Neon Gypsy

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2011-11-01T21:12:00.000-07:00

There is a quiet beauty in everybody.

It sings like the first call of a bird, it shouts like a child, it glows

like an imploding star.

It is poetry, the way they speak, in their walk, in their movements.

Hold it sacred, for that beauty is where you will find your

own solace, your own peace.

Look within others to learn how to see yourself.

(Photos via bleue marine, )

Time

2011-11-01T20:38:00.000-07:00

It has been so long since I have last been here,

since I have shared and dreamed and explained on this page.

Since I last posted I have moved to a new country,

surrounded myself with new smiles,

encountered countless new trees and danced on new soil.

But I miss writing these thoughts,

recording my hopes for the world,

taking all I am feeling and writing it here.

So I am back, ready, stronger and wiser and more excited about life.

I hope you continue with me on this journey, this adventure,

in this wild wild world.

take me away

2011-08-19T19:10:00.000-07:00

I believe in running away to the seaside

to crying in the presence of seagulls

to dreaming as the darkness settles in.

There is something beautiful in the dance

that is created in the lonely spaces, the lovely spaces,

where all is quiet but the chaos inside yourself.

Look out into the distance

and into yourself.

Find what you want, hold the thought in your hand,

and continue running-

this time, towards that thought.

children of nature

2011-07-16T17:00:00.000-07:00

Run outside in the rain barefoot and spin spin spin.

Breathe in the droplets, the smell of the trees, the feeling of electic life in the thunder that roars overhead, in the shadows that dance in the corners.

Feel the heartbeat of the earth in the moist soil, the damp grass, the great big sky overhead.

Do not resist that hesitant moment between wisdom and new beginnings.

It is wisdom in itself,

it is the new morning you have waited for

through this long night.

People

2011-07-13T15:30:00.000-07:00

Surround yourself with dynamic, spontaneous, beautiful people.

People who challenge you

and take your breath away.

Revolution

2011-06-13T02:20:00.000-07:00

The new rebellion is not hatred or destruction.

The world around us is littered in these things already,

to fight the fire with a match

is only asking to get burned.

Watch those who try, watch the spark catch and fly down the tiny branch in their hand

until they are seeing their skin singed.

Until they are watching their own clothing burning

and calling it a success.

We will refuse those lies.

We will refuse to be like them.

Rebellion is defiance,

but the best will be in the way

they don't expect, the way they cannot anticipate.

We are expected to divide. We are expected to compete.

We are expected to accept the rules that benefit us

and ignore those they hurt.

But we will not.

The new rebellion is the revolution,

the new thought and love and creation emerging quietly across the globe.

People who see beyond our artificial barriers and boundaries,

who refuse to be anything less than united.

Beyond cities, beyond countries-

this is a world wide shift in consciousness. This is a shift in thought.

You are already breathing it, living it.

Fighting quietly against those who hate and are cruel,

fighting against those who try to say

one human is better than another.

It is in the acceptance,

the unconditional love and support to those around us.

It is in the love to a stranger, the offering to buy a dinner,

the paying of a toll for the person behind you

where it shines.

This magic, this love, this new beginning.

It is our time, it is our revolt.

be brave

2011-04-24T10:40:00.000-07:00

I think the most beautiful thing a person can do is live.

Live outrageously, courageously,

with intention.

There is a difference between those who live and those who exist.

There is a difference in their voice, in their step, in their breath.

Most importantly,

there is a difference in their heart.

They say there are two ways to bring brightness into this world: to be the light, but also to be the mirror that reflects it. I don't think the mirror has to be quieter. I don't think the mirror is any less of light.

Have you seen a disco ball?

It takes the light one step further, one step further into beautiful.

"My life is my message" Ghandi said,

and that is the best message I think one can give.

Live as you intend the world to be, live as you wish people to be, live

and they will follow.

And it will be beautiful.

Believe in kissing.

2011-03-31T20:32:00.000-07:00

so live!

2011-03-30T14:09:00.000-07:00

To live is a challenge, a revolution, a constant reinvention

of yourself.

Do not listen to the idea of evolution,

take your soul and shake it,

in one swift motion

wipe your slate clean.

This is the beginning of something grand,

extraordinary!

Every one of your hopes is alive, is illuminated, is

breathing in time with you.

And you have the control.

This is your world.

You have the control-

to create beauty, life, a world you can love living in.

You are the

change-maker, pace-breaker

leader to those around you.

Be the change you wish to see,

and those around will follow.

nature, nurture

2011-03-21T14:16:00.000-07:00

Reach out, reach up. The sky is blue and wide and open,

the clouds are smiling on your soul.

Our souls are free, not meant to be confined

in human made walls and limits!

Open your eyes to your heart,

look at who you are, what you want and where

you stand.

Reach past what you know or can find easily-

embrace the challenge

and then run.

filled with hope, hope filled, hopeful

2011-03-04T07:00:00.000-08:00

I wanted to say something to you.

Something like

"Hello there,

good day isn't it,

beautiful day isn't it,

would you be mine, be mine all the time?"

You are beautiful and wonderful and surprising and new.

And I am hopeful for no reason.

But sometimes that is the best reason.

do good

2011-03-02T21:56:00.000-08:00

“ Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something."

— Henry David Thoreau

born this way

2011-02-18T00:10:00.000-08:00

Love this song

and this girl does an incredible job.

words words words

2011-02-08T01:52:00.000-08:00

All I want is for someone to listen, someone to hear, someone to know, someone to understand.

Those someones give the words

meaning.

supernovas and stardust

2011-02-05T00:24:00.000-08:00

You are the light in my veins, the sunshine under my feet.

You are the sound of the ocean buried in the conch,

the sound of the hidden coins in my mother's couch.

You are the Atlas of my world, the invisible hand, the center of it all.

let go

2011-01-17T01:46:00.000-08:00

There is that one thing.

That one moment you hesitated, that one second you waited,

that one thing that has not stopped

haunting you since.

Can you see it? It hurts to imagine it, fear pulses in your toes.

But look at it. See it for what it is-

raw, naked, imperfect.

And now it is a burning ball of fire in the

pit of your stomach, white hot flames

licking your guts.

Hold your hands in front of you,

palms up. Now reach inside yourself,

reach through the skin and tissue and muscles

and grab that flaming mess.

Throw it far far away...

watch it fly, watch it disapear beyond the horizon,

see the sparks fly up from where it landed.

And feel the rush of the relief

course through you.

Free.

new year, now clear

2011-01-10T00:30:00.000-08:00

It has been many breaths, many moons, many shooting stars and lightning bursts

but I am home. Not in the sense of

a structure or wooden frame, not in the sense of dinner table conversations,

or family movie nights, or landscaped lawns. Home in the

idea of the word, in the comfort in my heart

and understanding in my veins.

I am back and ready for a year of light and love,

a year of glimmering home in the shadowy corners,

a year of chances and make-believe.

speak, scream, shout!

2010-11-24T00:47:00.000-08:00

There are moments when your hear your heart beat and you know it is time.

And your brain may fight and push and argue

but you know.

You know that you have words that have been locked in your soul,

waiting to fly out

and it is time to set them free.

In mid-air they dazzle and shine, so much that you may fear them.

