#of course it ties up to the social media perception of me because for example when i write fiction in english i can steel see

[ratgirrrl]

the silly thing about Language is that it will make you feel like a different person when you write something in not your native one

[bimtheory]

I've recently done something I never thought I would, I've gotten in anime. I think the innocent girl next door bimbo act is a style that works best for gaining power while not being perceived as a threat. I'm studying it more and learning how to adopt it in my daily life and interactions. I love your perspective and ideas so I wanted to ask your thoughts on this and on the innocent girl next door act.

I have to be honest, I'm not overly familiar with the "girl next door" archetype because, to me, the girl next door is everything a bimbo isn't. But that's really just a preference, bimbos aren't that cut and dry. Just yesterday I was considering making a post about the basic bimbo types because I tried watching Jersey Shore and it made me realize that when we talk about intelligence, well, lack of intelligence -- there are pretty consistent forms it comes in. People get REALLY hung up on the intelligence loss aspect of bimbofication and claim "bimbos don't need to be dumb" but its all about one's personal perception of what "dumb" is. Chances are whatever alternative they suggest in place of intelligence loss is something that can also be read as "dumb".

Excuse me for going off on a tangent here but I'm going to continue. I also almost made this point on the main blog several months ago using My Little Pony characters as examples but I kept debating the... ethics? of that. Anyway, I'm gonna do it now.

Let's begin with Twilight Sparkle (These will be very loose examples btw). You may think "how could a character who's whole thing is being an egghead bookworm represent a lack of intelligence?" Very easily actually. A character like Twilight's stupidity would come in the form of the Absent-Minded Professor archetype. Basically, picture a bimbo who's very competent or intelligent but also a total klutz. We can have a bimbo character who's technically smart but express a sense and perception of stupidity by making them clumsy, oblivious, and socially unaware.

Then you have Fluttershy, who would probably fall more into the innocent girl next door type as you've described. A Fluttershy type bimbo would be perceived as unintelligent through being docile, passive, meek, (I personally prefer these words to just "submissive") or gullible. But she could still technically be smart.

Rarity... kind of goes without saying. A "lack of intelligence" would be expressed through perceived superficiality, an interest in glamorous and feminine things. This is literally the plot of Legally Blonde. Rarity and Elle are girly and glamorous but also kind and intelligent. Of course you could also make this type of bimbo much more vapid and uncaring, even cruel, and get the more trophy wife-gold digger social media influencer type of bimbo. Again, there are A LOT of different bimbo types. Moving on.

Pinkie Pie. Pinkie would represent probably the most common and popular type of bimbo. Silly, giggly, bubbly, hedonistic. Of course, this doesn't mean the character would actually have to be "dumb" in a technical sense, and Pinkie definitely isn't.

Now... Rainbow Dash. With her and AJ being the tomboys of the group there's bound to be a bit of overlap but I'd argue the perception of stupidity tied to RD would be that of a meathead jock. You don't see bimbos like this often, if ever, but it'd be the type of bimbo that's very brash. While a Pinkie type bimbo would probably exhibit eager playfulness an RD-style bimbo might be more aggressive in her pursuits. Her "stupidity" would be expressed through recklessness, cockiness, and probably like crass vulgarity.

And finally, Applejack. While I mentioned there being overlap between her and an RD-style bimbo it may be more accurate to say an Applejack style bimbo would have more in common with the Fluttershy-style in that the Apple-bimbo would appear stupid via a lack of pretension. Sort of the "Farmer's Daughter" type, there's a traditional aspect to it. The Applejack style bimbo would be marked by simplicity above all, the most likely to settle down and be a housewife. There's also possibly the connotation of being and ignorance stemming from small-town seclusion, refusal to change, or a refusal to question things. Consider the episodes:

Applebuck Season

Look Before You Sleep

Bridle Gossip

Over a Barrel

Made in Manehattan

Applejack's Day Off

The Cart Before the Ponies

Honest Apple

Sincerest apologies for the very long detour, anon. Like I was saying, I'm not familiar enough with the "Girl Next Door" archetype to truly comment, maybe not familiar enough with anime either because it took me forever to come up with even one example -- Orihime Inoue from Bleach, and I can't think of anyone else. But it does seem like something to consider and definitely look more into, if you're comfortable sending another message I'd love to know specifically what anime you've been watching and what characters you had in mind. Also curious as to how you plan on employing these tactics IRL. It does strike me, now that I'm winding down, that by "gaining power" you may be referring to like Emmet Till shit, performing innocence and vulnerability to get men be very protective of you.

[rollercoasterwords]

Have no clue if you’re still on The Prank discourse but one thing I find so interesting about it is how much it emotionally affects people compared to something like Regulus being a canonical blood supremacist or Barty torturing people or other more traditional bad guys. And I think a lot has to do with how it affects two characters that people often project themselves into (Remus and Snape) rather than just being a generic “oh ya he tried to murder someone we hear about for a line or two.” Like people don’t approach it from a literary or a character standpoint, they often seem to see it as something that wronged THEM. It’s so fascinating to me- the epitome of how one attempted murder is a tragedy but the attempted murder of many that I don’t happen to care about is an easily ignored statistic.

of COURSE i am happy to continue talking about The Prank u bring up a really interesting point!! i do think a lot of the things that become these big like...moral debates in this fandom have less to do with like. actual morality and more to do with like....constructing identity through social media. like god ok let me see if i can be concise abt this:

we're being increasingly conditioned to construct our identities around online presence and social signifiers like the media we consume; so for a lot of people the books they read or the shows they watch etc etc are not just something to enjoy but are a pillar around which they are constructing their perceptions of themself. and in order to reify that construction you basically have to put yourself in this constant feedback loop of posting these social signifiers so that other people can look at them and go "oh so this is your identity," because a performance can't be real without an audience.

SO. i feel like that's where we're getting people who will say "oh yeah i'm a [character] kin" and feel as though that is truly an important expression of their deepest personal selves. and then, once your identity is tied to those characters, any attack on those characters feels like an attack on you. you can't accept the fact that other people might interpret the characters differently, because to do so would mean to accept that this thing you've tied your identity to is somewhat meaningless/empty/fluid/unstable, which would force you to confront the fact that this identity you're performing is, in fact, a performance, and not a revealing of some true and inherent inner self.

in reality, all of the things that happen in harry potter do not hold any real-life moral weight. like...these actions aren't happening. we aren't talking about real people doing real things to each other, we're talking about characters. so to use an example from ur message, barty killing his dad is no better or worse than The Prank, because neither of those things actually happened. and THAT means that everybody can take those fictional actions and interpret them in different ways and say they think one is better or worse within this fictional context, but there is no single true and correct interpretation, because none of this is real.

so, yeah. i think ur 100% right that when we do get these really contentious debates about the morality of certain characters, it's because people aren't approaching the topic through the lens of literary critique but rather through the lens of this Personal Moral Performance. like, if you kin sirius, and someone says sirius was bad for doing The Prank, then you HAVE to defend sirius and insist that that person is wrong, because u need to perform ur own moral correctness to the audience. like, sirius can't be a morally bad character, because i kin sirius, and i am morally good.

and yeah, that definitely leads to some cognitive dissonance! people are going to be quick to defend the characters they've attached themselves to while decrying the bad actions of the characters they don't like/don't care about--again, oftentimes to perform Morality on the internet more than in service of any actual literary critique. and like. if ur stuck in this mindset of feeling like you need to be constantly proving to the world how morally good you are, then anyone pointing out the fact that you defend one character but shit on another who did similar things is gonna feel like a personal attack, and that just makes the whole situation worse because then you feel like you need to dig your heels in and insist that your interpretations are right and their interpretations are wrong, and nobody feels like they can give ground without becoming Problematic for defending/shitting on whatever character they're fighting about.

[letrashbag]

Got into a huge fight with my mom yesterday. Whoopee.

To preface, I don't fight with my mom. I've got a lot of people pleasing and social anxiety issues and I just don't do conflict. I would rather shove myself into a box while breaking all of my bones than communicate that a behavior is hurting me and that I want it to stop. But every once in a while I'll put on my big boy pants and be brave about it. Usually in relation to issues of racism and queerphobia. So I'll call out my parents for being transphobic or closeminded, but I try to do it in a respectful and civil way. I don't try and tell them they're wrong about these things, I just try and get them to realize that there is no logical backing for their views.

So this all started with the Barbie movie (really it started with the "Disney selling out to woke leftists" but whatever). My mom was saying that she didn't want to watch it because men were presented as stupid so women could be shown as powerful. Me and my sibling kind of pushed back, because that is not the messaging of the Barbie movie and then it just devolved from there. (my mom has a habit of either misunderstanding or flat out refuting basic arguments that we then have to focus on so she can understand the full picture for the main argument, which is how this conversation got so crazy) We tried to explain the objectification of women in media (specifically how women are often not used as full thought-out characters but as tools to further the plot for the men in the movie) and used an example from one of her favorite movies. In it the main dude married this hot successful woman and we were trying to explain that her function in the plot of the movie was to make the main character look successful to other men. She could not comprehend this idea and insisted that since she did not watch the movie that way, that just wasn't true. (And of course, there is something to be said for death of the author and interpreting characters how you want to, but that doesn't erase the objective analytical perspective of character purpose and the near constant objectification of women in media.) This then turned into us trying to explain what objectification even is, because yes "ugly" women can and are objectified too. Objectification is viewing a person as an object, something that all AFAB face to some degree because vagina=sex=object (valuable or not) in our society. Then we had to explain that yes, society is a thing that influences everybody. She genuinely was fighting the idea that there is a societal standard of beauty. I had to explain that personal attraction is different than perception of beauty. You are not physically or emotionally attracted to everyone you find beautiful. There is appreciation, aesthetic attraction, and socially informed views of beauty. And then we came to the fact that everyone is socialized by our SOCIETY and that gives them biases and teaches them behaviors. Seems simple right? Apprently not.

She kept insisting that society did not influence her opinions, ever, and they are all her own, and she has no biases at all. She would admit that everyone else was influenced by their family and therefore had biases and would make assumptions about people, but not her. No, she's special. She doesn't judge people by their appearance, ever. This became a fight over the fact that human brains operate a certain way and that the way process information, especially visual information, is inherently tied to making assumptions about people based on our social knowledge. I kept bringing up like scientific facts about how the brain works, and she was so insistent that it didn't matter. She literally asked me if I took away science, what is my argument here? Like punk? Why is science not a good argument? Why can't I reference peer reviewed studies and anatomical features? Why doesn't that count? But you get to just be like "I believe that my brain doesn't do that"? What? But then she'd make claims about how the brain changes as you grow, like synapses can change, and that means she just grew out of making assumptions about people. Which 1) is a SCIENCE BASED ARGUMENT 2) true in the sense that your neural network can grow, decay, and change based off of how you use it but not true in the sense that you can change the way you process information. I tried using the analysis of your cells can regenerate, but you can't regrow an arm (after a certain point of development in the womb) to show that yes, one fact may be true but it doesn't mean you can take that fact to the extreme. AND THEN....SHE TOLD ME SHE DIDNT KNOW IF CELLS REGENERATE OR NOT. SHE'S A TEACHER. FOR SOMEONE WHO SEEMS TO FALL INTO THE "BASIC BIOLOGY" GROUP YOU SURE DON'T KNOW BASIC BIOLOGY. BUT SHE DOESN'T TEACH BIOLOGY. SO WHY SHOULD SHE KNOW BASIC HUMAN FUNCTIONS. She also refuted the idea of subconscious informing your actions in a way that wasn't just telling your consciousness "that person is ugly", which is not how subconsciouses work at all, but she wouldn't believe me.

She just kept insisting that she was the exception, and that her brain doesn't do that. (Side note, when she said everything has exceptions, I asked her if every functioning human had a brain, are there any exceptions to that, she said yes as far she knew but she didn't learn anatomy in school. Incredulous, we asked if she had ever been told in school that she had a brain. She said no. We asked how she knew she had one then. She said God told her. After some more pushing and prodding, it was like pulling teeth, she finally admitted that she did in fact learn about brains in 9th grade science. Which was where? SCHOOL, SO YES SCHOOL AND SCIENCE TAUGHT YOU THAT YOU HAVE A BRAIN, SO WHY DID YOU SAY NO??????????) And obviously, I don't believe her, because once again that is literally how brains work, and she refuses to believe me because how dare science inform my world views.

It's like she thinks I'm being brainwashed because I use science and my education to inform my views and beliefs. I don't just trust that my brain made a totally great decision for itself independent of any influence and nothing else matters.

UUUUGUUGUGUUGHGGUHGUGHUGHUGUHUHGHHGHHGHGHGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHUHUHHHHFHHHHHHH

I also made her cry because I was trying to explain that growing up in a racist household isn't always being explicitly told that "black people are bad", so I brought up an example of a conversation that happened like 3 years ago in our house which was just a butt ton of microaggressions, and she immediately was like "I don't remember this conversation, I wouldn't have agreed with that stuff." and then after insisting that she certainly didn't refute the stuff my dad was saying and that the conversation did in fact happen (note that I was not calling her racist, I made it clear that this was a conversation that happened awhile ago, and it was just an example that I know she was witness to of a racist conversation not being explicitly about how people of color are bad) and she lost her mind, crying about how if I knew the way dad had treated her and the way she really felt then I wouldn't dare bring this up and that she never agreed with his views on "black people and gay people" and clearly I don't know her as well as I think I do. Which I understand to an extent, I understand that my dad is not a great person for a lot of reasons, and that my mom does not fully agree with him. And I truly hadn't meant to accuse her of racism in that moment. So I apologized for bringing up a sensitive topic and explained why I had. Then we just got right back into it. (She also admitted that she had wanted and implied that she still did want a divorce.)

She probably thinks that I hate her and that I think she's an idiot. She also probably thinks I've been brainwashed by society and that I've been lost to the woke leftists. I'm so excited to leave in a couple of weeks. I'm only home right now for the summer, and I go back to college soon. As soon as I'm gone, I'm going to shave my head and try to forget about all this crap. I just don't know how to act right now. I'm not going to apologize for insisting that she's wrong, cause she is. And I know she won't apologize cause she thinks she's right. I probably should apologize for getting so upset, but I was careful not to say anything insulting or offensive that wasn't just a scientific truth, so I really don't want to apologize for anything. But my family has an absolutely horrible dynamic. Us kids were always forced to apologize to each other and say "it's okay", so know we just don't. I've apologized a couple of times to my youngest brother because there have been times where I've lost my temper and genuinely been in the wrong, but when I get into tiffs with most of my other siblings we just get over it. Which probably isn't healthy, but whatever. I just want to leave and be done with it.

I'm probably not coming home next summer and then I'll be graduating. It's too expensive for me to come back home for smaller breaks, so unless my parents will pay for it, this is probably the last time I'll be home. And I can't wait to get out. I hate being an adult and having to make these decisions for myself and having to get a job and all of that stuff, but I'd take it any day over sitting here in my house listening to my dad rant bigoted crap and my mom make everything about her. I can't wait to get away from the disgusting bathroom no one ever cleans, and the horrific way people clean dishes, and the broken a/c, and the camera in the living room, and the fact that there's animal hair everywhere which gives me a head ache, and the carpets are all disgusting from years of having animals poop and pee and puke all over without getting properly cleaned, and I can't even use the shower because its all so gross, and it's hot here, and there are so many bugs, and I'm allergic to everything, and the only friends I have here are old friends that I kind of stopped caring about years ago, but I still have to act like I want to see them whenever I come back, and I'm just so sick of this place.

[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. 

[amethystiridescence]

I debated a lot about whether to post this as I'm worried about it being misconstrued but I feel there's a lot of points that merit discussion. I'd definitely be open for people's thoughts on it.

tl;dr: society has an unhealthy deeply interwoven obsession with sex/romance as a be all and end all, and I think it's a large contributor to sexual violence against women.

