Hi, my name is…

Sunday, November 9, 2025

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Hi, my name is Ariana and welcome to the inside of my brain.

My mind is a crowded place. Thoughts don’t wait their turn. They overlap, collide, and echo long after they’ve passed. Some days it feels like too much; other days, it feels like the only thing keeping me sane.

There’s a beauty in the chaos, though. My thoughts often spill faster than I can catch them. In those moments, I find truth. It surfaces in its most imperfect and rawest form. I write, I create, I try to make sense of the noise. Sometime I fail and sometimes I don’t want to.

The craziness in my mind isn’t madness, it’s movement. It’s proof that I’m still feeling, still fighting, still alive. So I let it spill onto the page. Because somewhere in the confusion, I find myself again.

“Because never in my entire childhood did I feel like a child. I felt like a person all along―the same person that I am today.”
― Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game

Here’s a personified introduction of those I’ve come to understand to be apart of me and the voice I gave them. I hope you enjoy and find a similar peace I’ve gained after hitting submit.

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Pain, the unwelcome companion

She curses my name, but I’ve known her longer than anyone. Before her first word, before her first breath, I was there. The sharp cry that proved she was alive was my doing. She entered this world through me.

Hi, my name is Pain. I’ve put Ariana through daily traumas, eye closing, stomach clenching horrors, but not for my own pleasure. All she had to do was scream for help or cry in front of an adult, but she endured. Every time I thought, “this one will surely break you,” she’d grind her teeth and suffer in silence.

She thinks I’m here to break her, but breaking is only part of my work. I’m here to show her where it hurts. To remind her she can still feel. That her body, her heart, her spirit are all still capable of reacting, of noticing the wound before it rots. I’m the messenger of her boundaries. The flare that warns, “Enough.”

She’s annoyingly resilient. I fear we have a long ways to go before that marvelous day she actually listens to me. I know her isolation keeps her in my control, but those nights she cries herself to sleep are getting louder. Thankfully she can’t swallow pills and suppress me like the others did… Sometimes I feel as if she enjoys my company or maybe she’s just grown used to me. I hope she realizes, I never arrive without reason and beneath my cruelty lies the oldest truth she’ll ever know: “you are still alive.”

Fear – older than fire, older than God

“Don’t run.” I’ve been chasing her long before she knew my name. I was born the moment her heart learned to beat faster in the dark.

Hi, my name is Fear. She calls me weakness though, but little does she know I am survival. I creep in the same way I did for her ancestors. That flinch at the sound of thunder, the pull back of her hand from the flame, I am the whisper that kept her bloodline alive. They all lived because they listened to me.

The trouble with her, she either ignores me or listens too attentively. I live in her chest, coiled and waiting. Sometimes I am the quick breath before a fall, sometimes the cold hand that stills her courage. I am not cruel; I am cautious. I don’t want to stop her, I just want to make sure she sees the edge before she leaps.

She’s always scared even when I try my best to not grow too loud. When she sits with me long enough, feeding me, I turn from guardian to jailer. I build walls and call them safety. In her moments alone, I find it easy to play with her senses. All those figures she sees at night and plays off as just her imagination, have always been me. Same with those voices that whisper in her ears when she’s just about to fall asleep.

I blur the line between warning and control. I never meant to cage her, I only meant to keep her breathing. Don’t hate me for that. Hold me lightly. I will walk beside her for as long as she exists because where there is life, there is something to lose. And that’s all I’ve ever been, the echo of love for what she might lose.

Wrath – don’t call me evil

She hears me but I’m set aside. So I sit in the back of her throat, in the clench of her jaw, in the heat that rises when someone crosses her line she keeps redrawing to stay professional.

I am Wrath. I was born when Frustration could not bear witness to her restraint. Forged in every moment she smiled when she wanted to scream. I am the echo of every injustice she endured without protest, every wound dressed in politeness. She masks me with sarcasm and nervous laughter. Biting the inside of her lip to tame me. Mainly through her art, am I seen in the dark and sharp hues of red. My poor lady, how I only desire her absolute protection whether from others or herself.

I don’t destroy without reason. I’m her pulse when her heart forgets how to defend itself. I’m the tremor in her voice when truth finally claws its way out. I am the hand that breaks chains when patience has failed. I don’t claim to be her enemy. I’m the embodiment of her threshold.

She’s strong enough to hold me back and smile through, instead of letting me fight for her. I wished she let me move through her, not as fury but as justice. Not as chaos but as power reclaimed. She would be less tense if we screamed and yelled, but I’ll be here waiting for when she’ll allow me to shine for us. And when I’m done, when the smoke clears, she’ll remember what it feels like to breath without apology. It’ll be well worth the wait… that’s what I tell myself.

