Celia, the day is November 25th, 2020. Querida Celia, the day is, oh god, December 26th. 23rd today's december 23rd happy merry christmas eve eve eve right so i graduate in one two three four days the day today is may 18th 2021 the day is june 2nd 2021 the day is february 15th And it is 1.43 a.m. I hope that when you listen to this, I'm super ready. And it's going to be very fun. Okay, that's all. Love you, bye! Dear Celia.
Okay. I think this works now. Okay. There's too much happening. Okay. Today is... I don't know what day it is, actually. Today is... Tuesday, January 7th. And welcome to the new season of the podcast. And honestly, there's kind of a lot going on. And where do we begin? No, I'm not going to apologize for it. This is my setup right now, and it will change. And I'm wearing... I'm wearing a Mexico jersey under here. This setup will change probably, but right now this is what we're doing.
And, oh my god, I literally, I can't even, no, I can't remember the last time I recorded a podcast. But I'm recording on the camcorder, so if we lose, if we lose power, es por eso. But, oh my gosh. Guys, it's 2025. Look, I have my little mug over here. If this looks like it's water, it is. Thank you. You're right. You're right. Because I'm dehydrated and I need to drink water. But it's 2025. Isn't that crazy? Isn't that absolutely insane that it's already 2025?
Today is January 7th, 2025. I didn't even say the year. Literally in my brain, it still feels like it's 2017. I don't even know what this episode is going to be called. New year. New me.
Say me no new year better me New Year say me but better no, I don't know what it's gonna be called leave If you're watching if you're seeing this you already know what it's gonna be called But I feel like I want to make this episode a little deep, honestly, because over break, I had a lot of thoughts, as I usually do. and i was waiting for this fancy mic setup to arrive so i didn't record anything but when i was home in my childhood bedroom
I started to just reflect a lot on how much has changed, how much I've changed. And I just... like i'm very proud and i'm also very sad in a way and i got very sad thinking about how much has changed because when i was little i wrote a poem about this and it ended up resonating with a lot of people too But when I was little, I feel like I kept dreaming to be...
25 or 24 I kept dreaming to be the age that I am now and I was telling one of my best friends this I said hey you know in a lot of ways I have my dream life And I am my dream person from that 12 year old self. And that's beautiful and also really scary because that comes with a lot of expectation of. being the person that she created in her head and a lot of in a lot of ways I am and a lot of things are also outside of my control like I know
Ugh, this is gonna expose me so bad. This is gonna expose me so bad. But whatever. This is good. You know, this is a safe zone. This is a safe zone. But when I was little, I would write letters to... my future husband and i think i i probably already have made a tick tock about that but tick tock who knows if that's gonna be there but when i was little i would write letters to my future husband and i still have a couple of them somewhere
but it would be like to open on valentine's day or to open on to open when you meet the one and so some of them were letters to him and some of them were letters to me And I went back and I read some of those letters like years ago. This wasn't this last vacation, this last whatever when I was home. I'm tired. Excuse me. 25 is, I'm old. But I was reading them and so much of my worth was attributed to not if I had accomplished my dreams, not if I had gone to the school that I wanted to go to.
none of that which in itself still isn't still shouldn't have been giving me that sense of worth because my worth is so much more than just where i end up going to school what degree i end up getting what job i end up getting it's so much more than that but at the time I didn't even think about that which is what little academic validation me normally thought of but I thought of it more of I hope that you've met the one
I hope that you have your future husband. And I gave that man a name in everything. Like, it was crazy. Because I was like, no, we need to manifest it. We need to manifest it. And it started showing up in my life.
in really weird ways and i remember i was i've said this so many times this is such a broken record but i've only been in two real relationships and then like one situationship type of thing which we don't talk about no no we'll talk about it but it was weird because when i was in my most serious relationship the first time that i went to his house
his wi-fi or went to his apartment or dorm or whatever his wi-fi had a name you know like usually it'll be like whatever like blah blah internet company name numbers but this man's internet router had like a full name like a a person's name and guess guess what the name was just guess guess i'm not gonna tell you obviously because then every person with that name is gonna be like it's me but it's it had the
the wi-fi my then boyfriend's wi-fi had the same name that i had decided had to be my future husband's name at 12. and i was like 19 now And I was like, that's crazy. That's just a coincidence. That's just a coincidence. No, it wasn't. It was literally my guardian angels like whispering in my ear like, girl, this is not the one.
