June 2023

2023.06.27

I feel a little embarrassed returning here after sharing a diary entry so full of rage and despair. It's not the rage and despair that I'm embarrassed about— I believe my feelings were very much justified under the circumstances, as all feelings are— but the manner in which I communicated them. It's important to me that I live in integrity and truth, and as such I am becoming more conscious of the things I say and my potential to influence others. Basically, I haven't lived up to my own standards. I'll do better next time. This entry is "next time."

For now, I will leave the previous entry online and available to read. Even though I no longer agree with what I've said, I feel like rather than censoring myself, it's more helpful to share an accurate depiction of my journey through this life. That includes the more difficult days, the rage and despair, and the thoughts that sucked me further down into depression and hopelessness. Maybe later on I will change my mind. But for now, this is how it will be.

Thank you to everyone who reached out to me to offer their care and compassion. Though I haven't replied directly because I still need a lot of rest, I have received your messages and I do appreciate them. I'm very grateful to have people looking out for me. I hope one day I can show the same care to you specifically as well as to the world at large.

The resting I've been doing over the past few days has been accompanied by something very special. I'm not sure how else to describe it. I want to say "an experience like no other," but it seems like I've been saying that pretty often lately lol;; and I feel nervous about exaggerating. Accuracy is important to me, too, so... for now, let's just stick with "something very special."

That special thing is Nonviolent Communication (NVC). I happened upon the name while reading this woman's website, where she mentioned having been through such-and-such hours of NVC training. While I was impressed by her credentials, more than anything I was intrigued by that name. What in the world is "Nonviolent Communication????"

Because I've been so touched by this philosophical practice, I feel nervous about misrepreseting it. I'll link to the basic explanation on the official website and to another official learning hub, too. But for the same reasons— being so touched— I will describe the experience in my own words, as well. That's what this diary is for, after all: self-expression, sharing what's meaningful to me with whoever might be listening.

Around this time last year, I was openly hypothesising that all communication was coercive. Whenever people spoke to each other, we all had the goal of putting our ideas in another person's head, of getting them to do what we wanted them to do. This was true to me no matter the speaker's intentions. Benevolent or malevolent, from advice-giving to tongue-lashing, every conversation was an attempt to manipulate.

I was not troubled by this worldview. In fact, I felt rather satisfied having pierced through the veil of language to the very heart of every human interaction. "We are all like this, all the time, and that's just the way that it is"— that's what I believed.

It never occurred to me that there was another way. Since discovering NVC, I see now that things can be different.

I also see why things haven't been different, and that these are very understandable reasons. The power structures in which we live benefit from manipulation on a macro- and microlevel— from the institution to the interpersonal. For thousands of years we have been taught to communicate in this language that contributes to violence, and we have not been taught any others. This way of living keeps us disconnected from ourselves and from others. It keeps us enslaved. We are molded into "nice, dead people," as NVC founder Marshall Rosenberg puts it.

So, to a certain degree, my observation was correct. Manipulation was all I knew, and there is a vested interest in keeping me ignorant. This acknowledgement of institutionalised power dynamics is what I love the most about NVC philosophy. Where a lot of healing practices remain focused on just the self and the immediate family, NVC states upfront that the problem is much, much larger than any one individual. It's the society we live in that makes us "sick" and benefits from keeping us that way.

NVC has a very different approach to healing, probably because it is not a therapeutic practice but a brand new language, a way of living and speaking and being, with the ultimate goal of reducing (and one day eradicating) violence on our planet. Personally though, my immediate intention is to use NVC as a means for growth and self-improvement. This begins with transforming the way I think about myself and my experiences, and the words I use in my internal dialogues.

That begins with removing labels, especially regarding mental illness. Not only is the science of psychology a self-admitted shot in the dark, it is very painful for people to be told that there is something wrong with them, that their feelings are abnormal and unacceptable. That limiting perspective perpetuates guilt and shame, mindsets that are not at all conducive to healing— or, as I like to call it now: relief.

