#i totally get having other social medias if you want to cultivate a following or have a shop/business or smthg

[greenerteacups]

Hey GTC, I have always been such a fan of your Tumblr and your engagement with the fandom. However I must say that as of late, the questions you’re being asked most often are essentially variants of “Will X happen?” or “Will Y character do Z like in the book?” or even, “I’m noticing Theme A, will it continue in future chapters?”

A significant element of the fun that you’ve created for Lionheart readers is that we don’t know which elements and events of the JKR texts you’ll preserve untouched and which you’ll turn into the sixth and seventh year Lionheart storylines. I adore making my guesses to which parts of canon you’ll play with and which parts you’ll completely and utterly upend. Unfortunately, questions that ask about canon events in books 5-7 ruin so much of the fun.

Historically, you’ve used the Ask box to provide us with analyses of your own work and characterizations, but I feel as if recently you are often indulging questions about books 5, 6, and 7. I hate to say it, but I even feel that your answers veer into spoiler territory. I used to lurk your Tumblr incessantly, but since I’ve started to see this influx in predictive questions these past couple weeks, I’ve been avoiding the app.

It’s such a gift that we get to engage with your work on such a vibrant epistolary and interactive space as your Tumblr. I know that you can’t control what fans ask, but I humbly request that you please consider refusing to answer questions that ask you to ponder future events. Thank you for your tender care to everyone in the fandom. ❤️‍🔥🦁🧡

Hey, what's up, dude. I hear you. Sorry about that.

The problem is that the line between spoilers and not spoilers is totally subjective, and the line between "spoilers that are fine" and "spoilers that bother me" is also totally subjective. I don't know where you are on it, but we probably don't line up, and that's okay. I just don't know how I'd begin to sort out questions that one person considers "too much" from what someone else just thinks is fun analysis. My hard rules are as follows: I don't answer any questions about future ships, events, or arcs (and I get a lot). I haven't revealed anything that I would be unhappy to discover in a Tumblr askbox instead of a fic itself. True, I've dropped teaser/trailer stuff for 6 and 7, but to be honest, even looking over the stuff I've posted recently — I hate to say it, but I disagree with you. It isn't spoilers. Not to me, anyway.

But that's just me! There's no right or wrong answer here, it's just a coordination problem of how we can both cultivate social media experiences that make us happy. For instance: I like answering questions about my fic. It makes me happy to talk to people who want to know what happens. It encourages me and gets me excited to write about it, and I don't believe that any of the content on my Tumblr spoils what's going to happen. I don't really want to stop doing that, so I'm not going to. If that means you and other readers whose spoiler thresholds are below mine can't engage with my Tumblr, that's a natural consequence of us having different attitudes about media, and it was bound to happen. I'm sorry that that's the case, but it would bring me much more grief for you to injure your reading experience than it would for you to avoid my (largely irrelevant) e-journal full of random metatext. I love my fic, and I love my readers, you most certainly included; I do not, candidly speaking, love my Tumblr account. And for what it's worth, I absolutely do not think anything I've written on here is worth diminishing your experience of a story you enjoy. It wouldn't jive with my philosophy of literature and art.

So here's what I got: I'll continue tagging spoilers about past and current events as [#lionheart spoilers], and if a question makes reference to events not published, I'll use the tag [#prognosticating]. That way you can block the tag, and other readers can enjoy content that fits under their threshold of non-spoilerism. If our thresholds still don't line up, then I think the only solution may really be to block the [#lionheart spoilers] tag altogether. That's probably not the answer you're looking for, but it's the best I can do.

[angelisgonnastartchangingurls]

sam

sam reminded annie of robbie a lot. he was a tall, kind of goofy but handsome guy in his mid-20s. he was two years into a professional career and a kind of early adulthood malaise was setting in.

annie's conversations with him about essentially how to have fun and build a life around work were very frank. he asked her if she did drugs, and she said yes, she did a lot of recreational drugs in fact. they talked about casual sex -- annie told him she was in several very casual relationships but also just tried to cultivate an air of being "basically dtf at all times" that led to things like, she told him honestly, giving her best friend's dad a blowjob. twice.

sam was having a lot of sex, but seemed pretty bored by it. he did well on apps but found it kind of empty. meanwhile, he had lots of nonsexual friendships with women. annie made the suggestion that maybe he could fuck the women in his social groups and he seemed bewildered as to how that would even happen without an app to facilitate. she gave him some pointers.

one day, sam came in and told annie he wanted to tell her about something he'd never told anyone.

he told her that when he was 17 years old, browsing around on social media, he had come across a video of his older sister having sex.

"came across it how?" annie asked.

he explained that it was on tumblr, and he followed a page where real couples submitted things, and one of the submissions was his sister and her boyfriend. and he knew for sure because both of their faces were in the video, as well as their correct first names.

"the internet used to be crazy," annie said.

she asked him how seeing the video made him feel and he said it felt like getting forbidden knowledge. he told her he watched the video, and even downloaded it, and watched it several times over the course of a year or so, at which point he felt guilty and deleted it.

"you ever jerk off to it?" annie asked, curious and nonjudgmental.

"yeah, a couple times," he said.

"did you ever tell your sister?"

"no," he said. "and that's the thing. i feel like i should."

"why?"

"well, i guess like, she's married now, to a different guy, and she's pregnant, and like, we have a different kind of friendship now like a real one, as adults, and I like the way we're being really honest and open with each other, about our lives and our parents and i feel like i'm hiding something from her."

"tell her," annie said.

"she'll freak out."

"i don't know," annie said. "i mean don't tell her you jerked off to it, at least not right away. just tell her you saw it and you wanted her to know because it felt weird to have that hidden from her. i think she'll get it and she might not even mind. i mean she wanted people to see her fucking when she submitted the video."

sam said he'd think about it.

he had kind of a funny grin on his face when he came back the next week.

"so," he said. "i told my sister, and you were right."

"what happened?"

"well, i told her i needed to confess something weird from our youth and i told her, and she laughed, and she was like, oh god i was worried you like killed a dog or something. and then she said she remembered the video really well because it had gone all over tumblr and several of her friends had seen it, which at the time was a real turn on. i said you don't think it's weird that i watched it? and she said, "no, i mean, i was really hot when i made that, i was like 20. i wanted everyone to see me naked."

"how graphic was the video?" annie asked.

"i mean you see everything, it's a full fuck. she sucks his cock, he takes off her clothes, they fuck in a bunch of positions, you see like her entire pussy and ass, and he cums on her pussy at the end."

"shaved?" annie asked.

"yeah," he said.

"so what else happened?"

"she said that if she'd come across a video like that of me she would have absolutely watched it too, and she said she's not ashamed of her body at all, so it's totally fine. and i said she shouldn't be ashamed of her body and she looks even better now than she did then."

"well, that was good thing to say," annie said. "how pregnant is she?"

"i think 20 weeks? she just has a little baby bump. it's cute."

annie sensed there was more to the story, somehow. "so then what?"

sam grinned, "well, then she was like, 'you should show me your cock so we're even.'"

"did she use the word cock?"

"yeah," he said. "why?"

"it's just a very horny word. like, as opposed to dick. or penis."

"well, she definitely said cock, because i was like, 'my cock is not like, very impressive just all by itself.' and she asked if i had any videos of me fucking my girlfriend. which i don't, unfortunately."

"unfortunately," annie said.

"so she was like, 'just get it hard' and i was kind of hesitating, so she showed me her tits."

"wow," annie said. "i like your sister."

"she had this tank top on and she just pulled it down. her boobs are like, way bigger than they were in the video."

"so what did you do?"

he laughed. "i started stroking my cock in my shorts, like trying to get it hard before i pulled it out, and she reached over and pulled my shorts down. like, my cock and balls popped out."

annie laughed. "what did she think?"

"she said, 'you have a great cock.'"

"did you like hearing that?"

"for sure," he said. "and so then i was hard, so i kind of just stood there with it out for a minute. and i said it was weird, and she said it didn't really have to be, she told me she had nothing to hide from me. and i also said that like, i normally am shaved but i was kind of neglecting it, and so then she stood up and she pulled down her jeans and she showed me she had like, a full bush."

"hell yeah," annie said.

"i'd actually never seen a girl in real life with a bush before."

"really?" annie said.

"it's pretty rare," he said. "she's the only one i know."

"i have a full bush," annie said. "so now you know two."

"do you think it's like crazy that she did that?"

"no," annie said. "i live with my brother and he sees me naked all the time and i like it," she said. "i like the intimacy it creates. i don't hide anything from him, either. i like total honesty."

"i like that you're so honest with me," he said. "sometimes i feel like you tell me too much."

"like what?"

"like that you do coke and have a bush, like, it's really weird to sit here across from you and see you all dressed up professional and nice and to imagine you snorting lines and having sex."

"well, i do snort lines and have sex," annie said. "just not in here. but i don't mind that you imagine that."

"women are really different than i assumed," sam said.

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

choose violence ask game: 3, 12 and 22?

p.s. love your blog, please keep spreading the truth!

And I love blogging <3!!! I do it for the girls and the gays.

>>>><<<<

Answers under the cut . . . This is gonna be a long one.

3) Screenshot or description of the worse take you've seen on tumblr?

Okay, so, the only problem with this one is that I've literally seen too many to count. But the one that I'd often seen and had the most visceral reaction to were definitely the longer, well articulated analysis posts from stans that did SO MUCH bending and twisting to claim Adora being equally toxic/(and or abusive) to Catra. Which, obviously, I also spent time analyzing. Trying my best to understand what was going on. And you know what? I get it. I don't agree. But I get it. Adora and Catra grew up under the same circumstances, so yeah, they wouldn't be entirely innocent of picking up bad habits from their childhood. Realistically. Fine.

But implying that Adora is worse? Worse than Catra?

...

Anyway, I've suffered from my own self-inflicted torture in the past. I wish I hadn't spent so much time reading stan analysis the way I did, but... Here we are.

And that's just on Tumblr. I don't believe that other social media/forum sites are better or worse about c//a and SPOP, but I have seen worse in The Wilds. (At least on Tumblr there's the filtering options. Everywhere else, good luck).

12) The unpopular character that you actually like, and why more people should like them?

