no edits, first and final take

Here’s me trying out the stream of conciousness thing. Conciousness? Consciousness? Honestly I never know how to spell that word. Anyways, I never like doing this because I feel like there’s always a million thoughts going on in my head at once and it’ll never be cohesive, and I really wanted it to be cohesive so that I could make this super deep and meaningful and maybe slightly witty post to put up on my blog. But yolo that. (I use yolo as a verb, ofc). I saw someone I really admire do this, he has his own Substack which I am subscribed to. As soon as I saw the notif in my email this morning, I was excited to read. He is one of those people that I just think are so cool and that I look up to, because he is doing what I want to be doing. Living life the way I think it’s meant to be lived. There used to be a long list of these people that I thought were out of reach, and that I thought were unattainable for me. I thought what they were doing was unattainable for me. But then I mustered up just a little bit of courage and DM’d them. And what do you know! They responded! Super sweet, super encouraging, super helpful people. I don’t know why I was ever afraid before. Maybe because I had put them so high up on a pedestal that I was afraid I wasn’t doing something worthy enough to impress them, or not doing something worthy enough to even be talking to them. But it’s like they say, someone more successful than you will never judge you for taking the first step. After talking to a couple of my idols, I learned that they were no different than I was. They’re all a couple years older, sure, but they too were once kids in college, with fun hobbies, a passion for life, a desire to have something of their own, their own quirks, loving friends, moments of confusion and whatnot. But here’s where the gap was. The gap that set them up on a pedestal for me. They have a lot more audacity than I do at the moment. And I use having audacity as a compliment. Having the audacity to dream big, the audacity to be delusional about those dreams, the audacity of asking for what you want, the audacity to reach out to those who don’t even know you exist, the audacity to fail and learn and keep trying till you get it right. Some people may hate on me for using as “harsh” of a word as “audacity” but I think it’s perfectly fitting. Because I think only someone with a lot of courage would have the audacity to believe in a path that no one else does. I want to have as much audacity as them. I think I’ve used the word audacity too much. I’ll replace it with cupcake. I miss eating cupcakes. One time I bought a pack from Target and ate all the cakes and scraped the icing off and it looked like there was a cupcake massacre in the box. Anyways, back to the audacity, sorry, cupcake. I want to have that much cupcake. I used to. When I was 16, I asked for an internship at a lab at the University of Pennsylvania. Who let me think I could have a research position at one of the most prestigious institutions in the world as a 16 year old with barely any healthcare or research experience, even compared to her peers? Seriously, like who did I think I was? Well, I worked there for the rest of my high school career and it was easily one of my top 3 experiences from that time, even though I am not pursuing the healthcare field anymore. I used to have a lot more cupcake to ask for what I wanted because I figured the worst answer I could get was “no”, and that would leave me with nothing. Which is what I started with anyways. So what harm was there?Somewhere along the way I think I lost a bit of that mindset. I still do spontaneous and cupcake-y things, but the severity has definitely lessened. I find myself putting off a lot of things I definitely would not have before, not reaching out (maybe because of fear? of what? i couldn’t tell ya), and I know that it is inhibiting me from reaching my full potential. Maybe I need rejection therapy. It sounds so scary. But that’s the point. If you’re scared, do it scared, yk? I wish I could flip a switch and say I’ll start doing it tomorrow. You know when you get that sudden surge of motivation and want to start things immediately? Although I learned this the hard way (as I do with most things), discipline beats motivation, every single time. And building that discipline takes time. I’m sure I’m a bit off topic right now but I guess that’s the point of the stream of consciousness huh? Oh look at that, I learned how to spell it! (Google docs didn’t underline it with disapproval yay).
That said… maybe I haven’t lost all my cupcake. I actually did a little something today. I’m studying abroad soon in Southeast Asia and definitely need a lot of sunscreen for that. So I casually reached out to my favorite sunscreen brand on Instagram to ask if they’d send me a couple of free products… because, you know, the worst they could say is no. And to my surprise, they said yes. Yay! Now I won’t get skin cancer! Small win, but I think it’s proof that the cupcake is still in there somewhere.
I want to continue with just reaching out to those who I find inspiring, like I did with a few before, and see where what paths I can take from there. I suppose I could go on YouTube, or read a book about what to do to achieve my dreams, but as my favorite and dearest Jafar says, “You can’t read experience.” Love him. So yay. I just want to keep asking for the things I want, whether that’s opportunities, connections, experiences, or whatever else, because that’s the only way I’m going to get where I want to be. I don’t want to hold myself back from reaching out or going for something just because I’m scared of hearing “no.” There are already so many people in the world who’ll say no to you. Don’t be one of them. Don’t say no to yourself before anyone else even gets the chance to. Have the audacity to ask, to try, to become. The life you want is waiting for you to believe you deserve it.

I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into my brain, I shall keep you updated on where this takes me.