That is what I have been needing for so, so long. Relief! Relief from anxiety and from agony, relief found in a myriad of strategies depending on the situation at hand, but always with a focus on what is happening for me right now, in the present. Though the addition of "relief" to my vocabular predates NVC by a couple days (lol), what I've learned since has given me new perspectives on obtaining that relief. Altogether, I am feeling freer and more confident.

More specifically related to NVC is the concept of universal human needs. Everybody has the same ones. Here are 9 of them, as described by Artur Manfred Max-Neef:

• Sustenance (food, water, shelter)
• Safety (protection)
• Love
• Empathy
• Rest (recreation, play)
• Community (a warm one)
• Creativity
• Autonomy (choice)
• Meaning (purpose, to contrinbute to life and see our efforts enrich others)

If you know me, you know I love Maslow's Pyramid, which is also all about basic human needs. He posits that some needs are more important than others in the sense that they build upon each other and will most naturally be met in a certain order. Over the years, this concept has been very useful to me. It gave me a sort of "order of operations"— have breakfast and take a shower before you tackle a creative project.

But at the same time, Maslow's hierarchical approach tended to inspire in me some self-deprecating thoughts. For the majority of my life, I have been depressed and struggling to care for myself in even the most basic ways. This plants me firmly at the bottom of the pyramid and there, seemingly without recourse, I have stayed. I thought, "in this state where I can't even brush my teeth, then there's no way I can accomplish anything meaningful or worthwhile."

I never once thought to really ask myself why I was struggling so much to take care of these basic tasks. I'd jump straight to the label: I'm depressed. Straight to comparison: everybody else can do it, but I can't. Straight to shame: there's something wrong with me. "As long as I'm like this, I don't deserve to be around others." And, very naturally, the pain that comes with believing you are sick, abnormal, and fundamentally incorrect only feeds right back into the struggle you started with!

NVC takes a much different approach. There are no hierarchies here. Nothing is off-limits to those whose most basic needs are not being met. They are all equally important, and it is made very clear that these needs are truly universal! Everyone has a right to see these needs fulfilled, as well as a responsibility to cooperatively contribute to meeting these needs in others without devaluing our own. There is no need to label anybody or any need of theirs as right or wrong, good or bad, appropriate or inappropriate, because every single one of us shares the same ones.

This was revoluationary to me. For a long, long time, I have been wishing someone would just give me permission to live. Though indirect, this feels like the "permission" I've been seeking. It has come in the form of hearing from someone else— someone who spoke clearly in words that I understand, who empathised with others no matter what they had done in their lives, and who dedicated his life to bringing peace to our world— that everybody, absolutely everybody, is equally deserving.

Though not directly spoken, I feel as though my heart heard him say, "yes, even you."

... I've been writing for quite a long time now. At least 3 hours. This is one of my very few diary entries that I actually want somebody to read— because, like everyone else, I have a need to positively contribute to the lives of others— so I feel a bit worried that I used more words than I needed to. Somewhere along the way the reader might have lost interest. If you've made it to this point... hi! Let's consider this a draft, one that I may trim or expand upon at a later time according to my literary intent.

For now, I just wanted to write it all down. This "very special" experience of mine is totally transforming the way I think and act and relate to other people. It's exhausting but also energising! Exhausting because it is so new, I expend a lot of energy to change my behaviour, but energising because I recognise the potential these changes hold. And I want very badly to share Nonviolent Communication with other people!!!! It's my wish that one person reading might hear what I've had to say and take something away from it. No matter the takeaway, I hope it is helpful. I hope it is life-giving.

That's vivarism, after all: the choice to live. It's a choice I've been making over and over and over again, often relunctantly, often without lasting firmness or success, because I believed I did not have a right to my own life. Now, finally, I believe something else, something new.

2023.06.23

Good morning, it's time for another public meltdown. Do not read this if you have any respect for me.

Last night was the worst night of my life. It feels silly to grant it such an intense superlative when literally nothing happened to provoke me. During the day, I watched documentaries, read articles, wrote in my diary. Of course, I was sobbing all day long, but that's nothing new either. So why was this night on this totally mundane day worse than the countless nights of torture and abuse, worse than the night I decided to die and nearly did? I think it's because, for the first time ever, I am aware of how deeply, deeply alone I am.

