[Hi, hi! I'm going to be one of those annoying people who can't help but revert to themselves when presented with the lives and very real concerns of other people.]
I went hiking once with my grandfather who, at the ripe age of 75, was better acquainted with the outdoorsy lifestyle than myself (I'm in my 20s). The sun was high. I was coughing up my lungs. And before this particular event in my life, I never even thought it possible to simultaneously feel your legs burning and yet find them numb from pain.Ā
When I couldnāt take it anymore, I found a neat little slump with a shade and rested there. I have a penchant for drama but if Iām being honest, without the slump, the climb wouldnāt have been possible for me.Ā
Since then, Iāve been working on thinking about the slump, not as a pit that epitomizes our downward spiral, but as a place of rest. Recovery. Maybe even a chance to discover things without the weight of productivity. I tend to revisit āthe slumpā a lot these days.Ā
Walking always helps. Go outside for a bit. Laugh with good friends. I know you have things to do and places to be, but thereās nothing quite like the view in front of us.
May 19, 2024
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working from what may seem like very surface level cliches but stay w me here
((tldr: why not just believe that its all working out for the better, even if thats not what you planned? also, empathy and objectivity are a solid duo that id like to see in combination more frequently.))
putting this at the top because this is a dissertation, at best; psychosis, at the other end of the pendulum.
sooooooo the fact that u have no control over life liek At All. has been a consistently terrifying concept for FOREVER as a shorty who is Clinically a control freak, but realizing that the unpredictable essence that makes all of this shit unnerving is the very thing that can take the weight of life off of your shoulders has been pretty revolutionary.
im still digesting/integrating it one bite at a time, for sure, so call me a hypocrite ESPECIALLY if you know me personally. when in clarity, though, its been so pleasant to realize that since Nothing truly matters that much since nothing is set in stone anyway- w regard to action, approach, fulfilling temporary expectations of yourself, whether or not you reach short term goals, etc.- living life completely and utterly for yourself and whatever that means to you at any given moment will likely ultimately be the plan that brings you most fulfillment, when all is said and done.
whether that means taking the risk and changing your major, taking that freaky elective bc it sounds cool, moving in w some randos in a townhouse, quitting your job and starting something new- maybe it winds up being an epic fail, who knows? as long as youre setting goals that align with an ultimate sense of who you are and what youre looking to get out of life, which i presume can be solidified further by pursuing said experiences just for the sake of it? right? helps u figure out what u actually want? and as long as you keep bareback essential priorities straight (financial and emotional stability come to mind), then theres no reason for impermanence to work against you.
this also counts for people, as well. i feel like we hold others to critical standards, as we should, but contemporarily tend to neglect the fact that people DO change. morals/how you view the world are impacted by experience, and we are all fruits of very very different trees. completely dependent on circumstance, of course, empathy/understanding/consequential second chances are side-swept under the premise of respect/accountability. accountability is CRUCIAL, but i feel like so many of us (myself included) take that to heart and forget that figuring out how someone got to some place is a key aspect of understanding whether or not their position was truly from a place of lack of respect? if that makes any sense??
i also have been thinking about this a lot: my best friend throughout middle school and i fell out the summer before sophomore year overā¦nothing? idk, 3 years of seeing each other every single day (neighbors) to no contact until senior of high school- still werenāt talking regularly or anything though.
2 years ago, she turned 20. i posted an old photo of us because, despite everything, 20ās a big one.
this year, weāve spent late nights on facetime, drove to watch the sunrise after hours of catching up on god knows what on the hill where we would listen to music while her mom cooked dinner, and sheās been my go to for any necessary bitching/ranting during whats been the worst year my mental health has ever seen??
time is your friend, if you let it be. connections arent a race in any dynamic, and itās never over if itās truly meant to happen.
let life change. i think.
Dec 5, 2024
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This might not make the most sense but if I donāt write it I know Iāll be angry with myself.Ā
As someone who has always naturally been drawn to archives and journals and stories- Iāve found that Iāve been trapping myself in the narrative. The idea that life is a singular, vertical narrative, that pain is not simply pain but part of some bigger cycle of distribution and retribution. That pain is naturally repaid with love or safety or comfort. This narrative keeps me coddled in myself, it keeps me safe from having to face the fact that tomorrow might not be easier than today. That this year might not feel much better than last year. That as some things go on, they donāt always get lighter. They donāt alchemize from emotionally pain into material pleasure.Ā
The heroās journey tells us that the narrative follows simple steps. We are called- your alarm, a Britney Spears song, plays in the morning. Your car breaks down in an unfamiliar part of the city. Thereās a death in the family. Whatever it is, the call is something that moves us from familiarity to the unknown. It pulls the hero into the journey. We will then face the unknown and hopefully overcome it.Ā But what about the calls that we donāt answer? Or when we get stuck in the unknown? What about when we are braver than brave and we still cannot overcome everything? Iāve learned that sometimes our pain doesnāt come with atonement. Sometimes there is no return.Ā
Life doesnāt fit into the narrative. The alarm in itself is a narrative, you set it the night before, or maybe you set it three years ago and youāve been waking up to the same song every single day. The car is a narrative, the unfamiliar side of the city is a narrative. Why havenāt you been there? The death is a narrative explored and experienced by every person in your family, every friend of the dead, every coworker who called the morning after to see why they didnāt show up when their alarm went off that day. Everything is a million narratives coinciding and to trap ourselves into one, to tell ourselves only one story, is blinding us to the intricate nature of life. We cannot exist in only one dimension, and to choose to exist in various different- sometimes beautiful and sometimes horrible- narratives at once is to choose to stop coddling oneself, to stop following your pain like it always has something to give you.Ā
Sometimes it doesnāt. Maybe thatās fine.Ā
Mar 11, 2024
Spent the day with my momāit was nice, overdue. But now Iām wrung out, heavy-limbed, like I left pieces of myself scattered along the way. Is it the starkness of seeing the world unfiltered, or the quiet exhaustion of performing okay-ness? I donāt know. Maybe Iām not sad. Maybe this is just the shape I take nowā kicking up my feet on the edge of something vast, staring out, waiting to feel like I belong to myself again.
Feb 14, 2025
Top Recs from @shekyerb00ty
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Just when you think you can't love rice more...throw a bowl of day-old rice in a hot pan, add a little seasoning and last year's frozen thanksgiving turkey et voila! A feast for the gods. Can't go wrong with fried rice. <3
Jun 12, 2024
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Reedsy has a free resource for this! Check it out: https://blog.reedsy.com/literary-agents/ Hope this helps!!!!
May 29, 2024