“I’m Not Everything I Want To Be, But I’m More Than I Was, And I’m Still Learning.”

Being brave doesn't mean you aren't scared. Being brave means you are scared, really scared, badly scared, and you do the right thing anyway.

— Neil Gaiman, Coraline

Being a lot to handle is NOT a bad thing. You are a complex being with a story, emotions, thoughts, fears, interests, values, ideas etc. Do not listen to anyone who tells you that you are too much - it simply means that there is more to love about you. You contain an entire universe inside of you and if anybody claims that you are too hard to deal with, it just means that they are incapable of loving every part of you. It has absolutely nothing to do with you. So, embrace every little thing of your wonderful soul, my love. For: "You will never be too much for the person who cannot get enough of you."

“One day it just clicks… You realise what is important and what isn’t, you learn to care less about what other people think of you and care more about what you think of yourself. You realise how far you have come and you remember thinking that things were such a mess they’d never recover and then you smile. You smile because you’re truly proud of the person you have fought to become.”

— Unknown

Fryderyk Chopin, in a letter to Tytus Woyciechowski. Warsaw, 17 April 1830

i want to climb through the clouds and exist there all by myself i want to hold hands with heaven sing sweet melodies to the moon i want to be unafraid and full of overflowing lust for life wave stars and galaxies into my bones and ribs i want to understand life and death but all i do is waste my youth to the endless sadness of my heart

A young Buddha story I always liked (you might have heard it). When the Buddha was a young prince he was sitting in the garden one day when suddenly out of the sky a swan came crashing down, blood spurting everywhere, an arrow firmly lodged in it’s neck. It flailed on the ground piteously. The Buddha had not yet Awakened, so he ran over and panicked, started calling to his servants to come help him.

From around the corner comes his infamous cousin Devadatta with a big smile on his face. He says ‘don’t take it away! That’s the best shot I’ve made yet. That’s my spoils’. The Buddha is horrified, Devadatta is proud. ‘The bird needs help’, the young Buddha said. ‘The bird is my trophy,’ says Devadatta. The advisors aren’t really sure what to do, and the two boys can’t agree. So they go to the court room where the king and the ministers are gathered, and the court decides to hear the case between the two boys as a kind of break.

Devadatta makes his argument clear: ‘I shot the bird. By doing so, I claimed it. This is how everything works, every stone in this palace and each place of land one owns.’

The Buddha, young and bashful, says ‘Everyone agrees that things that hate each other belong apart, and that those who love each other belong together. Devadatta showed violence to the bird, who will not leave my lap, so you have to understand it as hate; I cared for the bird, who will not leave my lap, so it is clearly love. Hence the bird is under my care.’

The council weighs the arguments after the boys have spoken, admiring Devadatta’s maturity and a little embarassed by the Buddha’s emotional plea. Just as they’re about to make their judgement in favor of Devadatta, the king gives a small cough, and the courtiers remember themself: The Buddha is in the right, the bird belongs to him. Devadatta is outraged, screams injustice, storms out of the room.

Telling this story later in life, the Buddha says ‘Do you know? Devadatta had the better argument, of course. I only won because I was the king’s son—-pure privilege. In a sense, it wasn’t right. But I did care for that bird, and a week later it flew away squawking and happy.’

“The things that we love tell us what we are.”

— Thomas Aquinas

i don’t know if maybe i’m being too emotional but i refound this picture and started crying on the spot. the black panthers, yellow peril, and the brown berets. this is powerful, y’all. i think one of my next posts for @bfpnola will be about these groups, their impact, and how they intertwine. this makes my heart hurt but in the best way.

~ Autumn colours in Ferdinand Knab’s paintings