Dears, it’s been a while again. Busy busy busy with life (so much has happened!!), I went a whole year without writing a blog post on JunealHolder.blog. Even as it may sometimes take a while before I write something on the blog, I eventually find my way back here. While I didn’t write on the blog for an entire year, I did publish my first book this year, though 👀😁: The Return. (Check it out here when you finish with this post).

In all honesty, this post has been in the making since the summer. This piece is inspired by the words of a close friend of mine who complimented me some months ago on the “beautiful life” that I have “curated” for myself. Ironically, I wrote that, “I want to live a life worth living” in a journal somewhere in 2023. Even as it’s hard to admit, I wasn’t completely fulfilled with how my life was looking a year ago. I had moments of happiness and excitement, but I felt like something was still missing.

When I look at my life now, it feels like one that I consider worth living. I even found an entry about how grateful I felt for “a life worth living” in my new journal back in the summer. It’s amazing how your life can change.

Apparently, my wish to live a life that I deemed worth living came true.

After much healing and purging, after a few deaths and rebirths, I feel confident saying that I’m living one of my main intentions: I love, I feel loved and I feel surrounded by love; I’m living a life filled with love. That is the achievement of a lifetime for me.

At thirty, I’m not afraid to say that I’m living a happy life; I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. I’m not afraid to say that I’m deeply in love; I’ve never loved this much and so close to unconditionally as I currently am. My relationships with both with myself and my environments have improved significantly compared to some time ago. The people in my life are wonderful folks. And I feel content and grateful for the people, opportunities and expansion I experience in my life.

But is that all that makes my life “worth living?” Does this mean that I’m set? Does this mean I no longer feel pain? How about challenges and uncertainties – am I done with those? What makes a life “worth living” in my book? Read on to find out…

Before I dive in, let’s take a few steps back to basics. That is, let me start by noting that I am not separate from All That Is. We are energetic, relational beings. And it is because of that, that I don’t think that one can “curate” a “beautiful life” in a vacuum. That’s to say we need people to curate our lives with, for they are the heart of Life and reflections of how we interact with Love.

My joy is relational. My love is relational. My happiness is relational. I know this because I know that my life happens in relation to others.

I am aware that happiness is not static; a happy life is part of a bigger journey with many moments that are anything but happy. It’s unpredictable, filled with unexpected surprises – sometimes surprises and moments you’re REALLY NOT waiting on. Like my latest tax bill😒… A happy life is not void of unhappy, challenging, patience-and-trust testing moments.

In fact, I’m still learning how to regulate my emotions optimally and more healthily. I’m still learning how to deal with my neurodivergence as well as the “big” feelings that come with having my conditions. While at it, I’m still resolving parental wounds and some (childhood) traumas. I’m still learning and adopting more sustainable practices to cope with life unfolding as I learn to fully let go of habits and patterns that do not work for my highest intentions for myself. Also, I still have more questions than answers when it comes to uncertainties that I face.

In the words of Londrelle, “Life is a beautiful mess.” But it’s one worth living, though. At least, that’s my reality. And I’ve been intentionally curating mine in a way that feels genuinely beautiful and worth living.

How did I get there? I’ve eventually realized that none of the things I’m still working through, the days that are less than desirable, nor the challenges I face make my life any less beautiful and worth living. Believe me, I’ve lived pain that I didn’t imagine I could survive, and I got my heart broken one too many times (mostly by myself). But I did survive, and my heart is healthy and full of love. Many tears later, I’m here with a smile (I’m literally smiling as I’m writing this sentence).

After questioning for a long time why certain things happen the way they do, I am now more focused with how to live the life I intend. In what follows, I want to share with you some of the elements I’ve realized that contribute to this life worth living. They, too, help me find ways how to live more aligned with my intentions.

Elements to A Life Worth Living

Among the things that make my life worth living are first of all the opportunities presented before us. As in, we get to live. But we only live as we want, if we want, in the environment that we want. We get to grow, but again, only to the extent that we actually want. We get to love and strive for more love in our lives. If we want and choose for it. We have opportunities to hate, too. We are presented with moments to enjoy and also suffer if we choose to. We can observe, reflect, learn, and do better – if we want to. Indeed, we are presented with opportunities to experience life as we intend.

If, for example, “freedom” is one of my intentions for my life, I get opportunities to experience that. Similarly, if experiencing “love” is something that you desire, you get opportunities to do so. This happens by being shown and experiencing what freedom and love are not, and what they are, too, so we can choose between what we know to be truth and feel resonance with.