Don't. Your power is your truth, your power is your love,

your power is in these words that need to be said.

Everyone wants to know they are not alone,

everyone wants to know there is a person who is looking out for them

no matter what. No matter what.

So speak those words, tell the truths, cry out to the wind, the sky, the air,

the people that you love.

The people that matter.

They are waiting-

this is your time.

Sorry for the terribly long breaks between posts right now my lovely readers, I'll try to be better! Thank you always for the sweet and wonderful comments. Things are insanely busy right now so I haven't had much time to be on here but I am always thinking of all of you and when days seem especially long I actually go back and read the lovely comments on posts, they make things so much better. You all are so fabulous :)

i'm shining like fireworks

2010-11-14T21:27:00.000-08:00

Do you see me when you look to the sky, look to the stars?

Because each shining light reminds me of you,

of the brightness in your eyes, in the glimmer that I saw.

You can lose me now, you can leave me now,

you can pretend we've been over since the day we begun.

But I won't forget, and neither will the stars.

If you could just stop whispering those lies,

beautiful twists of smoke, curling in the air,

intoxicating me.

If you could just stop acting as though there is an ocean between us,

acting as though there is something we cannot get over.

I want to be your friend.

I don't need to be anything more.

I'm scared to touch you because I don't want you to think I mean it.

I'm scared to be near you because I don't want to lose you entirely,

I don't want to lose you forever.

I drew a black line in pastel across a white canvas.

You took your hand and smeared it as you interlocked our fingers,

as you looked at me,

taking me back to when it was our hearts interlocked.

I ran away fast and I ran away far,

but I can't forget you.

But maybe it's not about forgetting.

It's about remembering,

remembering the feeling, the hope, the knowledge that yes,

I can be loved.

move along, move on

2010-11-07T22:28:00.000-08:00

It was an odd sort of nostalgia, an odd sort of longing, an odd sort of empty. It was haunting in it's familiarity, the way your stomach twists when you see a stranger that resembles a long lost friend. After you pass them, you miss the stranger. You miss the friend, but you miss the stranger more, because you didn't ruin things with them. You didn't lose them. You still have hope.

That's all that friendship is really, hope, she thought. Hope that this person won't let you down like the last. Hope that this person will love you unconditionally. Hope that this person will answer their phone at three in the morning if you call. Hope that this person will keep their promises, will hold your hand, will carry you when you need it.

credit: Lauren Treece

She struggled with reconcilling hope and physical loss, as the list of all those moving out into the world flashed on the inside of her eyelids. She had always lived by the motto that if it was meant to be, it will be. She knew not all friends would last forever, and the ones who did were the ones who mattered. And people had moved before. And she was right, the ones she still knew, years later, were the ones who mattered.

But it was frightening thinking about losing anybody, because everybody mattered to her right now. These people were her ground, her earth, her support and her connection to something more solid than the fleeting oxygen, those who entered her life only to leave. That departure was easy, it was expected. But the earth moving beneath her feet, that was different.

"Attachment is suffering", she had read the other day, before vowing to live a more continual life, reach a more fluid existence. She knew she could not lose attachment entirely, because attachment made life meaningful, but she recognized it as an after the fact attitute- moving forward after recognizing the attachment had become toxic.

what makes you stronger?

2010-10-28T20:05:00.000-07:00

hello there lovely,

you are far too young, far too beautiful, far too wonderful

to feel so broken

so wake up!

wake up to the birds, wake up to the sunshine, wake up to the sea

solitude is not sadness, and dependence is not weakness

look at yourself.

look at all you are carrying, look at who you've become,

and be amazed.

own yourself.

own everything you are, the dark and the light.

there are no mistakes within people, no mistakes in your creation

you are marvelously whole,

and don't listen to the fools who tell you otherwise!

this little light of mine, i'm gonna let it shine

2010-10-26T20:24:00.000-07:00

Replace your darkness with light, your hatred with love

There are always those corners of your mind that need cleaning,

always those places that could be beautiful if only illuminated

Like fire, it is a chance, a hope,

a moment that will burst into so much more

watch me

2010-10-15T00:49:00.000-07:00

Nobody can stop you, nobody will stop you

from growing, from blooming, from blossoming.

You decide your life

You don't need their permission or approval

It's all you.

Your choices are your beliefs,

show the world how you feel, who you are.

(Because you are beautiful

and the world could always use a little more beautiful)

"My life is my message" said Ghandi.

What do you want to show the world?

What do you have to teach?

Live your message.

People will stare, will stop, will pay attention:

you will change lives.

go forth

2010-10-10T13:44:00.000-07:00

You know what you must do. You know why you are here.

There are voices that will tell you no, that will say you can't

until you almost believe it.

But just when you are about to,

inhale deeply.

Stretch your arms upward and feel your breath in your heart.

Bring your hands down and touch your belly, touch your knees and elbows.

Know that you are whole.

You know your reason. You are living your purpose.

Have faith in the bones that hold you together, in the skin that you inhabit.

You are a light-bringer, a wonder-maker, a world-healer.

Each of us, in the way we live, in the way we walk, in our words and in our hearts.

Bring what you may, be what you must

in this wild and wonderous world.

rainbow dreamer

2010-10-07T22:48:00.000-07:00

Dear secret painters, hidden writers, pretend illustrators, imaginary artists everywhere!

This is your call. This is your reminder.

You love the feeling of the wood between your fingers, the colors falling onto the page. You love the scent of the paint, smearing it onto the canvas, blending and stirring. You love the way the words ring out after you've written them, the way they send shivers up your spine.

Go out, go forth, create!

The world is filled with destruction, with hatred, with malice,

it is up to us to overcome it.

To build over it, to shut it down

by bringing the beautiful up.

Create! Today is the day.

Create something beautiful!

numb

2010-10-05T01:25:00.000-07:00

She wanted to run away.

The feeling of hot cement under her cracked feet, the feeling of sand between her toes, the wet morning grass stretching beneath her strides.

She needed to leave.

She couldn't remember the feeling when she was here.

But she could still it, a ghost, hovering in front of her.

It trembled and shivered, gleamed and glittered, but when she extended her hand outward it would twitch away.

She wanted to go back to the feeling, bathe in it, soak in it until her skin shone again. Cover herself until she remembered how to breathe. Until her heart began to beat again.

But it teased her, whispering that it was not that easy.

She had to bring it back, she had to live it back, she had to remember how she had let go and stepped forward and trusted and fell all over again.

She had to live it all over again.

She couldn't run, or hide. For it would run faster, hide better.

She had to stop reaching for the ghost,

and create a new feeling.

city by the bay

2010-10-03T02:28:00.000-07:00

Dress up just for fun.

There are people around you who are tired of the monotony but paralyzed by fear.

They can't do it themselves. But you can inspire them.

Every place needs a trendsetter. Not in the norm, but in the way that pushes buttons and boundaries. That makes people question and debate. That prods open their droopy eyelids.

You know the type of person you want to be. What is seperating you from being that person? Visualize the obstacles, give them faces and bodies. See their taut skin or bony shoulders.

Now kick them down. You are a skilled fighter, punching them in the face, kicking in their knees, bruising and beating them until they fall to the ground. The concrete caked earth swallows them.

