#also dont kill me but. ive never liked combine creativity stuff

[donttellthemangosiwashere]

Tierlist made by @intrulogical

[elyvorg]

What would you think of a talentswap au? I know we all love kaito in all his wonderful spacey self, but ive seen some really interesting concepts for ultimate assassin kaito, as well as ultimate astronaut maki, ultimate detective kaede and ultimate pianist shuichi. Some very interesting things could be done with their histories and how they affect their present, especially if the changes are minimised. (Say, Shuichi's uncle being a pianist rather than a detective.)

I dont think the original character arcs could be pulled off as well, what with how the character's pasts affect how they react to the situations they're thrown in during the killing game (for example i doubt maki would have gone directly to murdering kokichi when she's convinced he's the mastermind if she hadn't been raised as an assassin) but i think there is some interesting potential in what would and wouldnt change about them

I know talentswap AUs are a pretty popular thing in this fandom, and I do enjoy looking at people's ideas in terms of the creative aesthetic redesigns of characters they can come up with. As a narrative thing, though, the concept just doesn't really do it for me.

I agree with your point that it can be an interesting exercise to imagine how a character we know might have diverged from the same starting point through slightly different circumstances in their life, and what would and wouldn't change about them. But I'm just not especially interested in the end result, because ultimately, whether by a little or by a lot, they going to end up as a different characters.

Obviously, as you can tell from my blog, I like thinking about AU scenarios. But, for me, they need to be plot AUs, not character AUs. I enjoy plot AUs because I like imagining how the characters I already know and love would react in interesting ways to new and different situations not seen in canon. I'm much less into AUs where the characters have been changed such that they only superficially resemble the ones that I'm a fan of.

For the most obvious example of this, let’s take Maki. The reasons I love her, the things that really make her Maki to me, are the trauma she suffered in being forced to be an assassin, the issues and self-loathing she has today because of that, and how amazing it is that she still manages to be a good person at heart despite everything. A Maki who was literally anything other than the Ultimate Assassin wouldn't have any of that, and then she's just... not really Maki any more. It's not just that she obviously wouldn't try to kill Kokichi; none of her story would be the same at all.

The same also goes for anyone else who's talent-swapped into being an Ultimate Assassin, because that level of trauma is going to significantly change anyone. To take another example, because this is a hypothetical I have actually thought about a bit, let's try to imagine an Ultimate Assassin Kaito.

With the caveat that I don't actively seek out every talent-swap out there, I've happened across an assassin-Kaito concept or two that basically looks like the same Kaito: he incidentally murders people for a job, but then he also still has sidekicks and looks after kids and is his usual optimistic Kaito-y self when he's not doing a murder. That's a cute idea; I understand the desire to keep Kaito recognisable, but I just... I don't think that would be possible. I don't think anyone, no matter how resilient, could still be like that after going through what Maki went through and being forced to kill so many people. Maki didn't end up the way she did because she was weak; far from it.

(And it's obviously even less possible that Kaito wasn't forced and traumatised into this just like Maki was, because he'd never choose to kill people for a living. Perhaps we could imagine that Kaito was at one of the cult-run orphanages (for minimal changes, maybe his grandparents weren't there after his parents died? oh nooo) and got scouted, and/or volunteered in order to protect someone else because he's exactly as selfless as Maki.)

After going through all that, especially since he started from the same point of someone fundamentally very selfless and caring, an assassin-Kaito's issues would end up very similar to canon-Maki's. He'd still care about other people beneath it all, but it'd be hard to notice that when he'd also hate himself and feel like he doesn't deserve to be around anyone, let alone help them, because who'd want advice from a killer?

The only really different part would be his outward personality. Kaito's general personality is nothing like what Maki's was pre-trauma, so he'd have ended up with something quite different from Maki's cold aloofness. Specifically, if you'll bear with me on the out-of-left-field example here, I think he might have ended up looking something like Axel from Kingdom Hearts. (I once hyperfixated on Axel, okay, so I've thought about this a lot.)

In short, Axel used to be a good kid, a bit of a cocky attention seeker but with a heart of gold, until he was forced into doing horrible things for an evil organisation against his will. He pretty much coped with that by accepting that he's A Bad Guy now, and owning it, carrying out his evil missions in a stylish, badass sort of way, like a twisted version of the cocky kid he used to be. This also conveniently gives him something he can focus on to avoid thinking about all the things he hates and never wanted about this. Given that Kaito was a vaguely similar kind of kid to what Axel used to be, it seems possible that he might cope in a similar way if put through the child-slave-assassin wringer.

But, while the end result would definitely be a very fun and fascinating character, my point is that it still wouldn't be Kaito as we know him at all. It'd be an entirely new character. He'd have Kaito's name and face and pre-assassin-training childhood, but those details would be the least interesting things about him.

