A Love Letter to California

I will never forget the moment I crossed the state border into California after driving with all of my positions in my Toyota Corolla across the country. The moment I realized.. this is it… I just drove into a dream.

Sunsets and journaling at the beach

Nights out in Hollywood dancing with my friends

Spending full days dancing under the sun and palm trees

Knowing an adventure is always a short drive away

Losing myself in the Malibu mountains

Hiking to places that feel like they are not on earth

Forming bonds that will last a life time

Driving down the PCH with the windows down so I can smell the saltwater

The festivals in San Bernadino

Moving into my first apartment with palm trees right outside my door

Being surrounded by people who believe in you and inspire you to chase your dreams..

Like I said.. it has been a dream. It has been a movie and I don’t even recognize the girl who drove across the state lines and the girl sitting her now typing this out in my office in Los Angeles.

I don’t know where I will end up in life.. I don’t know where I will live in 3 years, I don’t know who will be in my life, I don’t know what I will have accomplished… who I will be. But I do know one thing… no matter where the rest of life takes me… I will always remember these days & this life I am building in California as the most transformative exciting time of my life. These will be the days that I tell my grandkids about one day…

California, I love you.. thank you for changing me and showing me … ME and all that I can be.

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I Owe It To My Heart

I am so sorry heart… for trying to force you to go to spaces that did not want to hold you. Instead of protecting you when I knew I needed to.. I decided to give even more of you to someone else and hoped that maybe they would protect you… since it is so hard for me to do so myself. So I gave and gave.. and sacrificed and sacrificed.. and there were some moments when I thought it would be okay.. but I always knew, I knew that you would get hurt. And I knew that I was seeking the wrong person to hold and cherish you…

It hurts to feel like your heart is not wanted. It hurts to want to protect someone’s else heart more than your own. And it hurts seeing that same person protect the heart of someone else even when it means hurting yours.

It hurts to heal and it hurts to stay this way. It hurts to feel and it hurts not to feel. It hurts to do the right thing and it hurts to do the wrong thing. It is impossible to escape without… hurt.

But I owe it to my heart, to reclaim her. To protect her at all costs, to remind her how important she is, to remind her that she deserves to be cherished, loved, and protected. I owe it to my heart to let new parts build in the holes that were left from the parts I gave to others. And I owe it to my heart to never give her away again to someone who does not want to accept it.

I owe my heart healing and as much as it hurts… I am going to give it to her.

Ups and Downs

Have I really truly recovered? Or am I just more aware of my pain?

Do I really love myself now? Or is that just what I feel like I “have to say”?

Am I really doing the work? Or am I doing the “work”?

I don’t know… I really don’t know. I go through moments of extreme elation and days of happiness, where I know that I am this amazing person with a story to tell and gifts to give to the world… where I know I am someone who can 100 percent make a difference… Where I know I am someone worth loving and worth making effort for. The person that is so remarkable and talented that she must have this HUGE plan stored for her…

But then I also go through moments when I feel like the same person who once wrote in this blog about how much she hated herself..that person who never felt like she could overcome her pain.. the person who has NO idea where to begin when it comes to confronting her trauma and beginning to heal..that person who feels entirely alone and like no one will ever truly understand her pain.. because I don’t even understand my pain sometimes.

I am both of these people honestly… and I am also neither of them. It really just depends on the day… and the moment in time.. there is a major part of me that understands the beauty of life and how MUCH the world can offer… and can see all the potential in who I can be. But there is also a part of me that doesn’t care, that would rather drown herself in substances to forget.. that is entirely closed off and wants to be numb all the time.

So which part wins??

I guess it depends on the day honestly. Which is also scary…I don’t want to go through the super highs and these ultra lows and not know what to do in between. I am moving to California soon and I can see myself going down two paths… a beautiful one and a dark one.. and I know it is my choice which path I go down.. But I still feel like I have no idea.

So idk, honestly. It is weird that I feel so open on this platform when I don’t in any other aspects, but maybe because a part of me feels like I am writing into the void… or maybe because I read every comment and I always have and I know that people on here.. they really do care. Idk. IDK .. IDK

I DONT FUCKING KNOWWW.

That seems to be how my life is. Some days are great and others feel like this and it is far and few in between… Anyways, I should TRY and go to sleep instead of continuing to get myself worked up. But if you are still reading, idk either but I hope to know that maybe… someONE out there can relate to me.. but if not… at least I have this space to release. Tomorrow might be an entirely different entry but until then..

Good Night.

The Contradiction of Alone

How do you explain the feeling of loneliness when you are surrounded by people who care for you?

How do you explain the feeling of having no one when there are people you know you could turn to if you had to?

How do you explain the sadness of feeling like you can not count on anyone, when there are so many people that would try to if you let them?

How do you explain the pain of not being able to turn to the people closest to you when you haven’t always been a good friend back?

