march recs

28 Mar, 2024

March is almost over. I’m spending Easter break back home. The past few days I’ve felt weird, emotionally, but nevertheless, I am happy.

This is my take on a personal recommendation list. As a day 1 (okay, maybe more like day 50) reader of Perfectly Imperfect, I love nothing more than being helpfully instructed by other people who seem to know what they’re talking about. This extends into real life as well, however I am also VERY sensitive to any form of ‘splaining’, so you better not assume that I’m stupid in the process. Anyway, the one thing that I dislike about personal recommendations is that a lot of the time it can seem like another cog in the capitalist machine, in the sense that it can be a particularly powerful instrument for compelling people to buy things that they do not need. So here’s my list of recs. I tried to steer away from products and instead focus on ideas and thoughts. Also, I think this is the longest post I’ve written so far.

1. Looking forlorn. One thing that I have realised about myself is that I like to be seen. I don’t care if I’m wearing my pyjamas or my eyeliner is running or it’s some ungodly hour of the night—having someone, anyone, see me reminds me that I exist and that my image is perpetually changeable. Living on campus is the perfect environment for being seen because all you need to do is step outside of your room and meander down the hallways. The way that I’ve been choosing to present myself is with a sulky look on my face, a practice that I have engaged in since I was young. Maybe it’s a reaction to being told that I ‘would be prettier if I smiled more’. Evidently, it’s not a flattering look to have. But it’s fun, so who cares?
2. Prefixing your limiting thoughts with the words ‘I am not above …’. Every time you have the opportunity to do something, but then hear that voice in your head go ew, cringe, rephrase with ‘I am not above …’. For example: ‘I am not above making an occasional fool out of myself’, ‘I am not above goofy dancing’, ‘I am not above bad karaoke’, ‘I am not above trying hard as opposed to being apathetic’.
3. Wearing makeup. I recently got into doing my makeup as a method of destressing. I’ll take a break from studying and just spend 15 minutes doing my makeup. It makes me feel good and it takes me off from staring at a screen. I don’t have a lot of products since it was never really something that I did much, so I usually just do some combination of blush, eyeliner, brows, mascara and some lip product. It’s fun. I’d love to start experimenting more.
4. Doing spontaneous things like staying up till 3am talking with your friends.
5. Writing a Bearblog. I spent three years trying to write a substack but I was constantly overwhelmed with the idea that whatever I published would have to satisfy an ongoing theme, and be homogenised into a consistent standard or style. In many ways, Substack seems more like a platform for cultivating a personal brand than it is for writing¹. In any case, I love the Bearblog platform because it is centred around writing in a way that is personal and organic, rather than being a filtered commodification of the self.
6. ‘Wax on, wax off’. When I was in high school, I went to an event with a guest speaker who was in some kind of managerial role in the army. To be honest, I don’t remember the speech very clearly but what I do remember is that he kind of went on about the idea of ‘wax on, wax off.’ Now I’m probably completely butchering the cultural reference here, but it was a Karate Kid reference, and I think the premise of it is that you can put effort into things and have it seem like you’re not getting anything back from it, but everything eventually comes back to you. It can be in the form of a lesson learnt or a broadening of perspective, and even though it can be intangible, it’s still there. Basically, with discretion, it’s pretty difficult to waste your effort.
7. Not caring about being skinny anymore. This is a big step for me. I just don’t care anymore. It’s liberating.

Take care of yourself.

Yours,

Eve