Today, I planned to meet a friend for a casual coffee in Antibes… but that turned into lunch, which turned into a walk along the sea, which turned into a few glasses of wine later into the night. Some of the best moments in life are unexpected ones.
We’ve known each other for a couple of years now, and we’ve both grown a lot in that time. Today was a kind of celebration of our growth. It got me thinking about the person I was, and how living in France had made me the person I’d always wanted to be without realising it.
When I had arrived in the little village of Valbonne in 2020, I was someone who wanted to remain invisible. I hated inconveniencing others, to the point where I would make things regularly very difficult for myself. Somehow, I would characterise this as “kind” but now I look back and realise that this type of kindness wasn’t actually helping anyone at all.
The thing about this period of my life is that I was faced with a contradictory dilemma of strong desires. My desire to remain unseen, and my desire to take up space. When you travel to a country where you don’t speak the language, I can only describe it as if someone has stolen away your mouth. The things that you find easy to do in your home country, become a headache in a new one. You cannot read, you cannot listen, you cannot speak… but you can still feel. You have everything trapped inside of you… feelings that you wish to share with others, good or bad, and it remains trapped until you have the courage to express yourself. You may not want to be heard, but you do want to make a sound.
Learning to speak French was not only a tool for me, it was a way of facing some of my biggest fears. I had to open up, and make mistakes in front of people I didn’t know in order to make my daily life more liveable. In order to do this, I had to risk being heard… being judged, and letting other people form their opinion on me while I remained defenceless with my mostly muted tongue. Having been a lawyer, this is definitely not something I was used to. But making myself adjust to it has given me some of the best memories with some of the most important people in my life. Needless to say, it has been worth it.
France has taught me so much more than just how to speak French. It’s taught me how to hold myself as equal, alongside others, and follow my heart without taking responsibility for how others are affected by that. It’s taught me how to let go, and let myself be who I am while also letting others be who they are.
Little things that I had previously taken for granted, suddenly became big opportunities to feel grateful. Taking this moment to look back made me smile – something that I had been so afraid of doing, turned out to be the biggest gift that I would carry with me for life.
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