What I Found On My Old Tumblr
What would your past self say about who you are becoming today?
I often work with past and future self-talk in my intention-setting and manifestation work. I can imagine myself 5 years from now speaking to my current self, offering insight and direction as to what to do or not do that will enable that future self to exist. She’s been through it all already so she can offer a roadmap.
But I have a much, much harder time speaking to my past self. There are more fishnet tangles of emotion with bright weights of sorrow and guilt wrapped up in it. I was not always a nice, zen-seeking person. I was certainly not always a happy person. I was angry, hurting, and bitter throughout much of my 20s. So speaking backwards 5-10 years to that person is extremely difficult because, even though I’m happy and blessed to be where I am today, the actions of that past self can seem hard to forgive in hindsight.
But we work on that. Every day. Allowing and understanding and forgiving that her anger colored so much of her actions; admitting that sometimes that anger was totally justified, and sometimes it was utterly selfish.
Recently, I rediscovered my old Tumblr account. A garden of Wes Anderson gifs, plaid flannel, and rockabilly hairstyles lovingly tended from 2010 through 2016. I curated that page with the blind fire of a twenty-something. It is a balance between careful selection and reckless internet abandon.
Scrolling through those highly textural images, sweeping illustrations, vintage film clips, and Anaïs Nin quotes, I realize that the person who strung together these jet black pearls is still very much informing what I do every day. The art that inspired me then did a really damn good job shaping the choices I would make.
Through these disparate sources of influence, I trained my eye to recognize what it was that I liked, so that when it showed up in my life seven years later, I was ready for it.
Vision-boarding is a powerful tool, but I did not know that in 2010.
I certainly would not have said at the time that a digital scrapbook of typography and contemporary dance videos would count as one. But we give a lot of energy to the things that get the most of our attention, which is why it is important to direct your attention with intention. When I zoom out and look at the whole five years’ collection, patterns emerge and crystalize into values that I am living out today.
The person who put together this infinite scroll of cascading waterfalls, leather jackets, and wildlife portraits would be so thrilled to know that I am committed to slow living in a house with not one but TWO exposed brick fireplaces, linen bedding, a black cat, lots of skulls, and an apple tree. Her heart would leap into her throat to hear about my motorcycle-riding, bass-playing, arborist partner.
She would fall off the chair to learn how many of the people in those photographs of motorcycles and blue jeans that she reposted are now in her cellphone or mutual follows. I would love to whisper in her ear stories of nights sleeping under desert stars, of perpetual creative evolution, and of how we learned the lesson that you don’t have to always wear your full suit of armor.
How important and timely it felt to walk backward through the darkest times of my life as presented in a digital magpie’s nest. Often when I think back on those times, my mind swerves away like a tongue recoiling from a sensitive tooth. It is hard for me to reconcile all that volcanic energy (Pele, Kali, creator-destroyer) with my current practices of stillness. But imagining my past self experiencing swells of pride and vindication gives me some space for my present self to offer that past self some kindness.
Because she scrolled late into the night, collecting cultural memorabilia and learning to recognize resonance, my life now hums like the inside of an old bell. Because she idly annotated images of powerful women, I became one.
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Callahan Woodbery @thisiscallahan (IG/T/P/FB) is a travel essayist, artist, and creative guide. She can usually be found in the desert, by a river, or on a backcountry trail. But if you can’t find her there, try her home in Nashville, Tennessee. Find more of her work at thisiscallahan.com