I am one of those people who can never settle. Where others would see in me someone who is never satisfied, I would know that although I am never dis-satisfied, I am seldom fully content. For example, I did well in my GCSEs: I set my sights as high as possible, didn't make them (of course), but I excelled nonetheless. I don’t look back with regret, but really and truly, I wanted more. My A Levels - a similar story, but my degree - slightly different; for the first time, I exceeded my expectations - sort of. Here’s where it gets interesting:

I realised that in defining my expectations as whatever exists slightly out of my reach, exceeding my expectations was not exceeding my expectations. Let me explain:

I went to uni, like many, aspiring for a First. Realising that a First was out of my reach, I lowered my sights to a 2:1. Until a 2:1 was too attainable. Knowing that a First, although possible, was improbable, I settled for a high 2:1.

I got a First. Something strange happened: I remembered all of the reasons why I could, and should, have gotten a First - my expectations for assignments were set at 90%, not 70%, and I knew, full well, that I could operate to a high-First level. Hence, in getting a First and exceeding my expectations, I was able to realise that I actually fell short of them.

To stress, regardless of my degree classification, I wouldn’t have felt bad or wished that I could change anything. This isn’t a story of one of those people that robs themselves of achievement or fulfillment. Rather, it is a story about someone who shifts their expectations so as to never allow themselves to fully reach them: I always aspire to overachieve, but I ensure that I never do, because overachievement is just achievement if we remove the subjectivity.

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I do what I do because of that persistent voice of discontent; the one we all have - the voice that tells you that you’re not satisfied. It is not negative, necessarily, yet it is oft a reminder that “this is not good enough”. My voice and I seldom choose to generate negativity, but rather inspiration - the message: “you know that better is within your capability, and you know that you can make your life, and the life of those around you, easier if you manifest better from within yourself.” When it hands me statements like the previous, what this voice is also saying is: “you know what better looks like and you know why better needs to happen. You, therefore, are discontent with the way things currently are. What was once good enough is no longer good enough. There are no excuses. Fix it.”

I have learned to agree with this voice because, rather than as a negative, I have come to view the discontent that it generates as the driver of all change. “If things were good enough,” I would ask myself, “why would they ever need to change?”

Looking inwardly, I would confidently say that the psyche I have founded upon this outlook has served me almost exclusively positively. Then I started looking outwardly. Then I realised that this is also how I love. Then I started to see where the problems arose...

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I can confidently say that I don’t hold others to the same standards that I hold myself to - far from it, no one else is supposed to be me, or any more like me than they currently are for that matter.

That was only partially true. The closer you are to me, the more I love you. The more, therefore, I take responsibility for your problems, and the more I try to solve them in my own, characteristic, way through my own, characteristic, outlook. Hence, the more similarities there are between the way that I view you and the aforementioned way that I view myself. So to rephrase: I often hold others that I love to the same standards that I hold myself to.

When I love people, I am invested in making their life easier and reducing their discontent. I believe the greatest gift that you can give someone is the version of themselves that solves the internal problems responsible for generating the discontent that they hold for themselves and their environment. I believe that in doing so, in helping someone to manifest these changes, you make someone’s life better. This view crystalised for me on the eve of the announcement of the second lockdown. It was my sister. Let me explain:

Boris Johnson announced the lockdown as I was at a friend’s house. As the word came in, my friend received a call, asking if they were okay in light of the news. At this point, a lightbulb had gone off in my mind: “Yunus!! This is how you be a supporting friend?!” I extended a similar query out to my sister. Her reply stuck with me:

“No, I am not fine at all, far from it: I feel like I am on the verge of having a breakdown.” She explained: “I feel trapped; the physical entrapment of having to stay at home again is an inescapable reminder of the ongoing feeling of being trapped within myself and my life...” The conversation continued from there as an apple grew in my throat and a sinking feeling in my stomach.

It was at that point that helping to rid my sister, and others for that matter, of this feeling of entrapment became one of my foremost incentives. It has found its way, centre stage, into what we do at the PDProject. It has led me to slowly unravel, back to how I used to view things, all of the thinking that I painfully grew to resist. You see, I used to take a slightly less “accommodating” - shall we say - view of my sister. Let me explain:

My sister is four years older than I, and took a gap year before completing her Bachelor’s degree. She stayed at home whilst she studied in London for three years. Hence, the year she entered graduate life was the year that I entered undergraduate life, moving out to study in Bristol. By this point, I was well aware that my sister struggled at uni, with her mental health making completion an accomplishment in itself. Graduation meant that the primary stressor, university, had been eased.

