1. pork and cucumber dumplings

2. a morning alone

3. her reminder – “if it’s meant to be, it will be”

4. our (reunion?) dinner

5. walking aimlessly around school

6. new friends!!!

7. old friends!!!!!!!!!!!!!

8. the sunset

9. “ares! ares!” (fleming’s right-hand rule)

10. the three mantous they left for me on the coffee table

11. “do you want breakfast at eight?” (which is

12. something to look forward to, tomorrow)

is it okay to dislike someone? there’s this person i’ve gotten to know this year that i don’t quite like. it’s surprising that i feel this way because it’s been a while since i’ve felt such an intensely negative emotion towards someone.

everything about him just rubs me the wrong way. i can’t seem to look beyond his arrogant and dominating personality. i know that isn’t all there is to him, but i can’t help but focus on the Bad. i think my brain is too used to hyperfixating on negative thoughts. i used to think it only affected how i view myself. maybe it also affects how i view others.

but maybe there is nothing wrong with disliking someone. not everyone likes me anyway, i can’t possibly like everyone i meet either. maybe it’s enough that i continue to treat him with respect! i don’t necessarily have to like him.

i hope we become friends, somehow :O but even if we don’t, i know this is temporary. we are both travelling and we just happen to be in transit at the same time, in the same place. i guess we will both go our separate ways eventually.

it’s been a while since i’ve done anything remotely artsy. i think i kinda miss it. i drew some things on my ipad today! it’s so therapeutic to zoom in, all the way in, and colour each pixel one by one.

reason to make things (if you want) #16: because it can help you realise that you don’t ruin everything. you’re capable of more than destruction. you can make good things, and you can make good things last. – @emmnotemma on instagram

everything feels slow and sluggish today. the colours around me are dull and faint. i wish i could alter my vision, colour in each greyed pixel. but i know there’s nothing wrong with my environment and that it is just as vibrant as before. there’s something wrong with my eyes :< bad thoughts galore.

what do you do when you feel sad for no reason? it is such a frustrating thing, to have a problem but not know what the root of the problem is. i’ll ask Z if and when i see her. meanwhile i will be kind to myself… TvT i hope tomorrow will be better.

ah, valentine’s day. today, i finally made a friend. :^) she is quiet and we are quiet together. it is a comfortable silence. “i had fun today,” she told me, “i’m so glad i have a friend now.” i’m so glad i have a friend too! we high-fived. it’s lonely being alone.

friendships are so strange. how do you make friends? how do you choose who to be friends with? should you force your (introverted, unsociable) self to make friends, or just let things fall into place? i believe that all relationships take effort though, or else they’ll slowly fizzle out and fade away. :< lately i’ve been texting many people first (yes first, haha scary) but it’s been very, very nice… taking the first step makes you vulnerable! dare to be vulnerable.

i think i am secretly a very judgemental person. sometimes a person’s Loudness puts me off and it makes me want to not befriend them. i hope i don’t seem too aloof… i’ve been trying to smile more lately, talk more. it feels unnatural :/// but i will try my bestest to be friendly. it’s getting better.

can’t wait for orientation to end…

i am typing feverishly, feeling the tears prickle in my eyes. you see, i don’t quite know how to feel about this day of Change. all i can focus on is the huge, gaping cracks in the ground as i wobble precariously at the edge. the noise is loud today: it was loud around me and even louder in my head. fear.

rejection is so difficult to deal with and it doesn’t ever seem to get tired of taunting me. it hurts, deeply. i can feel the pain deep in my gut. maybe my strong reaction to this new series of rejections reflects my lack of trust (in the universe, in God). i am a big believer of fate, of there being a plan laid out for me (or at least, that’s what i want to believe). but it is so incredibly difficult to trust in God when nothing is going the way you want it to go. the ground is shifting.

