Overcoming Anxiety and Self-Doubt: A Spoken-Word Poem
At the 2019 Speaker Slam® Grand Slam, the Inspirational Speaking Finals held at Lyric Theatre in Toronto, Jovana Borojevic took the stage with a five minute story.
Transcript
I step inside of my house, everything becomes still. And all I can hear are my own thoughts. My palms get sweaty, and I feel the weight of my aloneness. That place where you'd rather run away than come home every day, I've lived there. I lived in a crippling cycle of worry, searching for hiding spots in familiar rooms that carried reminders of where I didn't want to be. The once perfectly painted, dusty pink walls became raised, cracked, and paper-thin. And when I wasn't trapped in the noise of my own silence, it was like I was living with the roommate I never wanted.
You see, the walls were my soul, and my home was always me. The uninvited roommate's name was sadness, and the noise was the you'll never be enough melody. I hated my home, not the one built of tiles, drywall, and a keyhole, but the one built of bones, muscles, and a delicate soul. I spent years filling unworthiness cracks with change feels good plaster and stop worrying insulation, ignoring the pungent smell of rotting self-hatred mold, and sweeping shame dust under the emotional exhaustion couch.
I stowed all the unacceptable parts of me away. Coming home was what I feared most every day, and the more I tried to control my fear, the more it tightened its grip and screamed its daily plea, "I'm here. Can you please just look at me?" I would entertain fear's request and say, "Yes." But I could hear the prominent no echoing off the tightness in my chest. But one Wednesday, no different than the rest, something was different. And I just kept thinking, "How hard could it be?"
I sat down on the cold tiles in front of my mirror because my legs were tall, and in this moment, I just wanted to feel small. Inhale. Eye contact. Exhale. My protective wall blinded me, and I resorted to the only defense I knew. I was ready to flee. But for one moment, I thought, "What if I just looked around the wall and saw what my fear was asking of me after all?" What if I entered the room I avoided most, the one where I stowed all the intrusive thoughts, all the bloat?
I ran my hand across my stomach, and all the overcrowded hiding spots were unlocked. With each passing second, I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rising, my gaze shifting from my reflection to the back of my eyelids. A wave of shame washed over me, but I consciously decided, "Not this time. I will not leave." There was something about intentionally placing my hand over the singular place where I felt my life source flowing through me. It was like each breath was putting out flames of anxiety.
And as the sounds of the world faded that day, I realized I didn't have to run away. I wanted to love the vessel that carried me, the same home where my sister, mother, father came for love and security. I accepted fears as gifts from my soul born within me, speaking through me, desperately trying to reach out. And in order to receive their messages, I had to let them in. I had to say hello to anxiety, invite sadness in for coffee, and thank them for existing with sincerity.
And instead of stowing the less desirable away, I had to lovingly open the door and thank them for their stay. Defeating my fear of facing my soul meant trusting myself to step over the thresholds of insecurity, conquering my desire to flee the one place I was actually meant to be. It meant learning that love was not just a feeling. Love was an action, and the fear was never about running away. It was always about creating a space that felt safe enough to stay.
Fear and trust, darkness and light, it is the union of these perfectly human existences that makes us complete, balanced, and right. My home will never be perfect, but it will always be whole. Woo! Yeah!
Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.