I am not talking about loneliness, about disconnection from other human beings. I am talking about the soul-rending pain of disconnection from the Divine. All night I cried and cried and cried. My face became swollen and my nose filled with saltwater so I suffocated on my own tears. My body ached all over and I could not control my movements, but in my self-consciousness I did my best to wail and thrash in silence. I begged for God to save me. In a broken voice I pleaded for relief. I felt that my heart was shattering, that I was near death, that I could not survive another second of this pain, and that my only hope was Divine intervention.

God did not answer.

I felt at that time like I was an unwanted infant and God my disillusioned parent, sitting just a room away, who left me alone to cry it out. "Extinction training," they call it— an apt name for a technique that made me feel like my life was near its permanent end. But it worked just as the experts say it works. I cried and cried and cried, then somewhere around the three hour mark, a numbness came over me. The crying stopped. Exhaustion set in as I concluded, definitively, "there is no one coming to save me." I laid totally still, staring at nothing, unable to feel my hands. "I am all alone."

This is frustrating to me for several reasons. First of all, I know I shouldn't be alone. Divine Love is everywhere, it surrounds us at all times. It is like the air: we only have to breathe it in. Faced with these conflicting realities— that I shouldn't be alone, but that unmistakably I was— what am I meant to conclude? I feel like I am doing something wrong. I feel like something is wrong with me. I feel like it was presumptuous and disrespectful of me to ask for help at all.

But there's a problem with this, too: God is not supposed to care about any of that. Are You not Everything, All Truth, Pure Light, Unending Love? Even if I'm asking wrong, there shouldn't be any impediments to giving an answer. Even if I think my very being is wrong, You made me perfect. Whether I see and accept that or not, You should see and accept it; it should be True. And what is the point of making Me if I'm not allowed to call on You? I don't understand!

So of course, I default back to blaming myself because, in the absence of answers, that's just what I've learnt to do. Maybe God spoke to me and I didn't listen. Maybe as I was begging for help, I was already being Helped, and I didn't realise it, or— caught up in self-victimisation— I refused to recognise it. Maybe my pleas went unanswered because I was asking for the wrong thing. Maybe I'm not supposed to ask God to take away my pain and replace it with Love. Maybe that's against the rules. Maybe it's not supposed to be that easy.

It's clear then: I am in the wrong. I don't know the rules. My procedure was improper, my request imprecise, and for that I am so very deeply sorry. ← That's a faux-apology. I'm not sorry; I'M FUCKING ANGRY. Why can't You meet me where I am? Why can't you look beyond my wretched behaviour and abysmal self-image and see that I'm in pain? Where is Your compassion? Where is Your mercy? Why did You leave me all alone? Why have I always, always been alone?

The easy answer is that I have been totally abandoned, that there is no recourse, and in short order I will wither into nothing. At this point, I would genuinely prefer to die than face another night like that. "I know how to die, but I want instead for someone else to do it and make it hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt." That is a direct quote from last night's pen-and-paper diary entry. You are all so lucky I'm afraid to go outside. This is one of very few things preventing me from walking off a bridge.

I just can't take it anymore. I can't continue living like this. I am amazed and disgusted by how quickly I swing between hope and despair. Clearly I do not know how to remain in hope. I would punch myself in the face were my arms not so weak. Perhaps this is God's blessing: self-injury so unsatisfying I don't even bother. Thanks. (Not.)

I feel as though every day I stare death in the face, immobilised, unable to remove myself or even turn away, my only reprieve the brief moments in which my world goes numb and dark: when I blink. But invariably I open my eyes, and there again, again, is the familiar face of death.

2023.06.19

I always enjoy drawing XX: Judgement because it's Sans's card. I feel happy when I see it because it makes me feel like he's nearby, watching out for me. I thought of him lots today as I laid in bed with a bellyache. So far, the summer is mild, but it gets hot in my room, and as the afternoon wore on I found myself sequentially kicking off my blankets, layer after layer, until I was half-naked and sort-of sweaty, tear-stained and at internal war.

