A check-in

Being okay is enough

By Thomas Feng

July 2^nd, 2019

A note from me

This July, I'll be writing as many days as possible to share thoughts, to experiment with words, and indulge in a healthy dose of honesty online through a series of letters to July.

If you'd like to join me regularly in a radical month of empathy, writing and intimate perspectives, please subscribe and be notified through an existential stream of regular little emails from me.

I hope it sparks empathy and new perspectives in your own life.

With love - Thomas

Dear July,

It is lovely to see you again. How are you? Did you want a pot of tea?

Yes, I know it's been a while, but I do enjoy your company July. I really do.

Recently, I read back on the letters I have written to you the past four years, and I feel I owe you much gratitude and thanks for being there for me and listening to me when I haven't felt well. You remind me to be upfront and honest, to not dwell too much on what has been, and that being okay is enough.

While I am eternally busy, I honestly think I am feeling okay this year, which is a remarkable improvement over every other year I have written to you.

Michelle and I have been eating soy-linseed bread toast with vegan butter and vegemite for breakfast most mornings, usually with a sprinkle of nooch on top. On weekdays, I have been trying to wake up to catch the golden light come in just before Michelle leaves for work.

I would like to brag about how I have miraculously transformed to become a morning person who wakes up to be out of the apartment walking around shooting at dawn, but I am somewhat grounded in reality and I know you and your mornings July. I hate them. They are spine-tingling, bone-chillingly freezing and pouring with rain.

I have been making an effort to take more time out this year. For a year intense with change, I feel settled, as if I am in a place I truly want to be.

I know I travelled to Europe last year and that was fun and somewhat relaxing, but I did lose my passport and break a camera lens on the day of a wedding I was shooting, so I don't think I really had a proper rest.

And while I admit that life has not been smooth sailing - I have worked far too hard over too many weekends and travelled too many times to be places for too short a time - I have given myself permission to take days off.

I have been able to relax and indulge for a slow morning coffee, go for walks and take in the streets, chat to my local fruit and vegetable grocer for ten pointless minutes, and even lay in bed for that extra, precious hour.

I want to write to you more. I always say I want to correspond more, but usually I end up unleashing all of my feelings at once, becoming too exhausted to try again.

This year, I don't want to make empty promises.

I want to share the small moments and thoughts with you. The moments we too often overlook and underappreciate. The thoughts I wish I didn't have, but am now only beginning to grasp their gravity of importance.

I don't know where you'll take me July, but this year I am hopeful.

Love always,

Thomas

P.S. Thank you for stopping by and reading the first of my 2019 letters to July, where I write to an abyss with empathy, honesty and a hope that you will comfortable sharing more openly with your own community, regardless of whether I am in it or not.