returning to the drawing board
imposter syndrome and intentionality and coming back to myself
I am a firm believer that one can assess the the stages of their heartbreak solely through the content on their Tik Tok feed. Stage 1 predominantly includes (but is not limited to) other users going through heartbreak. They are sad, and you are sad, and there is sad music, and there are sad comments, and the light at the end of the hypothetical tunnel is nowhere to be seen. Stage 2 includes what I like to call “False Hope Tik Tok” and this is where I found myself four years ago, nearly to the day. It is the side of Tik Tok that presents you with tarot card readings, or the initial of the person who you are meant to be with, and other “signs” that give you hope that “your person will come back”, all you have to do is comment to “claim” and “follow” and “like for more” — perhaps purchase a reading online — and soon enough you will be reunited with your happily ever after. Did I comment “claim” on more than 10 occasions? Yes. Did I contemplate purchasing a reading? Yes. Was I convinced they could be my soulmate? Quite possibly so. (This is not to shade Tarot readings, by the way, I personally found that a hefty amount were on my FYP during my heartbreak, much of them leaving me with a clouded reality.)
As I was not-so-smoothly exiting the trenches of the Tarot Tik Tok, erasing any idea that they would, indeed, come back, my FYP eventually landed on Stage 3: the healing phase. Self-care tips, self-discovery journeys, learning to find yourself in your newfound independence. Inspiring, hopeful, uplifting. Lots of journaling. Lots of We’re Not Really Strangers (at least for me). Lots of new outlooks on life. The light at the end of the tunnel, visible and within reach. On one occasion, my feed presented a poetry book, You’ll come back to yourself, a hand flipping through its pages as white on-screen text read, “whatever I land on is what you need to hear right now” — I do not often read poetry (although I wish I was a person who truly understood it), nor can I remember what the “landed on” poem was, but I felt a certain kind of calling to this book. I ended up buying a copy, reading and highlighting every other sentence, and eventually it became an artefact of the very early stages of my healing process.
It has been about four years since I have thought about that book. In fact, I ended up lending it to a friend who was going through heartbreak in 2021, and at that point in my life I had no time for Tik Tok because I was packing my belongings into two suitcases and a 55 liter backpack bursting at the seams, preparing to move from San Francisco to London by my lonesome. In three days from writing this — September 6 — I will have officially lived here, in England, for three whole years.
Sometimes, a word or phrase will get stuck in my head and I will not let myself stop thinking about it until I do something with it (the genesis of most of these Substack posts and lots of unfinished Notes app entries), and currently it is the sentiment “you’ll come back to yourself.” Whether I am repeating a book title or a common phrase, I do not know, but this time around, it feels less induced by heartbreak, more-so by other equally-as-unwanted-emotions-to-be-worked-through. To come back implies a departure from, and that much reigns true to these last few weeks. I have been struggling with feelings of self-comparison and imposter syndrome, and jealousy (which I hate to say, but it is true) repeatedly asking myself questions I cannot seem to find answers to: what am I even doing this for? If not for myself, then who? And if not who, then why? And now, days away from my three year anniversary with the city of London, I am attempting to come back to who I was at the start of it all, while I was packing all of the clothes and shoes and possessions I owned into my beloved Osprey.
For as long as my memory holds, I have always loved making things and writing about things and documenting things. I have a whole bookshelf of journals from the last 11 years, I have YouTube videos — public, private, and unlisted — from ages 10-16, and in both my current home and childhood home I have boxes upon boxes of memories: old concert tickets, every birthday card I have ever received because what if they pass away and I want to get their handwriting tattooed, plane tickets, random wristbands from random events, postcards. Some call it emotional hoarding, I call it memory collecting. As a child, school presentations were my favorite — despite being so anxiety ridden I missed a whole month of seventh grade — because it meant a trip to Michael’s (a craft store, not a human) with my mom to buy a poster board, and on our way to the check out till I would sneak some stickers, stencils, stationary, and glitter glue into the bright red cart. I also loved birthdays, whether my own or someone else’s, and holidays too, because it meant making handmade cards and party planning — I remember crafting Tiffany & Co themed birthday invites for my 16th birthday party, printed on none other than Tiffany blue card-stock paper, slid into a matching envelope and tied with a white, satin ribbon — and throughout my adolescence, two of my dream jobs were “florist” and “wedding planner.” No matter the project, birthday, or holiday — even April Fool’s Day — anything that required a trip to Michael’s (again, a store, not a human) had little Tatum absolutely stoked. My mom and her wallet — not so much.
