#also if you don't like this system idk how your brain works

[monstrouscrew]

don't wake me up

(mixed trimax and tristamp designs just because i can. Livio 🖤💚🤍)

(ID in the alt text)

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bonus w/o sunglasses

(ID in the alt text)

[brehaaorgana]

ADHD money/budgeting system I'm currently using for my benefit is going well (I've been using it for like half a year now?), and I wanna recommend it.

You Need a Budget is EXCELLENT. 10/10 do recommend. Uhhh rambling about it and my generic disclaimers + gushing extensively under the cut but TL;DR I think it's great for ADHD ppl, I've used it for 6+ months now and I find it super SUPER helpful. also weirdly fun.

DISCLAIMERS:

Budgeting helps you understand/know your money, it can't make money appear where there is none.

Everyone should learn to budget even if you don't have much money (especially then)

This is NOT a magic trick solution. Just like everything else, it is an assistive tool. This is one of those adult things we can't simply opt out of without negative consequences, though.

My advice is based on something I am currently able to do. That is, I can spend an amount of money on this specific thing that works well for me. If you have no extra money to spend then previously I was tracking things in a notebook. So you can still do this.

I believe Dave Ramsey is a fundie fraud/hack and no one should listen to him about money.

DID YOU KNOW THEY CANCELLED MINT???

Okay? OKAY.

Ahem.

You Need a Budget is EXCELLENT.

It is called YNAB for short. The first 34 days are your free trial, and that is my referral link. If anyone uses it and then signs up for a subscription, we both get a month free. Also you can share a subscription with up to six people (account owner can see everything but individuals can pick and choose what they share amongst each other) so like...idk your whole polycule can be on one account. Or your kids. Whatever.

If you are a student, it's free for a year. If you aren't, a subscription is $99 for a year (paid all at once) or $14.99 monthly, which is equivalent to paying Amazon prime. Go cancel Prime and get this instead tbh.

They got a whole article just on ynab and ADHD. They also have like...a big variety of ways to access their info? They have a book, podcast episodes, YouTube videos, blog posts, q&A's, free live workshops you can join (you can request live captioning), emails they can send (if you want) a wiki, and so on. They got workshops on all kinds of topics!!

So whatever ends up working for your brain. It also has a matching app.

If you lost Mint this year they have a gajillion things for moving from Mint.

Also they have a "got five minutes?" Page which has a slider so you can decide how much attention/time you have before going on lol:

They only have 4 rules of the budget, they're simple and practical, and it doesn't get judgey or like...mean about your spending.

1. Give every dollar a job 2. Embrace your true expenses 3. Roll with the punches 4. Age your money.

THEN THEY BREAK THESE DOWN INTO SMALL STEPS FOR YOU! They even have a printable! Also these rules are great because there's built in expectations that things WILL HAPPEN and it's NOT all or nothing with a fear of total collapse into failure. Reality and The Plan don't always align, especially if you have ADHD. So it's directing our energy towards the true expenses and not clinging to The Plan!! over reality.

You can automate a lot of shit (you can sync with your bank accounts just like mint, but also automate tagging the categories of regular expenses/transactions). And if for whatever reason you accidentally do something that makes the budget look weird or wrong:

A) you can usually fix it somehow OR b) they have like, a button you can press that gives you a clean slate and archives the previous version of the budget for you.

So if you forget for a few weeks or months, or accidentally input something wildly wrong, or just don't want to look at a really terrible month anymore and feel like you need a fresh start you can usually either fix it or start fresh which is really nice.

The app also (for whatever reason) scratches my itch to have things like...have incentives or little game-like goals in a way mint never did? I don't know why. Filling up the bars or putting money into the categories to cover my expenses is satisfying lmao. You can also make a big wish expense category for all the fun shit you want, and fund it whenever you can and then you can see the little bar go up and that's fun.

Anyways I've been using it for like 6+ months now and I think it's really helped me when I use it.

[sylusjinwoon]

{ 175 }

heartbreak feels so good.

jinwoo sung x fem.reader

warnings: mentions of physical intimacy, but nothing too explicit.

{ we could cry a little, cry a lot | don't stop dancing, don't dare stop | we'll cry later or cry now | you know it's heartbreak | we could dance our tears away | emancipate ourselves | we'll cry later or cry now, but baby | heartbreak feels so good }

anonymous said: HELLO!! ⭐ anon here and I have an idea. I literally can't stop thinking about it. It's gonna make my brain hurt so I won't hide it any longer ☹️

GAHAHAHAHAHAHA imagine Jinwoo who had a one night stand with reader. It was like after a party and they decided to hook up for one night, but reader regretted it afterwards bc of how shameful she thought she was—like bravely being involved with the Sung Jinwoo in such field??? Also what—he agreed and looked smug too or was she mistaken???

Jinwoo already knew reader and had been eyeing her for a while but didn't say anything about it. Before he even woke up, she was already gone and he was instantly reminded of the night they spent together.

Pookie got awkward after that and started to avoid Jinwoo. Meanwhile, little did she know, he actually liked to observe reader from afar. He'd often find it cute when she'd take one step away from him sideways as the tip of her ears go red.

Idk man one day Jinwoo just said "fuck this let's go on a date" and then boom their relationship bloomed. I'm so into this trope 😭 no toxicity, just two people being awkward and slowly exploring their actual feelings for each other. I'm sorry if this is too long, but still, if you saw this, thank you for reading. I hope you have a good day! I just can't help but yap every single change I get. ♪⁠～⁠(⁠´⁠ε⁠｀⁠ ⁠)

this had to be the biggest mistake of your life-

but truly, how could you have possibly even try to think straight when you had wanted nothing more than to just play pretend for one night? to actually feel like you were cherished and loved by someone who meant a lot to you?

the party you attended was, of course, thrown as a celebration for hunters and healers alike. the chairman had gone all out for everyone who had worked hard for the nation and wanted to give everyone a chance to de-stress and enjoy themselves.

from the fanciest bottles of champagne and wine that cost more than your salary to the perfectly catered food that seemed to suit everyone’s cravings and needs-

admittedly, you felt a bit out of your element.

the fact that so many people were here at this venue made you feel incredibly overwhelmed. in hopes of trying to maintain your sanity, you head over to the waiters and waitresses serving glass upon glass of expensive liquor, downing each of them while praying that the liquid courage would take effect and you could properly mingle with everyone else.

after downing just a few glasses of bubbly champagne, you could feel the heat against your cheeks coupled along with a slight tipsiness as the alcohol courses through your veins. yet, in the midst of your increasing drunken stupor, the strange sensation of being watched was what ultimately made you face him-

the tenth s-rank hunter, sung jinwoo.

he was leaning against the wall, tending to his own glass of red wine as his grey eyes remained rooted to your form. an almost mischievous grin was felt spreading across your lips, noticing how a certain blond hunter wasn’t latched on to him like a leech.

jinwoo is an incredibly fine specimen… i could work with this.

the alcohol in your system gave you the much needed courage to sidle up to him, your lips turned up in a smile as you casually smoothed out your dress. “hey hunter sung, funny seeing you here. you have always remained so elusive during gatherings like this.”

a look of pure amusement was shining within his grey eyes. “well, i figured it was time to change that, since it would be rude not to show up to at least one of the chairman’s events.”

you hum at his answer while sliding your hand up his dress shirt, earning a choked sound from him. “hm, you know, i was shocked to not see hunter cha clinging to you tonight. she’s the type that can never seem to leave you alone…”

“ah, w-well, she doesn’t always wish to hang out with me now that i’ve- wait, what are you doing?”

wow, his skin is so smooth… i can feel his muscles from beneath this flimsy dress shirt.

jinwoo’s breath hitches when your press the palm of your hand against his chest, purposely trailing your touches down to his abdomen as you leaned up to whisper in his ear. “the chairman said he rented out some floors of the hotel in case his guests got tired. shall i keep you company instead of cha hae-in tonight?”

you never got a chance to hear jinwoo’s answer or see his expression. simply grabbing a hold of his hand, you took the elevators to one of the booked floors, taking a card key from one of the hotel staff before shoving jinwoo into one of the rooms.

all you wanted was a chance to experience this type of intimacy with a man you respected and admired-

but you weren’t expecting jinwoo to be so gentle with you throughout it all.

you didn’t expect him to kiss every inch of your skin, filling you with so much pleasure that you became sensitive to his every touch.

you didn’t expect him to slowly make love to you, tangling your limbs together like he never wanted to let go of you.

and you certainly didn’t expect to experience such an intense release throughout your night together with jinwoo.

with the post lovemaking (and post champagne) quality kicking in just a few hours later, you awaken in the middle of the night with a start, feeling cold as the night air pricked at your skin, sending goosebumps down the length of your arms. your heart was a pounding mess as you ran a hand through your tangled hair.

recalling the ache felt between your legs, you look behind you to see jinwoo still sound asleep. he lay on his stomach, with the sheets just barely clinging on to his muscled back, making your mouth water in response.

your lips itched with the sudden desire to latch against his skin;

your whole body was screaming at you to just lay next to him and bask in his warmth;

but it was the more rational part of your mind that stopped you from acting on those irrational urges.

he’s going to wake up and regret sleeping with you.

with a purse of your lips, you allow your bare feet to touch at the carpeted floors. you slowly began to pick up the remnants of your undergarments while hastily putting them on along with your now wrinkled dress.

never once did you avert your gaze from jinwoo.

never once did he awaken to try and stop you from leaving.

it’s for the best.

giving the sleeping jinwoo one last look of yearning, you silently left the hotel room with every intention of never seeing the famous hunter ever again.

