1. Understand what triggers burnout for you.

2. Do research to understand the key symptoms of burnout, and be diligent in recognizing when those symptoms become present in your day-to-day life.

3. Say you’re feeling sluggish; understand where the sluggishness is coming from in your body, and how intense it is. As you get better, and better at this, you will have the skills to identify symptoms of burnout earlier.

4. Figure out a handful of regulation tools that work for you. An important tool I use is a bed-rot hour, where I set a timer, lie down, stare at the ceiling, and think about life for a set amount of time.

5. When little tasks start to become tough, space them out with breaks in between.

6. Always ask if an assignment is graded on completion, and if it is, do the bare minimum work for it. You don’t have to put 100% into everything you do 100% of the time. Especially if you aren’t interested in the thing you’re doing.

7. Set aside time to hang out with friends. Having a support system is key for your mental health. It is important to make time for fun.

8. Connect with other people who also struggle with burnout, and become accountability partners. This can look like reminding the other to take breaks, or brainstorming triggers together.

1. Get your materials ready. You should have a resume that you can attach to every email, and depending on the industry you’re looking for mentors/opportunities in, you may consider attaching a writing sample, CV, or misc work sample.

2. Nail your email subject. It is important not to be too general. Rephrase Mentorship Inquiry to Mentorship Request from Youth Violinist. Or something like that specific to you.

3. Start with a greeting, then share something you learned in your research about the person, and then state your name, age, and three biggest accomplishments in the field or interest you share.

4. Next, make your ask. It should be three sentences, no more, no less. Your ask should state what you want from them, why you want it, and how this could be a mutually beneficial arrangement for both of you.

5. Create an email template that has your greeting, with a space for each individual’s name, a space for something you learned about them through research, your bio, your ask, and then a nice closing.

6. Personalization is the most important part of the cold email process. It shows respect and care for each person you're reaching out to. You want to make sure that you address people by their correct name. Sometimes, if you’re going fast, you can accidentally use the name of a person that you previously emailed. This has happened to me before. Please be mindful and read an email over before you send it. Calling someone by the wrong name will automatically disqualify you from consideration, and I want you to get all the opportunities available to you.

7. It’s a numbers game. Keep at it even if you're getting a lot of rejections at first. Make a goal number of people you’re going to research and cold email every day, and stick to it. The more people you reach out to, the more likely you’re going to get a yes.

8. Have a spreadsheet with a list of people you’ve reached out to, and whether they’ve responded. It’s a small world, and sometimes if you’re doing another batch of cold emails, you may forget you emailed somebody and reach out again. Trust me, keeping track of those things is a lifesaver in the long run.

1. Get your writing out there. This is the most important thing. Resources like the NewPages Guide for Young Writers or WriteGirl’s Clubhouse share a list of literary magazines that accept teen writing, if you don’t know where to start.

2. Submit to every literary magazine you can get your hands on. Eventually, one, two, three, or more likely more will accept your work.

3. Contests. There are a few high-profile contests for teen writers. Examples include Scholastic Arts and Writing, YoungArts, and The JFK Profile in Courage essay contest. And for the poets, applying to your county’s regional Youth Poet Laureate contest is always a good first step.

4. Summer programs are another thing that you should be doing. These can be residential programs at places like Smith College or Lewis and Clark College, online classes with the Kenyon Writers Workshop or the Iowa Writers Workshop, or local creative writing classes in your city. Anything to show that you are challenging yourself to learn new things outside of the school year.

5. Start some kind of passion project and see it through. I’m not just talking about your work in progress, though if you finish it, and are shopping it around to agents before college apps time, truly, how, like, show me your ways. What I’m talking about is starting a literacy organization that gives books to under-resourced families or an English tutoring business. Anything to show that you have interests that lead to tangible outcomes.

6. It is important to seek out mentors where you can. Maybe it’s an English teacher or someone through an existing organization like WriteGirl. But if that doesn’t work, it’s time for the trusty cold email. If you email enough people asking if you could be their mentee, eventually, you’ll get a yes. There are always some people in any industry who are open to helping teens gain experience.

7. This is the most important part. Take care of yourself, take breaks, go on walks. I’m not going to tell you not to let writing consume you, because I know it is impossible to fight against that pull to your craft. Still, healthy habits are important, and taking time to nurture your body will make your mind stronger. I promise.

Doing all these things now will help you break into the literary/publishing industry after college applications; more than that, it will lead you to have a sense of accomplishment from creating long-term connections, a portfolio of literary work, and a project that has an impact on the world around you.

