Blog: Life Through An Ever Shrinking Lens

I know that title sounds daunting, maybe even fringing on the nihilistic, but I promise you, this blog will be quite the opposite. Over the years I’ve written many blogs with the title of “life through” or “life in” or something else along those lines, so that’s how the title came to me naturally in the midst of the brainstorm that was coming up with the topic for this blog. Life through an ever shrinking lens. Okay, so it’s not nihilism, it’s not deprecation, & I promise you it’s not claustrophobic as the imagery probably draws into your mind. So what is this blog about? This blog is about the shift in perspective that seems to be coming with age, or maybe it’s just a sign of the times.

A lot of the time when I sit down to write blogs at the end of my week they end up being about synchronicities, those moments in my day to day life that shared an over arching theme for the week, month, or however long the greater powers that be saw fit to hammer the lesson into my brain. This week was one such week. I had a friend send me a tweet on twitter (I shall never refer to it as X. it’s idiotic) that said the following:

“Me at 22: Wow, life really ends at 21.

Me at 25: Wow, life really ends at 24.

Me at 28: I’ve really been in the mood for an apple danish lately, I can’t wait to get to walk to the corner store & get myself an apple danish! :)”

— @LeftAtLondon On Twitter

To which he accompanied with the comment, “tea kinda” which then sparked a conversation which then led to the inception of this blog. & you know what? It is “tea, kinda!”

Again, I haven’t decided on whether to caulk all of this up to age, as both he & I are in our early thirties with a fully developed frontal lobe (in theory) or whether it’s an experience that those younger than us are also feeling of late, the data sample is far too small & limited for anything conclusive there. What I am noticing, however, specifically speaking for myself, my friend, & even Evan, whom I asked his thoughts on when the topic originally came up, is that we all are finding ourselves more & more in the mindset of enjoying the little things. Caring more about the “sweet treats” that make us smile, the company that we share a kindred soul with, & finding wonder at every turn.

I’m sure there is a term for all of this, I’m also certain that if I allowed myself to venture into the internet in search of it that this blog would end up being delayed another hour or two in its completion simply from the rabbit hole that I would no doubt stumble headlong into. What I do know if that the lens is shrinking. I no longer care so much what the broader collective thinks & feels about me, I no longer care what they want from me as an individual, & I no longer seek the approval of those who I know I would have to encase myself in some false presentation of who I am to be in the good graces of. I am, all in all, in search of simple, humble, minuscule happiness. I am looking for connection, not out of need for acceptance or desire to expand a social circle, but simply to share something human with another person on the same level. To laugh & collaborate, to create & feel & empathize with because I think we have lost a lot of that in the rat race of clout, fame, popularity, & ambition.

I live a lot of my days of late in more silence that I had allowed in before. I sit & ponder the thoughts that pass through my brain, I think of the daily cross sections of humanity & how beautiful a lot of what we encounter in our day to day lives actual is. I think about life & its cycles. I think about evolution, adaptation, passion, experience, & I marvel at how grandiose it all is. How precise, calculated, & yet utterly wild it all is. In a lot of ways, in shrinking the lens, in minimizing the focus away from things that really don’t matter, I am finding infinite streams of beauty & expression.

I know that last paragraph sounded pretty ‘woo woo.’ I hope that I didn’t lose you in it, but in all honesty that is what I feel, that is what is flowing through my mind. That is how I am living my life at the moment. & it’s simple & mundane at times but it is so refreshing to live in the quiet sometimes. To just be. To experience the marvel that it is to be human & the astonishing ways in which that manifests.

I’m going to leave you with one last anecdote before I sign off on this blog & let you all continue about your day. It’s a story that involves one of my favorite topics, Harvey. I’m going to keep this story light. I’m not going to delve into the pain of missing him or any of the grief there in, but I do want to tell you all a story that involves him in his later years.

Harvey on our daily walks was prone to literally stopping & smelling the roses. This was probably way less to do with the flowering fauna he frequented himself & more to do with the other dogs & animals who had done the same, marking as they went along. Either way the story rings true. Harvey, on our walks, would stop often to take deep long inspective sniffs at many of the plants along the path, most of whom flowered at one point or another. Often Evan & I would try to hurry him along to keep the walk moving, that was until we read something that mentioned that dogs stopping & investigating is ten times more stimulating for them & their brains than just the walk itself. Then we too slowed & allowed his reprieve from the walk.

When Harvey passed our vet sent us an ink print of his nose. Evan & I then went around to each of the spots that he would stop each day on our walks, collected & dried the flowers from the plants that he had spent so much time & waining energy interacting with. They now adorn his nose print in a wooden frame in our living room.

So what’s the lesson here? Why bring it up? How does it connect? Harvey saw the value in stopping the motion that often was difficult for him to stop & start & taking in these expression & signatures of life. It wasn’t til he was gone that I truly appreciated them for what they were, that I truly understood how important if is to cut it all out, stop, & experience something just for the beauty of what it is or the signature that it bares.

We live in such a grind culture. We live in a culture that idolizes, that rewards the image & not the individual. We project our most attractive aspects up onto social media or our blogs but seldom do we take the time to shut it all out & really experience what it is to be human. We don’t think about the years that pastry chef spent perfecting that danish that lives at the corner shop you love, down the street from where you build your life & the cross section that all of that is. We don’t allow ourselves to feel the embrace of our partner or our friends without the fear of judgement or the pretense that we feel is required because that is what media or life has taught us we must do. We don’t ask for the things we need simply because we don’t want to be a burden so we suffer in the discomfort. We don’t stop & ponder the rain or the birds or the plants & the cycles they exist in & perpetuate. We try to force our lives into an all encompassing, broad lens, but I think if you zoom in, shrink it down, you will find all of the magnanimous happenings that you have been searching for.

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Blog: Beauty & Grief

Hi friends.

I hope you have had a wonderful week, though I know for a lot of you that hasn’t been the case. For whatever reason there seems to have been an uptick in those passing this last week or so; dearest friends & loved ones, beloved furry companions, staples of communities, & sudden shifting tides that have led to difficult decisions & great heartache across the board. If you find yourself in any of those categories I first want to offer you me deepest, most sincere condolences. I also want to shed some light on what you can expect going & hopefully bring a little peace your way through shared experience & understanding.

If you weren’t aware, back in May I lost my almost decade & a half companion Harvey & while yes, he was “just a dog,” he was so much more than that to me & to most of the people that had the pleasure of knowing him. I have no children other than those who bare fur & walk on all fours. That’s not a dig at saying my (non-existent) human children are very bizarre, I’m simply saying that all I have, paternally, are the animals that I have adopted over the years. I’m not going to turn this blog into a statement about how people should or shouldn’t be able to grieve their pets, but a lot of recent research shows that those of us who have strong, almost familial connections to our pets, mourn them in an identical way to how you would mourn the loss of a family member. Harvey was my boy, he was with me for over thirteen years of my life & he was, for a long time, who I looked forward to coming home to at the end of the day. So his loss ripped me apart, it shattered me to the core, & forced me to rebuild a life without him in it.

I’m not going to sit here & lie to you or belittle you. It’s hard, it’s impossibly hard, the grief that lingers like fog & settles into your bones like lead. You will have days where it is debilitating, but you will also have days where the sun shines through the blinds & melancholy & hope replace the anguish & despair. But with all things challenging in life you must face it head on & take it one step at a time.

There will be a time, when the wound of loss is fresh, where you will seemingly forget a time when your eyes were not floodgates constantly on the verge of spilling over. Then too will come a day when you can’t remember the last time you felt that way, when you can’t remember the last time you cried. You will be visited in your dreams & reach for them in your sleep & wake up with a tear soaked pillow & a yearning that can never be satiated. There will be times when a certain song, sound, smell, phrasing, sight will hit you in just the right way & you’ll find yourself back in the thick of it all. Even I still find myself here once in a blue moon all of these months later, but it does get easier & the triggers get fewer & farther between & at some point melancholy takes over the bitter sadness & all you will find is sweet longing & remembrance.

There’s a quote that I use often because of just how perfectly stated it is. It can be found in the Disney+ Show “WandaVision” at a point where one character, Vision, finds another, Wanda, sitting in the room ruminating on the death of her brother. In my mind Wanda becomes apologetic for her expression of grief & Vision delivers the beautiful line "what is grief if not love persevering?” That’s a line I think about often & as someone who often deals in lyrics or creative writing, is ultimately one that I wish I had thought of. Though as of now it definitely would’ve reached a wider audience on Disney+ than me.

We seldom think of grief this way. My perception of it has always been a dark, navy/grayish cloud of despair that sticks to the skin & sinks into the marrow. Almost like some dark force whose job it is to chain you to the depths. I think recently that idea has changed for me. We like to quantify grief in stages. First you hit the one, then the other, then the other three. And while a part of me thinks to an extent that is true in terms of the overarching experience, I think we dip in & out of each of the five stages intermittently & at times randomly. You see, if we look at grief from the perspective of love’s perseverance it becomes something entirely different, it becomes an immensely beautiful, deeply human experience.

Those who do not grieve are whose who have not known love. They have not felt its entirely. individually unique hold on their heart to then know what it is to suddenly have to live without it. They do not see the way in which our memory replays each of the moments, begging us to find what is irreplaceably lost. They do not understand the vacuum of space that feels ripped from your chest because they have not felt that level of DNA melding, intertwining love. Be so glad for that. Know that your sadness can only come from one who has been loved.

My advise to you is to feel these moments. Live in these memories savoring the shimmeringly perfect details & embrace the pain & the detriment that comes with them because these moments will fade. The intensity at which you feel their loss will fade & so too will the sharp edges of those bold, flashing memories. Grieve as you are told to love, wholeheartedly & know that you don’t owe anyone your tears or your smiles. You are allowed to be as “put together” as you need to be, or to not be. Feel what you need to feel because that is the only way to experience grief for what it is, without allowing it to compress down & fester & become this thing that sours your soul or the memory of those who you have lost. Be vulnerable, be bold, claim time for yourself & feel. You will get through it & you will find that those memories that bring you pain will, over time, fill you to the core with that feeling of love that I know right now you feel you have lost. I would also advise you that those you have lost would want you to continue living your life & to not let the delicate balance between succumbing & healing shift too far into the former.

My thoughts & love go out to you all. I understand that no words that I say or no sentiments that I extend will be enough to repair what has been broken, that is entirely up to you.

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Blog: Ponderance & Teacups

Lately I’ve found myself leaning more & more into ponderances & have caught myself marveling at the ‘through lines’ of it all. Yes, I know ponderances isn’t a word, but I enjoyed the cadence of it in my brain & the way it fits in form. To ponder is to think carefully or in detail about & adding the suffix “ance” insinuates a state of being, ponderances therefore being states of thoughtful thinking. There’s something shimmery & quant about that. Like nostalgia set to theory. I don’t know if it’s the years, the journey into mindfulness, the season of life, or what the cause of this often aloof status would be, but it’s brought about many connections in my head that warm the heart & bring me to marvel at the grand ‘happenstance’ of it all.

One such ponderance & the conclusion that it led to finds its way back to me almost on the daily in the form of teacups. I am a lover of beverages in most of their forms. Most dietitians I’m sure would scoff at the amount of “wasted calories” that I drink, but there’s something altogether entertaining about a drink that’s tastes invigorate the senses & occupy the mind. I am a tea drinker, of course, because of this love (in addition to coffee, cocktails, juices, craft sodas, tonics, etc. etc.). I find the combination of flavors, as well as their medicinal properties, to be fascinating & therefore I consume some form of tea almost each & every day. The existence of this love for beverages has also led me to the accumulation of many a drinking vessel, all of which sit in the same cupboard awaiting their specific & unique intended use.

