butterfly rising #1: joy as an act of resistance (7 weekly readings)

clairo and phoebe / idles and kissing boys / sally / pink hair AT LAST / first cd since 2009 / momma killed me; clairo resurrected me / something is happening in the world right now: reality is rising

welcome to the weekly edition!

today’s edition of butterfly rising includes:

💖 writing from the main pub
💖 life updates: thank you clairo and phoebe
💖 glimpses from my world
💖 books
💖 weekly readings

---

---

writing from the main publication this week

---

7 songs to tell your family to shut the fuck up

my advice for your twenties: resist or you will be turned into a piece of material

love is a feeling that arises when

venice: the emptiness of C and me; without V, no hope for me; inside the sky with E (memory collage 2009)

in india: a sense of unreality (memories & photographs) (paid)

going abroad and personal transformation (7 weekly readings)

also, i was on

Taylor Cecelia Brook

‘s podcast!!! we had an amazing conversation: taylor is such a beautiful human and i love her so much:

Queer Safe Spaces, Being Our Most Authentic Selves, and Boomer Americanism.

---

life updates

---

i got my hair dyed all fucking pink baby!!!!!

people in my life told me, “you can’t do that.”

people actually said to me, “it won’t look good.”

thank you so much to maddie my amazing hair stylist!!!

maddie inspires me to embrace joy as an act of resistance!

the appointment took over 5 hours and just flew by!!

also:

for the first time since like fucking 2009,

i bought a cd!!! it came with a clairo shirt i ordered and i am so excited about it!!!!

look how fucking bad ass this disc is:

what the fuck??? how bad ass is that disc?!?!

---

here i am walking around in the rain,

as happy as i was when i was dancing in the rain at her show in queens,

and i am listening to charm,

and i am feeling like a goddess:

i also listened to momma for a bit and had this crazy realization!

momma killed me and clairo resurrected me lolllll!!

but it’s true though!!

---

glimpses from my world

---

i love to walk in the evening.

like, when i see the sun beginning to set, i just:

need to go outside and get those sparkles into my eyes.

here are some shots from the other night. i took these after hanging out with my new friend R!! she is very fun and we both love buffy!!

she makes me feel like such a girl.

R making me feel like a girl:

that is a part is of why this post is SO special to me and why i am so happy so many of you have been reading it.

if you want to understand me better than you currently do, then read this post:

the two posts that are so incredibly special to me:

clairo, buddhism, nyc, and queerhood (retrospective diary: 2019-2024)

phoebe bridgers and the music that blossomed my queerness (retrospective diary: 2021-2024)

these two posts are so special to me that i did something unhinged:

i messaged clairo, i messaged phoebe.

i sent them the links.

why?

because i’m a crazy person!

and because i just want them to know:

clairo and phoebe: your art fucking saved my life

clairo and phoebe: the music you create, the lyrics you write, they brought me out of darkness and into the light of the world

clairo and phoebe: not one stream of light coming out from me right now would be visible without your art as my spiritual foundation.

in august i went supernova, and it’s thanks to you.

thank you.

fucking thank you.

---

---

notes from last night:

---

books

---

it’s mine baby!!!!

i got the new sally rooney and i am so fucking excited!!

also,

when i was at the bookstore,

i found this for such a great deal,

and of course, spiritually,

i bought it for

Janu

, lover of space:

i love you

Janu

!!!!!

go subscribe to janu (or you are out of your mind)

but also, coffee table books!

i wrote in my post 10 tactics for overcoming writer’s block about how important coffee tables are! go check it out!!

i can’t wait to see what this one will inspire me to dream about!

i really want to write another space-inspired post!!!!
i was a supernova and he was a black hole: end of a friendship

---

introducing the weekly readings

---

album cover: idles — “joy as an act of resistance”

i'm a real boy
boy and i cry
i love myself
and i want to try
this is why you never see your father cry
this is why you never see your father cry
this is why you never see your father

i kissed a boy and i liked it

man up
sit down
chin up
pipe down
socks up
don't cry
drink up
don't whine
this is why
this is why
this is why

this is why
this is why
this is why

---

Luisa

This means that the only scenario in which Substack will remove far-right extremists or any type of harmful content is when people are in physical danger. As if online threats aren’t real. As if cyberbullying isn’t real.

There are so many women, POCs, and queer people who have become the target of violent men on this website. They have been sexually harassed and called racial and homophobic slurs. Worst of all, they will continue to be targets as long the right to do it exists within this platform.

This week,

sarah cucchiara

from people’s princess and

Amanda!

from Certified got their latest piece stolen, plagiarized, and mocked by a man. Word for word, he replicated their entire work and only changed the word “men” for “women.” This is a vile act that can only be understood as pure misogyny. The worst part? Substack allows it, all in the name of “free speech”

why are there weirdos in my comments?

