chillswagdopesoul

[chillswagdopesoul]

Imagine if you met someone who can't eat watermelon. Not that they're allergic or unable somehow, but they just haven't figured out how to do that. So you're like "what the hell do you mean? it works just like eating anything else, you open your mouth, sink your teeth in, take a bite and chew. If you can bite, chew and swallow, you should be able to eat a watermelon."

And they agree that yes, they do know how to eat, in theory. The problem is the watermelon. Surely, if they figured out where to start, they'd figure out how to do it, but they have no clue how to get started with it.

This goes back and forth. No, it's not an emotional issue, they're not afraid of the watermelon. They can eat any other fruit, other sweet things, and other watery things ("it's watery?" they ask you). Is it the colour? Do they have a problem eating things that are green on the outside and red on the inside?

"It's red on the inside?"

Wait, they've never seen the inside? At this point you have to ask them how, exactly, they eat the watermelon. So to demonstrate, they take a whole, round, uncut watermelon, and try to bite straight into it. Even if they could bite through the crust, there's no way to get human jaws around it.

"Oh, you're supposed to cut it first. You cut the crust open and only chew through the insides."

And they had no idea. All their life this person has had no idea how to eat a watermelon, despite of being told again and again and again that it's easy, it's ridiculous to struggle with something so simple, there's no way that someone just can't eat a watermelon, how can you even mange to be bad at something as fucking simple as eating watermelon.

If someone can't do something after being repeatedly told to "just do it", there might be some key component missing that one side has no idea about, and the other side assumed was so obvious it goes without mention.

[chillswagdopesoul]

[chillswagdopesoul]

Alright kids say it with me

My thoughts don’t make me a bad person

My feelings don’t make me a bad person

My thoughts, feelings, and impulses only exist inside my head, and none of it matters unless I act on it

Nobody can see my thoughts or emotions

The only things anyone can see and judge me on are my actions

There’s no such thing as a thought crime

thank u

[chillswagdopesoul]

Growing up is actually all about realizing people don’t inherently dislike you and it’s a bit odd to assume they do

[chillswagdopesoul]

on being yourself

@ brainsoupp_ on twitter// @stmichaelthearchangel// @ cybermrcury on twitter// @throughmy-eyez // @ shellerina on twitter// @caesarsaladinn// @ nelsoncj4 on twitter // @ heimberg_a on twitter// make your own kind of music by cass elliot// @ soledadfrancis on twitter// ? // @ sourcenectar on twitter// @superorganism

[chillswagdopesoul]

Me when I catch myself thinking "I wonder what it's like to be chosen by somebody" but then I remember my best friend chooses to be my best friend and my mutuals choose to follow me and the minimum wage employee chooses to give me sincere kindness that I remember years later because I was going through a hard time and it meant a lot

[chillswagdopesoul]

to quote my bestie and pulitzer prize winner tony kushner “hope isn’t a choice, it’s a moral obligation, an obligation to the cells in your body” and “it is an ethical obligation to look for hope; it is an obligation not to despair.” like god. it is so fucking hard it is harder than anything in the world to wake up and have faith that things will be better and we can change things but it is the only thing we tangibly have and can pass on to other people. idrk where i was going with this but yea

[chillswagdopesoul]

fucking hate it when the stuff everybody says "actually works" does actually work.

hate exercising and realizing i've let go of a lot of anxiety and anger because i've overturned my fight-or-flight response.

hate eating right and eating enough and eating 3 times a day and realizing i'm less anxious and i have more energy

hate journaling in my stupid notebook with my stupid bic ballpoint and realizing that i've actually started healing about something once i'm able to externalize it

hate forgiving myself hate complimenting myself more often hate treating myself with kindness hate taking a gratitude inventory hate having patience hate talking to myself gently

hate turning my little face up to the sun and taking deep breaths and looking at nature and grounding myself and realizing that i feel less burdened and more hopeful, more actually-here, that i am able to see the good sides of myself more clearly, that i am able to see not only how far i have to grow - but also how much growth i have already done & how much of my life i truly fill with light and laughter and love

horrible horrible horrible. hate it but i'm gonna do it tho

[chillswagdopesoul]

here's a trick for getting this stain out. did you know you can make that dish in batches and it freezes great? that's actually really easy to fix, you only need a screwdriver and a replacement hinge. I can show you if you want. I can't buy you a new one, but maybe this will help. maybe the info will serve you one day. most people don't realize you can ask for a discount on those types of purchases, did you know? here's how I would try. maybe this will save you a little money. I don't have anything else to offer you. I hope it's enough. it's not much, but this'll balance the flavor and make cheap taste fantastic, it's crazy right? I wish I had more to give you. I've heard of that before, here's what someone I know tried. maybe that'll save you some time and worry. you can buy that part and do it yourself, let me take a look. here's what I would do. let's give it a shot. it's ugly, but it works. I hope that fixes it. I hope I made things easier for you.

