My 28th Birthday - Words of Remembrance & Love to Myself
I celebrate all my younger selves who persevered through the impossible and built the magical life I’m living now.
I celebrate present-me who is a badass and writing these words.
I celebrate all my future versions who will keep realising our dreams.
I love you ❤️🔥
My 7 year-old self is very close with me right now.
I wrote this yesterday:
‘I take her gently by the hand, a soft smile, warm dark brown gaze.
“What do you love to do?” I ask.
She looks at me shyly. For a second, she hesitates, then pulls me by the hand to her room.
“Look, I invented this game yesterday. You have to finish one task before you can do the next level,” she says, smiling at me with sparkling eyes, a piece of paper in her hand.
I see some pencil drawings with geometrical shapes and some writings.
“And here are some books I got from the library yesterday. Don’t tell my parents, but I want to read all of them tonight!” She points proudly at a stack of books on the table.
“And here I started writing a story. There’s a TV show called Winx Club with witches that have magic skills. I want to be a witch too!”
She continues talking, taking me through different parts of her room, showing her little secrets of happiness.
“Are you okay?” She stops mid-sentence and looks at me, half-curious, half-worried, eyes shimmering with excitement.
“I’m more than okay,” I smile, fighting back my tears.
How could I have forgotten this?
Innocent joy and boundless awe. Moving through life like an adventure, daily riddles to solve. Oh, how much I loved riddles! Everything can be turned into play, into a potential quest, infinite imagination.
Our hands still intertwined, I kneel before her to be at eye level and look into her beautiful brown Asian eyes.
“Can you promise me something?” I ask.
“Yes, sure.”
“It is very important that you keep doing what you love to do, okay? Keep that joy in your heart. And if one day, you can’t find it anymore, and life seems dark and hopeless, remember that it is always there and will always be there. Trust that it will come back. Never give up on that joy, do you understand me?”
She thinks a moment about my words, furrowing her brows.
Then her face lights up.
“This sounds like a riddle! I love solving riddles!”
🧩