Guys. I LOVE SWIFT WIND. I FUCKING LOVE SWIFT WIND I DON'T CARE THAT HE'S ANNOYING THEY'RE ALL FUCKING ANNOYING!!!

First of all, yes, yes, yes, Swift Wind is horrendous wasted potential (surprise, surprise), and yes, of course, I'm still pissed over it. Those scenes where he's so loyal and kind to Adora, and she, having no other point of reference for a friend, much less a resourceful friend... Like, awwhh. Plus, he makes it very clear that he has his own will and isn't just mindlessly following Adora around like a god-honest horse would. He has his own agenda. He doesn't have to go into battle with Adora, and doesn't gain too much from risking his life to help her and her friends in the short term, but Swift Wind does it anyway. He's interested and invested in Adora, personally, anyway. He wants to be there for her and support her growth as a person.

And Adora deserves all of those amazing, raw, sappy, fairytale friendships!

I DON'T CARE THAT HE'S LITERALLY A HORSE HE IS STILL FUNCTIONALLY A HUMAN BEING. THEY ARE BESTIES. THEY LITERALLY HAVE A MY LITTLE PONY FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC LINK GOING ON. THEY SHOULD HAVE CONSIDERED SWIFTIE TO BE APART OF THE BEST FRIENDS SQUAD, I ACTUALLY DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY HE ISN'T.

MORE LOVE FOR SWIFT WIND!!!

22) Favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores?

In my experience, this is the type of fandom that cultivates, um, extreme niches, for lack of a better term. As in, literally what my blog is compared to a "stan's" blog. They're like. Different SPOP fans everywhere, so I don't truly believe that there's a portion of this show that is genuinely ignored... There's someone out there that liked even the tiniest, unimportant fraction of this show. Just got to go find them. (Hell, I know people that love, like, Tall Star specifically, out of all the other characters. Nothing has gone totally unnoticed, which is something I really love about the fanbase as a whole, despite everything).

Anyway, to keep it short, my favorite "underappreciated" parts are hm... Maybe the parts where Adora gets to explore the world around her? And not in a super plot related way. I know that the BFS goofing off so much isn't totally ignored. But I like to see that Adora especially was still learning new things everyday in canon, just like, randomly. Nothing to do with the Horde or the Rebellion. Just. She should be excited for the new world around her, dude. Those are pretty rare moments in the show, actually. Wish there were more.

[protectcosette]

Maybe just learn to be comfortable with minors instead of having this fcked up mindset pretending minors are an entirely different species that exist outside of society....

Especially when you were a minor yourself not too long ago...

i am comfortable with minors, actually, I'm an assistant teacher. I get paid $12 per hour, I'm definitely not in it for the money; liking and respecting kids is part of the territory. I fully respect minors' autonomy and personhood.

Minors, specifically teenagers, are learning a lot about personhood in a relatively short time. They're learning what media literacy is, how to form their own opinions, how to interact with people of all demographics in a healthy way... That's great! It's a super important part of psychological development.

At the same time, I don't always want to see minors in every online space. I am allowed to have that boundary.

On pretty much every social media platform other than tumblr, I can't control who pops up on my feed, it's all algorithm based. I am totally fine interacting with minors on those sites, it's out of my control and I'm cool with that.

Tumblr, on the other hand, allows users quite a bit more control over what content they see on their dashboard. As my job does center around working with kids, just about every part of my life requires interaction with minors, and it can be a little bit tiring to be present for/involved in the development of kids I have never met.

I will be taking advantage of Tumblr's lack of algorithm to cultivate one (1) space for myself with little-to-no direct interaction with minors.

Maybe you should just learn to be comfortable with the fact that you are not entitled to other people's time or energy, and a single sentence briefly saying that someone would prefer to avoid following minors does not give you any details about why they don't want to follow minors.

Anon, if you see this, you owe me any apology lmfao. I don't expect you to follow through, you would clearly rather view me as some big bad adult who hates kids than see me as a whole person with nuanced opinions, but it's very rude to make assumptions that people are hateful based on VERY little information and then force them to deal with those assumptions.

Just know that this wasn't a kind way to interact with another human. And messages like these are exactly why I like to have one place where I limit who I interact with much more heavily.

[idkimnotreal]

healthygamergg said in a video that people post on the internet their biggest insecurities.

i can’t express an opinion about this because i never post (though you could say i seek intimacy when i journal on here, which is spot on). i don’t have instagram and i never tweet. 

but this made me think about him. he posts himself. his image. mostly his face - sometimes he posts his body, but it’s really only once in a while, and even when he’s shirtless, he rarely makes his body the focus of the video or picture. if he were insecure about his body image, he’d post his body most of the time. yet he doesn’t. i’d thought he was insecure about it because he’s skinnier and shorter than most boys (though he has abs), but if he doesn’t post about it... then what?

it may just not be his biggest insecurity is all. not something that’s so much on his mind so as to make his social media persona all about it.

i know he’s deeply insecure. i just know it. it’s from several things i’ve observed about his behaviour on social media. and even his posture in some stuff his friends posted (i did stalk them once). he’s usually in the background, quiet. he doesn’t like being the center of attention. and yet that’s what social media is all about - it’s a paradox. he’s introverted and shy but cultivated a following of thousands. and he never interacts. it’s like he likes being showered with attention but he doesn’t really feed from that. he just stares at it. he’s empty inside - his own words - but the attention he gets is not enough. not even close.

when i confronted him after he screenshot my first dm, i knew his deepest insecurities were emotional. that it was about personality. why? because everyone calls him cute and hot on social media. he already knows that. should i tell him he’s ugly? he’d scoff at my dms. no. i knew i had to go deeper. his insecurities are what he’s not telling us. it’s what you’ve got to observe to understand. a bodybuilder gym rat who posts his muscles maybe isn’t worried with his body image necessarily but with being seen as strong or worthy. valuable. 

same with him. he’s a tiktok fuckboy but not exactly. he’s too different. his vibe is calm, affectionate, timid. most people who post their images on social media seek validation through physical appearance, yet i don’t think that’s his case. i get from his posts that he’s not trying to be called hot. like he already knows that (he doesn’t think that himself, but he knows other people consider him hot. i think his problems with his image stem from emotional issues). a comment calling him “hot” never draws his attention. you could even say that by showing kindness in public at times he was trying to build an image of someone who’s nice. a good person. worthy of love. useful.

what intrigues me, though, is that he sometimes posts love declarations. to his family, occasional girlfriend (who i think is this one gal who he broke up with at least twice) and, most of all, his friends. his best friend, who he has a full blown bromance with, and his close circle of friends. it seems that’s not reciprocated because i visited their profiles on several apps (twitter, instagram, tiktok) and they don’t post about their friends. when they go out they do, but A (i’m gonna call him that, it’s his initial) declares his love without reason. so i thought, maybe he needs love? he strikes me as a very needy guy. emotionally needy. after his latest breakup, he complained about being an affectionate guy and how women always dump you for a funny, cold guy.

as a kid, he reminds me of myself when i was a kid. so maybe i’m projecting but it sounds like he had a difficult childhooh of not fitting in and for being extra sensitive as a late teen he’s clashing with a world that’s more often than not unjust. and that’s the total of it. that’s why i want to protect him. i know what that’s like because i was once like him, not entirely, but i don’t want him to be traumatised because he’s too good for this world. i wish i could avoid that for him. i’d give a lot to.

he sounded happier last night. i wonder if he takes my dms seriously. my apology this time was less confusing and i said i like him regardless of how he’s changing. if he needs love, and he posts about his close friends, reading that on reverse, it’s as if he’s desperate to take in love from anywhere. that’s the impression i get from him. that he loves his friends overwhelmingly but they don’t give him enough love and he can’t do anything about it. why does he seem to care so much about what i say? i, a stranger? in love with him, sure, and very perceptive, but still a stranger. it may be a coincidence but i think his mood shifts according to the tone of my dms. it’s hard to let this go. the notion that i may be more important than i think. i’m giving my words to him a heavy weight and i’m certain this is the right decision because i’d rather be safe than sorry. after all, he hasn’t even said no yet (and he reads my dms, and he hasn’t blocked me despite being insulted twice), so he still wants something from... this. i don’t know what. maybe he doesn’t as well.

[kiddokori]

finding an artist on instagram that doesn’t have a tumblr i can follow is like seeing the kindest loveliest girl in the world date a mediocre man that doesn’t even remember her birthday. babygirl you could do so much better

[fannish-karmiya]

Since people first started noticing translation errors and missing lines in volume 1 of the official MDZS English translation, I have become increasingly uncomfortable with how fandom discusses it. It's only grown worse since volume 2 came out and also had missing lines, and I feel like I really have to say something about it.

Look, it's fine that you're upset that the translations aren't perfect. It is unfortunate, for sure! But I've been seeing people harassing Suika and turning them into a scapegoat since day one, and it's only been getting worse and worse. That is not acceptable.

I always thought, based on the timeline, that Suika was probably being rushed on the MDZS translation. Seven Seas wanted all three MXTX books out for the holiday sales, and they didn't care that TGCF was fully translated, SVSSS was partially complete, and MDZS meanwhile needed a new translation from the ground-up. Giving it longer and releasing it later, or delaying all three books, was never going to happen because companies love holiday releases and the sales associated.

Even hearing about the Seven Seas workers trying to unionise because they're overworked and underpaid hasn't changed anyone's opinions on the matter; somehow Suika is the exception, and I find it very mean-spirited and cruel.

I've seen people say things like:

'This news about SS has nothing to do with Suika, they're just a bad translator.'

'Suika is unprofessional and doesn't care about MDZS, only TGCF.'

'Translation is a professional, full-time job and they're clearly not up to it.'

'I don't trust Suika now because they blocked so-and-so on social media.'

And that's much more kindly worded than what I've actually seen out on social media; I'm paraphrasing and not doing a great job of conveying just how bad it really is!

Look, I don't follow Suika. I don't even know much about them. I have no skin in the game besides basic human decency. I just see that people are being cruel and turning Suika into a scapegoat for what is clearly a company-wide problem, and I find it extremely disappointing.

