#just doesn't really hit me me with the same dopamine as it used to.. which honestly? i'm kinda happy about lmao | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

4seasonsofart · 11 months

Text

Why people love S1 Vinland Saga and hate S2 (A Theory)

There's something special about War Arc Thorfinn for so many people. I've heard a lot of discourse about Season 2 and how it doesn't have enough action. About how Thorfinn is lame now because he's only farming. (etc... etc...) I still think you're a loser and lack media literacy if you hate Season 2 just because it doesn't have 'enough action'. Although, I think there is a deeper reason why the transition between Arcs and Seasons feels so monumental here.

Change, life and death, and the passing of time are all bittersweet things for many people. A lot of people fear these things, and the transition between Season 1 and Season 2 has a lot of them. Thorfinn becomes empty, Canute is now a king, and so many of the major characters that we grew up with are now dead for the sake of Thorfinn's development.

We also have the passing of generational trauma and how our characters deal with it. It felt like Thorfinn was an angry little kitten, and now he is a depressed and then enlightened man. It can cause whiplash. A sense of loss. A sense of sadness within us. Many people regress when faced with such things. Which is why Season 2 can feel jarring to most.

We once had something full of action, and now we have nothing. There are a lot of people on their journey to healing. So many people still have their internalized hatred and emotions within them. Which is why they connect with how broken and conflicted Thorfinn is in Season 1. So many people can relate to him. That anger. That pain. That wanting to hurt everyone who hurt you.

It's relatable. It's healing in a way.

Then we have Thorfinn in Season 2, who is beginning to heal. Who is depressed. Who learns to love and gains a friend. For a lot of people, that causes a conflicting feeling inside. Why am I not there? Why can't that be me? Why does that cause me to feel this way? It can trigger a bad reaction or a need to regress to how things used to be.

People are so used to being broken... that they are scared to heal. The anger and pain is the only thing they've ever known. So they relate and love Season 1 Thorfinn. 'He's so me fr fr.'

It's different, and it hurts to see people (even fictional characters) grow and change so drastically. We also have a sub-culture of anime enthusiasts who just like themeless fighting and large explosions of color. So people who like just seeing dramatic fights and bland storylines won't like this. They are used to the 'main character being angry, then defeating a monster, then winning, and then getting angry again.' This is the cycle that continues through many (in my opinion) poorly written manga and books.

Manga like Vinland Saga, Vagabond, and Berserk (etc...) offer a deeper and more gut-wrenching approach to this. They focus on the characters and the themes more than baseline action and intrigue. That's why treasured pieces of literature have such small fanbases. We live in a society that prioritizes 'fast food' intake of content with little substance or meaning. People just want to see something pretty and not think about it. Which is a side effect of many people's addiction to TikTok.

Which pains me but also makes me happy. I like the Vinland Saga fan base; I like that it's small. I can't help but feel a little protective over fictional characters because this story has meant so much to me and my own personal growth. We've seen what happens when themeless and quite bland animes get really large fan bases. (My Hero Academia, for example.) I don't want the message of this story to be lost because people so easily write it off for not filling their dopamine hits.

So from people's own trauma and connections to Season 1 Thorfinn to substanceless media being popularized, it isn't a surprise that many people just write off Season 2. No, it isn't the same as Season 1, but that isn't a bad thing. Want more Season 1 Thorfinn? Intake fanfiction or art created by fans, or make some of your own. You are not limited to only what is shown on your screen or in the manga. That's the great thing about fan bases and fan-made things. It's your interpretation of the character. It's both the original creators and yours.

Just be decent and try to have some media literacy. To all of the 'Incels', 'beta males', and rage baiters who try to hate on this masterpiece- go back to your fanservice animes with poorly written female characters and unneeded nudity.

I didn't know how to really get my thoughts out correctly while writing this, so I hope everyone who reads it understands what I am trying to say.

#vinland saga #thorfinn #thorfinn karlsefni #my thoughts #my commentary #war arc #anime and manga #subculture thoughts #love all of the non-toxic people in the Vinland Saga fanbase #if you don't like it #don't read it #keep scrolling #feel free to ask questions #or to have a productive conversation in the comments #once again #don't like don't interact #or if you will- be respectful

12 notes · View notes

fandomshatepeoplewdisabilities · 1 year

Note

Responding to this ask: 724247727036366848/hi-i-saw-your-post-about-how-people-wont-see. I have a lot of chronic pain and fatigue issues, especially in my joints (my doctors believe it's either hEDS or HSD) and I play roller derby which is a high contact sport. There are definitely days when I can't play or I need to be on a lower rotation, but I actually love it. And sometimes, personally (and I want to be VERY CLEAR that this is not necessarily a widespread experience, idk, it's just my own personal experience), I find it a lot easier to deal with muscle pain or bruises or fatigue from derby than the chronic pain and fatigue I experience anyway. Especially since I get SUCH a dopamine hit from it all!

I have to be mindful and deliberate about managing my energy etc, but I know I'm far from the only one with chronic joint pain in my sport!

One advantage of it over running (just since it was mentioned in the response) is that despite there being a lot of hitting/contact (all of which is trained extensively and gradually), roller skating is far LOWER impact on the joints than running generally speaking. Running is quite high impact, I struggle to run still because it causes far more pain to my already hurting joints (and because COVID has fucked up my cardiovascular health...). But hitting someone else, when done right, doesn't cause impact (and thus pain) to my joints in the same way! In my experience, I tend to use my muscles more to both hit and withstand hitting.

So my answer to the original anon would be: it totally depends on the sport. But not all high contact sports would hurt in that way and may even be a form of release!

Hey thanks for weighing in!!! I really appreciate different view points because hey maybe I should try roller skating so thank you for reaching out!

For reference here's the ask you're replying to

mod ali

#ableism #accessibility #chronic pain #writing the other

12 notes · View notes

lightandwinged · 1 year

Text

So I have to rant about a health thing and it's related to dieting and weight loss/things around that, so if that's a triggering subject for you, either ignore this or if you really want to read it, read with knowledge that this is the subject matter at hand.

You see, I entered my medical group's nonsurgical bariatric program this month.

This isn't something I was planning on doing just yet, mostly because I believe firmly that physical health and mental health go hand-in-hand, and while I do want to get my physical health figured out, I'm trying to blow apart the kinks with my mental health right now, which is a process. I'm doing EMDR to work through some fucked up traumatic memories, and it's working wonders, but it's exhausting and hard work.

BUT then I went in to my primary because my ability to have an orgasm has dwindled to near zero in recent months. And not going into too much detail about that, but considering my history of spinal injury, that's a huge red flag, so my primary for once got really alarmed when I told her something and asked me to come in.

My primary is not very good with fat people. I've had primaries who are good with fat people, who've sort of said, "yeah, your BMI isn't where I'm supposed to say it is, but you're otherwise perfectly healthy, so let's talk about what you came in here for today," and they're great. This primary... well, she hears out my complaint but wants to mostly focus on my weight the whole time. Like as little as possible on the complaint (e.g., "that spot looks like a mole, so here's a referral to the dermatologist. Now, they did weigh you when you came in, and I noticed that...") and most of it on my weight. It's annoying.

And this time was no exception. She's concerned about my migraines and loss of sensation, so she gave me referrals to neurology and PT and then we started talking about my weight. She asked if I still drank Dr. Pepper (which I was like, "yeah, but I'm not fucking him, so what does this have to do with my orgasms?") and then offered to refer me to the practice's nonsurgical bariatric program, and I said sure, because I wanted her to leave me alone.

And so far, it's not great. The advice they have for weight loss is the kind of shit you can find on any Reddit thread about Lizzo. It's the kind of bland, soulless one-size-fits-all diet approach that I could get without subjecting myself to copays--shit like "aim for no more than 1200-1500 calories a day and exercise at least 150 minutes a week" which literally, you google "diet" and there it is, that exact advice.

