LIVIA'S BOOKLET

Hi Dad, It’s me again. Another 6th June has come around, and as always, I find myself reaching for words that somehow carry everything I’ve lived through back to you. It’s the 27th time I’m doing this now, though sometimes it still feels like I’m learning how to speak into silence. Life has been… full. Not in a loud or perfect way, but in that quiet, complicated way you only understand when you’re the one living it. Since last June, I’ve had days where I felt like I was finally getting things right—like I was becoming someone I could be proud of. I’ve also had days where I doubted everything, where even simple things felt heavier than they should. But I kept going. I think that’s something I’ve learned to do better now… just keep going, even when I don’t fully understand where I’m headed. There have been small victories too. The kind I don’t always say out loud, but I know you would’ve noticed. The moments I handled things better than I used to. The times I chose patience over reaction...

  He walks with mountains in his chest, yet greets the world with a smile steady enough to convince everyone he is fine. The bills know his name. Responsibility knows his address. Expectations pull up a chair at every table he sits at, eating first, leaving him with whatever remains. He was taught that strength looks like silence, so he learned to swallow storms whole. He buries disappointment beneath firm handshakes. He folds heartbreak into quiet laughter. He trains his eyes to hold back oceans. And somehow, the world mistakes his silence for peace. But there are nights when darkness settles heavily upon the room and the ceiling becomes a faithful witness to battles no one else can hear. Nights when exhaustion sits at the edge of his bed and asks questions for which he has no answers. Who carries the carrier? Who lifts the shoulders that hold everyone else? Who heals the healer? Who listens when the strong one finally breaks? Yet morning still finds him standing. Not...

  May arrived quietly. Not with celebration, not with certainty but with heavy eyes, tired prayers, and the kind of silence that sits beside you even in crowded rooms. I think some months come to test the weight of our hearts. And May did exactly that. It stretched me in places I never spoke about. It showed me how exhausting it is to keep holding onto people, memories, dreams, and versions of life that no longer hold onto us. Some days felt unbearably long. Like standing at a closed door, knocking softly, hoping destiny would suddenly remember my name. I carried disappointment so gently that nobody noticed how much it was bruising me. I smiled through conversations while quietly grieving things I could not explain without trembling. But somewhere between the breaking and surviving, I began to understand something important: Not everything delayed is meant for destruction. Not everything lost is asking to be chased. And not every season of stillness means life has forgotten us. Som...

  There is a version of me that existed before disappointment became familiar. A softer version. A louder dreamer. Someone who believed that good hearts are always met with good intentions. I miss her sometimes. Not because life destroyed her completely, but because survival changed the way she looks at everything now. These past months have taught me how quietly people leave. How promises expire. How loneliness can exist even in rooms full of love. And yet somehow, I am still here. Still waking up. Still trying. Still searching for light in places that once buried me in darkness. That must mean something. Maybe strength is not becoming fearless. Maybe it is continuing despite the fear. Continuing despite the delays, the heartbreak, the unanswered questions. There are days I still mourn the life I imagined for myself. The timing. The people. The version of happiness I thought would arrive sooner. But lately, I have stopped asking life, “Why me?” Instead, I ask, “What is this pain t...

  May found me tired. Not the kind of tired sleep can fix, but the kind that settles quietly inside the heart after too many disappointments dressed as lessons. I entered this month carrying invisible wars. Smiling in public. Breaking in private. Pretending certain things no longer hurt simply because I had survived them before. But healing becomes difficult when you keep revisiting places within yourself that were never kind to you. So this month, I am learning silence. Not weakness. Not surrender. Just silence. The kind that no longer feels the need to explain pain to people who only understand it when it wears tears. I no longer want to force conversations, connections, or outcomes. Some things become lighter the moment we stop carrying them. And perhaps peace is not always found in receiving more. Perhaps sometimes it arrives when we finally accept what must be released. May does not feel magical yet. But it feels honest. And honestly, that is enough for me right now.

    You came into my life like rain on unfinished roads  messy, heavy, and impossible to ignore. You uncovered emotions I had buried beneath busy days and forced smiles. You reminded me that some wounds do not heal because time passes, but because we finally stop reopening them. This month, I lost interest in forcing things. I stopped chasing explanations from people who had already changed. Stopped romanticizing places that only held memories and not peace. Stopped standing at emotional doorways waiting for someone to choose me fully. And strangely, the moment I loosened my grip on what was draining me, I could finally breathe again. April was not beautiful in the usual way. It did not arrive with miracles or loud victories. But somewhere inside the exhaustion, I found honesty. Honesty about what hurts me. About what keeps me stagnant. About how much of myself I have abandoned trying to save things that were already falling apart. So as the month ends, I am not asking li...

