As if I were walking inside a dream I once had, familiar, but not real.

I remember moving there on July 7th, 2024. I remember exactly how I felt walking into the empty living room before the furniture had arrived. My chest tightening at the mere thought of how nostalgic I’d be when I eventually had to leave.

I was right.

Once I moved there, it was the first time I ever felt at home. Life didn’t seem so small anymore. I had my routine. I had things exactly how I wanted them to be. I’d make drinks for my friends and me, and we’d sit on the balcony watching the water. I’d write while listening to it, get Burger King and marathon a TV show, have endless sleepovers, endless stories.

But as time passed, I started wanting something else, to be someplace else. I complained about how lonely I felt, about spending entire days without saying a word, it was too cold for too long. The city was too loud and chaotic, while Long Island felt too quiet and boring. And, somehow, I couldn’t seem to go a week without getting another parking ticket.

Then the feeling of not belonging returned like the prodigal son.

But I was finally home. It felt as though someone had torn a page out of my journal, the one where I described my dream apartment, and built it for me.

So why did so many things start to feel out of place?

Why did I feel out of place?

Going through my drafts, I found an unfinished essay about the same topic. There, I wrote about this weird feeling I have, where I miss everything I’ve left behind even though I know I wouldn’t actually want to be there forever. I wondered whether what I really miss are the versions of myself that were allowed to experience each chapter of my life.

I wrote about moving back home from South Africa, knowing that even if I were to return, it would never be the same. So for the following months, I mourned my time there. I would be with my friends, either wishing I were back in South Africa or feeling nostalgic for the fact that this moment, too, would soon be over. The feeling that time was slipping away, the incapacity of freezing a moment, was devastating to me. To look around and realize that, in just a few hours, this would become a memory.

I kind of chuckled when I read it, realizing how consistent I am about my nostalgia.

Looking back, I understand that I had it so easy, and I wish I could go back and really take advantage of the life I had a year ago because, right now, her grass seems greener.

I think I’m one of those people who wishes they could be everywhere at once. But I also know I’m the kind of person who gets so caught up in her own head that she forgets to actually live in the moment. It’s almost like my mind can’t really comprehend the concept of the present. It’s either stuck in the past or almost throwing up from anxiety about the future.

So obviously, even a chipmunk’s grass looks greener than mine.

I idealize my life once it’s no longer accessible to me, once I can no longer complain about it. So I guess it’s interesting to realize that being anywhere while yearning to be somewhere else will leave you with unfinished business wherever you go.

The other day, I caught myself trying to minimize how I felt for being too sensitive, too emotional. As if feeling things deeply was somehow shameful. As if I were a fish out of water. And when I called my mom sobbing to ask her if I was indeed too much, if I was being dramatic to the point where my imagination had created depth in something superficial, that’s when I knew: I had been brainwashed. I had made myself so small that I couldn’t even trust my own judgment.

I think it became a habit to associate those words with each other. Sensitivity became nothing more than mere attention-seeking, synonymous with being dramatic. Weirdly enough, we painted them as negative adjectives, as signs of weakness, and gave them a bad connotation. But I believe sensitivity to be one of the greatest attributes someone can have: being able to understand someone else’s pain, and even in anger and hurt, still recognize that you would never wish the same feeling to be felt by anyone else

Funny enough, two days ago I wrote in my journal:

“My feelings tend to be very overwhelming, and I wish I could hold on to people the way a tree holds on to its roots. To make them stay, to make them care, as I do… and it’s funny that the standard I have for other people is much higher than the standard I have for myself. But the idea of losing certain people is so unbearable to me, as if one of my arms were to be gone. That I would change myself just to fit into their lives. Even if that meant I would be slowly disappearing.”

That couldn’t have been written at a more ironic time.

That’s what I was so used to doing. Justifying the unjustifiable because I had always been so terrified of losing the potential they could have in my life, of losing the familiarity people brought with them. I wanted them to stay so badly that I made myself stay, without anyone ever asking me to. I didn’t want to be haunted by their memories.

So if I became more digestible to them, if I changed my ways just a little bit, then maybe they would care as much as I did. If I didn’t talk as much anymore, asked fewer questions, then they wouldn’t have access to the parts of me I had slowly learned to see as flaws through their eyes. I guess I’m still learning that making yourself stay, hoping that it will make them stay too, is one damn way to be a masochist. So what price was I willing to pay to keep them?

It’s when the realization hits that wanting them to stay could never be enough. Because staying was never going to give you the version of them you hoped for or the one you needed.

I think what I’m trying to process is that you can’t hold on to people hoping they’ll stay exactly as they were. Or believing that if you wait long enough, they’ll wake up as the version you remember, and somehow you’ll have them back.

I kept believing that if I waited long enough, or wanted hard enough, I could find my way back to who they used to be. But you can hold someone close without being able to keep them the same.

And whispering quiet prayers to the clock, hoping time might fix exactly what’s been missing, is a prayer I’ve never known time to answer.

You can keep the flowers. It doesn’t mean they’re not dead.

I recently started therapy again, which has been both frustrating and strangely helpful at the same time, so I’ve been spending a little more time in my head than usual

There have been so many situations in my life where I’ve wondered whether a relationship meant more to me than it ever did to the other person, whether platonic or romantic.

Questions like: ‘Was that real, or did I imagine it?’ ‘How come they didn’t feel the same way when we both experienced the same thing?’ And suddenly, the feeling of silliness kicks in.

maybe I’m too emotional, dramatic, or too sensitive. but I’m coming to the conclusion (perhaps wrongly, perhaps not) that how someone else feels about a situation doesn’t determine how you were supposed to feel about that same experience. Some things simply hold different weights for different people, even when it was the exact same situation.

It doesn’t change the impact something had on you. We can go through the exact same thing and walk away with completely different emotions, different interpretations, and different meanings attached to it all. but If it felt real to you, then somehow, in some way, it was real.

I think we tend to downplay the seriousness of our feelings because it feels silly to have cared so much when, for the other person, it maybe seemed like nothing at all, or at least didn’t affect them the way it affected us. We start thinking that because someone else experienced it differently, we somehow felt too much.

But two truths can coexist at the same time. Maybe it meant exactly as much as it feels like it meant to me, and for them it meant exactly as much as they felt capable of giving. None of us necessarily being wrong, just experiencing the same thing with different levels of intention and intensity.

And especially now that we’re constantly encouraged to treat everything as fleeting experiences, it all feels temporary. In doing so, lines tend to get blurred. It almost feels like nothing is allowed to hold weight anymore. So when something affects you deeply, you almost feel guilty for it. Like you have to justify why you cared at all. And when it all comes to an end and I’m left trying to explain what actually happened, I start doubting my own perception of things. Like maybe I should be committed to a psych ward for somehow creating my own version of reality.

I also wonder if my inability to communicate certain things is what got me exactly where I am right now. The fear of asking certain questions and ruining something, or getting an answer that would finally bring me clarity, just not the kind I wanted.

I’m working on that after recent events... Because there are very few things more terrifying than telling someone how you feel and realizing they don’t feel the same way. Maybe willingly jumping into a shark cage. To me, both experiences feel equally life-threatening.

But when you avoid saying things out loud, you’re left with all these unanswered questions, trying to make sense of something that was never fully explained in the first place

It’s like hoping someone would magically know that you love apples, and then feeling disappointed when they never bring you apples, even though you never told them you loved apples in the first place.