And it's not what I want. I know that I have issues with food. I stress eat, and I eat my safe foods in order to keep some semblance of order in my chaotic life. I've developed a fear of wasting food for some reason (it never used to exist; I used to be like "mm, two bites was enough noodle"), and so I tend to wolf down way more food than I should because I don't want to throw any away, especially if it's something I really like. Being autistic, I have very beige safe foods because the foods that are the same taste and temperature every time tend to be beige and super processed. My relationship with vegetables and fruits is fraught. And though I've never LIKED doing a lot of moving around (and living on a hill that's at a 45 degree angle doesn't help that), the trauma of my spinal injury really made it terrifying for me, like if I do too much in the wrong way, I'll be screaming for my life in the back of an ambulance again.

In other words, I know what my issues are. And what I want is to have a healthy relationship with food. I want to eat for the joy of it, not for a hit of dopamine or to wolf down a plate of pasta carbonara bigger than my face because I'm afraid of it being wasted. I want to enjoy the flavors of the foods I eat and savor them and embrace everything that food is besides fuel: it's joy, it's community, it's art, it's culture. I want to feel the way I've felt when eating a new dish so very often. I want to embrace vegetables and fruits. And I want to move. I want to hike all the gorgeous paths nearby. I want to dance without getting super tired. I want to walk around the city without hurting.

But this program.

They gave us a handbook, and the moralization of food is just. Everywhere. Salmon good. Kale good. Egg good. But god forbid you have a slice of cake at a coworker's birthday party. The handbook writes about it, "too bad about the cake, but you'll do better the rest of the day." When we had group therapy the other day, two participants had just gone on vacation and were beating themselves up for not eating "good" on vacation (not "well" because eating well and eating good are two different things). They kept lamenting how they were bad for eating at restaurants because they couldn't control what was in the food, and I was like... if we were all way thinner, our therapist would be telling us to stop sweating it, so wtf?

But instead, the therapist talked about whether this was a "lapse" in judgment or a "relapse" into eating bad. And I do get that food is an addiction in a lot of times and that learning to not binge eat or eat mindlessly is very important. I'm working on mindful eating myself. But lord almighty, I'm not going to self flagellate over going to a nice restaurant on vacation because I couldn't see how much salt was going in the dish. For me, the victory on vacation would be having that dish I couldn't control because I wouldn't know what was in it and trying something new and maybe even liking it.

I just. nngh. I don't love being fat. I miss buying straight size clothes and not feeling like I take up too much space and not feeling like my ass needs a "wide load" sign on it. But if I lose weight, I want it to be from a healthy and sustainable place, not from a place of hyper control. I have negative interest in weighing myself every day, as they suggest. I have negative interest in even thinking about losing weight when I travel. I want a healthy relationship with food, but this isn't it, not by a long shot.

#abby's physical health #adventures in bariatric BS #diet culture #weight loss culture #disordered eating is cool if you're fat!#because if you're fat you don't get to have food!#you just get rice cakes and a treadmill and a tiny jillian michaels #sitting on your shoulder and screaming that you are worthless #yay!

14 notes · View notes

nephrastar · 2 years

Text

Honestly convinced that, barring maybe tumblr, bigwig social media has collapsed damn near all of my social circles.

All this shit about figuring out the algorithm, all this shit about analytics, SEO, about view time, about follower count... I just fucking hate it all now. Social media basically turned the internet from a wild west with pockets of peaceful and interesting communes to a monolithic walled city where the only thing that matters is numbers. And if you get big numbers, congrats you get to be famous!! But only if you can keep those numbers going.

And let me tell you from personal experience-- 9 times out of 10, when you post something to social media at "the right time of day" with the intent of getting some clout, your post just... Does not get clout, most of the time.

Any post that goes viral is a benefactor of circumstance. In my almost 20 years of being on the internet, the one and only thing I've ever posted that went viral was a shitpost on Twitter of me memeing on a restaurant because they had a tip limit on their app and they along with many other food and adjacent companies were being criticized for not paying their employees a living wage. This was in 2022. Last year. I learned nothing from having hundreds of thousands of likes and retweets, and have not had anything nearly as popular since. I promoted my art Twitter in the replies, but you wanna know what that did?

Absolutely FUCKING NOTHING. I didnt make any money as a result of piggybacking that viral tweet. I didn't have people clamoring for what i had to offer. And it was then when I realized that getting big numbers anywhere will ultimately amount to jack and shit. And Jack had long since left town.

That may sound like i was upset that i didnt become internet famous overnight. I honestly wasn't, but there's a point to be made here-- the chances of your platform becoming big and internet famous are about as good as your acting landing you a breakout role in a Hollywood film. You're competing with hundreds of hours worth of content per second on most platforms, and depending on the site, their algorithm, which may or may not be controlled by real life humans.

Nobody can know for certain what types of videos will be hits on YouTube anymore. not even YouTube staff know what will be hits anymore because their algorithm is a machine learning AI, and creating any content at all with the intent of beating the algorithm or making faceless computers happy will lead to burnout. And when that content doesn't make the big numbers, you're probably going to feel like it's your fault when it's really not. this goes for any social media site that uses similar methods to "curate" their user's site experience.

And I've seen far too many people i know fall into this trap, which may as well be gambling. Getting good numbers so you can get that nice dopamine hit. Then maybe you hit a jackpot. Then you're just outright delighted. So you do the same thing you did before. But it doesn't make big numbers this time. Was it something you did? Ah well. Post again. Nothing. You adjust how you post and when to post. Maybe what to post, even. But still... Your content isn't doing well. You may as well be playing slots at a casino, except instead of losing thousands of dollars you're losing time. Time that, honestly, would've been better spent doing something you legitimately like to do.

The way i see it, make content like the algorithm doesn't exist-- make videos infodumping about your special interest like view counts dont matter, draw art and post it with the same energy a 5 year old has when they show off their macaroni art to their parents. Make the music you want to hear played during a thunderstorm.

Make the content that you want because you like the idea of it existing. At the end of the day, that content is FOR YOU! It has value because you poured your passion and love into it, and no amount of Algorithms or influencer courses or viral content will ever change that. And if that does eventually lead to you being notable and successful, then congratulations! You have a large audience that's cheering you on and encouraging you to do what you love.

#vent post #Neph does a vent

14 notes · View notes

butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway · 2 years

Text

Okay, I think I have finally found a cleaning strategy that is compatible with my fucking MYRIAD MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES while also not being so hard on my body that it causes an autoimmune flare up so buckle up lets go.

First things first, I have taken to using Grove for all of my cleaning supplies. Are they bougie as hell? Yes. Could I pay less for the literal same products (down to the volume and brand) somewhere else? Usually yes. Does the environmental footprint of the delivery of these supply boxes every month probably outweigh the environmental friendliness of their packaging? Almost certainly. BUT!!!!!!

My brain doesn't do the feel-good biochemicals real good (or really any of the biochemicals) so getting a delivery of pretty, autoimmune safe household goods every month triggers that lovely little hit of dopamine so without fucking fail every time one arrives, within a day I have carefully unpacked all my little goodies (they even send me a surprise** present with every box???? What more could a depressed burnt out bitch with no executive functioning want???), and within a week I have gone on a cleaning binge where I hyper fixate on my apartment one room at a time until the whole goddamn thing looks like it could be coming straight out of a designer tiny house catalog because I'm just???? So excited???? To smell all my nice scented cleaning supplies and play with my pretty new organizer items????

**the best part is that the surprise gift isn't actually a surprise because you get to pick it yourself from one of three options during the order process, but because I have extremely limited working memory and recall, I never remember which one I picked and can somehow have both the experience of a specifically chosen by me tailored extra gift AND a special surprise present I didn't expect at the same goddamn time.

So. A+ marketing strategy honestly, hits me right in the neurotransmitters every time, and given how long I can go without lifting a fucking spray bottle normally, I'm calling it an accessibility tax.

Anyway, horrifically this is only step one of my new cleaning process, and, honestly the rest of it is probably A) personal, and B) gross as hell so I'm gonna put this under a cut and you can feel free to skip it. But all my comrades out there who can't for the life of them keep a cleaning schedule because the dopamine don't work good, get you a cleaning product subscription (Grove isn't the only one but they're all about the same) because that bad boi will get ya every time, tricking you into thinking cleaning is fun by making it feel new and jazzy.

