This post started out as a series of Shower Thoughts^TM and we’ll see where it ends up.

Disclaimer: this post is not actually very serious; for entertainment purposes only, consume accordingly.

A wise man¹ once said² that when people look at those who achieve extraordinary success, they admire the results, not the work. They admire what they can see (the big achievement), not what they can’t see (the day-to-day grind, year after year after year). Success is the tip of an iceberg, made up of a much greater amount of mostly invisible hard work and discipline. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately as I trudge through the trenches of my writing journey.³

I am not having a good time right now, and one of the few things that is motivating me to keep going is this idea that, should I be so fortunate to one day achieve any measure of success worth admiring, it will have been because of days – months, years – like these. Because of the difficult, unglamorous work that I didn’t quit, even when I really wanted to. It feels like I’ve been pushing a millstone up a mountain (hi, Sisyphus) for an eternity, but it’s actually only been a couple of years, which is NOTHING in the scheme of things. I might be 46, but as a writer, I’m still a baby taking my first steps.

Our culture has become obsessed with instant results (hello, viral success) and it’s warping our brains. Speak for yourself, Adina? OK, fine. I’m pretty sure that a good chunk of my unhappiness is rooted in the feeling that I’m a failure because, after 2 years, I’m still nowhere closer to being an overnight success. But then, as a sometimes-wise woman⁴ once told a friend, hard work is a lottery ticket, not a guarantee that you’ll win the prize. Hard work buys you admission to the game, but it doesn’t buy you luck. Some things are out of your control, and you just have to accept that and focus on the things that you can control.⁵

Unrelated but also related: I have adopted a new, late-in-the-year resolution to improve my Spanish. Stay with me here.

I took Spanish for a couple of years in Uni and fell in love with the language. [A lot of that has to do with Latin music, which I adore.] Next to English, it’s my favorite language – sorry to my ancestors, who spoke neither and are now rolling in their graves. Anyway, I didn’t stick with it long enough to become fully proficient back in the day, and then quickly lost most of whatever proficiency I had managed to get because I never used it. [Except for what was necessary to understand bachata lyrics, but I digress.] Recently, I realized that one of my few regrets in life is that I did not work harder, when I was younger, to learn and be fluent in more languages. I think there is something incredible about the ability to think and speak in different languages – even just from a neural plasticity perspective.

So, I’m working on my Spanish again …by watching interviews and documentaries with/about my fave football players⁶ and clubs. Now, you might be thinking: pero, porque? Like, why that, specifically? Glad you asked, allow me to share my pedagogical theory.

I think there’s a pretty general consensus that, once you have the basics more or less down, the best way to improve your language proficiency is by listening to native speakers speak. There are many ways to do that, including no shortage of conversational coaches on social media, etc. Back in the day, some of my Romanian friends taught themselves Italian by watching Italian soap operas. I decided to take a different approach with Spanish for a few reasons.

One, I want to be exposed to the way Spanish people talk to each other, unscripted. If I can understand that, then understanding the more formal Spanish used in movies or books should be a breeze.

Two, I don’t have access to Spanish reality TV (which I assume exists) and I also don’t have the bandwidth to get emotionally invested in randos talking about their love lives or whatever. When you understand only half of what’s being said at any given time, you need to have some compelling reason to continue listening. Enter football – something I’m currently already invested in. Listening to elite players talk about their sports philosophy also interests me because (as noted in the footnotes and elsewhere) it’s something I can relate back to writing.⁷ And since Spanish football has been pretty dominant in the last 15-20 years, there’s a lot of content available to watch.

OK, but how is this related to what I was talking about before?

Working on my Spanish is a daily reminder of how consistent practice/work/discipline adds up over time, even if, day to day, it doesn’t seem like it. And that progress doesn’t always feel linear. There are days when I feel like I’m on a roll, picking up 80%+ of what’s being said, and then the day next, I’ll only be able to understand 1 word out of every 5 and feel like a complete loser. But if I look back to where I started, a month ago, the improvement is definitely noticeable. Small but noticeable. I am super curious to see where I’ll be in, say, six months – assuming I can stick with it.⁸

And you know what? I can say the same thing about writing too. And if I keep saying it, then maybe I won’t quit. That’s what success looks like, baby.⁹

Thank you for coming to my Shower Thoughts^TM pep talk. If you know any good (Spanish) sports documentaries, preferably about football, let me know in the comments.

