leeisallyouneed

Latest Posts by leeisallyouneed

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Very few things

Very few things feel good these days and if they do they last just for a bit, it’s most dire at night, when the sun goes down and the lights are out and there is only you, just about to take a pause on consciousness that’s when the shortness of breath, the ever present pain in your back, the heaviness in your chest all raise their voices and then you try, really try to think about things that feel good and you realize there are afew things, but just very few things.

They taught us to be quiet about it. To cross our legs. To hide our hunger. To feel shame for the fire that lives between our thighs.

They whispered that good girls don’t touch themselves. That women who love sex are dirty. Easy. Wrong. But they forgot something.

Sex is power. Sex is healing. Sex is fucking holy.

When I touch myself, I’m not being selfish— I’m remembering I’m alive. When I moan, it’s not sin—it’s release. It’s prayer. It’s worship. It’s a woman choosing herself.

I love sex. I love pleasure. I love the wild, untamed, wet, shivering truth of my body.

And there is no shame in that. Not anymore. Not here. Not in this temple I call me.

— Seraphine 💋🔥💦

Spinoffs: Space Station Innovations in Your Cart (and Heart!)

You might think NASA technology is just spaceships and telescopes, but did you know the camera in your cell phone is, too? It’s one of many NASA innovations now found everywhere on Earth.

The International Space Station has had crew living on it for 25 years straight. In that time, the space station has enabled a tremendous amount of research, helping NASA and scientists better understand long-term living in space – but it’s not just knowledge coming back down to Earth! Technologies developed for the space station and experiments conducted aboard the orbiting lab also benefit people on the planet below. Here are a few of these inventions, or spinoffs, you can find in your everyday life.

A Sunscreen That Blocks Radiation in Space – and on Your Face

After surviving for 18 months outside the International Space Station, an extremely hardy organism is now improving sunscreens and face cream products from a cosmetics company, which licensed use of the organism from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Build Muscle With or Without Gravity

Muscles atrophy quickly in space, so when astronauts began long stays on the International Space Station, they needed some specialized exercise equipment. A resistance mechanism made of a coiled metal spring formed the basis of the first way for astronauts to “lift weights” in space. Soon after, that same design became the heart of compact home gym equipment.

Fresh Greens Every Day of the Year

The need to grow fresh food in space pushed NASA to develop indoor agriculture techniques. Thanks to the agency’s research, private companies are building on NASA’s vertical farm structure, plant-growth “recipes,” and environmental-control data to create indoor farms, resulting in higher crop yields and better-quality produce while conserving water and energy and eliminating the need for pesticides.

Cultivating Hearts and Knees in Space

Gravity is a significant obstacle to bioprinting cells and growing human tissue on Earth because heavier components settle to the bottoms of petri dishes. In the absence of gravity, each cell layer stays in place, which is how it’s possible to grow heart and knee tissue on the space station. The same principle also allows mixing of complex pharmaceuticals on orbit.

Storing Oodles of Energy

NASA chose nickel-hydrogen batteries to power the Hubble Space Telescope and the International Space Station because the technology is safe, reliable in extreme temperatures, and long-lived. NASA’s improvements brought down the cost of the technology, which is now used by large-scale utilities and renewable power plants that need to store energy generated by intermittent sources.

You can read about many more products sourced from the ISS on spinoff.nasa.gov.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

MY HEART 😭💜

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

I am okay

You have to say it at-least ten times before your brain registers it

“Please, I want so badly for the good things to happen.”

— Sylvia Plath

I miss my lover

I miss the way they laugh, that rings across the room

I miss the way they call to me, which is so specific to them

I miss their quiet presence, with no pretense just them sitting comfortably in their skin,

I miss my lover and the way they bring me food even when i am upset, but

I do not miss the long arguments, the feeling of being unheard or unseen, i do not miss constantly making space for them to expand to exist

With no space for me to be sometimes, i do not miss being a the center of someone else's world or the long winded understanding it requires to love another person

In the space of longing after all is said and done at the core of it all, I miss my lover because love is rarely perfect

Tell me whats’s on your mind

Tell me what’s on your mind today, is it an ex lover you don’t talk to anymore or the job you didn’t get

Is it clouds in the sky as you stare in awe, is it the friend by your side, telling you what’s life been like for them lately.

