Mantras

Warning: Every learning portrayed here is the product of experiences forged in fire, 

often with immeasurable pain. 

The reader should not dare to think this is wisdom, but rather the result of infinite clumsiness. 

Additionally, everything written here, like me and my circumstances, is subject to change.

A healthy relationship of any kind is teamwork, not competition. It's about growing together, not about who wins.

All the relationships you've had, have, and will have will (for life or death) end. Consider, then, that every interaction you have will be, by its very nature, the first, the only, and the last one. Enjoy them, and when the time is right, let them go with love and gratitude.

Always listen to your intuition, without exception. Your brain has evolved in layers, and the first layer is precisely the one that sends warning signals to your body when something is wrong. Millions of years of evolution haven't been in vain: listen to your survival instinct; it's clear and compelling.

Corollary: Separate your intuition from your anxiety. Intuition communicates with equanimity; anxiety, with ruminative emotional chatter.

Being possessed by emotions robs you of objectivity. If an emotion is ruling you, the first thing to do is stop and define it; then, proceed as you need to.

Believe in proverbs. In its various forms and manifestations, humanity has always been and will always be essentially the same. Ancient wisdom should not be disregarded.

Compatible boundaries are necessary for relationships to work. The more others' boundaries exceed yours, or vice versa, the more incompatible the relationship will become. And that's okay.

Fundamental corollary: If you constantly bend your boundaries to meet someone else's expectations, you'll forget who you are. Compromise is good; fracture is not.

Devoting your energy to pleasing others will attract the wrong people into your life. There are emotional parasites waiting eagery to lurk, waiting to feast on people incapable of saying no.

Don't be a mirror for someone who doesn't want to look at themselves. Many, many people are not ready to be reborn: some aren't yet, and others never will be. It's not your place to rush the process for others. 

Corollary: Be alert to the signs of emotional irresponsibility. If you get involved with someone who has no intention of looking inward and questioning their own actions, sooner or later, you will pay the price.

Don't fill the silence. Give others the space to show who they are.

Don't make decisions from a place of death; decide from a place of life. The fear of dying, the fear of loss, the fear of a cycle ending, makes us make decisions from a place of grief, anticipating (or rather, prolonging) the pain. Decide from a place of life, from the search for a path of peace.

Emotional transformation (and healing) is one of the most intimate processes a human being experiences. Like every personal hell, every path to healing and spiritual growth is a personal journey. Supporting and being present is a tremendous blessing and a great privilege (both for the one healing and for those witnessing it), but you cannot intervene.

Every hell is personal. It's beautiful to have people around supporting you to get out of it, but your hell remains yours alone.

Corollary: You shouldn't interfere in other people's hell, because their demons may end up hunting you.

Every situation that upsets you teaches you something. Sometimes it's about what you need to learn about yourself; other times it teaches you about others (and sometimes, too, how to refine your own boundaries).

Feeling your emotions is healthy and necessary. Suppressing your emotions will damage your health (sometimes irreversibly). On the other hand, letting emotions control you will lead you to the worst places imaginable. If you understand your feelings, you can also guide them, welcome its spectrum, and you will be (and feel) more fulfilled.

Friendship is the relationship that should flow most easily. It's tribal love, a safe space, and people with whom you can leave most of your masks behind. It doesn't mean there won't be differences; it means that, despite the differences, the common ground, the shared moments, and the growth together are experiences you'll never stop valuing.

Giving advice to someone is like entering their home. You either ask permission or you are invited in. Offering advice without prior consent is not only disrespectful; it is also a violation of privacy.

Healing is not a bed of roses. Healing, in fact, is deciding to cross the path of thorns you're trying to avoid. It's chaotic and painful; not only because you must confront the emotions you've suppressed, but also because you have to accept that on more than one occasion, your lack of awareness harmed others. The reward for learning to deal with pain is learning to deal with joy. 

Corollary: It's difficult to think about embarking on a path that will hurt and force us to confront our own shadows; for this reason, most people don't do it. What makes it worthwhile is that, scarred and scabbed, the you you become after looking honestly at the mirror, will be the most beautiful and powerful version of yourself.

If you try to change someone, let it be yourself. Changing others is impossible and will only result in emotional fractures. Changing yourself also hurts, and yet, this is not only possible but also one of the biggest and most beautiful acts of resistance you can undertake.

Let go of the illusion of control. Fortunately, we have no control over anything or anyone but ourselves. It's terrifying at first, and liberating later.