How could they ever meet expectations that were never spoken out loud?

I think that’s where so many things fall apart. Not because people don’t care, but because we kinda expect others to understand things we’ve never had the courage to say. To respect boundaries that were never set. We hope they’ll read between the lines, notice the hints, decode our silences, and somehow arrive at exactly what we need.

And maybe that’s where my own fear comes in too. Because communicating honestly means risking disappointment. It means asking for the apples and accepting that maybe they’ll say no, maybe they won’t bring them, or maybe they never wanted apples in the first place.

But at least then you know.

Because there’s a difference between being rejected for something you openly asked for and feeling hurt over expectations someone never even knew existed. and then you find yourself in an infinite loop of what if i had said this or that?

So it’s okay that maybe, for them, it didn’t mean what it meant to me. But it’s also okay that it meant so much to me.

Because meaning isn’t measured by how equally it was felt.

I rewatched Penelope last night. I hadn’t seen it since I was about 10.

The story follows a girl born with a pig’s nose because of a family curse. The curse can only be broken if someone truly loves and accepts her as she is, but her mother spends years trying to ‘fix’ her instead, convinced that her real self exists somewhere beneath what makes her different.

In the end, Penelope accepts herself first, and the curse breaks.

Her mother is left realizing it could have disappeared years earlier if she had simply loved her daughter as she already was.

I don’t think we can ever really be happy if we’re constantly waiting to be accepted in order to feel okay about who we are. If you’re waiting for anyone to “see you” and approve of you, it starts to feel like you’re just postponing your own life.

You can hope to be understood, but it’s not always required.

We grow up with this quiet expectation to make everyone around us proud. And without noticing, we start choosing versions of ourselves that are easier for others to accept than they are honest.

When our inner circle seems to follow the same path, it becomes difficult to swim against the tide of what is considered normal. But what is ‘normal’, really?

We often think of reality as something we experience individually, shaped by our own thoughts and decisions. But a large part of what we call reality is intersubjective, shared beliefs constructed by society, culture, and collective agreement.

At the same time, there is subjective reality, our personal perception of the world, our inner lens through which we interpret everything we experience.

The problem is that our subjective reality is not formed in isolation. It is heavily influenced by the intersubjective world we are born into.

We are raised within systems of belief long before we are aware that they are systems at all. Family, culture, religion, education, they shape what we consider normal, possible, desirable, or correct.

So much of what we think of as personal choice is actually the result of absorbed perspectives that we never consciously selected.

And if that is true, then the idea of a single “right path” becomes difficult to define. Not because all paths are equal, but because the frameworks that define “right” and “wrong” are themselves constructed.

In that sense, we are not only living our own reality, we are also living inside realities that were passed down to us.

The question then is not whether individuality exists, but how much of it we are able to consciously reclaim.

We don’t experience the world as it is, we experience it through the reality we construct internally.

Our perception is always filtered. If we are shaped from a place of insecurity, doubt, or fear, we will often interpret the world through that same lens. Not because the world is inherently that way, but because that is the structure we have learned to use to understand it.

As a result, experience becomes less about what is objectively happening and more about how it is being interpreted by us.

That is often where the feeling of disconnection comes from.

Not because we are empty, but because we are full of everything except what we have consciously chosen.

I grew up in a very conservative environment in Brazil, where certain paths were already defined before you were old enough to question them. Leaving to experience something unfamiliar made me realize how much of what I thought was “normal” was actually inherited, not chosen.

It’s a heavy thing, feeling like you’re constantly letting people down just by existing as you are. not becoming the version of you they pictured in their minds.

But you can’t disappoint yourself just to avoid disappointing others.

At some point, we have to accept that people will project. They will attach their dreams to us. They will imagine versions of our lives that were never ours to live.

But you don’t actually owe anyone the fulfillment of their expectations of you.

We are not a continuation of our parents’ ambitions, not a correction of their regrets. we are not a mirror built to reflect what other people didn’t get to become.

We are not replicas and we were never meant to exist as so.

There’s a scene in Little Women where Jo tells Meg they can run away from her wedding if she leaves now, that Meg is going to be bored of him in two years. Meg responds, ‘I want to marry him because I love him,’ followed by the infamous line:

‘Just because my dreams are different than yours doesn’t mean they’re unimportant.’

That’s the thing: just because something feels right to you doesn’t mean it fits someone else’s life. And just because someone doesn’t understand your dream doesn’t mean it isn’t real.

Sometimes even we don’t fully understand our own path yet. And that gets judged too, like uncertainty is a flaw instead of part of becoming.

If Penelope had been taught from the beginning that she was already enough, there would have been no curse to break.

But instead, she grew up learning that love had conditions. That acceptance had requirements. That she needed to change to be worthy of being seen.

And I think that shapes people more than we like to admit.

Because if your first understanding of love is that you must become someone else to receive it… you will spend a long time trying to earn what was never supposed to be conditional in the first place.

You shouldn’t have to attach yourself to anything just to feel worthy of existing.

Your worth was never meant to come from what you hold onto, because your mind and your soul could never be replicated.

I like candles, and my night routine. It’s always a coconut or vanilla scent, anything else gives me a headache. I can’t not have my nails done or it feels like I’m naked. Although I can’t do certain colors, it doesn’t really feel like me. I like experimenting, even though I always regret picking a weird shade of blue or a pink that is too pink.

Dark red suits me, but sometimes it feels strange, almost like I’m trying too hard. But a light white feels right, almost like that is who I want to be.

I want to be the girl whose nails are always done in a light color. They feel peaceful, almost like the world stops for them to breathe. patient, graceful, not an ounce of overthinking in their system. It’s almost like they are getting paid to exist among us.

Every time it gets dark, I pray I learn to be empathetic. To understand the real feeling of forgiveness. That even the air I breathe feels kind.

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I read a piece once about how we try to define ourselves through hobbies. The author said she hates when people ask what she likes to do in her free time. And strangely, I feel the same way. It feels like trying to sell a product, listing things to sound interesting enough. Like, yes, throw a reality show my way and you would absolutely love to watch my day.

Another question that makes me want to jump off a bridge—any bridge—is “what do you want to do with your life?”

Maybe because trying to explain our entire existence through hobbies and future goals sounds more like advertising than being human. Being allowed to exist in doubt, figuring things out as we go, failing here and there, but still becoming something in the process.

The other day I caught myself thinking that I’ve been neglecting my sense of self. That maybe I’m becoming a little dumb. A little uninteresting. But I stopped mid-thought and wondered how many people would look at me strangely if I asked them something that didn’t allow for a generic answer, something that required even half a second of real thought.

Maybe we were taught that performing is more important than being real. Like having is the same thing as being.

I get embarrassed when someone looks at me directly and asks me questions like that. And it’s even worse when I try to answer.

I love talking about myself, but I get annoyed when I’m questioned. That’s where I draw the line. I don’t want to be quizzed, maybe because I don’t have rational explanations for half the things I say, and I hate being wrong.

Or maybe I’m just obnoxious. That’s always a possibility.

My uncle said something to me the other day at my grandmother’s birthday, after four years of not seeing me. He held my chin and said, “you are so pretty, but you won’t look this good for much longer, so use this pretty face of yours while you still can.”

It was one of those moments where you tilt your head slightly and narrow your eyes, like maybe that will help you read the subliminal message.

So I need to confess, I think I’m going through a phase.

How soon am I going to lose my appeal? Or better yet, what does that even mean?