---

we are under attack,

and we always will be.

these people hate us,

and much has been written about why:

our happiness is what they hate most.

this is why they attack us when we are being happy.

we must raise up voices like

Luisa

’s when she strikes back:

but not only must we strike back,

because we are not here to fight:

we are here to be joyful,

we are here to love each other,

we are are to always remember:

our joy is an act of resistance.

---

see below for 6 additional weekly readings

---

photo my own

---

Valerie

If you’re happy the way you are, no beauty product or collagen powder can be advertised to you as essential. Shareholders would prefer it if we hated ourselves just enough to seek salvation: since total self-hatred would lead to indifference towards any form of improvement, we need to feel like the solution is right around the corner. Marketers know this. Influencers know this. Our purchasing power is reliant upon our being desperate sad but not hopeless sad — you need to be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel so you can buy more stuff to ease, or shall we say postpone, your suffering. The beauty and wellness industries, disingenuous as they are, continue to perpetuate these lies, convincing us that the pursuit of the ultimate aesthetic is not just achievable, but somehow empowering, doable, and good for you. No matter how many lip oils you own or how long you go without dinner, there will always be a new way to feel inferior. In Dialectic of Enlightenment, a defining work on mass culture by M. Horkheimer and T. Adorno dating all the way back to 1947, still surprisingly relevant and evergreen, it says: “The culture industry perpetually cheats its consumers of what it perpetually promises... The promise is illusory: all it actually confirms is that the real point will never be reached, that the diner must be satisfied with the menu.” Living in oscillation between self-hatred and knowing that your greatest fix just might await you at the esthetician’s office, the gym, or your local Sephora aisle both keep the $617.2 billion beauty industry, coupled with diet culture, afloat.

self-hatred and a diet coke

---

cass 💌

but, you know what?

it is okay that i don’t know exactly who i am yet. it will take time to figure out, and i have plenty of time (even though i often feel like i don’t!).

it is okay if, in the process of unmasking, people decide that i am too distant, or don’t smile enough, or make enough eye contact, or engage in enough stimulating small-talk. those are not the people who i want to surround myself with anyway. i want to surround myself with people who love me for exactly who i am, who cherish and appreciate me, who want to be around me. i deserve that!

it is okay.

it. is. okay.

it is a process and i must take the time to listen to myself, care for myself, and support myself. 

it is not a race. 

and to my fellow neurodivergent community,

be kind to yourselves. you are amazing exactly as you are and you deserve to exist authentically. 

who even am i?

---

michela

Many times in my life, I’ve always seen myself as lacking—not enough for others, not enough for the beautiful things that happened to me. I’ve always been an introverted person, more out of necessity than choice. A necessity born from not wanting to be negatively judged for being myself. My old self considered this shyness a ‘safe zone’ , a place to feel secure from the world, without realizing the loneliness it brought.

For several years now, since I started my university journey, I’ve been trying to change this part of myself, a part I’ve never truly felt was mine. A mask I sewed onto myself to be invisible, away from others' judgment.

I spent a lot of time turning over my thoughts due to my lack of courage to challenge myself to change the things that made me unhappy.

But now, I’m facing my 20s with a different perspective. There are times when being myself and exposing more of who I am makes me feel different, more authentic. It’s a feeling I’m not at all familiar with, but deep down, it helps me see the world from a different angle.

It’s important to challenge ourselves and understand who we are in doing so. On several occasions, I find myself not overthinking the countless consequences that might arise, simply throwing myself into the authenticity of who I am and who I want to be.

Our twenties are also for this: to turn the page from the person we were and to embrace and accept our new selves, to discover who we are and who we want to become.

am I being too hard on myself?

---

Liv ₊˚౨ৎ˚₊

Despite thinking that I could never be loved — platonically or romantically — because of how I look, I have met such great and genuine people from adolescence to adulthood; people who I am still friends with from high school who never cared about the visible hair on my body, people I have met in my university years so far that never gave me judgemental vibes when talking to me. I’ve met people who have inspired me to be comfortable in my own skin; to not care about others’ perceptions of me, and to live my life how I want to. 

I wish I could tell the confused little girl and the disconsolate teenager that people will love her for who she is. She will find people who don’t care about the hair on her arms or her face. I would tell her to wear the shirts she wants to and stop caring about what people will think about it. 

And to my future self, I hope that I can learn to be kinder and to give myself some grace. 

This Is My “Girlhood”

---

edgard

this is about every immigrant kid who's ever had to translate for their parents at a doctor's appointment. it's about every international student who's ever felt homesick for a language. it's about every person who's ever felt like they're living in the hyphen between two cultures.

if you've only spoken english to me, you don't know me

---

Lex

now that I am here, in this moment, in front of my fire, with the moon hanging so graciously above me, and the cicadas singing—I realize the myth that is ‘arriving.’ 

your future, your dream moment. we are indeed where we need to be, in the times when we wish we were further, or had the life of someone else. I have the upmost respect for the part of me that wants to learn above all else, and move forward, and be everything—but I forgot to take moments to remember myself as the glorious author of everything I am. (emphasis mine)

it’s always dark in massachusetts .. how I illuminated my own path

---

---