{ … }

to say you were embarrassed after that night would be the understatement of the century.

you had little clue as to truly how much time had passed, since your mind kept giving you flashbacks of how drunk and needy you were-

and also how caring jinwoo was when he willingly spent the night with you.

this embarrassment was what fuels you to continue avoiding jinwoo like a damn plague, with you taking on much lower leveled raids, raids that jinwoo wouldn’t pay the slightest attention to while slowly burying yourself with your duties.

you never sought to join any guilds and made it your life’s mission to stay far away from ahjin’s building, never once wishing to run into jinwoo.

in fact, you were perfectly fine with acting like your one night stand with him never happened at all.

however, unlucky for you, jinwoo himself didn’t seem to share that same sentiment.

{ … }

the moment you left him that night was the moment jinwoo had his first taste of true regret.

he felt so happy and excited when you approached him and invited him to spend the night with you. you never knew it, but jinwoo was achingly in love with you. he had hoped that with this chance, he could spoil you rotten with pleasure while taking great lengths to worship you; to love you like he had always wanted to.

when he could feel the pleasure washing over you with each and every stroke, jinwoo had gone a little crazy over you. the poor hunter had to bite down on his lips to prevent his words of utter love and devotion for you from spilling out.

but instead of choosing to tell you with words, he tells you with his actions alone.

yet still, it wasn’t enough to keep you by his side-

which was frustrating, to say the least.

jinwoo was no fool; he could tell that you were taking great lengths to avoid him. each time he would try to find you (whether it be during raids or just in general around the city) you would find ways to avoid ever meeting him by either switching out with another hunter / healer, or using the crowd to hide yourself away from him.

whenever this happens, jinwoo could only manage to let out an exasperated sigh in response. his hair would become a mess from the sheer amount of times he had run his fingers through them, trying to think of new ways to talk to you and finally confess.

throughout it all, jinwoo was left feeling a little listless, his mind always managing to go back to you…

by now, jinwoo had become desperate to finally have you.

while staring blankly at the ceiling of his office, jinwoo leans back against his chair while whispering your name.

if jinwoo couldn’t get to you by fair means, then he would have to start playing dirty, using his abilities as the shadow monarch to finally get through to you.

{ … }

so far, everything had been going according to plan on your end.

you had been successfully avoiding jinwoo for close to 4 months now, and when you were certain his lingering presence was no longer felt or seen within your periphery did you finally decide to head out for the night.

you were dying to get out of your apartment, wanting to try that new café or head to your go-to bookstore to read a new novel or two. yet your desire to always avoid jinwoo made you turn into a bit of a hermit (albeit unwillingly, but still.)

basking in the night air and the bustling sounds of seoul, you walked with a bit of a bounce in your step, thinking about your plans for the night. while you walked, you kept your gaze forward, and was caught off guard by the strangest phenomenon.

one minute, the sidewalk was free of any pedestrians, and the next, a man wearing an expensive looking coat appears just a mere inches away from you.

you recall letting out a gasp, hands already outreached to try and avoid face planting against the man’s broad back-

however, when he turns around was when you felt all of the air leave your lungs.

sung jinwoo was now facing you, his height still towering over you as his arms remained open, casually catching you within his embrace as your face landed against his chest. by now, your heart was pounding, making the blood rush to your ears as you began to feel dizzy.

“looks like i finally caught you.” a rich chuckle fills your ears when jinwoo places a lingering kiss against the top of your head, causing you to let out several sputters of his name.

“h-how did you-“

“did you forget who i am… and what i can do?”

his question successfully makes your heart skip beats, thinking back to the rumors that pertained to jinwoo and his ability to summon millions of shadow soldiers. along with this ability, you also knew that he could place many of those soldiers within anyone’s shadow while exchanging places with them on a whim.

“what? w-when did you manage to place your soldiers within my shadow?”

jinwoo hums, placing a hand beneath your chin, forcing you to look him in the eye. “when you came up to me at the party and lead me back to the hotel room.” a sly smile paints his handsome features when he leans down to whisper against your ear, “but you have to understand, even before that night, i was already half in love with you. i couldn’t help it when you gave me such a perfect opportunity.”

his sudden confession nearly makes you fall to your knees, but jinwoo manages to catch you in time, wrapping his arms around your waist while holding you even closer to him.

“so tell me, my beloved treasure, why you were so dead set on avoiding me?” he meets your gaze then, eyes filled with a subtle look of pain. “do you know how much it hurt me, seeing you ignoring me so blatantly like that?”

your breathing comes out as uneven, with you avoiding his gaze as you played with the front of his shirt, “i’m sorry, i thought that night was the only way to experience that type of intimacy with you. i convinced myself that i was nothing to you… and i-“

you hear jinwoo let out a hiss of your name before crashing his lips against yours in a searing kiss. it was enough to make you swallow your words as you moaned into his kiss, shyly kissing him back as jinwoo tightens his arms around you.

“shut up.” he manages to hoarsely say against your lips. “you drive me so fucking crazy all the time, but i still love you this much. never talk down about yourself in such a way ever again, because from this point on, you’re mine.”

you look into his eyes once more and see them burning a deep purple for you. there wasn’t a hint of a lie within the depths of his gaze, and the truth of his confession was finally beginning to sink into you.

“o-oh…”

your heart seemed to be beating a mile a minute now, racing so much that it overwhelmed you with its rapid palpitations.

letting out one last sigh of your name, jinwoo brings your head back into his chest, hugging you tightly. “when i’m done holding you like this, i’m going to take you out on a much needed date, and you are finally going to give us a chance. if you try to run again, just know that i will keep chasing you while chipping away at the walls you stubbornly built around your heart.”

you let out a tiny squeak, but couldn’t help but grin in response to his passionate words. “your plan is already working.” you murmur against his chest.

moving away from jinwoo, you look up at him with bright eyes all while giving him a genuine smile. “my heart is already yours, so-“

jinwoo interrupts you yet again, this time by picking you up and spinning you around in happy circles, hands clutched tightly against your sides when he brings you back down to him. nuzzling his nose against yours, you watch as a smirk paints his gorgeous features.

“it’s about damn time you finally admitted your feelings for me.”

and with yet another kiss shared beneath the city lights, you no longer felt the pangs of heartbreak filling your veins, feeling it slowly morph into the requited love you had always desired with your beloved sung jinwoo ♡

a.n. - and i’m so happy to finish this. this should be my 40th jinwoo oneshot, which is insane to think about 😭 currently unedited but, i hope you enjoyed this @ ⭐️ anon 🥹

all stories are written by rei; reposts, translations, and plagiarism are not allowed.