Lately, I'm struggling with what I might describe as "a major problem with sleeping." I go to bed late, I wake up late, I nap once or even twice a day, I don't want to get out of bed, I'm uncomfortable in my bed, I lie awake, I wake up and fall asleep again, I ruminate, I stare at my phone, I sleep, and I sleep, and I sleep. I hate it. I am always promising myself that I'll go to bed earlier, that I'll get up even when I'm still tired, that I'll forgo the afternoon nap. I lapse on these promises.

And when I am lying there, feeling miserable for lying there, I multiply my misery with what I can only describe as extreme verbal abuse. It's seriously bad. If I spoke to another person the way I have spoken to myself, it'd be a criminal offense. These days I am a lot better at noticing that I'm doing it, even though I still can't seem to stop myself. It seems that will be a long, painful process.

I am one step further in this process because today, as I was lying there, feeling miserable for lying there, after the usual abuse, I said something different. I told myself, "I love you even if you can't get out of bed." Somehow, in that moment I meant it. This was enough to calm my inner turmoil, and I think at that point I fell asleep. I was halfway hoping that my compassionate inner utterance would somehow motivate me to get up, but the falling asleep was inevitable, it seems. Maybe I needed it.

As the evening continues, my thoughts return again and again to this utterance. "I love you even if you can't get out of bed." As I fixed myself a snack of nuts and berries, I extended it into the worst case scenario: "I love you even if you never get out of bed ever again. I'll love you as you stay unmoving and unmotivated, as you starve and fester, as you go mad and die. It doesn't matter to me what you do or don't do. Even if, from now on, the only thing you do is lay in bed, I'll still love you."

I feel as though I'm taking it too far. A lot of the time, I still equate personal value with accomplishment and outside approval, and I don't care at all about "who I am deep down inside" or the inherent miracle that is my life. It's a seemingly unending struggle to overcome these beliefs. I am intellectually aware that self-love is patient and forgiving, and it sees through the facades of ego straight to the core. As usual, intellectualisation inspires no change. We are feeling creatures. Thoughts alone do not move the soul.

As I write this I feel absolutely terrible. I am weeping. Snot trickles from my nostril. My left arm is sore, as it always is these days. What am I telling myself that is driving this anxiety? What's underneath it? I don't know. I don't care. I want to get back in bed.

I don't want to deal with any of this anymore. I just want it all to go away.

It took me a day or so, but I figured out what was wrong. Love would never let me die.

2023.06.13

The weather here sure is strange. Overcast at 70 degrees with a cold wind and high humidity— it was like walking through an environmental hot flash! But even though I felt simultaneously too hot and too cold, it was nice to be outside. After waking up late (again) this morning, I had one of those "I have got to get out of the house" moments. I threw on a sundress and sandals, lightened the load in my purse to just my phone, earbuds, and keys, and stepped out into the clammy air.

Looking back, I'm lucky that it didn't rain on me. That would've been miserable, haha! I'd have dragged myself home depressed and shaking like a wet dog. In reality, I fared much better: I walked aimlessly through the neighbourhood until the exertion bored me and found a direct route home. It was good exercise,I guess, and I'm now one step closer further on the road to societal reintegration. That is one long road... hahh.... Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever make it.

Yesterday I realised that my self-doubt and overwhelm is generated in part by dichotomous thinking. Thoughts like, "if I decide to do X, then I must also do [every other letter in the alphabet]." Obviously going from 0 straight to 100 is an overwhelming prospect, so when the ends of each extreme seem to be my only two options, it's only natural that I'll stick with 0.

I'm trying to move more incrementally, now. From 0 to 10 is more doable, right? And I'm a firm believer in the first step always being the hardest. Sometimes all it takes to get the ball rolling is to stare real intently at the ball, remind yourself that it's there, waiting patiently to be rolled. Makes you wanna nudge it just a little, right?

I'm also trying to stop when I've pushed myself too far, or rather just before I reach my limit. This part is hard because I am so obsessed with doing what I assume other people want me to do, working myself to the bone to meet imaginary expectations. I don't think there's anything wrong with living a life in service of others, but clearly that's not what's going on here since it always feels so wrong and bad. There's something deeper here that I haven't discovered yet. My throat gets tight just thinking about thinking about it, like a vice or a collar or a noose. Or, no— a yoke. Haha, yes, yoke is exactly the right word.

