I think my algorithm is trying to save me.

Every time I open TikTok or Instagram, I see little pockets of magic. Girls pressing flowers between the pages of books. Tiny cafés hidden under vines. Handmade journals with dried petals tucked inside. People baking bread, painting, reading by the window while the afternoon sun spills across the room.

Everything looks soft.

Everything looks slow.

Everything feels… alive.

Sometimes I wonder if it’s all real.

Or if we’re simply getting better at decorating reality.

People call it whimsical. Cottagecore. Fairycore. Ghibli.

Whatever name it has, I always stop scrolling.

Because for a few seconds, life looks exactly the way I always wished it would.

Then I close my phone.

Emails are waiting.

Bills still exist.

Someone is rushing to work.

Someone is exhausted.

Someone is grieving.

Reality doesn’t suddenly become softer because my algorithm decided to show me flowers instead of bad news.

But maybe that’s not the point.

Maybe whimsical isn’t about pretending life is beautiful.

Maybe it’s about refusing to let beauty disappear.

Maybe pressing flowers into a journal isn’t childish.

Maybe reading under a tree isn’t unproductive.

Maybe buying yourself tulips after a hard week isn’t romanticizing life.

Maybe it’s remembering that life isn’t only deadlines and surviving.

Maybe it’s remembering you’re still alive.

And I think that’s why so many people are drawn to it.

Not because we’re trying to escape reality.

Because reality is already heavy enough.

Sometimes a loaf of homemade bread…

a watercolor painting…

a cup of tea…

or sunlight through the curtains…

is enough to remind us that life is happening outside of our worries too.

Maybe whimsical isn’t the trend.

Maybe hope is.

And maybe, after everything we’ve been through,

hope just happens to wear flowers in its hair.

The sentiment beyond what words could imagine,
Fully expressed through silent dialogue,
Perfumed words not in the form of verbal,
But in the language of floral.

Let this be a remembrance when the color fades and dries,
As I pick this intentionally for reasons and what it personifies.
In different ranges of my emotions,
Hopefully, you’ll understand what my heart tries to reveal in devotion.

Hoping the secret message reaches you, darling,
As I am wishing and manifesting.
God knows for whom I was thinking,
And you’re not excluded every time I am praying.

Every Wednesday, as marked,
You’ll have your bouquet, my love.
Let the hidden meaning be perceived,
As there’s a handwritten letter on the side for you to decipher.

Orchids, as you are rare, exemplifying your delicate beauty,
Amaryllis, for I value you beyond your beauty.
Camellia, for I adore you endlessly,
White lilac, as with you I feel heavenly.

White clover, hoping you’ll think of me,
Blue salvia, as I think of you daily.
Violet, for I am faithful, my lovely,
Edelweiss, for my devotion to you, the love of my life.

Our platonic and romantic love blooms,
Where the garden of affection lasts.
Let’s make this grow until we grow old and go,
Praying when we’re gone, it will never die, my dearest.

In this nuanced form of communication,
May the bouquets communicate within.
As you said “YES” to the dozen red roses that denote “BE MINE,”
Now I am giving you a bouquet of yarrow, for my everlasting love and vow to love you until the end — 
The God-sent gift which I now call MINE.

I found an old poem I wrote when I was younger. I really, really loved flowers so much that I ended up writing about them. I almost laughed at how dramatic I was. I was a girl who believed love could be hidden in flowers, letters, and little gestures.

But maybe she wasn’t foolish. Maybe she was just someone who already understood that some feelings are too big to say plainly.

I hope you’ll like this one as much as I still do, because it holds a special place in my heart.

I was sitting outside on the balcony of my cousin’s house. Inside, her pamalaye was happening. Voices of parents, close relatives, the bride, and groom blend into one long, serious conversation. They were talking about plans, expectations, and the future. The kind of talk that quietly shapes what a marriage will look like before it even begins.

My cousins and I stayed outside, listening without really listening, just waiting. At one point, my aunt asked her, “Ikaw, overall… what can you say?” Something about that question stayed with me. And without noticing, I drifted somewhere else.

I started imagining myself inside that room, sitting properly, being asked the same question. But when I tried to answer, nothing came to mind except what I didn’t want.

I don’t want a drunkard.
I don’t want a man who treats marriage like a convenience.
I don’t want love to feel one-sided, like I’m just someone who will take care of him when he gets old.

