In April's newsletter I had a link to a survey to see what the readers of this newsletter want now that we're in year 2 of this mf'in thang, and the feedback was so sweet.  Thank you so much for all of your kind words, topic suggestions, and answers to my questions!  I put a lot of effort into these and hearing your thoughts about it and reading all those words of encouragement made me so happy.  I asked if y'all wanted guest columnists on the newsletter, and almost every person said yes, but only occasionally.  Which means I need to pick my guest columnists very carefully!  Luckily, I very genuinely have some of the most incredible friends on earth, many of which you also know and love.  So I thought who better to kick off our first guest column other than my beautiful Cancerian angel, Tefi.  

 

You probably follow Tef on TikTok, and if you don't its probably because you've literally never opened the app because my girl is queen of the clock app, amongst so any other things.  She says it in her column below, but what you see really is what you get with her.  She is never trying to be anyone else, and I think that is why the girlies of the internet love her so much.  Her authenticity shines through - and it shines brightly! 

 

However, what happens when someones authentic self evolves into a newer, maybe even more authentic version of self? Especially when your own personal evolution, the same type of evolution that happens to every emotionally intelligent human being on planet earth, happens in front of the often faceless audience of the internet? Are you free to be a newer version of self?  Are you confined to the version of self that the internet met you at?  These are all questions my girl dives into, in her own voice and dropping almost as many f bombs as I do (sorry MJ and MJ!!! Both our moms are MJ's). 

 

 I love her so deeply, and I know you will too.  Enjoy Tefi's piece below! 

I work in pop culture, I’m 32 years old, I’m from Miami, I live in Brooklyn, I’m single, I’m a Cancer, my mom is Colombian and my dad is Brazilian, I am the oldest of three, and I am a content creator full time. I have no idea what I’m doing. I know that’s not terrifying and relatable because I’m not a fucking surgeon but I really have no idea what I’m doing. I hate when I say that and my friends are like “ugh me too” and I’m like.... You’re a lawyer. I need you to know what you are doing please.

 

I know the majority of people have no idea what the fuck they are doing and that makes me feel better because PRODUCTIVITY IS NOT PURPOSE but oh my GOD does productivity feel good. I just wish I had more of a job title than “professionally myself” because like you, I am always changing. It also fucks with my sense of general sense of a life path and boundaries with work, which I am looking forward to unpacking in therapy. I haven’t been in therapy for a year because I like working so hard. Snake eating it’s own tail etc, etc. There are opinions I have from 2020 that went viral that I can’t relate to at all anymore. It’s like my job consists of actively fossilizing my thoughts, looks, appearance, love interests, and sadly: bad bangs. I will touch on this another time (fucking never).

 

But then again: I think I do know what I want. I think I want everything, unfortunately. I would like to ring life like a towel. AND I’m not afraid to work for it. Shit, I am not above begging. I am happy to show up and show out. I walk into every room like I am already your friend, like I already got the job, like I am both opening and closing the show.

However, there is still the part of me that needs you to tell me that I am deserving. And I absolutely mean you, reader.

 

We’ve never met, I don’t know your name, what you’re studying or what you do, where you live, where you’re from and yet I have curated my life around external validation. Brick by brick and like by like, my youth was devoted to the male gaze so much so that I designed my adult life to depend on gaze in general. I mean, it’s not like it used to be. The internet used to suck in a different way. Today’s internet still sucks but it’s a different animal. Yesterday’s social media was Stepford Wives in comparison to today’s Truman Show.

 

And meeting people isn’t hard but it IS weird. I am always walking the line of confidence vs. defensiveness. It’s not a line to cross but rather a monofilament fishing line. “Oh me? I’m a content creator.” That’s the beginning of the end depending on who I’m talking to. Sometimes I’ll even get: “Oh! You’re a blogger?”

