Toxic relationship!

We can very easily mistake attachment for love. We can very easily mistake gripping, and clasping at a relationship for fighting for it, for caring in ways most don’t these days. But that can often mean that we’re fostering an unhealthy attachment. Attachment speaks to trying to keep something in your life from a place of helplessness. Attachment is what we feel when we genuinely believe that we need someone in our lives because they make us feel a specific way — they make us feel less lonely, they praise us, they validate us, etc. Therefore, attachment is “I love you because you save me / fulfill me / etc and without you I will be lost.” Genuine love is simply just “I love you.” So you can see that difference. It comes from a compassionate place. Attachment comes from a transactional place. That is why attachment often makes you feel anxious, or distraught, we are fearing the loss of distraction.

Attachment is holding on very tightly. Genuine love is holding on very gently, nurturing a connection, allowing for it to be a blessing in your life and not needing it in order to feel complete or whole or validated, but rather, appreciating it. Attachment is possession. Genuine love is union. Attachment is fear. Genuine love is freedom.

We build out our attachment styles from a very young age. This is one of the first things you learn when you take a psychology course. And so if you’re sitting here and you’re like “Man, why do I approach the people in my life this way? Why do I send my heart into the world like this? Why do I grip or seek attention or validation in order to affirm my worth?” I need you to understand you are so human. And at times, it isn’t even a conscious choice we make, but rather, it is a pattern. And you don’t have to feel shame over that. You don’t have to apologize for the way in which you are trying to heal parts of yourself you didn’t even know were not serving you. Be gentle with yourself.

We have grown up in a world that has taught us that attachment is the very essence of love, that we have to fight, and grip, and try to ensure that those in our lives stay within it no matter what, that we need them, that they complete us. From a very young age, our culture communicates the idea that happiness is synonymous with possessing things. And this is why, I think, so many people feel like we’re missing something. As a result, our entire existence is shaped around accumulating things with the hope that they’ll make us feel good. We develop an obsessive attachment to things, ideas, and people. We believe that we can give meaning to our lives this way. If you seek love to fill a void in your life that’s been carved out by insecurity, pain, fear, or loneliness. If you are coming from a place of neediness and dependence, your relationship will turn into one based on attachment. When you’re attached to somebody, it’s almost like a drug. You’re dependent on them to fulfill your happiness. When they’re gone, you’re not content. If they leave you, you have withdrawal.

And I think we all know that that isn’t love.

Attachment is egocentric. Love is altruistic.

When we enter into relationships from a place of attachment, it is often because the people we crash ourselves into make us feel complete and validated in a way that we haven’t learned to do on our own. And while it is important to feel comfortable and secure in a relationship, only being in one for the sake of completion or wholeness or fulfilment can cause you to build your foundation around another person, rather than around yourself. Because another human being is good at making us feel less lonely, or more desired, we keep them around. We put in effort because we know that that effort means we are going to be rewarded with attention, or distraction. And that is why we say that attachment comes from an egocentric place, it comes from this place of thinking about yourself and yourself only.

Love on the other hand, genuine and altruistic love, means that you are thinking of the other person. You feel loved, and cared for when you are with them, but it is not the sole reason why you keep the connection in your life. You love them, and instead of just being concerned with how they are making you feel, instead of just needing them to fill your voids, you desire to deepen your connection because you want to make them happy. You make them a priority. You choose them, you find balance in the relationship. It isn’t transactional. You genuinely care from a deeply compassionate place.

Attachment makes you feel overwhelmed, and anxious, when this person isn’t around. Love makes you miss them.

Attachment makes you feel alone and overwhelmed when you are not with the person you are attached too. They crack light into your chest, they make you feel good, they make you feel happy and euphoric but this is because they fulfill your need for attention. They boost your confidence. When you are attached to someone, your desire to be around them at all times is in direct correlation with your desire to distract yourself from your loneliness. That;s a hard pill to swallow. We have all been there. You can’t get enough of them. And so, when you are away from them, it feels disorienting.

This is when problems will start to occur in relationships. This is where a lot of gripping can be found, where you need more and more and more from someone and it becomes an unhealthy need. When you are attached you might start to put this person over anyone, especially your friends and family. You want their undivided attention, you want to build your world around them. This can be dangerous because our connections may not last forever and when someone is no longer there anymore, when they move on for whatever reason if they do, or if they feel like they cannot be the person for you any longer, a void is created in your life, and you might realize you aren’t left with anyone at your side. You gave so much of yourself to this person because you thought they completed you. And in their leaving, you feel incomplete, broken.

Love, on the other hand, makes you miss the person when you are apart from them. And I’m smiling when I say that because I know what that genuinely feels like. You want to be around this person, not because you need them to give you attention, but rather, because you enjoy their presence. You let it flow through you like rain. When they aren’t around, you’re not distressed. You just miss them. It doesn’t consume your thoughts and feelings when you are not with them. When you truly are in love with someone, it doesn’t matter if you are apart for a little while, because the feeling still remains in your heart. There is no obsessive need to be with them all day, every day, to validate the connection or affirm it’s permanence in your life. You can still appreciate them from afar, as their whole individual selves, and that is beautiful.

Attachment is surface level. Love is deep.

I know this one might feel confusing, because when you are attached to someone you feel so tethered to them. When you are attached to someone, as we have already said, you are attached to them because of how they make you feel. And when you’re approaching a relationship from this place, you’re validated enough and affirmed enough just through their presence, you often don’t dive into the heart of them. You are getting complimented and supported, and that is all you need from the relationship.

Love is the complete opposite of that. When you are in love, you feel so passionately for this person from a place of curiosity, and joy, and hope. You want to know everything about them, what they desire, what they dream about being. You want to know their history, what their childhood was like, and all of the things that make up their interior world. You want to know how many sugars they take in their morning coffee, and what songs makes them cry, and the way it felt to go through the things in life that weathered and built them. You want to see them. You want to dive into the heart of them, and understand them on a level that transcends transaction, but rather, bonds you to them because you fundamentally see them. In this way, you are creating an unbreakable connection with them, getting to know them deeper better than you have with anyone else ever before, and that is extremely special, and that is extremely rare. To be understood by someone, to be seen by them, to be held by them in all that we are are, and all of our mistakes, and all of our shortcomings and dreams and thoughts, etc is so beautiful. And that is what makes love so much deeper than attachment.

Attachment is controlling. Love is freeing.

When you are attached to someone, because you desire to spend so much time around them in order to feel good, you might realize that you are using controlling behavior in order to do so. For example, this shows up a lot in unhealthy attachments as one person in the relationship convincing the person they are attached to not to hang out with their friends, or their family, and instead to hang out with them, and this is where we often see a lot of manipulation. I don’t even think this manipulation is something most are aware of, but it’s there, because an attached person wants the focus on you and you only. This is really unhealthy behavior, and it shows that you are definitely not in love with them. You are trying to control someone, and you wouldn’t do this if you really cared about them and their feelings.

When you are in love, of course, you want to spend as much time as possible with the person that you care for. Love is beautiful, and it adds a sunny kind of happiness into your life, it feels like a blessing. But when it comes to genuine love, you would never put your needs above theirs, in the sense that, if they have their own individual lives, if they have their own desires and hobbies and things that also add happiness into their life, you would never ask them to give that up in order to spend more time with you. You understand that what’s going to make them happy is to keep spending time with their family and their friends, so there is encouragement there. You respect them and care about how they feel, and because of that you would never tell them what to do. You would never try to manipulate them into spending time with you because then it isn’t real. When you love someone you don’t ever put them in an ultimatum position where they have to choose you over their own freedom. A deep, and compassionate, genuine loving relationship goes off the basis that two independent people come together and love each other, without controlling each other. It is a union, and appreciation.

Attachment stifles growth. Love encourages it.

When you are attached to someone, as I said before, you want to be around them all the time. And in doing so, you become a very integral part of their life as well. As long as they make you feel good, you’re happy, and you don’t want anything to change. So, you won’t encourage that change, or that personal development and growth for them, you won’t encourage them to follow their dreams and to become the absolute most evolved and aware and happy human being they can be, because you are afraid that once that occurs, you will lose them. You grip at who they are, and you don’t give them the space to become who they can be. And within this, you are also restricting that same growth for yourself.

When you are in love with someone, you will try to encourage them to be the best version of themselves. They will also do the same for you. You both positively impact one another, you are overwhelmed with joy at the thought of them being happy and fulfilled and growing into the kind of person they have been working so hard to become. You will provide support for your partner, and they will do the same for you. You both care about what the other person wants, so you will help them to achieve whatever it is. A loving relationship is where you both stimulate each other to take on your lives in the most successful way possible, knowing that you always have someone that will be there to help you, support you and love you.

Through loving someone genuinely and compassionately, you will become a better and more loving person yourself. Instead of needing to be pacified, or appeased, and built up constantly, never called out or challenged to grow, love helps for you to be able to notice the more negative qualities that you have, and you will try to fix them so that they don’t harm your relationship. Love inspires you to be better, not from a place of being self centered, but rather, from a place of gratitude. How do I work on becoming whole on my own, so that I can better show up? How do I work on healing my wounds, so that I do not allow for them to wound this person I care for? By loving someone else, you can look deeper within yourself and fix the parts of you that don’t resonate with your kind heart or the kind of connection you have. You grow.

Attachment is difficult. Love is easy.

When you are attached to someone, it is always rooted in this concept of being made whole by them, of needing them in your life because they are the source of your happiness or fulfillment. They make you feel good, and instead of understanding that you will be completely fine if this relationship leaves your life, or if you just can’t make it work, attachment grips. It clings from a place of neediness. You feel distraught, you feel anxious, you feel overwhelmed and almost manic at times because you are always worried that you are going to lose someone. You hold on so tightly, and that is overwhelming, and exhausting, and it burrows into the heart of you and can make you feel distress, because you cannot possibly love someone you are constantly worried you are going to lose. That takes you out of your presence completely. And you can’t love someone when you have convinced yourself that that love is the only reason why you are happy — when you use it in that way, you will do anything to keep it around, and that isn’t healthy. There are no boundaries there. It becomes a toxic attachment for self preservation, rather than choosing someone from a compassionate, and balanced, place. From a place of knowing that you get to appreciate and care for them as they are, for as long as life affords you the beautiful opportunity, and you won’t be destroyed without them, bur rather, you’ll be thankful for what they taught you. If things get hard, not in the sense that you should run away when life gets tough, but if you genuinely cannot make up the miles, or if you genuinely cannot make the dynamic work any longer, you let go. You love from a distance, you lay that hope down. You appreciate what it was without needing to ask it to be more than what it can be. There is acceptance. There is flow. There is calm.

And that is what love is. Love is ease. Love is calm. Genuine lovers choose each other each moment. Again and again, each day that they’re together, they wake up and choose each other. There are no hooks into the future of what will be and for how long, and there are no promises or guarantees. There is just calm. And acceptance. And gratitude. And appreciation. And there is no fear of loss, because you know that you will never lose something you have felt so deeply. You will carry it within you forever. This love does not make you grip. You hold it gently. You are at peace within it. Genuine love is detached love in the sense that it embraces uncertainty. It embraces that fact that the only thing we know for sure is that everything is going to change. It embraces this and still chooses to be open and vulnerable and, in this way, detached love is the most courageous act. It is beautiful and selfless and full of gratitude and appreciation.

To sum it up:

Attachment, is overwhelming bouts of anxiety. It is clinging tightly for fear they might leave. It is shutting down emotionally instead of opening up. Attachment is idealizing your relationships instead of seeing them for what they are. Attachment is feeling like you need more, like your partner is never enough. Attachment is relying on your partner for your own fulfillment. Attachment is always waiting for the other shoe to drop, like you are stuck and trapped and without other options because you are so deeply dependent. Attachment is blaming your partner for your unhappiness. Attachment is hiding who you truly are, because you are afraid of rejection. Attachment is heavy.

Love on the other hand, is openness and expansiveness. Love is embracing vulnerability as a strength, not a weakness. Love is having a strong sense of self worth. Love is trusting in yourself and the other person. Love is growing closer to your partner everyday. Love is empathy, and understanding and forgiveness. Love is giving, and receiving, unconditionally. Love is listening without judgement. Love is communicating even when you would rather walk away. Love is sharing your feelings openly and honestly. Love is taking responsibility for your actions. Love is learning more about yourself through the freedom of your connection, and growing with one another. Love is knowing, above all else, that while you absolutely enjoy and feel so grateful to have someone in your life, you’ll be okay even if it doesn’t work out.

So, now that we have differentiated between attachment and love, how do we move towards more secure connections? How do we reframe our relationships?

Firstly, it’s important to understand that attachment isn’t wrong. It isn’t a dirty word. Yes, there are forms of attachment that cause anxiety, that feel painful, that we only keep in our lives to fill a void or to keep someone around for the attention, but there is also secure attachment. Good attachment. And that kind of approach to a relationship, is secure, and that is where genuine love thrives. So if we know that sometimes we chase the insecure form of attachment, if we have differentiated between attachment and love, it’s important to become aware of our patterns and really dive into why we choose the painful relationships versus the secure ones in our lives. It is within that understanding that we can move towards more secure relationships, relationships that are rooted and grounded and foundationally beautiful to the point of being peaceful for us. Love should always be peaceful, and if we work towards healing the parts of ourselves that do not defend that, we have a chance at finding something really tender, and really beautiful in our lives.

Attachment isn’t a bad thing. We are always going to be attached, and dependent — it is an evolutionary trait we have inherited. Yes, independence is necessary — to be an individual is important. But independence is strengthened through dependence. It’s called the dependence paradox. We need one another. Do not feel shame for needing someone, or for wanting them close. Don’t listen to a society that tells you that caring or relying or depending on another human being is wrong. We wouldn’t be here, as a species, if we hadn’t relied on our tribes, our family structures, etc to protect us as we evolved. We have always been a connected species. Humans crave connection because connection was safety, connection was structure, connection was security within the knowledge that you had someone to lean on, that you weren’t always in danger, and we evolved from there. It is so human.

So instead of convincing yourself that you need to detach, or be less connected, I really hope you understand that that isn’t the case when it comes to healing a tendency to love from a place of attachment. Instead, we just want to work on ways to turn an anxious, sometimes toxic attachment, into one that is more secure.

It’s important to remind ourselves that our attachment style has been handed down to us within the ways in which the world has treated us, or cared for us. They say that we inherit our attachment style from the ways in which we were cared for as children. And so the way we approach relationships, the way we act within them, our patterns and our emotional responses, are deeply rooted and constructed before we are even fully aware of that. And that understanding is freeing in a way, because I know how difficult it can be to read articles like this and to think “My goodness, I really don’t have a healthy approach to relationships, or love.” You can blame yourself. You can wonder why it is so difficult to just crash your heart into the good kind of love, instead of always experiencing the kind of connection that hurts, that feels almost too heavy to hold. But within this lesson, we learn that it isn’t our fault. These patterns are deeply rooted, and so, all we can do is become more aware of them. All we can do is acknowledge them, so that we may work towards healing them.

When it comes to attached love, there is often a fear of abandonment. I think a lot of people can relate to this. So many of us are terrified of those we care for walking away from us. That kind of attachment causes you to always be loving from a place of never wanting to lose someone. It causes anxiety, it causes stress, it can cause you to grip. And when we love from a place like that, it isn’t really love, because it is hurting you. You strive so deeply just to keep something in your life, because it is filling a part of you, or validating you, or taking up space in your world, and you are so scared of losing someone, that you end up losing yourself.

When we attach anxiously, or fearfully, we are constantly seeking external validation in love. We need that person in our lives because they make us feel complete. And so, because of that, maybe you don’t set boundaries in your relationships. Maybe you stay silent when you really feel like you want to speak. Maybe you are so scared of being alone, you settle for those who don’t actually fulfill you. Maybe you are so afraid of being walked away from, that you grip so hard, and so tightly, that you suffocate love or experience extreme insecurity within it.

This can cause you to lose your relationship to yourself because you will constantly try to please the people in your life, at your own expense.This perpetuates the lack of relationship to yourself because you’re so focused on others, and not on your own needs, your own relationship with yourself, your own happiness, etc. And then when things go wrong, or when the person who was fulfilling so much of you walks away, or does leave, or needs to take time for themselves because they are their own individual with their own needs and their own lives and sometimes people have a change of heart, when that happens — it can be really disheartening, and really debilitating. Your brain doesn’t say “Okay, we just weren’t meant to be!” but rather, it says “I am not good enough to be loved.”

Because you have constantly sought out others to prove your goodness to yourself, because you have constantly placed your worth into the hands of others and how they love you or if they stay, it can become very hard for you to let go of love. You can try to grip at it, or manipulate situations in order to keep it in your life. You can quiet yourself as not to disturb your peace. You truly do lose yourself, and that is why we say that attached love isn’t love. Because love helps you find yourself. Love helps you grow yourself. Love is freedom, genuine love pins hope to your bones and never makes you question yourself.

Attached love is built on the most fragile foundation. Because if you spend so much time making your confidence dependent on the outside world, and something goes wrong, in your mind you make that mean that you’re not good enough, and that is so fragile. That is not how love should make you feel. That is not secure.

So how do we reprogram this? How do we teach ourselves to break these patterns? To heal them? How do we move forward in our life and approach relationships from a place where we are cultivating real and genuine love?

Firstly— know your pattern. Create a cohesive narrative.

Remember — you cannot heal what you do not acknowledge. And the biggest thing you can do for yourself is to really dive into your self awareness, and ask yourself hard questions. You need to get to a place where you can see yourself in the cycle or the pattern.

So ask yourself: What is it you are drawn to in love, and how has that made you feel in the past? What is it you ignore in love, the things that you quiet yourself from caring about because you don’t want to come off as too needy or too this or too that, because you want to people please? What is familiar or comfortable for you, what do you often chase even if it hasn’t necessarily felt secure or good for you in the past? What scares you in relationships, what ignites fear in you, what makes you want to leap into action and fix things, and make sure that the people you love don’t leave? How do you show up, and have you been showing up, fully and authentically in your last relationships? If you are constantly afraid of losing the people you love, have you truly been showing them the most honest and authentic aspects of who you are? Or have you been loving them from a place of wanting to keep them in your life? Do you use people to externally meet your needs? Do you use love and relationships as a dependent way of proving to yourself that you are worthy and good and deserving?

Explore why that is so. You need to have an understanding of yourself to know it’s not random. Attachment traumas happen so early that we think it is our fault. “That’s just me, that’s just how I am and it won’t change” But you have to be honest with yourself. There is a version of you that is beyond this. That will find genuine love.

Learn how to meet your own needs.

Get in touch with your feelings and your needs on a regular basis. Really evaluate what you want in a partner, and try to teach yourself how to seek out secure forms of love rather than insecure ones. This has a lot to do with learning how to be your own foundation, learning how to take care of yourself and validate yourself so that you do not put all of that pressure on your partner or the relationship you are in. When you are your own home, the dependency isn’t codependent, it’s just human, it’s secure, because it’s something that is beautiful in your life. You don’t need it to feel fulfilled, you appreciate it because it adds joy into your life.

And when you learn how to meet your own needs, you are telling yourself that you can be your own home. That you have the capacity to determine your own worth, your own goodness, and your own security without needing another person to give that to you. You don’t always have to meet your needs through your partner. In secure love, leaning on a partner is an incredible asset. There is open communication, there is understanding, there is a safety that you feel knowing that someone is in your corner. In insecure love, there is anxiety, because you don’t know how to lean on yourself. All of the pressure it put in your needs being met externally, your worth being validated externally, your goodness being validated externally, and if that external factor ever left, your foundation would also leave with it.

You don’t want that. So how do you learn to meet your own needs? You start small. You start with awareness. Each day, really assess your emotions. Ask yourself what you need. When you are feeling sad, what do you need from a place of security and not fear? When you are feeling exhausted or burnt out, what do you need? And then figure out a strategy to meet those needs. What can you give yourself? What can you do to show up for yourself? What are the smallest things you can do for yourself that teach you that you have the capacity to take care of yourself, that you can be a safe place for yourself as well?

And within this understanding, and this learning, you will slowly start to understand why you might have chosen insecure love on so many occasions. You thought that you needed it in order to be okay. You can really pinpoint the moments where you chose people from a place of fear, rather than from a place of genuinely wanting them in your life. Within all of this awareness, you can start to choose people who can meet your secure needs, people who will truly add value to your life in a genuine way.

And that changes everything. Because it helps you to create boundaries. Usually, when we are afraid of losing love, we say “Okay — I want to make sure I do everything right. I can’t afford to make any mistakes. One wrong move and I could jeopardize the entire relationship.” When you learn how to meet your own needs, you don’t silence yourself or your communication at all. You learn how to embrace who you are, because you derive your own worth. And from there, you approach people differently.

In dating situations, your thinking will shift from “Does he or she like me?” to “Is this someone I should invest in emotionally? Is he or she capable of giving me what I need on a fundamental level, not from a place of fear?” Going forward with a relationship will become about choices you have to make. You’ll start asking yourself questions like: “How much is this person capable of intimacy? Is he sending mixed messages or is he genuinely interested in being close?” You won’t grip at the first sign of attention. You won’t be afraid. You will only put your energy and your time into the things that are secure, and you won’t lose yourself in love. You will grow in love.

Deepen your connection to the world around you, not the world you’ve created in one person.

You want to have a lot of ways to really enrich your life outside of the relationship. Hobbies, a job you love, etc. You want to make sure you’re living your life on purpose.

So ask yourself ‚ what are the things outside of this person that make you feel the most you? What are the things you leap towards, that genuinely make you want to get up in the morning?

And if your answers for those questions were — well, my relationship does, or the person Im with does, then you have to understand that is okay. When you are so enmeshed, as we have spoken about, you can make another human being the centre of your universe. Step back into yourself. Give yourself permission to stand in who you are, and what you want, and create the structure for that life.

