Interview with Myriam Ben Salem

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“I believe in strong women. I believe in a woman who can stand up for herself. I believe in the woman who doesn’t need to hide behind her husband’s back. I believe that if you have problems, as a woman you deal with them, you don’t play victim, you don’t make yourself look pitiful, you don’t point fingers. You stand and you deal. You face the world with a head held high and you carry the universe in your heart.”― C. JoyBell C.

Myriam Ben Salem is not just a writer but truly an empathetic person. I don’t know her personally but her writings spoke to me in a way that I felt like reading her work more and more.

She writes about human behavior, human expression, and human experiences. There is no dearth of topics at her end and her passion for writing makes me believe in humanity a bit more because she always relates those examples with her personal life too.

I find her an extremely humble and generous soul. I wish to meet her in person someday till then I would be rejoicing reading her work here on Medium. I hope you all love reading her responses too.

1. Where do you belong to? Is there anything you would like to change about the place you belong to?

I belong to the Universe and any liked-minded and light-hearted tribe! And, no, I’d change nothing to where I belong! As a free spirit and a universal citizen by heart, I choose intentionally where to belong. 

Of course, there have been failures along the way when I was stubborn and persistent in believing in the potential I was seeing in a person while ignoring the most important detail: their readiness to grow! I like to think I learned my lesson. 😊

2. What sets your soul on fire?

That’s a truly difficult question, given the multitude of choices! Witnessing any tiny manifestation of breaking with the stigmas. Observing with pride people decided to pay the price of setting themselves free from their life-time of conditioning. Noticing the warrior spirit and people taking their power back.

For the quick story, I was at my Swedish friend's place last year. They were at the office and I was getting ready to go out for an appointment. Meanwhile, I was listening to some music playing randomly. 

I heard someone introducing the rehearsal of a song in such an attractive way that I couldn’t resist the temptation to stop everything and watch it! The song's name is “This is me” from the masterpiece “The Greatest Showman”. 

It was the first time I heard it. I was sitting at the table while I suddenly felt the urge to stand up. I danced, sang, and cried so loudly that I was expecting the police to knock at the door! I simply had a blast and I’m pretty sure you will, as well!

From the author's YouTube channel

3. Which one is your favorite family memory, and why?

I’m afraid I don’t have any, as sad as it may sound. I was raised in a dysfunctional family system. I was always feeling something was off, and my household never felt like home despite the perfect image sold to the world. 

When I was attending college, I rent a small apartment. The owner was such a lovely person that I had the privilege to be invited for lunch or dinner frequently. Each time I was about to leave, I was feeling such discomfort as I couldn’t understand why I  never felt that good when I was sharing the meal with my own family.

A similar experience occurred when I was in Stockholm. My friends hosted me for a month. I can never show all the gratitude I have for the magic stay! They saw my silliest and happiest version because their energy is so welcoming!

They’re real, generous, and hilarious. We were spending hours having dinner talking about everything, and most importantly, giggling! We loved watching movies, eating caramel corn and ice-cream. We were spending our weekends mostly on mother nature after having breakfast at home. 

My heart was bleeding when I was about to leave. I spent a month adapting to my place. I still miss them and the rituals we had every day. I’ve secretly (up to this moment 😊) wished they were my family.

4. Is there anyone in your life you could give your life for? If yes, why?

Not really! The heroic idea of sacrificing my life for some cause or someone never crossed my mind, to be very honest, except for my little brother in my nightmares as a kid. I've been suffering my whole life from a “rescuer” pattern. I destroyed the two first layers: 

• All human beings are inherently good; thus, deserve a chance to be guided to the light.
• There is no such a thing as "toxic" inherently good folks. Hence, I have the duty to rescue those individuals even though their behavior is selfish, that they're impulsive and can't be accountable for their mistakes, that they don't care about my feelings at all, and love their quick fixes.
  