I used to love catching my reflection in passing mirrors. But now I feel more aware of my presence. Like if I don’t stare at my bare face long enough, I might lose the only thing that makes me worth noticing.

And maybe that ties back to identity again. If I’m not interesting enough, at least I can say I’m okay-looking.

But if I’m not certain about my future, if my identity feels unstable, and time slowly erases the way my skin sits on my face, what exactly is left?

I read somewhere that life has no meaning unless you give it one. So is that what all of this is? The effort to appear refreshing, the personality traits we adopt to be more appealing, the carefully constructed goals so we can be perceived as ambitious?

A false sense of stability. A performance.

Maybe this is all just overanalyzing. I notice my own contradictions, my own hypocrisy.

So I guess I just wonder, which version of myself am I performing for me? And which one am I trying to become so I can finally feel comfortable saying what I want to do with my life?

And why does something as small as light white nail polish make me think about it at all?

“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.”

There’s that iconic scene in Sex and the City where Carrie asks her friends, “Where does the love go after you break up with someone?” and Samantha cynically replies, “To their next girlfriend!”

I don’t believe so. I believe it stays with you, but in a much quieter way. It lingers deep.

I recently ended something with someone I deeply care about. It wasn’t like we called each other and said the words out loud; we just stopped calling. Mutually. I have my theories about what could have happened, I think it was mostly my fault, but that’s another story. What I’m trying to say is that even though I believe it’s over, I still care for him. I still have the same feelings I did months ago.

I don’t think you can actually get over someone completely. I think they will always be there. You simply don’t think about them as often. It’s like a song you get obsessed with; you can’t stop playing it, and then one day, you just... don’t. Suddenly, you’ve completely forgotten about the song, until one day you hear it again, only to remember how much you love it.

Some songs will forever be special, regardless of how much time has passed. Not just any song you slightly like, but the ones you were passionate about. The ones that taught you something. It doesn’t mean they will forever be your favorite, but there was a reason they made such an impact on your life. Their flaws could never possibly erase the way they once made you feel.

Sometimes it’s expected that the day you realize it’s not going to work, you should magically erase them from your memory. But this isn’t The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, is it? we don’t just erase parts of our existence.

We can be conflicted when feelings don’t expire just because access does.

It’s such a weird feeling when you don’t really know what to do with the affection left over for them. Almost like they become statues in the sanctuary of your mind, left intact, frozen in time, as if nothing ever changed. It’s a process of detaching from the person, but attaching to the memory.

Perhaps we only ever “get over” the hope, the expectation, and the excitement that came around every time they did. We put so much weight on hoping they things would change, or on expectations of where it could lead. But there is a sweetness in choosing to keep someone in your memory simply because they once meant the world to you; because they were once all you could dream about.

And it is somehow comforting to believe that maybe they also think about you when your favorite song starts playing.

I got invited to watch Hamnet at the theater this week by a friend, and honestly, I wasn’t expecting much. I hadn’t watched a truly great movie in a long time.

As we left the theater, we were speechless. The acting, the writing, everything exhaled passion. It was exactly what I’d been complaining was missing from so many of the films I’d been watching.

When I was thirteen, I told my therapist I was going through a phase where I wanted to get into acting. I was extremely emotionally repressed at the time. My therapist had one of those moments I imagine she probably high-fived herself for afterward. She said, “Acting requires vulnerability. An actor has to feel comfortable with their own emotions in order to portray someone else’s. They have to feel things and be okay with showing them.”

How do we expect to make art, to make people feel something? Because let’s be honest, the whole point of art is expression. It’s about making our feelings, thoughts, and stories seen and heard, in the hope that someone else might relate. Whether that’s through fashion, writing, music, film, architecture. There is always a feeling behind it, or at least a mix of them.

And what is the point of any of it if we’re not vulnerable enough to bring it to life? If we keep trying to hide? Vulnerability and sensitivity are the very core of expression — love, sadness, anger, fear, grief, desire, guilt, confusion. It takes authenticity to be an artist.

With unlimited access came endless labels. We fear judgment, we fear being seen, and we fear feeling too much. We fear getting hurt, so we deprive ourselves of feeling anything at all. As a result, we’re left with nothing to share with the world, ashamed of our own desires.

As Chloé Zhao once mentioned something Paul Mescal said during an awards speech for Hamnet: making the film made him realize the most important part of being an artist is learning to be vulnerable enough to allow ourselves to be seen, for who we are now, who we are becoming, and to give ourselves fully to the world. Even the parts of ourselves we’re ashamed of, afraid of, or that feel imperfect.

Through that exposure, the people we speak to are able to recognize themselves, to feel seen, and to begin accepting who they are in their entirety. That, ultimately, is the point of art, not performance. Art isn’t about displaying emotion; it’s about offering truth.

Being minimalistic and nonchalant became “it” — compliments, even personality traits, applied to life itself. Fashion used to be a statement of who someone was, almost like a sixth sense: another language, whispered but never hidden.

It’s as if we lost the art of communication and replaced it with practicality. A lot of this can be attributed to the post-COVID era, when for nearly two years people barely left their houses and pajamas became working clothes. Social interaction was reduced to screens. Flirting at a bar or dancing in a club stopped being part of the weekend.

I remember going out with my boss in New York once. She was shocked by how underdressed people were, sneakers, sweatpants. Her disappointment was clear. In her clubbing days, people wore their best pieces just to go out for dinner or drinks. Maybe because that was the only way to show who they were. No curated Instagram posts. No edited photos. No way to fake it. You couldn’t stalk someone online and form an impression beforehand.

When we think about it, romantic connections have historically been some of the most intense emotional experiences we have. When intimacy becomes guarded and connections stay shallow, art begins to mirror that restraint and loses one of its most powerful sources of intensity. Seduction stops playing a role. Desire becomes less sought after. Passion slowly fades. Runways grow more conservative, office-core, clothes meant to be worn at home and outside. The need to stand out is pushed backstage, while the comfort of blending in, of not risking anything, whether through personal style or through what we consider to be our own art, skyrockets.

What once required boldness — wearing certain pieces and being admired for that boldness and authenticity is now replaced with a single question: would the masses agree this is normal and acceptable?

Curiosity starts to fade, and numbness begins to look appealing, almost comfortable. Neutral aesthetics begin to mirror emotional restraint.

If inspiration comes from everywhere, how do we live in a time where everything feels so robotic and still expect human interaction, or any form of expression, to move us enough that we feel the need to externalize something?

If passion is lacking in every form, then inspiration is too. How does a generation with access to every possible kind of art, endless references, endless stimulation feel so little urgency to create something genuine?

How did we become so reserved that we’re unwilling to share our struggles as human beings with the world, in the hope that someone else might feel that strange sense of connection? How did we start taking our own right to express ourselves for granted, treating it as something to be ashamed of rather than a consequence and the beauty of being alive?

And how do we expect to influence future generations if we can’t even bring ourselves to feel openly and freely?

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We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster, that we go bankrupt by the age of 30. But to make yourself feel nothing, so as not to feel anyhting. What a waste. -Call Me By Your Name

It’s 12:56 a.m., and I’m lying in bed trying to fall asleep when I decide I should probably block this guy. I like him too much, and we live in different countries.

Then it hits me: that’s the least of my problems.

Almost embarrassing, actually — how small that concern is compared to everything else quietly collapsing in my head. And just like that, I can’t breathe.

