I’m Melissa - Nice to Meet You!

Perhaps like most kids, I went through my school years always planning to attend college to obtain that coveted degree that symbolized competence, success, and a secure future. I had no idea which degree I might want to go for, but going to college was a given - after all, that’s the only way to get anywhere meaningful in life, right? And so off I went to the most prestigious school that I could get into, pursuing one of the most difficult engineering degrees that was available and of some interest to me. Uncertain about that path throughout my entire college career, I never felt much of a connection to my deeper sense of myself.

Laser-focused on pride and success, however, I allowed my ego and fear to play significant roles in driving these life decisions. Getting my college degree and excelling at my coursework became the forefront of my life for years, and I was willing to sacrifice everything else - stable finances, new friendships, an exercise routine and healthy diet, and family time - in a never-ending push to maximize my GPA upon receiving that piece of paper at the end of doing my time in the dorms.

Not unlike my prestige-driven motivations in college, upon graduating, I chose to work at one of the largest and most famous companies in my industry. My college grad mindset - which was not meaningfully guided or molded by anyone that knew anything about getting into “the real world” for the first time - was: choose an impressive company and role, get as many credentials as I can, and start making money. How many of those things sound like things that are aligned to my core and my passions? The answer is none - they were as superficial as they sound.

When I received my 5-year service award consisting of a company-engraved trinket and a congratulatory certificate, I felt I was being thrown a paper bone except it hit me with the weight of a brick instead. Five years gone?! What was I doing with my life? I entered a full-blown, quarter-life crisis after neglecting my needs for so long, needs that I never consciously paid any attention to. I realized I didn’t even know what fulfilled me as a human being, but I knew it wasn’t that job or that lifestyle. I barely knew myself anymore; everything I worked for seemed to have been for all the wrong things. I endured crying spells for months on end as I felt my soul suffocating while I attempted to iterate on my life by searching for a new job.

Then my dream came true - I found a cutting-edge, start-up company that gave me more autonomy, more exciting work, and never-ending growth opportunities (along with a decent salary bump). I was ecstatic to get the position and worked myself to the bone with 80-hour weeks, driven by my need to please and hold onto the rare opportunity I had gained. I knew that it was closer to what I really wanted - something with more freedom and more excitement - but I fell back into being blinded by the challenge and the prestige, almost like tunnel vision.

Two years into the job, I found myself renting a small room in someone’s house to save money (in the super-expensive San Francisco bay area) while paying off school debt, and I was draining myself across the board. My work became my life, and everything else - though “important” to me, so I said - always came second, every day. Along my path to burnout, I suddenly caught a viral infection. My overwhelm and anxiety from work and from this new illness quickly spun me into a downward health spiral, experiencing the most bizarre and scary symptoms: splitting headaches, burning ears, peeling skin, abdominal pain, burning legs, nausea, shooting spinal pains, significant weight loss, and tingling that began spreading further throughout my body by the day. It turned out - though I didn’t know it at the time - that I had developed a vague autoimmune condition seemingly overnight, and it led to my taking four months of medical leave from work.

During that time, I was a complete wreck and unable to function day-to-day, with no diagnosis after about one hundred doctors’ appointments and dozens of tests. My days were filled with panic attacks and hopelessness, and I could barely care for myself. I was terrified, beaten down, and at my breaking point. I realized that the doctors weren’t helping; in fact, nothing “out there” was helping me.

This insight and my desperation for answers motivated me to turn inward. I began to believe that the answers were within me, and I had the power to heal myself. A combination of deep inner work, major lifestyle changes, and alternative treatments helped me to slowly recover and stabilize. I returned to work with a newfound appreciation of my mind-body connection and my true priorities (health now #1).

I had escaped my quarter-life crisis from my first job - which was generally focused on my career path and purpose in life - first by switching jobs and then by suddenly becoming distracted by my health woes that stole 100% of my attention and energy. I began to recognize the role that I had played - through my beliefs, behaviors, priorities, mindset, values, and the culmination of all my decisions - in my illness and my overall life trajectory. This led me to a confusing place - an actual expansion of my original quarter-life crisis, a real existential crisis - of questioning all aspects of my life, holistically.

In order to make any real change in my life to find fulfillment and to take charge of my long-term health, I had to take a deeper look at who I was and what that meant in terms of the interactions among my mission, my health, my relationships, and all of my life dreams and goals. I had to throw away my preconceived notions of what I was “supposed” to do and start from scratch to re-engage with myself with a completely refreshed approach and a wider, clearer lens on life.

After a lot of internal and external work, I came to a place of deeper understanding of who I was - my essence - and the ways in which I could live a more joyful, balanced life that met my needs and allowed me to fully express myself in the ways I had been yearning to for so long but ignoring. This shifted my life vision toward an authentic path filled with goals of all kinds that aligned with my deepest self - the real me that had been silenced for over a decade.

My existential crisis as well as my health crisis drove me to help others heal and recover from paths that were not serving them. I began to recognize the same suffering and tragedies that I had experienced in those all around me: in professionals of all ages, all backgrounds, and with varying degrees of awareness of what they were truly going through. People were burnt out, sick, depressed, confused, and feeling lost and disconnected. Some try to hide it; some can’t stop talking about it.

A large part of my life mission is now to support professionals experiencing existential and/or health crises to find themselves again, from the inside out, and to transform the life they’ve settled for thus far into one of authenticity and true fulfillment.