How do you explain feeling drained by interacting with people but wishing people would still reach out?

I wish I knew. I wish I could understand this for myself. I have been deeply hurt over the distance of close friends… of seeing my close friends develop strong bonds with new friends, relationships, or friend groups that I am not a part of… of feeling like an afterthought to the lives of many people that hold a top priority in my life. But on that same token… I can understand it. I can understand areas where I am not the greatest friend.. and how I don’t really let new people in… or even want to… and how oftentimes I even shut down people who have proven themselves to me. I also find it hard to be there for others and reach out to others when I know I should because it just can be so incredibly draining.

You know where I envision myself? Alone in a brand new country. Somewhere that I don’t know anyone, far from everyone. Somewhere I am not connected to anyone.. or rooted to anyone and anything. I romanticize being truly alone in that fashion. Not this weird purgatory “aloneness” that I feel now where I am not actually alone but feel like it.. but a place where I don’t know anyone or anything and am not connected to anyone. So I can truly just feel free to be myself. Entirely. Sometimes I really do feel like I am meant to walk this path of life alone… like I don’t need to have close friends or family. Just alone to walk my path and lead and inspire others along the way.. I guess what I don’t like about being alone now is that I am still surrounded by friends and family and people who I expect to have my back or people who expect me to have theirs… and so when those expectations aren’t met I feel hurt and conflicted. So I can only imagine and romanticize what it might feel like to be released from that.

Anyways, I am sure there are a lot of contradictions in this…I didn’t really have much of a direction in writing this. My old posts used to have a call to action or a way to inspire others. But now this blog just feels like a place where I can be vulnerable, however messy that may be.

A place where I can peel apart the Layers of A Rose.

Layers of A Rose

The first thing you see when you look at a rose is the beauty of the flower. You take in the color of the rose, the leaves, the greeness of the stem, the number of petals.. intertwined around the stem in such a delicate pattern. It intrigues you. You get closer to the rose, more and more intrigued by the beauty. That is when you notice the scent. That beautiful smell. After the curiosty of all the senses have been stimulated… you move closer to the rose. You go to pick it and are shocked to look down a see a bleeding hand.

That is when you notice the thorns. If you peel off all of the petals, the “Layers of A Rose”, you would be left with just a stem of thorns. The captivating essence of the rose that once drew you in is gone and you are left with the pain from the thorns that remain.

I think of myself as a rose. From first glance, I am someone that people wouldn’t expect to have these layers, these thorns… and no one really takes the time to truly peel away my layers to reveal the pain that I am often in.. to feel my thorns. Those that try I tend to push away.. I don’t trust people with my thorns… because when I have trusted people, they haven’t been there for me and there is nothing worse than being in pain and not being able to turn to even the people you are supposed to trust. So I have learned not to let my thorns bleed on anyone but myself.. because I will always have my back… right? I can work to heal the wounds of my thorns. But sometimes I do fantasize about that person.. that person that will take on my thorns and understand me on a deeper level. I know that type of understanding exists among people.. just haven’t found it for myself.

Anyways, that is the explanation to the name. I haven’t written on this blog in years and so much has changed.. I am hoping to get back into writing on it. So at least I have a place to write about my thorns… even if no one is listening.

Kathryn-

My World is Back in Color

I just wanted to write this as a hello again to the blogging world! 

I was suffering through a lot at the beginning of the years and my posts began to become dark and hopeless and I wanted my blog to be something that was light and uplifting and motivating! 

So I just wanted to let you all know that I will be posting again regularly and that life is getting better for me and I have been feeling so happy with the direction the rest of my year is going.

Thank you to everyone who wrote to me when things were dark because it was re reading those comments that helped me push through.

I am so excited to share the good that has been going on in my life and I can’t wait to start posting again regularly.

Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart. 

https://layersofarose.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/my-heart/

https://layersofarose.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/my-heart/

My heart

My heart hurts

I’m don’t want to be the person that is always available to hang out with when no one ele is aeound 

But I don’t want to be the person that always gets left out 

I know to be the person I want to be I need to get left out 

But I have been left out my whole life because of my homeschooling that not fitting in seems like the only thing that matters 

When it comes down to it my friends don’t care that I am suffering they just care that I am a good time 

And I don’t know how to weed those friends out from the ones that care 

I am feeling very low 

I didn’t want this blog to become a place where I vent like it is a diary 

But I don’t know what to do.

I need new friends. I need new help. I need people to who think I am worth it enough to stay through the hard parts. But I don’t know where to find these people… I will try to be more positive later.. thank you. 

Some good things

Things are getting better, just wanted to bullet some happiness I have found since I wrote my last post

– got an internship at a modeling agency 

– being recognized by my boss at work 

– shot pictures with 4 different photographers

– sang for an audience 

– wrote down song lyrics 

I’ve been teaching myself to learn how to find happiness again from the things I used to love. Trying to focus on the good.