I hate nights. They’re my biological alarm for overthinking. For losing my mind in a very private way. Every possibility of what went wrong, what is going wrong, and what could go wrong starts scrolling through my head like a For You page, but make it, well maybe I fucking hate it here.

It’s that feeling where you want to go for a run in the middle of the night, but you can’t because it’s the middle of the night and common sense still exists. You want to do something. Anything that doesn’t involve pacing frantically in your room while your mind tries to comprehend the sudden breakdown.

My eyes overflow with tears, and the only word that comes out of my mouth is “what?”.

Almost like I went back in time the second I stepped into my old room. Suddenly, I’m 16 again, crying like a child in the middle of the night, under the blanket, covering my face with a pillow so no one will hear me.

I needed air, so I pressed my face against the AC. That didn’t help either. I could breathe perfectly fine, my body just decided that tonight I needed a different activity, and my brain wasn’t feeling particularly cooperative.

Suddenly, I’m questioning every decision I’ve made in the past few months. Everything I hate. And if I hate so much, why am I obsessing over the least important problem of all?

Being home during the holidays usually does this to me. It brings this familiar, suffocating feeling that I did everything wrong. Another year gone in a blink. Time feels frozen, but not quite. I feel older, just not wiser. My body is experiencing time. My mind isn’t.

If I had to explain it visually: I’m stuck in a maze with no way out.

I finally reach the age where it feels almost illegal to be uncertain. To still carry the wounds of my childhood. I am a grown-up. Whatever the fuck that really means.

While my parents try to convince me that I have poor decision-making skills which, let’s be honest, I probably do. But so do they.

The pressure of being the child who didn’t reach people’s expectations should be a crime. Especially when they hang a picture on the wall of a random girl who’s got it all ( a 9–5 and a husband).

I feel suffocated by my own thoughts, completely disconnected from myself. I haven’t been able to think clearly for months. Life didn’t just shift, it took a sharp, unexpected turn.

I’m not trying to be pessimistic. I’m trying to be honest. Because lying has become second nature — not because people can’t handle the truth, but because I can’t bear the weight of my own feelings.

I think about all the ideas I have, everything I dream about day and night, and how little I do to actually make them real. It’s not failure I’m afraid of. It’s my own disappointment. That quiet thought that says: I waited all this time for this?

I romanticized my potential, and now I’m terrified of being exposed.

So… I waste time doing the most unremarkable things imaginable. It’s easy to hide behind “what’s meant to be will be.” Well, maybe what I really need is a slap on the face and a reality check.

But at the same time, nothing ever feels good enough.

Sometimes I convince myself my writing is so boring it could put John Summit to sleep mid-set. It doesn’t feel original, even though, realistically, nothing is. I’ll read something someone else wrote about a topic I’ve been thinking about writing it for days and immediately think: They’re actually smart and I suddenly sound stupid.

It feels like something is missing. Depth, maybe. Curiosity. That obsessive interest in something that makes you forget to eat.

Two months ago, it was quantum physics, manifestation, consciousness, the brain. I felt stupid half the time, but it was the most alive my mind had felt in months. Like it was finally being used.

Maybe my writing isn’t boring. Maybe I’m just lazy with my own depth. Actually, that’s not a maybe, I’m sugarcoating it. It’s not that I lack depth; it’s that committing to it would mean risking mediocrity, and possibly failing anyway.

I also think I beat myself up for the wrong reasons. I was raised by wolves and expected them to turn into lambs with time. They didn’t. And when hating yourself is something other people do so easily, it’s tempting to make it a habit. But hatred doesn’t belong to you just because it happened to you. Thank God we’re allowed to have our own way to see life, having our own perspective and shaping our world.

I reread something I wrote recently about life being about allowing yourself to be loved and loving people even when you don’t understand them. I surprised myself with that thought.

Maybe that’s what I’m missing: sensitivity. The understanding that I’ll never experience life from someone else’s body, their wounds, their perspective so its okay not to understand them or their actions

Being this critical eventually turns inward. You start hating your own talent. Your own potential. You kill your own vibe without even realizing it.

Who would’ve thought?

So my New Year’s resolution is to stop being such a bitch, but also holding myself accountable for not failing because I didn’t even bother trying.

“No one will love you if you’re unattractive,” said Melanie Martinez in the song Mrs. Potato Head.

When that song first came out almost nine years ago, it had a strange impact on me. I had grown up to be the most fake-confident girl I had ever seen, while being chronically insecure inside. Everything about my body, face, and personality triggered insecurities rooted deep in my core. Comparing myself to every single girl who had ever stepped foot on this planet was my favorite hobby. My nose was too big, I hated my smile, my thighs were too thin, and I was way taller than more than half of the girls I knew. But I fear that’s every teenage girl, we basically go through a phase where we hate every single thing about ourselves.

The thing is, what was only supposed to be a phase during teenage years didn’t end for everyone. With the rise of social media came the peak of self-comparison. You scroll for two seconds and see a thousand different attractive people on your screen, leading to the infamous question: “Why don’t I look like that?” We want to look like anyone else — except ourselves.

Critical thinking is out. Ozempic is very much in.

But why think when you can be pretty?

I was shocked to see a picture the other day while scrolling on Instagram, one that made me think I had gone crazy. I found myself staring at the photo for five minutes, trying to make sense of why I was seeing the same face on five different people. Until I realized they had just had the same procedures done and followed the same makeup routine.

I started wondering if we’d slowly been taught that nothing about us was worth leaving untouched.

“Well, there’s always something to fix,” a friend said casually while we played every girl’s favorite game: naming the cosmetic procedures we’d get if money wasn’t an issue. Some of the answers were basically, “If I reincarnated again.”

What often goes unnoticed is how closely this constant body-checking is tied to anxiety and depression, the belief that if you change everything about yourself (and then some), everything will be fine, as long as the scale and the mirror keep you in check.

The idea that beauty comes with pain has been haunting women since the day we were born. As women, we were raised to believe that by looking flawless, reaching perfection would lead to being loved. If sticking syringes into our faces and bodies is the price to finally be accepted and happy, why not? Willingly giving away every single characteristic of ourselves in the name of acceptance.

The pressure isn’t new. Women have been measured by their appearance for centuries, reduced to something meant to be looked at. And even now, after everything we like to believe has changed, that expectation lingers. When women are only asked to look good and stay there, it becomes easy to assume that nothing else inside us really matters. If appearance is all that is required, why would we need anything else to offer?

Why can’t beauty look like the little girl in our childhood pictures?

We aren’t taught how to deal with our mental health issues, nor to question why we’re so easily triggered by what we see online. Why this constant feeling of lacking something we didn’t even know about a week ago? Our algorithm whispers instructions on how to be hotter, better, fitter. How to be visually pleasing, while quietly erasing the fact that we still have a mind and a soul.

Conformity quietly became the trend of the moment, with aesthetics replacing identity, making it easy to blend in until individuality feels unfamiliar. The title of “being cool” now belongs to those who consume, to the oversaturation of sameness. Having the same skincare products, clothing pieces, and even looking alike gives a false sense of community and familiarity. A Band-Aid covering the wounds of a life full of inner struggles and low self-esteem.

The “How To” has become an epidemic, teaching us how to be ourselves. How little attention is given to young girls who are the target of this marketing, where being perfect is the new normal, while having different features is seen as degrading and something that lowers your social status.

