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During my meditations this week, I accepted an important sacrifice I had to make. Sacrifice is strange to me. Sometimes I go out of the way trying to find a way where I can get everything I want without losing anything. I try to strategize, work around the way people perceive me, hoping I can get what I want from them in the end. That’s not going to work this time. One day, they’ll know. 

One day my family, who I love dearly, will know what I do in life. They’ll see for themselves that their Christian views aren’t as valuable to me when it comes to my career and lifestyle. They’ll see that animism, paganism, the occult, world religions, philosophies, history, science, the arts and more are my passions in life. For so long I feared they would see me as anti-Protestant Christian and use that as an excuse to abandon me. I desperately didn’t want that since they’ve done a lot for me and I want to offer my gratitude. It turns out I can definitely live my life how I want and still have them in my wonderful life. They’re the ones who make it wonderful actually. They inspire me tremendously because they are always teaching me even when I disagree with them, even when their words make sense or when their words hurt, and definitely when they show me their passion for their faith and their god. Their god is not mine and I’ve accepted they will put their god before me and others in many, if not all, instances. I thought that meant abandonment, but actually, according to their faith, it means they’ll love me more.

“Home” is Where The Art Is

TikTok: @amyoverthinks

So what am I sacrificing exactly? The notion that people will always abandon me? No…Abandonment happens. Separation happens. People make their choices and sometimes that means you can’t walk with them through the consequences of those choices. Loss happens. You can’t control everything. You can’t make someone care about you, control the way they see you, force them to believe what you believe. I’m sacrificing the perception of myself that thinks I can’t survive if my family sees who I really am and what my life is dedicated to, which is mysticism and the arts. Not only am I incredibly proud of my life path, but I feel more dignified when I remember my life, my power, and my purpose belong to me and only me; expressing the exploration of my life, power, and purpose, is done through my art. I love my family and because of that love, I don’t fear them. I forgive myself for perceiving them as figures in my life that wanted to tear me down, when they’ve consistently lifted me up, albeit with the hopes that I’ll become a dutiful Christian like them. If I can accept that I can survive whatever their response is to my life’s work, I believe they’ll come to accept what they can’t control as well: my will.

This was a long time coming, but I think this epiphany has to be one of the most important ones of my life. Many of us artists struggle with having a lack of support from family, whether it be in the form of disapproval or apathy. The amount of willpower it takes to sacrifice the internal battle of trying to be yourself while also making others happy is an incredible amount. Doesn’t everybody talk about that? Everyone says,”Just be yourself,” when we also know there are only a select few who accept you or maybe come close to accepting you. What’s most important is accepting ourselves. Another cliche, but it’s fucking true. We must accept who we are if we’re ever going to summon the willpower to live our life as we want to. It makes whatever consequence you suspect you’ll confront as an opportunity to trust yourself to make the best choice for yourself. As someone who advocates for autonomy and freedom, I must accept that I don’t want to put my energy into trying to make my family like me or understand me. I want to put my energy into my life’s work and, if I’m being frank, be rich enough to take care of my family and myself. I mean let’s be real here; when you start making money doing what you love, and I mean good money, your family probably won’t be that concerned about the how and why at first.

6 Ways To Cleanse and Empower Yourself

My life path number is 8, often called “The CEO” path. I kept doubting whether that really matched my desires and ambitions for a good portion of my life. I’m not doubting anymore. With the acceptance of the self comes purpose and with a sense of purpose comes will. I’m too determined to be worried about disapproval. The game is on.

L.

The Lack Mentality Is Killing Us

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Photo by Suzy Hazelwood on Pexels.com

Hello,

My head has been stuck in the books lately and when that happens blog posts seem to gradually fade, haha. Between studying, blogging, and my other music projects, I’m missing my novel and the VPD entries again. So I thought maybe I should take NaNoWriMo seriously and see how far I get. Once Samhain passes, taking on the NaNoWriMo challenge will be intimidating for sure, but I just really miss my novel, or rather the world I’m building and my characters. It’s dark scifi-fantasy novel and the first draft was over 400 pages and over 136,000 words. Working on the second draft definitely came with some struggles (and a lot of panicking, to be honest), but that beautiful big-picture view of the entire project and the awesome information I’m retaining from my psychology classes keeps connecting the dots between my characters and all the ways I can torture-DEVELOP them. Hehehehe.

