"Hi" to you new people & blowing up on notes
Introducing myself and sharing my recent blow-up
First of all: I am glad to be back from my first vacation-round this summer, it has been a blast & thank you all for giving me the time & space to take a break from posting here! I hope you had a nice time too!
Second: I have gained quite some new subscribers and followers here, so I thought to make a quick introduction for those of you who are new here:
My name is Daria & when I am asked who I think I am, I like to say something along the lines: “I feel like I am a fluffy soul that floats around here on earth, joining different adventures, meeting fellow souls & solving the quests of our lives.”
This type of reply might sound weird to some, others might laugh. Maybe it is even weirder when I tell you that I am officially a scientist, PhD and all, & then I speak about souls? How does that fit together?
To me, it totally does! It makes a lot of sense in my mind and my inner world. Why? I can’t tell you… maybe it makes it more understandable when I say that I am also an artist? Cos artists are often seen as fluffy, eccentric people, maybe a bit crazy too.
Then, maybe I am even more crazy, cos during my PhD I actually found back to my love for art & decided to start my own company & combine both of these passions of mine, becoming a scientific illustrator. And therefore I am also: an entrepreneur. Boom.
All that, while hating and fearing money & bureaucracy, in a country I immigrated to (Sweden) & with minus-knowledge about business & freelancing.
So somehow, I am a lot of different things at once, like most of us are, I assume. I am also super interested in philosophy & psychology, I love deep questions and wonderings about life, I love to dance, hike & camp, I have a doggie and I also love to write. Oh, what I do not love is AI… generative AI, AI that is used for writing & creativity basically. Maybe you have noticed already, cos I jump a lot in my thoughts & my mind: none of these words I ever will write here have been polished, fixed, or structured by any AI tool.
They come straight out of my mind, through my arms, and hands & 8.3 fingers, raw as they are onto this piece of digital paper… directly into your eyes & brain while you are reading them.
Oh, maybe you startled when you read 8.3 fingers, rightfully so: what the heck? Yeah, cos I have 8.3 fingers only, differently formed ones as well. So, what I also am is a (officially) 50% disabled person since I have what is called Split-hands and -Foot malformation, or Ectrodactylie.
But, if you ask me: I couldn’t give a damn about these 1.7 missing fingers. I love my hands the way they are and & absolutely do not feel disabled at all. If I dare to say so: I am convinced that there are many 10-fingered people out here that are more disabled than me, just by behaving like poop to other people. Disrespect, unkindness & all that is much more disabling than a couple of fewer fingers. There we go, I said it :D
Aaannnyyyways, I totally digressed to try to cover who I am for you all beautiful souls, and maybe you have gotten a bit of an idea about me now.
Now, the question is: what will you get every week or every second week from this subscription? That is a great question, and I do not have a clear, structured answer to be honest… mainly because I am constantly thinking and re-thinking what I want this space to be.
I call it “How to Human” because being a human is something that fascinates me, all aspects of it! The science, the art, the emotions, the feelings, the social inetractions, the dilemmas, the thoughts, questions & wonderings… I simply LOVE to be a human, even if its tough sometimes, and I fear that we are loosing ourselves as a species a little bit.
Be it because of chronic stress, pressure, overworking, social media, AI, technology, crappy jobmarket… we could all make a huge list why that is happening…
But no matter the reason why, I think it is a tragedy & tehrefore I decided to share all kinds of aspects here with my writing. Human things. Struggles, wins, projects, ideas, ANYthing that comes from my human experience and if I share it & it just helps ONE person in the world, I am happy.
At the same time, I will be honest: writing helps me a lot to process my human experiences, so it is a bit of selfishness involved here too ;). Writing is one of the greatest tools we have (if we do not outsource it to other thingies), for many reasons: our thinking, speaking, explaining ,articulating, connection, our brain development, motor skills etc.
Omg, I could continue that rabbithole on why it is important to not just type on a keyboard, but actually write and sketch & scribble… but I wont. Maybe some other time.
