Category: What Just Happened: Personal Anecdotes

Posted in Confessions, Creative Writing, Keep Moving: Motivation and Inspiration

The Girl in the Shadow: Introduction

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

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Here is an introduction to a series of short stories I will write.  The Girl in the Shadow is a part of my creative process to grasp and understand what its like to be an introvert and an empath.  Two new concepts to me.  Also a part of SparklyWarTanks’ Writing to Heal, this writing will be both encouraging, bazaar, fictional, and autobiographical.  She is something new to me.

And I tell the story of the girl in the shadow. She sees and feels everything, from the hurts that you feel to the tears that have dried away. She encourages those who are often forgot about and left to decay in their own sad minds and weary souls. She tells the stories of those left behind and outcast. 

Shes in the shadows observing.  Shes an introvert but feels all that is around her, the vibration of the strangers, the betrayal of friends, and struggles of her family.  She’s empathic and can’t help but know the emotions and strains of those around her. An energy she can’t escape.  She’s been running for so long, but now she just sits, watches, and writes.  She writes down the emotions and hurt, and flips it.  She carries with her in silent prayers the promised happiness and hope lost and buried with the dead end situation and crusted forgiveness. She’s the stranger rooting for you and the one who cries when you find yourself lonely. She feels for you when you feel the most alone. She knows how it feels. No one sees her either. 

She’s learning what it means to be outside and to be strange.  To not fit in. She’s learning what love is, and hate, and fear.  She’s learning pain, and grief, and depression and anxiety.  She’s learning what’s shes known all her life except this time she sees it in other people. 

The Girl in The Shadow Introduction

Posted in Confessions, Keep Moving: Motivation and Inspiration, Love

Excerpt From my “Blood Honesty” Portion of SWT Writing Therapy

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

 

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So I’m in the process of adding a new portion of SWT writing called “Blood Honesty.” This will be a collection of therapy writing, creative writing pieces and reflections that helps me recall memories that has come up over and over. I relate how these memories have boiled into hurt and how I operate with people. This writing will be in my next book project “Writing to Heal: Power of Written Word.”

This is an excerpt from a Blood Honesty post that I wrote on November 27th:

The concept of love is so underrated, mixed and confused with all emotions felt by people. But love, real love, unconditional love felt by someone that doesn’t have to love you is deep, its true, and its the most genuine of human emotion and character.  When real love happens, when you see it unravel in the ways that it works wholeheartedly is profound, complicated, confusing, and impossibly possible (now you know why people cling to the trope and figure of Jesus Christ). It’s this idea that makes people want to live longer.  It’s this concept of love despite the fear of disappointment and inevitable death that keeps and makes peace and inclusivity possible.  The absence of love causes mental health issues and division, just like the absence of light is darkness and loneliness.  Conditional love (masked emotional confusions and uncertainty ), the love that is so commonly mistaken for unconditional love (genuine love) is what we don’t know how to feel or what to do when we feel it (unless its from a parent or guardian to a child which can still have complication).  How crazy it sounds that this can be felt by us, by people, especially people who are different, is what we need (and what is taught in every central religion essentially) that people don’t understand and cant contemplate. We need this love toward each other, everyone, not just people who are like us or share similar ideological, political, or religious views.  We need love despite what separates us and what makes us distant from one another. We need love.  Unconditional love.

 

Posted in Confessions, What Just Happened: Personal Anecdotes

It Runs Deep

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

You know why its been hard to sleep at night while sleeping all day these past couple days, these past couple months?  I’ve realized myself in depths too deep to describe to people.  I’ve itched to tell someone that my issues run deeper than repression and unconscious feelings.  That I’m trying to balance my empathy with my confusion and self-protection.  That I’m an ultra introvert and feel everything around me.  That I love even when that person doesn’t love me to.  That I care because I understand even when I haven’t gone through it myself.  Situations are different but feelings, feelings come universal.  I know what depression feels like, and anxiety.  I know how betrayal feels and disappointment.  I know too well self-hate and being ashamed.  It wasn’t till Thursday that I realized that I know when someone is lying to me and when someone is being real and authentic.  When things I’ve been trying to hide have been written on my forehead all along.  I realized that I just want to know how it feels for someone to fall in love with me because then I can prove myself wrong, that it is possible.  That I can do what I want without regulation because of shame.  Shame that I haven’t noticed guide how I see my body.  I’ve been ashamed for a long time.