Love is unconditional; relationships are conditional. You can love without limits, but your bonds must be symbiotic by definition. Love is something you carry with you, regardless the state of your relationships.

Nothing is personal. No action (even if it's in response to something you've done) is fundamentally about you, but rather about how the other person understands the world through their own codes and experiences.

Corollary: Everything is personal. Just as others respond to their own history and worldview, so do you. In that sense, your experience of the world is entirely personal and not obvious to others.

Physical attraction can be extremely dangerous. If what you feel is physical magnetism, you're very likely to fall into the trap of the halo effect.

The best gift you can give those you love is your presence. Value that gift even when others are giving it to you.

The concept of lying is much deeper than what we are often taught. It's not just about claiming that "The White House is brown." Relationally, lying is the inconsistency between words and actions. The more inconsistencies, the more lies there are. Be careful not to be blinded by your expectations of others based solely on what they say they will do.

The most important word in your vocabulary should be "No." It teaches you who you are, it protects you, and it teaches you who respects you and who only sees personal gain through your lack of boundaries.

The same patterns you used to survive a difficult childhood can be the ones that destroy you in adulthood. Acting from trauma, anxiety, anticipation, and defensiveness can lead you (and will lead you) to unwanted situations that will only worsen if you don't wake up. Examine and discover who you are so you can be in charge of your emotions, not the other way around.

The shadow you're unaware of (or don't want to accept) will control and destroy your relationships of all kinds. Radical acceptance of who you are will allow you not only to find your peace but also to experience love and all its nuances from the right place in your heart.

Those who refuse to carry their own burdens will hold you responsible for them. People who don't deal with their demons will sooner or later blame you for having them.

To love is to open layers of your heart. The more you love, the more layers open (and the more vulnerable you are). Be careful when choosing to whom you give that power.

True relationships will have difficult conversations and moments. As long as it's possible to work through them, relationships will find strength in navigating those paths.

We know so little that we know nothing. Understanding this maxim will allow you to open all doors at once. There is no certainty about anything. There are always different interpretations of everything.

Corollary: To know, ask. Every human being is a world unto themselves, and understanding is achieved through active conversation.

When in doubt, ask. In an open and non-binary way: What, how, when, where, why? Questions will help you know if your interpretation of what you hear aligns with the message being communicated to you.

You will never, ever know the true motivations of someone who approaches you. Some will reveal themselves in a couple of days, others will take years. That said, the person you trust most should always be yourself.

The end.

 And then it happened.

The last person asking for food finally succumbed to famine.

Her name was Mary. She was 10 years old.

The doctors run to help her, exhausted from hunger, but still able to move freely.

People bringing the humanitarian aid to the forbidden border cried massively in an ineffable pain.

The soldiers lowered their guard and went to celebrate. After all, the 24/7 shifts were finally over.

The city then, for weeks, 

remained in deaf silence.

The news covered the issue casually in their lower credits, 

while announcing the winner of that year's Nobel Peace Prize.

(The following year, the winner was a politician 

whose social crusade was to clean the city of bodies and debris).

Today, in the newspaper, 

I saw this open land sale to invest in luxury hotels. 

The name of the city in question sounded painfully familiar.

Stuck.

5:10 am.

While the dawn in the sky slowly clears up and my thoughts remain increasingly foggy after 30 minutes of sleep, the biggest struggle at the moment is that my feelings, as in a bottleneck, pile up and blend; cutting both their clarity and the capacity to let them go.

One clear confusion, oxymoronically speaking, is that to this point and in new spheres of interaction, I no longer know who the hell I am now. 

It would be easy to just answer this -oxymoronically framed- wondering; however, it is so complex that no matter how much I do try to dig into every (sometimes even painfully) calculated (and defined by who do I want to be) decision, some of them take me by surprise in such a deep level, that it feels like a new person (or my true person) has taken over my self and leads every scenario... from kisses shared at 6:00 am with a cherished and wanted love, to an unexpected fight with a total stranger.

That on the side of one (fractalic) thought.

And then it is the feelings. 

There, also, the so-called new (true) person manages at their best with feelings known just recently, like a blindfold that is finally gone and allows her to see every colour for the very first time.

I would love to dig into explaining how this part is, but this is truly not possible. 

Suffice it to say that, after growing up, a normal adult person has experienced almost the whole range of emotions a human can experience... And this person is experiencing and managing all of them, every time they happen, as if they were her very first time... 

I guess a good consolation for this part is 

that I will definitely get used 

to feel in a different 

(maybe better)

way.

This overwhelm-ness, though, is the struggle. 