Suika addressed the situation regarding volume one, and their response was very professional. One thing they revealed is that the editorial staff make a lot of changes to the translation after they've turned in their draft:

This translation is not the sole responsibility of Suika and Pengie, and yet they're the only ones being blamed for these errors. They're not the ones in charge of the errata sheets on the website or updating the ebooks with the new corrections; that's on other staff at Seven Seas if those aren't done yet or something is still missing. Is it simply because they're the most public faces in fandom who are involved in the MDZS translation that they've become the scapegoats for everything that went wrong?

I find it deeply ironic, given that a significant theme in MDZS is that Wei Wuxian is turned into a scapegoat by the cultivation world and blamed for all sorts of things he was uninvolved in.

People were criticising those who were less bothered by the translation errors for being 'classist' and not understanding that the books are very expensive for some, especially if they have to import them. But there's no sympathy at all for Suika, who is working on the TGCF revisions, MDZS translation from scratch, and a third job on top of that!

How can you talk about classism while ignoring that the translator is busy working three jobs at once?

People talk about how it's totally OK to block anyone on social media, for any reason, including simply disagreeing with something they say. But when Suika blocks people because they're being harassed because of the translation, that's suddenly a black mark against them?

Everyone was excited that we were getting translations by fan translators who know the genre and what fans want, but now that those translations weren't 100% perfect, I suddenly see a bunch of talk that fan translators aren't good enough and shouldn't have had the job. 'Oh, no, it should be done by professional translators'.

The thing is that mainstream fiction is not translated in the same way as manga or light novels or C-novels, because it's being done for a different readership. Go look up, say, a Murakami Haruki novel on Amazon and read the preview! It lacks any of the original honorifics, and I swear it seems like even the language has been shifted to sound more like it was originally written in English. A 'professional' translator who doesn't work on these genres would not leave honorifics intact, they would not know that 'jindan' is popularly translated as 'golden core' or that 'qiankun pouch' should be left intact rather than translated in full. We'd wind up with more stuff like 'senior martial sister' and it would be a disaster.

The problem isn't that these fan translators aren't 'good enough' or don't care about their work. It's that they're being rushed and not paid for full-time work, even though translation like this is a full-time job. How can people in one breath criticise Seven Seas for these things, then turn around and say that the translation errors in MDZS have nothing to do with it and it's all just Suika's fault?

Why do you feel the need to turn someone into a scapegoat and heap hatred onto a stranger online?

[nctjpeg]

Truthfully speaking, every idol in kpop is an industry plant... they train for years with a company to be put in the industry. If that's not an industry plant idk what is. What that guy said was mean but not entirely wrong.

(ok so full disclaimer this is too long and if you don’t read all of this I don’t blame you)

That’s true! I’ve joked that industry plants are just American K-Pop idols in the past and that people who act like they’re the worst thing to happen to music need to realize that every artist you’ve ever discovered and loved is because the music industry interfered i’m their career at one point or another unless you listen to really really obscure music. I was basing my argument off what I think the average perception of an “industry plant” artist is in the American/Western music industry.

So that would be:

someone scooped up by a label and crafted to appear as if they were an indie artist coming up in the industry, with a homegrown/“organic” following. (In contrast with K-Pop, it’s well-known that these groups are processed and did not come together like how bands are “supposed” to form)

who may also be be given an entirely different persona in comparison to who they were genuinely –think Tramp Stamps or Babygoth. (This does absolutely happen in K-Pop too, i’m just pointing it out as a pattern i’ve noticed amongst western industry plants)

But what I dislike about the western perception of K-Pop the most is that I’ve noticed people act like because these groups are manufactured by labels that they don’t work for their fame. People know they train for months/years, but I don’t think it fully connects for some people exactly how much the average K-Pop idol has to sacrifice to get a shot at debuting.

I also think that someone who may not be familiar with K-Pop may think that all labels are rich and powerful and that debuting in a group is equivalent to immediate success. The stuff smaller K-Pop groups (like BTS once was) go through to try and promote their bands is 100% comparable to what a struggling band or artist in the western music industry might do to try and further their career. We all know how some K-Pop labels are seemingly incompetent at managing their artists, so even if there is a label managing an idol group’s career, it’s not nearly as cushy as what I imagine the average American industry plant’s experience might be like. Especially since a lot of western music labels are owned by a few large companies.

Focusing on BTS specifically, there was a lot that contributed to them becoming the most successful K-Pop group to exist currently. Hard work, the cultivating of a fandom that feels especially connected to and defensive of them (even compared to other kpop fandoms), social media, the previous success of other K-Pop bands giving them more momentum to fully break into international markets, but their success was never guaranteed. BigHit wasn’t a big label when BTS first started, they had no big groups before BTS to help build a fandom off of, and if you look at material that came out from their early era’s you can tell the budgets were significantly lower. They did have to earnestly grow their following from nothing to something.

I could be 100% totally wrong and just spewing hot air at this point, and I don’t even like BTS very much anymore, but with the original comment I read that caused me to start thinking about this you could just tell OP was very much a “HURR DURR BOYBAND BAD!!! OLDER MUSIC GOOD!!!” type of person. K-Pop has a lot more nuance than people give it credit for and I want nothing more than to be able to talk about it like how someone would talk about other genres of music.

[dramaticviolincrescendo]

I've really enjoyed your recent meta takes and was wondering if you could elaborate on your thoughts on Mandy + Ian and her going for Lip as a result (from your Ian Relationships meta)? I love reading about M+I and their connection is just so dear to me 😭

(P.S Thank you for being such a beacon of positivity in the Shameless fandom! I only got into the show during lockdown last year but it's become such a comfort so it makes me so happy to see positivity right now. ❤ )

Oh my gosh, thank you so much! You’re seriously too kind! I totally sympathize with you: Shameless has shot straight to the top of my list of comfort media since watching it right around the same time, so I’m really passionate about sharing the love around. 😃🧡 

To me, one of the most important things to look at in this analysis is motives—who each of these characters are, what they desire for themselves, and how those factors fit together like a puzzle.

Mandy is in such a difficult position. It’s not as easy as saying that she’s a victim of abuse and wants nothing more than to get as far from her family as possible, because that’s simply not true. In s1, we see that she’s very comfortable in her house. She and Mickey exhibit your standard sibling animosity (and competition for Ian’s attention, unbeknownst to her), she makes breakfast for Terry even though she’s obviously not super respectful to him as a parent, and she clearly has a solid understanding of where her family stands in the neighborhood. In a way, she thrives on that in the beginning. At but a word, she can do serious damage to somebody without raising a finger herself. Viewing Ian’s lack of response to her advances as an insult, she takes full advantage of that. In s2, we know that she is being abused in such a heinous way. She takes charge of the situation, although not in a manner that would save her from it. She leaves the house for a while to avoid Terry; she holds him at gunpoint and forces him to accept what he already knows so that he won’t hurt Ian. When they talk afterward, she even recounts what happened in a way that makes it sound like no big deal—he was drunk, and he didn’t know who she was, so it’s whatever. (It isn’t. We know it isn’t. If this is going to be her reality, however, then she’s going to own it. No one will look down on her, especially not a Gallagher who’s barely ahead of her in social standing.)

We’ll pause there because so much of how Mandy changed afterward is tied to Lip, but we can already see that Mandy isn’t like Mickey. Mickey stuck it out with his family and very clearly fell into the same trap we’ve heard verbalized by other male characters, namely the notion that men can’t be abused. It doesn’t matter that that is entirely inaccurate—that’s what they’ve been taught in their environment. That’s what’s normal to them. (That’s part of the dramatic irony in this scenario: we can see how damaging and traumatic these events are, but the characters don’t have our perspective. I don’t think Mickey sees what happened to him as rape, just like Ian doesn’t see what happened to him as grooming or assault. That’s for the audience to comprehend in terms of gravity and should add to our sympathy for them.)

Mandy is different. Women are abused all the time in their neighborhood. It’s visible, and it’s pervasive. In s3, Mandy immediately teaches Debbie how to defend herself against it. She didn’t have to learn. Like not seeing themselves as victims is part of the boys’ culture, fighting not to be one is part of the girls’. But there’s a contradiction in her life: the Milkoviches are the neighborhood badasses, and while she shares in that, it’s limited by her sex. There is something she will never be able to overcome in order to see the same return on her reputation that Mickey and Terry do, not unless she gets out, which will be extremely difficult on her own merits. She’s living in poverty and not doing well in school. Her prospects are limited—she told the counselor so. Based on that conversation and her history with boys even before meeting Ian, she clearly sees one surefire avenue to get out of this hole she’s stuck in: a man with the resources to get out and take her with him.  If she’s lucky, it’ll even be a good man with a good heart who wants to do good in the world.

Now, let’s talk about Ian. (See what I did there?) This doesn’t need to be long because I’ve already talked so much about Ian already lately, but let’s wax poetic just a bit. Ian wants to be a good person. He wants to be able to get by, even be successful, without having to do it through scamming and stealing. He has goals and ambitions, and whatever anybody thinks of those ambitions, he did it with the mindset that he would be a hero—a protector. Along with that, he never gives up. When Mandy sets her brothers on him, he doesn’t hide forever—he seeks her out multiple times to fix the situation. When he can’t get into West Point, he doesn’t quit ROTC and ignore his dreams. He keeps going.

Not only is he someone who wants to be good for himself, but he wants to be good for others too. He shows Mandy kindness that she arguably hasn’t seen from anyone else before. He takes care of his family when hers tends to focus on themselves and their own individual survival more of the time. Ian has what she would have seen as the potential to get out, and at the time, that is what he wants. It isn’t as an escape for him, but as a way to facilitate his own dreams.

The problem? Ian is gay. We can see that that bothers her sometimes because she forgets. She goes in for a kiss in s2 and has to reel back, settling for a hug instead. She gets tired of hearing him talk about Kash in s1 and kisses him to shut him up, saying she just wanted to kiss her fake boyfriend. Ian isn’t attainable. If Ian leaves, he won’t take her with him as a partner, and she can’t ask as a friend. How desperate would that seem to someone who refuses to be put in a position where she even slightly perceives him to be pitying her? She can’t ask. Not Ian. She needs someone else, someone who is also good and capable of getting out of here—who can be convinced to even if they don’t want to. Someone she can also trust and has some sort of connection with. Someone who is a fixer, and someone she can draw in with the only thing she thinks she has of any value: her body.