I couldn’t write.  I couldn’t write something, anything in the past couple days, an encouragement, a phrase like I usually do because even in the mist of a good moment I drive myself crazy with thoughts and confusions instead of just letting go.  I wanted to stop writing because no one reads. I’m better off just driving myself insane because no one cares about me or what I have to say anyway. Whats funny is I only known a person a couple of days and I just want to say everything to them. That I want to write again because I got my excitement back just over one conversation.  But the fear came back. I should keep to myself but they made me tell them things I never tell anyone and now I’m so self-aware.  I trace my thoughts back to why I hide in my room and lock the door behind me.  Why I cover my face in shame instead of embracing my flaws and things that make me unique.  Why I convinced myself that I’d never fit in in this world so I hide in the shadows. Why I convinced myself a long time ago that I’m meant to be alone and by myself all the time.  And this person said two words:

It’s okay.

Suddenly these words didn’t have the same weight like when I say it to myself.  It had denser weight and made me believe it in a split second.

Not sure if any of this made sense, but it’s way harder knowing the reasons for the scars that run deep then being oblivious to the pain and feelings you have all the time.  Just to remember the times when you felt useless, or hopeless, or lonely, or ugly brings back the foundations of why you hide things deep in the first place, but its better to know so you can work with yourself.

Its okay to let your scars show sometimes, maybe the person your showing them to will help you deal with them.  Don’t repress those feelings anymore. Work with yourself. One push. One phrase from the right person or even yourself can help the process of healing.  Things may not seem important but they are, you are important and so are you moving on.  Don’t trap yourself.  Don’t drive yourself crazy.  Let something change.  Let someone, something, a moment, a thought, a feeling change how you perceive who you are. Realize yourself.  Be happy.  You deserve to be happy.

You deserve a break from the deep. Things, better things, better moments, better thoughts, better people are waiting for you at the surface.  Let yourself loose.  Let yourself free.

Posted in Confessions

Our Collective Identity is being Attacked: We have a Right to be Outraged  

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

Took a while, hours, a day or so, to find my voice and words for the reality of whats happening to our collective unconscious.  Being an American now and one that is a part of one of several underprivileged groups, is troublesome and uncomfortable.  I’m in a state of denial and confusion.  To see the state and tone of grief our country is going through, the plaguing aura running through the streets making waking up in the morning feel like a state of emergency, weighs heavy on me.  To see so many people I know, don’t know, and feel for walk the streets of these states in anger, fear, and anxiety makes it all the more important to support and stand up for one another.  This election isn’t all about a presidency, it’s not all about politics, it’s not all about government or possible policies.  This election is about an attack on a collective identity, it’s about oppression, it’s about hindering ones freedom to be without prejudice or racism, sexism, homophobia, and islamaphobia.  This election makes people afraid, angry, and disappointed about their citizenship and because people actually feel like this is what makes this election all the more important.  

Viweing, analyzing, and reading over, seeing all of so many peoples opinions has shown me that despite peoples plea to be calm, that it’s going to okay, doesn’t seem to grasp or fathom the extent to where someone feels threatened because of their identity.  They have a right to feel and to be angered and dissapointed. Being a woman, a latina, makes me unwelcomed, it makes me someone who is in a targeted group whether I like it or not. I don’t have control over the reality of that oppression (this is not new), but for someone to be a threat to my freedom of identity is the problem. 

I matter.  Everyone of us matter. The ones who are targeted, the ones who are seen as unwelcomed, the ones who are marginalized and oppressed every day.  We matter.  And because we have to prove that we matter makes America dangerous. Because we have to say black lives matter, and women lives matter, and muslim lives matter as phrases of their own proves the urgency that who we are as a collective is not being seen as important or valued.