In a secure relationship, you should be excited to have another person in your life, they should bring joy to your day. But you should also have other things that spark something beautiful inside of you, other things that feed into your sense of self. This world is the most incredible place. There is so much to discover, so much to learn, and if you allow yourself to chase the things in life that really help you to come back home to yourself, you won’t feel lost of destroyed or anxious if things change in your relationship. You will know that you can stand in yourself, you can stand in your passion, you can stand in your hobbies, in the things that genuinely crack light into your soul, instead of just standing in another person and thinking that is living.

Live your life with purpose. Really show up for yourself and who you want to be in this world. You deserve that.

At the end of the day, you deserve to find good love. You deserve to find secure love. You deserve to have the kind of relationship that feels like peace, that genuinely feels like a beautiful addition to your already beautiful life. You deserve to feel like you can be yourself. You deserve to communicate your needs. You deserve to know that you are your own home, that you have the capacity to love and take care of yourself, that you have the capacity to derive your own worth. You deserve love.

So remember, an activated attachment system is not passionate love. Next time you date someone and find yourself feeling anxious, insecure, and obsessive—only to feel elated every once in a while—tell yourself this is most likely an activated attachment system and not love! True love, in the evolutionary sense, means calm. Means peace. I hope you feel inspired to seek that out, to heal patterns that maybe are blocking you from finding that, or encouraging you to settle for less. I hope you believe that there is more for you out there.

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This is the new loneliness!

It’s a weekday evening and you’re feeling restless. You’re texting friends and you’re watching Netflix and you’re on your laptop and you’re scrolling through Tumblr or Facebook or Instagram or Twitter. Your attention is in ten different directions, yet there’s a tug, a tiny voice in the back of your mind. It asks: what are you distracting yourself from? You ignore. Scroll again. Click again.

You send a text: “Wanna hang tomorrow night?”

“Sure, I need to leave my apartment eventually, lol”

“L O L, me too, goddddd. Ok, let’s plan tomorrow”

Tomorrow rolls around.

“You know, can we maybe rain check on plans? I’m cozy!”

“YES, omg, I totally wanted to bail, too. PERFECT.”

Then, you two text all night. Netflix on in the background. Computer on your lap. Scroll. Click. Scroll. Click. Refresh. Scroll. Click. Text.

Wait a second. What? How is this our new normal? What are we doing with our lives? Making plans with actual human beings and then canceling in favor of a screen, Netflix, gchat, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. How is this okay? How are we accepting this?

How is this a life?

It’s not a life, actually. We cannot spend our days hunched over a screen forging a sense of human interaction. This is not what we were made for. I can guarantee all your best memories live within the moments with others. Where’s your great memory with the internet? Is this really all there is now?

When you look back on your life, will you be happy by how much Netflix you’ve watched? Will you be happy about the graveyard of plans you let fall by the wayside? Will you be happy when you’re surrounded by no one because we’ve all pushed each other away? Pushed and pushed and pushed and, in favor of what? What the hell are we pushing each other away for?

It’s the weirdest thing: our generation. We’re the least and most connected generation ever and yet if you spend some time on the internet, you see:

depression, undiagnosed, unchecked
anxiety, of the social variety
loneliness, rampant and unbelievable
sadness, like it’s a lifestyle
homebodies, like never leaving our apartments is healthy
introverts, like connection with other people is a bad thing
hate people! like it’s cool…
cancel plans! like it’s kind…
Netflix! like it’s a human being…

Do people have true mental illnesses? God, yes. Of course! But this isn’t about mental illness. People with diagnosable depression, anxiety, and other mental illnesses don’t make a lifestyle of it. They don’t make a home in those diseases. They frantically fight for their life, because they must. They get help. They furiously chase their happiness.

Our generation of sadness and loneliness is of the unchecked variety. Of wallowing. Of letting ourselves be disconnected from both others and ourselves. Learning to soothe more than heal. Learning to put a band-aid on problems instead of working through and solving our problems. If something is not immediate, we don’t want it, even if it’ll make us stronger. We’re not growing as people, not really. We’re shoving away “bad feelings” we don’t want to face by clicking, refreshing, scrolling until we’ve numbed ourselves out enough. It’s addiction.

Emotional strength is earned. It cannot be earned by self-distraction. And, that’s what all of this is. DISTRACTION.

Distraction from ourselves.
Distraction from potential pain.
Distraction from our lives, those hopes, those dreams.
Distraction from vulnerability.
Distraction from compassion.
Distraction from kindness.
Distraction from… each other.

And, it is making us miserable. It really is. Take a look at your life. Take a look at how you spend your time. Are you happy? Do you have joy? When’s the last time you sat in front of a computer screen for longer than 2-3 hours and walked away feeling joyous and energized? When’s the last time a computer, a television screen, an iPad, a phone… made you feel alive? When’s the last time you felt you were loved and taken care of and healed? When’s the last time you felt strong?

We’ve taken it too far, that’s what is problematic. The internet and these devices are not wholly unhealthy, but it’s the obsession, the constant consumption, the way it breeds a lack of connection with real people. And, it does breed that.

Can all of this technology be great? Yes. But we’re not using it that way. We’re being reckless. We’re acting like none of this matters, that how we spend our days is not how we spend our lives, but it all matters and how we spend our days is exactly how we spend our lives. It is. It just is.

I think we’re afraid, but that’s the whole point of life—that facing down our fears provides for a richer experience. We are not meant to circumvent the process of healing ourselves. We need to face who we are in order to be who we are. We cannot find true connection and true love and the purity of both of those experiences while spending our days not caring about others or ourselves. To not care is to be cool now? Pizza! Netflix! Do nothing all day! Sweatpants! Homebody! Introvert! Hahahahahahahahahah, we’re all so sad and hate each other!

But, it’s not funny. None of this is.

This is your life. YOUR. LIFE. Do you get it? This is it. And you’re fucking wasting it. Wake up. Life happens in a blink. Once it’s gone, it’s gone. Don’t scroll, click, refresh it away. Be here, now. Show up. Care about shit. Care about others. Care about yourself. Be better than this. Let’s all do it. And, if we all do it: maybe it’ll be a fucking revolution. Finally.

I’m sick of this sadness. I’m sick of this loneliness. I’m sick of this disconnection from others. I’m so sick of it. Aren’t you?

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Don’t ignore the red flags!

I’m slowly learning that ignoring the red flags you see in the beginning is probably the worst thing you could do to yourself because they never turn green and they never change. I’m slowly learning that the old cliche that the red flags you see in the beginning become the reasons you leave later is not a cliche at all, it’s a fact. It’s a tried and tested method. I’m slowly learning that just because you want to keep someone around doesn’t mean you lie to yourself about what you’re seeing and what you know deep inside.

I’m slowly learning that your gut is usually right, that initial feeling you get that something isn’t right, that pause that happens when you see or hear something that shows you another side of that person, that uneasy feeling you get around them when something is off and you feel like they’re either lying to you or manipulating you. These are the feelings you shouldn’t ignore because they tell you everything you need to know and eventually they become too hard to overlook. After all, you see them clearly as time goes by.

I’m slowly learning that ignoring the red flags will only hurt you because you will be staying in a relationship where you’re not getting what you want and you will always feel like you’re lowering your standards or compromising or letting a lot of things slide and that ends up holding you back from giving unconditionally, from loving freely, from trusting the other person and it ends up bringing out a different version of you. A defensive version, a doubtful version, a version that is ready to throw in the towel any minute.

I’m not saying that there won’t be any differences or challenges in your relationships, that’s normal but what’s not normal is knowing you deserve more love and respect than what you’re getting. What’s not normal is allowing someone else to make you believe that this is all they can give to you and that’s what you deserve. What’s not normal is allowing someone else to make you feel unworthy and unloved or make you feel like communicating your needs is dramatic on your part. What’s not normal is someone making you feel like you’re asking for too much when you’re asking for the bare minimum.

I’m slowly learning that leaving those who make you feel like you’re hard to love or that making an effort with you is a burden is the best choice you could make and the earlier you make it, the better. The more red flags you ignore, the more time you’ll waste because trust me, ignoring the red flags just because you like someone will only make you feel unworthy and unloved and you deserve a lot more than that. You deserve not to question how someone feels about you or how much they want you in their life.

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Don’t stop investing in yourself!

I hope you never stop investing in yourself no matter who you’re with or how much you’re loved or how much you’ve accomplished. I hope you don’t suppress your needs or desires because you’re afraid of how people will perceive you or how they’ll judge you. I hope you can always be enough for yourself without needing that validation from others, without waiting for a pat on the back because sometimes you have to start with yourself. You have to be your own motivation before others can motivate you. Sometimes you won’t find the support you’re looking for in others but you can always find it within you.

I hope you never stop protecting yourself from those trying to bring you down or hurt you or make you feel like you’re not good enough. I hope you can always protect yourself from those trying to underestimate whatever it is that you do; your work, your talent, your passion or your hobbies. Don’t allow their opinions to take up a lot of space in your head and don’t let how they see you be your mirror. Protect yourself from those who never walked a day in your shoes yet feel like they have the right to tell you what you should and shouldn’t do. Protect yourself from those who pretend to have your best interest at heart but don’t know what truly makes you happy or those trying to make it dark every time you truly shine.

I hope you never stop believing in love but I hope you can always be content on your own. I hope you don’t settle just because the clock is ticking and I hope you don’t stay too long with someone who doesn’t value or respect you. I hope you can walk away when you see a pattern that’s not going to change and I hope you can walk away from someone who brings out the worst in you because love is supposed to bring out the best in you. I hope you never stop bringing the best in you to the table even if you’re eating alone.

I hope you never stop investing in yourself no matter how busy or overwhelmed you are because at the end of the day, you truly only have yourself. At the end of the day, it’s hard to predict where life will take the ones you love or who will suddenly decide to pursue other things or who will move to another country. People will always follow what makes them happy, they will always do what’s best for them and you should always be prepared for these moments. For the moments when you’ll have to be all alone or the moments when you’ll feel like no one is by your side. Prepare yourself for the moments when you’ll need all your strength and resilience and no one else can give you that.

Invest in yourself because it’s worth all the time, money and effort in the world. Invest in yourself because it may as well be the only commitment that’s guaranteed and the return on investment is always rewarding.

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Let your loved one’s know that you love them!

Sometimes in this life, we keep counting on the fact that the people we love will just know that we do love them, which makes us forget to say it out loud or show it anymore. But here’s the thing, no matter how much you think the person in front of you may know that you love them, you need to tell them, and you need to show them how much they truly mean to you.

We just keep on living our everyday lives, and we forget to look our loved ones in the eyes and let them see how much love we have for them. We forget to recognize the importance of a simple touch that can show a person how much we care about them. We forget to say a kind word that shows how much we appreciate them. We forget to give them a genuine smile that tells them how happy we are to see them, or a hug that shows them how much we miss them, or even a simple text to check up on them that shows them that we are thinking about them.

Many of us wonder what the point of doing all this is. They already know that we love them. We don’t need to prove it. But the thing is, they may actually not be aware of our love, or sometimes they may even forget that we love them in the first place because we fail to do all this. We forget to show them how special they are to us and how grateful we are to have them in our lives.

No matter how much you love someone and no matter how long you have been together, you need to constantly tell them and show them that you do love them and care about them and appreciate them. Life is just so much more beautiful when you show your emotions instead of counting on the fact that your loved ones will know how you feel about them without you telling them or showing them.

I think it’s tragic that some people spend a lifetime being loved by someone, yet never get the chance to know or feel this love. So, please don’t love silently. Let your love be loud, heard, and felt. Don’t just keep it inside of you and hope that others will just somehow know it and be able to feel it.

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Reality!

I lie about being fine because it is an easy way to keep conversations from becoming awkward. Yes, I am going through something. Yes, it would help to get some of my darker emotions off my chest. But that does not mean I want to talk about my problems to every single person who approaches me. Most of the time, I would rather continue masquerading as someone who has his shit together. I don’t want the pity that comes along with admitting I am not okay. I do not want to ruin polite conversations with the truth.
I sometimes think of myself as weak, but in reality, I am afraid my loved ones are not strong enough to deal with the truth about what I am going through. I am afraid it will be too much for them to handle so I bear the weight of my problems on my own. I cannot protect myself from the demons trapped inside my mind, but I can at least protect them.
I lie about being fine because I have trouble verbalizing my pain. Words like tired and worried, or even words like anxious or depressed, do not get my point across. If someone has never experienced those emotions in the same way as me, then they will not be able to fully understand what I mean. And when they ask for clarification, when they try to get a better understanding of what I am experiencing, I will not know what to say. I will not be able to explain what not being okay feels like. I will not even be able to list the reasons why I am not okay. My emotions are not always tied to logic. Most of the time, they make no sense at all.
I lie about being fine because I understand how irrational my thinking can sound. Most of my worries do not make sense to me either but I cannot change my brain chemistry, I cannot make myself stop doing things, or thinking things, just because they are bad for me.
I do not need anyone around to judge me. I do not need them to tell me how unhealthy my actions are. I already know. I already hate myself for it.
I lie about being fine because my loved ones want me to be fine. They want me to be happy. They want to know that I am doing okay. Even though I understand my illnesses are not my fault, I still feel guilty about being unable to give my loved ones that kind of comfort. I feel bad about being an extra reason for them to worry. It doesn’t feel fair.
Even though I know I should open up more, even though I realize it would be healthier to tell the truth, I still lie about being fine because it has become a habit. It is something I do without thinking. I am not trying to deceive anyone. I am only trying to make it through my day in one piece. And maybe a part of me believes that if I say the words enough, if I pretend enough, then it will turn into a reality.

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Blessing in disguise!

When I look back on some of the things I prayed for in the past, I feel lucky and grateful that they didn’t happen because now that I know better, some of the things I prayed for would have ruined my life. You see, it’s not that God didn’t answer your prayer, he answered it by not giving it to you. It was his way of telling you that this is not going to serve you and one day you will know exactly why.

Sometimes it’s a blessing that it didn’t work out with someone you wanted to be with because they weren’t good for you or they had circumstances that you wouldn’t have been able to live with because you hear what people say about them now or you see what kind of partner they are and you get why God didn’t make it happen. Sometimes it doesn’t work out because you were meant to find someone better for you or make room for them to show up.

Sometimes it’s a blessing that you didn’t get the job you wanted because you didn’t know what kind of environment you were going to be in and it pushed you to be creative and look outside your field or your comfort zone and you found something that motivated you more, something you were more passionate about and something you can actually make a difference in. There’s always a bigger reason why you weren’t granted your wishes and the reason is always valid and serving your best interest.

Sometimes God doesn’t answer your prayer the way you want to but he answers them in his own way. Maybe that looks like rejection or failure or heartbreak or injustice in the beginning but when you accept that reality and start moving on with your life, you look back and you understand how his answer was much better than yours. You look back and you secretly thank him for changing your path or your calling or your heart. You thank him for removing certain people and opportunities from your life because now you know how toxic they could have been. Now you know what’s right for you and what you deserve and that’s something God knew all along.

Sometimes it’s a blessing that you didn’t get what you prayed for because that means that God has better plans for you and his blessings will exceed everything you once prayed for. When you figure out God’s vision behind your unanswered prayers, you will understand that sometimes he protects you from yourself.

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Who hurt you?

Someone once asked me

Bright eyes full of concern

“Who hurt you?”

I only wish I could have told them, that would be the kind of pain I long for

I have dealt in the currency of broken hearts ever since I realized I had one

That is the pain I know how to break with, how to mourn, how to survive

The one I cannot escape is the hurt I unleash on myself

In the quietest hours of the night, the anger, the shame, the hatred that has no end

It’s the screaming that I can’t quite get to quieten down

The cuts that leave no visible marks

It’s the harsh eyes that find nothing worth looking at

It’s an ocean of insecurities that I willingly deep dive into

A part at me forever at war with the rest

It’s the endless wondering and wishing I could be better

Who hurt me?

Oh I did, and I don’t know how to stop.

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Sometimes!

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The purpose of pain!

It is a universal truth: something only runs when it is being chased. A gazelle from a lion. A minute from a second. A criminal from a cop. We run because we fear danger. We run because we believe if we stay in one spot, pain will ensue. We don’t stop until we feel safe again. An object in motion will stay in motion, Sir Newton proclaimed. But why do we claim ourselves prey when pain itself doesn’t take ownership as a predator? What if this seemingly terrifying danger isn’t a lion set to devour us but rather something else?

I have noticed that grief is a lot like that twist on your left side when you’re running sprints. You notice the sting. Your legs halt for a moment. Is the cramp there because you were running or because you stopped?

When you lose someone, biological reasoning aside, an epiphany often arises in you. There is a threshold moment when you realize: this is just a person. Was a person. And like a place, you can leave them, but they can never really leave you. An imprint with terrible precision. A mark. An absence of their presence and the presence of absence itself. An essence of them in your being that doesn’t really ever go away. Not fully.

When your legs begin tracking again, you tell yourself this was not just a person. It was a living, breathing entity of passion and light and dark and joy and sadness and everything in between. Maybe his eyes were green. Maybe her laugh was magic. You curse at the sky (and believe me, I do) but it doesn’t make the twist go away. So long as you keep running, the cramp keeps crushing. Some days it’s faint. Some nights it’s violent.

Will the ache ever go away?

When you realize the question of suffering proves to be continual rather than resolvable, you begin to see that maybe the hurt you have been running from isn’t a predator. By definition, pain and suffering are not the same thing. Pain is: a momentary sensation stemming from activation by a singular event. Suffering is: a continual experience associated with the perception of harm or the threat of it. In other words, pain happens. Suffering follows.

But what would happen if you allowed yourself to feel it instead of avoiding it?

When you are out of breath and pain has finally found your hand, you have two choices: you can welcome it or you can close your fist. It is hard for me to say it without my fingers shaking on these keys, but I urge you to form your palm into the position of acceptance. I truly believe that anything worth receiving is found in the form of letting go.

After a person is gone, we solely have the capability to agree with fate. That is all. Perhaps the pain you are running from is an ally. A teacher. A teammate.

Perhaps if you feel like you have hit a wall, it means it is time to rest on it.

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Ignore her!

Ignore her text because she doesn’t care enough to answer yours.

And if she can’t do the bare minimum good luck getting her to do anything else.

Ignore her text because she’s not making a point to show up.

Ignore her text because all you’ve been doing is talking for months and nothing has come of it.

Ignore her text because you and I both know you deserve more than someone who makes you wonder how they feel about you.

Ignore her text because your feelings are not a game and texting you just to see if you’ll answer shows a sense of insecurity in her.

Ignore her text because you shouldn’t keep asking for what you deserve.

Ignore her text because you need someone who is going to make you better not make your life worse.

Ignore her text because that’s all it is…a text.

Ignore her text because you deserve a phone call.

Ignore her text because you can. That lie you’re telling yourself about why you’re answering or you’re not strong enough to ignore it, is only that… a lie.

You’re strong enough to ignore her text.

Ignore her text because she cancelled again and shouldn’t be easily forgiven.

Ignore her text because your friends are tired of the screenshots and forwarded messages of one day she’s a great girl and one day she isn’t.

Ignore her text because she’s an ass even on her ‘good days.’

Ignore her text because you shouldn’t be impressed by someone coming back you should want someone who never leaves in the first place.

Ignore her text because she’s probably talking to other guys and you know it.

Ignore her text because you deserve more than someone who makes you think too hard about what you’re going to say and what she’ll think about you when you say it.

Ignore her text because you deserve more than waiting.

Ignore her text because you deserve someone who doesn’t make you feel guilty and weak for answering.

Ignore her text because you deserve an answer every time.

Ignore her text because if she doesn’t care enough to think about you at 2pm than forget about her at 2 am.

Ignore her text because you respect yourself enough to no longer tolerate mistreatment.

Ignore her text because she deserves to know what it’s really like to live without you, it’s only then she’ll realize your value and worth.

But most of all ignore her text because there is someone out there who won’t.

And every time you answer her, you’re taking one step further away from finding the person you deserve. The woman who not only will answer your text but will show up the fuck up the way women are supposed to.

And when a woman shows up she’ll come with flowers she won’t text you an emoji rose.

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Dear Diary!

Dear Diary,

I’ve been writing in you for as long as I can remember. When I was younger, I would write about how annoying my brother was being, or how unfair it was that my parents had stricter rules for me than him. Or I’d write about the cute and hot girls in my class. Or how I wished I was friends with certain girls, but they didn’t like me.

My problems have gotten a lot more complicated than that, but here I am still writing in you and I don’t even know why.

Dear Diary,

Was it about these pages? They know more about me than anyone. Sometimes I write to you like you’re my best friend, waiting to here the gossip. Other days I write to you as if to give future me a message (even though we both know I won’t listen). And sometimes I write to you, as if I’m already gone.

Dear Diary,

Am I being selfish? Keeping all these secrets for just you and I to share? You’re like my therapist, except I pay you less, but you know more than she does. I do ask you both for advice, and it ends up the same – talking it all out until I come up with the solutions on my own. I hate that.

Dear Diary,

It’s a weird feeling, you know? I write to you and I feel heard. But you don’t hear me. You could never hear me. You’re a book. A page. A piece of paper or a word document on my computer. You don’t have opinions. You don’t even reply. Everything on these pages comes from my heart, my head and only I can see it. Only I dictate what I write and what I do with what’s written. And maybe, that’s the problem.

Dear Diary,

What if I shared our secrets? Tore open the book, sent the word documents, left all that’s written open to explore? Would people still love once they saw the thoughts in my head? Would they judge me? Would it make them want to hold me tight, or run away screaming?

But you are my comfort zone, and I’m happy here.

Dear Diary,

How many other people feel this way? Do you think if I opened my heart and mind, that people would realize they too have felt the same way I do? Would it bring us closer? Is that what the world needs? To better understand each other? To let each other read our diaries, show our scars and our fears, and understand each other? To not run away from baggage, but help one another carry theirs around? Would it feel less heavy?

