#she is a born artist. it is instinctive and deep-rooted so she can’t just ’not do it’

[itspileofgoodthings]

not to mention my own instinct that Taylor is protecting Joe through her own abundant outpouring

[aion-rsa]

Why Evil is the Only TV Procedural Worth Watching

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This Evil article contains spoilers. You can read a spoiler-free review of the show here.

Who knows what evils lie at the heart of CBS’s Evil? Shadows know. We consulted a book of shadows (not the one Leland Townsend (Michael Emerson) skims, too many spoilers there) to cut into the left ventricle of the darkness feeding the network’s supernatural series, now in production for season 2. The blood of the police procedural pumps through the veins of the paranormal investigation show, but Evil transcends the statutes of those limitations. Occasionally by papal decree. The series is intelligent, filled with symbolism, and its main character, who is training to be a priest, drops acid on a semi-regular basis. And he’s not microdosing. Look at those baggies.

Evil doesn’t debunk demonic possession, which is the main thrust of the team’s investigations. It never treats it as campy. The series believes demons are real, even giving the audience a breakdown of the six different forms possession take. But it deliciously stops short of giving full commitment. The show also explores how to parse out personal responsibility when there’s a supernatural being to blame. In episode 7, “Vatican 3,” we learn “the court does not acknowledge demonic possession” in determining guilt or innocence. The series further muddies the waters when the crew has to take a hard look at a murder committed by someone who wasn’t possessed, such as when the parents of what they believed is a demonically possessed child kill him. The series further turns the screw because the kid they killed to save their other children was born evil. It was literally in his genes.

Evil shares DNA with The X-Files, and David Acosta, played with charisma and empathy by Mike Colter (Luke Cage), is the new show’s Fox “Spooky” Mulder. He is looking for answers beyond the veil, which has the same letters as evil, and he is putting the pieces together like a hidden map of old Manhattan. There’s a truth out there and he’s willing to do whatever it takes to understand it. He’s not in it to solve any crimes against venal sins. He is looking for deeper meaning, and this alone puts the series above most procedurals. David’s got a bit of the scientist Dodge from original The Planet of the Apes film in his cinematic character. One of the first astronauts to delve so deep into the outer reaches of space, “He’d walk naked into a live volcano if he thought he could learn something no other man knew.” David is the same. He was a foreign correspondent in war-ravaged Afghanistan who got to know the soldiers whose stories he reported. Truth and knowledge are the most noble of callings, and ultimately come before his religious calling.

While the basic premise of a spiritual believer teamed with a dissenting psychologist is procedural trope, Evil is out to debunk the law of its diminishing returns. First, the show teams David with not just one skeptical voice, but two. Katja Herbers’ Dr. Kristen Bouchard plays the same role Agent Dana Scully played to Mulder, and with a similar arsenal. She comes from a different perspective, though. Bouchard does indeed believe in miracles, but thinks they all have scientific explanations. She is confident the only reason something might defy natural principles is because science hasn’t been applied properly yet. Scully, who wore a cross and took her faith seriously, accepted miracles on faith. David and Kristen rarely come to the same conclusion.

Ben Shakir, played by Aasif Mandvi, brings common knowledge, and shades his skepticism with cynicism. The former Daily Show correspondent takes on the weight of all three Lone Gunmen but with more constructive skills. Before joining the paranormal team, he was a carpenter, just like Jesus. Ben knows how things work, and when everyday mechanisms like sinks or faulty wiring are the root cause of supernatural phenomena, he can turn the screws, and spot the mold. Ben, “the Magnificent,” as Kristen’s children call him, is also tech savvy, and quite capable of hacking hackers.

Evil also throws things at Ben which he can’t easily spackle over with even the best of tests. Try as he may, and he tries, he can’t explain the light of an angel in the frame of a surveillance video. There is no evidence of doctoring, even at the most expert levels. “The world is weird,” David passes off as dating advice when Ben asks about potential girlfriend Vanessa (Nicole Shalhoub), who wants to know she if she should detach from her dead sister before committing to a new relationship. Vanessa thinks she is “tethered” to her phantom sister by the right arm.

Supernatural science is bizarre, creators Robert and Michelle King (The Good Wife, Braindead) believe. They push the show to diagnose causes the external evidence of exorcisms and stigmata, the bleeding wounds which correspond to the wounds on Christ’s hands when he was nailed to the cross. Because stigmatics display their wounds as they are portrayed artistically, rather than how the Romans historically would have done the crucifixion, it proves it comes from a psychological source. Internal belief causes the phenomena, not external spiritual forces. Evil explains that, allowing ample room for skepticism, belief, and even poetic reasons for spiritual incursions. David quotes Shakespeare to enunciate his faith. The concept of free will doesn’t come up in most procedurals. Neither does the way sociopolitical issues are turned into supernatural questions and tied to the origins of evil.