 

I know how people feel about content creators, I see the way their faces change. Immediately I am someone attention seeking, probably obnoxious and undeserving. I always think of Pink’s “Stupid Girls” music video and how she imitated Paris and Lindsay. I think that’s how people view influencers. I don’t even say the word “influencer”, I try to avoid it. But then when I say content creator, people are like “so what kind of content do you make?” And when I say “pop culture” it’s pretty much over for me LOL. So I stopped saying that. Now I say “I overshare on the internet professionally”. Because that’s also true. I absolutely overshare. There are people online that I have never met that know I suffer from depression, my relationship with my family, my opinions on mostly everything, inside jokes I have with my siblings, they’ve virtually met all my best friends. I think people ask me questions sometimes about how hard it must be and it feels like a catch 22- how the fuck am I supposed to complain about my job? When teachers are buying their own supplies for their classrooms, when nurses are understaffed and underpaid and overworked? There a million ways I, a college drop out from Miami with virtually no kind of technical skill, vocation or lick of common sense, am very lucky. VERY lucky. It’s just getting a little blurry for me. How much am I willing to share, and if I share all the time, will people actually ever really want to know me? I have a rule about details: I don’t like them. I don’t like feeling like I’m posting a monologue, I would like to feel like you could tell me anything and I would understand, like I am on your side. In order to do that, I have to put some skin in the game. But it is definitely getting blurry up in here. I’m not a character, I really am a kind of see is what you get person, I’m well intentioned, I want to be of service in this life. 

 

However: I am cringy. I know I am.

 

There WAS FOR SURE a time where I thought I was very cool. I got myspace when I was fifteen. FIFTEEN and I think my first post was a bikini pic? I remember my first comment was some dude in his 30’s and he said “no tits”. Unfortunately reader he was right, I’m barely a B cup and thank you to all the middle school boys who ensured I was very aware. God bless you all. I hope that realtor career really takes off.

 

Ok- back to 15. The year is 2005, Tom Cruise is jumping on couches, whispers about Brangelina are only beginning to swirl, Jude Law is sorry he cheated on Sienna, society is given the gift of “Wedding Crashers” and I got my first comment ever and it’s about my tits. I WAS ELATED. I just couldn’t believe someone fucking saw my page- immediately hooked. If you could put that feeling in a bottle I would be a fucking bar fly. I think that was my first introduction to really committing to perfection. As a first born of three, I was already committed to perfection but consider me now saluting to the flag of perception from here on out. Trying to keep up with Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton at 15 is NOT easy but some of these bitches out here were really doin it!!! With just a digital camera!! They had the angles, and the clothes, and the friends. I love directions, I love a recipe, I love a plan, I love a to-do list and social media finally gave me a road map to being hot. And hot girls got to have the best high school experiences: look at every teen drama in existence. The loser only starts to turn her life around after a make over and a boyfriend. With social media I no longer had to be well rounded, I JUST HAD TO LOOK IT. Like you, dear sweet reader, I had been dreaming of being hot my whole life. I can remember wanting to be pretty SO BAD- which kind of breaks my heart. Because I was pretty. I wish I could go back and tell 15 year old me that. I am sure my grandparents and my mom told me all the time. But it wasn’t enough. The introduction to constant and yet inconsistent external validation on the internet changed my life, and most likely rotted my brain a bit. Kids are usually comparing themselves to other kids in their class, but MySpace and later Facebook ensured we were comparing ourselves 24/7 to people we would never meet, in states we would never visit, with orange tans they could never sustain. C’est la vie.

 

I like to call teenage years the adolescent parrot stage because that’s when a parrot is mostly balding and awkward. Every generation has something, some kind of “bar” to measure popularity or likability, but I don’t think we really understood what social media was doing to the perception of self. ** I will say though if I was a teenager today and someone showed me a “filter”, even if it was fucking “Paris” on IG, I would have been waaaaaaaay more insane in the membrane than I was in 2005. I don’t know how parents do it.

 

There are many expressions in American society that encourage growing from your mistakes, viewing life as a journey, celebrating the wins and moving on from the losses, embracing the twists and turns life can throw at you with some grace and humor. Something like: “life’s a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get” or “life is full of ups and downs”, and “no one is perfect”. Those ideals would no longer relate to my generation of orange, dream matte mousse wearing, eyebrowless baddies. One profile photo could embarrass your family, your friends, end a relationship. If you think that’s dramatic, please consult a teenager. People idolize y2k now: the tank tops, the zig zag middle part, the low rise jeans, the chunky belts, you name it. But if we are going to unpack y2k let’s really do it. We stood on a culture obsessed with perception and we amplified it a million degrees. A hellish degree, actually. Us middle class cuties did not have a lot of material to work with but we Tim Gunned it. WE MADE IT WORK. AND NOW WE TAKE ANTI DEPRESSANTS.
Women of Wellbutrin: I stand with you!