[torchtour]

Hi hello I love your Euclidian designs could you explain their anatomy

tysm!! here's some bullshit biology. if i spelled anything wrong. um. i didnt

transcription (since my colors/handwriting are whack) and elaboration below cut hehe

"cellulose microfibril bricks, colored by carotenoid pigment (xanthophyll)" they help maintain the shape of the cell/provide structural integrity to an overall squishy organism. the pigment xanthophyll is yellow (because. bill. yellow) and facilitates photosynthesis yay solar power. the nature of bill's mutation includes a full wall of this shit covering his whole body like a carapace

""brain"/ganglia" very rudimentary nervous system that's just a bundle of nerves hooked up to the eyes. important to note that the nerves are robust and mobile like electrical wires so don't mind being jostled by eye movement

"cilia assist in movement and sensing" leeetle hairs that aren't hairs at all but microtubules coated by the plasma membrane. kinda like whiskers/barbels but used for swimming

"double membrane (two phospholipid bilayers), pseudopods made of actin filaments and filled with cytoplasm" and also "pseudopods are mobile and variable (stretchy) the gripperssssssss if you wanna see some epic pseudopod action just look up amoeba hunting on youtube

"eyelids and "lashes"/teeth" the retractable sheathes that cover the eye have scutes that can flex and poke out as a sorta velcro-y set of teeth and manipulate objects

"mitochondrial pump" i'm sorry to say i didn't actually have an idea of what this organ was when i drew the first drawing don't tell anyone but i make shit up as i go along ummm but now it's the pseudo-heart organelle that generates atp (mitochondria) and circulates shit 'round the body (pump)

"2D eyes can perceive color, brightness, and a single layer/line of depth" so these basically work how the eyes work in flatland where euclideans can only see an infinitely thin plane of color and shadow

"reproductive organs and gametes" my euclideans have external fertilization where a pair (any pair works cuz they all have the same haploid gams) just mush together their gametes to make a baby love wins i didn't really think this through shhh i just cant imagine these things fucking im sorry they're too weird maybe the foreplay goes crazy idk

that's basically it uhm i labeled each shape as "cuboidal", "triangular", and "circular" and then that "circles are (superficially) bilaterally symmetrical" cuz they only got the one eye oh and the circular one is labeled as "juvenile has no compartment for reproductive organs" cuz why not ok bye

[zhongrin]

┋ The Steambird Issue No.517

article commissioned by the fontaine steambird magazine and written by ✾ mei/rin ✾

[Breaking News!] Our Fontaine gadget makers did it again, folks!

A collaboration project between Fontaine's best gadget makers and the scholars at Sumeru Akademiya has resulted in a prototype device inspired by the now-obsolete AKASHA system.

Not many details have been revealed, but as the scholars described it, they are aiming to use the concept of AKASHA to create a virtual space, called TeyvaTweets, where people can communicate with one another without seeing each other's faces! Yes - much quite like a communication device, but one that utilizes text instead of the usual verbal methods of communication.

A few selected testers have been invited to try it out, and if you're one of the lucky ones - congratulations! We look forward to seeing how this new technology will help connect people across Teyvat.

——————————⟡⟡⟡ ✉️ ⟡⟡⟡——————————

Dear <USER>,

𝒞ongratulations! You have been selected to help with testing out the fruits of our labor, here at the Sumeru-Fontaine collaboration project. Enclosed is the device containing the application: TeyvaTweets. Have fun perusing it, and we look forward to your feedback.

⧽ [ Turn on the device ]         [ Leave it off ]

ps. user manual and warnings attached on a separate page.

𝚄𝚜𝚎𝚛 𝙼𝚊𝚗𝚞𝚊𝚕 𝚟𝟷.𝟶.

you should be able to open it using both phone and pc (it's just a normal website).

clicking on pfp/name/username in a tweet (orange box) will open the profile of that person. clicking the 'x' icon on the popup box's top right side will close the user profile.

clicking the tweet on the main page will open the tweet's replies thread. clicking the back button will bring you back to the main page.

𝚆𝚊𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜.

there are suggestive contents inside, but nothing explicit.

some of you make cameos under other people's tweets too! see if you can spot yourself ;)

there's a lot of images for this one so the page might load slowly for you, especially if your internet isn't fast. i'm also using a free hosting service from GitHub, so yeah.

in order to indulge everyone, please pretend the tweet reply threads that 'overlap' with one another is a separate world on their own (e.g. if multiple people are flirting with a character and they flirt back in the reply thread don't point fingers and say that they're unfaithful / is cheating / ruin someone else's fun in general ;;;)

tested on chrome & safari web browsers on a mac and iphone + google pixel. crossing my fingers that it works on other devices too...

created for 𝓏𝒽𝑜𝓃𝑔𝓇𝒾𝓃'𝐬 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭 (submissions are closed)

might make a y/n-ify version of this in the future bc my brain accidentally fleshed out a whole concept of how it would work, but don't count me on that bc it's gonna take a lot more effort than this and honestly idk if it's even worth it-

——————————⟡⟡⟡ ✉️ ⟡⟡⟡——————————

© zhongrin | 2023 ◆ no repost. reblogs much appreciated. feel free to reach out to submit suggestions, feedback, comments, or if you just want to talk!

◇ taglist ◇ @thestarsofenkanomiya | @genshinparty | @abyssmal-skies | @hamdehlesmis | @depressivecomforts | @sophiethewitch1 | @why-am-i-here-someone-save-me | @sunnshineflxwer | @heartonthemoon | @yuutasbabe | @percyval-archives | @carbs-need-more-love | @rebeccka | @queen-belial | @stygianoir | @silentmoths | @niktwazny303 | @dustofthedailylife | @herdrops | @diebischesther | @marina-and-the-memes | @angryhope | @mixed-kester | @shuangxo | @fiannee | @lordbugs | @anonymousficreader | @shizunxie | @ladylofspades | @sup-zfam | @ansy-tea | @irethepotato | @nachotrash | @algrimmammon | @sassy-cat-in-town

[sophieinwonderland]

Hullo! I have questions? I’m trying to figure out what endogenic systems are, and it’s all decently new to me.

If this ask is rude in any way please void

What is a willowgenic system?

Are median-systems (monoconcious) systems strictly endogenic?

Are dreamaway systems (maladaptive daydreaming systems, MaDDs systems) endogenic? (Curious about this one because anti-endos do not like answering that one)

And last but not least, how does tulpmacy works (idk if I spelt that right)

Thank you for your time!!!

Hi there! Thanks for the questions!

A "willogenic" system is a term for a created system, and is usually used as an alternative to tulpamancy. The big difference being that tulpamancy has a much more extensive community with a masive trove of resources that isn't always connected to the more general plural community.

I don't much like "willogenic" as a term personally as I feel it simplifies the process, suggesting the headmates can be created through will alone.

Tulpamancy generally works, in its most basic form, by talking to an entity in your head until it becomes autonomous and sentient. There are a few different variations of this.

The most popular in the community seems to be starting from scratch. You give your tulpa an appearance and imagine their appearance, but not much else. Maybe you'll imagine a few personality traits for them as well. If you talk to them enough and treat them like their own person, you'll eventually hear a voice belonging to them. It will sound similar to your internal thoughts, but different at the same time. So the job of a tulpamancer is to listen for these voices. Or often before a voice, you may instead sense your tulpa's feelings and emotions in the beginning before the tulpa is actually vocal. (This is usually called tulpish.)

The less popular method, but the most common for producing accidental tulpas, is creating a more-developed character and "parroting," where you speak for them in the beginning. Do this long enough, and that character you controlled initially will develop independence and autonomy. Many tulpamancers end up being writers whose creations become sentient.

The reason for this, I believe, is that a lot of fiction writing involves low levels of dissociation. When you think about it, it requires you to compartmentalize. To feel what a character feels, you need to put all your knowledge and feelings as the writer in one box, and the feelings of the character in a second box.

This is even more true when you start talking to the character, and having conversations with them as yourself.

And no, median systems are not inherently endogenic. There are plenty of median systems out there who are traumagenic, and one could consider certain forms of OSDD a type of median system. Additionally, many polyfragmented systems will describe having median subsystems.

Dreamway systems will also vary in origin. Some are traumagenic. Some are endogenic. And sometimes it's complicated.

Maladaptive daydreaming itself is heavily associated with trauma, but can exist without trauma present. This is because of an addictive quality of daydreaming. And even if the daydreaming is caused by trauma, that doesn't mean that the system is. In a traumagenic system, the system is created by the trauma directly, and the brain basically trying to quarantine the trauma from the rest of the system. In a dreamway system, the maladaptive daydreaming may be caused by trauma, but that doesn't mean the system is.

Dreamway systems, even if the MADD itself is traumagenic, may lack the "EP" or trauma-holding headmates characteristic of CDDs (complex dissociative disorders) under the structural dissociation model.

[schizosupport]

Do you have any advice for telling the difference between ipseity disturbances and identity fragmentation related to OSDDID? I definitely have identity fluctuations and spend a great deal of time pondering my self but idk what the actual cause is

What comes to mind may or may not be helpful, because experiences aren't universal. But I'm thinking of my fiance who's multiple (used to be DID but it's more complicated now while also being more functional) and me, and sometimes I discuss ipseity disturbance stuff with them, and they don't relate at all.

So for me there is a relation between ipseity disturbance and feeling multiple, because for me that's related also to the eternal question "who/what/how am I (and if yes how many?)". Ipseity disturbance affects all of me, and it's the backdrop of how I and every aspect of me thinks about ourselves in the world.