Regarding the discussions that Sarah Everad’s case has reawoken, there are few voices trying to invalidate the most common argument by saying “there’s no point telling men not to rape/murder because the messed up men will do it anyway”. But this is an extreme simplification of the matter at hand. The issue lies with the perpetrators of course and NEVER the victims. But we need to explore what breeds the mentality of the perpetrators as SO many women have recounted their experiences, so it’s obvious that the problem is widespread at varying levels. The levels range from the simplest catcaller to cases like Elliot Rodger and Sarah Everad’s killer.

My belief is that a lot of the mentality surrounding the violence and aggression towards women stems from male entitlement. That phrase alone is a buzzword, and again its often used with a simple-cut phrase with “women don’t owe men anything” which is entirely true, but whilst unlearning entitlement is a step further than telling men “don’t rape”, its still not tackling the problem at its roots.

Men in our society have been exposed to lifelong conditioning through mass media and social-engineering. We are more than familiar with movies/tv series where romantic/sexual attention from a woman is often a reward/end goal for the male protagonists. Sometimes there are men pitted against each other vying for the affections of a woman like it’s a coveted prize, and it’s normalised with humorous portrayal. Or sometimes sexual/romantic interest is not a reward, it’s a given, no matter what kind of person the male character is; see any series where a conventionally unattractive/unpleasant man always keeps his devoted, conventionally attractive wife despite his obvious flaws (Peter Griffin, Homer Simpson, Fred Flintstone). Then of course there’s the normalising of not taking no for an answer and constantly persisting and being rewarded eventually for it; for example The Notebook is considered a very romantic film but the male character literally threatens to kill himself to make her agree to date him. And of course there’s very damaging concepts presented by films like the 40 Year Old Virgin, but we’ll come to the negative sex-shaming in a tick.

Luckily thanks in huge part to movements like #MeToo, the idea of consent and ‘no means no’ is being more consistently normalised in modern mass media. Netflix’s Sex Education explores this but it’s still guilty of making the female love interest the end prize goal for the male protagonist.

Now it’s not just in media that this environment of coveting sexual/romantic affection as the ultimate goal is encouraged. Its a socially-engineered thing. A lot of us are aware of the double standard in which men are revered/congratulated by their peers for being sexually/romantically popular with women whereas women are shamed, but we often don’t talk about the poisonous culture in which men who aren’t sexually/romantically active or “successful” are shamed and humiliated. How many times have we witnessed people shaming or embarrassing their mates for not having a romantic partner or ‘not getting some’ or even worse, for being a virgin? The culture surrounding virginity is disgusting, it’s both shamed and coveted. This also ties into insults surrounding size/functionality of genitalia and how men are taught that’s one of the worst kind of insult they can receive. Same goes for insults surrounding “haha you can’t get laid/get any”. Plus some men deliberately pass down this mentality and on top they encourage younger male peers/family members to “keep at it” and “don’t take no for an answer” as if teaching younger men how to ‘get women’ is an important lesson that must be passed on.

One thing that’s also alarming is that this taught drive for sexual/romantic attraction is so inbuilt that men are taught to bypass a lot of principles for the chance of it, such as lying about their interests or faking a personality to keep a woman interested. I’ve also seen men forgiven for tardiness because they ‘got lucky the night before’ (that expression itself feeds into this ‘covet/reward’ culture). Only last week I was watching a video about how women were sexually harassed with deeply unpleasant/objectifying comments online whilst doing Twitch streams and I saw a man reply “Women complain all the time about getting attention, they have no idea how lucky they are, I’d kill for a woman to desire me like that”. Men are inherently taught by both peers and media that their entire self-worth is largely determined by whether they receive romantic/sexual attention, no matter how insincere/damaging it is. Hell, even when discussions about men who’ve committed atrocities against women come up, instead of sympathising with the women who have been hurt and those whose are more scared as a result, men instead tend to lament “men like this guy ruin it for other men, they spoil my chances with other women because women assume I’m like him”. A lot of this is a large part of why incel culture is more dangerously rife than it should ever be. The mere words ‘involuntarily celibate’ are all that’s wrong with what I’m discussing.

Lets be clear, society’s inbuilt social hierarchy around sexual/romantic frequency is poisonous to everyone, especially women and the way so many shape their lives around how ‘attractive’ they’re perceived as, and of course the damage it does to the barely-fledged self esteems and images of teenage girls.

Plus both genders suffer in nearly equal ways under some lenses. People who choose to live without a romantic partner are assumed to be “unable to find love” or “unfortunately lonely” (although its worth noting the semantic sexism of bachelor vs spinster). People who are virgins beyond their teens, hell even just beyond legal age, are pitied/shamed. And people stay in abusive relationships because society's taught us that being unhappy is better than being alone. It’s impossible for people to pass through life without being subject to the social perception of how ‘successful they are in love/sex’.

But in particular with men, it’s incredibly dangerous as it destroys how men perceive themselves, teaching them that women are a given or a prize and if they don’t receive, they’re shamed. Combine that with social engineering of which in general, men are taught to express their anger/frustration with physical exertion or violence. This lays groundwork for male entitlement at its most damaging and dangerous, because not only does it wreck the mental health of men who constantly wonder why they’re not getting what the world taught them they should receive, it also sows the seeds of violent thinking in some. How many times have we as women (as is our basic right) refused the advances of men in public and they’ve responded angrily, and sometimes they’ve been laughed at by their peers as it happens. Humiliation is a degrading and powerful thing and for those who’ve been taught to react aggressively to situations, those with weaker self-esteems (thanks to a myriad of sexist reasons eg 'man up') and those with lack of proper mental health help (again, a huge male-centric problem eg;'boys don't cry'), it can lead to breeding resentment, self-loathing, sometimes suicidal tendencies but more crucially, the anger/vengeance/entitlement that resides in would-be stalkers, rapists and murderers. Elliot Rodger called his murderous rampage a “Day of Retribution” as he lamented “having been at college and still being a virgin” and said he had “no choice to exact revenge on the society that had “denied” him sex and love. He targeted a sorority whose members he had deemed the “hottest” at his college, “the kind of girls I’ve always desired but was never able to have”.

You can see I’ve been carefully trying to toe a line between not excusing the behaviour of men who treat women horribly as a result of all this and more, but also understanding the damaging conditioning in which society has woven. Teaching men “don’t rape” and “women don’t owe you anything” are basic steps, but we need to tackle issues deeper than that. We need to stop teaching everyone that being sexually/romantically desired is NOT the be all and end all of life, that being sexually/romantically desirable is not the sum of someone’s self-worth, and that there is NO shame in being without a partner or not being sexually active.

I understand that society’s obsession with sex/romance/attraction is deeply interwoven and its not going to be unlearned in a day, but can you imagine a world where teenagers are raised being told that their attractiveness/desire popularity doesn’t define their worth to others. Can you imagine a world where women don’t constantly make the majority of their concerns about how attractive people perceive them as before how kind/intelligent they’re perceived as? Can you imagine a world where people don’t feel pressured into sex as virgins, or pressured into relationships where they’re unhappy because it’s better than being alone? Where someone can be without a partner and be their own person without people assuming that its chosen solitude and not liberated independence.

I know romantic/sexual companionship is very central to how the majority of people operate. But consider this, a world where sex/romance isn’t a heavily pressurised must-do, but an opt-in and opt-out path where people can explore at their own pace and with their own limitations and boundaries without people constantly passing judgement on it. Its an idealistic idea, and seeing the way that asexuals are mistreated is another factor in just how society shames those who opt-out of sexual activity. But I believe a lot of this discussion can lead to more practical steps than saying “don’t rape”

How about;

Don’t shame anyone for being a virgin at any age.

Don’t shame anyone for not having a partner.

Don’t shame anyone for not being sexually active.

Unlearn phrases like “get lucky” and “winning the girl/heart”.

Don’t use insults aimed at size/functionality of genitalia.

Don’t insult people based on their appearance.

Just a few ideas to start undoing the entitlement culture that puts so many women in danger.

And of course, wearily I’ll state the disclaimers.

None of this behaviour discussed excuses even the most ‘harmless’ of catcalls, let alone the reprehensible behaviour of the worst offenders. I just think it’s important to understand the finer points of what breeds this consistent societally inbuilt violence and hatred against women. I really really cannot state this too much, this is not a victim-blame, women do not deserve a single infinitesimal part of anything they've gone through just because they insulted some dude's penis.

Being sexually/romantically active is never ever a bad thing of course provided it’s legal, safe and fully consensual. It just shouldn’t be the only path that people feel forced to take.

Briefly, someone might argue that its okay for me to promote that being sexually inactive is all peachy keen is hypocritical when I'm in a happy relationship, but if I was single, you could just as easily argue that I'd be trying to validate being without a partner for my own gratification.

And yes. We know. Not all men. I know plenty of people, not just men who see past a lot of the shaming and conditioning, and continue to liberate themselves from society’s warped expectations of what they should be doing with their lives. But try this, YES ALL MEN are subject to this sexual/romantic obsession that the world forces on them. When a director chooses to have a man portrayed as the butt of a joke because he’s rebuffed by a woman, he’s sending out a message to all men that some of their worth is determined on whether a woman accepts their affections. Whenever a man snidely jokes to his friends that someone he knows can’t get a woman, he teaches his friends that their lives are only validated on whether they can attain partners. Not all men may not be predatory. But all men are targeted by this conditioning. And as a result of all this, all women are afraid.

Followup: Men receiving non romantic affection is largely shamed as well and as a result its not nearly as common as it should be. Men receiving platonic affection doesn't happen nearly as much as it should, because men are taught that platonic affection is never platonic because if it comes from men it must be gay, and if it comes from women, it must come from a place of attraction. This can tie into the larger discussions already at hand regarding men's mental health and the lack of support it recieves.

[chenvs3000]

This Is Just The Beginning

Although this class may be coming to an end, our journey as nature interpreters is just beginning. As we reach the end of the semester, I wanted to revisit the three main questions we’ve been asked throughout the semester: (1) who am I as an interpreter, (2) who is my audience, and (3) how can I make this experience meaningful (Beck et al., 2018).

First, who am I as an interpreter? Just because I don’t have a job as a nature interpreter, doesn’t mean I can act as a nature interpreter for the people I interact with in my life. I have two main identities as a nature interpreter: (1) a citizen and (2) a scientist. How I interpret nature in these two roles may differ, but I still feel a moral obligation to spread awareness about nature, conservation, and sustainability everyday.

This class hasn’t necessarily taught me anything new about nature, I know just as much about the environment as I did in January. But the key thing I have learned is how to share this knowledge. As a citizen, I have learned how I can converse with those around me in a way that I can spark an interest in nature and inspire them to live sustainably on their own terms. Nobody likes to be forced or pushed to live a certain way, but effective nature interpretation can inspire people to change all on their own. This is tied to my personal ethical belief that nature interpreters must have autonomy. Autonomy means that individuals have a right to self-determination, that is, to make decisions about their lives without interference from others. This essentially means that we can teach people and try and inspire them to continue their personal journey and relationship with the environment, but at the end of the day we can’t force them or judge them for not being more proactive about conservation. I have also learned new ways to interpret my research findings better as a scientist. I have learned that writing about new findings isn’t enough, and for any type of presentation to be meaningful you must explain why it is important in a broader environmental context. The most important lesson I have learned is that role of interpretation is to make intellectual connections between what the audience already knows and new information I am trying to provide, and make emotional connections so they can learn why something is important and why they should care about it.

Another key aspect about who I am as an interpreter relates to who I am as a person. My privileges, personal learning style, ethics, and beliefs all impact who I am as a person. And while these facets of my identify can sometimes help me connect with my audience, they can also hinder my connection with them as well. For example, my learning styles are spatial and interpersonal. I learn best with mind-maps or charts connecting ideas and bouncing ideas of others and actively discussing topics. It’s quite funny because me and my roommate discovered we have completely opposite learning styles as hers are intrapersonal and logical-mathematical. She often found when we studied together, my talking and disusing would distract her and hinder her from thinking about topics and understanding them – but I couldn’t understand them without talking about aloud with someone else. I used to always approach teaching as if I was trying to teach myself, but I have learned that everyone learns differently so this teaching style isn’t always effective. I have learned that I must manipulate how I present in a way that anyone could understand and learn from my presentation.

A picture I took using self-timer in Killarney, ON with my roommate Sarah - the one with a completely different learning style than me. 

Second, who is my audience? Like I said previously, sometimes I’m may be interpreting to my friends and family, and sometimes I may be interpreting in a professional setting to strangers. As an individual, there are certain approaches I can take to spark an interest in nature while I have their attention (Beck et al., 2018). First, you have to approach conversations with a good-natured demeanor, because a brash or confrontation demeanor can cause the listener to feel attacked or not want to listen to what you have to say. This is especially important when talking about touchy subjects or controversial topics like religion, politics, or using live animals for education. I’ve also learned to emirate confidence. I can get nervous especially in front of groups or strangers, so this is easier when I’m talking with close friends and family. But I’ve notice when listening to others speak that confidence promotes engagement and active listening, and really helps the audience believe in the credibility of the facts and be inspired by the information – especially when the presenter is visibly enthralled and excited about the topic. And lastly, I’ve learned that enthusiasm and passion is contagious. The energy you surround yourself with is the energy you bring into your life. I have such a deep love for the environment, but not everyone seems to always think its as cool as I do. But when you speak and are truly excited about what your talking about, you create an atmosphere of inspiration. I pressure my mom not to rake up the leaves this past fall because I learned that leaves can provide over-winter habitat for bees, and provide lots of nutrients for the soil in the spring. She thought I was crazy and hated the idea because “leaves are messy”, but my passion and visible enthusiasm about doing this is what ultimately convinced her that this must be important because of how excited I was about it.

A picture I took of my tree plant crew. I hired this amazing group of people to work on my crew this past summer, and they have listened to many of my passionate talks about nature - teaching them about the importance of replanting forests, and how the results of their work will quite literally live on for 70+ years. 

As a scientist, the internet and social media are really some of the only platforms to promote research papers and make new research findings available to the public. Working with professors and academics I have learned that social platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn, and personal websites/blogs are great ways to spread research. Some professors even become guests on podcasts to talk about their research. The mantra in Richard Louv’s book The Natue Principle is that the more high tech our lives become, the more nature we need (Hooykaas, 2021). And while I agree with this belief, this course has also taught me that technology can be a steppingstone to developing a relationship with nature. May people these days live in urban cities where it is difficult to find a place nearby where they can escape and experience nature, and this can be especially impactful for children. But, as we have learned, the internet and virtual teaching approaches can actually be very effective for nature interpretation. Technology can provide a doorway to teach children about nature and provoke their curiosity. Interpreting nature consists of helping people to fall in love with nature and accepting that protecting and conserving something requires us to love it first, and to do so we need to know it. Technology is one of the most effective tools we have to spread environmental messages, and introduce the public to new topics, and hopefully we can inspire them enough to keep wanting to learn and do more.

A screen capture from the website for the lab I work in at Dalhousie University. We use this website, along with twitter and LinkedIn accounts to promote new research papers written by members of the lab. https://www.seafloormapping.ca/

Finally, how can I make this experience meaningful? I’ve touched on this a couple times in the paragraphs above, but I truly believe that the way to make a presentation special is about shifting your audience’s perception. Interpretation is about opening people’s minds to wonder and new ways of perceiving the world, beyond normal every day thinking (Beck et al., 2018). It’s very similar to seeing the world through the eyes of a child, romanticizing the mundane, and learning to love nature in its raw and chaotic forms. In summary, it’s not about making your presentation special, its about showing your audience that nature is special – and as a result your presentation will become inspiring and meaningful. There are certain approaches to do this effectively depending on your audience, but the key role of interpretation is the same no matter who you are or who you are presenting to.

