on looking

the wisdom of the unseen

I don’t know what I am searching for,

But I never find it when I am looking.

Ever.

And even when we do know what we’re looking for, if we put it under a microscope, we can’t see it even if it’s right in front of our face¹.

I’m not that into astrology, but this year is the year of the snake….think: shedding. coiling. sensing.

If you’re thinking damn, yeah…I promise you, we’re all saying it. Lol.

My younger brother had a snake² when we were younger, and every time it would shed its skin I would always wonder how it felt. Don’t you feel raw in the world bb?

Yet Lizard (lol, the snake’s name³) would continue doin’ his thing. Seemingly with the same energy as before.

Shedding. Even the word makes me squirm a bit. Not enough to feel like it’s painful but this essence of discomfort.

Not too long ago before moving back to the States, I woke up one day and had this major desire to get acupuncture. I had literally never done it before, but it was something in me like: acupuncture⁴. NOW. Today.

And so I went.

I have been dealing with this annoying skin issue on my hands for essentially my whole life and had gone to dermatologists, naturopaths, etc and nothing really worked. Annoying, yes. But nothing that was restricting any basic activity. (God thank you)

She clocked it immediately. “You have a blockage in your lung meridian. Air keeps things moving through your body. And when it’s blocked from flowing even the smallest thing can get stuck, especially in topical areas like the skin.”

“What emotion is this linked to?”

“Grief.”

……

Same feeling as hearing the word shedding. Although on a pendulum of pain, definitely swinging on the felt side.

“But I’m not grieving anything?”

To which I was met with a soft smile.

One that said: mi amor, we both know that the body speaks louder than words.

To this, I ask you…what is your body saying right now?

Gently whispering for you to hear, but in your quest for answers you have dismissed….

For real.

Close your eyes for just a sec. Deep breath in and out.

Where lights up most?

We tend to be “so” surprised by what we find, yet simultaneously unfazed because we know it’s always been there.

I think where we fumble is having shame for not seeing it. Shame-ception of sorts.

Shame for being finally able to see shame. Grieving the time we spent ignoring our grief.

But how can we look for something we’ve never fully seen?

So caught up on the minutiae of our day-to-day that yes we’ve gotten glimpses of what’s below the surface but never gotten quite acquainted with the depth of it’s identity.

It’s like a neighbor a few doors down. You see them on the street some days as you walk your dog. Maybe chance places you in the same subway car here and there. But not until you’re both caught at the foot of the platform when a rainstorm unfolds and share a single umbrella on the walk home, you really don’t know the fullness of what’s there.

You invite them over for dinner that weekend. Realize you were meant to be friends.

Not then, but now.

The experiences that you collected over the course of you being neighbors-not-friends are the right amount of aged to be the perfect ingredients for a fine feast of connection⁵.

What we’re looking for is rarely hiding from us.

It’s protecting us from seeing too much before we’re ready.

Granting us vision when we can truly be held in its beauty.

May we continue shedding,

shedding,

shedding,

what we don’t need until then.

Kiss kiss.

---

Other Bites

• Currently obsessed with Love on the Spectrum; IDK how I haven’t watched this before but the purity, honesty, and integrity is just … wow

• Fixation song of the week

• Field notes

  

  my journal, a random pop up, kiss kiss in the wild (promise not me)

• An audio visualization by yours truly for CLO-CIRCLE - June’s theme: nature; I’ll be regularly contributing (and recently got a better mic, lol) so subscribe

  • They also have a really lovely virtual, global philosophy circle each month around a dedicated monthly theme <3

• Loving Sublime — here is my public library

  • Can finally put all of my city guides in one place!

  • Also expanding surface area for digital synchronicity…

    

• I shared photos of myself with my pops for father’s day from childhood and now I want to start a photo book of everyone I know as their lil baby selves. Genuinely if you see this please send me your baby photo as well as whatever comes to mind to share from their shoes. I’ll go first:

  

  I just want to be That’s So Raven when I grow up, and a mom, and drive a pink car

  Besitos <3

1. Lol, I am currently traveling quite a bit and living out of a suitcase. I feel like I get tested with this every other day. I have concluded the perfect method to finding things which is often intentionally forgetting about it for minimum 60 seconds and boom. Found. It’s like this past self wisdom has the chance to reboot. Men especially take note.

2. My dad was allergic to dogs… but also recently got a dog so I’m like dawg??? Hahhaa. Single father pass on this one. Lol. Love you dad I know you’re reading.

3. I truly was raised on reggae and dry humor.

4. Without sounding like an annoying IG hippie archetype, acupuncture is honestly one of the most transformative practices I have ever engaged in…yeah, ever. Ice baths, plant medi, talk therapy … miles behind what acu has allowed me to see. Genuinely there are no words involved just deeper listening to the body. A friend saw me after being away for a few months and genuinely asked: did you get taller? Girl I’m a late 20s chica my height cannot increase, but energy can certainly grow. That’s on healing trauma in the body through feeling not words pushing it around.

5. Why is this giving the Ratatouille scene where he bites the strawberry? This articulation of taste also? Oscary-worthy tbh.