Run. What are you doing? What are you doing? Mama is like, yeah, déjalo en paz. But that happened. Whatever. And then my best friend and I... bless her heart love love her love us both she'd also put a name to hers and so i kept telling me like telling myself like oh yeah like they'll both come into our lives at the same time like we manifested this whole entire thing
And I'm saying this now because before I wouldn't talk about it because I was like, no, if I talk about it, it's not going to come true. And now this is going to sound so sad, but I feel like I've made my peace with it not happening. And not to say I'm like... I'm like, I'm not, it's not that I'm, it's not that I've given up on it, but in a way I kind of have, but I think it's good for me.
to not and I don't know like interpret that as you will but so I kept telling myself like okay that'd be crazy but whatever like we live in different places Later on, two years later, maybe three years later, when I'm doing research in Maryland, I'm... I go to this little, they had like a bar, like a party or something that the post packs were going to go to. And it was this like board game bar.
so it's like you went and I don't really drink so I was like okay I don't even like board games honestly I don't know why I went because my roommate wanted to go and I love my roommate and so I went with her and some of our other friends and so we go
and we're all like sitting at the table and i'm such a hopeless romantic when i was younger i was such a hopeless romantic that i feel like anytime i had the opportunity to meet new people i was like oh my god what if i meet my husband oh my god like And I'm like, girl, just enjoy it. Just let it be what it is. It doesn't have to be this huge thing. Anyways. Anyways.
So I'm there at this, like, board game bar type of thing. And this guy arrives late. And I was like, okay, like, this guy's cute. Like, whatever. And I'm, like, sitting with my friends. He ends up sitting next to me. And we're, like, doing introductions, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so he introduces himself. with guess what name and i was like okay all right that's a weird coincidence and then his friend who's next to him introduces himself with the name that my best friend
had put for her future husband in our little journals. And when I, I, the world, the world stopped. I was like, oh my God. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. I think I texted her and I was like, oh my god, bro. Oh my god. The problem with that, obviously this person was not my future husband by any means.
Wish them well. Wish them all well. Lejos de mi. Thank you. The problem with creating this idea in your head that I didn't necessarily understand when I was younger Or maybe I did and I chose to ignore it because I needed it to survive somehow. Is that when you create this idea of somebody else that you expect to come into your life.
You are accepting that your life is lacking. And what I mean by that is by constantly telling myself like, oh, like it's going to happen, it's going to happen, it's going to happen, it's going to happen. I was telling the universe. it's not happening and in a way that was the echo that got back to me of it's not happening and then it's not happening it's not happening it's not happening And in a lot of ways, I had to experience that because I remember when I was younger, I was so annoyed.
about the fact that my parents were like, no, like, don't date when you're young, like, blah, blah, blah, like, focus on school. Like, I was like, why? And in a way, it was also, it was hard because I got really, really good at that. relying on academic validation and then there it was kind of this switch when I did start dating where instead of academic validation being my primary sense of worth now it was how do people see me how do people like me
How can I be somebody's partner? I can't love myself until somebody else loves me. I can't think I'm beautiful unless somebody else tells me I'm beautiful. And it's so weird.
being older and i know i know i have like younger listeners too and i'm going to tell you this now because i think perspective is really important and i i wish i'll get into this too because i think i i do want to talk about this but If I had had my brain, my fully matured frontal lobe perfection cortex of a brain, when I was younger, I would have moved. so differently.
Instead of seeing it as a deficit in my part, I think it's a really beautiful advantage because I'm able to feel things very deeply. And because I'm able to feel things, I'm able to work through things. And in part, that's because of a lot of therapy. But I think it's also now having the perspective of, say I did go through another breakup. Okay, great. I've survived.