I don’t think I’m ready.

Dear Diary,

Maybe one day I’ll be ready. Maybe it’ll go better than I thought. But until I can find a better listener than you, I don’t think these pages will ever stop.

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The girl with a sunflower!

“Bang!” We heard something loud and stopped dead in our tracks. Could we have just heard what we thought we heard?

We waited a moment and listened, then continued ahead on our trek through the woods.

We had been there many times before. Not this particular place, but it felt familiar, for we had been lost in the woods more times than we could count. “Come on,” Aanshi yelled as she ran in front of me through the trees, shoving aside branches and leaves.

Then we saw it. There was a huge treehouse high up in a tree about ten feet in front of us. “Look,” she yelled and kept running ahead. We were so excited to find something new and fun in the middle of the dense woods that normally seem to never end, and we couldn’t wait to climb up inside of it.

“Bang!” We heard it again, and this time we knew for sure that it was a gunshot.

“Run!” I yelled loudly. Aanshi and I turned around and took back off into the thick of the woods, this time thankful for its never-ending denseness, for this time we wanted to hide, and we ran back to the safety of our homes.

I did not expect to get shot at while hanging out with Aanshi, but our adventures together were always unpredictable. I never knew if she attracted danger, or if danger attracted her. I just knew that she was wild and free-spirited, and I liked it.

Aanshi and I were friends by default, as she was my age and lived down the street. I lucked out having such an adventurous friend in close proximity to hang out with. Sure, she could be overwhelming at times (like the time she threw a spider down my shirt), but there was never a dull moment when I was with Aanshi.

I was always up for fun, but Aanshi’s idea of fun was often a bit different than mine and with way fewer rules. However, she had a way of getting me to do just about anything.

The street we lived on was at the bottom of an incredibly steep hill. After school, we would get off of the bus and slide down the hill using our Trapper Keepers as sleds. More adventures happened at the top of the hill because that was our bus stop, and we had plenty of time to kill while we waited.

One day, while waiting for the bus, we decided to play Truth or Dare. Aanshi thought we should take turns mooning the road for a full minute, and we were not allowed to pull up our pants no matter who drove by. Each time it was Aanshi’s turn, no one drove by. Each time it was my turn, a car drove by. Luckily, I didn’t know any of the drivers or passengers. My luck would eventually run out.

After Aanshi took a turn, I was up, so I hid my face and braced myself for the inevitable humiliation to come. Sure enough, a car passed. Then, a car passed full of familiar faces, including our neighbors and a former friend of mine who had moved to the area just a year before. I would not have even known it was them if not for Aanshi’s obnoxiously loud laugh.

I turned around and saw the shocked look on their faces. “Aanshi,” I yelled as I yanked up my pants and took off running. It was one thing for her to constantly coerce me to do things, but it was another for me to be the one to get in trouble for all of her ideas. “My turn,” she said and proceeded to walk back to the road.

“Unbelievable,” I thought. “Does she have no boundaries? Does anything scare her?” I was utterly fascinated by her brazen fearlessness. This is why I willingly joined all of her antics. Even if I knew they were wrong sometimes, it didn’t matter, as the limits did not exist. A little voice inside of my head always told me not to listen to her, but I always told it to shut up.

Even though many of our times together involved hijinx, we had just as much fun during our innocent activities. From playing with Barbies to dancing to riding bikes, we always had a blast. I will never forget when she saw an asymmetrical hairstyle in a magazine and showed up to school with the same hairstyle shortly after. She told me that she cut it herself.

Aanshi and I lost touch sometime in high school after she transferred to another school. One day I met a kid at the mall who went to the same school as Aanshi, and I asked him if he knew her. He thrust out his hand and pointed to a mark. “See that? That’s from a pencil.”

“Oh, so you DO know her!” I said, snickering. I guarantee you that kid deserved it.

I never knew where Aanshi ended up, and I often wondered what she was doing. Years later, before Facebook became a central point for staying connected, I tried to look her up but couldn’t find her. I called her mom and asked her for Aanshi’s contact information. “Aanshi is gone,” she said. I paused in shocked silence. I couldn’t believe it. “She died from an asthma attack,” she said. She had moved across the country and was living her life to the fullest until her untimely death.

I later friended her mom on Facebook and looked at the pictures she posted of Aanshi on her page. There she was, with that bright smile and that free spirit shining through her eyes. Her mom often posts pictures of sunflowers, Aanshi’s favorite flower. It fits her so well, bright and wild.

I carry a piece of that spirit inside of me, as she permanently influenced me to be more carefree. Aanshi stayed wild and free throughout her lifetime. I wish I never lost touch with her. I don’t know where we go after our life ends on earth, but I want to go wherever she is.

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Content vs Knowledge

If a girl posts a picture or a reel, she gets over 500 likes. But if I’m posting knowledge, maybe about 20 likes?

You like her pictures better because it gets straight to the point? Her brown eyes tell a better story?

Her legs and small waist is clear and you don’t have to read between the lines?

The drooling emoji if she turns to the side but a scroll pass if I’m speaking my mind?

Is it because we don’t like to be educated? Our generation aren’t intellectuals? We don’t like to read?

I think so.

You don’t like to be challenged? You want someone easy?

Would you say it’s almost intimidating?

“We know that when a human stands up and speaks truth to power, there will be attempts to put them down. So I’m not going to be put down and I’m not going anywhere.”

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How to be your own best friend

Seneca wrote, “What progress, you ask, have I made? I have begun to be a friend to myself.”

I have wrestled with this idea for quite some time now because this thought is incredibly subjective, and so everyone has their own opinion of what it means to be a friend to yourself. Until recently, I really struggled to form my own opinion, as I often found myself on extreme ends of thinking depending on my state of being.

It’s becoming increasingly common in our current culture to see articles, social media posts, videos, and podcasts address topics on self-care and self-love. Conventional advice on self-care and self-love tend to gravitate towards actions and thoughts such as:

Embrace your flaws

Enjoy your own company

Permit yourself to feel things

Be more forgiving to yourself

Indulge in retail therapy

Don’t work too hard or too much

Take a bubble bath

Be kinder to yourself

…you get the gist.

The above actions and thoughts are valid and essential ways to be a friend to yourself. My intention is not to dispute any of the conventional self-care and self-love advice because I recognize its importance in maintaining our physical, mental, and emotional well-being. I merely wish to explore an alternate perspective on these ideas of being a friend to yourself, self-care, and self-love.

Perhaps being a friend to yourself is being hard on yourself. When I say this, I am by no means advocating for this hustle culture that is toxic and unhealthy.

Rather, being hard on yourself is:

Having personal accountability

Holding yourself to a higher standard

Being self-critical and not letting yourself off the hook

Delaying immediate gratification for delayed gratification

The truth is, your brain is wired to keep you safe by signaling you to stop at any form of discomfort. Unfortunately, this is how you get trapped in your comfort zone. It’s the path of least resistance, and we are all prone to it, myself included.

Being hard on yourself, and in essence, the highest form of self-love, is having the willingness to delay what you think you want now for what you want in the future. You do so through having self-awareness.

Seneca wrote, “I do not yet, however, assure myself, or indulge the hope, that there are no elements left in me which need to be changed. Of course there are many that should be made more compact, or made thinner, or be brought into greater prominence. And indeed, this very fact is proof that my spirit is altered into something better – that it can see its own faults, of which it was previously ignorant.”

Self-awareness is mastery over oneself. It’s having a rooted understanding of your principles and values from which you operate. It enables you to properly judge whether your habits, thoughts, and qualities align with your principles and values. If they are incongruent, it’s critical that you eliminate, minimize, or form new ones.

In essence, healthy judgment alongside self-awareness guides you in your day-to-day decision-making processes to create an effective, meaningful, and fulfilling life.

Without self-awareness, you empower other people and circumstances to shape much of your life by default. Therein, you constantly operate from a place of reactivity, which causes much inner turmoil. A reactive mentality may well be the antithesis of being a friend to yourself, of self-care and self-love.

On the one hand, excessive focus on conventional self-care and self-love advice is akin to a person with eternal student syndrome — endlessly studying, never producing, with a lack of results. On the other hand, excessive focus on the unconventional method of self-love that I explored, being hard on yourself, results in ruined physical, mental and emotional health and broken relationships.

To live an effective, meaningful and fulfilling life, you must find a balance between conventional self-care and self-love advice and the unconventional method of being hard on yourself.

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The Constellations!

God, Goddess, Creator, Mother Nature, Universe? I am unsure of who created me. Who took the stars, crushed them into fine powder, and poured them into this vessel. Who took the clay of the planets and molded me into this imperfect being, filled with the magic of the universe. Who put the twinkle of the stars in my eyes and a spark a flame in my heart. This burning desire for curiosity and passion for the souls that pass in and out of my orbit. To whatever powers-that-be that decided that I was worthy of the air that fills my lungs to feed the rose vines that creep and grow up in branches, that decided I was worthy of the sunshine on my face, the light that my soul bathes in, cleansing me of darkness that lingers in the form of memories of my own self-destruction, I say thank you to you. Thank you for this eternal gift of my life, for I did not always see it as a gift but a curse—a curse of heartache, trauma, and darkness. Because what purpose could the breaking of vases and the shattering of glass possibly serve? But now I know it served me plenty, for in the breaking, I learned to pick up the pieces. The pieces of myself, and yes, I cut myself on those broken shards, because facing the parts of myself I had tried so hard to hate and ignore is painful. It is painful to get to know the soul you have long ignored. It is painful to learn to love yourself, heartbreaking to turn hate into love. It is anything but easy to rewrite the story without erasing the dialogue but to instead reshape what was already there. Understanding that the skeleton, the groundwork, was necessary and more than enough.

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When you can’t find the words!

I’m wrapped up in my blanket that feels like a cloud holding me close. The soft glow of my crystal lamp gives off enough light to see my words, but it’s intimate enough that I don’t feel exposed. The pen strokes are furiously outside the lines, and it’s unsettling not having any reason or rhythm for this writing. Devoid of emotion. Words only scratching the surface.

Like an adult version of hide and seek, I’m constantly seeking myself and waiting to be found. I don’t know how to rip myself raw, and it’s not for lack of trying. It’s not that I’m even afraid. I just truly don’t know how to hold the box cutter to strip the cardboard cutouts hiding the real me.\

How do small, fragile hands that cramp from any pressure possibly grasp something that can be used as a weapon?

What I truly want to explore is the vintage wooden treasure chest under my bed, the one storing my cobwebs. A web I’m not afraid to get tangled in, and that I welcome. I want to write about the click of the lock, the creak opening a wave of emotions, my fingers submerged in an ocean of tears that are decades old. How the humans I’ve lost still live there, how desperately my heart needs this visitor.

I want to write that I often wonder if my nature is human. I want to ask myself if I’ll ever separate the collective and being seen as not special.

I want to write about this existence, and how it’s more than seeing any writing on the wall, that it’s about seeing a painting of you. I want to write about finding a spot in my nature, not allowing myself to become a piece of decor that I barely glance at anymore.

I want to write about being held down by dark entities, that I’m done writing about my inability to turn off the light. I want to write about how humans drink my softness, but my heart goes unnoticed. I’d rather write that humans see through me, but never see my wings.

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You’re a beautifully wild thing!

There are boys
who are going to promise you
forevers in song,
in poetry,
in words that are just so damned pretty
they will be hard to resist.

You’re their dream girl.
Beautiful, strong, independent.
Forever, they sigh, forever.

But their forevers come
with hidden terms and conditions, their love is a secret contract,
with addendum and asterisks.

Forever is only
until you start dreaming too much, talking too loudly,
kissing too strongly,
and debating too heatedly.

It’s not girl-like, they will say,
you’re hard to understand, they will rationalise,
impossible for anyone to put up with
let alone love.

Can’t you be beautiful in limitation?
Strong sometimes but weak more often?
Independent whilst being helpless?
They will ask you to be
all these impractical things
without thinking that these
are all the same qualities
they once fell in love with.

They are going to make you doubt yourself, beautiful.
And even then, even when they have wronged you,
misunderstood your debates for insolence
misinterpreted your strength for arrogance,
you will reach inside yourself
to find the things they are looking for,
because you want — you need to be loved.

You will learn to talk quietly,
love gingerly,
dream a little less,
let him kiss you instead.

Stop.

You do not need to change yourself,
for boys who fell in love with
a beautiful, wild thing
that they are too ill equipped
and must cage to ‘handle’.

You do not make yourself less
when you are a comet filled with such power and intensity,
that you are
waiting to blaze
across this universe.

You are unexplored, unusual
and frighteningly beautiful.
And only a few will understand
the way to love you
without breaking you
and making you dangerous.

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Aurora Borealis!

The lights in the sky have always meant home. The North. Miles of flat road and high beams and no one else around. A gift from above not meant to be explained or counted on or captured — just experienced.

They shut you up and glue you to your driver’s seat on the side of the road where you pull over to watch them move.

You can’t go out and find them, you can just hope when the conditions are right that they will come. You can only be ready to stop what you are doing if they choose to appear. You can only consent to their capricious ways.

It was like that with us, I couldn’t make you do anything. I couldn’t make you love me or believe that I loved you. I could just be ready to stop, those few times when things were good. Stop what I am doing and be in the moment, knowing it will not last.

I still read your emails sometimes when I want to be sad.

I still wonder if you were the one I was supposed to figure out how to be with, but I was too young and too dumb to figure out how to make you want to be with me.

You are still a fixed point in my history even though I think I have also moved on.

Because I could set a watch by the times I think about you. You have become a benchmark in my life. The familiar thing I hope to catch in my review mirror when I am driving at night.

You are still a mark in the distance I can use to find my way. When your ghost comes around he is still comforting, familiar, fleeting.

When your memory finds me, you still feel like home.

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How important are your intuitions!

We are in the midst of an important change for all of humanity. In the past few months, the coronavirus pandemic has affected our lives in unprecedented ways. We have been forced to reconsider how we interact with others and isolate ourselves in our own homes. There’s still a lot to learn, but it’s heart-warming to see nations working together to find a cure for the virus. Putting aside the political rhetoric, I believe humanity is on the precipice of expanding its consciousness. Have you noticed this sense of cooperation in your own country? Have you seen people help others such as the elderly, neighbors, friends, and family?

There’s a greater sense of collaboration that takes place when tragedy ensues. We awaken our kindred spirit to help others in altruistic ways. Mankind has been trading currency for as long as we can remember, which has contributed to modern civilization and world economies. However, it has created greed and an uneven distribution of wealth. Money has created privileged people and underprivileged societies. For this reason, I believe our intuition will become a form of currency in the post-coronavirus world. What do I mean by this?

For those who have harnessed their intuition, they know it is a precious faculty. Our intuition is associated with the resonance of the soul and speaks in quiet whispers, instead of the loud voice of the ego. Therefore, as our consciousness awakens in the years ahead, our intuition will be the strongest currency amongst that shift. Intuition is like a GPS is to a car. If you’ve called upon your intuition, you will know it is reliable and the more we engage it, the greater it becomes. Can you relate to this? Have you used your intuition to make balanced decisions in your life? Did it work out in your favor?

Here’s why intuition will be the strongest form of currency in the years ahead:

You cannot trade intuition.

Those who use it will benefit from it greatly.

Intuition is like your own fingerprint, each one unique.

It increases in power the more we use it.

It does not depreciate.

It cannot be lost or stolen.

It cannot be hacked.

It is reliable and accurate.

It has no agenda, unlike the ego.

What I’m suggesting is that our intuition will be a powerful superpower right under our nose. Its uniqueness means we will make decisions exclusive to our lives, and the more we trust it, the better it works. Dr Catherine Wilkins echoes this sentiment in her book, Soul’s Brain: The Neurology and Logic of Your Intuition: “Because of the unique nature of our neurology, our intuition will work differently from others, even though it’s telling us about the same universe we all live in.” The world will undoubtedly change for the better in the years ahead. I believe the shift in humanity’s consciousness will give people back their power and intuition will become its guiding source. The power I’m talking about is one’s authentic self and merging with our core being. I’m not talking about a spiritual apocalypse, but something simpler. It is about learning to trust ourselves, and the inherent power bequeathed to us by a benevolent universe. It will involve overcoming fear and a shift towards love, compassion, and higher states of awareness.

This is not a prophetic glimpse into the future, but based on my observations over the years, those with a strong intuition succeed in life. They trust their inherent power to make important decisions. I’ve witnessed this in my life, where my earlier choices were made by reason and logic alone. Nowadays, my intuition is a powerful ally which I call upon regularly. The key to awakening our intuition is to use it often and trust in the outcome. It requires having faith in our invested power and not second-guessing ourselves.

To live a balanced life, we ought to work harmoniously with our intuition. An awakening of consciousness refers to an expanded awareness of our thoughts. Knowing this, I’d like you to reflect on areas where you used intuition to make well-intentioned decisions. Think about how intuition communicates to you, unlike the forceful power of the ego. How can you better develop your intuition? Perhaps through your relationship with others? Your career, finances, health, etc.? Put intuition to practice in the smallest ways and observe the outcome. Look for signs where intuition is calling you instead of reason and logic. It is when we awaken our inherent power, that intuition will become a guiding force in our life.

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The late train!

Many a sleepless night, I lie there in the darkness, eyes open wide
Lost in a myriad of thoughts, I wander aimlessly, searching for a ride

A colossal light appears in the horizon, thundering towards me like a mighty juggernaut
It approaches hastily still, I recognize it, my late night train of thought

Rain starts to pour and hail shortly follows. A storm is slowly brewing, I’m already soaking wet
Jump on the train, I decide, like I’ve done so many times. Feels like I keep on paying a giant endless debt

I walk across the hallway like I did a million times before. Ah, there it is! My usual window seat is here
Gazing through the window, I keep on staring at my usual thoughts, memories, and my one greatest fear

A lighting bolt ferociously strikes, everything goes dark, it’s suddenly pitch black
Memories, thoughts, and fears start seeping in, like water through the window crack

Maybe this is how it finally ends; to finally find peace, a passenger on an endless trip
Forever roaming the railway of my convoluted mind, trapped in this cursed ship

Zapping thoughts continue to ricochet in my head though, denying me even that sort of rest
What a tiring existence this has become, I’m discontented with taking this neverending test

Alas, I always seem to do this to me every time I get back on my feet
When will it end? I ask myself; I can take it no more, I’m utterly dead beat

Knots so tight have me tied, I struggle to break free, I endure through the ultimate pain
Whatever it takes, I must find it in me to conjure the courage to jump off this damned train

I tell myself, Maybe this time, things will pan out just the way I hope
For that is only way I would keep my sanity, the one way I could cope

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Love Hate!

Here we are at another impasse

Where we’ve both spewed to much venom and left the other burned

And I hate you so much I’ll storm out and never say your name again

But those dark eyes that see right through me are so burned in my memory

My thoughts often drift back to them

And I can’t say what I mean when I’m half a bottle in

And I don’t mean what I say when I’ve had too much to remember in the morning

But I’m too proud to admit I might’ve done something wrong

So I’ll stick to my story that it was all your fault

Because it hurts a little less

This is the end of you and I, finally I suppose

I wish I wasn’t like this

The thorns only grow around my garden when you scare me

Vulnerability never did a girl any good with a boy like you

Or at least that’s what I tell myself

My defenses will protect my heart

But they make me lose you every time

People like us, we’re meant to come and go

The free birds drifting in the wind

But ever since I started loving you I wanted a home again

You’re bad for me, you’re bad for me, I write it over and over like a punishment

But my heart longs and calls out for all the things you did that were good for me

Pulled apart for you in tiny pretty little pieces

The constant ring around what we do

We’ve done it for so long, in flux between—

“I’m done, I can’t do this anymore”

To “I’m all about you”

Between “I love you, I’m your woman” and “block, delete, ignore”

You know I’ve been half truthing you

Or lying, it’s all the same now

It’s only different when you’re playing this lovers game

I love you and I hate you, so fucking much on both

But you’re so very much a part of me now

I hate myself

You see the opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference

Indifference is something I’ve never felt for you

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Please understand!

You are each beautiful, tragically so. You are the sum of your parts, but in that you are a striking testament to your story.

Your scars. Your lines. Your curves. Dimples where skin hangs just slightly sallow over bones, and freckles where maybe you wish they weren’t. But you are as beautiful as you are lovely, as bold as you are lovable, as you felt your first love, running reassuring fingers and lips over every inch that you said you could not get enough of.

You are more valuable than any dollar amount you could ever spend on this cosmetic, surface-perfecting world, or on the emptying fee you pay for a membership to a place which you will and should never belong because you are there for them and their approval, and not to fuel and love and empower your precious temple.

You are more than the late night, half-forgotten weekends you left in a blur, but so proudly displayed in digital pixels because you were there. And that’s important and worth bragging about, right? But in 10 years, what will you be remembering? The guy or guy that eye-fucked you and maybe went further that night? The people whose arms drunkenly wrapped around you, or whose lips bumped your face but only to say, “tonight was the best” or that they “fucking love you,” but wouldn’t be there in the morning when you were swallowed in your fears and regrets as you looked in the mirror at the girl or guy who was just a ghost of you?

Or will you remember the one who showed up even when you said you weren’t worth it, and cleaned you up and held you up. Because you weren’t perfect. For the very reason that you aren’t, and yet you are MORE.

You can wake up that morning and wash from your face and body the physical evidence of the night before, but you don’t need to, half terrified, post a photo of #nomakeup or #morningafter.

You don’t need their permission to be you at your purest, truest beauty. But for God’s sake, please give yourself permission. Put down that blade or that magazine or that damn cell phone that allows you to feel so worthless, because you are so worth it.