(I would recommend checking out Axel's storyline to see a character along these lines, but honestly the required untangling of the Kingdom Hearts lore-spaghetti is not necessarily worth your while. That and all this stuff about his issues is pretty subtle and I only really noticed it at all because I happened to like him enough to hyperfixate for a while.)

Even putting aside the extreme example of an assassin talent, a lot of Danganronpa characters are as great as they are specifically because their personality and their talent make such a good combination. Take Shuichi, whose issues and character arc and potential as an interesting protagonist revolve around the fact that he's an Ultimate Detective who starts out weak. A pianist Shuichi would just be a somewhat anxious and insecure pianist, which wouldn't be especially interesting or important to the progression of a killing game. Meanwhile, a detective Kaede would be way more confident about her detectiveness than Shuichi and would probably look something like a more optimistic and trusting Kyoko; again, less interesting. [Edit: or would she?] To bring in some other combinations of these four, a detective Maki would look very similar to Kyoko, because she'd have similar trust issues from her orphanage days.

As for a detective Kaito, sure, we can imagine a Kaito who's the same kind of person but with a passion for solving mysteries (which he’s also actually good at) instead of space. He'd still do his sidekick thing, of course, because the only thing that'd make him lose that central part of himself is loads of childhood trauma. But then this Kaito is just genuinely every bit the hero everyone needs, solving the cases and supporting the others in one package... and, whoops, there goes all of his issues and character arc. At best, he'd still struggle a little with the Gonta situation in trial 4, but that struggle wouldn't be actually about Shuichi and so it wouldn't be nearly as fun. (A detective Kaito still wouldn't struggle as much to accept Gonta did it, either, because he'd be someone who's used to trusting the facts and logic alongside his instincts about people to intuit the truth.) And he’d still struggle a bit with dying if we gave him the virus, but so much less so, because at least he’d be obviously managing to be the hero he wants to be before the end.

An astronaut Maki would pretty much just be a regular astronaut who happened to be an orphan. She'd need to have taught herself to be good with communication and teamwork because that's necessary to be an astronaut, so she'd mostly just be a little bit like Kaito but extremely toned down. (Again, Maki without her assassin trauma kind of just becomes a fairly ordinary competent person and not really Maki as we know her.) Even then, it's a huge stretch that someone pragmatic and cautious like her would have been willing to risk losing everything just to take the astronaut exam as a teenager. And an astronaut Shuichi doesn't even seem possible; he'd have been way too insecure to apply to astronaut training early like Kaito did, no matter how badly he'd hypothetically love to go to space. Really, Kaito's reckless personality is a necessary part of having an Ultimate - as in, teenage - Astronaut. Pretty much all of these kids' talents are intrinsically tied in some way into who they are as a person and as a character in this story.

The only talent-swap within these particular four characters we're talking about that I think would work in terms of keeping them basically themselves is between Kaito and Kaede. That's because they were both written with the talents they have to help enhance the kind of people they are, and they're such similar people in the first place. Both of them are selfless and optimistic and all about working together and helping others; Kaede plays music to make people smile, while Kaito's astronaut training requires him to be someone who values communication and co-operation. I can just about see a talent-swap between these two making sense while still retaining everything important about who they are as people and keeping their stories roughly the same. You'd have a space-flavoured Kaede and a music-flavoured Kaito, but their personalities would still be very recognisably them.

(Though, still, I dunno if I'd have loved a pianist Kaito quite as much. There's just something about that space theme that helps get across how bombastically over-the-top he is in a way that a more down-to-earth talent simply can't quite match. Also, that execution.)

...The problem with this, though, is that the new music-Kaito and space-Kaede wouldn't be all that meaningfully interesting to explore compared to their original versions. Which I guess is kind of the unavoidable catch-22 I have with character AUs. Making big changes to a character can be an interesting thought experiment, but it ultimately results in them no longer being the characters I've grown to love any more, while changes that keep them still recognisably the same people are inherently going to be pretty superficial changes that aren’t worth exploring very much.

[vampyrslutton]

My Sides

What?! I was tagged? By @ts-anxiety-angst of all people?! I do not deserve this honor! Ive kind of wanted to do this! And i actually made a video with 3 of my sides as my final project for my video class so I already know my sides, but dont have them named. I alos kind of have like 6 because I can’t quite figure out how to combine some of them into one side.

Anxiety-Genderfluid-They/Them I myself am Genderfluid, and so is my Anxiety. They’re honestly a dick. They basically sit there, and make sure I that I feel like shit about myself even if I was feeling good. Basically the only positive thing they do is make me hang out with friends and go to stuff for fear we’ll miss something and be abandoned again. On the other hand though, they also make me over think going to things until I’m scared to go. They’re a jerk. Anyway, I picture them in black Harley Davidson boots, black pleather pants, black pleather biker vest with an androgynous hair style with a small ponytail, and the bags under their eyes from making sure I’m freaking out at 3 in the morning on a school night. They get along best with Schemes, and kind of hate Fandoms.

