vetiveroil

August 13th, 2025 Last night was fun. I had no energy to journal, and so I never finished my entry. Because I’ve decided that this is, in fact my space, I may go back and finalize it in some form or fashion. Something I’ve been marinating with is my therapist’s feedback from yesterday’s session. I notice our sessions have started to become a little more clinical, but there’s a level of trust there so her questions, no matter how investigative don’t feel as probing. One of the things we’ve been discussing is how my very emotionally distant relationship with my father has made me distant from men in general. I’ve often asked myself if I fall into that stereotype of “daddy issues” and I never thought I did, but I guess I just wasn’t thinking deep enough. I never felt anything towards most men but sheer apathy . The women in my life, as emotionally volatile as they were always did a great job at modeling basic care and love that whatever men wanted to offer me seemed to pale in comparison...

August 11th, 2025 “Mercury is the planet associated with communication, expression, and cognition. It's also thought to influence how people think, talk, and understand things, and can affect learning, curiosity, and the ability to communicate.” ✶ I used to like it when we were together.  There was a time when you understood me better than I understood myself. That touched me so deep, because I was used to being misunderstood, rejected, left out.  When we were together, it felt like that was all I needed.  Y ou were peering into my soul, and I was naked, raw; unashamed. Today I woke up, and you weren’t next to me. Laughter has gone quiet.  Brazen attempts just feel foolish now. You’re peering into me; but it’s no longer my soul you’re seeing. 8/11/24.

August 11th, 2025 9:14AM - Integrity Due to some irresponsible actions taken in the past, I’ve been reflecting a lot on the concept of integrity . What it is, how it looks, what it means to have it - where my lines are drawn, essentially. Nothing catastrophic happened today, despite what my brain has been telling me. I had two separate chances to go back and revisit my bad deed - I didn't. I prayed this morning for protection as well as the wisdom to know what to do. I'm not sure if my spirit or just my fear of making things worse was running the show, but I figured the prayer was working. Covering my tracks feels a little bit like revisiting and I don't want to revisit.  12:22PM - My Desert Rose: I saw 2 of the blooms had snapped off over the weekend. My desert rose is now down to one fully bloomed flower, and one on the verge of ripening. I believe this is the last bloom of the season. That makes me weirdly bittersweet. I'm very attached to this plant. The symbolism o...

August 10th, 2025 1:50AM: I’m getting a familiar feeling. It’s been at least a year and half since I would lay on my bed in my apartment in Brooklyn and wonder why I felt so hopeless. For some reason, an old friend briefly came to mind. I’m working on extending more grace to others - not being so extreme with my feelings, but I think that’s supposed to start with me. I’m wallowing in my own remorse, self-hatred, and whatever else exists in the cesspool that is my subconscious. I should go back to working out more. It’s been two weeks, and I haven’t completely fallen off, but the decline has been steep. I’m also thinking of my father. In brief moments like this, I can just almost humanize him enough to feel pity for him. He said to me today, in response to reminding him that I’ll be twenty four, “you’re advancing - and in the same way I’m becoming an old man. You were just a baby.” And that felt like someone has threw an axe directly at my chest. I miss when I was a child, when my fathe...

August 9th, 2025 Dear Ancestors, I am writing to confess today.  Yesterday, I did something bad. I knew it was bad when I did it, but my insecurities spoke louder than my integrity. It's been sitting on the back of my neck since, but this evening when I took down my hair and the warm water hit my scalp - it suddenly cascaded down my back and has been clinging to me since. After nearly a day of pushing back the anxiety humming at the back of my head, I'm now feeling the weight of it all. My conscience (or rather, my anxiety) plays out the severity of the consequences, almost like a flashback. It feels like one of those moments when time almost stops and it all feels so heavy and intense. I don't know where to start, I don't know how to justify it, let alone help myself. I'm afraid to speak, because it seems like I'm smearing my own name by doing so. If I speak, I am forfeiting my victimhood. My armor. I am, instead, naked and ashamed.  I'm making errors quite...