1 Fernando Torres
2 In an interview I watched because I’m trying to improve my proficiency in Spanish. I’ll come back to that part later. For the purposes of this part of the discussion, I can confirm that I’m, like, 95% sure I correctly translated this portion of the conversation (which I’m only paraphrasing here).
3 At this point, you may be sure that I will find a way to relate absolutely everything back to one of 2 things: writing and/or football.
4 Me.
5 This bit was also in the above-noted interview. I suspect my man Torres is something of a Stoic at heart, mostly because he name-dropped Marcus Aurelius in said interview as well. [Come to think of it, it would have been more surprising if he hadn’t, being a 40-something white dude and all.]
6 Fernando Torres, mostly.
7 And also, some of them (ahem) are extremely easy on the eyes, which helps a lot when my brain occasionally zones out on translating and I miss, like, five minutes of context I’m too lazy to rewind.
8 On that note, if you’re Spanish, please do not leave me a comment to inform me that my Spanish tutor and sports philosopher, F. Torres, is problematic in some way that I have not yet grasped. If that’s the case,¹⁰ let me discover it for myself in six months’ time, when I will (hopefully) be able to understand 100% of what he’s saying. Por favor & gracias.
9 I also stole this bit from Torres, who probably stole it from Marcus Aurelius.
10 I have no illusions left about famous people. The last decade has annihilated them completely. Nothing surprises me anymore.

After 8 months of waiting for my promised ‘best year ever’ to get rolling, I gave up on astrology last month and said to hell with it but … like … what in the Mercury gatorade is going on this week?? Every day felt like I was swimming against the stream with my hands tied behind my back. Can I just, like, not? I’m tired, boss.

I know some of my friends are also struggling right now, which sucks even more. I wish I could be there for them more, but I can barely manage to tie my own shoes at the moment. I know some of you can probably relate, so hugs to you too.

I did have a fun day of birthday adventures with my daughter on Monday, which was a nice way to kick off her official teenage era. I expect it’s going to be a bumpy ride at times, but I am excited for this next chapter of parenthood. It will be an interesting one, for sure!

I’m less excited for the next chapter in my publishing journey, having been reminded again this week about how much I hate marketing. TBH, I thought that by now – with 3, soon to be 4 published books under my belt – I would be starting to see some organic growth in reach/readership, but it isn’t happening. It’s a bummer, and I’m trying not to let it become a total de-motivator. But it’s pretty obvious that, unless I start getting serious about marketing, I’m going to keep launching books that only a handful of people will ever read. As someone who. just. wants. to. write (and share stories), it’s … blergh.

Speaking of things not going amazing, the Champions League kicked off this week, and my team is already down in their group rankings, having lost its first game. That’s on top of losing its last two domestic league games. When I started following Atleti, I called it my Cinderella team – aka the long-shot, underdog – and I’m learning in real time how true that is. Funny enough, I watched a documentary about the club this week, whose main theme was, basically, “don’t be an Atleti supporter unless you’re prepared to get your heart broken pretty much every season.” They always put up a good fight, only to inevitably fall just short of glory.

Come to think of it, that also describes me, LOL! Atleti, c’est moi.

[Except that they’ve actually won a few trophies, unlike moi. Sigh.]

Have a great weekend!

I promised we would talk about Botox so let’s go!

I have not made a secret of the fact that I get Botox (and have since about 2017 or so), but I don’t talk about it a lot. It’s not a choice that has ever felt fraught for me, probably because my original motivation wasn’t tied to considerations of youthfulness or attractiveness. Over the years, I have not been tempted to expand my regimen to include other types of cosmetic interventions, like fillers, chemical peels, laser treatments, etc. Now, at 46, my face has lost quite a bit of volume and definitely looks ‘older’ than in the past. Sometimes, that does bother me a bit. But, still, I have not taken any other steps to ‘address the issue’, as it were — nor, at this point, am I planning to.

I started getting Botox because of my Resting Bitch Face. I can’t tell you how often I’ve had people mention, once we started talking, that they initially thought I was intimidating/cold/aloof, etc. At rest, my face does have a tendency to look ‘severe’ and, in the past, that was exacerbated by my ‘elevens’ (the large wrinkles between my eyebrows) that made me seem like I was constantly frowning even when I wasn’t. I got Botox to smooth them out, and found it helped quite a bit. After a while, I extended the injections to my forehead as well, because it felt weird to have a smooth section around my eyebrows and deep wrinkles immediately above. I have an extremely expressive face so, when I talked, it was noticeable.

Thinking about all this now made me realize some uncomfortable things. First of all, that my decision was definitely influenced by societal expectations for women not to present as ‘bitchy’ or ‘intimidating’ — something we don’t require of men. I am working to make peace with that. For better or worse, it is an economically rational choice (my appearance does impact my professional life, as someone who works in a client-facing role). I know that, by making it, I am reinforcing the societal norm, and that is something I am grappling with. When and how will it be possible for me to stop participating? I have a lot of relative privilege, given my race, profession, financial situation, etc., but I am still part of the ‘rat race’ for the time being. Will it be different once I retire? Maybe.

