Shadow Self and Fear

When you have a calling, there’s always going to be a way.

Encouraged by the sweetest barista at a new location in San Jose, Caffé Bene, I sit at this glossy wooden table with a double shot of mahogany dark espresso, enriched with the new sounds and whispers of conversations beyond and within my world in different languages around me.

I’ve been navigating so much mental ground: a new partnership, saying “don’t wait for me” to a friend who invited me to travel the world with him, still wondering if that decision was rooted in myself or from the “approval” of another (my partner); noticing the frustrations (and I’m actively moving to reword my thoughts, so that emotions don’t seem so swelling, but honestly, they are a lot to navigate on my own sometimes) around being in the monogamous framework of a partnership and still wondering if I’m poly, even sitting down to write this blog and noticing that the layers of perfectionism that once protected me are at the forefront of my mask right now: healthily existing, grateful for every aspect of my life and that I get to navigate these challenges with the sense of loving awareness that’s been building in me from 26 years of life.

Coffee doesn’t taste the same everywhere — culture doesn’t feel the same everywhere.

Each day is enriched by different thoughts: I’ve been navigating in and out of the worlds I’ve created for myself; despite being told I’m the sweetest, I still beat myself up for the silliest of things, encouraging myself to speak my truth and faltering in space time, looking for the signs outside of myself. Technically, I’ve always BEEN my own authority — but I’ve learned how to ask for help, and how to be heart-centered… selflessly, while being able to put yourself first (is life a paradox?)

One of my favorite artists, who I actually connected with before and after his first live show back in SF, with one of my other favorite artists — both of whose musics flowed me throoooouugh 2020 (I still have videos of me dancing to their songs in my backyard learning how to hoop, going jogging in the morning — the only music that didn’t clog my brain but helped me tap into joy and thoroughly fulfilling happiness)… is going on his second tour, and stopping in San Francisco, yet again.

A surge of anxiety flows through me, eagerness to reach out and hit him up and connect with loving joy and see if he wants to hang out after the show, do I even go?! And he is also the reason: the mirror to me that my dreams are not larger than myself, they’re right at the same level. (Currently, I told my partner that I was going to be occupied for the next 3 hours — ROCD? or is it that I’m not sure if he’s really the right one for me, and half my brain is occupied with thoughts of my relationship with HIM?) This artist that I’m EAGER to connect with is coming back into my city; after his set, I saw him again and complimented him hugely, just gave him a massive hug and hoped it was grounding. I shared that I’d taken videos of him, or maybe he’d said that he wanted to send videos to his parents (haha ☺️🥺), and I was willing to share them. To which: after a brief back and forth of consent and safety, he offered to just give me his number where I shyly said I could just DM them to him on IG (suuuper shy, I get so shy when I’m around people I admire/up close, I never even imagined this artist to have a face, let alone be meeting up with him and speaking like we were comfortable old friends — like I could see myself wearing a big red scarf or coat, if he gave them to me, and moving in with him into an apartment in New York and starting a life journey there). Then — I had to remember — I just started dating someone, a musician as well, six months before. [hesitant to publish this: because what if either of these artists are reading?]

There is so much more to say. Oscillating between good and bad, wondering if I’m evil — I’m finally ready to take this personal leap of faith into the unknown, to trust that… Hey, the things that I have been denying I’ve wanted, are actually some things that are incredibly possible: like, working toward an enormous income, and doing so in a way that uses my college degree;

Noticing interpersonally, I’m withholding information because I’m upset and I feel like Noah has hurt me by just NOT being as communicative as I have continuously asked him to be. He’s never outright abused or wanted to hurt me, but I can’t help but feel this… anger within myself, toward myself: because I’ve crossed a personal boundary in letting his life be bigger than mine, and only seeing myself as a SUPPORTING character. I feel almost invalidated, my entire heart and life and desires and the WORLD I live in, when I do this — only see myself as a supporting character.

