Welcome to “Notes from My Journal,” a space on my blog where I share intimate reflections and heartfelt musings, inviting you to join me on a journey of self-discovery, healing, and growth. In this series of posts, you’ll find the raw emotions, lessons learned, and the beauty that unfolds when vulnerability meets ink.
A bit of back story…
This is a love letter of sorts. A reflection to my inner child. A state of the self, so to speak. It was a practice I was invited to try by my friend, mentor, and spiritual rebel, Angela Fernandez.
Full disclosure, I fought writing this for several weeks but Angela held me accountable because she knew the power of this practice and she trusted that, despite my fears and resistance, release and healing would come when I connected my heart to my hand and let it out. It’s deeply vulnerable and raw. I share it in its entirety.
If you’ve ever felt disconnected, ashamed, unsatisfied with where you are, if you’ve ever thought back to your inner child and her hopes and dreams and felt this insurmountable crevice existing between that vision and what feels like your reality now, you are not alone. And, while no time machine can magically transport you to those moments where your choices took you down a different path, it is never too late to choose to forgive yourself and find a new path forward.
I have found that life requires two things: courage and a kick-ass support team. Most days, my deepest gratitude comes from knowing I have the latter to remind me I also have the former.
Journal Text
Dear Little Marisa,
We have always understood that emotional and mental health are a priority. I honor our continued belief and practice to connect with the world of spirits and nature.
Our sensitivity made us not only empathic but a fighter for the causes we believe in. It is our time to raise our voice and call others to action to unite to connect.
I’m staring at all the colors of markers in the box, thinking about the quote we read recently about crayons. Every color serves a purpose.
You were always drawn to green and purple nature royalty.
Where do favorite colors come from? Our conditioning? A connection to a past life experience? An soul knowing?
Staring at the box I still feel drawn to the purples and greens.
The red captures my attention: blood, fire, power, destruction. Did we ever draw red hearts and really feel empowered by them? Those memories feel like conditioning. Did I just want to belong? Want to fit in? To please others?
Hearts are red, but are they not the red of the crayon or marker we used then or I see now. They’re more of a Bordeaux red than a scarlet.
But we are conditioned. We are taught.
And I was taught that to belong I must fit in. I learned to conform, adapt, to shapeshift from one group to another. My parents couldn’t send me to gymnastics class, but I learned to bend and contort my body nonetheless. Not in physical space but emotionally.
Is that when I started feeling and liking blue? Is that when I started to prefer hanging out with the boys?
For some reason, around boys, I remember feeling safer, calmer. They protected me in ways that I believed my dad would. But they were less scary than he was.
Become small and attentive. Fit in with the boys and someone will have your back on the playground.
Have my back from whom? Who were the bullies? Did we have bullies?
I fear the biggest bully was myself.
My inner critic who grew and grew became the Bully and the Savior. It hurt less – or I could at least pretend it did. If I didn’t fit in, if I couldn’t have classic beauty. If I didn’t get the attention I sought. I had to take that sadness and push it down inside because I couldn’t fight it, didn’t know where it was coming from, didn’t know why it was there.
The water felt like a safe space – the warmth of the sand, the gentle waves.
Flipper episodes on TV. Dolphins could protect me. They were loyal. They were logical.
Not like the humans around me who were volatile. Humans can be uncomfortable, fearful, capable of destruction.
Blue became a color of safety – the sky, the water – I yearned to be surrounded by it. And boys spent more time drawing with it. Dressed in it.
And then we grew. I grew on top more than anywhere else. Awkward, uncomfortable, fearful. And the inner critic became more and more both the suit of armor and the sword sticking in my back.
Insecurity, unworthiness, black.
Why couldn’t I fit in?
Maybe if I tried all the activities I’d find me I’d find one I excelled at.
Instead, I found I was good at a lot of them but had to choose. There wasn’t enough time to do it all. I had to choose where I wanted to fit in. Whose praise, whose validation was the most important to receive? The adults or the kids?
I could read them now. I could conform more easily. Their expectations were clearer. Those my age made no sense. They were like me: constantly shapeshifting, trying to create their own identities.
People please
Pretty please
Trauma averted
Pain diverted.
I knew what to do to fit in
While secretly learning to hate being in my skin.
Not feeling “enough”
Had to get tough
Locked the pain inside.
Don’t let them see you cry.
That’s what I had to do to fit in
Secretly wishing people would look beneath my skin.
The crazy thing as I write this down, I see the inner strength you built for us. I can’t do a pull-up to save my life but I can feel deeply, see clearly. Nothing stays hidden. And isn’t that a gift?
I have the capacity to heal others, to heal myself, to hold space for someone’s deep emotional pain. In honoring ours, I ground myself.
I see our humanness. And our soul.
You saved us, little one. More times than you realize.
Because you desired to live.
You trusted someone would discover your true essence. And guess what?
You led us to discover it ourselves.
I’m here to pick you. To pick up your fight and stand for you. Now and forever.
A bit of an epilogue
After reading my reflections to Angela, she said it felt like she watched me tear through a brick wall and expose my heart inside, surrounded by a lotus flower. The lotus flower is often seen as a symbol of strength, resilience, and rebirth. I copied her words into an AI image generator and this was the result:
It’s my new screensaver.