There’s also a contradiction we rarely acknowledge. We complain about influencers for being fake, for altering their bodies and faces, yet we’re often the same ones dissecting their appearances in the comments, telling them to get Botox, go on a diet, or get breast implants. As if their bodies were other people’s personal projects. Quietly teaching insecurity, we demand authenticity while creating the pressure that makes it almost impossible. Suddenly, beauty has turned into a currency. The less we feel we have inside, the more we project it outward, trying to prove something, often without even realizing what. Perhaps, as a society, we’ve become so disconnected from anything real that the dopamine rush of fake connection is all we know now.

In the music video for Pretty Hurts by Beyoncé, she is asked a question by the host of a beauty pageant: “What’s your aspiration in life?” To this, she answers, “To be happy.” Seeking perfection is just another search for happiness, as if it were a treasure hunt, you have no idea what you’re looking for or why you’re looking at all. So the easiest route is to feel a sense of control through the only thing you can actually change: your appearance.

Understanding and addressing what triggers our insecurities is fundamental. It leads to less blind searching for fulfillment and less excessive, unnecessary fixing.

Because happiness was never supposed to come from perfection, and we were never meant to exist as decoration.

We’ve all been there. You’re seeing a guy, you really like him, you’ve told all your friends about him. You’re already planning your entire wedding in Italy. You had an amazing date last night and then, all of a sudden, he completely disappears from the face of the earth, making you believe that maybe aliens do exist and he was taken to another planet. Obviously the right answer.

The point is: getting ghosted can bring you dangerously close to what feels like a psychotic episode. When you get crickets instead of a simple “it was great, but…”, your imagination runs wild if you give it even a second. Suddenly, the way you said hi feels embarrassing. Maybe you closed the car door too aggressively. Maybe you told a joke that didn’t sound nearly as bad the night before. And now you’re replaying it all, wondering why the hell you said any of it especially when there’s no mutual friend you can casually interrogate and turn into your own private detective.

At this point, ghosting feels like a rite of passage for anyone who breathes and attempts to date in modern times.

PS: If you’re past the age of seventeen, there is absolutely no excuse for disappearing on someone you were seeing. For the love of God, at least have ChatGPT write a short paragraph explaining why you don’t think you’re a good fit and add: “make it really sweet.” And hit send.

After meeting so many ghosts throughout my late teens and early twenties, I’ve come to believe I’ve developed the perfect routine for when it happens.

So, in the name of I wish someone had told me this the first time I got extremely ghosted, here is my go-to guide for whenever you get ghosted based on absolutely nothing except my own experience and what actually works for me.

1. Surround yourself with your friends. Aggressively.

It’s important to spend as much time as possible with your friends. In my case, I love going out, so anything club, bar,or party-related. you’ll find my name at the top of the list. But if that’s not really your vibe, movie nights, sleepovers, coffee shops, or getting lunch with an old friend work just as well.

You need to remind yourself that you are fun to be around, and that there are people who would kill just to spend time with you. So many people genuinely believe they’re boring or hard to like, when in reality they’re just spending too much time alone with their thoughts.

2. Journal as much as you can.

You have to express your feelings somehow—poetry, painting, drawing, writing letters, short stories, anything. You don’t have to be good at it. It doesn’t have to make sense. It’s just about understanding what you’re feeling and thinking. Ask yourself: What would I say if I had the chance? Boom. You’ll feel a weight fall off your back.

3. If you don’t have any hobbies, find one

To me, this is the most important one. You have to enjoy doing things by yourself things that shut your mind off from everything else. Try a new sport, start a new book, bake until there’s no more space in the fridge, or try something you’ve never done before but always wanted to.

Be so excited about what you can do and how interesting and fun your life can be that you realize how little and irrelevant it is that someone didn’t bother to text you back.

4. Stop romanticizing the silence.

I know for a fact many of us start posting literally anything just to get the other person’s attention or obsessively checking who viewed our stories. So let’s spare ourselves.Hide your stories from him and mute his.

Don’t relive the good times like it’s a comfort movie. Think about the things you didn’t like about him (weird, yes but it works). And if your mind starts wondering what you did wrong, just assume he lost his phone. There. Peace restored.

At some point, you realize that waiting for closure is just another way of staying attached. You don’t actually need a reply to understand what happened. You don’t need one last conversation to move on. It didn’t work out and that’s fine.

Be comfortable with the idea of not being chosen. It hurts, yes. But it’s okay to feel it. It’s not embarrassing to have had real feelings for someone who didn’t correspond them. That doesn’t make you naive or dramatic.

Maybe there’s a next. But before that, spend time with yourself. Don’t jump into the arms of the first person you see crossing the street just to distract yourself. Distraction only delays the hurt. Sometimes it passes it on to a poor soul who had nothing to do with the situation. Other times, it comes back louder.

And then you’re playing “Pushing It Down and Praying” by Lizzy McAlpine like it’s your life’s anthem.

And maybe you’ll realize the person you’re missing wasn’t really who you thought they were. You just overly romanticized them and filled in the blanks yourself. Perhaps the personality you liked so much was actually created by you. I once heard someone say that a crush is just a lack of information and unfortunately, that made a lot of sense.

Or maybe you’ll realize it was all a performance and you played along. You played the version of yourself that felt chosen, interesting, temporarily enough. And when that feeling vanishes, you start questioning your worth.

It’s insane how fast low self-esteem rushes in to explain the silence. You wait to be chosen again, and suddenly anyone will do. But the moment they leave, you’re back where you started hoping someone else will come along and convince you that you’re worth staying for.

A solid sense of self is the only thing that doesn’t disappear when they do.

In the meantime, here’s a little playlist, in case you feel like bawling your eyes out :)

I think having a crush might be one of the symptoms of psychosis.

Maybe I just have too much time on my hands. Maybe I’m bored.

But that’s not true. I have plenty to worry about, and even more to do. So tell me why I can’t think of anything else other than this guy. It’s like even breathing reminds me of him. It’s getting old already. I should personally award myself a medal if I manage to go twenty-four hours without mentioning his name or, God forbid, thinking about him at all.

And the worst part? It gets even worse when you actually try to sit with yourself and understand why he’s all you can think about. Does he make me feel special? No. Far from that. He makes me feel like the most ordinary girl to ever step foot on this earth.

There’s that feeling some people bring like whenever you open your mouth, you suddenly become the least interesting person they’ve ever had the misfortune of meeting. Still, for some reason, his memory is engraved in my brain. Every time I close my eyes, I think of him.

As I was trying to meditate (yes, I fell victim of that cult lol) I couldn’t get rid of the thoughts of him, completely ruining the process. And as I started to think I was going crazy (because let’s be honest, it’s overwhelming when it feels like someone has their hands wrapped around your brain and you don’t know what to do, you can’t think of anything else. It almost makes you wanna walk into your own brain and drag this person out of there.) I suddenly had a realization. This, I realized, is my coping mechanism: my brain holding on to a fleeting ‘good’ feeling, pretending this is the biggest problem in my life when, of course, it’s not.

I just moved from New York to Los Angeles a month ago, trying to rebuild my life from scratch. In a few weeks, I’ll go back to my home country for the first time in two years. Half the time, I have no idea what I’m even doing. Decisions feel too big to handle, like life is happening faster than I can catch. And when everything around you feels uncertain, your brain looks for something familiar to hold on to, something that feels exciting, comforting, safe. Maybe that’s why my mind keeps returning to him. Not to him, really, but to a time when things were lighter, when I felt like I could breathe. That’s what I miss.