Okay, so your cleaning supplies arrived this week and have been burning a seasonally scented hole in the back of your fucking brain for the last 4 days, and you finally have an entire 24 hour period with zero time specific obligations, which means the cleaning fest can begin as soon as you convince your executive functioning to allow you to put down your phone, stand up, and walk into the other goddamn room.

This takes approximately.....six hours. Mostly because that's how long it takes for your wife to take the dogs to the park for the afternoon and the day has some serious "may not be perceived in your natural habitat" vibes, so that's how long it takes for the house to be empty of every living thing that cannot help but be up in your business. The cats don't go anywhere but that's okay because the second they see you go for the cleaning supplies the retreat to their dens and refuse to come out until at least 24 hours have passed. There is no danger of the cats perceiving you until this whole farce has ended, so the cats can stay.

Now your brain is on some unmedicated OCD, autism, ADHD, CPTSD, and suicidal depression shit and has been since at least 1997, so there's a lot of conflicting motivations/needs happening up in your grey matter meats right now and here's how you're going to rank them for the duration of your cleaning binge:

You skipped your last couple of cleaning deliveries because you were broke and miserable and that means it's been about 2 months since the last time you cleaned anything which would be fine if it weren't for the fact that 2 people, 2 dogs, and 2 cats live in this 550sqft apartment and these 6 living creatures somehow seem to secrete filth like a weird protective outer layer, which means that for the past 2 weeks at minimum you have been Carefully Never Thinking about what might be on the surfaces that you're touching and the only thing allowing you to still set your bare foot down on your hardwood floor is the layer of dirty laundry that develops over everything when you've forgotten to do laundry for a month, and if you have to really think about what you're cleaning you're going to cry, vomit, and then bite something, only possibly in that order

This is true in all 3 total rooms of the house, which means some of what you might have to clean is definitively more triggering than others, but also the dogs DO have a tendency to destroy anything they can fit in their unhinged maws directly on top of your sheets and pillows on the bed and this means that while technically the content is less upsetting, the experience is So Unfathomably Much Worse, but you only ever have one room's worth of cleaning in you per 24 hour period and anyway your wife will be back with the dogs in a max of 2 hrs so some Decisions TM will need to be made

Once the momentum stops so does the cleaning and god help you if you're halfway done because neither your wife nor your trained service animal nor g-d them fucking selves will be able to stop the meltdown that happens every time you have to walk in that room until you manage to finish the job

So you decide to clean in the following order:

Bathroom

Bedroom

Galley kitchen/front entry combo

Pros to this decision:

If your wife brings the dogs back before you're done cleaning the bathroom is the only room where you can close yourself in long enough to finish cleaning.

Tiniest room in the house

Clean tub (don't think about the implications here or you will spend the rest of day in paralyzed hysterics)

Clean toilet (if you even begin to consider the implications of this, drop 50mg of THC tincture immediately or wifey will find you flat on the floor screaming so hard you don't make any noise)

This is where most of your preferred clothes end up when they turn into laundry so the basket of clothes you collect is an absolute guarantee of having the Good Clothes back in rotation if you can also schlep down 3 flights of stairs to the basement at least 3 times to do some washing.

Bathroom is very pretty when clean, and will stand out really fucking hard from the rest of the house after your done which will increase the chances of the OCD making you clean the other two rooms on future 24 hour periods of zero obligation, which will help you roll the cleaning motivation from your delivery over until next weekend because you will need 2-3 weeks to actually clean every room (there is only 24 hr period of zero obligation guaranteed per week)

When you're done cleaning you can take a bath and it'll feel really fucking good as long as you rinse down the shower enough not to have a dermatological reaction to your cleaning products from soaking in tainted water

Now that you have crossed the first hurdle you will need the following supplies in order to complete your mission (supply list backfilled after writing out your entire process because like fuck will you ever remember every item you need in order to clean a room literally ever):

Multi purpose cleaner (with secret ingredient dish soap)

Tub and tile cleaner

Paper towels

Microfiber cleaning clothes (at least 3)

A pair of those shitty dish washing gloves from the dollar tree

Broom and dustpan

Trash bags

Trash bins

Sponge/scrub brush

Phone (for music and also missing all of your wife's text messages and phone calls about the dogs because your brain literally cannot comprehend external existence while cleaning)

Your oldest pair of ER scrub pants and a sports bra built for a fucking linebacker's worth of titty (mine's made of terrycloth because I love myself and would rather die than feel sweat on my skin)

Empty laundry hamper

Now that you collected all of your shit (definitely prior to starting and not by scampering in and out of the bathroom the entire cleaning process like a deranged chicken looking for the Good Foraged Seeds) you're going to hunker down and get to work. You put on your most boogying playlist and get to work.

Step 1) pick up all the textiles on the floor and add them to the hamper (step 1a is to shake them out before throwing them in but you have to walk the line of thinking about this just enough to remember to do it but not so much that you notice all the fuckingggggggg debris????? that falls out of your clothes.

Step 2) pick up any objects off the floor that you will not be throwing away and set them in the bathtub, you'll come back to this later

Step 3) grab that broom and sweep up your floors into a big pile on the floor. Best if you sing and dance and really get all hyped up about your music while this one happens or you will be forced to reckon with how many times your skin has made contact with your floor seasonings.

Step 4) take your new trash pile and scoop that shit into one of your trash bags you don't need to be meticulous here because you'll be doing another pass on the floors later, but you need to get the big stuff up and outta your way.

Step 5) take all the stuff off your sink and add it to the bathtub pile

Step 6) empty the bathroom trash and then pop the bin into the bathtub with everything else

Step 7) spray down every goddamn surface (except the bathtub and its contents) with your multi purpose cleaner. Mine's in an orange bottle and smells like grapefruit because I'm not allowed to eat grapefruit anymore or I'll die, but fuck man I just love grapefruit?????? Floors are included as a surface in this spraydown.

Step 8) use your paper towels to do a first pass of "wiping up" on your surfaces. This will be upsetting. Keep the toilet lid up for emergency vomiting, vut try to head it off by breathing in through your nose for a 4 count and out through your mouth for a 6 count.

Step 9) now that your surfaces are sanitary, spray down another layer of multi purpose cleaner. Floors are included as a surface in this spraydown.

Step 10) use your microfiber cloth to scrub your surfaces and really clean up any of the stuff underneath the stuff. This will be the first time you feel capable of acknowledging the reality of what you are cleaning because at least now it doesn't look like a fucking yeti tracked hair, mud, and plant matter through every inch of your home

Step 11) shake your microfiber cloth out in a trash bag, and then drop it into the laundry hamper

Step 12) remove any items from the tub pile that shouldn't get wet and wipe them down with wet wipes or a damp paper towel before putting them In Their Spot

Step 13) fill the tub with about 2 inches of the hottest water you can manage and toss any rim-of-tub items into your remaining tub pile

Step 14) start washing, drying, and putting away each of the items in the tub pile one at a time until the tub pile is gone. Rim of tub items go in the sink temporarily.

Step 15) spray down the tub with tub and tile cleaner on the outside, inside, and rim

Step 16) use your sponge to scrub the tub with the cleaner and wipe the leavings down onto the floor of the tub.

Step 17) use paper towels to wipe up the leavings on the floor of the tub until it's nearly dry and all debris is removed

Step 18) rinse tub, but no need to get meticulous

Step 18) spray down the tub, the walls of the shower, and the lower half of the shower curtain with multi purpose cleaner

Step 19) use a cleaning cloth to wipe down the entire tub, walls, and curtain

Step 20) thoroughly rinse the tub, walls, and curtain with water and wipe down the outside with damp paper towels

Step 21) spray some multi purpose cleaner directly onto a clean cloth and use it to wipe down baseboards, heaters/radiators, walls, etc.

Step 22) put the rim-of-tub items back on the tub rim now that it's mostly dry

Step 23) spray scented disinfectant in the room including two spritzes directly into the trash can and two spritzes directly into the toilet bowl

Step 24) restock the toilet paper and top off the soap dispenser, etc

Step 25) add a bleach tablet to the toilet tank which you thankfully HAVE been remembering to do regularly because it means you don't have to scrub your toilet bowl literally ever and honestly that's a small mercy because you used to just end every bathroom cleaning day vomiting into the bowl as you cleaned it, so life hack those consequences!

