Evolution is a subtle transformation stretched across millions of years.

I now turn 35. I must have already evolved hundreds of thousands of times albeit in small and unnoticeable ways. Yet I am no longer the person I was 5 or 10 years ago. Some of my values and beliefs have shifted the more I learn from this world. I have gone thru a pandemic. I have faced bitter truths that erased the fantasies and romance of youth. I have learned that happiness is something I have to win for myself and should not delegate to someone else.

And still, many things remain unchanging like how I’m drawn to people and their stories. How I still offer up my heart to whoever it crashes towards.

I had written birthday wishes to someone just a few days ago. And my birthday wishes to him are the sort of things I’d like to receive myself.

I wish I’d be able to look back in my life all worn out, energy expended, heart and life given away. I wish I were courageous, brave against the fears that are constantly being projected to me by my surroundings—a Florence Nightingale who overcomes the fear taught to her by her parents and society.

I wish I was always out of breath from trying, pursuing, and feeling. And I wish my rest is always deep and happy and tired from a full day. I wish I would continually seek my northern star despite a noisy world full of distractions, full of detours, and lies.

I wish I would love myself in the way I had always wanted to be loved by someone. In full acceptance of my imperfections and always cheering for myself, always believing that no matter what, I am my own home.

I wish I would laugh whenever the opportunity presented itself and not take myself too seriously all the time. I wish I would always, always choose connection despite my fears of rejection and scars from the past.

I wish that I would always choose people over things, temperance over indulgence, forgiveness over anger, bravery over fear.

Happy birthday, self. I love you.