Now I’m reading
The Black Book of Power* by Stan Taylor
https://stantaylor.com/?srsltid=AfmBOorr9SMAHmewYXMwYFLxmCzjCsHqjObrk0IQkpgvunsInIwhSZRj
I thought it would show me how other people play with power. Instead it started exposing how I play with my own. Not loudly, not with drama. Quietly. Through all the things I say I will do “SOON”.
This book talks about control and hidden games. And suddenly I see my own game. I am not addicted to chaos. I am addicted to “ALMOST” indeed.
Almost ready.
Almost different.
Almost becoming that version of me I keep talking about.
There is a kind of addiction that doesn’t look like addiction. No crisis, no collapse, no obvious self-destruction. Just a quiet hum of almost changing. I’ve lived in that hum for years. It’s subtle and tender, like a song that keeps you slightly numb. It feels like growth because it’s full of thoughts about growth. But in reality, it’s the prettiest form of avoidance I know.
I tell myself, this time I will do it differently. I research workouts, buy the groceries, set alarms, make plans. I feel that small high of “I’m about to begin.” It soothes me. That anticipation is its own drug. I fall asleep in it, proud of the person I’m just about to become. Tomorrow always feels bright, available, forgiving. It promises to hold all my good intentions. The problem is, tomorrow never arrives.
From the outside it probably looks like I’m “working on myself.”
Reading, reflecting, being deep. But if someone filmed me for a week, they’d mostly catch me thinking about changing, not doing it. postponing. Preparing. Promising. A lot of inner monologue, not so much movement.
I have all the pieces already. That’s the funny part.
Books I underlined, even Books I still not read yet and yet, it start tk get dusty untouchable. Notes from courses. Screenshots of quotes that “changed my life.” My phone is basically a museum of epiphanies. I like to walk through it sometimes, touch an old insight, feel briefly special, then put it back on the shelf.
My mind is full of other people’s breakthroughs. I treat them like crystals. I don’t really use them. I just hold them and say, “Wow, so powerful,” while my own life stays exactly the same.
I tell myself I am self‑aware. I can describe my patterns, name my trauma, analyze my childhood. It sounds impressive, but awareness alone is like reading a menu and never eating. At some point, the body needs food, not words.
And when I tell myself “I’ll start tomorrow,” I feel an instant relief. It’s like taking something.
I don’t need chemicals, I have my own in‑house pharmacy called “later.”
“Tomorrow” is gentle. It says, you’re tired, you’ve been through a lot, take it easy, you deserve rest. It sounds caring. It feels like self‑love. But actually, it keeps me stuck in rehearsal mode. I am always getting ready, never arriving.
I buy vegetables with pure intention. Then I watch them slowly die in the fridge while I scroll or think about “new recipes.” Every wilted thing is a small funeral for a promise I didn’t keep. It’s not just food I’m throwing away, it’s my word.
I tell myself I’m not that bad, at least I’m not numbing myself with medication or quick fixes. I don’t take pharma drugs, I don’t believe in masking symptoms and calling it healing. But then I see how I sedate myself with something else: comfort, fantasy, and spiritual language.
Self‑betrayal doesn’t show up with a big knife. It arrives as a whisper.
- “I’ll do it later.”
- “I’ll start next week.”
- “I’ll change when the timing is right.”
Every time I say I will do something and then I don’t, something small in me learns:
Your word is optional.
It’s not a big drama, it’s erosion. Slow. Invisible. But my body feels it. That heaviness when I look at a pile of tasks I abandoned. That little sting when I remember what I said yesterday and did not follow.
The shame is subtle. It’s not a breakdown, it’s a quiet feeling that I cannot fully trust myself. And the more that feeling grows, the more I escape into imagination, where I am always “about to become” someone else.
My partner gives stability. Emotionally, practically. A soft base. In many ways it’s beautiful. And in many ways, it exposes my shadow.
Because sometimes I use that safety to go unconscious.
I call it being “in my feminine.” I say I’m surrendering, receiving, flowing. Sounds pretty. But if I’m honest, sometimes it’s not surrender.
It’s collapse.
I hand over the steering wheel of my own life, then decorate it with words like softness and trust.
While im reading this book, somehow im thinking, maybe real feminine, at least how I’m starting to see it, is not letting someone else live my life for me. It’s not giving away all structure and calling it divine. It’s staying soft and open, yes, but still leading my own energy. Still responsible for my choices.
When I don’t do that, “feminine” becomes just another excuse. A spiritual outfit I put on top of my avoidance.
What I’m playing with now is extremely unglamorous.
Five minutes of movement. Not “new body, new lifestyle.” Just five minutes.
Cooking one real meal from what I already have. Not a full weekly meal plan.
Answering one message I keep avoiding. Not clearing my whole life in one night.
When I do these small things, I try to really feel them. To mark them inside my body: this is what it’s like when I actually do what I said I would do.
No one claps obviously. There is no big story. But something in me stands a little taller. It is tiny, but it’s real.
And for a long time I lived as “potential.” People said I was talented, deep, intuitive. I liked that. It was like walking around with a future crown hovering above my head. I didn’t realize how addictive that was.
Potential is safe. It is always ahead of you. It never asks you to show receipts.
But proof is different. Proof is simple and sometimes boring. It’s:
- I said I would move, and I moved.
- I said I would cook, and I cooked.
- I said I would write, and there are words on the page.
Potential lives in the mouth. Proof lives in the calendar.
To me, letting go of “ALMOST” feels like quitting a drug. I don’t get that same rush anymore from plans and visions and new beginnings in my head. That little high is gone.
Instead, I get this quiet, flat feeling. Just me and the next small thing. There is no fireworks when I do five minutes of stretching. But later, when I lie down at night, I feel slightly cleaner inside. Less noise. Less pretending.
Sometimes my old voice comes back. The one that says, “Wait, the timing isn’t right, start when you’re fully ready, make a real plan.” I hear it and I almost laugh.
Of course you are here. You’re the part of me that loves drama more than truth.
Reading this book made me realize something uncomfortable: the most constant manipulator in my life is not a person “out there.”
It’s the part of me that sells comfort as care, delay as wisdom, collapse as feminine.
I thought power was going to look like strategy, dominance, sharp boundaries.
But right now, for me, power looks like this:
I say a simple thing.
Then I do the simple thing.
Not perfectly. Not every time. But more and more often, my word and my action meet each other in the same room.
It doesn’t look impressive from the outside. No one will write a poem about me washing my dishes when I said I would. But inside, it changes the whole atmosphere. There is less fog. Less self‑doubt. More quiet respect.
Maybe that’s the real shift.
I’m less addicted to the idea of becoming powerful one day.
And I am more interested in being slightly more honest today.
Inside Heilsche 
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