Blaming it on society is falling flat, because in the end we are society! But what does that mean if we don’t take responsibility for the very words we tell ourselves? What difference does it make if we don’t see the difference between a meal that we ate and a meal we nourished our body with? Or, the weight we lift versus the weight that we carry? Because if we make the team, maybe they won’t take notice of the fact that, indeed, we bat for the other one?

And in spite of the flag you fly or the cross you wear, the cross you bear has grown too heavy for just you to carry, when you’re so worn thin by trying to win and be bones and skin, or be built in muscles to strengthen only an ideal of what is considered progress. And you can’t even process the words as they fly across the screen. But what do they mean they know your secret? And what will they say if they know? Will you have to show all of the scars you’ve been hiding? Reminders of the times when you just didn’t cut it?

Put down the bottle or blade and walk away from the mirror that’s so one sided that you’re practically blinded by what you can’t see. Pick up the phone or the pen and remind yourself again and again and again that you are love.

You are beauty.

But even if she says you are so handsome, you won’t believe her because you still pay ransom to those voices in your head that told you: your choices were to change who you were or never be wanted. But you are wanted and loved, no need to be haunted. She loves your soul and the way you bite your lip when you’re happy. He noticed the way your smile slips when you see your reflection in a store window as you pass by. But tonight you are naked, curves and dimples in all the wrong places, but to him, you are perfect, because you let your guard down for a second enough to be yourself. And God, it was beautiful.

So, look again as you pass by the window and see through to the people you knew but tried to hide from. Send a smile, love, ‘cause you bet they’ll smile back. ‘Cause even if your smile was fake, it forced you to take note of the moment you lacked the courage to love yourself and be noticed. Your voice shouldn’t shake when you say “this is me.” It should resonate as you own it, and take back your identity past what you see on the social media or computer screen.

You are beautiful, and tragically so. You are the sum of your parts, but your parts are just parts until you give them value. The labels are just labels until you allow them to stick to your skin or your sickness lets them in to your mind and lets them grow. So don’t sow the seed of doubt, but instead, cast it out with the strength of a voice that says, “I am LOVE.” That voice is a choice to be love and not just loved, because no love will be enough until you learn to love yourself.

So reach out and then back in, feel the skin your beautiful soul lives in. Forgive him, the one that ever made you feel less, and don’t you dare forget to forgive yourself, too.

You are not weak, but stronger than anything that has tried to break you yet.

So speak it out loud, the permission to be proud, to love yourself and be. Healthy.

“The wealth of the industry of consumerist low self-esteem will be okay without me. I am not broken. I am free. Beautiful, Me.”

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Fear of flying!

Do birds fear dying while flying? Do they feel their last fall as they crash on the ground? The soft grass in their wings? Or the hard and cold or hot pavement stone or rooftop? Do they look at the sky in the end and wish they could feel the air once again?

Where do they go and die? They go and die in the silent dark places? Our of sight? A lonely death? Hopping on one leg, dragging the other wing through the mud, wanting to fly but the muddy ground has now become their new home.

No matter how much you spend your life flying around, you’ll be buried in the ground in the end.

Like the fishes in the sea, they swim and swim, but eventually get buried in the ground, how do fishes die in the water? Do they see the sunlight sparkling on the surface of the ocean from below, as their fins give out and they fall through the waves, the ray of light piercing the water, blinds them for a second, as they fall into the dark depths where they never even dared to swim around of, do they feel fear of the abyss that swallows them?
I would, I do.

I feel like the bird falling with broken wings, looking up at the sky for the last time wanting to fly, not wanting to hit the ground, not wanting a new home, not wanting the soft grass or the hard rooftops and concrete roads,

I feel like the fish drowning as their lungs give out, water becoming poison as it were to every other animal, oh how you laughed at them when they drowned, gasping for breath when you could breathe so easily, and now you understand, the water filling up your body, but it’s not helping you live, everything going dark but your eyes on the sunlight on the surface, for the last time, you can feel the darkness coming all around you from behind, fear settling in your heart as the final thing you’re going to feel on this earth, don’t be afraid, you were always meant to go there, to the place you’re afraid of.

It’s not a new home, it’s your old one.

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The lone wolf!

In a pack of wolves, the alpha walks at the end. He wanders the wild, crossing every stream, feeling the way through the darkness in order for his beloved pack to remain as one. This is the core intent of those who feel like an outcast—only the compassion is acted out from a distance. If the alpha decides to depart from the group, the pack will disregard him as their keeper. The sound of every howl is the order of nature playing itself out in life—this we must accept. However, any tempo to be separated from one’s own revivification is one we must not. There is a borderline to the instinctual nature. A single choice made that does not animate the human heart is one that is left in the reigns of fear. We must not confuse fear with instinct. The wilderness on every occasion will fade in the former.

Walking the end is the only way to birth the freedom of beginning. Pure gifts must grow in darkness, and with this night comes considerable separation. One must become fluent in the poetry and wander worlds to discover the secrets that belong to them. Any soul disregarded, condemned, or misunderstood can understand the truth of existence deeper than what is perceived.

Walk at the end and walk tall. Run from the numbness that settles on the heart. Run from the comparison that picks at the bone. Run from passion that doesn’t burn itself whole. Run from anything that doesn’t make the lingering air easier to breathe in. Bite the grip of every dream, walk tall, and let no one who hasn’t made a dance floor out of roamed land try to tame the wild one within.

The lone wolf in the eyes of evening is therefore never lonely. He is accompanied by his heart and the faith that works as his power. The body must run, the heart must not. Compassion’s rhythm is a master of on and off. A continuous movement that finds comfort in the dark unseen. The lone wolf then realizes that attributes of overcoming need to develop in order for the healer to carry the medicine home.

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You are not always a part of what is meant for you! (By Dhimahi Jani)

You are not always a part of what is meant for you!

Exactly!
This is always a reality check of not being a part of what is meant to you! It is always either this or that.

Hello all! After a long but hope you appreciate!
We have always said that what is meant to you will be yours. But here I’m saying opposite because this is what reality is.

There is always somethings which you think you’ll be a part of but you end up doing something else. Is this what karma says? Basically karma is always what we think rather than what is there according to us!

Let me answer what I said. You are having two different competitions and in which one is your favourite but you are not able to be a part of. So this is what I mentioned that the competition was meant for you but you were not a part of then what is the point of believing what is meant to you will be yours.

Now I know some will say you’ll get it life is long, start believing. Yes you might be right or might be wrong but when you were in need of that competition certificate you didn’t get it. Then maybe what I said will be somewhat true.

I say Be a achiever not a believer. Because when you start dreaming of achieving you automatically start believing! On a good note don’t think of what is yours. Just start achieving and that will be considered yours!

Hace that confidence and being confident on yourself! Thank you!🤍

Dhimahi🤍

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The earth woman!

The earth woman journeys to the underworld. She is where lifeforms begin to evolve into pure connection. She is the sheltered places we rest our heads at night — the cradle of nature and of life. She is the peacemaker, the builder, the mother, the musician, the analyst, the minister, and the nurturer who incorporates her heart’s essence with her daily work. She takes us on an undisturbed adventure into something truly honorable, provides the skills to make it happen, and single-mindedly guides the mission forward. She is the soil that feeds us, the ground that supports us, and the stability that roots us in faith. She embodies a certain supporting power, a deep hidden sanctuary of comfort that allows all who enter her presence to feel infinitely protected. She is the place where we patiently wait and build both internal and external strength, expertise, and dedication, to then take a stand in this world. From the final edge of adventure, she is the point of culmination and fulfilment. She fastens the grip of our lineage, our inspiration, our legacy, our cravings, and our dreams, propelling us to make them a solidified reality. According to these dreams, she designs the space, the mood, and the ambience in order to assure a certain level of completion. As an influential caretaker, she must act in the way she knows best — to serve, to connect, to raise awareness, and to encourage sound action which travels through her body to the entire collective. She must know, there is no doubt that cannot be overcome, no obsession that should overthrow the mind, and no concern that is worth lost time. Marked by the clay that runs through her fingers, she sculpts a terracotta mold of both worlds linking two into one, all in order to arrange a serene life that extends beyond the comfort of her sacred homeland.

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Be Patient and watch!

Just be patient and watch how everything eventually works out in your favor, even if it doesn’t seem like it right now.

Just be patient and you will understand why some people weren’t meant to stay in your life. You will see their true colors, you will see how they treat other people, you will see how they manage their own life and you will then understand why these people weren’t going to do you any good. Why their presence in your life would have only drained you.

Just be patient and karma will get you justice from all those who deliberately lied to you or betrayed you. Life has a funny way of giving those people a taste of their own bitter medicine. Like you get fired and in a short amount of time, the company is not doing so well anymore. The person who broke your heart and disrespected you suddenly is suffering from the same kind of betrayal and loss they put you through and the cycle goes on. Just be patient and let karma do the dirty work.

Just be patient and everything that once unsettled you will be settled for you because that’s how the universe works, you don’t get your justice or your closure or your answers right away and at times it may feel like the odds are stacked against you and nothing seems to be going in your favor but then it all just falls into place. The answer just comes to you on a random Tuesday morning. Your closure comes with a twist as you sit back and enjoy the show.

Just be patient because when you rush and take matters into your own hands, you can sometimes ruin the wonderful surprise the universe has for you. Sometimes we get carried away and we don’t wait to see how things will unfold for us because we’re too obsessed with getting the outcome we want immediately. We want to punish those who hurt us and get even with those who kicked us when we’re down but we don’t let the universe work its magic.

God is watching. God knows exactly what happened to you and who did what and what their intentions were and God knows how much you’ve suffered and he is fighting your battles behind the scenes. He’s not going to let those who purposely wounded you slip away without a few bruises. He’s not going to let all those months or years you spent in agony go to waste, he’s going to reward you with something you never imagined, something beyond your wildest dreams because that’s how God works. He turns it all around. Nothing will ever stay the same. The pain and the loss will eventually be replaced with bliss and abundance.

Just be patient and watch how your faith in God and his mercy will grant you everything you ever wanted and more. Just be patient and watch how God wins every battle you once thought you had lost.

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Why female friendships help you?

I call myself a Feminist because I’m one, and I’m ready for all the criticism building up in your head, from the moment you read the title, because I’m really being an asshole discriminating against men. But well, I’m just going to talk about my personal experiences, and I strongly believe, that despite fighting for and voicing the concerns of one and all as aware citizens, human beings as complex beings always have the license to have their personal favourites, to have their personal biases and choices, because we can’t incorporate everyone equally into our lives. Well, no, I’m not generalising men and women as friends, I’m merely talking about the number of limited people that I’ve run into in my even more limited life span.

I had always lived in an environment which didn’t discriminate between the numbers of testosterone and estrogen. But a year back, I entered the all girls college that I had always dreamed of being a significant part of, and since then, female companionship has been a constant theme for me. These companions of mine, noticed every single thing about me, from the way I put on my eyeliner, to the way I’d burst into an idiosyncratic laughter that would bubble up the entire room. This somehow made me notice myself more, and take conscious deliberate action, instead of merely doing anything “in the heat of the moment”, which my guy friends had often insisted on.

Not that, these girls, couldn’t be spontaneous and carefree, in fact their care was as natural and as effortless as the water of a spring, that it didn’t require conscious, planned efforts. It’s not as if they are reacting to people’s needs, or doing things because they are compelled to, but rather, as if they’re so connected to the people they love and admire, that they can detect those needs without them being visibly voiced.

If I turned up for ten meetings that we planned and didn’t turn up for one, I would be taken to the road to guilt for days to come. But you know what? This actually taught me that human connections like plants need to be watered and nurtured regularly, and every little seed sown now, can grow up to become a beautiful tree, in the times to come. Everything is getting noticed. Everything matters.

Guy friends mostly need to do something in order to pass time. But female friends will just look at each other’s faces, sit, talk, catch up on each other’s lives and problems, offer an ear or a solution or healing hugs, and that’s it. It’s like your escape from the detachment and the carelessness of the world, it’s like your safe little world where you can pour everything out and know that it will be kept with utmost care and love. And this unknowingly increases reliability, as you feel that the other person, just needs, to be with you, not “something to do” with you.

Now the painful part, the judgement that comes with it, showing you the reality of your problem, and deciding your possible course of action, will make you feel shitty, when all you’re craving for, is for the other person to tell you, how right you are and what absolute assholes the other people in your life are, all you need to hear to be comforted is how you two will go together to knock the living shit out of those assholes. But the path that you always knew you should’ve taken but didn’t have the strength to take, will only come with the pain of thinking things through, judging, facing, analysing, and planning.

While I sometimes crave being with my guy friends because of absolutely how easy going they are and because of how little they actually demand from me, they don’t really seek my attention or my time or the tiny details of my life regularly, I get scared of turning into the person who applies the same approach not only to her friends but also to her own life.

Female friendships are definitely demanding, downright exhausting, require emotional nurturing and explanations for things done and things not done, involve venting and ranting sessions, and “what the hell are you doing?” reprimanding sessions, but trust me, they completely transform you as a person, and this change is hard in the middle, but gorgeous when it reaches the end. It’s the kind of love affair that you can criticise all you want, even want to run away from, but you know, that’s the only thing you can run to when you actually need something.

This transformation will walk down to the little areas of your life. You might notice this change, from how you’re not as lazy as you used to be about helping your mother with chores, you’re a little less shamed of crying and accepting your emotions in public, you can always hug and emotionally nurture other people without wondering what they are thinking about you, and you can live your life in a planned deliberate manner, you can make things happen instead of merely letting things happen to you. And yes, you’re no longer just an escapist, as you can face your problems head on, no matter how hard it sounds.

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Maybe you need a break!

Some girls are always running around, trying to get shit done. They have a million things on their plate because they hate saying no to an opportunity, no to a friend in need, no to the chance to have some fun. Stressed out girls are trying their hardest to balance their social lives and careers, their relationships and their mental health. But they can’t juggle everything evenly.

Some girls always feel guilty about something. If they’re working extra hours, they’ll feel bad about missing a party with their friends. If they’re spending quality time with their boyfriend, they feel bad about missing out on time with their families. It’s impossible for them to do everything that’s scribbled onto their to-do list, but they still try. They work their asses off each and every day.

Some girls are always on the move. Even when they’re sitting still, their minds are running at a million miles per hour. They’re thinking through everything they have to do tomorrow and everything they should’ve accomplished today. They rarely give themselves a moment of rest. Their me-time is usually spent multitasking. It’s hard for them to focus on one thing at a time because there’s so much they want to accomplish in this life and so little time.

Some girls are trying their hardest to make something of themselves. They want to be a good girlfriend, a good daughter, a good worker, a good friend. They don’t want to disappoint anyone, especially themselves. Their high standards make it impossible for them to get a moment of rest. They always feel like they could be doing more, like they’re never reaching their full potential.

Some girls don’t know how to relax. They get restless when they’re lounging around for too long. They feel pressured to act productive at every moment of the day because they might fall behind if they take a two-second breather. They feel the most at home when they’re rushing around, jumping from activity to activity. It might not be the healthiest lifestyle, but it’s all that they know.

Some girls have a million reasons to be proud of themselves, but they never take the time to stop and celebrate. Instead of patting themselves on the back for yesterday’s accomplishments, they’re already worrying about tomorrow. They have trouble living in the moment. They always tell themselves they’ll relax once they finish this one thing, but then they find a new thing that stresses them out. Their hard work is never complete.

Some girls rarely have time for themselves. They’re always worrying about something or someone in their life. These girls are trying to do the right thing – but they need to remember they matter, too. They can’t keep pushing themselves until they burn out. They can’t work themselves to exhaustion. They deserve to spend some time doing what they want without a checklist, without a plan, without a worry in the world. Stressed out girls are always trying to better themselves, but sometimes, the best thing to do is simply give yourself a break.

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Ever fallen in love with a ghost?

Our only reach was for the glass of hope that was centered between us. Parched of connection, we thirstily and desperately extended our tired hands, at first for each other and then for nothing. This is what it’s like to love a ghost. Our promised “could-be’s” pooled at the base of our icy foundations. We began to crumble. Those shared moments frozen in space and time were dissolving into the unreachable.

Gone. Forgotten.

This absent love had vanished into something we once called hope. Irrational idealism constructed itself into burdening expectations. I had no choice but to fail you. I chose to drink from your cup full of translucent emptiness. Oh! How my eyes strained to see the sweet liquid of your promises, your sticky web of forevers and always. I struggled to manifest an illusion into reality. I tried to see the man you presented to me on that first night so long ago. As if a dream, a string of stars would beam behind your twinkling grin every time time you called me beautiful. You illuminated my girlish daydreams. You carved my name into the moon; you told me it was mine. I believed you. You had me. I was yours. I folded into the comforts of an indolent love. You were someone then, I think. You were someone just for me. Now I chase the ghost of a love I’m not sure ever existed. You were my dream, and I slept nicely for some time.

I sometimes miss a smile I’m not sure was ever even mine. A smile that once looked sweet as honeysuckle but turned malicious with the setting of the sun. I lost myself in your vacancy. I craved your medicine, your attention. You made me need you. I let myself need you. I built a foundation within your void and floated aimlessly while you quietly whispered my way into complete obsession. Just like a fickle child having fought so hard to obtain an overvalued plaything, your pleasure was in the chase. “I got what I wanted and now I want something else.” The mantra of a broken man.

I didn’t fail you. You failed me. You failed yourself. I gave you the roadmap to my heart and you played illiterate. You created a shrine of me that existed only in yourself. Who was I to you and how did I not know her? I gave you most of me, the little morsels I had. I tried to fit your image of perfection despite every reason not to. My meek attempts to resolve an unsatisfactory love left me defeated. You left me without moving at all.

I could not let go. My fingers were trapped in memories of someone just like you. Nothing seemed real anymore.

But now I let go. Exhaustion released my tight grip and I watched you drift away into the sun, burned like Icarus in your selfish ambition. I finally heard the hatred in your tone. I finally felt the disdain for my existence within your realm. I finally climbed out from your dark abyss. Then I floated softly into the unknown. How blissful this world is without your angry stare. As with each passing cloud, I recognize the fleeting nature of your so-called commitments. I breathe in the release. And with each exhale, I say goodbye.

I don’t wish you the pain you couldn’t help but to give me. I wish only to release myself. I’ll carve my own name into the moon and call it mine. I need me and there isn’t room for you. May the stars guide you home, invisible lover. I think I loved you. I hope, one day, you love you too.

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Maybe LOVE!

How do you define love? A chemical reaction? Deep feelings of attachment, affection, and need. Dramatic, sudden feelings of attraction and respect? Sometimes you fill journals trying to define love, but the answer was on the first page. Maybe love is a fleeting emotion of care and affection. Maybe a soulmate is a moment in time, a hobby, a pet, a sense of purpose. Maybe love is words, acts, touch, time, or gifts. Maybe love is patient, awkward, and kind. Maybe love is a one-night stand that stays for breakfast. Maybe love is the sympathetic ear of an Uber driver who hands you a tissue to wipe away your tears. Maybe love is infinite eye contact with a stranger on a bus. Maybe love is a mother watching her child grow from the lessons she taught him. Maybe love is the callous hands of a mechanic who helps carry the burden you carried alone. Maybe love makes the bed; maybe love stays tangled in the sheets. Maybe love is an apology that has already been forgiven. Maybe love is arguments; maybe love is the stillness between arguments — a comfortable silence lost in reverie. Maybe love is compatible zodiac signs meeting as the stars align. Maybe love is a back and forth. Maybe love boards your flight just before take off, to get down on one knee and risk it all. Maybe love lets you fly. Maybe love is made between the sheets and between the lines. Maybe love is a gentle reminder, a home base, a random act of kindness. Maybe love is in the moonlight at the roller derby. Maybe love is the waves that crash at Point Dume. Maybe love is a misstep, a mistake. Maybe love is the reality you create while the world is ending. Maybe love is a lesson learned too late; maybe love is a lesson learned on time. Maybe love is a string of serendipities that leads to that one perfect moment when you realize its breakdown or breakthrough. Love actually is all around you. Describing love is like describing the taste of water—it just nourishes you.

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You cannot be fixed!

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you feel like you are
For you are fine china
With your cracks filled with gold
That radiate brighter than the sun

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you feel overwhelmed
With the heaviness
And weight of the world
Know that you are allowed
To put it down
To let go
For your strength
Comes from softness
And you’ve proved this to yourself
Time and time again
As you always
Survive

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you’re scared
Shitless
For you are a masterpiece
A real life, fluid
Work of art
The way you shrink and expand
With fear
And courage

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you feel less than
For you are of service to the world
When you show up
As your authentic self
In a society
That whispers
You are too much
Too little
Too this
Too that
Buy this
Buy that
No
You are you
And that is your gift
To the world

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you feel lost
For you are a seeker
An explorer
Of courage and strength
Willing to let go
Of the woman
You were told you had to be
In order to discover and create
Who you truly are

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you are anxious as hell
For you show up
And do the work
To free yourself
Of unresolved issues of the past
And the illusion of safety
Built on superficiality
That disconnects us from others
Like the masks we were taught to wear

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even when you feel fucking crazy
And uncertain
And insecure
And ungrounded
You are okay
Even when you aren’t
For you don’t always have to be
You are human
After all
And yet
You are a miracle

You cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
Even though your heart has been
A time or two
It has always healed
You have always healed
And you always will
If you let yourself

You need to know this
Can you know this
Will you remember
That you cannot be fixed
For you are not broken
You can’t be
For you are fine china
With your cracks filled with gold
That radiate brighter than the sun

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Please don’t attach me to people who are not meant to stay!

Dear God,

Please don’t let me get attached to what’s not meant for me anymore. Don’t let me get attached to something or someone that you plan on taking away from me.

I know your plan is unknown but until you reveal it to me, please make it easier. Don’t let me hold on to what I need to let go of. Don’t let me fight for what I need to release. Do not let me desire what will eventually destroy me. Do not let me love those who will break my heart.