Meanwhile my fiancée is plural, and it's just a given fact of life. He has a ton of different voices and tracks etc in his brain, and several different people. In the past he had amnesia between alters, and they were each very much rooted in their own self-experience, just different people. Now where amnesia is a more diffuse symptom and he has much more communication and cooperation in the system, it still hasn't changed the fact that each system-member experience themself in an immediate way, and while they can absolutely go down the rabbit hole of "why does my brain work like this", it doesn't pose a question to the basic level at which any given alter interacts with their own self and the world.

Ipseity disturbance is kinda deconstructionist if you know what I mean. It keeps deconstructing things until they fall apart. And that can lead to a sense of a fragmented self, which I think can lead to experiences of having a plural self/selves. But it isn't a necessity to have that deconstruction to experience DIDOSDD or other types of multiplicity.

For lots of folks their status as plural is based on simple observation of how they exist in the world, and while they might worry about whether they're "faking" in some way, the experience of a plural self doesn't inherently lead them to deconstruct their sense of self/collective or individual senses of self.

I think at the same time, that if you experience ipseity disturbance, it's practically impossible for that not to affect how you interact with experiences of DIDOSDD or other forms of plurality (if you have them). So trying to detangle whether your plural experiences are caused by something else as well might be an uphill battle.

Personally we've kinda come to accept that it doesn't matter a lot WHY we have a plural experience, there's nothing inherently wrong with existing in that way, and it gets to just "be". It took me years to arrive to that peace of mind, but I'm glad to be here.

[keyboardandquill]

On creating a wiki for your worldbuilding

Do you have a lot of lore to keep track of? Whether you're an author, a Game Master, or simply someone who really really likes worldbuilding, this post is for you.

Here's a quick overview of what I'll be talking about:

Platforms people use to create personal wikis

Formats and organization systems you may find useful when creating your own wiki

A brief look at the actual content you might put in your wiki (I'm planning a more in-depth post on that later with more images and demos)

And because this is gonna be a long'un, I'm putting a read-more here! I'll also make downloadable epub and PDF versions of this post available for free on my Ko-Fi at some point in the future.

(I'm also planning to reblog with a list of links later on, but I want this initial post shows up in search)

Also now that you're here, I'm going to say this isn't, like, super comprehensive or anything. I'm just talking about stuff I know a little about or have experience with. Please feel free to reblog with additions and/or corrections as needed!

What is a wiki?

According to Wikipedia, "a wiki is a hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience, using a web browser."

In this case, you'll likely be the sole person making updates to your wiki. The web browser part is optional these days as well, as you'll soon see.

Platforms for creating wikis

Websites for creating worldbuilding wikis

WorldAnvil

This one is actually designed for people who want to create big worldbuilding wikis.

Pros: Worldbuilding prompts! Those are great. It's got a pretty comprehensive set of article types too.

Cons: Kind of expensive to upgrade for features like making your wiki private, and it does NOT work well with adblock turned on, so if you don't want to pay for a membership you'll get inundated with ads. I'm not a huge fan of the interface in general and a lot of it isn't intuitive, but I like what they're doing so I support them anyway.

---

Tiddlywiki/Tiddlyhost.com.

In addition to having a cat as its icon and also a silly name, each 'article' you create with this is called a 'tiddler' which makes me think of Chuck Tingle. I haven't used it much myself yet, but I did make an account and it seems pretty neat.

---

Miraheze

A community-hosted wiki platform that runs on MediaWiki (which is what Wikipedia runs off of).

Pros: It's not Fandom.com.

Cons: You have to request a wiki and can't just make it yourself, as far as I can tell. I haven't actually looked into this one as much.

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Neocities

An option for if you want to go super oldschool and create a website using only basic html and hyperlinks (without the handy shortcuts of bbcode or Markdown). Monthly cost is $5 usd if you want to have more space and your own domain.

Pros: 100% control over your content.

Cons: Doesn't support PHP databases for wiki software, and can be fairly labour-intensive to update if you break a link or something.

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Fandom.com

Unfortunately, this one is the top result you'll get when you look up how to make your own wiki. I'm only including it here to tell you to stay as far away from it as possible!!

Its staff are known to ban wiki creators from their own wikis and a bunch of other nonsense that I'm not getting into here.

Programs and apps/web apps for creating worldbuilding wikis

Obsidian.md

My personal favourite. I'm planning to make a whole post about how I use it in the near future as part of this article series.

It's a markdown-based application that you can get on just about any platform (Windows, MacOS, Linux, iOS, Android, etc) which is great. Obsidian is really easy to pick up and use and also has great themes and community plugins!

Best thing is, it's FREE and you only have to pay if you use their publishing service, which... I don't, so.

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Notion

I've heard this one is pretty good too. Idk if it costs anything. It's another "second brain" style app (might be markdown also?) and I think it might do more than Obsidian, but I haven't checked it out much myself.

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Microsoft Word/Google Docs etc.

...Or just about any word processor that lets you create internal hyperlinks. Word may work best due to the collapsible headings so it doesn't get too unwieldy, but *shrug* whatever floats your boat.

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Excel/Google Sheets etc.

Or, again, any spreadsheet creator that lets you create internal hyperlinks.

I'd recommend having some basic spreadsheet knowledge before doing this. It could get complicated. Before I started using Obsidian, I was using Sheets to keep track of my glossary, notes about characters, and plot ideas.

Types of formatting & organization systems

There are as many organization systems as there are people who want to organize their stuff. Everybody needs something a little different! I find the ones that work best for me are systems that have a lot of customization options.

Here are a couple I know of.

Johnny Decimal

This system is absurdly simple in its concept and yet so versatile. From their website (it's just johnnydecimal dot com but I'll link it in a reblog later):

Take everything you need to organise and sort it in to, at most, ten large buckets.

Make sure the buckets are unambiguously different.

Put a label on each bucket.

Their website has a better explanation than I can give in this post, but I'll sum up the appeal of this system as quoted from their site: "There's only one place anything can ever be."

Usefully, part of this method is creating a directory for the rest of the system.

So if you're like me and tend to shove things wherever only to lose track of it later, this is a great system—especially when used in conjunction with the Zettelkasten Method (see below).

---

Zettelkasten Method

Originally devised as an extensive paper-based knowledge management system, Zettelkasten is meant to easily add new entries to a knowledge base while giving each one a unique ID for easy 'linking.'

The creator of this method said 'it is not important where you place the note, as long as you can link to it.'

As with the Johnny Decimal system, I can't explain it super succinctly (nor can the website, if I'm being honest), so I'll include a link in a future reblog for a video that gave me an excellent run-down of the basics.

Setting up your own system

An organization system is only useful if you can actually, y'know, use it.

It can be fun to set up a super-detailed organization system with predetermined categories for everything, but is it easy for you to use? How will you navigate it?

Making decisions

There will be a lot of decisions to make as you set up your system. The only set-in-stone rule I follow is... don't set anything in stone. It's okay if you decide something that doesn't work later on.

Figuring out your categories

My advice: go fairly broad. You can always sub-categorize. I'm going to go over my own wikis for Athenaeum and Rocket Boosters in detail in a later post, but here are the starting top-level categories I'd recommend for worldbuilders:

A meta category for notes about your database, templates, and any relevant research you've done.

Characters, including main characters, minor characters, and important figures

Worldbuilding

In the last category, which is the main reason for the existence of my wiki, I might have:

Culture

History

Locations

Organizations

Lore (if relevant)

Technology

Transportation

I'll go over the nuances of these 'main' subcategories in that future post I mentioned. In other words, the stuff that actually goes in those categories!

Determining the importance and relevance of worldbuilding elements

You'll need to figure out whether a topic is complex enough to deserve its own entry, or if it should be a sub-heading under another entry. It's okay if you decide on both! I have short subheadings under some entries that amount to "see [link to main entry on that topic]."

I've also decided to expand subheadings into their own topics, and I've removed topics as their own entry and shoved them under subheadings. I do this a lot, in fact! So it's okay if you don't know.

Templates

Will you be creating several of one type of entry?

Individual character profiles

Towns and cities

Factions

(to name a few)

It might be handy to figure out the basic types of information you'll need about each of those things and create a template for them.

A character template might have spaces for the basics, such as name, role, age, and so on.

Some characters will have a lot more information, and some might have even less than what your template dictates! And that's fine.

A word of warning about using system-creation as procrastination

Creating a wiki can be a daunting task. You might decide it's not for you, and that's okay. But you might also decide to go headlong into the process and work on every minute detail, and that is also okay, but.

But.

Beware of using your wiki as an excuse to procrastinate your actual writing/session preparation. Yes, use it to keep track of all the lore you've injected into your manuscript/campaign/whatever, just make sure it stays in its place as a companion to your main project rather than becoming your main project.

How formal should your entries be?