And you are set free.

Dress up in clothing, in silky fabric and strands of pearls.

But also dress up in your life. Do something unexpected, whisper a complement to a stranger. Each day is a manequin, waiting for you to dress it.

Be daring and different, but most importantly

do what is difficult.

strangers aren't dangers

2010-09-29T23:47:00.000-07:00

I love this idea.

A random talk, a moment that could become so much more.

I adore possibility, I adore potential.

It keeps me optimistic.

what's so amazing that keeps us stargazing

2010-09-28T02:09:00.000-07:00

She would stare up at the stars each night before bed. Examine each one closely, looking for the unique twinkle, the strange sparkle, the magic that was different for each.

Then she would close her eyes.

Listen to the silence.

To the sound of the universe ripping apart and the sound of the bees humming around, trying to keep the order.

Einstein had said that if bees were to go extinct, humans would follow in four years.

That's high school.

That's a few breaths, a few twitches of the eye, nothing more.

That's how connected we are.

She thought of her yoga teacher, the sound of the room breathing energy, creating light.

She thought about the first sound in the universe, the electric calm that filled the space.

Omm..Omm..Omm..

The sound of the honey bees.

"yes, i think we've met before"

2010-09-26T02:28:00.000-07:00

It's about the love, not the lover.

It's about the feeling, the truth, the part of you that cringes when you remember.

It's letting go and starting anew,

but not starting over.

There's a grand world out there, a crazy world of beautiful people

just waiting to love and be loved.

So let your heart light shine on,

let it glow and flicker and tremble and reflect and shimmer.

Admire the shadows cast,

because they are as much a part of the beauty as the light.

living vs. existing

2010-09-24T17:09:00.000-07:00

some kind of wonderful

2010-09-20T23:31:00.000-07:00

There was something beautiful and strange in vulnerability, she decided. In the moment when it felt as though every occurance in the world, every tiny interaction and experience was drilling into your skin, the feeling when you believed you were the entirety of mankind- Atlas bearing the world on his shoulders.

The peculiar blossoming pressure in the gap between your spine and shoulderbones, a weight where wings should grow.

There was a relationship to be had in self-reflection, in those times of existence when consciousness was filtered and drained through a lense beyond ones own, a lense of the intermost soul.

She knew her own emptiness, the bones in her that were still blank slates, awaiting their fate to be etched in by time. She decided she was glad she didn't know what the words would be.

The faint echos of the music that would trickle into her future was playing somewhere, softly.

She let a finger fall into her reflection, sending out tiny ripples that fluttered and shook the image.

Just like that, she thought, it all could change.

When the pieces floated back her image shone like she had never seen,

the sun had slipped into the right place in the midst of the chaos.

Don't Ask Don't Tell

2010-09-18T01:16:00.000-07:00

Asking for equality, asking for liberty.

Equality,

to fight like other soldiers, to demonstrate pride for their country, to protect and serve.

Liberty,

to not hide who they are, to not have to act ashamed, to live as their true selves.

It's just love,

but is love ever "just" anything?

Love is everything.

We should be arguing over hate, fighting prejudice,

not allowing it because of who a person loves.

Please call, email, tweet-
anything to get ahold of your Congress representative.

http://www.sldn.org/blog/archives/gaga

Let your voice be heard.

a world to believe in

2010-09-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

more adventurous

2010-09-13T00:31:00.000-07:00

It was time for a change, she decided. It was time to be stronger.

To step out of the pool of self pity, step away from the dangers of selective memories, all of the good moments looping through her head, every disapointment erased.

It was time to see the beauty in her breakdown, time to emerge as something more.

"Attachment brings suffering"

She remembered the words that had been whispered to her as she hiked through the forest one day. An elderly man, a faded green cap on his head had asked her to stop for a moment. He said he had learned one thing in life, and had nobody to tell. He asked if she would listen.

That was the first thing he taught her, to listen. To hear his intention beyond the words. To understand him. He was letting her, a complete stranger, into his life. How beautiful, how achingly raw! She wanted to rejoice but knew that was not his intention. Instead, she opened her heart and mind...and heard.

Now she was listening to herself.

Her heart beating, the nerves in her mind and body humming as she moved her fingers, her toes. As she walked. Now she knew who she had to be. She had to let go of the person that hurt, she had to let go of the person that was clinging desperately. Moving forward meant moving out, like a snake slipping out of its skin. She would grow in new ways, change it all.

Become more adventurous.

trust in the world

2010-09-11T00:25:00.000-07:00

There are more beautiful people in the world than there are bad people. You don't hear about them on the news, their faces aren't pasted on the fronts of magazines, but they are there. Maybe you know one. And now imagine, that that one person knows one more. And one more. And on and on it goes.

Sometimes the beautiful in people is hard to find. In those people, remember that they are probably struggling with something invisible, intangible, indistinguishable to you or I, but to them it is a constant fight. They are using all their beautiful in that fight at that moment, so you can't see it. But it's there.

I remember one year I met a boy who was angry all the time. My most vivid memory was when he went into a fit because a group of us were playing cards and he was delt a bad hand. When we asked him to calm down, he screamed as though he was dying. It was a hidious, horrific sound-the kind of blaring noise that twists your insides and makes your heart afraid to beat. He knocked over a jar and the glass shattered everywhere. He kept screaming.

Three years ago he began coming out to people, telling us he was gay. Today he is one of the sweetest people I know. He explained to us what had happened with his old rage one day, telling us that the screaming was his struggle. It was a fight he could never win, because he was competing against himself. Trying to change himself.

Half of him constantly winning, half of him constantly losing.

Beautiful people are everywhere. They are your companions as you walk down the street, they are the man serving you your coffee, they are the person holding the door. Be a beautiful person. Do something more for these people today. Smile a bit bigger, give away some spare change, call an old friend and remind them you love them.

Believe in the world. It is a beautiful place, abundant with beautiful people.

STREET smART

2010-09-10T00:09:00.000-07:00

Graffiti Stop Motion by Broken Fingaz

This is just such a cool video, I had to share!

paris 1959

2010-09-09T00:32:00.000-07:00

When I feel lost I look to "Howl" that I have pasted on my wall.

I twist myself into the words, get dizzy from all the thoughts that are flying by my face. I open up my Kerouac and thumb through the pages, catching snatches of phrases here and there.

Everything so free, so free.

When I'm done I feel more lost than when I'd begun.

But so much more free, so much more free.

And I remember that is all that matters.

knowledge

2010-09-07T00:57:00.000-07:00

Open up your heart, open up your mind, open up a good book.
Learn something new and talk about it.

Talk with with doodles in a notebook,

talk with your hands, talk with your friends.

Talk until you understand,

until the awe of it brings you to silence.

"You can only see as far as you think"

Think farther. See farther.

Let the light shine into your minds, onto your thoughts.

Spread your mental wings

and soar.

you asked me about praying mantises

2010-09-03T20:28:00.000-07:00

I can't get this poem out of my head.

Maybe because it's so simple but so true. Maybe it's because I'm scared to death I can't be with you in this life, but I haven't given up hope on the next. Maybe it's because I read this right after we talked about praying mantises. Maybe it's because now that I know the answer I don't think you care.