My mugs, which are often the cup chosen for tea time, actually sit opposite all of the others in my kitchen. However, the tea strainers all sit with the other tea items; the teapot, the ceremonial tea cups, etc. & with the tea paraphernalia lives two very distinct tea cups that are actually one of the newer additions to the collection. Did I mention they also come with a story?

When I go to make my tea; when the water has been warmed, the mug & the leaves has been selected, & I go in search of a strainer they always catch my eye & I can’t help but smile as my fingertips drift over them to where the things I need are stored. They don’t look like much. They’re small, entirely porcelain white, except for the blue lined base & two little raised details that sit on either side of the cups; a soft greyed purple & a blush pink flower & a few cerulean & sage leaves. The tea cups are unassuming. They’re delicate & beautiful when taken in but when places in a collection I’m not sure they’re the first thing that most people would notice. That’s definitely not the case for me as they stand out like a spot in the night, anchoring me to lineage, fate, & a bond between peoples living on opposite ends of the earth.

I don’t know entirely where the teacups originated outside of knowing that they are Japanese in make & in origin. They were brought across the Pacific Ocean, packed carefully in with an assortment of other personal treasures & articles of a life being transplanted from one country to another. Through time & years they ended up in a home on a hilltop in Hillsboro, Oregon where a first generation Japanese family lived with their daughter next door to my parents & their daughter at the time. I’m not sure at what point the family moved away back across the sea, but I do know in the interim, in that time spent as neighbors, they & my parents became rather close. Just as my sister did to their daughter. I have no recollection of the bond or the family in my early years of life because I was a newly minted human being & I’m fairly certain they were gone before my time of memory, but when they departed this country they left behind certain items & gifts, two of which where these teacups.

Years went by & stories were told & the family became a staple of the history that is my immediate family though the years had drifted us apart. Technology had changed, each of us had moved ten times over, the children were grown & starting families & lives of their own, & the ties & bonds slipped nearly into fable. My mother would often sit & express how much she longed to reconnect with the friends whom they hadn’t been able to reach for the many years of separation they'd endured. That was until my love stepped in.

Evan is notoriously good for finding things & people lost to the internet, he should probably be a private investigator, & in the span of around thirty minutes to an hour, he was able to find the socials & email for the family now living in Japan. From there my mother began to reconnect which then led to her connecting me with the daughter of the family whom now I share an online connection with delighting in the photos she posts of her & her blossoming family. And then there are these teacups.

My mom isn’t a tea drinker, if she does, she’s a mug drinker for sure favoring something that comes in a bag over loose leaf. She has not the desire for the ceremonial, meditative aspects of tea brewing & drinking & in knowing that I do, she gifted me the teacups along with the story of their origin. It was a while later, after using them & having them as a staple of my cupboard of cups that I really realized the serendipity of what I had. The amount of life that these simple ceramic vessels had seen & endured all while intertwining two families from two entirely different cultural backgrounds & locations.

The cups were gifted or bought in Japan, where they were crafted. They were used by a family who crossed the largest ocean on the planet to start a new life in an entirely different country. They were passed, lovingly, to my family as their previous owners parted these lands where they sat, waiting the years for the one member of my family who would use them for their intended use to be gifted them. They would then reignite the stories & the desire of connection in which my chosen partner, someone from an entirely different family, from an entirely different part of the country, would reconnect the two separated families. And now they have a home in my house in Tennessee where they frequently spark my sense of wonder & amazement at the sheer tenacity of the invisible string that guides us along. Where they are an anchor point of admiration & love across time, space, generations, & peoples.

I know someday these cups may break. I’m sure out of clumsiness that some day I may accidentally knock them from their shelf & shatter them into a million pieces. And while the idea of losing these points of reference & reverence saddens me, I know that their meaning & their purpose will have been served & that their timing, their patience, & fortitude will have amounted to so much more than just a pair of teacups. Things are just things, stuff is just stuff, but meaning & love & companionship leave behind marks. We can never see them but they are very much felt & maybe, who knows, when the timing is right & if these cups have outlived a love I carry for their practical uses. Maybe they too will make another trip across the sea where they will be returned to a member of the bloodline that gifted them so lovingly to mine & the intersectionality will continue.

Blog: Do We Still Need Pride- 2024 Edition

Every year I don’t think I’m going to redo this blog until I sit down in the month of June & find myself reentering the title into the title line above. I never planned for this to become a yearly installment, but alas it seems here we are once again. Each year that I do this blog I end up highlighting the reasons in which celebrating the month of June as LGBTQ Pride is still entirely important. I do so using current & pending Anti-LGBTQ laws, relevant stories, & shamelessly, a bit of my own personal opinion as someone who lives within the community & finds the vast majority of their friends falling under one of the letters covered in the month.

If I’m being frank, I don’t take much enjoyment in writing this blog year to year. A lot of the time the reason for that is because the resounding “yes” of an answer to the question presented in the title of this piece comes with heavy news & disheartening statistics. A lot of the time this blog also ends up taking the form of a research paper when majority of what I do is think pieces, travel blogs, personal stories, & the like. This blog often weighs heavily on me as it feels, in a lot of ways, that true equality & freedom get farther & farther our of reach.

I understand that in a lot of ways progress has marched on & made a lot of headway. There is more & more queer representation in media, more queer artists are receiving their much deserved flowers & not being maligned because of their gender identity or sexual orientation. But with the march of progress & the normalizing of things that the hateful deemed taboo for many many years comes those with loud voices who make massive waves in the public by having a platform that is divisive & fueled by scapegoating & misinformation.

I want to make a few things abundantly clear before I continue on. If you are someone reading this who finds themselves on the side of history where you’re saying things like “why don’t straight people have a month” or “I just don't understand why they have to rub their lifestyle in our faces” I want you to read the following paragraph very carefully. Okay? This is a safe space for you as much as it is for those of my fellow members of the alphabet mafia. This is a safe space for you to challenge & question if what you believe & feel is true or not or if it’s just talking points & frustration. Your emotions are valid & they exist for a reason, though I’m not sure entirely if they’re being pointed at the right folks. Are you ready?

The LGBTQ community does not endorse pedophilia. We do not & will not ever include pedophilia in the rainbow banner, nor will we ever praise the outward expression of such. If anyone has told you otherwise I would ask you to reexamine your sources & reexamine their sources. Along that same vein. No one is giving gender reassignment surgery to minors & if they are (big if there) the vast majority of us also agree that said doctor should lose their license. The last & final thing that I need you to be clear on before we go forward is whether or not any of this is natural. The science, the legitimate science, has proven same sex attraction, gender dysphoria, etc, etc, etc, to be a common & pervasive thing not only amongst human beings but also all over the animal kingdom. That is no longer up for debate despite that seeming to be a “discourse” I hear brought up time & time again. Being queer is not a choice. Having the courage & the privilege to live an openly queer lifestyle that honors who you are as a person inside & out is. It is something that needs to be normalized because it is normal. No one is trying to convert children into becoming LGBTQ, if anything people are, again, trying to normalize a scientifically normal occurrence so that those who fall under the blanket of being LGBTQ stop feeling & being ostracized, vilified, murdered, beaten, abused, driven to suicide, & misunderstood. We are talking about human beings here. We are talking about your sons, daughters, children. We are talking about your brothers, sisters, siblings, mothers, fathers, parents, guardians, aunts, uncles, relatives, best friends, significant others, we are talking about real people in your lives that you probably claim to love.

As I mentioned above the march has been discouraging over the last couple of years & June 2023-June 2024 is no different. States continue to propose & pass laws that limit the rights of those in the queer community & hate crimes, specifically against those who are trans, are reaching decades long record highs. We are currently staring down the barrel of Project 2025, a Republican plan to completely gut the rights of LGBTQ Americans on Day 1 of a conservative dominated Washington DC. That’s not hyperbolic, you can read about it on the RNC’s site, laid out in plain English, right here. We are at a pivotal point in our history where the casual hate & bigotry has reached a boiling point that threatens to boil over in November of this year.

Additionally, retailers like Target, Walmart, etc. have either scaled back their Pride collections of entirely dismissed them following the outcry of the vocal minority during June of 2023. While rainbow capitalism isn’t great, neither is erasing the visibility & presence it gave to the community on a national scale.

Pride is once again slipping back into the realms of its origin & becoming a protest. A protest for visibility, for public safety, for rights. It’s becoming a protest for freedom, not only of expression, but also of peace of mind & security. Pride is undoubtedly more important than ever. It is a demand to be seen, to be heard, to not go silently & turn over because it’s convenient or easier for those who live on the outside looking in. Pride is not only needed, it is essential. It is essential for those who someday dream of having a quiet, normal life with their partner & their children. It is essential to the person who one day dreams of looking in the mirror & seeing their body reflect the beautiful human underneath. It is essential to those who dream of living a life free of fear of persecution, of emotional & physical harm, of having to chose between who you are & who those with outdated mentalities think you need to be. Pride is essential. Pride is community building, fortifying, & solidifying. Pride is health care, preventative care, & suicide prevention. Pride is expression, & honesty, & loving. Pride is, & continues to be, needed.

If you are someone who is reading this who finds themselves within the community; whether that’s questioning or confirmed, you are loved & you are valid & there are people out there who are so beyond ready to embrace the real you & show you what real, true, unconditional love looks like. If you are someone who is not in the community but loves its members personally, on behalf of all of us, thank you. Your support, affirmation, & affection goes so much farther than you could ever know. If you are someone who is neither of these things I challenge you. I challenge you to make a queer friend, to reach out to that estranged loved one, to make a genuine human effort to see them as who they are because I promise you’ll find so much beauty & unfiltered love waiting there. Set your beliefs, your politics, your whatever aside for a while & meet someone where they are, just as two human beings trying to make their way through the world. And finally, if you are someone who claims to love a queer person but then votes against them every chance you get, I beg of you, listen to what those in marginalized groups are trying to tell you. Please. It is not a loving act to claim that you care for someone & then worsen their lives because you think they’re overreacting or being alarmist. The last couple of years have proven that none of us were or are being alarmist.

As always, much love to you all,

& of course, Happy Pride!

-C

Blog: Life In Repair

I’m not going to spend this blog talking about Harvey, though I could do so indefinitely. I’m not here to talk about my ear or anything regarding the anxiety I have/had around it. Though these things will feature in the blog only in their remnants, what I’d like to talk about today is more in line with what it means & what if feels like to be living life ‘in repair.’

In addition to the two aforementioned events, Evan & I had a tough May 2024. Everything seemed to be perpetually going wrong. Our month started off with me noticing a mealybug infestation on a whole room of my house plants. After failed treatment after failed treatment I finally took them outside, removed the dirt entirely, lightly pressure washed the plants, soaked them & their pots in a water & castile soap mixture for around thirty minutes, rinsed them again, sprayed them down with alcohol, rinsed them again, & repotted them in new soil that was treated with systemic to get rid of any possible eggs which all took about six hours total. (I found more mealybugs back on the same plants yesterday…) Then one of the more expensive pumps on my fish tank went out. Then our dishwasher broke & flooded our kitchen & the cabinets. Then we started to hear birds in our walls which then lead to an infestation of bird mites. Then Max scratched the screen of Evan’s brand new MacBook. Then Harvey passed. Then our AC went out. And while in the grand scheme of things a lot of these items are trivial, they still added up to be major stressors.