Optional step 26 is to excitedly tell your wife as soon as she and the dogs roll up that you just cleaned the bathroom and she should go see it when she has a minute and she looks at you and says "i take it that's why I couldn't reach you?" And you go "oh shit, we did talk about this didn't we?" And she goes "it wasn't an emergency, but I am glad you're alive" and you go "I'm really sorry I'll figure something out for next time but also it really does look super clean and pretty and I am still waiting on the last little bit of dopamine that comes from external validation and praise?" And she says "fine" and goes to look and then gives you a forehead kiss and says "it looks really good baby, thank you" and you say "!!!!!!!" and then you go collapse in bed for at least an hour while your body catches up with the fucking stunt you just pulled.

Your bathroom does look fucking spectacular tho, so at least there's that.

#my own special version of how to keep house while drowning #obsessive compulsive AuDHD edition #like folks #i cannot emphasize enough how badly my contamination obsessions mesh with my executive dysfunction #this is literally the only way I keep up with cleaning #and keeping up with cleaning is the only way i don't slowly disintegrate into a hysterical lump of goo #cleaning routines are the stuff of nightmares for me #but i hope this helps someone else because fuck knows i'd have loved to not have to reinvent the wheel on this one

13 notes · View notes

violentviolette · 2 years

Note

Reading your recent impulse control post, the whole "needing to use a lot of conscious energy to control impulses" is so true and is explained really well. I don't know if you've ever had this same experience, but a lot of my impulses are incredibly persistent—to the point that even if I manage to hold them back for some days, acting on them is inevitable; the impulse is simply delayed in the end. it's always inevitable that I'm going to feed into, say, an impulse of buying a switch I will not use even if I manage to hold it back for a couple days. it's literally something I can't ever fully rein in. I'll get the impulse to buy a specific thing, and even if I manage to NOT buy said thing for a while, I will always end up buying it in the end and it's so bad. the only time I ever successfully 'control' the impulse is due to my immense paranoia around spending/saving money, but even that doesn't stop me some of the time. not sure if this counts as impulse control, but it's definitely something I always have to consciously talk myself down from acting on and it's such a damn pain because that feeling of HAVING to act on the impulse doesn't leave in the end majority of the time. it's like a ghost sidekick haunting you every day. I should be banned from having a credit card.

that actually wouldnt qualify as an impulse, but only because of the very specific circumstances. ur definitly right that the sudden urge to buy something because u Want It even if its a bad financial decision or u dont need it is definitly an impulse, and if u bought it right there everytime without stopping urself it would be an issue of impulse control

but since it persists for days and the impulse doesnt pass after uve successfully controlled it and instead keeps reoccuring till u give in to the feeling/thought, then it kind of evolves into being a self control and gratification issue. impulses are classified as quick immediate sudden urges, and then they leave just as quickly. so any feeling that lasts past that first initial thought or moment is no longer an impulse

in this case, it then becomes an issue of gratification. which is something thats super common for cluster b pds and tons of other mental illnesses. we have dysfunctional reward centers in our brains and dont recieve proper chemical rewards for the right executive functions and tasks. this often leads us to have chronically understimulated brains that become very bad at not seeking out immediate hits of dopamine, which is why so many mentally ill people struggle with drug, shopping, and gambling addictions. ur brain wont be satisfied until u give it the hit of dopamine that the action brings and it will just keep eating at u until u do it.

this is super common and something i struggle with a lot. im really bad with money and have been addicted to almost every chemical ive pumped into my body to make it feel something lmfaooooo

so while thats definitly highkey something all cluster b's struggle with its much closer to addiction than strictly impulse control, which isnt to say impulse control doesnt play a big part in addiction, just that what ur describing is more than just impulse control if that makes sense

these are like, much more nuanced distinctions though and like describing that situation as impulse control isnt wrong at all, but the distinctions can be helpful when looking to break down and understand the behavior so u can get better control over it

#jack.speaks #anon #aspd #cluster b #cluster b pd #impulse control #cluster b personality disorder

6 notes · View notes

noes-pillow · 2 years

Text

Well... would ya LOOK at that...

I’m gonna be real I don’t have any event planned for 100 followers lol, sorry y’all. I feel like its been no time since 50 I swear.

But I do have this... (edit: this is long, didn’t mean it to be, I don’t even know where I was going with this when I wrote it, lets call it a brain dump)

Life has a funny way of doing things when it comes to how I apply my emotions to my writing...

Even though its 90% done, there's a portion of a scene in A Memory is Not Enough that I've been putting off. For many different reasons.

It's gonna be very rhetorically challenging.

It's gonna be very emotionally challenging.

...and also I just finished reading a really long book (tgcf) so I'm just chasing the dopamine and I didn't wanna write 🤷‍♀️

But suddenly last night I had a dream about suddenly seeing my dad again.

It's been 6 months since he passed.

In the dream I was screaming and crying telling him to help me make sure I wasn't dreaming. To do anything. Hit me, kick me, push me to the ground. None of this is something my dad would ever do, but I wanted to feel pain because in my eyes the pain would make me wake up if I was indeed dreaming.

Last night I learned pain doesn't make you wake up from a dream.

...or at least perceived pain in your dream doesn't.

Because at one point I had been kicked to the ground and I thought I had proven whatever I was in was not a dream. My life had been lying to me. My dad was alive and I had confirmed it wasn’t a dream... or thought I did.

Except when I looked up I saw my mom as well and something clicked. This February mom will have been dead for 3 years. So that’s when I woke up.

...

Something you've lost in your life will always make its way into your dreams if you miss it enough. And there's no sure way to test if you're dreaming or not...

...except when you naturally wake up.

"Alex, what in the hell does this have to do with your writing?"

Well... I think I just found out how I'm gonna write that once scene I’ve been putting off.

And I'm sorry in advance, but I think grief is such a powerful emotion. Its the only emotion I have never been able to control or fully mask. I can only funnel it into my writing.

And I like to watch my readers SQIRM

I like to see you all comment and tell me you cried or screamed or wished for a different ending or really ANY comment at all.

I feel like I can show a bit of what I'm feeling using the characters that we all love. Because when someone loses someone there’s no such thing as true empathy. No one will ever really KNOW how I feel.

But if I kill a character we love using what grief I have, a lot of us will feel the same... or at least similar.

And since I can't FORCE anyone to read my stories, I feel like the people that do make me feel... heard. And in turn I like hearing from YOU ALL. Which sounds cheesy as fuck but I don't have a better word for it.

So... as I didn’t intend to write this massive text post, all I gotta say is...

Thank You.

Thank you for liking, reblogging, commenting, or reading my stories.

Thank you for sending me prompts.

Thank you for loving VNC with me in general. The ride would not be anywhere near as fun without having this blog.

I know followers don’t matter, I don’t really care about this number at all tbh. It’s just an excuse for me to thank the little corner of the internet which I have made this blog to be.

It’s nothing really in the grand scheme, but to me it is still... something.

Thanks guys. I’ll be around 💜💙

With love,

Alex

fin

#also i start my new job in a week!!!#the majority of the work ive done on this blog has been between graduation and my first job and i wouldnt have it any other way #happy 100 everyone

3 notes · View notes

infiniteanalemma · 10 months

Text

So, I said I'd do a NaNo 2023 retrospective on the things I've learned over the past month. Here this bad boy is. It took me a little longer than expected, because it's a long, long post. (Y'all know I can't help but write an essay for every little thing!) Admittedly, it's somewhat self-indulgent, but it (hopefully) has some useful information about writing strategies. As per my usual policy, under the cut so it doesn't clog anyone's dash.

Okay, so, to start ... I've been doing NaNoWriMo since 2016, but this is only my second time winning. I also won last year's NaNo, using the same project. I don't want to get too deep into what the project is, as I don't want to kill my forward movement by talking about it before I'm far enough along to get feedback. What I'll say is that it's a visual novel/game script, and I already had a pretty good chunk of content before I used it as my NaNo project.