  There is a day that does not pass, it only circles back, soft-footed, unannounced. I have learned not to fight it. It arrives in small ways in the silence between breaths, in the way light rests on empty spaces as if it remembers what once belonged there. I still imagine you in outlines I cannot complete a voice just beyond sound, a presence I almost reach until the moment breaks like thin glass in my hands. Something in me shifted that day not loudly, not all at once but deep enough that even time could not smooth its edges. I have carried it since this quiet, unspoken weight, this tenderness that aches without asking permission. And though the world kept moving, I learned a different rhythm one where loss breathes beside me, not as an enemy, but as a shadow that knows my name. Some things are never buried. They simply become part of you woven into your pulse, hidden in your strength, resting in the spaces you no longer try to fill. A...

  Grief is not loud in my life. It does not scream or shatter glass. It sits in the space between my ribs, breathing softly, like it belongs there. I have learned to carry it gently, like a cup filled too close to the brim, careful not to spill what I no longer have the strength to clean up. There were words I folded into silence, stitched into the lining of my chest. They live there still; unspoken, unheard, unforgiven. Sometimes I wonder if they echo in another world, if somewhere you heard me and chose not to answer. I go on; not because I have healed, but because the world does not pause for broken things. And yet, in the quietest moments, I still turn; as if you might be there, as if grief might finally loosen its grip and let me breathe without remembering.

  March will end quietly for me. Not with celebration, not with grand declarations about becoming someone new. Just the simple understanding that I am still here after everything. There were days when I felt smaller inside my own life — speaking less, explaining more, trying to fit my heart into places that were not made for it. I learned that healing is not a straight road. Some mornings I woke up and felt strong for no reason. Other mornings carried the old weight like it had never left. But I kept going anyway. I stopped trying to be the person everyone expected me to be. I allowed myself to be tired. To be unsure. To move slower than the world wanted. I am learning that growth does not always feel powerful. Sometimes it feels like letting go of noise you once thought was part of love. Now I sit with my life differently. Not rushing to fill silence. Not forcing happiness to arrive early. Just watching the dust settle after the long walki...

  People said Kude was focused. He liked it that way. To him, focus meant silence around his decisions, silence around emotions he did not want to manage, and silence from people who expected more from him than he was willing to give. Kude believed feelings were inconvenient. Not feelings in general; just the ones that came from others when they became complicated. He dated women, but he did it like someone selecting useful arrangements for a life already planned. If a woman had money, he stayed close. If she was kind and emotionally available, he enjoyed the comfort without asking himself whether he was giving the same back. He liked being treated well. Like a king sitting quietly in a palace he never built. He expected respect, attention, and small sacrifices — the kind people make when they care about someone. But when a woman tried to express what she felt, Kude's expression changed. He would listen without really listening. Then he would say her feelings were st...

I did not leave with anger in my chest. There was no loud door closing behind me, no words thrown into the air like broken glass. I left the way tired people leave when they have carried things long after their hands began to hurt. It was not bravery at first. It was exhaustion wearing the shape of clarity. I learned that some storms do not end with fighting. Sometimes you stop standing in the rain and walk slowly toward somewhere warmer. Reclamation came quietly. Not like the stories people tell about sudden strength returning overnight, but like remembering how to breathe without thinking about it too much. I started choosing silence that did not punish my heart. I started keeping my energy the way one keeps clean water not giving it away to everything that asks for a drink. Renewal did not arrive as a new life. It came as small permissions I gave myself: to rest without guilt, to hope without rushing, to rebuild without announcing it to anyone. Th...

There was a time when I stopped expecting much from myself. Not because I had given up completely, but because some days felt heavier than I knew how to carry. I kept moving through them anyway showing up where I needed to, doing the small things that keep a life from falling apart. No one really notices those kinds of efforts. They look ordinary from the outside. But slowly, without any big announcement, something began to change. I started sleeping better. I started answering messages again. I started believing that a bad season is not the same thing as a ruined life. The comeback didn’t arrive like people imagine. No applause, no sudden victory. Just a quiet decision to stand up again and keep going with a little more honesty than before. And that has been enough.

Not everything in life is meant to last. Some friendships begin with excitement and slowly turn quiet. Some relationships carry more confusion than comfort. And sometimes there are connections that stay in the middle — not quite meaningful, but not completely gone either. Many people call them situationships, but whatever name we give them, they often leave us feeling uncertain about where we stand. For a long time, people hold on to these connections because they hope things will improve. It feels easier to wait than to accept that something is no longer working. We tell ourselves that maybe the other person will change, maybe the effort will finally become mutual, and maybe the silence will eventually turn into understanding. But with time, a simple truth begins to show itself. Some relationships do not grow because they were never meant to. They may have served a purpose at one moment in life; companionship during a lonely period, someone to talk to when things fel...