Because I get attached easily and I hold on to things tightly, so please don’t let my mind want things that I can’t handle, don’t let my mind trick me into wanting things I don’t need or things that are not good for me. Please don’t let my heart miss people who don’t miss me. Don’t let my heart long for the ones who left. Don’t let my heart fall in love with someone who doesn’t want to stay.

Please don’t let me get attached to the things that keep me up at night, to people who leave me wondering and to places I’m not meant to live in. Bring me closer to what’s meant for me, let me hold on to those who are meant to stay.

But let me forget about the things that were never meant to be, give me the faith I need to believe that I’m better off without them. Give me the wisdom I need to realize that I deserve so much better and that I’ll be happier somewhere else with somebody else.

Or just give me tolerance I need right now to be okay with not getting the things I want, with not loving the ones I wanted to love and give me the patience I need to wait for your blessings and wait for your gifts.

But for now, please don’t let me get attached to what’s wrong for me. Don’t let me invest so much in things or people I’m bound to lose. Don’t let me want what’s not mine. Don’t let me build a future around what’s temporary.

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Can you see it in my eyes???

How someone behaves when they’re in love, varies from person to person. Every person has their own way of showing that they care about you. But I don’t feel like doing stuff for someone anymore, I have become very numb and shallow when it comes to showing love. Whatever I invested in my last relationship, I am not even able to invest that much in my current relationship. By saying this, I don’t mean that I do not love my partner, it just means that I am so done with doing things that I used to, because those things were ineffective.
I have so much of love inside me and I do not know any way to express that she’d like. I have never made a card for someone, making a card is not me. I have never written a letter to someone until I was heart-broken, I have not written anything lately. Because I started to feel that these words doesn’t matter to people anymore. But I would do all this if my partner wants me to, because I do love her, a lot.
The thing with me and expressing love is that I expect people to see the love in my eyes, when I look at them with all my heart. I expect them to feel the love when I hug them like I never want to let them go. I expect people to feel the love when I ask if they’re having their meals on time. I do not ever want to treat people like shit, it is not in me to mistreat someone. And it is pretty much obvious that most of the times, how we behave, doesn’t match the expectations of our partner. So what do we do now? Change?
I fear that trying to change myself would make things work if I fail. What if the person doesn’t love the evolved version of myself? Trying to change would be a very risky thing to do. I don’t want to lose the love I have, the ONLY love I have.
I am going to try and do things that would help me showing my love but it is on the other person to be able to see it through else I would have to push myself really hard in this, ha-ha.
Piece of advice – try to see the love in people, in what they do, what they say to you. The little things are what hold the truth about how someone feels about you. Keep loving ❤

Self Apology!

So, this is me. I am trying to make myself understand that all of these open wounds are mine to heal and mine alone. Nobody’s coming back to undo what they have done so carelessly and without even the smallest shred of regret. They’re just not.

This is me recognizing that you no longer need to be a painful memory. I have to let you become a life lesson. It won’t happen overnight; chances are, in the morning, the thought of you will still sting. Even so, day after day, week after week, you’ll fade away and all that will be left are just some wise words to live by.

This is me apologizing on your behalf. This is for all the unnecessary pain you caused. This is for your cruelty and disregard towards me. This is for all the moments that scarred my soul and weakened my belief in good. This is me apologizing for all the panic attacks and insecurities you caused. This is me apologizing for all the damage you brought on. This is me no longer letting you live rent-free in my mind.

This is me apologizing for the bitter person you’ve turned me into. This is me apologizing for the fact that you took away a part of me that I will never be able to bring back. This is me apologizing for the fact that you made feel like a burden when I clearly wasn’t.

Finally, this is me apologizing for letting myself be taken advantage of. I am sorry I believed you would be different. I am truly sorry I thought that somehow you would see what you were doing and you would eventually stop. I am sorry that I continued to make excuses for you.

I am accepting your apology and I am moving on. It’s time.

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Wait for it!

Wait for it.

Wait for the one who understands your anxieties. Wait for the one who knows when they’re clogging your mind. Wait for the one who knows how to pull you out of that.

Wait for the one who looks at you and only you when you’re talking. Wait for the one who makes you feel like you two are in your own world even when you’re in public spaces. Wait for the one who only sees you when you walk into a room.

Wait for the one who makes you feel safe. Wait for the one whose presence brings you immediate comfort. Wait for the one who feels like home.

Wait for the one who helps you see why it didn’t work out with the others. Wait for the one who shows you why things happen for a reason.

Wait for the one who makes you laugh when you’re crying. Wait for the one who doesn’t leave when you’re mad. Wait for the one who talks through things with you because they believe in you and the relationship you have.

Wait for the one who doesn’t just tell you how they feel, they show you. Wait for the one who shows and maintains consistency. Wait for the one who doesn’t leave you guessing and racking your brain about where you stand.

Wait for the one where the connection is effortless and natural. Wait for the one who meets your expectations and standards. Wait for the one who shows you why you could never settle for anyone else before them.

Wait for the one who doesn’t pressure you to be anything you don’t want to be. Wait for the one who sees you in your entirety, flaws and all, and loves you because of them, not in spite of them.

Wait for the one who shows you how incredible love is. Wait for the who loves you so much they would give you the world if they could. Wait for the one you would want to give the world to as well.

Wait for the one who understands that relationships are hard and messy but wants to do it with you anyways. Wait for the one who is more afraid to lose you, than they are to settle down and be with someone seriously. Wait for someone who understands you are a blessing and never wants to disrespect the universe by giving you up.

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How important is loving yourself?

The love you find within yourself will be yours forever. However, I know that the journey back home to yourself, the journey towards being comfortable, and at peace, on your own, and learning how to hold your own heart, and hold your own space, in a way that doesn’t scare you, but rather, in a way that empowers you, isn’t easy.

We live in a world where we are constantly being fed so many distractions. We don’t have to learn how to be alone with ourselves, because we never really are. We can fill our lives to the brim with other people, with being busy, with work, with scrolling, with so many energetically and time consuming things, that we never really have to sit with ourselves and be alone with ourselves if we don’t want to.

Often the answer is no. And that is why alone is considered something that is uncomfortable, and something that most human beings avoid. It’s difficult, it’s hard to be alone. And that is something you don’t have to be ashamed of. You don’t have to vilify yourself for maybe finding it hard to love yourself, or to be okay on your own. At the end of the day, we need one another. We need meaningful relationships, we need that interaction. It is why we have evolved and survived for so long as a species. Learning how to be alone does not mean that you need to shut out the world, that you need to never ask for help, that you need to be closed off and removed from connection. It’s beautiful to want to love, to want to experience so much at the hands of life with the people who make you feel seen and heard and at peace within this world. But when we focus so much on finding that feeling externally, sometimes we forget that we can give it to ourselves as well. Sometimes we forget that the love we have always sought in others can first, and foremost, be found within ourselves.

This is your reminder that alone is not synonymous with not good enough. Alone is not a weakness, it is not something to be ashamed of. Alone is a gift. It is a foundation, a steady ground within yourself that will be there whether or not you are in a relationship, or you get a good morning text. Alone is knowledge, in yourself and in your hopes. Alone is a ruthless dedication to understanding your heart and fighting for what compels it after years of allowing for it to be loved in halves. Alone is not lonely. Alone is not broken. Alone is an anchoring, a healing — a reminder that the love you find within yourself will be yours forever, a reminder that you have the capacity to be your own home.

I believe so deeply in learning how to be alone, because often when we are afraid of being alone, we tend to keep things in our lives that are not meant for us. When we are afraid of being alone, sometimes we settle for less than what we know we deserve, or need, or deeply desire, because we would rather have something than nothing. We tolerate behavior, or things that do not inspire us, or encourage our growth, or love us the way we have always dreamed of being loved, because we do not want to lose what we have just in case something better does not come along. And if something better does not come along, if we don’t have another human being or their attention telling us that we are loved, that we are worthy, that we are valid, then who will? Learning how to be alone teaches us that even if everything external leaves us, even if the home we have built within so many things in this life suddenly shatters, or disappears, we will always have the ability to step into the home that is our own heart, our own soul, our own mind.

Learning how to be alone is important because it is in our capacity to be alone that we no longer settle for things that we have outgrown. We no longer grip. We no longer seek external validation as a means of feeling loved, or worthy. We have done the work to love ourselves. We have done the work to be okay within our quiet, within our calm, within our minds. We have broken up the dirt within ourselves, we have looked the scary things in the face, we have no longer swept them under the rug, we have no longer allowed for fear to allocate our energy to things that are not deserving of it. Instead, we have faced the fear. We have grown within it. We have learned how to be strong on our own. How to build that foundation.

And it is within that, that we start to see the things that come into our lives from a place of self respect, and self love, rather than fear. When you are comfortable on your own, the things that you allow into your heart, into your life, are only ever going to be adding to it. You are no longer allowing yourself to accept things that ask you to settle, that ask for you to be less of yourself, that make you feel like you are hard to love, or like you just have to accept them because they are there. Instead, now, the things that you allow into your life, are things that are growing you, and inspiring you, and helping for you to stay true to yourself. It is no longer a question of if someone likes you, if you are good enough. It’s a question of if you like them, if they can give you what you need, what you desire. There is no longer this worry of being without, because you are never without when you know you have yourself.

From this space, your capacity to love others also increases. When we love from a place of fear, from a place of being so worried that we will lose someone, from a place of being so scared that we are going to end up alone — that is not love. That is attachment. And we know that attachment will never turn into love, because attachment is the kind of dynamic that makes us think we have to possess something in order to be happy, that we need it in our lives in order to feel fulfilled and at peace. When we can be our own peace, when we can fulfill ourselves, when we can be our own happiness — we love freely, and openly, and with ease. We can be fully present, we can love from a place deep within ourselves, from a place of deep understanding of our hearts, and our worth, and we can give so much to those in our lives from a place of compassion and empathy, rather than giving from a place of fear, which is often just us trying to possess something.

However — this kind of growth is so incredibly difficult at first. Studies have shown that people would rather administer an electric shock to themselves than be alone with their thoughts for 15 minutes. There is such an aversion to being alone, because we are so stimulated, we are so convinced that we always have to be seeking our happiness outside of ourselves. But there is a lot of beauty that can be found from committing to yourself and to committing to working through that discomfort. On a biological level, when we work through things that are creating a stress response like discomfort within us, when we commit to a task or achieving something, and ensuring that we are pushing ourselves along, it actually creates a dopamine reward system within our brains. We are literally learning how to reward ourselves, not externally, but within the act of committing to something deeper for ourselves, within the act of committing to being better, to doing the work — that act of self-love actually creates a happiness response within ourselves. Slowly alone becomes something that feels less uncomfortable. Slowly, our alone becomes a beautiful place to be.

And so in understanding that — no matter how difficult it is, this is your encouragement to commit to yourself. To start leaning into your own soul. To finally sit with yourself and listen to your needs and know yourself. To do the work.

If the idea of being alone scares you, that is when you know that you need to remind yourself that you are your own home. That is when you know you need to start learning how to give yourself the same love you seek externally. That is when you know you need to quiet the distractions, you need to be okay in your own company. Because it is better to be alone than to be with someone who makes you feel lonely. And it is better to be alone than to be settling for things that you know deep down are not for you. It is better to be alone than to make love into something you feel you have to grip at, something you have to possess, instead of something beautiful and soft. It is better to be alone than to lose yourself in the need for external validation. It is better to be alone.

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The importance of loving with all your heart!

To the women I have once loved, and to the one I love now:

If you could see yourself through my eyes, you would know how amazing you are. When I love, I love hard. It is who I am, and it is something I cannot change. My joke is that I am searching for the doctor who can remove that cell in your brain that makes you fall in love without anything else being altered, and I have not yet found a doctor that can do that. All kidding aside, when I love, it makes me feel the most alive and has given more meaning to my world and who is in it. It makes me happy.

I recently told a special someone, “If you could see yourself the way I see you, you would know that you are amazing and capable of doing everything and anything.” She looked at me with her big eyes and gave me a thankful and humble smile. What is it that makes us look at someone and feel that they are this amazing human when we are with them? They say the feel-good hormone oxytocin enhances your bond with the person you are attracted to. Well, I must produce a shitload of oxytocin for myself and the universe. They have tons of books on love, experts who claim to be love gurus, rules on what to do and what not to do if you love someone. I mean, do we really need to pay people or read a book on how to love? Love is our true nature. Unfortunately, society, family, religion, rules that were put in your head, expectations, and your ego all play a part. It is not easy.

The truth is that we all do not get back the love we give, so it is first important to love yourself. Some people are just not capable, and that can suck big time. You will not be able to give what you do not have, and you are not able to receive what another person does not have to give. It sounds easy and makes sense, but when your emotions are involved, it does not make any sense to you, and love is not that simple. It is important to remember that when you love yourself, you can love and give to others.

At the end of the day, who you love and how you love is your business. We are responsible for our choices and our actions. We are all capable of only so much, and some people are more capable than others. Keep on loving! The real test of love is shown through actions. Kindness and compassion come from the heart, so let your heart motivate yourself and others. Like I said, love is our true nature, so go out there and spread that love around. I know that I have left a beautiful imprint on a heart or two. They were very lucky.

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Right now, you are my everything!

I will always remember You because even though we are something

with some thing

we will never be any thing

anything at all is no thing and

nothing can compare to how You make me feel

indescribable inexplicable impossible to explain to anyone or any one incandescently happy

And all I know is out of everybody

and every body

we have the same feet

And out of everyone

or every one

we see without eyes we speak without words

And we are

incredible in repose while we sit side by side staring out at the night

time with You is time well spent

on the back of your truck eating sundaes

in the park at midnight

And now there is nowhere else

no where else

I’d rather be laying with You

in your bed where I feel whole I feel, I feel? I feel

while I listen to the rain beat the window like your heart against my ear

The background movie plays softly and echoes my thoughts

“Everything is more beautiful because we’re doomed. You will never be lovelier than You are now. We will never be here again.”

Right now You are every thing I love

You are everything

and then some

forehead kisses are all it takes while I sleep next to You there is nothing left to dream about

You draw me even closer to the warmth of your chest

as the morning makes its way through the blinds

I beg the sunlight for just a few more moments of our synchronized breath

Less than a minute left in this paradise with You

are all I want

in our something nothing anything everything

that must come to an end

so I remember to remember until the alarm clock screams bringing this utopia to a screeching halt

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Goodbye!

Goodbye, my best friend.
Goodbye, best friend I ever had.

I know what we had wasn’t perfect,
I know what we had caused a lot of pain,
I know what we had will largely be forgotten.
And our memory will just be a name.

It’s not the stuff that sticks.
It’s not the love letters,
Or the postcards,
Or the beach-front kiss.
It’s not the bad times,
Or the good times,
Or the promises we missed.

Dear girl,
It was the times I glimpsed into your soul.
The moments where your essence shone like a light from the sun,
Where I could see you,
As though for the very first time,
A little girl,
Bright and smiling and filled with seas of wonder.

It was the feeling you get when you truly see and truly love.
Your divine collided with mine,
And for a moment,
We were the same.
We were one.
Presence and surrender wrapped in light and love.

I have no regrets with you, dear friend.
All is permissible.

All the damage is my gift.
All the rage, my teacher.
All the pain is my promise.
All the ways of imperfect love
Turned me inward to find my own perfect love.

I have no regrets with you, dear friend.

For a time,
Your laugh rescued me.
A siren,
Wild and alive,
Something to wake me up
From my sinking slumber.

Thank you for being you.
I forgive you.
I forgive me.

All is permissible.
All is allowable.
All is love.

I have no regrets with you, dear friend.

I will never know you the way I once did.
But in some ways, I will know you better.
I will know you without the damage.
I will see you in pure light,
In the awakening of my own consciousness.

I will see you as a traveler,
A beautiful soul,
Sometimes lost, but always reaching for the depths of love.

For in the end,
As the writer says,
We are all just walking each other home.
I’m just glad that for a little while,
I got to walk alongside you.

I now know, dear friend, how much I love you.
For love is not a selfish thing,
And it demands nothing.
It simply is,
It simply allows.

I will never be that close to you again,
And the love I have for you will be from a distance,
Like a guide.

I will never allow anyone to treat me the way you did,
And for that,
I thank you.

Now I know how I like to loved,
And how I don’t like to be loved.

I have no regrets with you, dear friend.

May your path be filled with light and awakening,
May your beauty enliven as you become more conscious.
May you choose to live with your heart wide open,
And give love freely to all those you choose.

May my eternal thank you
Be heard in all of your days
And all of your decades.

I have no regrets with you, dear friend.
Fly away little bird,
You have my blessing.
Farewell,
And goodbye my best friend.

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Manasvi Nimgade

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Bhavesh Sahu

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Rage and Love!

Isn’t it funny how you can go from loving somebody unconditionally to hating them in a split second

Isn’t it funny how the rage can consume you

can completely devour you

can chew you up only to spit you back out

completely disheveled and naked

left bare with nothing but hate as your compass points north

what’s even funnier is how easy it is to allow it to

it’s funny how a single moment can be flipped 180

it’s funny how in a split second everything can change

what’s even funnier is how no one could have known, yet everyone acts accordingly, as if they knew this would happen

as if they were rehearsing

as if they were waiting for this moment subconsciously

isn’t it funny how rage works

it feeds you fear and mistrust

it lives off the darkest aspects of you

it lives off of your anger, your hatred, your every dark feeling

and just like at an orchestra

it pulls every dark feeling together into one coherent mass

and just like that, it’s like a wave of emotions have hit you and you’re too dazed to fully comprehend

isn’t it funny how rage does that to a person

they act like soldiers

like little marionettes

in a twisted play

a play called life

and isn’t it funny how life works

it’s funny how you can switch from rage to sadness in a split second

kind of like flipping the light switch

and just like that, your rage is gone

and what’s replaced it is something else

something deeper

it’s called sadness

it’s funny how you can keep flipping through your emotions

rage, sadness, happiness, guilt, anger, disgust, rage, love, rage, rage, rage,

and

love

because at the end of the day

it’s funny how love truly does trump all

it truly does

even if you’re blinded by the hate to see it

believe it

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Set them free!

There are some ghosts that simply don’t seem to want to leave.

They have made a home in the between; feeling at home in the attic or basement with the other pieces of history.

Comfortable among the cobwebs.

Settled in the still air.

Delighted in the darkness.

One may visit them from time to time and this is where they get their energy.

Though there is no need for them in the present day.

Hopefully they will no longer haunt and soon fade away.

For time is now, in this moment and one can not go back and they can not be pulled forward.

There is no place for them to go and no place to grow.

They are stuck in a trap that opens and closes on both sides.

Time to time they will make themselves known to find a way to let go and be let go.

They are ghosts you are holding in some way.

When you hear them start to stir, through the walls or ceiling, open a window or a door and set them free.

There is no time to wait or hesitate.

They are ready, in full movement and ready to flee.

Do not invite them in.

Do not bring them back to life only for a night.

They are part of a past history.

Let this be their last haunting.

Now is the time to take back the energy.

Steady in your steps.

Let thoughts stream, in the present, is where they need to be.

Look them in the eye for a final time and do not let them come alive.

When the ghosts start to stir, whether it be in your heart or in your mind;

Let them be.

Don’t give them energy.

Set them free.

Open up and let them leave.

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I don’t wanna be a stranger anymore!

Emotions leak through the crevices made by the broken edges of the heart, lies that leak through perfectly glued excuses, what do you believe? What are the things you believe in anymore? Are you one of them?

Do you believe things will get better or will they repeat the same pattern as before?

Who will return to you when the week ends? Will you shut the door on their face?

What does it mean to forgive anyway? Isn’t it a bit redundant when it happens all the time? You get hurt and then you are the one that apologizes to them?

What kind of trouble did your beliefs get you into this time around?

Did you think what you wanted was really the truth? Or you just wanted to be truthful for once with someone?

What are these secrets that you would die to protect? What is this form of security around your heart and mind that keeps you from living your life as you want to?

When I see you taking a step back, I want to take a step forward, the more you purse your lips, the more I want to pry them open, what is it that you think when you look at me looking at you like you’re the only person in the room, the only person in the world?

Walk with me, along this line of trees, along this endless shore, along the houses that might be ours sometime in the future,

What is your favorite color of the sky? How does it feel when you have nothing left in your life to protect so you turn that need to protect to other people no matter what the damage that does to you?

What is this need to let others push you down from cliffs and from buildings just so you can feel the fall and feel alive just for a short while?

You’re not going to feel anything when you hit the ground, you’re going to have to start over once again, with someone new, make a new set of beliefs, brainwash yourself with new memories,
someone new to chase, someone new to protect,

What will happen when your illusions shatter? What will happen to your heart?

I feel like an outsider in your world no matter how much we talk,

I just don’t want to feel like a stranger in your life anymore.

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A coffee date! (By Mayuri Gopani aka Misnaming Diaries)

A boy and a girl from different backgrounds fall in love regardless of their upbringing. Never had this feeling before.
It was a glorious , beautiful day ..
We’d left the coffee shop but then he pulled me inside ,saying “c’mon, let’s be basic cool dudes and get some pumpkin spice.
I don’t like coffee. I never had.
But when he handed over to me with that blushing face and a cute smile on his lips , it was the best thing I’d have had ever tasted.
My hand still tingled where he grabbed it.
And then we had a little chat him asking me
“Who do you like?” He whispered
And I looked away but deep inside I wanted to let him know that it is you , you the thousand times and more. You are the only one I could think about. You’re super cool , handsome and funny..and I always love the way you tilt your hairs..
But unfortunately I looked down at my cup and shrugged my shoulders.
He looked at me “as if he already knew what was the truth” and said “what if I tell you about mine?” Will you tell me yours.-?
Okay I said.
And then the story begins !.

.
.
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Please follow them here.

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Stages of Infatuation!