I'll get more into why that is important later, but for now, I'll just say that I've been writing for a long time and have a long trail of unfinished projects stretched out behind me.

First, though, let me just start with some background information, to lay the foundation of some of both the problems and solutions I've discovered. If you don't care about the background stuff, and are just interested in potential strategies, look for the ** down below.

Okay, I can reasonably say that this November was a whole mess, as per usual. It seems like something insane happens to me every November, and this year was no exception in that regard. Even so, I managed to write every single day of the month except one, which was the day I wound up in the ER. Long story short, my doctor had me try out a new medicine this month and I had a bad reaction to it. (I'm fine, for the record. It took about a week to get out of my system, but I'm okay now.) That one day aside, I wrote every day and on most days, managed to write more than my necessary minimum.

Personally, I'm really proud of myself for pulling that off. As someone with Attention Deficit Disorder (inattentive variant, not hyperactive), it's remarkably difficult for me to form habits and stick with them. I have a huge problem with sticking to something every day, and there's a tendency for me to quit doing something completely if I miss even one day.

I'm also really bad about rewarding myself for success, and I don't get that natural hit of dopamine for finishing my tasks. (Thanks, brain!) This means that even when I succeed, it's hard for me to even appreciate it. Between that and my executive dysfunction, it's hard to stick to doing anything consistently for 30 days. I've had to figure out ways to make myself acknowledge and reward myself for reaching my goals, something I've struggled with for a long time.

Now, part of the problems I've had in the past with completing NaNo was that, in addition to having crazy things happen during November, I've never really had much support in my writing endeavors. I was surrounded by people who thought writing was a waste of time, and didn't understand (or, frankly, care to understand) why I wanted to do it.

As someone who both writes and creates visual art, it's hard to create when people discourage you from creating unless you're actively making money on it. Now, these people weren't trying to be malicious. On the contrary, they were trying to be helpful. They just see things like writing and art as fanciful and unnecessary, a distraction from real things that you should be doing instead. This seems to be a common problem for creatives. Believe me, I've tried relating it back to their hobbies and how they enjoy spending time on doing those things without financial compensation, but somehow my writing and art are different to them.

After a while, I quit trying to explain it to them and attempted to do all my work in (effectively) secret. Combine that with my other problems, and what you get is inconsistent output that lasts only as long as I could force myself to keep going only for myself. As you might imagine, that typically didn't work out well. If I gave up on a project, no one knew except for me, and no one cared except me. Hence, several dead projects and WIPs. It did not help to have other people encouraging me to stop writing and try it next year, only for the same thing to happen again that next year of telling me to quit and put it off again for another year.

Fast forward to last year.

It was a bad year for me in a lot of respects, but somehow, I managed to win NaNo for the first time ever. How did I manage that? It was a combination of things, honestly, but I think it boils down to three main reasons: one, instead of a new project (like I'd tried in previous years), I started NaNo on a project I'd already been working on for quite a while, something which already had a decent chunk of words. (This is the game I mentioned before.) Two, I allowed myself to "cheat" my word count by including things that were related but not directly in the manuscript (working on background lore, codex entries, and such). And three, I told a small handful of others about it who weren't in my well-meaning-but-discouraging immediate circle.

I still did my writing largely "in secret," as I didn't confide in those few other people the idea of what I was doing, only that it was "a writing thing" and explained the concept of NaNo to them. Still, having others know I was trying to reach a word count and being supportive instead of critical did wonders for having me hold myself accountable for not skipping days. Maybe that seems like common sense, but I was so used to having to hide what I was doing or be met with concerned disapproval or condescending amusement at my "fancy" that it was a whole sort of whiplash to meet people who simply thought it was incredible that I could write so many words.

Plus, by allowing myself to "cheat," I did an end-run around my perfectionism, which tells me that if I don't do the task exactly right, I shouldn't even bother to do it at all. Perfectionism (at least for me) isn't just the enemy that tells me every word has to be perfect, but also that the way I do it also has to be perfect. I "cheated" a fair bit that November, and it was incredibly freeing.

This NaNo, I decided to springboard off of last year's revelations. If merely telling others helped me hold myself accountable for my days, this year I decided I would do at least one in-person write-in and meet with other NaNo-ers. (Is that the word? What do we even call ourselves? Oh, it's WriMos, isn't it? ... Honestly, that word doesn't look much better.) I also gave myself permission again to "cheat", and while I did end up doing it one time, I actually didn't really need to this go-round. Merely knowing that I could do it was enough that it took the pressure off for having to get it perfect.

But that wasn't enough. I decided I'd try to push myself even more this go around. (Yes, I know ... some of you can possibly feel the hubris rearing its head, the pride awaiting the fall. We're getting there.) I decided I'd try out a whole bunch of strategies I'd heard or considered, but not yet given a go.

This is where it becomes somewhat relevant that I'd recently been put on a new medication. Unbeknownst to me at the time, the medicine contained a fairly powerful stimulant that is commonly used for weight loss. (That's not why I was taking it, but that information is relevant for what comes next.)

For the first time in a long time, I was feeling good. I had more energy than I'd had in years, along with a brand new ability to focus. On one particular day in my first week, I knocked out over 3,000 words. I was pretty consistently hitting above par, racking up my word count. I was getting those words in, buddy. Things were going amazingly well. It was not to last, however.

Warning: medical stuff ahead, for those who'd like to skip it!

To its credit, the medicine worked. It accomplished what it was supposed to do, which was to help my body use the energy I had and not feel so lethargic, and increase my focus. Unfortunately, it also did some things it really didn't need to do to my body alongside that. I realized in short order that I was having side effects from the medicine, and quit taking it as soon as I realized.

I am an inherently stubborn person when I want to be, though, so I suffered for three days before having someone take me to the ER. Even then, I didn't want to go because I had convinced myself there was nothing they were going to be able to do except tell me I had to wait for the medicine to work out of my system. I told myself I could sit and suffer at home just as well as I could sit and suffer at the ER. It took my doctor telling me to go before I reluctantly gave in.

It's a good thing I did, though, as among its other side effects, the medicine left me severely dehydrated even after the copious amounts of water I'd been drinking. My veins were so shriveled up that even one of the hospital's phlebotomists couldn't find a vein in my elbow or wrist to put my IV in, so they ended up sticking it in my bicep. I was partially correct that they couldn't do anything to get the medicine out of my system any faster, but they did make sure I was at least somewhat hydrated before they let me go.

Okay, hospital stuff over!

After I went home, my body had to crash out and recover. I had to go the rest of November without that extra pep, while also recovering from the side effects. That put me at a low, while trying to keep up writing. I'd built myself a nice little buffer at the beginning of the month, but my jaunt to the ER ate a decent-sized chunk out of it.

Here's where those strategies came into play. I'd discovered a few things I felt were helpful, but I'd been pumped full of energy when I started. Now that I was working from a deficit, the true effectiveness of those strategies would show themselves. Would they still work when I was struggling to accomplish anything, or was my ease at writing purely from the stimulant?

** Here's the list of strategies that ended up sticking with me through the month:

Music - I've tried writing with music before, but I always felt it was a distraction. However, this time around, I tried writing to video game soundtracks -- and this actually worked for me. I think part of the reason it worked for me is that most music in video games doesn't have lyrics, and I think lyrics are a large part of why other music distracts me. However, listening to classical or modern classical music didn't work well to me, either. I think what made the soundtracks work for me is that I largely used music from games that I've played: as a gamer, I've been essentially conditioned to focus on in-game tasks while those tracks play on loop. That translates into writing without becoming distracted. Notably, it doesn't work with video game tracks from games I haven't played. Familiarity seems key, at least for me. This might not work for everyone, but it might work for other gamers.

Writing Sprints - I've also tried these before, and they didn't seem to work in the past. However, I think what made them work this time is a combination of two things: shorter lengths, and consistent rewards. My ideal sprint time seems to be between 10 and 20 minutes. Longer sprints become tiresome, and my attention starts to drift. Shorter sprints make me feel pressured as I try to think what to write, which causes a sort of mini-writer's block. 10 to 20 minutes seems to be my golden mean; long enough to think without feeling the pressure of the countdown, short enough not to strain my focus. Then, regardless of words written, the sprint is followed by a break with a reward. My word counts during these little sprints tend to be somewhat small, usually between 50 to 200 words at a pop, but those add up. Anything that adds words to the count works.

