Loopholes

and other ways I trick myself into having a good time.

Much to my surprise, it’s only one month after my last post and I have an insistent itch that is compelling me to write another newsletter, as if I’m some kind of neurotypical king with consistent habits and a trove of finished projects. Hilariously enough, this is exactly what I feel pushed to write about, the idea of what it means to actually finish what we start as well as curiosity around project and responsibility-related boundaries. I was reading one of Cody Cook Parrott’s recent newsletters and they are currently promoting classes and ideas around the very same subject.

Self-examination in the air, quite literally. The current longer-term astrology is bonkers, it’s pushing and pulling and stretching and squeezing us to the limit, and it’s such a confusing mix of exciting and horrible. Everyone I know is having a crisis of self that is unfolding devastatingly slowly and causing a sort of the-house-of-cards-may-fall-at-any-minute sort of anxiety. For example, the Sun is currently in Libra, which brings our attention to anything in our lives that is out of balance, and we’re likely to experience delays or indecision that force us to reconsider what balance looks like and what may need to change or end/leave in order to find equilibrium again. Since sun signs last about a month, we can look to the current Moon sign for guidance over the next few days as to how to go about the task at hand. At the time of writing this, the moon is in Pisces, inviting us to lean on our intuitions and allow our emotions to flow freely so that we can access deeper states of creativity and more nuanced decision making. The upcoming full moon is in Aries, bringing momentum and weight to the notion of, and I kid you not, what it means for us when we don’t follow-through and how to get ourselves to pick up and start over again.

If you’re not actively committed to self-reflection, you may just be wondering why you feel more tense than usual, or why you suddenly feel very invested in changing something about yourself or your life, or you may be fighting the idea of changing jobs or locations or dropping partners or friends from which you never thought you’d separate. There is so much up for review right now, and I encourage you to intentionally consider what is working for you in life and what just isn’t cutting it anymore. Is anything causing you endless, unnecessary stress? Is it an action/habit/idea that you have perpetuated? I am reflecting quite a bit lately on what “follow-through” means to me, a concept that follows me like a plague despite my attempts to routinely push it off a cliff. I am not a stranger to avoiding phone calls, texts, debts, and projects as long as humanly possible, and I am fully aware that sometimes this avoidance really harms me in the short term or sometimes long-run. I also understand that I am the only person who can do something about this in service of respecting and loving myself. Knowing that and actually taking action through it is the hardest part, but there are fun little loopholes you can embrace.

I am fortunate to have grown up in the early 90s. I am old enough to remember phone books (the concept of which I recently had to explain to my 14 year old niece, which made me feel insane), memorizing my friends’ phone numbers and calling to see if they were home (or just showing up unannounced, also insane), the brilliance of playing Pogs, and AOL dial-up CD’s that had to be mailed out to everyone. Time moved differently. Spending 3 hours knee-deep in a bog while trying to spot bullfrogs under the mud is an entirely different pace than spending 3 hours trying to trap your Sims’s CPS lady in a brick room that she cannot escape or forcing them to DJ all night at a neighbor’s house party while they beg you for sleep. One is also, dare I say, a little more educational and enriching vs. mildly concerning and deeply questionable. The sense of urgency that the internet brought wasn’t quite as brutal as is now, though. It was legitimately slower and had less to offer in 1998 than it does in 2025, so regardless of having a computer in the house I was bored a lot, which to a kid with ADHD feels like you’re being drowned alive. It forced me to use my imagination outside though, because there really were no other options. There was this sort of “anything goes” flair to everything, an energy of needing to create, participate, and experiment. It’s these things that call to me when I spend intentional time away from the internet, and it’s these things that remind me that all of my unfinished hobby projects are remnants of play rather than failure. Engaging in random playfulness and occasional boredom a la my/your childhood is a loophole. Find out what happens when you’re bored but going online is not an option and I bet your nine year old self will swim up from the depths to lend a hand and probably also complain that What do you mean we’re in our 30s and we still don’t own several horses? And I’ll show her the horse-shaped toaster I recently screenshotted. It won’t work.