Fantasy-Male-He/Him Fantasy sits over on my more male identifying side and has been with me the second longest. I was obsessed with vampires and all things supernatural when I was 4 and I still am. As a result, he represents that love of myths, legends, and fantasy in all his vampiric glory. He literally has black dress shoes, black socks, black dress pants, a blood red dress shirt, red eyes, fangs, short black hair (dyed because mine is brown), and will sometimes wear a cape with a horribly cringy fake accent. He also harbors my creativity so is where my daydreams, fanfictions, and art come from as well as my love of acting. His personality is of refinement, sophistication, and gentlemanlyness. He likes Fandoms best despite how much she makes him cringe, and likes Perversion the least for their crudeness.

Fandoms-Female-She/Her She is the definition of that one cringey weeb scrolling through tumblr at all hours, openly going “OmG LOL sO RndM!!1!111!!!!!” that we all cringe about but secretly know we all have a small amount of. She wears black combat boots that kind of look like Maka Albarns, black and red school girl skirt, some sort of fandom shirt, black leather jacket with loads of buttons and pins, and hair died pink, purple, and red with a head band. She has the phandom catwhiskers, and is always speaking in refernces, old memes, and tumblr quotes without a care in the world. I guess she would harbour my Morality? She is incredibly bubbly with a screechy fangirl voice ,and just wants to have fun. She is where my inspiration for some creativity comes from which is why her and Fantasy get along so well. She’s also where my want to be a Voice Actor is. She gets along best with Fantasy, Schemes, and Perversion, but is basically Anxiety’s counter so doesn’t sit well with them.

Schemes-Genderfluid-They/Them I guess they could be considered my logic? They’re where most of my intellegenceis stored, basically where my evil plots come from and are my drama consultant when writing. They’re also the reason some have said I sould be an info broker. They’ve always been mischievious since we were little and were the first one as I’ve always liked to impress and or disturb adults with my knowledge. In the knowledge department, they have a fascination of loving to learn random facts that know one would take the time to learn or that they know sould disturb someone to know. They actually have an appreciation for zoology and biology while my other sides tend to focus on art and creativity. In terms of actual schemes, they’re always plotting how to mess with people, and if some one hurts me, you know they have the information to bring them down while making sure they never hurt anyone again. They like to be the big evil mastermind, but they still don’t want to hurt anyone unless they hurt us. They can easily manipulate and talk their way through anything. Schemes can be seen wearing gender neautral business casual in monochromes and dark reds and blues. While my other sides wear contacts, they wear business looking glasses. They say because the glare looks more evil, but its literally because we’re blind as a fucking bat without them. They’re best friends with Perversion, but due to some betrayals over the years, has become more cynical and is now close to Anxiety as well, working close with and manipulating them to avoid further betrayal. They don’t dislike anyone really as they recognize they’re all part of a whole so don’t see a point in disliking anybody.

Perversion-Female-She/Her “You and you’re search history are the reason we’re going to hell!” “*Smirks* Well you can’t spell Perversion without S.I.N.” Perversion or Sin, whichever you want to call her, she’s a tomboy and a major flirt. She is where my love of dirty jokes and fart humor comes from, and she isn’t afraid to make one whatever the situation. She loves working with Schemes to disturb people with a dirty joke or lewd info, just to see peoples recation. If she can slip an innuendo in somewhere, its already done. Now I said she’s a flirt and she is, but only if we’re dating someone and only towards that person otherwise its “Error 404: Witty comment not found. Insert dirty joke that will get us put in the brozone. Oh we’re at work? Stare and stutter like an idiot.” So basically she thinks, she’s a flirt, but she can’t for the life of her unless in costume. She doesn’t mind the BroZone. She’s comfortable there, and loves it there, but hates being there when she didn’t intend to be. Otherwise, she doesn’t mind and loves being one of the guys, and loves new guys’ reactions when she makes a dirty joke. She can be found wearing very tomboy attire, but in the most provacative way possible while still being perfectly decent cause, hey, we ain’t a hoe. She is best friends with Schemes, and loves meeting up with Fantasy and Fandoms to write fanfiction. She hates Anxiety because she blames them for our inability to flirt properly.