So basically, I’m really enthusiastic and can’t wait to take on this challenge along with report my daily progress. Also, my cover song and poetry reading will be finished within this week and posted in the first week of November. I hope you’ll like it and thank you for your patience. I’m getting much better at actually completing projects rather than jumping around from one to another aren’t I? Good for me. Are you a fellow writer thinking of trying out NaNoWriMo as well?

Be well.

More On Writing

Accepting That I’m A Plantser – VPD

Genre Study: Horror and Magical Realism

Do You Read To Death or Read for Sex? – VPD

Kill Your Darlings (or Torture Them) – VPD

clouds under full moon

To Be The Proper Guardian of My Own Health – [Just Me & Video]

The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs or impede their efforts to obtain it. Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily or mental and spiritual John Stuart Mill […]

by Authentikei

Taking A Break – [Just Me]

My mental health really sucks right now, so I’m taking a few weeks off. I may be on socials or try to post some poetry. Forgive the silence and thanks for understanding. L.

by Authentikei

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The Shadow Self

“…is an archetype that forms part of the unconscious mind and is composed of repressed ideas, instincts, impulses, weaknesses, desires, perversions, and embarrassing fears. This archetype is often described as the darker side of the psyche, representing wildness, chaos, and the unknown.” – Loner Wolf

The shadow is an archetype formed in the unconscious or subconscious coined by clinical psychologist and mystic Carl G. Jung. Working with your shadow requires confronting and embracing repressed feelings. Confronting one’s shadow can be done through divination, meditation, creative projects, journaling, therapy/counseling, and many other ways. If you find that you’re able to honestly express yourself through writing and journaling, you will love the Shadow Work Journal on Loner Wolf, a spiritual mentorship site run by Mateo Sol and Aletheia Luna. This year, I’ve decided to combine divination techniques with their shadow journaling prompts and have found it to be a very thoughtful collection of prompts that help you address what needs confronting and what self-care needs require more attention. My previous shadow work sessions focused on confrontation and I rarely gave myself self-care time. I wanted to give the journal a try because I was very impressed by Loner Wolf’s breakdown of the shadow self and all its potential.

So What’s The Point?

The point of shadow work is to work on the part of yourself that you have labeled as “evil” or “shameful” and instead of turning away from it, you see the shadow for what it is, starting with the fact that you are the shadow. Rejecting any part of yourself often develops into subconscious defense mechanisms, losing your sense of self, robbing yourself of autonomy, and even losing touch with reality. Psychologically, the repression of an aspect of the self creates a dissonance between one’s personal reality and reality as it is. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Repression in itself is a defense mechanism and defending ourselves is innate. However, defense mechanisms can build into unhealthy and unwanted habits.

Those of us who need to work with our shadow see ourselves pushing our loved ones away, having trouble connecting with others, struggling to see ourselves in a realistic light, believing negative and inaccurate perceptions without challenging them, hurting ourselves and others more than we meant to… the list goes on. The point of shadow work is to take that step towards understanding ourselves. Additionally, don’t believe that this is just for the “spiritual” person. The aspects of shadow work has appeared through works of art, philosophical discussions, scientific studies on humanity, and even in our particular day-to-day events where we have these epiphanies about ourselves. Shadow work in itself is a reflective process and I strongly recommend reading Loner Wolf’s article on the Shadow Self and take that step towards self-actualization.

More on Metaphysics, Occult, and Spirituality

The Backwards Law and The Wheel of Fortune

6 Ways To Cleanse and Empower Yourself

Synchronicity Numbers – 11:11 and More

3 Questions You Should Ask While Researching The Occult

Exhausted – [Just Me]

Too many social outings in one sitting have depleted me, but I’m looking forward to nearing the end of one project and prepare started on another. I spent this past week just trying to get my energy back. I’m glad I was able to get some work done, but I’m definitely not at 100% yet. […]

by Authentikei
people walking on street

No Justice, No Peace – Update: Stop Line 3

Please visit the page No Justice, No Peace to find resources regarding Line 3, a pipeline transferring crude oil over the Mississippi river twice and is actively damaging indigenous land. Thank you.

by Authentikei

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moral criticism:

“A type of literary criticism that evaluates a work on the basis of the moral elements it contains and their correspondence to the accepted moral standards of the time or to those ethical principles that the critic feels should govern human life. Ideally, the moral critic, in judging a literary work, applies only those moral standards presented in the work itself or, failing that, makes his or her own beliefs clear to the reader.” – The NTC’s Dictionary of Literary Terms

I’m currently writing an psychoanalysis on the horror/thriller film The Platform directed by Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia currently on Netflix. It’s almost impossible to avoid doing a kind of moral criticism not only trying to interpret the morals addressed in the work itself, but also express your own feelings about the events throughout the story (especially that ending!). Doing my best to stay within the realm of psychoanalysis, I inevitably ran into psychological terms that framed my view of the many facets of morality portrayed in this film. I have no desire to push my views on the audience, but the subjectivity that comes with psychoanalysis and the unreachable idealism of a moral critique makes it difficult to not address my views, which hasn’t been as optimistic as most analyses and reviews.