That would be Lip. Not only does he meet all of those criteria at the time, but she knows she can trust him. She trusts Ian, and Ian is closer to Lip than he is to anyone else—even her. No, Lip doesn’t have any convictions or real desire to leave, but he has potential. She can work with that. She’s also there for the entire Karen saga, so she knows that Lip is someone who takes his responsibilities to the people he’s with very seriously and tries so hard to cultivate that connection. (For example, feeding him, making herself sexually available as often as possible, letting him stay with her when he can’t go anywhere else without any conditions, etc. We even begin to see her distancing herself from Ian a little bit by s3, putting all of her energy into what she has with Lip when, a year ago, they were sneaking around because she said she didn’t want Ian to know about them. That isn’t to say that Ian was seeking her out either, being quite distracted with Mickey, but it’s noticeable for me.)

Like Mickey, Mandy also has a very deep capacity for emotion and affection that seems incongruous with her personality a lot of the time. Also like Mickey, nobody brought that out in her—it was always there. As much as she seemed to hope that Lip would take care of her, the process of growing closer to him led to a level of affection. I don’t particularly read their relationship as being a deep one. Both of them were using the other, to an extent, to deal with their trauma in other areas of their lives. But that sort of thing can foster a kinship, a mutual understanding that transcends time and place and even the terrible stuff that people do to one another.

So, it doesn’t work out. Mandy is hurt and does something unforgivable. She then runs from Lip, straight into what she feels is her only alternative now: an abuser. What else is there for a girl in her position? Ian was unattainable because of his sexuality, but to someone beaten down again and again, perhaps she believed he was also unattainable because he was too good a person. Lip was unattainable despite her best efforts to bridge that gap because of what he had with Karen, but to someone beaten down again and again, perhaps she believed he was also unattainable because her position in his life was to give but never to take. With Kenyatta, all she does is give. She’s embraced being beaten down because what else is there? She leaves with him, believing there’s nothing for her there.

When she finally finds her strength, far from home but hopefully under better circumstances than when she lived in Chicago, she still follows the formula that has ruled her decision-making for some time: finding a place where she can have the control over her life that was never there before, but still with the belief that what she has to offer isn’t academic or able to be built or improved upon. Ian has worked past his perception that his body was what he had to offer, that it was what would provide him with the love he was looking for. But of course, he has. He’s had Mickey to love him when he’s healthy and love him when he’s lost a bunch of weight from a depressive episode spent in bed. He’s had his family to mess up here and there but ultimately love him so much.

Mandy doesn’t have that. She didn’t then either. She got what she wanted—she got out. She even implied that that was the most important thing by telling Ian that being born on the South Side doesn’t mean that’s where they have to stay. But Ian “got out” of the spiral of abuse he unknowingly suffered and the mindset that it fostered while Mandy didn’t. This isn’t to say anything negative about sex work, of course, only the mindset that led Mandy to this point in her life. And when she leaves the house for the last time, she looks at Lip after having asked about him, and they acknowledge each other the way that people who once knew each other do.

I’ve made the joke before that to Milkoviches, Gallaghers are like catnip. It’s flippant and funny enough when we consider how many of them have dated at one point or other. I’ve also said the Milkoviches are designed as a foil to the Gallaghers, a juxtaposed image of what they could have been had their situation been altered slightly. In s10, Mickey mentions how the Gallaghers are messed up and he’s never been happier to be a Milkovich, so there’s some awareness there that these are the two notorious families of the neighborhood, albeit for different reasons. For Mandy to see that not one, but two Gallaghers are out of reach? To perhaps feel as though she’s less than even them, or made to feel that way in her interactions with Lip? It’s the ultimate slap in the face.

She trusts Ian more than anyone else in her life, to the point where she will still call him to help her hide a body long after she’s left him and their home behind. But trusting Ian led her to loving Ian, and she couldn’t have him. Trusting Ian led her to meeting Lip, and if Ian was so good and loved Lip so much, he had to be worth it too. And to her, he was. The problem was that she felt that she wasn’t.

Self-fulfilling prophecies suck: when you’re treated like garbage by a neighborhood that sees your family as garbage and repeatedly experience things that will make you feel like garbage around people with the best intentions, you’ll start believing that you are, in fact, garbage. I think what we’ve watched with Mandy is a steady decline from a place of strength in herself and weakness in her environment to an overall place of weakness that she couldn’t escape. Not with Ian and, when she realized that wouldn’t happen, not with the only real alternative she thought she could trust since she trusted Ian so deeply. 

[r6shippingdelivery]

hello :) this was open so i thought i’d shoot my shot hehe

any headcanons on how nighthaven fits into rainbow? like how the members interact with the rest of the ops? or any thoughts regarding rhem really

please and thank u :)

Hi there! And of course, the inbox is open and y’all are welcome to send asks, headcanon requests, my (admittedly biased) opinion, or whatever you want 😄

I’m going to be upfront and say that, in my opinion, Nighthaven was a mistake, lore wise. Adding a group of PMCs, having the unofficial second in command of Rainbow -Ash- epxress her disapproval, introduce Nighthaven with a video that had them painted in weird/suspicious vibes, and then... do nothing at all with that conflict? Well, I mean, Harry makes them do like the military olympics or some other bullshit on the Stadium, but otherwise this fantastic potential for conflict within the team and weaving a plot around that has been absolutely wasted.

Furthermore, I hate all of the Nighthaven attackers so far 😅 I think they’re both deeply unlikable, but you asked for headcanons, not a rant, so let’s go! This was just a preface to let my feelings about them clear, since I won’t be very kind to Nighthaven in my headcanons and/or stories. If that bothers anyone cause you really like them, fair enough, you can keep scrolling now. Otherwise, follow me:

Nighthaven fits into Rainbow like two puzzle pieces that aren’t meant to connect but that someone jammed together all the same.

Ash loudly opposed their recruitment and seems to harbor a personal dislike of Kali (which I totally understand). We also know Kali blocked in some capacity Mira’s evaluation of her gadget, calling in her lawyers at one point when the director of R&D was making sure this new technology was safe and up to the standards of Rainbow. So I can’t imagine there’s much love lost between those two either. The fact Kali seems abrasive, ruthless, and used to being obeyed without delay doesn’t seem to put her in a good position to make many friends among counter-terrorist operators, who probably see her little group with some degree of distrust too (but that’s just my opinion).

Wamai seems pretty particular to talk with, and it’s my personal belief he might play up the “weirdness” part of his personality to see how people react to it. However, I can see him bonding in some capacity with Valkyrie (and maybe Blackbeard too). Not only was that concept art of the two having a running endurance competition, but they also share a common interest in swimming and the seas.

He showed a certain interest/friendly overtures with Fuze, since both spent  a lot of time in the shoot house, testing various strategies against each other. (literal excerpt from his gadget evaluation record). Until Kali put an end to that, since she feared Fuze might be getting too familiar with her proprietary technology. I think Wamai’s loyalty to Kali is admirable, but ultimately what would keep him from becoming more comfortable around the rest of Rainbow. He could eventually belong in Rainbow, if it wasn’t because he’s first and foremost Kali’s henchman.

Then we have Ace. *Sighs*. He is definitely good at his job, and he got into Nighthaven because he once saved Kali’s life and she offered him to work for her as repayment. Ace’s problem, simply put, is that he’s a self-centered attention whore. He only cares for his job because of the good publicity it garners him on social media, and he seems to cultivate an image/persona he puts in display and has nothing to do with how he actually is. As Harry puts it:  “His persona drives him to be congenial and to excel in working closely with his peers, at least until the time comes to give a post-mission interview. “ That last part makes me believe he’s the sort to throw his teammates under the bus when something goes wrong, as long as it allows him to save face and keep getting the public adoration he craves above all. 

I believe this thirst for applause would irritate Doc beyond belief, who at first would be excited to have a paramedic on the team. But after meeting the man, not so much. Kapkan didn’t sound very thrilled with him on the report he did, more like he was skeptical and grudgingly admitted his skills lived up to his reputation - meanwhile he had only praises for Melusi. By his own nature, and that deceptively humble and altruistic public persona, I think he would alienate many of the more practical and no-nonsense operators.

Aruni I can see integrating fully and gladly into Rainbow. She has history with Thermite and they’re old friends. She’s a recent addition to Nighthaven, and only in it to get access to cutting edge prosthetic technology. She was in the Royal Thai Police, and after her accident, she became a private detective. Her story would garner the sympathy of many, I wager, and she has Thermite to vouch for her. She seems to have aided Twitch in the mandatory evaluation of her gadget, and she was enthusiastic when Twitch made some suggestions to modify it. She’s a recent addition, but Aruni is the only Nighthaven member I can see truly fitting in Rainbow.

[brie-haus]

Champagne Problems

I am about to get as real as I have possibly ever gotten on social media. This is deeply emotional, deep stuff. If cheery, happy posts are your thing, you may want to skip this one.

My entire life I have been a deeply emotional person. For most of my life I have tried my damnedest to hide the emotions. “Conceal, don’t feel, don’t let them know,” was the anthem of my life years before I was dreamed by Menzel. I feel deeply and words cut me down like a knife.

I was hurt very badly by children when I was younger and transferred to public school for the first time. I was the “weird, quiet girl from the Christian school” and I never stopped being an outsider. I searched my entire school career for a nice group of friends. I did have a friend group for a few years and that turned very, very sour. I never stopped trying. But something inside of me always feared getting hurt, knew deep down I was less than, and was not liked. That’s not to say I wasn’t friendly. I was friendly with the majority of the people I went to school with, but I never found one of those lasting friendships you see in the movies.

Some of those friendships fell apart for simple reasons. Someone transfers, someone changes interests. And some of them were because I seemed to have a knack for saying or doing the wrong thing. In therapy I learned this was a defense mechanism. When I thought someone was going to hurt me, I did the hurting first. It’s so messed up, but that is me.

