Timing is important. There’s many couples right now madly in love and aligned, who wouldn’t be together if one or both people didn’t wait. If they didn’t get out of certain situations. If time was reversed and they were in different mentalities, different bodies and circumstances, their unions wouldn’t exist. It wasn’t the time for it then. But it works for both now. Many folks upgrade later in life. More than we realize. They wouldn’t be into each other as their younger selves. They wouldn’t have been prepared.

In a way it’s kinda sad because it seems like you have to be desirable to be a catch. You must be patient and none of us want that. But it also proves how important potential and growth is. Some ppl are meant to be late bloomers, but they bloom regardless.

We all grow with time. We’re not at our best at young ages. We become more wise. We’ve retained more information. You didn’t know what you know now two years ago. Emotionally you know how to handle things better. You know how to pick your battles and know what isn’t worth the energy. We know what will work for us and what won’t, as time passes. We become more inspirational and have a testimony with age. Don’t rush.

Needed this 🙏🏾

I think you need a break

In case anyone needs this today.

Reminder for bad days (via canspotatimeagent)

A cherry blossom bunny encouraging you to grow! 🌸 It’s never too late.

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this was the best one i saw yesterday on r/ambien im not sure if everyone has lurked on it and has seen all it offers

My mom was on that shit when I was a kid and I believe every word of this

7 Daily Reminders

1. My self worth does not depend on what others think and say about me.

2. My self worth does not depend on how I look or what I weigh.

3. My self worth does not depend on my marks or performance.

4. My self worth does not depend on my number of followers.

5. I am enough just as I am.

6. I can succeed despite a bad day.

7. I am beautiful and valuable – and will treat myself with kindness and respect.

I keep having to remind myself that at one point, the only thing JK Rowling knew about her book idea was that she wanted to write about a boy who finds out he's a wizard. Even she had to start at the beginning.

KEEP WRITING! ~N

you can do this. stop sabotaging yourself and your dreams. there will be risks, there will be stress, but go on and actually pursue what you want to do. you will not regret having tried, all things considered. self-doubt can destroy so much of your life. don’t let it, please. 

I’m pretending all the time to be, kinder, stronger, funnier, more sociable than I am. I guess we’re all like that but it just feels so inadequate.

What’s the difference?

I know it sounds flippant but… certain things are fundamentally performative.  And other things are so close as makes no difference.

Kindness is performative.  Actions are kind, and people are kind by performing those actions.  You can’t “pretend” to be kinder than you are, you can only perform kindness or not perform kindness, and choosing to perform kindness is always worthwhile, no matter how much you may second-guess your motivations.

Strength is so many things.  It takes strength to pretend a strength you don’t feel.  And the way to achieve strength is to exercise it, so long as you do it in enough moderation to not strain or break anything.  Being able to affect strength when necessary while being able to put it down again when that in turn is necessary is healthy.  Everyone starts weight training with the littlest weights.  It’s not fake or pretending to do what you gotta do in any given situation.

Funniness lives in the interlocutor, not in the speaker.  It doesn’t matter how funny you think you are (or think you are pretending to be) - that’s not how it’s measured.  At what point are you “pretending” to be a musician if the music still gets made?  And often what it’s tempting to describe in first person as “pretending” is more accurately described in the third person as “practicing” - which is of course the way you cause things to Be.

Sociability is also performative.  Pretending to be sociable is just…being sociable, despite a disinclination towards it.  It’s making an effort towards something you value.  So long as the effort is not so great that it backfires into resentment, there’s no practical difference.  

Qualities or activities or whatever are no less worthy because you have to actively choose to perform them.  If anything, the worthiness lies in the act of choosing.  It’s not “pretending” - it’s agency.

tl;dr: ain’t nothing wrong with “fake it till you make it.”  A plastic spoon* holds just as much soup as a “real” one

* I keep wanting to talk about semantic domains!  Artifacts are defined by their utility, whereas living things are defined by their identity.  So plastic forks are still forks, but plastic flowers aren’t flowers.  So there’s two pep-talk messages to take away from this: (1) for certain things, the distinction between “fake” and “real” isn’t a relevant one so long as they still get the job done, and (2) the purpose of a living thing is to be the thing that it is.  The idea of a “useless person” is as semantically nonsensical as the idea of “pretend kindness” (or fake cutlery).

I love this post. It illustrates what I think is maybe the key difference between a developing self-identity and a formed self-identity, which is, like…confidence? If you are BEING kind, consistently, if you are prioritizing that over your own comfort or fatigue or even, occasionally, your emotional inclination (because OH MY GOD FUCK THIS GUY, I HAVE HAD IT UP TO HERE–uuughhh, but no, I’m not gonna lash out at him, that won’t accomplish anything, and besides, he’s probably had a bad day, he’s under a lot of stress, I don’t have to be an asshole about this…), guess what? That makes you kind. That is literally what kindness is. Same for patience, same for strength, same for all of this stuff. You got it. You’re doing it. You’re not faking anything. Stop second-guessing yourself and cutting yourself down. Give yourself enough credit to look at your actions and confidently assert to yourself that you are no longer just making things up as you go. 

Hey. You there. I know 2017 has been a really rough year, but you made it and I’m goddamn proud of you.

