Flowers For My Lovelies

02/06/25

posting this to promise to myself that I will actually get something done today

☑ tune cello

☑ finish job application for local bookshop

☑ print off emails about work experience

☑ attend both work experience events today

☑ minimum 40 minutes music practice

☑ try make sure i have to to eat lunch

☑ sort out some files from the stuff i won't need next year

on building mental discipline

do something small that challenges you every day for a week. something small, whatever that means to you. maybe that's drinking a cup of water with every meal, going outside for ten minutes, or going for a run, taking a cold shower. whatever a small but tricky task means to you, do that every single day for a week.

it will be hard for about three days and then it will be easier.

the week after do a slightly bigger task. again, do whatever the next step up would be. cook a meal from scratch, call your mum, schedule an appointment, make the bed every day.

it will be hard for three days, then it will get easier.

third week do an even bigger task. vacuum your apartment, go to the gym, iron your shirts. whatever the next step up is for you, do that.

over time your brain will find it far easier to pick up new habits. it will have become used to the idea that you do new things and it is hard for a few days, but you always stick to it. you've built up your reputation with yourself to the point that your brain automatically thinks of you as disciplined and hardworking.

work out what habits your ideal self will do, meal prepping, exercising, seeing friends, going to therapy, and do them. your brain will have learnt that you do things even when they are hard, because it knows they eventually will get easier.

build up your reputation with yourself.

Wikipedia / Image from pinterest / Machiavelli / George Santayana / Thucydides / Image from pinterest / Abba - Waterloo / J. M. Barrie - Peter Pan / Fibonacci spiral / Catherynne M. Valente

physically go to your local library at least once. seriously.

look around. find a random book with a cover that catches your attention. read the description. read the first page. if you like the sounds of it, borrow it and take it home to read. borrow a handful of books even.

if a book loses your interest, drop it. if a book grips onto you, ride that wave.

i've struggled to read recreationally for years despite having read so much as a kid. a lot of us are frozen by the seemingly infinite choices. even when we buy books to take home, we don't read them because which book is worth reading first? we don't have to decide, we have it right here in our bookshelves, we have an eternity of never deciding.

in this past month, i have read five books, most of them i've never heard of when i spotted their cover at the library. most of them, i've ended up loving. the due date of library books maintains the ability to read a book so i can return them to the library and leave the library with more books. an even better incentive than borrowing ebooks, because i actually have to leave the house and not be a hermit.

so if you used to enjoy reading but struggle with it now, ignore the book recs you hear. go to the library, come across a book that piques your interest, and read one page after another until you either lose interest or finish the book.

then it's onto the next one.

quality over quantity

there's a story my dad always tells me about a man who is trying to cut a huge tree down. and he has been at it for hours, his arms are aching, hes exhausted, but the tree is slowly but surely being cut down. the problem is that he has been going for so long that his axe is really blunt. so another guy comes up to him and asks him why he is trying to work with a blunted axe, pointing out that it is so much easier to take a quick break to sharpen your axe and then start work again. but the man refuses, saying that he is being productive at the moment, and he cannot possibly waste time sharpening the axe because he has other tasks to get onto.

if he sharpened the axe the tree would come down faster, and he would have time for the other things he wants to do.

it is far better to take a 30 minute break, take time to jog around the block, make a cup of tea, eat a quick snack, than to try and solidly work for hours and hours.

yes technically you spent more time working, but you probably would have gotten more stuff done if you took a break and refreshed your brain.

sharpen your axe!!

last seen 20:47

sometimes i open my phone and i check when he was last online.

i don't ever message, we have nothing to say to each other anymore, we have already said far too much

i just want to know - its a small act of comfort. i picture him checking his phone at clapham junction, or putting his phone away because a lecture is about to start, breifly replying to a text between sets at the gym.

i picture him doing these inane, everyday activities because i don't know anything about his life anymore. i focus on the facts i know irrefutably because the fact that our routines no longer intertwine like smoke kills me.

he always seems to have come offline just minutes before

maybe this means something, something about how we always just miss each other, the timing was never right, tangled miscommunication

'i can't sleep, can i come back in' 'sorry i missed this message, i fell asleep' 'not here, not here, not here'

i sit and i look at his profile picture, and my heart reaction to the last message he sent, and the words 'last seen 20:47' and i imagine i can smell his distinctive scent, like i have entered a room he was in only moments before.

i think i will spend the rest of my life chasing this boy.

I love you for your post about the “I’m just a girl” phenomenon - my eyes cannot roll far back enough into my skull when I hear someone say it in earnest

thank you! i'm so glad people agree with me on this! whenever i've brought it up to people i hear saying this they just argue thats its not that deep, but i think it is that deep!

one of the biggest things I can advocate for (in academia, but also just in life) is to build credibility with yourself. It’s easy to fall into the habit of thinking of yourself as someone who does things last minute or who struggles to start tasks. people will tell you that you just need to build different habits, but I know for me at least the idea of ‘habit’ is sort of abstract and dehumanizing. Credibility is more like ‘I’ve done this before, so I know I can do it, and more importantly I trust myself to do it’. you set an assignment goal for the day and you meet it, and then you feel stronger setting one the next day. You establish a relationship with yourself that’s built on confidence and trust. That in turn starts to erode the barrier of insecurity and perfectionism and makes it easier to start and finish tasks. reframing the narrative as a process of building credibility makes it easier to celebrate each step and recognize how strong your relationship with yourself can become

btw forgive and forget is a myth, you can forget sure, for your own peace, but forgiveness is not necessary, you are not sanctified by your loving and forgiving nature btw. you can hate forever and its ok <3

(this is about my history teacher)

he is not my favourite sacrificial lamb, he has no bite

he is least my favourite sacrificial lamb because he is so sweet and innocent. i put the cold harsh blade against his throat and his eyes are so clear when they look up at me. he doesn't even think to reproach me for the horrors i put him through. he forgives and he forgives and he forgives.

my favourite sacrificial lamb fights. he bleats for all he is worth and tries to run away on his skinny coltish legs. his eyes are older than they should be and i can see the anger of every lamb before him in them. he makes me feel sorry for what i have to do.

because that is how it needs to be. i need to feel pain and regret and responsibility for the sacrifice to work. if i don't feel disgusted at my actions then there is nothing to cleanse and purify.

fight and scream little lambs, never let us take you easily. if you die quietly we will never feel the guilt, and it will be for nothing.

and then at night i kneel and i pray, not to the god for whom i commit these atrocities, but to the lambs skipping across the inky sky.

ignosce mihi little lambs, just not for this.