Maybe it's because that's how poetry should be.

The words should stalk your days, the ideas coiling around your dreams.

An Entomologist's Last Love Letter, Jared Singer

dear samantha
i’m sorry
we have to get a divorce
i know that seems like an odd way to start a love letter but let me explain:
it’s not you
it sure as hell isn’t me
it’s just human beings don’t love as well as insects do
i love you.. far too much to let what we have be ruined by the failings of our species

i saw the way you looked at the waiter last night
i know you would never DO anything, you never do but..
i saw the way you looked at the waiter last night
did you know that when a female fly accepts the pheromones put off by a male fly, it re-writes her brain, destroys the receptors that receive pheromones, sensing the change, the male fly does the same. when two flies love each other they do it so hard, they will never love anything else ever again. if either one of them dies before procreation can happen both sets of genetic code are lost forever. now that… is dedication.

after Elizabeth and i broke up we spent three days dividing everything we had bought together
like if i knew what pots were mine like if i knew which drapes were mine somehow the pain would go away
this is not true
after two praying mantises mate, the nervous system of the male begins to shut down
while he still has control over his motor functions
he flops onto his back, exposing his soft underbelly up to his lover like a gift
she then proceeds to lovingly dice him into tiny cubes
spooning every morsel into her mouth
she wastes nothing
even the exoskeleton goes
she does this so that once their children are born she has something to regurgitate to feed them
now that.. is selflessness
i could never do that for you

so i have a new plan
i’m gonna leave you now
i’m gonna spend the rest of my life committing petty injustices
i hope you do the same
i will jay walk at every opportunity
i will steal things i could easily afford
i will be rude to strangers
i hope you do the same
i hope reincarnation is real
i hope our petty crimes are enough to cause us to be reborn as lesser creatures
i hope we are reborn as flies
so that we can love each other as hard as we were meant to.

tough love

2010-09-01T01:03:00.000-07:00

She was beautiful in a way most wouldn't understand. They could see her symetrical face, they could observe the graceful indents of her waist, the arch of her back and curve of her hand, but that all meant nothing because they couldn't see her. It was as though she lived in the awkward pause of existence between being and not, as though the society was her sea and she was constantly struggling to come up for air. She could accomadate this world, but not live comfortably within its bounds.

Perhaps it was because she was too harsh. People couldn't understand her honestly, couldn't take in her bitter flavor, couldn't swallow her words that seemed to be drenched in alcohol and lit on fire. Her casual conversation was most people's 3 am drunk phone calls to a detested ex-husband.

But she didn't know how else to exist. How else to be human, how else to survive. It was her honesty that made her beautiful, she decided., When she looked in the mirror she knew exactly who she was looking at. Her sculpted arms, the sharp dash of her collarbone-there was never a question. Looking in the mirror gave her answers.

But she was the only one who would ask the questions. She filled her life with wants and needs, lists of goals to fufill and clothing to buy. She stoked her closet with corsets and lace, with dresses that fell upon her hips like waterfalls, and heels that punctured the earth mercilessly. But they did nothing for her. Everybody looked, but nobody cared. And eventually she stopped caring too. And forgot why she had begun collecting in the first place.

Collecting things because she couldn't collect people.

And all she ever really wanted was to be loved. And for somebody to say so.

But nobody dared to say those words

to a person they couldn't really see.

fly away

2010-08-29T22:02:00.000-07:00

"I always wonder why birds choose

to stay in the same place,

when they can fly anywhere on earth.

Then I ask myself the same question."

Where do you dream of traveling my loves?
Now, how will you make it happen?

i love people

2010-08-28T00:28:00.000-07:00

I want to meet the world.

I think everybody is just so incredibly beautiful.

I can't help but love everybody. I can't help but see the good in them.

And I think everybody can see that good.

But there are people who walk their entire lives without knowing the good inside them.

There are people who walk their entire lives unloved

because nobody's told them otherwise.

Tell them. Speak up.

There are people out there that need to hear your voice.

They need to hear what you already know.

That they are beautiful.

fight for love

2010-08-24T19:39:00.000-07:00

brave new world

2010-08-22T19:07:00.000-07:00

"But I don't want comfort.

I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness.

I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly,

"I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

-Brave New World

I had to read this book for summer reading, and I loved it. Those were my favorite lines.

Because honestly, what good is comfort if you never get to feel freely?

I think everything is beautiful.

The rush is beautiful...and the fall. Because when we fall, we get to stumble up again.

We get to take the hands of the people who love us.

We get to realize how strong we are.

Look around you.

Life happens because of feelings.

The true actions are done because of how a person feels.

It's what makes us incredibly, grotesquely, miraculously human.

We can pretend that our uncontrollable feelings are our faults, our downfall. We can try to lose ourselves in the silicone labrynth of technology, drown ourselves in paperwork and dollar bills. We can take medication until we forget who we are. We can diagnose and catalogue and graph and map and disect and try to find the heart strings to pull so we never have to cry. We can kill so we don't have to think.

Or we can take ourselves as messy and imperfect.

We can take ourselves as feel-ers, as life live-ers, as truth-ers.

"All good things are wild and free"

-Thoreau

change

2010-08-20T23:53:00.000-07:00

The lights vibrated, pulsated, floated through the air like independent particles with their own mind. The girl opened her mouth and let her ribcage fly out, felt her muscles twist and shake and tremble with a feeling beyond rage. The feeling of edge. The state of existance just beyond an emotion.

The microphone in her hand, she was armed. Words flew like diamonds, shattering on the ground, slicing into people's faces and legs, cutting them raw.

This is your wake up! She shouted.

This is it! Now what will you do? Tell me, what do you want to do!

"Everybody here lives in fear. I want you to open up beyond that! Yes, it's uncomfortable,

Yes it hurts, so feel it! Feel that!"

Her voice lowered to a trembling whisper, a sound that crawled through the dingy basement, brushing against the people inside.

"Can you break yourself?" She asked.

"Can you break yourself so that you can put yourself back together in a new way?

Will you? Will you try it?

Because that's the only way to change, really,

that's the only way to change."

freedom

2010-08-20T00:09:00.000-07:00

courage

2010-08-18T17:27:00.000-07:00

I used to think that "fearless" was the best motto.

But then I heard the quote

"Courage is not the absense of fear,

but the knowledge that

something else is more important than fear"

I think that makes the action more meaningful.

Knowing that you are scared, knowing that you have fear

but still moving forward.

i see you in my dreams

2010-08-17T13:04:00.000-07:00

Do you remember when you promised me we'd catch fireflies? You said we'd put them in glass jars, and hang them from the branches above our heads, so they'd illuminate the shadows, and we could breathe in the light. Then you said we'd set them free, because all creatures should be free, and we'd breathe in the shadows, and watch for shooting stars.

Do you remember when you promised me we'd stargaze on that hill? And when they tried to make us come in, when they tried to make us leave just after the sun had tipped off the edge of the horizon and the sky was still blue, you took my hand and pointed it up. "There's a star," you said. And you looked at me, and I knew you meant that you would always keep your promises.

