Another Revolution Around the Sun

I wrote this last night before I left for my birthday dinner but didn’t get a chance to post it. Dinner was wonderful and I’m no longer feeling as sensitive as I was when I wrote this, but I still want to share it, because it feels a little disingenuous to not be honest about my ongoing relationship with my mental health. I’m pretty happy these days, but not always, and it’s important to me to be real about that.

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It’s my birthday today and, in keeping with the trend of the past two years, a time for me to reflect on how my life has evolved in the past year.

This is basically going to be a freewrite since I’m squeezing this in during the increasingly rare hour of free time that I have in between going from one thing to the next. If I could summarize the past year actually, that would be it - constant movement between cities, between meetings, between apartments, between engagements. It’s been fun, but of course exhausting, and I always find myself a little weathered after long stretches of social interaction and emotional investment. I’m especially feeling it after my competition this past weekend.

As I’ve shouted from the rooftops, over the weekend I competed in my first pole competition and placed first in my category. While I’m extremely proud of myself and happy with the result, honestly it was hard to not have any of my friends or family there to experience it with me, to help carry the intensity of the day after 2.5 fairly intense months of training and being very mindful of my consumption habits, my recovery, my social commitments, etc. Don’t get me wrong, I’m incredibly appreciative of the outpouring of love and encouragement I’ve received, and I’m lucky to have an amazing network of people rooting for me. I moreso weigh whether competing is for me, if I’m made out for the training and discipline it requires. While physically I think I’m capable, mentally, I’m not quite sure.

I’m constantly mindful of my mental health and the way I tend to oscillate from one extreme to the next. I’ve been going to therapy for the past year, which has been extremely helpful, and I’ve spent much of the past year being very intentional about how I track my patterns and emotional responses, how I communicate with others, and how to identify what I need (and by extension how to communicate what I need to others) when I’m in an emotional valley.

Training for this competition really shone a light on my intensity as a person, my dissatisfaction with anything but the absolute best, my high expectations of myself, and it was a fucking lot. I’m a fucking lot. I literally achieved my goal, beyond my goal really, and I still watch videos of my performance and nitpick areas of improvement. I just don’t know that I can trust myself to continue to compete and do right by myself, so that’s kind of where I’m at (though I do love being on stage, I am a Leo after all).

That all being said, overall I am much happier these days, and living intentionally has improved so many areas of my life. I’ve shed the weight of imposter syndrome at work and learned how to really own up to my abilities and skills. I’ve fallen in love with someone who rivals my ambition and thoughtfulness, someone with whom I feel deep partnership and trust. And somewhere along the way I became an athlete, something I never could have foreseen when I was younger, dreading PE classes and getting picked last for team sports.

So sure, while I’m feeling extra reflective and sensitive today, I know that this feeling will pass, and in truth these feelings pass much more quickly than they did even a year ago. It would be remiss for me to not say thanks again to everyone who's reached out to congratulate and celebrate me - I can’t tell you how much it means to me, and I’m appreciative of all the kind words and thoughts, especially when I struggle to give them to myself.

I continue to welcome my evolution as a person, hopefully towards an increasingly better and more self-aware version of myself, on this birthday and all of my birthdays yet to come. Cheers.

Love In All Its Forms

I sometimes feel like a spectator outside of my life, marveling at the way things have unfolded, often better than I anticipated.

My life has been marked by a series of fortunate events - such as my unexpected acceptance into Berkeley where I met many brilliant, hilarious friends who I’m fortunate to still have in my life. Or the trajectory of my career, the success of which still catches me off guard. Or now, in my new relationship, with someone who is so incredibly warm and silly and kind and devastatingly handsome, I’m sometimes baffled he even exists.

I find myself bracing for impact. How can this be real? How can he be real? How can we fit into each other‘s lives in a way that feels inexplicable? While I can’t explain it, I am grateful. I look back at my old writing, all my love letters to a faceless, anonymous “you,” and I can’t help but feel like he is the person I’ve been writing to all along. He is the “you” I’ve been speaking to.

I once wrote that I wanted a hungry kind of love, one that felt sticky between my fingers. I’ve since changed my mind. I’ve discovered that what I really want is an easy kind of love. One where I don’t overthink everything that I say or do, one that doesn’t make me fear what happens next. What I really want is a love I can wrap around me like a warm blanket, a love I can sleep soundly in, curled up in its safety.

