I wasn’t able to post yesterday, but better late than never..

 

 

Hello lovelies!

Today I’ll be sharing a couple of affirmations with you, for the times when you might need a little pick me up, some encouragement, or even just a reminder that you are wonderful. I found a similar post by another blogger and I hope you’ll check her site out as this is what I was inspired by. 🙂

I have incomprehensible worth.

I have come to this planet to learn to love myself more, and to share that love with all those around me.

It is safe to look within.

I trust the process of life.

We are all family, and the planet is our home.

Whatever I need to know is revealed to me at exactly the right time.

I devote a portion of my time to helping others. It is good for my own health.

I know that old, negative patterns no longer limit me. I let them go with ease.

In the infinity of life where I am, all is perfect, whole, and complete.

What’s your favourite affirmation from here? Do you have any of your own?

Peace, love, hugs, magic, sunshine, and all the other lovely things in the world to you, my reader.

Thank you dreamers xo

 

 

 

 

‘I’d tap that white ass.’ [about the school librarian]

There’s this boy in my grade who has become quite notorious, or at least in my eyes, for his digusting, objectifying comments about women, about girls. He’s in my maths class, so I end up hearing a lot of what he has to say. He has a friend who thinks it’s funny to make rude motions behind the the teachers’ back. He must admire him, because he started doing it too.

I was in line one day last week, waiting to go to my english class. He was behind me, a tall, looming, big, maori boy. Not that I really cared. I was having a conversation with a good male friend when he suddenly stopped talking, and laughed. Some sort of disbelief mixed with genuine laughter. “Do you know what so and so is doing behind you?” I turn around. He’s just standing there. I turn back around, and all the boys laugh. “I’ll tell you in class.” my friend whispers, smiling. As it turns out, he’d been pretending to slap my butt. Multiple times.

It was a tiny bit funny, but not in the way  you’d think. And it prompted me to think.. “wow, that didn’t make me feel great. or even like a person, really.’ ‘

‘What can I do about that?’

Well, it has to be something.

Because I don’t want to live, nor have my generations live in a world where being a girl is the highest form of insult. Where we are objectified to that point that we feel ashamed to go out wearing anything that may be deemed revealing, in case we get called sluts. But, dressing modestly makes us prudes. Where we are expected to need men/ boys to save us, to help us, to be with us, to protect us, to fix our cars and mow our lawns and be top CEOs and go places and do shit. like. a. man. would. because. we. are. only. female.

Feminism is an equal rights movement that aims to remove the disparities between genders, including those of people with non binary gender indentities. For example, the wage gap,As of today, Australia’s national gender pay gap is sitting at 15.3%. There is even more of a difference for women- and people, of colour.

Perhaps, the saddest part of all is that this happens a lot. It is common and ingrained in our society. Subtle and not so subtle sexism, I mean. There’s this girl in my grade who refuses to shave her legs. I have judged her in the past, and I still can’t wrap my head around why she doesn’t seem to care, but I no longer make it my problem. I choose to shave my legs, but that’s my decision. Do what makes you feel empowered, and do it for you.

Have you ever been told to man up, or stop doing something like a girl? I happens to boys too, and that’s why this is an everybody issue. Have you ever been told that your clothes don’t equal consent.. or that they do? Have you ever been shamed for what you choose to wear, or don’t?

An interesting point: there isn’t a male equivalent to the word ‘slut’ or ‘whore’, or anything like that. Not that it’s a nice word, and should even be used on anybody, but consider that.. us women, us girls; that’s not us, and yet, that’s what we’re sometimes made out to be.

Even things our parents, our friends, our teachers, do, can be offensive. In Year Seven, there was this very odd boy who liked me. He found out one day, that a girl in our grade had upset me, and so he took it into his hands to punish her.. he told me what he’d do by means of ‘demonstration’, pushing me under a small table, one hand over my mouth, the other groping me. There was no space to move, or words to escape my lips. I came out soon after, and all the boys laughed. He kept following me. And then there’s the boy who likes porn so much he tries to watch it in English class. Who thinks all girls will fall at his feet, drooling over his abs. No chance.

An angle not commonly discussed within this issue is animal rights being a feminist issue. It is wrong, in this day and age, to box up this issue and whittle it down to one particular thing. We must consider all.

“Women = Nonhuman Animals = Sexualized = Dominated = Meat = Objects of Pleasurable Consumption.

Nonhuman Animals = Feminized = Sexualized = Dominated = Meat
= Objects of Pleasurable Consumption. ”

— Dr. Corey Lee Wrenn of Vegan Feminist Network

[I encourage you to visit this link to understand better]

“Animal rights is a feminist issue. There, I said it,” wrote Aph Ko, a contributor to Everyday Feminism. For Ko, the exploitation of animals’ lives and bodies parallel the feminists’ fight against the patriarchy’s general dismissal of women’s rights to their own bodies. She points out that many women, especially feminists, are very aware of the objectification rhetoric concerning the portrayal of women’s bodies in the media.

Many times, women are reduced to accessories in male-centered stories. “

I wrote this post today because I believe that it needs to be talked about. This isn’t the first time I’ve opened myself up to criticism or mentioned ‘the unmentionable’, and it certainly won’t be the last.

Peace, love, hugs, magic, sunshine, and all the other lovely things in the world to you, my reader.

Thank you dreamers xo

 

PS. First off, get out of your reader and go to my website to view this post! I’ve changed my blog design a lil x hope you like it!

If you’re ever feeling a bit drained, you’ll know that the little things make a big difference.

