I want to be a Jo, and in and of itself, that makes me an Amy

For a long time, I considered myself to be a Jo March. Honestly, it was the only reflection that made sense to see when I looked at my own life, the only narrative that felt big enough to match the roaring expectations of navigating my twenties. The unbothered, wild independence she stands for is a beautiful, heavy, hard-won thing. It’s a path carved out by the power and determination of the women before us who fought to give us the right to choose it—to hand us the keys to our own autonomy, that gave us the space to exist outside the lines, question the rigid social expectations, and live on our own terms without needing permission. Jo represents a specific kind of spirit, a distinct and intoxicating way of moving through the world that naturally draws people in. It’s an identity defined by a fierce, wild passion and an effortless carefreeness that fills a room. There is an intense loyalty, a protective nature, and a massive creative ambition there, but also a quick temper and a beautiful messiness that makes it all so incredibly human. This sounds exactly like the type of person I envision myself to be. It is a way of existing on an individual wavelength, comfortable enough in that skin to stay untethered by expectations. It is a natural independence that allows a focus on what matters most to the heart, living exactly how desired without ever waiting for approval. Yet, this existence isn't completely invincible; underneath that magnetic force, there is a subtle worry about being good enough, an ache to be loved, and a quiet fear of the crushing weight of being lonely. But the response to that fear isn't to freeze or look for approval— it is to run faster before the creeping mist of doubt can settle over. It is to keep moving forward on individual terms, refusing to bend. In reality, it is a desire to just burn bright.

For the longest time, I looked at that effortless gravity and saw my own reflection, or at least the one I desperately wanted to see. I wanted to inhabit that skin so badly it ached, because in a world that feels completely out of control, acting like you don't care feels like the safest thing, ironically. I’ve spent the beginning of my twenties wearing Jo as a heavy winter coat, showcasing a detached cynicism and trying to convince myself that I was just as loud, just as reckless, and just as completely capable of the risks of the world around me. I wanted to believe I could just leap blindly into the dark without a safety net, unconcerned with where or how hard I landed. I wanted to be the girl who could laugh off the opinions of the room, spill her drinks, make a complete mess of her life, and keep running without looking back. It’s an easy narrative to sell yourself when you're navigating the unscripted era of your twenties—you tell yourself you're an independent cynic because it feels safer than admitting how deeply you crave to be chosen, how much you care about the opinions of the room, and how badly you want the world to look at you with validation.

But there has been a quiet, seismic moment of self-discovery i’ve been grappling with at this point of my life—not a loss of who I am, but a profound, eye-opening awakening. It’s the moment where you finally stop running, sit down on the floor of your bedroom, and look at your reflection beneath the heavy coat. You look in the mirror and realize that wanting so desperately to be a Jo is, in and of itself, the very thing that makes you an Amy.

Because when the performative noise fades, the truth is much simpler, and much heavier: I don’t have that carefree attitude. I’m not wild, reckless, and fiercely unapologetic in everything I do. I don't just blindly take risks and assume the universe will catch me. The reality is, I care too much about the stakes of the real world. To carry an Amy core in a world obsessed with Jo is to feel like you are walking through life with an internal anchor pulling at your heels while everyone else is floating. I worry about the future, I overanalyze the room, and I am far too deeply anchored to reality to ever truly be carefree about how I navigate it. I care about the opinions of the people around me, I care about the image I present, and I care about whether the ground beneath my feet is going to crumble. It’s an exhausting, beautiful complexity—and it means that my independence looks entirely different.

When you are young, it is easy to mistake a fear of growing up for a fierce independence. I used to be terrified of my fading time in childhood, completely panicked by the thought of losing the structure I’ve always known, and desperate to keep everything exactly as it was—a terror that is entirely Jo March. But somewhere along the line, the mist settled, and I realized I am not that girl. I am not hiding from the clock or clinging to the past.

The reality is that the girls who are like Jo and the girls who are like Amy are not opposites at all. We are two sides of the exact same coin, chasing the same massive, blinding dreams on completely parallel lines. We are essentially cut from the same cloth, harboring the same echoing desire for a life that is undoubtedly exceptional. We both possess this inane, roaring drive to be noticed, to stand out, and to leave an undeniable mark on a world that so often tells women to remain quiet and small. The split isn't in what we want out of life—it’s in how we internalize, process, and handle the raw friction of reality.

The Jo-type girls move through the world with a natural defiance, letting their raw passion dictate their moves. They have the rare luxury of letting their talent or their presence speak for itself, entirely unconcerned with traditional expectations or the paths laid out before them. But navigating life as an Amy means your ambition is tied to a brilliant, sharp awareness of the room.

Louisa May Alcott didn't just write Amy as a flat, calculated shadow; she wrote her as outgoing, remarkably sharp-witted, and outspoken. She is a girl who loves to be unserious, but fiercely wishes to be taken seriously. That specific duality is a constant, exhausting tug-of-war in my own everyday life. I love the lighthearted moments, the laughter, and the unbothered whimsy of just existing, but it creates a dynamic where people constantly misread me and see a shallow pond. They look at the exterior I’ve built and miss the depth underneath, assuming that because I enjoy the beautiful, lighter pieces of life, I must not possess as complex, as analytical of a mind. Like Amy, I am left constantly trying to prove my own intelligence and sea of identity to a room that has already decided who I am.