Anyway, Cody wrote in their latest newsletter, “What I have learned is that consistency isn’t about the task itself. It’s about the process of return. The process of accepting our capacity and greeting it with reverence.”

I really love this not just because it allows us to be more patient with ourselves, which is often so deeply needed, but because I am such a huge fan of the idea of revering our capacities and honoring when we both can and - gasp - cannot do something. Our endlessly urgent, late stage capitalist culture demands that we move as quickly as possible and suggests that if we cannot “keep up,” then we will absolutely be left behind. Endlessly scrolling instagram always leaves me feeling lacking —

You only make x amount of money? Go make MORE. MANIFEST, BOSS GIRL. BARF
You need to be married by the time you’re 30 or you should be embarrassed!! And lonely!! And addicted to skincare so you don’t keep scaring away the good ones!!
You’re 35 and you’re still renting instead of owning? Here’s how to stop being a loser.
You just lost 20 pounds? Why not 40? Why not become transparent??
Can’t lose weight fast enough? Here’s a SHOT and some NAUSEA. GO FASTER.
Here is my Amazon haul, you NEED this limited edition brat tumbler and this glitter infused coffee station syrup and these under-the-counter lights!! They’re already in your cart. We actually already pressed “buy with 1-click” for you!

Listen, I would get so mad at my mom growing up when she wouldn’t let me have everything I wanted all the time. She was so good at saying no to me, and in retrospect I remember again and again how important it is to WANT something and not get it so that you are forced to make peace with what you have and/or get really creative and find alternate pathways, leaving you realizing that your moment of crazed infatuation was actually temporary. I specifically remember a time when my mom wouldn’t buy me my own mini Jeep that I felt was MADE for me to chase our chickens with, so I made a concerted effort to become better friends with the neighbor kids and I ended up borrowing theirs. Ingenuity at its finest. Also, I made friends, which is worth a hell of a lot more than a plastic Jeep I’d quite literally grow out of within a year or two. I think it’s also worth noting that I am the queen of buy-yourself-a-treat when life is hard or something amazing happens, and I probably still need to scale back on what my brain considers difficult or exciting. I am an expert at bargaining about deserving treat deliverance. I am learning, in this season of how to trick myself into finishing what I start or doing things I don’t want to do, when to tell myself no and when to figuratively force myself to play outside and find a way through it. Or rather, when I truly should buy a treat and when I’m just bored and need to touch grass.

(Absolutely *loves* to touch grass and doesn’t even know what Google is)

I know so many people who run themselves ragged trying to keep up with it all or who are stuck in comparison loops because their life doesn’t look the same as everyone else’s and so they can’t escape the repetitive, mocking siren of dissatisfaction. ME INCLUDED. There is such a fine, fine line between getting necessary shit done and running an endless race, and it’s important to build discernment so you can know when to act accordingly and when to set it all down. I recently jumped the Instagram ship without warning because I logged on one morning and within 15 minutes was so dysregulated I was en route to a panic attack. I felt like I zoomed out of my body and was looking down at myself feeling so much compassion and remorse, like “Girl, why did you do this yourself? Just log off.” So I did, and what I’ve been doing since is trying to be radically honest with myself about how much money I spend when I have ads in my face all day, or how obsessive I have been yet again about whether or not my body is acceptable, or how much shame I carry because my life hasn’t followed the “perfect” path. What I’ve found is that I’m doing fine! Who knew! Also, my creativity has been stifled and that’s a shame but I want to remedy it! Also, I’m actually really lonely! And I’m facing that truth in a big way and it’s painful! But, because I’m doing an honest and compassionate investigation, it’s not making it all worse as I genuinely feared it would, but rather it is gently nudging me to allow intimacy back into my life and to play around with new projects and to remember what it’s like to be truly bored. The ultimate loophole, and now I can see it all for what it is. A big invitation toward ongoing acts of self love.