People often argue about what truly makes a person happy. Some say it is money. Others insist it is love. The truth is that most of us spend our lives somewhere in between these two ideas, trying to understand how much each one really matters. Money does bring a certain kind of happiness, though people sometimes hesitate to admit it. Having enough money to pay rent, buy food, cover medical bills, or help family removes a lot of silent stress. When basic needs are met, the mind rests a little easier. It becomes possible to sleep better, plan ahead, and breathe without constantly calculating what might go wrong tomorrow. But money has limits. It can make life comfortable, but it cannot always make it meaningful. A full wallet does not sit next to you when you feel overwhelmed. It does not ask how your day was. It does not notice when something in your voice sounds different. That is where love comes in. Love, whether from family, friends, or a partner, fills a differe...

Some days light is not the sunrise or the bright afternoon sky. Sometimes it is a small yellow smiley face at the end of a message from someone who knows you have been quiet lately. It is not a big thing. Just a tiny circle, two dots for eyes, a curved line that pretends everything will be okay. But it helps. Because on days when your own smile is still finding its way back, that little face holds the space for it. And the light is not loud or dramatic. It is gentle. It sits beside you quietly until you remember how to smile again.  

  Each morning blooms with a quiet promise, a gentle nudge that life is moving, even when the path bends in ways unseen. Trust the rhythm, let the unseen guide your step, for even rivers carve mountains with patience. Change is a friend, not a foe, a soft hand reshaping the heart’s edges. Release the fear of endings, and watch your days weave into patterns that shimmer with unexpected light. Success does not always roar; sometimes it hums in the small victories— the smile shared, the kindness given, the courage to pause, to listen, to breathe, aligning each moment with your soul’s quiet song. Walk with grace through ordinary hours, for each step is sacred, each stumble a teacher. Life unfolds in trust, in gentle surrender, and the world bends toward you when your heart keeps its own quiet rhythm.

  I learned the hymn before I learned my own name, faith handed down like heirloom silver, worn but holy. My mouth shaped hallelujah the way elders taught me— soft knees, bowed head, belief pressed into bone. Back then, heaven answered quickly, or maybe I didn’t yet know how to hear the silence. Now my hallelujah limps. It arrives bruised, breathless, missing notes. It rises from a chest tight with unanswered prayers, from nights where God feels like a closed door and I am knocking with hands already bleeding. Still, I knock. There is steam in my prayers— not desire of the body, but the heat of longing, the ache of wanting God to be near now, to touch the wound, to say my name again. Faith sweats when it’s worked hard. Mine has labored in the dark. I have cried into scriptures until the ink blurred, tears baptizing verses I no longer understood. Purity became a question instead of a crown, obedience a heavy garment in a burning room. I stayed. I always stayed. Silence became my san...

  I folded my hands around the memories like they were still warm, like they could explain themselves. Once, they fit me perfectly— every habit, every promise, every quiet yes sat in my chest and called it home. I did not question the joy then; I lived inside it the way you live inside skin. But seasons change even the truest shelters. What once fed me began to ask for blood, and what made me whole learned to take pieces instead. I stayed longer than wisdom allows, calling it loyalty, calling it love, pretending the ache was just growth and not the sound of myself thinning out. Letting go was not brave—it was brutal. It felt like tearing down a house I built with my bare hands and faith. I mourned the version of me who believed that right things stay right forever, that feeling safe was a permanent state and not a fragile agreement with time. Now I walk away without apology, but not without grief. I carry the sorrow like a scar that still remembers pain. Some things save you only f...

This year opens like a wide horizon, unwritten and breathing, calling us forward. We step out of yesterday’s shadows, hands empty of regret, hearts full of resolve, learning that beginnings are not fragile— they are brave by nature. We fortify ourselves with lessons learned the hard way, brick by brick, truth by truth. What once wounded us now becomes armor, what tried to break us now reinforces our spine. We are not starting over empty— we are starting over equipped. Change arrives without apology, and we welcome it with open palms. We loosen our grip on what no longer fits, shed old skins of fear and smallness. Growth demands motion, and we move— not because it’s easy, but because it’s necessary. And here we rise into the promise of greatness, not borrowed, not delayed, but owned. This new year doesn’t crown us—it dares us. To build boldly, to dream louder, to live fully. We step forward fortified, transformed, ready to become everything we survived to be .