Jan. 13, 2026 - Surprises

Hey! I celebrated my birthday recently and I’m now a year older! I spent my morning going to church with my family and the pastor who’s usually there, wasn’t there because he went on vacation apparently.

Just a note, I wouldn’t say I’m religious. I rarely go to church, but when I do, I find myself getting sleepy when the pastor starts going on about a story in the bible. I wasn’t sure how to feel about the substitute pastor right until he went on about surprises. The usual pastor goes on about his interpretation of a story in the bible and then makes real-life connections to it, but dude, whatever the substitute pastor was going on about, I was eating up.

He talked about how as a kid, surprises were always a thing that was fun and exciting, but as we get older, that joy of surprises starts to fade. That fading has to do something with the idea that as we get older, we have more experiences and are therefore less excited when surprises do arise since we’ve already done all that living.

He challenged that idea and said that maybe we should be more open to these surprises. As in, instead of always just expecting that that’s just how things were supposed to be, maybe we should be more appreciative of those surprises that come our way. Life will always continue to surprise me, so why should I stop getting excited over them just because I’m getting a little older?

I think I might have already been doing this unknowingly, but sometimes it’s nice to get reminded. I feel as though my life has just been so much more full because I’ve been more accepting and open to the people and experiences that come my way. This past summer, especially, was one where I experienced so many surprises. If I really think about it, perhaps all my past summers have been like this, where I just experience all these new things, but don’t really appreciate or think about them. I was more intentional about the way I thought about people, events and just anything new that came my way.

I also had this thing going where I was taking “risks” or just doing stuff that “scared me” and dude, regardless of what happened, I was fine every time. It was amazing and I felt so alive. Dude, I think I was getting this high from the anticipation of what was going to happen next. For example, I absolutely dreaded any type of social interaction, but once I learned how to talk to people, I got excited that I got to know them a bit better. It got easier the more I did it and I made some new friends along the way hehe. Once I started thinking and seeing things through a lens where life wasn’t actually out to get me, my life literally started to take shape into one where I was so glad to have woken up the next day because I knew it was going to be another new adventure for me. It is so fucking true when you believe in something, whether be it good or bad, it will fucking manifest. Holy shit, dude.

Now that I read this a second time, boy, does this sound cheesy as fuck, but I’m also perhaps a giant cheese-ball. Anyway, life continues to surprise me because I acknowledge things as they are and go “hey, I did not expect that” and it helps my days all feel distinct from one another. I used to be in this constant cycle of living the same day over and over, and maybe I still am, but if I intentionally do something to make them all feel different from one another, it works, every time. I don’t know how my day is going to go, but I can definitely plan for it and just see what happens.

I quite literally get surprised by each day and it’s a wonderful feeling to see my life not as a mundane cycle where I’ll eventually die, but rather a series of new adventures where I don’t know where I’ll end up. This then of course is the lead to my next adventure and that’s the cycle I’m pretty much in right now. Kind of like watching an episode of any show. The show is fun to watch because the characters are always doing something different in each episode, like some wacky or stupid shit. You want to keep watching the show because you think “what could possibly happen in the next episode”? Be open to surprises, man, and then adapt. Anything could happen. Like in a show! Shoutout to the substitute pastor for that reminder that I am living right now for realsies.

Thanks 4 reading & take care always, girl

Jan. 8, 2026 - Not Every Crush Could Be Your Partner and That’s Normal

Note: Everything I say in here is an analogy and metaphorical. Also, when I talk about crushing in this context, I’m talking about seeing an attractive person and never talking to them ever. As in you know of them.

You know how in elementary or middle school, if you told your friend you had a crush on someone, all they’d do is tease you. Like god forbid you thought someone was cute, because all your friends would do is push you towards them, or giggle a little too loud while they’re around and just let your crush and the entire world know that you’re into them. I mean, that was kind of the same thing too when I was in high school, so nevermind.