Now, enough for this extended introduction. I wanted to share with you something that happened recently, that caused many people to follow me here and even subscribe:
it was a rather emotional note I shared, out of the blue & it kind of blew up a bit. That note has more than 70 likes and more than 110 comments, including very nice conversations I had. For me those numbers are a big deal, the biggest note I ever had, here on this platform.
For those of you who did not notice it, here it is, copy pasted from the notes tab. Two weeks ago, I got into a situation that triggered me & I wrote this note:
“WHY do people prefer fakeness?!?!
Fake smiles, fake Hi’s, fake waves, fake interest?!
I dont get it, really I dont.
Cos I cant handle it, I really can’t, it makes me physically sick. Whyyyy this lying and deceiving?!
Can’t we just be ourselves, normal, open, honest, true to our nature?!
Without faking shit?!?!?!”
I never expected that this mini rant-note would resonate with so many & that I would have very interesting conversations resulting from it.
There is a lot of context to this piece, a lot of inner world happenings and external world happenings, there is a lot of nuance to it as well. Like there always is. And like with everything, everyone might interpret it differently.
But what stroke me is, that many resonated with perceived fakeness that they experience as well. & that they cant handle it. Also many great explanations why it exists in us humans. It is a fascinating topic for sure.
What is maybe important to say is, that I was in a very emotional and vulnerable state at the time writing it and I do not think that all people prefer fakeness; I also think there is a difference between being polite and obviously playing a huge, fake masquerade.
For me, this note has a lot of truth though, especially when it comes to how I perceive the world and people. I am a highly perceptive and sensitive individual and I pick up on many subtle things in my surrounding and in people. It is like I am constantly collecting data and pictures and puzzles are formed in my head. It can sometimes be overwhelming and in that moment it was too much.
Maybe this is also the reason why I am interested in so many things: science, art, people, psychology, nature etc… it is very natural for me to combine different things, aspects of life and draw conclusions. It is quite scientific if you want to break it down, but it is more intuitive than “sciency”, it is automatic in my brain and my perception and sometimes it can get too much when I get ambiguous information.
I pick up on lies and deceivements rather easily, especially when they are very clear (to me :D)and when I am forced to participate in a play that is obviously fake, I revolt. I refuse to do it. Because it makes me feel ill, truly, deeply sick.
So I will always be drawn to the hard & tough truth, more than to any fake & polite lie. And unfortunately this is a tough cookie to swallow, because of how a big part of humanity is acting & playing along the rules of games that have been put up. Not everyone, but many.
At the same time, I know & see & feel that we are all changing for the better. We are growing and outgrowing old believes and I am an endless optimist, some say I am naive, but I truly believe that we are moving towards a better & more true & honest world.
You are welcome to fight me on this, discuss it, we can talk it through ,I love to do that & maybe I will learn a bit from you. Oh, cos this is also something I strongly believe in: changing opinions when faced with new aspects of/in life. It is crucial for us to do that to develop further.
And by that I don’t mean to listen to the medical/pharmaceutical complex, or governments and politicians, what you should do and take, cos everyone does it... I mean: we all have the freedom of choice to do whatever we want to do, as long as we do not harm anyone along the way, and within that reasoning, we can change opinions upon experiments we have done, or suggestions that trusted people gave us.
Oh no, I see myself getting into another rabbithole once again… btw, when I mean rabbithole, I do not mean I screen the internet for facts & things like that, I mean my own experience & my own mind & my own-life-rabbithole. It is also infused by what I consume from media, but I try to have the majority of my experiences & thoughts & experiments done on myself & draw from these to come to conclusions.
And with that: I can never know what is right and best for someone else! You do you, I do I. We can respectfully exchange and learn from each other, but in the end, we all have to decide for ourselves… oh: and proper, decent ethical and moral standards are also a favorite topic of mine! Love me some great ethical standards, I cant tell you…
But seriously, I think this should be it for now. I have talked so much, I hope I gave you an insight into who I am, how I think and what I write about.
I might share some artworks here with you, just so you know that I sometiems also send process updates on what I create, artistically speaking. Here we go:
This is it for today, it has become longer than I thought, but I am happy to be back on track again! If you have any questions, feel free to ask away & I will gladly answer :)
Love,
Daria