We have to help each other feel safe and supported.  What is happening is not being overexagerated, its a response to a threat to our emotional, physical, and mental well being.  We are responding to what has been said to us by power and privilege.  We are defending our right to ourselves. Be outraged. We matter. I matter. Our lives matter. 

Posted in Confessions, Keep Moving: Motivation and Inspiration, Quotes, Self-Care, Self-Talk, What Just Happened: Personal Anecdotes

I Love Myself for the First Time in My Life

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

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I’m beautiful because even though I might not believe I can at first I still try, even though I struggle to see that I’m beautiful I encourage others to believe they are, and even though I sometimes don’t think I’m good enough I push through anyway.

I love me because I’m persistent, I continue, and I’m learning.  I love me because although things have been difficult, I still have a vision and I still want to pursue it.

It wasn’t until a year after I did this project, a project where I walked around and asked various women why they loved themselves and found themselves beautiful, that I realized I do love myself and find myself beautiful. Before, I didn’t know why I thought I was beautiful or if I had any reason to love myself.  I was only concerned about the women I asked.  I wanted them to realize for that split second, the few minutes that we shared, to think, and to write down why they were beautiful.  I was focused on them and not on me.  I didn’t think I mattered.  How I thought about myself didn’t matter. I don’t think I found myself beautiful at all previous this realization.

This poster is what I looked at every day in my room at school for the last semester of my senior year.  It motivated me to figure out why I would love myself or find myself beautiful.  However, I found it difficult to pinpoint the reasons.

After I graduated I brought the poster home and placed in on my sister’s side of our room, parallel to my bed where I could face it and see it every day.

Fast forward to last weekend where I found the Dr.Pepper Tuition Giveaway Competiton.  Unlike me, I joined the competition and the first step was to write a goal I have to save the world and explain it.  Of course, it took me some time to think about exactly what I wanted to say, but here is what I said:

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It took a day after when I was trying to accumulate votes to be able to upload a video, that I realized then that I wanted to expand SparklyWarTanks into an actual thing.  Dr. Pepper helped me to see why I’m beautiful.  It helped me to realized what I wanted to do with my life.  How I want to impact the lives of others and why this is so important to me. I want to change how women see themselves and communicate their perspective and understanding to others through their culture, ideologies, and values.

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I don’t want other women to feel like me.  Where the first 21 years of my life I didn’t love myself or find myself beautiful.  I don’t want women to look and confide in outside things to make them happy.  I don’t want women to drown in their own societal expectations and obligations and not be able to give one reason why they are amazing, worthy, and able.  I saw SparklyWarTanks bigger.

Now this is my vision to make this, what I’m doing, bigger.  I want to help.

I never felt like this before, ready to save the world.  I hope I can make this something, something huge, something that can really influence the spread of self-love.

Posted in Confessions, Quotes

Some People’s Purpose is to Break your Heart

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

Some People’s Purpose is to Break Your Heart

It’s one of those nights where my brains ability to reminisce creates uncomfortable memory recovery.  Where I do not understand why some people have come and gone in seconds, some in months, and some in years.  I learned that not everyone is meant to stay in your life, they’re just meant to teach you lessons, but it also occurred to me that some people are just meant to break your heart.  I’m not only talking about the casual break up with a significant partner, but also family and friends.  Some people enter your life to break you down—some short term and others long term.  In other instances they will just leave while others will linger then leave eventually. Some will even care then stop caring.

This realization has made me, yet again, afraid to create new bonds and friendships but hopeful of the possibility to create and learn from new experiences at the same time.  Life has a way of masking hurt and pain by revealing those wounds into experiences that you would not have witnessed otherwise. I’ve had a fair share, I would say, of rejections and disappointments of people who said they cared but didn’t and a whole lot of self hatred because of it, but I learned (even though those incidents still haunt me in the deep hours of the night) how to appreciate myself and my own company.

Don’t let the illusion of brokenness from people who’s purpose in your life was to break your heart keep you from becoming yourself.