Now that I’m older, I can have conversations with friends and go “Oh yea, do you remember that guy we went to school with? He’s cute” and they’d go “Yea I see it” and that would be it. It wouldn’t be this big of a deal, unlike before, where it seemed as though the person I was crushing on was the only good-looking stranger in our 100km radius and if we didn’t end up together, it would be the end of the world. I mean, it used to feel like that. As a literal child, at the age of 13, being rejected by your crush was excruciatingly painful for some reason. At least, that’s what it felt like for me. Then again, any type of loss of somebody that you cared about is hard. No big deal though because I lived through allat lawl. ANYWAYS.

As a 20-something year old now, I’ve had my fair share of love and heartbreak. I’ll start by saying that being in a healthy, loving relationship is amazing. You have someone that gets you and loves you and all that type of stuff, but man, nothing compares to that high when you have a crush on somebody. You know that feeling when you just see another person and then you think “...”, but in a non-dramatic way. It’s just that realization of “oh”. This is not to say I prefer crushing on someone over being in a relationship, but having a crush on someone feels like sitting on the edge of a cliff. You look out to see the vast, open world and beneath you are either metal spikes or the world’s largest pillow, but the thing is, you don’t know what’s down there because it’s too far down to be able to tell.

I like to imagine that at the bottom of every cliff, the world’s largest pillow is waiting for me. It was true a ton of other times, so why not this one? Well, I’ve also had my share of landing on spikes and also landing on a pillow, but then an anvil falls on me. Do you know what I mean? There’s all this risk that comes with sitting on that edge of a cliff, but there’s something so thrilling about imagining and thinking of what could be and what if. Don’t get me wrong, I love to get my creative juices flowing and all, but at the end of the day, I don’t live in my imagination. I can go on about my appreciation for and my belief in the saying, “as above, so below”, but that’s a whole other conversation I’ll do a deeper dive into sometime.

That’s the thing about having a crush on someone. A crush is a lack of information (check out Natalie Etched’s video on this, she is da realest). They aren’t this wild, majestic, rare being that the universe just decides to magically summon one day into existence. They’re literally just a person. A person that lives and breathes and has an entire complex life like me. So, I could literally go up to them and talk to them and find out who they truly are. I guess doing that would be the equivalent of jumping down, but you're in a parachute or you just dive head first. It's your game plan after all, you decide. It’s when I get to know them that I realize and get to decide for myself if I still like them like that. The best thing that could happen is that they want to know me too. On the flip side, the worst thing that could happen is that they say they’re not interested. Regardless of what they say, it’s a win. If they want to know more about me, great! If not, also great, because now I can shift my focus onto finding other people who will be interested in me. Dude, if there’s anything I got from watching a bunch of Natalie’s videos, is that rejection is redirection. It applies to so many aspects of life, and this is just one of them.

In one of the comments of that video, someone had said that “sometimes fantasies about your crush are better off being fantasies. Not every crush could be your partner and it’s normal”. LITERALLY, DUDE. You know, the fun thing about crushing on people is that I get to see them, smile at myself knowing I saw an attractive person, and then get on with my day. It’s not something I need, but a little extra something that makes my day better. Sure, it could be even better if they were this person in my fantasy, but it’s also freeing to know that there are no strings attached. No consequences. This, of course, is not to be confused with having a sneaky link. Again, I love myself a healthy relationship, but damn, does it feel good to go home and not have that responsibility of being in a relationship. All the time I spend is directed towards myself and me only. As long as I am not spending an unhealthy and disgusting amount of time over a person I know nothing about, I am chilling and I am living.

Having crushes is a normal experience. It’s not always a waste of time, but there is a fine line between thinking about them every now and then compared to obsessing over them, spending way too much time in your head, painting them as your perfect somebody. Most of the time, I find myself getting up from the edge of that cliff and walking away. Sometimes, I do it unconsciously, but I don’t have the feeling of wanting to see what’s at the bottom of every cliff. Sometimes, it’s just nice to see the view.

Thanks 4 reading & take care always, girl