I cannot describe to you how lonely my adult life has been only having casual friendships. Going through illness, turmoil at work, marital issues, family disputes, everything all normal people experience and your only close friend being your husband. I love my husband dearly and I truly cannot imagine doing life with (or even living with!) anyone but him. He is exactly what I need in so many ways but your spouse cannot also be your best and only friend. There are some things you just need to bounce off of exterior people. I don’t think I will ever truly have what I see other people have. A circle of girlfriends they trust and love dearly.

So why bring this up now? Well, I have been asked why I made the decision to “remove” certain people from my life that I was close to and why I “unfollowed” old friends from social media. I feel like the best way to truly answer these questions, is to explain my history.

Anyone who has known me for more than ~4 years knows that I went through a several years long spell where depression ruled my life. I cried multiple times every single day. I took depression naps every day, sometimes multiple times a day. The depression and anxiety not only controlled many facets of my life but it also caused me physical pain. Beyond that, the depression medication and alcohol packed on pounds. I put on over 60 lbs in less than two months’ time. I sought out and stuck with therapy for the first time in my entire life. I was able to right my ship. I no longer take any depression medication at all. But it wasn’t just talking out my problems that helped me come out the other side. It was a total lifestyle change.

Any good therapist will identify your triggers and help you control them. PTSD, Anxiety, Depression. Things that will never be in the rearview for me but that I control every single day. Part of it involves taking a serious look at the people that you choose to surround yourself with. Certain people in my life were constantly causing turmoil, constantly setting a tone of depression and whining and that often left me in that same headspace. There were triggers on social media. Slowly, over time, with the help of lots of research, I learned that social media sites like Instagram or Facebook where people sugarcoat their life and only post the best of the best can be used to cultivate envy greener than a four leaf clover or it could be rebuilt as a tool to help me in my journey. I unfollowed people who caused me pain, to make me feel like I wasn’t enough, like I was doing things wrong and I followed accounts that posted fitness motivation, healthy meals, home décor and tidying techniques, beautiful landscape art, and accounts that I align with in terms of social justice education.

It has changed my entire life. You truly are what you eat. If you ingest negativity, toxic people, drama, people that make you feel like you aren’t enough, that is what YOU become and believe you are. You have the power to flip the script. Eleanor Roosevelt said “no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” So stop giving people that aren’t worth it an access pass to eff up your psyche.

For me this goes beyond unfollowing things that are obviously negative. Things I also take into perspective: does this person add more to my feed/life than they take away? If someone posts things that you overall do not identify with, and frequently raises your blood pressure then you need to make sure that you are getting a heck of a lot out of their other posts. If not, you just unfollow or hide or whatever the case may be and you move on. This isn’t canceling someone. You can still see someone in real life and decide their social media content is not for you. You decide what fits into your daily headspace, and bloodlines or long standing friendships shouldn’t overrule your inner peace.

For years I thought there was something wrong with me because of my empathy. I watch a movie or a news report, cry like a baby when people die. I follow people on social media and though am not deeply close to them, am extremely moved by cancer diagnoses, critical illness, etc. I am effected deeply by issues like BLM and LGBTQ rights and feel so insanely helpless that I cannot help more than I can but also so deeply guilty on a personal and “on behalf of a larger group” level that sometimes it is a physical pain that I feel. Deaths of certain celebrities that I have never met bring me to tears. I thought for so long it was a flaw to be so deeply emotional. But being so empathetic is what helps me relate to people, to grow and see other sides of issues that I was raised oblivious to. I no longer see this trait in such a negative light.

But the other side of being deeply emotional is that you feel ALL emotions deeply. Disappointment. Anger. Frustration. Hope. Darkness. Sadness. You have to guard yourself more, because no one else is going to look out for you, to fight for you. No one else is going to understand the way that words tear you down and replay in your head for hours after they’ve been said like a highlights reel.

So I’ve gone around the world to say that life is complicated. Every person is fighting a battle that you don’t know about. There is almost always a reason people are private and protective of themselves. I do not expect anyone to understand, to relate, but I had to get this out onto paper.

[psychologyofsex]

The Difference Between a 'Hopeless Romantic' and a 'Hopeful Romantic'

What does it mean to be a “hopeless romantic?” You can find countless media articles talking about people’s opinions on this, but from a scientific perspective, what it really refers to is an implicit theory that some people hold about what makes for a good relationship. Specifically, it refers to a belief in relationship destiny.

Destiny belief is defined as “the belief that potential relationship partners are either compatible or they are not” [1]. People who hold this belief think that they need only minimal information about another person in order to know whether they click and whether they can make a relationship work. In other words, it’s either meant to be, or it isn’t. There’s no middle ground or uncertainty.

This belief system involves seeing love through a very romanticized lens—one that has qualities akin to what you might hear about in a fairy tale. For example, someone with strong destiny beliefs is likely to believe strongly in the idea of “love at first sight” and that there is one perfect partner out there for them who will suddenly appear and sweep them off of their feet, with a “happily ever after” ending.

If you’ve ever fantasized about what it would be like to live in a romantic fairy tale, you’re not alone—it’s perfectly normal to find this idea arousing or appealing. There’s also nothing wrong with trying to incorporate some degree of romanticism into your dating and intimate life, such as going all out to make an engagement, wedding, or honeymoon feel extraordinarily special.

However, where this kind of belief system can potentially become a problem is when it is carried to the extreme. For example, if you think that there is only one “right" person for you in the entire world and that everything will work out easily once you meet them, you might very well pass up on a lot of great opportunities.

In fact, what we see in the research is that people with strong destiny beliefs tend to break up faster and have a harder time making relationships last because, rather than working through problems that might arise, they jump ship and take it as a sign that things weren’t meant to be [2]. As a result, they never really learn how to manage and overcome conflict, with is pretty much inevitable in relationships. So hopeless romantics run the risk of not finding true happiness because their expectations and standards are unrealistic and they don’t learn the skills necessary for keeping a relationship going. However, not everyone who is in love with the idea of being in love falls into the “hopeless romantic” category. It’s also possible to be a “hopeful romantic,” which involves sharing some belief in relationship destiny, but also having what are known as growth beliefs. Rather than seeing conflict as a sign that it’s the wrong relationship, someone with growth beliefs views this as a challenge or obstacle to be overcome that will only make the relationship stronger in the end.

Likewise, whereas a hopeless romantic may look at a decline in passion over time (which is totally normal, by the way!) as a sign of a poor match and start plotting an exit strategy, a hopeful romantic might view this as a sign that it’s time to put some effort into their bedroom game to get the spark back—and keep it going for the long haul.

In short, someone who is high in destiny beliefs but low in growth beliefs would likely fall into the hopeless romantic category, whereas someone who as high in both beliefs would likely fall into the hopeful romantic category. Of course, it’s also possible to be low in both belief sets, which I would characterize as being a relationship pessimist. Alternatively, you can be low on destiny and high on growth, which means you think that any relationship can potentially work if you’re willing to put in the effort—I’d characterize this as being a relationship optimist or a relationship pragmatist.

As you can see, there are a lot of different ways to view love and relationships. And it’s not inherently problematic to view love through a romanticized lens. Just remember that one of the main keys to success is having a growth mindset and recognizing that good relationships don’t typically come easily. As with everything else in life, a good relationship requires some work and effort to maintain.

Want to learn more about Sex and Psychology? Click here for more from the blog or here to listen to the podcast. Follow Sex and Psychology on Facebook, Twitter (@JustinLehmiller), or Reddit to receive updates. You can also follow Dr. Lehmiller on YouTube and Instagram.

[1] Knee, C. R., Patrick, H., & Lonsbary, C. (2003). Implicit theories of relationships: Orientations toward evaluation and cultivation. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 7(1), 41-55.

[2] Le, B., Dove, N. L., Agnew, C. R., Korn, M. S., & Mutso, A. A. (2010). Predicting nonmarital romantic relationship dissolution: A meta‐analytic synthesis. Personal Relationships, 17(3), 377-390.

Image Source: 123RF/aija444

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[arihi]

Blog Topics and Personality

Just read an interesting post on social media in kink - and wanted to update on what it feels like my blog has been lately! (Coming back here to say, the post went on a lot longer than I anticipated, so sorry and the TL;DR will be at the bottom!)

I know I was a hypno community writer and what not and I’m sorry the last forever has been more about emotional intimacy and relationships and light-hearted anecdotes of me cooking or trying to catch kitchen knives because I have no survival instincts!! It is strange - perhaps it is that I have moved more away from kink in my blog topics that I don’t feel too caught up in what a kink persona might look like, because I have been mostly just blathering on about myself all this time.

I feel as if I might be the most boring person on the planet. I once cried into Spider’s arms and apologized for not being more interesting (which is in retrospect heartbreaking.) I know this is not true! But I grew up with such a bland personality for my parents to project whatever expectations they had that coming into my own life in my young adult years I feel sometimes that I lack experience and knowledge in life and hobbies and all what not. And maybe it’s true - but it at least would show me that it is not a lack of personality so much as opportunities to let it shine. If you’re reading this, clearly you don’t think I’m the most boring individual ever (I hope!). I have had people reach out to me or reply or just like my posts and all of those interactions, no matter how small, encourage me. I know there’s a lot to be said on the prevalence of social media and how interacting with it conditions a feeling of being behind in life or envying others or rushing for those likes and comments for dopamine hits, but in the same breath I do think that social media has many good merits. Now more than ever we are exposed to the stories of those around us, those not like us or those we would not otherwise know of, and we cultivate empathy within our communities. Selfishly, my own life at least has been drastically changed for the better because of this, and I know that if I had never made a Tumblr and met all the people I did and talked about my life on here, I would not be here where I am today.

I started the blog with the idea of talking about hypnosis through a new subject’s eyes, learning about it, and at some point along the way I started writing stories - and I was determined to keep it limited to that. “People aren’t,” I told my one vanilla friend who knows about the community, “going to want to read a blog about ME.” And over the years, the months where I hadn’t written anything remotely hot and the months I had complained about sleep or laughed excitedly about ties, the months I had panicked about my increasingly terrifying home life, I came to realize it wasn’t true.