I liked nerdy boys with bad haircuts and even worse acne. In order for me to be attracted to them, they had to be attracted to me but wish they weren’t, and dislike authority .

I had these dreams of being a girl with a boyfriend. I thought being with a man would make me happy. But then each time I was with one, I had panic attacks, doubted myself, and felt trapped in something I didn’t want.

I thought the individual guy was the issue.

That’s when I learned the term compulsory heterosexuality. The idea that everyone should be heterosexual, and that anything but is wrong, as well as, the societal conditioning that makes queer people, most often, queer women, and femmes, think that we are attracted to opposite sex, however we are just attracted to the idea of being in a relationship that ascribes to societal norms. While, every queer women, and femme identifies with this concept in differing amounts, I very much saw myself with in that concept. I realized I wanted to fit in and ascribe to societal norms, no matter what it cost me emotionally.

According to me at the time, relationships were supposed to feel rough and straggly, like pulling teeth without anesthesia. Nobody told me they could be soft and sweet, like rock candy sticking to sugar.

When I met my current girlfriend, violets curled around my heart.

They were incredible, infuriating, soft, and most of all calming. They were something that I never had in a partner: steady. They challenged me, but kept me sane.

This isn’t a love letter to my girlfriend or a scathing retort against the boys I’ve dated.

It’s something else entirely.

I never let myself understand that love, whether it’s queer or not, should look different for everyone. That if what I was craving was based on societal conditioning, not an actual want, then it wasn’t something I should pursue.

It’s not easy, but if you follow this five-step plan, you'll be able to get an internship in any field you want. And I’m not just talking for the sake of talking here. This exact formula gave me five internship offers.

1. Understand what you want to be doing. You need to know what field you want to be working in, but also what you want to be learning in that field/the work you want to be doing. Knowing these three things will help you understand how to communicate with potential employers.

2. Study cover letters and cold email templates. Before you start reaching out to apply to internships or people blind, you need to understand what works.

3. Without a resume, you can’t get your foot in the door. You don’t need to have a lot of experience; it could just include school clubs or work you did around the house. You can make anything into job experience if you try hard enough.

4. You have to search long and hard for opportunities. If I were looking for internships in the publishing industry, I would search, “Publishing internships.” “Literary agency internships.” “Internships with Literary Agencies.” “Literary Agents that Need Interns,” and “Big Five Publishing Internships.” Then, I would look through every result.

5. Gather the list of internships you’re eligible for, and apply for them all. The more, the better. It’s a numbers game.

6. After that, don’t wait to hear back. It’s time for phase two. Make a list of every connection you have to your chosen industry and contact them asking if they need an intern. Attach a resume in the body of your email.

7. If you don’t have any connections to the industry you’re trying to break into, that’s okay. Because the next step is to find new connections. You may think that your lack of experience is a minus, but when it comes to internships and people willing to pass on their wisdom, it is often a plus. Great places to cold email are individual website contact forms or societies for your goal profession.

8. Your cold email should have a brief professional bio, something interesting that you find on the person you're emailing’s website that is unique to them and their career, what you hope for in an internship, and a link to your resume or industry-specific work samples.

9. Your cold email should be personal to each specific person you contact. This doesn’t mean rewriting the email for each different inquiry; however, you still should take the time to individually research every person you are contacting. Your email imparts genuine excitement to work with them.

10. Quantity matters. You should be emailing over two hundred people, and if you’re not hearing back, edit your cold email and send it out to another hundred. You’re not going to break into any industry without hustling, and as I said before, this game is all about the numbers.

Bonus Tips: Take breaks, don’t overschedule yourself, and keep track of who you contact in a spreadsheet, so you don’t accidentally contact someone twice.

And please, please, please, give yourself grace. Just by reading this article, you’re investing in your future, and if you get no’s at the beginning of this journey, that doesn’t mean the yes won’t come.

I didn’t take up space before discovering her. I would shrink smaller and smaller into my shell. Convinced the world would be better off without my words. Finding Sappho’s work and learning about the secret group of queer women writers that she created started to shift my perspective. Her perseverance through unspeakable adversity and her confidence in her writing gave me the courage to stand by my words and embrace my creative potential.

Sappho inspired me to push boundaries and lay myself bare on the page. Her words lit up the contracted places in my consciousness, and her strength kept me going when I wanted to quit. On those days, when I got nothing but literary magazine rejections and thought maybe writing wasn’t for me after all.