Additionally while all of this was happening Evan was departing his old job preparing to turn his other into a full time gig, I was wrapping recording & mixing of my next single, we were shooting & creating content for it, all while trying to maintain the every day day to day events & goings on around the house & within our social lives. We were both getting more & more stretched thin while fighting the anxieties of healing & later to currently the grief of losing a member of our immediate family. We truly began to wonder if were in fact cursed.

I’m not bringing any of this up to gain your pity, I’m not here to say “oh, poor us, look at the shit storm we’ve been navigating.” I understand life comes at you in waves & that sometimes the surf can be treacherous to even drowning. I just needed to outline those events for you so you understand where I’m coming from. I’d be lying to you all if I said I didn’t feel like I had a bit of stress fatigue, I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t still actively grieving though each day does get easier than the last. But what I want to illustrate to you all if what I am trying to extend to myself & what I recommended extending two weeks ago when I wrote “Healing Doesn’t Happen Overnight.” That it’s okay to give yourself grace & have a little patience as you do your best to reassemble a life.

I am living life in repair, as I know so many of us are right now. What does that look like? What does that mean? It means I’m chugging along but I’m being mindful. I’m keeping stock of the things that still require my attention both within my being as well as in my environment & doing my best to mend & set them properly so that they begin to heal or are easier to pick up & complete along the way. I’m extending the understanding that it’s a long month & that I’ve been through a lot. I’m also keeping vigilant & staying at the ready for the inevitability that more things will come.

I’m allowing myself to say no, I’m conquering projects that I put off, I’m prioritizing my health, my wellbeing, because I cannot properly help & assist anyone else while I am still fractured & neither can you & neither should you. You are worthy of health, you are worthy of peace & the feeling of safety. You are worthy of life as it exists to the fullest extend. And so am I!

I know fixing the problems & sitting off to the side while the world seems to go by can be disheartening, it can feel like you’re wasting away or like you’re being antisocial, a bad friend, a bad family member, but your health, in all aspects, is important. Repairs are worth the time that it takes for them to take hold & be functional again.

I also want you to realize that sometimes things don’t heal in the same way that they originated. Some things wither off & die, but it is only to make room for new growth & new life. In traditional tarot reading there is a card called ‘The Tower.’ The Tower to a lot of people signals doom, & to an extent that’s what the card stands for on the surface. In reality the story behind The Tower is a fire that destroys the building in its entirety. What happens next is a beautiful thing. You sift through the ashes & find what remains. You find the pieces that resisted the fire, the resilient, the gems that were tucked away in the walls, & from the ash & dismay, you build a better tower to stand in the place of that which you thought you wanted but was no longer serving you & was standing in the way of something better.

Be diligent in sifting through your ashes. Notice the messages, the lessons, & once you have everything you need to move forward, plant that first brick, then the next. Build your tower more magnificent & glistening than that which stood before. Repair, remake, & remain resilient.

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Blog: The Part Of Pet Ownership That No One Takes To Heart

Hiya, Happy Thanksgiving to all of my US based folks or those who celebrate! If you’re going back through the log of my blogs & noticing that last week I was noticeably it’s due to two prominent reasons. The first is that my immediate family celebrated the holiday last Friday & thus I was busy cooking, socializing, & entertaining. The second reason is the topic of this week’s blog & while I don’t intend for it to be a downer, I’d be lying if I said the subject matter is a walk through the park. Nevertheless, it is something I feel drawn to speak on in this season of life as well as this season of the year since many people will soon be giving or receiving the gift of a furry, feathered, &/or scaled friend & should understand what exactly it is you or your loved one is signing up for.

Some of you may be aware of the ‘zoo’ that I have at my house; two golden retrievers (Harvey (12) & Peter (3)), two domestic shorthair cats (Jade (13) & Max (5)), & a 185 gallon saltwater fish tank. In addition to a jungle of over 150 house plants. Today we’re going to be focused on my eldest golden, Harvey, for the purpose of our narrative.

I grew up with animals, we always had big dogs when I was young, Newfoundlands to be exact. Over the years we also had cats, fish, frogs, & two terriers, but I always wanted a Golden Retriever. I remember a friend of mine’s parents from elementary school used to breed them & the movie Homeward Bound featured an old golden named Shadow, so I’m sure that’s where the obsession started. Despite the want, we never got goldens so after I moved out I rescued Harvey from an abusive mill at the age of six months old. He was incredibly hard to potty train as he’d spent his entire life up to that point on concrete & was afraid of grass. It didn’t help that my apartment at the time had concrete floors. Harvey, despite my early frustrations with him, is & has always been the perfect dog. He is loyal & loving to a fault. He is gentle & has the most kind heart of any being I have yet to come across. He was instantly my guy, the gold (pun intended) standard to which I shall now hold every dog for the rest of my life, but Harvey’s biggest fault & the one to which all great dogs falter, is that he grew old.

It’s hard, you know. It’s so damned hard to watch your best friend, your buddy, your companion, your most goodest of boys grey around the muzzle, then struggle to find their footing, then have a hard time getting up & lose interest in their toys or their favorite snacks. It’s so unrelentingly hard when those beautiful, loving brown eyes begin to cloud over & their breath begins to get labored & you start to have to think about the beginnings of the end of your time with this purest of hearts that you wish endlessly would beat on forever. & unfortunately this is the part of pet ownership that far too many find to be just way too difficult.

The shelters are full of animals whose previous owners truly didn’t understand. They didn’t know the commitment, emotionally, physically, spiritually, that it takes to raise & care for an animal & I feel sorry for them. Not just for the abandoned animals, of which the majority are over half their lifespan in age, but also for the people who will never know what it is to spend the course of their life being unconditionally loved by an animal.

About a week & a half ago Harvey fell. We were out on a walk & he just kind of crumpled. From there he spent the next couple of days incapable of getting up, when he’d try to stand or walk he’d fall or his legs would drag, he wasn’t eating, wasn’t taking treats & I truly began to think that this was it, this was going to be the last week that I had with this golden angel who poops in my yard & gets taken on daily walks around the block. Ev & I canceled our flights to Kansas City & loaded up both of the dogs in the the car to drive the 16 hours round trip not only so we could tend to Harvey, but also so my parents, who have so much love for my dear boy, could say goodbye to him. Over the next week he didn’t get that much better, though he did eat & regained a bit of his footing, & for the first time since I’d been bringing him back to Kansas he didn’t ascend the stairs with me to sleep at the foot of my bed.

Evan & I did our best to prepare for what we thought was surely the end; we told our friends who had special connections with Harvey to come say their goodbyes, we set Harvey’s paw print in a mold to have a token or remembrance & I don’t think there was a day in which I didn’t have to go off on my own for a while to break down & weep. It’s a truly impossible thing but you do it because you wouldn’t give back a single minute that you shared with that animal.

I’m sure I’m not too many blogs off from writing about my dearly departed dog but we’re not there yet. Harvey went from the shell of a dog he was last week back to somewhat of his older self. The vet explained to me that small scale strokes are common in large dogs of his age & there’s a potential that’s what happened, but I most fortunately get more time with my guy, time where he is still the happy, smiling dog I love with every cell of my heart & for that I am so infinitely grateful. But I know there will come a day, sooner rather than later, where I will have to say goodbye to my red, shaggy rock & I will face that with a broken heart & tear stained cheeks but I will be there, with him, til the end because how could I not be?

This past week & a half has been a rollercoaster & in all honesty, if I were to put into words how I’ve been feeling, the answer would be fragile. I wrote this blog with tears streaming my face, but I bare them with all of the pride in the world, because over the last twelve years I have had the utmost privilege of being loved, unconditionally, even on the days where I definitely didn’t deserve it, by the best dog I could have ever dreamed of & I have loved him back. But I know, at the end of it, when all is said & done & I am left to come home with nothing but a collar, I’ll know that for all of the love I gave him, he will always have loved me more & I would do it all again in a heartbeat knowing how it feels when it’s time to let a great dog go.

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Requested Blog: The Music Man & The Sea

Today we have ourselves another blog request. It’s funny, for a long time I put out feelers on weeks where I was feeling a bit like the well of my creativity is running a bit dry & most of the time those have come back with zilch. Once I rephrased the blog type as basically being my own personal request line, the requests came flooding in. I got a ton of suggestions this week but this one, which retapped the well & that felt the most intriguing to me to explore. This week’s prompt comes from my line time friend, the ever brilliant Dr. Morgan Turner. Doc Turner proposed the question: how do the ocean & music relate in my world, or how do they not?

A truly intriguing question!

If you’re someone who knows me or follows me in any small capacity you may have taken notice to my undying & blistering love for the sea. Why I don’t live by one, ask Nashville. But you see, there lies the disconnect. I have these two great loves; music & the ocean & yet the nature of the music I do & the place I inhabit keep these two worlds apart for me. Could I move to Los Angeles & be by the ocean, yes but I also have the conundrum of not wanting to inhabit a shoebox for the price of what I have here in Nashville. Really what it boils down to is that I’m unable to have my cake & eat it too, at least in the capacity that I want to be able to. So I guess that’s how they’re dissonant on a logistical & physical level, going deeper than that requires a bit more thought though.

How does the ocean relate to my music, or how does it not? To be quite frank & curt in my response, I’m not sure they do & maybe that’s a problem. Maybe a part of the reason why I feel so disjointed, disconnect, & lost most of the time is because I have forced my two great loves to be separate entities that I have to portion myself out for both spiritually & physically & maybe I need to find a way to marry the two. Maybe I need to spend a little time in & by the ocean sampling the sounds, the subtle nuances, & figuring out in what ways they inspire me to create. In all honesty, I’ve never tried to join the two & maybe that’s part of the problem.

Maybe I’m looking at my life the wrong way. Maybe instead of seeing myself as this person looking down a million different paths trying desperately to choose the right one, hoping I do, maybe I need to look at my life with the path starting in a different location.

On another note I think the ocean has always been an escape for me. It’s the place that I go to be at peace, to disconnect, to be in wonder & marvel at the world. I don’t know if it’s a place that I feel inspires me in the musical sense. Music occupies less of a therapeutic lens for me & more of a lens of enjoyment & fun. I make music because performing is what makes me feel alive. I make music because my narcissism loves a stage & a crowd & if I’m being honest, being the center of attention, something that I feel like I loathe in my day to day life. The stage is where I go to feel like I matter to society at large, the ocean is where I go to heal & dissolve away into nothing. So I guess in a lot of ways they sit at opposite ends of the spectrum.

This got a lot more introspective & revelationary (I know it’s not a word, but it should be) than I thought it would! Maybe I do need to attempt to bridge the gaps in my life a little better. Maybe I should look into finding a place that allows me to have all of my loves in one place while still keeping me out of life in what is basically a dormitory. Maybe I should be more open to that idea & the idea of relocation if I feel it’s something that will serve me & mine.

Keep these recs coming, they’re fun! If you have a blog suggestion please don’t hesitate to reach out, I’m definitely going to start a list & keep track of the ones I feel drawn to even if another occupies the weekly space!

As always, much love to you all!

-C

Blog: Little Abundances

If you’re a follower of mine on my Instagram, today’s blog posting will not be entirely foreign to you. I posted the tiniest anecdote around the roots of this story on my story posts a few days ago & got incredible feedback simply regarding the short paragraph that I had written. So, naturally I though that I should expand upon it in this longer form setting.