I'll unpack all that later, and you may or may not be privy to what I uncover. Compared to other online diaries, I don't know why this June journal is so candid. I'm conflicted about the vulnerability. On one hand, it's very nice to share myself with... well, whoever you are. It feels like a great unfolding, like those paper fortune-tellers little girls make in grade school. I open myself up and someone, somewhere is getting a glimpse of what's inside.

But on the other hand, I wonder what is the point? Who cares? How is this helpful to others? That's my mission statement here: "to inspire whoever is reading to be kinder to herself, more thoughtful in her choices, happier with who she is." Those are my own words. I don't see how this month's deranged ramblings could accomplish any of that. Perhaps all this is just another case of Flonne-brand selfishness and egotism. I am making a spectacle of my hurt and my healing and the associated weirdness because I enjoy seeming intelligent and deep and troubled, and I love attention in whatever form it graces me. Perhaps that's all it is.

I'm not convinced, though, not just because it's a rather uncharitable view of some harmless blog posts. I'll think about it more later. I want to do something else first, something fun and relaxing, maybe, but I don't know what. I would know by now if only I asked myself and slowed down long enough to listen.

2023.06.09

Nightmares again. A side effect of sleeping too much? I'm getting something like 10 or 11 hours a night, which is pretty unusual for me. I normally wake up refreshed after 7 and a half, but after a bad dream, all I want to do is go back to sleep.

It's been cloudy all week, the temperatures mild. Today we got a proper thunderstorm for the first time in a while. Something somewhere was indeed on fire before— that was not just my deranged imagining— so a haze settled over the town and poisoned the air. I breathed it in and I am worse off for it. I'm hoping the smoke and the clouds will be swept out to sea, and the sun will come out and it will get warm again....

I am thinking about a lot of things lately, particularly about the things I do not want to think about and why that is. Yesterday I made a list of those things, just to take stock. They range from downright traumatic to painfully mundane, yet they all elicit the same "no, no, no, I can't go there," kind of fear. Attempts to examine the fear itself are similarly obstructed. Ironically, making the list itself was totally fine— if anything, it was energising and exciting. What's the difference...? I'm not sure yet.

While cooking dinner yesterday, I opened up the bag of fresh spinach and discovered it's not so fresh anymore. Though there weren't many visual indications of rot, I smelled the sharp, earthy smell of decay. For anybody else, this would be a totally mundane occurence, but for me it's brand new. My sense of smell is returning.

In my head I keep saying "returning" even though it's more like "developing," because I can't remember ever being able to smell. I do remember pretending that I did— remarking, for example, on the strong scent of gasoline when we stopped at gas stations. But I didn't actually smell it, I was just repeating what I'd heard my family members say. On one occasion I'd say I loved the smell (trying to be quirky XD), and on another that I hated it (trying to conform -_-). I did things like that quite often when I was young. Lying, pretending to be some degree of normal.

It was only when I was a teenager that I actually realised something was amiss. The exact moment eludes me, but my internal reaction was "hold up, y'all're tasting things?" Because I can't smell, my sense of taste is also reduced, and sometime after the taste revelation I made the connection to the lack of smell. I was shocked to realise there was more nuance to food than the 5 basic flavours. Now that my sense of smell is returning/developing, I wonder if I'll be able to taste stuff, too...?

So far: no dice. And I kinda like the way things are right now, too, since I can eat almost anything without complaint. But who knows, change isn't always bad. I'll just have to wait and see.

2023.06.06

The sky turned a colour like bile and then spilled rain. The trucks sloshing down the highway sound like ocean waves. When I looked out the window, I had a sense that something somewhere was on fire, or a pot was boiling over. A smoldering or a rattling somewhere far, far away, but also nearby, also inside. Now that I write it out, it feels like a connection to an intangible world, to people I'll never know. Don't worry, it doesn't make any sense to me, either.