Sappho’s poetry was more than just an outlet; her words were a saving grace. Through her writing, the essence of her is always with me. During my first heartbreak, loss of loved ones, and confronting my abuser, she, in spirit, has been there beside me. Her voice, tender but unafraid, reminds me who I am and that because I stand on her shoulders, I can get through anything.

Those moments when her writings helped me through hardship made me discover not only the impact her writings had on me but also how much she’s influenced my own work. How before her I never noticed what all my creations had in common. Every short story, poem, novel and piece of experimental fiction was written for the next generation of mouthy, wild-haired, grieving survivors, so they can see their not alone.

It took years of writing mentorship programs, classes and hours spent scribbling away before I got any results. There were moments when I thought I would never reap the rewards of my hard work, but that day came and it changed my life forever.

My first publication happened on May 13th, 2023, from an OP-ED, I wrote about The Federal Minimum Wage. That was all the encouragement I needed. I started filling out submission forms and writing cover letters daily. Since then, I’ve been published in twenty-nine different literary magazines across the country and am on the third draft of an eighty-thousand word novel.

My words had crackle, rhythm and rhyme but they needed work. They needed to be cut and reshaped. Trimmed and shaken. From a young age, I thought that I didn’t have a work ethic. I was unfocused, enamored with everything that crossed my path. Never sticking with one thing. Little did young me, or anyone know, it just took finding the right thing to bring out the dedicated, focused, passionate creator I always was.

“Trump Administration Taps Climate Science Critic to Oversee Flagship Report”

“Leaked Madison Square Garden Database Secretly Tagged 93 Celebrities as ‘LGBTQIA’ With No Explanation Why”

“Lorenzo Salgado Araujo shot and killed by ICE agent in Houston, authorities confirm”

I want to be a writer. I want to help people and do good in the world.

But can I if there is no world left?

I want to make my own money, and I want to construct the family I wanted growing up.

My dreams overflow.

“It is wrong to dream.”

“There are more important things in life.”

Our country was built on the backs of enslaved people, the erasure of Native Americans, and the oppression of women.

The system was set up to try to make sure that most Americans don’t succeed.

Yet, many do.

Many create music, art, writing, painting, and businesses. They construct families and communities that do the restorative work the system should be doing.

There isn’t a resurgence in hate; it’s been here all along. It’s always been strong and putrid and potent; just now, we’re putting a bigger spotlight on it.

A part of me wants to shrivel up and admit defeat.

The world, and especially America, is so broken; why should I even try to do something about it?

When I have my manic moments, I think the opposite way, because the world is probably ending, I have to do, create, make, see, build, and feel everything:

Now, now, now.

But that isn’t the solution either.

Our joy is the resistance, our dreaming is the plan, and the communities we create is what holds it all together.

The rejection letter was more well-worded than that. It said there my work was well-written, and there was a place for it somewhere, but that their magazine wasn’t it.

Twelve-year-old me didn’t hear genuine feedback; that letter was ten thousand fire ants taking a steaming pile of shit on her self-worth.

I sobbed all over my computer screen. So much so it turned a shade of silver that I hope never to see again.

I stopped writing forever.

Almost.

A cliché stood in my way.

If you stop, not only do the negative thoughts win, but you’ll never know what happens if you do make it.

What if the stars align and you become the writer that you always wanted to be?

And I wanted it, I still want it. My heart zings with dreamy excitement when I think about standing up on a stage reading a published novel of mine to an audience of adoring fans.

The dreams are my energy as I stay up writing until the sun rises and my stomach curdles with the nausea of early morning.

I scrimp, pinch, cup, and scrape my writing until it sings.

It’s still not perfect. It won’t ever be.

Because that’s not what successful authors are. Their works have plot holes, character inconsistencies, and misused commas.

They’re just the ones who put their work out there when it was good enough and then did that over and over again until their writing became great.

Should I do it? Of course I shouldn’t. I’m a bad singer.

Eight-year-old me could do this. She could send a recording of her singing to a classmate who is interested in her singing on his backing track.

Who am I kidding, of course she couldn’t.

When I was eight years old, I had been in the choir for three years already. The director was a shrill type. A poised woman with the kind of ambition that doesn’t settle for anything less than perfection.

Instead of reinforcing this through positivity and healthy habits, the director chose to use threats and thinly veiled murder jokes to set up an environment of fear and anxiety.

The first time anything happened, I was five and a group of us hadn’t learned the harmonies we were supposed to. The director told us that she’d slit our throats with a rusty machete if we neglected our practice again.