The stuckness.

The pain.

Do I accept this version of me?

Should I embrace this version of me?

Is it okay if I like it?

6:03 am.

Time to try and sleep a little, at least.

The price of growing.

I started this entry, weeks ago, under the title "Nostalgia". It invaded me at that time as much as it does now and yet, in the big picture, this is nothing more than a superficial layer for a much deeper structural feeling.

And well, as curiosity is my engine and compass, I could not help but -quietly- let the beautiful Nostalgia invade me and penetrate every corner of my day and my dreams, to -from my stillness- observe and feel every nuance and every layer she wanted to show me.

And I reached her centre. 

Nostalgia would be a view of the past from Solitude.

So I approached Solitude.

Solitude, still and silent, 

invaded me and penetrated me as well.

Solitude, still and silent, 

made a lump in my throat.

And I cried bitterly out of Solitude.

I felt, in every tear and every pain, also every name, face, moment, kiss, laugh, idealisation, tenderness, love, insult, mistreatment, devaluation, contempt, disdain, blame, deflection, and cynicism… Resounding mixes of what had to be left behind.

And while it is true that Solitude felt that way, 

it also went through me without leaving wounds.

At her centre, finally,

I saw myself.

Girl-woman.

I saw myself full of scars and scabs. 

Covered in mud, tar, blood, and sweat.

I saw myself tired and hurt, 

but more whole than ever.

Growing up is an absolutely extraordinary journey.

Growing up is also an absolutely painful journey: Not only because the fight with our own demons is hard, painful, and shameful; but also because many, many times, that growth will involve loneliness: from the people who separated their paths from ours as we did not learn in time, and ourselves, since sometimes growing up means also deciding to separate our paths from the people we loved and were important to us... the option of staying would only mean going back on a road that is only meant to go forward, and that will not bring us satisfaction or happiness of any kind.

...And because our own versions of ourselves, which were left behind, also remind us that in those versions we were happier with less (and we accepted the painful, abusive unhappiness as one more ingredient of that status quo). 

And therein lies Nostalgia.

We were born alone.

It is the destiny of Life to meet Death and it is the destiny of every Beginning to meet its End; which does not make the experience of any event less real. If anything, this awareness helps us to live each adventure from the peace of its absolute and ephemeral genuineness.

Perhaps that is why growing is so worth it despite the price one pays: The path to the end becomes peaceful and one begins to find gentle aromas after a journey of thorns.

Perhaps that is why growing is so worth it despite the price one pays: The price of meeting oneself, without fear, is truly impossible to measure.

Deal?

As the number of full moons that I’ll have the pleasure to see while holding your hand is limited;

as the number of fights that we have ahead might just be a bit more than the number of full moons;

as the times my index will “poup” the tip of your nose -and the fun, entertaining times in between- are falling into the countdown of an imminent end like a cracked hourglass…

I propose you to enjoy this ride with the safe,

temporary and total adrenaline that a roller coaster offers:

Imagine, just for a moment,

that I am your person

and not only a bridge;

Let me imagine that I’ll have the pleasure 

to keep exploring how it feels

when Love and Life meet.

Closure

I fall into the loop of the same triggers.

And I see only a void waiting to suck me in.

It’s hard, in the middle of the onirical mist, to get a sense of what is simply a very vivid mental hell and what is a real foot that moves innocently, but drastically, into nothing, as a limb does when the body is entering the state of torpor.

There's no possible masking in any case: The nervous system will get immediately triggered by what modeled it in the first place, and it will do it the same way for a nightmare, the imagination of a possible catastrophic scenario, a painful wait for uncertain bad news, or the maddening moment in which you stopped everything inside and around, and broke every possible healing or closure, when you decided to leave this Realm, 18 years ago, through the back door.

The letter I never sent

Dear you (or dearest, or beloved you):

It is time for this letter to reach your hands, your eyes, or any sense that allows you to absorb as much as I try to convey in this letter.

Much has happened since I last heard from you. Whether it was two months ago or twenty years ago in Earth time, the different paths that are travelled in each act, step and error, can turn just one day into an entire eternity.

I write this letter to you with a unique and universal intention.

What I never said (and/or what I never let you say) became dozens (sometimes hundreds) of paths called "what if...?". Not only because of the possible (probably more conciliatory) way out that these paths would have offered; but also because in many of them you would still be here, in my life, perhaps by my side... or perhaps I would still be on your radar.