So, it’s wild — I’ve been tOLD I have “main character energy” — but I never thought that was a good thing, nor did I really care to understand what that means. Now, I get it — I’m not Noah’s supporting character, though I can be and I love showing up for him in that way, but I am someone who craves deeply for more in her life, and I’m absolutely capable of showing up for myself in that way.

I realized that I don’t exactly NEED this relationship. But I do want it, and I have wanted to make it work. So maybe that’s my impetus for working it through… I just also, crave meeting this new artist and being friends with the right people in my life (seems to be a common theme). Healing through and grieving the past, of past lovers and almost-but-not-quite-fulfilled in relational partnership zones, and surrendering them… Revisiting lists of the goals and dreams I’d made for the past three years, and checking off or crossing off the ones that I finally have found to be the most important to me.

Jealousy just symbolises that you want something… For me, it’s been a constant awareness around my body and how my vessel is functioning in holding me, my heart, my organs, my soul and spirit, which also exude from me — I hope. I have noticed my arms are skinnier, and biking in the sun has made me tanner — these boost my confidence for sure, I can’t even lie!! <3

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Now, instead of trying to be deep, I guess I’ll give myself permission to write from the top of my head :) Wish me luck in searching for a high paying job —— this was a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge decision shift that I believe just changed the course of my entire life. I noticed how I cry because I feel like I can’t rely on anyone — but I’m 26 years old. Recently, I was talking with my friend Sarah about farming and asked if I could go and visit her farm. (Mind you — as I’m writing this, I’m employed at a rather high-paying French bakery/cafe/pastry cafe with coffee in a local city, Los Gatos. Since I started working there, we increased our sales by 200%, becoming sold out almost every day, and I was receiving rave compliments and reviews from the guests there; I also have taken on so much work and let my heart lead, noticing that I felt called to shepherd my fellow coworkers into leading roles and positions, encouraging and training others, and essentially taking over on coffees while working there [I’m kind of very grateful that I don’t have to be working right now, yet I was so aware of the stress of it while I was there. Wishing I could give more back to the collective, but ultimately stuck behind a counter and pouring intentions into all of my coffees… I did start to make friends and new connections, and maybe these are the fruits that I oughtta start picking while they are ripe!! Save me a spot, PLEASE!!)

I did get a raise, because I asked for one, and the only reason I’m not working right now is because I sprained my ankle… while stopped at a red light before my neighborhood, one day after a hella stressful day at work, I made the split second decision to sprint out of my car and hand a pastry from the café to the homeless man at the intersection. On my way back, my ankle just slipped from its designated spot, lol, and boom, I just felt this immense pain and knew that I’d twisted and probably sprained it. Driving home, I was howling with pain and just releasing the stress of the day through my screams and sobs; I had already been on the phone with my partner earlier in the day, and ah yes!! All of this, I deeply believe, also happened because that day, I was asked to train someone new, without my boss (which had never happened before), and another coworker who was normally very fast and quippy was immensely negative, and being around her, she was nitpicking, disrespectful, applying and popping her lip gloss, and literally doing things she was not supposed to be doing and taking her breaks without consulting me first [which is just a respectful protocol of working with others in this specific workplace, which is very centered around respect]. I was in partnership with Amway, and looked UP to someone I’d met while working in the cafe, and we’d connected and shared stories about our lives, talked about goals, and I’d essentially signed on to Amway. And at the time, I was sending her Kates (communications through this app that the organization uses), asking how to make this entire thing a coachable moment that I could later present to my boss, because we were NOT able to close everything in time, and I was just crying, thinking I was a failure, so upset and sad and miserable, and to top this all off —- before I could decide on a message to send my boss, after the sprain, my mom, my dear beloved mother, had me iced, elevating my foot, and laying in bed — and I was out/would be out for the next month ++.

I didn’t even realize how much I’d needed this break.

(note to you, note to self: listen to your intuition, and trust in the grace and love of the universe).