if you dislike nara smith, try becoming her instead

she's not your enemy, she's your hero

Jun 07, 2024

tldr: being on your own timeline + clarity of vision + follow through

envy, and its miscontents

your relationship with trust often reveals your relationship with envy. perhaps it’s not cool to admit you’ve been envious of others. but it’s not about being cool, it’s about being human. and wanting what others have for ourselves is a story as old as time. or at least, as old as shakespeare.

we should all be fearful of living a life we do not deserve. a life where we settled for what was given to us, even if it’s not what we wanted. often times, settling in life is either the result of us lacking the strength to go after what we actually want, or simply not knowing what it is we even want.

fear not, our envy can be a compass to uncover what we actually want in life. after all, you wouldn't be a hater towards another for having something you want if you didn’t actually care about that thing.

in your envy lies your salvation.

i’ve written about my belief in inevitable ends. for me, an inevitable end is something you create through sheer will. the law of cause and effect. if it does not materialize for you in the way you envisioned and desire, it simply means the gods are sending you something better. in the immortal words of a woman i greatly admire, “life works for me, not the other way around.”

p.s. share this with a woman who always gets what she wants.

social media, and all the women i’d kill to be

we are comfortably into the second decade of social media. where has it gotten us? for starters, we now exist in each other lives in a way our ancestors never contended with. at any given moment, you can connect with someone half way around the way in a meaningful way, if not a parasocial one. the platforms of the past decade brought billions of people into one hub in pursuit of “connection.” in this decade, it’s interesting to see people splinter off from these platforms in search for their own communities. home with those who share their obsessions, not shame them for it.

for those of us who still hang on to the mega platforms, what does it do for us? as both a spectator and a participant, i find that there are two pathways: suffer, or be inspired. by suffering i mean that i find that there are those who hyperfixate on a figure or trend to the point of obsession or burnout.

for example, beginning in 2021 the “that girl” trend ushered in countless disciples under its banner and birthed a litany of sub-genres, such as the “clean girl” aesthetic. at the apex of this, hailey rhode bieber rode the wave into founding her eponymous brand, rhode, and countless influencer accounts were skyrocketed. my favorite from that era is hannah adkins. she seems sweet, and reminds me of a vs angel from the early aughts. i’m a fan. to the point of hailey, this article captures her positioning within the marketplace best:

“she remains primarily a mood board … not a persona, but an idea to aspire to.”

kyndall cunningham.

there are countless young women with 10-step morning and nighttime routines, skincare closets that could fill an entire sephora shelf, and a standing pilates appointment every saturday morning because aspiring to the idea of hailey-sofia-[name of the it girl du jour] is worth the labor. honestly? i’m in alignment. i love the idea of beauty built upon discipline. but i’m a venusian. beauty is a way of life for me, and it’s the only way i want to exist in this life. i get it. and i’m on board.

for those not fully on board. for those overwhelmed. and frankly, for those who simply couldn’t be bothered. my solution is, and will always be, to simply exist within your own beauty standard. care not for the current social media “aesthetic” and how you need to revamp your entire wardrobe to fit it. care not about purchasing the latest skincare product in your never-ending pursuit of “glass skin.” care not about hailey-sofia-[name of the it girl du jour]. care only about you. just you. as you are. sans filter. sans filler.

that said, if you find that even from a place of total self-acceptance, you remain unsatisfied. be it with your “aesthetic” (not your natural beauty or how you currently present). be it with your accomplishments (not your daily efforts or work ethic). be it with your status (not tied to your self worth or self esteem), then change. use your endless scrolling, that pinch of envy you feel when you see the umpteenth video of nara smith cooking for her family from scratch in runway chanel as your sign to move forward towards nara’s reality and away from yours. if our envy is a compass to uncover what we actually want in life, let your compass lead you to making the decisions that make you having the financial and time freedom to cook from scratch in a cardigan that costs your current rent your inevitable end.

the hate directed towards nara continues to fascinate me. there’s an essay to be written on just that. but the takeaway there will be the same as the takeaway here: be inspired, or suffer.

better put, she’s not your enemy, she's your hero.

p.s. share this with a woman who doesn’t know who nara smith is actually.

envy’s place in a diouana woman’s world

we, few but proud, diouana women understand that there is no place for suffering in our lives. it’s antithetical to our status as women who get what we want. an affront to our birthrights of rest, beauty, love, and luxury. diouana women do not stand for suffering. diouana women do not suffer in life.

we do, however, use envy, and especially anger, to our benefit. those who study tarot, vedic astrology, and have watched shera’s spirituality channel since they were 17 (there’s an essay to be written about how this woman is a better witch than she is a hypergamist and how her current mainstreaming is a gift from venus [shera deity worships] for her countless years of devotion to the venusian arts; but i’ll leave that as a shit post on my tumblr; which i’d probably delete five minutes after posting it anyways), know that potential energy must be translated into kinetic energy. not only is it the first law of thermodynamics, it’s an alchemical principle.

the anger you currently feel at not being where you want to be, or having what you want to have, or even being who you want to be, is the energy you must use as fuel to power you through the labor you must expense to do what you need to do to have what it is you desire. it may not be an actual principle of economics, but there is a general understanding among economists that there is no such thing as a free lunch. if diouana women know anything, we know economics. we understand demand and supply. we understand the law of scarcity. we understand what leads to a deficit.

if your efforts are your supply, and where / what / who you want to be are your demand, then they must be equal to reach equilibrium. to that end, the more work you put in, they greater likelihood of you getting what you are. the less work you put in, the lesser likelihood there is of you getting what you want. if you put no work in, you will not get what you want. at this point, your demand will be greater than your supply and you will run a deficit. and diouana woman are always solvent. and that’s on john maynard keynes. it’s basic facts. are you not a woman who gets what you want? yes? then put in the work. become nara, hailey, sofia, whomever. better yet, become you.

p.s. truth or dare

you know how in your diary, you write something down then rip it out and place it in the tiny makeup bag you keep in your purse as a manifestation method? yeah, these p.s. truth or dares are the digital versions of my little ripped off notes.

truth: being a go-getter. a self-starter. someone my 14 year old self would be proud of!!!

dare: hating on other women. there’s a time and a place for that, and it’s not on this substack or anyway in my world.