OverFlow: Hello! I've Gone Into Hiding for a While.
How is everyone doing?
OverFlow is what happens when I overthink, overflow, and over-everything. When my feelings have nowhere to go, I write about them.
I’ve missed two Sundays — not that most of you would have noticed — and I’m sorry that I’ve been gone. June has been a difficult month for me. Has it been difficult to get through for any of you?
I don’t want to be the type of person that blames the stars but it really does feel like everything just came together — the eclipse season starting with the total lunar eclipse on May 26 and ending with the annular solar eclipse on June 10, Mercury retrograde from May 29 to June 22 in Gemini, and the Summer Solstice on June 20 which is also when Jupiter begins a four-month-long retrograde. It was also Father’s Day on June 20 — a day that’s not that easy for me to get through.
That’s a lot of energies bumping and conflicting with one another, and I feel like everyone’s gone a little haywire because of it.
What Have I Been up to All This Time?
There’s really not much to tell. I’m still working my way through #Decolonize30for30’s 2021 incarnation — I’m at day 28 right now. After a year of going through decolonization work through poetry and meditation, I’m starting to see that it’s near impossible to cultivate a truly decolonized way of thinking as someone who grew up in the Philippines and then moved to the U.S. as an adult. I’m still trying, though.
I’ve started bullet journaling, which has me keeping up important self-care habits that I often forget to do or push aside because I’m focusing on more “essential” things like work and errands. I’m learning to assert that I’m important, too — and that working on myself should be a priority. I still go to therapy twice a month. And I’m sleeping more often and for much longer — worried about some naps being actual depression naps but I think I’d feel much worse if I were depressed.
July is coming, which means the birthday blues are right around the corner. I haven’t really felt them yet but maybe it’s because I’ve been in a cloud of grief recently. Father’s Day is the reason, along with me smelling kalachuchi and cigarettes indoors the entire week before it. I feel like my Father is here, checking up on me and worrying about the fact that I’m a little bit all over the place. Maybe he’s also watching me watch Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist and crying at all the dead dad scenes. Hmmm.
Raf and I have fought a lot, and I’ve also fought with myself. Meditation these days is sometimes too heavy to do before work but it’s a habit I need to force myself to do. These days, it’s all about me feeling guilty for feeling “not okay,” whatever that means. I know that I’m actually okay and that I’m doing things that are good for me, so I think what’s happening is that I’m making myself feel guilty about not being happy and contented enough. I don’t know.
What to See What I Write for Work?
I write consistently for ReviewThis. And while the stuff I’ve written during this month hasn’t gone up yet, here are my last five published articles on the site:
I’ve also gone back to ghostwriting — which has muddled up my work schedule a little bit. I’m always juggling editing, writing, and ghostwriting on weekdays.
What Did You Do for the Strawberry Moon?
I’m writing this newsletter on the 22nd, so the Strawberry Moon hasn’t happened yet for me. On June 24, it will be the full Strawberry Moon — the last full moon of the summer and the first full moon of the spring. After this long period of conflicting energies, it’s bound to be a relief to bask in the Strawberry Moon’s presence.
What spells or manifestations or rituals did you do? Whatever you’ve done, please don’t forget to add a little bit of self-care to your schedule. God knows we all need it.
Photo by Kyle Sudu on Unsplash
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