I've survived plenty of them say I do fail an exam okay great I've survived say I don't get into the school I wanted to get into for whatever reason okay great like like any at this point as you get older
You've experienced so many things that you're like, I've survived that. I've handled it. Everything will be okay. And same thing goes for when you... like I said when I was younger I kept comparing myself to my this is gonna make me cry holy shit I did not expect that I kept comparing my present self to my future self so say I was like 12 13 14 me at that age would compare me to who I was going to be at 25
and it's I never really had this like I think it's very easy on social media to feel jealous and to compare yourself and do all these things but in a sense the person that I was always comparing myself to was me but the better version me but the older version me but that had her shit together version me but the has a nice boyfriend version has a nice house version like and in a way that was really harmful
because I never let myself just exist as who I was and I really thought about that over this break because I was like I'm 25 I'm 25 like that's it I don't even fathom that and in a lot of ways I feel 25 and in a lot of ways I still feel the ages I felt that I was comparing myself to but now being the person that they kept comparing themselves to i'm not like yeah you should have been like me bro you you should have had your shit together you should have had your
you should have been less depressed you should have been more beautiful you should have put on more makeup no i don't think that at all i don't think that at all and if you need a message from your future self right now if you're a lot like me which you might be i hold so much love for my past self and i honestly honestly believe that she was just trying her best and
Everything she did wrong, everything she did right, she didn't know. She didn't know any better. She didn't know how somebody was going to treat her. She didn't know how that relationship was going to end up. She didn't know. that sometimes signs can just be signs names can just be names they don't have to mean that's your future husband they don't have to mean you have to go to that party they don't have to mean anything they mean what you want them to mean
And there were so many times that I would force myself to do things, especially in college, bro. Like, ugh. I've always been a very rule follower. type of person and so I didn't really go to any parties in high school not that I was invited to any parties either but like I
I didn't mind that. Like, I would watch the little high school movies and the American high school movies and be like, oh my God, like, las fiestas, a mí no me invitan en ningún lugar. But then at the same time, I'd be like, but I don't... i had like social anxiety i'm like i don't want to go so it's kind of like this dance of i want to but i don't i want to but i really don't like really like like you know when you have to cancel plans and you're like ah damn
You hate to see it. That was supposed to sound sarcastic for those that can't see my face. But... When I was in college, I would force myself to go to parties because the people that I was hanging out with really like going to parties and Sure, sometimes it was fun I'm not going to die. Sometimes it's fun to dance. I love dancing. But sometimes it's just annoying when you're like the most sober person there.
And you've had the same conversation with the same person three times because they're too drunk to remember. And you're like, why am I here? And I always think of that Alessia Cara song that's like, truly, I ain't got no business here.
and she's talking about the how she's at the party that she doesn't want to be at and i felt like that so many times and i also had such a bad sense of self that i i honestly thought nobody cared about me and that if something happened to me nobody would mind which is sad it's really really like even saying that out loud like makes me want to weep and i'm not saying that to be like oh yeah like feel bad for me but it's
I would be that person that would like stay behind to see if somebody noticed. And my friends would start getting annoyed with me and stuff. But it wasn't that I was doing it to be annoying. It was that I was doing it because I genuinely felt. That if I wasn't there nobody would notice. That's so sad. That's so sad. Damn. And sometimes.
They would, and sometimes they would and they would get mad at me for being that way. But I didn't necessarily... know why I was being that way and I think that's that's hard and that's harmful in the sense literally I'm crying guys no no oh anyways end of the podcast no no but it's when you're that little and it is little
Like, I remember feeling like 17 and 18 was so old, and I felt like such an adult, and I was so excited to be an adult. And in a lot of ways, I was. In a lot of ways, I grew up really fast. Moving across the country makes you grow up really fast. And... It feels like a lifetime ago now. That's what I mean. When I say that things feel like such a big deal in the moment and then you grow up and you're like, oh, that thing that I was super upset about.
Was seven years ago. That person that made fun of me. I've never spoken to them again. That person that rejected me. I have no idea what's happening in their life anymore. I don't care. I don't care. And it... I feel like when it first happens, you say that, but you don't mean it. Like, oh, yeah, like, I don't care, like, whatever. And then you see whatever your ex with someone new, and you're like, no! But it's... Then...
It's five years later and you're like, I probably couldn't even recognize that person in the street right now. And they probably wouldn't recognize me. And if they did, we would still walk our separate ways.