Towards the turn of the year I had a TikTok creator, of whom I should give credit for this idea if their name hadn’t been alluding me for the last few weeks, come across my daily doom scroll. She works specifically in a spiritualist setting but has had a lot of clients talk about their manifestations & how they have trouble believing that the things they want are coming their way when they live in a state of lack. She went on to explain that it, to her, an impossibility to manifest from a mindset of lack & offered a quick tip on how to escape that cumbersome feeling. Her method was altogether simple & has, over the last week & some change, become a staple in my day to day thought process.

Her suggestion for escaping scarcity mindsets was incremental. She said that every day, at the end of her day, she writes down three things that happened that were little abundances. This teaches the brain to look out for things to be thankful for & recognize that even when things don’t seem to be going your way, there are always little things to latch onto that will shine even the slightest bit of light on darker situations. So what are little abundances? What does that look like in the mundane day to day?

A little abundance is simply something that went your way in the tiniest of ways, let’s come up with some examples shall we?

Maybe there was a 10% discount on something you needed from the grocer.

Maybe your fragrance of choice or someone else’s hit the olfactory just right & made you smile.

Maybe you woke up without feeling achy or sore.

Maybe you wore an outfit that made you feel alluring or sexy.

Maybe you made it through the day with less anxiety or depression than the day prior.

Maybe you came across a post that made you think of an old friend or helped you to learn something interesting you hadn’t known before.

Maybe you simply enjoyed being in someone’s presence.

Maybe the perfect stone caught your eye as you were walking & you gained a new pocket companion.

Maybe your pet showed you affection & love.

Maybe someone in your family or friend group did.

Maybe that last quarter mile of your run felt a little easier than normal.

Maybe you found time to read a book or watch a show or movie that makes you feel something.

Maybe you had a good hair day.

Maybe you noticed a new grey hair (again is a gift after all).

Maybe you felt a sense of wanderlust walking through nature.

Maybe you got in your car & it was the perfect temperature or the perfect song was playing.

Maybe all of the machines or weights at the gym were open when you needed them.

Maybe you enjoyed a cup of your favorite tea or coffee.

Maybe an animal graced you with its presence outside.

Maybe you found a $20 note in your coat pocket.

Maybe you finally beat that level in that game you’ve been playing.

Maybe you brightened someone else’s day.

Is this starting to make sense to you? There is no limit to how “small” these little abundances can be. The point is to start recognizing them as God, The Universe, Nature, whatever you believe in sets them in your path, accepting them, & being grateful for their enrichment of your life. You cannot expect to embrace & love the unknown that is life if you aren’t willing to, as the saying goes, stop & smell the roses.

Now my method of this looks a little different. I knew that if it came down to be writing out my little abundances list every night I wouldn’t do it, I’d forget to or view it as a chore. So my list is mental & isn’t restricted to the time in which I lay my head to rest at night, nor is it limited to three items.

I count my abundances as the day rolls on, why this works for me, I don’t know. How it ends up not being forgotten, again, don’t know, but thus far, every day throughout my day, I am reminded from something within to find my little abundances that I’ve experienced thus far & look on them with love, gratitude, & admiration. On my list today: I had a package arrive that I wasn’t expecting until next week, I woke up several times in the night to Max, on of our cats, snuggled into me purring loudly, I had enough time to complete all of the tasks I needed to get done today, I had a humorous dream last night, my dogs listened when they got in a tiff while playing & I didn’t have to break up a fight, I had ample leftovers in my fridge & didn’t have to cook in a day where my time was scarce, I was notified of a refill order for one of my scripts that now I don’t have to call my doctor to get filled, I lit & dispelled some Palo Santo, one of my favorite, most comforting scents, I noticed a few of my plants have new leaves despite it being winter & not a time for usual growth, I woke up today but did so feeling energized, well, & taken care of, my Irish Breakfast Tea that I’m sipping while writing this is brewed perfectly, I got a good picture of Harvey, my rapidly aging Golden, of whom I don’t know how many more pictures I’ll have the privilege of taking.

Your life is rich my dear readers, you just have to look for it. That’s not discounting your problems, your ailments, your struggles, but the beauty in life is found in the little things, in the little abundances that show us that somewhere out there something, someone, is on our side & that this beautifully tragic, lonely, simply complex life is worth living day by day.

I’d love if you all would adopt this philosophy as well or at the very least give the abundance lists a try. Do it in your own way, make it your own, however that looks. Talk about it openly & honestly, let people in to celebrate with you your tiny victories.

I hope this post hasn’t been too flowery for some of you, I know we’re all on different levels of our life journey & have different degrees of happiness, privilege, health, & prosperity. Just know this comes from a place of love & gratitude for all of you who take the time to read my thoughts each week. You all make my little abundances list every week!

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Blog: If Jesus Is The Reason For The Season, Then Why Does It Feel So Cold?

Back in June I was inspired to write a blog call “No Hate Like Christian Love.” At the time I was hesitant to put out the blog simply because I have people near & dear to me that I thought would disapprove of scoff at the blog simply because of what I chose to title it. I was wrong. In fact, to this day, exactly seven months later, it still remains the most popular blog of mine that I have ever written averaging anywhere from 100-200 individual monthly readers. It’s the blog I’ve received the most feedback on as well, all of which has been set to the tune of agreement. These, for the most part, are people who have been burned or ostracized by the church & it breaks my heart to see the commonality that so many of them share.

When I sat down to write today my brain just kept drifting back to that blog & it got me thinking, have things improved since June, when I wrote & posted it, or are things the same or worse then they were then from the standpoint of Christians using their beliefs as a “moral’ superiority? Sadly, I think the answer is the latter.

Over Thanksgiving I had this discussion with several people in my life who I would consider to be or have at one point or another been right smack dab in the middle of the church Christian lifestyle. This group included my parents; life long church goers & believers who lead the worship team at their small American Baptist Church, my dear friend David; a “missions” worker around the world & lover of Jesus (I put missions in quotes simply because what he does, to me, doesn’t constitute classification under the same blanket as the traditional colonist mentality & practice of missions work), & Evan; a former worship leader & attendee of bible college. Naturally I was also a part of this group, not just the silent observer.

Our discussion began around the subject of Christmas & my often outright disdain for the holiday. I think for a lot of us, especially in my generation & younger, Christmas is not the shining beacon of hope & joy that it is for those living in the older generations. In addition, we, generationally, have more access to the global network of information & have seen behind the curtain where Christmas & its outright stolen traditions are concerned. We don’t buy into the commercialism of the holiday, partially because a lot of us can’t afford to, & thus it becomes one of the most stressful times of the year for us all. However, my mother offered the argument that at the end of the day, what we are celebrating, as christians, is the birth of Christ. The “reason for the season” & all that.

I’m not sure how we circled back to the whole “no hate like christian love thing” but I believe it stemmed from one of my parents asking why I no longer attend church if I, as I say, consider myself a believer. From there entered David, a literal missionary who refuses to find a church to call his “home.” We talked about how the church is driving people away in droves & trying desperately to blame it on the media, or the LGBTQIA+ population, or schools, or drag story time, but is refusing outright to look inward & see itself as the root cause.

We came back to how “young people just don’t want to believe” & I offered the argument of what is being missed. You see, much like I mentioned in NHLCL (No Hate Like Christian Love), we read the book, we were taught about Jesus. We attended the Sunday schools & the church services & the vacation bible school, but when we got to an age where critical thinking came into play, where identity started to form, we looked around at the “brood of vipers” (Matt 12:34) & saw not a scrape of the unconditional love of Christ. We saw people who claimed to love us as we are outwardly belittle & damn the very people that we are or the people that we love & said “enough of this, this is not what love looks like” & we left. As I said in NHLCL, as well as that evening, the problem isn’t that we weren’t taught about Jesus, the problem is that we were & we don’t see that reflected in the people or the values of the church.

I hope what I’ve said thus far hasn’t turned too many of you off. I’m sure there are many people who will read this & not even make it to this paragraph, but if we, as christians, are to overcome the stigmas wrapped around us & the church, then we have to listen & we have to apply critical thinking & we have to know our biblical history & understand when & where & why the bible was modified to fit certain political ideology & personal agendas because this is another huge thing turning people away from churches.

Did you know that christians are far more likely to believe conspiracy theories than any other religious affiliation? Did you know that the brains of those identifying as atheist have been proven to think far more analytically than those identifying as believers? Why do you think that is? As I mentioned in the previous blog, I am not here to lecture or demean, nor am I here to minimize your beliefs. I just want to pose questions that get people thinking. I want to bridge the gap between the, dare I say, secluded world of the church & the outside world. Christians, the stigma against you is that you are self absorbed, incapable of critical thought, & often downright heartless, which for a religion based supposedly all in love, doesn’t seem to align does it?

Something that I had to cope with & make peace with is the following statement:

If you need the threat of eternal damnation to evoke good behavior & kindness then it’s time to revaluate your moral standing & personal shortcomings.

We are called to love, unconditionally, to embrace humanity with open arms & without judgment WITHOUT the expectation of reward, but simply out of the kindness of your heart. That reward includes salvation.

I write all of this because I want you to see. If Jesus is truly, to you, the reason for the season, then celebrate that & celebrate that as Christ would. Christ wouldn’t yell at the cashier for saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” because they don’t know which of the six holidays that happen in December you celebrate. Christ would celebrate with an outpour of love, compassion, kindness, & empathy. Not commercialism, elitism, being exclusionary, & ‘holier than thou.’

There is a reason that NHLCL remains my top viewed post. It’s because it speaks to a universal ache felt by those on the receiving end of christianity. It speaks to the religious trauma, to the family issues, to the isolation that so many feel because of those operating out of the “love of Christ.”

If Jesus is the reason for the season, then why does it feel so cold to so many people when it should be filled with warmth, joy, community, & happiness?

Happy Holidays & Much Love To You All,

-C

Blog: Now You're Family

I swear this is my last blog about Fiji…unless you’d like it not to be, I’m sure I can squeeze another two or three stories & life lessons out of that amazing trip! For now I’ll leave you all with this blog in hopes that it leaves you as inspired & hopeful as the experience did me!

One thing I thing that ended up being very different from my expectation of Fiji was the reality of it. I think we’re often times, especially in the US, thought to view Fiji as the perpetual postcard; a place where no matter where you look you’ll find picturesque white sand beaches, palm trees, & crystal clear waters & while that does exist it is definitely an exception, not the rule.

Majority of the residents of Fiji live below, what we in the western world would deem, the poverty line. The housing of those who dwell on the islands often consist of tin roofed, one room homes with an outdoor kitchen & while I’m sure a lot of us would find this difficult, the Fijians don’t seem to let it dampen their spirits.

It’s true of a lot of tourism driven countries where the lives of those who were born & raised in said country live drastically different lives than what those visiting are presented with, it creates an odd disconnect. There’s a very odd feeling when you’ve spent x amount of dollars to fly halfway across the world, hop on a privately escorted shuttle service, & are being taken to a resort whose rooms are bigger than majority of the homes of those who reside there. It’s an odd disconnect when you’re met with something clearly meant to welcome visitors that often has an “off limits” feel to those whose country it is.

This is not the point of my blog, but I feel its worth mentioning in order to set the scene for what I want to talk about.

While riding in one of the aforementioned private escort shuttles to go river tubing I overheard a conversation between one of my fellow divers, Elaine, & our driver that day. Elaine had sat up front with the driver & the two had been talking for quite a while before he mentioned the following. He said to Elaine that even though the Fijians may not have the room or the food outright, there is always room at the table & room in the home for one more. That no matter how hard life appears they are always willing to sacrifice a little room or a little food for someone else. I soon found out this was a common feeling amongst the Fijian people.