Lastly,

Adrenaline-Genderfluid-They/Them This crazy side is why people call me insane. They love ziplining while doing tricks, parasailing, skydiving, four-wheeling, dirt biking, and surfing. They’re also my love and skill or wrestling, weightlifting, martial arts, and boxing come from. They are my ability to take an extreme sport and in twenty minutes do it like I’ve been doing it all my life. They’re my determination, and passion, and my drive to keep up with the guys in a biologically female body. They are the reason I have a freakishly high pain tolerance and no fear. Basically if people think I’d be insane to try it, as long as it’s legal, Adrenaline’s motto will be “Hold my beer and watch this.” They’re the one that will make me put myself out there and talk to people every now and again. They also hold my minor obsession with piercing. They’re also the reason I’m thinking of learning pole dancing from watching Yuri!! on Ice, knife throwing from reading a fanfiction wear Thomas’s Anxiety knew how to throw knives, and I am voodoo after watching Buzzfeed Unsolved Supernatural despite Fantasy telling us not to fuck with that shit without proper training. Adrenaline will probably get me killed one day haha! They can be found in cargo shorts, hiking boots (despite not hiking), a tank top, sunglasses, and some sort of head gear depending on what they’re doing with a grin that says “This is gonna be awesome!” They’ll also have a knife hidden at all times so they can kick someone’s ass if hand to hand won’t work, but can otherwise take someone down that way. Adrenaline loves all the sides except for Anxiety. They blame them for our lack of friends, and know they aren’t wrong.

Did i do this right? I hope I did. Um, I don’t really have any tumblr friends yet so no one to tag so I guess tag yourself if you haven’t done this yet?

[sugasugasuga]

mvs im kind of in love with (a wip)

#wyd by ikon - i love this one because i feel like with boy band mvs they often fall into the weird “6 boys (sometimes literally) chasing the same girl which proves most writers and directors and stuff are male because any woman would know that said girl would be scared for her life)” trope and this mv is the complete opposite, and portrays romance, or rather the cutesy precursor to romance (yes things aren't/shouldnt be inherently romantic but the vibe and interactions and overall feeling of the this song/mv hints at romance so well, i’m more than okay with it. it’s romantic, but this kind of romantic i support) so well. it’s rarely dramatic (or at least not the mv type of dramatic) and there’s not usually a GROUNDBREAKING moment where you confess your undying love for each other and live happily ever after. those kinds of stories can sometimes feel like more of a caricature of real life, whereas this feels like a snapshot of real life. it does an excellent job of showing those small little moments in the honey moon phase that lead up to romance. the characters are tiptoeing around each other and there’s nothing explicitly romantic but the combination of the music and visuals are enough; nothing needs to be explicitly romantic. one of my favourite things about mvs like this is that i don’t feel like i need to know the words theyre singing in order to understand. it just sort of speaks for itself in its own way and it portrays the emotions its trying to show so well since it doesnt solely rely on the lyrics.   airplane (which i also really like, but not enough for it to make it on to the list “officially) does a similar thing,  and i like that it has more of an arch than this one, but i do feel like looking up the lyrics for that made a lot more sense. at first i felt that the third wheeling/””friendzone”” (for the lack of a better word) thing felt a bit out of place and like they were trying to tell 2 different stories at once but now i feel like it’s just trying to portray a more fleshed out relationship 

i am you, you are me by zico - this is my favourite music video of all time (i love the entirety of inu/run/the prologue etc more but that counts as more of a ‘mv series’ in my mind and you cant compare the two since they’re trying to achieve such different things). i feel overwhelmed by how much i love this mv every time i watch it. i genuinely can’t handle it and i have so many thoughts, starting to talk about it is kind of intimidating and i’ve been putting it off for ages.  several months later: OK I REWATCHED IT LETS DO THIS. every time i watch this mv i am overwhelmed by how much i love it. every time im like “it cant be as good as i remember” but then it is. watching it just makes me feel so soft and warm and quiet. there’s nothing in the whole mv that feels out of place. i love the clothes, i love the hair, i love how natural everything feels. the set is phenomenal, it creates this strange, distant, otherworldly, completely independent little universe. the products that are perfectly lined up and the lights and the way colour and the flickering of the light/the tv is being used makes it feel a bit like a dream. the sparkle at the beginning also gives it a fairy tale kind of vibe. it just feels surreal, blending reality and fantasy in a really god way. the close ups of the people/the sets are being used in the perfect moments, it just creates this beautiful balance that just works so well together. there’s a lot going on, but it never feels like its too much. i love love l o v e the two characters interactions. the mv feels like a whole story that says soooo much without having to say anything at all. the exchanged looks and the gradual development and the interactions are just so perfect. its one of those things where things dont need to be explicitly romantic to be romantic, the combination of the visuals and the song just conveys this very specific feeling extremely well. i love the way they toe around each other and test each other a little bit, how it feels very careful and new at first but then gets more familiar. i love how they look at each other.  i love the parts where they sit back to back and the camera spins around them. i love the part where you have a red close up of zico and she's layered above in blue. that could have looked strange but it works extremely well. everything in this mv feels like it happens or is there for a reason. it feels very intentional, but in a casual way, if that makes sense. i love the pace. i think this is partly caused by the fact that it looks like everything is just slightly slowed down, so it feels more relaxed and gives off this “we have all the time in the world” vibe, and also similar to the otherworldly feeling i mentioned earlier. i love how the sign went from opened/closed to opened/opened.i just dont even know how to say it but from 0:16-0:22, the way the perspectives are shown is just wonderful. i love the way its blurry for a split second  at 0:12. i just love all the details. i love how this mv makes me feel. i want to live in this. 