I’ve spent the last couple of years cultivating love – love of my friends, love of my work, love of myself, and love of my life. And in so doing I’ve learned that love should be easy, given and accepted freely. It shouldn’t come with conditions, with rationalizations, with excuses. I’m lucky to find myself in love again, with someone who makes it so easy.

I love you, Liam. Thank you for being you.

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Hey love hey life hey you.

Sometimes I think the small print to the laws of physics will be revealed to say that you and I were made for each other. Sometimes I think one day they’ll change certain mathematical properties to declare that you plus me will always equal us. Sometimes, but just sometimes, I think the chemistry between us will eventually reach an explosive state, and we’ll forever be bonded together at the lips and hips. Physically, mentally, emotionally. Sometimes I think the universe has actually conspired to use its gravitative state to perpetually draw us two together.

Hey love hey life hey you.

Sometimes I think we’re forever doomed to repeatedly find each other. I think our moments of separation over time over space over miles are mere formalities of living, because I think between us there’ll always exist a thread to follow back to one another. Like Theseus in the labyrinth with the Minotaur, I think we’ll always have an invisible ball of thread in our hands to lead us back to the beginning. If we are the sum of our parts, I can tell you right now that the addition of my parts would equal you.

Hey love hey life hey you.

I may be lost, but I know one day you’ll find me.

- (me, circa 2005)

2018 Fucked

Wow, seeing my 2017 survey still on the front page of my blog made me realize that I didn’t blog this year as much as I expected I would, but I’m going to chalk that up to being really happy and living a full fucking life in 2018.

This is the 15th year (!!!) that I’ve done this survey, and I’ve now crossed the threshold from being self-conscious about it being silly and weird to being really proud that I’ve managed to keep it up for 15-fucking-years (with the exception of 2010, which was kind of blur in my life anyway).

If you’ve been following my writing, you’ll know that I’ve had kind of an up and down last few years struggling with depression and anxiety and several major life transitions, but 2018 felt like the culmination of many years of self-reflection and internal work, and these days I’m just really happy and grateful for everything that transpired to get me to where I am today.

This isn’t the most articulate choice of words, but I’ve also been sick for the past month, so bear with me while I do this hopped up on a cocktail of different medications. Here we go!

Past years for reference:

2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003

1. What did you do in 2018 that you’d never done before?
I now use Evernote to log all the new shit I do throughout the year, because I literally think about what I’m going to put in this survey all year round.

This year I took an aerial class, taught a yoga class, ate crickets in Mexico City (also the first time I traveled to Mexico), went to a concert by myself (HONNE!), experienced a sound bath, reported for jury duty, left my phone number on a receipt for a server, went to therapy (highly recommend), was fully nude in public (at a Korean spa), and got peed on during a date (by my date’s dog).

I had a lot of physical achievements this year, like going outdoor rock climbing for the first time, doing up to 4 unassisted chin-ups/pull-ups, some acro yoga poses, some advanced yoga transitions and poses, and so many pole tricks.

Travel-wise, I went to Mexico City (twice), Scottsdale, Denver, and Joshua Tree!

It’s hard to tell from the picture but there’s a big fucking gap on the other side of the rock I’m on so this was a little terrifying

2. Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
My 2018 goals:

• Find balance in the different parts of my life. I feel like I did a decent job of this. Considering how much I traveled this year (I averaged a flight a week), I still kept up with work and maintaining my relationships - even fostered new ones. I still wrote, I still did artsy shit, I still maintained a pretty active workout schedule between pole and yoga, and I still volunteered (though not on a regular basis). The one thing I didn’t do was cook, but I’m learning (through therapy!) to not be so hard on myself and feel like I need to fill up all of my time, and to give myself permission occasionally to relax and do nothing. And realistically, my priorities are work, my relationships, and my workout routines - I know now that it’s unlikely that I can make time for ALL OF MY HOBBIES on a monthly basis, so I feel good about how I spread my time this year.

• Teach yoga on a semi-regular basis. Totally fucking failed at this. I couldn’t make the time for it during the first half of the year when I was traveling almost every other week, and then I lost all momentum when I started poling, which has really become my new focus. Teaching yoga has been relegated to the backburner of my life, but I’m actually ok with it, because what I’ve discovered is that I really just love being a student. I still carry the lessons I learned in my yoga teacher training with me, but yeah, teaching yoga is a future me thing to figure out.

• Make an active effort to avoid behaviors that cause me anxiety. Fucking achieved. Well, for the most part. I can’t say I was 100% successful at avoiding these behaviors, but I was successful at moderating my anxiety so that I didn’t have eating problems this year. Therapy and moving on from people and experiences that didn’t serve me certainly helped.