I wish for the life of me I could remember our driver’s name that day, shame on me for forgetting the openness & outward kindness of a stranger, but he also mentioned that to Fijians, once you’ve been on to the islands once, you’re a part of them. He said that to his people each of us was now family & that at any given time their doors were open to us for as long as we wanted or needed.

Wouldn’t it be amazing if the rest of the world worked that way? Wouldn’t it be amazing if we all thought as such & acted as such? That no matter how hard things were for us, we always have the time & energy to embrace those who come knocking on our door & say “how can I help?”

You see it occurs to me that the people that have the most, the countries that have the most, are often the ones who are most cut off to helping their “family.” We were welcomed, graciously, into a home in a village with around twenty people. Asked to take a seat, to make ourselves comfortable, & were then offered a portion of the owner’s lunch. A lunch that he had to farm for six months to get to produce crop. He not only offered us up the portion, but the entirety of what he had to eat for that afternoon with a beaming smile & radiant joy! Why aren’t we all like that?

We, in the US, have so, so much. A lot of us do anyway. Yet we shut our hearts, homes, & borders off to those who desperately need to be welcomed, to be shown through the door, welcomed, & offered a plate & a seat at the table & if they are offered entry it’s usually with stipulations. You have to give your life to MY God, have to work towards MY system, have to do something for MY cause or life. Acts of kindness & support rarely come simply from the goodness of ones heart. We need to cut the divides, to cut the ego & the “I’m better than” attitudes, & proudly exclaim to those who come willingly to our door “now you’re family.”

I hope you have a fantastic weekend & find a little moment or two over the next week to make a stranger feel loved, even in the smallest capacity.

Much love to you all,

-C

Blog: Understanding You Value

Hi Friends,

Happy Friday!…if that’s when you’re reading this, if not, Happy Whatever Day It Is For You!

I’m currently a part of a twelve week accelerator that brought up something very interesting I felt would fit immaculately as this week’s blog entry. This prompt was given to us in the form of a question. That question we were asked was to identify the three world that describe you, or as my friend Leena put it, the three reasons that you’re the person people pick up the phone to call when they’re needing X,Y, & Z in their life. What draws people to you?

I’m sure many of you saw that I posted the question on my socials to get feedback from those of you that follow me or know me because, after all, you/they know exactly what it is you/they get from me. I got a lot of really interesting responses & so many of you said so many things that warmed my heart to the core but at the end of it all, I had to narrow the list down to three.

I started by bunching any “like minded” words together to see if I could find a commonality between them or a culminating theme. Here’s what I came up with.

My three words are:

Serene, Considerate, & Curious

The beauty of these three words is that they’re tentative, constantly subject to change because, as we change & evolve, so too must our three words.

The point of this exercise allows you to begin to understand your value, to understand the things that you bring to the table as a human being that make others seek you out or that enrich someone else’s life.

I chose serene because many people say I have a calming presence about me, that I make them feel safe &/or secure. I am often seen as gentle or down to earth. The energy I give off is grounding & comfortable, it allows people to let their guard down & be 100% who they are, unapologetically.

I chose considerate because the word that popped up the most for me, from you all, was kind. I was also gifted words like sensitive, caring, loyal, thoughtful, & present. All of which I felt were summed up well in “considerate,” because at the end of the day what is kindness if not consideration for the feelings, emotions, needs, etc. of someone else on a human level?

My final word, to be honest, is still a bit of a work in progress. In all actuality my original work was “communicative” because I got words like strong, brave, leader, communicator; so I felt that enveloped those things, but the more I sat with it the less it felt right. I recently changed to “curious” because I am a lover of culture, a lover of art, I crave new & exciting foods, drinks, etc., I love travel & discovery, I love reading & learning new things. I love to have my mind blown. I like to try to be ahead of the curve & pushing the limits. New science excites me & new cultures invigorate me. I love sharing these experiences as well as I’m sure many of my friends & the many blogs I’ve written will tell you! Truly curiosity often gets the best of me in the best possible way.

Enough about me though, yeah? Let’s go further down this value rabbit hole.

What Is Your Value?

Each of us has many things that make us valuable, but what is specific to you? No one is valueless, so I’m going to go ahead & shut that down for a lot of you reading this right now, no one. Your value is what gives you an edge in life, it’s the aspects of yourself that make you interesting, that call the world to you, that make you feel alive, & make you feel important.

I’m genuinely curious, there’s that word again, to see what some of you think your specific value is so if it’s not too much & you’d like to drop what you think your three words are in the comments of this post or on whichever social you found this in I’d be delighted to know!

So often we are taught to diminish ourselves, to not be boisterous or to shrink away from the spotlight but I think that taught behavior can be harmful, especially where self esteem & confidence are concerned. I’m sure that a lot of you were raised, as I was, to embrace humility & to always be humble & I’m not at all saying those are bad traits, but we are often pushed too far into those traits to the point where it becomes damaging to our self image. In all honesty, I think a lot of the shrinking of self neuters us. We begin to feel worthless, like our little victories aren’t worth celebrating or even that the big victories aren’t worth celebrating because to do so would be seen as too bold & brazen. Our over abundance of humility is minimizing us & creating unhealthy beliefs around who we are, what we can accomplish, & what we are worth.

I, myself, was always taught “pride cometh before the fall” & I don’t entirely disagree; foolhardy & an overabundance of pride can absolutely be blinding & very much a turn off to the majority of people, but a little pride is totally healthy. We always crave the pride of others but never allow it for ourselves. We love to hear those close to us tell us how proud they are of us, but don’t reserve any of that emotion for ourselves. Be proud of who you are, be proud of the road that brought you here today because the person who climbed the mountain is worth being proud of. You’ve overcome your struggles, you’ve overcome your pain, & even if you’ve faltered be proud of your defeats & learn from them so that next time you can be proud of your victories.

We are luminous beings, all of us. So please, let the light of what makes you so incredibly special shine unabashedly bright!

As always, much love to you all,

Please let me know what your three words are!

-C

Blog: Seeking Movement

This blog was actually a suggestion of a fan & friend of mine who reached out earlier this week to ask my thoughts on Brené Brown. Truthfully, I’m not as familiar with her work as I probably should be or would like to be but that’s not to say she hasn’t drifted in & out of my orbit from time to time. The ask was if I had read Brown’s new book “Atlas Of The Heart.” Truthfully I have not, but, his point is the ask was that I, over the holidays, had written a blog outlining the reasons why sad holiday music is the preferred holiday music for so many of us. You can read that one here. In said blog, aside from outlining the reasons behind the sadness felt during the holidays I also talked briefly about wanting to feel something, to feel connected or seen through these musical pieces. He had just come across the section of Brown’s book in which she talks about grief, he sent me a few screen shots to read & I immediately felt seen by what Brené had to say.

My first adult introduction to Brené happened due to my friend Leena who put together a writing camp. In this camp she used Brené’s example of empathy vs sympathy & how that relates to the cowriting space, I later wrote an entire blog on that which you can read here. I was also advised to give her book “The Gifts Of Imperfection” a read which unfortunately I still have yet to begin. From there it seemed that Brené Brown was popping up all over my life or at least the lens of it. Jake went on Brown’s podcast, I wrote the blog & had a bunch of people talking about Brown directly to me, I had several other people suggest “Gifts” to me, I had people posting her quotes all over my feed. It truly began to felt like a sign that maybe her thoughts were worth investing in further!

The screen shot in question that I mentioned in the first paragraph talks about the reason we as consumers love sad movies. In the section Brown takes about how a researcher by the name of Julian Hanich & his colleagues were investigating something they called the “Sad-FIlm Paradox.” The questions the researchers proposed was "how can a negative emotion such as sadness go together with “aesthetic liking” & even pleasure? Their findings? People like to be moved.

The beauty in the sad films, sad songs, sad books, etc. is that “we feel connected to what it means to be human, to be reminded of our inextricable connection to one another,” Brené explains. It shifts the mindset of the individual into one of “us.” From “me” to “we.” The study further revealed that there is a “highly significant positive correlation between sadness & enjoyment." This process of feeling sad or lonely or want makes us feel moved which then turns into enjoyment. “Hence sadness primarily functions as a contributor to & intensifier of the emotional state of being moved.” -Brené Brown, Atlas Of The Heart

This really stuck a chord with me! You see, if the above is to be believed, we as humans consume art to feel something, to feel connected to the community around us. We, in a manor of speaking, go out to concerts, to movies, to art shows, to the library & bookstores, to our streaming services seeking movement. We desire a shift from one emotion to another in a form of escapism from the mundane. There’s a quote from Stage Coach, Tom Jackson, in which he says exactly this, “audiences go to shows to feel something or else they’d stay at home & listen to the record from their couch.”

I truly think that’s beautiful, that the reason we as human beings consumer art, specifically sad art, is out of a desire for connection, for understanding. As a lover of all things sad media wise there’s something incredibly therapeutic about the experience of being moved. I am a self proclaimed cinephile, I love movies, deeply. I go to the theater seeking movement, seeking joy & tears & pain & wonder as I’m sure many of you reading this do as well, there’s no shame in it. It also allows us to flex our “empathy” muscle which I think we all could use from time to time.

At the end of the day love the art you love, you don’t have to justify it to anyone, there’s a reason it clicks with you & most likely it’s because it makes you feel seen or connected. It has succeeded in providing the movement you sought out. Relish that, feel the way it makes you feel & be grateful for that experience! Great art is hard to come by so love what you love & do so boldly!

As always, have a fantastic weekend!

Much love to you all,

C

Blog: Sympathy Vs. Empathy

A few weeks ago I was part of a songwriting workshop with a few of my fellow songwriters led by Leena Regan. One of the first things she started out with on the very first day of the workshop was reiterating the importance of trust & vulnerability in the co-writing space. It is often very hard to be vulnerable with people if you don’t trust what they’ll do with the information you give them after all. We as writers, or I guess even as humans, tend to paint the broad strokes of our stories & negate the little intimate details that personalize the story to you. I think a lot of us have been taught over the years that broad strokes equal more of a mass appeal & I’d argue that’s a false belief.

Think of your favorite artists, think of your favorite songs. Are they broad or are they very specific to the story being told or the life of the artist/writer in question? I’m going to go ahead & guess that, for the most part, they’re very specific. These are the songs we should all be trying to write, those that are personal to us, those that convey emotion not only in the listener but also in the artists themselves. Ever watched an artist try to sell a song they have no attachment to? It’s painful.

So what’s my point in all this? How does this relate to all of you non-writers out there? How does this apply to your life? Leena’s next point in fostering a creative space conducive to specific art is to approach the write, the story of life you’re being told, with empathy.

I think most people assume that they’re empathetic humans, I’m not arguing that you’re not, but I would like to highlight, as Leena did with us, the importance in the differences between being sympathetic & being empathetic. I think a lot of people assume they’re synonymous. That sympathy & empathy are one in the same, but at simply is not the truth. Let’s break it down by definition first.

Dictionary.com defines sympathy as ‘feelings or impulses of compassion.’ Well then what is compassion? It is ‘a feeling of deep sympathy & sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering.’ Meanwhile the definition for empathy reads ‘the psychological identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.’ Notice the difference there? Sympathy boils down to simply feeling, it does not seek to equalize, it simply exists as a separation. You feel this way & I recognize it, but I want to fix or change it. Empathy on the other hand is the equalizer. It is identifying something within yourself that can relate to the other person’s experience. It does not seek to repair or alter, it seeks to humanize & understand.

