Episode Transcript
Hello.
Hello and welcome.
to another episode.
of help me see.
That's it.
And exhale.
2025 has.
Been absolutely unhinged.
(00:26):
Um, I've been sick.
I got really sick and I don't remember if I mentioned this on the last episode, but.
I had the flu and it was took so long.
It was horrific.
And I've had a clogged ear for weeks.
It's still clogged and ringing.
Driving me.
Absolutely fucking insane.
(00:48):
And, uh, I started a new job.
A part-time job.
So I've been.
Trying to find.
A new flow and, um, Version of normal.
But still not fully recovered.
From the whole house sickness and also still.
(01:09):
Hearing an incessant ringing inside of my head, which seems actually wildly appropriate.
I've also been absolutely.
So distracted and.
Consumed with the horrifying reality that.
California is facing right now with the fires in Los Angeles.
(01:34):
It.
Ways so heavy on my heart.
Just unfathomable.
Damage and.
I can't even.
Speak to it.
And it's also so bizarre.
Like life is so bizarre.
(01:55):
As I'm sitting here glued to screens, like watching the devastation and.
I look out my window and I'm in a place covered with snow, but it's just.
So.
Disorienting to be.
Made.
Aware in such an intense way of how different.
(02:18):
Our realities are.
Going about like a life as normal here feels.
Like.
Wrong.
And inappropriate.
And.
Cold.
Thinking about what's going on in other places.
And then.
You know, but also as we know.
(02:44):
More suffering.
Doesn't.
Help suffering.
You know, I always felt growing up.
(03:07):
Really.
Guilty and privately ashamed of.
Like even as a young girl, like.
Of how.
Deeply.
I felt.
The pain of something else happening.
Someone else's.
(03:28):
Experience.
I would carry it with me.
I would hear something on the news about.
Someone, some family from another state, whatever it was.
And.
Feel sick to my stomach for.
For days.
And like, there are some stories that I still stick with me.
(03:50):
I could still remember them and remember how sick I felt and.
Some details about the new story or whatever it was.
And now we call that empathy and we.
Acknowledge it as like this.
(04:15):
I don't know, like a noble.
Kind compassionate trait or whatever.
But.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I don't even know what I'm trying to say.
I just feel.
Like somehow.
(04:36):
Being that affected.
by the suffering of others.
And yet not.
Being able to.
Help in any meaningful way, feels like selfish and.
(04:58):
I don't know.
I guess selfish is what it feels, but it's so funny how.
I would never think that of someone else.
I was in a poetry class, the other.
day and.
The.
The facilitator.
Said something that really resonated with me Her name's Trivarna Hariharan and.
(05:27):
Her community is.
Wild flowers as prayers and, um, So I was in class and.
She had commented on.
How.
The poem.
Or a poem in general, doesn't need to resolve.
Whatever it is you're addressing, it doesn't need to be resolved.
(05:51):
And.
Hit me like a ton of bricks.
Um, Because immediately, I recognize that.
I am.
Not only asking.
My art.
Too.
Heal me.
(06:13):
I'm expecting my art to resolve.
So many things inside of me.
Just because the art.
Can.
Clarify and aluminate and.
(06:37):
Help you feel through.
things.
doesn't mean.
That those things feel resolved.
Or complete.
So.
Right now.
I am feeling through.
And working on.
(06:58):
A new level of unconditional.
With my art and what that means.
I'll read a.
Journal entry for this morning.
(07:24):
Because it.
I feel very much in this world.
Okay.
I feel guilty for the pictures.
I don't take.
I know better than to dismiss.
It as being lazy or incapable.
I don't know, it all just feels like too much.
As if I want to, but I can't.
(07:46):
And also I can.
But I don't want to.
I see photographers photographing their families.
So exquisitely.
So often.
And I feel.
The paying of a gross mix of guilt and apathy.
(08:07):
At the core.
I'm concerned with this and what it means.
I can't tell whether it's concern.
From my life.
Or my work.
I can't and won't force it.
And so I sit.
(08:30):
I want to be compelled.
Irresistibly drawn, obsessed, nearly possessed.
By my art.
But what if that's killing it? What if I was right, all along to feel uncomfortable with my photographer title.
(08:53):
Because it was never about the photographs.
There was just no other way.
There was just no other way.
so why feel this pull?.
(09:15):
This responsibility and.
Demand of yourself to.
Create.
Art of your life.
(09:36):
It's not exactly the creation part, it's.
More the.
Not doing it.
That bothers me not feeling compelled to do it.
That bothers me.
And.
I don't know, part of me feels like.
(10:03):
Maybe I'm just not inspired right now.
