Darling. I know you are scared, and God knows you have every reason to be. I know it feels impossible to take a step in any direction when you feel so lost and rudderless- when you feel like so much is stacked up against you. When you’re body is shaken by an illness that debilitates you and it makes it impossible some days to look after yourself, so you lie there hungry and tired and scared because you can’t quite explain the basic tasks you need someone else to do for you. When you’re unsure of which direction your relationship is going in, or even what you want, so you lay awake analysing it, unable to enjoy the present without a definite future. When you’ve spent so long being buffeted between what different people want for you, and ideas you’ve barely had a grasp of, that you don’t even know what you really want and what you only think you want as a result of the issues that stack up inside you like a house of cards. When no one else can tell you the answers to what you want and at every turn your made to feel watery- irrational, over-sensitive and emotional, so that even you can’t see your own emotions clearly through the tears. When you have lost so much just this year alone, that even if you were to figure out where you wanted to be, you’d feel too scared to take a step in case you lost everything again. Darling, it’s understandable that you’re scared.
But you have worked too hard, even when propelling yourself in directions, at other people’s suggestions, to give up now.
You have worked too hard at bringing a beam of brightness to other people’s lives to give up on your own.
You have struggled for too long to just lie there now. Numbing yourself with T.V you’re not even interested in, silencing your thoughts with sleep- ignoring the needs of your body or the wants of your heart.
When you wake up at 4:29 in the morning, your stomach lurching because you were too ill and tired of feeding yourself properly yesterday- your skin crawling due to the showers you’ve been unable to take- don’t force yourself to go back to sleep until a more acceptable hour. For there is nothing acceptable about your situation.
Instead, listen to your body. Make yourself the most nourishing breakfast you can even if there is very little food in the fridge. Eat it not whilst consuming TV- but while watching videos on how to heal yourself, or in silence, listening to the soft hush of bird song between the punctuation of the rain.
Take time to paint your nails- because I know how happy that makes you. Paint them because you want to, because of that sense of togetherness a manicure makes you feel.
Take a long shower even if your body is shaking with tiredness. Scrub yourself until your hair feels soft and squeaky clean, and until your skin is smooth and no longer itchy. Scrub your face with the skin routine that you’ve been skipping. Stand under the warm water until it relieves the aches in your muscles and the dryness in your eyes.
When you get out, wrap yourself up in the fluffiest towels, taking care to dry each tiny toe, like you would with a baby. Massage sweetly scented lotion into every inch of your skin. Get dressed in one of your prettiest outfits even if you’re going nowhere. And if it will make you feel better, take the time to do your makeup. Experimenting with colours because you want to and not because you were told these are the colours you should wear.
If after all this it’s still not even 6 in the morning- tidy your surroundings anyway. Make your bedroom your sanctuary.
Write down all your thoughts in a journal, even the ones that are difficult and painful to admit.
Spend some hours learning to paint or draw, just because you like it.
Arrive early to that appointment about your future even if you can’t see how it falls in line with where you want to go. And be honest about how you’re feeling lost, about your sense of direction, about where you want to be.
Enrol yourself in societies that propel you into the spotlight and capture your interests.
Turn off your phone so you’re just with your own thoughts for a day.
Even if you don’t have much money spend what you have on good food and the finest ingredients.
Cook yourself dinner and don’t have the tv on. Listen to new music instead. So that you fill your little kitchen with sights and sounds and so that you feel the earth on the vegetables, the cooking oil and the herbs, beneath your creative and capable hands.
Share your creations even if they’re not perfect
Do things because you enjoy them not because you’re good at it.
Make loose blueprints- but throw away the plans
Fall in love with yourself before you try and fall in love with others
And trust if something is meant to be then somehow it will happen.
Then at the end of the day, when you finally crash again, know that it’s okay to feel scared. At least you’re moving.