I have two questions for you to think about after reading this post:

(1)  In what role(s) do you see yourself applying what we have learned in this class. It could be as a park guide, a parent, a mentor, a researcher, or a friend. (Remember, anyone can be an interpreter)

(2) Looking back, who as been an unexpected/unofficial nature interpreter in your own life. Maybe it’s a family member who first introduced you to nature, or a teacher who took you on a field trip. 

Thanks for reading:) - Claire

Sources: 

Beck, L., Cable, T.T., & Knudson, D.M. (2018). Interpreting cultural and natural heritage for a better world. Sagamore Venture Publishing LLC.

Hooykaas, A. (2021). Unit 10: Nature Interpretation’s Role in Environmental Sustainability [Course Website]. University of Guelph Courselink. https://courselink.uoguelph.ca/d2l/le/content/666945/viewContent/2597605/View

Hookyaas, A. (2021). Unit 08: The Role of Technology in Nature Interpretation. CourseLink. https://courselink.uoguelph.ca/d2l/le/content/666945/viewContent/2594169/View.

[hatari-translations]

hello I was wondering if you could translate a Matthías' discussion with Lýsa – Rokkhátíð samtalsins on the video shown on Facebook? It won't let me post the link in this ask but it was on their facebook page 06/09/19 and it's 32 minutes long. Takk fyrir :)

Wow, I managed to find one video and do that one only to then realize that one was only 27 minutes and the 32-minute one you were actually pointing to was a continuation of the same panel. Well, otherwise I might have blanched at the idea of watching an entire hour-long panel discussion, but apparently I did.

I’m not translating the whole panel because I would die, but I’ll do all of Matthías’s bits plus any relevant context. This is a panel discussion titled “Couch talk: Does art reflect society?”; as that implies, mostly they’re discussing the nature of art, but Hatari also comes up.

(Incidentally, this panel is where that video from Twitter I made a best effort to translate the other day was from! So if you wanted to know the actual context there, it’s here.)

The speakers on the panel, as introduced at the start, are:

- Matthías Tryggvi Haraldsson, “musician, multimedia artist, author, journalist, but mainly I think he’s a playwright”- Jón Gnarr, “author and comedian, actually also a playwright” (also known as the singer of the Spillingadans sketch)- Lóa Hjálmtýsdóttir, “comic artist and musician”- Harpa Þórsdóttir, “museum director of the National Gallery of Iceland”

The first of the two videos is here.

The first question is just what comes to mind when you contemplate the question of whether art reflects society. On this, Matthías says:

Einmitt. Ég held að það séu ekkert nema þversagnir sem komi upp úr því að kryfja þessa spurningu, út af því að ég er sjálfur svo oft í mótsögn við sjálfan mig, þegar ég fer að velta þessu fyrir mér. Ég held að óhjákvæmilega þá erum við í samtali og einhverskonar sambandi við samtímann, en ég myndi samt aldrei gera þá kröfu til listarinnar að hún þurfi að réttlæta sig með pólitík eða samtali eða því að vera að ávarpa nútímann. Ég held það sé algengur misskilningur í garð listarinnar að hún innihaldi upplýsingar eða skoðanir, eða sé með einhverjum hætti bókstafleg, og ég held hún geri það… hún getur gert það, vissulega, hún getur gert svo margt, en þarf alls ekki að gera það, og gerir það sjaldnar en maður kannski heldur. Hún inniheldur ekki endilega upplýsingar eða merkingu, hún inniber eitthvað… annan skilning eða skynjun líka. Þannig að ég bara, ég veit það ekki, sko. Ég er alveg gáttaður gagnvart þessari spurningu.

Translation:

Right. I think all you’ll get from dissecting this question is paradoxes, because I myself so often just start to contradict myself when I start to think about this. I think inevitably we are in a dialogue with, and some kind of relationship to, modern society, but I’d still never demand art justify itself with politics or a dialogue or addressing the modern day. I think there’s a common misunderstanding of art that it contains information or opinions, or is somehow literal, and I think it… it can do that, of course, it can do so many things, but it doesn’t have to, and it does that less often than you might think. It’s not necessarily informational or meaningful, it can incorporate some… some other understanding or perception. So I just, I don’t know. I’m speechless before this question.

Jón Gnarr says he dabbled in surrealism, and that he’s since then been accused of doing surrealistic comedy. Matthías cuts in with “Accused of.”

The host mentions that the three of them on the sofa, the artists, all use multiple very different tools in their art and are working in different media. Matthías says “Classic Iceland.” She adds, “You’re multitalented artists.” She asks what’s the best tool for doing this sort of social commentary in art, and starts with Matthías because Hatari’s Eurovision act is still very fresh in all of our memories (Matthías does an awkward little fist pump). She asks if we are to conclude music or performance art is the best medium for political commentary. Matthías responds:

Skilvirk tól til að ávarpa samtímann eru kannski tól sem ná til margra, og það var mikill munur til dæmis á Eurovision og fleiri sýningum sem ég hef staðið að, að allt í einu er áhorfendafjöldinn talinn í einhverjum milljónum sjónvarpsskjám Evrópu en ekki þessum tugum eða kannski hundruðum sem manni tekst að selja leikhúsmiða. Þannig að ef maður er bara að tala um að ná til, þá vissulega var það nýjung, og kannski tónlistin geti náð þeim - ég veit ekki hvort það sé hæðum eða þeirri útbreiðslu á, er rosa “mainstream” - getur verið það. Sem er rosa - það er rosa mikið vald í því, rosa mikill kraftur, og þar af leiðandi rosa mikil ábyrgð líka. En listrænt séð, valdamesta tólið er alltaf bara það sem ljá sköpuninni farveg, og það er bara ólíkt milli allra sem spreyta sig, held ég. Þannig að mér finnst leikritun og Eurovision bara jafnkraftmikil þannig, það fer bara eftir hugmyndinni og hvert hún fer. Og mér fannst svo sem gott að nefna þennan vinkil, eða hvað það var, samtímann, pólitík, listamenn - maður veit ekki hvar maður flækist í þetta, en maður er það óhjákvæmilega, og við höfðum ekki hugmynd um að umsókn okkar í Eurovision myndi spírala á þann hátt sem hún gerði. Þannig að mér finnst mjög gott að nefna þetta samtal við samtímann hringiðu, og maður veit ekki alltaf hvert hún fer.

Translation:

Efficient tools for speaking to the modern day are perhaps tools that can reach a lot of people. There was a big difference between for example Eurovision and other shows that I’ve organized, how suddenly the audience numbers in the millions of TV screens in Europe instead of the dozens or maybe hundreds that you can sell a theater ticket to. So if you’re just talking about reach, of course that was a novelty, and perhaps music can reach the - I don’t know if it’s heights, or the reach, it’s very “mainstream” - it can be. Which is very - there’s a lot of power in that, a lot of force, and therefore a lot of responsibility as well. But artistically, the most powerful tool is always just what sparks your creativity, and that’s different for everyone who’s trying it out, I think. So I think playwriting and Eurovision are equally powerful, in that way, it just depends on the idea and where it leads. And I thought it was good to mention this angle, or whatever it was, modern society, politics, artists - you don’t know where you get entangled in all this, but you inevitably are, and we had no idea that our application for Eurovision would spiral the way it did. So I think it’s appropriate to call this dialogue with modernity a vortex, and you don’t always know where it’s going.

Lóa says, “I was going to say, about plays and Eurovision, that in my mind I think the play lives longer, because the other is so tied to the spring where it’s performed, and then maybe a bit from there, whereas the play somehow… oh, I don’t know.” Matthías suggests, “It gets republished when I die and so on.”

Later, after the host asks how Lóa channels it when she feels righteous anger about something, Lóa talks about how really she’d be most inclined to just write a Facebook post; she talks about how she’s tried to get off Facebook because she didn’t like becoming obsessed with likes and shares all just preaching to the choir. Then she mentions how Eurovision is a platform that’ll reach a lot of people who don’t already agree with you. Matthías adds:

Má ég koma með innskot í þetta? Út af því að þú varst að tala um einhverja réttláta reiði, og hvaða miðil maður myndi setja hana í - það verður bara oft svo banal þegar maður sér svo skýrt ásetninginn í listaverkinu, og þess vegna þegar þú fórst að tala um þessa réttlátu reiði og hvar maður myndi miðla henni, þá finnst mér mjög rökrétt einmitt að bregðast við með einhverjum pistli, þar sem þú ert bara bókstaflega að segja skoðanir. En þegar maður sér það yfirfært yfir á listamenn, þá verður það oft hvorki skoðuninni né listaverkinu til framdráttar, út af því að það er svo tvívítt.

Translation:

Can I add something to this? Because you were talking about some righteous anger, and what medium you’d channel it into - it just tends to become so banal when you can see so transparently the agenda behind the art, and that’s why when you started talking about that righteous anger and where you’d channel it, I think it’s very reasonable to react with some kind of article, where you’re literally just voicing your opinion. But when you see that projected onto artists, it often diminishes both the opinion and the art, because it’s so two-dimensional.

Harpa mentions in relation to Eurovision that visual artists kind of envy not getting to have the kind of megaphone that a musician has. Matthías says: “Maybe what we need is a Euro- really Eurovision should be called Euro-hearing, and Euro-vision should be visual arts competition.”

The second video is here; it does not seem to pick up immediately after the end of the other video, but since a panel like this being an hour sounds about right, I imagine we’re not losing too much in between.

It starts with Lóa saying something about “after losing those art awards”; she’s giggling a bit too much for me to understand entirely what she’s saying without knowing what preceded it. At this, Matthías says “I don’t know, it might put it in context.”

Jón Gnarr mentions how we are all slaves to capitalism, Matthías nods deeply.

Jón Gnarr talks also about the distinction he’s always felt there is between comedy and entertainment. He thinks in a way entertainment value is why Donald Trump is president of the US, producing headlines and bizarre events like a reality TV show, and we march along with it because we’re all within this system of capitalism. Matthías nods emphatically again. Jón Gnarr for next Hatari member 2k20.

Next, the host asks: as consumers of art, what medium or presentation or particular artists tend to move you the most and get you to think? Lóa talks about the emotions she felt seeing an exhibition by a relatively unknown woman whose work inspired later, better-known artists, and how she’d been kind of resistant to visual art for a while because she feels like she knows too much to be able to enjoy herself properly looking at visual art, but still knows too little to be a good artist. In response to this, Matthías says:

Mér finnst þessi - hvað sagðirðu, þessi mótþrói, svolítið góður punktur, út af því að um leið og þú myndar náin tengsl eða sekkur þér í eitthvað, ég held það eigi bara við um öll fög, ekki bara miðla í listum, en ef ég tala bara um leikhúsið, þá er ég núna búinn að flækja mig inn í það, og þá fer maður fyrir vikið að taka rosa nærri sér, bæði gott og lélegt, og leikhúsfólk getur verið rosa sárt ef það kemur af lélegri sýningu, eða eitthvað rosa upprifið yfir góðri, og mér finnst það svo fallegt að taka því bara nærri sér sama hvað manni finnst. Ég held ef maður myndi fara í Listasafn Íslands og hneykslast bara rækilega þá væri það held ég bara sigur, eða vera rosa ánægður. Því dýpra sem maður grefur sig ofan í eitthvað, því meira verður þetta svona mótþróa haltu mér-slepptu mér samband við það.

Translation:

I think this - what did you call it, this resistance, is a pretty good point, because as soon as you form a close connection or really sink yourself into something, I think this applies to anything and not just art mediums, but if I just talk abut theater, I’ve now gotten myself entangled in that, and then as a result you start to take it really personally, both the good and the bad. Theater people can be really upset exiting a bad show, or just ecstatic over a good one, and I think it’s so beautiful to just be able to feel it so strongly, regardless of what it is that you think. I think if you visited the National Gallery of Iceland and just really bristled at something, that’s a victory, or if you’re incredibly happy. The deeper you get into something, the more you get this resistance-based hold-me release-me relationship to it.

Jón Gnarr describes how he just can’t deal with music - he has written music, but if he’s in a place that’s playing music for more than ten minutes, he just has to leave or ask them to turn it off. Matthías seems very amused. He has similar difficulties with theater, and Matthías says “As a playwright.” Jón Gnarr talks a bit more about this and how TV is the art form closest to his heart. Matthías asks, “Do you feel offended by bad shows? If there’s something you’ve been told to watch, and you take the time, and you just think it sucks - does it upset you?” He says yes, that he’ll actually get kind of mad about it.

The host asks about the time that passes between something happening and being relevant and when artists can produce art in response to it (this is the bit that was in that Twitter clip):

Matthías: Eins og þú málar þetta upp núna þá er eins og það komi eitthvað í fréttirnar og [snaps fingers] og ég fari beint heim og semji lag, bara [holds the microphone like he’s performing a Hatari song], og það sé bara svona “buzzer”, tveim mánuðum seinna kemur viðbragð Hatara við, hérna, því að það sé kominn nýr dómsmálaráðherra, eða eitthvað svona. Ég held það sé ekki alveg…

Jón Gnarr: Þá er hann kannski búinn að segja af sér.

Matthías: Já, þá er hann kannski búinn að segja af sér. Fullt af lögum sem við höfum ekkert birt, bara út af því að það er… Nei, það er ekkert að því.

Translation:

Matthías: The way you’re presenting it here, it’s like something’s in the news and [snaps fingers] I just go straight home and write a song, just [holds the microphone like he’s performing a Hatari song], and it’s just a buzzer, two months later you get Hatari’s reaction to, like, the appointing of a new justice minister, or something like that. I don’t think that’s quite…

Jón Gnarr: By then maybe they’ve already resigned.

Matthías: Yeah, by then maybe they’ve already resigned! A bunch of songs we never even published, just because… No, nothing wrong with that.

The host says something about Hatari in response to this, but I can’t make it out.

Matthías continues:

Nei, þetta er meira svona eitthvað samkurl eða hringiða eða eitthvað kosmos sem við erum öll flækt í - Hatari, dómsmálaráðherra, Eurovision, við sem listamenn - það er ekki beint listamenn sem viðbragð við einhverjum atburði, heldur eru atburðirnir og listamennirnir einhvern veginn í sama drullupollinum, og úr verður nýr dómsmálaráðherra og nýtt lag eftir Hatara, og þetta er allt viðbragð við sama drullupollinum, myndi ég halda.

Translation:

No, it’s more like some kind of mishmash or vortex or some cosmos that we’re all entangled in - Hatari, the justice minister, Eurovision, we as artists - it’s not exactly artists reacting to some event, but rather the events and the artists are somehow all part of the same sludge, and from it you get a new justice minister and a new Hatari song, and it’s all a reaction to that same sludge, I think.

Lóa says the only artist who she thinks can respond to events in real time is Hugleikur [Dagsson, comic artist]; Matthías seems to have been about to suggest the same.

An audience question brings up how often society reacts to art just as art can react to society.

Jón Gnarr talks about how when he creates characters, he feels like he’s just a medium contacting people who already exist somewhere in another dimension somehow - people ask him “How did you come up with that?” and he doesn’t really feel like he came up with anything. (As a writer, I relate to this.) The host notices Matthías wants to say something.

Nei, já, ég tengi bara við þetta, og að sjálfsögðu er góður punktur að samfélagið bregst við listinni eins og listin bregst við samfélaginu. Maður kannski fer að lesa svolítið bókstaflega í hlutina ef allt á að vera viðbragð við einhverju ákveðnu. En ég tengi líka við þetta, að ég held það sé rosa ríkjandi hugsun, eða það er svona sterkt í okkur, að hugsa um listamanninn sem einhvern svona snilling, sem fær gáfulega hugmynd, eða gáfulega skoðun, sem hann ætli aldeilis að miðla af listfengi til þess að breyta skoðunum okkar sem horfa, út af því að það sé betri skoðun, sem hann veit. Þetta er svona misskilningur, sem… oft veit maður ekki alveg… Maður er að káfa á einhverjum þversögnum eða einhverju sem maður skilur ekki alveg sjálfur, og eitt leiðir af öðru, og maður hafði einhverja hugmynd um hvert það átti að fara í byrjun, en hún fer annað, og hún verður einhver hringavitleysa, þannig að… kannski dettur maður þá inn á eitthvað sem er svona rosalega gáfulegt eða á undan sinni samtíð, en ég held það sé ekkert endilega persónunni að þakka.

