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the other day, someone who is a few years younger than me told me that they look up to me. they casually mentioned it in conversation. and i started to cry. for the past few months i have been consumed by grief in a way that has forced me to lose much of myself, and i’ve been working really hard to find who i am again. or at least the me that i can be now. i feel like an absolute wreck, a crash out, a mid-life crisis divorced father stuck in a 23 year old girls body. it was nice to be reminded that all of that is just about being human. that it doesn’t define me. i am only evolving. i like that others can still see greatness in you even when you don’t feel it yourself.
Feb 24, 2025

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I'm also 23, and I relate a lot to finding who I am. Except I'm not sure if I ever knew who I was. Im dealing with the grief of my own addictions right now. I'm happy you were given such a thoughtful comment, I know how much it probably meant to you. Love yourself, friend. ❤️
Feb 25, 2025
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we feel like a wreck - yet others still see us whole. like they can see something in us that we can’t. maybe that’s the truth - we’re not lost. just changing. grief doesn’t erase who you are. even now. someone sees you as someone to look up to. that has to mean something. maybe that’s what being human is - constAntly shifting between who we think we are and who others remind us we can be. griEf has a way of making everything feel unrecognizable. likE you’re walking through a house you used to live in but all the furniture is gone. it’s easy to believe that means you’ve lost yourself. but maybe you’re juSt in the middle of rearranging. maybe that emptiness isn’t losS but space for something new. the fact that someone looks up to you. says everything. even at your most unCertain - you are something worth admiring. even when you don’t feel steady - you are still standing. maybe you don’t have to find your way back. maybe you are aLready becoming eXactly who you’re supposed to be.
Feb 24, 2025

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This is a little long winded and personal. Please forgive me. It's been exactly one year since my great aunt passed away - she was a pillar of the family, a very intelligent and witty woman whom we all loved. She used to cut out stories from the newspaper/ magazines and mail them to me while I lived away, and she had the most incredible handwriting I’ve ever seen. She was, to use one of her favorite things to call me, a “real mensch.” Less than 48 hours after that, I got broken up with. We had been dating for almost two years. It was the healthiest relationship I had ever been in. Yet, we were laying in my teenage bedroom at my parents house, and she was crying. All I remember is thinking to myself “FIGHT for her you DUMB MOTHERFUCKER, you CAN’T lose another woman” - but I didn’t. I was scared. And just like that, the best year of my life came crashing down in spectacular fashion. Two extremely hard hits at once. I had to keep moving forward. I didn’t see any alternative. And as a result, I sank into what I can only describe as my own death spiral. Lots of cigs, lots of booze, lots of work, all to drown out the voices in my head telling me “maybe this isn’t a good idea.” I didn’t allow myself to MOURN then. To feel sad, to feel loss, and to work it out constructively and communally. Now, a year later, I’m finally allowing myself to feel those emotions about both of those things. Finally crawling out of that death spiral. Mourning isn’t weakness, nor is grief. Just…if you haven’t properly mourned something, anything, I recommend allowing yourself to. Keeping something like that inside, no matter how compartmentalized it may be, is a bad idea.
Mar 8, 2025
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I haven't lived very long, but so far in my expirence love and grief have made me feel most human. There are plenty of other feelings that connect me to life & the beauty of living, but love and grief seem to be the most potent. Do we appreciate these emotions because they make us feel complex & beautiful, or is it because of the pure, visceral intensity of the feelings themselves? I asked AI, and it told me it would never biologically be able to understand what it feels like to experience an emotion. That made me cry.
Feb 20, 2025
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the other day i went out to an unfinished nuclear plant with some old highschool friends. we cut a hole in the fence and ran to one of the massive, truly massive cooling towers. it was terrifyingly big, like really, seriously, huge. it was my third time there and definitely had not lost any of its effect on me. the four of us stood underneath it for a good forty minutes. looking up through the top to see the last touch of sunset resting on the rim, and later planets. we stood there for long stretches of silence until someone would shift their weight and the crunch of a couple pebbles underfoot would echo so loud and clear we could all hear it. we sang there in the echo beneath the tower until it was totally dark. later, in the front seat of my best friend‘s car as we played american football i cried. i don’t think anyone noticed, i think they were busy with whatever they were thinking about. i cried because of how long i had gone wanting this feeling. that i hadn’t seen these old friends in months and had been struggling to meet anyone i felt could be the kind of people i wanted to really love like i did my friends from highschool. i want people to love so badly, to go to a sketchy abandoned nuclear plant and watch the sunset and sing together. we forget how long it takes to make friends like that i guess. it’s only been one semester, and i shouldn‘t let that be me down. i love you all so much :)
Jan 29, 2025

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