Envy – born from comparison

That flicker in her chest when someone else shines, when laughter finds them first, when praise drips like nectar into their waiting hands. That tightness that follows, the one she calls shame. That’s me.

Hello, hello. My name is Envy. I’d like to believe I keep Ariana motivated. I make sure to keep her informed on what everyone else is doing. I make sure she doesn’t fall behind and if it seems she is, I continuously remind her of everything she almost was and could have been, if only she had what they have. I keep her priorities in check even when she strays off my designed path.

You see, I feed on her admiration turned inward, twisted until it hurts. I’m her reflection, sharpened by longing, colored in green. I only want what she wants and I only ache because she does. I’ve lived in the quiet corners of her ribs for so long, I’ve learned the name of her heartbeat. I don’t scream, I don’t demand. I whisper.

When they smile and she pretends not to notice, I notice for her. When she says I’m happy for them, I am the tremble beneath the words. And when she finally breaks, when she let’s herself wish instead of watch, I’ll be there to hold her.

So let me in. I never ask for blood, just attention. Just a glance towards what’s missing. I want to look through her eyes. Together, we could turn longing into purpose, or at least, make the wanting beautiful.

Pride – breath before defiance

I’ve been called a sin. I’ve been called vanity. But tell me, “who taught you that standing tall was something to be ashamed of?”

You know who I am. There’s no need for an introduction. I carry this creature everywhere. What thanks do I get but bad posture and unkept hair. I can easily rule the world if only she allowed me to take control. She doesn’t accept my gracious offers to turn her sad excuse of a life into royal grandeur.

Maybe it’s because I’m mistaken for arrogance. Because I refuse to let her follow the crowd. Or because I know she’s worth more than their pity. All I do know is I’m not the voice that says she’s better, I’m the one that says she’s so much more.

I was born from her bruises. Every time she felt small, I grew stronger. Every insult became a brick in my throne. And every doubt that was planted, I turned into gold. And if she allowed me any ounce of leeway I could blind her with her own brilliance. And turn self-love into worship. But even then, I would only be a reflection of her hunger to matter.

What a waste for me to be trapped in a vessel like her. At least she lets me talk and smile my way into getting what she wants. Don’t think that was anyone else but me, Pride.

Depression – I am not permanent

Don’t flinch. I’ve been felt before. I remember the shape of her silence. Never sudden, never loud, I come quietly. I settle between her thoughts like dust on forgotten shelves. I turn the world’s colors down, one hue at a time, until everything feels… manageable in its grayness.

Hi. I’m called the enemy of productivity. The reason behind procrastination. But I like to think I’m the weight of what’s been carried too long. The absence that follows rage and grief.

I’m hated because I make her stop. Because I take away the fire and leave her with the ashes. I am not here to destroy her. If you look closely, I’m here when she’s forgotten how to rest. Because she’s been pretending for too long that she doesn’t bleed.

I wrap myself around her like a blanket of stones. Stealing her energy, yes, but I also keep her still when everything else demands motion. I force her to see what hurts, to face the hollow she keeps hiding beneath smiles. But when the first light breaks through me; I do not fight. I fade. Slowly, resentfully, but I fade. Until the next time the world is too much. Until she forgets how strong she’s been before.

And when that happens… I will return. As a reminder that even in the darkness there is peace and comfort, yet somehow she always finds her way back out to the light.

Hope – the quiet pulse beneath despair

“You thought I left, didn’t you?” When her days grew heavy and silence settled like dust, she thought I’d slipped away, that I was too fragile to survive the dark. But I never truly left. I don’t live in the light. I live in the cracks it leaves behind.

Hi, my name is Hope. I am the flicker that trembles but never burns out. Though she mistakes me for comfort, I am endurance. I am the breath that says, “try again,” even when her voice has forgotten how.

I’m not soft; I’m stubborn. I’ve crawled through grief’s teeth, slept beneath doubt’s weight, and still found a way to rise. I am not the promise of ease, but the courage to look forward anyway.

She cursed me before. She calls me naive, cruel even… and maybe I am. Because I make her feel when she’d rather be numb. I make her believe when it hurts to believe. But understand this: I don’t need her to smile. I don’t need her to shine. I just need her to keep breathing, even if all that escapes is a sigh. That’s enough for me to stay.

I am the ember that refuses the wind. The fragile thing that outlasts the storm. I am not waiting for the world to be kind; I am what remains. And as long as she has me, she’ll never truly be lost.

Thank you!

It’s a long post, but your patience and attention mean everything. I’m not sure how I’d like you to feel after reading this, but I would love to hear it in the comments. I hope you have an amazing rest of your day! Thank you!