Sometimes I see you in my dreams. You are walking by on the sidewalk, fast. You are the waiter in a restaurant. I never recognize your face until after I wake up. Then I cry because I have so many things to say to you, but you're gone.

Last night was different. I saw you and I handed you a letter. I had written everything our silence said to me, and when I handed it to you I told you I was afraid. You read the letter without opening the envelope, and I knew you were more upset by my fear than my words. You held me, and in your breath I felt the apology I would never hear, in your breath I felt resolution beat into my heart.

When you walked away, lenseless glasses were suddenly on your face. I laughed because you looked funny with glasses, but you didn't hear me. The girl next to me whispered, "You made that boy cry?" I looked closer, and realized they were fogging up.

When I woke up my fingers were woven in the blanket, my hand curled like it had been in yours.

not enough time

2010-08-14T00:48:00.000-07:00

There was just never the right amount of time, she decided. Time to say hello, time to hug, time to apologize, time to promise, time to say goodbye. It was all whizzing by her like the colors on a groteque merry go round. Round and round and round.

Whenever she'd walk by old trees she would always wonder what the branches had been wittness to. And if the people underneath them had even noticed their existence. When she was under young trees she thought about returning in forty years to see them grown, to see how the time had passed in that unmoving life. To bear witness to the change in herself.

People kept leaving her. She felt as though her insides were a lake, a murky pool of water that sat in the middle of her stomach. She would punch a hole through her skin with her fist, scoop out the water in shaking hands and watch the tiny droplets that splashed onto the ground below. She could feel their hearts beating as they fell.

All that was left in her was a desert. The dunes reflected the moonlight, the blazing gleam where no shadow was cast. It was silent except for the wind, whistling through the hollowed out space. She realized there was nothing that would grow there, nothing she could plant.

She had to leave too, if she wanted to get anywhere. She had to rise over the anti-flood and find the place where the olive branch would grow. She had to nest there, and leave the wasteland. Leave it before she ran out of time.

living

2010-07-28T09:29:00.000-07:00

It's easy to avoid life. It's easy to shell up, shut up, hole up, bury yourself in the busywork and nightmeres and fear. But the most rebellious thing you can do, the best person you can be, is somebody who runs at life. Who sees the incredible color spectrum of love and evil, of hate and anger, of miracles and wonders, and challenge it head on.

Stand there with open arms and recieve-

you are the gold at the end of the rainbow.

Living is hard to see as a choice, becaue it is our existence.

Our today and tomorrow, our now and forever.

But it is a choice.

Living is active (breathing is not),

Living is being conscious of your existence, of your feelings and your cravings and your dreams.

Living means taking risks, jumping off the cliff, dancing in the street.

Living means falling in love, eating too many sweets, crying when it hurts.

Living means trusting, opening, welcoming.

Living means pain and broken hearts.

Living is seeing everything in the world,

and realizing how beautiful the choice is.

Do one thing today that makes you feel more alive than you knew you could.

happiness

2010-07-19T11:42:00.000-07:00

via The Satorialist

walking

2010-07-15T07:07:00.000-07:00

"walk by faith, not by sight"

transformations

2010-07-13T20:30:00.000-07:00

"Il faut bien que je supporte deux ou trois chenilles si je veux connaître les papillons."

-Le Petit Prince

You must know the caterpillars if you want to know the butterflies.

sticks and stones

2010-07-11T14:30:00.000-07:00

via For Stars Will Rise Again

where the wild things are

2010-07-09T15:15:00.000-07:00

run away. run fast. run far.

hold your breath. hold a hand.

reach higher.

spread your fingers, feel the webbing between them make your arms into wings.

now jump.

chances, uncertainty, change, uncomfortable

as you fly up

clear, understood, new, fresh

as you fly down.

what is the difference between flying and falling?

the sea

2010-07-08T07:30:00.000-07:00

like a dream

2010-07-06T03:47:00.000-07:00

Glove map of London, 1851, by George Shove

i'm about to leave on a plane ride to new places, to see new faces, to walk in an unfamiliar world.

i love this feeling.

anticipation and adventure.

the next few posts, for around the next three weeks will be automated, and i won't be able to get back to you, my loves, until i get back.

i hope you all are having beautiful summer

of madness and miracles (:

you are the world

2010-07-02T17:00:00.000-07:00

(a secret about me:

i love stacking rocks like in the first picture-

it is my favorite meditation.

the beauty is in the destruction as well,

watching the waves destroy in a single blow

what you've built up for hours.

it's truly healing.)

Here's your precious oil

2010-06-28T20:00:00.000-07:00

"Here's your precious oil"

by JenavieveMarie

Artist statement:

"I am not some animal fanatic, but I can't imagine humans would

ever know what it is like

to choke on oil, to be blinded by it, to be weighted down by it

to the point of just dying

because it fills your nose, your mouth, your eyes.

This is acrylic paint and even the smell of it and the feel of it on my skin

sent me reeling,

to be completely drenched in oil

would be torture,

not to mention the problems it will be causing for people soon, too. It will begin to affect more than the animals and natural environment pretty soon."

submerged

2010-06-25T16:56:00.000-07:00

She wore gauzy clothes that drifted with the wind, in pale shades of iris and indigo, lace dripping off the ends and dancing in the shadows of the creases. In the top drawer of her antique dresser she kept a tiny glass box filled with silver glitter, and she would throw it in the air and dance under it before she left her room. It was the magic that would weave a shell around her, weave a shell that would protect her from the real world.

To her, the real world was everything dark and dirty and scary. The vibrations of her parents shouting, the cold, empty feeling when somebody stopped holding her hand. It was the awkward stares that twisted people's insides, it was the crude jokes of class clowns.

The only place she felt safe was in the water. The ocean was her favorite place in the world, and she felt far more composed floating there than walking on land. When she was above the sand, above the shells, above all that was hard and concrete, she knew life would be okay. In the comfortable rush of the waves, she knew she was born a mermaid, cast ashore and given heavy weights for legs because of some unthinkable sins of a past life.

Please forgive me, she would cry to the sea, Please let me return.

But the ocean's angels only turned their scaled tails away, letting her tears fall in with the rest of the castaways.

You must live the life you've been given

they sung her, you must live the life you've been given.

And when she asked why, they whisper

Because we must, because we must.

We looked back, you see, we looked back.

We are only whole in the ocean, on land we are a pile of salt.

life changing

2010-06-23T23:25:00.000-07:00

i feel like this is important.

i feel like this is new.

i feel like i have said this a million times but this time it actually matters.

i will be with the people who i love.

the toxic people, the harmful people, the liars, the thieves,

i am leaving them behind.

i will be with the people i love.

a whole new world

2010-06-21T23:22:00.000-07:00

"If you want to achieve greatness,

stop asking for permission"

Walking on sunshine

2010-06-20T19:08:00.000-07:00

This adorable dress from fred flare looks just like the one Quinn wears

in the Walking on Sunshine/Halo song!

I finally just saw the first volume of season 1 of Glee!
Now I finally understand the obsession, it just makes me happy,
or should I say,
GLEEful ;)

Happy Birthday

2010-06-20T00:06:00.000-07:00

David W. Cerny / Reuters via the Wall St. Journal

A man wrote on a mural of Myanmar’s democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi during an event in Prague Friday to mark her 65th birthday.