Where a Jo effortlessly walks into a space, completely comfortable in her mess, and commands the room without even trying, whether it’s true or not I feel as if I am operating like Peter Pan’s shadow, constantly trying to detach myself from the crushing weight of feeling like the permanent second choice. The way his shadow tries desperately to detach itself from Peter and be as captivating on his own. Jo effortlessly gets noticed without even trying; she has a world that watches her every move, waiting to see what she will do next. Maybe it isn’t actually true, maybe the Jo-type girls of have it just as bad or even worse, this is only my perspective after all. But I do know navigating life as an Amy means learning how to move through the world in the dark, with no one watching.

It can be a heavy way to grow through your twenties. There is a quiet, persistent pressure in knowing that there is no safety net beneath your feet—no one is waiting in the wings to pick you up if you fall, and no one is behind you pushing you to succeed. Every ounce of momentum, every single choice, and every bit of stability has to come from within your own self-reliant space. As an Amy it turns you into a high-achiever who thinks love and validation need to be actively earned, leaving you trapped in a cycle where you rarely believe a compliment when it actually comes your way. You are building a life from scratch in the quiet, carrying the heavy anchor of reality in your bones while watching everyone else float by on an effortless current.

Yet, that early pressure forces you to build an incredible resilience. Because you have to depend on yourself so early, you learn never to wait around for anyone to save you or fix things for you. Once again, similar to Jo built with an entirely different foundation. You turn that independence into a profound capacity to be an incredibly empathetic, dependable anchor for the people you care about. You love self-improvement, good company, and the finer, beautiful things in life because you believe you deserve a life that is exceptional. You care about how you present yourself to the world because you hold yourself to a higher standard, and you refuse to apologize for wanting a life that is grand and put together. It means that your independence isn't about being wild and reckless, but about having the courage to look at reality and own your place within it.

The core misconception about navigating life as an Amy is the assumption that choosing a practical path means stripping your world of true romance, settling into a cold, definitive realism that leaves little room for magic. But that isn't true at all. The reality is that I romanticize life deeply. I chase the beauty in the everyday, I indulge in the things that aren't practical, and I harbor a soul that is completely, undeniably drawn to magic. That is why I wore the heavy coat for so long, believing I belonged with the Jos of the world. Again, we are travelling to a similar destination but on parallel lines. We both want a life that feels grand, exceptional, and filled with a love like you only see in the movies. The difference is simply that I dream them differently.

I have never known how to move through the world in small, measured doses. When I care about something, or when I love someone, I throw my absolute soul into it, trying my hardest and giving everything I have because a casual existence has never interested me. But the reality of living with that kind of intensity is that your effort doesn't automatically mean you get chosen. It forces a constant comparison. You find yourself standing in spaces watching people who seem to glide forward. It leaves you holding a deep well of self-doubt, overanalyzing every conversation and milestone, because when you are working twice as hard just to feel included, the fear of coming up short stays locked in the back of your mind.

Carrying that constant fear of coming up short doesn’t leave you defeated; instead, it builds a kind of defiance in your bones. When you spend years believing you have to work twice as hard just to be seen or included, it becomes completely impossible to settle for an ordinary life just to get by. You look at mediocrity and decide that it isn’t an option for you. Your mind refuses to accept a compromised existence. Like Amy, you find yourself locking eyes with the world and declaring a fundamental truth:

I want to be great or nothing.

It is a massive standard to set for yourself, and it requires a rare kind of bravery. The real challenge is looking at a situation, seeing the uncertainty of the unknown, and still finding the ambition to try anyway. You care too much about the future to live carelessly in the moment. That protective instinct is exactly why you keep your guard up; you are a hopeless romantic who wants a life filled with a grand, exceptional love like you see in the movies, but you refuse to just jump headfirst into a volatile dark and willingly suffer for it. You want the magic, but you also demand the practical security that keeps your life from falling apart.

That need for security is the reason I’ve chosen the path I’m on. Growing up, I was raised to believe that I needed to fully support myself and guarantee my own stability, rather than relying on anyone else. A philosophy that is necessary, empowering, and terrifying. Keeping my deepest interest in writing and literature as a hobby wasn’t a timid surrender born out of fear; it was just a choice to keep it safe. I looked at how difficult it is to achieve excellence and security in a creative field, and I didn’t want to watch my passion turn into a stressful chore. So, I chose a stable path as my anchor, leaving writing to exist as a loved hobby—which is what I am doing right now. It takes a lot of maturity to hold onto a romantic vision of the world while securing the stability you need. I know I don’t fully understand everything I shifted around to make this work, and I live with a quiet wonder of what-ifs in the back of my mind. But I chose a route that honors both my creative soul and my need for reality.

But this protective way of life doesn’t just dictate how I view a career; it follows me directly into how I love, how I fight, and how I exist when the door is closed. When you are a perfectionist who believes your place in the world must be actively earned, you become hyper-conscious of everyone around you. You carry an incredibly kind, caring, and generous heart, always wanting to help, but it sets up a heavy imbalance in your personal connections. Like Amy, who poured her whole soul into her family only to watch the world look past her, I routinely find myself loving people more than they love me. You pour everything you have into relationships while secretly wondering in the quiet moments if you are actually lovable just as you are. It turns you into someone who is deeply sensitive and entirely too hard on yourself, struggling to believe validation when it comes your way because you have spent so long feeling like you have to perform to be seen.