So, with all these new projects and ideas, I’m remembering that I do have difficulty with follow-through. This stings a bit in several ways, as I was told recently that a former employer is telling future employers that I “have difficulty with follow through.” While I actually don’t agree with this feedback in a professional sense and have never been spoken to ever in my life about this possible issue (I’m too dang scared at work to not do what’s asked of me!), it has caused me to just think about what follow-through means and how I might unknowingly avoid things at work or at home. My ADHD brain causes me to make piles of stuff at home that I don’t know how to deal with, like old but necessary pieces of mail, random items that don’t yet have a resting place, laundry that is neither clean nor dirty, etc. I will pass by these piles every day, sometimes for months if I’m not careful or attentive. I will also conjure up mean little green, thorny gremlins that sit on my shoulder and tell me I’m useless or disgusting for not simply filing that old 401k statement or throwing away the uneaten rice from last week. In these moments I try to remember when my therapist told me to schedule things like worrying about finances or cleaning out the fridge instead of just leaving those actions to chance, as I’m want to do. I punt the gremlins to the back and tell them to come knocking next Wednesday at 4:30pm when I have time to do it or think about it. I feel that my life is just learning to strategize with a brain that refuses to comply, and through that I’m forced to also realize how much space for grace is also needed and available.

Cody Cook-Parrott invites us to look at these pieces with reverence, so deciding that my consistently difficult parts of self are holy feels like a tremendous act of love. I’m not going to passively “love and light” them to death but rather hold them close when they’re tired and encourage them when there is legitimate space to move and create. We aren’t meant to move as quickly as culture dictates, so I don’t need to impose unnecessary timing restrictions on myself. We’re meant to move slowly, with wonder in our hearts and with space to ask a lot of questions. I believe that this is a great invitation for everyone during the current astrological climate of self-examination. I recently gave a tarot reading to a friend who said she had been spending a lot of time closed off, just grieving and worrying nonstop in her apartment and she was having trouble landing clients. She said she felt more despondent than ever, and her Guides told me to remind her to go outside and find the magic. They noted that magic is always available, and we can go greet it anytime and instantly remember how much it enjoys revealing itself to us and playing around, and that it can change the fabric of our reality in record timing. In the weeks since the reading, that friend has shared with me all of the purely magical things that have happened since she made a concentrated effort to go outside and into her city with no agenda. Within two days she ended up at a rooftop party with a bunch of people who wanted to connect with her and share their contact info so they could work her, then she randomly found a copy of “A Course in Miracles,” then one of her clients paid her well over what she charged, etc. Pure magic, just from stepping outside and embracing boredom.

You are always one choice away from a complete 180. Choice is all we have, so make life work for you. Be the magician. It’s always in your hands, and if it’s not, then let it go for now. So much of our agitation comes from feeling like things are out-of-control, but sometimes they’re supposed to be! Sometimes you’re supposed to flail and rage and feel nuts because that’s when you’re most often being guided to let a ton of old shit go. I was reading an article recently about the evolution of mental health diagnoses and what psychological wellness has meant to various cultures across time and space, and what I honestly took away from it was how various mental health states have been weaponized and stripped of dignity rather than celebrated and explored with reverence and creativity. I wrote a script in my 20s about this very notion, about what could happen if we were to return to a place where we can acknowledge these diagnoses/states with radical acceptance and curiosity rather than blame, fear, and control. At the very least, I’ve witnessed my own emotional responses dramatically shapeshift as I’ve made it a point to explore the hidden stories I carry about who I am and what I do and why. I was told at 19 that ADHD would be a thorn in my side forevermore, and now it’s my friend. I don’t always have to like that friend, but I can love them all the same, and that’s made a remarkable difference in how I perceive myself and my capabilities.

Life is hard, so remind yourself how fun it can be. That’s your only project this week, or this month. If you’re feeling depressed and stagnant, shake things up bit by bit by indulging your younger self. Take the class for fun, not to try to create a hobby you can monetize. Talk to the trees in your yard and tell them what you’re worried about or sketch them in a notebook even if you think you can’t draw very well. Make macaroni with cut up hot dogs or your other favorite childhood meal. If you have trouble following through on things you actually need to follow through on, set a small timer, do some of the thing, then take a break to eat cereal or scream into the void, and repeat. Small steps. No steps. Baby steps. Clown steps.

Love you.

Til next time.