Translation:

No, well, I just relate to that. And of course it’s a good point that society responds to art the same way art responds to society. You might start to read things a bit too literally if everything is supposed to be a response to something in particular. But I also relate to that. I think it’s a very common point of view, or there’s a strong impulse in us, to think of an artist as some kind of genius, who has some intellectual idea, or an intellectual opinion, that he’s totally going to communicate artistically in order to change the opinions of us viewers, because it’s a better opinion, that he knows. It’s kind of a misunderstanding, which… often you don’t really know… You’re groping at some paradoxes or something you don’t really understand yourself, and one thing leads to another, and you had some idea where it was supposed to go at the start, but then it goes somewhere else, and it becomes some circular nonsense, so that… maybe you stumble onto something that’s sounds really smart or ahead of its time, but I don’t think that’s necessarily due to the person.

Then, Jón Gnarr: Yeah, I think often we’re doing artists a disfavor by asking them stuff as if they’re…

Matthías: Smart.

And that’s about it for what Matthías says in the panel! Man, I agree pretty hard with just about everything he said there.

[byastrodust]

My honest to god opinion about Larry

I do realize that this is a devastating time for the fandom, yet certain reactions to Félicité’s passing got me thinking. ((This post has nothing to do with that but I might sum up my thoughts on that topic later)).

Let me start with a couple of disclaimers before anyone comes at my throat.

- I’m 23 years old, I’d like to believe I’m a grown ass adult and I rarely concern myself with problems that are not actually mine (I simply don’t have the time ok)

- I DO read (or occasionally write) Larry fanfic for ONE reason: the idea of them as a couple, their dynamic is interesting and appealing and it had a wide audinece. AKA I enjoy the literature.

- there was a time when I was a firm believer of ‘Larry’ but that’s gone now

- also I’m not trying to spread hate, it’s all just my opinion which I’m just as entitled to as you are to yours. If you don’t think the way I do I respect that and we’ll agree to disagree. OK? Cool?

Here’s the TEA ::

1. Larry? Old news.

I don’t think that Harry and Louis are a couple. Tbh I don’t think they’re really friendly anymore even. Why? Because their LACK OF INTERACTION. And for those who will have excuses here’s how I see it. Niall/Harry, Niall/Louis, Liam/Louis had no problem with interacting, going to each other’s shows etc. But all H&L did was awkwardly acknowledge each other’s existence and solo carrier, usually when they’re asked. Yeah they were nice, because neither of them are assholes, but that’s about it. Also, they’re no longer tied to their old management so I highly doubt their lack of interaction comes from a management standpoint. It’s simply not logical. (Also if you really think about it, fans lose their shits when H&L and even mentioned in the same context, what idiot of a management team would not utilize that free promo if they were in fact a couple/friends. This aspect never made sense to me. Let’s be real, show biz is finally(?) realizing that they can market ‘gay’ and it sells. Again, I could write a whole post on that.) So, naturally, their lack of interaction to me clearly indicates that they are not in close proximity to each other. Are they both in London? So am I and millions of other people, it’s simply not substantial enought to count as ecidence.

2. The fandom phenomenon

Is it too late to mention that I’m a psychology major, specializing in fandom mentality and toxic obsessions? Oh well. Here’s my two cents on Larry from a semi(? I’d like to think about myself as a pro but boy I still have years to get there) professional point of view.

Larry shippers are intense, extreme and compulsive. But it’s ok. I’m not here to give anyone that bitter pill of reality and if you want to believe that Larry’s married, living in a cute cottage with a white picket fence, who am I to shatter that picture? Believe it or not, idealization is actually healthy to a certain degree. BUT. The god honest truth is that Larry is a phenomenon created and fueled by obsessive fan behavior and refusal of hard case evidence. I’m sorry to burst a bubble but how many times did they deny Larry? A lot! Even Zayn did in his book (btw who the fuck knew Zayn had a book wow) after cutting all legal ties with 1D. And he was bitter. So if Larry was real, Zayn had the perfect opportunity to expose it. Instead he said that the allegations strained their friendship and it hurt them. Liam said something similar in an Out magazine interview as well (soz I didn’t fact check so feel free to correct me). Why do so many people still believe that Larry is real? Because of the way fans built up their relationship. And here I have to say that I do not exclude the possibility that at some point they might have been more than friends. Boyfriends, fwb, kissed once? Idk. Do I personally believe that any of that happened? No. But it is a possibility. And I see why people would be so hooked on their relationship. But here’s my theory.

You don’t ship Louis and Harry. You ship who you think Louis and Harry are. You ship the idea. Frankly, the fans don’t know them, they only know their public persona, a carefully crafted social construction.

That doesn’t mean that the ‘real’ Harry and the ‘real’ Louis is different from their public persona. It’s more like they’re extentions of each other. Just like you have different personas: who you are with friends, with family, how you behave online or in real life. These personas all build up the personality and they cannot be separated, yet neither is true without the others. (Phew got a little carried away in the shrink bs sorry)

So what fans know is one of their personas (and with celebrities you also have to consider that their public persona is always shaped by the fans’ perception).

In English: fans created Larry and their belief makes it real for them (kinda like in the first season of Supernatural when they hunted a monster that was created by the town’s belief in it)

So for all those reasons, I question the validity of Larry Stylinson. From a completely neutral (well sorta) standpoint it is clear that Louis and Harry are not a couple, but I do see why people want them to be. Honestly, I think this whole thing got a little out of hand and with media outlets like Twitter and Tumblr I doubt it’ll slow down soon. However, the power of the fandom is damn impressive.

And now let me get to why I finally wrote this damn thesis on Larry.

3. What you think is not real

So with Félicité’s passing, the past couple of days I saw people complain about fans taking pictures with Harry on the basis of Larry. Mostly those comments say that fans should respect Harry’s grief and leave him alone. Here’s a couple things to consider (whether or not you believe in Larry)

- Harry is a grown ass adult and if he feels like fans are disrespecting his privacy he will not take pictures with them. It’s his decision and for the love of god don’t treat him like a child that can’t stand up for himself.

- more importantly (and it might hurt, I’m sorry) Harry might not grief Félicité at all. That sounds mean let me explain. Yes, her death is a tragedy, yes it is awful and unjust. But. Unless you had a personal relationship with the person passing it’s not grief, it’s projected sympathy. And that’s all right, it’s natural, and confusing the two is understandable. Here’s a personal example: when my best friend’s mum died I was devastated and sad but I wouldn’t necessarily say I grieved, because I was not in a personal relationship with her. We talked sometimes, we liked each other but that’s it. And I’m not a piece of shit becuase of it. It’s just natural. Same with Harry. I’m pretty damn sure that he feels awful for Fizzy, for Louis, for the situation but that might not be greif. Because it doesn’t affect him personally. So people asking photos of Harry isn’t the same like they’d ask Louis (now that would be outright disrespectful)

Soooooooooooo.

Tbh this is something I wanted to address for a long time but I never had the time or the will to type it. Of course I could be totally wrong, that’s always a possibility. And if you think I’m just talking out of my arse, I respect that.

Actually, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Especially if you believe in Larry.

Please be civil and kind. I’d love to start a conversation.

There are so many more topics I could and would love to address, so I might be back with another lengthy one.

🖤

//footnote: the whole Larry fanfiction thing is a whoooooole another story, but I personally don’t think that shipping and writing/reading fanfiction has anything to do with actually pushing and believing in Larry. A good fanfic I appreciate lol//

[nightrainlily]

DAY TWELVE: WE MAKE OUR OWN FAMILIES

each run is more beautiful than the last. I went yesterday north to a neighboring village, then to another, and then back. the first one I visited was so tiny that I later asked Johnny what people do there. this morning, I ran slightly farther than intended because I made a turn onto a path which looked very legit, but which ended abruptly in the forest, without outlet. I then ran through the brush in the general direction of our house, with just a little bit of panic. but it was fine! I made it out the other side, into a field of beautiful sunflowers. so, I suppose it was worth the trouble.

I came back to find our whole party gathered around the kitchen island, talking. today is our last day in Burgundy, and while John is returning to Paris with us, he will be busy with work a lot of our stay there. effectively, my mother and he are coming to a close on their concentrated time together. if you’ve ever heard me talk about my uncle Johnny, it’s probably John that I’m talking about, and I call him my uncle because he and my mother have been best friends since high school, even though he moved literally to another continent six years into their friendship. when he first left, letters took weeks to travel, long distance calls were fifty dollars for fifteen minutes, and social media didn’t exist. our family contends that they were able to stay connected because they are truly soulmates and not even an act of God could tear them apart. and separation of the Atlantic in the 1970s was sort of like an act of God.

there is a kind of love in their relationship that I can only hope to achieve in my longterm friendships, a love that comes only with time and dedication. through this bond, Johnny has become my family, in a way that frankly some of my blood relatives with whom I have little to no relationship will ever be. I count it as a blessing that my mother has always instilled in me that family is a fluid thing, with more gray than black and white. I know that although my actual biological relations are few, I have a large family, a group of people who love me unconditionally.

when Johnny chose to emigrate to France, he was really only a few years older than Joelle and me. it was a decision that obviously changed the course of his life. I asked him if he was ultimately glad that he moved, and he said yes. although he was very close to his mother, I think that John also knows that we make our own families. he has found a community of friends, as well as Fred, with whom he can give and receive love. he does lament the language barrier; while of course he is fluent, he told me, “you’re never yourself in a foreign language.” he said that humor is difficult in translation, and that there’s a level of constant stress inherent in the process of conversation. Amalia even said that speaking English constantly on her Australian exchange was exhausting, and she started learning English when she was five. I can’t imagine for Johnny, who wasn’t fluent when he arrived here initially, how difficult the first few years must have been, before he adapted to this requirement of living in a foreign country. I would think you could never really relax. to combat this difficulty, he says he has an English night with two of his friends, expatriates from Ireland and England respectively. no French-speaking people are allowed, and they maintain their weekly appointment without fail, because it’s so important to have the break from the grind of translation.

Johnny has now lived in France for longer than he lived in America. of course, that fact is sad for us, my mother especially, because we selfishly want him closer to us, easier to access. the time difference limits contact, as does sheer distance. but John would probably never leave France; he dislikes American politics and has built a life here that he loves. the passage of his halfway point also coincided with the certification of his French passport and status as a French citizen. he decided not to give up his American citizenship, partly because my mother would be really upset, but also because a part of him is tied to those first twenty years of his life in the States.

I think about what I would do in his position. I can’t imagine living so far away from my mother, or from the things I know and which bring me comfort in their familiarity. learning a language and a culture is a process which can take a lifetime, and John still says he is surprised by some of the aspects of the French way of life that he just can’t quite digest. but in his time here, France has become his home.

I believe that people can have many homes over the course of their lives, and even multiple at once. for example, I hope to make Berkeley my home in the fall, but Phoenix will always be the home of my childhood. and for a time, both places will exist simultaneously, each owning different parts of myself. I think the perception that any place you choose can become your home is the key to being happy in whatever environment in which you find yourself. Johnny could not have survived a single Parisian winter without the conviction that this city could be his city. and I don’t think I’ll make it through a week of college without that same belief.

the fluidity of these ideas, home and family, have allowed Johnny, and honestly anyone else who leaves behind the world they know for a chance at a new life, to be truly happy in an alien environment. and it takes a special kind of courage to grasp the opportunity to make such a monumental change, for better or for worse. I’ve grown up with that inspiration in Johnny, and I hope that sharing just a glimpse into his story might inspire you too.

to the dreamers,

amaya

1. Julia - The Beatles

2. Nobody Else Will Be There - The National

3. Hounds of Love - Kate Bush

[rosedalemike]

The Mood: Blog #5 "Perception/Loneliness”

written Sunday April 8th at 5:36 am     Ever wonder what others think about you? Not that you should care what others think about you, but do you ever sometimes just wonder if maybe you were a dick/bitch to that someone when you didn't mean to be- and then on the other hand- way too nice/generous to someone who probably just talks shit about you? It happens to me a lot. It's probably one of the biggest reasons I'm traveling around by myself.

     Not that anything specifically like that came up this week. I've just been thinking about it more as I've finally been poking my head out of my basement to get back out to play shows. Just kinda like 'what does this person actually think of me? Did they actually just enjoy this show? Would they actually listen to my music regularly?' Not that they need to respect me or anything for me to like them. And, needless to say, I'm extremely grateful they came out to support anyway. It just sometimes makes me ponder things like: who is my actual demographic? What makes our distracted generation listen to an artist regularly? How/why can I make a stranger who has no idea what I do be completely invested in my art yet people who have seen me grow this garden for years suddenly have zero interest in Rosedale?

      Maybe some of those answers are relatable to reasons why I enjoy being alone. I know that probably sounds really sad to most people but hear me out...     

     Intro to sidetrack: I got into this topic with a long time fan at tonight's show. She was thanking me for being so nice and always inviting her out to shows. I had to tell her 'if only you knew how many people block me for that same gesture' (see blog #4). She was genuinely pumping my tires pretty good. Don't get it twisted- her boyfriend was right there the whole time and he was also cool A-F, as the kids say...

      She went on to say how she used to hang out with Hedley years ago whenever they were in town and they were rude dicks. She couldn't fathom their conversations. As easy as it might have been for me to jump on the freshly-greased "Hate-Hedley" bandwagon (kinda punny if you watch Trailer Park Boys) It got me thinking that maybe, as humans, when we're in our packs we often come across as unwelcoming. Especially bands! The inside jokes, the anything-goes-ness, the gear-geak battles/bro-downs. Looking back, I'm sure Rosedale sure fit that shoe for years! And I'd imagine macho sports teams come off as even more unwelcoming to strangers. (there I go- generalizing again...)

     But it's all perception- How do we perceive their inside jokes and harmless offside humour? Maybe Hedley were total dicks a few years ago, maybe they're not anymore. All I know is nothing really surprises me and I think even some of my favourite people get offended out of perceived context- not easily, per say- just out of common, outside perception. I'm sure I could go even more south and throw in some President Trump examples here but that dude gets enough external spotlight. And to clarify (before I get me a page-full of political/social facts that I have 0 any interest in); I'm neither a Trump or a Hedley fan...or Nickleback, for that matter...but I'm also not a total hater. I'm just saying they're prime examples of how perception and context have some serious horsepower especially in our ever changing world of social media/open-broadcasting.     

     Here's a wider, more harmless example of the two sides of perception that's a little closer to home; my set at Hard Luck in Toronto last Saturday. There was a high energy and big crowd in the room right as I was setting up. I played an ok set, nothing remarkable in my mind. But a very rare thing was happening; Humans were turning into Rosedaliens right before my eyes! They were feeding off of my music in ways only artists on the radio can relate to! They were eating up the positive message and yelling positive messages right back! The vibe was bliss! Nobody cared what anyone in the room might think of them. The phones were only out for "Eldorado's Climax" or to record/snapchat/livestream! After the set people were buying all the merch! I must have taken 15 photos with fans and strangers! Signed a few posters and CDs! Young, hip humans were telling me their stories! My tires were pumped way past any psi they've ever seen! Etcetera!!!

     Then I played London Ontario at the legendary Call the Office on the same night of the week, same time... (The only difference with this given Saturday was that there was no Easter/Passover excuses in my inbox.) But there were a total of maybe 15 people there. They were standing 30 feet away of the stage. I played/sang/delivered by far the best Rosedale set so far this tour with a proud smile on my face and, although the other bands and their friends kinda danced and inched closer towards the stage, not a single CD or shirt left the merch bins. Nobody asked to take their photo with me. Come to think of it, I was even getting the whole "This-dude-needs-a-band" vibe.