And I don’t think my early experiences or my stories were any less me, or that my increasingly personal anecdotes are any more me. They’re different facets of me, ones that I show to others or show less often. Related: I think sometimes we have competent outward facing personas, and then inward facing personas, and the discrepancy between the two makes us feel as if we are deceiving others - but I believe both personas to be true to ourselves. We just think that our inner selves, the one we spend the most time with that we show to others the least, are our only ‘true’ selves, and we internalize the failings and shortcomings and insecurities of it to be who we really are. That’s simply not the case. I think I am an anxious and often insecure little ball, and that is true to myself, but I think that I am also a lot of the things that other people may see in me - and that is true to myself too, even if I have a hard time believing it. We are anxious or insecure or scared inner selves, but we are also competent caretakers, charismatic managers, respected professors, diligent students, and all those other outward selves we show society.

I think a lot of people do know me as the writer who talks a lot about her life, but at least some followers I do think see me more as Ari who sometimes writes, which I feel both guilty about and humbled by. That is to say, we may cultivate personas online and when the communities are primarily kink-based, our instinct is to put those experiences facing forward. But, I don’t think we have to be big contributors to our communities in constantly teaching classes or producing hypnosis content to be accepted and welcomed and loved - perhaps, once in a while, it is okay to just be ourselves.

Anyway, I think I definitely lost any chance at having a cool mysterious awesome kink persona when I shared all this dumb crap about me setting down a bowl of ramen and getting scared by the noise, or my cropped nudes accidentally making their way onto a personalized mug for my grandparents, or accidentally maybe coming out to my brother and immediately tripping up the stairs in my attempt to flee, or any multitude of silly anecdotes that yes, do sometimes make me out to be a fool - but that I think others enjoy reading and hopefully smile at.

The last hypnosis story I wrote looks like was about a month and a half ago which isn’t the longest I’ve gone without writing! But life is hectic at the moment, I’m moving soon as well, and I haven’t had the time to sit down and actually write. Hopefully soon, I’ll get to return to it! (I say this every time, but I mean it.)

TL;DR: Just kidding I don’t have a really good summarization, but like - I love when in the community, we might get to see the face behind the blog when the curtain slips, once in a while. (And I think a lot of people do.)* So if you’re someone who may be lurking or who is hesitant about diving into the community because you’re not sure what you can ‘offer’ that others can’t - your place in a given community should not be based on that.

*This of course doesn’t necessarily include people who use Tumblr as fantasy collections and fodder, which is also totally cool, but may more apply to those who use Tumblr and other platforms as social media (with emphasis on the social).

[mintycanoodles]

mmmmmmaybe a Cupcake Wars au where the Graduation Kiss never happened and Bitty and Jack went their separate ways never able to shake the feeling they missed out on something big and maybe neither of them really get over it but what can you do but waste countless sleepless nights thinking about what if’s??

so a handful of years down the road Bitty has his bakery and Jack is the darling of the Falconers but is a walking talking PR disaster who never really grew out of the hockey robot thing. so.

The Falconers are having some sort of Thing and get involved with Cupcake Wars to promote it. And who gets guest judge duty? To work on his public persona and media navigational abilities? Jack of course.

And who, of course, is one of the contestants??? Bitty duh so Bitty goes, and iirc contestants aren’t told the theme or guest judge beforehand so the drama bomb that drops when eyes meet and repressed feelings get tapped into and yeeesh now that’s what I call Awkward.

so. Despite two participants with major internal and interpersonal drama happening, the episode actually goes mostly smoothly. Neither Jack nor Bitty mentions it to anyone on the production team because whose business is it anyway and obviously no one did any homework on them so they?? act like they just don’t know each other???????? It’s not like they can sneak off for five minutes and hash it out so both just. Try not to interact directly too much but come on you know things happen.

Bitty can’t exactly forget Jack’s favorites and Jack cannot even begin to be unbiased (not when every taste he gets of Bitty's baking feels like home again, even after all this time). Jack may or may not fight the judges at every critique aimed at Bitty’s cupcakes, but Bitty hardly needs it, he solidly trounces the competition and wins. And gets invited to the Falconers Thing. Which works out pretty great in Jack's eyes.

Except it doesn’t. Bitty avoids him all evening? He cold shoulders Jack the whole time and Jack kind of gets it, the cameras are still rolling and they can’t exactly catch up now but still? Before Jack gets anything approaching a chance to talk Bitty packs up and he’s out of there as soon as he’s contractually able to.

So Jack may or may not eat his feelings in cupcakes over it. It feels like another missed opportunity and it stings and he wonders how he keeps getting it so wrong.

According to Georgia it’s an unqualified success. She watches the footage, pats him on the back for going through with it, and says something offhand about how well he got on with a few of the contestants (one in particular she notices. she doesn’t mention it). Jack gets in a funk over it, but there’s nothing to do but forget about it until the episode airs.

No one, definitely not Georgia, definitely not the PR department, is prepared for the chaos the premier causes. It’s not immediate, the episode comes out on a quiet Tuesday and the Falcs do some promotion for it, but not much, so some of Jack’s diehard fans watch it but they’re not expecting any kind of major major response. It was supposed to be something small and light to soften Jack’s image and work his media relations muscles. Who even watches Cupcake Wars anyways???? Plenty do. And they go nuts for the episode.

People who have no idea who Jack is, barely an idea what hockey even is, see Mr. tall dark and Canadian and see too exactly what Georgia had seen. Bitty and Jack and all the special attention paid to the little southern baker boy.

It’s, of course, obvious to anyone with eyes the sparks between them, the lingering looks, how Bitty can barely stop from grinning when Jack lists off his every favorite part of Bitty's cupcakes but has monosyllabic responses for the other contestants. As subtle as the two thought they’d been, they really hadn’t and it’s only a matter of time before it’s trending on Twitter and every lovelorn Cupcake Wars fan is writing RPF and subtweeting the Falcs and Bitty's account about it.

This is not exactly the public image Georgia had been hoping Jack would cultivate. They try to put out the fires, calm things down and make a few #relatable Twitter posts about it that the PR interns cook up. Georgia wheedles the real story out of Jack, and it throws her off kilter actually, once he fesses up to a few details that would make the collective heads of the internet reel, but she’s a professional. The PR team is a crack squad. They get things under control.

Until, of course, some intrepid fans uncover The Truth.

Mamely, how Bitty and Jack totally knew each other because they were totally on the same hockey team in college??? And had totally set records together and there were totally pictures still archived on school websites of celebration hugs and even a few traces left of a senior photography project that featured one Eric R. Bittle (and others) in touchingly intimate portraits???? and uhhhhh explanations????????? are needed?????????

#cupcakegate takes the Twitterverse by collective storm. Kardashians whom??? Bitty gets bombarded, the Falconer’s can’t make a single post about a home game without demands for updates on the drama and Georgia is nearly drowning in it all but wading through it like a champ.

The PR department reaches out to Bitty in an email that Bitty never responds to, his stomach too tied up in knots over all this debacle is bringing up, but he feels like this is partially his fault. He tries his best. He does a tell all vlog to set the record straight.

He tries to keep it simple, stick to the main points.

Why didn’t they say anything? Why act like they didn’t know each other?

Neither of them knew the other would be there (truth) and they didn’t want to disrupt filming or make it seem like Bitty had an unfair advantage.

Are they currently romantically involved?

No (truth).

Had they ever, at any point, back in college, been romantically involved?

No (truth?).

Was there anything, anything at all behind the long looks and soft gazes? A single spark? An ounce of unspoken, hidden attraction?????

No (lies).

Bitty bears his heart a little, gets going on a tangent on their relationship back in college and how much Jack helped him through and what a good team they’d been and how he’s a little sad he and Jack drifted so far apart (lies, it hurts, it’s never stopped hurting) but he’s happy for Jack and really proud of him and glad he got the chance to see him again and wishes him the best (truth).

Of COURSE this only makes things worse. Bless Bitty's heart but he has zero self awareness when it comes to Jack and his clearly lovesick vlog brings avid followers of the whole debacle to new emotional heights. People are invested. The drama continues.

It comes to a head when Jack himself braves the world of Twitter, finally, to try and hash things out privately with Bitty so he logs onto the dusty old handle Georgia created and verified for him ages ago that he’d, bless her heart, just never gotten the hang of. He knows Bitty's handle from all this hullabaloo now so he opens up a message, stares at the blinking screen for about a minute, then promptly has a breakdown.

Everything comes back to him. Every warm moment they’d shared back in college. Every time he felt Bitty there for him and every inch of home and safe Bitty ever gave him.

And how he never told Bitty how he felt (lies. still feels). How he’d let that slip right through his fuckup fingers.

It takes him two weeks to draft the message. That’s ages in internet time, so things die down a bit in the interim and other celebrity dramas unfold so Jack finally stops getting pestered about it by every pap and chirped by every team mate. He’s glad they’ll never put him on reality baking competition show duty again but is it worth it? (yes. yes it is)

It gives Jack plenty of time to stew and stew he does, until he’s finally able to write out a pretty succinct summary of everything he never got a chance to say.

It boils down to a couple main points:

Bitty was probably the best thing that ever happened to Jack. Bitty made him softer and better able to handle things and just gave him the safety net he needed and he would always be grateful to Bitty for that.

Jack had also never meant for them to drift apart, he’d always wanted to stay in touch, actually, he’d always wanted so much more than that but Jack knew Bitty didn’t feel the same way, so Jack created the space between them and he was sorry he’d been such a poor friend and had gotten it so wrong.

Jack hoped, maybe beyond hope, that it wasn’t too late. Jack asked if they could be friends again, that he missed Bitty, and he hoped to hear back from him.

Jack is rather proud of himself for all the emotional eloquence that goes into the message. He thinks Shitty would be, too. Of course, it is kind of annoying he has to split it up into so many pieces and tag Bitty's account in each one so they’ll send to him, something about a 140 character limit? Jack doesn’t really get it, but social media isn’t his thing. So he sends his piecemeal message and waits patiently for Bitty to get back to him.

Georgia regrets ever trying to get Jack any amount of media exposure.