Is it picture online of a friend doing something you would also love to do, or a love interest on a trip you would love to also be on

Is it the work you do and hate or the work you do and love

Is it lunch today or dinner plans tomorrow with your friends, is it the loneliness that sometimes visits you or the joy of sharing your space with your cat

Tell me what’s on your mind, let’s share the joy or burden together

I am choosing to be grateful,

For my body, my legs especially they are so strong and they work so hard, I am also grateful for the wind or breeze helps with the heat cause it’s so hot these days, I am grateful for ice cold water with little chunks of ice in it, I am grateful for my friends and how they cheer me up, I am grateful that my loved ones are okay, I am grateful for my hands, they helps us work and make delicious meals for ourselves, i an thankfull for my gut health, digesting all my food, I am grateful for love, from my family, lovers and friends, I grateful for comfort shows that keeps my breathe moving steadily, grateful for work that is exciting, grateful for the opportunities that come my way.

I am grateful

This rings so true today

Do I exist

Like I know I am here

I feel my body, I see everything around me

I smell smells

I hear things

I feel feels, I love and I am loved

But sometimes it doesn’t feel real

It’s hard to call it dissonance

But I feel untethered from time to time

Like most times I am not here

But the real me fights through the haze and I am me

In that moment

But that makes all the other moment not feel real

Okay it doesn’t sound coherent

Maybe it’s not

Maybe that’s the whole point

Am I ambitious

I have dreams, goals, things I want to do the kind of life I want to live but am i ambitious? I feel like I want to achieve my goals but also sleep when I need to or even want to, I want to have this lifestyle but actually have time to be in it.

Now I am not interested in being a new bill gates or Elon musk because I feel that kind of success defeats the purpose, your time, mind and life is perpetually occupied with one thing and for me that’s not exactly living

You know “do it scared” is a legit CBT technique called Behavioral Activation. The basic tenet of it is that there’s a thing you have to do for your wellbeing that you’re having an emotion about (that you’re scared), and thoughts about (that you don’t want to do it) but the easiest thing to change out of the three of those (behavior, thoughts, emotions) is the behavior itself.

Because actually doing the work to change the emotion or thought so you want to do the thing is gonna take all day, but going and doing the thing without changing the thought or emotion is gonna take you like 10 seconds. And then once the thing is done (or started) your thoughts and emotions about it are kind of automatically different than they were before.

Doing it scared literally makes you less scared.

Note: it’s not the quick fix that avoiding the behavior is. It’s gonna take a lot of doing it scared before you get to do it not scared. But the difference is you’re doing it. And you’re building up to a day when doing it isn’t the worst thing you’ve ever done.

An aerial view of one of the busiest cities in West Africa, Lagos, Nigeria

Photographed by Wale Adebisi [@waleadebisiphotography]

7, 8, 9 billion people I’d still chose you, why? I don’t know, I just know that I would, if wishes came through, we’d never be apart, all my anxiety wouldn’t exist, and I’d love you even more than I do now. It’s not just about you, it’s about us, I am scared of the hope, the tiny voice that keeps saying maybe this isn’t the end, maybe we’d chose different. Maybe we are still young, still figuring it out, still trying to have conversations, still t r y i n g t o s a y I l o v e y o u. If wishes came through, we’d hold so tight nothing would pull us apart but the high is high and reality slowly walks in, we both stand as still as we can not breathing, so we are invincible, maybe that’s what it’s all about being delulu until it becomes the solulu

Recent musing

Friendships come in different forms, yet we often overlook that a friend represents a relationship. Just as life ebbs and flows in a romantic relationship, a similar dynamic occurs in friendship.

I have two wonderful close friends. One, whom we'll call A, has been my day one; we have been closely connected for almost 20 years. She feels like a part of me in another body, but with her own unique twist. My second friend, whom we'll call Y, is someone whose energy matches mine perfectly. I made friends with Y in my twenties, and I look forward to a lifelong relationship with her.

A and I rarely fight; we see eye to eye on about 95% of things and truly understand each other. However, with Y, we do have disagreements from time to time, but the love between us remains strong.

I've noticed that when you share a conflict you're having with someone, people's responses often depend on your relationship with that person. For example, if it's a romantic partner, they might try to help you see things from a different perspective, unless the disagreement is particularly severe or the partner is abusive. In those cases, people generally won't advise you to end the relationship. However, when it comes to friendships, it seems that we tend to have less compassion.

We often believe that all friendships should resemble the ideal of "i and A," where everything is perfect. However, in reality, friendships are more like "i and T." It's normal to have disagreements; what's important is how we handle them. It's okay to fight, make amends, learn from the experience, and grow together. There's no need to cut ties with a friend over a misunderstanding. While I recognize that this might be an unpopular opinion, I believe it's a necessary reality. Personally, I tend to reflect seriously before ending any relationship, but I notice that many people react impulsively during conflicts in friendships.

