For my last post of the year, I figured it’s time to be a bit introspective. Here’s the thing – we’re all the villains in someone’s story. That’s expected. But what happens when you look in the mirror one day and realize that maybe, just maybe, you’re the villain of your own? More of my story later, but obviously, today we’re going to be talking about Black Swan.

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Natalie Portman’s devastatingly beautiful portrayal of prima ballerina Nina illustrates her descent into madness as she struggles to fully encapsulate the darkness of Odile in her company’s production of Swan Lake. She constantly compares herself to her eerily identical alternate, Lily, and begins to wake up with injuries after intense hallucinations. On opening night, Nina confronts Lily, and Nina stabs her, seemingly killing her. But by the final act, Nina realizes that she has actually stabbed herself, and collapses on stage after a flawless performance.

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On the surface, the film asks viewers if whether pain is the common denominator to all meaningful art. However, beyond this, it raises questions on how far we can remove ourselves from the consequences of our psychosis. It’s a hard pill to swallow: we can blame insanity on the pressure to be perfect, or say it’s from past trauma, or even make the inept men around us shoulder the guilt. But if at the end of the day, we let the crazy consume us, if we let it control not just our reactions, but the conscious actions we take, who else can we blame but ourselves?

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To look at the movie through an even narrower lens of the female gaze, Nina’s plight is a shared experience between all women: internalizing society’s standards and forcing yourself to adhere meticulously to them till you break. Jane Fonda’s character in another film, My Life So Far, has a quote that’s always stuck with me:

“This toxic striving for perfection is a female thing. How many men obsess about being perfect? For men, generally, good enough is good enough.”

The bar for men is so low even I can’t limbo under it. And I’m like five foot. So that should tell you something. But regardless, the drastic differences in the scrutiny men and women are held under is enough to make any woman go absolutely balls to the wall insane. This whole blog centers on that idea! But I guess the idea I’m trying to leave you all with is that yes, being a crazy girl is nothing to be ashamed about. Choose to be your most unhinged self everyday because God knows more people need the wake up call only a truly feral woman can provide. But don’t let the hurt make you bitter, or jaded, or cynical. I’ve been there… Boy, that was a bleak couple months. And there’s never a reason to be like Nina, and harm yourself over what has been done to you. There’s always hope for us crazy girls <3 (and if not, we can all just pivot into being old crazy cat ladies).