There’s an excellent video from Brené Brown that was shared along within the lesson, in it she shows that often the sympathetic seek to divert. “I lost my house.” “At least you had a house to lose.” “I failed out of college.” “Well, at least you could afford to go in the first place.” Where in the empathetic would approach “I lost my house” with something along the lines of “I’m so sorry to hear that, I’m here for you & I’ll do my best to meet you where you’re at emotionally” or “I failed out of college” with “do you want to talk about it?” It does not seek to repair or override someone else’s life experience or emotion. I’ll link Brené’s video below, she explains it a lot better than I do. It’s also a short video that I promise it’s worth the watch!

I have said quite often in blogs of the past that I feel we as humans sorely lack empathy. I think it is one of the biggest things dividing us as people. So many of us strive for empathy but stop at sympathy, we do not bring ourselves into the experience of another to the best of our ability, instead we simply seek to divert & adjust. In the writing space beautiful art is born from a space of empathy, in the corporate world employers begin to understand their employees, in the political world we begin to recognize & acknowledge those we marginalize & belittle. Empathy is the key to all of it. It takes the selfish angle out of the picture & instead strives for human understanding. We could all use a bit more empathy, we could all show a bit more love & understanding.

I write all of this from a place of love & with a desire to unify, not alienate, but I hope the next time someone comes to you with their pain or troubles that the words “at least” don’t appear in your response. Treat your peers, your family, your loved ones, your colleagues, your grocer, your gas station attendant, your etc, with empathy not just sympathy. We each deserve to be met where we are not passively rushed out of our strife.

I hope you have a great weekend & remember be loving to one another.

-C

Blog: Stop Pressing Mute

Do you ever find yourself minimizing yourself, omitting parts of your personality or who you really are as a person just to make the other people around you feel more comfortable? Do you often do so even when you have no idea how that other person will reach? It’s sometimes like you have this whole preconceived narrative in your head about how they won’t want to be around you any longer or you feel like they won’t love you anymore because it doesn’t fit into their ideal of who you are as a person. You’re not alone if you do, I think to some extend we all do this, we all mute parts of ourselves, situationally, in an attempt to fit in.

I mean, why shouldn’t we? We evolved from hunter/gatherers, a society where being outcast could mean life or death. We depended upon the tribe or the collective for shelter, food, water, & other resources, so of course that mentality has been drilled into our brains. From there we cultivated farmland, becoming agriculturally bound & even then if you didn’t present properly to the ruling faction or the person in charge of getting your food, granted you weren’t farming it yourself, you would starve. These social constructs continued on & on & on perpetuated by class, religion, tradition, & other miscellaneous societal contracts that we’re all expected to adhere to, even if some of those contracts have long since expired.

We are now living in the 21st century, never have we ever been, as a global community, more connected. I know a lot of you would argue a dissonance because of technology & while I definitely think it’s a double edged sword, it has never been easier for us as human beings to find communities where we belong. There are people out there who believe the same things, feel the same way, geek out over the same material or hobbies as us & yet still we mute ourselves.

I am beyond guilty of this, it’s something I still fight to break on the daily because there is an expectation when you grow up a middle-class midwest American white boy in a baptist church with an often old school family. That’s nothing against them or my upbringing, it’s just a lot of the time for so many of us, the expectation & the reality collide & usually the expectation seems to win.

Think in terms of tectonic plates. One plate represents who you are as a person, the other being who you’re expected to be. As you grow up those plates fight for dominance & eventually one wins. I have always been envious of those who let themselves win over the localized social constructs. To many of us, they bear the name of “black sheep.” I always thought myself a black sheep because the person living inside didn’t match the mask I was presenting, but I let the weight of expectation submerge me.

There are so many things, even to this day at the age of 29 that I wish I could be, so many regrets for times I wished I were bolder or more “me” so that I didn’t have to actively & delicately tear down the person that so many thought I was in order to reestablish the truth. That, however, is a waste of time. Living in regret is giving energy to a past that is already written, not a future that is yours to make. There are so many things I wish I could be outwardly without the fear of losing those I love or feeling their affections diminish. There are so many songs, speeches, blogs that I’ve written, that no matter how much I want to share will probably never see the light of day & that sucks. They are the parts of myself that I continue to lock away out of someone else’s comfort because at the end of the day I am still choosing comfort over the truth.

I hope you’ll do better that me. I hope you will choose yourself. It’s a hard thing, believe me, I know, I just want you all to know that you’re worthy of love as you are, as who you are, unapologetically. You are worthy of love. This is as much a reminder to me as it is to you all but I hope you take it to heart. As I said before, there is a community out there that would love nothing more than to embrace you, as you are, complete & whole with no alterations & no subjugations & I ache for you to find them if you haven’t already. It’s time to pull back the curtain & show the world the beautiful being that you are. It’s time to stop pressing mute on who you are.

Blog: Persevere

Hi lovelies, how has your day been?!

I hope you’re having yourself a wonderful August in spite of the garbage can fire that seems to be the world at the moment. There’s a lot of pain & heavy feelings going around & I know that so many of you are feeling them so deeply with every fiber of who you are. In all honesty I started this blog with a completely different intent in mind, I was going to write about something that has nothing to do with any of this but as I’m sat down to write, this is what has come to the surface.

I don’t want to get into the specifics of what is happening locally, nationally, globally, etc., not because I’m afraid to steer into the politics on it (you should know me better than that by now) but because I feel this blog needs more general appeal. It needs to be able to be stumbled upon years from now & spark something in the reader outside of the timeframe of its current intent. I’m not ascribing to this some grand purpose or importance because I know it won’t be that, this is just the thoughts of a late twenty-something with a heavy heart trying to inject the smallest amount of light back into the darkness in the hopes that it ignites something brighter in you that you can pass along.

The world is a dark place but there’s so much beauty to be had in it. I know at times that can be hard to see, we’re blinded by the headlines & the disasters we’re faced with, but I’ve found that humanity thrives best not in the moments of grand retribution & triumph but in the small moments that remind us what it is to be alive. It’s in the moments of soft realization where you are reminded of the things you love & why you love them. It’s in the daily mountains we climb, each looking far different from those of our peers but still often requiring immense effort to best. Humanity is found in the perseverance of life because how else do we define life if not the will to keep going even when everything is screaming at you to give up?

I know I don’t have all the answers, I don’t claim to & there is immeasurable beauty in that, in the mystery. We are amazing, luminous beings who often do such dark things to one another with little to no regard. We pick fights, we subjugate those we deem less than, we rage war, & rip apart our planet but I believe, in the end, the light will prevail. I know it’s hard. I know it is. I know there are days when it feels hopeless, where you feel lost in all the noise, or shoved aside, placed in the background. I know that feeling sucks. I’m not here to say the night is always darkest before the dawn, I’m here to urge you to look for those incredible moments of beauty. I’m also fully aware that this may come across as “fluff” or the drippings of my bleeding heart. I mean it, I do & I believe it myself.

I know things look bleak. I know that brighter tomorrow looks a million miles away & feels like it may never come at all, persevere. Just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, neither will the world or your world change over night, but brighter tomorrows are worth fighting for.

I’d be lying if I said that all of this had a clear end in mind. I just wrote what came up as it happened. These may end up just being the ramblings of the heavy hearted but I hope it ends up being more than that. I hope you get some substance out of it even if it’s the smallest of amounts. I don’t really know what to say to you other than I understand the pain that you feel, I understand the hopelessness, I understand the hurt & the abandonment you feel, I do but these are not the end all, be all. Keep pushing on & finding those moments of life that get peppered into the every day. Treat people with kindness & love unconditionally.

I love you immensely.

Happy Friday.

-C

Blog: The 28 Lessons I Learned From My 28th Year (Deep Dive)

The 28 Lessons I Learned From My 28th Year

(In No Particular Order)

-We’re all a whole lot more connected than we think.

I don’t entirely know how I mean this. When I went through & wrote each of these this was the last one I did simply because I don’t know how entirely to put it into words, but let me try. I think from a spiritual standpoint this is true; we’re all brothers & sisters but I also mean from a ecological stand point. The decisions that are often made to cut cost or make a profit end up not only harming the earth or the integrity of a business or relationship but they often also do damage to other human beings whether the effects are immediate or take their sweet time showing up. We are all linked from an energy standpoint too I guess. We’re all made of stardust. We all contain matter from the beginning of the universe & we all contain matter & energy that has been transferred from something else to us. By the food we eat, the air we breathe, etc, we are all sharing the same finite matter.

-It’s okay to let go of hope for an apology you may never receive. (See Blog)

Not going to go that deep into this one simply because I wrote a whole blog post about it. What I will add is if you’re holding out hope for the apology you’re probably not going to receive then you’re keeping energy, both physical & mental, you’re not fully living in the present moment. You’re also carrying around a lot of heavy feelings that burden you for no reason.

-A lot of the world’s problems could be solved with a little less selfishness.

Climate change, poverty, slavery, they’re all linked in the fact that they require someone to give something up to solve them & often times that something doesn’t require a massive change in their life. Take COVID for example. Countries that implemented mask mandates & hard lockdowns didn’t suffer nearly as badly as the US did, has, & continues to do. Some countries are even completely out of the COVID muck & are living maskless, normal lives. But of course it “infringed on people’s civil rights” to mandate masks or to require people to stay home & thus we are still in the midst of it. Not to mention the aspect of mask wearing that literally could save someone else life but you know, screw other people as long as I can not have a little piece of cloth over my face.

-You’ll never have the answers to everything & there’s beauty in that.

We have many religions in this world that tote this same idea. Some better than others, but the general concept is still there. We as humans always want to know why everything around us happens & the more we discover the more questions we have. I think when you take things as they are & leave a little room for the divine it creates space for majesty. After all, only about .00000001% of matter is observable to the naked eye. What happens in the other 99.99999999%?

-Money is a resource, it carries no charge or intent.

I think so many of us are taught growing up that money is the root of all evil, that it’s only good for corrupting & only obtained & sought after by the greedy. I couldn’t disagree more. Do I think money is saintly? No. Money, a lot like water is a resource & an abundant one at that; it is meant to me spent, earned, traded, used, etc. When you lose the emotional value you’ve invested into it suddenly the stress of not having enough of it fades away. There are always ways to make money, always way to alleviate the burdens of desire for it & I think some of the most successful people in the world would agree with that. I’d point you to a friend of mine’s book, “Rich As F*ck” by Amanda Francis, she covers this a lot better than I ever could!

-Held anger, resentment, or disappointment fester & manifests physically.

There’s a true story in a book I’ve been reading (this is the prologue to the book, not the whole thing) about a woman who's husband takes his own life & leaves her to tend their two children & home, along with her career in neuroscience on her own. He didn’t leave a note, didn’t even try to make up an excuse or a lie about where he was going. He just walked out the door. The woman harbored feelings of resentment, anger, frustration, hopelessness, grief, etc. & within six months of her husbands death she was unable to walk. Her problems continued when she developed ulcers in her mouth, her hair started falling out, she stopped being able to produce saliva, & doctors could not figure out what was wrong with her. The woman began therapy, began meditating, began to take back her own life & dismissed the dark, heavy feelings she’d held onto for so long. In addition to all of this she was given a new hope for life, started focusing on the small things around her that brought her joy. Within a year she was walking again, another six months later the ulcers cleared up, another year later her body started producing saliva again. There are countless stories like this where people are forced to carry heavy burdens on their heart or mind & develop illnesses directly correlated to what they’re holding onto.

-You are enough just as you are in this moment.

