Maybe we are the crazy ones here
So what
Hi there,
In a Child’s Pose, kneeling with your forehead to the floor and arms stretched out in front of you, tears fall upwards; towards the eyebrows, onto the forehead. It’s a new feeling. “Let go,” she says, “Just breathe. You’re safe here. You don’t have to do anything else right now.” Yoga at 10am on a Sunday: Church for the secular. Let go, let go, let go. I do as I’m told and I learn tears can fall up, towards the sky, if you surrender.
Five things to share:
"I wouldn't stand there if I were you," I'm waiting for the streetcar with my AirPods blasting Drake. I pull one of them out instinctively; the music pauses and I step off the drain grates: The train rumbles beneath. I smile at the stranger spewing the warning at me. I used to be terrified of these things— grates and strangers. Afraid, knowing my luck, it would buckle under my weight and down to hell I go. Afraid, knowing my luck, they would turn out no good and down to hell I go. My first instinct is to put my AirPods back on. Do not engage with strangers; no matter how harmless they look. That's the first lesson this city's inhabitants must learn. The city can swallow you whole if you're not careful, I need to be careful. But despite myself, and because talking to strangers has become my favourite thing to do in-the-between moments— waiting for the bus, for my coffee, in line at the grocery store— I try my luck. I get closer to her as I step off the grates; "Ooo, I'm scared of those things," she continues. "You know nothing happens," I tease, "People walk on these all the time." This is the reasoning I used to get over my irrational fear of standing/walking on trench grates and I hope it might help her too.
A quote I want to share with you:
Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
IRL > URL
It takes a daily effort to be free
Don’t you know it.
A question for you: What are you leaving in 2023?
I recently bough a metal bucket, labeled it Things I am leaving in 2023 and have been throwing notes of things I will not be bringing into the new year into it. I will burn the contents on 12/31/2023. This is the brilliant idea $140/hour can get you. Thank god neither of us have to pay for it— Metal bucket costs $5.
P.s. Three years of paper journaling!!! The years are short for real. Time flies. There is no going back once you get acquainted with the analog process. A slow, quiet, offline morning with coffee, a notebook and pen is my life-sustaining practice. I also appreciate how my inner voice, my writing voice, and how I speak IRL are very close in style so I can share a page from my journal without feeling fraudulent.
That’s all for this week!
Thank you for reading, and share with anyone you think may benefit.
time spent offline is now a monthly analog publication you can get delivered straight to your mailbox with 20 ideas every month.
Until next time,
Mehret