• Maintain a regular meditation practice. Not really. My meditation practice has come and gone in waves - I would still like to be better about this next year.

• Finish my bedroom. I finally got a queen size mattress and some new sheets, but other than that, my bedroom is just as sparse and sad as it was last year. Another 2019 me goal.

My 2019 goals:

• Be kinder and more responsible with my body. I’ve never considered myself an athletic person because I hated sports growing up and I’ve never been into conventional workouts or forms of exercise, but what I’ve since discovered is that my body is actually pretty fucking strong and flexible. I have a tendency to push my body past its limits (as I’m prone to do with all things in my life) - always testing the line between discomfort and pain - and I ended up injuring both of my wrists last month by over-poling and subsequently over-working them in yoga, and they’re still on the path to rehab. I know that I need to be conscious of my hypermobility and take better care of my body during and in-between workouts, but I’ve just never put the time into researching and understanding what that means or how to do it. My injuries this year have definitely been a wakeup call to be more mindful.

• Maintain a regular meditation practice. Another one of my tendencies is if I can’t do something full-out, then I won’t do it. Part of the reason why I didn’t keep up with meditating was because if I felt like I didn’t have 10-15 minutes to spare in the morning because I was running late to work, I just wouldn’t do it. In therapy I’ve learned that I’m pretty hard on myself (surprise, surprise), so something I have to actively work on is giving myself permission to not do everything at the arbitrarily high standard I set for myself, and remind myself that even 5 minutes of meditation a day is better than nothing.

• Volunteer at least once a quarter. I only volunteered once this year for 826LA’s Great Personal Statement Weekend, but I really really love 826LA’s mission, and while I realistically can’t make time to volunteer every month, volunteering at least once a quarter should be achievable.

• Compete or perform publicly on pole. I was supposed to participate in a pole showcase a couple weeks ago but had to drop out because of my wrists. Going back to my first goal, I’d really like to be more responsible about my body next year so that I can get back into pole and actually perform or compete, which is my ultimate fitness goal (some people train for marathons, I just want to be half-naked doing pole tricks in 8-inch heels).

• Get my finances back in fucking order. A few years ago I was SUPER into managing my finances - I’d paid off all my credit cards, opened a Roth IRA, and was contributing regularly into that, my 401k, and my savings. When I was unemployed, my bank account became a scary place and I formed an unfortunate habit of not looking at it, which has persisted to this day. I’m fortunate now to have a regular income, but I’ve been so fucking irresponsible about budgeting and managing my expenses that it can’t be looking good in there. I really need to get my shit back together next year, and I’m posting this on the internet to hold myself accountable.

• Finish my bedroom. See above. If I don’t hang up all of my goddamn art, I don’t deserve any more nice things.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
A bunch of my close friends have gotten married over the last few years, but no one has entered the baby making phase…yet

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No

5. What countries did you visit?
Mexico! Twice. Within like a 3 month period for two different 30th birthday celebrations, it was a little extra. And also Spain (Madrid) for work.

6. What would you like to have in 2019 that you lacked in 2018?
A sense of frugality

7. What date from 2018 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
September 28 - when my date’s dog peed all over my legs during our first date

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Honestly, my body is in the best fucking shape it’s ever been in and I’m pretty proud of it. I’ve never felt more confident and sexy and comfortable in my skin, and it’s all thanks to pole and yoga  

9. What was your biggest failure?
Ugh, pushing myself to pole for 5 hours in one day because I was having anxiety about my pole performance, only to injure both of my wrists and have to drop out of the performance all together. LESSON LEARNED 

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Yeah, both of my fucking wrists. I’ve also been coughing for the last month which has been a pain in the ass

11. What was the best thing you bought?
The Malibu Airbnb that I rented for my 30th birthday and, like, all of my pole classes/clothes/shoes. HAVE I MENTIONED THAT I LOVE POLE

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Still mine. I made good decisions this year and I’m pretty pleased with myself

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
All of the fucking racists and white nationalists that have come out of the woodwork in the last couple of years. The mass shooter of the month. Etc.