And that would be okay. That would be okay. And... I'm the youngest in my family, so I've never been a big sister to anybody. And I've always wanted to be. But I always felt... that I didn't know how to be and I think social media in a way has been really healing for me which is crazy because sometimes there's a lot of bad shit and sometimes you know the hate comments do be getting to me a little bit
But for the most part, it's very healing in that this person that I've created online, that you see here in this little rectangle, is who I am. And is who I'm going to be. And who I have been. And that was one of the biggest reasons why I wanted to create content. And even just being able to watch videos of myself from years ago. And how much I've grown. And how much I've changed. And how much my mentality has shifted to...
Instead of always expecting something to be better, accepting that it's good right now. Because it is. It doesn't have to be perfect to be something that you love. You don't have to be an expert to have the hobby. And even today, I was about to be like, oh, I need to go put on makeup because I look kind of weird. And then I was like, but it...
I love makeup. I love makeup. Don't get me wrong. I love putting it on for me. I wouldn't have been putting it on for me. I would have been putting it on because I would have... preface with oh no like sorry that i look so bad guys like i don't look bad i'm just on my couch talking to this beautiful amazing microphone to my little camcorder that i
My eighth grade graduation was recorded on this camera. Isn't that crazy? And now it sells for like thousands of dollars probably. But it's... I spent so long. Wishing to be who I am that I almost didn't realize when I became her And I'm glad I'm realizing it Because I would hate, you know, would it suck to never meet your soulmate, to never have a partner, to be alone for the rest of your life? Yeah, maybe. Sure.
it still wouldn't suck as bad as if I kept comparing myself to my 40 year old version my 60 year old version and being like i haven't done as much i i'm not as confident i'm not this blah blah blah blah and then suddenly i'm 100 and i don't know where my life went because i spent all of it comparing not myself to others but myself to myself Myself to who I could have been to who I have yet to be And so I never took the time to be like hey This is who you are And that's pretty damn great
You don't have to have it all together. You don't have to know what the next step is. Sometimes you gotta go back and forth a little shimmy. A little shimmy shimmy. And I... It's sad to know that now because so much time has passed, but I only know that because so much time has passed, if that makes sense. So I think don't be hard on yourself if you're younger.
and you're having a lot of these same feelings but just know that you know i used to always put those things on pinterest that's like this too shall pass the i used to pin the little things a little quote i was like when is it gonna pass when when and then it passes and i don't say that for everything
i'm talking about this specific situation of how i felt about my romantic self because i think i saw this one video that kind of annoyed me where someone was like oh finally the romantic girl is like lost she's lost hope and love or what like First of all, that's none of your business. Second of all, I haven't. I've just shifted my hope. I've put it in a different basket, if you will. And instead of
Let's look at it this way instead of keeping my house at a temperature that I don't want it at because I feel like it'll be somebody else's favorite temperature I'm putting it at however. I want it. It's my house. I'm the one that lives here Why am I saving? And when I was writing that poem about the garden, I was talking about how now I'm stranded in this garden that I've cultivated and built.
And I've been so distracted saving space for you that I've started to let the flowers wilt. That isn't the exact thing. It was this idea of if you keep... If you keep waiting for the future, obviously the present is going to pass. And it's like, why am I not good enough to just be? And I have so many dreams.
for 2025 that have nothing to do with whether i am or am not in a relationship like that has nothing to do with me that's like honest honestly god's plan la virgencita de guadalupe's plan bro like Because there's so much more to life. There's so much more to life. And I feel like if I, if I stayed in that, and I'm not saying this of like, if you're a romantic, that's bad. No, I'm saying this for me. Me, that was bad. You live your life. That's your life. That's your life.
This Diario Romántico, this is my diary. So you're stuck reading it with me and listening to it with me. Unless you want to go, which is okay. It was nice to see you. Bye. But it's... It got to the point where I was like, why is this such a big fucking deal in my life? Why? Honestly, I have yet to ever be in a relationship with a man. That has made me feel is whole and beautiful and wonderful as I make myself feel as my friends help make me feel Because they genuinely care and I don't
I feel like whenever I'm in a relationship, I'm playing this part of perfect girlfriend, perfect Celia, perfect person. And at some point, I realize that it's not that I wanted.