I’ll definitely share my analysis of The Platform on my Vocal profile when it’s finished.

Do you think being the ideal moral critic, where you’re focusing on the moral standards or ethics of the work itself, is possible?

Writing Advice

Are You A Planner or a Pantser? I’m a Plantser

Genre Study: On Horror and Magical Realism

To The Writer Ashamed of Resting

Kill Your Darlings (Or Torture Them)

Three Essential Writing Techniques from Stoker’s Dracula and The Epistolary Narrative

back view of person standing on country road between trees

Inner Search – [Just Me]

“You are free and that is why you are lost.” – Franz Kafka, “Letter to His Father” I constantly sway back and forth between knowing who I am and what I want, then not knowing anything about myself at all. It’s like an automatic dissociation from the self and it leaves me ungrounded, floating. I […]

by Authentikei
fashion red people woman

Anxious Plans – [Poetry]

Lost to ambiguity, I’m nothing. Obstacles with no substance nor logic conquer all. Circumstances are conspiracies. My anger’s self-righteousness must win the war. All in life plans to witness my reactivity and self-destruction because, of course, the world revolves around my demise; saying otherwise is a risky lie. Read full poem on Vocal. Photo Credit: […]

by Authentikei
purple petaled flower on white surface

The Relief of Simplicity and Being AntiPerfection— [Just Me]

Wow, I talk about perfectionism a lot don’t I? Lol, well that’s because it haunts the f**k out of me. I’m a very ambitious, but sensitive person. I have big ideas that turn into elaborate, yet overwhelming strategies, and have issues altering those strategies only because I get stuck in a strong spell of the […]

by Authentikei

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I’ve been listening to three audiobooks for my own self-improvement. Currently, my picks are You Creative Career by Anna Sabino (this is actually a reread for me), The Business of Being a Writer by Jane Friedman, and How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety by Ellen Hendriksen, Ph.D. There’s so much about self-improvement that have nothing to do with yourself as an individual. There’s more advice about how other people are, how they can help or hurt you, and how to connect with the people you do want in your life. I’m an anxiety-ridden artist who is improving on being my natural confident self rather than faking it. I have my days where I’m still faking it for other people. It gives me this strange sense of imposter syndrome and I feel less grounded in who I am. One trait about myself that I know is unshakable is my ambition. My individualism shines when I’m driven and courageous enough to deal with unpredictable challenges or make mistakes and learn from them. When this part of me shines, I start to see a pattern with some of the people in my life. They don’t shine with me and my anxiety responds to that by saying “darken down a bit or you’ll hurt their feelings.” I’m done doing that sh*t and here’s why.

Photo by Matheus Bertelli on Pexels.com

While meditating today, I accepted another complexity of human nature that can be a beautiful, but paralyzing thing: self-esteem. Self-esteem is more about how we see ourselves and how we think others see us than it is about confidence. Self-esteem, to me, is self-consciousness and self-awareness. It’s the blurry area of our self-image that doesn’t clear up unless we do something with the intent clear things up. What I started doing is imagining myself in the social situations mentioned in my audiobooks and take a moment to ask myself, “Is this the kind of interaction or relationship I’m willing or wanting to have with another person?” When Your Creative Career and The Business of Being a Writer discuss building and connecting with an audience, connecting with the right people in the field, and presenting my work proudly and thoughtfully, it’s often a resounding “Hell yeah I want that.” When How To Be Yourself bring up familiar anxiety-based feelings and anxiety-triggering interactions, it’s often a, “I don’t want that and I’m not completely sure how to change that yet, but I want to keep trying.” It’s like a little roleplay I do in a visualization kind of way, but there’s something I haven’t been paying attention to while I do this. My ambition makes me shine. What I should be asking myself is, “Can I shine and stop giving a f**k about everything my anxiety is worried about?” I truly believe I can, but that depends on my social circle and addressing old socializing habits I picked up to “darken” myself.