At some point between my fifth grade presentation on the Pier 39 where I likely decorated a poster board in San Francisco themed stickers and images of the seals and the infamous crepe stand printed from the family computer, and eventually turning my “florist” dream job into a reality when I worked part time at the local flower shop in my early twenties, I decided to digitize my love for making things and documentation by treating my social media accounts sort of like an open diary. A digital scrapbook. A mood board, but in real life, but also online, if you will. Blurring the line between the analog and the digital. I began doodling musings over my photos, embellishing them in stickers and ribbons and anything else that was flat and scannable and made posting to Instagram less of an anxiety inducing activity and more of an ongoing art project that continues to this day. On Tik Tok I started sharing my creations and editing tutorials for anyone else who wanted a mini introduction to things like Photoshop and zines, although these days my account has turned into a hodgepodge of outfit videos and the occasional creative tutorial when I find the time because most of my hours during the week are spent in an office and most of my hours during the weekend are spent either seeing friends or doing life admin or neither or both. Adulthood :-(
My “artsy” social media posts never seemed to resonate with the people in my online circles — mainly those from my hometown — but they eventually started to garner (for the most part) positive attention from crowds of people on the internet who, like me, enjoy stickers and introspection and documentation and Pinterest and other cute things. As time went on, though, I felt a certain type of pressure — set upon myself by none other than myself — to upkeep an online presence, and then at some other point I felt the dilemma that people who post online tend to feel where they do not know if they are making art for themselves or for others, and then they go on Tik Tok and see other people doing exactly what they are doing which is objectively a good thing because it means there are more likeminded people out there with similar interests but for some reason they keep on doom-scrolling and keep on comparing and keep on doubting the authenticity and validity of what they do, and then they realize that perhaps they are dealing with envy and also a scarcity mindset which is quite simply Not The Vibe, and then they kind of start to spiral in the form of a Substack post because, after all, they started this Substack because they wanted to write for themselves, free from any desire of numbers, merely a void to shout their thoughts into.
My apologies. I digress.
The other day, I went to a cafe with a dear friend of mine — she is someone who occasionally shares her art and writing online (we met through Tik Tok), and once dealt with the feelings that I am dealing with right now — and we wound up talking about this and so much more. I felt embarrassed to admit my inner dilemmas, because in hindsight comparing yourself to other people online feels like a silly thing to worry about when 1. There are bigger issues and 2. You verbalize it, out loud. “No, it’s not embarrassing, it’s so valid,” she said. “It can feel so frustrating seeing people do something that you also want to do, but doing it more successfully. But you need to step back and remind yourself why you do it to begin with.” We ultimately came to two conclusions: To: 1. take the negative feelings and twist it into inspiration — to see someone accomplishing the things I want to accomplish and re-shift my brain to think, “Wow, this is inspiring to see someone do this, this means I can do it, too, in my own way.” and 2. return back to the drawing board and remember why I started creating; to be purposeful in what I choose to create and post and write and wear moving forward. To come back to myself and to create for myself.