August 7th, 2025 Last night I felt really tender. I found myself in tears, and then it hit me - my luteal phase.  The good news is that the tenderness vanished by morning, but the aftertaste lingered.  At work, YouTube started playing this video , completely by chance. An interesting part that caught my attention was when he spoke about about how in children, there’s often a “split” that occurs in how they view their caregivers. They’ll split the parent into two separate people the “good” parent and the “bad” parent to help them make sense of why a single person can occupy these different roles - loving, and yet sometimes cruel.  Yesterday, we had a relative over the house. She was there with her two young kids, and the little girl (about 6 years old) ran up behind me in the kitchen, and audaciously opened our fridge door to see what was in it. In an instant, her mom pounced on her, and gave her a firm smack on the behind and scolded her for her bad manners. I watched as ...

August 6th, 2025 I woke up this morning and felt re-invigorated. Maybe it’s because I slept 6 hours, as opposed to the usual 4-5 I've getting lately, and have been dialing back the sugar and processed foods, or maybe it’s because of the insights I received yesterday. My therapist pointed out to me that the big “stressor” I’m probably experiencing whiplash from is the whole ordeal with my previous manager, and his complete and total disregard for me as a person. After reflecting on that, I realized she was right. I can’t help but continually feel frazzled by that experience. It’s been months, and I’m telling myself that I need to forgive myself, and that I didn’t mistreat anyone, and so I don’t deserve to carry the shame of what someone else did to me. Funny how your brain can know something your body struggles to accept. My shame comes from not speaking up for myself more, and I'm perceiving more slights than usual as a result. Today, I found out I screwed up at work (again). M...

August 5th, 2025 I forgot to pray again this morning.  I also realized I like it here, a lot,  actually.  The process all feels very convenient, which is nice. I ended up leaving work early again, this time for a Gyno appointment. Everyone complimented me, and I guess the weight loss is evident now, which should make me feel good, but it just leaves a funny feeling in my stomach, which I think is resentment . I weighed 4 pounds more than what my scale tells me at home, and my heart has been racing since. I wonder if eating like shit the past week is to blame, but it makes me want to get back on track and never get off.  After that appointment, I ended up in a therapy session, and it was oddly insightful. We divulged some of my past history, and it was strange segmenting and dissecting my own childhood in that way. Yet, I didn't feel very ashamed. My therapist asked if I had any men I felt were "role models" for me at any point, and I replied no. She seemed taken abac...

August 4th, 2025 This morning, despite having ample time to spare, I forgot to complete my prayer ritual before leaving the house. That's a first of many weeks for me, and I felt awful about it at first, though today is overwhelmingly positive.  I’m asking myself today, are there certain levels of self-scrutiny that become dangerous to a person’s well-being? I keep trying to sniff out the root of something . And yet, I can’t really find it. Ambivalent attachment? Weak will? Dysregulated nervous system? Lack of healthy socialization? Propensity towards self-harm? Thinking about oneself too much? I’m running myself into a spiral trying to figure out why I am the way that I am, and in turn, why I keep feeling the way I feel. Why there seems to be so much friction with other people. Even when they’re okay , I never feel fully settled. That, or I feel utterly ashamed of myself in relation to them. I’m trying to implement more movement again, later I’ll go a long walk, since I’ll have so...

  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 quit...

  MY DESIRES: First and foremost, I want a big loft for an apartment.  → it must feel warm - with brick finishes and solid wood throughout. → a venetian plaster mural at the corridor. → large, floor to ceiling windows → a plot of land to grow vetiver and lavender on. → a plant nursery to house my adeniums. → an art collection comprised of pieces from my friends. → wall-mounted incense burners to waft throughout the space - anytime I want.  → hardwood floors or black large format tiles. → an Andrianna Shamaris petrified wood console table. → a Japanese style soaking tub (made of black stone). → a solid wood 8ft table to host frequent dinner parties at. I want a pet cat (a girl) and a big ass flemish rabbit (also a girl).  I want a career I built just for me - not just something I stumbled into. I want to travel (often) and indulge my curiosity. I want a body I love to look at, that feels good to live in. I want to have real connections, not just a passive network of ...

 July 27th, 2025 This morning I did my makeup, wore earrings, and slicked my hair back (as much as I could in its current state). What I intended to do was buy coffee and go to the park for another long walk, but then it started to pour vigorously, so I ended up at the gym, over-done, smelling like my Rose-Oudh tincture..trying to catch my breath on a treadmill - sweat running down my temples.   For what it's worth, I left still looking good. I saw that the gallery I used to frequent earlier this year was having a celebration to commemorate the program I knew them for, as well as a farewell because they are shutting down for the time being. A part of me was wanting to shower, dress myself elegantly, and go - partially because I'd like to attend and commemorate what's happening, but mostly because I hoped I'd see someone I haven't crossed paths with in some time.  It was sometime in March when we first crossed paths.  I had stumbled into the gallery purely by cha...

