Intentions & Reinventions

Hello Cuties. Welcome to my brain dump. I wrote this the morning I was supposed to be productive, but instead spiraled into metaphysical dread and emotional architecture. Enjoy.

This morning, for the first time ever, I wrote down my intentions for the day. I wish I were the kind of person who does this regularly - but alas, I’m not.

A friend of a friend of my ex-husband once introduced me to the concept of intentions. He said declaring them at the start of the day would help us live better - with purpose.

Alright, fine - that’s not exactly how it went. He was lighting up a spliff and asked us to declare our intentions for smoking it, to make the journey to being high more meaningful and align our chakras.

I closed my eyes as my brain whispered in my skull, I want the cookies on the table to taste better.

It didn’t feel like it qualified as a spiritual intention, but it was the truth. And no one had to know that but me.

Once I pretended to surrender to his ritual, the blonde man-bun rang a tiny bell he used for sound baths, then gently placed it beside his statue of Ganesh. Next to Ganesh stood Shiv. And beside Shiv, a laughing Buddha.

Buddha and I made eye contact, and in that moment, I swear he knew what I was thinking.

Why do white people always mispronounce chakras? It takes one Google search. And yet, I bit my tongue - mostly because I didn’t care enough to correct him. I just wanted the yummy cookies.

Back to this morning. I wrote a long list of things I hoped to accomplish today (not one of them was writing this), and then promptly picked up my phone and started doomscrolling.

Ah, procrastination. My worst enemy. My oldest companion. At least I’m consistent.

ChatGPT says we doomscroll for risk-free dopamine hits. No potential for failure. No room for boredom. Just effortless, endless entertainment. As my brain gorges on my feed, lapping up each post like water, I happen upon a video of the controlled demolition of a hotel in New Jersey. After a few timed explosions, the building folds in on itself. Glass shatters floor by floor. The mast - its proud little crown - is the last to fall.

This makes me inexplicably sad.

I think of the people who built that hotel. How it must’ve stood when it was first finished: gleaming, hopeful, proud. Why does this feel like mourning? Am I projecting human emotion onto concrete? Equating it with the death of a person? Does my empathy extend unnecessarily to everything that exists?

(Not to bugs. So, not everything.)

Or perhaps I’m grieving the human emotions it conjured in the hearts of those who built it, ruled it - like the tiny empire that it once was.

I open the comments section, hoping someone else has felt this way and explained it better. It’s full of people making jokes about 9/11. Never open the comments section.

I close the app.

Strange how dark jokes work. They lie in wait - for a life, or a building, or an empire to fall - so they can return as echoes. Aftershocks. A silence thick with grief, then wailing ghosts in the ether of our memories. Eventually, they get bored and reinvent themselves to become a different kind of shock, but a shock all the same. First come the tears, then comes the laughter. Mourning becomes meme.

Once, in the UK, I passed a protected house. I had heard of protected sites here, but never seen one before. I expected grandeur. Something monumental. But it was a weary little cottage with a tree growing out of a window.

Why was this protected, I often wonder? Or rather, why did I feel nothing for it?

Why was I generous with my empathy for the demolished hotel, but indifferent to this tiny, weathered home? Was it because it was small? Unremarkable?

Do I only mourn the loss of things that took great effort to build?

I try to imagine the Burj Khalifa being dismantled one day, and my heart breaks at even the thought. I do not love it because it’s the tallest building in the world. My heartstrings are tied to its beautiful curves because it has grounded me for thirteen years in Dubai. Through all the ups and downs and devastation of my becoming, it stood tall. Steady. Unwavering. Anchored to the sky - a sky that knew me fully, for it watched it all happen. I find comfort in this.

Why has my heart latched on to the Burj, and not any other buildings? Is it visibility? Or does my empathy only extend to things that are tall? As a short person, I am disgruntled by this epiphany.

I wonder… If I were a building, would I be a protected site?

Probably not. If it were up to my human form, I’d be dismantled immediately - everyone’s chakras still perfectly intact.

I suppose I’d grieve myself. A wailing ghost only known by a cloudless sky. By some stroke of magic, it would rain. And in the boredom of my failure, I would reinvent myself. Grow, like a sapling. Small and weak at first, but with great effort.

I am smiling now, as it all sounds a bit familiar, does it not? Haha.

I was a building once. Small but proud. I remember the dismantling, though it becomes foggier every day. I mourned the loss of me then, and sometimes, when I run into an echo of her, I still do. But not quite as much as I would mourn the loss of me now.

Me now, that exists in the aftershock. First came the tears, then came the laughter.

This took great effort to build.