I was away in Bristol, but would return home for Christmas, Easter, Summer - first year, second year, third year - to see my sister still living at home, and still without long-term employment. I would witness snapshots of immaterialising results, which led to immaterialising hope, which led to immaterialising efforts, which led to immaterialising mental health. The growing frustration and discontent with a stagnating self and a stagnating life only exacerbated the situation. After a while, I would return home to what looked like a lifestyle that was orchestrating its own demise. Increasingly, I thought I had to say or do something. My doing so, by and large, was a resounding failure:

When I would raise points along the lines of “if we’re going to get anywhere, we need a plan, with some deadlines and some accountability,” I would get responses like “you’re acting like being here was the plan, Yunus. I do not want to be here! This was not the plan! I had a plan - I did get a graduate job - but I was working in an unsafe environment which resulted in my permanent injury and me quitting. That’s why I am here, not because of a lack of plan!”

I couldn’t help but think that that changes little. If we harbour the same aspirations for ourselves, the same things - almost regardless of what gets thrown our way - is needed from us to get us out of this situation. “We either do them, or change our expectations,” my thoughts, and words, went. All attempts to convey these views were hopelessly unsuccessful. Any solutions proposed - shut down. The response: “a lack of compassion, a lack of understanding, a lack of care…” Any deadlines I tried to impart - shut down. “Placing unnecessary stress on people.” Much to my frustration, my attempts to improve the situation were doing more harm than good.

In the end I let it be known that I thought my sister should take any job that she could possibly get and move out as soon as possible. That was me shooting myself in the foot. Cold shoulders got put up and conversations stopped being had with me - understandably so. “We already know where you stand and I don’t want to have the same conversation again,” the explanations went.

They knew what it was that I was after, but they did not know how, or most importantly, why I wanted to get there. It wasn’t until very recently, some 4 years later, that I found someone who put it well, better my approach through the differentiation of two concepts; maternal love and paternal love:

“Maternal love is the unconditional love - no matter what this person does, they're still my baby,” they said, as they seemed to be explaining my mother’s approach. “Fatherly love, on the other hand, is still love, but it is a love that desires you to be the [your] best. It is seemingly conditional, but it is conditional to motivate you to greatness.” They used the analogy of parenting a son: “[Paternal love] is like: ‘you're my son, but that's wrong - I'm not proud of you and that's shameful. Yes, this is who you are, but I want you to be better - this is not who I raised you to be.’” It was as if someone was reciting my love language. They continued, highlighting the contrast between the two, “maternal love is: ‘I'll love my baby just the way he is, [whereas paternal love is] I'll love my baby to become the man he is supposed to be. Therefore, I will discipline him, I will give him consequences, I will tell him what he needs to hear - the harsh truths.’”

Their words rang so true with me. I explained them to my mother, who, because I have never been able to convey exactly how and why I wished to help my sister, has long had a chip on her shoulder about my approach to the issue. “There have been some things in my life that have been as a result of my shortcomings, and I have struggled to sort them out,” I began. “They have been letting yourself and those that I care about down, but most of all, they have been letting me down. I haven’t really known how to deal with them, and the only successful method I have found thus far is to force myself into the, typically uncomfortable, environment that demands this elusive virtue from myself. Often, this environment exists outside of the home, away from you,” I told my mum. “The reason I do this is because, in not doing so, it generates the discontent that feeds the hatred (strong word) of myself, my life and those around me. I have to do this for myself, in order to do what I need to for those around me. It is only when I rid myself of the traits that serve as a disutility (to myself), that I can serve those aforementioned three - yourself, those that I care about down, and I. Sometimes this looks harsh or extreme. Sometimes it looks distant and cold. But me doing this has always been essential. For all of us.”

I detailed a previous conversation that I had had with my sister in which she illuminated the concept of empowerment, something that I had long failed to comprehend. She informed me that many, herself included, default to an “I can’t” outlook to life. Empowerment, something that we can do for ourselves as well as others can do for us, was simply the shifting of that outlook from “I can’t” to “I can.”

With this context, I continued to my mother: “At least, when I do this, when I force myself relentlessly into new and uncomfortable environments, I make it impossible to look in the mirror and say ‘I can’t,’ and say that I hate myself and my life because I have left both them to stagnate, never facing and embracing the obstacles that came my way. At least I am forced to make internal progress and keep proving to myself that I am strong enough to overcome my hardships, and resourceful enough to change my life for the better. No matter my circumstances. Because, when you don’t do this, when you look in the mirror and can’t say that to yourself,” I explained, “the person and the life that you see looking back at you begin to look very dark, very quickly.”

I also took the time to detail my lockdown conversation with my sister some months back, the one in which she explained her experiences of feeling “trapped.” Thereafter, I continued: “So, with regards to my sister and the things that I have or haven’t done or said to try and ‘help’ her out, I would rather be harsh and misunderstood, but she be the person that she has needed herself to be. The other option is to be soft and ‘supportive’ whilst watching her grow to hate herself and her life. Yes, this is projecting the way I view myself onto others, which I may have no right to do” I detailed, “but it is the only way I know to solve these problems. Because I love her, I am not happy - as she is not happy - with the person she is and the position that she finds herself in because, as we all know, she, primarily, wants and needs better from herself.”

My mum understood.

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