growth, then decay, then transformation

Yes, the title is a Breaking Bad reference. Sue me.

Hello, Vocal family! It’s been a couple of months—well, half a year, actually—since I’ve written anything on here, but I’ve finally found my way back. I’ve missed this community so much, and I just wanted to write a quick little piece before I jump back into writing and reading and talking with you all again :)

To be fully transparent, I’ve been struggling a lot as of late. I’ve undergone some realizations and have made some decisions that have made this year one of the hardest periods of my life. I’ve gone through some pretty extreme life changes over these past few months, and it’s been beyond difficult to deal with and accept the new future I’ve chosen, even though I don’t regret the choices I feel like I had to make.

In short, without getting too personal, it’s heartbreaking to feel like choosing yourself for the first time leaves you with no choice but to hurt another. There’s a lot of grief, a lot of guilt, a lot of shame, and I’ve been navigating all of those feelings. But there’s also freedom, lightness, newness, and what I feel may be a personal awakening of my own.

A lot of you who’ve followed me on here and are even a little familiar with my work may know that I’ve been struggling with depression for the past few years. A lot of my poetry and stories delve into that, into the darkness of my mind, into insecurity and resentment and doubt. I felt like I was stuck in a never-ending loop of loneliness and desolation, and there was nothing that could get me out of my own head. But I hadn’t realized that a lot of my emotional isolation was at my own hand. I’ve always been so influenced by others, and if the people around me were most content not trusting others, I would be too. If they were most comfortable sitting in their depression, afraid to let it go, I would be too. I understood that fear; I would stay right where they were.

But I decided that even if I came to regret it, I wanted to trust others again. I wanted to make new friendships, meet new people, make new connections. I wanted to hug a new friend for the first time. I wanted to go out with someone new for coffee and just listen to them talk. I wanted to go out and laugh with others without shame or doubt, without feeling naive for enjoying my time with them. I wanted to learn more about the people around me in a genuine way, because in this short life, people are all we have. I wanted to experience all the little things, sharing these small human moments with another.

My own lack of hope was being constantly reinforced by myself and the people around me, by no fault of their own. Things can feel hopeless. It would be dishonest to ignore those feelings when they come. But for the first time in a long time, after changing my own life so drastically, after choosing myself for the first time in a very long time, I’ve began to feel hope for the future.

And there’s pain, too. There’s mourning for a version of the past that could have been. There’s shame, for selfishly paving a new future for myself without those who’ve grown up beside me by my side. For my fellow deeply emotional, people pleasing folks, there’s always a shame in doubt and in wanting, in admitting what we feel, in doing what truly feels right to us, in choosing ourselves instead of others. But sometimes, we can love someone or something so, so fucking much, and still realize it’s not good for us in the long run. Two things can always be true at once, and it’s so hard. But you have to put yourself first, even when it is, and listen to your heart.

Do you ever reach a period in your life where you feel so very unlike yourself, almost like you’ve fallen out of your own body and mind? Then you blink, and days have passed, and everything seems different? It’s odd and almost scary how things change, how people change, how our lives can be altered so permanently. I feel so ashamed for it, yet so grateful all the same. In letting go of something that I treasured so dearly, I’m realizing my mind is my own again. The things I thought I believed have been called into question, and I’m coming to conclusions about what I feel, what I believe, what I want, what I need.

There are so many things about myself I want to work on now that I feel that I’m seeing things more clearly. There is so much I have to learn about internal strength and confidence, and so much to unlearn too. But I’m realizing a lot of parts of me aren’t quite as dark as I thought they were, or maybe even as I inadvertently pretended they were, to be able to connect to and relate to the darkness of others in my life that I have since had to let go. I hate the lightness I feel sometimes without holding so many of those struggles on my shoulders. It makes me feel guilty, like I’m not doing what I should be doing, but that isn’t true. I’m realizing I was carrying so much pressure and pain that wasn’t my own, and that my next step is to let it go, no matter how difficult that may be.

I’m still figuring out who I am, even in my mid-twenties, and I’m still navigating my shame everyday. I’ll always have regrets about decisions my past self made, or didn’t make. But there are parts of myself, parts that have always been there, that I’ve neglected for too long. And as I build myself up and learn who I am more and more, I find myself the closest to happiness that I’ve felt in a long, long time.

Does that mean no more depressing pieces on here? No, most certainly not. But it does mean I am more ready and willing than I’ve ever been to delve back into what I love: writing. Creativity and connection. That’s why we’re here, I believe.

Thank you all so much for reading; it is so great to finally be back. <3