  

The third is the most challenging one and is still a work in progress. The last conclusion is "Even non-toxic inherently good people wouldn’t earn a chance unless they asked explicitly or implicitly for some guidance. Free-will is key."

It seems to me pure selflessness is more about proving something to oneself than it is healthy behavior. In my opinion, being a giver is an exquisite virtue unless we have no healthy boundaries; in which case we would be the ones permitting people to take advantage of us. Last but not least, there is a dark side linked to selflessness: many manipulators are pretending it as part of the false image they’re selling to the world. That’s when it becomes literally dangerous!

5. Do you pour love into yourself from time to time?

Well, I think my very favorite way to implicitly show love to myself is taking care of my overall health involving my four basic needs — Intellectual (to learn), Emotional (to love), Physical (to live), and Spiritual (to leave a principled legacy), and continue doing my best to maintain the balance between all my dimensions.

True self-care is not salt baths and chocolate cake. It is making the choice to build a life you don’t need to regularly escape from. ~ Brianna Wiest 

Open your heart. Take the whole-person approach — body, mind, heart and spirit — and see what a powerful expression “open your heart” is. Physically, keep your arteries clean through proper diet and exercise so that your heart is strong and healthy. Open your heart emotionally so that you are willing to involve people in the problem and work out solutions together, and listen deeply for understanding. Open your heart mentally so that you are constantly learning, see people as whole people, and free yourself of “quick-fix” thinking, so that leadership indeed becomes your choice. Open your heart spiritually so that your life is driven by a higher wisdom, by a divine conscience whose ethic in finding yourself through losing yourself in the service of others — doing well by doing good. ~ Stephen Covey

More to the point, I love myself through taking care of my balance; which automatically results in my happiness/fulfilment: the product of having reconnected with the servant leader in us and of being on a noble mission that goes beyond ourselves instead of chasing a self-serving goal and “success”.

The mission does not have to be as big as saving the world from a pandemic. As introduced above, it only needs to be principled and is the manifestation of our “Spiritual Intelligence”. Inspiring a person or making their day through a simple free act of kindness does the trick!

Interestingly, it explains why I don’t really “need” the “quick-fix” hormones anymore, while I used to survive on them. I was getting depressed whenever I was compelled to stop exercising (no Endorphins anymore), or that I was going through a relationship breakup (no more Dopamine).

6. How often you observe the people near you?

Thank you for asking this question, my friend! I love it! I’d say that’s a fundamental part of what I’m doing effortlessly! Let me share one of the stories that are close to my heart if you don’t mind!

It happened a few months ago in a supermarket. I was in the deli section admiring the service quality of the responsible person with a smile. I was waiting for my turn while another customer asked for information. He was looking for sausage. I need to provide you with some context: in Tunisia, we don’t produce sausage. We have a similar product we call “Merguez”. When it exists, it’s seldom local.

The client was a tourist. So, the employee looked confused since he didn’t even know the word. I saw it and quickly translated it. I felt he was relieved but still embarrassed. So, I added, “Oh you don’t have to know it at all, you know! It’s not part of our locally produced food! He’s a tourist, and we forgot to tell you about it; it’s not your fault!”

And I continued talking to him about it so that he could form a better idea. His questions and comments were showing how much he was actively listening! I was impressed with his internal security. I can be so bothered by passive listeners! When I was about to go, he told me, “I wish all customers were like you”, to which I answered, “No; I was the honored one!”

7. Why do you hope for? Does it change something within you or around you?

Ahaaa! Well, it will bring us to my legacy! Contributing to reversing the imbalanced, selfish, immoral, manipulative world in which we’re living through educating the kind-hearted people, and getting them to realize they are the secret weapon whenever they decide to break the denial circle, become self-aware and pay the transformation’s price. Also, implicitly inspiring change through modeling servant leadership or even making a person’s day a little brighter is more than enough to make me feel beyond fulfilled!

