Vacation. in Phoenix

I just got back from 5 days in Chicago. First of all, I had the most incredible, interesting, fun, happy, and sad vacation of my life. I think if there is a human emotion that exists, I experienced it at least once in those 5 days.

I also had another acid trip. It was very different from the first one, mostly because I had an idea of what to expect, and I had a plan. I had a list of ideas/thoughts/concepts that I prepared mentally in the week before, things I wanted to try to actively think about and work through during the trip. That part didn’t turn out anything at all like I’d thought it would. It was the most interesting sensation. I was aware that I was basically tripping balls and that all of these things were going on in my head somewhere, but… Well, as I explained it to the Unicorn at the time, it was like I could see that little green hard drive light just flashing away, obviously processing data of some kind, but I couldn’t access the hard drive and read the data myself with my conscious mind. I could feel it happening, though. I know that a hell of a lot of things are going to be crawling out of my mind over the next couple of weeks as they drift to the surface once the subconscious is done sorting them out.

A pretty major thing so far is the concept that I am okay. I’m good. I don’t mean my mood or whatever. I mean me, as a human being. I’m good. I’m a good human. My presence brings joy to people. I am not an annoyance or an inconvenience. I’m giving and loving and funny and kind. I’m not awkward or weird, I’m perfect just the way I am. And I don’t have to let that inner awkwardness affect me anymore. I don’t have to feel awkward or like I don’t fit in or like I have to be someone different depending on circumstance or situation. I can just always be exactly what I am. The right people will love me for that. The ones who don’t love me? Well, that’s okay, too. I don’t need them to love me. I don’t need everyone to like me or think I’m cool or smart or talented, because I already have so many people in my life who love and appreciate me. I don’t need more outside validation. I am validated. I validate myself every day by being myself. I really love her, the girl in the mirror, the girl in the pictures that the Unicorn took of me and keeps sending to me in a trickle, one at a time, with a comment like, “Lookit how cute she is!” And I look at her and, goddamn, she really is so cute. She’s smiling so big and her eyes are sparkly and she’s so happy and loved.

I had a little conversation with myself on my drive home. It’s a thing I’ve noticed myself doing more and more in recent months, actually talking to myself out loud. I mean, sure, it’s just another symptom of dissociation, but it feels good to do it, to let what feels like the two halves of myself duke it out a little. I let myself say the negative things out loud, the sad, hurtful thoughts. And what I’ve discovered is, when I do that, when I say the bad thought out loud, it’s like the “other me” hears it and laughs. Those thoughts sound so very stupid when I say them out loud. And then, new me counters those thoughts with facts.

I said to myself, “The fact that you are loved is undeniable. It is knowledge, not opinion.”

Because the way that I am loved? Well, it’s inconceivable to me, but it’s also undeniable, like the sun and the moon and the stars in the sky, just a simple, observable fact of the way the universe exists. Because he makes it like that. He loves me like that, in a way that is so blatantly obvious that to deny it would be akin to claiming the earth is flat.

And even if I go through the rest of my life never bringing another ounce of joy to another person’s life, well… I have touched at least one, and that’s something. I also possess the knowledge that it is far more than just one and also that I am capable of touching infinite lives as long as I don’t allow self-doubt to hold me back.

I’m feeling a pretty extreme lack of self-doubt currently, so I’m pretty sure my whole life is about to change in significant and unforeseen ways. Because I’m okay. I’m good. And I love to share.