So part of me is just afraid to feel like a failure, to not be able to handle the weight of what it means to be a grown-up. I think that’s why I was trying so hard to romanticize something, to sugarcoat my little reality.

That probably explains the teenage behavior. I’m terrified that time is flying by too quickly, that I have to suddenly be mature and start making better decisions. And what screams teenage girl more than being obsessed with a crush and creating fake scenarios in your head before bed?

I realize I’m actually in love with the distraction, with the hustle to try to prove my worth. Which allows me to ignore my real problems. It’s like giving my brain a little break.

See, I avoid allowing myself to feel things, so I rather get distracted. But the more you do that, the more it feels like you’re slowly drowning. The water’s already in your brain, messing with your thoughts, clouding your judgment until you can’t even tell what’s real anymore. You start wondering how you even let it get this far, not realizing it’s the constant chase for validation, the distraction mixed with those little moments of excitement.

I think it’s also tied to the ego. You make it your life mission to impress someone, to make them like you, and when they give you breadcrumbs of attention or affection, you hold on for dear life. Then, when they start to pull away, your ego starts breaking things inside your head, wondering what’s suddenly wrong with you. Why can’t they stay? Why can’t they like you anymore? It becomes an infinite loop, chasing small doses of dopamine.

But why is it so terrifying to actually face my emotions that I keep running from them?

Reality can be heavy, I get it. daydreaming feels like a little escape route. It’s comforting, harmless even… until you realize it gets you nowhere. Because, let’s be honest, nothing changes if nothing changes.

The crazy thing is how I was avoiding facing my true emotions for this new phase of my life and pretending that the most important thing is having a crush on someone.

He became my “mental escape hatch,” a place my brain runs to when reality feels too heavy. It’s familiar, comforting and that doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings for him. Most of it, though, is me creating safety where there isn’t any.

However, I can’t keep using my fears as an excuse to act like I’m fifteen. There’s no Prince Charming coming to fix my life, face my reality, or make my decisions for me. So I guess it’s time to leave La La Land behind.

I find it hard to enjoy conversations nowadays, always so dull, so boring, meaningless. No original thoughts, even my thoughts sometimes sound like something you would find online or in a sad pop song written by a 13-year-old aspiring to be the next Taylor Swift. “You look exactly like this influencer.” Great. Kill me now. Not even my looks are original. Shake a tree, and five versions of me will fall like apples.

You are not getting any younger, I am reminded every single day as I notice lines forming around my eyes. What’s the next move? Career plans? Thoughts about marriage? Children? Buying your own house? Boyfriends? Not an ounce of love in sight. At this point, winning the lottery sounds more plausible than finding genuine love, but also I can be considered too picky. I’ve heard, “You might stay alone forever if you keep choosing like this.” I’ve got to agree, to refuse to date someone whose personality and emotions are even plainer than AI is outrageous indeed.

I hate feelings. Every time I sense a different emotion, I take a shower to see if it’ll wash away. But weirdly enough, I roll my eyes if I see a happy couple walking around holding hands. The thought of happy relationships makes me want to throw up and throw a party at the same time. I crave connection like I crave nicotine after two drinks in. Impress me and make my heart race in the first ten minutes we meet, or else, you stand no chance. I use dates as a form of exposure therapy, such as an interview where I can say whatever I want, talk about me, my opinions, and my perspectives in life, giving no space or care about theirs.

I am afraid to be too much, but is that really a thing? I know I am a hypocrite, but I have known for a while. I write in my journal, judge strangers with a smirk, say my affirmations daily, pray, do everything by the book in a search to fix everything I apparently messed up on purpose without purpose.

“I love you,” I say under my breath, as in silence I watch them walk away. I turn my back, crack a joke, shed a tear, knowing I will mourn them for the rest of my days. Hoping for a miracle, I cross my fingers and blow out candles to make my wishes come true. As I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, I wonder how I will ever be able to swallow everything I actually want to say. Maybe my writing is my redemption. My salvation. Who knows. I will sob for a week straight after being so positive for an entire year. I can’t even stand the word “energy” being pronounced near me. But my friends are getting married. They’re adults. And I have to stop behaving and thinking like a rebellious teenager.

I can’t move, my past shows I ruin everything that dares to cross my path. But nooo, the universe isn’t out to get me. I am not that special for higher forces to be conspiring against me. I created my reality, so who can I yell at? Who should I blame? Not me. Maybe my ADHD for making me such a distracted person I couldn’t even realize I was creating chaos for my future self. I am built from random metaphors people try to read but can’t quite understand.

I want to be seen and heard, but I lose my voice whenever I am asked a question. My palms sweat, and the voices in my head whisper, “Don’t say anything that could be remotely stupid.” It’s blank. Nothing comes to mind, so I mumble words that don’t make any sense, trying to form a sentence. Only God knows how smart I actually am when I am alone. But maybe I am just delusional. I have this higher sense of self. I can do it all, be it all.

“You overthink too much. You get bored very easily. You just got to push through.” Well, really, aren’t you the new Sherlock fucking Holmes? Maybe they say that because they don’t know I’m a Gemini, or because they don’t think at all, and it shows. Critical thinking? A myth in their lives. I am terribly comfortable in my own mind, and I dare to say it’s my favorite place on earth, and I’d pack my stuff and move there in a heartbeat.

I think too much. I feel things too deeply with every fiber of my body. I love life, I swear to myself, and really, I think I do. The only moment that makes me rethink that is whenever someone is over-babbling about probably the least interesting possible thing ever, and there is no escape. Nothing you can say besides ‘wow’, even though you have absolutely no clue what’s being said. That genuinely makes me question whether I like being alive or not.

Life is a curse and a blessing. Either you suck it up, or you suck it up. Really, there’s no in between. “Who do you want to be?” they ask, so I’ll order a drink and ask, how much time do they have?

I also have tons of questions, more than I would like to admit. What’s the secret to self-satisfaction and success? Is it luck, talent, perhaps dedication? And now I ask, how much time do I have to figure out the answers for these? Or maybe some people just have it in them, the stars are aligned for them. I mean, what the hell, good for them.

you never learned what genre I write in, yet you mock my writing.

as I kneel in prayer, begging to go back to who I was before you,

that the wind might take all of my memories of you.

but you laugh, realizing I’ve become exactly who you are,

as if worshipping my mind was your way of draining it,

since you couldn’t have it for yourself.

in an attempt to steal my soul, so you could replicate it on someone who could pass for me standing from behind.

you said I was made to be loved.

not by you, no, not by anyone else.

I was too good to be true,

a circus to visit, to momentarily admire.

and when the spectacle ended,

you clapped, looked around, praised the numbers.

“forever my favorite. brilliant.”

then you turned around,

collected your litter, your popcorn, and left.

never to look back, never to be seen again.

you’d already watched the show once,

no reason to come back.

and I became a short, forgotten story you sometimes tell.

“A mad woman. That is what she was,” I hear you say.

even though I know you build puzzles with my poems on it whenever you miss feeling something.

but I was meant to be loved.

maybe not for long.

not forever.

although I crave love deep in my bones,

perhaps I should accept my fate:

even you were capable of being loved,

but not me.

no, not me.

I love routine and the fear of falling into it.

I learned to live in the dark.

Trying to impress the impressionable.

And as much as I twist myself to admit it, I found my passion early in life:

diving headfirst into the shallow.

I claim to want silence, yet I keep lighting bonfires just to watch who turns their head.