You could literally be anyone. You didn’t have to be yourself. It was perfect for the adolescent parrot, and perfect for the introduction of Instagram.

Instagram really took off in 2010 and the plague of “the curated life”. The majority of influencers we were first introduced to were wealthy and thin and hot and knew other wealthy thin hot people.

 

But that's changed.

If it hadn’t changed I probably wouldn’t be a content creator today. I just kinda got sick of it. We all kinda got sick of it. Cringe was crowned king, and the cringier THE BETTER.
I think that cringe used to mean loser and now it means someone really fuckless. I am for the most part really fuckless- I mean, I’m thirty fucking two. There’s only so much fuck a millennial can really give these days. A fuck? In this society? In the words of Wedding Crashers: ERRONEOUS. But I still have that 15 year old tittless (lmao) girl in the back of mind asking herself “ok but it this cool? Are we being like, cool?”

My dear wonderful reader, your opinion absolutely matters to me. At the end of the day I designed it to be this way. I plucked and churned all my hurt and any traumas into content because I don’t want anyone to feel alone. The mere thought of letting someone down is paralyzing to me.

There’s no way around it. I owe the people who interact with me and support me, everything. And then I think: who the fuck do you think you are? Like as if everyone doesn’t have lives, full of their own everyday dramas, disappointments, selfies and celebration. Post whatever the fuck you want, be whoever you want. Complain if you want, cheer yourself on if you want. External validation lasts, what? 15 minutes? But me? I’ll be tittless forever, and I’m ok with that.

Okay hi it's me, Nat again! Is she not the best?? I'm so happy you guys were into having guest writers, because I want to share all of my friends and their beautiful perspectives with you! If you want more from Tefi, you can find her on all socials at @hellotefi 💖

Okay so shifting gears here.. another thing I learned from last month's survey is that you want updates on what I've got going on with work and my brand! I'm glad I asked because I always assume no one really cares, but then literally every person who did the survey said they wanted the updates.  So thank you!  Thank you for supporting me in so many ways, you'll never know how much it means to me.  With that being said.. here's what I've got goin' on! 

 

⚡️ I launched my Barbiecore Collection

 

 

 

Maybe I'll put them up for sale on my website, maybe I won't, but I'm having fun with it regardless, and whenever I need some extra healing, I always turn to paint. So it's very therapeutic for me. WITH ALL OF THAT BEING SAID… over the next few months while I'm in treatment and recovering from it, you can expect to see some random shit hit my website lmao. I kind of want to make another shirt like the Britney one but with Martha Stewart, and also maybe some fun Thank You or Greeting cards.. idk it all depends on how much strength I have on any given day! 

As always, the photos are hyperlinked to the products to save you a Googie search!

HOLD UP.. I JUST HAD AN IDEA FOR A NEW SEGMENT

Unless you know me IRL you probably wouldn't know that I am ALWAYS at the movies.  My therapist thinks it's because I cope by leaving my own body and also take on everyone else's emotional state and feel the need to make sure everyone feels comfortable, emotionally safe, and entertained at the expense of my own energy. So when I go to movies I can be entertained without having to sacrifice myself, take responsibility for anyone else, or live in my actual reality and that's why I like it so much… but that's neither here nor there!!!!!!!!!!! Also, in case you're wondering, yes I am a Woman of Wellbutrin™️. 

I figured because I see so many, I could give you my recco on the ones I've seen recently!  Would that be something you would be into?  Do y'all like going to the movies or not really? Maybe I should just do my recs as TikToks or something. Let me know pls! Actually maybe I'll put another anonymous poll.. yeah I'll do that. Here it is. If you hate it please tell me cause you know I spend a shitload of time on these newsletters and I don't want to waste my time or yours!

Alright JESUS CHRIST I gotta let y'all go!  Thanks for reading as ALWAYS!  I appreciate you so much.  And special thanks to my sweet angel Tefi, who is always telling people about this newsletter and has always been such an encouraging and loving friend. I'll see y'all next month! In the meantime, I'd love to connect with you on the IG or on the TinkTonks!