I really love the friends I have in my life and no matter their flaws or shortcomings, I love them unconditionally. Unconditional love doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t set boundaries though; if anything, it shows that you still love that person just as much as you love yourself. I can’t tell you how fired up I get when my friends tell me they’re not capable of reaching whatever goals they try to set for themselves. The first thing I do is say, “Actually you can do that. Even though you have weaknesses here, your forgetting how your strengths can help you work though that.” Sometimes my friends hear me and sometimes my friends don’t hear me because their anxiety, depression, or whatever pain they’re working through is screaming louder. I had a hard time accepting when their pain was louder than me, but I’m accepting it now and also accepting that shining while your friends are still working on their issues is okay. In no way am I saying give up on them and go on your merry way shining all you want. I’m just saying that the ambitious type has a fire in them that needs to burn even though other people in your life haven’t sparked their own fire. There’s no need to guilt trip yourself and there’s no need to do the opposite like trying to force your friends to be more like you. Let them be and let yourself be. Self-sabotage doesn’t make friendships stronger, but authentic compassion and self-respect does extraordinary well for all types of relationships, according to psychology.

Be well.

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A while ago I ran into a Tumblr post about “grind culture” describing how there are people who are perfectionistic in regards to how they should be working, studying, living, and that reminded me of my fellow fans of the dark academia aesthetic and the studyblr tag. Here is the post:

https://authentikei.tumblr.com/post/626756932106059776/this-is-something-us-dark-academia-fans-are-trying

I talk about perfectionism a bit whether I’m blogging or writing an article and it’s because it’s something that empowers me and haunts me. Although I’m so incredibly excited to be working on my psychology degree and in love with the course material so far, I had a meltdown over a quiz that I failed. I cried and panicked for nearly an hour and had to spend another hour calming myself down. In hindsight, I felt ridiculous, but more than anything I felt powerless. The perfectionism in me has developed into something that makes my mood swings and anxiety incredibly difficult to control. Therapy helped, but the feeling of shame took more time to work through.

I go through this as a writer too. What I was really worried about after my meltdown was my inability to handle something as small as a failed quiz leading to my inability to brace for subjective opinions about my work and career path. It was all revolving around a small failure that was hypothetically turning into a gargantuan failure. So after meditating on this, I came to the quick conclusion that first off, I was so tired of being this mean to myself; I truly do love myself so being unnecessarily harsh feels like a regression in my pursuit for better emotional and mental health. Then, I decided to challenge my view on what a “failure” is. At my core, I believed failure means shame and punishment. To challenge this core belief, I switched from calling my failures into mistakes. Failure can have a crassness to it, but “mistake” reminded me of the classic term “learn from your mistakes”. After that, I could look back at the quiz as a lesson about my mistakes.

What I learned was incredibly helpful. I took notice my anxiety levels while studying and doing any exercise, quiz, or whatever that “tests” me. I learned that instead of expecting perfectionism, I could strive for excellence, which to me requires an open and teachable mind that enjoys the process of self-improvement (You know, the whole “it’s the journey, not the destination” thing). I balance this out by thinking about my health logically. For excellence to happen, my brain needs rest, my body needs care, and my soul needs joyful reminders of my ambitions and aspirations. Although I did make sure to follow a schedule so the workload each day wasn’t more stressful than it already was, I didn’t take myself to the rigidity of grind culture I used partake in a long time ago in a elementary charter school far, far away almost until grad school. Knowing my personality, I’m already in that frame of mind where I want and will do my best. There’s absolutely no need for me to make my perfectionism into a monster, when its brought me so far and polished my work ethic. The most important lesson from that silly quiz was… don’t take the quiz if you’re panicking about the time limit more than the material. Lol.

Anyway, I just wanted to share that. Now that I have a decent routine with my psych classes, I can return to my writing routine. I am so glad my structure has returned and is solid enough to try new things.

Have a good one.

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This is a video from the YouTube channel XELASOMA, who I cam across recently. I’ve been diving into the Jungian archetype meanings after taking a test and doing some research specifically for my novel and the VPD articles. I think this youtuber explained The Magician so precisely and eloquently. I hope you enjoy his video and subscribe.

Let me know what you think. What archetype do you resonate with?

One Day They’ll Know – [Just Me]

During my meditations this week, I accepted an important sacrifice I had to make. Sacrifice is strange to me. Sometimes I go out of the way trying to find a way where I can get everything I want without losing anything. I try to strategize, work around the way people perceive me, hoping I can […]

by Authentikei

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Wow, I am… I want to say I’m “exhausted”, but really I’m proud. There were moments of emotional adversity within the previous week. I survived it. Sometimes it’s weird to look back at a past moment that previously would’ve led to a more explosive result. I’ve been practicing ignoring things more, which I shared on Instagram.

