I've had writer's block since the holidays...
My mind has been breathing plenty - I have much to say - but it needs to catch its breath sometimes before I can make sense of it enough to convey. And then once I start to make sense I lose it again, similar to a breath. In it comes, out it goes, back and forth, on and on, until one day when there will be no more breaths to breathe. What a lovely thing it is to breathe. More and more it’s become something I’m in awe of. Us; swelling, collapsing bodies that give life and give love when we’re able to. We’re a mess of life. So much living and breathing and everything in-between-ing. Isn't it funny how we do things to shorten our breaths? How we drink and smoke and shove our bodies full of toxic shit to kill it faster. To take time away from it all. Hysterical.
I'm finding my breath though. To find your breath is to pay attention to it although it comes and goes, it's still one mechanism.
The more I find my breath the more I feel myself letting go of the reigns. I’ve found there’s been no point in holding on as I have. We’re all going to fall of the edge of life at some point. And I don’t mean that in a stuffy, cynical way, but a rather playful way. Maybe life can be playful, too. You would think with the way it likes to fuck with us, couldn’t we fuck with it back? I can’t decide if I get to say these things purely because I’m privileged. Because although I’ve suffered in my life, most of it was self-inflicted. My circumstances have been quite comfy compared to some humans on this Earth. And I don’t know why. And sometimes that upsets me. Why do I get to play with life while others only get to survive? Or is it judgmental of me to think that’s “only” what they do? But maybe there isn’t an answer. Hopefully there isn’t, because even if there was, would I really want to know? Why some people suffer so much more than others? Maybe the meaning isn’t even in the answer, but in the question itself.
It’s the questioning all the time that drives us mad. It’s all the wondering. Why did I do that? What will I do then? What does it mean, anyway? But it’s also the questioning that gets us further, so seemingly it’s our blessing and our curse. The very thing that drives us into greatness and into madness. The desire to know something we can’t. I think life is quite clever. She and Him make a great team, as sick in their heads as they may be. We’re one. I wish we could remember that now. We’re different but we’re still one. Holy shit did I just unknowingly quote Bono? Wow, that's really great. It sure has been a blur getting here - to this place, but I think this must be the place - the one I've been wanting to reach.
Last year interrupted the blur...
I owe a lot to the year 2018. It opened my eyes and showed me a view of the world I’d never seen before, right from my own doorstep. I've traveled the world far and wide and still never saw the world more clearly than I do now. I see my only duty is to be me, and I don't have shit to apologize for anymore. I don’t have to apologize so much for being. For being a woman who doesn’t always hold it all together, for being a human who’s been a mess more than not, for being me - authentically me. Because even the times I was avoiding my existence I was creating it, too. Meaning all of my existence is me. And I’m finally finding my power in it, as fucking cliche as that sounds. So if I seem different it’s because I am. And if it bothers you that’s okay. But I encourage you to look in the mirror, because all the people who I used to dislike for no reason were actually the person I'm becoming now. I hated free-spirited people, as if it was too hard to see the thing I knew I could be but refused to let myself.
My whole life I tried to fit into the boxes that others designed, but now I understand I can design my own damn box. When we finally decide to give into our creativity and live out our lives in accordance to it, we surrender to the fact that much of what we do will sit well with some and not well with others, and some won't even give a flying fuck. But that can’t stop me. Sometimes you just have to say what you have to say to get it out, sometimes you just have to do what your body is telling you to do, and others will agree or not, and your stance on it will change or not. Some people can’t live in this world on anyone else's terms so they create their own. And I feel the Universe rewards these people a lot of the time. And I think to myself, why can’t I be one of those people? Maybe I just need to tell myself I am. Maybe I already am? There’s always this fine line between striving to get ahead and letting go to become who you are. I walk it constantly.
All this mind breathing - see below got me thinking about a narrative regarding all the narratives in our minds and how they rule our lives. What’s something you’ve been telling yourself for ages that holds no truth anymore? A narrative you’ve outgrown and proved wrong yet somehow still believe. For me it was A. believing I needed to be liked and accepted by everyone, and B. that I had to fake who I was in order to do so. Which I suppose is true; you do need to fake a lot of things to try and be liked by everyone. What a chore. Now I know the reality is you just be who the fuck you are so the people who really see you show up and the others fall away, and that's perfectly okay.
Mind Breathing (noun) - Is the act of feeding your brain with the truths of the world instead of the lies. It takes a lot of work because most everything is a lie. When you reach this place, if you should, be grateful. It takes a lot of work to wake up and accept that you are. Bravo. See also: Sam Mother Fucking Harris
It’s been really lovely finding solace in just being alive when for so long my life tortured me. I did all I could to not sit with who I was. But it’s okay. It’s okay I hated myself and may again at some point in the future, but for right now I don’t. And I’m truly for the first time in my life incredibly grateful. And the genuine kind, not the forced kind because a self-help book said I’d manifest more shit if I did it. I’ve been feeling very in tune with my life lately. Like the pieces are falling into place. But maybe part of that is surrendering to the fact that I am but a mere piece of an even larger puzzle. One that hardly sheds light on me and my story when you look at it as a whole. Sometimes it’s scary to think the world doesn’t revolve around me. Shattering everything you ever believed has that effect. But it’s liberating, too. Like maybe doing the things that intimidate me most shouldn’t since I hardly even matter. I mean I matter the way a piece of a puzzle does to an entire puzzle. But I don’t mean very much without the rest of you.
At the end of the day I found that my life has to work for me. I am the one who goes to sleep with myself every night, usually alone, and when I die I will be all alone with myself. As I cross over into whatever comes next, whether it be another life or the nothingness we all tend to fear, it will be my mind in my ceasing body that will be guiding me. Or maybe it won’t, maybe I go mad at some point. As if I haven’t already. Who knows! That’s the point. We just don’t know and to pretend like we do is the lie we keep believing. All I know is I want to feel so much love and pain. I want to leave feeling full, like a bucket of water filled to the brim with droplets of experience. And although there isn’t really a self to love, there is a connection between your mind and body that’s meant to be more sound than not. And when you start to realize that, you feel yourself growing, with yourself. And it's the jam.