Tag: Mental health

Come Together

November 15th, 2023

A close friend and I talked a while ago about their newest journey into healthier habits in every category possible. But there was something they said that had a huge impact on both of us:

“I wasn’t broken because I was never fully assembled.”

It’s been weeks since hearing that, and it hits deep each time I think of it.

I relate to it for reasons that are explored in this blog’s life. It’s been about me trying to make sense of many things while reconstructing old though patterns. Ones that inspired self-destructive behaviors, some of which I recently corrected (again).

And like I said recently, I have to do my best to not hurt myself over mistakes and miseducated choices, past or present. I’m still learning how to be the person I wanted to be in seasons I rejected it in favor of pleasing other people’s egos.

It’s better to praise the inner reconstruction, than to live in shame of the times you weren’t whole enough believe in your power. That’s going to make a huge difference in where I end up in the future.

I’m already seeing that happening with my friend, just as heavily as they did me when I began this journey.

D.F.
Remember the Time

November 13th, 2023

Even with everything I’ve shared and grew through in this blog, there are a series of things that once haunted me.

Doesn’t matter how old I was, or what level of intellect I wished I had in questionable and dark choices. I still have reminders of how I shouldn’t hurt myself for being who I was in old seasons of miseducation and ignorance.

We all owe ourselves forgiveness for who we were. The harder you cringe, curl your toes, or even shadowbox at who you were, the better you’ve become at not repeating those actions.

If there were cases where people were affected by our old choices, thoughts of them seeing us as that person may still live within. Sad as it may feel, it’s not our job to convince them that we’ve changed for the better.

As long as we know we have, it’s a way to keep seeing those seasons as lessons and not anchors.

I’ve said the last line many times in this blog, and it’s going to be said again in the future. Mostly because there are still things I’m sure I have yet to see that way. Some finally got that treatment this month, decades after most events.

That’s proof of how important it is to take your time in growing and healing from things you may still fight yourself about. You still have the right to take those stories to the grave, while sharing lessons you’ve learned from those rude days.

Forgiveness is still a key way to share those lessons without the weight of the past halting or stopping your progress.

Your future self will thank you.

D.F.
Wake, Rattle, & Roll

November 10th, 2023

So the “sunlight before screens” method had immediate results. Productivity was at a new high that I rarely ever experienced, and I was able to take on some things that were looming over me for years.

The first of it involved paper shredding. We’re talking papers that were decades old. Like “primary bank changed multiple names” kind of old. The same for former employment documents and other things that should be digital now.

The closet was the next step. While still picking at things inside it here and there, many things that were no longer needed or even forgot about were either trashed, donated, or other means of disposal. Still have a ways to go.

Another good one is having the drive to write ahead of time again. Since returning from my September break, I was feeling a bit sluggish trying to get something up and ready for the next regular days. It may be a bit before I’m over a month ahead like before, but I’ll get there.

Now I know the sunlight/screen thing isn’t a surefire method of being productive in everyone’s life. Some of you have schedules and obligations that might not even come close to anything I’m doing. But whatever works for us in a healthy way is something to clearly keep going with.

Maintaining it will be the wild part, but the good feelings gained from all the examples I mentioned will make it easier to do.
D.F.
Always Sunny

November 8th, 2023

Continuing from the last post, I’ve become more proactive in disconnecting from technology when it comes to nightly and morning routines.

This was something I was doing for months now, but more in the “yo-yo diet” style where I’d fall back to old habits pretty fast. It can get annoying, especially if you’ve lied to yourself like I did about being “good” with old habits.

That’s when I ran into Mel Robbins. Through YouTube, not physically. That would be bad.

If you’re not familiar with her, she wears many hats aside from being a motivational speaker and life coach. One of her episodes had a guest that promoted a “sunlight before screens” method for better sleep and productivity.

Before this, I did something close to it, where I would have the phone placed further away from me in the bed. I’d have soft music playing me to sleep, and it worked out for a time.

That lasted longer than expected, mostly because first thing in the morning I’d reach for my phone and risk a lack of production in things outside of it. Now I laugh because Mel herself said to have your phone out the bedroom altogether.

I modified that statement to simply turning the phone off. Not only because it also deserves a break, but it cuts my need for the sleep aid I had been onto for years. A close friend of mine even said to do this once, and I was not in a place to take that to heart like I am now.