One of the reasons why I’m pursuing psychology is to address the function or desire behind emotional manipulation. It’s amazing how far a person will go to convince you that you should be submitting to a higher power, an authoritarian figure, or even that person in order to have betterment in your life. It’s salesmanship, really. Lol, really petty salesmanship.

As I pursue my psychology degree, I look forward to a deeper plunge into the almost ridiculous ways a human will take to feel validated. It’s not like the desire for validation is bad. Validation in itself, I think, it’s very natural. I’d be a hypocrite for saying the opposite, especially as a writer/artist. I just feel that the way we pursue validation through means of force, manipulation, and otherwise is not just astounding, but also contradictory. That’s just my opinion though. I hope to expand upon that later in the future through more publications and art.

I hope you all are well. Have a good one.

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Hello,

It’s been a good work day. I’ll release a new VPD tomorrow. I guess I wanted to just express what’s been on my mind lately. There’s been the comfort in stagnancy that I’ve been holding onto and it’s a side of me I don’t like. That side feels like an older version of myself that has such a lack of belief and lack of rationality when it comes to making choices. Like many, I have turned a blind eye on my own strength, but will tap into it for the sake of validation from others or creating this concept more founded in fantasy than logic that my life purpose will miraculously make sense.

Today, I’m proud of myself for noticing that there were times the realization of my own strength led to incredible accomplishments. I have a Masters in Liberal Studies with a concentration in Creative Writing when some guiding voices nudged me out of the Political Science courses and into the English courses as an undergrad. Through that journey I embraced my love for writing fiction, poetry, and essays. Now I’m reflecting again, those guiding voices being more metaphysical than in person this time, feeling the call to advance my gifts as a mystic into a tangible career. I was unsure about whether I wanted to really talk about this on here because there’s still so much to plan and prepare for, but this is Authentikei, right? I’m supposed to be authentic. I think I would make a great personality psychologist. I’ve come this far trusting in my psychic and intuitive abilities to guide me to write about metaphysics and literature, but I haven’t considered applying my abilities to psychology, which has been a love of mine for a very long time. I’m sort of aspiring to be like Carl Jung, who was not just a clinical psychologist, but also a lover of metaphysics, occultist, and mystic in his own right. Can’t I do that? Especially as a writer?

So yeah. That’s a thing. It’s a thing that feels very, very right to pursue. We’ll see what happens. This doesn’t mean I stop any of this. I have to write and working on my projects almost every day now or I’m just lost, but I definitely feel I have the capability to handle advancing my education and applying that achievement to my current career. What would you think of a personality psychologist who wrote dark fantasy and poetry, did literary analyses for fun, and researched metaphysical/occult topics? What kind of career would come out of that do you think?

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There’s a great difference between being alone and lonely. When you wake up, you do realize that you’re never really alone, but the loneliness can creep in at times. Loneliness is actually a perception more than it is a fact. Do we all feel lonely sometimes? Definitely. However, I feel the reason why loneliness is a matter of perception is because this feeling only appears when we experience disconnection.

Even with family and friends around, disconnection occurs when it seems like we’re out of harmony with what’s happening around us. Since a lot of what happens to reality mirrors what’s going on within ourselves, disharmony with reality makes us want to disconnect. I recently experienced this disharmony. The best thing I did for myself is sit down and cry, talk to my spirit guides, create music, draw; in other words, I had to express how I felt about the disharmony. Afterwards, the external reality responded with signs and messages. This also helped me gain clarity on my own internal dialogue that at first seemed so repetitive and directionless. That’s what I mean by reality mirroring what’s going on within. If there is disconnection due to disharmony, all we can do is express that.

To manifest the connection and belongingness we long for in life, our expressions for what we need in life need to be loud and true. Some of us express privately, like myself. Some of us need to express it more publicly. Either way is considered loud and true because the universe listens and responds. Even those who don’t feel that the universe is really listening still NEED to express themselves. Their expression is an action that leads to a reaction. That’s the universe speaking, whether they like it or not. Every action parallels, ripples, echoes, and mirrors what’s already there. If we remember that expressing our needs and desires can guide us in life, no matter how directionless we feel in the moment, results will happen.

Change is the only constant, immutable energy that surrounds us. It’s sentience is still being debated by humanity, but I surely believe that energy is listening. You are not alone. The universe listens and responds.