And because you care so intensely, that guarded, put-together exterior can only hold so much before it completely overflows. I am not a detached cynic, and I am not without my insecurities. There are moments in my life where the pressure gets too high and my raw emotions take over completely—where the shell cracks and I let my anger or my obsession run the room. You become sensitive to a fault, letting a hyper-fixation take the wheel because you refuse to live a muted, casual life. You let your obsession take over because your passion is too big to be contained at times. You feel things with a sharpness that a carefree person could never understand, and you refuse to apologize for the mess when it finally spills over.

Dropping the costume isn’t a loss. It is the moment you finally stop fighting your own gravity and realize that building your own foundation is far more satisfying than trying to float. Secure your roof, feel every single thing too deeply, refuse to apologize for wanting a grand life, and step completely into your own light.

There is an immense, protective pride that comes with dropping the weight of who you thought you were supposed to be. I spent so long treating Amy March like a cautionary tale or a secondary option, but the truth is, I relate to her deeply. I understand her because parts of me that I carry, I am able to se in parts of her. I love what she represents. I love her ambition, her emotional intensity, her drive for self-improvement, and the determination it takes to carry self-doubt but try anyway. Amy holds her head up high. She isn't a lesser version of a woman; she is its own profound superpower. Realizing that I inhabit her skin is a massive, eye-opening victory. I am an Amy, and I absolutely love it.

If you are a Jo, go run wild and chase the narrative that burns the brightest. If you are a Meg, buy the expensive dress and protect your world. If you are a Beth, keep your quiet peace and love your people fiercely. And if you are an Amy, stop apologizing for wanting it all and protect your romantic heart. Enjoy life without the heavy coat.

Just a small piece of advice, don’t fall for your sister’s best friend….or your best friend’s brother…. And actually you CAN quote me on this.

Xoxo, Haleyanna.

Allegedly ☕️

I need to talk about Slayyyter. Seriously, her music is constantly playing in my head on a loop. "Brand new chanel$"—this is what I want to hear when I’m out in NYC, dancing with my friends at some bar in the LES. I’m tired of the music at the pregame or ride to the bar being better than the music on the dance floor. Please bring back getting lost on the dance floor and get rid of the fly on the wall holding a beer attitude a lot of people have. When it’s a girls night out I expect my feet to hurt the next day.

The Paperstack 📖

Currently I am on Chapter six of Crescent City House of Earth and Blood. Still in the very early world-building stage, but I am enjoying it so far; maybe minus the immediate heartbreak but we’ll see what happens. I’ve been annotating as I go so we’ll see what I am able to figure out on my own and my theories in next week’s Paperstack. I’ve read ACOTAR and TOG and I am in love with the MAAS universe, so I only have high expectations going forward.

There is a widely known stereotype about the eldest daughter that continuously reduces our entire existence to a joke about being hyper-organized perfectionists—putting us into this neat little box where we are just naturally bossy control freaks. But looking at it as a simple desire for control misses the real truth of what is happening under the surface. That unshakeable, stone-like exterior is just a shield. In truth, it is a quiet, exhausting habit of putting yourself on the back burner that you learn when you're growing up, constantly absorbing everyone else’s chaos and holding up their world while yours quietly sits spinning on its axis slowly shrinking to make room.

We spend so much time being the ones to lean on, taking care of everyone else, and constantly being there to handle their heavy pieces that we completely forget—or don't even know how—to help ourselves. Now, this might not be the case for every single eldest daughter out there, but it is for me, and this is for the daughters who relate to it. Or, maybe so you can understand us a bit more. This role leaves you feeling completely clueless about how to make a single decision for your own life or even how to care for your own mind, while simultaneously turning you into the protective, dependable anchor for everyone you love in your twenties. This includes family, friends, coworkers, and relationships. We aren’t trying to control everything; we are just used to holding things steady for everyone else, trapped in a space where we can easily be there for the people around us, but completely freeze the second we try to figure out what we actually want for ourselves.

The real truth of being the firstborn daughter is that you learn to read an emotional room long before you ever learn to read a book. You grow up watching your parents when they are at their most fragile—when they are still young, overwhelmed, and just stumbling through the dark trying to figure out how to be adults themselves. You see the quiet exhaustion in the kitchen or the tight strain in their voices after a long day, and it changes you. You naturally just start stepping up and silently helping, holding things together before anyone even thinks to ask you to. But the second you do, that quiet help becomes an unspoken expectation.

Suddenly, you are expected to grow up faster, to constantly be present, and to act as an extra arm for your parents and a shoulder to lean on—completely forgetting that you are just a kid yourself who didn't necessarily want that burden. This is where it all started. You start swallowing your own feelings, big and small, because you realize very quickly that your anger, your sadness, or your disappointments aren't even heard. They just matter less compared to everything else.

This unspoken divide completely shapes how you grow up alongside your siblings. It creates a reality where two people can live under the exact same roof but experience two completely different worlds. While your younger siblings get to have the public tantrums, the bad grades, and the messy teenage identity crises, you are forced to grow up sooner than everyone else around you. You learn to manage your own life, your own broken hearts, and your own mistakes because you are already so used to being the one who helps hold things steady. Your siblings get the version of your parents that has finally figured it out—the version that has learned to relax and let things slide—while you get the version that was anxious and learning everything for the first time on you.

