Youthful Life: X

Truth - The human experience is centered around community. We are not meant to be alone. In fact, community is critical to our survival as individuals, both in practicality and psychologically. In extreme circumstances, prolonged isolation from others results in the deterioration of the psyche, cognitive functions, and grasp on reality. We figuratively, and quite literally need people. The sustained relationships we form are essential to our existence and persistence throughout the entirety of our lives. And so let us commune.   "What it meant to me: a happy life, of course, companionship, of course. A common objective,  I think." Denis Thatcher   Behavioral styles speak to our most common ways of being. They predict how we act, interact, and communicate. For me, my introverted nature can be a challenge to overcome, particularly when it comes to forging and maintaining relationships. I am someone who loves to be invited to things but takes even more pleasure in...

Truth - How we are effects who we are. Everything that we do, and the things that happen to us have an impact on the ways that we proceed. We as people are collections of experiences, memories, and emotions. This amalgamation of all that we determines how we show and where we show up. There is a reason for our actions, our words, and our understandings of the world, and everything it. Truly reflecting on and processing through those root causes is a lifelong quest to understand the enigmatic simplicity. What are you looking for? "We don't know all the answers. If we knew all the answers we'd be bored, wouldn't we? We keep looking, searching, trying to get more knowledge." Jack LaLanne   "What are you looking for?"  It's the question that always comes up during any type of dating situation. Honestly, what kind of question is that? It depends on the person. All I know is that when I know, I'll know . Why do I have to know what I want in a...

Truth - Each period of life is marked by pivotal events, but possibly even more so the presence and the absence of those around us. People play such critical roles in our lives. The ways that people move in an out orbit to us truly is a synchronized performance of the most marvelous proportions. As some move closer in proximity, others retreat. There we are in the center of it all, pushing, and pulling on the heavenly bodies of those around us. What happens some come too close - are they burned in the process? What about those that or depart from our gravitational field, are they forever lost to the cosmos? How do we account for drift? "We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end." Blaise Pascal The world is a funny place. I find myself more and more moving through it and being in awe. The world is truly an elaborate labyrinth that one barely ever makes much headway in. I think of all the ways I make my world small, more m...

Truth - Our skin tells a story. It can reveal the years worth of lived in the form of hieroglyphs disguised in the musings of finely etched wrinkles. It can tell of our hardships in the rough wear of calloused palms, gently bleeding knuckles, and dirt enhanced nails. It can convey our narrative of  barrages of blood drawings, stitched scars, and gnarly bruises. It also shares our culture, heritage, and some of the communities we belong to in addition to that common history. What does your skin say? "The very definition of 'blackness' is as broad as that of 'whiteness,' yet we're seemingly always trying to find a specific, limited definition." Issa Rae I don't know. I just felt compelled to write this ode of sorts to my skin, to all people othered because of their external physicality, and as a challenge to those who still believe skin is a valid unit of measurement for the value of a human life. My skin is me and yet I am not my skin. Who wou...