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“Maturity is a social construct upheld by the patriarchy with an incredibly narrow, white, cis, neurotypical scope to enforce conformity and then implemented as an othering and shaming tactic for anyone that steps outside of that paradigm.”
Your emotional struggles as a human are not a moral judgment of your worth, and they’re not a reflection on your ability to help others.”
“If sitting with them were comfortable, we wouldn’t let them fester until they infected our hearts and our heads. But we avoid. We throw ourselves into work or vices or others because it’s easier to focus on those things than our own hurt.”
sit with whatever emotions come up. Trace their source like a map in your body. Let them burn until they snuff out, if you’re able.”
Therapy is scary because it requires you to be brave. It’s one of the most radical forms of self-love.”
Both things could be true.
As an adult, she still had a dangerous notebook-buying habit, but rarely took the time to fill them.
“You might not necessarily be nice, but I’ve always known you were kind.”
You don’t have to pretend to be okay.”
I want being me to be enough.”
The problem with being self-aware and introspective while also being, admittedly, emotionally damaged was that Indira could reason through her feelings and their source and how they didn’t serve her, but she also couldn’t stop the ruminating circles of feeling them.
We wouldn’t expect someone with asthma to recognize they have asthma and then be able to go and sprint a mile without needing an inhaler. Healing from those internal wounds takes time. Sometimes a lifetime. But it’s the willingness to work on it that matters.”
Because feelings matter. They’re chemicals mixing with experiences and some deep, unknown part of a human soul. They make us who we are and I always wanted to help people find a way to steer their ship when those feelings had them lost at sea.”
“It’s okay to sit with the feelings that don’t feel good,” Dr. Koh had said. “It means your body is digesting them, taking what it needs from the sensation and processing the rest to leave you, or guide you on what to do to honor those feelings.
We all hurtle through life, getting bumped and cracked and broken along the way, but we are solely responsible for our own healing.”
we go forward together.
Trauma and happy endings aren’t mutually exclusive.
“Loving yourself isn’t a sin, Jude. Giving yourself love won’t diminish the love and caring you give to others. In fact, it’s one of the best things you can do for the people in your life.”
“When you love yourself, you commit to knowing yourself,”
None of it was some designless cosmic cruelty. It’s war. It’s humans fighting each other. Hurting each other. And people in nice suits sitting at desks in nice offices in safe cities get to decide when and where to send people to hurt each other, for purposes none of us ever get to know.”