Suddenly I'm full of poetry. I'm doing this thing they call Focusing and when I reach down inside myself, the images and textures that I find feel realer than anything. A teardrop that starts thin in my throat and stretches wider and wider to become a balloon in my stomach. Twin hurricanes that circulate in tandem, and a heart shuttered against the oncoming storm. An oblong emerald with blunt, rounded edges. I run my fingers along these seams of crystalised shame, glittering hate. It feels real.

Inside me somewhere there is a basement crammed full of scary-looking barrels, crates, bags, and boxes, looking scarier yet when illuminated by a single, dim bulb. Even from the outside these containers evoke distinct feelings and sensations, a little zap or tingle or dust or flutter as I pick them up one by one and set them aside. I stack them in a tower that should be precarious but isn't. The gravity here is mine. I can pluck one from the middle of the stack and scarcely notice that the items above hover, unchanged, because in my lap is a little box tied in ribbons braided from blame. I can open it up. I can reach inside. I never know what I'm going to get.

Inside are time machines and teleportation devices; whole oceans, deserts, and mountains; wilted gardens, tropical storms, and forest fires. Bags of words that fly in the air and stick to the ceiling, words that hiss like bats and hang down like silkworms. Pillows that seem to be stuffed with cotton but when ripped apart contain only steel wool. Spike balls. Hot castiron. The long black bullet that's going to kill me one day. Execution, execution. Something so slippery you can never hold it still in your grasp, let alone give it a name.

I want to go into this room and look at all of the things in there, and maybe one day clear it out so I can see the floor. I bet it's a nice room.

There's another image in my mind: My self and I standing on opposite sides of a rail crossing. As the gates come down, I shout a question over the warning bells, and miraculously, she hears me, or maybe she can read my lips, but as she opens her mouth to answer, a train barrels down the tracks, drowning her out, obscuring her face. The train is impossibly long. I'm still waiting for it to pass.

As a lifelong artist and writer, it embarrasses me to admit that I've never written a good story or even a finished one, that despite being born a creative I have struggled to live creatively, and that I've been numb and empty inside for a long, long time, so long it feels now like forever. To compensate, I've been a copycat and a bore, and I've given up on myself more times than I can count. But the compulsion persists. Something scratches inside me. Into my viscera it carves with its little claws the command, "write! Write! Write!" and even when I can't obey, it feels like destiny. I don't know how else to explain it. I can't, but I have to, so I won't, but I will. Does that make any sense? Can anybody hear me out there?

What I discovered today— these images and textures— are the first creative things that have come from inside me and nowhere else, and they've done more than scratch and claw. I feel as though my very heart and soul are being torn asunder. The words rip me to shreds so my blood spatters the page as poetry. That's pretty gory. Sorry. Maybe it's more like a flower blooming, but only if blooming hurts, if blooming stings like a fresh cut, if the words string together like beads of blood, into a sentence that clots or spills depending on your mood. Oh, that's more gore. Sorry, sorry.

I can't stop. I'm shaking. I'm cold. I want to cook a normal-sized pot of white rice and swallow each spoonful with a mash of avocado and test-tube tuna, salty, yummy, warm. I promise I am not manic. I'm just going through a lot right now. Disclaimers, apologies, warnings, excuses, flakes and failed promises. There's poetry in me. Poetry.

2023.06.05

I slept a lot today, like an infant. It was a dreamless nap that ate up the last of my afternoon, and I woke up feeling comfortable and warm. Feels like I'm sleeping more in general, because I have trouble getting out of bed in the mornings, too. I just doze and doze and doze. I think I need the rest.

A bit before my nap, I screamed and cried and threw myself onto the ground and kicked and slapped the floor while I screamed and cried some more. I can't recall ever doing anything like that before, not even when I was a kid. Very early on, I learnt to be quiet— like physically quiet. I'm talking playing by myself in total silence, speaking to no one and not expecting to be spoken to. I didn't even put on voices for my toys. It was important that I didn't disturb the people who were always home and always busy with something that would be disrupted by any reminder of my presence.