      So why did the mediocre Toronto performance get a way better response than the solid London set? Or even the relatively strong Brampton set that we filmed. It seems like it had nothing at all to do with me. It was entirely based on the crowd's perception! My good friend, Jonny (who is pretty knowledgeable with live music/performance/production), came out to both the Toronto show and the Brampton show. Even his perception was completely altered by these energized, Toronto meat baffles! Jonny thought the Toronto set was better. “You’re ready! Epic, prolific,” were his and his Toronto company’s words. He wished I'd filmed the Toronto show instead of Brampton. Kind of off topic (but, really, why I used the term "meat baffles"); Jonny also said the sound was bad in Brampton (and so did his Brampton company) and much better in Toronto. Where-as Bryan and Danny...and my mom... said that Brampton was the better sounding Rosedale show (and they were all also at the Toronto show!)

      So just because I had a generous, high energy crowd in front of the stage in Toronto, I was worth something to everyone in the room. I even sounded better, in Jonny’s opinion. People wanted pictures, autographs, and merch because their perception of Rosedale was a promising one. Yet, I could play the same exact set on the same night, same time, in a more intimate setting with a more solid performance and have my picture, signature, and merch less desired than just a couple more drinks. The other two bands played amazing sets as well. I was actually, genuinely blown away, like, fanboying on Adelaide’s guitarist, getting chills from Mermaids Exist’s harmonies etc. But they too set up their merch table for nothing. It is a very common display of how people's perception is strongly influenced by the context of their surroundings.

      The only person, arguably, in the room who felt...in the presence of greats- was myself! I know I played a legendary set and I'm 100% certain that if Adelaide and Mermaids Exist keep slugging away like that- they're gonna come built-in to everyone's iPhone 12s!

     This “perception-check” is nothing new to booking agents. They no longer accept buy-ons. (Of course I've tried!) Money can't buy you happiness, or a loyal following. Agents, labels, and managers want their bands playing to full rooms only. Intimate shows (as in half empty capacity shows...yes, I took the pessimist approach) are only creating negative perceptions. If, by some stroke of Modesty-Miracles, some of these rock star agents did stumble into reading this, they were thinking "No shit, Shirlock. Stop playing small shows" 5 paragraphs ago. I'm just letting everyone else know; the artist is about 10% responsible for impressing/entertaining the audience. The other 90% is the context of that room and a good chunk of that context is just simply the amount of people there. (other smaller pieces of the pie; venue decor/layout, sound engineering, staff, house music ...to name a few.) Maybe all of this is very obvious to most people already. I just wish solving all the pieces of that pie were easy or at least in my hands. But the modern ratio still just seems crazy to me, growing up in the punk/emo scene.    

      I think maybe another reason it seems crazy to me ties back to the fact that I'm alone a lot. When I'm alone I have more of an open mind and agenda. I think this could be the case for most people. There was one guy at the near-empty London show who was jumping up and down during my set. He was alone and so stoked. He didn't care what anyone thought- a proud new fan! I threw a pick perfectly into his hands at the end of my near-perfect set (#pingofftheforehead, Toronto show inside joke). He's been messaging my instagram all day. He didn't buy merch (he might have if there was a big generous crowd there, though) but he signed up and watched all of my youtube videos today.

      I think most people actually have a better time traveling/exploring/wondering out by themselves than they realize. I believe you're more accepting of different environments and cultural differences when you're by yourself. You're taking it all in and enjoying it. You're making new friends out of strangers who have no knowledge of your history as you have no knowledge of theirs. You feel like you can open new chapters of your own book and appreciate the fresh pages they're showing you, and consider the context. You might be thinking "so-&-so would love this" but chances are, if "so-&-so" were there, you'd likely be missing this too while off hanging at the bar or whatever.

      When you have your crew/family/entourage beside you for every door you open, life can start to pass you by. You might be having a great time with them and jel with them like peas and carrots, but the element of wonder and discovery isn't quite the same. It's sometimes like an invisible stress and I'd even go as far as to say that it is the main reason why bands break up on their first tour. Bands aside though, I've heard first-hand stories of good friends traveling together that went through episodes where they were so pissed off with each other that they wouldn't even talk to one another for hours. Sure, it could be the simple fact that you're now living with this friend/band hour-by-hour on this trip (Egos clash, ideas vary, mistakes affect everyone, true colours flourish etc.) and you're stuck with them for the next however-many-days. But I'm certain that a group-of-friends/family/band living together in their hometown would go over way better than living together in a new city every night. And traveling with a significant other- well that's an entirely different blog for a different day.

      I'm not sure if any of this is proven or factual. This is just me rambling at 5:30 am after a show. Another thing I hear a lot is "Mike, you just haven't found the right “one”/bandmates/friends". Fair enough. But maybe I'm just your classic degenerate- I could just be a weird lonely dinosaur that likes to roam alone. #lonewolf. But I think all of that coincides with the original point I made about being a dick to someone you actually really like/love. We've all done it, I'm sure. The nicest human in the world can be passive/harsh without realizing it. But as much as I think butting heads is inevitable when you're living together in uncharted land, there are friends that manage to really understand me and at least aim to dodge my weird pet-peeves (ie. guitar cases on stage). Of course, they can't drop their established lives/commitments to come travel around with me for months. So maybe there are layers to my solo-ness. (...loneliness sounded too sad.) 

LYRIC PARTY: 

Chasing the sun isn't my kind of fun I'd rather sit and catch snowflakes on my tongue When summers gone I won't be sad As you cling on to all the good times that you've had 'cause being alone isn't really all that bad - The Ataris "If You Really Want To Hear About It"

     But really, even when there's no stranger's pages or culture shock to take in, I have some great times by myself that I wouldn't be able to have with most company around. I wouldn't be able to write this blog in my bed at 5:30am. I wouldn't be able to listen to my new demos and imagine them mixed like my latest releases with my Westones on my 2 hour drive home from London. That, in itself, could easily be considered insanely narcissistic. And so could this; I love hanging out with myself! We get along very well. My tastebuds can be pretty inconsiderate to my gut's needs, and my lower brain is not too happy with the way upper brain has been handling brief encounters with the opposite sex, but alas, we're working on it!

      Another thing I like about being alone is that I'm pretty sure people like me more. Whenever I have friends around, it's almost like nobody wants to help with anything. And when I'm "working" away on something, a stranger might say something like "where's your friends? Why don't they help you with that?" As if to say "you need better friends, dude." It's really odd but it happens a lot and those little events tend to commit-to-memory for whatever reason. Kinda like that long-red-light that never fails to time out your drive perfectly. (One of the few books I've actually finished reading, "Stumbling On Happiness" (Daniel Gilbert), describes this human condition a bunch... took me three years to finish that damn book.) 

LYRIC PARTY: "Hangman, it's not your fault Commit this to memory The bright ideas are wasted and lost along the way" - Motion City Soundtrack "Hangman" (I could've sworn {or swore??} he said "For bright ideas always get lost along the way" then I looked it up... didn't look up sworn/swore though.)      Anyway, I guess this late night, scatter brained blog wants you to consider the context and surroundings when formulating an opinion/perception. And look at loneliness in a bright light. There are many positives. Don't ignore all your friends and family by any means, I'm just saying; A lot of people fear loneliness like they're gonna die alone and they need company at all times. "Alone time" is your most productive time. And productivity, as vague a term, is probably the healthiest form of instant gratification. So do something productive towards your goals the next time you're alone. And while you're at it, open up a new chapter to that old friend you later get to hang out with...

     Yeah, this one was all over the place. Thanks for reading though. If you made it this far, you're a trooper and I love you. 

Shows this week: Wednesday, April 11th - Ottawa, ON @ Mavericks -  10:00 set time, 19+, $8 cover https://www.facebook.com/events/321180534953651/ Thursday, April 12th - Kingston, ON @ Bar 56 - 9:30ish set time, 19+ish, $10 cover https://www.facebook.com/events/368799986934799/     Friday, April 13th - Potsdam, NY @ Hurly's/SUNY Potsdam -  7:30 doors/ 9ish set time - All Ages , FREE https://www.facebook.com/events/363889120774025/ Saturday, April 14th - Rochester, NY @ Firehouse - 8:00 doors/10ish set time - 21 +, $5 cover https://www.facebook.com/events/568521663507443 Sunday, April 15th - Pittsburgh, PA @ The Smiling Moose - 7:00 doors/ 9:00 set time, 21+, $8 tickets**/ $10 doors https://www.facebook.com/events/402443740204364/ Monday, April 16th - Cleveland, OH @ Grog Shop - 6:30 doors, 8:30 set time, ALL AGES, $8 tickets/$10 doors https://www.facebook.com/events/163297504327206/

[manicdepressivebipolar]

Parayno: The Psychology of Cheating and Moving On (Millennial edition)

Background on the Psychology of Cheating: I always get cheated on during my college days at Baguio, even if it is a fling or even when I am in a relationship. I never knew how cheating starts before, at one moment both you and your partner are just spending time together and then the next thing you know, he/she already has someone for “back-up”. There’s are specific/certain kind of emotion you elicit one is jealousy, second is anger and third is sadness and then you follow it up with the thought of not being enough or what have you done and not done to deserve the pain and the treatment that you just experienced that very moment.

My view on cheating was very simple, cause and effect. My relationships were like a redundant movie-like scenes. The happening was so redundant and almost as if it was deja-voo all over again every after another. My university year was as colorful as a festival. I was not those type of ladies who focuses on one goal, studies a week before exams and goes home before curfew. I was the exact complete different. I studied 30 minutes before every exam, goes home way past curfew, drunk, and I was happy-go-lucky person when it comes to my grades.

 Cheating was re-occurring to my entire college life and I fall for the same reason every single time. Until I got fed up. So the last two relationships I decided to observe the patterns of how the pattern of behavior is and will be to lead me into a conclusion. This theory will not only explain the similar patterns of behavir but also the logic behind why men and women cheat on their partner.

 This theory of mine will also go into details of the person who gets into the process of “moving-on” from a cheater/heartbreak and will also explain how redundant the process of moving on as well.

 The Case of “Gaby”

Gaby is my friend who is 21, we hang out for a few years during college. Gaby was more of an acquaintance than a friend actually. We shared only the topical secrets we have, the ones that are similar to the environment we move into. We have a lot of common friends but we don’t have the same common interest. She likes to party at night but stay at home during the day, she disregards school as if it was just her past time during the day time. I hung out with her every after school for coffee, drinks and other activities Gaby had a long-term boyfriend, Elijah. Elijah, when we first met, he looked really kind, sweet and obedient to the needs of Gaby. Their relationship seems to look perfect and it seems like there is more to expect from their relationship than the typical-average-relationship now-a-days. Millenials love to post whatever was/is happening in their sical life so, I kind-of watched most of their “stories” on instagram when they were still together. As usual , they portray the most “perfect” couple on social media but one afternoon Gaby asked me to go out wither and have  decent dinner and coffee with her. She told me that Elijah has been cheating on her for so long, that she could not handle the pain anymore Elijah was giving her. She kept crying until she started saying “ang tanga tanga ko” and hurting her self constantly with her left hand pounding her left leg. It was a sign of regret I guess… She told me that she endured the pain too long that it was an “enough” reason to leave their long term relationship. I told her todo what she thinks is the best for her mental health. I have observed them both on social media. Both of them seem to look happy , but of course that is social media. Elijah went to me one night and told me that, after all the cheating his heart is still with Gaby and he wished that she have never done that. On the other side, Gaby, already have moved on she is happy now with another guy and soon she is getting married.

  One on one interview with Elijah:

 I asked Elijah why did he do it when Gaby was willing to do so much for her and can offer him so much. Verbatim he said: “Mahal ko siya, oo, pero nakakasawa na kasi ung araw-araw nalang naming pag aaway ng wala namang rason. Diba? Nakakasawa na” and she kept blaming her because of her wrong doing by continuing “Bakit siya rin naman hidni ko siya pinipigilan pag lalabas sila ng mga tropa nya kahit ung mga lalaki pa kasama nya. Alam na alam mo iyon Minette” it was hard fo me respond that time because I just wanted his POV on why he did that but when I got to the bottom of it, I asked him directly “so bakit ka nga nag cheat? Ano ang rason?” and he said “ Hindi ko din alam”

 Cheating - As described in Merriam Webster Dictionary; to break a rule or law usually to gain an advantage at something (which includes lying). When you enter into a relationship there is a non-written rule there there are things you can and cannot do to your partner. Looking for someone other than your partner is considered as cheating and doing with other things like being intimate to other than your partner is considered as cheating.

 The psychology of cheating (reasons)

1) When a person has fallen out of love but not want to cut ties with their partners

2) When a person feels unappreciated in the relationship and someone other than your partner showed the slightest appreciation for him/her

3) When a person lacks attention within the relationship

4) Sexual Temptations

5) “Pambobola” which made his/her fall in-love with the one he/she is chatting with

6) Constant hanging out and falls for the “constant companion”

7) Revenge

8) Unsatisfied - When you feel that your partner is not enough/ good enough for you

 These are the reasons why men and women cheat. Cheating would not be possible if there is no one to give motive or at least self-motive. Rollo May defined love/agape as a healthy adult relationship blend all four forms of love. In a relationship it should include interest, patience, trust, understanding, all of these must go together so that a relationships has respect and commitment to each other so in that way cheating can be prevented.

 There are also instances where these goes together but there is this thing called “temptation” and you lose control of yourself at some point and gave in to the so-called temptation. Some people have a hard time saying “no”. In relation to this, if a person has a hard time in refusing invited to parties, to meet ups or whatsoever that involves the opposite sex or even the same sex and one has motive towards the other who is in a relationship then it will be gateway, a weakness to that person to refuse offers.

 “I was just being kind” excuse- This line is used for those who really had no intention of cheating but gave in to temptation.

” Kasalanan ko talaga” - Knows that he/she is going to cheat or cheating with his/her partner and kept it a secret but eventually his/her partner found out.

” Eh, ganoon din naman siya” - Both are not okay emotionally and physically unsatisfied with each other but still wants to be in ties with each other ” Mahal kita pero…” Cheated with his/her partner because partner is not satisfying enough at a specific aspect.

“ Minsan lang naman” - Made a choice to cheat on his/her partner already (knows what he/she is already into but still pursues it)

 And a whole lot more. Cheating for me is a choice you make. Even the slightest flirty jokes, the messages that meant something, keeping a secret to your partner about someone you’ve been seeing or talking to all these falls under cheating. Because if your love each other the tendency is that you focus on many things that will benefit for the both of you and to grow as healthy individuals by supporting each other’s goal and dreams. Relationships are too ideal and movie-like perceptions, there are bad days there are also good days but when the Agape is more prominent for each other, there is no need to find another person to waste time on and effort.

 The cycle of moving on from a bad break up

 I can assume that this cycle is applicable to everyone that has been into a bad break up with his or her partner. Unless he or she just played behind the bushes, made you a past time or if he or she found someone better than you (replacement) then he or she would not feel guilty at all to the break up event that he or she experienced.

 For the case of Gaby and Elijah, I can somehow assume that today, our millenia world has affected how we view relationships. Social media can portray so much happiness and how your life is doing and how perfect and in place everything is but in reality it is all a lie and it rots you. It prevents you on sharing to someone that you are not that kind of person that you portray on social media. They have portrayed such good example and character to people that views their “stories” on instagram but in reality both of them were cheating in the end. 

Cheating is not deserved by anyone in general because the pain it give the receiver is crucial, it alters sleep, thoughts, emotions and especially way of thinking. As if the effects are from a taken synthetic drug. I am very amused how love and pain can ruin us like any other kind of drugs. As if we are overdosed and gets all the side effects of the drug. The receiver of the pain even looses weight and may look a little bit off and different, even the way they eat, the way how people interact, it is either they are irritable or rather wont seem to care at all.