8. How does it feel like being a woman to you?

The former me would have answered disempowered and under pressure: the pressure of being the perfect young lady, daughter, sister, friend, religious woman; the pressure of being the brilliant student promoted her whole life who was never asked about the path she wanted to pursue so that to give back to the world; the pressure of getting married and having kids before it is too late for her.

The new me is a strong believer that being a man or a woman or a transgender is meaningless. Our level of reconnection with the pure spirit and the servant leader in us is what truly matters!

Consequently, I took care of answering a couple of conventional questions asked to women regularly.

When are you planning to make us happy by getting married?

It won’t be for you I’m afraid, and I don’t mean to offend you in any case!

Don’t you think it’s time for you to have kids?

I believe I am the one to decide when it’s suitable for me, right? I would only have my offspring if I could make sure to raise servant leaders. Interestingly, I would gladly opt for adopting kids who are waiting for someone to take a chance on them!

9. What you would like us to remember you for?

I’d love to be remembered as a responsible human being who, despite having been conditioned, was brave enough to invest in re-writing the warped subconscious program — an adventure whose paycheck is priceless; as a human being who had always been loyal to the universal principles, treated everybody fairly and respectfully, and stood for what’s right no matter the cost; as an authentic individual speaking her truth even when everyone wore masks and preferred buying into the lies; as a person of integrity, emotionally mature, showing up in the world with an abundance mentality, genuinely kind and generous, who embodied vulnerability, was living wholeheartedly including apologizing quickly and sincerely whenever screwing things up, and whose energy was contagious; as a moral authority speaking for those who have no voice and a change-maker through merely modeling servant leadership daily.

10. How you would describe your life?

Up to September 2018, I’d say I used to survive. After having been harshly abused by a malignant narcissist, I was about to end my life. I was saved at the last moment by the grace of my pure love divinity through an out-of-body experience. It was as if the servant leader in me dissociated to make me see all the lies of my unhealthy ego and realize this gigantic universe was not revolving around my small self.

Most importantly, and during this magic dissociation, I was able to visualize I was on this planet for a mission. That was the moment of my migration from being religious to spiritual.

The butterfly took time to emerge. The caterpillar had to heal the easiest scars and gain some strength to start the most rewarding investment of the whole existence: destroying all my limiting beliefs about myself — fixing my insecure attachment style — and the world where the subtle manipulation happens.

I rewired the invasive subconscious program I never wrote in the first place in alignment with the original center the creator granted us: the principles. And my gratitude to the universe for that trauma is beyond being describable. It was what I needed.

I love my intentional life today. I’m not looking for my worth in the external world anymore, given that destroying my limiting beliefs about both myself and the world made it possible to reconnect with the intrinsic one that was discriminated against. 

My priorities are fully aligned with my purpose. I have nothing to prove and do nothing to please anyone at my expense anymore. Defining myself as a Universal Citizen, I don’t plan to own a house at any point. As long as I pay my rent wherever I am, I’ll be beyond satisfied.

11. What keeps you on your toes, and how do you like to spend your time?

Well, I won’t say I tend to remain alert and ready for anything that might happen. Being armed with some knowledge about human behavior and having reconnected with my purest gut and developed my critical thinking skills to the highest levels, I am fortunate enough to see the manipulation games from far away.

Regarding my survival and finances which could drastically suffer from time to time, I don’t worry either, given that I wholly trust the challenges and hardship the Universe has been throwing at me so far have always been all that I needed to (un)become the filter and get closer to my true original self!

*Un(become) meaning: getting rid of all the life-time of conditioning constructs and going back to the original being; moving from the personality sphere to the character arena!

Another factor that empowers me during the financial crisis is that I’m not pouring my worth from my belongings or how much money I have in my bank account. I recognize the importance of money to live a decent life, but I am the master. Should you be interested, I made a trial to explore the link between money and happiness in detail here.

When it comes to how I like to spend my time, the shortest answer would be “effectively”, that is working most of the time on “important but not urgent” activities while keeping myself wonderous and open to all the unplanned magical connections the Universe is offering, whether it is with human beings or any other living creature!