sentimental by winner - ngl i just love the way this is shot and the colours and the styling and chilled and lazy and careless atmosphere that the visuals and the song create, but also how it somehow shows this underlying frustration? looking up the lyrics helped with this one - i kinda guessed the whole “i miss u” thing because of the title and it has this bittersweetness to it? i just think that this is a great example of a series of seemingly borderline nonsensical/weird/”random” things (eg. the lobster, the bathtub, the guy dancing around with the cat or the guy riding the bike whilst lying on the floor) but it made sense, somehow? it felt like all those little details just showed the frustration and boredom and that they’re not quite sure what to do with themselves and how missing someone can drive you a little bit crazy. not to mention that the cat is a metaphor for “im going to die alone with 18 cats” and the bike thing reminds me a little bit of carousel by melanie martinez, in other words just feeling like you/a relationship is going nowhere. i also love the repeated use/portrayal of musical instruments (even/especially the ones where they go a bit crazy) because it feels like that shows working through your feelings through creativity and expressing yourself. and i also love the couple making out in random places because that’s essentially what it feels like when you like someone who likes someone else, them being with that person is always just sort of... there... i like the almost intruder-like portrayal of it here. i also love the separate rooms because they’re such a cool way to show the characters’ isolation and give them a bit of individuality, whilst still tying it all together with the band/kitchen sequences. 

you’re the best by mamamoo - i like this one because it’s a great example of “we all like the same person but not in a way that suggests we want to kill them and wear their skin”. also, i love the song and the styling (mamamoo are the only people in this world that can pull off bootcut jeans) and the colours and the choreo and the set and the retro/vintagey vibe it all gives off and how the music video perfectly compliments the song and every things so bright and wonderful and i love the dorky moments and i love the scenes under the white sheet (one of the weirdest things ive said in a while) but theyre just so radiant and soft and i love the little animations, they’re so subtle it took me aaaages to see them and theyre so small and cute and fit really well (its not like lalaland floating galaxy dance that feels out of place) and its overall just such a wonderful experience to watch the mv and also i am in love with every single one of these girls 

why so lonely by wonder girls - this one borders on including random things just for the sake of including random things, but it does it so well, i honestly dont care. you do need subs, i think? but its overall just so good that it doesnt matter too much. it just has this “i dont give a shit” in such a classy, controlled, badass lana del rey way. i watched this for the first time when it first came out, i think, about 9 months ago? and i still haven't stopped thinking/forgotten about it, simply because it was so unlike anything ive ever seen before and i honestly wasn’t even sure whether i like it or not. but i do. i love the blocky colors and the styling and the set and the actual format/size of the video and how you have the black borders on the side and how they all fit together perfectly to create this vintage/retro/strange different reality or its own world. the fact that they all perform/sing with this deadpan face and intense eye contact is also that perfect kind of strange that just goes really well with the entire mv. i love the ending and i love that it has this little arch to it, even if its kind of a crazy one, but i love that it’s not wannabe badass (like me lol) or cutesy, it’s just so fucking cool and well made in its own way.  

fine by taeyeon this is the one. the mv that will be the death of me. i love how simple this was and that the way it was shot and the variety and the colours and how pretty it was in a soft, subtle way made it really really interesting or ’’’moving’’’’ i guess. (i always say the same thing, i know, but these are just the things i love about mvs??) the underlying theme/repeated use of photographs and that type of imagery to indicate the passing of time and memories was just stunning and perfect and added this feeling of nostalgia and missing someone/something and perfectly complimented the song. i love that this is another one that just feels really sincere and real and not dramatic at all, all the interactions between the couple are just really really cute and i love that one moment where she's just in the kitchen drinking a glass of water because (at least i think that) it’s this strange relatable feeling of being a bit lost and just thinking and wandering around the house and drinking a glass of water and thinking about stuff. it’s just overall wonderful. 