In-person writing events - I'm an extreme introvert, so I don't think I could do a daily or even weekly meet-up, at least not consistently. That said, I do think this helped motivate me. Sometimes it's a struggle for me to socialize, so an in-person event was an excuse to get out of the house and be around people. At the same time, the goal wasn't to have to interact, but for each of us to focus on our writing -- a "social" event, but one where each of us doing our own thing. Plus, everyone at our write-in was very nice, and also pretty small-scale. It might have been a whole different story if I'd shown up and there were a hundred people there. Ours ranged from three to about seven people. Small, low-key, informal -- and with snacks! That worked for me tremendously well.

4thewords - Now, I'm 100% committed to this one yet, as I didn't start it until over halfway through November, but so far, it seems to be working pretty well. I actually found this one in NaNo's resources. Basically, it's a RPG-like "game" where you fight monsters by doing timed writing sprints. I actually wrote this post in 4thewords. You can line up a row of monsters of your choice to "fight" in an uninterrupted stream. As of typing this right now, I'm "battling" a monster called a Kai, which has a 75 word count with a 10 minute timer. Different monsters have different word counts and time limits. As soon as you defeat a monster, it goes on to the next one in your queue until you've reached the end of the total word count. When you win, you get experience and items, which can be used for future battles and/or to customize your in-game avatar. I haven't delved deep into the more gamey aspects yet. There's in-game story lore, quests to complete, and different locations to visit. It also counts your daily writing streak, but only gives you credit for your streak if you've written at least 444 words. I know there are other timed sprint apps out there, but this one does have a whole host of features, all of which are optional. You aren't in any way punished if you break your streak, for example, and there are in-game items you can use to "repair" a broken streak if that's something that bothers you. I don't know for sure that it's something I'll stick with long term, but it does seem to be working for the moment. It is paid, though. There's a 30 day free trial, which I'm still in, and a $4 monthly membership.

Small Rewards - As I mentioned above in Writing Sprints, I made sure to reward myself for meeting my goals, whether it was reaching my daily word count or finishing a sprint. I'm bad about not keeping track of my successes, let alone reward myself for them. As a side effect, it can be hard to see the progress I make. For me, it's easy to only look at the big goals and try to come up with a reward that matches that, but that has historically never worked for me. Forcing myself to stop and acknowledge small successes has been very helpful. I've experimented with a few different types of reward. The small, consistent rewards seem to work better -- giving myself a short dose of social media/discord time for finishing a sprint, looking at video game stuff (new games I'd like to try, game mods, etc.), a little snack for hitting a thousand words. I'm trying to be careful about using food as a reward, especially sweets, because that can be a bad habit to get into. Still, it does seem work pretty well.

"Cheats" - Last year's NaNo, I gave myself permission to cheat a little, and as I said, that helped take a lot of that perfectionism pressure off. So this year, I decided to sort of bake that into my writing strategy. It doesn't have to be perfect. I know that. I've heard so many writing advice gurus talk again and again about "shitty first drafts" and I acknowledge what they say makes sense. (For everyone except me, my brain says.) My "cheats" are really just another way of doing that. I made liberal use of my *Unfinished* tag, allowing myself to skip over things that I just didn't feel like writing and move on. I gave myself permission to leave things "ugly" and repetitive. I allowed myself to just strike out things I was no longer happy with and rewrite it, while still letting that old stuff count as words written. (After all, I did write it. Why shouldn't I give myself credit for it and let it go toward my word count?) Sure, this made my manuscript look ugly, but by doing that intentionally, I managed to sort of shut down the part of my brain that criticizes me for not being "good" enough. I did it on purpose, brain. It's supposed to look that way, so shut it and let me get back to work. And it did.

There are a few other things I'm still on the fence about. I'll keep giving those a try and see how it works for me. In the meanwhile, here's some things that didn't work for me (and why they didn't work for me), but others may find useful:

Scrivener - Wait! Don't pick up your pitchfork just yet! I love Scrivener, and I use it all the time. It's super helpful for me, but -- and here's the key part -- not for writing in. It's a great little tool for planning, background lore, keeping track of important details ... just not so great for me at being a manuscript. If you're on the fence about buying it, I do recommend it. It's got a bunch of useful features, and it makes for a great story bible. But as both a "traditional" story writer and a budding game dev, I don't recommend it as a word processor.

Music - I mentioned music in my strategies that worked, but I'm also putting it here, because I tried new musical things that didn't work, too. I already mentioned lyrics and unfamiliar instrumentals in the previous bit, but another thing I noticed didn't work well for me were instrumental covers of popular songs. I found them in a lot of "study focus" type playlists and gave it a go. While I do find some of them pretty relaxing to listen to, I think the main reason they didn't work for me is that I recognized the songs and still wound up "singing along" with where I knew the lyrics were supposed to be. Apparently, my brain latches on to that familiarity and becomes distracted in the same way songs with lyrics distract me. If you have a similar brand of neuro-spiciness, this may not be the way to go for you either.

Ambient Chaos and white noise generators - Ambient Chaos is such a cool app, and I really wish it had worked for me. To give a little explanation, it's basically a sound mixer for random background noises, each with its own volume slider. Some are ones you might expect, like rain, waves or a coffee shop. Some are weird: beehive, zombie invasion, nuclear siren, alien ship. Others seem pretty counterproductive, like couple arguing, fireworks, marching band or construction site. Still, you can mix and match as you like, and some combinations are actually pretty pleasing to listen to. Like the study focus music, I found both Ambient Chaos and some white noise videos very relaxing, but on this one I'm not entirely sure why it didn't work for me. Maybe it's because I don't really like repetitive noise, but it wound up making me blank out when I was trying to think about what to write next. I guess white noise fills up the space in my brain? Who knows. Sometimes the brain just says no.

"Big" Rewards - This is probably going to seem counterintuitive, but in addition to smaller rewards for meeting smaller goals, I tried to give myself bigger rewards for bigger accomplishments. Going out to dinner for writing a certain number of days in a row, buying something I didn't really need but wanted as a treat, that sort of thing. And while I really enjoyed those things, I don't feel like they did much to actually motivate me. Again, this may be the Attention Deficit problem rearing its ugly head once more, but my sense is that those things aren't immediate enough to trigger that reward "conditioning". The smaller rewards were things I could do right away -- immediate gratification. The bigger things took a little more time to set up, and in that time, the effect was lost on me. I still knew why I did it, but that didn't make me want to do it again to any appreciable degree. It didn't hurt, mind you. It just wasn't effective. My motivation level was the same as it had been before the reward, and the monetary cost wasn't really worth it to be a viable system to continue using to motivate myself.

As always, I don't think any of the strategies that didn't work are actually bad, for what it's worth. They just didn't work for me.

If there's anything I've learned in my now years of writing, it's that writing isn't so different from the other skills we have to hone with time. When we first start out, we try all kinds of things, hoping there's some magic method or tool that will make everything work. Unfortunately, the one and only method that works above all others is doing the thing, repeatedly. Everything else is just polishing and refining that. In one way, that sucks because it never really feels much easier. In another, it's sort of reassuring that, if you keep at it, you will get better.

Anyway, this is probably long enough. It's late here, and I'm tired. This post was as much for my own benefit as anyone else, as it helps me to write things out so I can really examine it, but I do hope it proves helpful to someone out there.

#nanowrimo #nano 2023 #about writing #writer stuff #ia personal #ia rambles about...