When our priorities grow out of what we really stand for, only then will we find ourselves «investing our time & effort in what’s important», and will we have sufficient, independent will power to say “no” -pleasantly, smiling, unapologetically to other only seemingly urgent but unimportant activities! ~ Stephen Covey

12. When life gives you a lemon, what do you make out of it?

Two options, I think:

• A lemon pie to follow Elsie de Wolfe’s lead “I am going to make everything around me beautiful — that will be my life.”

• I would eat it and make a silly facial expression! I don’t take myself too seriously in front of hardships anymore. 😊 Here is a small sample (context: during our Halloween party, there was a technical issue; the music kept being interrupted and everybody was frustrated):

From the author's YouTube channel

13. What mystery of life you would like to have an answer for?

I am eagerly interested in finding an answer to three major mysteries:

• Is narcissism the result of a genetic predisposition that does not manifest unless the disorder is psychologically or physically triggered by childhood experience? Is the disorder purely genetic, passed down to a certain percentage of offspring, and requiring no triggering events or experiences at all?
• What makes breaking the “denial” mechanism easier for some people?
• Whether we are living in virtual reality, a matrix, a simulation? And if yes, why?

For the last question, I’m aware that Gregg Braden (of whom I’m a huge fan) has been exploring this topic in a series of episodes on Gaia. I’m postponing starting the education until I can block a whole week for the purpose. I know I won’t be able to stop diving whenever I start this very intriguing area! 😊

14. How were you different five years ago from what you are today?

Oh gosh! I’m a new person as you might have already guessed from questions 8. And 10. 😊 I used to suffer from Perfectionism Syndrome: a combination of a pleaser and an achiever; both of which being compensation of low self-esteem and an intrinsic worth discriminated against.

As an adaptation to my environment, I grew to become Fearful-Avoidant but didn’t have the chance to know people from the same category. People belonging to this insecure attachment style develop hypervigilance and a high level of observation when it comes to human behavior. As a result, they are experts in spotting any microscopic swing in someone’s mood and act accordingly.

At the same time, and because they have no clue that this skill was part of their subconscious survival strategy, they tend to expect others to mind-read them as well. They believe that it is the norm and how relationships should look like. When two fearful-avoidant individuals are in a relationship, they can get along so well with each other and build a healthy relationship. The same logic applies when it comes to a secure/secure or secure/fearful-avoidant type of relationship.

Curiously, it is not that easy for Fearful-Avoidant individuals to attract each other whether it’s a romantic relationship or friendship. The simple explanation is that we tend to be unconsciously attracted to the kind of bond we are familiar with, and which is hurting us the most… That’s why so many unaware empaths fall for narcissists for instance.

I also had so many limiting beliefs about the world among which “Homophobia” that I took care of demolishing during my very first self-awareness serious exercise this way:

One needs to ask oneself two trivial questions:

• Is the homosexual community hurting anyone by their sexual orientation? It is similar to ask oneself whether anyone’s heterosexuality hurts somebody else. Note that I don’t even use the straight label. The answer is as trivial as the question: No.
• If I am homophobic, am I violating any universal principle? The answer is: Yes. I am violating the principle of human dignity. I am violating the principle of free will if we consider there is a choice at all. We only need to observe the animals’ kingdom to realize homosexuality is natural. I am violating the principle of fairness. The homosexual community suffers from discrimination and marginalization daily.

In summary, we are not only violating one or two but three universal principles. What does such a realization activate? Tapping into our emotional right brain and triggering conscious shame. At the same time, this magic and painful awakening create a feeling of compassion for homosexual people. Most importantly, it gives birth to writing a new algorithm in our subconscious program, which would replace the old deformed one.

I wrote this piece about the process I followed to set myself free, would it be worth your time.

15. What would you like to leave as your legacy? Is there any message you would like to communicate with us?

First, the part has already been answered in question number 9.

And for the second part,

That would be my message! 😊

From the author's YouTube channel