I don’t want a home where chores are measured by gender, where being a woman automatically means carrying everything.

I don’t want someone with too many vices.
Someone who thinks he knows everything but never listens.
Someone who walks away when he’s wrong, like silence can erase the truth.

I don’t want a man who chooses his friends over his family.
Or someone unprepared for marriage, someone who enters it only for comfort, not commitment.

I kept going. Answer after answer, list after list, until I suddenly stopped. Because something about my answers felt… familiar.

And after a few quiet minutes, it hit me. The things I was trying so hard to avoid weren’t random.

They had a face.

They had a voice.

They had a history.

They looked like my father.

It struck me, slowly and painfully, that I don’t just know what I don’t want. I learned it.

If someone asked me, “What do you want in a man?” I don’t think I would give them dreams.

I would give them corrections.

Because each answer feels like I’m trying to fix something I grew up with.

And somewhere between those answers, I realized I wasn’t just describing a future husband. I was describing a man I had been learning how to survive.

Until I noticed the shape of my words, and it looked like home. It looked like him.

And I wondered… if I will ever really choose love, or if I will spend my life trying to rewrite the love my mother, my brother, and I didn’t get right the first time.

Life lately feels like a circus, and the people around me feel like the audience. I hate to admit it, but I stepped onto that stage too. I performed, tried to be funny, interesting, present — just to feel like I mattered. But the thing about a circus is that the show ends. The lights go off, everyone goes home, and they forget. Not because they’re cruel, but because they have their own lives, and I have mine. So why does it feel like I have to keep performing just to stay?

When I’m with my friends, I feel like I’m always acting. I talk more than I should, react more than I feel, stretch my energy just to match theirs. Because when I don’t, they ask, “Why are you so quiet?” or “Are you okay?” And I remember this one time — we were all sitting together, everyone laughing, talking over each other, the kind of moment that’s supposed to feel full. I was there, listening, smiling at the right parts, nodding like I belonged. Then someone looked at me and said, “You’ve been so quiet.” I didn’t know what to say. Because I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t upset. I was just… there. But somehow, that didn’t feel like enough.

And that’s when I start to wonder if being myself is not enough. The truth is, sometimes I just want to listen — that’s how I exist in a room. But it feels like listening isn’t a role anyone notices. So I try to contribute, I try to keep up, I try to be someone they won’t get tired of. And maybe that’s where it starts to hurt.

I reply fast. I make sure I’m present. Sometimes I even force the last message, just so the conversation doesn’t die with me. Because I’m scared that if I stop, they’ll slowly lose interest, and I’ll disappear. My mom tells me to go out and make new friends, but I don’t even know how to exist without feeling like I have to perform, and that scares me. Because I love my friends — I really do. But sometimes, being around them feels draining, like I’m a sponge soaking up everything without ever being poured into. And then I feel guilty for even thinking that.

So I ask myself if I’m the problem. If I’m too quiet, too much, or not enough. Or maybe I’m just tired of feeling like I have to earn a place where I should already belong.

Maybe life isn’t a circus. Maybe I just keep putting myself on stage, thinking that if I stop performing, there will be nothing left worth staying for. And maybe that’s the part that hurts the most — not the fear of being alone, but the fear that if I am just myself, quietly existing, no one will stay long enough to see me.

Because at the end of the day, I don’t really want to perform. I don’t want to be interesting or entertaining all the time. I just want to be someone who can sit in a room, say nothing, and still feel like I belong. I just want to be known without having to prove that I’m worth knowing.

And maybe that’s what we’re all quietly afraid of

that if we stop trying so hard to be liked,
we’ll finally find out that we were never someone people would choose in the first place.

I think I did this to myself. Not all at once, but slowly, in ways I barely noticed until I was already in too deep. You could call it self-sabotage — maybe even a pathetic one. I know I have this fear of missing out, this constant feeling that life is happening somewhere else and I’m not there. Did I do something about it? No. And somehow, that makes it worse. Because I know, and I still don’t move.

There was a version of me that said yes to working from home. Graveyard shift. Long nights. Quiet, almost isolating. I told myself it was practical, that it was for my family, that I was being responsible. But a part of me wonders — did I say yes because it was easier to disappear like that? Not all at once. Just slowly. Quietly.

I’m not writing this for attention or validation. I just opened this app, read my old pieces, and realized something. I always end them with hope, like I’m someone who will change, like I’m someone who will try. But here I am, still the same, still stuck between knowing and not doing. And it confuses me.