Honestly this one's entirely up to you. I have a mix. Some entries are written like Wikipedia entries with a thorough explanation of the topic with proper punctuation and formatting, while others are simply bullet-point lists of thoughts and ideas that I can return to at a later date.

What methods do you use to keep track of your lore and worldbuilding? Let me know in a reblog or comment!

And please make sure to check the notes. I'll be reblogging with links, and then reblogging that reblog to make sure they're, y'know, actually visible in the notes.

[orkbutch]

sound like terf talking points ngl. just say you don’t think trans women are women and go :/

I'm assuming this ask is referring to this post, otherwise idk what it'd be about That post was made in response to me first noticing trans men talking about "transmisandry". An element of whats being called transmisandry is the exact experience I described in that post, and I was giving my opinion on that change in gender perception and how battling against that is pretty futile. As I said in the post, this wariness toward masculinity and cis men - I'm just going to call this 'Man Wariness' for short - is also something the vast majority of trans women have internalised. (I only say "vast majority" because I guess there could be The Exception? but really I just think All women have that wariness lmao.)

I became aware of this discussion because trans women that I follow on twitter have been pushing back on the misogyny and transmisogyny that's been expressed by the people championing the existence of transmisandry the hardest. I've been witnessing a lot of conversations trans women are having about the trans/misogyny they've experienced specifically from trans men. They (accurately imo) identify this as a threat to the integrity of feminism, particularly within transgender thought/politics, because misandry is not a real oppressive framework that exists. Pro-transmisandrists have been arguing that misandry is real and harms trans women as well, because The Man Wariness - non-men having learned to be guarded and fearful of masculinity & (what their brain associates subconsciously with) cis men - can also be directed at trans women, and results in transphobia toward those women.

The trans women disagreeing resent the framing of this as a 'misandry' issue because, of course, trans women are women. The people that hate trans women, even the ones that call them men to abuse them, don't actually see them as Men. In the eye of the transphobe, terf or GC, trans women are something else entirely, an inherently deviant third thing. Pushing back against "misandry", a supposed systemic oppressive hatred of manhood and men, does absolutely nothing to protect women from oppression. Trans women are oppressed, attacked, assaulted and abused mostly viciously and routinely by cis men. Labelling a description and discussion of Man Wariness as "TERF talking points" is just... deeply, deeply unhelpful imo. Man Wariness is just real. Thats just how a LOT of people operate in the world, trans women included. Obviously this learned wariness ends up impacting how many trans women are viewed and treated, and I understand being skeptical of me defending Man Wariness because of that. I was talking about it in the context of trans men/mascs' experiences specifically. Honestly... I don't really have helpful, thorough thoughts on how Man Wariness impacts trans women/fems and how that should be tackled. Its a bit of a wicked problem, I'm not trans fem and I haven't seen much discussion about this specifically. I assume because its a touchy subject thats kind of avoided. On the one hand, I believe deeply that trans women shouldn't need to perform/achieve a certain level of femininity in order to be safe, happy and acknowledged by society as women. On the other hand, Man Wariness is an uncontrollable response that is very deeply internalised, often directly connected to traumatic experiences, and I don't think its something that can be explored and addressed unless we can talk about it openly and frankly. Your response to this is very counter-productive imo. It just shuts down any possibility of a nuanced, open discussion. Maybe it'd be helpful if I was a terf, but I'm not lol. Which is obvious if you've known me or followed my work for any significant amount of time. Its the kind of response that shames someone for having Man Wariness, and feeling shame about an uncontrollable emotional response is toxic. Thats going to make that person feel they're irredeemably transphobic in some deeply embedded way that makes them reluctant to interact with trans women. And if theres anything that I think would break down someone's Man Wariness reaction to trans women, it would be having more familiarity with trans women because they'd pretty quickly internalise that trans women are not a threat and are women. OR of course that shame makes them feel rejected and alienated from trans friendly sphears, and they then turn toward TERF & GC sphears where they can be reassured their Man Wariness is fine, and are then vulnerable to being radicalised. But you know in my opinion no matter where that discussion went, no matter how immovable Man Wariness could be proven to be, that will NEVER invalidate that trans people have a right to safety, health, happiness and acceptance within society as the gender we know we are. That's actually just fact. These discussions are simply figuring out How that should come to be, and what our vision of a better, trans accepting society might look like.

[kurt-dontcry]

COD au idea help!

(Please inform me of any spelling errors or grammar mistakes I didn't check I'm literally writing this one hour before midnight)

Ok ok so listen listen. My brain is obsessed with an COD au idea. I'm not sure tho if I should go for it.

I'm only planning to mske this a short comic so probably only 1 chapter. Because A I'm still working on the Poltergeist Roach au and B I don't have a clue how to make this more than one chapter.

Au idea:

Ever heard of the show "Pantheon" ?honestly best show I've seen in a long time.

no? ok let me give you a quick run down on the premise. Some smart guy (don't exactly know what his job was/is) has figured out how to create an Uploaded intelligence (Ui for short) which essentially is an exact scan of someone's brain (the original brain gets destroyed during the scanning process) Uploaded to the internet and essentially a copy of the person with the same memories,senses, feelings and so on they are the same as their past self just faster and ... immortal. That guy essentially has the dream to create a perfect world where every human is an Ui, free from mortality. With endless possibilities he's willing to do everything to achieve it. (Btw the public is not aware of Uis)

So the show is essentially about those Uis and the conflicts they bring as well as the chances. For example people that don't have long to live being given another chance or people that never had a fair chance to begin with. But then there is also the dark side unethical experiments. Uis intentionally Uploaded to attack certain groups. Uis hacking into systems like the military to control weapons,steal data and so much more.

(For better explanation just watch the show please I wasn't able to cover everything In this explanation unless I wanted to turn one post into a 6000 word mini novel)

Yes or you have read the above

So essentially this concept but COD like Idk one of the 141 members getting injured during a mission and falling into a coma, that they are very unlikely to wake up from getting uploaded without their consent. leaving that person and the rest of the team struggling with the new reality. Some of them maybe not accepting it claiming that person got killed by the upload and so on.

soooooooo what do you think? Should I go for it?

(You can also use this idea for your own works if you want. no credit necessary after all I do not own either of these source materials. Would still be nice if you tell me tho I would love to see it)

[solarmagickstar]

I've been hearing a lot of "gen alpha can't read cause they're iPad kids."

But like are we asking them what they *can* do?

Or how *they're* feeling even?

I distinctly remember adults when I was a kid saying we'd all be "brain dead" because of tv or texting or the Internet or some shit. And we couldn't defend ourselves cause we were literally children.

It's like this every time.

And every time each generation has to prove they're worthy of adulthood.

And this gen isn't even all in middle school yet and y'all are calling them failures right in front of their faces. It's not ganna help. If anything it'll make this much much worse.

I'm a Gen Z (well I'm in the transitional area between millennial and Z but most millennials tell me I'm gen z so fine.) I have gen alpha kids. And a lot of them (classmates and the like) are anxious asf about the world.

I wonder if they're putting up a tough front to keep the only control they have in the world as children.

Or living free before they have to become the overworked adults they see in their lives.

Or ya know death by school shootings if they're in America.

Or idk die from a once in a century plague cause their parents won't let them get vaccinated.

Or maybe it's something we could never describe or understand since we're not in that position.

Honestly every commentator I've seen on this topic hasn't asked a child how they literally feel. Like you don't have to put them on camera obviously (maybe don't actually for their safety) but like just ask? Or find ways to ask, kids can be shy about their true feelings sometimes. Especially if we keep pretending like we know them.

Teachers are over worked, parents are over worked. But haven't they always been? (Maybe we should actually do something about that? Like a lot have already been saying, but like actually do it? Maybe baby sit your friend's kid or go to the grocery store with them to help chaperone them? And try and do it for them for free, I get it if you can't but those who can should. I'm also not saying your should steal baby supplies, I'd never say that, I'd also never say to just steal food and hand them out, or to steal teaching and school supplies and just give em away or anything of course not! And I wish I could put the proper tone marks on this but for legal purposes I am being sarcastic.)

And doesn't each generation come with more problems or perceived problems because that's life? We're always going to find something wrong with the younger generation, we're constantly evolving and we're constantly looking for ways how.

Last thing.

What is intelligence?

Is it *really* being able to read?

Is it *really* scoring high on tests for studies?

Didn't we *just* talk about how standardised tests are wild and are often not very good at displaying what kids can actually do? Or are often hard to grade because of lack of staffing? Something something Pearson? Something something my history text book was older than me something something "Bill Clinton the president everyone is looking forward to!" Written on the back page Something something coming home to see late night TV making jokes about his shitty behaviour but making it more about the person who was literally harmed by this and making fun of her well into the 2000s..... (Oh has our education system and environment for kids always been kinda shitty? No way almost like it's a never ending battle.)