Evil is almost a character in Evil, and has relatable entry points. Real demons first get to Kristen’s four young daughters through an augmented reality videogame. A little girl who never takes off her Halloween mask almost gets the sisters to bury one alive. We don’t know how much of the characters’ perceptions is the result of a demon character’s influence on them. Each character is slowly being tempted by the dark side.

Kristen joined the team as a rational thinker but has had to accommodate uncomfortable ideas and adjust her comfort zone accordingly. In her usual line of work, she’s analyzed the criminally insane, but the show has pushed her into close contact with people who are evil in the Biblical sense. She is being pushed incrementally by forces in and out of her control. Her own mother Sheryl (Christine Lahti) sides with a manipulative competitor, Leland, over her daughter, and he’s made direct threats. The first season can be seen as Kristen’s slow corruption. The second season may see Kirsten apply her skills to her own situation, which will delve further into the dichotomy between the spiritual and pragmatic.

This is because Kristen may have already fallen. The final episode includes a telltale blood stain, which she wills Ben to unsee. On any procedural this is considered a clue, but here on Evil, the evidence actually points further than a mere homicide. It is the first sign that a main character has gone to the dark side. It is confirmed when the touch of a crucifix blisters her hand. There’s no such thing as an original sin and Kristen has been flirting with temptation long before this.

Kristen is a married nonpracticing Catholic who lost her faith. She’s sexually attracted to David, a man on his way to becoming a priest. When this subject was broached on the classic 1970s cop comedy Barney Miller, a prostitute who was supposed to be a young priest’s last fling before he entered a monastery said “I break laws, not commandments.” It feels like Kristen reminds herself of this every time the two of them are on screen alone together. Their sexual chemistry is that palpable. Yes, this is very similar to the long-gesticulating romance between Mulder and Scully, but he was no priest and she wasn’t married. Not only is Kristen married, but she’s got half a brood of daughters. Annoying things, really, but at least one of them has an excuse. Another reason Evil is the only procedural worth watching is because everyone on it just might be cursed. That’s not found in the manuals.

Evil towers over contemporary procedurals in how it’s going dark. Most procedurals chase a morally compromised arc, but Evil treats it like an encroaching corruption. Kristen, who is sworn to uphold the law, may have gone more than rogue vigilante. Besides the crucifix-burning season closing, David has visions of a goat demon waiting for Kristen with a scythe. She’d been tormented by her own personal demon throughout the season but when the George, the demon-like creature who visits Kristen during sleep paralysis, falls on the knife, it changes nothing. He is just one of many demons. One of them set up practice and is taking office hours with Leland.

The Demon Therapist is an all-male Goat of Mendes, or Baphomet. The show gets into how different biblical angels look from how they’re perceived artistically and by the contemporary faithful, but won’t present a faithful representation of Baphomet. It’s as patriarchal as Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Evil keeps it vague whether the goat demon is real or in Leland’s head. The Demon therapist appears in Kristen’s dreams as well. Lexis (Maddy Crocco) disabled the house alarm for the visiting devil therapist when he invites her to “the next level,” making it seem she is at least susceptible to underworldly influence. The kids are irritating, but they are a bargaining chip and their father, Adam, put them up for grabs when they chanted together offering an exchange of souls. Kristen was co-opted into evil through protective motherly instinct. She doesn’t see the mark of the devil as a badge of honor. When Kristen puts the cross in her palm, she doesn’t look like she expected it as much as feared it.

While the network show will never have the freedoms afforded cable series, the acting is top notch all around. Series like HBO’s Perry Mason or even Showtime’s reimagined second incarnation of Penny Dreadful: City of Angels, provide a wider range of emotion and carnality. But Evil gives us muted, for the most part believable performances, very often underplayed. As are the special effects and use of technology as a narrative device. Too many procedurals treat high tech surveillance and other investigative tools like they are all-seeing eyes which can count nostril hairs.  It has become normalized. Evil doesn’t waste intellectual space with unreasonable gadgets. The tools Ben or Leland use to their computerized ends are believable. At one point, Kristen asks Ben to record a cell phone conversation which is already halfway over. She is surprised he can’t with all his special skills.