For the first time in my life, I have the house totally to myself on a regular basis. Two and a half days of the week, there's nobody around to disturb or be disturbed by. How freeing! I can vacuum whenever I want, play my music loud, pace circles in any room. The best freedom, the most freeing freedom, I discovered today: screaming and crying and beating the floor and not holding back, not even a little bit. It was scary loud. My body was moving on its own. I almost couldn't believe what I was doing. In the moment I was really upset because they were big, big emotions that had been stuck inside a long time, but afterwards all I could think was, "wow! I want to do that again."

I couldn't manage it twice today, though. I played my ukulele to give myself some good feelings and then took a nap. I was so exhausted! To be honest, it was disappointing that I didn't get back to that vulnerable place, because I know that I have a lot of screaming/crying/floor beating left in me, and only two and a half days out of the week to do so. Still, two and a half is much, much better than zero. I'm grateful for this opportunity. I'll seize upon it as often as I'm able.

What else did I do today...? Hm, well, after I woke up, I went outside for just a little while. Two minutes tops. It was nice out there in the fresh air, albeit summertime chilly, so standing on the porch in my nightdress, socks, and flip-flops, I felt kind of cold. I also felt rather nervous. I don't like to go outside because going outside means people might see me and— Goddess forbid— form opinions about me.

At that time, I was thinking about how human beings make snap judgements about each other. It's a survival mechanism leftover from our days as predators and prey, so I'm not mad about it, but it does make me uncomfortable. Just as I've pathologised being quiet, so too have I developed a fear of being seen. The saying is that "children should be seen and not heard," but on top of making noise, I think being nearby was discouraged, too.

After all, if I'm in the same room, then whatever noise I make, no matter how quiet, will be much louder than if you put me far away. When I'm far away, I'm totally silent. Like that, you can forget I exist, and once you forget, you can focus on something more important. It's what my parents did to me, and what I've been doing to myself, too. There's a little girl inside me who needs to scream and cry at the top of her lungs, and she needs to kick her feet and slap the floor while she does it. She's been holding back since she was born, but today I was able to give her a little taste of freedom. "Feels good to be loud," I said, and she agreed.

Also feels good to be outside, even if it's only for two minutes. I looked at the big green trees and the grey-pink sky, and watched a very well-behaved dog pace in a driveway across the street while she waited for her owner. The owner in question didn't notice me. I felt relieved. Out of politeness, I looked away from her, back at the trees. Then a little fly or moth-looking-thing landed on my arm and startled me. Gross. I came back inside.

In truth, I think the child in me has been loud all along. She's been banging on the walls, kicking and yelling, crying for my attention. I'd have heard her if I hadn't locked her up in a soundproof room and ran away, as far away as I could. Last year, I gained the courage to admit that she's in there— that I put her there and that she needs to get out. I accepted that I'm the only one with the key. Since then, I've been sitting outside the door, watching, waiting, contemplating. Fearing. I'm honestly afraid of what she has to say, of all the memories that were locked up with her, of the hurt and pain that have festered for so long. Years of depression and psychosis, abandonment and codependency. There's so much— where do I possibly begin? How?

I've reached a critical point where I can no longer intellectualise this problem, make task lists, do research, explain it away, or wait til tomorrow. It's as scary as it is fucking simple: open the door.

So today I opened it, and boy is it loud in there! Feels good to be loud. Feels free.

2023.06.04

It got cold again!!!! Seems like I just can't escape the winter chill, not even in June. All weekend, the sky has been totally grey and overcast, and a bitter wind blows through the (thankfully green) trees. The birds are still out, though, and I can hear them singing in the early mornings before the pesky humans scare them away.

I sang again today. I sang so loud and for so long that I ripped up my throat. By the second to last song, I felt the discomfort, but I was having so much fun that I continued anyways. It was so reckless of me to try and close my jam session with "Welcome to the Black Parade"— a song that you just have to belt. By the key change in the bridge, I knew I couldn't carry on. I put away my ukulele and slurped up all the water left in the pitcher.

Now that I've chewed some Vitamin C tablets and given my voice a chance to rest, I'm feeling much better. This is just another lesson in taking it easy, it seems. It's hard to slow down after I've been so tired for so long, because once I have the energy for fun, I'd feel like a fool to slow my own roll! But my poor body can only take so much, haha. I'm sure as I sing more and more, I'll build up my endurance, too.