If you don’t know the opposite of your intentions, you won’t recognize the difference when they realize themselves. That’s why I firmly believe that the opportunities we get to experience life as intended should not be taken for granted.

Secondly, I embrace the people in my life, for they create the platform to have the opportunities mentioned above. I understand how the people in our lives play a role in the experiences we create and have, and I embrace their influence in that.

Relationships help us curate our lives. It is therefore that I am very mindful of and intentional about the people who are part of my life, as they play a HUGE role in the creation of my life experience.

While we need people, we can be mindful of the people in our lives. Like Eartha Kitt said, we can “be choosey” about the people in our lives. Some of our relational ties were given to us (like families we were born into or found ourselves in through, for example, marriage and partnerships), while others, we get to choose, like our close friends.

I believe that it’s relevant to note that we are not necessarily bound to any ties, even as we sometimes restrict ourselves with the belief that with some people, sometimes, we don’t have a choice. I’m aware that I do have a say in the relational ships I board and entertain, and that these relational ships will be crucial in how I experience my reality.

Understanding the pivotal role people and circumstances play in how I curate my life in terms of the opportunities that I’m given to be and become is a big part in the “curation” of my beautiful life.

As I mentioned earlier, you cannot create a life in a vacuum. So outside of your close relationships, you still have to deal with people. And the thing about people is that we are all a walking universe. More often than not, socialized very differently from each other.

Now, here is where things start to get a bit more challenging to truly curate our lives as we intend. You see, there are rules, expectations, and social contracts in place. They are informed by a myriad of factors – including, but not limited to, cultures, ideologies, and norms. All these influence our values systems, which, in turn, inform our belief systems, which in turn affects how we perceive and experience moments.

This means that, to curate a life, we first have to (learn to) deconstruct our individual and social reality.

This process of deconstructing reality is challenging and confronting, because it means that we must learn to question what is and what works, and our position in relation to them.

If your whole life you have been told that you “should” do certain things, to question why that is the case opens you to different types of answers. The answers you might find as you question reality may even clash with your own beliefs and thoughts about what life is about. Are you willing to question your own beliefs and thoughts, too? You see how disruptive deconstructing can be?

Disruption is not always a bad thing, but it may hurt our sense of identity and be a source of confusion. For, “who am I and who do I want to be if not who I was told, thought and believed I should be?”, are hard questions to break down for ourselves.

But it isn’t until after questioning and disrupting, that we can rebuild our individual universes from a unique perspective.

This rebuilding of our universes may or may not be counterculture or unorthodox. But that’s the freedom that we have; we get to choose. Our agency gives us the option to also continue to follow tradition and rules and accept that things are the way they are for a reason not worth scrutinizing. We may choose to therefore follow traditional scripts on how to live life. That option is also available.

This brings me to the third elements that makes my life worth living: having curiosity as a friend.

Somehow, along the way, I made my beautiful, messy life one I believe is “worth living”; I’m surrounded by people who- and moments that present me with opportunities to enjoy and experience and explore this life.

I believe that my life is fulfilling and one worth living because I am taking the time to deconstruct and reconstruct my unique universe over and over again; I am taking the time to question and wonder why I believe certain things about the world, and whether my beliefs are contributing to the life I envision for myself.

I’m taking the time to question my identity and how I see myself in relation to All That Is, and continue to learn and adapt. The only way to do that is with a spirit of curiosity and openness to change.

I approach life with a curiosity of a child; open to learning as I grow. The difference between me and a child is that I get to decide what I do with the information I get and there is no one to tell me that I “should” do things a certain way at this point when it comes to my journey.

This ongoing process of becoming demands for me to question, learn, and adapt accordingly. Leaning into my expansion is a process of shedding and letting go to keep growing into who I intend to become. I have accepted the invitation from Life to lean into my own expansion a while ago and I have not regretted it. Evolution demands change, so I willingly continue to change with a sense of curiosity as I get new information and new experiences.

As shown in this post, having a life I deem as “worth living” is nothing more than a life of intentionality and curiosity, filled with people and opportunities.

Lastly, I want to share a note that came to me not so long ago:

When you realize that this temporary journey on Earth is part of something much much bigger that will continue to exist beyond your existence, you may consider stop taking it so seriously. But at the same time, you may take your responsibility in what you want to make out of it. Nothing must, but options are available.

Thank you again for your time, dears.

With love,
Jun ✨

P.S.: you can find more information about “Soul Poetry Volume I: The Return” by clicking here.