never ever by got7 - this is just beautiful. that’s the only way to describe it. all the scenes are gorgeous and well balanced, if that makes sense? i love the colours and the contrast between the white and the bluish black with just enough vibrant colours to make it interesting and the smoke thing and the outfits its all just well rounded, somehow. id be OBSESSED with this band if they were on spotify  

fxxk it by bigbang - this ones slightly different bc i saw the mv a while back and i thought it was alright but then i went to hoho’s k pop shop in london and picked up 2 like, credit card sized poster type bigbang things so i was like “guess i should give them another try” and i listened to more of their stuff and i really really really like this song (and a lot of their other songs, actually?? i had no idea that they’ve recently been making so much chilled music?? i guess i just kept thinking of fantastic baby when i heard bigbang) and i think its just another instance of the mv matching the song really well. and i love the styling and colors. i say that every time bUT JUST LOOK AT IT ITS SO COOL 

crooked by g-dragon - i just kind of assumed ive already talked about this because its one of my favourites and it has been for like a year or something?side note before i rewatch it and give my detailed opinions: coup d’etat reminds me of a very specific couple of weeks of my life. it basically just feels like walking to the my best friend’s place in may or june in the evenings last year and its still light and really nice and warm and im wearing ripped jeans and doc martens and my leather jacket and me and my best friend hang out and watch a movie or walk around while we’re ”””””studying”””” and its just a. lot.  but ANYWAY i just love this so much. i love the song and the music video s o m u c h. not just because i have this weird sentimental connection to it. i just feel like it conveys this feeling of helpless, reckless, careless, self destructive badassness so strongly that there is no doubt about it, regardless of the lyrics. i looked them up once and i forgot and im sure theyre good but i just really feel like the sound and the visuals combine so well that theyre a bonus rather than something you need to understand. it just makes me feel this strange sense of pity and it has that kind of underlying sense of sadness and despair and loneliness and not being sure what to do with yourself and not quite belonging but covering it all with this appearance of not caring even though you care so much at the same time and i just love it so much. all i know is that walking places whilst listening to g-dragon is a very unique, specific feeling that i love 

she's a baby by zico - since i am you, you are me is basically my favourite mv ever i put off watching this for like 2 weeks. i was kinda nervous, ngl?? idek know why tbh? i guess i didnt want to be disappointed? but maaan. i was not disappointed. of course i dont like it as much as i am you, but i love love love that it has the same gentle pastel vibe and it just made me feel all soft inside and it made me smile and i just love it. im not gonna go on about how much i love the colors and the way its shot and stuff bc i say the same thing every time but jusT LOOK AT IT. its GORGEOUS. 

rumor by kard - this looks cool as fuck on your phone, i really really like the song and just generally love that kard always does completely new, different stuff and does it super well. (i just love their music in general bc their lyrics mean soooo much to me whenever i feel A Lot) 

neverland by holland - boy where to even start with this one. to begin with, i want to take the first 30 seconds and hang them up on my wall. tattoo them on my body. they’re just so quiet and pretty and perfect. i love the yellow neverland font. and just the contrast between the dark scenes where he’s alone and the brightness of the beach and the sky when they’re together???? SO damn good. the combination of the two makes the mv feel like it’s like a memory - when you think of someone you used to like, you think about all of it. it’s not just the good and it’s not just the bad, in a way, you’re brain smashes it all together. it just does such an excellent job of making you feel something. and the interactions between the two boys. they’re so cute and soft together but the mv also manages to give their relationship a bit of depth and it’s just great to watch. and their kiss might be my favourite “tv” kiss ever? i usually just find kisses in movies and tv shows (especially dramas) very “whatever” but this one was just so cute. they’re so cute. it’s just great. and i love the sound of the actual music so much? i’m usually not into soft music but this is actually so damn good????? im honestly just dying for holland to make more music 

[writingguide003-blog]

44 Writing Hacks From Some of the Greatest Writers Who Ever Lived

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44 Writing Hacks From Some of the Greatest Writers Who Ever Lived

Writing looks fun, but doing it professionally is hard. Like really hard. Why on earth am I doing this?-hard.

Which is probably why so many people want to write, yet so few actually do. But there are ways to make it easier, as many writers can tell you. Tricks that have been discovered over the centuries to help with this difficult craft.

In another industry, these tricks would be considered trade secrets. But writers are generous and they love to share (often in books about writing). They explain their own strategies for how to deal with writers block to how to make sure your computer never eats your manuscript. They give away this hard-won knowledge so that other aspiring writers wont have to struggle in the same way. Over my career, Ive tried to collect these little bits of wisdom in my commonplace book (also a writers trick which I picked up from Montaigne) and am grateful for the guidance theyve provided.

Below, Ive shared a collection of writing hacks from some amazing writers like Kurt Vonnegut, George Orwell, Stephen King, Elizabeth Gilbert, Anne Lamott, and Raymond Chandler. I hope its not too presumptuous but I snuck in a few of my own too (not that I think Im anywhere near as good as them).

Anyway, heres to making this tough job a tiny bit easier!

[*] When you have an idea for an article or a bookwrite it down. Dont let it float around in your head. Thats a recipe for losing it. As Beethoven is reported to have said, If I don’t write it down immediately I forget it right away. If I put it into a sketchbook I never forget it, and I never have to look it up again.

[*] The important thing is to start. At the end of John Fantes book Dreams from Bunker Hill, the character, a writer, reminds himself that if he can write one great line, he can write two and if he can write two he can write three, and if he can write three, he can write forever. He pauses. Even that seemed insurmountable. So he types out four lines from one of his favorite poems. What the hell, he says, a man has to start someplace.

