Ashly Lorenzana

“I'm pretty lost in becoming all this frost. Bitter, like Winter. Strung-out like a string of pearls.”

“I'm falling apart, one part after another. Falling down on the world like snow. Half of me is already on the ground, watching from below.”

“Trees lose their leaves in blizzards like these.”

“Hope is a Heaven to keep you out of Hell. It's hard work believing that it's there.”

“People accuse me of falling in love easily. It just means that I'm able to see the beauty in most of the people who cross paths with me and I appreciate it for what it is and also for what it isn't. Love is imperfect. Falling for someone's flaws is just as necessary as falling for their strengths. And people like myself, who fall into love easily, are sometimes the loneliest souls around at the end of the day.”

“Some people like living in black and white worlds. Let them stay there. Appreciate all the colors you see in your world though.”

“I don't think I've ever dared to write down what I see in the ruins of me, or tell in any detail the scars and all their secrets.”

“If you love yourself the most at your happiest moments, there is no reason not to be fond of who you are in the dark.”

“Anything that lights your world leaves it dark once it's gone.”

“Just remember that those who feel profoundly depressed are those whose happiness is likewise intense. What's so wrong with that?”

“We may seem fine, even when the pain remains right there beneath our surface.”

“The parts of me that hurt the worst want me to write something for them, but I can't. I don't know what to say. I'm lost in all this sadness, and so are they.”

“Sooner or later in life, we will all take our own turn being in the position we once had someone else in.”

“It's so hard to find the place somewhere in the middle of the best and worst I've felt.”

“The world is big in some ways, and so small in others.”

“It's always almost Autumn, down here at Rock Bottom.”

“I think there were times when I was so afraid of losing you that I forgot I even had you at all.”

“You cannot force things apart that are bound at the heart.”

“The only thing that feels worse than being stuck in a situation that makes you unhappy is realizing that you are not ready or willing to change whatever it is.”

“A lot of things in life won't make sense, so be sure to make the most sense out of those that do.”

“Remember that every person who you come into contact to on any given day has a story that is probably far more amazing than you will imagine and no one is going to just offer up their entire life's worth of experiences to you because you want them to. It takes time to draw someone's story out from within them. It takes trust. It takes sincerity and dedication. Keep in mind that each and every interaction you have with all those people on a daily basis is a unique opportunity to develop any kind of relationship with that person that the two of you might want to be a part of. It doesn't matter how you meet them or what it is that you do with them. It can be as mundane as waving to them in the morning as they leave their driveway, or it can be as huge as saving someone's life in a moment of uncertainty and sacrifice. Each person has the potential to become a friend or a lover or to simply teach you something important and then slip back into the endless rush of other bodies moving about the planet around us. Don't pass these chances up too often, or you'll get lost in the tide yourself.”

“Morality and legality have nothing to do with one another. I'm more than fine with breaking a law if it disagrees with my values and morals.”

“There will be a time when you are forced to follow your heart away from someone you love.”

“Don't kid yourself by saying that one time can't make you addicted. It can. I believed it couldn't too when I first tried meth. I was so, so wrong. The worst part about it is that you won't realize what has happened immediately afterwards. Addiction is a gradual process and it doesn't happen overnight. But trust me when I tell you that one time is all that it takes to set this into motion. It can and it will.”

“99% of all addicts are liars and thieves. This might sound unfair and even close-minded, but it's the truth. There are some exceptions to the rules, but they are incredibly rare. Most people are no match for their addictions. They will be driven to do things they would normally never have considered all in the name of getting high. Sad, but true. So if you're thinking of trying drugs, keep in mind that all the people you will be dealing with are likely to steal from you and lie to you at your own expense.”

“I can pretty much guarantee that you will at some point find yourself doing something that at one point you swore you'd never do. You'll do it for the sake of getting high, either directly or indirectly. Trust me. It will happen. You might think you know yourself better than anyone, but you have yet to become acquainted with your addiction. It will introduce itself in ways that you never thought were possible.”