Jack’s not so private love letter is screen capped, saved to hard drives, printed into longevity and takes the internet land by storm all over again. Jacks completely oblivious to it until day two or so when Shitty, Lardo, and every person he knew at any point at Samwell bomb his phone. Georgia does her best, she really does, but it’s the last straw for the PR team. They’ve long since collapsed in a puddle of tears and Georgia has to coordinate the disaster relief effort herself and enforce the media lockdown until they can just deal with this and Jack, it’s okay, we’re all here for you and your sexuality is valid but honey, no more internet for you. Georgia does take the thread down but its too little too late and there is going to be a million and one interviews about this and she hasn’t slept in days and-

and Jack feels bad for her. He feels a little embarrassed his personal business is so out in the open like that but. Well. It’s his own fault. He should have probably asked a few more questions about how to work Twitter. But deep down? It’s a huge weight off. He’d never exactly planned on coming out publicly because he never really thought he’d have anyone who would make him consider it but. Well. He’s said what he needed to say. About time.

He lets Georgia tell him what to do and what to say to whom. He does a few interviews, nothing televised, just a few online publications. It takes several more weeks for any of it to approach any sort of calm again, but eventually, an equilibrium is reached. And then, only then, does Jack get a call from a number he doesn’t have saved yet.

“Hey, Jack,” he hears in a thick southern accent when he picks up, and it doesn’t, not at all, send a shiver of pure warmth all the way down to his toes (lies, all lies).

“Bittle-Eric? Bitty. Hey,” he says. Bitty laughs.

“I think maybe we should talk. Would you, maybe, want to meet up for coffee sometime?”

“Yeah. Yeah, of course, I’d love that.” (truth)

[brandingexpert]

Branding Studio For Growth

Working with Bethany made the creation of our new website such a fun and exciting project. She is very organized and ensured smooth communication throughout the whole project. She is also a very intuitive designer, and managed to visually translate our branding studio spirit perfectly. The team of BMRTN + Citizen was essential in helping us translate a major organizational pivot into updated brand positioning. Thanks to this team https://craftandroot.com/ we preserved the best of our brand and maintained the trust and support of our partners during a time of major organizational change. Communication so simple, it makes people fall in love with the brands created here. We partnered with Pinterest Business to create a website that’s as useful and engaging as their platform, while helping to tailor their new branding for the digital space.

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Our sights are set on strategy, design, storytelling, and creating an impact. Lifestyle brands to tech, startups to venture capitalists, professional services to professional sports—we dig down to build up.

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Every touch point is covered in order to create a complete brand experience that satisfies and delights your consumer. Once we understand exactly who your customer is and what they want, we find a way to turn your brand into an experience that will not only satisfy but that will delight your consumer.

Our branding services, coaching, workshops and DIY tools and resources help you launch, grow or pivot your business. Our focus is giving you what you need to be a successful, thriving business that supports your values. That's what it felt like when Anna asked us to help her reposition her coaching business and align her branding and messaging with her renewed focus. As a Three Principles Coach, Anna speaks the same high-vibe language we do, and we share the belief that fulfillment comes when you tap into your truth to serve your greatest purpose. As in coaching, our process always begins with a discovery session to determine a client's needs and goals. In addition to a full website redesign with new icons and infographics, sales + outreach tools, copywriting and a lead magnet.

She has served as an instructor of copywriting, design and creative concepts at Seattle’s School of Visual Concepts. Suzie also serves on the board or in an advisory role with the American Parkinson Disease Association, Campaign for Female Education, Boys & Girls Clubs of America and others. In concert with empowering future generations, we also invest in women and minority led businesses. With our incubator and accelerator program, TF7 offers its expertise in business strategy and brand marketing to support the severely underserved communities in the start-up world. This work contributes directly to individual entrepreneurs, VC’s or non-profit organizations focused on serving this community. This year is different though, and brands won’t be able to employ the same marketing strategies as in years past to engage customers. This year requires an approach that is deeply connected, authentic, and thoughtfully responsive to consumer needs during a time when nothing is status quo.

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Oregon Lane Studio creates visual brands and beautiful custom Showit websites for passionate business owners ready to reach a new level and spark incredible growth. As a creative business owner, trying to stand out in a crowded market is a huge challenge, but it doesn’t have to be. With a clean and professional design that lights you up and makes you so excited about your brand, you can present yourself as the expert you are. Knowing that your brand visuals are sharing your business even when you’re not in the room. Whether you’re a start-up brand or a seasoned entrepreneur, you know how important it is to get your branding right.

Whenever a potential customer encounters you, they should feel like they are talking directly to you. Your brand is an extension of who you are and what you want to be known for. We create brands that look and sound like you and speak directly to the people or companies you want to work with. DesignGood is a full-service, high-vibe design and branding studio that helps you build your business and brand around the life you want to live.

Proven experience managing complex projects with multiple deliverables and tight timelines. Facilitate internal meetings, negotiate conflicts, build up teams and group dynamics, and enable creative thought processes and strategy. Provide structure around disciplines where needed.

From strategy to identity and beyond, we are your dedicated partner across the entire branding journey. We listen, observe, research, and collaborate with our clients every step of the way to guarantee authentic results. If your brand is ready to make a change, we are here to guide you through it. No matter where you are right now, working with DesignGood will help you create the vision of where you are headed and give you the tools and resources to get you there. We help you pinpoint your audience, spotlight your expertise and establish your business as the go-to source for whatever you're creating in the world.

If you’re ready to feel empowered with a new visual identity that not only accurately reflects your business and brand aspirations, but also resonates with your desired audience too, you’re in the right place. The importance of branding is often overlooked by most companies. As discussed in this article from The New York Times, “A brand is a company’s face to the world.” At Level8 we take that very seriously. Detail-oriented, proactive and a protector of both the creative and the creative process with an eye on the budget, timeline, team, vendor relationships, and production partnerships.

A boldly artistic creative studio specializing in branding and web design. At Studio Brand, we know that our success depends on the success of our clients' campaigns, and ultimately their business. This is why we've pooled a talented team of creatives and analytics who are laser-focused on being great at what they do. We treat our clients' business like it's our own and work tirelessly to ensure we are bringing value to each marketing dollar we spend. A wide range of a-la-carte graphic design services can be added on to the main packages. We will happily curate a custom combination for you! Brand Labs provides entrepreneurs, small business owners, and independent designers with the tools to help objectively build a foundational brand strategy.

In our opinion, for digital products, the bare minimum would be a visual identity and marketing website. On the projects I collaborate with some extraordinary and talented people and as a result branding.studio continuously delivers extraordinarily. Make your brand well defined with solid structure, engaging personality and beautiful visual assets. Our minimal, reductive style of design allows clients to create clarity and transform their brands into powerful assets.

By doing so, we've made some good friends along the way. Technology is really the story of our future, and it’s a story we love to uncover here at Incubate. I love rounding projects out with gorgeous printed goods, and professional designed websites. This ensures the whole package - your entire brand experience - is a cohesive journey.

[ailahveyou]

PUZZLE OUT; A REFLECTION

“I embraced who I am and I don’t want to stop.” - Supergirl; Kara Zor-el

How do you define ‘YOU’? How hard can it be to be ‘YOU’? - these questions help us understand more of what may ourselves have to pop out. In the midst of the journey you have in life, there are certain areas that you question and that we are about to find out.

These past few weeks we’ve had our classes in our GE HUMS 101, we learned about talking and recognizing LIFE in different aspect and perspectives of philosophers and sociologists. We gained more knowledge about the SELF. So let me give you a little tour of what we discussed and so you can catch up.

On the first part of our tour, this is about SELF THROUGH PHILOSOPHER’S PERSPECTIVES. This topic involves different philosophers explaining what they think about the self’s essence that is present in us. As you can see, with these philosophers we learn and reflect each of their ideas about ourselves.

Just like our friend above this text, Socrates, one of the early philosophers, paved the way of questioning and discovering more about self. He introduced the SOCRATIC METHOD to allow human beings to gain more knowledge. Not just questioning, we also tend to observe ours. The self has levels that we already know and some that needs to be discovered. in our daily lives, we tend to ask ourselves who are we gonna be today or how can we behave with what’s gonna come. These components on this topic helps us recognize more and just like me, I just learned that when you intact all the philosopher’s ideas you can get that greater picture of yourself and could understand more. 

So let’s say good bye for a little bit to Socrates and let me introduce you to some Sociologists whom discussed about SELF THROUGH SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES.

Society is a big influence to an individual. It can either demand, command or request. They tend to change behaviors with the people around you for acceptance and it will mirror yourself of what you’ve become with the influence of social norms.  As I observed, people nowadays, mostly teens, are looking for acceptance within the society. they tend to change their self-identity for the sake of fame an acceptance within their peers. It’s not that bad we tend to change ourselves of what we feel and for the better.

For example, Hua Mulan - the Chinese lady whom applied for the Chinese army as a man to help her father and bring honor to her family. Mulan was never the perfect daughter but she tried to do everything her family requested so she could bring pride and honor to her family. However, she failed to accomplish the request and disappointed of what happened with her and the matchmaker. She was in awe when she knew that there was supposed to be one man that can represent their family to apply for the army. Her father was sick and she couldn’t stand it. She ran away with her horse and the guardian spirit that her ancestors gave her. Before she deployed herself, she cut her hair and wrapped her breast as if she was not a woman so that the army will accept her. She hid her true identity for months as Hua Ping, she trained and she felt she found her self by being who she is. Then until the end, she revealed herself to the people as a woman. At first, they wouldn’t accept a woman in the army as if it’s a crime. But then she truly recognized her potential and alongside everyone accepted her even her colleagues. 

There is good and bad of the influence that society can bring but the important thing that we should know that we have to recognize of what is better for us and even healthier to what we bring and cultivate among others. 

Let’s just leave Mulan right there and move on with our tremendous tour. Let’s go and talk about SELF AS EMBEDDED IN CULTURE.

Culture. Culture is one’s way of life. Just like religion, traditions and lifestyle. It’s like a pattern that we do with our lives that we believe and follow.

Like me, as a Pinay, I practice by saying ‘opo’ and ‘po’ to the elders, being hospitable to visitors, likes to party and gather and also we, pinoys, celebrate the longest Christmas vacation. This culture that we have that we share is the bondness and this allows us to identify of who we are. Similar to the phenomenal series Harry Potter, a ficitional story by J.K Rowling.  The novels chronicle the lives of a young wizard, Harry Potter, and his friends Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry lived his life being a muggle (human) but everything changed on his 11th birthday. Harry went to the world of Witchcraft and Wizardry and learned different cultures and beliefs as a wizard. He shared the bond with his three friends and learned the meaning of magic and power. 