Have we truly figured out if the kids are alright?

Have they ever been?

Do we even know what that fucking means????

[nyaagolor]

Paldean League Worldbuilding

aka how Geeta is reshaping the poke-economy and making herself the most hated woman ever in the process

I generally try to keep any sort of real world analogues out of my HCs for Pokemon bc I think it's more of a utopian society and doesn't need to operate on the same logic of economics or politics as irl, but swsh and sv seem more grounded in our reality so I've been thinking about them (especially sv) a LOT. Decided I would just dump all my musings and HCs about the paldean league here if only to organize it all. Also disclaimer that I am not an economist and will never pretend to be so it’s more than likely this system would never work irl but it’s pokemon so it’s fine

The Galarian and Paldean Leagues always struck me as relatively recent, at least in terms of their current operation, and mostly spearheaded by a super ambitious head of operations who restructured the entire place as soon as they got there. I'll talk about Galar in another post, but atm Paldea has my brain in a chokehold so this is all about them

My main HC about the Paldean League is that up until extremely recently (20 years ago give or take I'm not doing specific timelines here) the Paldean League was extremely corrupt and poorly run. When the Paldean empire collapsed, the League was formed as a way to try and maintain the status quo and keep power in the hands of those who previously held it. It was, and continued to be for the next few centuries, an oligarchy. No one in the system was elected, and those in lower positions had to be personally selected and approved by their superiors. There were no checks and balances, so the people at the top could and did maintain power indefinitely. By the time we reached 20~ years before the main story, the structure was as follows:

Chairman: The leader of the entire thing. Has absolute power over everyone else in the system. Does all the boring stuff Top Champion: A battler and figurehead for the public. The "face" of the League, but generally not in charge of anything and has no political power. Their battle with up and coming trainers determines whether they get champion rank ^ If ur thinking this is similar to the Galar League, you'd be correct. They were based off the same model for a while Elite Four: Originally called the Council of Four, they act as a council that makes decisions along with the Chairman and test trainers' worthiness. Typically in charge of a handful of gym leaders Gym Leaders: Local political leaders that operate under the Council of Four and ensure things don't get too rowdy on the town level. In charge of testing trainers, protecting the town from wild threats, keeping up appearances, and union busting (they mostly did that last one) Everyone else: Salary workers. They have not yet unionized

The system, ultimately, was corrupt as hell. There was no job security, and the hierarchical nature of the league ensured you had to suck up to and do the dirty work for your boss if you wanted to get paid at all. Unions? Idk her. Corruption and embezzlement was the name of the game, and Paldea was basically flat broke because of it, with infrastructure decades behind neighboring regions and a bevvy of shitty trainers. The champion, unlike other regions, was not decided by who unseated the current champion. It didn't matter how good someone was, they had to be selected by the chairman to be Top Champion, and the Chairman would only select someone who would work with them without question. Paldea was basically the laughingstock of the world because of their complete and utter incompetence in any and all battle tournaments and lack of advancements in literally every sector. Then shit hit the fan and we moved onto the system we see in-game

I'm not sure what the event was (a recession, investigative journalism, doesn't really matter) but the newfound understanding of just HOW corrupt the league was and the resulting scandal made the Chairman resign and shook the very foundation of the League. Luckily or unluckily, a young upstart politician named Geeta was quick to fill that void, and through a few political loopholes and charisma, she managed to secure herself as Chairwoman. She had long since hated the current Paldean system, thinking that it held her beloved region back from greatness. She had always been gunning for higher and higher positions, a dark horse of Paldean politics with undetermined motives, extreme intelligence, and frightening levels of ambition. The Chairman had always had their eye on her, personally keeping her in check, but when they were gone Geeta immediately seized the opportunity to grab as much power as physically possible. Getting the position made her effectively untouchable, and that was the ultimate goal, because her plan for Paldea was about to make her the single most hated woman in the region's history

Geeta, upon gaining a position where they legally could not get rid of her, decided to fire every single person in the upper echelons of the league. Every gym leader, elite four, and the top champion were all fired, and she withdrew Paldea from every battling tournament and public appearance until she could workshop the league into something servicable. It was the boldest move since the dissolving of the Paldean Monarchy and it did NOT make her any friends

Though her ultimate goal was to reform the entire Paldean league, her early changes were only possible because of the old system. She could and did reform the system to her liking without consequence only because of the old hierarchy system already in place. Her ability to hand select her coworkers and fire people indiscriminately was one of the greatest abuses of power Paldea had ever seen, whether for noble reasons or not, and the people she fired tried to smear her as much as they could. Though these radical steps were necessary to undo and reshape the corruption hellscape the League had become, it wasn't exactly a good look for the new chairwoman (not that she cared)

Geeta also combined the top champion position and chairwoman position, which was so shockingly unpopular and suspicious-looking that she effectively cemented her godawful reputation. She saw the top champion as an unnecessary expense and decided to take on the responsibilities herself so she could funnel the top champion salary into public projects. This is part of the reason why she’s so Bad at being champion: she’s doing it to save the league money and only needs to the absolute bare minimum. Most of her job for the first decade was analyzing the current hierarchy, finding trainers to fill positions, and trying to figure out how to fix things so that would be sustainable after she left and wouldn't fall back into old corruption. She took on a job in the academy schoolboard to keep an eye out for younger trainers, put as much money into research and economic opportunities as possible, then got to work shaping the League to her vision

Her main vision for the league was to make as many parts of the system economically self-sustaining as possible, which was vital for her gym leader choices. She picked people who had *enough* skill in battling, but who all had other careers that would generate interest in and revenue for the gym. Paldea didn't have the pure battling talent yet to make a name for itself on any kind of world stage so Geeta was completely unconcerned about the actual battling skill of her picks as long as they were good enough and making cash. In terms of gym challenges, she mandated that they had to be free or extremely cheap and somehow tied to the town itself-- the giant contraptions of other regions were NOT in the budget. She wanted the gym system to be a celebration of the towns they were in and to inspire people to visit in the same way Galar's stadiums did, all in the hopes that gyms wouldn't need money from the league itself

The gyms would maintain a similar system as before, with each town and gym operating like a smaller independent organization. Most day to day operations and decisions like numbers of workers and salaries would be handled by the gyms themselves, but with all details publicly available so interventions could take place if things got fishy. All revenue generated by the gym would stay within the town-- it would be used to pay salaries, do upkeep, etc, and anything left over could be used to make renovations / add more stuff to gym challenges / support local businesses. If the revenue generated wasn't enough to cover upkeep and salary, the league would fill in the rest

The reason the gym buildings Look Like That is because the old league funneled most of the money into the pockets of the higher-ups and very little was allocated for building gyms. Geeta kept the design bc it's cheap, Paldea is broke, and the uniformity of the gyms allows trainers to find it more easily. it's also convenient if there's a turnover of the position-- no need to build a new gym! It's mostly an administrative office anyway, only there for paperwork and to house office staff, and Geeta is under the (correct) impression that most gym leaders prefer having stages at their favorite places instead of a specific building. Only two gym leaders have strong negative opinions about the building itself: Grusha, who can't have an outdoor reception area because of the snow and hates sitting in the lobby all the time, and Brassius, who thinks it's ugly as shit (he's right) and wants to paint a mural on it

The gym system is actually run much better than it was before-- it's still hitting its stride at the time of the game but is shaping up into a system that will work long after Geeta retires. The gym leaders also like how things are run quite a bit-- they just hate Geeta as a person (but that's smth I plan on exploring in another post)

The Elite Four is something Geeta admittedly hasn't put much thought into: her main focus was on redoing the administrative side of the league and ensuring the gyms were generating enough money to function + helping the towns they were in. The Elite Four, in her mind, were an afterthought, especially since she stripped them of their political power and distributed that power amongst regular office staff. She uncoupled politics from battling in the upper spheres of the league, allowing for more concentrated and specialized attention to issues so the Elite Four could just battle

In the new league, the Elite Four isn't a council of politicians, just people who test the strength of trainers looking to be champion-- every current Elite Four member is an employee in another sector working the job for a bonus (except for Poppy-- her parents are accountants and she ended up in the position as a joke that went a liiiiittle too far). In the future, the Elite Four and Top Champion might be dedicated battlers rather than a side hustle, but Paldea doesn't have the talent nor money for that at the moment

