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Day 2:

What do you need more of in your life?

Based on recent reflections, I really feel like my life could use more independent adventure. There is so much that I have held back from because I feel too embarrassed to do it on my own and I want to change that.

I want to be more adventurous and I am tired of waiting around for people to do things when all I need is myself. I refuse to live in solitary because the mean little voices in my head are telling me people are silently judging me.

So, this will be a list of things I need and need to do in my life:

Kayaking.

Go to a concert.

Bike ride.

Visit a national park.

Go to the beach.

Get a tattoo.

Travel to a different city.

Go camping.

Go on a cruise.

Visit a bookstore.

This is just a small list of things that I want to get to one day but I will be adding to this list and scratching off as the year goes on. I feel like in order to stay more accountable I will be writing a brief text post about the experience.

In the garden and Summer, 1890s

Thomas Wilmer Dewing

Day 7:

Do you hold grudges against others that could be let go? What’s your motive for holding onto them?

If there is one thing that I have begrudgingly learned from my late father, it is the ability to hold a grudge. Pride meant everything to him and as an adult, I am realizing that I am my father's daughter. There are friends who I am sure have matured and realized their mistakes but I am still stuck in the past. I am holding on to the thread and the memory of them screwing me over. It hurt my feelings to know that someone I loved at one point in time could negate my feelings entirely and purposely hurt me.

I think I hold onto them because I do not want them to ever happen to me again. I don't want to look like an idiot forgiving someone for continuously screwing me over. At the end of the day, while I am scared of being hurt, I am terrified of looking like a complete idiot. So, in turn, I hold onto things and they are always at the forefront of my mind.

I do truly hope to let go of those inhibitions one day and just let things come and go as the universe wishes it but I know I'll have to work hard to get there one day.

Day 14:

What do you minimize about yourself? What do you flaunt?

Since I am fatter than most people, I try to minimize myself in several ways. I try not to take up too much space but always end up failing. When I am on a plane, I will make myself uncomfortable by squeezing my arms in so that I do not touch the person next to me. Id I am in a car, I will do the same but scooch as close to the door as possible. If I am in a crowded place, in an elevator, on the sidewalk, etc.

It is so subconscious at this point that I do not realize even doing it. It truly was not until this question that I realized I was making myself uncomfortable so that my bigness would not offend or bother anyone around me.

What I flaunt is more of a difficult question because it is so much easier to think of the negative than the positive. But I think that I am at a place in my life where I will proudly (kinda but I'll explain later) flaunt my height. I love wearing heels and I love going out and peering over a group because with heels I am about 6 feet tall. BUt the only time I feel self-conscious about my height is when a guy I am talking to is shorter than me in heels. And I KNOW that I shouldn't care but it is still a stigma that has stuck to me that will take some time to unlearn.

Are we all just pullin' you down? [x]

Day 8:

What do you hate about others? Why? What might that say about yourself?

Hate is such a strong word and I feel like there is so very little that I hate but if I had to categorize something, it would be the fact that people choose to hate others. What I am referring to is when people hate people who have to get abortions, people who are going through the journey of transition, people who fall in love with the same sex, or just people who choose to use their religion to spew hate.

I am in no way saying that people should all think one way because that would be ridiculous but at some point we have to stop letting hate rule our lives. If it is not hurting others, animals, or objectively morally wrong, I believe people should just be able to live their lives how they choose.

As for what that says about me, I think it just means that I am open-minded and mind my business, in general. There are always new things that I am learning every day and I will stumble every once in a while but I will never let hate ruin my heart. It is so toxic and I refuse to be someone that people dread to be around.

Shadow Work Prompts

With my last post being about shadow work, I thought I’d give y’all some prompts to use.

How does the feeling of envy show up in your life?

What do you need more of in your life?

What do you love most about yourself?

If you could get rid of one bad memory, what would it be and why?

In what ways are you inauthentic?

What irrational fears do you have and how do they hold you back?

Do you hold grudges against others that could be let go? What’s your motive for holding onto them?

What do you hate about others? Why? What might that say about yourself?

What do you need to stop running away from?

What do you need to let go of?

What should you attract into your life?

How do you feel about “love”?

Why do you think you don’t deserve love?

What do you minimize about yourself? What do you flaunt?

How do you deal with criticism?

How do you perceive pain?

Why haven’t you dealt with your past before?

What don’t you like about your life? Why? How can you change it?

How often do you lie to yourself and what about?

What emotion(s) do you try to avoid? Why don’t you want to feel those ways?

Write a letter to someone who hurt you and then burn it.

How does your inner child see you?

How are you deceiving yourself?

What does success mean to you? How are you standing in your own way?

What is going on in your life that you are actively ignoring?

What keeps you motivated?

What inspires you?

Who or what is making your life difficult? How can you deal with it constructively?

How have you been betrayed in your life? What did it teach you?

How has your voice been stifled in the past?

What areas of your life do you excel in?

What are the most important/integral things you have learned over the past few years?

In what ways are you too defensive? Why?

How are you pessimistic in your own life?

Why do you not trust others?

What hardships have you overcome? How has it changed you?

What are you doing to pursue your dreams?

What do you still need to forgive yourself for?

What did that relationship teach you? (you know the one… that one)

How can you maintain your individuality?

In what ways can you be more true to yourself?

In what ways are you lying to yourself? Why?

How can you lead with your heart in your life?

How have your dreams fallen short of reality?

What is your relationship with your mother like?

What is your relationship with your father like?

Write a letter to your inner child. Maybe apologize for what has happened to them and that you couldn’t protect them, tell them how far you have come and how much you have done. Say whatever comes to mind.

How have you been a martyr/victim in your own life?

I’ll keep this post updated with more prompts when I find them

My aunt died two days ago and while we were not super close, I feel her loss so profoundly. I have experienced so much death in my almost 30 years and it never gets easier. I got to the hospital just as they were taking her away and I wish I had arrived a few minutes later. I wish I never had to see them unwrap her like a mummy so I could say goodbye. She was cocooned and buckled in and all I could do was shake. Because even though I have been to too many funerals to count, I had never been around someone who just took their last breath. All I could think about was my dad in that moment and how the last time I saw him he was basically a vegetable in the bed. I begged him to move on so that he and everyone else would no longer be suffering. At that moment, all I could think about was how is just dust in a tomb somewhere. The thought of someone just leaving this universe as if they were never even here is so unfathomable to me.

Death scares me so profoundly and sometimes I feel like it is looming over me. That at any moment my life will be taken from me and I will be just a memory for everyone around me.

OK, I feel like I need to make a list because the point of this whole Tumblr was to stay on track and I have done nothing to stay on track. I have not started working out, I have not started eating better, and I am messier than ever.

I am going to make a weekly chart and hopefully, I can stick to it.

Again, hopefully, by posting it here, I will be able to stay on track!

Wish me Lucky!

Day 10:

What do you need to let go of?

I need to let go of the trauma my parents put me through. I need to let go of everything that happened to me growing up and instead become a better person because of it. I need to stop swearing off people, things, and opportunities because I am terrified of ending up like my parents.

My mom and dad were so toxic together that I used to hope that they would divorce but they "stayed together for the kids." But that is bullshit, they stayed together because it was easier and because they were selfish. And I look back and I refuse to ever go through that and because I am holding onto that I have been so scared to love that I have closed off completely. I think that I am unlovable.

I know that it is all in my head but there are so many years of watching my parents hate each other, makeup, abuse each other, dance, drink, and smoke themselves to death, and the cycle would just continue.

I do not want to fall into that cycle but I fear that I have created a whole new toxic cycle instead.