Try to let go of past relationships that didn’t work out. It will take time and probably a lot of tears, but someone else is waiting and they will come with purpose to build you up, stay, push you, and help you get to your power and worth.

Don’t allow past actions of other people to keep you from becoming, teaching, and building those you encounter.  You are not alone.

Be great and be yourself.  That’s all that is necessary.

Posted in Confessions, Quotes

A False Saying: Expect what you Deserve 

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

It bothers me that people actually think that they shouldn’t expect happiness and kindness once they’ve done something great.  It bothers me that people don’t expect for others to care and love them back.  Whats the point of loving if your not going to receive love back? It’s not about materiel expectation but having a will to give back and keep being great.  Sometimes it gets discouraging to always be the one to step up and be the bigger person.  Sometimes you just want to see someone else care as much as you do. You want to see someone else extend a hand when you need them too.  You should be able to expect love to come back when all you’ve been doing is putting it out.  It’s not fair that this world has taught us that we shouldn’t expect goodness to come out of goodness.  We shouldn’t stop expecting, we should be dissapointed in people saying we should stop expecting.

Posted in Confessions, Creative Writing, Self-Talk, What Just Happened: Personal Anecdotes

Dear Anxiety

Posted on by SparklyWarTanks

I see you standing there.  I remember when you started.  I remember the moment when you showed your face in the mist of a random moment.  I couldn’t take the tasks and the fears, and the rules, and the obsessions, and the self induced heart breaks, and the frequent rejections.   I injected you into me.  Like a drug I didn’t take.  It was a present moment where I felt the symptoms.  I fell sick from the exhaustion of perfect perceptions of normality and nature.  I wasn’t this and I wasn’t that.  I wasn’t good enough for this, and that, and him, and her, and that thing that dictates success and a better life.   

I remember you when I was a little girl.  Your face was new.  No one liked me and I didn’t want to go to school.  I’d rather stay at home where the noise was less loud, and I had my barbie dolls to keep me company and cleaning to sooth me with my head in the clouds.  I remember having dreams where I was someone else and everything I knew was the dream and I would wake up and everything was different, but every morning reality hit me.  Nothing was different nothing changed.

But what was different from then and now is that I repressed you and thought you had gone away.  The fear in religion took over and I was scared of that too.  Heaven and hell, but you came back and here’s how.

I remember you were there when I hated myself and I didn’t talk for three days.  You were there when I met depression too and it wanted to stay.  I remember you when I couldn’t sit in that meeting because all they promised was stress and pain.  I remember you when I thought my dog would be real sick and not be able to come home to tame you in my brain.

I remember you when I thought they’d be disappointed in me because I was a failure and I was the weakest link.  I remember you when they called me ugly and low self esteem was around and annoyed me like a leaky sink.  I remember you when I went to the counseling psych centers, you were there sitting with me.  I remember you sitting in two places, outside and inside, it was fall semester my senior year and that test, the GRE, made you show your true intentions.

I felt the nausea in my stomach every moment of every day.  My head to the ground because I couldn’t look my fear in the face.  I feel the headaches coming on and the craving for sleep, but constantly staying awake because I had so much to do but my motivation was down to my feet.  You boiled over and I was afraid to live.  Every day was a struggle, but I survived it.

I know what makes you spark and what makes you sleep now, and it’s kinda crazy.  Only one year since you’ve been full blown ruining my life, but I’m not going to let you take me.  Some days are harder than others, and sometimes I don’t want to wake up, I get scared of the sun coming up because that means I have to push myself to do something.

Let me tell you something, and I laugh at this now, but I understand where you came from and you’re unacceptable and something I won’t allow.  Running through the history of how you came to be, my self-realization and power is greater than you’ll ever be.  With my beliefs and my strengths, my spirit, my drive, and my motivation you won’t get fed anymore because what’s inside of me is pure love and it’s hungry.

So I thought I’d write you this letter to show myself that I conquered you for good and that you are something of my past I can talk about freely and unafraid as I should.

                                                                                                                                     Sincerely,

                                                                                                                                      Your Past Prisoner  

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