messily letting go of things

molting no. 4 – june 2024

Here is a messier version of ‘moltings’ because it seems that this past month my inner child artist has decided to revolt against my previous formats/Substack sections because they have started to feel like (accidental) ’rules’ and authority which I can’t help but push back against. I’m like a toddler that learns the word ‘no’ and says no to even their favorite things just because they can. So I’m finding a way around my inner toddler’s no’s by still doing moltings but in a different way––like when a toddler (me) is tantrumming about their food, saying they won’t eat it, so then the parent (also me) turns around and rearranges it on the plate, maybe cuts up the pieces a little more, and then suddenly the toddler is munching away, tantrum forgotten, thinking they got their way when you, in fact, did too.

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1. I want to be someone that looks into the void of the unknown and gets giddy with excitement at all the possibilities that could be birthed out of what seems like nothingness, emptiness, but is really a fertile ground housing the seeds for anything we want, just waiting to be activated by our attention.

2. I wonder if I was an astronaut in space I would be hanging there, suspended but attached to the ship, scared out of my mind OR in absolute awe of the cosmos around me, feeling the pulse and origin of life despite not necessarily seeing it at all. I honestly think the latter to be true. (Or realistically a bit of both but a higher percentage of the latter.)

3. I want that to be my knee-jerk reaction to uncertainty. It currently is not. Currently, it takes me a while to get there, usually after a few breakdowns of grasping too hard and then, finally, I reach an I-give-up surrender state that turns out to be quite fruitful. Yet right when I think I’ve shortened the timeline between initial grasp and surrender, I move down another spiral loop and I am meant to surrender again.

4. The next spiral for me has been around the fear of making the wrong decision. The paralysis. I wonder if a lot of other people feel this. God, I hope so, because if not then that would confirm my fear that I am indeed defective. I wonder this frequently, do you wonder this too? I hope, even though I wouldn’t wish that dreadful thought upon anyone, but still, I hope, because being not alone here would feel nice and maybe confirm that I am not in fact defective, I’m just human.

5. Why do I have to feel so fucking much? Why do these things that other people can happily put up with for years, like a job that pays the bills but brings little fulfillment, fucking eat away at me but doesn’t for others? Part of me wishes I didn’t care so much about everything but the reality is that I do and another part of me also knows that this is actually a really beautiful bit of my soul that is just on its way to discovering its best medium to be expressed.

6. To feel defective is hard because it makes you feel really fucking alone. Defective is the evil twin of unique. It’s a fucked of form of being “special” except it feels like what sets you apart repels people/opportunities rather than draws them to you.

7. (There is something wrong with me and no one else?)

8. Thank you for letting me roll around in my shadowy victimhood for a moment. I needed it. Sometimes you gotta do that before you take back your power and your responsibility for your own reality. You let your inner child have a tantrum but you have to remember to call in your inner mother to reel her in and say woah woah woah baby let’s remember that your suffering is not random, it is your path that you’re meant to walk and learn so well with curiosity and investigation so then you can help others along it too! There is purpose that is dying to be awakened in the areas of your life that cause you pain.

9. And still, this has been hard. I don’t really know what “this” even is because I’m in the midst of it, but if I were to zoom back and play God puppeteer for a moment, I would say that it is a pivotal time in my late 20s where I’m realizing more clearly what I do want in life and what I don’t want in life. I am trying to figure out how to move towards creating what I want whilst still having to hold onto what I don’t want because I need it to e.g. pay the bills/survive. I’m trying to wring out the gratitude for where I am and accept the now and be here, not there (far away in the future, right alongside my anxiety). I’m learning that it isn’t about making the right decision, it’s about making the bold decision–-the one that you will be proud of on your deathbed because you gave it your all and didn’t hold back. I’m realizing that so much of my own suffering (dare I say all of it?) is self imposed, created by the beautiful and at times wretched thing that is my mind.

10. Ugh, I want to reach out my hand more. I have always been the I-can-do-it-myself girl and it gets lonely over here. I don’t like being a lone wolf but it has been what feels safe to me because I have done it my whole life. I am at the point where I now see that the deep love that I yearn for, the heart-warming sense of community, the peaceful day-to-day existence, etc.––all of it isn’t gonna happen with the lone-wolf way that I’m currently being. The Kristen that has these things is communally minded and leaning on others and having others lean on her and loving it oh so much.

11. In the depths of the lone-wolf state of being, I feel like a stray dog that is snarling at your hand with food in it. When I finally let go of the fear that holds me back, I become the dog that greets you by immediately laying down and rolling onto its back for tummy rubs. I want another of my knee-jerk reactions to become rolling over for tummy rubs. I let go of the snarl. I’m done with the snarl. I want the tummy rubs.

12. I want to be here now and go after my dreams––have future-focused goals without getting lost in them and neglecting myself and my life that is happening right here, right now. I am still working on mastering this balance, though I wonder if anyone ever actually masters it? Or is The Way simply this dance of straying and returning home? Like how meditation isn’t meant to be about having no thoughts, but rather when thoughts do arise and you return to the stillness behind the thoughts, you are in your meditative practice and doing a great job. Remembering that the act of returning to the practice does not evade even the master themselves…

13. “Designing life well is practicing controlled surrender and surrendered control.” – @peathefeary

14. Again and again and again my clenched fists are unfurling. My body slowly realizing it is safe to ask for help, it is safe to try bold new things. My hands and my jaw and between my shoulder blades hold the muscle memory of that old way of being. All are slowly unfurling, slowly unclenching, slowly relaxing, slowly wriggling themselves out. They brace ! and then relax again and then brace ! then relax a little more. My hands are a bit clammy from how long they have been held shut and my jaw a bit sore and my shoulders a bit tight, but nothing some stretching and rubbing can’t help.

15. “What if there were no problem right now? What if there were nothing to change about this? What if this is it? In this next moment, is there really something that needs to change? And where is the self that would require such change?” – Sam Harris via one of his daily Waking Up meditations

16. I was about to workout and I glanced at our magical backyard and then at my parents sitting inside and I walked in with tears streaming down my face as I said, “this’ll probably be the last time that I live with you guys for the rest of my life.” I got a sandwich hug as a response. I wiped my eyes on my sweatshirt while they got two tissues for themselves. Then as I slipped back out to indeed workout, I said with my head peeping through the door, “this time together is sacred.” It felt like a prayer.

17. “There is another layer of Being Present that goes beyond the exact moment, but the era you are in. Letting yourself live where you live, Be the age you are, Have the problems you have. Trust this Town. Maybe you leave one day? But you won’t know unless you own it for a while.” – @sighswoon

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I love you.

Kristen xoxo