"I was curious and eager to learn about what I presented with as a child. Being curious kept me interested, it kept me sane, it kept me going. I had a strong desire to learn about myself, I needed to know what was wrong with me. I wanted to be able to function in my life without judgments on my abilities being passed.

It was because no one talked about my disability that I was curious to know. I wasn’t letting go. We have a right to know about ourselves, what we deal with and how we present. We should want to have an interest in ourselves, so that we can better place our struggles.

I was silent but I never stopped thinking about and motivating myself to understand and build on my experiences, motivated to change my circumstances, around something I knew nothing about.

Curiosity benefits us. The more curious we are, the more inquisitive we become, the more we learn about ourselves, the sharper we become. Being curious saved my life."

Ilana Estelle is a mental health and wellbeing advocate who combines educational insight with her personal experience of living with physical, mental, and emotional disabilities. She holds diplomas in Counselling, Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Therapy, Psychotherapy and Counselling, and Stress Management. Through her writing, Ilana supports others in navigating their emotional, mental, and physical health challenges. In addition to writing for The CP Diary, her work has appeared in healthy lifestyle magazines. Ilana is also the author of three books: Cerebral Palsy: A Story – Finding the Calm After the Storm, Spirituality, Healing and Me, and Survival: The Covid Years – Time for Change.

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4 comments on “Curiosity”

  1. Albert Einstein said he wasn't talented, just curious. I think he was being more than a little modest but he had a point.

    Being curious opens us up to new experiences and that has to be a good thing.

    1. Yes, he was a brilliant scholar and I think you're right Albert Einstein was modest too. Through curiosity I believe we may find we have talent.

      Without exploring or being curious about things, we will never learn and it is when we learn that we open up up to new possibilities and new talent that we didn't know we had, that resides within us.

      That is exactly what happened to me.

  2. Unfortunately, I grew up in a world where curiosity was highly discouraged, seeing as my parents wanted us to pretend that things were great at home, when they were usually anything but.

    I was a curious child and figured out a lot of things on my own, but there were still a lot of things that someone should have taught us, since our parents certainly didn't.

    It would have been fantastic to have known that it was okay to be curious, instead of always being made to feel like it was such a bad thing.

    1. Thanks Randy. Yes, curiosity is never a bad thing. I'm so pleased you were a 'curious child.' Through what you say about your childhood, I think being curious got you through, like it did for me.

      I would never have had it any other way. In may cases, it will and does save us from stress and anxiety.

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