There’s something oddly comforting about mediocrity, how it keeps my feet on the ground.

As if on some random Thursday, I could wake up and decide to leave it behind, but never again have the chance to bathe in my own mediocrity.

I’ll admit, on behalf of all of us,

that we are driven more by fear

than by that glorified thing called ambition.

And I make a point of blending in with the ordinary

some kind of test based solely on my perception,

to feel something, to confirm if I rot along with them.

At some point, change must come.

My brain will start to decay, and I’ll lose all my best arguments.

I see nobility in wanting to share riches with those who don’t speak my dialect,

but I get frustrated when they don’t understand a single word I say.

But how could I carry the word persistent in the right pocket of my shirt if I didn’t persist in my mistakes?

I swore to my ancestors that I’d embody originality to the letter, be the personification of individuality.

They just forgot to tell me that cheating wasn’t allowed.

So I ended up making the scars on my chest the most interesting thing about me.

Until one day I woke up to the revelation that it made me more “common” than I’d ever imagined.

I rolled my eyes at myself.

My stomach turned just at the sound of the word.

I took a deep breath and remembered I still had my exterior to make up for the lack of substance.

Which still leaves me contradicting myself in endless internal debates.

Some kind of museum piece worth staring at for a few seconds,

but never enough to make anyone read the description beside it.

Maybe my looks, the drinks, the smoke hovering above my head overshadow the complexity of my mind.

Or maybe I’m being ironic, minimizing my passion for empty nights, for that slight feeling my third drink brings, every shallow conversation, every glance exchanged with strangers, every lie told in the name of freedom.

That feeling that each glass brings you closer to yourself.

As if the world stops for a few hours or better yet,

my mind finally does.

And I’ll admit: I’d live drunk if I could.

I’d fall asleep and wake up with a bottle of tequila in my arms.

But that’s one of those opinions we keep to ourselves, trying to hide how emotionally unstable we really are.

At dawn, I switch into my other self

the one who writes,

the one who reads,

the one who lets the nights become myth.

Honestly, if I ever crossed paths with that other version of me wandering the city, probably drunk, I doubt I’d recognize her.

And I’m proud of that.

Let’s call it “overthinking.” I would spend my days imagining what could be said about the things I had done, or what everyone’s reaction would be if I were to do something different. I lived for them. I made the opinion of others my personal bible. The thought of people not understanding my mind haunted me. I wished people around me could read me from the inside, to see me in a better light, to know me like I know myself.

All because I thought they cared. Or maybe I was the one who cared too much.

I couldn’t bear to be misunderstood, even though I was doing some pretty questionable things during my teenage years. I was naive, impulsive, and had the worst judgment possible. But I was yet to learn that people’s reactions, how they perceive you, are actually reflections of themselves, their insecurities, fears, and desires.

“We don’t see things as they are; we see them as we are.”— Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin

I constantly misread comments or looks because I spent so much of my time judging myself that I assumed others were doing the same. It’s like when you have a pimple and you go out, that’s all you can think about, so anyone who even glances your way, you assume they noticed the freaking pimple.

I hated confrontation. I’d apologize even when I wasn’t in the wrong. I’d keep my mouth shut even when my boundaries were pushed. Even better I had no boundaries. I didn’t disagree with a single soul, no matter how outrageous it sounded to me. I felt genuinely sick if I heard someone didn’t like me. I wanted to be loved. I wanted to be the nicest person this world had ever seen, even if that meant losing my essence. I cared so much about how I was being perceived that I had no opinion, no personality.

But how big of an ego did I have, to imagine I was so important to my acquaintances that I was all they thought and talked about?

And so what if they did? So what if they don’t agree with every single decision I make, if I’m not their favorite person on this earth? It’s better to be unapologetically yourself and be surrounded by those who genuinely love you despite your faults. To feel safe being you, than to live to please people whose lives wouldn’t change if you vanished completely from their presence.

Learning that nothing is that personal is a hard pill to swallow, to understand that no one is making decisions out of spite for you, that their lives aren’t devoted to you. And no, the world doesn’t revolve around us. So next time someone does something that bothers you deeply, take a moment to reflect on how much of that really has anything to do with you, and you’ll realize that 98% of the time, the answer is that they weren’t thinking of you at all.

I used to have the most insane hangxiety after a night of drinking. I wouldn’t leave my bed, twisting myself in regret, thinking about what people were saying about me after the night before. (I did exaggerate, I admit. and some nights were actually too much.)

The thing is, the more we think about something, the worse it gets in our minds. If I asked you right now to list three embarrassing things one of your friends has done, it would take you a couple of minutes to come up with an answer. But if I asked you to list ten embarrassing things you’ve done, you’d be able to answer in a heartbeat.

There’s no such thing as “being too much.” If you feel like that, it’s because you’re around the wrong people.

Allowing yourself to be who you want to be, to be passionate about things, to talk about what shakes your world is what makes you memorable later in life. How incredibly interesting it is to be different, to carry unique stories, interests, talents, dreams, opinions and not care about what others think.

Because caring more about what others think than about being true to yourself is to fail your inner child and your future self.

I’d rather be adored for being me than tolerated for trying to please. To shrink yourself to fit others’ expectations until you lose your sense of self — that’s no way to live.

I know it’s easier said than done, but just imagine how many good stories you’ll have if you live instead of perform. Half of my deadliest embarrassing moments have become my favorite ones to tell. And yeah this is advice for me too. Because I still catch myself wondering what people think of me here and there. But then I literally try to talk myself out of it.

We are not that special.

And thank God for that because it means no one cares enough to keep score.

I don’t consider myself a relationship girl. I can’t picture being a girlfriend. I don’t look at anyone’s relationship and think, wow, I wish I was in one. I get the ick so easily it’s embarrassing. I’ve never been in love or wished I dated someone specific. I just can’t bring myself to care enough.

Which is weird, because I also can’t stand the idea of something “casual.” I always develop feelings, just not deep enough to make me commit. Maybe it’s because I get bored easily. Or maybe it’s because I enjoy my own company and my peace way too much to give that space up for someone else.

Don’t get me wrong, I love going on dates. I thrive on first dates. I flirt more than I probably should, but as long as it doesn’t mean anything, it’s fun. I enjoy texting my not-really “situationships” and the random calls. All of it is enjoyable… until it starts to get serious. Then I disappear.

I like being free. I like not having to worry about getting hurt or having my heart broken into a million pieces. I know it sounds weird, but I think it’s kind of stupid to open up like that, to willingly give someone the opportunity to ruin my entire life.

Maybe I’m too scared to learn what real feelings are, to be raw and vulnerable. Even though I know that living in fear of getting hurt is just another way of hurting myself.

I’ve let so many people go because I got scared, only to realize that at some point I’ll have to take a risk instead of just watching from the sidelines.

I once told a therapist that I was terrified of not being reciprocated, of waking up one day to learn that my boyfriend didn’t love me anymore. (Mind you, I’ve never even had a boyfriend.) It’s almost like I’m afraid of being seen completely. Because what’s the guarantee that once you let someone in, once they know every single piece of you, they’ll actually stay?

It’s easy when they leave before they really know me, it’s almost a relief, because then the loss doesn’t feel like a loss at all. If they never saw the parts I hide I can keep telling myself it wasn’t real. That story comforts me: they didn’t leave me, they left a character I’d been performing. But the terrifying thing is the opposite: what if someone stays long enough to know the real me, the version of myself I only show when I think no one’s watching, and then chooses to leave anyway? That possibility knocks all the wind out of me. Because then I would know that who I really am wasn’t enough to make them stay. So that’s why I perform.