This one is simple. To quote Amanda Francis “you are worthy because you are.” You are made in the image of God, all of us. If that’s the case then there’s something divine about each of us, a divine spark. You are worthy of love, worthy of your dreams, worthy of happiness not because of something you did but simply because you are. Believe that!

-Paint your nails, wear the dress, be authentically you. (See Blog)

Once again, see blog haha. Life is far too short to live worried about what other people think of you. Be whoever the hell you want to be, if it brings you happiness live in that happiness. You are not responsible for someone else’s, only your own, so live bolding & unapologetically authentic to the ghost that occupies your shell! Adorn your earthly home however you see fit!

-Working out your mind is just as, if not more important, than working out your body.

As we age the neuroplasticity of our brain begins to fade away. We begin to form nerve clusters that help us to navigate day to day life on autopilot. Skills that we had to learn become second nature to us; driving becomes easy, cutting up veggies gets done in seconds instead of minutes, we easily sew or knit or whatever it is in life you do that’s second nature to you. In the same way we form these clusters of neurons for skills we also form them or memory & thus these things occupy our mind & make it harder for us to form new clusters in our brain. But modern research has actually shown us that our neuroplasticity never in fact goes away, unless you have a degeneration of one form or another. In fact, our brain can be reworked & improved upon daily! This comes from reading & learning but it also comes with being present, not dwelling on the memories you have or not allowing the things in your life to become automatic. By being present, realigning your life & your mind, mostly through conscious meditation, we are able to continue the neuroplasticity of our adolescence into our adult life & further on still. Working out your mind keeps you young & spry, it keeps you open to new ideas & experiences, & it doesn’t limit you to routine.

-We don’t give ourselves nearly enough grace.

I’m pretty good at grace when it comes to other people, I feel. I often forgive a little too easily or have more patience than I feel most would especially in a service setting. So, why don’t I extend those same courtesies to myself? Why am I so much harder on myself than I am to other people? Is it because I feel in control of myself? Is it because my opinion is the only opinion of myself that truly matters? In a sense, probably “yes” to all of those. We expect others to extend grace to us & we ourselves extend grace outwards but seldom is it reflected back within ourselves.

-Life is meant to be spent living, not sat at a desk.

I don’t know if I’m the only one but the idea of a 9 to 5, a job spent in a cubicle or sat at a desk sounds like a death sentence. It sounds to me like a one way ticket to depression town for me & that’s something I try to avidly avoid. We as humans crave novelty, it’s what makes us feel alive & y’all, that ain’t it.

-If it takes 60 seconds or less do it immediately.

This is more of a productivity thing than anything, if a task you need to accomplish in your day will take 60 seconds or less, do it immediately! It’ll be done & won’t continues cluttering up your mental to-do list.

-You don’t need a special occasion to treat yourself or those around you.

Why do you need a special occasion to do the things you want to do, to have the things you want to have, to dote upon those you care about? Why does it have to be your birthday for you to get a cake or to indulge in a nice meal? Why does it have to be a holiday for you to celebrate life with your friends & family? I understand if you take about the sparsity of it that it may devalue the meaning or feeling but wouldn’t we all love for it to feel like it’s our birthday a little more often than just once a year?

-Stop calling them cheat meals, it promotes shame.

This relates a little into my rant about the 75 hard challenge but for the love of holy God above, stop calling them cheat meal. Stop shaming yourself for eating the things you want. I understand indulgences aren’t meant to be a daily occurrence but why punish yourself for eating what you crave? Instead of viewing them as a cheat, view them as a reward for all the hard work you’ve put in!

-Never feel bad or guilty for spending money on the things or the people you love.

See above, money is a resource. Just because someone doesn’t understand something you love doesn’t mean you should love it any less. I’m not saying constantly blow your bank roll but just as you are worthy simply because you are, you are worthy of having the things you want out of life simply because you are. Money comes & goes, experiences are sacred.

-Taking the time to clear your mind of the BS on a day to day basis does wonders for your creativity & your mental health.

Whether this takes the shape of meditation or journaling I highly recommend it. We let our brains get so fogged up with the things that really don’t matter or the feelings that we can’t do anything to change in that moment. Taking the time to simply clear the mental air, to note the things occupying your headspace, frees up so much cognitive room.

-If you wouldn't stand up for yourself why would you expect someone else to?

This one I’m still a bit iffy on. What I specifically mean by this has to relate to those times in which something happens & you think “huh, why didn’t then stand up for me?” When the real question should be “why didn’t I stand up for myself?” Now, naturally, this doesn’t apply to those instances in which you stand up for yourself & the situation continues to deteriorate & the people around you do nothing. I’m talking about owning who you are & being confident in that & knowing your worth & what is a respectful & appropriate way in which you should be treated.

-You never know who needs a bit of daily encouragement or kindness; have patience & be compassionate.

I try to practice this one daily, especially to randos I interact with in public. These can be as simple as complimenting a barista’s pin or genuinely asking someone you’re interacting with how their day was, taking a wholehearted momentary interested in the life of a stranger. This doesn’t just apply to strangers of course, I encourage you to randomly text your friends & tell them how beautiful they are or how much you appreciate them. You never know who is having a hard day, who is doubting themself, who is struggling. Be kind & spread love everywhere you go, even at the Target checkout.

-You will never know the degree to which someone has or has not suffered in their life or which engrained systems have suppressed them. Stop telling them they’re wrong for feeling the way they do.

The reason this popped into my head mostly has to do with the racial equality movements of the last year. So often I see people trying to excuse the experience of someone else simply because that isn’t their lived experience. “They should just work harder, they shouldn’t have worn that/they were asking for it, they have the same opportunities as me,” these are all things that diminish someone else’s lived experience & the pain that experience has caused them. Stop being a selfish asshole & think of someone else for a change! This applies politically as well…naturally.

-The eyes are truly the windows to the soul, masks proved that.

For those that actually spent the last year wearing face masks it’s become overly apparent just how much you can tell about a person simply by looking into their eyes. You can often see their joy, their exhaustion, their wonder, their pain simply by observing the little space above their nose & blow their brow. It’s truly extraordinary just how much we humans wear our heart, not on our sleeve, but behind our eyes.

-We live in a system that puts profits over people…but you knew that.

Nikola Tesla was nearing his 50th birthday when he had a breakthrough around energy. He was on the verge of discovering a limitless, clean source of energy. So what happened? Nik pitched this idea to his backers, capitalists, & all of them pulled their funding. Not because the idea wasn’t sound, but because it would infringe upon their profits. The same goes for the modern food/medical systems in the states. So many things are deregulated or legal for human consumption that would otherwise be outlawed. Why? Because we live in a for profit healthcare system. If you keep people sick & needing medical, business will always be booming.

-Conventional retirement sounds like a nightmare, quarantine proves that.

The idea of sitting around, doing nothing sounds horrible to me. The idea of my daily routine becoming so predictably mundane sounds like Hell. I’m not saying retiring is a bad thing, but the slow pace retirement we’re often presented with feels like murder.

-The more you give, the more you receive in all aspects of your life, but be sure to take care of yourself too.

Being a helpful person if very rewarding, especially when it comes with no ties or catches, but if you’re sacrificing your health & wellness to save someone else’s over & over again you’re going to crash & burn. Being a giving person is a beautiful thing but don’t give all of your energy & light away! Don’t forget you’re worthy of it too!

-If you are someone in a position of power; socially, financially, from a cooperate standpoint, etc, it is your responsibly to stand up & speak up for those farther down the ladder than you.

Hi, music industry, looking at you! I have so many friend, colleagues, whatever what all share so many of the same stories. One of the people we know ends up “making it” & all of the sudden they’re a ghost. Of course they fake niceties to you at the supermarket & ask to hear what you’re working on but how many of them actually help the next people in line? This isn’t just the music biz either, there are so many instances I’ve seen of people too selfish or self absorbed in the “me, me, me” of it all they leave other deserving people behind or they vote in favor of themselves instead of the less fortunate or they trample all over people on their way up the ladder. Don’t be like those people, I’ll do my best not to be.

-Your home is meant to be personal, fill it with the things you love & the things that feel like you.

Woof, we spent a lot of time in our homes over the span of 2020 & boy did my home begin to not feel like my own. I was never one to really invest in decor, to put stock in the little kitchity things that fulled the nooks & crannies of my dwelling but the longer I stuck tether to this abode, the more I feel passionately that it should reflect me as a person. The more I personalize my house with quirky things that bring me little sparks of joy the more at home I feel & in turn the more comfortable with myself I become. Having an outward expression of what lies beneath helps to solidify the feeling of self.

-Extend joy & love outwards, always, but for God’s sake extend it back to yourself as well.

Is there a greater emotion than joy? Is there a greater feeling than love? No. I’ll answer for you & the answer is no. People often reflect back when they’re presented so why not look for a little bit of love to be sent your way. I am someone who has a very difficult time with self love, I was raised in a world where pride was the greatest sin one could commit & where self betterment was contrary to God. I struggle desperately to show myself love & that also stems from me feeling like no one could possibly love the person that I am underneath. Fortunately I’m working on that & you should too but the best way to receive love & joy is to give it!

-We give far too much of our energy to the past (grievances, trauma, etc) & the future (worry, anxieties, anticipation) never living in the moment & being present.

I mentioned this a little above, but how can you expect to be present when you’re constantly worried about the future or constantly stuck reliving the past? We get into these patterns of life where we do the same old things over & over always anxious over the future when in reality we’ve already written it. How can you expect your future to change when there’s no differential in your present? Thats the same as the definition of insanity; doing the same thing over & over again & expecting a different result.

-Not enough people read or actively do things to expand their minds anymore.

The number of people I know that actively read has got to be around 10% at max. No joke. No one reads anymore & those that do often don’t read about anything new. The read something in the same genre or topic as they always do. They read strictly non-fiction or fiction. They limit their world view to whatever they’ve deemed legible & don’t try to expand outwards from there. In a similar vein to many people go to the same vacation spots, the same restaurants, do the same things, hang out with the same people, etc. We grow & adapt from changing situations. It also does wonders for your ability to empathize which we are severely lack in.

Blog: The 28 Lessons I Learned From My 28th Year (List)

The 28 Lessons I Learned From My 28th Year

(In No Particular Order)

-We’re all a whole lot more connected than we think.

-It’s okay to let go of hope for an apology you may never receive. (See Blog)

-A lot of the world’s problems could be solved with a little less selfishness.

-You’ll never have the answers to everything & there’s beauty in that.

-Money is a resource, it carries no charge or intent.

-Held anger, resentment, or disappointment fester & manifests physically.

-You are enough just as you are in this moment.

-Paint your nails, wear the dress, be authentically you. (See Blog)

-Working out your mind is just as, if not more important, than working out your body.

-We don’t give ourselves nearly enough grace.

-Life is meant to be spent living, not sat at a desk.

-If it takes 60 seconds or less do it immediately.

-You don’t need a special occasion to treat yourself or those around you.

-Stop calling them cheat meals, it promotes shame.

-Never feel bad or guilty for spending money on the things or the people you love.

-Taking the time to clear your mind of the BS on a day to day basis does wonders for your creativity & your mental health.

-If you wouldn't stand up for yourself why would you expect someone else to?

-You never know who needs a bit of daily encouragement or kindness; have patience & be compassionate.

-You will never know the degree to which someone has or has not suffered in their life or which engrained systems have suppressed them. Stop telling them they’re wrong for feeling the way they do.

-The eyes are truly the windows to the soul, masks proved that.