First-ever romantic gestures strung up on display for the world to see, strangers become witnesses to pleasant uncertainty. Not wanting to confuse kindness for interest, the mind wanders. Flowers die in winter; how could she ever know this could possibly bloom? My mind gone, yet my body present. Seemingly mundane movements leave me breathless. I touched him with an icy hand, trying to ignite the same fire and curiosity that he had set alight inside me, forever coursing through my veins, burning through my very seams. Intoxicating eye contact can’t help but look away. Stolen kisses in the dead of the night. Our hot, steamy breath competing against the cold that is July. Lost in each other, forever entwined. Perfectly crafted puzzles of our own creation. Left forever falling to the thought of you. Time is too precious, and how I adore every minute with you. When your eyes melt into concern and ask those few simple words, “You okay baby?” I realize nothing could be purer. Although not so everlasting as I intended. The perfectness was bittersweet. Nothing but a mirage, disguised with thick perfumes and smiles that could hide desperation. Indecencies now paint these paper-thin walls. You could do anything that you pleased, as long as it kept you, and you did. You created your own work of art on my very seams. You were only tainting me, so I showed no mind. Free to expel every desire you craved. Your fingers painted away at my skin. Teething away at me. If only your presence had lingered like the ink splotches and braille you marked me with. It’s not a bruise, just an ink spill. You vandalized my outer surface. I let you nevertheless. I would have done everything to make you happy, I did too. At the risk of me. At the risk of losing myself, and I did too. I broke myself trying to make you want me again and again. You could feel it in the air, the quiet weeping, the sad sob stories left behind closed doors and within tear-soaked pillows. The kind of pain that makes you want to scream. The worst part was that you saw my pain. I’m sure you felt it too, and I’ll never forgive you for that. I let you be my everything, and for that, I blame myself.

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Seven Minutes!

One time when my cousin and I were talking
He suddenly asked me if I’ve ever experienced witnessing a solar eclipse
I just smiled
Thought of you
Then said, “Somewhat.”
He asked why I said “Somewhat”
I explained to him that a solar eclipse lasts for seven minutes
Seven minutes just like my love for you.

On the first minute
My heart was beating so fast with joy
On the first chance that I got to see you
I thought before that only blue or green or brown are the only beautiful eye colors
But with each time I get to stare into your onyx-like eyes
Which contained all the secrets of the universe
I realized that I was wrong
I realized that I could also fall in love with black eyes
I just had to meet you.

I also implanted in my memories the moments I got to spend with you
I also gave more thanks for the moments when I was able to talk about you with a smile on my face
I even thanked the universe and God because they allowed me
They gave me a chance to meet you
To experience having you in my life
To have seven minutes to be happy with you.

On the second minute
When I looked at you once again
I suddenly remembered what my friend told me
As a warning if the time ever came that I get to witness a solar eclipse
“Be careful and don’t stare for too long.
You might be enamored by its beauty,
Get blinded, and fall.”
I suddenly remembered that because he was right
I stared at you too much
I glanced at you too much, not realizing that I was already falling for you.

On the third minute
Just like any person witnessing a solar eclipse
I was suddenly visited by the words “I wish”
I wish I did so many things differently
I wish I didn’t rush everything I needed to do
I wish I didn’t allow myself to be defeated by my emotions
I wish I immediately told you that I loved you
Because yes, I loved you before
And until now, I still love you
But I got scared
Scared that I wouldn’t be good enough for you
But I wish
I wish I said and did all the things that my heart was telling me
And didn’t let fear or doubt reign over my heart.

On the fourth minute
Yes, I admit that there were many “I wishes” that crossed my mind
But just like someone who is glancing at a solar eclipse
I was content when it came to you
I was content that I get to look at you
I was content that I get to see you smile
I was content in knowing that you were happy
I was content for the simple reason that you were on my mind anyways.

Yes, you’re on my mind
In the morning, you’re on my mind
Have you had your morning coffee already?
Have you had your favorite food yet?
At lunch, you’re still on my mind
I know that you’re busy but please eat lunch and not just drink coffee
Because I don’t want you feeling weak
At night, you’re even more on my mind
Are you going straight home
Or are you gonna go out with friends or eat dinner
Or maybe, if you’re free
Can we see each other
I’m sorry if you’re getting annoyed by my repeated invitations
But I wanna see you
I wanna see you because sometimes
I’m not content anymore that you’re just on my mind.

On the fifth minute
I was slapped by the truth that
It hurts
That it already hurts
That you’re already hurting me
Because I keep giving you so much love
That you never bothered to notice.
I thought that I was okay
Because I thought I was used to it
But it hurts even until now
Why is it that the things we consider beautiful
Are the ones that will hurt us so much?

The fragrant rose with many colors
Will hurt you when you poke yourself with its thorns
The beautiful view at the peak of a mountain
Will make you suffer until you can’t endure it anymore
And will make you give up
The goals and dreams that we like to immerse ourselves in
Will drown you in loneliness when they don’t come true
A person who will knock on the door of your life
And before you even open the door, they will let themselves in
And when they enter, they will suddenly grab your hands
Pulling you closer to them
Until the moment comes when you’re staring into their eyes
And you won’t realize that you’re already falling for them
Only for them to let you feel that they’re only just a dream.

I knew that I was gonna fall for you
And I tried everything I could so that I wouldn’t get hurt
I tried to control my emotions
I tried to not desire too much
I tried not to have too much hope
I tried everything to stop myself from getting hurt
But I couldn’t stop myself from loving you.

The sixth minute
Is when the moment came when I realized that
It was almost over
The seven minutes I’d be with you was almost over
The moments that were so happy that I couldn’t get out of my mind were almost over
And the words “I wish” arrived once again
I wish that I’d be given more chance and time to be with you
Even if it were just for one year
Even just one month
Even if it were just a day
Because yes
Yes, I’ve accepted that maybe we’re not meant for forever
But I’d be happy if I could just have one day of you
I wish and dream to be your sometimes.

The seventh minute
Is when the moment of farewell came
Goodbye
It still hurts so much to say “Goodbye”
But if the time ever comes that you need me
Don’t worry
Because even if I don’t know what will happen in the future
And even if the world separates the two of us
I will search for you
I will look for you
And I will return to you over and over
Just to experience once again those seven minutes with you.

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Manasvi Nimgade

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Bhavesh Sahu

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Kiss me!

Kiss me, that’s what you said.
You always say that every time we are alone.
You say that the very moment I step into your home.

Kiss me.
Those two words echoes through my brain and then my body vibrates.
You hug me, I try not to hug you back.
It takes all my will not to return it to you, I badly want to.
To feel my body close to yours.
To be yours.
Be yours.
Be only yours.

Kiss me.
Something about the way you say it, commanding yet hushed.
A beckoning call, that I must indeed, kiss you.
Something that sounds authoritative yet I cannot help but concede.
I fold, I follow.

Hence, I no longer lean back when you lean in.
I just wait until your lips lands mine and despite this feeling, this ecstasy…
so heavily euphoric, like the smoke filling my lungs when I consume my cigarettes.

I want you.

I’ve never wanted anyone like this in a long while.

I want you to want me the same way I do.
And you do, you do want me.
Only in the way you want to.

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Richa Talreja

(400th post guys ❤️)

Do check out Ms. Talreja’s amazing artwork!

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And her art page ID here!

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Bupa dentist Melbourne…less than others (Kavita Choithnani)

The grand’s of the family would always work that the whole family should remain
together and live happy life in the same way the bupa is such head which would
take care of the different countries regarding their health and teeth.
Bupa dentist Melbourne would take caution of services like they made the
standards for the purpose of fees, make hospitals, rating hospitals according to
their treatment, rating of the doctors of different fields.
The dentist which would work according to the standards given by the bupa
syndicate is come to know as bupa dentist Melbourne. The procedure need to be
as per the instruction and guidelines given by the bupa as it would keep the
patient its priority.
Bupa would also provide the fees chart according to which the fees need to be
charged by the bupa dentist Melbourne. The bupa is a category of safeguard that
it would charge the minimum price of the treatment and also the medicines. All
the points related to the before treatment and after treatment need to be
discussed before the treatment.
For keeping the teeth surviving the bupa dentist Melbourne would work
altogether with the team and work for that. Removing the chain of teeth through
the root can be done and also the treatment to put the new channel of the teeth
can be done and if the patient want any cleanliness of teeth they should take
advice from the dentist is compulsory as it can harm due to heavy usage.
Factors need to be considered before choosing the dentist that it should be of
bupa dentist Melbourne as it would have all the knowledge related to the patient
problem as well as the procedure which need to be carried to solve the problem
through the expertise.

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Chirag Parmar

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Rajvee Dedhia

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Manasvi Nimgade

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You’re irreplaceable!

I know that it hurts at first, it cuts deep into your childhood wounds and all the times you felt you weren’t good enough. It takes you back to all the times you weren’t chosen whether it was your basketball team at school or the first job you ever interviewed for or the first person you ever loved. It reminds you of all those times you felt so replaceable, so rejected and all those times you wanted to be picked but you ended picking yourself up instead.

But here’s what I know for sure, sometimes not being picked for something you wanted is exactly what you need to redirect yourself or your life. It’s exactly what you need to pick another sport, another company, another career and another person. It’s exactly the kind of guidance you pray for and at first it may seem like the answer isn’t in your favor but it ends up being the best decision for you. I once read that sometimes what didn’t work for you actually worked for you!

Sometimes not being picked has nothing to do with you. Maybe you didn’t meet all the qualifications the company was looking for or maybe you were overqualified and they weren’t able to meet all your expectations. Maybe the company didn’t hire you because they knew you would have a voice and ask for a lot of changes they were not ready for. Maybe the person you wanted didn’t choose you because you were so sure of what you wanted and they were lost. Maybe you’re not the kind of person that’s going to reward inconsistent behavior or lies or disrespect and they don’t want to deal with any of it because they’re not looking for anything serious.

Sometimes people replace you because they didn’t get the chance to know who you really are and what you can offer and that’s not your fault that they couldn’t see that because the moment you feel replaced is the moment you remove yourself from that situation or that person. It’s the moment you stop trying. It’s that moment you can’t erase because for a second, you feel like everything you did wasn’t enough but just like anything in life, there’s always the other side.

There comes a moment after when you walk into an interview and you feel like you’re being appreciated and treated with the respect you deserve. The company is willing to do whatever it takes to get you onboard and you didn’t have to chase after all the managers for a follow-up. There comes a moment when you meet someone and they don’t hesitate for a second to show you how much you mean to them and how lucky they feel to be in your life. You’re not guessing where you stand with them or if they like you enough or if they care as much you do. There comes a moment when someone makes you feel irreplaceable and you will recognize it in an instant because now you know the difference and now you can see the signs.

Because I think the law of life goes something like this; those who made you feel replaceable are easy to replace but those who make you feel irreplaceable are the only ones worth holding on to.

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It’s too late!

My entire life I’ve tried to be a people pleaser. To do anything and everything to make people happy, to make them stay. Maybe that stems from my abandonment issues, my fear that everyone I love will leave.

I’m flawed in so many ways. I don’t always brush my hair, most days I get up for work 30 minutes before I need to leave, my skin isn’t clear, and my outfits aren’t always planned. I’m not a perfect person, but then again, I’ve never claimed to be.

Before I say more, I want to say goodbye, and thank you. Thank you to all of the people who never believed in me, to everyone who left and decided I wasn’t worth the trouble. I also want to thank everyone who was there, who always had my back, who stayed by my side while I figured out who I was.

But if you’re reading this, it’s too late… The guy you knew before is gone. You crushed his confidence and made him believe he wasn’t good enough, you made him believe he would never be good enough.

You don’t know me anymore.

This guy got up. This guy is smart and mature. This guy has people who love and support him. This guy has confidence and is determined to do something with his life. Nobody’s stopping this guy—he’s on fire.

This guy is more than enough.

He’s better than the jealous girls and fragile men who spread rumors about him. He’s better than the voices in his head that tell him he won’t make it.

This guy is loving and kind. He is successful and will make something of himself, no matter what it takes.

If you’ve come to find the old me, he’s gone. It’s too late.

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Watch me go!

I saw you last night.

First time since I “broke your heart.”

You called. I answered.

Your voice crackling with desperation, begging to see me.

No part of me wanted you.

Still, I went.

Two a.m. love.

Actually, not love.

Artificial connection. Sex.

I wanted to be touched, but not by you.

I don’t regret it, but I will never go back.

You pulled out.

I cried.

Seeing you in front of me.

A stranger.

You begged me to stay, to let you hold me.

I panicked.

I felt claustrophobic, trapped.

I ran.

So fast.

4:30 a.m.

No one in sight.

The silent streets gave me the answer I was looking for.

They whispered, “Never again.”

I agree.

I trusted you once.

With my whole heart.

A trust unearned, undeserved.

You broke me.

Breaking my heart in a way you knew would sting.

Infidelity.

The only kind I couldn’t justify.

Emotionally charged, historical, connected.

Ex-girlfriend.

Blonde.

You were being too attentive.

Something was off.

I cracked the code to your iPad.

Four digits you hid so well.

I read the texts.

“Do you feel guilty about yesterday?”

She did.

You didn’t.

You kissed her.

In the car.

The car we drove in together.

Her airpods in the center console.

Did you think I wouldn’t notice?

Your hometown.

Me, a visitor.

Adjusting to your habits, your needs.

Being the good girl.

The one who does the laundry and the dishes.

The one who makes you coffee in the morning.

The one who cuts your hair because the barber is closed.

That’s not me.

Never has been.

But for you, I sacrificed.

Too much it seems.

Your family telling me how happy you looked.

Not happy enough.

You were greedy.

Still are.

Needing attention from your girlfriend and your ex.

I wanted mine too.

Instead, I channeled it into you.

All my love wasted.

My fault.

You were never capable.

I knew that.

Now?

You’re obsessed with me.

Of course you are.

You watched me walk away.

You see what you lost.

My ass out the door, your ass stepping in.

I saw the light on the other side, you finally saw it in me.

You only started giving because you got caught.

You fucked me, thinking of her.

Now, you will fuck another, thinking of me.

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Let it hurt!

They say,

Let it hurt then let it go.

I think you should know… I never let it go.

So free, but always running.

Restricted those lies to myself.

Pulled back the curtains and allowed sunlight in,

only to close them once more.

I cannot remain true to myself while constantly pretending I was alright.

I cannot remain true to myself while pretending it didn’t cut me up like knives.

I pulled the dagger out from behind me, but I cannot complain when I run headfirst into it.

I owe no apologies for these self-inflicted wounds.

I take full responsibility for the pain I have caused myself.

I repent and I invent,

I’m shedding everything I thought I once knew, because I cannot remain in the pain of being stagnant any longer.

They say,

Let it hurt

Then let it go.

Here I am being casted away pretending we never meant a thing.

We went from auburn colors to a faded black.

Colors so dark I wasn’t even sure how we mixed so brightly in the first place.

Let it hurt, Let it go

Though I’ll have you know, I’m not sure I ever let the pain consume me.

When things ended, I felt nothing.

I’ve become so numb to your tears and so dull to my fears I wonder if I still even have these emotions left inside me.

The pain I caused you, I feel sorrow for.

These regrets that consume me are slowly catching up.

I’ve been traveling and I’m obsessed with the beauty of the world.

I’ve been traveling and I’m obsessed with running away.

What am I running from?

Who am I running to?

Because doing this alone, I was starting to resonate on the thought of missing you.

I guess I never listened.

I never let it hurt,

So I still have yet to let this go.

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Is this love?

One day, someday, today, the light will come.

It creeps up, the crawling dawn sleepily lolling over the horizon. The light is gentle and warm and glowing, dripping; melted ice cream across the window pane.

Can you fall in love with the way early morning light presses into bookshelves, spreading warmth into cold corners of the room?

It will seep beneath your skin, a layer of heat that blossoms from rose buds kissing the inside of your elbows, teardrops of sweat beading along translucent folds. I am tantalized, infected, enamored.

If swollen lips should tingle against soft skin, aching, searching, does this mean I’m in love? I don’t mean love in an endless sense, in the way you dream of romance as a child. All white lace and church bells ringing high, singing promises of forever.

I mean in love in the way that your heart aches when you fall into bed, crushing worn jersey and soft flannel into exhausted limbs. That feeling of peace when you come home from school after a hard day to be met with arms extended and heart open, ready to be cradled while the darkness passes into nothing.

But the light will continue. It will bubble and fester until it is too blistering to simply press your tired eyes together and bask in the pleasure of the heat.

No, this light demands you. Your attention, your mind; your voice, your body.

Before you know it, they have arrived. The sweet talkers, the soothing voices, the well-meaning and the well-mannered. The hellions, the soul crushers, the confidence eaters. In whatever form (and don’t be surprised should they shift before your eyes), they will come, and they will try to steal this. They will see your light, maybe before you see it yourself, and in their way siphon this from you.

And it might even feel good when they take from you. Punishing you in the way you’ve always felt you needed to be punished, justifying your worthlessness, highlighting the caves that swiss cheese the inside of your ribs, the weak tissue of your body that has been waiting, hoping, holding its breath until it could let go and collapse and fall fall fall—release into itself, into nothing at all.

We cannot help but seek fullness, roundness, in this life. To fill the dark parts with soft cotton soaked in sweet cream.

It is then, in that moment, when you realize what has always been true. They could never take from you what is you, what you are made of. Starlight and moon-dust and all that is beautiful on and in this earth and far beyond.

Maybe this is just the magic of the early morning, or the feeling of smooth coffee coating my tongue and throat, or the faint taste of honey warming my lips. But I feel hope in the tender parts of my stomach, radiating.

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I hope you never stop!

I hope you never stop believing in love.

Even when your heart is broken, and your trust is shattered, and you have a sadness that seeps into your blood and rests within your bones, I hope you continue to fight for love. To be open to receiving love. To continue to believe in love.

I know it’s hard.

I know it’s easier to tell yourself that love is not for you, that it is the thing of teenage fantasies, and the plotline of romantic comedies, and something reserved for other people. I know it’s easier to believe somehow the lie that you are not lovable, that there is something inherently broken within you, that you are better off alone.

I get it; I do.

But I hope you resist the urge to hold onto those lies and instead realize this to be true – you are worth loving, and love is meant for you, too.

Yes, even you.

So please remember to keep believing in love. Believe in the thing that lights your soul on fire, the thing that makes your heart feel as if it cannot stay within your chest. Believe in the goodness that makes you feel as if you’re standing in the sun on a warm summer day, and as if you’re a child on Christmas morning, and as if you’re someone who has never seen the fall of fresh snow.

I hope you continue to believe in the tender moments that can only exist within two people. A silence that is not scary but comforting. A deep understanding of the light and dark that lives within another human’s heart. Tangled limbs and tangled words and a feeling of connection that the dictionary has yet to name adequately.

I hope you continue to believe in the strength that comes from giving your heart over to another human – and that magic is born from your bond and your union. It’s the kind of magic that can move mountains and make you believe that anything is possible.

I hope you never stop believing in love – for love will never stop believing in you.

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AWARELESS TO AWARENESS ❤🌈 (By Siddhi Sheth)

“When did you decide to be gay? What happened to you? You’ve changed? That’s so gay!
that person doesn’t really look like a man/woman” ?

We all have heard people saying things like this all the time even in a random conversation.
Why is this community of people looked down upon? Well, let’s become more aware of
what the LGBTQ community really is and learn how we all can overcome our deeply
rooted gender biases and be more accepting of people of our own community.

LGBTQA stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and asexuality & allies.
Allies are heterosexual and cisperson who extend their support to this group of community
and, significantly, we encourage them to be accepted by our patriarchal society by giving
them equal rights, freedom just like individuals who choose to identify themselves as male
and female.

Talking about gender sexuality lies on a spectrum, belonging to this wide range of spectrum
doesn’t make people indifferent. We have been oppressed by our rigid cultural and
education system which typically lacks awareness about what sexuality is. People who
identify themselves as queer or gay are not born gay or bisexual but they instead choose to
belong to a different gender just like a heterosexual cisperson chooses to identify
themselves as male and female. Suppose you have a friend named Ted and he likes to eat
pizza with pineapple toppings which of course you don’t like buttttt this doesn’t mean
you’ll abandon your dear friend right? Ted is much more than just eating pineapple pizza!

He is firstly a human being and might have all those qualities that you possess so why is it
that we have difficulty accepting them as our people? Possibly because we have our
stereotypes and prejudice that we hold onto due to the influence of our culture,
environment, and political view around us. So how do we educate ourselves and others
around us? We can begin by looking for specific prejudices that we hold and learn why we
hold them in the first place? Wearing certain types of clothes doesn’t give us the right to
make assumptions about what gender an individual belongs to and that doesn’t mean that
we should discriminate against people from wearing things according to their preferred
style.

Society, in general, has imprinted criteria into our minds which influences our perception
about how we ought to behave, how a male and female should dress which makes a
community or a culture very reluctant and rigid to accept people belonging to diverse
sexuality. one thing that it fails to acknowledge that choosing to be homosexual, bisexual or
queer is not a phase or a fun thing to do it takes a lot of courage to come out there is a
misconception that coming out makes things easy which is the not the case. If we as a
community let people decide to be whatever the heck they want and let them live, we live in
a democratic country where everyone is allowed equal freedom of choice and freedom of
expression.

To sum it up, people of diverse genders are “normal” and holding stereotypical beliefs
against them will not only affect them emotionally but also psychologically. Accepting our
deeply rooted patriarchal belief and becoming aware and educating ourselves and not
letting it influence our belief is a way we as a society can become truly democratic.

Everyone deserves to be respected despite section 377 being legalized. We still need to work
towards LGBTQ awareness and treat them with dignity. By assisting to the marginalized
LGBTQ community we can help them earn socio-economic status. Creating awareness
groups to educate schools and colleges to prevent bullying.

By including parents in
activities can help them be more inclusive and accepting, by implementing LGBTQ
friendless policy in the workplace will encourage more acceptance among employees.

