Love this necklace

everything will be okay

S P A C E D

Ever felt this way?  I felt kind of like this tonight when my arm carelessly upended my first beer.  And yes, shards flew.  Waitress hated me after that.

Doing nothing(something) in a beautiful place again

I

swam.  ate another smoothie/granola confection.  listened to music that reminded me of the 7th grade.

Waimanalo Beach

Beach staple bag, staple cutoff levi's, staple slippers.

To the left.

To the right, someone's makeshift... umbrella? shack?

Diagonally in the distance: "rabbit island".

Soul Gardening: no. IV the one where the answer floats into my head

              Putting people on pedestals before I know them has been a lifetime affliction for me.  Maybe I’m afraid to get to know them or I’m scared that they’ll disappoint me (which let’s face it, they inevitably will).  Whichever the case, in order to get to truly know someone, I would probably have to get rid of the image of the perfect life I imagine them having and accept that they are like everyone else – and like me – flawed.

              Besides the fact that it pains me to leave them on this pedestal (it just reminds me of how imperfect my own life is), it’s radically unfair to put the pressure of perfection on someone.  Accepting flaws is half the battle – the other half is realizing that it shouldn’t be scary to relate and to communicate with the people that appeal to you.

              A big part of relieving the destructive behavior of “pedestaling” is by keeping yourself grounded.  By keeping grounded and not letting your head get too far in the clouds and imagining ridiculous things, you realize that the truth of life is that it is real and perfectly imperfect – and that’s what makes it valuable.

                                                                                                            

i did nothing today

I

relaxed.  felt the sun.  got splashed.  became addicted to granola+guavasmoothie+bananas.  talked.  laughed.  spent the day with leftover sand on one side of my face.  heard the sounds of samba.  relaaaxed.

They looked like Gingerbread Houses...  Rows and rows and rows of Gingerbread Houses!  mmmmm.  Seriously, I want to live on Gingerbread Block.

View from the front(side).  These are dark.  It was actually very shiny!

To the left.

To the right.

Acai bowls are going to be my summer staple.  or maybe just granola.

BIO: talking to myself

Name: Crystal


Age: 21


At The Moment...


Favorite musical artist:  Graffiti6


Favorite designer:  Wildfox


Favorite shoes:  Nine West studded gladiator sandals


Favorite t.v. show: Spaced


Favorite movie:  Eat Pray Love


Favorite quote:  "It took me a long time not to judge myself through someone else's eyes." - Sally Field


Favorite picture: 

Favorite trend:  opaque flowy tops; crop tops; seriously frayed cut-off denim shorts


Favorite ice cream:  Peppermint (actually it's an All Time favorite)


Favorite song:  "Samba de Bencao"  Bebel Gilberto


Favorite summer "activity":  Sunbathing (now you know why I put quotations on "activity")


Favorite book:  Percy Jackson & The Olympians (series, actually)


Favorite drink:  Metromint chocolatemint water (sounds gross but it's actually mucho refreshing and leaves a slight hint of chocolate at the end which is surprisingly wonderful.  Try it.


Favorite ringtone:  intro to "Taper Jean Girl"  Kings of Leon


Favorite website to frequent for outfit inspiration:  Nasty Gal or 
Freepeople

Favorite summer accessory:  vintage-y shades


Favorite summer location:  "Tongs" (out-of-the-way beach spot to lie in the sun)


Favorite snack:  Blueberries and Goat Cheese with honey drizzled over


Favorite actor to ogle:  Logan Lerman


Favorite actress to ogle:  Crystal Reed


Favorite radio station:  KTUH


annnnnnnd favorite summer alcoholic beverage:  the all-time refreshing Mojito or Marrrrrgarita

Soul Gardening no. III the one where i let go

A helpful hint that can only come from an outside perspective:  If I hold onto things that I’m uneasy about then I unwittingly give power to negative energy in my life and then I’m desperately confused as to how to rid myself of the quicksand feeling of gloom.  If I just let go of everything, and I mean everything that weighs me down, then I present myself with the quickest, most simple solution to all my inner wars.  But then I want to pinch myself really hard for not seeing it before and wasting A LOT of my time being wretched and wondering how to get out of the funk. 

In a real garden sometimes you plant a flower or fruit or vegetable or herb or whatever with high hopes that it will flourish and take root and gloriously spread throughout with perfect petals and luscious heavenly blooms.  When it doesn’t, brutal disappointment takes over and you wonder why that plant just wouldn’t grow for you.  What you’re not acknowledging is that on the back of the package, the directions for growth clearly state that the climate should be cold with little to no sun when you live on a tropical island smack dab in the middle of the equator. And you ask yourself why? 

Hypothetically, that special plant is a dream or wish you wanted to cultivate and see to fruition.  I see it as a big favor to let myself know that maybe some of those dreams weren’t meant for me or maybe it just wasn’t the right time (which by the way, if we all acknowledged that for some of our hopes we would feel a lot more free of worry and bitter disappointment). 

Letting go of dreams that I feel strongly for and slapping myself back to reality usually leaves a sour taste in my mouth.  Letting go of things for everyone is hard, and once I accept that I’m just like everyone else and I feel just like everyone else, things won’t seem so difficult as I think. 

When I have an issue in my life, I get single-minded and see only the extreme lows of a situation and am left somewhat answerless.  Sometimes it leaves me in a vegetative funk for weeks, and sometimes the feeling fleets after a day or two.  Who knows what controls the length of these spells?  Then again, maybe I control them.  Maybe I say when to stop and when to start.  Makes sense, right?  I am the master of the controls for my own life.  Then why am I so darn stubborn sometimes when it comes to pulling myself up?   