The real weight of having to step up across your formative years is that you lose a bit of your girlhood before you are ever ready to let it go. You trade those soft, carefree moments of just being a kid because you are too busy being present, being an extra arm, and making sure the foundation stays solid.

But let’s be entirely real with ourselves: all that early pressure doesn’t just leave you with quiet isolation—it also molds you into an incredibly independent, resilient, and deeply profound woman. There is a quiet, powerful competence that comes with being the firstborn. It gives you this beautiful, unshakeable capability in your twenties, born from a rich, deeply close relationship with your own mind. Because you had to depend on yourself so early, you learned how to retreat inward, creating a personal sanctuary inside your own head where you keep the rawest, most unguarded pieces of who you are. Since we spend our lives presenting only the most polished, effortless pieces to the outside world, your inner mind becomes the only place where you become truly honest with yourself—a concept most people struggle with. A place of deep emotion, raw honesty, and piercing thoughts.

The independence we’ve built is a beautiful complex where you never wait around for anyone to save you or fix things for you; your independence is a sacred, self-reliant space where you can bear the weight of life completely on your own two feet. And because you know exactly what it feels like to carry things in the dark, that internal depth turns you into an incredibly empathetic, dependable anchor for the people you care about. You are a master at listening and giving advice because you have the profound capacity to help others navigate their own paths. But that is exactly where the double standard sneaks in and catches you. You pour so much of yourself into being there for everyone else that you don’t even know how to turn that care inward, leaving you confused when it comes to your own life.

For the longest time, I let that independence define me, mostly because it makes it look like you have everything completely figured out. When you're the one who is always dependable, people naturally look to you for security. Yes, I am good at giving advice, solving the problems of others, and listening—but behind closed doors, I was basically a phony when it came to me. My brain who I had built this profound level of comfort with didn’t even realize that what we were so good at, we didn’t know how to apply to ourselves. I never actually learned how to use it to make choices for my own life. Myself, the person I know most, who I have been nothing but completely honest with, and yet in a way, I was absolutely clueless about myself. Well... I was. It is a strange thing to live a life that looks so structured and put together from the outside, while secretly being just as lost as everyone else—maybe even more. When it came to making a single choice solely for myself, like figuring out what I wanted out of my own life instead of just choosing what felt safe, I would completely freeze. It was so much easier to have these answers tucked deep into my mind than finally put myself first and take risks. I spent so much time being present for the things around me that I forgot how to figure out who I was outside of them.

But I didn't let myself stay trapped in that loop. I finally forced myself to stop running, sit down in the quiet, and come to terms with that realization. I looked at the blank space inside my head and had to ask myself the hard questions: Why is it that I can give endless grace, patience, and support to everyone around me, yet the second I look at my own life, I become my own harshest critic and judge? Why am I so quick to help them chase what they want, while I constantly hold myself back? How can I so easily be available, encouraging, and helpful to others and not myself? I realized that I needed to start turning those qualities and support towards myself. When you so desperately want to be there for others, you forget about yourself. Figuring out who I am isn't just about moving forward—it’s about liberating the exact part of myself that I shrunk away as a child. I am actively giving permission to the little girl who felt she had to keep everything inside and be invisible to finally step out, make a mess, and occupy the room. There has been a strict, suffocating timetable floating in front of us our entire lives—this unwritten rule that we have to be perfect, settled, and structured right out of the gate—but I chose to tear it up. We are completely free to change the script, accept changes as they come, and let ourselves figure things out as we go along. I am allowed to take up space and put myself first and it is not selfish.

Choosing to take up space is terrifying, especially when you are so used to keeping everything locked away. I still internalize almost everything, and on the nights when the lack of sleep catches up to me and the bags under my eyes are too heavy to ignore, my brain and my diary are still my closest friends who hold the weight of my unfiltered thoughts and how deeply I feel everything. But looking at myself honestly in the quiet of this room, I recognize that I wouldn’t trade the capacity to feel this deeply for anything. Being the eldest daughter didn’t just give me a burden; it gave me my actual soul.

It made me the person who notices the small, quiet things in life, and that closeness with myself is something I’m finally learning to protect. So if you are sitting on your bed tonight, completely overwhelmed by your own life and trying to navigate who you are, here is my unfiltered big-sister advice: give yourself permission to just be messy. You don’t have to carry the answer to everything. If you spent half the time on yourself that you spent on the world around you how different would your life be? I know it’s easier said than done but just start with one day. Ignore everyone and everything for one day. You’ll learn so much about yourself when you let yourself be happy and alone. Real adulthood isn’t about being an unbreakable shield; it’s about realizing that you are allowed to just exist, exactly as you are, without needing to justify your space in the room.

Now, go shut your laptop, turn off your lights, and let yourself get some actual time alone. Or take a shot of tequila and be messy. Either way, don’t quote me on this.