Because I know I’m lucky. I know I have things others don’t. So why do I feel like this? Why do I still end up here? Maybe I like being on the edge. Maybe it makes me feel like I’m capable of something more — even if I never reach it.

My body is here, functioning. But I’m not really inside it. Not fully. It feels like I’m watching myself slip away slowly — not because I was pushed, but because I kept stepping back. And maybe that’s the hardest part to admit. Not that life is hard, but that I am the one making it harder.

I know I’m the one digging this hole. I just don’t know why I keep picking up the shovel.

I love like this —

you tell me your favorite song,
and I listen to it like it’s a part of you I’m allowed to keep.
I play it over and over,
trying to understand you
in ways you never asked me to.

You recommend a movie or a series,
and I watch it alone,
then come back to you
as if we shared it.

You say a perfume smells good,
and I buy it
just in case
you’d recognize me
in something familiar.

I do love like this.
Always.

And somewhere in between
learning you

I forgot myself.

I adjusted so quietly
you never had to notice.
I became easy to understand,
easy to like,
easy to keep

but never truly known.

And maybe that’s what hurts the most.

Not that I loved you too much,
but that I kept translating myself
into something you could understand

while no one ever learned
how to speak me.

So if there’s one thing
I’ve learned from loving like this —

it’s this:

may I find someone
who speaks my language,
so I don’t spend a lifetime
translating my heart
just to be loved.

I work remotely.

I prayed for this kind of job, something quiet, something safe for someone like me who gets overwhelmed easily. When I got hired, I thought, finally, this is it.

So why did I draft my resignation letter?

On my first day, there was no training. Just forwarded emails, a pile of tasks I didn’t understand, and a meeting where I was already expected to deliver. I was trying to keep up with things I had no background in, trying not to look lost when I already was.

I lasted one week.

It was too much. I resigned. And even then, I told my client it was okay if I wouldn’t get paid for that week. And I didn’t.

Then another offer came.
From the same company.

Adjusted hours. More rest. A setup that sounded like it would finally work for me.

So I said yes.

Why?

Because of pressure.
Money.
People.
My needs.
My family.
The life I’m trying to build.

At first, it got better. I was moved to a different department, something closer to what I know. It felt manageable.

But not everything that feels better is actually okay.

The workload grew heavier.
The pay became delayed.
Everything started to feel chaotic again.
And the people you hope would understand you… didn’t.

You’re just an employee. Replaceable. Expected to endure.

So why did I stay?

Still the same reasons.

Pressure.
Money.
People.
The fear of not having anything if I let this go.

But also something deeper.

What if I fail again?
What if I fall back into that same hole I barely got out of?
What if I’m really just not enough?

I tell myself I’m staying because I’m strong.

But sometimes, I wonder if I’m just afraid.

Afraid to choose myself.
Afraid to rest.
Afraid to admit that this is already hurting me.

Now, I have a drafted resignation letter sitting quietly in my files.

In a week, I’ll be one year in this company.

And somehow, I’m proud of that.

I survived something that was never gentle with me.

But this isn’t just about work.

This is about a girl who is still unsure of herself.
A girl who feels like she has to prove something to people who never really believed in her, and to those who still do.
A girl who keeps choosing everything else before herself.

Because there are bills.
Because there are expectations.
Because there are people she loves.

And because she doesn’t know yet if she’ll be okay without all of this.

But more than anything —

She’s tired.

Not lazy.
Not weak.
Just tired.

So now I’m here, staring at a letter I already wrote.

And the only question left is —

Should I finally choose myself?

When I was younger, I thought I was just sensitive. I cried too easily, cared too much, and held on to things that didn’t belong to me. But I didn’t realize that feeling everything, every ache, every unspoken sadness would someday feel like too much.

I don’t want to hear anything.
I don’t want to see anything.
I don’t want to feel everything.
I am too fragile for everything.

It’s strange to walk through life and feel everything twice, once for myself, and once for everyone else. When my friend is sad, I feel her pain in my bones. When someone’s angry, my chest tightens as if I owe them an apology. When the world is quiet, I still hear the ache of people pretending they’re okay.

It’s heavy, always knowing, always sensing, always carrying what isn’t mine. It’s like being built to protect everyone but never having anyone protect your back. Sometimes I don’t even know whose pain I’m crying for, mine or theirs.

