sweetheart asked me why? why unblock him if you don’t care about him anymore? i hesitated — because i want him to watch? is it contradictory? is it petty? i wasn’t sure.
and as if by design, he appeared again on my stories. it was intriguing, but that was all — i didn’t feel anything aside from curious indifference and amusement.
so this is what it feels like when someone doesn’t matter anymore.
it was strangely poetic — like this was always bound to happen, and i was merely a passive observer to the predetermined unfolding. indeed, it was never about us, but i might have been wrong about the other part — it was never about you, even. it was about me: what i thought i wanted from you before i realised it had been in me from the beginning, just that i recognise it only now. that’s why a relationship takes at least two to work: there needs to be you and me to be an us.
i unblocked all of them because they don’t matter anymore; i think it is a natural consequence of letting go.
isn’t that wonderful? we love, we learn, and we forgive others and ourselves.
Don’t waste your time chasing butterflies. Mend your garden, and the butterflies will come.
Mario Quintana, Butterflies (translated from the original, “Borboletas”)
I feel I’ve grown a lot emotionally over the past six months. There might still be things I’m not ready to admit to myself — such as my irrational desire for a perfect partner who will ostensibly complete me — but I am also gradually realising that perhaps, just perhaps — I can be whole on my own after all.
I have embarked on so many projects this year that the younger me could hardly have imagined. Pilates princess, babygirl energy? Clarifying my boundaries, and letting go of people and things not contributing to my growth? Living as my authentic self, unwilling to be stifled by others’ projections?
Isn’t this what I wanted all along? All of this seems unreal.
I’ll keep doing these and more because I want to — not because anyone else has told me to, or because someone or society said it’s good for me. It’s good for me because I decided it is, and so it shall be.
I am tending to my garden; I will keep tending to it, rain or shine. The butterflies will come, not because I called out to them, but only because they find it a beautiful place to be.
They may be fickle; they may not stay.
And that’s okay; in the meantime — as we were meant to — we can play.
The post that started it all. Reading this again makes me laugh because it demonstrates my point that people fundamentally don’t change. I mean, look at these iconic quotes from 2019 me:
“I enjoy oversharing about my life to the discomfort of others, though I should really know better. Either way, you’ll get my irrelevant opinions on all sorts of issues.”
“If you think I don’t have any [haters], you’d be surprised — I am so popular it pains me. I can’t even sin in good conscience anymore.”
This post was the first example of what I would become most well-known for among my juniors — reviews and advice relating to my academic pursuits. And my wit, of course.
One of my purer self-expressions at the time related to the paradox of online authenticity — a recurring issue in my life. The dilemma in summary: being “real” online necessitates sharing negative experiences and potentially controversial opinions because that’s real life. However, doing so could lead to adverse consequences, mainly: (1) it might not be good for your reputation in a hypercurated online environment and (2) your disclosure could be weaponised against you.
(1) is more rooted in insecurity than anything else, but (2) is a real concern. Someone reported me to my superiors when I was a student leader because I allegedly made an inflammatory comment online.
The only thing I learned from that affair then, unfortunately for the instigator, is that some people have such uninteresting lives that they can only spend it attempting (and failing) to drag others down. But I’ll admit that the experience helped me learn to criticise in a way that convinces audiences while the targets can’t do jackshit to me. (-:
I only resolved the dilemma after going through therapy: now, I share whatever I want without concern for others’ opinions. The value that I create and the way I treat others is testament enough to my character. If you can’t see it, that’s on you and not me x
2020: the liberal feminist (ironic) era [16 posts]
Self-explanatory. Interesting in the sense that men do not only represent an outlet of emotional and sexual fulfilment for me (god, if only I could choose otherwise), but because the concept of manhood defined my psychic development as a woman. Freud would be proud.
A chauvinist triggered me to write this. The post is noteworthy because it demonstrated my propensity for conflict and polemics. I’m more selective with my battles now because I’m better able to distinguish what’s worth my time.
But my desire and ability to put men in their place will never die.
Trivia: named after a popular shoujo manga I read when I was younger.
This is the post I am most well-known for. I wrote it because it is what I would have wanted to read as a junior. The support I received motivated me to keep writing; it might be part of the reason I am still posting today.
This post marked a breakthrough for me because it was the first time I actively sought help for my depressive symptoms. It was formative in terms of my journey as a mental health advocate.
Trivia: did you guys know I got into trouble for this series (the mental health logs), because someone didn’t like what I said and reported it to someone with authority over me? I got away again, of course (see the pattern here?), because 1) I can and 2) people are delusional to think that they can police my non-political opinions in our fair and free society.