Xoxo, Haleyanna

Allegedly ☕️

The 23-Year Sequel Trap: The news that Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey are officially planning a sequel to How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days twenty-three years later. Allegedly, it’s a win for 2000s rom-com nostalgia and cinema lovers, but let's be entirely real please: trying to recreate lightning in a bottle two decades later is a lazy money grab. Please can we leave the yellow dress and love ferns in 2003 where it belongs before you ruin the memory. What we need is new. I’m tired of having to rely on movies from the 80s-00s, (don’t get it twisted they’re the absolute best), why can’t we get a movie as beautifully written now? Please remind me love still exists in the year 2026 without having to recycle the classics. With that said I will be first in line to see it. They may be wrong for it but I can’t resist.

The Paperstack 📖

• The Mad Wife by Meagan Church: I loved the premise of this book—it's a 1950s story about a woman named Lillian who is trying to survive the suffocating expectation to be a perfect, quiet suburban housewife while feeling her mind slowly unraveling after having a baby. The book spends so much time going into incredible detail about the sheer exhaustion of her daily life, the subtle ways her husband minimizes her, and the terrifying medical misogyny of that era where any independent thought is labeled as hysteria. Because those parts went so deep into her psychological isolation, I had massive expectations for the payoff. I actually liked the direction of the ending, but the writing simply wasn’t enough to match that heavy groundwork. After hundreds of pages of slow, brilliant erosion, the final conflict felt completely rushed, wrapping up her entire fate in a quick bow instead of giving the story the space it deserved. You are left wanting so much more depth from the resolution. Still, I have to give credit where it's due: the plot twist genuinely caught me off guard and saved it from being a flat two-star disappointment, so I bumped my final rating up to a three.

• Would I recommend? The answer is yes. The ending may not have been everything I expected, but it is still a great look at the very real struggles of women and motherhood during a time when misogyny had a much more blatant, institutionalized presence.

Let’s be completely honest with ourselves: A lowercase “hey” sent at 11:45 PM on a random Thursday night is not a greeting. It is a late night ego boost. You’ve spent all week thinking about this person, quietly debating whether you should say “screw you” to your own self-respect and reach out first. Instead, you’re left compulsively checking the views on your Instagram story—even though nothing has changed since you last checked five minutes ago.

Let’s be clear: there is absolutely nothing wrong with the casual and the meaningless. Sometimes, it is better that way. I can admit I enjoy— and may even indulge in— the narrative of a girl going after exactly what she wants, screwing the attached strings, and enjoying the momentum of passion. But thats different, I’m talking about the ones who lead us on, under-appreciate us, and take us for granted. And in this case, that narrative has an irritating habit of coming back to bite me in the ass. I am the number one advocate for enjoying your twenties as they are meant to be but there has to be a line between growing into adulthood and the epidemic of the 26 year old toddler. So if you’re someone who’s tired of the immense lack of emotional maturity and chronic fear of commitment plaguing the majority of those in their 20s then ignore the blue bubble and keep reading.

A text sent at 11:45 PM is exactly what you think it is: a low-effort boundary test wrapped especially for you in a floating blue bubble and three nerve-wracking dots. It is the ultimate litmus test of modern dating. They don’t want to know how your week is going, they don’t care what you ate for dinner, and they certainly aren’t asking how you’re feeling after a long week of work. They just want to see if your self-respect is currently running a shift, or if your boundaries are off the clock and you’ll open the door.

Whatever that late-night message says, probably along the lines of “What are you doing?”, it required zero active brain cells to come up with. There was no indication of thought— just a baseline autopilot system running in the seven seconds it took for them to open their phone, find your number, type a cheap one-liner, and hit send. But let’s be entirely real: it isn’t actually always that simple. It’s an attempt to rob you of your peace. They’re sitting in the quiet of their own space, feeling a temporary lapse in their own ego, and treating your name on their screen like a cheap emotional charger. Sorry if this comes off harsh but they don’t want you; they want the immediate, predictable hit of dopamine that comes from watching you compromise your time for theirs.

Here you are— pajamas on, face mask applied, candle lit, favorite show on in the background— sitting on your clean satin sheets staring at your phone screen. You’re analyzing their punctuation and overthinking your response, if you should even respond, and when you should. It’s as if you’re back in high school and this is some complex calculus problem. This cat-and-mouse game is a direct insult to our intelligence. But worse? It is a message sent by someone who knows that if you answer within the next five minutes, they officially own the narrative of your entire week.

What happened was, they saw you looking good in a low-cut top, in a low-light snapshot. They realized you were out in the world, probably having a great time existing completely outside of their control, that’s when they decided to fire off a four-word, heat-seeking missile with the purpose to disrupt your peace. It wasn’t sent out of a place of genuine curiosity or care; it was sent out to drag your attention back to them and what they want.

There is a specific kind of psychological whiplash that hits when they view your Instagram story and minutes later, casually weasel their way into your inbox with some unoriginal, and understandably irritating line like “what are you up to?” The biggest tragedy of it all is that your reply dictates your entire social standing in their mind. If you answer immediately they know they’re on your mind and assume you have nothing better going on. If you don’t answer at all then you’ve won the round— but you’re still left lying awake at 1:00 AM thinking what if. So, is it really a win? Sounds more like a double-edged sword.

Because as much as I hate to admit it, it’s true. Whether it sparks flutters of excitement or crashing waves of existential dread, that low-effort message usually affects us. I won’t pretend to speak for every single person who sees that message on their phone, but I will happily air out my own inner personal realities. I’ll admit that it does affect me— and maybe you’re home right now reading this and nodding along. Of course I don’t want it to, this circumstance seems so minuscule when compared to the game of life, but i’m a woman in my twenties with a lot of feelings, so it does.