1 note · View note

chocobox · 1 year

Text

hopefully i don't sound too 'woe is me' about this (i do i started waxing poetic,) i'm just trying to sort out my own feelings. that said...

i think i'm too hard on myself about trying not to feel sad that i can't ever really be a part of the self ship community the way i was anymore. i don't think it was about validation, as i tend to parrot, as much as it was about connection. i liked feeling like i could share this part of myself with others who could share their parts in return. but now that i'm as far as i am in my understanding, there is no going back even if i wanted to.

it is not a community that believes in forgiveness. it's built on 2010s tumblr politics, the type where you find the bad guys and fight them off. the type that doesn't believe in humanity. i knew the risks when i took them (said like a soldier lol.) i'm ultimately glad i separated myself from that community because it has spurred a lot of self growth and maturity i wouldn't have obtained if i had continued to obey the dni rules of my mutuals. i don't consider learning the truth to be a mistake, i'm aware now that the behavior i myself partook in was wrong, and i'm better for it. i just wish other people would have listened when i said 'actually, no, he's not a nazi' because he LITERALLY WASN'T!!!! but when i posted about him i forgot that the people who saw that post weren't seeing me, they were seeing a label they had already been told how to perceive. that's the bad guy from the bad show, this mutual has gone fallow! alas, i may use them for dopamine hits no longer! begone!

i just hate it because like. i know i wasn't doing anything wrong! i am a person who would never in a million years like a fascist! but so many people just immediately came to conclusions based on false assumptions. i almost wish i had done something bad, then at least the reaction would have been justified. no, this could have happened to any tv show. aot had just enough subject matter for people to twist into lies for it to become as hated as it is. all people know are that there are nazis, and the titans are jewish people. so they come to conclusions. but the characters they assume are nazis ARE jewish people. and then it all falls apart! because surprise, it's a narrative ABOUT antisemitism & fascism, not a narrative in favor of it! eeeeeveryone inside the walls is jewish. all of them. and there are a few nazis in there... but they're jewish children who are being exploited by the nazi government as child soldiers. so still jewish. and all of them have incredibly complicated trauma on the matter that gets explored in a nuanced and empathetic manner! Idk i'm just rambling about aot at this point lolol but my reason for talking about this is just what i said and have been saying.

i simply wish the community was truly a 'community.' it's only really for people who fit a narrow and flawed perception of how to be 'moral' with extensive virtue signaling dnis and all of the right opinions, which you've always held, because god forbid someone dredge up an old discord screenshot to justify a petty grudge. but i also hate proship communities. i hate the way they have no standards for what is and isn't okay. i hate groupthink. i wish people could form their own opinions. and i don't lack a community per se, i have many amazing friends who i am lucky to have in my life, i just enjoy new people. i enjoy self ships and self inserts and seeing other people creatively love themselves. it's just sad to know i can never be a part of it the same way again, not only due to my own disillusionment, but because unless my self ships are palatable, even if i can find mutuals who are chill and get it, they can't... reblog my posts. it's as though i'm stuck in the shallow waves of a tidepool, watching as everyone else plays in the ocean. sometimes people will come my way and offer me a bit, but they'll never invite me over with them, for i'm covered in sea urchins! what would the others think? and i don't hold it against anyone, i don't want anyone to sacrifice their community and end up like me. i just think i'm allowed to be a bit sad all the same. i do miss sharing en masse with people who will share back to me.

#antisemitism tw #sparkletwinkles #ntm the way i saw so many people f/oing like. child abusers and characters who Are For Real Fascists #clay puppington? no one bats an eye... but Levi on the other hand.

0 notes

the-hydroxian-artblog · 2 years

Note

I understand of course that there's no artistic shortcuts, and that the only way to learn to do a thing is to practice it a bunch.

But man, every time I see your art on my dash, some part of my wishes I could flip a switch and just mimic that style in one go. How long does it generally take you to do any of your random sketches? And do you have any advice for nailing the sort of. Casual dynamic style you do so well.

Most sketches of just a pose and a half take me anywhere from 25 minutes to an hour, mostly depending on both how detailed the character is, and how ambitious/inspired I'm feeling to draw them.

It's as you said, hard to recommend anything other than "practice", but I detailed my study regimen here. Something I hear is useful but don't do myself is straight up tracing sketches of other artists (for your eyes only, don't go posting them and making claims), mainly to learn and improve your own muscle memory and "get in their head". I've only done that very sporadically as inking practice. That's not me saying it isn't a good idea, I just haven't built up the habit. Feel free to do that with my own work, by the way!

Either way, my "casual dynamic style" comes from honing my eye and muscle memory to the point where I can draw poses more efficiently and visualize them, which my daily study regimen helped me hone. When you "get" to where I am, you'll find that there's only more to learn, though. Think of speedrunners; someone being better than even 90% of players looks impressive, but once you hone your skill to that point, you'll realize there's 10 times as much distance between you and the guy that's better than 93% of players. People who shoot for world records, being the best of the best, wind up making thousands more attempts than others lower on the ladder ever will.

The biggest takeaway is that you shouldn't be expecting yourself to be all that satisfied at any point, IF you aren't drawing something you enjoy. DALL-E 2 images look impressive and even incredible, but after a while the novelty begins to wear off. Training your neural pathways to make better and better art works the same way; you actually dampen your ability to get a dopamine hit off of good art alone, so you try to make it better, and eventually you grow only somewhat satisfied with your new normal. You need to draw stuff that actually makes you happy. That's the sort of thing that will fuel your journey for real. It's why art quality seems to not really matter all that much on social media, as it's work that the viewer and artist relates with that often winds up getting any traction. It's not a great analogy as all art has inherent value, but some kinds of art is definitely more motivating to draw and engage with than other kinds.

It's also why I draw stupid shit all the time. I get more of a dopamine hit drawing stupid shit that scratches an itch. Maybe your thing is cats. Shipping characters. Trains. Buildings. Find something you can't easily get tired of drawing, and study it as often as you can. Not too much to burn you out, but enough that you don't mind taking the challenge again and again. Don't rush it, just study a small amount at regular intervals. It's as David Karp once said: It doesn't matter how slow you go so long as you do not stop.

#littlestartemis #FAQ

122 notes · View notes

sometimesdesperate · 3 years

Note

Hey! I’m the anon who asked the bondage/ace question on amysubmits. You mentioned that you had a lot of words because you super relate. I would love to hear your advice and experience. I’m still quite confused haha! Thank you 😊

Yeah! Sorry, I meant to come back to that and kept getting distracted every time I started to. Like I said. It's a lot of words. 😬 I hope at least some of them are helpful.

So, asexuality and bondage (I'm using bondage as an example since it was something you mentioned but this applies to any aspect of BDSM/a D/s dynamic) and submission in general. (Some/any/all of this may or may not apply, I can only really talk in generals and personal experience, I don't wanna make any assumptions.) For context, I am a sex positive and sex favorable ace. (Some folks make a distinction, with sex positive meaning they aren't bothered by other people having sex, but don't want it themselves, and sex favorable meaning they enjoy the act for their own sake. Some don't make a distinction. Both are totally fair and valid but I mention it as like a, way to be on the same page I guess.)

So in that context and for me, bondage is not always a sexual thing. It can be! But for me it is mostly a comfort thing. I actually find being tied up to be comforting and cozy the same way an oversized sweater or a big blanket are. It is also, at times, more an act of submission, having my movement restricted and being inconvenienced because someone else gets enjoyment out of it gives me like, a very particular kind of dopamine/serotonin hit or something. It can also be arousing. These can cross over sometimes, but not always.

Point is. Bondage, (and any other kink) is not inherently a submissive act or a sexual one. You can enjoy one without enjoying the other two sides, and you can enjoy two sides but not the third, or today you like one side and tomorrow it's another. And there's lots of other forms of enjoyment people get out of stuff that have nothing to do with any of these three. (I also like the idea of having someone I trust so completely that I'm willing to be vulnerable to the point of being helpless, which is a fourth side of bondage that appeals to me that also exists both together and separate from the other 3 at different times, but that's another story.)

BDSM covers a HUGE range of topics. Figuring out which ones you like is a bit of trial and error and exploration. If you want to explore the sexual side of things, great! If not, you don't have to. And anyone saying otherwise has a lacking understanding of BDSM. Which is not uncommon, and is in no way a judgement call!

Re: the submitting only out of boredom bit. This kinda calls back to the idea that bondage (and everything else) isn't necessarily submissive. You can be into the idea of being tied up (whether as a fantasy only or as a self directed act or as an act to engage in with others, or a mix of these) and not be submissive. It's possible being tied up is your thing, but being submissive isn't. It's also possible your style of submission doesn't match up with your partner's style of dominance. Or that for you, D/s isn't a sexual thing but for your partner it is and that difference is causing an issue because their understanding of BDSM is entirely sexual. None of this is insurmountable, for the record! It just takes some communication.