 There are several disadvantages of the pain received from cheating, number one is you loose so much focus on your daily life style, second is that you doubt yourself and question your self “what have I done wrong” to yourself and to your “ex”, third you lose apatite which follows your mood, your sleep, your physical well being or worse, your mental health.

 Some people really forces themselves to go back to the same person who have hurt them, why? Because comfort to the soul is the soul happiness. It is the comfort and understanding and the time span you have been together, enough to be a reason of forgiveness and getting back together or fixing the relationship and forget the bitterness and tragedy you have experienced. Both can be vulnerable and impulsive. Both can also regret decision that they make on the spot and ends up unhappy in the end so the cycle will continue until agreed to end the relationship in an unpleasant way (because both are already fed up with each other)

 Men always takes the leap first to go solo flight while women suffers the longest. The difference is that when a man is done having their pleasure or good time with other people he goes back the his comfort zone but when a woman moves on she grieves for so long enough to think and pick u herself and not going back to the same situation she just experienced so she find another way to feel comfortable with or without someone.

  Conclusions and assumptions

 Before, studies show that men cheat more than women but based on critical observations I can say that there is an equal results between male and females on cheating. Males can tend to be just “showy” or vulgar to the public when it comes to cheating due to the environment they move in. For example here in Baguio City (the case of Gaby and Elijah) They both were in the same environment so gossip is one fact to expose their cheating incidents especially with Elijah who has been known as Gaby’s “perfect boyfriend” for years.

You can only be accused of cheating if you get caught either in the naked eye or through phoning someone. Baguio City, the setting, is very small and in this town, people know people so in other words an exchange of news can travel fast in this town especially when you have a lot of common friends.

 Another conclusion is that men tend to get bored more because they have lesser attention span than females they lose focus easily hence, can find the “thrill” or the same missing feeling to someone that they think they can give an equal experience to what they are missing. I can relate this action or behavior same as using drugs. Once you get addicted to the feeling you tend to find it very often if the WANT is not being satisfied then you tend to look for that “wanted” feeling. In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs the first one to find is not affection but physiological needs. So, in other words most men cheat because of sexual drives and other thrill that goes with the physiological satisfaction.

 Women on the other hand, tend to cheat as well but in a very secretive manner. They know someone with motive but still tends to go to that person because women seek attention, affection (even though it is just for a short span of time which we call “fake love”) and comfort. Most f the women go with other guys to rant their feelings to their current situation to their partner and eventually men will absorb their weakness and the women will fall to the person who is capable of constantly reassuring her and comforting her. Women are always in denial for a faulty act they always wanted to have a straight-up image so they tend to be not vulgar whenever they do cheat. Some women are not fully aware they are cheating until they fall for the charisma of they guy who is showing him what she thinks she deserves. In relation to Maslow’s hierarchy of need women do cheat because of two reasons 1) Physiological needs and 2) Love and belongingness

 Overall, when it comes to both parties cheating there is nothing to expect than a bad break-up, as they say “there is no good in goodbyes” so whenever they do undergo the end part of the tunnel. They both part ways, they go on different directions.

 For the one that has received pain the most he/she tends to move on on slower because he/she will absorb and try to find his/her “self-worth” again before fully moving on or at least admitted to him/herself that he/she has finally moved on and moved out of the toxic situation that he/she is in.

 For the ones that has caused pain, after all the “good time” he/she has been through, his/her realizations will come late and may increase the chance of going back to his/her previous partner. “strike the iron while its hot they say” because while the receiver of the pain has not yet fully moved-on he/she may still accept his partner after the break up.

 Truly love is unexplainable, it does not even have its own concrete definition. For me so as cheating and moving on, it does not have a concrete singular definition why people do it but there are similar patterns of behavior that are observable through time and may make a further study about “why men cheat more than women” or measure how fast one can recover through a bad break up. I am in an awe how human behavior can have patterns with different situations.

[charlieharry1]

Five digital marketing sins that kill lead era Are you making essential digital advertising mistakes that affect lead generation?

Right here are the five most common ones we see groups make. In a global where there are 2 trillion google searches  Digital Marketing Company in Brighton every year, it’s tougher than ever to reduce thru the net noise. That’s why it’s so vital to invest in the right technique to virtual advertising and marketing. But among the net and the inbox, groups are making vital mistakes that at once have an effect on lead generation. Here are the 5 maximum commonplace ones we see. 

1. No longer focusing at the proper problems and keywords

people don’t choose you due to the fact they assume you’re the nice product or service, they select you because you provide the quality approach to their problem. Consultancy advertising interactions places it very properly – your product isn't always the hero of your corporation story, your patron is. Because of this a hit lead era is ready targeting the right people with the right issues, and understanding what keywords they use in on-line research. Look for longer keyword phrases that replicate how prospects are looking for answers. As an example, in case you’re focused on small organizations for touch management, try specializing in ‘a way to handle customer court cases’ in preference to ‘crm gadget for smes’. 

2. Message mismatch

that is wherein we start searching at the purchaser adventure. I see this mistake all of the time, and it’s a conversion killer. Here’s what normally takes place. I see a percent advert or acquire a sales email. The message grabs my interest and i’m inquisitive about studying extra. I click on the call to motion and am directed to a touchdown page. But the touchdown web page header isn’t at once tied to the message inside the name to motion. This is message mismatch. I’m enthusiastic about studying greater, however the organization is being coy approximately telling me what i want to know. I don’t have time for a detective assignment, so i close the browser window. Don’t do this. As a substitute, take your prospect on a adventure of matching messages. Right here’s an example. I’m on a eating place e mail list. I received an e mail with this subject line:

Read Also:-  Google has added a new feature to Google My Business for hotels

 New menu – 2 for 1 on all dishes

i like the eating place, i’m curious about the new menu and that i like the sound of 2 for 1. So i open it. The first element i see once i open the email is:

 They’ve matched the primary message from the subject line. Take a look at. The second one component i see is:

They’ve matched message number 

2. I’m getting the facts i notion i might get from the subject line. I’m glad i’m getting to know what i wanted to, so i preserve reading. I see some mouth-watering snap shots and examine approximately what’s developing at the restaurant. The call to action at the lowest of the email is: I click on that, and the landing page header is: and there’s a form proper there for me to pick the date and time for my booking. At each degree, this eating place is giving me exactly what i’m looking forward to. Reflect onconsideration on your emails, on line adverts, social updates and get in touch with to movement buttons – with every click on, ensure you fulfil the promise you’ve made to the reader. 

3. Going for the massive conversion too quickly

this sin applies to organizations selling excessive-cost products and services. If it costs lots of money, no longer many people are going to respond to something that announces ‘buy now’. It’s too big a jump. I’m now not equipped to hand over my credit score card info (or my recognition, if it’s a commercial enterprise purchase) with out studying more – and possibly speaking to a person. Break the purchasing procedure into small conversions. We often get clients to map it out using put up-it notes. Pick out what the chance is looking for at each degree, and create micro-conversions for each one. You can see an instance on the make home page. We sell digital advertising services. If you’re looking to put money into a brand new internet site, social media campaign or on-line advertising, your process is to talk to a few specialists, test their portfolios, study their method for your requirements and get a quote. If we placed a large section on our domestic page that ends with ‘ship us your brief’, very few people will chunk because it’s too massive a step. They don’t understand enough about us, and they'll now not even realize exactly what they need to do (that’s what they want us for). Rather, we recognized the micro-conversion – a internet site critique. Step one in digital marketing achievement is ensuring your internet site is running for you. So that’s the huge factor we ask possibilities to do on our domestic page. We were speaking to a patron these days who wanted to send an electronic mail linking to a weblog publish and a landing web page. The weblog submit would have a bit of perception on technology traits, and the touchdown web page could supply readers the opportunity to talk to a income adviser. 

4. We advocate you recognition on one intention according to conversation 99% of the time. When you offer more than one preference, potentialities are more likely to pick out not anything. As an alternative, show you recognize the problem and provide the single great subsequent step in the direction of an answer. In this purchaser’s case, we endorsed including key factors about the advantages of era trends inside the e-mail itself, bolstering the argument for clicking on to the landing web page. Then the touchdown page covered greater detail about product blessings and special gives, guiding possibilities to discuss their requirements with a income adviser. Giving a clear course indicates you’re an expert who know precisely what prospects need to do to clear up their problem. 

5. Not developing a nurturing funnel

just due to the fact potentialities aren’t equipped to convert now doesn’t mean they gained’t be ready later. And if they’ve offered now, they'll be ripe for pass-selling. Don’t allow the possibility neglect approximately you, or you leave out out on the ones destiny possibilities. Allow’s take those possibilities one by one. The first is the possibility that’s no longer geared up to transform. Those are humans you want to nurture. Maybe it’s a piece of remarketing. She decided not to buy the ones shoes, however if she sees that stunning suede enticing her as she’s scrolling via fb, she can also properly reconsider. If it’s a conference, ship a series of electronic mail invitations focusing on one of a kind elements of the schedule and what the prospect will learn. Tell a tale inside the months main up to the day, so by the point the registration closing date rolls around the prospect is worried about missing out on all of the cost you’re presenting. The second possibility is the repeat client. Now not most effective do you need to nurture possibilities via the buying procedure, you need to delight current clients and maintain them coming back. Amazon are masters at this with their ‘people who offered x also offered.’ emails. That’s smooth  Digital Marketing Company Edinburgh to do if you’re an ecommerce organization. However even in case you’re promoting a complex services or products, you want to be doing this. Have the income adviser or client courting manager flag new merchandise as they arrive in. E-mail imparting annual opinions to look if necessities exchange. Ship publications explaining how clients can get extra fee from their purchase.

[topicprinter]

With COVID being the topic that dominates our media, it’s pretty hard to get away from.While I’m not particularly interested in pandemics, I do find it an interesting and unique opportunity to observe human behavior. (As I imagine most of us marketers here do as well.)There are a few things I’d like to discuss in this essay:I’ve decided to split it up into multiple parts instead, so today we’ll just examine point i.i. Behavioral PsychologyCOVID is a perfect example of why technological innovation is not enough. With no vaccine available yet, how do you get experts to share their knowledge in a way such that it actually gets absorbed? How can we combat laid-back governmental approaches? Why are certain governments laid-back to begin with? How can we influence human behavior such that people self-isolate, wash their hands, and generally help decrease the rate at which COVID spreads?ii. Hoarding and ScalpingA subset of people have started hoarding and scalping basic supplies. Why? And what are the ethics of price gouging? Should this be regulated (conservative) or would this be better solved by free markets (liberal)? Are such people balancing market inefficiencies or creating them? Can we create worse situations with good intentions?iii. Injecting RandomnessIt’s safe to say that a lot of people’s routines have been turned upside down. Companies being forced to do remote. People’s automated routines being disrupted. Could there be a strange upside here, or not?i. BEHAVIORAL PSYCHOLOGYThere are many technological problems. Before you can influence people you should know toward what end. What are you trying to accomplish? What is the truth?Science can answer these questions. What’s the basic reproduction rate? How should we judge risk? Why does it spread? What measures are effective?But while creatives are well aware that they lack the tools to do the job of scientists, there’s often an unconscious assumption that that line of reasoning need not travel in the opposite direction. And as it is with all things, the less you know, the easier it is to fall into the Dunning-Kruger trap.So you see smart people trying to influence behavior with stats, graphs, and complex lexicon. But because we’re all capable of understanding English as opposed to mathematics, there’s a tendency to overestimate the complexity of math (due to intimidation of strange symbols) and to underestimate the complexity of influencing behavior (because we all speak English). I.e. It’s tempting to think, ex post facto, that it’s easy to run through the maze after you’ve been guided through it.This is a fascinating bias I call tool bias (if it has an official name, let me know), which ties the complexity of the tool to the perception of difficulty. Math can appear complex even when the application is very simple. Influencing behavior can appear simple even when the application is very complex. This phenomenon occurs in comedy as well. It’s easy to underestimate how difficult it is to create a good set because the tools (language) are simple, so while you laugh you think, I could do this easily.So how do you get experts to communicate their knowledge effectively? Answer: you don’t. While this job needs to get done, the person who does it is relatively fungible. I.e. Structural integrity tests need to be run at SpaceX but it need not be Elon who runs them.When scientists have figured out part of the puzzle, it needs to get passed onto the creative department if you will, just like you’d do with a brief for an ad agency.WHEN RATIONALITY KILLS PEOPLE AND IRRATIONALITY SAVES THEMHundreds of thousands of years have selected for humans that are best adapted to the environments such that they pass on their genes. One trait of past environments was risk. Risk of being eaten. Risk of starving. Risk of getting killed. Risk of an accident which results in you killing yourself, and so on.So it makes sense that from an evolutionary perspective, humans that were best able to reduce individual risk had a higher chance of passing on their genes.This creates biases in us where we fear spiders more than we fear doctors with messy handwriting. Even though messy handwriting which causes patients to receive the wrong dosage or incorrect medicine has an astronomically higher probability of killing you than a spider does (Sokol & Hettige, 2006; see also Ennik, 1980).And then there’s systemic risk (Taleb & Norman, 2020). Behavior that’s pretty safe for an individual can be highly risky for the collective.Younglings who’ve read How Our Physics Envy Results In False Confidence In Our Organizations might recognize the similarities with ergodicity economics; analyzing a system using an ensemble perspective need not equal an analysis using a time perspective. So a decision can be both good and bad depending on whether you look at it from the POV of the collective or the individual.When individual risk is low but systemic risk is a risk to all, it’ll still feel rational to act in a conservative way. But that would maximize the rate (R0) at which COVID spreads if adopted by all, which would optimize harm done at the systemic level (Ecdc, 2020). Healthcare gets overloaded if the people that would get sick get sick at the same time. Non-related emergencies might not be treated due to a lack of resources. Doctors might need to choose between patients. More doctors and healthcare staff might get sick due to a scarcity of masks and other materials (which decreases the number of patients that can be treated). And if the maximum number of people are infected, the number of people that get sick is higher than if fewer people get infected by using social distancing. After 14 days in quarantine and not getting sick, the probability that you’ll infect someone is low. If you do get sick, then the probability that you’ll infect others after about 10 days of showing symptoms, is also low. There also might be second-order risks such as hoarding, scalping, riots and such.Acting rationally will harm others initially, and then it’ll harm you as well. So the right course of action is to act irrationally; to ‘overreact/panic’ at the individual level to minimize systemic risk.In essence, this is a technical way of saying: ‘sometimes, things that feel dangerous are safe, and things that feel safe are dangerous.’HOW SHOULD WE INFLUENCE HUMAN BEHAVIOR?Experts in advertising have taught us that influence follows a predictable pattern in precisely the following order:i. Get the attention of the consumerii. Communicate CLEARLY to the consumeriii. Persuade the consumerIn order to persuade, you must communicate, and in order to communicate, you must first get the attention of the consumer.Nearly 90% of ads aren’t remembered, and this is being done by so-called experts in my industry!So clearly, the hardest part is getting attention.When we have the attention of people, we need to communicate. That requires that we’re crystal clear on what 1 thing we wish to communicate in our message. And it needs to be digestible for the average person without them having to expend any effort.Let’s take ‘washing hands more frequently’. You don’t want to run a campaign with washing hands, and social distancing, and coughing in the elbow, and doing elbow bumps instead of handshakes, all in one campaign. [1]It’s also important that it’s created with Kahneman’s system 1 (or fast thinking) in mind (Kahneman, 2014; see also Kannengiesser & Gero, 2019).Can the message be absorbed by scrolling past it, quickly glancing at it or walking past it? Does your grandma understand what’s being said? How about your 7-year-old niece?If it meets those criteria it’s probably good. Simplicity is your friend.And finally, you need to persuade the person we’re talking to. Give them a reason to do what we’d like them to do.The fact that hand sanitizer is hoarded is a sign of the poor job that’s being done on communicating the superior effectiveness of soap. Professor Thordarson’s thread on why soap is so effective against viruses.We know that women are better at grabbing attention than men for both men and women, so running a campaign with an attractive celebrity would likely grab people’s attention.The headline of the copy or the intro of an ad could be something along the lines of: ‘’Do you know the single, most effective way to protect yourself during the Corona outbreak?’’ ‘’Yeah.. me neither. Turns out, that it’s social distancing. But properly washing your hands is a close second. It actually kills the viruses.’’Followed by a demonstration of how to properly wash your hands.This would cover all the bases, attention, communication, and persuasion.Now as you might remember from Alchemy: Turning Words Into Money (The best guide on the web when it comes to writing effective sales copy), it does not matter how great your starting point is, it is still merely a starting point. This means it’s important to test at a small scale such that we can test its effectiveness. Creative work is not like mathematical work. We do the best we can, present it to reality and see what happens. Using things like split tests and gauging its reception, we can get a feel for how good of a job our campaign is doing.NOTES[1] Those elbow bumps are quite possibly the dumbest thing I’ve seen in my career. It’s clear that no one with even a minimal understanding of human behavior was involved. This is another clear sign of the overestimation of tech and the underestimation of creative. People didn’t feel the need to include experts because it never occurred to them there are right ways and wrong ways to solve the problem of replacing handshakes.Handshakes are deeply ingrained so it’s already a tall order. That’s made even worse by this new, socially embarrassing behavior. If you want people to replace a culture behavior it either needs to be cool or have a low amount of friction.You could make it cool by having celebrities and influencers do that elbow thing, but why learn a new behavior. The simple nod is something that we’ve been doing for ages. It would be much easier to replace the handshake with a nod or a slight bow.REFERENCESEnnik F. (1980). Deaths from bites and stings of venomous animals. The Western journal of medicine, 133(6), 463–468.European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic: increased transmission in the EU/EEA and the UK — sixth update — 12 March 2020. Stockholm: ECDC; 2020Kannengiesser, Udo & Gero, John. (2019). Empirical Evidence for Kahneman’s System 1 and System 2 Thinking in Design.Sokol, D. K., & Hettige, S. (2006). Poor handwriting remains a significant problem in medicine. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 99(12), 645–646. https://doi.org/10.1258/jrsm.99.12.645Taleb, N., & Norman, J. (2020). Ethics of Precaution:Individual and Systemic Risk. Retrieved from http://academia.edu/42223846/Ethics_of_Precaution_Individual_and_Systemic_RiskIf you made it to the end, thanks for reading. You can find more content on behavior design, marketing and entrepreneurial science over at www.younglingfeynman.com/featured