I have had a long troubled history of insomnia since I was an adolescent (it’s gotten a lot better in 2024, though). I paid doctors hundreds of dollars to confirm what I already knew. Speaking from experience: if you have a sleep issue, also get your mental health checked out — the two are inextricable from one another.
More political commentary. The feelings I experienced when I posted this and when I saw the response to it solidified my commitment to write until I die.
Being single and encountering a bunch of men made me have Many Thoughts about the nature of love, dating, and marriage. So where better to organise all these thoughts creatively than here?
I would like to thank the men who inspired me because, hell, I was compulsively putting out banger after banger LOL. Sublimation is real, and I have lived it.
Embarked on this because I love self-improvement projects and gamifying my life. It’s not working out great because I clearly have impulsivity issues, but I’d be damned if I wasn’t having fun.
Another banger of a series (a little bit of disclosure: I was lovesick. I might still be. But I wouldn’t worry, because it’ll all work out in the end.)
That was a sweet trip down memory lane. Happy 5th birthday, my darling blog! I love you.
I had a dream — a nightmare, perhaps — where I was lying beside one of them.
A third party, a casual talker who seemed to lack self-awareness, shared the bed with us. Staring at his back, turned away from us and at a respectful distance, I found myself grateful rather than annoyed by his intrusion.
Either way, I remained pensive, a feeling of discomfort bubbling in my chest until I mentioned that maybe I should go home instead. I said it was the morning, but I just didn’t want to be around him.
Curled up beside me, close enough but never making contact, he muttered something to pacify me. But his body language did not match his words — he seemed to want to get closer and closer the more I squirmed to get further.
He wasn’t the only one, I realise. In every moment I was with them, the abject terror of being jumped pervaded our waltzes; the only real choice I had was whether to lean into the joy of being hunted. I allowed them to decentre me — for that was what I was willing to give — and all of them seemed to revel in taking without reciprocating.
And then they would eventually tell me, sometimes not even directly, as if I wasn’t worth their while — that I was too much for them.
we are going to cross paths with many, many people in our lifetime. we cannot hold on to all of them, much as we want to. letting go of people and the longing for more with them is an unavoidable fact of being alive that we must reconcile ourselves with eventually. some people, including ourselves from others’ perspective, are meant to only be with us temporarily. that is by design, whether willed by the Creator or the nihilistic cosmos that toys with us.
yet this does not mean you are an interregnum — an intermission or a short distraction from normalcy. you are an experience, a lesson, a force of nature: you are the universe’s manifestation of love. everyone is, even those who hurt us. the only thing we can do is make the best of the present because that’s all we’ll ever have in the end — you imprint their shadow onto your soul so that even when they fade away in time, they’ll always be a part of you. their memory belongs to you now; keep what you like, discard what you don’t.
so when you meet other travellers like yourself who want to stay and grow with you, hold onto them — not enough to lose yourself, but enough so that in the rare chance they want to be bound to you too, both of you will share a bond — a bond that defines what it means to be human.
writing this to you on a whim. yes, to you, my dearest, who is reading this post unprompted. i won’t be sharing about this one; i’ll actively bury it, even. because it’s for you.
don’t get me wrong, i love getting views on my posts. after all, what is self-expression without an audience? i did realise recently, however, that all the people i’ve loved before have encountered my blog in one incarnation or another. it existed in different physical forms, but it didn’t matter; the core was the same — all of them were always an extension of me.
it might just have been morbid curiosity on their part, in the same way you cannot take your eyes off an impending crash. nonetheless, i choose to believe they loved me too, in their own way, or better: they might not have wanted to, but they couldn’t help it in the end.
my mind’s running, it always is: i am enraptured by the significance of what it means for me to write and for you to read. between our screens is a whole parallel universe, and all it has is us two. do you understand?
do you ever wonder if i’m writing about you? what do you think i want from you, and what do you want from me?
do you love me, did you love me at all?
if you decided to leave, why am i still writing to you, and why are you still here reading?
every mistake you’ve made and every wrong you’ve experienced is a learning lesson — it happened so that you could be here, in this moment, as a wiser and stronger person.
it is terrifying to realise that no one owes you anything, i know. on the other hand, you are no longer bound to anyone’s expectations.
maybe liberation was meant to come together with loneliness? nothing in this world comes easy.
recently i’ve been playing, i’ve been played; i’ve been trapped in a prisoner’s dilemma. i confessed, i waited, they stayed quiet: i was punished for my faith, and then twice. i persisted until i was a willing party no longer: i had to, i have to, i need to act in my best interest.
but love isn’t a game; if it must be one, then the optimal outcome is not to play.
it doesn’t matter if you crawl back begging for forgiveness; there is nothing to repent for, because there was nothing between us in the first place.
and what about regret? again, i don’t regret anything — except what we could not have.
baby g’s diary 