My ramble tonight is simply that your friends deserve a second chance, or even a third and fourth, too, as long as they are not malicious and do not intentionally harm you.

Fe

On the verge 

This is not a poem or poetry, it’s rambling, I feel close to tears not for anything in particular but because I think I feel everything and nothing all at once, i want them to come get me and make me feel better, i want them to call but i know I don’t want to pick up, I want them to stay and I want them to go, I want the opportunities but I don’t know if I can manage, I want ice cream, berry blast and suya, I want to be home so bad, I want to close the door of my room and disappear, I want to ball my eyes out.

I want to not care so much, while simultaneously caring about everything, I wish I had more bandwidth, I feel loose at the hems, I feel too overstimulated but somehow bored, I want to not exist, I want to not feel, I want to sleep so deeply and only wake up when necessary, I want love, I want to be wanted but also not care about being wanted, I want to move out but stay put.

Nothing helps, nothing helps, should I have fought harder, why does life have so much to do with fighting, even plants fight each other for sunlight, can being alive even ever be categorized as peaceful, I think to be alive is chaos, living is chaotic, the entire universe is chaos with everything hanging on a delicate balance.

This too shall pass, Abi is that this too shall end, anyone Sha, social media is shit, the economy is shit, can I manage my life, myself. Knowing there is something special about myself doesn’t make me feel special, does anyone feel so uncomfortable being seen as I do? I don’t want to need anyone or anything, why do we all need sustenance, why can’t life be just a little easier, to be Nigerian feels like you drew the short straw, do you think we draw straws for the kind of life we get to live?

I passed out once, I think about it sometimes the simple and quiet emptiness of not being conscious or could we also say of not existing, I feel nothing but a low buzz of everything, I know it’s there, I am just disconnected

Alone Not Lonely (2024) By Bisola Michal, Nigerian artist

I participated in a live quiz by a writer on Substack, which got me thinking about love, partners, and relationships. People who believe in and practice monogamy often see their love as pure, earnest, and true. In contrast, those who explore other types of relationships, such as polyamory, are often viewed as less pure, less earnest, and definitely untrue.

For a long time, I believed in the ideology that polyamorous love was somehow less pure because society teaches that true love is meant to be between two people forever. However, we are society, and we have the power to determine our own beliefs and values. Thus, we can choose to view love differently.

Regardless of other factors, love is love. If it's not genuine, then it simply isn't. When you truly love someone—or multiple people—your affection for one person doesn't diminish the love you have for another. We express love in different ways, and it's impossible to equate or quantify it.

An important aspect to consider is the notion that differing levels of commitment in polyamorous relationships indicate a lack of commitment overall. However, that is not the case. If someone is open and transparent with their partners about wanting to be involved with both, how is that not a form of commitment? In fact, it could be seen as a double commitment!

The idea that someone can love two or more people romantically because one person isn’t enough for them is a common myth. It’s important to recognize that it’s never truly about the other person. What does it even mean for someone to be "enough"? We need community and connection, and a person can thrive with more than one meaningful relationship. This doesn't automatically make each person any less whole or sufficient. In my view, the answer is no; they are still complete individuals.

I am tired of ranting and will head to bed now

Fe

This might be an unpopular opinion but:

I'd rather start the romance all over again

I'd rather fix the problems

I‘d rather work on the triggers

I'd rather find out what went wrong

I‘d rather go through the hardships

I'd rather go through more fights and arguments

I'd rather go on more dates

I'd rather work on winning you over a million times

Than to start all over again with someone that won't be the same

The scene at Osun Osogbo in Osun State, Nigeria by Adeolu Osibodu (@adeoluosibodu)

I don’t know what to write, maybe it’s because I’m in the midst of a lot of feelings, it hit me today just how low on cash I am and even doh there are a few things in the works, I wonder if I will survive long enough, I am second guessing my decision to leave my job about a year ago but another part of me is saying f*** that mostly because it’s not worth it.

I have 40gh in my account all I can do is work and eat, I can’t do anything spontaneous, I am looking at myself and I am worried, ngl I feel very very worried, I am looking around for who is going to help and feel shame, I feel embarrassed that I am trying to get someone to help me or give me money, like a handout.

I know I made the right decision, it’s not been easy, there is a heavy sigh in my heart, and I know that I need to hang in there, need to believe but omo it’s hard to do in this exact moment

So I am back to my warrior position, lying on the floor in fetal position were I can find the strength to get up, trust and believe that everything is going to be alright but for now we lie down