People talk about finding the one like one day you’re going to run into a person that completes you. Like all the things you wish to be, you can claim by default for being with someone who has them. If that’s the case, we really have become consumers in every corner of our lives. Especially the most important corners.

Giddy in love with life in this moment. Science you blow my mind and excited me. Sunshine you fill my heart with warmth and trust. Breeze, you make my feet light and carefree. Water, you remind me to stay patient and loyal. I am thankful for your daily love and consistency through the season of my mind. May I never forget to seek moments with you.

Your happiness is a choice

Tick, zip, tick, zip, tick..

I looked into the mirror at the back of a man’s bleached hair hunched over. His body language alone indicated extreme focus probably visible on his face. The pointer finger on my left hand was really warm as if all my blood was pooling in that single appendage. It might as well have been because the out of body experience pulling me out of my conscious mind and into the feelings of the room was probably due to blood supply neglecting my brain. Let alone the fact that I was, despite my better judgment, doing this on a whim.

“See, quick and easy. What do ya think, man?” the back of his head now lifted and I refocused on the brown eyes staring at me. I confidently looked down at the fresh ink neatly pinned into my skin.

“Looks…dope.” I sounded surprised.

See, I’ve always thought of myself as the adventurous type but always in a groomed, good girl kind of way. Sure I’d go running at 6:30 am for the hell of it or fly halfway around the world to visit an old friend. Might even get a little too tipsy and kiss a stranger in the back of the bar. But I always had these lines in the back of my head that I set out to never, ever cross-not even while intoxicated.

Anyways, that’s the way I lived before I realized that life is really not all that sheltered. People you love can wake up one day and decide not to love you anymore. Weeks, months, years that feel so right pass with the blink of an eye. It’s just better to live life with an open hand after all. So I decided that if I ever felt like I was the happiest in all my life, I would tag my body so that when it passes I would still have the permanent reminder that part of that time was still, and will always be, with me.

Until you’ve experienced it, you’d never understand the beauty and addiction to dark, hard places

where even the 

                         smallest 

                                       sliver of light is

                                                  so blinding and impactful.

You’ve spent so much time learning these things that make you so happy, why not use it to teach others? Write. Volunteer. Listen to people’s passions and connect them to spaces they can explore more. How beautiful it is when that is actualized.

you know you’re healing when “all too well” sounds more like a love song than a breakup song

You are never responsible for the way other people treat you.

They say expiration dates draft a liberal timeline in order to ensure safety. Boldly written. Sometimes down to the second. Yet, if consumed a few days after, nothing tastes different. But the ingredients are slowly approaching the day they will.

Life’s expiration dates are not always so obvious. What happens in that timeframe where something’s over but it is not completely expired? Sometimes confusion. Suffering. Aching. Resetting. All I know is that there finally comes a moment when you truly believe it’s over and really expired. 

THAT feels like freedom. It feels like acceptance. It’s the moment you no longer let your mind dwell on what could have been or the pain. Instead, you’re glad that your safety is ensured. All the beautiful change that has bloomed inside is yours. You do not have to prove anything or have the time to pay attention to that which is already expired.

You are SO much more than this world will ever try to convince you you are. You hold immense power when you come to recognize and actualize on that. Breathe in love. Breathe out fear. Breathe in peace. Breathe out regrets. Breathe in gratitude. Breathe out control. Don’t stop until you’re free and full.