-We live in a system that puts profits over people…but you knew that.

-Conventional retirement sounds like a nightmare, quarantine proves that.

-The more you give, the more you receive in all aspects of your life, but be sure to take care of yourself too.

-If you are someone in a position of power; socially, financially, from a cooperate standpoint, etc, it is your responsibly to stand up & speak up for those farther down the ladder than you.

-Your home is meant to be personal, fill it with the things you love & the things that feel like you.

-Extend joy & love outwards, always, but for God’s sake extend it back to yourself as well.

-We give far too much of our energy to the past (grievances, trauma, etc) & the future (worry, anxieties, anticipation) never living in the moment & being present.

-Not enough people read or actively do things to expand their minds anymore.

Blog: It’s Okay To Give Up On The Apology You May Never Get

Hi folk!

Interesting topic for this week’s blog, no? I’m sure the title put some people on edge before I’d even began but I felt compelled to write about this, this week. I actually started jotting down ideas for this blog throughout my week as I’ve been reading more introspective literature & doing more personal evaluation all in the name of trying to clear the debris that’s gotten in the way of my creative processes especially when it comes to writing. As I’ve stated before in blogs, specifically those regarding the state of the world or the way people treat other people, I have often found myself dwelling on anger. Not an emotion or a feeling I typically enjoy & usually, despite my sign (Aries), something I maintain fairly well outside of the flashes that occasionally arise in me. I was angry & I couldn’t for the life of me pinpoint what was causing it.

I’ve been doing quite a bit of journaling, answering some difficult questions about myself; the emotions & memories that live inside of me, amongst other things. I was prompted one afternoon to answer the following question:

“Why Are You Angry?”

My first response was “psh, I’m not!” That was a lie. You see, deep down I had this building, nagging rage that I couldn’t explain & really sitting & reflecting upon this question brought me to the realization that I was angry. In fact very much so.

The next prompt was:

“Is there anything you haven’t forgiven yourself or someone else for?”

That’s when it struck me.

You see I’d been dwelling upon this desire, this festering, insistent desire that I knew was farfetched at the best of times & was ultimately bogging me down. I was waiting for an apology that knew I will probably never receive. That’s a hard thing to live with, especially if that person is no longer in your life & even more so if that person is still a constant in your life but nonetheless we all still live with it.

We’re all human, we all make mistakes, we all hurt each other & sometimes we don’t realize the extent to which we’ve done damage to another person. Sometimes we don’t even realize we’ve done anything wrong. And that’s where this gets tough. It’s one thing entirely to ignore the pain you’ve caused someone out of pride or spite, it’s another thing entirely to be completely oblivious to it. But it doesn’t matter.

Let me say that again, it. doesn’t. matter. Bottling hurt helps no one, it benefits no one, the only thing that it does is harm you. Holding onto hurt leaves a piece of you in the past, it holds you back from growth & from realizing your true potential. Sometimes you just have to let it go.

There is peace in that, forgiveness. There is light, unfettered freedom. I’m not saying you have to ignore what someone has done to you, but I am saying that you can give yourself permission to let it go, to let bygones be bygones. I know that sometimes we so desperately just want someone to say “I’m sorry” for them to do the bare minimum & acknowledge what they’ve done but when everything in your gut is telling you that it’s never going to happen what good does it do to hold onto that distain?

I just wanted to come on here tonight & much like Elsa give you permission to let it go. To start a fresh, new day & be at peace. Acknowledge the pain, dissect it, but don’t keep holding onto it. You deserve better than that, you’re worthy of feeling better than that. So just let it go. I know it’s not always that simple but it is. It’s okay to say “thank you for protecting me, for making me feel like I’m deserving of an apology but you’ve surpassed your usefulness in my life & in my mind, but it’s time for me to let it go.”

You’re worthy of being at peace, of feeling light & unrestrained. Love yourself enough to see that.

Blog: Wear The Dress

Self confidence is a lot like a day at the river. Some people are fearless, swinging gallantly into the current without a care in the world. Others of us are a little more timid, entering the water one step at a time, carefully calculating each submerged rock, cranny, & finding footing before we shift our weight & commit to the step. Then, there are those who spend their whole lives sat on the banks, never knowing the joy they miss, always wondering what might be.

My first thought in making this analogy was to make it about a pool; same concept, different aptitudes. The reason I chose the river over the pool boils down to one thing. The current. You see a pool has minimal current at best while a river has the potential to sweep you off your feet & carry you away. A river has a higher threshold for fear & therefore is something we deem to be more dangerous. You see those who would deter you from entering a pool are few & far between (that is unless you’ve got your phone in your pocket or it simply isn’t the time for swimming.) Where as those who fear the current more readily voice their opinions & hesitations.

So how does this all relate? What does this have to do with my title, “Wear The Dress?” Allow me to explain. You see, a few months ago something entered the collective consciousness of American society that I feel has yet to have fully exit its media cycle; Harry Styles wore a dress on the cover of Vogue magazine. For whatever reason a lot of right-wing pendants were infuriated by this & became all up in arms about “the fall of masculinity” & the “loss of manly men.” Notice how I said American society above, majority of other countries couldn’t have cared less. I, myself, was so blown away by the sheer stupidity of this backlash that I went out & made a post in solidarity with Styles where I myself wore a dress.

See below:

Before you come for me, yes, I know that Harry is not the first man to wear a dress for a photoshoot, that’s part of why the controversy is so outlandish. I also understand that this look is not for everyone & you know what? THAT’S OKAY!!!!! But isn’t it incredible to be able to have the freedom to express oneself outside the confines of the status quo in a manner that does literally no harm to anyone else?

I’m sure if you’ve made it this far into the blog you’re beginning to ask yourself, “what’s the point?” I’m getting there I promise, but pretext is important. You see there’s a really lovely quote that Rick Barker, Taylor Swift’s former manager says when he’s dealing with artist that I think applies perfectly lot life as well. It follows:

“I have artists that come to me every day asking me to make them the next Taylor Swift & I tell them no. Not because I don’t think I couldn’t do it but because there’s already a Taylor Swift who is doing the best “Taylor Swift” that anyone out there is going to do. So you go do the best “you” that you can do, because there’s no one out there who is going to do a better “you” than you can.”

— Rick Barker

We are each unique in our own way, the status quo is just an illusion, it is a prison that restricts us. It keeps us from being who we so desperately know we are & want to be. It is the naysayers sat on the bank telling you you’ll never survive the current because you dare to be different from them, you dare to live freely & express yourself boldly without limitation. The dress is not for everyone but then again neither are blue jeans, neither are painted nails or certain lengths or styles of hair but if that’s what makes you, you & makes you feel the most you then by all means wear them & wear them boldly. I understand that to a lot of us these little things are the great plunge from the rope swing into the river so I would challenge you to find your wading steps. Paint one nail, wear it out, see how you feel. Remember that bravery is not always grandiose & brazen nor will you always feel comfortable in your bolder steps but give yourself the patience to live in them & accept them as a part of yourself if you so feel they are.

Don’t for a second think that this is limited to your outward appearance or your public presentation either; your inner machinations are just as important, if not more so than the statements you provide externally. Love who you love, unapologetically! Stand up for what you believe is right. But at the end of the day be sure to check in on yourself, be honest & vulnerable, don’t judge the things you find based on how the world tells you that you should. You are enough, you have always been. You have everything you need contained inside the vessel you inhabit & that is beautiful, powerful, & inspiring. You never know who needs to see the person you are living bolding & unapologetically, you never know whose life you might change or even save just from being you.

So wear the dress.

-C

P.S.

I wanted to end on that point but I also felt inclined to level with you & tell you that this blog is as much for you, the reader, as it is for me, the writer. I’m having to unlearn a lot of things the society I grew up in taught me, I’m having to come to terms with myself & who I am wholeheartedly. The good, the bad, the ugly, all of it makes up me. And believe me, I have my days of doubt & struggle just as much as you do but I am working on it & I’m giving myself patience & grace in the meantime.

Blog: Lover In The Sheets, Bigot In The Streets

Hi folks, how’re we doing? I hope the answer is incredible!

Earlier this week I had the privilege of consuming Homecoming King by Hasan Minhaj, his hour & some change comedy special on Netflix. In said comedy special Hasan effortlessly balances comedy & tragedy by telling the story of his life as an Islamic Indian American living in California. Hasan’s experience that he describes has a definite through line that carries across time & is still very poignant today, despite most of it having happened over ten to fifteen years ago. It is a point that I found extremely relevant to our modern political climate here in the state, though I think it translates overseas as well. Hasan, who rose to prominence through The Daily Show with John Stewart as well as his own show, Patriot Act, lays out this ostracizing of groups he refers to as “the other” within American society & highlights a problem that many of us who identify as “not racist” seem to want to ignore. I think this blog will end up being something similar to my blog regarding LGBTQIA+ affirmation but it incorporates the broader topic of not only sexuality or gender identify but also race. These topics have commonalities, though they are altogether inherently different. However, for the sake of this argument, for the sake of “the other” we’ll be incorporating the two together as I’d like to further add to Hasan’s point. I think the best place to start here is with the simplicity that Hasan distills this down to. One simple phrase that I’m sure we’ve all heard or thought;

What. Will. People. Think?

You see in Hasan’s narrative he comes face to face with two very distinct types of racism; having his family threatened & the windows of their car smashed out the evening of September 11th, 2001, and not being allowed to take his white date to prom because there were going to be pictures, evidence she had gone with someone they considered to be “other.” Naturally I’d like to focus on the latter here as the former, while it still runs rampant, at the very least is outwardly & actively frowned upon by those who actually have a brain between their ears. I want to talk about that silent form of bigotry, the kind that sneaks up, that makes you lock your car doors in that “bad” neighborhood, the kind that says “love the sinner, not the sin,” the kind that causes you to save face. That’s they kind I want to shine a light on here.

You see the most heartbreaking part about Hasan’s story, to me, is not necessarily that it happened, because any person of color will tell you, racism happens just as any LGBTQIA+ person will tell you homophobia/transphobia happen, just as any non-christian will tell you xenophobia happens. (Not that it’s okay that they do, but they do happen.) The thing that is heartbreaking is that Hasan thought these people were different; this was a white family who under normal circumstances had welcomed him into their home, had broken bread with him, treated him like an equal, had gone as far as to tell him they loved him but when it came time to do so in the public eye their love had conditions. Hasan couldn’t go to prom with their daughter not because “they didn’t love him” or think he was a stand up lad but because there would be pictures of them together, people would see their daughter with someone they considered to be a part of “the other.” At first a lot of us may be thinking, shame on them, I would never, & that may be true, you may never but I can’t help think further down the rabbit hole on this.

Let me ask you this. How many queer individuals have “accepting” parents that introduce their partner as their friend or roommate? How non-binary or trans individuals have people in their lives that don’t honor their chosen pronouns? How many people exclude a particular person because they wouldn’t fit the rest of the group simply based on their racial or religious background? How many keep in tact the boys club solely on merit or shame other cultures simply because they don’t understand them & have no interest in trying to? Isn’t it amazing how loud actions often contradict the words of those who claim to not have fear or prejudice living in their hearts?

What will people think?

Screw that.

Who the hell cares?!

Love with conditions is neither love nor is it worth your time. If your precious image is more important to you than loving another human, and I mean truly loving them as they are, not as you’d like them to be or as society or your faith says you should then you are no better than those who scream slurs from the side of the street. Be better. Choose to be better, choose love first, we’d all be a lot better off.

Much love to you all,

Thanks for reading!