The solution is and always will be simple:  you choose to stay happy or to stay sad.  There it is! That’s the secret!

Great.  Promise next post will be a little more happy.

Wildfox White Label: Fall 2011

This year's Fall '11 Wildfox White Label Collection is so hippy-ishly stunning I think I just died in front of my computer screen.  The wool sweaters: AH! The flowing incredibly long and dainty layers: OOH! The hot pants: WHAT! And the red velvet bell-bottoms?  DO NOT GET ME STARTED.  "swoon!"

And the accessories and velvet boots... Wildfox has really stepped up this year's fall collection in the inspirational name of vintage!

Soul Gardening no. II the one where i realize friends are what makes the world go round

If I consider my friends in my theoretical “soul garden” to be daisies, then I would want those damn cute (however clichéd) daisies to run as wild and freely as they pleased.  For most of my life I’ve cut off a lot of people who I didn’t want to be friends with or who I didn’t think were worth the time or trouble to get to know.  Sometimes it’s hard to communicate with people I barely know if I think they don’t show a genuine interest in wanting to explore the depths of my character.  For the people I have let in, however, I feel like I couldn’t live without or be apart from for more than three weeks (which could prove to be proof of my inevitable attachment to others, which is scary).  When something goes wrong in my life, an hour with one of my closest friends can begin a tremendous healing process that I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to instigate within myself. 

For me, “alone-time” can mean cutting myself off from a social world that can create subtle to extreme mood swings.  I feel alienated from every other socially capable person for a week or so and end up shutting myself up in my home instead of trying to figure out a way to fix the inner problem.  If I could picture this invisible opposing force that causes me such despair at times, I would paint them as those nasty nocturnal slugs that come like night terrors.  Sometimes they decide to show their slimy, destructive selves, and sometimes they decide to stay under the covers.  The only way to tackle this predicament would be to search directly for the source. 

If I were being completely honest (let’s just say for the sake of blogging that I am) I would acknowledge that the base of my problem would be deep-seated insecurities.  For whatever reason they pop up and take the wheel in my sometimes fantasy-driven life, they entangle my mind with self-destructive tendencies to disappear within myself to escape from a seemingly suffocating world. 

My friends (my daisies) provide me with veritable reasons to give myself love and encouragement.  To remedy my (at times) somewhat dipping self-esteem, sometimes even a ten-minute conversation will suffice.  Over-analyzing a situation comes naturally to me, and if I don’t get a second, third, fourth, or fifth opinion from my friends, it can be severely wasting on my energy.  I imagine the highest highs and lowest lows of whatever circumstance I’m in, but a guiding and encouraging word or two from people I trust can keep me grounded. 

The scary part is that I tend to rely on outside advice to fix a problem in my life when I should be taking counsel as a form of guidance, not a permanent answer. 

When I think of daisies, the first words that come to my mind are companionable, steady, and agreeable.  However, I can also think of these flowers as plain and clichéd.  That’s not to say that I think of my friends this way, although I can attest that circulating throughout the same group of friends for an extended period of time can become somewhat tiring to my spirit.

Back to the soul garden:  If I want to become an experienced cultivator of the theoretical forest that is my psyche, I’m trying to recognize the unique and gratifying gifts that are my daisies, my friends and accept the weeds that disguise themselves as this seemingly commonplace flower so that I can eliminate them.  Soul gardening is a tedious but valuable process, and starting with a salute towards my friends seems like the best place to start. 

Soul Gardening - no. I the one where i finally get personal

Let’s start out by addressing the fact that I am the kind of person who is prone to more flings than “long-term relationships”.  “Why is that?”  You ask?  Perhaps I have a common fear of commitment similar to the third of the population of America, or maybe it’s my doomed affliction of letting physical attraction take the wheel when it comes to the never-ending search for a magical golden heart to attach myself to.   Whatever it is, it’s become an unfortunate normality for me whenever my hormones decide to take a wild stroll with the opposite sex.  Plus, it’s really annoying.

Now, the predicament:  since my runaround heart seems to take sick pleasure in wasting my time with these unproductive and fruitless joyrides, my question is: How do I separate my real feelings from the infuriatingly convincing (however fleeting) “attacks” that seem to take over my nervous system when presented with a potential boy-anchor that could ground my head-in-the clouds life with love?  

Perhaps in my subconscious I am too swift to believe that a romantic love relationship with someone who my mind perceives as special will solve my problems, straighten out my chaotic life, and put an end to the miserable, time-consuming effort to pair up with another person who truly has my best interests at heart. 

Objectively, for most, the “purpose” of everyone’s life is to find that one ideal partner, that one person that can make your world stop spinning and start producing meaningful material that you can finally be proud of presenting to the world.  Everyone is searching, but how do we prune the weeds from the roses? 

For me, the aforementioned flings that I’ve participated in have always ended within the span of a month.  Any long-term relationship for me has lasted between a couple of months to a year, maybe a year and a half.  All have ended in disappointment.  Why do I keep searching and coming up with the wrong answer?  It’s time to upgrade to smarter strategy or to not have a strategy at all, maybe to stop expecting things to happen and to start letting things grow on their own.  It’s not as easy as it sounds, but I think it’s time to start doing some gardening on my soul.