#93 - Rabbit Rabbit! April Showers Are Here!

The first month that I would consider fully spring has come! It’s here! It’s already raining!

I got woken up by BooBoo walking across my hair (she’s very good at getting just one or two hairs under her paw and pressing against my pillow until I wake up—yes she is frighteningly intense but I like to imagine it’s just because she wants to spend more time together), realized the rainstorm was imminent, sprinted to the grocery store, and am now surrounded by three bevs.

Water, iced coffee, smoothie. A hattrick of hydration!

It would seem the eponymous shower’s have arrived, which is great and good and fine, I wanted a day inside to get my life set up for the month anyway.

It’s week 14 of the year! It’s quarter two babeyyyy! And since I’m going to have to review my work goals and set some new ones this week, I realized that I also wrote personal goals for the year and since this substack serves as my own personal thought archive, I even remember where I wrote them down.

My themes this year were set via wordsearch philosophy, because while I take myself seriously I am always here for a good bit! So, let’s review.

Friends

I love my friends so much. I have incredible people in my life who make me laugh harder than I ever thought possible, I am so lucky to be able to call them at any time for any reason, I appreciate what I am given and able to give in return, my friends fill me up with so much generosity and joy and hope and laughter and connection and they make me feel like I’m not strange or unloveable or that any of my quirks make me undeserving of their attention, care, or time.

Do I still want to make friends this year? Yeah! I really want to find people who will teach me D&D (I even got dice as a Christmas gift because I, again, have incredible friends who know me and know the things that I want but am trepidatious about admitting—especially to myself) and I basically want to increase the amount of friends I have who live in this city because I am so here for long distance friendships but I also would like to host a dinner party that doesn’t require Zoom!

I think in the past few months I’ve stopped beating myself up and having shame around the fact that it’s hard for me to find new people I want to be friends with, which is good. I’m still extremely hesitant when it comes to taking steps to forge connections and be vulnerable with new people but I can appreciate that as just…a truth, something to be aware of and push through rather than making it into a Big Thing That’s Stopping Me.

It may be harder for me, but that doesn’t mean I’m broken. It just means it’s harder.

I’m actually very excited that new people get to meet me now. I’ve never liked myself before, and now that I do it feels very…table flipped that my opinion of them matters just as much as their opinion of me. Wild what self-worth can do!

Commitment

Going strong! I’ve sent 15 substack essays so far this year as far as like Goals By Numbers I’m totally on track for another 52 (also, I’ve sent out over 100 ‘stacks since starting this and that’s truly wild to me but a really lovely reminder to myself that by committing to a reasonable goal I will continue to show up and then get to see results over time).

As far as my commitment to hitting deadlines, still good!

Commitment to myself has looked different. I’m breaking routines and systems more, I’m trying to be less regimented about my day-to-day because self-discpline is good but not when it gets so intense that breaking habits causes me to spiral. Temperance, babes!

Solitude

Spending time with myself on purpose? Good.

Admitting when I’m lonely to others? Good.

Not panicking over what it means to do activities solo? Gooooood.

Romance

Eh. Idk?

I wrote out the list of “things I want in a future partner” that’s supposed to Law Of Attraction them into my life. It’s a good list! Very complete!

Tbh, online dating is just not my favorite way to meet people. I would like a Singles Night for Stoners, please!

I went on some dates, I haven’t closed myself off, I’m just not particularly motivated about seeking out romantic relationships right now.

Romanticizing my life is fun though! I feel very swoony re: my new furniture, my apartment layout, the fact that I live in New York City, it’s all good. Romance is great and it doesn’t have to be regulated to one type of relationship! I would buy myself flowers if Weem wouldn’t ravage them immediately!

Alignment

Ergonomics-wise I invested in an Alicy layout keyboard that I’m truly so obsessed with and I recently got mint green keycaps for it and let me tell you I’ve never been happier typing and my wrists have never been more relived.

Still breathing through my nose every chance I get, still trying to sit up straight, still remembering to roll my shoulders back and down when out in public because I’m no longer trying to shrink away from the world.

Strength

Literally I have gotten stronger because I have weights I now do reps with because I was tired of my arms getting so sore.

Resolve & calm wise, I think I’m getting better at seeing my emotions as information rather than allowing them to overtake my response. Has that gone perfectly each time? No! But I no longer get mad at myself for having a reaction, I only reflect on how I shared the reaction/emotion with others.

Breakthrough

I’ve been outside a lot more. I’ve gone on many adventures and had afternoons spent in my absolute favorite ways: walking around the best city in the world.

January was a really tough month. I was being ruthlessly cruel to myself because I was just so tired of feeling like I was never going to get to the other side of the self-work, I was never going to develop a sense of self that wasn’t defined by the size of my body, I was struggling to believe that my friends weren’t all completely sick of me, like it wasn’t a good time! But I still got up and did things, even though it was really hard.

I went to yoga. I went on dates. I cleaned my apartment. I did yoga and mediation every morning. And they didn’t fix everything, but I felt better than when I allowed the day to swallow me whole.

I got out of the pit of despair. I kept on walking.

There is no one-and-done breakthrough, everyday is just stacking minor revelations atop one another and eventually realizing that I no longer use the voices of those I love to surreptitiously reflect my self-loathing in my own mind. It turns out, that was really poisonous! It’s so easy to slip into habits and never examine them, but as I’ve been building self-worth I keep coming up against the behaviors that made it so hard for me to develop any for so long.

So, I’m sorry, past-me, for treating myself that way. And I’m really sorry to all my friends mouths that I put words in, even though I never told them I was doing that. I’m so glad we made it through those woods. The branches were gnarly.

It’s been a pretty consistent three months. I get up, I do the necessary care-of-self tasks, and then I don’t spend the entire day reflecting on what a terrible person I am/must be. It’s been a really heady rush to realize just how much of my time previously was spent being my own enemy.

It was learned behavior, it wasn’t from nowhere, I have had extreme cruelty demonstrated to me by those I thought cared for me, I have no fundemantal understanding of unconditional love, but that doesn’t have to remain true. Instead of trying to prove something, instead of focusing on what others perceptions of me and my life were, I really solidified the value my own voice.

I’m not finished, but I’m no longer obsessing. The anxiety is overall a lot lower. My agorophobia is regressing one bagel order at a time.

The point of reflection is to appreciate how far I’ve come, because it’s always easier to remind myself of how far I have left to go. But progress is impressive. There is no point to having shame about the length of the journey as long as I keep moving towards the destination in some way!

I hope you have a lovely start to spring (even if it’s a bit muddy) and a wonderful April full of cute umbrellas that you manage to always have on you at the right moment!!

✌️ 🧡 ☔️