[chillswagdopesoul]

really everyone you love has something miserably wrong with them or an obvious flaw that won't ever be fixed but like it's up to you what kind of person you can and cannot deal with. someone in my family has anger issues which I can handle and diffuse with no problem, but a person who can't tolerate yelling could not be close to him. another person I know is very anxious & needs constant reassurance and she gets along famously with gentler and more straightforward people than myself, but I can't handle being second guessed all the time. someone who is loosey goosey with their morals wouldn't bother me, but a person with a profound sense of justice makes me feel afraid of getting on their bad side. none of these traits actually make someone a bad person & just because there are personalities I can't handle doesnt mean I'M a bad person either. litany against callout posts for stupid shit and simple incompatibilities we all have to live on this earth together & need to learn how to deal with each other

[chillswagdopesoul]

my partner said something that kinda rocked my world

[chillswagdopesoul]

it's okay, ulysses ogre. you can back up and try dubliners, it's a short story collection with much more straightforward prose, you can dive deep on one piece at a time, and once you've toyed around with that then I'm sure you'll have an easier time with ulysses. besides, I had an irish lit professor who'd been studying finnegans wake for twenty years and she said she still didn't really know what was going on in it. ulysses ogre, what really matters is if you are enjoying your time with literature and feel like you are gaining something, not whether you reach the "correct" conclusions. there's no need to try and force yourself through something if you feel like you aren't on an even enough plane with the text to reap any of its rewards.

[chillswagdopesoul]

i used to have no hope for the future but now i'm thinking. i want rich people food. i want rare sirloin steak. i've never had sirloin steak in my life. i think i want to try it before i die.

[chillswagdopesoul]

[chillswagdopesoul]

Something I don't think we talk enough about in discussions surrounding AI is the loss of perseverance.

I have a friend who works in education and he told me about how he was working with a small group of HS students to develop a new school sports chant. This was a very daunting task for the group, in large part because many had learning disabilities related to reading and writing, so coming up with a catchy, hard-hitting, probably rhyming, poetry-esque piece of collaborative writing felt like something outside of their skill range. But it wasn't! I knew that, he knew that, and he worked damn hard to convince the kids of that too. Even if the end result was terrible (by someone else's standards), we knew they had it in them to complete the piece and feel super proud of their creation.

Fast-forward a few days and he reports back that yes they have a chant now... but it's 99% AI. It was made by Chat-GPT. Once the kids realized they could just ask the bot to do the hard thing for them - and do it "better" than they (supposedly) ever could - that's the only route they were willing to take. It was either use Chat-GPT or don't do it at all. And I was just so devastated to hear this because Jesus Christ, struggling is important. Of course most 14-18 year olds aren't going to see the merit of that, let alone understand why that process (attempting something new and challenging) is more valuable than the end result (a "good" chant), but as adults we all have a responsibility to coach them through that messy process. Except that's become damn near impossible with an Instantly Do The Thing app in everyone's pocket. Yes, AI is fucking awful because of plagiarism and misinformation and the environmental impact, but it's also keeping people - particularly young people - from developing perseverance. It's not just important that you learn to write your own stuff because of intellectual agency, but because writing is hard and it's crucial that you learn how to persevere through doing hard things.

Write a shitty poem. Write an essay where half the textual 'evidence' doesn't track. Write an awkward as fuck email with an equally embarrassing typo. Every time you do you're not just developing that particular skill, you're also learning that you did something badly and the world didn't end. You can get through things! You can get through challenging things! Not everything in life has to be perfect but you know what? You'll only improve at the challenging stuff if you do a whole lot of it badly first. The ability to say, "I didn't think I could do that but I did it anyway. It's not great, but I did it," is SO IMPORTANT for developing confidence across the board, not just in these specific tasks.

Idk I'm just really worried about kids having to grow up in a world where (for a variety of reasons beyond just AI) they're not given the chance to struggle through new and challenging things like we used to.

[chillswagdopesoul]

“I’m much happier at 53 than I was at 23.” (x)

[chillswagdopesoul]