i thought X would make me happy, that God would let me do X. it didn’t work out, and so i prayed for Y. but Y is wrong too, it appears. i am feeling lost again. i hope i’m not too fragile for life…

but even as things change, and change, and change, i know that some things never will. look behind you, in the distance. your family and friends are cheering you on. look at the sky, at the clouds lazily drifting by. look at the waves gently lapping at the shore beneath you. maybe the view from the precipice isn’t so bad after all.

there was so much noise today. i didn’t quite expect it to be there: the low grumbles, the murmuring, faint yet persistent. i thought it would go away but it didn’t. the noise morphed into growls and roars. loud, blaring sirens. banshee shrieks.

it is inevitable! i am getting better but the noise will never fade, at least not so soon. i am glad i can catch pieces of their conversation, that i know there is a reason for the restlessness of their whispers. you’re not good enough, they say. you’re inadequate.

(i must remember that i am not. imperfection isn’t the same as inadequacy. i am imperfect yet adequate.)

today was quiet but it was loud inside my Head. the sky was clear, there was no trace of the gloomy rain of yesterday (though! there was a Rainbow). today was beautiful but somehow i couldn’t appreciate it.

it is human nature to want to be accepted. to be loved. to be valued for what you have to offer. i must remember not to feel guilty about these feelings..! it is enough to just notice them, gently, and to redirect my thoughts. (there are an infinite things you don’t have. at the same time, there are an infinite things you do have.)

tomorrow will be a day of Change. i am not ready, but i will roll up my sleeves! i will face whatever is to come. there is no turning back now.

i think i’ve finally accepted that i’m sick. i used to say that i’m okay with it but it was a half-lie (words are so flawed and imprecise). i had accepted it, advocated for it, but deep within me i still harboured stigma… against myself.

i am sick but now i know that it’s okay. i have a fear of Capital Letters. i think i like to feel small, it helps me believe that my thoughts are small and controllable, not Big and Powerful. and it is true, i need to remember that it’s true. my illness operates within me, i do not operate within it. i am my Thoughts, but not my sick ones. my brain gets carried away with false narratives. i just need to be careful. tread carefully.

i am getting Better. i capitalise “Better” because Real me knows it with certainty (although sick me thinks this is a fluke, that i still am very sick indeed, i will not believe it no no no). i am happier. calmer. i’m not afraid of being alone with my thoughts anymore (most of the time). i’m writing alone, in my bed, under the covers, it feels nice. (mostly. i can still feel a deep, dense pit in my stomach though it isn’t engulfing me. it can’t and won’t. ) you see, i am getting Better.

not everyone is getting better. recently he told us that he thinks his disorder is back. “you know i have a problem too, right?” i was shocked that he was talking about it so openly. i pray he knows that i am there for him. i am not good with words if they have to come out of my mouth. i hope he could feel my support for him, even though all i did then when he said that was to ruefully smile, and nod.

mental health is a spectrum. no one has perfect mental health. i need to remind myself this, constantly. i cannot work towards a perfection that doesn’t exist. i just need to reach a stage where i can function. where i can exist in peace. where i can Be. i just need to be Better, which is where i am right now. and i think that is more than enough.

First it was the diary, bounded by a flimsy plastic lock. Then came the journals (big and small), then the instagram and twitter accounts, then the (failed) blog. I always return to writing, somehow or other. I know I’m not the best writer— far from it, really. Words just are what I’m comfortable with.

Lately, my thoughts have been a tangled mess. Less so than before, but still confusing, disorienting. Frightening. I am getting better, I am not as sick as before. But I know I have a long, long way to go.

I hope my words make me feel less alone, though I know that my words will never contain the true essence of how I feel. Words are imprecise and flawed, and there is no going around it. I will have to make do.

Hello! I am a young soul. There is much I do not know, much I want to know, and much I do not know I want to know. I hope you bear with my foolishness and immaturity. My journey has just begun.

I am a stranger, a face in the crowd, and I want to share my story.