(one of my comfort youtubers at the moment, Inayah. this video appeared on my feed last week and i cannot put into words just how much i needed to hear it. thank u Inayah <3)
Coincidentally, when I moved to London three years ago is the exact day I passed the “you’ll come back to yourself” baton to a friend who needed it most and here I sit today, on my anniversary with the city of London, far from heartbroken and instead questioning — or redefining — what it means to return to oneself. When I started having these negative feelings that I am so desperately trying to get rid of, I immediately went under my bed and into my memory box to pull out a very specific print I bought two-or-so years ago, from one of my favorite artists (and Youtuber) Shayna Klee. On one side is a painting of an angel floating through a hazy, pastel dreamscape holding a silver laptop, and on the other side is a text called “My internet angels are watching over me.” I hung it on my wall with a clip so I could flip it over whenever I wanted to read the affirmation. When I do, one line always seems to stand out from the rest: I prioritize enjoying the process over attachment to outcomes.
When I first started posting my creations, it was hardly with any end-goal of reaching a certain number, or even an audience. Much like I am with these Substack posts, I was (and am) grateful when 1 person would take the time to read an article I wrote or flip through a zine I made or comment on a silly video of my outfit, but what ultimately brought me joy was the process. Being in a creative flow, letting the ideas pour out of you, and then editing and cutting down and shuffling around until deciding the project is complete. My friend Hunter texted me a photo of a letter I had written him when he was one of five people to purchase my second zine back in 2020. I was so excited that someone — anyone — wanted to have a piece of my art on their shelves. And I still get excited whenever someone purchases a zine, or when a bookstore agrees to stock a copy or two. While lots of these posts steer in the direction of me wishing I had more time to participate in my hobbies, lately I’ve been finding myself excited to return home from work and create pages for my next zine. I am trying my best to prioritize the process over the outcome, prioritize making my zine over making a TikTok and checking how many people liked it, because at the end of the day, all I have ever wanted to do is make art, take up space, and hope that it might inspire someone else to do the same.
(I should also clarify that I do not necessarily think that scrolling on social media has to be a negative thing, because through the internet I have found a lovely and inspiring community of creative individuals, writers, zine-makers, mixed media artists, photographers, illustrators, fashion girlies — some whom I have even befriended in real life. Through posting online, I’ve made some lifelong friends, and for that I am eternally grateful. In my next zine, I even invited some of them to contribute a spread, and I am so excited to have our creations together in one place. It is a blessing to be able to call my friends my inspiration. When I say scrolling, I’m more-so referring to scrolling and scrolling and spiraling and inevitably letting comparison be the thief of joy.)
As I decipher what coming back to oneself means, I think about when I decided to start posting videos of my outfits online, and my intention in doing so. I struggle with body dysmorphia and found that wearing clothes that made me happy helps me deal with it, and so I think I will take that mentality of “wearing what makes me happy” and apply it to this. Returning to myself through the things that make me smile: The Shayna Klee print under my bed (and now on my wall, angel-side on display). The hair clip I bought a few weeks ago (when I was little the haircut place I went to had a “bow tree” and I would always beg my mom to buy me a new bow each time I got my hair cut. I recently realized that the reason I love my hairclip, and why I have a bow tattoo is probably because I used to love bows as a little girl). Meeting up with friends for coffee and talking about everything and nothing at once, like I did the other day. Looking out the bus window and seeing a dad and his kid riding a bicycle — the tiny child sat just below the handlebars with their tiny backpack on — laughing because of how unstable the bike was, and thinking about the time I tried to ride a tandem bike in Amsterdam, or when I was 5 and my own dad removed the training wheels from my bike and pushed me down the street. Last night, my partner had some of his friends over for dinner, and at one point they were in the kitchen portioning out some artisanal tiramisu from none other than M&S — I sat on the couch, looking at empty wine bottles, glasses, and candles on the table — hearing laughter from afar and a Frank Ocean song spinning on the record player, and being reminded of the life and love I feel so lucky to have found.
Three years ago, I moved from California to London without knowing anyone, and now, I am surrounded by positivity and inspiration and creativity wherever I look; outside bus windows, in my home, on my phone. I am trying my very best to be intentional in my process, in my posting, and in the energy I put into the universe, and I am (hopefully) going to come back to myself.