To learn more, to join this fight for justice and peace, please go to:

http://uscampaignforburma.org/

Supercute!

2010-06-18T16:59:00.000-07:00

This video made me smile, so I just had to share!

let go

2010-06-17T09:27:00.000-07:00

It didn't take much for her to know it was the truth. There was something in the flavor of the air that day, in the delicate balance of salt and taffy, the rancid smell of the beached whale. She didn't think about it so much as she felt it. There was something in the fragile nature of the fog that day, the way she felt as though if she moved, it would shatter around her.

She had built up a life she hated. She had climbed to the top of the great pyramid, stepping on the backs of the people who had built it, clawing at hair and limbs to get there first. And now there were expectations. Expectations and responsibilities. Expectations and responsibilities and committments.

I can't live like this, she thought.

I won't live like this, she said out loud.

Somewhere a seagull let out a low call, and she felt a tiny crab venture over the veins in her foot. The white foam of the ocean bubbled around her, and the swollen waves coughed up seaweed and glass.

I will leave, she realized, I will run away from this grown up world

I don't need more money, I need more life!

Tell them

2010-06-17T05:42:00.000-07:00

If there is somebody in your life you love,

truly love,

stop holding back.

Today is the day to tell them.

joie de vivre

2010-06-13T23:57:00.000-07:00

i painted my nails a lovely cream green today- it was from a collection of polishes called "daydream" which i think is so incredibly lovely. i also met a nice boy who is about to embark on travels to asia, which i admire. i hope (but more expect) to see him in the future, which i am excited about. i jumped on a trampoline and dipped my toes in a pool. i went to my third bbq in the last three days, and ate some ben and jerrys and delicious pasta salad. tomorrow i am losing my wisdom teeth but i think it will be okay because i have beautiful friends who are going to keep me company in my painful and loopy stage after. one day of glee, one day of daria, and a friend coming from an hour away to bring me jello. i think this is the wonderful life.

i am exicited for possibilities, for life, for living.

infertility.

2010-06-09T15:33:00.000-07:00

She ate oranges with the peels still on. It felt rebellious and tough, and she knew it was good for her. She figured it into her health karma count- it counteracted the cigarette she indulged herself in each month.

(Even though the taste made her cry. Even though the process of lighting it haunted her. Even though she despised the memories that flew out of it in gasping ringlets.)

The blackened ceilings in her childhood home, holding her mothers shaking hand as the cancer devoured herfragile lungs. But she couldn't help it. It was an addiction, but not to the smoke. To the luxury, to the glamour she felt when she held that trash between her fingers, lifted it between her lips.

She felt like a trashy bohemian poet, the kind of girl who would try to sleep with Kerouac and Ginsberg. She would fix herself black coffee, poured in a stained, chipped mug, and balance a blank notebook on her lap, a pen held delicately in her right hand, waiting for the words to come. As the bitter taste collected in fuzz on her tongue, she waited for the words.

They never would come.

Then she would become frusterated, angry, furious. She would lick her lips and tug on her earlobe, she would wring her bony fingers until her fingernails were white. She would stop her feet and talk to herself, trying desperately to birth some revelation on the human condition.

The only passion she felt came from the lack of life in her.

She wanted stories to come, she wanted words and thoughts and life to just spill out of her. But as she neared the end of the cigarette, all she ever got was hacking, a cough that echoed her mother's last sounds. A cough that haunted her, that made her crush the ash onto her notebook, burning a hole in it. She would down the little coffee that was left, and be jittery when she stood.

Then she'd go inside, grab a few sleeping pills,

and get the best night's sleep of the month.

this is your sign

2010-06-08T07:29:00.000-07:00

Go. Go. Go.

What are you waiting for?

You know what I'm talking about.

I say "Yes" to you,

this is the sign you have been waiting for.

Go. Go. Go.

i read glamour and the guardian

2010-06-07T00:19:00.000-07:00

"i don't have to be your baby i don't have to be your baby..."

i am unbelievably obsessed with this song right now.
(starts at about 0:25)

i love the slam poetry part:

the speaking, the fierce independence, the energy.

gah-urls and cah-urls and sah-wurls

2010-06-06T01:16:00.000-07:00

via Tina + Wolf

nobody's barbie

2010-06-05T00:35:00.000-07:00

stitching with some sass.

&&&

you better believe i won't.

and you better not either

time to pretend

2010-06-02T22:32:00.000-07:00

I am pretending to be in a fairy tale, a vagabond, a reader, a writer, an artist...a person who lives her life without regrets and a person who lives for love.

And it's true, I think I am pretending less and becoming more.

What are you pretending to be my loves?

my life is my art

2010-05-27T23:49:00.000-07:00

I have made a decision to live fantastically, phenomenally, ridiculously. There is not enough time, there is simply not enough time. So many words, so many thoughts, so many visions that jolt from my body, that rattle my brains and veins and bones. I cannot type them fast enough, I cannot count the lose papers, ripped and bent, that litter my school bag, that carpet my floor. They are covered in sketches and scribbles, notes for the future and reflections on the past.

I have dreams of rooms where the ceiling is simply a billion balloons, held up by lace. The left wall is covered in mirrors, and the right wall is covered in televisions. The televisions will be playing a continual loop of people checking themselves in the mirrors, and people staring at the ceiling, wondering when the balloons will fall.

"My life is my message" said Gandhi, and I will write that on my arm until I remember. I can't get everything inside of me, that is throbbing and pulsing and aching and crying, out fast enough. A lifetime is a blink in this sea, where I am beating against the tide, swallowing the water, coughing up salt and vomiting sea glass in the most beautiful way I can.

Catherine Campbell, “In Our Nature”

I can. I can. I can. I can.

There is not enough time to give birth to all I see. And so my life will be my art. An ever evolving, growing, changing, wonderous, terrifying masterpiece. I am at a frightening moment where I feel as though I can physically shape my world, create it. Life is an experiement, one of those fantastic explosions of light and color so magical you want to froget how you got there and just stay frozen in that heat, in that feeling.

You must create that feeling. I must be that feeling. Be the light, the heat. People will want to be frozen in your moment, in the time you shape when you are around them. Look at your life, look at it in the expressions on the faces of those around you.
Realize what you can create, who you can become, who you already are.

Existence is influence

She dances.

2010-05-26T01:51:00.000-07:00

dear world,
i would just like to say that i love you.
i love the way your people smile and laugh, i love the way glasses fall to the ends of sweaty noses. i love the feeling of burrowing under layers of blankets, wool and cotton and fleece. i love the sounds in a forest, walking on dry leaves, birds wings when they leap from branches, a flower pushing out of the earth. i love the darkness, the still silence of the night when only the stars are screaming. i love the feeling of your toes entering the freezing ocean water, the momentary shock and the seemingly infinite numbness. i love the feeling of hot sand burning the soft skin between my toes. i love hot chocolate with cream, and coffee when it's scarcely past the point of burning your tongue. i love people who aren't afraid to open up, and make you a part of their life. i love woody allen movies and their awkward romances. i love falling in love. i love walking in chilly morning air, and the refreshing scent of dew. i love mint leaves in my lemonade. i love learning new things.
i love you.