I never let anyone in fully. I don’t give them the chance or the privilege to know the stupid little details, like how many freckles I have on my face, or how I make a wish every single time I blow out a candle

I’ve watched my friends go through breakups, their eyes puffy from crying, unable to eat or sleep. And if that were me? What if I could never recover? That’s my biggest fear, not being able to handle it or move on.

That’s why I’ve been running away from relationships like the devil runs from the cross. I choose emotionally unavailable guys because it’s easier. You already know how it’s going to end.

To be loved is scary.

To love someone is even scarier.

But isn’t that the point of life? We don’t get a crystal ball. We don’t get to know how things turn out. And unless I want to stay forever by myself with maybe three dogs and six cats, I’ve got to take a risk, cross my fingers and hope for the best.

At the end of the day, I know I’ll always have myself. I’ll always be able to rely on my friends and my family. And that’s enough.

Not everyone is going to be like the guy from high school who broke my heart when I was sixteen. Maybe I should give myself a little credit, that I’ll be able to handle whatever happens, that I will be able to stand up for myself.

It’s a curse, really, to be so afraid of something I’ve hoped for my entire life.

Maybe until I finally feel like I’ve found something real. But do we ever really feel like we have it all figured out?

It feels like I’m drowning in my own hopes and dreams, watching everyone else get what they’ve always wanted, except me. And with every step I take, it feels like I’m somehow walking backwards. Nothing feels right, going back home, staying, picking up some random job, dating someone, moving away from my friends and family. I feel like I’m constantly chasing this “right feeling,” the certainty that I’m in the right place at the right time.

Meanwhile, I keep preaching to myself that everything happens for a reason, even though I end up hugging myself some nights because of how lost I feel.

It’s such a specific feeling that it’s hard to share with people, being this vulnerable. But maybe that’s what makes it so profound: the privilege of being lost, yet knowing you can start over again and again. Better that than being stuck in a life that doesn’t feel like yours.

Someone once told me, “You have nothing to lose but everything to gain.” And maybe that’s true. I can’t feel more lost than I do right now… so maybe it only gets better from here.

There’s something magical about childhood, the way you feel like you can be anything you want. Impossible dreams that somehow feel so close, an imagination that stretches beyond any limits.

I remember playing mermaids, dressing up as a fairy in the backyard, tomorrow didn’t exist. Blanket forts, trying on every outfit in my mother’s closet while arguing with my imaginary kids.

Even chores were fun. Washing dishes made me feel more mature and responsible… until it became an obligation. From then on, I had to use my imagination to invent excuses for why I couldn’t wash them that day, testing my parents’ patience.

I wanted to be everything: a ballerina, an astronaut, an actress, a lawyer, a writer. It was exciting to imagine a future, to imagine being a teenager, to imagine turning twenty. My house was going to be entirely pink. But suddenly, with every candle I blew out on my birthday cake, something lost its magic.

I stopped talking about my dreams because they sounded childish. I wasn’t the first anymore to suggest what my mermaid name would be. My clothes didn’t excite me, and life started to feel more serious. I seemed silly for wanting different things.

Because, unfortunately, society pushes us toward “serious” jobs, toward knowing what we want to do for the rest of our lives far too early, even before we’ve figured out who we are.

By fifteen, the questions began: what major would I choose, what career would I pursue? Even though, at that age, my biggest concern was whether the boy I liked felt the same way about me. But everyone around me expected an answer, and some seemed so certain of theirs… I felt cornered, so I started rehearsing fake answers just to avoid disapproving stares.

That’s when I began to see myself in Peter Pan. I started to romanticize the idea of not growing up, of time slipping out of my control, moving too fast. That I hadn’t had enough time to truly be a child, that I still wanted to throw tantrums, cry over a toy, or have my biggest fear be the school calling my mom about something I’d done.

I wanted to go back to when my parents could fix everything wrong in my world. To be small enough to be carried because I simply didn’t want to walk anymore or pretend to be asleep in the car just so they’d carry me inside.

Sadly, I can’t even remember the last time any of that happened, and that’s what shocks me most. The uncertainty of when something becomes the last time… how we grow up in the blink of an eye.

And when we finally reach the age we spent years idolizing, we feel the deepest kind of grief for what once was childhood. So I can’t help but sympathize with Peter Pan, because I too would have surrendered to Neverland if I’d been given the choice.

And I allow myself to be examined meticulously.

Break my heart in two, and let each half decide its own fate.

I’ve always kept my bags packed at the foot of my bed since I was a child.

Like a blindfolded treasure hunt, not even knowing what prize I keep talking about, yet still using it as an excuse for my impulsive decisions.

But I wonder if the reward for abandoning those I would sacrifice myself for is truly worth it. If it’s worth the price. If there even is a reward for missing the golden years of the people life has given me.

Or maybe I just suffer from a kind of nomad syndrome, where the new or simply the idea of it makes my blood run faster.

Despite my constant nightmares that all my trees will wither before I ever get to enjoy their shade one last time.

I wake in the middle of the night with knots in my throat from everything I never had the chance to say.

But I found a solution: I pour my strongest prayers onto paper, turning my journal into my confidant.

Where my scribbles and pages know me in the deepest way, in the purest form ever seen by human eyes.

I tear my house apart the moment my vape magically disappears from sight, only to realize it was in my pocket the whole time.

I open TikTok every three minutes, and suddenly two and a half hours of my day are gone. Honestly, I can’t even remember a single video I watched.

The urge to buy things I don’t even need, just because they showed up in a video like some kind of guest star.

Absorbing other people’s personalities and styles without ever developing my own.

And as sad as it is, TikTok and social media have become the newest addiction just as destructive as nicotine.

We compare ourselves 24/7, sinking into debt in the attempt to “belong” to a selective cycle, swearing with every purchase that we’re one bill closer to “divine acceptance.”

Meanwhile, we don’t even know if we actually need that anti-wrinkle cream… at seventeen.

We ride along with the comfort of having no real interest in being ourselves or even in figuring out who we are.

We want the same lip fillers, the same brow lift, the same cup size, the same makeup routine identical to everyone else in the room.

And worst of all: the same personality as a cardboard door.

Originality has gone down the drain, and consumerism has reached its boiling point.

In the end, it’s hard to notice the social, psychological, and emotional uniformity when we surround ourselves with people as shallow as a puddle.

But why have we lost interest in ourselves?

In my humble opinion, it’s easier to absorb whatever comes from others than to deal with our own complexity.

To accept that the “flaws” in our bodies and the “failures” in our personalities are exactly what make us unique.

So we let ourselves fade into the background, not even knowing who our favorite artists are anymore, reading only the books trending online—that’s if we bother to read at all.

Unfortunately, we’ve turned into that Spider-Man meme, where three identical versions are pointing at each other.

I got tired of my Samba sneakers after two days, once I stepped outside and saw half the city wearing the same pair.

And yet, I stay obsessed with the idea of being “original” even though, under the sun, there’s nothing truly new.

No idea I’ll ever have will actually be unique.

But maybe that’s the whole point.

Because even if no outfit, thought, or creation is truly original, we are in some way unique.

The way we speak, the way we express ourselves, our quirks and tastes… none of that will ever be identical.

And maybe we should be content with that.