Maybe it wasn’t your moment, your day or even your year. But you have another right in front of you. Make it your fresh start.

sometimes i forget how many times i’ve picked myself off the floor, how many times i’ve washed away smudgy makeup and put myself to bed. how many times i’ve said no to something unhealthy. said yes to something good. how many times i’ve treated myself with kindness and patience. i forget how many times i’ve tended to wounds and made peace with my own anger. if i was taking care of a body that was not my own, i’d believe i was doing everything i could. so here’s to remembering that i’m doing the best i can.

please remember that a little progress is still progress

If anyone wants to know why I love and appreciate Taliesin Jaffe so much, here’s another reason to top off a very long list of reasons. 

Tweet from @softangels_: @executivegoth im having a really bad night and im trying to find a reason to live, any advice?

Reply from @executivegoth: Actually, yeah, fuck it. Here it is: [image attached]

Image description: A few years ago I was in one of my longest runs of severe depression (I’ve had a few) and decided, “fuck it. Since I know I can’t live like this for much longer, I’m going to do all the shit I’m terrified of, because no amount of “fucked up on meds” could possibly be worse than this living nightmare.”

I got a therapist who is amazing (took 3 tries). I got on meds, which took 7 different attempts including one that made me super agro, and many where I couldn’t feel any change for weeks. I took vitamins. I went outside every day, if only for 5 minutes. I failed to do the basic minimum to count as human A LOT. I told a few of my friends the truth instead of trying to pretend I was okay. Most were helpful as fuck, but not all.

And after all that and STILL being in therapy I can tell you that getting fully out of depression feels like gong technicolor in the wizard of oz. My brain wasn’t capable of producing the chemicals necessary to feel actual happiness. It was a car with gas but no oil. Just stuck and tearing itself apart.

I know it feels like there’s an external solution to these problems but there isn’t. Plenty of skinny hot people wanna fucking end it. Plenty of hot skinny people are hot and skinny because they are trying desperately to feel human. Respect your biology. Go figure out if your brain is even giving you the biological opportunity to feel good. Then go to a professional to help you clean up the mess, because it cannot be done alone, any more than you can remove your own tumors.

I would of crashed and burned HARD before Critical Role ever happened, and could have never imagined the life I have now. Accept you might not feel good for awhile, but there is that technicolor world, you just have to be open to some heavy emotional work to get there. Love you.

[ breaks added for accessibility ]

does anyone else have those moments where they just fall in love with being alive? like, maybe you’re in art class with soft music and you realize that this peaceful feeling is a part of life that you love and you want to just keep forever, and there are so many other parts of life too that are so wonderful and maybe existing isnt so bad after all

is this what being not depressed is like

no, this is what recovery is like. this is what being depressed is like, and it’s why we stay. because even when we’re sure this is it, this is the last day we can put up with it, this is the last hour, the last second - some part of us remembers these moments, and thinks - what if tomorrow has one of them. 

i used to joke i have bad days and worse days. i almost never do well. i feel like i keep barely a nose above the water.

but in those rare, rare, rare seconds where the waves stop for one second and i catch sight of something other than dark, i see it. the way a rose looks after a rain. how my mother smiles when she knows it’s my favorite meal that’s cooking. my best friend looking over his shoulder to flip me off again. the bike i rode at 7 and crashed at 17. a little bug struggling with five little legs - but walking, walking.

recovery isn’t smashing into these moments and realizing it’s finally happened, what those people said is true and it “all gets better”. recovery is remembering those moments and deciding - i want them back. it’s looking for them. sometimes it takes hours. sometimes days. sometimes months without any sight of them. but you look, you search even when you’re too tired to keep your eyes open, because you promised yourself … tomorrow. tomorrow will be the day we find one. a four leaf clover we know is our sign, the rainbow, the wishing well - the way out.

and when you find one, they get easier. four leaf clovers always grow in the same patch, after all. and your eyes get sharper. you figure out what makes any small part of you happy. you figure out that you might not be happy, but it’s good enough to stick around to watch the way oil looks in puddles and how she always cries at new year’s. and it might not be blisteringly, soul-crushingly happy in the way other people seem to feel things - in that mind-numbing wordless joy that shines in them, that glow i’m so envious of, that effortlessness - but it will be like this, just quiet, a moment of rest, of the shouts dimming for a minute, a peace.

it’s easy to say “i’m depressed, i’ll never be happy.” maybe. i hope not, because i’m still looking. and in these moments i’ve rediscovered that i am funny, that i like the color pink, that kittens and puppies never fail me. in these moments i’m still depressed, still me, still fighting an illness that wants to end me. but i’m fighting. i seek these moments in every second i get because i’m here and breathing and after all this i’m going to be pissed if this gets the better of me. 

maybe i’ll never figure out how to feel effortless and free. but i know that i feel love when the music is blaring and my hands are out the window and i feel love somewhere on the beach and i feel love watching salamanders wake up in the mornings. it’s not other people’s love, it’s far-off and it’s distant and it might not be “normal”, but it’s goddamn important to me. 

i didn’t wake up better. i forced better to come fight me. i’ve been walking towards recovery since i was 19. five years later and no, i’m not cured, but i see a lot more of these moments. or maybe they were always there, and only now am i realizing what i got in front of me.

and when it’s been bad again? when i’m not even breathing? when it’s been months since i felt anything, when the stress is too much and the sky is dark and the moon in me has fallen silent? i say: hang on. tomorrow might be the day we find it. tomorrow might be worth the fight.

the best part about this? eventually, i’m right.