And it's a winter and I'm tired and the holidays and all of the obvious, like, duh.
We can't always be in a season of creation.
And then another part of me.
It feels like.
(10:24):
Maybe I'm just really wanting.
Another way.
Maybe I'm just really craving.
(10:49):
To experience.
Uh, life through a different.
Modality.
And the guilt for not wanting and being genuinely inspired to be taking.
(11:15):
These pictures.
Is wasted energy and also important information.
I don't think guilt has to mean.
The.
It's like, oh, I know I should be doing it.
I think guilt is.
(11:35):
Shining a light on.
Shame.
And how do we unshaven? How do we get more curious about.
Why you feel like you need to do whatever you feel guilty about.
(12:03):
And making it.
Okay.
What happens then when you come from a place of like, Clean.
Slate when you come from a.
Place of.
Neutrality.
(12:24):
I'll read one more.
One more piece of writing.
Sorry, mate.
This one I made for my ear.
fucking.
Ear.
It's been three weeks since the virus traveled to my left ear and decided to confidently make a home for itself as if answering a prayer.
(12:51):
a constant ringing a muffled clog.
Everything too loud and too quiet all at once.
The most familiar experience.
It's my metaphorical life, but this time in physical, tangible form.
I've always desperately wanted to put my finger on the exact point of the sensation.
(13:15):
And now that I can.
I plead for it to go away.
I push and I pull I squeeze and try to blow it away.
With fear of the searing pain that always threatens to come with getting what I want.
Each morning, I opened my eyes and for a brief moment, unsure if it's still here.
(13:38):
Uh, possible freedom from the very thing have always wanted.
Before the virus I would put in earbuds and listen to brown noise.
an attempt to quiet my mind in life in order to hear myself.
7,000 ways to listen to not one of them allowing me to hear whatever it is that I want.
(14:03):
A taste of my own medicine and I cower like a child finally getting what they want and not being prepared.
To withstand what it means.
This virus too small to be seen, but able to multiply within the living cells of a host.
Maybe it will leave once I kill the part of me that invites it with conditions.
(14:25):
Maybe if I welcome it unconditionally, it will die of the contentment of having nothing else to prove.
And with that.
I finished that.
I was like, oh, How scary.
(14:52):
Contentment feels to me.
I don't know.
That's another episode.
I'm not ready to.
Unpack that, but.
It is midway through January and.
I have not.
(15:13):
Done any sort of.
New years visioning this, that the other, whatever.
I'm not there yet.
That's okay.
I want to give permission.
(15:34):
to you.
If you feel like you need it.
To let your personal new year start whenever the fuck you want.
Maybe the prompt for today.
Can be whatever it is.
(15:56):
You're struggling with.
Whatever it is, you're struggling with whatever it is that you were wrestling with.
Bring it to the forefront.
of.
Your mind.
We're going about to do a magic trick.
Okay.
(16:19):
And now.
Before you start thinking about or feeling into.
An answer or an impulse or an exploration around.
Where to move with it.
what if you insert right before.
(16:41):
That.
There's nothing wrong with me.
There's nothing wrong with me.
For feeling.
Other people's experiences deeply.
(17:03):
There's nothing wrong with me.
For not.
Feeling like taking pictures.
There's nothing wrong with me.
(17:26):
For any emotion? I feel.
The jumping off point.
Is.
There's nothing innately wrong with me or broken in me.
(17:47):
And I'm probably going to be able to make quantum leaps.
Non-linear.
Quantum leaps.
Okay.
(18:10):
If this episode feels incomplete it's because I feel incomplete right now and I'm going to.
Let it be incomplete because I am working on not demanding everything.
I create resolve something inside of me.
And ironically, maybe that will be resolved.
(18:30):
Um, Once again, I want to end by sending.
All of my love and heart and light and.
Just everything inside of me too.
Everyone's struggling in the fires of California and, um, if you've lost irreplaceable.
(18:57):
Family, put her AFS.
Um, I would love to offer.
To create.
New ones for you.
Or.
We create photographs from.
(19:17):
Old home videos.
If you have those.
I don't know.
I don't even know what to offer.
Um, All I know is.
I would love to.
Contribute something.
if that something that you would like.
(19:42):
Okay.
I am.
Going to go peel the kids out of bed, get them dressed and get to work.
Drive to work.
Until next time.
(20:07):
Let's just keep on.
Moving slowly and gently.
With ourselves into.
Maybe I'll start the new year soon.
I don't know.
I'll let you know. 309 00:20:24,723.7188209 --> 00:20:27,943.7188209 This has been an Awkward Sage Production.
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