AUGUST

 August 1st, 2025

I suppose it's fitting that August start on a random Friday.

I left work early today, thinking I'd come home to pack. I didn't make very much headway, and the lack of sleep, terrible nutrition and hydration is taking its toll on me. I found myself eating an entire plate of food, in bed, and I felt disgusted with myself. I leaped out of bed, got dressed, and walked to the gym for a good workout. I had a surplus of energy from all the grazing, so it really felt like nothing. 

Grazing feels too close to binging, and I reminded myself that I simply don't want to be that person anymore. 

I can't wait to be done with this stupid move so I can get back to a proper routine. 

I keep finding things to be grateful for, despite all of the ways in which things are going wrong, I could be living through much, much worse. I haven't been able to write the past couple of days, the best way I can describe it is being "constipated" - it's not quite a writer's block, I'm not necessarily using my imagination to fill in the blanks, but I seem to be disconnected with my feelings. 

Over the course of a few voice notes, I began telling my friend about my newfound realization of how bad my fear of vulnerability is. For instance, one of the ways in which I keep failing at relationships in general (from interactions with strangers, to friendships, etc.) is my extreme aversion to communicating when something hurts me. It always just feels like a humiliation rite more than anything. I'm also extremely cynical about the outcome, and secretly feel that my vulnerability will be used against me down the line. Cognitively, I understand how distorted that is, how untrue it is, and yet emotionally, I lack the will to change. 

Another thing I've been thinking about is my relationship to men and desirability. I've come such a long way physically over the past year. I remember my last birthday, being in the lowest place I've been in probably years. Hating myself and it reflecting in how I looked. I don't necessarily adore the person I am right now, nor the body I'm living in, but I've come a long way. I suppose it should make me feel good to be seen, especially as desirable. And yet, I have mixed feelings about it. I mistrust it..a lot! I'm also thinking about how much it sucks to have Saturn in the 5H - romance always seems blocked somehow. 

I spent the better part of this week and all of last week thinking of that guy I met all those months ago, and then the one after him, and nothing brought me relief. I started to self-immolate by telling myself that it must be something wrong with me. That I must be energetically barren, or just an awful person and that's why these things keep breaking down on me, and then I remembered that if I do choose to look at things that way - not only does nothing change, but no one is coming to change my mind. I'm simply stewing in my own self-hatred. For nothing.

I'm learning to make peace with how I look, and lately it's easy because how I look is being positively reinforced by my external world which hasn't always been the case. For instance, today I was at the gym and caught a glimpse of my reflection on a screen and my eyes went straight to my forehead. And I thought to myself, "I like my hairline" - and I never thought I'd wear my hair back unless it was after a flight to Turkey for a forehead reduction. Now I'm at peace with it. Same thing with my complexion, though it's been at least a decade since I had any qualms about my dark skin - I feel oddly at ease with it. 

There is a perk to growing older, and that's the acceptance that comes with age. 

I'm learning to accept and live with myself, and that is invaluable. 

One good thing about living in a body I hate a little less is that I'm able to dress myself a little more easily. I keep trying to find good lace intimates, because I like how I look in them. And I don't feel like a girl cosplaying as a grown woman when I put them on now, which is also new for me. 

Funny how one day you wake up, and you're maturing in ways you never thought you would. I'm in a few interesting venus cycles which tracks given the recurring feelings that are surfacing. 

I am being challenged to redirect my internal dialogue from "I'm failing, I must be deficient." to "I'm course correcting, so there must be some hope after all." Mostly this is at work, but in life it also applies. 

Today's fortune reads..

Let You Go - Clara La San

- vetiveroil