Shlanga

I didn’t go to class today. I wasn’t an important class, it’s really cold and i had to be there so so early. I’m happy that I can chose.

This kind of thing used to make me feel so anxious. Like I was doing something wrong, and it was going to backfire so hard. There was never a time to let go, because everithing was urgente and extremly important. But now I have my priorities in order, and it feels good, knowing when to give your worst, and no having much consequences. You have to know when and how be mediocre and be ok with that.

Something that literally changed my life was working with a friend on a coding thing. He was helping me create an auto rig script and was trying to explain something to me but his words were just turning into static in my brain. I was tired and confused and there was so many new concepts happening.

I could feel myself working toward a crying meltdown and was getting preemptively ashamed of what was about to happen when he said, “Hey, are you someone who benefits from breaks?”

It broke me.

Did I benefit from breaks? I didn’t know. I’d never taken them.

When a problem frustrated or upset me I just gritted my teeth and plowed through the emotional distress because eventually if you batter and flail at something long enough you figure it out. So what if you get bruised on the way.

I viscerally remembered in that moment being forced to sit at the table late into the night with my dad screaming at me, trying to understand math. I remembered taking that with me into adulthood and having breakdowns every week trying to understand coding. I could have taken a break? Would it help? I didn’t know! I’d never taken one!

“Yes,” I told him. We paused our call. I ate lunch. I focused on other stuff for half an hour. I came back in a significantly better state of mind, and the thing he’d been trying to explain had been gently cooking in the back of my head and seemed easier to understand.

Now when I find myself gritting my teeth at problems I can hear his gentle voice asking if I benefit from breaks. Yes, dear god, yes why did I never get taught breaks? Why was the only way I knew to keep suffering until something worked?

I was relating to this same friend recently my roadtrip to the redwoods with my wife. “We stopped every hour or so to get out and stretch our legs and switch drivers. It was really nice. When I was a kid we’d just drive twelve hours straight and not stop for anything, just gas. We’d eat in the car and power through.”

He gave a wry smile, immediately connecting the mindset of my parents on a road trip to what they’d instilled in me about brute forcing through discomfort. “Do you benefit from breaks?” he echoed, drawing my attention to it, making me smile with the same sad acknowledgement.

Take breaks. You’re allowed. You don’t have to slam into problems over and over and over, let yourself rest. It will get easier. Take. Breaks.

I’m obsessed with this man

he did it again

Mi perro es adorable. Tiene pinta de cachorro. Se acurruca siempre que puede. Tiene las patas muy cortitas. Da besitos. Se porta bien. En la casa.

Por que afuera casi mata a un perro, y de paso me mata a mi del susto. Me puse a divagar un segundo. Apareció un perro de la nada y tiro tan fuerte que rompió la correa y me quemó los dedos con el roce. Apenas lo logre agarrar me puse a llorar a mares, el pobre dueño me trato tan bien!!! Llore tanto y tanto rato que quede relajaita pal el resto del día. Nada que como una buena lloraita.

Hay tantos niños que nacen con una alita rota. Y yo quiero que vuelen compañero.

- Pedro Lemebel

wish my life was like a 90's movie where all my friends work in record stores and bookshops and coffee shops and we see really cool bands in small little clubs and get breakfast together and like hang out on roofs and shit