14. Where did most of your money go?
My birthday, pole, and yoga. Per usual.  

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
My birthday! Pole! And a man. :)

16. What song will always remind you of 2018?
Bob Moses - Enough to Believe, Petit Biscuit - Problems, Mahalia - Sober, HONNE - Feels So Good, RÜFÜS DU SOL - Treat You Better

17. Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder?
Even happier

ii. thinner or fatter?
Fitter! So much fitter. I have abs. I have definition in my arms. I lost the fat around my face. I’d be humble about it, but I’ve lost 20 lbs in the last 2 years and worked so fucking hard to get here, I’m going to celebrate it

iii. richer or poorer?
Er. I should be richer but I might be poorer, I’ve been so fucking financially irresponsible this year

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
I actually wish I’d set aside more time for myself this year. I traveled so much and gave so much of myself to my hobbies and to relationships, I don’t think I set aside enough time to just relax and recharge and I definitely felt the weight of that at different points this year

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Nothing. I had a good year

20. How did you spend Christmas?
Coughing, napping, marathoning Christmas movies, chilling with my fam. The usual.

22. Did you fall in love in 2018?
I’ve said this the last couple of years but it’s still true - every year I fall more in love with the person I’ve become and the life I’ve built for myself

23. How many one night stands?
None

24. What was your favorite TV program?
Insecure, Magic for Humans, and I know this is like a decade delayed, but I finally watched all of Sex and the City and that shit is still relevant

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
Nope, I still think hate is wasted energy

26. What was the best book you read?
OK YOU GUYS, I’M NOT GOING TO EVEN FRONT ABOUT THIS, but this year I read Matthew Hussey’s book Get the Guy, AND WHILE IT SOUNDS SUPER LAME AND CHEESY, I actually found it to be transformative. Yeah it’s a dating book, but it’s less about getting into a relationship and more about cultivating a life in which you’re happy with or without a relationship, and in so doing, opening up more opportunities to meet the kind of person you’d want to be in a relationship with. I also found its communication tips to be incredibly helpful, not just in dating but at work as well, and so yeah. I thought it was helpful and my life has improved since reading it so there you go.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Petit Biscuit and Mahalia

28. What did you want and get?
An epic 30th birthday celebration with all of my closest friends. A deeper sense of intimacy and emotional connection. And, like, all of the black, strappy pole clothes a girl could ever want.

29. What did you want and not get?
Nothing. I’m an annoying get-everything-she-wants kind of person

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
I LOVED Love, Simon! I also really liked Game Night and Sorry To Bother You (despite how weird the latter was). I wouldn’t say Hereditary was a favorite, but fuck that film still haunts me

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
The weekend before my birthday I rented a mansion in Malibu and all of my best friends came out from Austin, NYC, SF, and SD to spend the weekend with me and it was fucking magical. On my actual birthday I just went to pole because that’s how much I love pole - I chose it over having a fancy dinner, which is what I would have normally done in the past. I turned 30.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Nothing. This year was perfect.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2018?
Still black, still yoga-y, more real leather, more boots, even more naked than before (thanks pole)

34. What kept you sane?
My workout routines, my friends, but most of all therapy

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you want the most?
Still Jay Ellis. How can anyone resist that smile!?

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Admittedly I haven’t paid as close attention to the news this year beyond the headlines (can Trump just GTFO already?), but I guess I’m glad the midterms were, for the most part, not a disappointment

37. Who did you miss?
No one…I mean, not really. I don’t think it counts as “missing” if you know you’re going to see the person again soon. 😊

38. Who are cool new people you met?
Everyone from my yoga classes, from my pole classes, from my SF and LA offices

And of course, Liam.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2018?
Everyone should go to therapy. EVERYONE. THERAPY IS THE BEST.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

This feels so good (feels so good)
You got me in the mood, for love
I don’t know your horoscope 
But I know that you keep me close
‘Cause this feels so good (so good, so good)

- HONNE - Feels So Good

This is 30

In episode 9 of the 6th season of Sex and the City, "A Woman's Right to Shoes," Carrie's Manolo's get stolen at a friend's party, and when her friend refuses to replace them because of the steep price tag, Carrie reflects on how much money she's spent on wedding and baby shower gifts for this friend, and how she feels penalized for being a single person. At the end of the episode, Carrie succeeds at getting her friend to replace the shoes by telling her that she's getting married, to herself, and that she's registered only at Manolo's for - you guessed it - the pair of shoes that were stolen. 

I've thought about this episode a lot since I first watched it a few weeks ago, and I realized that in the planning for my 30th birthday, I kind of pulled a Carrie Bradshaw - but instead of asking for a replacement pair of Manolo Blahnik's, I threw a wedding-level party for myself, a single person, renting a million dollar home in Malibu and giving my friends 7 months notice to plan their trips out for my birthday. 