[amyddaniels]

How to Be Happy at Every Age

Yogis and scholars explain how to stay present and embrace what each decade brings your way.

I turned 40 last May, and I’m apparently about to tumble into years of despair. Because, according to friends and colleagues who hit that milestone a few years before I did (not to mention researchers), my “midlife crisis” is right around the corner. But I don’t buy it. Sure, I need at least an hour of meditation with one sock on, one sock off (no joke) and 1.5 (no more, no less) cups of Sleepytime tea to fall asleep, but that’s hardly what I’d call a crisis.

Jonathan Rauch, award-winning journalist and author of The Happiness Curve: Why Life Gets Better After 50 also rejects the idea of a midlife crisis, a term coined back in 1965 by psychologist Elliott Jaques. He prefers to call it a slump or, on perhaps less optimistic days, a “constant drizzle of disappointment.” Still pretty bleak sounding if you ask me.

Multiple studies of adults in countries around the world show a U shape on the happiness scale as we age. In fact, according to Rauch, “it turns up so frequently and in so many places that many happiness researchers take it for granted.” The U shape suggests that people feel good in their 20s, then get a bit more miserable in their 30s—until everything bottoms out in the fifth decade. In fact, according to a new study by Dartmouth professor David Blanchflower that examined trends in 132 countries, life’s “peak time for misery” happens around age 47. Ouch. Maybe that’s why my friends would rather say they’re celebrating the 20th anniversary of their 20th birthday than proudly own the Big 4-0.

See also Find the Happiness Within You

There is good news, however. Studies by Blanchflower and British researcher Andrew Oswald bear that out. Their findings suggest that well-being “declines steadily (apart from a blip around the mid-20s) until approximately 50; it then rises in a hill-like way up to the age of 70; after that it declines slightly until the age of 90.” Happiness deepens as we age, like a fine wine. But until then—what? Those of us in our 40s are destined to mope around and bide our time until we can get a senior discount? No thank you. Fortunately, University of Pennsylvania researcher Matt Killingsworth has a different point of view. He found that happiness is tied to being present—not fretting about the past or even lusting after retirement.

I decided to set off to find a way to make it through this quote unquote low point without entering crisis mode. There has to be a way to be happy—no matter what the trends suggest—at any age.

“THERE HAS TO BE A WAY TO BE HAPPY—NO MATTER WHAT THE TRENDS SUGGEST—AT ANY AGE.”

What Is Happiness, Anyway?

Clearly, how a person defines happiness affects their perception of it—and there are myriad definitions to consider, from ancient traditions to modern scholarly ones. In the yoga world, for example, there are at least four types of happiness. Santosha (contentment) implies a sense of delight; being content with what you have, who you are, and where you are in this moment. We’re happiest when we’re not wishing we were better, richer, kinder, or any other kind of different. Sukha (ease or, literally, a good space) is the comfort or sweetness we feel, even in the midst of confusion or turbulent times. For some people, mudita (sympathetic joy) is the hardest of all. It asks us to be joyful for those who are happiest; to be happy for the good fortune of others—even if they have what we wish we had. We experience ananda, the state of being blissfully happy, when we stop trying to find happiness and simply experience it. Yogic scholar Georg Feuerstein once wrote that ananda is “what we experience when our whole body radiates with joyous energy and we feel like embracing everyone and everything.” The Dalai Lama himself says that happiness is mainly having “a sense of deep satisfaction.” All of these definitions are, in the words of Killingsworth, “tied to being present.”

Rauch went with a more scholarly definition in his book. He breaks happiness down into two categories: affective well-being (how you feel today, how often you smile) and evaluative well-being (how you assess your life as a whole). His research looked at the latter: “You might not feel happy today, but you still feel your life is fulfilling and rewarding,” Rauch says.

See also 5 Happiness Boosting Poses

Although Rauch is a fan of the U curve, which he contends “has been pretty stable over time,” he also believes there will always be outliers. And even within the same shape, he says, the details of the curve, such as where it bends and at what age, vary by country, suggesting there could be some social impact to our well-being.

How to Be Happy at Every Age

Even if research shows happiness commonly dips in middle age, that doesn’t mean we can’t be happy at any age.

Linda Sparrowe, co-author of The Woman’s Book of Yoga and Health: A Lifelong Guide to Wellness (with Patricia Walden), believes that each stage of life has its high points on the happiness scale and, alas, its low points, too. Yoga and certain mindful lifestyle practices can maximize the pinnacles and minimize the troughs, she says. While the stages she writes about are fluid—adolescence moving into our 20s; early 40s holding fast to the 30s, the late 40s having more in common with the early 50s, and so forth—Sparrowe agrees that each decade brings something unique to our growth.

See also How to Train Your Brain for Happiness

Ayurvedic practitioner and yoga teacher trainer Niika Quistgard encourages people to look at doshic patterns as a general map, not an unbreakable fact. “There are generalizations that can help us take a closer look and see if they’re true for us at the time, but we can’t just boilerplate everyone,” Quistgard says. “Life is more complex than that.”

With that in mind, let’s examine the ups and downs—the gifts and challenges—each decade may bring.

THE 20S

Anyone who has navigated the rough waters of puberty knows how amazing it can feel to move past insecurities, erratic hormones, and conflicting messages from family, friends, and the media that threaten a person’s sense of self. No wonder the 20s are thought to be at the top of the happiness curve. Sure, there are still moments of doubt, as young people struggle to feel less awkward and more grounded—to become more independent, to find their voices, and to embrace both their vulnerabilities and their strengths. There are still times of falling down and getting back up and falling down again. That’s all part of what makes this the decade of “becoming.”

My 20s were a wild roller coaster, tearing through the social constructs that had limited my youth. I hit rock bottom, at one point living in my car after I left a dysfunctional relationship. But that was when I finally began to discover my true self and separate from my family, controlling partners, and trauma from my past. I had nothing, yet I had independence, and that was everything.

My 20s were challenging, but there really is no better time to try things on for size—to play with new ways of showing up in the world—and to explore new places, ideas, and relationships. Yogic philosophy calls this stage brahmacharya, or the student phase, which centers around learning, playing, and finding mentors.

See also 5 Ways to Boost Happiness

Yoga plays an important role in this time of awakening. A physical yoga practice—standing poses, arm balances, backbends and forward bends—can be stabilizing and strengthening, both for the body and for the emotions, and help to build self-confidence off the mat, too.

THE 30S

After a decade (or more) of self-inquiry and investigation, the 30s arrive, bringing a shift in focus from the inner to the outer world. Suddenly you are coming into your own, and you are ready to show the world your fabulousness. You are more outward-facing, establishing yourself in the workplace, creating new ideas, setting down roots, taking care of others, and perhaps starting a family. I got married and gave birth to my daughter when I was 30, and it completely transformed my life. At the same time, I was building my career as a travel writer—it was hectic, but I loved it. Yogic philosophy calls this period grihastha, or the householder period, a time of adventure, family, and enterprise during adulthood.

The challenge, of course, is you run the risk of losing yourself in the process, not making time to take care of your own physical and emotional needs. Sparrowe warns that when we move into this decade, we straddle “a fine line between being present in the world and being swallowed up by that world.” These are heated, ambitious, passionate years, influenced by the fiery pitta dosha, says Ayurvedic practitioner Quistgard.

See also Path to Happiness: 9 Interpretations of the Yamas + Niyamas

So, it’s important to stay balanced as much as possible. Otherwise, your creative, no-time-to-lose energy becomes more frantic, until you run the risk of chronic stress and burnout.

Committing to a regular yoga practice can bring your focus inward, which will help to calm and reset a young-adult nervous system. It worked for me. I didn’t really embrace a regular yoga and meditation practice until my 30s, and then it was out of necessity. I needed it as a way to create an intentional separation between my deadline-driven work life and my home life; I needed to learn how to truly finish something before I started something else—not just in a physical sense, but in my mind as well. A consistent home practice—even for 10 minutes a day—can give you a respite from all the responsibilities you shoulder (at work or at home), help you refuel, and put things back into perspective. Put your legs up the wall when you get home; listen to soothing music; do several rounds of pranayama (Nadi Shodhana is particularly balancing); go for a walk. And then, move into your non-work time with your full attention and joy.

THE 40S

When author Rauch hit his 40s, he was dissatisfied despite his achievements and wanted to know why.

So he did what any self-respecting journalist would do: He interviewed experts in psychology, neuroscience, economics, and sociology to help make sense of what was going on. He also conducted what he called an “unscientific survey” of approximately 300 ordinary people about their lives, he told me.

The results, which he describes in his book, led him to understand that our 40s are a decade of transition and a certain amount of upheaval. Our priorities—in other words, the things that relate to our sense of evaluative well-being—tend to change over time. We typically value competition, ambition, and achievement in our 20s, 30s, and early 40s, but as we move deeper into our fifth decade, we may start to question whether we’ve achieved our goals, whether we’ve done enough, and—even more fraught—whether we still matter. At the same time, Rauch says, “We’re beginning to shift our values toward caring, cooperation, and community,” which can feel confusing. Not to worry, he says. “If you hit a slump in your 40s, know it’s temporary and you have a lot to look forward to. Anyone who says, ‘If you haven’t made it by your 50s, you’re finished’ has it exactly backward.”

See also Bringing Happiness Home

Meditation and yoga nidra teacher Tracee Stanley encourages people to embrace the transitions in their lives, welcoming them as portals to redefine and rediscover at a deeper level what happiness truly means. “A lot of times in life when there’s a transition, there’s also a vacuum.

A void. The most powerful place to put your intention is in a void,” Stanley says. “In a transition, if we can stay awake and aware, that’s where power is.” Stanley recommends yoga nidra (yogic sleep) during this time, which she calls a deeply “immersive experience of self-inquiry and deep rest” that can increase your intuition and bring more clarity to your purpose—all of which will serve you well as you move into your later years.

THE 50S

Even though Rauch says we have a lot to look forward to in our 50s, sometimes that’s not immediately apparent. Entering a new era, some people complain that they feel invisible, irrelevant, or kind of “in the way” in a culture obsessed with youth. Some grumble that their bodies have changed and they hardly recognize themselves. Some women struggle with perimenopause and the realization that their childbearing years are officially over. Sounds rough to me. But Sparrowe doesn’t see it that way. She says the sixth decade brings opportunities for powerful, transformative experiences. If we enter into our 50s having taken care of ourselves, she says, we’re much more apt to weather the physical challenges and move into a stage of life in which we nurture others in a much larger context and find the confidence to speak our truths kindly and without apology.

See also Feel the Joy

This decade lines up with yogic philosophy’s third stage, vanaprastha, which focuses on contemplation, having less concern about material things, and solitude; it is also called the forest-dweller or retirement period (often marked by grandchildren).

On a physical and emotional level, yoga can help combat those pesky perimenopause symptoms—insomnia, hot flashes, fatigue, and anxiety. Specifically, forward bends, twists, and backbends can help pacify and then activate the adrenals. Baxter Bell, MD, author of Yoga for Healthy Aging: A Guide to Lifelong Well-Being, says that studies of longtime yoga practitioners and meditators also show calmer brainwave patterns, improvement in areas of the brain involved with cognitive decision-making and memory, and an improved ability to tune into the subtle messages of the body and respond to them more proactively than reactively. All of this is to say: Keep up your practice.

THE 60S AND BEYOND

For many people, their 60s, 70s, and 80s read like a litany of physical complaints: osteoporosis, heart disease, hip and knee pain. Sometimes the list seems endless. Of course, this time of life is so much more than that. In yogic philosophy, it is known as sannyasa: the time in which our attention moves deeper inward, toward union with the divine. Many retire, begin to let go of their possessions, and choose to spend more time in contemplation and in service to others. This sense of freedom can bring with it an almost childlike energy, an added layer of wisdom born from a lifetime of experiences.

Alan Castel, a professor in the Department of Psychology at UCLA, whose own research focuses on human memory, cognition, and cognitive aging, suggests that there could be a biological reason why the elder years sit at the top of the U curve. As we age, our brains actually latch onto and recall positive things more than negative ones, says Castel, author of Better with Age: The Psychology of Successful Aging. This is called the “positivity bias.” Castel references a study by Laura Carstensen that demonstrates if you show people two faces, one happy and one sad, younger people focus more on the sad face, whereas older people spend more time looking at the happy face.

See also Create a Life You Love

“This can influence memory—and mood. If you focus on positive things, those are the things you’re more likely to remember,” Castel says. Plus, even though your memory declines with age, your memory selectivity improves; you get better at focusing on the things that are important to you, Castel says.

To find balance at this stage—or really any stage—and to feel more connected to yourself and others, Quistgard recommends spending more time in nature, living with the natural circadian rhythm (waking with the sunrise, winding down with the sunset), and serving others. Do yoga, sit in meditation, and laugh as often as possible. Reach out to others, practice together, connect, mentor, and support one another.

“YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO SURRENDER AND TO KNOW THAT YOU’RE SUPPORTED IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO REALLY BE CONTENT.”

