I saw the dark side of the moooooon

& I'm answering... how do I stop thinking about him?

Good morning!

The lunar eclipse on Monday blew my mind!!! I wasn’t quite sure what to expect going into it. I have a vague memory of seeing a partial eclipse in 2017 in New Hampshire. I remember it being sort of underwhelming, it remained sunny the whole time and I saw just a little spot of the sun covered through my cardboard glasses. I went back and forth about whether traveling into the path of totality would be worth it but finally decided that in the off chance this was a miraculous experience, the inconvenience of it would be outweighed.

At nearly the top of Sugarloaf mountain in Maine, the DJ, who had set himself up unironically on the underside of a giant blow up octopus so it looked like him and his little stand was being birthed from it, stopped his extremely loud set to play dark side of the moon and then go completely quiet (a blessing) as the moon entirely covered the sun and everything went dark. The horizon was still slightly lit up like sunrise. We screamed and some of us cried. It was truly one of the most incredible things I’ve ever experienced. It lasted for four minutes, long enough to wonder whether there would be some sort of glitch and the lights just wouldn’t come back on.

Later, I wondered about the people in the path of totality that are somehow disconnected enough from the Great Stream of Information and hadn’t heard news of the eclipse, just to go outside and be utterly bewildered. After feeling so many things, I quickly asked the internet to provide me with some significant symbolism of the solar eclipse. I found scattered articles saying things like it was an “ego death” and encouraging “inner child work for Sagittarius” but nothing really captured what I felt; complete awe at a momentary blip of something so predictable and completely taken for granted. I still feel reluctant to thrust some great meaning onto it because the moment in itself felt like enough, the silence, the screams.

anonymous q&a

For more on how I answer anonymous questions see here. Submit an anonymous question here! I’m looking for questions to answer for a pride month q&a so send me your gay questions plz :)

Question:

I’m in my late-20’s (she/her). I was off and on with someone for pretty much all of my early twenties. Right now, we can’t be together but I can’t stop thinking about him. I don’t just wistfully think about him when looking out a train window, I literally think about him all the time. My question is— How do you stop thinking about someone? 

Answer:

This is one of my favorite questions to answer *flexes knuckles and begins typing furiously*. I recommend a two-part solution to this problem. The first is dealing with this person as part of your reality. By that I mean, make one last ditch effort to see if he can be part of your reality. This might not be the *most healthy* advice but I think it can really help. Have you really told him what you want with him and when? We often push off this step because we don’t want to experience rejection (it does feel temporarily better to exist in fantasy land). But, it’s much much easier to get someone out of your head if they’ve given you a clear rejection. Or, alternatively if they agree that they want to be with you and you can build a relationship in reality.

If you’ve already made your last ditch effort or are extremely clear on where you both stand, you can move on to the next step, which is dealing with him as part of your brain. Now that he solely exists in your mind or maybe occasionally on your phone, he needs to be dealt with like any other fixture in your brain, like insecurity or desire. Here are some ideas for helping your brain out:

• Stop talking to him. The inconsistent hit can be soooo addictive. Schedule a time you’ll text him (the surprise will make it all less exciting for your brain) or, best of all, don’t text him at all. 

• Because this person now solely exists in your mind, and you’re brain can’t stop spinning about them, I have some good news for you! You have a very active imagination. I also have a very active imagination (hence fiction writer) so before I started writing regularly, I had a lot of pent up imaginary powers and would apply them to whatever love interest was most elusive at the moment. I found writing fiction to really help with the real-life fantasy people that were plaguing me. What could that outlet look like for you?

• Fill three 8x11 pages with stream of consciousness writing. You might start with all of the writing being about him but if you do this multiple days in a row, you’ll probably find your brain gets tired and distracted other thoughts will seep in.

• Notice when thoughts of him are most present. Is it when you’re already in a low mood? Are there moments or days when you’re doing things and notice you don’t think about him? Keep doing those things!

• Know that you’re not alone in this. Our culture is obsessed with unfinished love. Almost every woman I know has had a person that lingers. The idea of there being just one person for us gets shoved down our throats from a very young age. So many stories we consume follow this plot line (the notebook, seven husbands of Evelyn Hugo and on and on). It’s just a story. Your life doesn’t end when a partnership with a particular person ends. You’re still alive. You can write new stories.

• Finally, accept that this is your reality right now. The more that we resist certain thought patterns, the more our brains love to follow them. Be gentle with yourself. Your brain is stuck in one of the most addictive thought patterns. It will get better, it’ll just take a little time.

I hope this helps even a little bit! <3 Zoe

something to read

The Bee Sting by Paul Murray I LOVE THIS BOOK. Along with, it seems everybody else last year. I’m obsessed with the multiple narrations including the bisexual father/daughter duo. It felt like the author took the anxieties written about right out of my head and onto the page.

Paul Murray’s wise words in the Guardian interview. “TO MAKE US FEEL LIKE BEING COCOONED IN THIS HALL OF MIRRORS IS A BETTER WAY TO BE.”

See you next month!! <3

about the writer:

Zoe Flavin is a queer writer, sex educator and oddly optimistic sagittarius living in Brooklyn with her dog Sunny. She is a graduate of Pomona College and an MFA candidate in fiction writing at New York University. Prior to attending NYU, she ran Planned Parenthood’s sex education programs for the state of Utah. She’s currently working on her first novel about a girl who seeks revenge in unlikely ways.