She didn’t mean it of course, but that didn’t matter. To a five year old brain, she became a hulking monster and the person I wanted to impress most at the same time.

I push rice falls into a bowl and I run cold water over it. The starch separates from the grain. I pour it into my rice cooker with swish.

When I left the choir seven-years later I thought my life was over. It was in a sense. When you’re in an environment like that, you think that you’re nothing without it. When in fact leaving allows your nervous system to start healing.

“I need sauce for the top.”

Togarashi, Soy Sauce, Sesame Oil and Rice Wine Vinegar.

When I was thirteen, I invited her to my Bat Mitzvah. A day filled with family, friends, fun and food. I didn’t do it because I wanted her to enjoy my special day with me, because I cared about her. I did it because I needed to prove to her I was good enough.

I take the fish out of the marinade and cut it into squares.

I boil water, drop in two eggs and set a timer for six minutes.

I was standing up in front of all my family and friends, the day of my Bat Mitzvah and all I could think about was her. She was late, I learned later that the reason was traffic but at that time, I thought she had decided not to come.

I should’ve been happy, but I wasn’t. Sure there was no anxiety or worry of being told I was singing a prayer wrong, but there was also no trauma bond. There is something so intoxicating about a person who has the ability to make or break your self esteem. I was drawn towards that choir and its director because it meant I didn’t have to build my own self worth. It was constructed for me.

She did come, stood in the back in a long tan coat. The day went fast, I danced and had a great time. But then came the candle lighting, the time to honor people who shaped me. I called her up and my heart was pounding.

I was.. Shaking.

I put the rice on the bottom of a shallow bowl, then the tuna, the jammy eggs and scallions for garnish.

I told her “thank you for never actually murdering me when you said you were going too.” and she laughed. Because of course she did. People like that, with good intentions but horrible actions don’t know the harm they cause.

I started to laugh, loud, boisterous laughter. The childhood trauma congealed and then disintegrated.

For that night.

The pressure has come back over the years. Especially, when I was asked to sing on a classmate’s backing track. I want to but the director’s voice was in my head, telling me I’m not good enough.

That the euphoric rush of adrenaline after that candle lighting needs to happen again. I can’t let this rule me anymore.

The last bite of the poke bowl is a mixture of the rice, fish and egg yolk.

A cacophony of flavors, protein, and carbs.

External and internal validation.

The answer to that question is multi-faceted.

So much so that I don’t have the answer.

I’ve achieved a lot in my young life, and this is just the beginning. Going over it all feels widely overzealous and egotistical of me, so instead I’ll say this;

I’ve pushed myself so hard that one night I cold emailed over 250+ entities for internship opportunities. I’ve created and scaled a non-profit, and I’ve gotten published thirty times.

Somebody once said How do you do it all? And the truth is I don’t. There are days when I barely get out of bed. I am either working constantly or recovering from those bursts of energy. I’m constantly catching up to things and people that I feel like have it all together.

I’m not going to say they probably don’t either. Because they might. There must be people out there who get up, drink their lemon water, don’t scroll, work for an appropriate amount of time, and then devote an hour to a hobby of their choosing before going to sleep at a reasonable hour.

I’ve never met a person like that, but I’m sure they exist.

My screen time is through the roof. I don’t have my driver’s license yet. Sometimes I’m so tired even though I’ve done nothing at all, and other times, I frankly don’t even know how the past me managed to achieve anything at all. Then two hours later, I’m cranking out two thousand words or getting an email saying I got another internship offer.

The strong, successful me and the me who is crippeled by self-doubt can exist simultaneously. Creating balance starts from decentering the ideals parroted to us by social media. It starts from doing one simple thing: creating more than you consume.

Your screen time and other unhealthy habits aren’t going to change overnight. Especially if you’re neurodivergent. A lot of us use screen time as a coping mechanism, and just telling ourselves that we need better coping skills isn’t enough.

Routines meant for able-bodied people with no exhaustion and the physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, and financial space for leisure aren’t sustainable. Because none of us has all of those things at once. Health habits shouldn’t look like grasping for an ideal that’s out of reach.

We shouldn’t have any sort of ideal.

Waking up and trying is enough.

I promise.

The crisp sound of the olive oil against the delicate vegetables whisks me away to my psychiatrist’s waiting room.

To opening the blue rice crispy treat wrapper and down the whole thing in one bite.

To lie in mom’s bed, head against her pillow.

“If we had only known sooner. Everything would’ve been different. I would’ve been different.”

