Yes, I Do My Gua Sha at the Bus Stop

If You Drive Past and See Me, Just Know I’m Thriving

If you’re ever driving down one of the main roads of Brisbane and you see a woman at a bus stop massaging her own face with focused intensity, hello. That’s me. I’m not having a moment. I’m not unwell. I’ve just decided that five idle minutes are not going to slip through my fingers when I’ve got cheekbones, deadlines, and a reputation for being mildly unhinged to maintain.

I don’t use a gua sha tool. I use my hands. These hands. The same ones that type emails I rewrite three times so I don’t sound feral, stir pasta like I’m filming a cooking segment no one asked for, pat Lulu while telling him he’s the most handsome boy in the Southern Hemisphere, and occasionally text men I absolutely know better than to text. If they can do all that, they can absolutely sculpt a jawline in public.

Here’s the truth. I cannot just sit there and wait like a normal person. Five minutes of doing nothing feels like a personal attack. My brain starts drafting arguments, rehashing conversations, inventing scenarios that haven’t happened yet. So instead of spiralling internally while pretending to scroll casually, I press my thumbs under my cheekbones and sweep upwards along my neck. Suddenly I’m in my body. Suddenly I’m doing something useful. Suddenly I’m the main character in a very low budget, high drama morning routine.

I’ve Never Been Subtle About Efficiency

Let’s establish something important about me: if self care requires the perfect lighting, an uninterrupted hour, and a playlist titled Soft Reset Energy, I’m not doing it. I’ll romanticise it. I’ll think about it. I’ll research it to death. But actually commit? Questionable. I’m a chaos goblin with ambition, not a monastery resident.

So I stack things. I layer habits like I’m building a skincare lasagne. I do red light therapy while standing on my vibration plate because if I’m going to glow, I may as well glow and gently rattle at the same time. I’ve mud masked while walking on a treadmill. I’ve hair oiled while answering emails. I was wearing sheet masks on long haul flights before it was cool, drifting over oceans looking like a hydrated ghost with goals.

It’s not obsession. It’s adaptation. I know I won’t stick to something that feels sacred and fragile, but I will stick to something that fits into the cracks of my day. That’s why the bus stop became my spa. I realised I was sitting there anyway, half scrolling, half dissociating, letting my thoughts run ahead of me. And I thought, what if instead of scrolling, we sculpt. What if instead of spiralling, we stimulate circulation? It felt ridiculous. But it also felt genius.

Self Care Doesn’t Have to Be Performed in Private

We will wear scrunchie shorts so tiny they’re practically punctuation at the gym. We will grunt through squats in front of strangers. We will film workouts from multiple angles and upload them before we’ve even wiped our face. Public exertion is normal. Public vulnerability is content. Public exhaustion is almost aspirational.

But massage your own face at a bus stop? Suddenly it’s intimate.

I don’t understand that logic. Why is taking care of yourself something that has to happen behind closed doors with flattering lighting and a carefully curated playlist? Why is burnout acceptable but visible self maintenance somehow indulgent? We’ve normalised being busy. We’ve normalised being tired. We’ve normalised pushing through. But the second you choose yourself in broad daylight, people act like you’ve broken a social contract.

I’m not interested in that contract. If I can take up space with stress, I can take up space with self care. If I can answer work emails on a cracked footpath while waiting for public transport, I can absolutely run my fingers along my jaw and encourage a bit of fluid movement. It’s not attention seeking. It’s not dramatic. It’s me refusing to abandon my body just because I’m visible.

It’s Not About Looking Snatched, It’s About Feeling Present

Let me be clear. I’m not standing there thinking, today we transform into a supermodel. I’m thinking, I’ve got five minutes and two hands. Let’s not waste them. I use gentle upward strokes along my neck, slow pressure under my cheekbones, a sweep across the brow. Nothing aggressive. Nothing frantic. Just deliberate movement and breath.

And something shifts. My shoulders drop. My jaw unclenches. My brain stops racing ahead to meetings and to do lists. The traffic becomes background noise instead of a personal assault. I’m grounded in the simplest way possible, through touch. Through rhythm. Through choosing to pay attention.