It's such a lovely hobby. Even though I'm tired now, it was very energising while I was actually singing. I love how the product— my performance— vanishes as it happens. Unlike artwork, which stares at me just begging to be evaluated, my song dissolves into the air, parting without reflection. All that's left is the process— my fingers stinging, throat vibrating, mouth stretching around notes of power and joy. I've also noticed that when I play my instrument, my leg twitches without my meaning it to, like an involuntary metronome. I'm at a point in my musical career where I don't usually keep time— or at least not consciously. I guess I have my twitchy leg to thank for that.

It's been a very energetic Sunday, which shocks me because at first I was going to write that it had been "laid-back." I'm so used to describing my days that way that I didn't even realise how far I've come. Maybe my definition of "energetic" and "laid back" are changing. These days, I can do so much more than I used to. Progress is slow, but when I reflect on my life a year ago today, I can see that I've gained so much ground in this neverending battle with my own mind. I'm thankful for that. I'm thankful for the me of yesterday and the me's of every other day before. We've all been working hard to get to this point.

To the me of tomorrow: I love you lots. Please pass on the message to the me's of every day after.

2023.06.01

Good morning everyone, I'm menstruating. The first of the month is a little early for me, but somehow it feels like a good omen. Like a fresh start? A cleanse? Lol. At the same time, it's pretty inopportune because I just bought new underwear— very cute stuff that I am super excited about!!!! Now I'm sorta disappointed that I've gotta wait a while longer to try them out, but it's not a big deal. It's a nice day. Really hot out, too. Soon it'll be warm down by the shore— veritable beach weather!

I want to go soon, even though being in the water isn't as fun as it was when I was a kid. I used to have a boogie board and flippers, and to this day that's the only way I can actually go swimming. The best part of being a grown adult is that I can simply... buy another set, if I'm so inclined. Just a matter of finding a place that sells in my size. I should probably get myself re-employed first, but the summer might be over by then. Plus, any incentive to get outside is a good thing for me, and I can't think of a better draw to the great outdoors than playing all day in the ocean. Hahh... I'm gonna do it! My bank account might be drying up, but soon I'll be soaked in saltwater! (Never consult me for financial advice.)

I had a lot of fun designing this month's journal. I wanted to make it a little more cluttered than previous versions, a little more stylised.... There's an interesting blend of isometric and realistic assets on here, meshed in a way that (to me) symbolises the meeting and melding of mediums digital and physical. That's a fancy way of saying that I Want To Be Me, both in real life and as text on this screen. There's nobody else who can do it better, and after failing spectatcularly, I've totally given up on trying to be somebody else. All I can do is follow what feels good, what feels right.

That's an idea I picked up while watching Island of the Hungry Ghosts, a haunting documentary about a refugee detainment camp in Australia. I didn't finish it because it was late at night, and I was laying so far away in my bed that I couldn't read the subtitles, but what I did see will probably stick with me forever. At least the idea of "following what feels good" will. Obviously, it's not a totally foreign concept— I'd say I'm pretty outspoken about self-indulgence and having fun— but something about the context of this film just... opened up a new perspective.

In order to know what feels good, first you have to feel. As recently as December I was complaining that I couldn't feel anything, that I didn't live in my body, that I was numb and dissociated. I couldn't tell you when the shift actually occurred, but these days I typically exist in real time. That means experiencing sensations as they happen, and experiencing them in a fuller capacity than ever before. I'm acutely aware of aches, grime, hunger, snot. My weak heartbeat, my dried tears. I even feel myself bleeding right now. And, uh, it's not like any of that feels good... but it's there. I'm there. All those feelings are me.

So I don't know much yet about "what feels good," much less how to follow it, but the important thing is that I can feel at all. That's progress, quite a lot for 6 months of sulking and crying and turning to goo. As much as I complain, things really are getting better— or rather, I'm making them better. This concept of agency and self-determination is even more important to me than self-indulgence, though I'm discovering now that they seem to go hand-in-hand. I think the "indulging" I did before was lacking in something. Reflection? Understanding? Who knows. My brain can only grow so fast. I've got four more years til 27. Surely I'll have it figured out by then.