And that’s when we realized that we are not ‘high maintenance’, but simply hungry, living on emotional crumbs for too long, and that when we express that weI have any appetite at all, that we were being ‘too much’, that we need to continue to not only strive to be physically thin, but emotionally lean as well.

That when we say that we are bone tired, reduced to the last inch of our rope, because we have over-functioned, as family, culture, society, and our internal selve told us, that being exhausted is not an identity or a trophy to be displayed, but our bodies being communicative and sending healthy signals that we need rest.

We are not being ‘high maintenance’ when we feel feelings. That allowing humans to feel rage, sorrow, loss, jealousy, will not ‘spoil’ children, as we were told growing up, and in fact, the emotional literacy and capacity to self-regulate would produce the very opposite of ‘being spoiled’.

That we are no longer interested (nor ever was, but perhaps did not return to our selves yet to know this enough), that existing for others’ convenience, pleasure, credit and general exploitation does not equate to being ‘high maintenance’. That refusing to be ‘agreeable’ or ‘respectable’ to prioritize wellness has nothing to do with ‘high maintenance’. 

Rather, it is simply maintenance. And even that, the need for me to maintain ourselves in any simple capacity can potentially be seen as ‘high’. That requiring any maintenance is seen as a threat, and hence the intended slur. Why is it that when we choose to rest, others call it ‘lucky’? As if, by a stroke of luck, we won the jackpot to meet our needs for a moment.

Mimi
Founder, spirit communicator and Wu shamanic occultist