I won't lie - it was a magical fucking weekend. Seeing so many of my favorite people at the same place at the same time is something I probably won't be able to replicate until I actually get married (assuming that ever happens), and I'm touched by how many people flew out - from New York, San Francisco, Oakland, and Austin - and how many people trekked the dark, off the beaten path road to the house to spend a few hours celebrating with me. 

It made me think back to my childhood and how much I struggled with friendship. My best friend in grade school was a girl who I inadvertently made cry all the time, and because I was a child and lacked empathy, I resented her for what I interpreted as oversensitivity and making me look like the bad guy (we still keep in touch and if you're reading this, hi and sorry again for being such an asshole growing up!). During my freshman year of high school, I woke up one day and discovered that the girls who I thought were my friends at school and at my church didn't actually like me, and in fact actively disliked me. I wasn't exactly "friendless" by the time high school ended, but there were very few people I considered close confidantes, and I entered college resigned to the idea that maybe I would never really make close friends, maybe I just don't get along with people, maybe I'm just not a likable person.

Then in college I joined a dance team and found people who were not only entertained by my sarcasm, but also shared it. I found people who wanted to be my friend, and not because it was convenient because we happened to be in the same classes, the same after school extracurriculars, or because our parents were friends, but because they actually liked me and wanted to be around me. I still count my decision to go to Berkeley one of the best decisions I've made in my life, and it's largely because of the network of people I was able to build during that time - people who I love and respect, who will fly across the country to spend a weekend of debauchery with me. 

As far as friendships go, I've been on an upward trajectory since college. Especially since moving to LA and becoming single, I've invested a lot of effort into nurturing my friendships and deepening the connections to the people in my life. I've been told that I'm a very reliable friend and it's something that I pride myself on, because it's a trait I've worked hard to cultivate. My belief is that if someone reaches out and wants to make time for me, then I'll reciprocate, because I think there should be an equal exchange of time and effort in any relationship. 

This is what my 30th birthday celebration was all about. It was about making space and time for the people I love and celebrating all of the wonderful memories and experiences we've shared over the years. It was about thanking the people in my life for being there, for loving me back, and for teaching me that I am indeed worthy of friendship and love.

And it was about partying. Hard. Let's just be real. 

Thanks again to everyone who came out for the party and to everyone who's taken the time to greet me today. I love you all and can't wait to spend another 30 years on this planet with you.

To See and Be Seen

Recently I've been thinking a lot about the idea of community, and how they say that a sense of belonging can help decrease one's feelings of depression and anxiety. Since my last blog I've continued to be in a good mental, emotional, and physical place, and I attribute it largely to the communities I've joined or nurtured in the last few months. Feeling like a contributor, and more importantly that my contributions are seen and valued, has transformed the way I view and experience my life in LA.

It took almost 4 years, but I finally have a regular yoga class schedule and know the names and faces of the regulars at the classes I frequent. I've dropped my guard a little and developed closer friendships with my coworkers, which has been a unique experience since I'm a remote employee and only see the people I work with once in a blue moon. And now that I have a stretch of uninterrupted time in LA, I've resolved to spend as many Sundays this summer connecting and practicing with the acroyoga community. 

Last, but certainly not least, I've started taking pole classes regularly, which is perhaps my favorite of all the communities I've joined so far. I love that pole emphasizes feminine energy, sexuality, and strength, and though my body is covered in bruises and burns, I find myself eager and excited to spend more time with such a badass community of women - women who are fearless, confident, and unapologetically sensual, yet strong. 

I can see why so many people turn to religion, to attribute the circumstances of life - both positive and negative - to a bigger master plan and purpose. I can also see why so many people fall into the trap of thinking that loneliness can only be solved with romantic love. Perhaps it's easier to think that our happiness falls into the hands of some master orchestrator or great love, and if only we find and surrender ourselves to them, then all the pieces of our lives will suddenly fall into place, all questions of the universe answered. 

Personally, I've never been convinced by religion, and I've already learned the life lesson that sacrificing myself for a relationship does not yield lasting happiness, so neither of those scenarios appeal to me much. Instead, I've learned how to find communities that I identify with, and to carve out pockets for myself within them. I've learned how to fill spaces with my presence, and how to balance giving and receiving attention. I've learned that warmth and connection is something you can cultivate irrespective of a romantic relationship. 

There is just something to be said about the satisfaction that comes from investing in something that invests equally in you. I'm grateful for the people I've met and the networks I've built over the last few months, the past year actually, because they've all contributed in one form or another to the confidence and stability I feel pretty consistently today.

Feeling seen is a powerful thing, and I don't take it for granted.