I often wonder what real insight I can provide. I wonder if there is anything I can say to convince you to let go of the very feelings we seem hardwired to suffer through— as if this inevitable text purgatory was written directly into our DNA. It feels like a generational promise made a thousand years ago to ensure the rise of emotional unavailability, modern situationships, and mind games. A rite of passage tormenting us as we grapple with the changes in that obscure, fragile timeline between our adolescence and full adulthood. Our twenties. And while I frequently fall victim to these exact stupid, obsessive thoughts like the rest of you, I like to think that makes me the perfect expert witness to speak on it.

In the wise words of Jane Austen, when will someone bewitch me, mind, body, and soul? Isn’t that the ultimate end we are all quietly craving? Yet if you look at the modern landscape, the art of yearning and affection is at an all-time low, and chivalry is on the brink of extinction. Most people in their twenties have conditioned themselves to want everything casual, fast, and strings unattached.

If that is not what you want, please do not settle for less. Just recognize that the exact second you start overanalyzing his message, overthinking your reply, and calculating response time, you’ve already lost the game. Do not cater to a ghost. Stop saying things simply because it’s what you think they want to hear.

Ultimately this late night dilemma boils down to a brutal reality check. Their next move will always reveal their intentions— whether they’re genuinely interested in your mind, or if they’re simply testing your baseline availability. At the same time, your response is just a reflection of how much energy you are willing to spend on someone who only remembers you when the sun goes down. It’s not about being perfect or having an unshakeable wall built up; it’s about recognizing whether you’re compromising your own peace just to keep a dead-end conversation alive.

Ready for your own bewitching?

Then roll your eyes and ignore the bubble. Let him sit completely alone in the silence he built. It may be difficult, and you might struggle or slip up along the way, but that only means you’re human. When the urge to reply hits, I recommend an immediate message straight to the group chat. Make plans for the weekend

-specifically, cocktails with the girls. Seriously: pick a time, pick a place, and put together an amazing outfit.

Remind yourself that you do not need his attention or his fleeting validation. Just look at what just happened: you ignored him, and the world kept spinning anyway.

If you are still completely unsure about what you want, pause and look at the situation with absolute honesty. Ask yourself how you are going to feel tomorrow morning when you wake up. Weigh the reality of whether you will regret responding if his line goes dead right after. Decide if you are looking for something genuinely casual, something serious, or if you are simply open to the possibilities. I promise you, deep down, you already know the answer. Maybe you’ve just been too scared to admit it to yourself. The second you answer yourself honestly, your next move becomes crystal clear.

Totally into it? I love that for you.

Here’s exactly what you do next: stop staring at the screen.

Pause your show, wash the face mask off, and let him know your intentions. In this case, I always recommend pulling out your favorite pair of lace “F me panties”. They have never done me wrong. Well…for the most part.

Don’t overwhelm yourself, and don’t hold your heart to any unachievable standards or expectations. As long as you enjoy yourself and remember that there is an entire, beautiful world spinning right under your feet, I applaud you.

Now, go make yourself a drink, put your phone on dnd... or go rummage through your underwear drawer. Either way, don’t quote me on this.

Xoxo, Haleyanna

Allegedly ☕️

• Now this may be a hot take but that’s the whole point of this. The double standard is insane to me. I must confess I did fall victim to the game shows about love. My name is Haleyanna and I’m a Love Island fan. Now, it is so predictable and irritatingly misogynistic the backlash and shaming given to Kenzie. I mean talk about a blindingly obvious double standard. I’m so tired of the stigma pertaining to the girls being the ones who have to be emotionally locked down after one night and the guys, time and time again, proving they’re no different than the rest. The girl did her thing!!! She played the game and she did it the best she could. I will admit she almost lost me for good with her Romeo and Juliet moment with Corbin, but she won me back one clam slam at a time. The amount of times the actions of Sincere, KC, and Zach have been brushed aside or forgiven was unfortunately expected. So let’s focus on the real villains here: the men of the villa.

The Paperstack 📖

• The Mad Wife - Meagan Church

  • Page count: 300

  • Current page: 72

Currently speeding my way through this 1950s suburban nightmare. There is truly nothing more frightening than the invalidation of a woman’s feelings and the historical reality of men labeling the complexity of our emotions as hysteria as soon as women don’t fit in the pretty little box built for them. The story follows Lulu Mayfield, a woman grappling with her emotions portraying the perfect suburban housewife. Lulu’s picture perfect life cracks with the coming of her second child, and then shatters with her obsession of the new neighbor, Bitsy. A psychological slow-burn that forces you to look at the reality of one’s crumbling mental sanity while trying to play a role we were not each designed to fit.