They say, or maybe I’ve read somewhere, that being an empath is a gift, not a curse.
But for me, it’s a curse.
To feel everything, but not mine.

My heart feels like a borrowed house. People come and go, leaving their stories, their grief, their laughter. And I stay cleaning up what’s left, remembering what I shouldn’t, feeling what isn’t mine to feel.

Once, I tried to stop caring. I ignored the heaviness in my chest, pretended I didn’t notice when someone’s smile didn’t reach their eyes. But I couldn’t. My heart doesn’t know how to unsee pain.

I wish I could shut it off, just for a while to sit in silence without carrying someone else’s noise, to breathe without guilt, to love without bleeding for everyone around me. But this is who I am the girl who feels too deeply, loves too quietly, and breaks for the world without letting it see her fall apart.

And maybe that’s okay. Maybe this is how I was made to feel the weight of hearts I don’t own, to carry pieces of the world in mine, and to hope that somehow, all this feeling still means something.

Because if I can make someone feel less alone, then maybe, just maybe, this curse is my way of loving.

I am scared of happiness.

Do you ever fear it, too? The way it sneaks in, makes you laugh, makes you believe things might finally be okay — and then rips it away?

Sometimes I feel like the more I taste happiness, the more I learn to despise it.

I remember being on a trip with my best friends, smiling, laughing, feeling like I belonged in that moment. Then my phone buzzed: a message from my brother. My dad was in the hospital.

Just like that, the air left my chest.

Or the times when I’m surrounded by people I love, having fun, but suddenly I feel out of place — like the room has rejected me and I don’t belong after all.

Or when I’m at peace, simply enjoying the quiet, and then work calls me back into stress, pressure, and exhaustion.

Even birthdays, celebrations, moments that are supposed to be pure joy — somehow, they always end in frustration, sadness, or anger.

So now I’m afraid of it.

Whenever I catch myself laughing, or feeling good, a thought claws in: What’s coming next? Will I cry again? Will I be left alone again? What terrible thing is waiting on the other side of this smile?

Sometimes I wonder if it’s pathetic. To hold happiness and already mourn it. To sit inside joy while bracing for the blow.

But that’s my curse. Happiness never stays. It always dissolves into something else — something darker.

And maybe that’s what hurts the most.

Not just the sadness itself, but this growing belief that I don’t deserve happiness. That it’s a punishment. That every time I laugh, I should already prepare to pay for it.

And maybe — just maybe — that’s the truth I’ve always known.

Every morning, the same question suffocates me: what if I am not enough for love? I open my eyes, and before the day even begins, I already feel the heaviness of wondering if anyone will ever choose me. Not for convenience. Not for safety. Not because it’s easier. But because they love me, wholly, fiercely, truthfully. And the more I wait, the more I doubt that day will ever come.

I’ve seen love at its ugliest. I’ve seen promises that turn into cages. I’ve seen forevers that wither into silence, into punishment, into duty with no heartbeat left. And I hate it. I hate how love can take someone so alive, so full of fire, and crush her until she becomes small, invisible, fragile. I’ve seen it with my own eyes — a woman who stayed, who forgave, who loved so hard it almost destroyed her. And I admire her strength, I truly do. But God, I don’t want that to be me. I cannot be her. I cannot love until I lose myself. And yet, what if I end up becoming her anyway?

What if I choose wrong? What if the man I give my heart to turns out to be the man who breaks it? What if the father of my children teaches them not how to love, but how to lie? What if I fail them before they are even born? That thought haunts me more than anything else. It keeps me awake at night. It makes me question whether I am even built for love, whether maybe I am unworthy of it.

Maybe that’s why love has not come for me yet. Maybe that’s why I am here, waiting, empty, because if I choose wrong, it won’t just ruin me. It will ruin them, too. And I cannot bear the thought of handing my children the same broken promises I have witnessed.

Still, a part of me tries to believe that somewhere out there is someone who won’t turn forever into a curse. Someone who won’t make me small. Someone who will stay, who will hold me, who will be the father my children deserve. I want to believe that. I whisper it to myself like a prayer. But even as I say it, fear coils inside me. My chest tightens. My throat closes.

Because love is terrifying. Because love can be cruel. Because love can shatter into pieces that cut too deep to ever heal. And I am so, so afraid. Afraid that no matter how much I dream, no matter how hard I try — in the end, I will give everything and still fail.