Those tiny pockets of care matter more than any dramatic spa day I book once, cancel twice, and then complain I never have time for. Five minutes in the morning. Maybe another five while the kettle boils. It adds up quietly. It builds consistency without fanfare. And consistency, as much as I love a grand gesture, is what actually changes things.

There’s also something deeply rebellious about refusing to wait for ideal conditions. I don’t need silence. I don’t need candles. I don’t need a perfectly clean bathroom mirror. I need my hands and a willingness to look mildly eccentric while the 385 bus approaches.

Romanticise the Mundane or It Will Drain You

If you don’t romanticise the ordinary, it will flatten you. The commute becomes something you endure. The waiting becomes something you resent. The in between moments of your day turn into dead space where your brain chews on anxiety.

So I decided the bus stop doesn’t get to steal my time. It becomes part of my ritual. Concrete under my feet. Sun burning my shoulders. My reflection faintly visible in the scratched shelter glass. I’m there, pressing my fingers into my own skin like I’m preparing for a royal engagement instead of a team meeting. It’s slightly delusional. It’s completely practical. It’s very on brand.

And here’s the thing. No one actually cares. People are too busy with their own lives to analyse my morning lymphatic routine. The fear that everyone is watching you dissolve the second you realise they’re not. You’re free. Free to massage your face. Free to stretch. Free to exist in your body without apology.

You don’t have to copy me. I’m not recruiting you into a public gua sha movement. But stop waiting for perfect conditions to look after yourself. Stop believing self care only counts if it’s private, aesthetic, and softly lit. If you’ve got five spare minutes and your own two hands, that’s enough.

Be a little dramatic about your wellbeing. Be slightly chaotic. Be consistent in small, ridiculous ways. Let the cars drive past while you quietly choose yourself anyway. If that means someone drives by and sees a woman sculpting her own jawline at 8.17am, so be it. I’ll be there, thriving, unbothered, and mildly luminous.

You Are Not Entitled to an Answer – Chaos, Crumbs and Clarity

In this episode of Chaos, Crumbs and Clarity, we're unpacking why you are not entitled to an answer. Specifically, we're talking about the strange little corner of modern dating where a few days of app chat somehow becomes an emotional contract, and suddenly a man you've never met believes your silence requires a formal explanation, a debrief, and possibly a follow-up meeting with management.I have two stories for you. One man who talked almost exclusively about himself, ignored the fact that I was sick, and then followed up a week later asking whether I'd reconsidered his "request for clarification". And another who became offended because I didn't respond to his selfie within two hours while I was lying in a dark room with a migraine. Sir. Please be serious.Because here's the thing. Before you've met someone, you do not owe them unlimited access to your time, attention, reassurance, or emotional labour. You don't have to justify why the vibes changed. You don't need a reason they'll consider reasonable. You are allowed to disengage because something felt off, because you changed your mind, because you met someone else, or because you're in your luteal phase and frankly the entire world can wait.Today we're talking about the difference between ghosting and simply disengaging, why demanding closure can become a boundary violation, the exhausting expectation that women should manage men's feelings for them, and why you do not need to JADE, justify, argue, defend, or explain, when you've already decided you're done. Let's get into it.Key Takeaways:A few days of chatting does not create a debt. Matching on an app, exchanging messages, or talking on the phone does not give someone a claim on your attention. Until you've actually built a connection, you are allowed to walk away without submitting supporting documentation.Closure is not something another person can demand from you. Asking once is one thing. Continuing to push after someone has clearly disengaged is not persistence or emotional maturity. It's refusing to accept the answer you've already been given.You do not need to JADE. You don't have to justify, argue, defend, or explain why you're no longer interested. The reason doesn't have to be good enough for him. It just has to be yours.Pre-date silence and post-date silence are not the same thing. If you've never met, disengaging is part of app dating. Once you've shared an actual date or developed a genuine connection, a simple goodbye becomes basic courtesy. Nobody needs a dissertation, but acknowledging another human being matters.Sometimes they don't miss you. They miss the audience. Someone can seem interested while actually being interested in having your attention. Real connection requires curiosity about you. If the only time they become deeply engaged is when you're leaving, pay attention to that.For more visit ⁠BryJaimea.com⁠ or follow over on IG ⁠@BryJaimea

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