Artwork by Norman Duenas

I will not be ashamed of myself any longer. I will not be ashamed of my choices, my decisions, my heartache, my sadness, my forgetfulness, my sorrow, my mindlessness, my laziness. I often wonder how everyone else does it? How do they keep it going long enough to accomplish something, long enough to build something off of. I have no experience with this...well maybe I do but it's out of my sight because I am too busy looking at everything else that I SHOULD be doing. Today, all day all I could think of was that I shouldn't be doing everything that I was doing. Every choice I made was counteracted with myself telling me, no...you really should be doing this instead. How frustrating and defeating that is to be constantly at odds with myself. I have no love for myself, as I am beginning to realize. I thought I did but it was false. It was covered up in clothes and trends, interesting facts and stories. All of it just make believe. I have no basis of who I am and who is me because I have forever buried myself in fear of actually being seen. I am scared of rejection. So, I outwardly reject those around me and the ones I do want to be around, end up rejecting me. It's the same story over and over again. When will it stop ? I feel pinned to the wheel, screaming and desperately wanting off but secretly enjoying it. What else do I know? This is comfortable....and now that I am slowly becoming unpinned, I feel even more scared. Scared of my potential. Scared of losing anything great that comes out of me. This loss runs deep, it is ingrained in my DNA. If for once, I could just forgive myself of everything I didn't do or was supposed to do. Forgive myself for not following through with something...giving up, especially. Forgive myself for being selfish, for being less than, for not eating the right foods for my body. Because it's all this scolding and
"should-be's" that are preventing me from being free. They cloud my mind, eat me up inside...literally  .