However, as I write this letter I also think about whether those "what ifs" would have also meant that who I am now, would not exist in the form that I have (you know, a different crystal in the kaleidoscope and a small turn of a couple of degrees fundamentally changes the large scale). And maybe it is thanks to you - and/or maybe it is thanks to your absence - that I am now who I am... maybe removing you (without saying or letting you say) was key so that in this present, my kaleidoscope with its shapes and colours as they are today, finds me at a point I never dreamed of being.

What would happen if, in this set of crystals, I met you again? What would happen if, in this set of crystals, I met you for the first time? Would I have understood from the beginning that you had to leave my life as soon as possible? Would you have understood it? Would you have perhaps made that decision much earlier than me?

Does it matter?

Probably not.

And yet here I am, tracing paths of what could -or could not- have been if our paths had not separated the way they did.

Every wound, every difference, every toxicity, every comment and even every blow, led me by reason or force to question my ways, my decisions and my reactions. More or less awake, I learned that the only way to survive is to question even the ground I walk on. And that was the road that brings me here and now, to this extremely complex and fractal specific moment, to write this letter to you.

Above all,

Thank you.

I would not have done it without you.

Dear you (or dearest, or beloved you), we may never meet face to face again. I may no longer exist on your radar and that's okay, I'm glad you've moved forward in the direction Life had for you (I'm even happier if this direction has brought you joy). You are still in mine, undoubtedly because something unresolved kept beating between my ears and my heart. That is why I've written this letter.

Perhaps,

as a kind of ritual or spell,

writing it will allow me to untie a thousand knots at once to continue on my journey.

I will then carry, without this knot of you, still something of you in me:

Your memory,

Your influence,

and perhaps even,

your pain (and mine).

All of the above, I guarantee you, 

transmuted into different forms of love.

Receive from me the most cordial greeting in the way you prefer.

And my deepest gratitude for having been part of my life.

S.

A loving goodbye.

Journeys.

Journeys begin, and journeys end.

Many of them will never begin, 

but all of them will end

(the journey of this specific writing,

the journey we start with the ones we've chosen to love,

and absolutely and definitely, the journey that brings me here, to write these lines, while I breathe and beat on the other side of the screen).

Many journeys I ended with so much pain that I decided to cause it too. 

Many others were so unbearable, that I soothed the pain with just enough venom to keep me alive and unfeeling.

And more times than I can admit, they even left me with a temporal void that throbbed insipidly inside my chest, while my body made all possible efforts to keep me alive and rebuild my heart.

Hearts, 

loves, 

losses, 

tears over books and words, 

and sometimes over numbers 

(dates and algebra).

What I never expected aeons ago was to meet the loves I'm losing now while this new, resilient, reshaped and a hundred times revived heart faces the pain 

without escaping it, 

without hurting back, 

And without needing anything but water to keep it flowing and floating, among the tears of joy, love, sadness, melancholy and hope that the end of this journey brings.

Why now? Why this way? Why this moment?

(...Why not?) 

Perhaps because this time, when I chose to love you (and learn from you, grow with you, and face my demons and triggers through you), I did it knowing that the price to pay would be this pain by the end of the journey

(but of all people, you were worth it).

I give myself entirely, completely, to the love and pain I feel now.
The lesson this time will be feeling the sweet pain and the sour happiness that the certainty of an end (like no other phenomenon in the world) gives.

Without knowing how long it would last, I began this journey of loving you how I now know I can. 

And the end arrived and held our hands telling us the biggest lesson: 

The healing power of a loving goodbye.

I love you. 

I'll always remember you.

Thank you, infinitely, for this journey.

S.

The mirror of our pain

On my inner journey, maybe the biggest highlight has been to discover how, in the middle of the darkness that takes over us when we feel mad or angry, there's a deeper layer that we're trying to protect: Our pain and sorrow.

It can be carefully, thanks to the right people around and a heart willing to learn, that one can be able to see this within themselves, by wondering why are we mad, and especially, what is the pain and vulnerability that we are protecting through that shield.

Opening up is never, never an easy process. On the contrary: Sometimes it is so hard, that we rather deflect onto other people and situations for what happens to us than hold accountability for our feelings, actions and reactions (maybe, because doing this last thing is assuming that there are wounds open and sometimes, these are too painful to even look at).

The good thing if you do? You will start the most amazing and transforming journey of your life, and will be able to go on with fewer burdens that weigh you down.

The bad thing? It will certainly hurt. 

Emotions are hard, but that's why they make you strong. 

...And it will always be better to face our demons than to hide from them.

"We are what we do, especially 

what we do to change what we are..."