[*] In fact, a lot of writers use that last technique. In Tobias Wolffs autobiographical novel Old School, the character types the passages from his favorite books just to know what it feels like to have those words flow through his fingertips. Hunter S. Thompson often did the same thing. This is another reason why technologies like ebooks and Evernote are inferior to physical interaction. Just highlighting something and saving it to a computer? Theres no tactile memory there.

[*] The greatest part of a writers time is spent in reading; a man will turn over half a library to make one book. Samuel Johnson

[*] Tim Ferriss has said that the goal for a productive writing life is two crappy pages a day. Just enough to make progress, not too ambitious to be intimidating.

[*] They say breakfast (protein) in the morning helps brain function. But in my experience, thats a trade-off with waking up and getting started right away. Apparently Kurt Vonnegut only ate after he worked for 2 hours. Maybe he felt like after that hed earned food.

[*] Michael Malice has advised dont edit while you write. I think this is good advice.

[*] In addition to making a distinction between editing and writing, Robert Greene advises to make an equally important distinction between research and writing. Trying to find where youre going while youre doing it is begging to get horribly lost. Writing is easier when the research is done and the framework has been laid out.

[*] Nassim Taleb wrote in Antifragile that every sentence in the book was a derivation, an application or an interpretation of the short maxim he opened with. THAT is why you want to get your thesis down and perfect. It makes the whole book/essay easier.

[*] Break big projects down into small, discrete chunks. As I am writing a book, I create a separate document for each chapter, as I am writing them. Its only later when I have gotten to the end that these chapters are combined into a single file. Why? The same reason it feels easier to swim seven sets of ten laps, than to swim a mile. Breaking it up into pieces makes it seem more achievable. The other benefit in writing? It creates a sense that each piece must stand on its own.

[*] Embrace what the strategist and theorist John Boyd called the draw-down period. Take a break right before you start. To think, to reflect, to doubt.

[*] On being a writer: All the days of his life he should be reading as faithfully as his partaking of food; reading, watching, listening. John Fante

[*] Dont get caught up with pesky details. When I am writing a draft, I try not to be concerned with exact dates, facts or figures. If I remember that a study conducted by INSERT UNIVERSITY found that XX% of businesses fail in the first FIVE/SIX? months, thats what I write (exactly like that). If I am writing that on June XX, 19XX Ronald Reagan gave his famous Tear Down This Wall speech in Berlin in front of XX,XXX people, thats how its going to look. Momentum is the most important thing in writing, so Ill fill the details in later. I just need to get the sentences down first. “Get through a draft as quickly as possible.” is how Joshua Wolf Shenk put it.

[*] Raymond Chandler had a trick of using small pieces of paper so he would never be afraid to start over. Also with only 12-15 lines per page, it forced economy of thought and actionwhich is why his stuff is so readable.

[*] In The Artists Way, Julia Cameron reminds us that our morning pages and our journaling dont count as writing. Just as walking doesnt count as exercise, this is just priming the pumpits a meditative experience. Make sure you treat it as such.

[*] Steven Pressfield said that he used to save each one of his manuscripts on a disk that hed keep in the glovebox of his car. Robert Greene told me he sometimes puts a copy of his manuscript in the trunk of his car just in case. I bought a fireproof gun safe and keep my stuff in therejust in case.

[*] My editor Niki Papadopoulos at Penguin: Its not what a book is. Its what a book does.

[*] While you are writing, read things totally unrelated to what youre writing. Youll be amazed at the totally unexpected connections youll make or strange things youll discover. As Shelby Foote put it in an interview with The Paris Review: I cant begin to tell you the things I discovered while I was looking for something else.

[*] Writing requires what Cal Newport calls deep workperiods of long, uninterrupted focus and creativity. If you dont give yourself enough of this time, your work suffers. He recommends recording your deep work time each dayso you actually know if youre budgeting properly.

[*] Software does not make you a better writer. Fuck Evernote. Fuck Scrivner. You dont need to get fancy. If classics were created with quill and ink, youll probably be fine with a Word Document. Or a blank piece of paper. Dont let technology distract you. As Joyce Carol Oates put it in an interview, Every writer has written by hand until relatively recent times. Writing is a consequence of thinking, planning, dreaming this is the process that results in writing, rather than the way in which the writing is recorded.

[*] Talk about the ideas in the work everywhere. Talk about the work itself nowhere. Dont be the person who tweets Im working on my novel. Be too busy writing for that. Helen Simpson has Faire et se taire from Flaubert on a Post-it near her desk, which she translates as Shut up and get on with it.

[*] Why cant you talk about the work? Its not because someone might steal it. Its because the validation you get on social media has a perverse effect. Youll less likely to put in the hard work to complete something that youve already been patted (or patted yourself) on the back for.