The second and more challenging realization is that my decision represented an attempt to compensate for and mask my own past trauma. This has brought up some very heavy feelings for me. Let me explain.

I was diagnosed with ADHD a few years ago. I have since come to believe that my neurodiversity includes a component of autism as well. I am high-functioning and have spent my entire life masking the things I felt were “odd” about me, to try to fit in. From a very early age, I had a sense of being a kind of alien, an observer looking in. That feeling was exacerbated when I became an immigrant. My first experiences in a new country (and language) were mostly unpleasant ones. My new classmates ostracized and bullied me, probably for many reasons, not only my foreignness. I was twelve when the bullying started — terrible timing, given how difficult adolescence can be in general, and how formative. It has taken me years of therapy to come to terms with everything that happened and to understand that I have lingering psychological damage from it.

My only ‘weapon’ against my bullies was to retreat into a shell of pretend detachment. No matter how devastated I was inside, I was determined not to let it show. I stayed quiet, detached, seemingly indifferent to people. I learned not to approach strangers, but to wait for them to talk to me first. It worked … in the sense that, after a while, my bullies got bored and left me alone. But it also meant that, from that point on, I struggled to make friends. My so-called aloofness was a wall that kept out potential foes and friends alike. I didn’t realize that until later, when I was in my early 20s — and that’s when it became an extra source of worry and shame. Once again, I was failing to fit in. So, I began to over-correct. To go out of my way to show people that, no, I’m not a bitch, I’m just shy (and terrified of how others will engage with me). Honestly, it was exhausting. Getting Botox was the easiest part.

But, looking back, it’s also maddening. Here, again, was a case of me changing something about myself to accommodate other people. To make them comfortable around me, when I was not extended that same grace when I needed it.

I am due for my biannual Botox appointment next month, and for the first time, I am questioning whether I want to go through with it or not. I haven’t decided yet. I probably will do it again, if only because I don’t feel ready to make a definitive decision in what still feels like the heat of the moment (emotionally speaking), so keeping the status quo seems like the way to go in the meantime.

But there is something else I wanted to share in this context, which has been on my mind since I listened to that episode of Diabolical Lies where they talked about fillers. Briefly, I found the discussion around the effects of fillers — how they don’t actually get absorbed in the body as people have been told, but rather just move around, leading over time to the appearance of ‘filler face’ — really fascinating and thought provoking. One of the hosts made the point that, basically, the first dose of fillers looks amazing, but that same effect can never be recreated again and chasing it leads to increasingly worse/less ‘natural’ results. Hearing this made me glad that I was never tempted to start down that path, but it also made me think about something else.

Cosmetic procedures become a status symbol in the last 20 years or so, but now that some of them are becoming increasingly accessible to ‘regular’ people (aka non-millionaires), I am wondering if we are going to see a swing in the opposite direction. Not to get bogged down in Bourdieu, but status symbols derive their power from inaccessibility. They are meant to differentiate and demarcate the boundaries between classes. If normies can get fillers, what are the rich going to do? Sure, they can get better fillers from better (more expensive) injectors, but it sounds like that’s a case of diminishing returns even for the rich. Look at Hollywood actresses over a certain age — or, hell, even certain billionaires who shall remain nameless. We have already started seeing signs of a trend of ‘glorifying’ visible aging. Mostly in white, affluent women — and mostly limited to white hair and a few aesthetic wrinkles — but still. I am curious to see where we go from here.

If aging becomes the next status symbol, it would make sense. Think about it. It signals that the person has the privilege to opt out of societal norms of beauty, at least the prevailing ones, but also the privilege to age ‘gracefully’. And it’s extra desirable because, for many people, it’s out of reach if, up to now, they have been using cosmetic procedures to look younger. Again, remember that fillers cannot be dissolved (without removing natural volume as well). So, basically, aging is a “look” only some can achieve now. Of course, we would still be talking about a curated version of aging, not the regular normie kind … but you know what I mean.

For this to happen, though, society would have to ease up on its obsession with youth, which has been a driving force — and, in recent decades, a status symbol — for a very, very long time. Will the pendulum fully swing? Or is society simply going to redefine the correct way to look youthful, to introduce new barriers to keep out the ‘barbarians’ trying to climb to the top of the status totem pole? Something to keep an eye on, if you’re interested in cultural phenomena 😉