everytingkris

[everytingkris]

Diesel Bedroom

Diesel Rock Pendant

Diesel Nebula Bed

Diesel Fork Table Lamp

Download: [X]

[everytingkris]

I just wanted to say, green is my aesthetic for this year. I feel purpose and passion in this colour and so I'm leaning into that feeling and manifesting it in my daily life in small ways. Like making this my phone wallpaper.

Currently listening to:

Scott Street by Phoebe Bridgers

[everytingkris]

Signs & Wonders: A 2019 Prayer

So it’s 2019, day 1 of a new batch of 365. As usual I am a hopeful, nervous wreck, ridiculously imbuing meaning into my every action and thinking everything that happens around me is an omen of the kind of year I’m going to have. This is, admittedly, an inherited behaviour. Growing up, my mom would never allow a new year to come without cleaning the entire house, taking out the trash, doing all the laundry etc. - because taking dirt into the new year meant taking baggage and unresolved issues into the new year. So yes, even hundreds of miles away from her, I emptied the trash at 10:45... just to be sure.

But if 2018 is anything to go by, there is no logic to these “omens” beyond that of my own making. I started 2018 at home in St. Thomas, Jamaica, worried about my Chevening application. There were no signs to predict the year ahead. There was nothing particularly remarkable about the day at all, other than that is was pleasant. And 2018 was a lovely year. I accomplished so much more than I expected. It was the kind of year I have to celebrate because so many of the years before it feel so empty by comparison. So many of the years before 2018 were filled with depression and anxiety, inactivity, self-doubt and self-pity and unhappiness. In 2018 I was always either working towards achieving something, achieving something or experiencing something new - good or bad. I was stretched mentally and physically in a way that was exhausting but that made me feel truly alive.

2018 brought clarity. But it’s unfair to put all of that on the year. I have to remind myself that 2018 was just 24 hours repeated 365 times. It’s just days, hours. There was nothing special about the year. What was special, was me. I did things differently this year. I occupied more space. I tried a little harder and the little extra effort paid off. It meant the dark times were fewer and the happy times were really happy. It meant honestly evaluating myself and my trajectory and adjusting course over and over again. It meant making my own decisions and my own mistakes and accepting the consequences and the hard truths. I felt more alive because I did more and thought more.

And yes, I am in a reflective mood because it’s New Years Day and that’s likely to wear off in a couple hours when I dive head-first into these essays but I’m writing this down to remind myself that I feel this way now. I don’t want to forget the lessons of 2018. I don’t want to start over. More than anything else, I want to build on this and level up. When I told a friend of mine I was starting this blog to record thoughts like these, she was mortified and because of her reaction I almost reconsidered doing this - but that’s what I have always done. I have always tried to curate an image for myself that is pleasing to others. I have always done what I’m supposed to do, instead of what I want to do and what I feel is right for me. This blog is an exercise in detoxification. I am challenging myself to be who I really am, honestly.

I am challenging myself to exist without excessive filters. To speak and live my truth. I am asking myself not to edit my soul because somewhere in the last couple years I lost my voice and as cliche as it sounds I lost my fire. I had no confidence in anything. If you spoke to 2014 Kristeena - she would tell you she’s intelligent, devours books for breakfast, quick-learner, poet/writer and she’s gonna live a creative life. 2017 Kristeena was intelligent but somehow less so. She didn’t read more than 3 books for the entire year. She learned very little and she didn’t write much and absolutely no poetry at all. 2018 Kristeena wasn’t a massive improvement on 2017 Kristeena, but she saw the gaps, she understood what she was doing wrong and consistently chose to try harder and do better and it worked for her. She wasn’t perfect but she was better and she appreciated being better.

2018 Kristeena felt like the start of something new, or the end of something I need to put behind me and as I turn 25 and embark on the next 5 years, I understand it now. I can finally connect the dots. I understand that the omens I should pay attention to, aren’t screech owls in the middle of the night. They aren’t black spots or broken mirrors. They’re the whispers of the selves I walk with, telling me to remember who I’ve been and believe in who I can become.  They’re the overlaps of my cumulative experience, tugging at me, steering me away from the same old mistakes and pointing me in the right direction. The omens are the intuition that’s becoming, the sixth sense my mother lives with, that my grandmothers knew, that my great-grandmothers carried and endured, and their mothers and their mothers. 

In 2019, I honour myself. I affirm my own identity. I believe in the strength I call upon across generations. I remember I am the deepest hope of my ancestors. I remember I am capable of more. I remember that my years are sacred and the best way to honour them is to live them fully. I remember that my years are a gift and the only way to honour them is to be myself. I remember that the universe will only ever be me, this one time, and all that I am, will only ever be, this one time. I honour that. I pray for the wisdom, strength, good health, confidence and peace I need to continue to imbue this life I live with magic and happiness. I pray for the empathy to remember I do not walk alone.