Week 06: Be excited.

Regular programming.

The second part of this ‘regular programming’ was written on Wednesday or so, I was going through a lot. Infact, this week was a lot and I'm really glad it's FINALLY Friday.

How I am feeling right now. I'm currently in school (at the time of writing this anyway). I'm attending an event at school that's supposed to start by 3pm, but somehow, it's 4:29pm and the program hasn't even started yet. It's just… There's nothing I really dislike more than people who don't keep to time.

I'm so exhausted, but right now, I feel just okay, but I'm tired and I need a hug. Anyways, I will just let you read my initial draft for the regular programming part of the newsletter, I didn't want to erase it because well… I just didn't want to.

I'm back from school, it's currently 8:02PM, and I'm really glad I opened my mind to learning and being involved with what was going on in school. It was interesting and not a waste of my time at all. I just wanted to put this in, considering the way I was feeling earlier.

Initial Entry:

Before I sat down to write this newsletter, I had quite a lot to say, but right now, my brain has gone blank. I guess I just have to start from somewhere and work my way up from there.

Currently, I'm hungry, but I'm not sure what I want to eat. Don't come for me, but I feel like February is moving so much slower than January, It's still 5th of February since 8 years ago.

I've been seeing posts where people are like “why are people complaining about how the year/month is moving slowly, we need to slow down and enjoy it”, well, no, I don't want to. It's easy to say that when you're having fun and you're not thinking about your entire existence everyday.

This week has been a lot. I've cried 3 times already. I felt like crying in school today (today is Wednesday). It's a miracle I have never lost my shit in this school. By “lost my shit”, I mean ‘screaming, crying, throwing up” kinda vibe.

I feel like I'm back at the same point I was at last year and that is too depressing. On a particular morning this week, I had a thought, a really dark thought that I hadn't had in a long time and it was like “oh, I'm back to this again”, it was just really sad.

I think the worst part of having a problem is when you feel like you can't talk about it with anyone because you've already concluded in your mind that they wouldn't understand and so, you just keep it to yourself and keep feeling like shit. It's terrible.

There's also the fear of being judged, a lot of “how did you even let this happen?”, but I didn't and if I could have done better at that point, I honestly would have, but I didn't (and couldn't) and I'm here now. I feel like this newsletter is all over the place, forgive me, but I'm really just tired.

My chest feels hot. I hate this school and I can't wait to be done with it, but sigh. I'm just really sad.

This will be me during my induction ceremony. It's not just the faculty, it's the school too. Let's say I'm ready to do my masters and this school is the only school I can do the masters, I will never go to school again in my life. Infact, any federal school in Nigeria.

Away from all that, I'm just going to do the best I can and TRY. No matter how scared I get, I'm not going to get trapped in a “depression cycle” like I have in my previous levels—you guys, something was always doing me, I just couldn't relax and I don't want to do that again. I will try my best to actively seek out joy.

Something that's making me excited is the magazine I'm going to be working on. At my faculty, I'm currently the editor in chief and there's usually an annual magazine that's launched during the faculty week (which is also an annual event).

I've never done something like this, so I'm looking forward to doing it, the entire process and everything. The plans haven't started yet, we are just in the pre-planning stage, but a little foundation work is being done. It's a new thing I'm doing, so I'm looking forward to the experience, I will update you as we go on.

Away from that, I still have to manage the editorial team to send out monthly issues and there's really nothing as frustrating as working with people who don't have the same “work values” as you. Nothing as frustrating, that's all I can say.

Books.

I started reading All About Love by Bell Hooks this week, it's the only thing I've read this week. I'm really familiar with the first few chapter because that's the only part I always manage to finish before I decide to drop the book in the previous years.

I'm determined to finish the book now though and opening my heart to it. I'm 17% in. I just finished the first chapter and I will share some of my highlights from the first chapter. The title of the first chapter is Clarity: Give Love Words.

"Our confusion about what we mean when we use the word “love” is the source of our difficulty in loving. If our society had a commonly held understanding of the meaning of love, the act of loving would not be so mystifying."

This entire part had my full attention, she talked about how our lack of definition of love is part of the problem. I agree with it because it's so commonplace to go with the idea that everything is not black and white, and so, there's no need to define certain things, but maybe some things should be (and are) black and white.

More highlights,

"Echoing the work of Erich Fromm, he defines love as “the will to extend one’s self for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth.” Explaining further, he continues: “Love is as love does. Love is an act of will—namely, both an intention and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love.””

"Affection is only one ingredient of love. To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients—care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication."

"Most of us learn early on to think of love as a feeling. When we feel deeply drawn to someone, we cathect with them; that is, we invest feelings or emotion in them. That process of investment wherein a loved one becomes important to us is called “cathexis.”"

"When we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another’s spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful and abusive. Love and abuse cannot coexist."