Happiness at Every Age

Of course, just because you practice yoga, chant mantras, or breathe rhythmically doesn’t guarantee your happiness, says yoga teacher Christi Sullivan. “If you go into [your practice] with the expectation that happiness and joy will be sprinkled on you like fairy dust, you’ll never find it,” she says.

“It’s not finding the feeling. It’s feeling the feeling that is already there,” she says. “If you wonder why life has lost its magic, it’s because we stopped showing up inside and were looking for it on the outside.”

See also 6-Step Meditation to Invoke Joy

So how do we get the magic back? By approaching our life with devotion and gratitude, without trying to “get something out of it,” says yoga nidra teacher Stanley. If you assign an expectation to an action (like “On a scale of 1 to 10, how happy do I want to be when I’m done?”), it changes the experience. “If you’re looking for it, it’s not going to happen,” she says, because your mind is too busy thinking. “You need to be able to surrender and to know that you’re supported in order to be able to really be content.”

This ties back into Killingsworth’s research about presence. While he was a doctoral student at Harvard, Killingsworth developed an app to track happiness and found that a wandering mind is an unhappy mind, even if you’re fantasizing about the good ol’ days or better days to come. He discovered that people are happiest when they stay in the moment.

Right here. Right now.

Even if you’re in an unpleasant situation, like a traffic jam, or say, I don’t know, freshly 40 with a U curve stacked against you.

See also A Meditation Practice To Let In Joy + Happiness

About the author

Aimee Heckel is a writer in Boulder, Colorado. Learn more at aimeeheckel.com

[krisiunicornio]

Yogis and scholars explain how to stay present and embrace what each decade brings your way.

I turned 40 last May, and I’m apparently about to tumble into years of despair. Because, according to friends and colleagues who hit that milestone a few years before I did (not to mention researchers), my “midlife crisis” is right around the corner. But I don’t buy it. Sure, I need at least an hour of meditation with one sock on, one sock off (no joke) and 1.5 (no more, no less) cups of Sleepytime tea to fall asleep, but that’s hardly what I’d call a crisis.

Jonathan Rauch, award-winning journalist and author of The Happiness Curve: Why Life Gets Better After 50 also rejects the idea of a midlife crisis, a term coined back in 1965 by psychologist Elliott Jaques. He prefers to call it a slump or, on perhaps less optimistic days, a “constant drizzle of disappointment.” Still pretty bleak sounding if you ask me.

Multiple studies of adults in countries around the world show a U shape on the happiness scale as we age. In fact, according to Rauch, “it turns up so frequently and in so many places that many happiness researchers take it for granted.” The U shape suggests that people feel good in their 20s, then get a bit more miserable in their 30s—until everything bottoms out in the fifth decade. In fact, according to a new study by Dartmouth professor David Blanchflower that examined trends in 132 countries, life’s “peak time for misery” happens around age 47. Ouch. Maybe that’s why my friends would rather say they’re celebrating the 20th anniversary of their 20th birthday than proudly own the Big 4-0.

See also Find the Happiness Within You

There is good news, however. Studies by Blanchflower and British researcher Andrew Oswald bear that out. Their findings suggest that well-being “declines steadily (apart from a blip around the mid-20s) until approximately 50; it then rises in a hill-like way up to the age of 70; after that it declines slightly until the age of 90.” Happiness deepens as we age, like a fine wine. But until then—what? Those of us in our 40s are destined to mope around and bide our time until we can get a senior discount? No thank you. Fortunately, University of Pennsylvania researcher Matt Killingsworth has a different point of view. He found that happiness is tied to being present—not fretting about the past or even lusting after retirement.

I decided to set off to find a way to make it through this quote unquote low point without entering crisis mode. There has to be a way to be happy—no matter what the trends suggest—at any age.

“THERE HAS TO BE A WAY TO BE HAPPY—NO MATTER WHAT THE TRENDS SUGGEST—AT ANY AGE.”

What Is Happiness, Anyway?

Clearly, how a person defines happiness affects their perception of it—and there are myriad definitions to consider, from ancient traditions to modern scholarly ones. In the yoga world, for example, there are at least four types of happiness. Santosha (contentment) implies a sense of delight; being content with what you have, who you are, and where you are in this moment. We’re happiest when we’re not wishing we were better, richer, kinder, or any other kind of different. Sukha (ease or, literally, a good space) is the comfort or sweetness we feel, even in the midst of confusion or turbulent times. For some people, mudita (sympathetic joy) is the hardest of all. It asks us to be joyful for those who are happiest; to be happy for the good fortune of others—even if they have what we wish we had. We experience ananda, the state of being blissfully happy, when we stop trying to find happiness and simply experience it. Yogic scholar Georg Feuerstein once wrote that ananda is “what we experience when our whole body radiates with joyous energy and we feel like embracing everyone and everything.” The Dalai Lama himself says that happiness is mainly having “a sense of deep satisfaction.” All of these definitions are, in the words of Killingsworth, “tied to being present.”

Rauch went with a more scholarly definition in his book. He breaks happiness down into two categories: affective well-being (how you feel today, how often you smile) and evaluative well-being (how you assess your life as a whole). His research looked at the latter: “You might not feel happy today, but you still feel your life is fulfilling and rewarding,” Rauch says.

See also 5 Happiness Boosting Poses

Although Rauch is a fan of the U curve, which he contends “has been pretty stable over time,” he also believes there will always be outliers. And even within the same shape, he says, the details of the curve, such as where it bends and at what age, vary by country, suggesting there could be some social impact to our well-being.

How to Be Happy at Every Age

Even if research shows happiness commonly dips in middle age, that doesn’t mean we can’t be happy at any age.

Linda Sparrowe, co-author of The Woman’s Book of Yoga and Health: A Lifelong Guide to Wellness (with Patricia Walden), believes that each stage of life has its high points on the happiness scale and, alas, its low points, too. Yoga and certain mindful lifestyle practices can maximize the pinnacles and minimize the troughs, she says. While the stages she writes about are fluid—adolescence moving into our 20s; early 40s holding fast to the 30s, the late 40s having more in common with the early 50s, and so forth—Sparrowe agrees that each decade brings something unique to our growth.

See also How to Train Your Brain for Happiness

Ayurvedic practitioner and yoga teacher trainer Niika Quistgard encourages people to look at doshic patterns as a general map, not an unbreakable fact. “There are generalizations that can help us take a closer look and see if they’re true for us at the time, but we can’t just boilerplate everyone,” Quistgard says. “Life is more complex than that.”

With that in mind, let’s examine the ups and downs—the gifts and challenges—each decade may bring.

THE 20S

Anyone who has navigated the rough waters of puberty knows how amazing it can feel to move past insecurities, erratic hormones, and conflicting messages from family, friends, and the media that threaten a person’s sense of self. No wonder the 20s are thought to be at the top of the happiness curve. Sure, there are still moments of doubt, as young people struggle to feel less awkward and more grounded—to become more independent, to find their voices, and to embrace both their vulnerabilities and their strengths. There are still times of falling down and getting back up and falling down again. That’s all part of what makes this the decade of “becoming.”

My 20s were a wild roller coaster, tearing through the social constructs that had limited my youth. I hit rock bottom, at one point living in my car after I left a dysfunctional relationship. But that was when I finally began to discover my true self and separate from my family, controlling partners, and trauma from my past. I had nothing, yet I had independence, and that was everything.

My 20s were challenging, but there really is no better time to try things on for size—to play with new ways of showing up in the world—and to explore new places, ideas, and relationships. Yogic philosophy calls this stage brahmacharya, or the student phase, which centers around learning, playing, and finding mentors.

See also 5 Ways to Boost Happiness

Yoga plays an important role in this time of awakening. A physical yoga practice—standing poses, arm balances, backbends and forward bends—can be stabilizing and strengthening, both for the body and for the emotions, and help to build self-confidence off the mat, too.

THE 30S

After a decade (or more) of self-inquiry and investigation, the 30s arrive, bringing a shift in focus from the inner to the outer world. Suddenly you are coming into your own, and you are ready to show the world your fabulousness. You are more outward-facing, establishing yourself in the workplace, creating new ideas, setting down roots, taking care of others, and perhaps starting a family. I got married and gave birth to my daughter when I was 30, and it completely transformed my life. At the same time, I was building my career as a travel writer—it was hectic, but I loved it. Yogic philosophy calls this period grihastha, or the householder period, a time of adventure, family, and enterprise during adulthood.

The challenge, of course, is you run the risk of losing yourself in the process, not making time to take care of your own physical and emotional needs. Sparrowe warns that when we move into this decade, we straddle “a fine line between being present in the world and being swallowed up by that world.” These are heated, ambitious, passionate years, influenced by the fiery pitta dosha, says Ayurvedic practitioner Quistgard.

See also Path to Happiness: 9 Interpretations of the Yamas + Niyamas

So, it’s important to stay balanced as much as possible. Otherwise, your creative, no-time-to-lose energy becomes more frantic, until you run the risk of chronic stress and burnout.

Committing to a regular yoga practice can bring your focus inward, which will help to calm and reset a young-adult nervous system. It worked for me. I didn’t really embrace a regular yoga and meditation practice until my 30s, and then it was out of necessity. I needed it as a way to create an intentional separation between my deadline-driven work life and my home life; I needed to learn how to truly finish something before I started something else—not just in a physical sense, but in my mind as well. A consistent home practice—even for 10 minutes a day—can give you a respite from all the responsibilities you shoulder (at work or at home), help you refuel, and put things back into perspective. Put your legs up the wall when you get home; listen to soothing music; do several rounds of pranayama (Nadi Shodhana is particularly balancing); go for a walk. And then, move into your non-work time with your full attention and joy.

THE 40S

When author Rauch hit his 40s, he was dissatisfied despite his achievements and wanted to know why.

So he did what any self-respecting journalist would do: He interviewed experts in psychology, neuroscience, economics, and sociology to help make sense of what was going on. He also conducted what he called an “unscientific survey” of approximately 300 ordinary people about their lives, he told me.

The results, which he describes in his book, led him to understand that our 40s are a decade of transition and a certain amount of upheaval. Our priorities—in other words, the things that relate to our sense of evaluative well-being—tend to change over time. We typically value competition, ambition, and achievement in our 20s, 30s, and early 40s, but as we move deeper into our fifth decade, we may start to question whether we’ve achieved our goals, whether we’ve done enough, and—even more fraught—whether we still matter. At the same time, Rauch says, “We’re beginning to shift our values toward caring, cooperation, and community,” which can feel confusing. Not to worry, he says. “If you hit a slump in your 40s, know it’s temporary and you have a lot to look forward to. Anyone who says, ‘If you haven’t made it by your 50s, you’re finished’ has it exactly backward.”

See also Bringing Happiness Home

Meditation and yoga nidra teacher Tracee Stanley encourages people to embrace the transitions in their lives, welcoming them as portals to redefine and rediscover at a deeper level what happiness truly means. “A lot of times in life when there’s a transition, there’s also a vacuum.

A void. The most powerful place to put your intention is in a void,” Stanley says. “In a transition, if we can stay awake and aware, that’s where power is.” Stanley recommends yoga nidra (yogic sleep) during this time, which she calls a deeply “immersive experience of self-inquiry and deep rest” that can increase your intuition and bring more clarity to your purpose—all of which will serve you well as you move into your later years.

THE 50S

Even though Rauch says we have a lot to look forward to in our 50s, sometimes that’s not immediately apparent. Entering a new era, some people complain that they feel invisible, irrelevant, or kind of “in the way” in a culture obsessed with youth. Some grumble that their bodies have changed and they hardly recognize themselves. Some women struggle with perimenopause and the realization that their childbearing years are officially over. Sounds rough to me. But Sparrowe doesn’t see it that way. She says the sixth decade brings opportunities for powerful, transformative experiences. If we enter into our 50s having taken care of ourselves, she says, we’re much more apt to weather the physical challenges and move into a stage of life in which we nurture others in a much larger context and find the confidence to speak our truths kindly and without apology.

See also Feel the Joy

This decade lines up with yogic philosophy’s third stage, vanaprastha, which focuses on contemplation, having less concern about material things, and solitude; it is also called the forest-dweller or retirement period (often marked by grandchildren).

On a physical and emotional level, yoga can help combat those pesky perimenopause symptoms—insomnia, hot flashes, fatigue, and anxiety. Specifically, forward bends, twists, and backbends can help pacify and then activate the adrenals. Baxter Bell, MD, author of Yoga for Healthy Aging: A Guide to Lifelong Well-Being, says that studies of longtime yoga practitioners and meditators also show calmer brainwave patterns, improvement in areas of the brain involved with cognitive decision-making and memory, and an improved ability to tune into the subtle messages of the body and respond to them more proactively than reactively. All of this is to say: Keep up your practice.

THE 60S AND BEYOND

For many people, their 60s, 70s, and 80s read like a litany of physical complaints: osteoporosis, heart disease, hip and knee pain. Sometimes the list seems endless. Of course, this time of life is so much more than that. In yogic philosophy, it is known as sannyasa: the time in which our attention moves deeper inward, toward union with the divine. Many retire, begin to let go of their possessions, and choose to spend more time in contemplation and in service to others. This sense of freedom can bring with it an almost childlike energy, an added layer of wisdom born from a lifetime of experiences.

Alan Castel, a professor in the Department of Psychology at UCLA, whose own research focuses on human memory, cognition, and cognitive aging, suggests that there could be a biological reason why the elder years sit at the top of the U curve. As we age, our brains actually latch onto and recall positive things more than negative ones, says Castel, author of Better with Age: The Psychology of Successful Aging. This is called the “positivity bias.” Castel references a study by Laura Carstensen that demonstrates if you show people two faces, one happy and one sad, younger people focus more on the sad face, whereas older people spend more time looking at the happy face.

See also Create a Life You Love

“This can influence memory—and mood. If you focus on positive things, those are the things you’re more likely to remember,” Castel says. Plus, even though your memory declines with age, your memory selectivity improves; you get better at focusing on the things that are important to you, Castel says.

To find balance at this stage—or really any stage—and to feel more connected to yourself and others, Quistgard recommends spending more time in nature, living with the natural circadian rhythm (waking with the sunrise, winding down with the sunset), and serving others. Do yoga, sit in meditation, and laugh as often as possible. Reach out to others, practice together, connect, mentor, and support one another.

“YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO SURRENDER AND TO KNOW THAT YOU’RE SUPPORTED IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO REALLY BE CONTENT.”

Happiness at Every Age

Of course, just because you practice yoga, chant mantras, or breathe rhythmically doesn’t guarantee your happiness, says yoga teacher Christi Sullivan. “If you go into [your practice] with the expectation that happiness and joy will be sprinkled on you like fairy dust, you’ll never find it,” she says.

“It’s not finding the feeling. It’s feeling the feeling that is already there,” she says. “If you wonder why life has lost its magic, it’s because we stopped showing up inside and were looking for it on the outside.”

See also 6-Step Meditation to Invoke Joy

So how do we get the magic back? By approaching our life with devotion and gratitude, without trying to “get something out of it,” says yoga nidra teacher Stanley. If you assign an expectation to an action (like “On a scale of 1 to 10, how happy do I want to be when I’m done?”), it changes the experience. “If you’re looking for it, it’s not going to happen,” she says, because your mind is too busy thinking. “You need to be able to surrender and to know that you’re supported in order to be able to really be content.”

This ties back into Killingsworth’s research about presence. While he was a doctoral student at Harvard, Killingsworth developed an app to track happiness and found that a wandering mind is an unhappy mind, even if you’re fantasizing about the good ol’ days or better days to come. He discovered that people are happiest when they stay in the moment.

Right here. Right now.

Even if you’re in an unpleasant situation, like a traffic jam, or say, I don’t know, freshly 40 with a U curve stacked against you.

See also A Meditation Practice To Let In Joy + Happiness

About the author

Aimee Heckel is a writer in Boulder, Colorado. Learn more at aimeeheckel.com