“If somebody never gets enough of you, they will always want more”

“It might be depressing, but it's also the truth that no one has the power, the money, or the resources to save everyone on the planet from going hungry, living in poverty or allowed basic human rights. But consider the other side of this: there are people in this world who truly WOULD do all of these things for everyone if only they could. There is hope after all.”

“Storytellers don't show, they tell. I'm sticking with that.”

“People leave imprints on our lives, shaping who we become in much the same way that a symbol is pressed into the page of a book to tell you who it comes from. Dogs, however, leave paw prints on our lives and our souls, which are as unique as fingerprints in every way.”

“I say fuck the old advice 'show, don't tell.' It's called story TELLING for a reason, and I'll stick to it!”

“All we know is what we're told.”

“It's okay to disagree with the thoughts or opinions expressed by other people. That doesn't give you the right to deny any sense they might make. Nor does it give you a right to accuse someone of poorly expressing their beliefs just because you don't like what they are saying. Learn to recognize good writing when you read it, even if it means overcoming your pride and opening your mind beyond what is comfortable.”

“You never know what lurks just beneath the surface of my fragile sanity.”

“Phones with numerical keypads worked best for dialing phone calls. Incidentally, phone calls tend to be the primary function of a phone. 'Smartphones' completely ignore these basic facts, resulting in some of the least intelligent devices I've seen yet. Oh the irony.”

“If you're going to do something, strive to do it better than anyone else. Do it all the way. If you're going to half-ass it, why bother?”

“Never try to do anything that is outside of who you are. A forced smile is a sign of what feels wrong in your heart, so recognize it when it happens. Living a lie will reduce you to one.”

“Fame is not so impossible for people with charisma, passion and talent. Being famous just means you have fans, and even one or two is enough to make you someone special. Ask a music fan who the best guitarist of all time is, and while one group insists that it was Jimmi Hendrix, another group swears that it was Eddie Van Halen instead. There will never be a time when everyone on this planet agrees on something like that, but luckily that's not important. All that matters is that both sides remain loyal, which they will assuming you continue to be who you are and do your thing. This is all that you need to be immortalized.”

“How good something is should never be determined by its cost, designer, origin, or its perceived value by others.”

“There is nothing wrong with revenge. The wrong has already been done, or there would be no need to even the score.”

“When you want to share something with another person more than anything, it is one of the most difficult things to realize that you can never have it. Accepting this realization is even more difficult. Loving someone does mean saying goodbye to them in some cases, though we will fight that until the oftentimes bitter end before doing the right thing.”

“The end of a relationship is not always a failure. Sometimes all the love in the world is not enough to save something. In these cases, it is not a matter of fault from either person. Some things cannot be, it's as simple as that.”

“A lot of people who find out about the things I do immediately figure I'm just a pathetic "druggie" with nothing to say that is worth hearing. They talk endless bull shit of "recovery!" They make it sound like some amazing discovery...don't they know I'm far too busy trying to recover me?”

“Two wrongs don't make a right, but neither does one. Revenge may seem petty by day, but on some nights she becomes Justice.”

“It may be a man's world, but men are easily controlled by women.”

“By judging others, you make yourself easy to judge.”

“There is nothing worse than having an enemy who is a total loser. It's incredibly frustrating when seeking revenge against one, because you come to the realization that there is really nothing you can do to make the person's life worse than it already is. They have nothing to take, there is no way to screw them over if you have been their victim. It's maddening.”

“You have to believe what you're saying if you're going to convince me. I just can't break that rule, even if I want to.”

“The easiest way to gain someone's trust is to deserve it. This should be pretty easy, assuming you're just being you and being real. Minimal effort too.”

“We judge others instantly by their clothes, their cars, their appearance, their race, their education, their social status. The list is endless. What gets me is that most people decide who another person is before they have even spoken to them. What's even worse is that these same people decide who someone else is, and don't even know who they are themselves.”