Investigative Selfism

“Be unafraid to be happy.
Be unafraid to love.
Be unafraid to make a difference.”

Jack Kornfield

I studied political science thinking this is how we change the world. And in a very important way, we do.

Yet later in life, I’ve realised that we can’t have a profound change on the outside without having the same on the inside. It’s just not gonna work.

A mind that’s not curious, a mind that’s not open, a mind that’s not liberated won’t be able to engage in creative processes of anti-oppression.

In other words, one thing became clear in my adult life:

If we want to build healthier societies, we need more mindfulness, awareness, agency, courage, compassion, and leadership with a heart.

And it all starts with us.

This realisation has further fuelled my curiosity – that investigative selfism – and has led me to study a range of disciplines: Buddhist psychology, neuroscience, nonviolent communication, cognitive behavioural therapy, neurolinguistic programming, the topic of trauma and addiction, the combo of colonialism, militarism, and imperialism, and a mix of studies that explain our human behaviour.

So many tools to equip ourselves, so little time. But it’s not only about studying them: it’s all about application.

As someone who’s been moving continents for the past fifteen years (read my longer story here), it finally hit me that I can be going to exciting places but if I’m bringing my old and unhealthy habits, limiting beliefs, my colonised mind, and other unwanted baggage with me, it’s not gonna magically leave me somehow.

Equipping myself to leave the unwanted baggage and empower myself instead by learning and unlearning things: this is what I’ve been doing in my personal life and in what you’re seeing on this website.

In the past years, Investigative Selfism has become inevitably increasingly intertwined with my project on politics – The Exploding Head. I am updating this introduction section of my website as genocide in Gaza, Palestine (where I have lived), is happening which has changed me forever. Those changes – the topics, the tools, the insights, the invitation to sit with our emotions – are also in Investigative Selfism. Because, after all, it all comes from my heart, however it’s doing.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I really appreciate it. And if anything that you’re seeing here resonates with you, please do get in touch.

Justina

“The ultimate lie we tell ourselves is not that there is no food, but that the soul isn’t hungry.”