In terms of economics, Geeta decided to set an inflation-adjusted salary rate for each position that was viewable by the public and that couldn't be changed without a public vote in the hopes this would limit corruption. She also redid the League Points system— it used to be how employees were paid, but now it’s mostly for trainers, allowing the league to subsidize common trainer goods and make things easier to buy (all employees are paid with regular money). Paldea doesn’t have designated trainer routes like other regions and cash is far easier to mug than digital currency, so trainers are encouraged to use LP as a precaution so they don’t get robbed while in the Paldean wilds. However because the LP system isn’t very popular and NOT secure, Geeta is debating phasing it out

In the new system, gyms operate mostly on their own, so the central administrative stuff (aka everything that happens in the league building by the academy as well as E4 salaries and whatnot) gets their money from returns on investments— mostly from Tera Orbs. Fees from defeating trainers also helps, but Geeta made sure not to tie it to anyone’s salaries so that they wouldn’t thrash trainers for money, as encouraging them is the whole point of the challenge. Side note about Tera Orbs: once the league got the patent, Geeta didn’t think twice about the professors, being far too busy with Everything Else to think about her old business partner. Not keeping an eye on them is one of her greatest regrets

In terms of future plans, Geeta has already implemented checks and balances on every position but her own. When she’s confident in how the League is progressing and is sure the system won’t fall back into corruption, she plans on turning her own position to an elected one. Geeta isn’t stupid, she knows that everyone hates her and will lose her position as soon as she puts proper checks and balances on it, so she’s waiting until she’s confident in the League’s system to let the rest of the league get rid of her. By that point, she hopes that the League will be organized, financially stable, and balanced enough so that it can run smoothly long after she’s gone. Also, the league is likely to enter back into international batting conferences by the end of the decade, since there’s a LOT of up and coming battling talent that can make Paldea proud (and hopefully bring enough positive attention and money back to the region so they can actually make the league profitable)

To me Paldea’s league always felt like it was in a transition period, building itself from the ground up again. We happen to see it right at the middle, just before it’s really up to a properly functioning and self-sustaining entity. I don’t really have a closer for this but if u read all the way here I’m very flattered and apologize for being a lil delusional about this :)

[antiendovents]

heyyy its ussss! its r (or maybe Eva idk) (nope yeah its r) and I just wanted to say you're awesome!!! (EVA GET OUT) we think you are super cool,sorry, but evalynn wanted to say smth to ya.

hiiiiiiii I think you're so cool and um I'm back and feeling way better and anyway yea love you (platonically) you're so cool yeah 💕💖

well that was rather embarrassing. the love letter we were referencing was our second message to you, in which saturn got way too in detail about me.

we are not dating lol, I have a gf (well, me and Eva share her, I think Saturn is aroace and evalynn is a child so yeah) (and our other alters almost never front) (cept one but I do not want to introduce her to you because she sucks and I really hate her) (shes very abrasive and generally assholey, she yells a lot at r and the rest of us).

anyway uhhhhh yeah I have like a quick question. can an alter have a backstory that's basically me but kinda tweaked? so evalynns backstory is basically mine (I'm the host), except I have a lot of trauma from COVID so for her COVID never happened. shes like forever in third grade, before COVID started and um kinda like a fictive but from real life. she also hates reminders of COVID so I'm gonna make sure she does not read the rest of this message cuz her mental health is already sorta iffy!!!

OH I NEED TO WARN YOU BOUT SMTH. my parents raised me z!onist and I'm not anymore cuz like... a lot of very obvious reasons, but evalynn does not have the skills to process this, so she generally does not talk about any of this. I've been doing my very best to make sure she doesn't know anything, so she may be a bit oblivious. we were never the sort of z!onist who wanted to like, kill everyone (tho I know some of those) we actually thought that the west bank and gaza should be allowed to be its own country even when we were younger, but she is still very connected to israel (we are Israeli, but again, stand for Palestine) so ummm please ignore her lol anyway bye lol (insert nervous laughter)

PLEASE DONT HATE US

-🌌🌠

hi again you two!! Thank you so much! You seem cool too (all of you) :D

And hi Evalynn! You're awesome and I'm glad you're feeling better now! Love you too (platonically ofc!) and I hope you have a great day(or night depending on where you are in the world!)

Also I didn't even notice that lol! When I go back now yeah that kind of was a love letter lol! but I guess a platonic love letter since you have a girlfriend and they're aroace?? Either way it's kind of cute (like in the way where you see best friends or siblings give eachother gifts or care about eachother a lot and you just go "awh")

And don't worry about that, we kind of get that! We'd probably introduce ourselves too if we didn't switch so much, infact we still need to work on introductions on our personal blog, we just don't know who to do cause they either stop fronting for a long time or cant be bothered to do it (and also we have a few alters like that, so we get why you might not want to introduce her to us, but either way you should know she's welcome here even if she is a bit "assholey")

And yeah, it is possible for alters to have similar but different "backstories" or whatever one would want to call it! I'd assume it would be that your brain just witholds memories of COVID from her due to it being too traumatic or stressful for her to handle, which might explain why she only seems to remember what happened before COVID and why she doesn't like reminders of it? (I don't know, I'm making assumptions based on how our system works a little, but our point is yeah it's entirely possible!)

And that's fine, we don't hate you for that. You cannot control how you were raised or what your parents believe in or even where you were born, you've changed and recognised that the belief is harmful and that's good enough, that's literally all you can do. It's understandable that some alters may not be able to fully process it, sometimes these things can be incredibly complicated and trying to change what you grew up with is hard, we're proud of you for doing it anyways, even if not all of you understand it perfectly

[ghost-of-a-system]

Asking about fronting / awareness / existing in Innerworld, how you percieve that, how others might if they see this, idk. (not dx, questioning at "ok there is apparently *something* idk how to comprehend it, so my perception / understanding / the concepts i'm fitting these experiences into might be wrong. but it is not nothing. and dissociation and trauma is medically dx sooo." but like i don't want to fakeclaim.) I see systems / alters talking about being in the headspace, living there, interacting, like they have their own consciousness, going to sleep there or doing activities. And I'm like - how - howwwww how are you that real and separate and alive For me it is more like there's the front room with a big control / signal board and whoever is at these controls is the current I. there's like that omniscient consciousness that is just linked to that front room. and i (?) sometimes see pictures of it or of other Alters, i hear their voices, sometimes we can interact. but conscious I = whoever is at the controls more or less. there'll be intrusions and fragments from elsewhere / others that i might be able to identify as "probably from xy" but not a real other I that exists and is able to think and have its own consciousness??? I think? So how do you do that shift from a collective consciousness to being separate? and like being real and thoughts and feelings and actions *existing* when they arent perceived through that front? Is this even how systems work / would I be a system if it's like that? is this collective PoV just actually all 1 personality that is changing wildly and only the intrusions are a different thing from that? is it all just me and I need to get my shit together and stop imagining stuff? i'm so confused by all this (reminder i'm as far as "there is something complex dissociative going on i guess??" - and that after said brain threatened revolution and unaliving us if we didn't stop denying their existence which uh pretty hard to argue with) honestly i'm amazed i can even type this without getting a strike i think this is the first time i've ever used we this much in a public space and was even thinking about signing off - midi / keeper / plus whoever the mini was in the middle there. also a bunch of others maybe somewhere around too, basically almost everyone who was distinct enough to get a name i guess somehow. but mainly those. ...a bit of time has passed and uh wtf howww what did you do brain?! and i feel obligated to add that this is all just in my head and i might as well have imagined / been crazy like I don't wanna appropriate anything ...more time has passed and I added this & cut out like 4000 words of further rambling: Idk I really hope this makes sense, if not please ask and I'll try to explain further! Also hope this was okay to ask, I really was trying to be respectful and stuff, you don't have to answer!

I feel that what you are describing could very well be perceived as a system one. Of course, the disclaimer... we are no professionals. But, if I am understanding this properly, we relate to feeling as though we are one consciousness, almost... cycling through different identities rather than (metaphorically) individual consciousnesses taking turns with control. At the end of the day, we are all one brain, I suppose! If you are a system, the most I could chalk this up to is simply being a matter of how your individual system functions. It isn't always the same down to the little details as someone else's, and it is all about what your brain needs.

We cannot answer on behalf of systems with complex headspaces, or inner-worlds, in which their alters can manifest and experience fleshed-out lives. We have no inner-world, and have never been able to experience this (Despite attempts). But, I do not believe that the presence of this is required for alters to be considered "more separate", or distinct. We have fairly distinct alters despite having no inner-world, no fronting room, and nothing of the sort. What makes us so distinct is who we are when we are here. But that is just our experience.