So far, I’ve done it on the weekdays. I hate to end this post like clickbait, but the results will surprise you. It surely did surprise me.

To be concluded on Friday.
Breathe

November 3rd, 2023

(Note: This was originally written in August 2023. Enough of it is still relevant. Enough to even keep its original title.)

Even with everything that I have shared and have been able to process since this started, I’m still learning how to protect myself from emotional attacks based off past events. It’s hard to do when you share any space with people that can do that at any time they please.

Regardless if anyone is in the room with you or not, they may have mastered the ability to dig at you subtly or with enough strength to keep making your business theirs, and their ego priority.

They may want you too exhausted to fight, or to get the last word in. But that’s where they’re wrong. No matter how well they can get either one, it shouldn’t change your mind about who they are and what needs to be said about them.

What they do with that information, and what my sources will do about mine, will have to be left up to chance. And I know that time is coming soon.

I might even be the reason behind letting it leak. I’ll be sure to let it be known what the results are. Long time followers deserve that much, just as much as the new ones.

Until then, I just have to remember to breathe to regulate everything and anything that comes to mind that sets those moments off inside me. It’s saved me so far, but I can’t say for how long.

Then again, I didn’t get this far by doubting my ability to push through it. There was a time that I doubted this blog would go past a month, or a week at least. It’s served as a reminder to keep going, fighting, and breathing.

Many will support me, but no one can do it for me. That’s what I have to make sure I keep stepping forward. So much, that the last steps out of certain houses will stay that way for good.

D.F.
Visionaries

November 1st, 2023

Many of us look a way that fits someone’s broad or narrow scope of a particular area. You could be minding your business in public until you’re asked if you have history in something based on your appearance.

If you do, it’s up to you whether you want to reveal that or not. If you don’t have history with the place in question, you’re also allowed to roll your eyes from being stereotyped for the millionth time.

When you don’t fit someone’s idea of a demographic that you’re uncomfortable with, they can either quietly accept your claim, or try to insult you for not following their script.

“Big for nothing,” “wasted talent,” “but you’re so (insert physical trait),” or “you’re missing out.” These are just a handful ones I know of. And to some agree I’ve been told.

Anyone bold or miseducated enough to tell you things like this are part of a system you were meant to be against, either on a small or large scale. It doesn’t matter if they are a stranger or even someone close. You know who you are and what you want to be for yourself, and for anyone else willing to listen and follow you.

If they want you to be shamed for not sitting with the “cool kids,” let them live the life a dissatisfied critic towards other people’s goals.

Sometimes these are people who gave up on their own, and felt it was easier to drag others down with them. Especially if you’ve chosen to not have people live vicariously through you in places you don’t want to be in, and not meant to be in.

Stick to your inner vision. Surround yourself with people that support it. Anyone that’s the opposite of that can keep up or keep away. It’s your life to life, not theirs to control.
Outlast

October 30th, 2023

I’ve been doing a lot of research about what it means to be a scapegoat. I’ve know of the term for ages, but it means more when I finally applied it to myself.

For those new to the term, it’s sometimes labeled as the “black sheep (of the family),” often the whistleblower that calls out negative behaviors, either towards an individual or towards a group or more.

The scapegoat can even be the trauma and insecurity dump, often by people that, as I’ve talked about many times and in different ways before, refuse to be held accountable by their faults. It’s easier to bring your own troubles up to boost their twisted ego(s).

While it’s VERY easy to tag that on family structures, social ones count as well. At least they’re easier to remove from your life, if not greatly limit their exposure to you.

So what do you do with this knowledge? Well one thing is to not let it define who you know you’re not. These labels only signify what you are to others that will find new ways to devalue you, hoping that you buy into the lie that you’re less than your heightened self-worth.

You keep doing what is best for you in your time. Reading, writing, teaching your way out from the system that needs you near them. The more they try to pull or keep you in, the more damaged they’ll feel without you.

Not your problem.

Even if they still treat you like the black sheep when you’ve gained that distance, let them. There’s no changing someone’s mind about you when they’ve set it to believe that your tainted role in life is finalized.

You’re better than their emotional jabs. Their fake tears. Their demands to be the old you.