I realized that culture is not the behavior itself but the bond and understanding that allows us to bond and share with different people to experience more. The shared culture you have is how you define yourself on how you deliver it and show it to others. Culture influenced us within our daily lives up until this century. This also bring us together as a nation through diversity.

So, carry on!

We are gonna talk about the PSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE OF THE SELF. 

The self has many facets that help make up integral parts of it, such as self-awareness, self-esteem, self-knowledge, and self-perception. In the basis of psychology, the mental state of the self allows you to think, act and evaluate. For me, the psychological perspective of the self is really important because it constructs the idea of one’s identity to achieve. For example, as we grow up we tend to observe our parents and analyze of what they are doing. Also, we tend to copy and idolize them of what they are doing.

On this lesson, we learned how to be aware with one’s self and also by understanding. Being influenced by the people around your environment makes yourself vulnerable and attached so we have to make sure we choose the right path we take. So thumbs up for that!

We quickly continue to the WESTERN AND EASTERN CONCEPT OF THE SELF.

Western people are ideally aware of themselves. They objectify themselves as INDIVIDUALS purely. They are autonomous. While, Eastern self is believing that there is no meaning of the self that is independent. 

Both of them play important roles within the different sides of the world. I believe the Western Self’s single-mindedness can be a weakness and also a strength, not just in our daily routine but also in different aspects. Eastern Self within us helps us appreciate the togetherness of one’s community and by depending and helping. Maybe both of them, don’t go good together but I believe that each of them have strong perspectives within different circumstances.

Moving along...

Let’s talk about THE PHYSICAL SELF.

The physical self refers to the body. Both external and internal. It is the temple of what we desire. People nowadays tend to get insecure with their bodies, mostly girls. It’s hard to say that most of them feel pressured by what they see in magazines and even the social media empire. Social media is technically perceiving the perfect body image of a person should and will have. That’s why they tend to buy stuff to maintain their beauty and body forms. 

I learned that self-esteem is really important even if you do not have the perfect body image. People tend to judge the other people’s body image and some of them end up being depressed. Yet, it is much more important to be beautiful in the inside

Being beautiful is not just by having a pretty face but also with a beautiful soul. Our forms do not measure the weight that social media carries. We do not have nothing to prove and no one to impress with. It’s the personality that counts!  . The thing you have to prioritize is how you avoid to intoxicate your inner self. You have to smile, be thankful and optimistic, and have a healthy and good attitude.

So let’s give that a big round of applause, folks! 

Let me tell you something that I learned about SEXUAL SELF.

Sexual self is not just what you think. Some people misunderstood these type of perspective just because it has the word, ‘SEX’, on it. Well, you’re wrong! So, let me clear things up. Sexual self is the totality of all sex characteristics, includes with the reproductive systems, different STDs, puberty, sexual arousal, etc. Sexual self invites us to learn more of what we have rather than we think. It tells us how our reproductive system works and changes throughout our entire life even on experiencing sexual arousal. 

It also talks about different components of love; on how people exchange or make a bond with their shared feelings for one another. Also, the awareness of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. 

So, if you’re reading this blog, I would definitely give you a perfect example. Have you heard or watched the series Sex Education? Just let me know, okay?

I’m gonna give you a quick summary about the story. In reference with Google, High school student Otis may not have much experience in the lovemaking department, but he gets good guidance on the topic in his personal sex ed course -- living with his mother, Jean, who is a sex therapist. Being surrounded by manuals, videos and tediously open conversations about sex, Otis has become a reluctant expert on the subject. When his classmates learn about his home life, Otis decides to use his insider knowledge to improve his status at school, so he teams with whip-smart bad girl Maeve to set up an underground sex therapy clinic to deal with their classmates' problems. But through his analysis of teenage sexuality, Otis realizes that he may need some therapy of his own.

This story is pretty nice with the topic about the sexual self, it allows teens to be more aware of what they do. Sexual self is really an important role to an individual, it helps to build a wall of self-awareness since teens nowadays are being pressured of what they see and also they tend to give there all just to be loved then some of them lead to teenage pregnancy/pre-marital sex and others may lead to death due to complication with some STDs.

Some are confused of what they feel and who they feel like being to be. It’s better to embrace who you really are and going out of your closet rather than being who they don’t want to be.

I just want to say and reflect that this generation that we have is unstoppable but it can yet be controlled. We can help them to educate themselves properly and being more aware of these things within the areas of their sexual self because it’s better to be safe than be sorry.

Moving on, let’s talk about the MATERIAL SELF.

The material self is the manifestation of one’s identity through his/her possessions. It can be their house, car, pet, and even clothes that you wear. They feel sentimental to a specific value. There is nothing wrong whether you define yourself from the the things you buy, you always have to make sure that you won’t lose yourself, even your credit card.

Material possession can be reflection of you hardwork (Belk,1988). It can also affect your personality and the way you see yourself.  There are some people who get sick, literally sick, from being a compulsive/impulsive buyer. It could cause depression, anxiety and even death. Being satisfied with things is not a problem but we have to make sure that we do need it and not just go hoarding stuffs.  So, one of the best Confessions of a Shopaholic shopping tips is to think first. Before buying anything, ask yourself a series of questions: Will I wear/use this more than once? Is this purchase going to affect me in a good way? Does this item match other ones in my closet? 

For me, being materialistic also has it’s negative effects, being boastful and also decreasing of the budget that you have. People to tend to be jealous with others of what they have because merely the mass or social media manipulates each individual’s mind, mostly females. People measure you things for you to be accepted by them. In the bright side, people tend to measure success also through the amount of things they possess because that individual is seeking high level of achievement or in Layman’s terms - HE DESERVES HIS HARD WORK AND SATISFACTION. Just like by buying a phone with the money you earned from your first ever salary. Materialism has its ups and downs, as long as it doesn’t destroy the your identity and your pockets.

In the other hand, SPIRITUAL SELF.

Spiritual self is the inner essence of your life force. 

Spirituality generally refers to the meaning and purpose of one’s life. Spirituality talks about worship, religion and act of faith. It doesn’t mean that we do have different beliefs and religion that doesn’t mean that we are different from each other. We strive, we suffer and we succeed. All of us experience the same virtue of life and it is in us on how we try to make it worth and different.

Spirituality also talks about logotheraphy - which is the pursuit of human existence as on man’s search for reflection. It is also a method that psychiatrists use to help their patients reconnects with themselves and stop being isolated with depression and anxiety.

I believe and I doubt; everyday we do not experience SUCCESS, VALUE, AND SUFFER. Life is not sweet if it’s not a roller coaster full of surprises and life is simple but not easy. Whenever we feel down, we come back and pray to our life force. We make ourselves feel optimism and faith to get back to ou feet. We reflect and meditate of things that makes us happy and worthy. No matter how hard and destructive life can be, you will never forget what is your true purpose in this world and we should go back to grounded in soil and fulfill. 

I’m gonna give you a quick overview about the POLITICAL SELF

Political self begins defining politics. Politics exists in all human societies. It can be in school, family and also churches. Popularly visible in governments. This helps to be more focused and considerate with your knowledge and responsibilities. This will help the self to maintain an environment where people can participate and learn about dominance, freedom and rights. 

As a democratic country, we have the right to vote. This resembles the importance of having human rights and free will.

I learned that we should know what is right from wrong about this. We can also be leaders and followers in our own way. People have power in their palms and also in their voices. I believe that the political self can provide the cultivation of individuals’ decision makings and also about their rights not being deprived.

Lastly, DIGITAL SELF.

Technology is fantastic. We send emails, watch movies online and just even use our phones to order food without going to the restaurant. Isn’t that amazing?

Digital technology is at the peak of our horizon. Technology influences the quality of life and the ways people act and interact. Technology is everywhere, we sleep with it and we even go to work with it. The whole world revolves around digital. But how does this affect ourselves?

People, mainly teens, are so obsessed with social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat). Digital self allows you to express or share yourselves through the internet. People tend to be more interested having ‘hearts’ and ‘likes’ rather than loving themselves. They depend of what people might say and to impress to get their social approval. As a matter of fact, you can also gain money with these ‘likes’ and ‘subscribers’ you have just like on Youtube. Take Cong TV as an example. 

It may also change your life in a good or bad way. You’re taking all the risk for it. Just like the movie, Nerve, where this young girl, Vee decides to join Nerve, a popular online game that challenges players to accept a series of dares. It's not long before the adrenaline-fueled competition requires her to perform increasingly dangerous stunts. When Nerve begins to take a sinister turn, Vee finds herself in a high-stakes finale that will ultimately determine her entire future. 

Another one is Xander Ford - keeps on being bashed just because people see him as senseless and has a horrible attitude. However, this may lead to social suicide. People being rejected and being embarrassed then end up getting depressed.

I do agree that digital technology is pretty amazing but it can hardly be forgiving.

Like what I said, Digital technology has it’s side effects, you can literally be hacked and also been taken hostage for SOCIAL IDENTITY THEFT or FRAUD. Criminals are also in the deepest areas in the internet. 

So we have to make sure of what we put on social media and even in the internet and the internet does not measure who we are and how we are loved. They even see it as a wasteland where people shed their tears and not to mention it’s also where we can store our memories for a lifetime. We always have to remember that we should THINK BEFORE WE CLICK

I think that sums up our tour. Before I end this blog, as you can see I am very fond of Supergirl. She strives her way out of the shadows just to know what is her purpose and to know more what she can do just by understanding herself. I just want to let you know that it is really hard to understand ourselves. We keep on trying to ask the same question over and over again. 

People cannot define ‘YOU’. You are the only one who can define yourself. 

This subject made me realize that I am greater that who I knew I could be. That is it. No amount of words how grateful I am to realize that it is really important to understand yourself and to figure out your purpose in life. In addition, this subject helped me thought that knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom and mastering yourself is the power and strength. You have nothing to prove and no one to impress with. 

Sometimes understanding yourself is pretty tough but when you reflect and get all the pieces together. As long as you have hope and faith within yourself, I’m pretty sure you’re gonna know what purpose in life that you have and so that you can influence others through a lighter path.