I wasn’t having ten greatest day today, but my mood was instantly lifted when I walked into the bathrooms and found the mirrors covered in beautiful quotes.

One of them really stood out to me: “be thankful for you pain, for you can’t have the rainbow without the rain.” How true is this? Not too long ago, I had a bad facial rash. I always knew that I was lucky to be blessed with great skin, but after getting that, I’m truly grateful. When we lose things, and even if we end up getting them back, we gain something else: an abundance of gratitude, a hint of patience and a whole lotta love.

boundless, infinite love to you, my beautiful readers xo

Happy Wednesday!

I’ll be honest.. It’s been four years since I first started blogging, and not once have I ever run out of post ideas.

Okay, that might not be true.

But generally, I have some good ideas!

Like this. This is one hell of a good post baby.

I hope you’re on the lookout for some channel recommendations, because I’m about to share one.

Button Poetry.

There is a certain beauty to spoken word poetry. The ability to turn the bad into good; the nothingness into art. Spoken word poetry will spill out of your lips like milk and honey, and it will make you so uncomfortable, but in a very comfortable way.

Button poetry is about the elephant in the room; the things you’d rather ignore but can’t, because they are numerous and commanding and much, much bigger than you or I.

Button poetry is about the beautiful [and ugly] things that happen when we are alone, inside our brains.

Button poetry is about you, and me, and the way we relate to the world.

The way we can breathe life into our words.

Step back, and be a little proud.

this is a nice one (:

 

boundless, infinite love to you, my beautiful readers xo

 

Happy Friday everybody!

As you know, it’s been back to school time for a while now.. six weeks, to be exact.

Not too long ago, I got my first English assessment task. I had to write a story on survival. I was initially thinking of writing about depression, but then I remembered that I didn’t need a good story.. I needed something unforgettable.

Enjoy.

And please leave some feedback, if you can!

My late husband was a special soul with a brilliant mind.

His every spoken word was beautifully crafted. I was not the same way and didn’t see his gift for what it was. I remember being critical, because at some level, his willingness to love and feel so deeply brought out my own insecurities.

I had always feared that I wasn’t enough.

Over time though, he changed. And I remained the same. A young woman in an aging body, stubborn and unwilling to accept the good she had while it remained.

The days of realisation dawned on me like a new sun, but I soon came to understand that they weren’t to last.

He was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s on January 1^st, 2004.

I was new again, dancing with my childhood sweetheart in a crowded school hall, posing for pictures I didn’t know were being taken.

My mind is my camera, and there are endless photos. I want to hold them close, just liked I held him, but they are inside. Until my mind deteriorates.

 

And then I’ll lose my children, then I’ll lose my love.

Or what is left of it.

 

One day, he sat, staring into space, not a single word escaping his lips.

He was so brilliant that it was as if I could hear his mind, all the words bouncing off, coming together so lovely, as if they were meant to be from the start; like us.

One day, the silence was deafening.

At this point, I’d learnt to read his eyes, and the way they crinkled at the corners, or didn’t crinkle at all. I’d learnt to read his nose, and the way it turned up at the tip. I’d learnt to read his lips, but they no longer formed words. Any words.

I longed to hear his silent words.

I’d learnt to read his ears, and the way it looked when he listened. But they were never open.

His carefully set features were a constant message, but they read blank; a new language he hadn’t quite gotten the hang of.

 

“Hello, hello, hello.” “Hello, is anybody home?” “Hello, I miss you.” “Hello, I love you.” “Hello, hello, hello.”

I spoke to him in childish words, because perhaps, he was only a young being, still blooming, not withering.

And I could be his protector, making sure he wasn’t picked too soon. But how soon is too soon? The soil of this earth seemed to rot him from the inside, turning colours into varied shades of back and white.

“I’m sorry” I told him, “I’m sorry that your mind is turning against you. Why are you killing yourself with your own weapon?”

 

I imagined the words settling on his skin, the ones he’d want to remember, being stored away for short term use. I’d speak their unique syllables, and they’d be released from their confines. Could I teach his ailing mind to be brilliant again?

“Can you wake up? You’re here, but you’re not, and that’s so painful for me. Watching you go in plain sight. Do you understand? Every day for the last thirty years, you’ve loved me in every way possible. And maybe you didn’t know it, but I loved you too.

And now I’m just another person, or thing. Can you tell the difference? Our memories and connections are what make us special. You’ve lost that, so I’m trying to hold on for the both of us. I can’t go from being your everything to something unrecognisable. I don’t know how to do that, and neither did you, until the disease took over your mind.”

For a brief moment, it was as if he had come alive again. Every single expression under the sun was visible in his normally vacant face, a clear reminder that he was there not there.

Eventually, I’d have to face the inevitable- acceptance. The man I loved would not be back, so there was only one thing left to do: the letting go.

 

I have lost my children
I have lost my love
I just sit in silence
Let the pictures soak
Out of televisions

I heard about this short film a while back, and then, again today, in a post by Abby Strangward over @ sea foaming. You should check that post out too.

This short film was a stellar example of how quickly our fears can turn into monsters. Except there’s no monsters, not under our beds, or even in our heads. There’s just us, and the way our minds turn against our bodies. There’s no harmony in this depiction. One man, at war with himself.

Just go under water, and inhale. It’ll feel great.

Don’t pull me under.. don’t pull me under.

Reliance, fight, submission. You cannot win in this way. It does sometimes feel, with depression and anxiety, like trying to parch year old thirst. There are ways to keep certain feelings at bay, using methods that bring other ‘monsters’ out of hiding.

It’s hard to breathe when you’re underwater.