Madness

2010-05-25T01:42:00.000-07:00

illuminated

2010-05-20T17:01:00.000-07:00

Her eyes were glazed over even though her heart was illuminated. When she opened her mouth she could hear the words falling on the floor, hitting the ground with a dull thud. The candles surrounding her made tiny pinholes of light in the darkness. Like the stars! exclaimed her little brother, and she smiled half-heartedly.

I'm sorry I'm so broken, she would apologize feverishly to her therepist. His eyes would glaze over as he replied in a facade of comfort, That's why I'm here. I just don't know, I don't know what I'm supposed to be saying, saying here to get better, you know? She would ask, feeling the sweat in her palms.

There's nothing you're supposed to say, he would repeat each time,

just tell me everything.

But she could never tell him everything. Because she always felt drained, beaten, torn when she left that sterile place. As though she had lost a part of herself. Walking into the sunshine was physically painful, she was dizzy at all the stoplights on the way home. The more of herself she gave away, the less she had to call her own.

And it wasn't fair at all, she thought to herself one day after their session. He wasn't even excited that I made guacamole for my neighbors, and he didn't care about Timmy's 7th birthday. He said he wanted to hear everything, and he's taking everything from me, but it means nothing in his hands.

If it meant nothing to me, I wouldn't need to see him at all.

It's the meaning that hurts, that shivers, that is cold and hot and pulsing with thought. It's the meaning that devours, that leaps and stretches and worms it's way into conversations with strangers. She couldn't help herself, she had to talk about it. The sessions took away the shards of broken glass she felt had been lodged in her skull, but she still carried their ghosts, imaginary friends that haunted and taunted, lounged around her in long white gowns. He could never see them, he could never take them away.

After everything else was gone, they were all she had.

STAY GOLD

2010-05-18T23:41:00.000-07:00

don't stay up too late. don't fall in love. don't fail any tests. don't drink. or do drugs. don't forget. don't worry about your hair. don't think about running away. don't talk back.

don't stop believing in dreams. or fairytales.

stay golden.

Model: Anja Rubik

Make-up: Diane Kendal

Photographer: Nathaniel Goldberg

Source: Vogue Nippon, May 09

Fly

2010-05-18T20:37:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you have to start anew. You have to wake up and not put your right foot down first. You have to set your alarm ten minutes earlier, and go outside when the sun is just beginning to burn over the scaffolding of the horizon. You have to squint at it, and feel the pain as your head pounds with the light and the wind and the strange sensation that comes from breathing morning dew. You have to go out to a fancy restaurant for lunch and splurge, because you deserve a treat. You have to look at your life and look at your priorities and decide if they match up. And if they don't, you can't allow yourself to shrug your shoulders and sigh with disapointment. You are not a failure, you are never a failure. You are a work in progress, a beautiful, horrific, lovely, awkward, shameful, fabulous, glowing, dramatic work of art. Some days your colors are like the rainbow, shaking and trembling with their conherence. Some days they all drip to the bottom of the canvas, a brown puddle. But you can always start again. You deserve a life you want to live, you deserve a life that makes you crave the daylight so you can begin again, you deserve a life that makes you smile, but you deserve a life so full and true that you cry as well.
So open your eyes, open your heart, open your soul,
and live that life.

Belonging

2010-05-11T22:19:00.000-07:00

Breathe deeply.

The love particles in your lungs have come from another

another life you do not know

but

they gave you life.

The peace particles you shed will go to another

another life you do not know

but

you gave them life.

With that knowledge

how can anyone be a stranger?

the greatest thing you'll ever learn....

2010-05-04T00:01:00.000-07:00

A teenager once asked an old man,

"in a relationship, which is more important:

to be loved or to love?"

then he replied,

“which is more important to a bird? the left wing or the right?”

(as seen on tumblr)

take my breath away

2010-04-25T02:16:00.000-07:00

She liked quiet things. The whisper of pages turning, the rustle of leaves, the tender broken sound of the fuzz of notebook paper being removed. Those things made her stomach tickle and made her want to cry. She could never understand why she felt this way, or what this feeling was. One time, she asked a girl sitting next to her to listen. The girl leaned in close, eyes wide, and watched as she ripped the frayed edges of the paper off. It was an almost perfect rip too, along those perforated dots. There was just one spot where it had actually torn into the paper, an indent of frayed fibers. The girl smacked her gum, her waxed eyebrows raised, "You gonna tell me sum-thaan or wuh-at?" She thought to herself, I just did.

But that was the thing about thoughts...they weren't the words that came from her mouth. Her thoughts were graceful, punctuated and grammatically correct. But the line from there to her tongue was broken, the way her lips moved was never in line with the images in her head. She wanted to scream, and scream loudly, and scream so the world could hear, and hear her speak beautifully, perfectly, precisely for once. She didn't want to stammer, she didn't want the extra clacking of teeth to hold her down, or the fear of bending a lip the wrong way to stop her. She wanted to climb out of that, reach up and grab the ledge of the cliff she was falling down and pull herself up. She wanted to lie down on the mossy ground and turn her head to the side and see that she was parallel to the horizon.

But being parallel to the universe, she thought, would that make me just another line? Somewhere in the caves of the cliff, somewhere in the river rushing below, somewhere in all of the cracks and crevices of rocks, voices chimed in and whispered, "If you are just another line, so is the horizon. So is the sunset. So is the earth itself."

building

2010-04-23T00:29:00.000-07:00

"we can build a new tomorrow today"

i just find this so tender, endearing, and beautiful.

Wonder

2010-04-18T17:49:00.000-07:00

I want to be face to face with something

commensurate to my capacity for wonder.

any suggestions?

tender is the night

2010-04-14T23:16:00.000-07:00

To her, the most touching moment was when the waves licked the shoreline, when the shells tumbled out of the womb, thrown out into the wide wide world. The earth teased, revealing only reminents of its mystery, giggling at the idea that humans could discover it all. She wished she was a mermaid, so she could be in on the secret too.

She liked taking naps, making pancakes, and the boy who lived next door. He was her favorite person in the world, and nobody could ever understand why. He walked with a swagger, he cursed and spoke in mumbled fragments, and he wanted to be like everybody else, a trait she despised. But one day, she had gone to drop off something at his house, and she saw him, a shadow through the doorway of his younger brother's bedroom. He pulled the comforter up to the boy's chin, he kissed his forhead, he whispered goodnight. And when his brother yelled "wait!", he turned, and checked under the bed, in the closet, in every drawer and outside the window for monsters.

She had an odd fear of feeling safe. When she was absorbed in fear, in stress, in worry, she was able to forget herself, able to forget her sadness, able to forget that she was more than her worldly accomplishments. She shivered when she was alone, feeling the thoughts ring in the back of her head. She could never trust the right people, and was constantly consumed by this wait for pain, this patience as she watched the guilitine come closer to her neck. Dependancy was worse than death.