I’m using rice noodles in this dish. They are homemade. Technically, I made them using rice wrappers that I bought at the store. But I did have to dip them in water and cut them into the shape of succulent noodles that you can only buy at the specialty Asian Market twenty minutes away from my house.

I tried to learn how to make homemade rice noodles several times. But I gave up, just like I gave up piano, ballet, math (several times), social media, several novel projects and so many other things.

When the psychiatrist said the word autism, I wasn’t surprised. The word had been reaching its way up my esophagus for years. I just couldn’t say it out loud.

I start chopping scallions for the garnish.

The shallots are taking longer than expected.

I was wild as a child. Not the kind of wild that kicks or screams. The kind of wild who doesn’t know her place. Who asks questions that make teachers’ eyebrows raise.

My family made the choice to homeschool me, the privilege of doing so, I am not blind too.

There were nights when I would be doing homework of some kind and my mom would be standing over me telling me all the things I was doing wrong, how I was developmentally off track. She couldn’t handle my math level which never rose above second grade, my chicken scratch handwriting or how I couldn’t open the refrigerator because I was scared of what I may find.

All I would do is sit and read all day. Sometimes I would talk to other children, but not “enough.” Or at least, not enough according to her. Looking back on it there were certain developmental stages I didn’t go through partly because I was homeschooled and partly because I wasn’t neurotypical.

Now that I am more “normal” presenting, there is this constant tug that comes with the pressure of trying to play catch up.

I add crushed garlic marinated in olive oil.

The shallots melt into it.

When I got to high school, my engine revved. Fast. I started my own non-profit, I got published thirty times, I made life long friendships, applied to nineteen colleges and got into sixteen, I was offered five presidential scholarships, went to public school and wrote over two hundred thousand words. Most notably, I raised my grade level in math and ended with an A in trigonometry my last semester of senior year.

My achievements were all motivated by the deep seeded thought that because I didn’t grow up like everyone else, I was incapable of success.

It stemmed from mom’s fear.

From that fear turning into being told that normal kids do this and you’re bad because you’re still doing that. It came from, why are you still doing that? You’re acting like a baby. You should be here, you shouldn’t be there. Why aren’t you doing this? What is wrong with you that you’re not where I was at your age.

The shallots tenderize.

I pour in the coconut milk.

The noodles are next.

I added the scallions.

I ladle the meal out into a plate and walk back into my room where I curl up and begin to eat.

My books that I used to spend all day reading, my stuffed animals that I still hold sometimes, my computer, my chargers, and everything else in this room is going to be packed up soon. I’m going to college twelve states away in the fall and while I’m nervous, I’m not quaking in my boots anymore.

Hearing the word autism in that psychiatrist’s office two weeks ago made me realize.

I was never wrong, broken or even different.

I was just me.

And I took a little extra time to tenderize.

are some of the labels I would use to describe myself.

None with judgement. Or at least, none with intended judgement. Though some words have implicit judgements infused within them.

The label that makes my chest zing with a sense of pride is the one of writer.

I write when I’m bored, when I am sad, or when I want to do something else. When I’m not writing, I’m thinking about writing or wishing I was writing or trying to get up the motivation to write.

The want of it smacks me in the face and then pulls me close like a sandstorm.

My addiction to it has been stoked by my chronic illness, which leaves me bedridden for untraceable stretches of time.

That’s another thing I am: an endo warrior.

Endometriosis (according to the Mayo Clinic) is a disease where cells similar to the lining of the uterus, or endometrium, grow outside the uterus.

The term endo warrior is used as a way to empower. It lights me up when I’m curled up in a ball crying from the pressure on my back, belly and legs. It pushes me to stand when a thousand metaphorical fire ants dance across my uterus.

I say that I’m an endo warrior with a puffed-out chest and a big smile. The word becomes a shield from the reality of the pain of it. I don’t smile because I like the pain I’m in; in fact, I don’t really know why I smile when I say it.

It softens things.

Does taking on the identity of an endo warrior mean I’m letting something that negatively affects me define me? Does taking on the label of an “endo warrior” or “survivor” make me a person who is making my trauma my whole personality?

Or is it that sometimes things happen to us and if we don’t reclaim them, we end up getting lost in them.

But can we get lost in an intense reclamation as well?

What is the line?

Is there one?

Is it about having a balance of positive and negative labels?

Or maybe, just maybe, everyone should choose how and what to reclaim, what labels to have, what labels to ditch.

Because as long as the person isn’t spewing:

racist/homophobic/transphobic/zenophobic/islamaphobic/

rhetoric or being a deplorable person in any other way;

Their choice is valid.