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[ruhlare]

someone who fills your silence with understanding. someone who hears the words you never say out loud. someone who feels the weight of your pain and sees beyond your anger. someone who walks gently through the parts you guard from others.

[haelxtii]

Choosing yourself

Choosing yourself doesn’t always start off beautifully

Sometimes it comes with strong winds and broken branches

until there’s no more leaves on your fruit tree that you tried to bear

Choosing yourself isn’t always beautiful

Most times it comes with heartaches and loneliness

just the right amount of tears to fill a bucket

Choosing yourself doesn’t always start beautifully

Most times it leaves you in a space where maybe considering not choosing yourself could fill a temporary happiness so you’re blind to the absence you’re feeling

and maybe that’s okay

Maybe that’s enough

Enough to get by that day

But one day the wind will calm down

and you’ll realize you’re still standing

even if the tree is bare

even if no one noticed how hard it was to walk away

So you let it fall

and you plant something new

something soft

something real

And maybe it’s not full yet

maybe it’s just a seed

but it’s yours

[shakespearesdaughters]

The Diaries of Franz Kafka, 1912

[luthienne]

We open each meeting by asking a simple question: What is keeping you alive today? This allows us to revel in the sometimes small motions that get us to the Next Thing. Yes, I did not want to get out of bed this morning, but there was one single long shard of sunlight that stumbled in through a tear in my curtains, and the warmth of it hitting my arm got me to that first hour of living. There was my dog, who, on the mornings I do not want to get out of bed, will rest silently at my feet and wait for me to slowly emerge from under the covers, and seeing her reminds me that I do, in fact, have only one lifetime in which I can love this animal. As far as I know, we will love each other only here, for a while, and that is worth seeing what I can make out of a few hours, even when I’m wrecked with despair.

Hanif Abdurraqib, In Defense of Despair

[roycohn]

david lynch understood on a fundamental level how abusive and exploitative the world is to those with the least power, particularly women and children. he created an entire lifetime's worth of cinematically and narratively groundbreaking work trying to grapple with that hostility and abuse, trying to reconcile the evil that exists in the hearts of everyday men with the goodness he saw there as well. he made survivors of unspeakable trauma feel seen and known in a way that few artists ever have and ever will, and never once shied away from the truth he knew and believed: that we are all innocent, that what has been done to you is not who you are, and even in times of abject despair, there are people who love you, who will not forget you or stop trying to save or defend or avenge you. i don't want that to go without notice. many people are mourning him for different reasons, and i agree, he was one of the greatest and most imaginative artists to ever be given free reign to paint on a cinematic canvas. but first and foremost, david lynch was an artist of enormous empathy, and i think those of us who saw ourselves in his work because of the empathy it afforded us are grieving particularly hard today.

his memory will always be a blessing.

[hayamidate]

[dream-wifey]

A beautiful life is possible, please never forget that. No matter how much pain and disappointment you've experienced.

[your-gay-grandma]

i need everyone to know that community is what will save us all in every single way imaginable. you forming a bond with your neighbour or coworker might help them move house or feel less alone or have the courage to leave an unhealthy living environment. you helping a stranger might provide them with hope. in turn, being able to lean on your community in times of need will save you. your broader bonds with your community are the revolution we need. our society seeks to divide and separate us in so many ways but we are all so much more united in our struggles and joys than you are made to believe. we need to hold onto each other very tightly.

[a-quiet-green-agreement]

She wanted to scream, but a person who is alone—alone in the absolute sense of the word—does not scream out her despair; it is useless. Deserts do not hear. But she can do things with her hands which even a desert must notice. She can tear at the sand until the desert bleeds.

– Stig Dagerman, from “Men of Character,” The Games of Night (Quartet, 1986)

[cinematapestry]

Porto (2016) dir. Gabe Klinger

[drops-of-universe]

trauma is so silly. its like “wow this memory Scares me to the point of feeling unwell”

[sanstoitniloi]

"You survive this and in some terrible way, which I suppose no one can ever describe, you are compelled, you are corralled, you are bullwhipped into dealing with whatever it is that hurt you. And what is crucial here is that if it hurt you, that is not what’s important. Everybody’s hurt. What is important, what corrals you, what bullwhips you, what drives you, torments you, is that you must find some way of using this to connect you with everyone else alive. This is all you have to do it with. You must understand that your pain is trivial except insofar as you can use it to connect with other people’s pain; and insofar as you can do that with your pain, you can be released from it, and then hopefully it works the other way around too; insofar as I can tell you what it is to suffer, perhaps I can help you to suffer less."

- James Baldwin, The Artist's Struggle for Integrity

[ashstfu]

forever in awe of people who pay attention. people who wait for you while you tie your shoes while the others have walked away. when they continue listening intently while the rest of the group stopped listening. noticing your moments of silence when everyone else hasn’t. “this made me think of you” noticing things you never even noticed about yourself. people who say “text me when you get home safe.” people who make you laugh until you cry. childhood friends who keep in touch. people with genuine intentions. people who are soft when the world has given them every opportunity to turn hard. the “let’s get ice cream” at 3am friend. the turn up the music in the car and sing friend. people whose actions match their words. people who make the world feel less chaotic. kindred spirits. the trustworthy and honest. hard workers. good listeners. clear communicators. people who love you for who you are. people who don’t ask you to be anything other than yourself. people who choose you. people who stay.

[mournfulroses]

Vladimir Mayakovsky, from a letter featured in "Love in the Heart of Everything; The Correspondence between Vladimir Mayakovsky & Lili Brik, 1915-1930,"

[soracities]

thinking over and over and over of that clip from a maya angelou talk about the importance of knowing one another's history. no matter how brutal no matter how bleak no matter how despairing no matter anything because the only way through it is to go all the way through it. and the only way to build anything with one another is by having gone all the way through it because otherwise there is no connection. whats a connection worth that's built on ignorance? sustained by ignorance? "only equals can make friends" she says. only equals.

[soracities]

clip here. full talk here.

[thisismatilda-deactivated202401]

Not.

by Erin Hanson

You are not your age,

Nor the size of clothes you wear,

You are not a weight,

Or the colour of your hair.

You are not your name,

Or the dimples in your cheeks,

You are all the books you read,

And all the words you speak,

You are your croaky morning voice,

And the smiles you try to hide,

You're the sweetness in your laughter,

And every tear you've cried,

You're the songs you sing so loudly,

When you know you're all alone,

You're the places that you've been to,

And the one that you call home,

You're the things that you believe in,

And the people that you love,

You're the photos in your bedroom,

And the future you dream of,

You're made of so much beauty,

But it seems that you forgot,

When you decided that you were defined,

By all the things you're not.

[expensiveity]

God, i don’t want to be stagnant. in this same place next year. introduce me to me. help me to see myself the way that you see me. do whatever you need to do in my life that guides me closer to you. and my destiny. heal my heart so my triggers become my testimonies. add or remove whoever or whatever you need to help me grow spiritually. develop in me the character to not just reach the places we talk about but the character to stay in those places.