At the end of the day, the only one who can define whether you are or aren't submissive is you, and that can change over time. Submission can take on so many different forms. I have been exploring my own relationship with kink and D/s for over a decade now, and just in the past three or four months that relationship has been flipped on its head quite a bit. Partners and friends and people within the community can help you piece things together and offer perspectives you might not have considered, but it is so easy to get stuck in someone else's idea of who you are. Part of figuring out how D/s and kink fit into my life was resisting my own tendency to do that, which is why I mention it.

So yeah. Basically, asexuality and BDSM and D/s work together however you want and need them to work together which maybe seems unhelpful because it's not a concrete answer but that also means that the possibilities are endless and it can be whatever you want, with lots of room to explore what works and what doesn't.

So yeah... I hope at least some of that is helpful! And if there's anything else I can help with or clarify, feel free to shoot me another ask or a message. (I think I have my messages set so you can't message me unless I follow you but if you want to send me a non-anon ask I can message you. (And won't share your username.))

#conciseness is not my strong suit

2 notes · View notes

that-wildwolf · 3 years

Text

Okay. I have some Stuff™ to say and I have no idea how long it's going to be or if it's going to be coherent because I'm just thinking out loud here so just bear with me.

I wanted to talk about fanfiction.

Specifically, I wanted to talk about what fanfiction is perceived like by someone who writes it but doesn't read and by someone who reads it but doesn't write.

A few days ago, I had the pleasure to go out with one of my best friends from high school. Covid restrictions are almost lifted, coffeeshops are recovering, the academic year hasn't started yet but kids are in school - the perfect opportunity to hang out with someone I hadn't seen for a long time.

We hit it off great—as we always do. You know how with some people, no matter how much time passes, you can just meet up like you just saw each other yesterday? That's the type of relationship we have. Which is funny because we're both rather reserved people. The quiet kid type? Probably part of the reason both of us enjoy the medium of fanfiction.

Fanfic is great. You can read whenever and wherever you want, as long as you're connected to the internet. And you can just as easily share stories you know people will want to read. It's great.

I've been writing fanfiction for the majority of my life, ever since I was a kid. There's just something freeing about the ability to express yourself artistically while still celebrating something you love, be it a movie, book, or video game or whatever. It's also satisfying to fill in the gaps, to create more content of what wasn't explored enough in canon. That relationship that you didn't get to see being domestic in their day to day life, or how that one character had originally become evil. If you've got an active imagination, writing fanfic is just a natural extension of consuming media. This wasn't said by the creators so it will be said by me. Maybe other people will enjoy it, too.

And when they do enjoy it, it feels absolutely wonderful. You can connect to other people from all around the world who have the same interests as you. They like what you've created. It's celebration of your work, which is celebration of another work that you both enjoy. It's not always easy to write fanfic, but in many ways it is very rewarding. Every nice comment I get makes my heart soar. It feels like being recognized, like being appreciated - not for your work or grades or, I don't know, something more pedestrian. No. It's being appreciated for something that is, essentially, at it's very core, a form of art. It's art! You made it! And people are saying how well you've done! They love it.

It's a great dopamine boost. I'm saying dopamine and not serotonin - you never really know for sure when or if you'll get another comment on your fic or if it'll be a nice one. This is a double edged sword; if you have self-esteem issues, if you're dependant on external validation... It can be easy to completely tie your worth to the feedback you receive on your fanfics.

Feedback, which isn't always necessarily a good reflection of the impact your work has had on others.

And this is where my second point comes into play. The readers.

So I was talking to my friend and we were talking about fanfic. Now, I don't know how things are in the West, but here, fanfiction still considered a somewhat taboo or "cringey" subject. I don't hide that I write fanfic because I'm proud of my work, but I'm often ridiculed by my peers because of it—even if it is just lighthearted teasing. My friend told me at least ten times that I'm the only person she can freely discuss this stuff with, and I got the impression that it means a lot to her.

No wonder it does. The fanfic you read or write is a very intimate thing - it's what you enjoy most, the most self-indulgent media you can consume; because the diversity of fanfics out there means everyone is bound to find something that's exactly tailored to their personal interests. It's the closest art to your soul as far as media consumption goes. No one reads fanfic unless they specifically search for that fanfic. You have to know what you want to read before you start reading - something that doesn't happen with published books.

My friend doesn't write fanfic, but she does read it. She reads a lot of it. And, me being the only person she feels comfortable discussing this with, we quickly drifted to the subject of fanfiction. We discussed various tropes and AUs and even though I was coming from almost exclusively a writer's perspective and she was coming from exclusively a reader's, we had a blast. We got so caught up in the conversation I didn't even notice we'd made it downtown; we'd been walking for a long time. Walking and talking about fanfic.

A few years ago I finally managed to convince her to start leaving comments on fanfics. She hadn't been doing it before for whatever reason... I suppose fanfic readers often take fanfic for granted, but this is my own speculation.

I don't read fanfic much. When I do, it's usually something my mutuals wrote. Writing fanfic takes up so much of my internet time that I simply don't have the time to read it.

Either way, we were talking about fanfic. About how fanfic is better than published books. Well, I wasn't actually saying this part, but I did listen to it very eagerly, because you know what? Even though we're in completely different fandoms and enjoy different things, my friend had some great points.

This is what I've learned a fanfic reader thinks of fanfiction.

Fanfic is often better than published books as long as it's well-written. Stories with off-putting bad grammar give good fanfics a bad rep.

Fanfic is immediately more engaging than other media because even if it's an AU completely removed from canon, you already care about the characters from the very beginning. You don't have to grow to like them because you already have an emotionalconnection to them.

Fanfic gives more than published books. My friend said that she doesn't read stories shorter than 30K words and generally avoids unfinished fics. The latter I understood without any explanation, even though I crave feedback on my ongoing fanfics. She mentioned that fanfic writers can be really underappreciated because a lot of fanfic is actually as long as actual published novels. (I found that tumblr post that has all the Harry Potter and LOTR books broken down by word count in order to compare fanfic length and showed it to her. She insisted that I send her a screenshot for future reference.)

She also said that she doesn't read or even like one-shots. Now, as someone who writes a lot of those, I couldn't not take it personally. I probed a little, genuinely confused about this. She said it's because they're too short: she barely has the time to start getting into the story when it ends. Personally, I think she's missing the point of one-shots, but maybe I'm wrong. Hell, who knows.

She likes AUs most, especially soulmate AUs, and generally doesn't read fanfic unless it's romance. I don't know if this holds true to all of even most fanfic readers, but I just thought I'd include this information, since I rarely get to gather this kind of data.

I asked her how she feels about tags, expecting an answer along the lines of "overtagging is annoying and you should only include the vital information" but instead I heard that properly tagged fanfics are gold and that more specific tags are really helpful too. I also asked about a dilemma I've been struggling with; whether to tag a pairing that only gets together at the end of the story and tagging it would be technically a spoiler. She said to hell with it and tag it. She said people who ship the pairing might not find the story otherwise - that is once again connected to her conviction that people don't read fanfics that aren't romance.

Well, here it is. A very long, very chaotic ramble about fanfic, with no structure or plan; I don't even know how else to wrap it up other than by saying "here it is". Either way I thought I'd share this here because I've been having some thoughts on this and especially because I rarely get to see the other point of view and I thought it'd be nice to show it to others, whether readers or writers.

And one last thing. Whether you read fanfic or write fanfic, regardless of if you do the other too, I thank you so much. I love fanfiction! Either way you're a part of this community and I'm really happy you're here! Fanfic is my honest to god favourite medium. I love expressing myself through characters and fandoms I love, and it warms my heart to know that millions of other people do, too. Stay safe out there <3

And since this is a post about fanfic, a link to my AO3 because like I said I crave attention.

#fanfic #fanfiction #fandom #ao3 #long #wild rambles #my life

4 notes · View notes