Containing the Multitudes
Love Letter #12: Bringing back my monthly segment to remind everyone that I keep biting off more than I can chew.
A Love Letter To is my monthly series where I organize the chaos of what I’m loving and fixationg on in the past month.
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Categorization is something that feeds me but also annoys me. I’ve always loved organizing the chaos of my life. It makes me feel safe, in control, like everything I discover, love and consume has a purpose and an endpoint. This is why I thrive on Pinterest — which is probably the longest social media site I’ve had besides my Facebook.
This is also why I have at this moment — nearly 30 Pinterest boards, around 106 playlists on Spotify (and counting) and an endless stream of Instagram saved folders. These folders give my racing thoughts a soft place to land so they don’t crash on the concrete and evaporate before I can grab hold. With music especially, I constantly find myself curating playlists that fit a specific mood, a certain memory or a hard-to-define aspiration. I feel a need to categorize what I read too: checking off “finished” on my Goodreads and Fable or making specific lists of books that gave me a certain take away.
At the same time, categorization makes me nauseated. Especially, when I feel like I’ve been categorized in people’s mind in a certain way that doesn’t give me room to grow. For a recent work-related retreat, we all took personality quizes to help us learn more about our more than 100 different people in the department. Part of the personality quiz was putting us in an either extrovert or introvert category. I leaned more towards introvert, but statistically my manager pointed out that I was pretty much smack in the middle.
That following weekend, my friend reminded me of the term “ambivert” — which refers to someone being part-introvert and part-extrovert. Honestly, I don’t think I’m that special because most people are on the spectrum like this. It’s less about if the introvert or extrovert description is accurate to you, but more about how important it is to you.
Labels. They give us freedom but also stifle us at the same time. We want so desperately to be unique, one of a kind. And yet, we categorize: personality tests, zodiac signs, birth charts, Spotify Wrapped results, personal style aesthetics, etc. But these two things can co-exist together.
Because I’d like to think that using these labels is less about wanting to understand ourselves, but more about wanting to understand each other. We want to have some of these categories in the back of our head so when we meet someone else, we can say: “Me too!” Mentioning your zodiac sign or personality type immediately gives us a form of conversational shorthand that connects us with the person in front of us.
Regardless, it’s something I always lean on when I feel lost — categorizing and color coding my personality in a way that at the very least, makes sense to me. I’ve mentioned this on the newsletter before, but one of my dad’s favorite Nietzsche quotes was: “One must organize the chaos in one’s mind by thinking oneself back to one’s true needs.” The first part of the quote has always stuck with me more than the second part.
Organize the chaos.
Organize the chaos.
I still see flashes of my father’s sticky notes covered office sometimes. Some of them faded and crumpled, being held up by thin pieces of tape. Glimpses of old phone numbers, quotes and personal reminders. I imagine him in his office, scribbling these notes feverishly, like he was trying to catch snowflakes out of a storm. This is how I feel when I wake up in a cold sweat, a thought in my head that I can’t quite bring to life, but I can at least put it in a category — for the time being.
I get tangled up in these categories somethings, I admit. The lists become too long, the folders too hard to locate on my desktop. But I can’t give them up either. Overall, they’re a necessary anchor I need for my sense of self — my sense of tasetemaking, at the very least — and how I introduce myself to the dreaded question: “What do you do?”
But then at other times, when I hear someone describe me, I think; No that’s wrong. That’s not right. Even though they may be simply repeating a label that I probably gave myself at some point! I can’t blame people for simply echoeing what I’ve said about myself. None of us can blame the people in our lives for not understanding every nuance we feel in our soul. The only frusterating part is even I don’t know if what I’m saying is true or not. And then I wonder: who does know the truth?
This is partially why I feel the need to bring back this monthly segment of the newsletter — one that has evolved over time but was the first format I utilized on a consistent basis. It give me a chance to recoup, reflect, recycle thoughts and fixations that may be of use for me in the future. An end-of-the-month review to help contain the multitudes.
“Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” — Walt Whitman
Because in truth, even though that’s a quote I live by, I have trouble containing them all sometimes. At times, it feels like the folders, boxes and file cabinets start to overflow like a hundred-year-old dam. And the things that start to overflow aren’t because of sheer quantity, but because there are certain things in my life that can’t be organized into a neat box or notebook.
So instead, I allow the aspects of this abstract mess to breathe and live on its own. And most importantly, I give myself permission to look into a box, see what I categorized in there and move it somewhere else.
Yours, Arbela. 💌
🎧 recent listens:
“High Violet” — The National. I’ve been re-listening to this album like a soothing meditation; before bed, during walks, in the shower, over and over and over. Even though the lyrics are incredible, my listening of The National usually consists of just letting the words, echeos and voices all blend togther. But with this re-listen, I’ve been paying more attention…like the beginning of the song, Sorrow: “Sorrow found me when I was young.”
“A Private Road” — Laura Groves. With vocals that remind me of Madonna, production that has whispers of Enya and an overal atmosphere that echoes the earnest emotion of the 1980s, this album may be one of my favorites of the year. The slow yet deeply intentional pace of each track takes me into a total trance, and there’s the words: “There's nothing to talk about. It's so good to feel a moment facing out, to our heartbeat.”
The track, “French Movie” by Loner, continues to haunt me and inspire me. I’ve been listening to it at least 3 times a week since I came across it last September.
📚 on my nightstand:
“My Husband” — Maud Ventura. I’ll never say no to a book about obsession. This books takes you into the head of a woman who’s lin love with her husband — seems normal enough — but as you read more, the story gets more twisted until you don’t know what to believe. A disturbing portrait of not only how our fixations can get the best of us, but also an honest portrayal of the often unequal structure within heterosexual marriages.
“Blue Horses” by Mary Oliver. I always take the longest to finish poetry books — on purpsose. This short collection by Mary Oliver was gifted to me by a friend and I took my time — line by line — to read and re-read each poem. “No Matter What” is still one I come back to like a prayer:
No matter what the world does,
some things don’t alter with time.
The first kiss, the first death.
The sorrowful sweetness of rhyme.
“The Posession” by Annie Ernaux. Since wolfing this down in under three days, I’ve already ordered two more of Ernaux’s books because I’m desperately wanting to make my way back into her head. A memoir that is written like an envious fever dream, “The Posession” is part of the reason I feel myself digging out of a reading slump — and craving more stories on envy and obsession.
“Sharp Objects” by Gillian Flynn. I wanted a spooky read for October, and boy did this deliver. This is one of those books that makes you feel sick and unwell. But that’s a testament to Flynn’s writing; the texture with which she writes Camille’s dark thoughts, the pulsating tension throughout the book and the overall feeling of sitting on a pin cushion the whole time. I love mysteries like this that manage to tell the psychological story of the character alongside a gripping mystery they’re uncovering.
