WORTH BEING SEEN
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Hey,
I abandoned my blog for seven months because some topics I wanted to discuss felt too personal, and I felt like I had nothing to give aside from unhinged rants that no one would care to read. But I suddenly feel like I have something to offer again. Let’s see how deep we can get.
Christianity
In many ways I have fallen out of love with God. And in many others I haven’t budged. I’ve found myself toying with go-to questions about Christianity, but in a more complex way than I could’ve imagined. I’ve also largely shut up about it because it’s emotionally draining.
I kept saying that God wont let me go until someone asked if it’s me that can’t let God go. Oh. I could just walk away from it all. But I realised that it’s true, I can’t let God go, because I don’t know how to live without him, and the world can be a very scary place. Where do I go from there? What about Psalms 73:25-26?
Anyway, as real and sure as God is to me, sometimes what I can feel, has all of my attention. That’s what people mean when they say heaven can be a place on earth. They say it’s encapsulated in moments of joy, pleasure, and contentment. For some people it’s all the heaven they need. That’s why they don’t care for eternity. I understand that.
Click here for a blog post I’ve just published about sobriety. I wrote it in June but felt too nervous to post back then.
Excited for adulthood
My sister sent me a TikTok that essentially said, you’re not “a 24-year-old teenager”. Grow up. It wasn’t personal but after watching it I decided to let go of a few things:
- The fact that three years ago I was a uni student, and now I’m a video journalist (the passage of time is often destabalising)
- Resentment directed at fate because I was thrown into adulthood during a pandemic
- A desire for my schedule to calm down, paired with the subtle loss of spontaneity
I’m preaching a forward-facing mindset. Over time I’ve learnt how much of a killer nostalgia is – how much resentment it can create for the present and its pressures. I express this in my poem, Dare I:
I have spent just as much time looking forward to-, as I have looking back you can guess which is more tangible than the other
But sometimes it’s easier than we think to be optimistic about the future – to be eager to grow up and embrace adulthood despite its gnashing teeth. You will get bitten, of course, but I don’t want to fall into the trap of exoticising childhood as if my present has no value.
As an adult I am less vulnerable, I have more agency, more freedom, more money, more wisdom, more social skills, more direction. I am grateful for that. I wonder if you also see adulthood in this way, and whether you have any resentment towards losing a chunk of your adulthood to a pandemic out of everyone’s control.
Are you able to see what you’ve achieved since, or to look forth with optimism because you’re still alive, meaning there’s still a chance, for anything?
It feels like we can grieve the past while moving forward. Have you thought of being a 24-year-old adult?
BUT, just because I said we should be excited for adulthood, it doesn’t mean I am everyday. Sometimes when I’m going to bed I listen to Drama by Erykah Badu. She says,
I can't believe That we're still living, Oh, in this crazy crazy world That I'm still living. With all the problems of the day, How can we go on? So tired of hearing people say How can we go on?
She released this in 1997! 26 years later I too can’t believe that we’re still living. But I’ll keep doing it anyway.
Copenhagen
I’m so proud of myself for going on my first solo trip in October. I used to say I’d never travel abroad solo because I hadn’t so much as booked a hotel myself before. How would I survive?! But after a conversation with an amazing friend I bit the bullet and did it. And I found so much joy in Copenhagen! I thought I was going to have a chance encounter there, or end up in a life-changing situation. But I think my purpose was to just go, and establish a higher level of being okay alone.
I put a picture of Nyhavn, a famous canal in the city, on my vision board in January. It was a beautiful moment to stand right where that picture was taken. I expressed my fears with dreaming big on a vision board because some things may not come to pass (keep reading for something that hasn’t come to pass). But this did, and it’s developed my confidence and self-trust because I came through for myself. Now I believe even more in my abilities to achieve what I want.
Peace
I’m labelling mundane days as peaceful.
I’d had a slow day at work and wasn’t in a good or bad mood, just in the middle. By the time I logged off I felt like the day had been uneventful, and there was nothing to reflect on. But rather than dismissing it as a forgettable, mundane day as I usually do, I sat in the thought for a bit longer. I eventually saw the day as peaceful – no stress. I ate, I relaxed, I was home. I was safe, warm and calm. It was peaceful, not mundane. Will I remember days like this forever? No. But peace in those moments is something to value.
Love
This is actually something I put on my vision board this year, and I felt pathetic doing it but at least I was honest. To admit I wanted love felt like begging for something, it felt embarrassing. And because the word is on my vision board, it’s looked me in the face every day this year! I felt very vulnerable admitting to myself that I want to be in love. I feel so exposed even writing it, like I’m risking this feeling of incompletion. And yet… nothing!
Did I have options? Yes. Did I try? Yes. Am I in love? No. Am I close to it now? No.
Writing this tells me that I won’t die if I express the desire for something like love. The admission itself is a form of vulnerability that I’ve never been comfortable in. I’m not in love. But I didn’t die. So now I’m less fearful of asking for things I may not get, not as scared of being vulnerable in that sense.
That’s it from me.
Throughout this year, something kept telling me that no one cares about what I have to say, and no one cares about my blog. I listened because the things I did want to discuss felt too personal, and all my draft posts were very “stream of consciousness” and quite confusing to even read back. That’s been the state of my mind. Sadly it caused me to abandon a safe space I created for myself when I was 16. Life is so inconsistent and unpredictable in that way. I didn’t think I’d spend most of 2023 not posting here.
Never again may I forget that my voice is worth being heard and my words are worth being read. My story is worth being told and I am worth being seen, because I am a part of this world too.
Even if I get no views on this, that will remain true. So I should always express. And because of that, I hope I write again soon.
Do you think of how you communicate your existence to the world? Does it matter to you? Or do you think I’m just dramatic?
Some Variables 