[*] When you find yourself stuck with writers block, pick up the phone and call someone smart and talk to them about whatever the specific area youre stuck with is. Not that youre stuck, but about the topic. By the time you put your phone down, youll have plenty to write. (As Seth Godin put it, nobody gets talkers block.)

[*] Keep a commonplace book with anecdotes, stories and quotes you can always usefrom inspiration to directly using in your writing. And these can be anything. H.L. Mencken for example, would methodically fill a notebook with incidents, recording scraps of dialogue and slang, columns from the New York Sun.

[*] As you write down quotes and observations in your commonplace book, make sure to do it by hand. As Raymond Chandler wrote, when you have to use your energy to put words down, you are more apt to make them count.

[*] Elizabeth Gilbert has a good trick for cutting: As you go along, Ask yourself if this sentence, paragraph, or chapter truly furthers the narrative. If not, chuck it. And as Stephen King famously put it, kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribblers heart, kill your darlings.

[*] Strenuous exercise everyday. For me, and for a lot of other writers, its running. Novelist Don DeLillo told The Paris Review how after writing for four hours, he goes running to shake off one world and enter another. Joyce Carol Oates, in her ode to running, said that the twin activities of running and writing keep the writer reasonably sane and with the hope, however illusory and temporary, of control.

[*] Ask yourself these four questions from George Orwell: What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image or idiom will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? Then finish with these final two questions: Could I put it more shortly? Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?

[*] As a writer you need to make use of everything that happens around you and use it as material. Make use of Seinfelds question: Im never not working on material. Every second of my existence, I am thinking, Can I do something with that?

[*] Airplanes with no wifi are a great place to write and even better for editing. Because there is nowhere to go and nothing else to do.

[*] Print and put a couple of important quotes up on the wall to help guide you (either generally, or for a specific project). Heres a quote from a scholar describing why Ciceros speeches were so effective which I put on my wall while I was writing my first book. At his best [Cicero] offered a sustained interest, a constant variety, a consummate blend of humour and pathos, of narrative and argument, of description and declamation; while every part is subordinated to the purpose of the whole, and combines, despite its intricacy of detail, to form a dramatic and coherent unit. (emphasis mine)

[*] Focus on what youre saying, worry less about how. As William March wrote in The Bad Seed, A great novelist with something to say has no concern with style or oddity of presentation.

[*] A little trick I came up with. After every day of work, I save my manuscript as a new file (for example: EgoIsTheEnemy2-26.docx) which is saved on my computer and in Dropbox (before Dropbox, I just emailed it to myself). This way I keep a running record of the evolution of book. It comforts me that I can always go back if I mess something up or if I have to turn back around.

[*] Famous ad-man David Ogilvy put it bluntly: Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.

[*] Envision who you are writing this for. Like really picture them. Dont go off in a cave and do this solely for yourself. As Kurt Vonnegut put it in his interview with The Paris Review: …every successful creative person creates with an audience of one in mind. Thats the secret of artistic unity. Anybody can achieve it, if he or she will make something with only one person in mind.

[*] Do not chase exotic locations to do some writing. Budd Schulbergs novel The Disenchanted about his time with F. Scott Fitzgerald expresses the dangers well: It was a time everyone was pressing wonderful houses on us. I have a perfectly marvelous house for you to write in, theyd say. Of course no one needs marvelous houses to write in. I still knew that much. All you needed was one room. But somehow the next house always beckoned.”

[*] True enough, though John Fante said that when you get stuck writing, hit the road.

[*] Commitments (at the micro-level) are important too. An article a week? An article a month? A book a year? A script every six weeks? Pick something, but commit to itpublicly or contractually. Quantity produces quality, as Ray Bradbury put it.

[*] Dont ever write anything you dont like yourself and if you do like it, dont take anyones advice about changing it. They just dont know. Raymond Chandler

[*] Neil Strauss and Tucker Max gave me another helpful iteration of that idea (which I later learned is from Neil Gaiman): When someone tells you something is wrong with your writing, theyre usually right. When they tell you how to fix it, theyre almost always wrong.

[*] Ogilvy had another good rule: Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.

[*] Print out the work and edit it by hand as often as possible. It gives you the readers point of view.

[*] Hemingway advised fellow writer Thomas Wolfe to break off work when you ‘are going good.’Then you can rest easily and on the next day easily resume. Brian Koppelman (Rounders, Billions) has referred to this as stopping on wet edge. It staves off the despair the next day.

[*] Keep the momentum: Never stop when you are stuck. You may not be able to solve the problem, but turn aside and write something else. Do not stop altogether. Jeanette Winterson

That taps me out for now. But every time I read I compile a few more notecards. Ill update you when Ive got another round to share.

In the meantime, stop reading stuff on the internet and get back to writing!

But if you have a second…share your own tips below.

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