If you’re careful, by the time they learn who you’ve become, it’ll be too late for them to try any of that.

And even in your carefulness, take breaks, but never stop.

D.F.
Risk

October 27th, 2023

On my last post, I said that I could have been in any location aside from my current one without the knowledge I gained by being where I am now.

What I didn’t get into is how so much of my locations of interest were based on past romantic ties.

It didn’t matter if we were in a relationship or feeling like one was possible, I always felt the need to be closer to the person of interest. Yes there were ones that lived close that could have been a romantic link, but whether near or far, there’s been silent or vocal agreements that friendship/acquaintanceship was for the best.

Except for one. A person that I share current mutual love for, while still abiding by the social labels of being “single.” Even with that, living closer is a feat that would guarantee us becoming “official,” but much growth has always been needed as individuals before knowing if even that is meant to be.

And that’s what was missing from past interests; me not knowing what I wanted in and for myself, and instead driving towards what I felt was needed for us to thrive. I made choices like that in my last official relationship, and off of that alone I eventually learned to be better.

Besides, having a relationship with yourself is what’s needed for any kind of partnership to thrive. You may not need to feel complete, and you may be chosen while you’re restructuring yourself. But you can still know enough to know what is best for you, and the both of you.

Even if what’s best means not being together as more than friends, or even as that.

Wherever my next destination is, it will be in a conscious mind that’s not based on trauma bonded actions like they used to be. And if my person and I are meant to be together in shorter traveling distance, surely there will be celebration.

Nothing would mean more than to celebrate choosing myself first, and let life do what it does best: keep on surprising me the way my person did 🙂

D.F.
Stay Home

October 25th, 2023

(Edited 10/26/2023)

For a long time I have been hearing and being told to appreciate what I have now against being frustrated over what I don’t have yet.

Maybe there is angst about that because there’s always been sense of selfishness and control that’s desired from people that want me around for their needs. The same people that are quick to remind me of them after I tell them what I want for myself.

That’s what makes it hard to look at any spin on the “be grateful for what you have” line. I could easily tell myself that the benefit of being here has been to be fueled by inconsistency, trauma, and many secrets to finally speak about it in a style that would be common in this MH space, but unprecedented within many of my family ties.

And for the many reasons I am grateful that I’m not in another space to call my own that’s removed from these environments, sometimes I have wondered if I would have been in a space to have written any of what I had?

I don’t think so.

I would have been in any given location* operating under even remnants of the systems that I grew up with, and believed I was fond of. I would have done more harm to myself than good if I stayed in that place while maintaining a new one.

So without being where I am now physically, the one thing that I can remain grateful for is the chance to fulfill this mission that I may as well have been built for, or even called to begin. I want to believe that others throughout personal generations started it in their own ways.

Who would I be if I wasn’t accepting the call to continue what they began?

D.F.

*This will branch to another topic this Friday.
Remember Me

October 16th, 2023

The thing about having friends for a very long time is that you get to see each other in different phases.

There are those that grow together through life events, and those that grow apart, sometimes for the same reasons. And with both sides, they the chances that either completely sever ties, or downgrade the friendships to being acquaintances. That way there’s less expectations on how you show up for each other.

I have noticed these things even before starting my mental health journey. While never putting it into words, it was always there. One that I know was due to social and political differences that bled into personal matters. Another had to stay gone because they were just a shifty person.

And as I have started this personal inner growth journey, the ones that have quietly downgraded to an acquaintance surely have seen me doing this with no chance of stopping. Often in the form of photos and videos, often ones I make, that are tied to these topics.

Some of them I know are going through it themselves, making similar discoveries as I have about the inspirations of their old behaviors, and that’s great. At times a few of us have actually had conversations about our discoveries, often finding deep parallels.

That’s why I find myself continuing the journey. Some of us may have limited access to people that they can talk to outside of professionals, through shared experiences or what reminds them how they’ve never been alone. How I’ve never been alone either.

Even if we’ve grown apart or become closer throughout this time, I do my best to let them know that they are not only important to themselves, onut they’re important to me, too.

No matter how little or frequent our interactions are, know that I am rooting for any form of healing you’re going through. Don’t forget to cheer for yourself, above anyone else.

D.F