A short poem by Fritz Perls,
I do my thing and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectation,
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you, and I am I,
And if by chance we find each other,
It’s beautiful.
If not, it can’t be helped.

~SIDDHI SHETH
(heterosexual Allie

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A letter to that friend who’s hurting!

My friend, this world is oh so intimidating. All I wish I could do is set you free from all the hurt and brokenness surrounding you right now.

No matter how many movie nights in we have and stunning sunsets I show you, I find myself still getting that late night text from you with the words “I feel so alone”, and it eats me apart inside that I can’t help you more.

Because you deserve more than this.

You deserve for your mind to love itself. You deserve to be surrounded by people who care about you way too much. You deserve to enjoy moments that are oh so special. And you deserve to feel like a badass woman.

To be completely honest it’s difficult seeing you like this. Someone who is a light in my life, has their light shut off right now. You’re appreciated more than you know.

We both know that ultimately it is you that is going to decide whether this world is worth pushing through and fighting for. I am just here to help you see the positives in it. I’m being honest when I say that when I think about your future all I can see is how far this world will take you. The places you’re going to go, the people you are going to meet, and the gem moments you are going to experience. You just have to hold on and get yourself there.

And I know you are probably rolling your eyes after reading that. You’re most likely thinking, “Do you really think it’s that easy, are you crazy?” Well, maybe a little crazy but I am choosing to show you how strong you are through my eyes and many more. All I want is infinite love and joy for you always.

I hope you come across this again when times feel a little less like you’re walking through mud. I hope that you are healing and you can start to understand why you broke.

Stay positive, love.

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Castles in the sky!

I always wondered what it would be like, playing house with the person you love.

Our imagination works to create a fairytale like the ones we grew up reading.

My mind painted a picture of white duvets and breakfasts in bed, where we talk about the lives we’d lead if we were just a bit younger and just a bit more naive. The winding road trips and the cartons of blueberries and your ‘60s mixtape. Finding old lottery tickets, ghost stories, your hand in mine, Sundays forever.

The white picket fence, replaced with a castle in the sky.

Don’t you feel like the walls are caving in? you ask me one night. You’re sitting on the couch in a dress I’ve never seen. People say to hang art on the walls. To give the illusion of space.

You have a faraway look in your eye, but I ignore what I see and listen to your words instead.

We drive to your parents to pick up the paintings. Four paintings of a rose.

Her favorites, your dad says as he packs them in the back of my truck.

I hang the roses. I see a garden, but you see the spaces in between.

We felt everything after midnight.

The piles of dishes, the unmade bed. The stack of papers on the desk, with your scribbled words that read: all we’ve ever wanted is everything.

The mess inside my head and the truth inside of yours.

So I ask what you want, and you tell me you want your heaven and you want your dreams.

I write to you to say that I’ll be the first to hang your pictures on gallery walls, to play the songs you write, to read your old stories and watch the scenes you star in.

I pick up the phone and stare at the ceiling.

The piles of dishes are gone. The bed is made. The stack of papers left with you, all but one that I keep in a drawer.

Stars dance next to me on the bed where you used to lie. You tell me the stars are dancing next to you, too.

I thought our home was those four walls, but our home is the sky.

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It sleeps!

I sleep, and the sickness sleeps with me.
It curls up safely inside me, making itself right at home.
I wake, and the sickness wakes with me. keeping me company in every motion, every inhale, every exhale. the sickness is a sucker for theatrics.

It drowns me in discomfort, it torments my body at every twist, every turn. and when the sickness is done admiring their handiwork, it hands me the broom and the dustpan on its way out the door, leaving me to clean up the mess.

It promises to be back when i wake the next day. do not fret, you haven’t seen the last of me. it’s an invisible crest I carry with me, a scarlet letter of sorts. do not get too comfortable, the sickness taunts. it threatens to make a mockery out of me, bringing me to my knees in submission.

The sickness has made a warrior out of me; I train daily for another opportunity to outsmart it, evade it, destroy it once and for all. but the sickness has secrets, a private arsenal I am not privy to. it is always one step ahead of me, no matter what I bring to the fight.

Most times I wonder: what does the world see when they look at me? do they just see the illness, the ugly, the scars, and the bruises? do they only see the war-torn shell of a human, making a fool of herself every chance that she gets? do they see weakness, do they lament my pitiful efforts? am I just another walking liability, a tragedy in mortal form? they must not see the talented gifts and passions that I possess. no, they must not see the daughter, the sister, the friend. the elusive illness ruins the party once again.

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You deserve someone who decides to do more than just staying!

I am tired of hearing we deserve someone that stays. We deserve more than that. I have been a witness to many relationships where partners had no intention of leaving but we are worthy of a love that is more than taking up residence on the other side of the bed, more than having a body on the other side of the dinner table.

I’ve been there. Been in a relationship where I knew I could trust their fidelity but I should not have trusted them to love me. On my bad days this person only made them worse, found ways to make themselves the main character in every story. They never took the time to understand me, slowly stopped touching me or listening to anything I had to say. I felt alone even with them sleeping right next to me. I knew I deserved more but I listened to others when they said “but they are a good person”. My own therapist even looked at me as if I was expecting too much. I wasn’t and you aren’t either if you’re wanting more from someone who isn’t making you feel valued.

You deserve to be put first, to be someone’s first thought at the rise of day. You deserve to be uplifted, words to hold you when the world lets go. You deserve to be rooted for, someone with arms raised for you on the sidelines. You deserve grace, someone to hold your imperfections with soft palms. You deserve to be desired, to feel want inside the grace of their fingertips. You deserve to be known, someone who’s memorized your favorite color, your coffee order, favorite flower, time of day, the wishes you’ve whispered in your sleep and all the things that give you butterflies. You deserve to feel whole, someone who would never take away from your precious life.

Please don’t settle for someone who only stays. I know loneliness can get the better of us but being with someone who causes more grief than joy, or isn’t adding any effort to your days will only leave you feeling more hollow. Demand more for yourself. Have the courage to wait for a love that you are deserving of. We deserve more than stay.

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I dialed !

I dialed your number hoping you’d pick up the call
That we could just pretend
Pretend again for the moment that everything is as it should be
It happened without coaxing, without pretense, without pressure
It seemed so easy and I visualized you picking up on the third ring so that you didn’t seem too eager
I’d ask you what you were doing and you’d tell me how you were thinking of me too and hoping that I would call
That you were just waiting for a moment of opportunity to know that you weren’t alone in your feelings
To know that you weren’t the only one replaying the memories over again in your head of the things that we said that came out as empty notes of acceptance and letting go
And we’d laugh
We’d laugh
We’d laugh and forget about the pain in our voices
All of the truths revealed that to be honest, neither one of us could really forget
I visualized the inflection in my voice as you spoke to show that I was genuinely happy to hear from you and that this wasn’t just a moment of weakness
I pretended we’d agree to meet over coffee the next day and catch up on life awkwardly scanning between each other’s eyes and our surroundings to gauge how honest the moment seemed
But you never picked up
I let it ring and heard your tone over the voicemail – something that used to seem so familiar but now felt so disconnected
I tried to hide the emptiness I felt welling in my heart
I hung up before the beep – All the words escaping me that could have left a message
“You called?”
I barely opened my eyes as I read the text message the next day
“I dialed you by accident,” was all I could say

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My daughter is not ours!

I’ve never been much of a man. I barely crack 5’6”, can’t handle my liquor, and I’ve never been in a fight in my life—but when Lainie got pregnant, I decided it was time for a change. I started working out. I learned how to change the oil and tires on the Buick. Hell, I even bought a pistol. I was going to protect them, Lainie and my unborn child both, whatever it took.

I could tell Lainie thought it was all a little silly, my newfound quest for manhood. It was easy for her to say. She was doing her part. Carrying the burden of life inside her, while all I could do was hold her hair, in the early stages of pregnancy, as she puked into the toilet—and sometimes I even fucked that up. She seemed to think she could do it all herself, and she was probably right. When I brought home the gun, she was livid. All we needed, she said, was a baseball bat. And someone strong enough to swing it, she might have added.

I took it back the next day and bought a Louisville Slugger instead.

The baby came without a hitch—little Annika, looking just like her mommy—and what we lacked in protection, Lainie made up for with near-neurotic preparation. She had it all; the books, the vitamins, the breastfeeding techniques. But perhaps her favorite new mom-toy came in the form of a Kiddos Baby Monitor that she got at the baby shower. I can’t remember who gave it to her.

It gave off a small hum, scarcely a whisper, every single night. Vague static; white noise—interrupted, only on occasion, by a cough or hiccup or whimper from sweet Annika. She wasn’t a fussy baby at all. The monitor rested on Lainie’s nightstand, securing my wife like a second quilt. A small red dot, indicating the device was alive and well, dimly bathed the room in crimson, and an optional display provided a blue-tinted camera feed aimed at Annika’s crib. We could hear her, we could see her, and all was well in paradise.

Oh, there were tough times, sure. The jaundice was bad and it led to things even worse. Pneumonia. Strep. Infections no fun for an adult but an enormous goddamn deal for a baby. We spent plenty of time in the hospital. The nurses all loved Annika. They always remarked on what a well-behaved baby she was.

The marriage grew stale, but what marriage doesn’t? The sex was rare and forced, just another thing for Lainie to check off her to-do list. Was it ever really not that way, though? I tried to remember, but life before Annika seemed trapped in a cloudless haze. Becoming a father seemed to alter the very structure of my brain.

The first year came and went. The Kiddos Baby Monitor ran out of batteries, and we never bothered to replace them. Annika was crawling. Then walking. The first word, spoken at the dinner table, which Lainie and I were both there for: Mango.

The words kept coming. Mommy. Diaper. Full. They were all expected, yet all met with excited applause from her mother and me. And then, one day, while Lainie was at spinning class and I was doing the newspaper crossword on the couch, Annika piped up from her playpen with a word I did not expect.

Fa-ther.

I sat up, straining silently to listen, sure I had misheard. But then it came again, even clearer than before.

Fa-ther.

Most dads would be thrilled. I was confused, and frankly, a bit unnerved. I had no idea where she’d learned that. I was always ‘daddy.’ In fact, as far as I’d seen, nobody had ever so much as breathed that word in front of her. Yet there she sat, squawking away, giving voice to a word uncomfortably formal as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

Father. Father. Father.

Lainie didn’t seem as interested as I did. In fact, she seemed more than a little bit miffed—Annika had been growing more distant from her lately. This was the age children usually clung tightest to their mothers, yet Annika seemed to have no such proclivity. One doctor theorized that Annika might be having her needs met through another source—did she have a stuffed animal she was particularly attached to? A blanket, maybe? We could think of nothing.

We had her tested for autism. Hell, we had her tested for everything. Nothing could explain her level of detachment from us, nor her remarkably tame behavior. The professionals had never seen anything like it, but didn’t seem to think it much cause for concern.

“Count your blessings, friend,” one of them told me in a heavy English accent as he escorted me from his office. “Between you and me, nine out of ten kids her age is a right little shit.”

Still, we couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. One night, Lainie had decided she’d had enough. She dug the old Kiddos Baby Monitor out of a box in the attic. She put new batteries in it, rewired the camera in Annika’s room, and for a few hours, the white noise hummed beneath our sleep once more.

I awoke to the sound of Annika babbling away in her crib. I turned toward the monitor, and my eyes swam, barely open, in the sea of crimson from its light. She was repeating the same word, again and again.

Fa-ther. Fa-ther.

I rolled over toward Lainie. She was still asleep—Annika wasn’t being very loud. I stumbled out of bed, wiping my eyes, and picked up the monitor. My fingers fumbled for the switch on the back, and when I flicked it, a dull blue glow sprang from nowhere. I squinted my eyes to see into Annika’s crib, and I let out a strangled cry. The monitor slipped from my hands and crashed to the floor. Lainie woke with a start, mumbling.

“Whatsamatter?”

But I couldn’t speak. Someone was holding my daughter.

Without a word, I ran into the hallway, not even bothering to grab the Louisville Slugger from the closet. The door to Annika’s room was open. My socks slid out from under me and I crashed to the wooden hallway floor as I reached it, and as I lie prone I had a clear view into the bedroom.

Annika sat up in her crib, crying wildly for a change, startled by the noise. Nobody was holding her.

“I swear to God, honey—”

But Lainie wasn’t having it.

“The first night we start using the monitor again, and it just happens to be the night an invisible man breaks into our house? And leaves her placed all neat in her crib where he found her?”

“He wasn’t invisible, and I can’t explain it, Lainie, I’m telling you what I saw.”

“Alright,” she said, as though humoring a child. “What did he look like?”

At this, I drew blank. I couldn’t exactly describe him—I hadn’t looked long enough. I felt that I had seen him before, though. Somewhere. I felt that seeing him at all, even in a completely non-threatening context, would have made me deeply uncomfortable. But I didn’t know how to explain this to Lainie, this vague recognition. So I just shrugged. She scoffed.

“Jesus. What am I supposed to do with this.”

But the whole thing had her spooked, I know it. That night she told me—if you hear anything from the monitor, anything at all, you wake me up right away. So I did.

Father. Father. Lainie’s voice rang out above the dead white noise.

Lainie snatched the cooing monitor from her bedside table less than a second after I’d woken her. She sat up and flicked the switch.

Lainie shrieked a horrible sobbing shriek. She flung the covers from her and leapt from the bed in one fluid motion, leaving the monitor face-up on the sheet behind her. On it I could see the man, cradling Annika with a light bounce, more clearly this time. And in a flash I knew exactly who he was. And this time, I stayed right where I lay.

It took Lainie a long time to calm Annika down—that scream had put a good scare into her. I don’t think Lainie even noticed that I never came in. By the time she got back to our bedroom, the lights were on and I sat on the bed, spread out with a couple of her old college photo albums.

She walked into the room and stopped in her tracks. She looked at me, at the albums, and back to me. I think in that moment we both knew it was over.

“He wasn’t in there,” she said after a long pause. “I know what you’re thinking, but it wasn’t him. Nobody was in there.”

“Fine,” I said. “But he was on the monitor. You know he was on the monitor. Why, Lainie?”

She looked down at the albums, at the old pictures from which Will Harding’s dumb fucking face grinned up at both of us, feigning innocence.

“Father.”

She looked at me, and the guilt shone in her eyes.

“Will’s the father. Not me. Will Harding.”

She started to cry. I stood up and walked out of the room, pausing a few inches from her face to say, softly, almost sweetly:

“You’re a real bitch, you know that?”

Then I left the house and never walked back inside. Lainie brought all my stuff to my new apartment a couple days later. The divorce went through quickly; she didn’t want it but she understood. She, of course, got custody of Annika, having the tremendous advantage of not only womanhood but of actually being Annika’s biological parent. I didn’t fight it. It’s amazing how quickly I stopped loving both of them.

Will Harding was a big, brash man. He had tattoos, muscles, and watched football and drank beer and got mean when he did. That’s why Lainie left him, after two passionate, terrible years. She once told me she married me because I was everything Will was not. But it wasn’t long before she realized that by the same token, Will was everything I was not. I guess old habits die hard. And three months after Annika was born, so did Will. He found out that Lainie had had a baby and came to the house. She shut him out, screaming at him that he wasn’t the father, he wasn’t, he wasn’t. But he knew—she was lying. So he got real drunk and real mad and didn’t put on his seatbelt and on his way back to our place he sped his fucking Camaro up a curb and into a big brick mailbox.

Lainie went to his fucking funeral. She told me she was getting her teeth cleaned.

She sent me a Christmas card last year—she and Annika, smiling underneath a hearth in cheesy red sweaters, stockings hung on either side of them. I looked at the little girl I used to call mine, now seven years old, and felt nothing. I wondered absently if I should feel guilty, and if I’d somehow failed as a dad. But those thoughts, often though they came, never lasted long. She didn’t need another father—she already had one, after all, and she seemed to like him just fine.

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Learn to love after trauma!

It’s hard to imagine that there might be other people who have endured trauma and might be experiencing similar roadblocks as mine. It’s a harsh reality, albeit comforting to know I may not be alone, to think someone else might have to feel these gut-wrenching emotions and battles.

Now over half a decade ago, I was in an emotionally, physically, and psychologically abusive relationship. Through my naivety, I had no idea I was dating a true sociopath for much of my young adult life. I’ve written page after page about these experiences. I have talked hour after hour in therapy about these traumas. I have worked long and hard to heal these scars and rebuild my own identity. I have come to terms with the horrible things that happened to my mind, body, and spirit over those five years. I gained strength, courage, and advocacy for my own self-worth. It took a long time, but I found peace. I found myself again.

I always knew my trauma was an old friend that would sit in the corner, never fully leaving the party. However, I learned how to protect myself from his harsh glares and biting words. I knew I could live with these memories and continue to learn from them. My internal battles were mainly fought and won. But now I’m realizing, all these years later, another war was waiting over the horizon. I had no idea how much more work I had to do until I started to love again.

Granted, my trauma has haunted many relationships since. It finds the smallest cracks to seep into and rips apart any chance at a connection. I have consistently had trust issues. I have sabotaged relationships with good, kind men for no reason other than it didn’t feel right. These were all minor battles, foreshadowing of the war to come. These minor characters in my life were never the ones I loved deep enough for the gates to open. So, they came and went in my life, never causing much of a commotion.

Things started to change when the real, “sometimes you just know” kind of love came to me. The effortless kind that seems to make you levitate. I found someone that reminded me I have a soul to give again; it was so easy to give. My old friend didn’t start to rock the boat until I was fully invested and fully absorbed in this love. And then, after a few months of bliss, he started to show his hand. My anxiety started to rise. Small things were becoming red flags. Trivial issues started to look like foundational problems. My own reality started to warp and I questioned every single one of my instincts. Am I overreacting to this? Am I being gaslit again, or did I cause this? Have I been the problem all along? At the peak of this emotional response, that debilitating feeling of anxiety that seems to consume my whole being, I find myself thinking, I wouldn’t wish this on my greatest enemy.

I drown in these thoughts, these inconsistencies, these anxieties. How do I recognize if I’m being abused again when I can’t trust my own brain? Is he yelling because I yelled first, or is it because he has anger issues? Is his apathy because I cry so much or because he completely lacks empathy? My impulse to protect myself kicks in during an argument and my voice needs to scream louder and firmer to make sure it’s heard. It remembers what it feels like to be small and suppressed. My body needs to be bigger and stronger because it remembers what it feels like to be taken advantage of. My heart fights to be nourished and cared for because it remembers what it feels like to be broken.

Then begins the endless cycle of self-loathing and regret. Those actions and words were not the real me. I worked so hard to rebuild and process this trauma, it is not possible I’m still damaged. All of those walls I have built to keep predators out were knocked down when I started to trust again. Now I second guess everything out of fear. My logic says that everyone is an enemy, but my heart sees the kindness in their souls. Where does the truth lie?

I wish I had a cathartic ending to this war, something to write in the history books. But I am learning. We all are learning. I hold out hope that one day a balance will start to form and I will be able to trust fully while not losing all of my strength. My internal conflict of overthinking will subside and the truth will become clearer. Until then, I will have patience with myself because even making it this far is a cause for joy and waving banners. I will find strength in the idea that maybe, possibly, I am not alone.

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Ekansh Khatwani

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I’m in love with the wave of you!

We deserved better timing. You deserved a better name than The One That Got Away. Our connection held a magnitude far beyond that cliché. It was kinetic – the kind you felt in the atoms that held the space between your skin and mine.

I mistakenly began to live in the book of you and I, not realizing you were just visiting a chapter of me. Both of us writing the words – you the epilogue, me the prologue. Even in our ending we balanced each other out.

I learned a lot with you. I learned that fleeting can still be impactful. That heartbreak is capable of compounding. While I was healing from him, I was hurting over you. Because while I was healing from him, I ended up hurt over you.

But the beauty of life is the dichotomy that she often dances within – and while I was healing from him, I was also able to attract you. While I was healing from him, I was able to open up to you. While I was healing from him, I was being inspired by you. While I was healing from him, you built me a safe space to do so.

In another lifetime you stayed a little while longer but in this lifetime I met you right after him. The Universe has a sick sense of humor. How do I mourn something that was never mine? Am I allowed to? How do I turn off the lights in the attic that holds the ephemeral moments of you. Are they even mine to keep?

Your t-shirt was only meant to be something borrowed and now it has found a home in the back of my closet as a reminder. A lesson in the form of an oversized Harley Davidson t-shirt.

I was a sinking boat that you pointed back home and I’m left here navigating the waters trying to accept you as the lighthouse instead of the shore I make it back to.

Until then, I’ll be swimming in the memories of the time I, for a brief moment, got to surf the wave of you.

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This too shall pass!

I know you are having a really hard time right now. And I know that “really hard” doesn’t truly sum it up…not in the least. If we are being real here, I know that right now you are feeling pretty devastated. You are hurting, both inside and out, and you can’t figure out how to make the pain go away. Your thoughts feel way too heavy and overbearing, and you don’t know what to do. You can’t figure out how to make things okay again, or how to convince yourself that it’s okay to be happy, or that there are things to be happy about. Instead, here you are, curled up in a ball on your bed, just trying to make your way through the darkness. Hurting on your own, while the rest of the world keeps moving on around you. I know how much it hurts, and how fatigued you are from just trying to keep your head above the water. I know how exhausted you are from holding the tears back and I know how scared you are feeling to be so alone and lonely in this dark space. You want help and support, but you don’t know what kind of support you need. You don’t know who to turn to or what to ask for, because you just don’t know what will help. You have no ideas left as to what will lift this heavy haze, this immeasurable sadness. You would love for someone to throw you a life preserver, but of course, it’s not that easy. You would love to take a Tylenol or get a good night of sleep to wash away the hurt, but you know that neither of these will fix the problem. You know that this is no quick fix. So you continue to tread water, and pray that someone or something will send you a “cure” to this immense pain.

