self care is not selfish.

how many times have i heard that before i really knew what it meant?

as an infp, i tend to be a little too altruistic. i tend to stay in toxic relationships and bad situations because i don’t want to hurt the other person. 

almost a year ago, i got a tattoo that says love yourself first, inspired by Jared Padalecki’s Always Keep Fighting campaign. and up until a week or so ago, i never really understood what that means either. 

whenever people ask me what it means, i say something along the lines of, “it means to love all the parts of yourself, even the ugly parts that you don’t like. because if you can’t love yourself, you can’t love others.” and that’s true, but i’m slowly learning there’s so much more. it means that if someone is hurting you, you have the right to leave. it means if you’ve given too much of yourself by overcommitting and overextending, you have every right to take those pieces back. it means that you deserve happiness. no matter who you are or what your past is or how you feel or what’s been done to you, you deserve love. you deserve a boyfriend or a girlfriend you adores you, friends who support you, and people who have your back. it’s about knowing when you come first. and it’s not all the time, but if your mental, physical, emotional, or spiritual health is at stake— you have every right to be “selfish”. 

it’s hard for me to imagine my life without ambition.

i wouldn't describe myself as over-ambitious, or a workaholic. i think it’s my never-ending passion, to learn more, and be more, and my also never-ending supply of daydreams. it’s a vicious combination.

i love to learn and grow, and being stagnant and static is definitely one of my worst nightmares. i used to have a friend who never wanted to grow or make anything of herself, and she and her boyfriend were so perfectly content to live off other people’s money. in the 6 years i had known her, nothing had changed. it was one of the many reasons our friendship ended— be around people like that for long enough, and you start to become them. 

because of my imagination and my passion, striving to become a better version of myself is something i have always known and tried to do. i get terribly restless when things get too still. 

“Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.”

i hate change, and i’m afraid to fall in love.

i hate watching my friends, my siblings, my cousins become a different person, and leave behind the people that used to be enough. i watch once stoic and independent people become whiny and clingy. i scroll through their instagrams that used to be filled with the adventures we used to take, and now it’s filled with their selfies of them and their “boo”.

they tell me “oh, just wait until you get a boyfriend!” well if that’s the cost of finding love, i don’t want it. people that i’ve let in close, let them see the real me-- i’m not abandoning them for a boy! who do i fall back on if i desert the only other people besides my family that have stood by me? they are my family! 

maybe that boils down to commitment issues. i’m not really sure. i know, at our cores, infp’s have to be true to themselves, and the thought of me sacrificing the person i’ve become and all that i am for the sake of a boy horrifies me. 

i don’t want to overthink you. i don’t want to imagine up some impossible person in my head. i don’t want to overanalyze every little thing you do online. i don’t want to spend any more time stalking you on facebook. i don’t want to be clingy. i don’t want to be too much.

i want to be just enough. i want you to message me. i want you to add me back. i want you to give me some indication that you feel it too. i want to know you. i want to know what do on rainy days. i want to know if you drink coffee or tea. i want to know what kind of music you listen to. i want to know your favorite movie. i want to know your mind at 2 am. i want to know you.

i hate embodying stereotypes. i take great pride in going against the flow in my own quiet, peaceful way. i don’t listen to mainstream music, i don’t dress in the current styles, and i’m so out of the loop on pop culture. i feel like if i don’t differentiate myself from the masses of basic white girls then i’ll drown in the crowd. i like to do things my own way, and am attracted to people who do the same.

people tell me i’m full of contradictions. my little brother tells me daily, when i randomly express how i’d kill to off-road in a white jeep, jam out to twenty one pilots and dan + shay in the same playlist, and long to live the dreams of danger, violence and adventure that live under my pale and quiet skin.