a game in order to get things our way, and the game sometimes is not pretty, and what we end up doing is hurting other people in the process as well, because we're losing our beautiful, feminine and we end up doing things that are not aligned with our identity and our true self.