#ive been on this website since like age 15 i can't let go don't judge me

[orchestrash]

i’m rolling my eyes at myself for being on this stupid website here making a post on new years eve but here are some facts about this past year:

it was shit!! laying in bed skipping class eating cereal watching the occasional movie until 2:30 pm uhhhhh not the best choice! leaving school in the middle of the day to use my down time to lay in bed (including that one time i accidentally fell asleep and was an HOUR late to rehearsal) - waste of time!! so yeah the first half of 2017 wasn’t my lowest point but was maybe my most embarrassing (also that email i sent out to only like three people with an attached flyer with a TYPO, still trying to live that down)

summer? summery. some real heart stopping beauty (mostly seeing the WA coast) and feeling for the first time in a while like i actually wanted something out of my life, like i actually wanted to DO something, like maybe my endgame wasn’t actually laying in bed until the afternoon and doing barely the bare minimum required for the rest of my life

and then the fall was a constant challenge of those beliefs!! like, hey audrey isn’t it embarassing that for 20 seconds you actually aspired to be something? like, you’re a joke. but u know what? maybe i can be a joke! I love to make people laugh! in addition it was marked by knowing that there are so many good things in my life and all those good things will one day end, bc everything in life is sooo finite! we are all just here coming in and out of everyone elses lives and everything you love...... will leave (except the ocean and the mountains, the earth will outlive me but it might not outlive humanity)

so how to i feel about 2018?? well i can’t tell if it really is self-sabotage or i actually can predict the future but here’s what i see:

i see myself being challenged at every corner i turn by the self loathing i let into my heart all those years ago! but i see myself healing and reframing the past and giving love to the version of me that needed it most and telling her i SEE her. and that’s all i want. i think that’s all we all want actually, or most of us, idk. to be SEEN, to not be afraid of who we are or who we were and hide nothing, let people love the things about ourselves that hurt us the most. (to be truly vulnerable and to know we are SAFE, the same thing i told myself just a few days before i turned 19)

and yeah, next fall is gonna be weird, my senior year is gonna be weird! some of my close friends are gonna be farther away than i’m used to and i’m not as good at being lonely as i used to be, and i was so unhappy then anyway. sometimes i struggle with the reality that we meet all these people in our lives and sometimes its only for the briefest period of time. people live for decades!! maybe i’ll be one of them! and then there are the people who are in our lives for only a handful of years that change us so much! i mourn every friendship i’ve ever lost dating back to like, age five (katie, my first bff in kindergarten! sheryl from middle school!) and preemptively mourn everything that hasn’t ended...... yet

so, idk, what’s the real point of this post? what are some actual concrete goals that can make 2018 less shitty than some previous years?

when you hear that voice, the part of you you imagine as a rude guest at a dinner party (shows up, insults the food, is rude to everyone, makes mean comments insulting EVERYTHING, is a huge dick, and all the other guests are like ‘bro you didn’t even have to come, youre only bringing everyone down w your toxic behavior) don’t ask it to leave nicely! fight it! punch it! punch the wall! sob loudly! just don’t let it make you stop, no matter how stupid it makes you feel. you have my permission to feel stupid for trying but to keep trying anyway. not bc one day you’ll prove you wrong about yourself (lets hope you do but lets not count on it) but bc laying in bed all day or failing before trying is worse than ATTEMPTED productivity, or at least the illusion of it

oh god, pls start doing cardio again. don’t look back at recordings from freshman year and go... wow isnt the slimness of my face and the contour of where my neck and chin meet superior? like sure maybe audrey of winter 2016 didnt have the most healthy weightloss habits but in the spring when your eating habits became like uhhh, somewhat disordered, that’s when you started gaining weight again (also its not about your weight, its about your health, blah blah, blah, body image issues? never hear of them)

cook yourself some nice nutritious food. youll actually feel better and i know you know it!!!

read a fucking book! i mean you’ve been okay at this including poetry you read like 30 books this year so like high five man but just..... keep reading. 

make something out of your commute dont just sit on tumblr or stare into space

i know you think its impossible to work smarter when youre uhhh, kinda stupid, but try it. just, try.

just pls actually learn a fucking thing about how to play the tin whistle

keep writing and keep being vulnerable with yourself and don’t lie and don’t hide when no one else is looking bc it’s uh, pointless. i mean, you’re getting good at this but no one will SEE you if you don’t let them. you know this. you know this.