We are no inner-world professionals; we hardly understand the ability to visualize in itself! Having aphantasia, and all. It may be better to ask a system who is more experienced with these things. But I will try. You mention wondering how to shift this one consciousness into being more separated, and I'm afraid I do not know if this is possible or something that someone can achieve. Perhaps we are uninformed, in which case I do hope that someone corrects us. I do recall reading about how inner-worlds can be constructed and expanded, if that was something you feel you are interested in, or something you feel could help. After all, inner worlds are visualization tools to help with communication, at the basics. I believe that this is generally achieved through therapy, though I'm sure it isn't required. You can probably try to look more into that online and see if anything helps.

This is the most I feel comfortable suggesting. I do not want to speak too much for something we do not experience.

Feel free to reach out if we misunderstood or should expand upon anything.

[catominor]

ok heres everything i have written about romegaverse in my drafts .... putting it under a readmore so that i dont have to subject anyone who is not interested in this beautiful horrible world weve created to my extensive romegaverse worldbuilding. also this is unedited so if its incomprehensible sorry i have a very rambly way of writing when im thinking through very important questions such as these.

ok but what about gender roles. obviously omegas are stereotyped to be more feminine, and this is certainly true for female omegas (who i imagine get stereotyped as oversexed and promiscuous, but are simultaneously lusted after/desirable) but male omegas, after gaining civil rights, have worked very hard to dispel stereotypes of them as effeminate and useless in 'male' spheres (which has only partly worked). perhaps if a male omega is married to a male alpha or beta he's called a wife and expected to take the wife's role in the relationship in private, but still at the same time expected not to act 'effeminate' in his public life (if he has one, which most high status male omegas choose to) and is held to similar standards about this as other men, because he is still a man.

i imagine there'd be weird double standards about both male and female omegas? like they'd be simultaneously revered and reviled. a male omega is highly desirable because he has, in romegaverse society's view, the brain of a man but with the ability to reproduce like a woman. but there;s also a distrust of his effeminate role in private life and whether that makes him untrustworthy. female omegas, again, are highly desirable but also distrusted because of their exaggerated femininity.

(as an aside i imagine female alphas would be viewed as undesirable to most men, but would perhaps have a special place in society? maybe have some kind of priesthood a lot of them are in or religious significance to them? there also probably wouldn't be very many of them depending on whether secondary gender is visible from birth (in which case a lot of them would probably be exposed) or appeared later, in which case there'd be an amount of them proportional to male alphas)

more romegaverse thoughts: i wonder if they would end up with a dearth of women in the population if men could get pregnant? like, having a daughter wouldn't be as useful as an omega son because a daughter wouldn't also be able to participate in politics like an omega son would, and you can still marry off your omega son too for alliances so it's like the best of both worlds (though obviously it would depend on your finances; it would cost a lot of money to both give your omega son a dowry and finance his political career). im picturing a world where like. 1/3 of people each are alphas, betas, and omegas. maybe due to this they've ended up with like a 60/40 or maybe even 70/30 male/female divide? fluctuating through time probably based on other factors like the economy and so on.

as for discrimination against omegas i imagine there was a big movement for more (male) omega political rights in like the early or mid republic. mayhaps even an omega war. so now they are able to participate in politics but theres still a lot of stereotypes about them and distrust of them/view of them as less capable than other types of men. i also don't think they would be allowed to participate in warfare due to their ability to get pregnant maybe?

marriages: id imagine any union that could produce children would be a marriageable one, but any combination of sexes that couldn't would not be marriageable. so a male alpha could marry anyone except another male alpha or a male beta, a female alpha could marry anyone at all, and so on. (this is assuming that male omegas and female alphas have both functioning reproductive systems? idk is that how it usually works?) (also not sure about female alpha/female beta or omega marriages? they wouldn't have much legal rights; but maybe it's a kind of right of three children type thing where the female alpha gets limited legal freedom once she marries another woman? or maybe female alphas always have that type of legal position by virtue of being alphas? probably the latter.)

relationships: it's socially disapproved of for said non-able-to-have-children couples to be in a relationship, but not necessarily illegal. it's also socially unacceptable for a man to have a relationship with a male omega who isn't his wife. (more to think about here but i am so tired)

hiding status?: i think it would be possible for people to hide their status (for instance, if an omega wanted to be in war) but it would be probably a lot more difficult for high social class people. because it's not necessarily immediately obvious on the outside whether someone's an alpha, a beta, or an omega, if you could get anyone who knew for sure either on board to lie for you or to at least keep quiet, you could probably use some kind of medication to disguise your smell or whatever (is that how it works? its like smell or pheromones based right?) and pretend to be a different status. (perhaps in an earlier period it was much stricter/society was more repressive about disclosing your status, but now that omegas have more rights it's less stringent)

[khaleesiofalicante]

A little advice and rant (because for some reason writing things here makes me feel better and hopefully doesn't, in-turn makes your mood somber)

Do you have days when you feel unproductive? What do you do?

This feels embarrassing to admit but I used to be one of those kids who got full marks in school and like the first year in college and now I can feel all that slipping away. I constantly feel like my parents are always disappointed in me. If they call me out, I lash out at them. The fact that I'm writing this is idk humiliating me, but I can't just keep it inside me anymore. Now I feel like I was never smart, I was just really good at faking it and now I'm not? I'm tired of faking it... what scares me is how i have started excepting what I am. It just terrifies me sometimes seeing what I have become. I feel angry when I tell this to a friend and they tell me oh ur smart ul make it and I just wanna scream at them like NO CANT YOU SEE IT IM NOT.

I'm glad you can come talk to me about stuff. I've always liked being someone people can talk to.

I do have days that I feel unproductive, but what you're describing sounds like a phase (for the lack of a better word).

As someone who was also the straight-A student in school, I always felt like school was... easier. College is something that is genuinely difficult in terms of the content we learn, the way we learn, the way we are taught, and our peers too. So, firstly, don't be too hard on yourself if you're struggling in college because it's supposed to be a little difficult.

Secondly, college gets harder every year—quite literally. So I think comparing yourself to your grades (or the amount of energy you had) during your first year to now is unfair to you. We don't have infinite amounts of energy and fucks to give. We do have finite amounts of passion for sure. These things get drained slowly, especially as we grow up. So that's why it's so important to study/work on things we enjoy and are passionate about so it's a little easier for us.

As someone whose self-esteem is very much tied to their intelligence, I understand you deeply. I once had a panic attack (a bad one) in my college bathroom when I found out I got a B in a subject. I remember my mom laughing and being like, "That's it? You're so dramatic," when I felt like I was literally collapsing.

So, I get you. I understand the need to be smart. But what I have moved away from is trying to measure my smartness through my grades. Because guess what? Grades don't fucking matter when you leave school/uni. It's not how we judge ourselves or our abilities. Now once you leave school/uni. It is a ridiculous system, and we mustn't let it make us feel shit about ourselves.

Just because you are not getting the same grades you used to, it doesn't mean you're not smart anymore. You do realize you literally know more than you did 2 or 3 years ago? You know more than you did a month ago? You are literally getting smarter every day. Just because it's not reflected in your grades doesn't mean you're not smart.

The fact that your grades are slipping could be because of so many things. The exam marking styles could have changed, the teachers could've become stricter, the subject might be harder, or maybe you have more difficulty remembering details because you are older and your brain has more things to focus on now. It could be any number of things. These are all things you can work on and improve.

There are lots of ways you can do this. Consider using a new learning style. I was always someone who learned visually, and I experimented with auditory learning in uni and realized voices are actually easier to remember than visuals (especially when I got older and could focus better). You can learn with others. It's okay to think of yourself as smart, but don't ever think you're the smartest person in the room - that shit is bad for you. So if you're struggling, look at the people who are not. Ask them to help. It doesn't make you stupid or small. Asking for help is the smartest thing anyone who wants to survive can do.

These are all things you can do to "get better" and go back to those standards you have set for yourself.

But from my heart, I tell you, don't try to live up to the standards you set for yourself when you were in school. The way you judged yourself in school cannot be the same system you judge yourself as an adult. It's two completely different lives, and trying to live up to those standards will only make you feel shit about yourself.

For what it's worth, I don't think you were faking it before. People don't feel so guilty and bad about losing something they faked. If this is something you want to fix and get back to those old grades, then like I said, try new things and see what works and what doesn't. But if you don't want to try too hard, that's okay too. It's not something to be ashamed about. I think the standards we set for ourselves should be based on our current realities, not our past or our future.

I am sure you will figure this one out and will feel like yourself again. You are smart. I have faith in you. You got this.

PS - Not to condone violence, but it's impossible to feel smart when the people around you make you feel stupid, so I don't blame you for lashing out at your parents. If their lack of support is making things worse, you need to tell them. If they want you to be smart, then they better act like it too.

Love 💜