She always felt guilty when she broke hearts. Not only for those she hurt, but for herself. Everytime she got to know someone she would bring herself closer, closer to them. Laughing and touching their shoulder with her forehead, smiling when nothing was funny, looking into their eyes and trying to find their souls. She loved knowing people. But she was always let down when she realized how little they knew about her. Then she would become cold, and they would question. She hated questions. The relationship that had never begun was destroyed with her silent frustration, an emotional atomic bomb. Everything deteriorated into dust. Everything gone.

photos via marie claire italia editorial, march 2010

explore

2010-04-12T23:44:00.000-07:00

The best conspiracy theory I've ever heard.

flying forward

2010-04-12T00:16:00.000-07:00

I'm going to tell you a secret, and I want you to listen. The trees say this secret in the way they sway, the flowers gossip it in the exchange of pollen, the sun shouts it out in light each morning and the moon sings it in a lullaby at night. You are beautiful, you are wonderful, you are marvelous. Look at yourself! Love yourself! Say it to yourself in the morning, remember it in the day. People will try to break your spirit, break your heart, break into your soul. You know why? Because your soul is full of jewels, treasures that are gleaming with hope and possibility and wonder for this world. And there are people who can't find them inside themselves, so they try to steal them from you. But the only way they can is if you let them. The only way they will is if you say okay. So don't break down sweetheart, don't let them. You are better than them, you are better than their superficial hatred, than their dark words and cruel laughter. You are a part of this big, magical universe, you are a part of the stars, a part of the trees, a part of the snow and a part of the mountains. Breathe in love. Breathe in trust. Breathe in a belief. A belief that you know your own worth, you know your own beauty. Now, live like you do.

timeless

2010-04-06T21:21:00.000-07:00

*that writing is not mine, i saved it from a tumblr a long time ago on my computer. i love it and it always inspires me.

gossamer goodnight

2010-04-05T19:34:00.000-07:00

I have always loved the word gossamer.

I heard the origin of it was in films of cobwebs floating over waters,

drifting in the air.

Magic

2010-04-03T20:42:00.000-07:00

via Luphia

PS Sorry for my lack of posts lately, I'm on a trip with my family and I don't have much time to blog! But I love you all, hope you're having a lovely beginning of spring (:

insomnia

2010-03-31T22:19:00.000-07:00

She liked feathers and raindrops and stars, and the way her mother said "dinner". She liked haunted houses and kittens and folk music and crafts. She liked boys who looked like girls and stores that smelled like perfume. She liked the way the sun rose hesitantly each morning, and the way the moon transformed.

It was ironic, she always thought to herself as she stared, fascinated, at the numbers flicking by on the digital clock, how much she enjoyed sleeping, and the concept of it, and the way it felt and all, but how little she actually slept. She would make up excuses, that she was too busy, or talking to somebody, or...or....(they all were lies).

The secret was that she hated sleeping at night. She fell into a dreamlike state of life as the numbers climbed towards their peak, and fell back to start again. It was as though sleep was irrelevant, since she was already dreaming. And the next morning, her eyes heavy with regret and sadness, her body would reject the day, her mind would reject the nerves that dashed around, craving those refreshing hours. But at night she would sit at the glowing screen and type on, type faster, trying to evade the hours as they came, feeling satisfied and exhausted as the night wore on.

she's ripping wings off of butterflies

2010-03-28T00:55:00.000-07:00

vogue italia march 2010
lady grey

by tim walker

Passion or Perfection?

2010-03-25T23:26:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, don't you just need intensity? Don't you get tired of the mundane, of the homework and tests and facebook and television? I say, forget it all. Put on a new shirt. Now add something that sparkles. And something that clashes. Do your hair differently and throw some feathers into the mix. Dust your eyes with glitter. Pout at your reflection. And then walk around barefoot, and say hello to strangers. The confines of suburbia are cracking, and you can break them. You can punch down the walls and awaken the city. Scream it out, shout it out, I say, live now, now, NOW! Stop waiting. Stop wasting time. Life is too short to sleep, life is too short to bother doing anything half way, because you'll never finish. Find something to care about. I mean, something to truly care about. Something that makes you want to cry, something that makes you want to climb the walls, something that makes you want to wake up in the morning. Don't do what makes other people like you, do what makes you happy. There are 6 billion people to like you, but maybe only one thing that truly makes you happy. Do it. The people who are worth knowing will come to you, the ones who want you to be happy. Even if you aren't perfect. Because being perfect isn't human. Being passionate is.

so lovely

2010-03-22T23:36:00.000-07:00

Just a lovely video for lovely people on this lovely day
(:

uncontrollable

2010-03-21T00:03:00.000-07:00

it's not giving up. it's giving in.

giving in to the universe, giving in to life, giving in to love.

i've got sunshine on a cloudy day

2010-03-18T16:24:00.000-07:00

I saw this, and it struck me, because I know I do this. I fear rejection to the point where the risk doesn't even seem worth it. And that is the part of me I think I need to evolve out of, get rid of, destroy. Because there is a fine line between falling and flying. At right now, I can't do either. But I stare longingly at the clouds, watching people-birds who can soar up there, whose wings are spread wide and flutter elegantly. And then, slightly below I see those with a determined gleam in their eyes, whose wings are trembling as they seperate from the body, twitching and shaking as they catch the wind. Time after time, I watch the determined gleam become a look of wisdom, a look of knowledge and peace and trust in the wind. They soar higher, their wings like beautiful dancers, cutting through the sky, creating a masterpiece. I'm standing on the edge of a cliff, waiting for my turn to jump. But I am done waiting. This middle ground is bland, with bland people and blank faces who eat nothing and smile a half-hearted sort of grin. I want my cheeks to hurt. I want to try, and fail, and crash to the rocks below and feel something there, feel some hurt and feel some passion and try again. Because those on the rocks are never there for long. I see them, leaping off the cliff confidently a second time, and I cry out to them, asking how they can be so hurt and still find it in their hearts to continue, and I can be so unbroken and yet still so full of fear. I tremble and shake, my wings quivering limply, begging me to try. My mind and heart are in a shouting match, my mind saying Not Yet, Maybe Later, Just Wait, It's Not The Right Time, and my heart saying now now now now now now now now.

"how can you stay outside, there's a beautiful mess inside"

2010-03-16T23:36:00.000-07:00

Haven't you ever wanted just to love? To hold somebody's hand and feel their warmth hovering in the space between your fingers, because it feels empty and cold alone? And you realize, it doesn't really matter who it is, because you get to this point of lonliness where you want love more than you want an actual person. That's when it's a problem, you see. Because your mind starts breaking up your past into tiny pieces, and putting together the beautiful colors that slip well together and fit perfectly. Until you're staring at this breathtaking jigsaw puzzle, and wanting it, and believing it to be real. Forgetting about those other pieces, shoved on the floor. Forgetting that people are not all pretty, that there is the ugly and the bad and the upset and the disgusting too. And that's what love is. It's not the perfection, so if you're looking for that, you'll forever be looking. It's the everything else. It's the good and the bad, the pretty and the ugly, the yin and the yang, all knotted and twisted and dirty and sparkling and confused.

spectacular spectacular

2010-03-14T22:58:00.000-07:00

I've seen this picture all over but I'm not sure of it's orgins! It reminds me of this though....

(not sure why)

I love moulin rouge. It reminds me of warm summer nights and cold lemonade and cuddling and seeing my best friends and laughter and all around good times.