It's not that I forced myself to be perfect. It's that going into it, I felt that if I wasn't perfect, they wouldn't love me. And it's a really shitty way to feel. And I think... it's not always that somebody else does that to us but so often we do it to ourselves and so often relationships don't work out because each person is doing it to themselves individually so it's like these two repulsive magnets
That they both like each other but it just won't work. You could argue, which I will argue, that that in itself is a reason not to be with someone. Because if neither of you feels comfortable being your honest to God authentic self, why are you trying to force it so bad?
That also took me a long time to realize because I was like no like it would have worked out if we could have just talked if blah blah blah blah blah blah It was never gonna work out for me for me with this this the people that i'm thinking about that i'm not going to disclose because it's like that's water under my bridge bro like bye smooth sailing or whatever the saying is in english but i talk about this
Not because I'm not over it. I talk about this because if I had known that this is how I would feel when I was older, again, I would not... have felt that it was the end of the world when it happened and I think if I can give that advice right now to a younger version of me to a younger version of you
to a future version of you to a future version of me who knows what's gonna happen i want to and even just speaking i think i need to like speak out my thoughts and the way that i feel about all this because it's it was just kind of in my brain And usually when I write poems, I use that as a form of therapy and it's very cathartic for me. But it's also nice to not feel like I have to construct this really beautiful thing. And I can just be.
That's gonna make me cry too. Damn. Damn, bro. I was not mentally prepared for this conversation. Wow. I'm not even faking it. This is like real tears. anyways and it's just hard because i i i got on social media when i was pretty young not posting but i i always wanted to be
Like, even this week, a lot of people were tagging me as, like, their favorite influencer. And I felt that so personally. And I felt like I was... like my my little self was kind of being seen because she's the one that wanted that so badly not that I don't want that I love love love being somebody that you can come and spend time with and
hopefully give good advice like all I would ever want to be is some sort of good role model if I can be because I've been very lucky but I've also worked incredibly hard and If I can do it, you can do it. And I think sometimes you just need to hear that. And sometimes you just need to see that. And some people get mad and they're like, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then I'm like, block button.
When I was 16, the people that I was following. It's not that they inspired me to be myself. It's that I was inspired to be a version of them.
because I was like that's who I have to be to be liked and that's who I have to be to be wanted and I have to dress this way and look this way and that's what society always tells us too and I think in the back of my head in the back of my mind you died and i didn't even cry no in the back of my head i think i almost made the subconscious promise with myself that if i ever
ever was to become that lucky to have people see me in that way I wouldn't want them to be me I would want them to be them because I you would be able to see that I got to where i got by being myself and that's what i try so hard that's why i don't use any filters in my pictures anymore if you look back to when i was in college i would use facetune on some of my pictures and i wasn't even posting
like an influencer like a content creator like literally me and my two friends and i was so insecure about my acne i didn't even have that much acne and it's like it shouldn't have been that big of a deal but I would have facetuned my teeth to be whiter because I was like, no, I can't have yellow teeth. Like, I'll look ugly, blah, blah, blah. And I, the other day, someone told me something that blew my mind.
many things blow my mind these days because I'm like damn like that's good write that down but somebody said I think it was like a Brene Brown video but they were discussing how the way that you're mean to others is how you're sub the way how you're mean to yourself is how you're subconsciously mean to others whether you know it or not so me i was thinking of all the times that i've like hated on myself for whatever reason and i'm like damn
i don't want to be judging other people for that that makes me feel kind of fucked up like i don't want to do that i don't want to be that kind of person like i want to accept people as they are and be be someone that they can come to with no social battery when they just need a place to stay when they're they want to feel safe and seen and heard like that's who i want to be for others I had to be that for myself in order to get to that point. And I think that's really important. But...
