a little toddler dabbles her toes in the Oregon coast waters, giggling and running from near her mamas.
her Portland cousins play near here with Auntie creating castles, jungles and rivers that flow the waves of the ocean waves and ecovillages below – the land, the sand interconnected to the depths of deepness below.
the sunbursts softly touch the reunion moments that cannot occur all the time.
sunbursts.
small joyful stands cheering for their favorite college teams,
swag outfits of hopes to hoops of dreams – we all have our shots.
for the beats that native musicians drum up to bless, to heal and to cheer the crowds to love,
the therapist who sits in her own softness after healing handing out hope through listening and assisting struggles of pain, finding laughter and humor to balance out the darkness.
the sunbursts come through the bubbled grey clouds that temporary pop up as life below saunters in shimmers to only be captured in the seconds that exist.
no tomorrow is promised.
no big kiss, no big hug, no sounds — so soak in it all.
soak in the life that leaves us to grow embedded in mother earth- panchamama and inti love – quechuan indigenous circles lift up and offer munay – deep love- where sunshine spreads limitlessly.

WHAT AM I MOST GRATEFUL FOR?
We Have A Technology Allowing Meaningful Interactions, Making Ourselves Share These Gifted Realities, Also Too, Especially For Unconditionally Loving Families, Our Roots.
What am I most grateful for?
If you’ve woken up and chose to keep going. Whether you’re in the calm seas of peace, or you’re riding the lows and highs of the waves that never seem to sleep.
What am I most grateful for?
To be able to create poems that explain the emotions I’ve grown in a strange dream that dreams to explore and release more. I’m grateful for my eyes, because there was a time in my life where I was legally blind for a week, and I remember thinking “how will I ever see what my drawings look like?” I’m grateful for the advances in modern medicine, for without it I wouldn’t have lasted past a few months without the creation of insulin. I’m grateful I’ve made it to 14 years past my date of diagnosis, and I plan to keep on goin, despite the lows of highs of these waves that never seem to sleep. (But always seem to dream) I’m grateful I’ve been able to come across the unsealed letters that reveal the real miracles that have survived and thrived through all types of weathers.
What am I most grateful for?
The family that’s handed me a purpose to see the dirt and to keep planting these seeds for you to read and examine, and to hopefully inspire a type of higher connection to yourself to seek the life that you deserve, and to know that each and every one of us are worth way more than worthless.

Speaking to every fighter
I’m so grateful that GOD took a chance on ME
Thankful that I am his rider
His unconditional love is beyond measures
His unconditional love is so comforting
Tangible and intangible
I just love the way GOD loves me
Don’t you see
If giving up was easy
Everyone would have took a backseat
Including me
I’m grateful for GOD’s presence
Most importantly never leaving me
Looking at my reflection
I’m grateful the mirror is always in front of ME
In the presence of darkness
GOD’S love always trembles the unseen
What are the fighters singing
Worthy Worthy Worthy
It’s a grateful human being

I’m forever grateful
That I am able to share my words
With people
And they often become inspired
By my positivity and willingness to share
Openly and comfortably
Everything I’ve been through
From heartache to heartbreak
There is no shame
Just lessons to be learned
I’m grateful for them all
Teachable moments that make me stand tall
I practice gratefulness every day
That’s why I’m grateful for everyone
I encounter daily
From strangers I meet on the street
To inconnus that have become great supporters
In any and everything I do
I’m forever grateful for restored love
Especially the woman that accepted me
And made me appreciate love again
Thank you for first being a friend
I’m forever grateful
For existing in a world
That doesn’t want you to survive
But I find a way to survive the odds stacked against me
Blessed to be alive
And continuously see
That I’m surrounded by the people meant to help me navigate this life!

The thing I am most grateful for in life
is life itself
my life. this life. me.
this may seem obvious, mundane, oversimplified
but not for me
I have anxiety,
depression,
complex PTSD,
and BPD
I always sort of shrugged at the anxiety;
worry is my natural state
and it always has been
it’s all I’ve ever known
but the depression, the PTSD, the BPD-
those came with time and unfortunate circumstances
the way they blend together and feed off of each other;
the fight is three against one and seems unfair

The little me in the photographs
she stares back at me so innocently
so timid and scared, so wholesome
she has no idea about all of the trauma that’s coming her way
she is going to face abuse and neglect
everyday for the next couple of decades
and this will shape her forever
I am grateful for this version of myself
because she got me through the hardest time of my life
I talk about her in the third person
because I never felt connected to past versions of myself
but especially the littlest version
I had to cope with too much back then;
I repressed so much of it
now I can’t remember huge chunks of my life
but they were too painful to experience the first time around
without having to carry the burden of memory, too

I neglected myself for most of my life,
never stopping to ask what I wanted or needed,
only concerned with pleasing others so I could survive
my default setting was a blank slate
ready to be molded into whatever the other person expected from me
this was conditioned in me
I was groomed to be the perfect victim
for anyone who wanted to control someone else;
a plague that would follow me well into my adult years
ignoring myself became so normal that I forgot who I am,
or maybe I never knew at all,
I was never given the space to find out
(hence the BPD)

I looked death in the eyes that summer
depression dared me to
BPD agreed
PTSD instigated
and I gave in
they convinced me that my life is worthless
and that I am a burden
how are they so good at that?
the overdose felt like a slow death
eventually I passed out
I don’t know how long I was unconscious for
definitely hours, maybe days
when I woke up and realized I was still alive
I was fucking pissed
I was immediately prepared to try again
I can’t really explain exactly what changed, or when, or why
recovery was a slow, excruciating process that I didn’t want to participate in
I guess I learned how to participate anyways
little by little, one step at a time
and the pain started to feel a little less intense, a little less often
so to be able to say today that I am grateful for this life
it is an accomplishment,
one that only came after a long and gruesome recovery process

I am grateful for the version of myself
that packed up all of my things
and moved out of my toxic environment
not once, not twice, but three times
in order to save myself
I am grateful for the version of me
that went to therapy for six years;
the version that took the time
to stare at all of my trauma,
find its roots,
and pour love into them
the way I always deserved
I unlearned a lifetime of self hatred
and as a 23 year old woman
I began to learn how to take care of myself
and maybe even grow to love myself

It has been a long, tiresome journey to this place of gratitude
I could never see a future for myself before
but now I’m starting to
so this is what I mean when I say I am grateful for my life
and I am grateful for myself
I’m grateful for all the different versions of me
that had to exist in order to carry me through
a lifetime of trauma and neglect
I got myself through everything
the world had to throw at me
without ever letting it take away my softness
or my hope for the possibility of something better
the fact that I am alive today is a privilege
and that is what I am most grateful for
I am grateful to simply be alive and to be me