tomfleton

[tomfleton]

[tomfleton]

“We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.”

— Anaïs Nin (via amortizing)

#quotes

[tomfleton]

1/2/23

After years of assuming they were destroyed in a flood, I recovered a treasure trove of memories I had been holding on to since elementary school: report cards, yearbook photos, awards, and assignments spanning my K-12 education, piles of handwritten notes with the most precise, tidy and color-coded (with gel pen!) notes, a few knick knacks and collectibles, and importantly, a few “self reflections” I completed throughout my adolescence.

At 25 years old and after some of the most challenging years of my life and a full year of weekly therapy sessions, I’ve come to terms with a few things. I have low self esteem and self worth, I’m afraid to put my dreams into words because I don’t think I deserve them, and I lie to myself. A major lie I’ve been telling myself for years unraveled today. For years, a mental narrative I’ve created is that in order to be the person I am today - someone who is easily liked, a charming, witty, ambitious, loved person - I had to change myself. That who I am is so different than my younger self, and that my younger self is someone who deserves to be shamed and ridiculed and judged. That my social anxiety in high school was a personal flaw that deserves an eye roll, that my obsession with tumblr and fanfiction and pop culture and the sims and reading love stories and everything else should be revealed only as an embarrassing story about the old me, a moral failure.

But today, looking at how I talked about my hopes and dreams in high school, the perspective I held about the world around me - the girl I am today also existed 10 years ago. She also existed 15 and 20 years ago. Everything great and lovely about me has always been in me and was never something I had to destroy the old parts of myself to gain. My values, how much I care, my dreams to be something more, my hopes for happiness, how much I love my family, how much I love to learn - all of this is unchanged and somehow I have the audacity to judge and shame my younger self who HONESTLY and truly NEVER did anything wrong.

My therapist spent months telling me that maybe I should give myself more grace and it’s easy to hear that and think that makes sense in a logical, distant way. But to see the evidence was groundbreaking. Of course, I have changed in good, important ways. But at my core - I am me at every age 0-25 that I’ve been alive and every single version was a lovely, kind girl who deserves my utmost empathy and care. Because if not me, then who else will love her forever?

#frah #marking progress

[tomfleton]

“I have led a toothless life, he thought. A toothless life. I have never bitten into anything. I was waiting. I was reserving myself for later on—and I have just noticed that my teeth have gone.”

— Jean-Paul Sartre, The Age of Reason

#words

[tomfleton]

Banana Yoshimoto, Kitchen

#Inspo

[tomfleton]

“The only true love is self-love. This is not narcissism (ego) or pessimism (lack of faith in others), its is simply true. You are the only person who will be with you forever and you are the person who knows you best. Being kind to yourself and "treating yourself like someone you love" as Adam Roa says is the key to being content in life.”

#thx Reddit lmao #frah

[tomfleton]

okay so who’s reading house pet?

#dramione

[tomfleton]

Do you mean isolation by bex-chan

#dramione

[tomfleton]

THAT SAID, can someone give me a list of the most popular dramione fics right now - need something to look forward to after law school finals :(

Omg I can’t believe I missed the 10 year anniversary of reading fanfiction for the first time!! But it was Nov 2012 so close enough right? Thanksgiving 2012 was the first time I read Isolation too life is crazy

[tomfleton]

Omg I can’t believe I missed the 10 year anniversary of reading fanfiction for the first time!! But it was Nov 2012 so close enough right? Thanksgiving 2012 was the first time I read Isolation too life is crazy

#farah reads fics #marking progress

[tomfleton]

i love it when you start doing little things different & notice how much you’ve grown as a person just by that. like you from a year ago would not have handled that situation the way you are now. you’ve changed for the better. & that is so satisfying

[tomfleton]

[tomfleton]

honestly I think a lot of the fics I read in high school irrevocably ruined my view of love and sex lol still trying to unlearn those things in my mid 20s

#y’all I love dramione I really really do but some of those dynamics did a NUMBER on my vulnerable #insecure trust issue filled brain LOL

[tomfleton]

omg hello !! how are you :)

I’m good!!! I’m in this fanfic phase again so brought me back to get senti on here LOL

[tomfleton]

hi anyone out there 🫡

[tomfleton]

[tomfleton]

“tumblr mutuals wrapped” you mean follow forever. you mean fucking follow forevers that people used to cook up graphics for and tag literally everyone they were mutuals w alphabetically back in like 2014