Subscribe

We all know how relationships end, at least the majority of them. The spilled tears, drawn boundaries, the symbolic burning of their existence in your life. It’s all there laid out for us; it might as well be drawn in permanent marker, branded in your history in sharpie. There becomes a line in the sand separating their existence from yours. A clean break. Or at least one hopes for a clean break. The point is a romantic relationship will inevitably lead to happily ever after or cease to exist. But no one prepares for the quiet, unexpected expiration of a friendship. Yeah— the kind that simply expires, not for any particular reason but, because we are ever changing, always evolving, constantly growing creatures. This type of ending is soft and quiet. You don’t even know it’s there until it’s gone. This type of ending doesn’t come with resentment, any wrong doing, or blame to place. That’s what gets us most, we are so accustomed to logical reasoning— this person hurt me, this person doesn’t deserve me, this person isn’t the right fit for me. Those are logical, those endings make sense. Maybe that’s why these expirations hurt differently; they’re soft and quiet. There’s no logical reason; we crave logical reasoning when emotions are so much more than that. Emotions can be the most illogical thing about us. This friendship. There’s no line drawn in the sand, no dramatic exit, no breakup speech; it just dissolves.

It’s the texts left on read, the rescheduling drinks for the third time promising you’ll make the next one, realizing the people you once shared everything with don’t have as much in common with the person you’ve become. Think about it like this, the person you are, the things that make you who you are, your soul, your brain, and the tangible things are an island. A distinct mass of land in a vast world of other people and their islands. Everything most important to you is kept close on this solid mass of land.

 It’s as if there has been a shift in your world, an unintentional drift— something quiet and invisible. Drifting slowly away from each other, so slow that you don’t even notice the distance until you’re staring at each other from two moving islands with an ocean of space in between you. An ocean built day by day, made of the very things pulling you apart— mismatched work schedules, unanswered texts, separate zip codes, new passions, and evolving lifestyles that don’t fit on the same piece of land anymore. They’re still there on that island but they’re drifting away, they’ll always be there as a part of your life, but they don’t hold the space they once did.

It seems to always arise out of the blue, the warning signs so silent and unnoticeable— but somewhere along the late work days, an ever growing, never-ending list of responsibilities, and post graduate life, that invisible string that was connecting you and all the pieces of your life feels different. What once felt like a thick rope intertwining all your relationships into a beautiful mosaic of the characters in your life suddenly feels frayed. You realize it’s not something permanent, there is no reinforced steel holding everyone in place but just what it is— a  simple string that frays and twists and loops.

The bittersweet end of an outgrown friendship. 

Unfortunately, we’ve all been here before, or maybe this is your first time standing on a thinning shoreline watching someone drift away. The first time you’ve noticed a frayed string. If that’s the case I urge you to grab a pint of your favorite ice cream, throw on your playlist of bittersweet songs you swear you only listen to when you’re sad and alone, and just sit with it. Because navigating an outgrown friendship is a quiet kind of heartbreak no one teaches you how to map. 

It’s nobody’s fault, it’s just one of the difficult realities no one expects when growing through your twenties. It’s the kind of thing that can drift by silently, but hit you harder than a relationship break up. 

When it comes to friendships, how do you prepare to lose someone you spent your previous years building your dream futures with. I mean, some of these girls we pictured as our bridesmaids, standing next to us on that altar silently rooting for us  while we confessed our deep love for the man of our dreams. The girl you know with one look would have your back and the getaway car behind the church to save you from making the biggest mistake of your life.The girl who religiously stalked the social media of all your crushes for you in high school to save yourself from the embarrassment of an accidental like on a post from two years ago. The girl who your freshman year of college shared an entire bottle of wine with you while you guys danced your heart away on the countertops to Taylor Swift’s newest album. I’m talking about the girl who held your hair back in the dingy bar bathroom after you said you were only going to have one drink— because whether we admit it or not, nothing brings us girls closer than the bathroom stall of the dirtiest bar you’ve ever been to. The girl you told each other all your secrets to at every middle school sleepover, the secrets and promises of that age felt like the most sacred times of your life.

And the truth I have for you here is, there is no clear way to brace for the shift. We are conditioned to associate growing with expanding, adding, and continuing. No one teaches you that adult growth is often a quiet game of subtraction. 

That invisible string of yours, its work isn’t done yet. There’s a missing piece to your mosaic, more room on your island. The empty spot is just slightly different now and you get to choose how to fill it or who to fill it with.

Yes it’s

a bittersweet reality, but it doesn’t make them a bad friend, and it doesn’t make you a cruel person. The weather is simply changing. You just have to pack for the new season, pull on your boots, and trust that the ground beneath your feet is still solid, even if you’re standing on it alone for now. 

If you need some time to mourn what once was by all means throw yourself a little pity party. Have a funeral for the girl who once was and the friendship you once had. 

But don’t feel guilty for making room for the woman you are becoming. All you know is, one day you woke up and realized you aren’t the same girl you were when you were nineteen. Maybe you don’t thrive on the chaos like others still do, like a younger version of you did. Maybe now you want quiet coffee dates, friends who ask how you’re really feeling, ones who care about the real answer, and a space where you don’t have to perform. 

That’s ok. Growing out of someone doesn’t mean you’ve done anything wrong; it means you’re in your next chapter. And the best part of it all is that you’ll never lose the memories of the person you once were with the friend you once knew. Your goals, your hopes and dreams, your lifestyle has changed. Embrace that change because you owe it to yourself. 

Whatever this new you wants is what the new you deserves. 

So until next time cherish some memories, prepare for the next season, and  always remember….. don’t quote me. 

xoxo, haleyanna.