I can’t fix what hurts. And I have no magical dust that will bring you immediate relief. But I can bring you hope. Or at least, I can encourage you to remember that hope exists. I can remind you of how loved and cared you are, despite the pain you are in. I can remind you that you are still loved and cared for, even when you are sad. And I can tell you that I hope things will be better for you soon. I can have hope for you, in the hopes that you will try your hardest to also have hope. And believe me, I know how difficult it can be to find hope when everything feels so very dark. I know what it feels like to have nothing to hold onto, nothing to steady yourself with, and nothing to believe in. But I still urge you to try. Try to be open to having hope. Because above all, even when things are awful and heavy and even when life feels insurmountable, the secret is learning how to have hope. It is learning that faith exists and that faith is real. It’s reminding yourself, over and over again, that you can have faith in tomorrow. It’s learning that the load will ease up in time. It’s learning that life ebbs and flows and that the goodness will outweigh the darkness in due time. All I ask of you is that you try your very hardest to trust that things won’t feel this way forever. Because they won’t. And knowing that things will get better will give you something to fight for.

And sometimes you have to remember that the universe is huge, and you are tiny, and that something somewhere out there in that vast open sky, is watching over you. Maybe it’s God, or the heavens. Maybe it’s a supernatural spirit. Maybe it’s magic, or maybe it’s your loved one looking down on you through the light in the sky. Or, maybe it’s just the stars and the sky and that bright shimmering moon that are shining light on you, letting you know that you are safe, that you will be okay.

And please know that even when you are sad, you are still so very special. Even when your heart is burnt out and your soul is tired, you are still so brave and strong. Your light still shines, even when the hurt is reflected in your eyes. And when you are sad, I hope you remember that you are something so precious that the universe made only one of you. And when things are hard, I hope you don’t forget this. I hope you don’t become so afraid of life that you forget how to live at all. Or that you forget to believe in yourself. To believe that you are capable of healing.

So if you are struggling right now, know this. Know that even though life can be so intensely painful, even though it can hurt more than you could’ve imagined, it won’t be this bad forever. The pain won’t stab you so hard forever. Eventually, it will subside. And you will be okay again. You will be you again. And know that even though you may feel like you have nothing left to live for, you always always always have something to live for. You are so loved. And there are many people out there just waiting to know you and love you. So hold on. Pain ends. Fear ends. Anxiety ends. And in time, the sunset will look much more like a sunrise. In time, the nights won’t be quite as terrifyingly lonely. And in time, you will find your way again.

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One year of you!

June

It wasn’t love at first sight with her but familiarity – the kind that only deepened the more our paths crossed, like walking on uncharted territory and feeling at home.

July

I told her I was bad with directions so she drew me a map showing me the way to her heart and told me that if I ever get lost, she can be home. I knew then that I was slowly unraveling, my secrets spilling out, our souls intertwining.

August

It was always an adventure with her. Even when we were just lying side by side on a rainy day talking about our dreams, it was a completely different world of our own. And I never wanted to leave.

September

The end came as silent as the leaves falling in autumn. There was no deciding moment; one day the leaves were falling then the next, the trees were bare. Our time has run out.

October

Suddenly it was raining gasoline and I was made of paper, and her name was a lit match. I set myself on fire every time I let myself remember.

November

Home suffocated me, and her face was painted all over the places we visited; there were too much of her, of us. I slept with the lights on and my doors open, hoping one night she’d come back. But she never did.

December

I saw her again and I could no longer recognize those eyes anymore. I wanted a goodbye that was concrete, something that could answer my questions, to bring out when I look back, but all I had was one last look of the face I loved turned into a stranger.

January

I had extraordinary days here. But the bad days were all that I could recall recently. They were drowning me and I couldn’t breathe without hurting my ribs. I needed to get out, to escape, to run away from here.

February

I waited for loneliness to make me want to come home. It never came. Where is home?

March

She’s been in my dreams recently; the kind that even when you wake up, you could still feel it, as if it really happened. In them, all my questions were answered and all our wrongs were made right. We were back to our place, and she was back to tracing constellations of promises on my skin. I heard her say my name and I swore, I almost wanted to come back home. But I woke up and nothing has changed.

April

I saw her picture on my timeline today. And I wish I could say that I didn’t feel anything but I did. It wasn’t an entire ocean drowning me, or an earthquake shaking my world, but drops of rain on my skin – not too much of a feeling but enough to be felt.

May

Spring was almost over. There was a cherry blossom tree near my new house, that reminded me of us – how short-lived its beauty was yet it was a blessing to have witnessed it. Thank you. I’m okay now.

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Thank you!

It can be quite hard for us to let go. Once we find someone who we connect with, it’s not easy to simply walk away. It can take us years to finally realize when it is time to go, and even then, letting go is not the easiest thing to do.

So, when the people we love abruptly leave our lives without any explanation or warning, it can feel like a shock to the system, like being thrown off of a moving train. We would have stayed on forever. We would have rode it right into the sunset.

Ghosting is an awful experience for anyone who has ever had to experience it. It is painful, it is harsh, and it is often a form of cowardice on the ghoster’s end. The warmth of love and affection is suddenly replaced by a harsh, cold winter. It can leave wounds that many struggle to heal from. As painful and enduring as it is, it can also be a way for us to get off a train that we don’t even realize we should not be on.

As Bob Dylan once said, “When something’s not right, it’s wrong.” Sometimes, things need to end before we even realize they do. When someone ghosts, it says more about them than it does about us. However, ghosting presents an unusual opportunity for self-healing. We often expect others to give us closure. We seek it out like a dog, calling and texting for that one last chance at it. Sadly, we never get it from those whom we seek it, and even when we do, it can feel terribly anticlimactic.

Ghosting presents us with the chance to give ourselves the closure we seek. We get to end the story how we want to. We get to tell ourselves that we loved and gave it our all. We get to analyze the relationship and understand where it went wrong in a way that helps us heal. As selfish as that sounds, we can give ourselves what we need to move on.

It is never okay to ghost someone. Everyone deserves clear and direct communication so that all parties have the opportunity to heal from the situation. However, not everyone has the empathy or the ability to do so, and what we can do with the circumstance of being ghosted is to let it allow us to be our own healers. We can give ourselves the very thing that the ghoster refused to give us, and that is the ability to see our own strength.

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Importance of a male best friend (By Priti Dalwani)

It never occurred to me that how my life would be without my male bff? I’ve never taken a moment to realize that how my life has been at an ease and comfort ever since he has joined me. He has now become an integral part of my life. Having him is like having a brother who is there to guard me but not a brother, you get me.! Having him is like having an ice-cream which would never cause me flu. I think i’ve always been selfish on my part, as he has never complained about not receiving the equivalent amount of love that he has always showered upon me. He’s the one who has made me believe that guys are sometimes good assholes to have around and to talk with. He has helped me in restoring the faith that not every guy with whom you cross your paths is for sex and relationship. Girl friends are great but having a guy best friend is beyond a feeling. Although, most of the male friends are annoying but these motherfuckers are worth to be annoyed by.They are the ones who introduce you to the world of profanity and its benefits. They are the most useless and precious at the same time. I hate their vulgar side but not much enough to abandon them. They are creep but they’ll pay attention to your cribbing side. My girlfriends are my skin, with me through thick and thin but my guy friends are spine, they bloody support me survive this cruel yet lovely world. I don’t wanna fall in love with them because i feel love comes along with destruction and at least in this lifetime i am not willing to forego my precious treasure in the name of love.

You must decide what’s really enough!

You must decide what is enough.

You must decide what is beautiful enough, what is successful enough, what is stable enough, what is wealthy enough, what is good enough.

You will never be at peace in your life unless you decide what is enough.

So do it. Draw a line in the sand.

You get to decide what a good outfit is, you get to decide what makes you look best, you get to decide what a good day at work is, you get to decide what a healthy day of eating is, you get to decide what a successful week, month and year looks like, you get to decide what constitutes a healthy relationship, you get to decide what’s the right hairstyle for you, you get to decide.

When you decide what is enough for your life, it means you are no longer on the endless, bottomless, vicious cycle of constantly trying to improve.

When you do not decide what is enough for you, you let the world dictate what is enough for them. And you cannot please everyone.

When you do not decide what is enough for you, you ensure that you will never, ever arrive.

Nothing will satiate your need to feel “better” because your emptiness is open-ended. It’s a bottomless well.

The incredible thing about deciding what is “enough” for you is that it directly counteracts perfectionism.

The question is not: “what is the most ideal thing I can fathom here?” it is: “what do I really need to survive, what do I really need to be okay, what is it that really makes me happy?”

When you are thinking of what your dream life would be, you are always going to fall short. This is actually not the foundation on which you can go about building a happy, peaceful existence.

Instead, you have to decide what is enough for you to feel okay.

Decide what kind of home is enough, what kind of clothes are enough, what kind of work is enough. When you do this, you begin to realize how very little you need.

No longer are you trying to fit and meet everyone’s expectations. No longer are you trying to edit yourself into some version of who you might, one day, become. When you decide what is enough for you, something magical happens. Everything around you starts to be enough.

When we are finally conscious of what it is we really need, we set a lower bar for what it takes to achieve it. When we do that, we feel more accomplished, fulfilled and healthy.

We are finally free to enjoy our lives because we are not constantly trying to fix and improve them.

Do you know what happens when we start behaving like self-respecting people who feel worthy, affirmed, and successful? We start creating worth, affirmation and success like never before.

The trick of it is that when we are resistant to determining what is “enough,” we are really hungry to self-hate ourselves into change.

This is not how it goes.

Instead, we become paralyzed and uncertain, we seize up and feel like we can’t step forward. It is from this place that we make our worst decisions. You cannot be a self-hating person and expect to build a loving, healthy life.

When you decide what is enough for you, you become a self-accepting person. Then you start to behave like a self-accepting person. Do you know what happens when you do that long-term? You build a life that someone who loves themselves would live.

You have to do it now.

If the money you have now is not enough, it will never be enough, no matter how much you make. If you are not happy with who you are now, you will never be happy, no matter how much you change. If you do not appreciate your relationships now, you will not appreciate them no matter how many you have.

Successful, empowered, happy people try to tell us this all the time. Only sometimes do we listen.

You are your own foundation.

You have to approach your life from a place in which you feel as though you are not constantly reaching for something unattainable.

This doesn’t atrophy your ambition.

This makes you whole, more motivated and empowered than ever before.

The irony about deciding what is “enough” is that eventually, it creates more goodness than we could ever fathom, far more than we would let ourselves have before.

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Losing Originality

People accept us for what they want us to be,

And not for what we really are.

The result: we try to possess

Qualities desired by others

So as to be appreciated by them,

Thus, losing originality of ourselves.

Depression exists because we try to look at ourselves

Too much in comparison with others,

And try to manipulate our negative qualities.

With the positive of the others

The result of which is: we discover our internal nakedness.

When we discover our nakedness,

We begin hiding our true selves

And become different persons

By trying to put on different qualities,

We don’t possess, thus losing originality of ourselves.

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You’re allowed to thrive!

You’re allowed to thrive.

You’re allowed to dig deep into your soul and find the things that lift you up and give you purpose and feed them. You’re allowed to nourish them and cultivate them in your own life each and every day. You don’t have to wait for someone to give you permission to begin. You don’t have to coast by, you don’t have to fly under the radar, you don’t have to live in a way that doesn’t let people see your shine – you are allowed to flourish.

You are allowed to thrive.

Yes, you.

You’re allowed to thrive in a marriage or a partnership that makes you want to lasso the moon. You’re allowed to wait for the kind of love that sticks. You’re allowed to wait for that person who feels like home, and your best friend, and your biggest cheerleader all rolled into one human being. I hope you hear me when I say that you do not have to merely settle into your marriage or your forever partnership.

You don’t have to settle for struggle – you’re allowed to thrive.

You’re allowed to thrive in a career that makes you feel excited to get up for work every day. It’s ok to want something that fills your heart and your bank account with meaning. It’s ok to wish that the two would co-exist. (They can.) Just as you wouldn’t settle for the great love of your life, I hope you wouldn’t settle for a career that leaves you empty, either. Let yourself shine in the skills that you have, and stop beating yourself up if you flounder within that discovery. It happens to the best of us. The trick is not believing the lie that you will flounder forever – you don’t have to. You’re allowed to thrive.

I’m not telling you that there won’t be moments of struggle. Of course, there will be. There will be moments of struggle, and moments of floundering. There will be moments when you think that you’ll never break through the surface or see the sun again. The key is remembering that you don’t have to stay hidden beneath the dirt for forever. You were built to grow, to bloom, to blossom and to flourish.

You were made to thrive.

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I think my daughter is killing people!

I’m 90 kilos (down from 120 during my years as a starting lineman at Gujarat State), 6’4” when I slouch, and used to getting what I want from people.

It’s been an adjustment accepting just how weak that Kiara – all 26 kilos of her – can make me feel.

I know that I’m not supposed to give my ten-year-old daughter anything that she wants. But when she gets moody, sulky, or irrational, and I know that I’m the cause – well I just don’t feel all that strong anymore.

She’s used to getting what she wants from me. I guess the apple doesn’t fall very far, huh?

Anyway, that’s how I ended up on a cruise to Mexcio.

—

Kiara loves reading about history and other cultures. That shit comes from her mom, without a doubt. Reading was something that I only ever did out of necessity. But she tore through books about Aztec, Olmec, and Mayan cultures faster than I could figure out how to pronounce the titles.

She researched the cruise herself, and even made a fucking spreadsheet about prices and excursions. She asked to take a family trip, I said no, and we booked it shortly after that.

—

I’m used to feeling strong. Nothing made me feel weaker than the times when Kiara was hurting. The night terrors when she was five left no memory with her, but I’ll admit that I cried when I didn’t know what to do when she woke up screaming. When she fell out of a tree at age eight, I started the precedent of buying her anything she wanted. That began her reptile phase; I bought more toy lizards and dinosaurs than I knew existed. By the time she was nine, I was actually skipping prime Sunday NFL time to watch ballet recitals.

I know that the best parent isn’t an indulgent one, but it’s hard to be confident on the day that you realize that your child is more intelligent than you.

—

“Remember,” the ship’s guide announced to the group, “this stretch of beach is a nature preserve. No one lives here, no one takes anything from here.” She shifted her sunglasses and looked away from the small tour group and down the ramp to the dock. I scanned her body when her face was turned. Not bad overall, at least an eight. And before you judge me for looking, I’ll have you know that my wife is a ten in my eyes, and she’s the only person besides Kiara who makes me uncomfortably weak.

I’d do anything for my family.

“There’s a Mayan saying about this area. ‘The heart of the land belongs to us all, because we come from the earth. We take nothing from the earth without giving something back.’ It’s a beautiful beach, folks, so please take nothing but photos. My name is Sarah if you have any questions.” She flashed a sweet but manufactured smile and led the group down the ramp and onto the shore.

—

“Look, Daddy, it’s a heart!” Kiara squinted in the bright daylight despite her little pink sunglasses, and handed me a warm piece of obsidian. “Can I have it?”

I took it from her and stared at the rock. It was, indeed, heart-shaped, four inches long, and rather out-of-place on this rocky beach. Everything else was smooth and tan. I sighed.

“No, Kiara, the nice lady said that we can’t take anything from the beach,” I explained firmly.

“I know, but can I take it?”

We took it.

—

“Morning, Sweetness,” I said, tousling her hair as I passed by her sleeping frame, empty coffee mug in hand.

“Mmmmffxx,” she mumbled in response.

I loved getting up early; Kiara hated it. My heart secretly ached when I thought about just how much more of my wife was in Kiara than I was.

She sat up in bed, her hair a wasp’s nest of chaos. “I’m sorry about the bees,” she offered, eyes still mostly closed.

“What’s that now?” I asked, pouring myself a cup of coffee.

Her eyes didn’t move. “When I found the giant bees, I wanted to look at them, because I didn’t know that they could be so big. You told me to get away because it wasn’t safe. Then I laughed and you yelled at me. I’m sorry I laughed. They all yelled at me.” She blinked and looked around blearily. “Well maybe it was a dream.”

I looked at her with mild concern. Heavy sleeper that she was, Kiara rarely talked about remembering any of her dreams. Even the night terrors didn’t leave an impact on her, and she never had any recollection of them the following morning.

“C’mon, Sweet Thing.” I responded, trying to push it from my mind. “Let’s get out of bed. We’re set to go scuba diving today!”

I tried, and failed, to ignore the memory of the buzzing sound that had awoken me the night before.

—

I couldn’t ignore what happened the next night.

Kiara had been reading some books about the native species of southeastern Mexico. Those books had lead to internet searches about different animals, her curious mind never satisfied. “Did you know that some bats have tongues that are longer than their bodies? And that the kraken was probably based on a real giant squid? Dad? Dad?”

I smiled and asked her what we might see on land tomorrow. She dove back into her book, fell asleep within minutes, and I chose to leave her undisturbed.

That’s when she started screaming.

Do you have any idea just how much noise a ten-year-old girl can make? The answer is no, unless you’ve heard one rip the night with a soul-chilling shriek.

She had been asleep on the fold-out couch when she sat up. Still asleep, she opened her mouth.

I was sure the other passengers would report an attempted homicide.

I was able to hold her trembling frame and rock her back and forth until the screaming stopped. Then she fell back over, still out cold, and I left to take a walk.

I was only crying a little.

It was well after midnight, and most people were back in their bunks. My wandering took me to a remote passage near the stern of the ship. The lighting was dim, with weak lamps spaced at fifteen-foot intervals and darkness in the gaps between. In retrospect, I think that it was near the crew’s quarters, but my aimless wandering had no apparent destination.

I nearly shit myself when a man emerged from the shadows.

“Sorry!” The man shot at me, clearly rattled himself. “Sorry. I thought I heard a kid screaming, so I ran out here… did you see anything?” He emerged into the fuller illumination of a hallway lamp. He was just a kid, really, one of the employees of the boat. I guess I really had wandered off the beaten path.

“I…” What could I say? That a screaming kid is exactly what had sent me out here? “Sorry, no. I’m just out stretching my legs.”

The kid didn’t seem to relax. “Okay, sir. Why don’t you head back to your bunk? I’ve been hearing a lot of-” Here he cut himself off and looked into the air like he had sensed something odd. I was about to ask him what it was when the sound came.

Do you have any idea what a hiss mixed with a growl sounds like? Neither did I. But here it was, creepy, eerie, and extremely discomforting. It was followed by an odor so overpowering that it nearly knocked me to the floor. It smelled of fish and decay.

That’s when the spider’s leg emerged from the shadows on my right and slammed onto the floor.

I was far too shocked to react at first. It was eight feet tall and had crashed into the metal walkway right next to the kid. He froze, completely pale.

Then the other leg landed right next to him. The hissing growl followed, horrifyingly vibrating the floor.

And I saw that they were not legs at all.

They were wings. What had seemed like giant spider legs were actually the claws of an enormous bat.

Shimmering green scales hung down from the appendages like jewels. What I was seeing was completely impossible. It made no sense at all. So I turned to run.

But to my left, in the darkness on the far side of the weak lamp, I saw the tentacles. Long. Green. Filled with suction cups, tipped in a triangular appendage, at least a dozen of them. The owner of the tendrils remained in darkness.

We were trapped.

And then it got worse.

At first, I thought it was a snake crawling across the floor to my right, arriving to complete the impossible unholy trinity of coils from the darkness. Then I realized that it was a tongue. It slithered across the ground, half a foot wide and five feet long. It left a trail of thick, gooey saliva in its wake. It turned and rose up in the air like a snake being charmed, and lovingly tapped the kid’s neck. Ghostly white, he stared wide-eyed at me. The only part of his body that he was willing to budge was his lips. He mouthed a silent “Help Me” before the tongue spun around him like a vortex, pinning his arms to his sides, and sliding its thick, slimy tip into his mouth.

The kid slammed to the floor, and the tongue dragged him into the darkness with a sick screeching sound. He never broke eye contact with me as he slid into obscurity. Soon all that was left of him was a dropped nametag, oozing with thick saliva, the word “Corey” just visible in the dim lamplight.

Only when I started to breathe and move freely once more did I even realize that I had been frozen in place. I looked to the left, and saw the green tentacles slide away as well.

Two thoughts bombarded me at the same time.

Get back to the room and make sure your family is safe collided with If you leave him now, Corey will certainly die.

What would you have done? Answer that before you judge me.

Because I turned to the left and sprinted toward my family’s room.

I know that he was someone else’s kid. But his father wasn’t here. Kiara’s father was.

My fears grew with each step. As I raced back to Room 3191, I was almost certain that I could see the tip of a tentacle whip around every corner just ahead of me. It was as though the thing was taunting me, and doing a damn good job of it.

I heard the door creak shut as I sprinted around the final corridor to our room.

No no no no no no no no I reached my hands out, sweaty and shaking, and grabbed the handle.

It opened easily.

But what I saw was not so easy to understand.

Kiara was still asleep on the bed, the light shining dimly just above her. Four tendrils slithered across the floor, then rose up into a space above her head. But instead of reaching out and grabbing my daughter, they were being sucked into oblivion, disappearing impossibly into thin air. The tentacles whipped back and forth at a faster and faster rate as they got shorter, in the same way that the end of a piece of spaghetti vibrates electrically before the tip is finally sucked up. In a sudden moment, the tips were all pulled in and disappeared as Kiara opened her eyes and sat up.

She stared at me sleepily. “Dad, I had a really bad dream.”

That was last night. This morning, we woke up to the ship buzzing with rumors. One of the employees seems to have disappeared. Nothing has been confirmed for certain.

But I don’t need confirmation. My daughter accidentally killed someone, and I intentionally let it happen.

Nothing can change what just happened. Nothing.

But for now, I’m trapped on a ship in the middle of the Caribbean, and I’m terrified about what’s going to happen next.

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