 July 23rd, 2025 Today was taxing as hell.  Maybe it's day three of my period, maybe I'm just running on five hours of sleep, and maybe it's because I haven't eaten more than like 600 calories a day in the past 4 days - I am spent . I went to the park for a long walk after work today, 45 minutes and 3 miles into it I realized I fucked up. I was too tired to walk back and so it was sleep in the park, or risk passing out. I didn't pass out, thankfully. Today I received exciting news - I was approved to proceed with something I asked for at work. An opportunity to upskill, and I feel so much more secure about it.  I am tempted to start overthinking and doubting myself. Yet there's a part of me that knows clearly the things I want, and is willing to pursue them head on.  I have to keep reminding myself that the entire journey won't always be visible, and sometimes taking the first step is what sets things in motion - and said motion is constantly shifting accord...

July 21st, 2025 Today was a blur, but, that’s been the entire month of July so far. All I can recall is that it’s been “slow” — so unlike the month of March..and May where everything felt like it was happening in light years. In March, I felt 13 again, in May, I had just turned 16. In July, I’m just 23.. I think one thing I’m allowing myself to swallow is the idea that I may forever be invisible . And I’m figuring out how I’d live my life if that were just a given..because it has felt that way for some time now. I’m still working on my terms and conditions for the upcoming year, but I know for a fact one of them will be to cease trying to appear..Simple as it sounds, it’s so taxing, and maybe July is the perfect month for early application of concept. For a long time, my strategy..or rather - my subconscious thought process has been to analyze and refine myself according to that data (in true Virgo fashion, LOL) what isn’t optimal for the results that I’m looking for. For instance, my ...

July 20th, 2025 My desert rose is on its third bloom cycle now.  Two Monday mornings ago, when I pulled up the blinds, the biggest bloom was beginning to sag, just as the one next to it was on the verge of opening up. Currently, I am staring at two flowers — which is delightful.  I have never, and still don't consider myself to be a plant person. However, I knew for some time that I'd wanted an adenium  before I saw them in person on my way out of a Trader Joe's I frequent. It wasn't ideal in any sense.  I imagined I'd have one of the arabicum vairety (my favorite) with a huge caudex and dozens of bright pink flowers, but most importantly, I imagined that it would have the sentimental value of being gifted to me by a lover. Like with a bouquet of roses, it's what I wrote down in my journal and hoped would manifest. At that point, May had sprung into June, the man I met the month prior had vanished and with that vanishment came a lingering bitterness. I spent an ...

July 19th, 2025 Today I drove to a wine bar in Brooklyn. I was hoping to secure a venue for my birthday party, but upon arrival, I found that I didn't care for the neighborhood or actual bar very much...I was able to commission my birthday cake, that I am very happy about.  I'm in disbelief that twenty-four is now on my doorstep, it feels like I accomplished so much, but in comparison to my desires, it feels very little. While driving through Brooklyn and the Western tip of Long Island, I was taking mental notes of which areas I liked the most, and which areas were particularly affluent or culturally homogenized. My brain also couldn't help but note the unkempt, clearly impoverished areas as well as what the people who inhabited them looked like. It all felt so extreme. I began to feel sad at how limiting poverty is, how political something as abstract as beauty could be and how so much of what we can accomplish is dictated by the amount of resources we have available to u...

July 17th, 2025 I stopped praying when I was around 11 years old. Back then, I was taught to pray the Mormon way, which starts with: Dear Heavenly Father, and ends with: And I say all of this, in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ,      Amen. These days, I am praying again, to perhaps a totally different entity, but I can't help but follow the same sequence. Every morning, after I’ve dressed myself for work, packed my breakfast and work lunch, grabbed my keys, and put on shoes and earrings, I find myself reaching for the little vial of Vetiver oil on my bedside table. I’ll roll it around in my hands, and then one drop on each wrist and start my prayer.  Vetiver originates from the Indian subcontinent.  Most of the Vetiver used commercially - I've read is produced in Haiti. From an agricultural and practical standpoint, it's a stable crop to grow and harvest, and is said to aid in protecting land from soil erosion. From a metaphysical perspec...