Allegedly ☕️

• This week’s hot take is about matching energy. In my opinion this whole trend is a scam, a way to care about what others think without saying you care what they think. It’s performative and I’m soooooo tired of all the performing. I say risk it all. Be honest, be chalant, be yourself. If you have to calculate the exact minutes it takes to respond to a text you aren’t in a relationship— you’re in a Cold War.

The Paper Stack 📖

• Expiration Dates by Rebecca Serle:

  • Page count: 256

  • Current page: 233

Because who wouldn’t want to know when the end of every relationship was coming. Saves the heartache, the insecurities, and the doubt.

A cute and enticing story about how a piece of scrap paper and a number can change everything. I will say the plot twist wasn’t very twisty, I guessed it from the beginning. But what would life be without cheesy romance.

A coincidence that I can tie this book to my the thoughts I put online. Imagine ehat it would feel like to get a slip of paper telling you exactly how many days or years you have with someone before the story. What if it makes watching the drift any easier, or if knowing the countdown would just make the time feel like a waiting room.

I’ll have more to say next week’s paper stack once I finish the book.

Reminiscing on Celaena and Sam tonight. As I do much too often. Thinking about what I’d consider to be my lavender soap. What makes us cling to these items so selfishly? Does it have to take a life altering change to remind us to share the good stuff? And if we are the selfish ones who in our lives are getting the cheap soap?

I’m Haleyanna.

I’m an eldest daughter, East Coast girl, and unfiltered big sister navigating my twenties. I spend most of my time overthinking life, overfilling my notes app, and oversharing with anyone willing to listen, all while pretending I understand the rules of life.

Truth be told, I’m scared of moving too fast and missing the small moments and equally terrified that I’m falling behind.

My internal chemistry is driven by a Leo sun, an Aquarius moon, and a Virgo rising—a curated blend that wires my brain with the urge to dramatize every aspect of my life while overanalyzing every bit of it. This creates a constant tug-of-war between my need for personal validation with my attempts to remain detached and a desperate urge to organize the absolute chaos of my life. Or maybe…it means absolutely nothing but a meager attempt to justify who I am in the world.

What I do know about myself is that I’m a hopeless romantic masking as an independent cynic. I get through by observing the universe through a rose-colored lens of Jane Austen’s words, the lyrical complexity of Evermore, every romance movie of the early 2000s, the overgrown mounds of books scattered across my floor, and the desire to feel, write, and express myself so deeply and freely.

Yet, I am completely and utterly human.

For all my love of books, writing, and journaling, I barely survived my writing and research course with a passing grade, effectively scaring me away from all other English courses. I tell you this because the opinion of the academic elite is entirely overrated. You don’t need a flawless GPA or a Master’s in writing to have a voice worth listening to.

Our twenties arrive like a sudden shift in the weather. One minute you are safely cocooned in the predictable routine of your school years, and the next you are standing on the pavement wondering when you became responsible for all of your life choices and how the choice of a sweet treat from your favorite place versus saving that money for your grocery bill became a moral conflict. We are caught in the exhausting crossfire between the nostalgic, cinematic romanticization of life we grew up watching on our screens and the cold, unscripted reality of adult life. No one gives you a warning that your early twenties will feel like a constant negotiation between the person you used to be and the person you are actively becoming. I say we can achieve a life of it all—love, growth, whimsy, realism, and drama, and it’s all written here every week.

This space is simply my running log of the journey. Consider it a digital sanctuary for the friction points of growing up: the friend groups that quietly dissolve into likes on social media posts, the absolute peril of modern dating where showing vulnerability is viewed as a red flag, and the persistent guilt of trying to look established while finding your place in the world.

Look, I don’t have all the answers, and I wasn’t given a rulebook on any of this. Expect a messy, beautiful mix of raw personal essays, general lifestyle commentary, my made-up rules, lists, and unbothered dos and don’ts. This is just my perspective, my opinion, and a space where none of us have to perform. It is typed straight from my collection of diaries, Post-its, shower thoughts, and Notes app entries. So honestly—don’t quote me on any of this.

How this works

My goal is to post on ✨Tuesday ✨ mornings around 7:00 AM EST. Some weeks will just be a long diary spill about whatever is on my mind, and other weeks will be unfiltered lists, unwritten rules, or my unedited thoughts. But regardless of whatever floats through my brain and onto these pages, I’ll end it with Allegedly— which is where I’ll give my uninhibited, honest opinions on whatever cultural moment, hot topic, or random obsession I’m currently overthinking— followed by The Paper Stack, which is just a quick peek at whatever book is currently in my bag.

I also really want this to be a place where people can connect, somewhere you can write to when you want. So I built an anonymous link where you can drop your own life drama, relationship/friendship mess, or quarter-life crisis. Maybe even just a comment, question, or thought of your own. Write your heart away, vent, or feel free to ask me anything. I don't want to give myself a rigid routine for this because I have no idea how many people will actually write to me, but whenever something in the mailbox catches my eye, you’ll be the first to hear about it. Your secrets are entirely safe with me. Feel free to sign your name or be anonymous—the choice is yours!

The mailbox link is right below and in my bio if you want to leave a draft in it, and you can drop your email if you want to follow along with the entries.

The confessional mailbox 💌 - https://forms.gle/UQLYDPFhU34YXVR57