Yeah, I think I feel very lucky and very honored that so many of you have followed my journey for so many years. I'm glad that I was able to grow because I think when I first started social media, it was almost like my last effort to be kind to myself. And I don't know if it was entirely kind at first because when you grow up being bullied, to put yourself in a situation where you might get bullied again is really hard and it's really painful.
and it's almost like masochistic in a way is that the word of like enjoying pain because i knew that it could be painful but it was also like high risk high reward baby you know like and now i'm really really thankful to that past version of me at 20 at 21 i'm thankful for all the mistakes that she made because it allowed me to learn from them
And I almost, I do see myself as a different person now, but I don't see her as someone that's bad or someone that I hate or someone that I killed off. I know a lot of those trends are like, who are you? Blah, blah, blah. Like I killed my old self. I don't see it. I hold a lot of respect and love for her. And I think she'd be very proud of me. But she would never know how proud I am of her Okay, all right, but it's
Life is hard. And growing up is hard. And experiencing things for the first time is very hard. And you have to have a lot of grace and kindness for yourself in those moments. And remember that there is... A future version of you that's really rooting for you, whether you know it or not, you can feel it. You can feel it. You can feel it in this podcast right now.
Just imagine all your future selves are whispering how much they love you and how much they adore you and how excited they are for this year. Not just this year, but every year. And 2025 just feels kind of magical.
And I don't know why, but I think, no, I know why. It feels magical because we're going to make it magical. And it's not going to be by doing anything too crazy or changing ourselves in some... drastic way it's just we are magic you're inherently magical so obviously your year is going to be magical too i think that's all i'm going to do for this podcast
because hopefully the setup works and if it doesn't i'm gonna have to change it thanks for listening to me cry for like i don't even know how long pero now i'm gonna go make dinner i think i'm gonna make a chocoflan today my new year's resolution is to cook more mexican food because i have to be a good tia celia and i don't know if i'll ever be a mama celia but
I can be a good Tia Celia right now. And that's what matters. And so I'm going to maybe go make a chocoflan. I got a heart butt cake pan. Oh, my God. But I think I might have needed. an eight to twelve cups one and i only got a six cups one so if this doesn't work out i'm gonna be really sad but i'm gonna put it on instagram i think i'm gonna post this i'm not even gonna edit this yeah i'm just gonna post because
I realize that so often I'm not posting on YouTube because I get too in my head about it. Or I'm not posting on the podcast because I'm like, nobody wants to hear what I have to say. But then I went back and I watched my own YouTube video that I made. a long time ago and back then when i i posted i was like oh my god i look so bad like they're gonna judge me like i'm gonna judge me and i did because i was judging myself i mean and then when i looked back i just started crying
Because I'm like, she's so beautiful. And she's so little. And she had no idea that she was doing her best. And she felt like her best wasn't good enough. But it was. Because her best allowed me to become me. and my best is gonna help my future version become her future version but right now i can just enjoy where i am and it's not that i want to be a new person in 2025 it's that i i want to be more myself By myself. Which sorry. Sorry future husband bro. Así es la vida. You wait around and you.
no no but it's i'm excited to i feel like the last year was kind of like a lot of first dates with myself and i first dates with all the different versions of me that i was and good and bad and annoying and happy and sad and my god unintentional rhyme what can i say she's a poet but i think i've gotten enough dates now to Enough dates with myself to be in a loving relationship. And it was my half birthday a couple days ago. So I'm 25 and a half. I'm closer to 26 now. Which is crazy.
I feel like I couldn't even imagine life after 25 when I was little. And now I'm 25 and a half. And life keeps moving. Life keeps going. Life is very patient. I agree with that sentiment from the prior podcast. But also, the present deserves to be appreciated as much as the future. It should be just as romantic as the past without the nostalgia. And you...
You have no idea how proud your future version is of you. Even if you feel that nobody else is proud of you, even if you feel like a disappointment. They understand. And they know that you're trying your best. Okay, I'm gonna go before I start sobbing into the microphone again. Okay, thank you so much for watching.
listening um i'm gonna post this on youtube now we're gonna be a youtube girlie because if tiktok is bad bro i'm gonna be so sad i put a lot of work into that but that's okay and we roll with the punches baby But if you like this episode, please share it. Please like. Subscribe. Subscribes. No. Suscribete. Suscribete. Al YouTube. Oh, my God. I hang out a lot with my cousins. Muchas gracias. I feel like a singer with this thing. No. I can't even remember. I don't know why I can't remember.
I can't do it. My voice is breaking. All right. Wrap it up. Wrap it up. Love you. Bye. Wait. Bye.