"Often we hear of a man who beats his children and wife and then goes to the corner bar and passionately proclaims how much he loves them. If you talk to the wife on a good day, she may also insist he loves her, despite his violence. An overwhelming majority of us come from dysfunctional families in which we were taught we were not okay, where we were shamed, verbally and/or physically abused, and emotionally neglected even as were also taught to believe that we were loved. For most folks it is just too threatening to embrace a definition of love that would no longer enable us to see love as present in our families. Too many of us need to cling to a notion of love that either makes abuse acceptable or at least makes it seem that whatever happened was not that bad."

"Remember, care is a dimension of love, but simply giving care does not mean we are loving."

"To begin by always thinking of love as an action rather than a feeling is one way in which anyone using the word in this manner automatically assumes accountability and responsibility."

"To think of actions shaping feelings is one way we rid ourselves of conventionally accepted assumptions such as that parents love their children, or that one simply “falls” in love without exercising will or choice, that there are such things as “crimes of passion,” i.e., he killed her because he loved her so much. If we were constantly remembering that love is as love does, we would not use the word in a manner that devalues and degrades its meaning. When we are loving we openly and honestly express care, affection, responsibility, respect, commitment, and trust.”

I personally love the phrase “love is as love does”. Since I read it, I keep thinking about it all the time and I just keep saying it out loud.

"Definitions are vital starting points for the imagination. What we cannot imagine cannot come into being. A good definition marks our starting point and lets us know where we want to end up. As we move toward our desired destination we chart the journey, creating a map. We need a map to guide us on our journey to love—starting with the place where we know what we mean when we speak of love."

"Undoubtedly, many of us are more comfortable with the notion that love can mean anything to anybody precisely because when we define it with precision and clarity it brings us face to face with our lacks—with terrible alienation." (ah. 💀)

Currently, my February TBR looks like this:

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix.

All About Love by Bell Hooks.

The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Gracia.

Spiral by Bal Khabra.

Lucky Girl by Irene Muchemi-Ndiritu.

I Am Not Jessica Chen by Ann Liang.

Deep End by Ali Hazelwood.

So far, I've only read Spiral by Bal Khabra from this list—it was disappointing, I'm not even going to lie. It's even more sad that I had been looking forward to this book since last year, I felt like pulling my hair out while reading it, like this can't be IT. Tch.

Anyways, this is what I plan on reading, even though I don't end up reading the books, it's better to have a plan than no plan, right?

Articles, blog posts, essays.

🌻 low-energy habits that improved my mental health

This was interesting to read, especially this part,

“13. ending the day with a low-effort joy: not everything has to be productive. some nights, i watch a show i’ve already seen a hundred times. some nights, i scroll through pinterest and romanticize random aesthetics. some nights, i listen to an old playlist and let myself feel nostalgic. i used to think i had to “wind down” in a correct way—reading before bed, meditating, avoiding screens. but i’ve found that joy, even in its simplest form, is what truly helps me sleep well.”

Recently, I've been trying to build a habit where I don't do anything serious from 6pm till whenever I go to bed (and I'm also trying to sleep early too, just because I can) and I try to stick with this no matter what.

This is really important to me because with work and school (especially school), it's easy for me to get wrapped up in the entire busyness (which is depressing) that I forget to do things that make me happy. By doing this everyday, I allow myself time to “distract” myself because the school will always be busy, I don't need to lose myself in its craziness.

Another thing I wanted to mention is the part where the author talked about “winding down the correct way", and I think everyone falls into a certain trap when they start their wellness journey where they try to do things the “right way”.

For example, I can't journal with prompts, I find it fruitless and boring, that's not the way I journal—I usually start with whatever is in my head and continue from there, but when I started journaling, I tried to use prompts, I had a lot of pictures I saved from Pinterest, but it didn't work and but I stuck with it, because I really wanted to write down my feelings, and by doing so, I figured out what worked for me.

So, when it comes to doing things to make yourself feel better, it's mostly about asking yourself what you like and figuring out what works best for you, but then again, you figure out what you like/what works for you by starting with the information you're seeing.

Start from where you are and you'll figure it out from there. Ask yourself questions; what do I like? What is relaxing to me? How can I make this work?

Actually, I'm learning that life is all about starting from somewhere and figuring it out from there. It's all a trial and error process.

Gather round.

💕 Read my literary blog.

💕 Follow my reading journey on bookstagram and Storygraph.

💕 Say hi on Instagram.

Once again, I just remembered what I learned about how the key to living a happy life is just opening your heart to experience and being excited. Make plans, you know, and be excited. I hope you have a wonderful weekend. 💞

I and ChatGPT are locked in. 🤞🏾

Sidenote: I really love those newsletters where I write about each day and what I did, it's usually so fun. I used to do it alot during my IT, and it's so fun to read. I will try to do that this week, especially with the weekly hospital posting. Let me know if you enjoy reading these types, too.