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This could easily be titled The Twitter Effect. And maybe it should be. I manage my company’s social media accounts and I noticed that I feel really good when our analytics show we’re getting a lot of exposure. And if these tweets don’t get likes then I feel myself getting down. I experience a loss of energy when a tweet doesn’t do well. The same for my personal Instagram page. If my Instagram posts get zero likes I feel worthless. I need validation that I’m living life well and if I’m living my life well then I’m going to show you everyday with a new Instagram story. We know those people. Some of us are those people. I’m slightly being a hater.
So why is Instagram the bar upon which I measure success? I need you to physically touch that heart in order to keep mine from falling apart. And when did this happen? When I think back to when I first started my Instagram account, I felt my moods falling in line with how well or how not well a post was doing. So I know when, I just don’t know why. Do you feel this Instagram Effect? I’ll go into it more if anyone is interested.
“As a social worker, I’m seeing red flags when you say that. Do you feel like you are a burden on your friends and family?” I was completing my discharge after-care plan with the social worker provided to me by…
You are an older version of your childhood. Your mistakes follow you. The places you want to get away from is where you will always end up. The words someone tells you are true. You are your circumstance. You will…
What makes this section in the pie of my life taste the way it does? Bitterness is sure to be found, then and now, but less back then so it seems. It was sweeter back then too, or again, so…
I did an online energy healing workshop yesterday hosted by Briana Borton, founder of The Dragontree (http://thedragontree.com/about/). Yes, yes, to some “energy healing” sounds hokey, and it sounded that way to me years ago. But I do believe we all…
“Sometimes you have to find your wings on the way down,” I once heard someone say. Hopeful words if I hadn’t already hit the ground. Where did the problems I was born into end and the ones I created begin?…
It’s true, I am healing from consequences I experienced due to my choices as an adult. I’m not blaming everything on my childhood. A lot of my behavior was a result of the environment I grew up in, and I…
Sometimes I feel like I take 10 steps forward and then 2 steps back. And while I’m still moving forward and making progress, it’s those 2 steps that hold so much pain and anger and frustration. They leave me with…
Writing a Memoir 101, a workshop I’m taking, is helping to strengthen my confidence as a writer and why I am worth reading. The book emphasizes the importance of reading: you cannot be a good author and tell the story…
I bought a journal off of Amazon with these words. My counselor and I are working on this concept – I’m good enough where I am. Sure, I could be better, healthier, skinnier. But that doesn’t make me good. I…
Struggle: this is a word I am familiar with. Sometimes too familiar, sometimes way too familiar. Hourly I find myself asking, “Will my struggle always be real?” Talking with my counselor earlier this week, she said something very Oprah-esque. “You…
Most of my life I have steered clear of my sisters’ dad’s family. When we would go and visit the aunts and uncles and cousins, I felt out of place and like I was wearing a sign that said “Not…
I had a revelation in a counseling session a couple weeks ago. For the first time, my counselor did the EMDR method. It was odd at first but I enjoyed it. She gave me a week to think of a…
Can there be growth without struggle? I switch back and forth between contentment, anger, and sadness. One constant is that I always feel blessed. How can I feel sad and blessed at the same time? I really don’t understand my…
Between Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert and an article I read in The Mission Newsletter, I am writing for the sake of writing. Because that’s how books are written. The author writes. Writes a lot. And I have not been…
My manuscript is currently pages of memories and insights. No order, just what I am remembering during the moments I write. I read that writers should not get too caught up or worried about “form,” because eventually paragraphs and pages…
You are an older version of your childhood. Your mistakes follow you. The places you want to get away from is where you will always end up. The words someone tells you are true. You are your circumstance. You will…
I’m going to try something new. I’m still working on the whole staying consistent thing, so we’ll see how long this lasts. Basically, I’m going to ramble about my thoughts and experiences I’ve had through the day, ruminating thoughts, bouts…
I’m having baby reservations. Last week I was saying that if I never had a child it would be my biggest, most sorrowful regret. But I’m nearing the “now or never” age and I’m finding myself not ready. I’m still…
I’ve been trying to find a way to say without saying that I have a problem taking prescription drugs as prescribed. I overtake the uppers to try and feel the least bit of relief from my depression and then overtake…
The following blog post was written in October 2018. I used to be an infamous canceler of counseling appointments. Infamous because of timing and repetition: always last-minute and approximately 3 out of 4 appointments. My previous counselor once told me,…