The series incorporates real world horrors into mundane life. Even some of the most normal looking settings carry a sense of unease, to underscore the show’s thesis that the supernatural is natural but never quite normalized. Many of the scenes are shot vertically, drawing the viewers’ eyes upward and inferring something is always going on above. The series’ many wide-angle shots put a distance between characters even in close-ups.

The show isn’t afraid to wear its influences on its sleeves, and on several occasions has a lot of fun with it. For Dr. Kurt Boggs’ (Kurt Fuller) arrival at an exorcism, they recreated Father Merrin’s introductory scene in the horror classic The Exorcist, shot for shot, even getting an exact replica of the light post and the same make car, though different year, from the film. They gave nods to Rosemary’s Baby, Misery, Cabin in the Woods, and Children of the Corn.  The climbing ax which Kirsten grabs on her way out to do damage on the serial killer Orson looks like it has teeth. As did the walking stick Lon Chaney’s Larry Talbot carried in The Wolfman. The demon George looks like Freddy Krueger’s good-looking cousin. The tonality of the show is reminiscent of Charles Laughton’s immeasurably influential Night of the Hunter.

The main reason Evil shines above most procedurals is because it is scary, and those scares have been building slowly and deliberately. Commonplace settings feel off, and the world around is filled with conspiracies and coverup. The Vatican asks the team to determine whether a woman who knows the hidden history of the church is a false prophet. The fertility clinic Kristen and her husband Andy used when conceiving Lexis corrupts fetuses with satanic insemination. A witty but innocuous internet meme, Puddy’s Christmas song, is a hummably foreboding earworm. Anything can go evil on Evil.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Evil season 2 is currently in production. Read more about that here.

The post Why Evil is the Only TV Procedural Worth Watching appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3fRxopa

[yeoldontknow]

As Still As Sound: 4

Author’s Note: thank you to everyone who has patiently waited for this update. ive been waiting for it too. ily so much. i hope you enjoy <3  Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female) Songs Mentioned: From Her To Eternity - Nick Cave and The Badseeds / Cry To Me - Solomon Burke Genre: soulmate!au; angst; fluff; romance Rating (this chapter): R Warnings: some mature sexual themes; explicit language Word Count: 9K

masterlist

Months ago, the concert was your idea, a thing you suggested with fire behind your teeth and adrenaline in your veins. 

You remember, now, the way your hands rushed to buy the tickets, typing passwords and entering pre-sale codes, telling Kate over and over down the phone that you’d pay for hers if you got in, that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity - that Nick Cave, more than anyone, had constructed your adulthood. In your heart, you carried him, the sound of his voice, and the words from his lips - a soundtrack of misery, anguish, and the fleeting experience of contentment that painted your journey into maturity red and red and red. 

Months ago, Kate agreed, her excitement at the prospect of joining you almost wild and ravenous. Together, you’d looked forward to this, marked days on calendars and held the tickets in your hands in the morning before work, disbelieving and somewhat overwhelmed.

Today, the concert is her idea, a suggestion born purely from kindness; a friendly reminder you need to go out, away from your home and away from your constant, desperate soundtrack - released, finally, from your state of entrapment.

It is not, you imagine, that your anticipation of the show has ceased - far from it - merely that your anticipation and excitement has been redirected to a man whose voice is just as low, just as effective, and meant for your ears alone. The gravel nestled within Chanyeol’s voice is a chocolate honeycomb of affection, putting syrup and sweetness and devotion into your blood - a sugar rush upon which you get high; where Nick’s lyrics remind you of the heartbreak so unilaterally partnered with the act of living, Chanyeol’s words - simple and unpoetic as they often are - ignite the hope you had scorned and turned away, putting the thrill of living back into your lungs.

For weeks you have wondered if this is how people live now, if this is how people had been living long before the solar flare - endlessly searching and seeking, restless and waiting for the vibrancy of an overeager heartbeat; hoping and hoping and hoping to be touched and felt and needed. 

Until Chanyeol, this was not you. These types of deep rooted, tenacious emotions carried with them an unprecedented sense of repulsion - not to the person, but to the intensity, and to, more than anything, the incomprehensible notion that you needed another person to feel whole. 

Finding romance, for you, was a pleasure, and seeking pleasure in another person was a brief, impermanent adventure, something only slightly more transient than a roller coaster. Did people always crave like this? Did your parents want and need and yearn for one another long before they had confirmation they could? Was it not existentially exhausting to want and pine and wish, almost as compulsively as breathing, for the arms of another?

Would you, had you met Chanyeol on the street and not entwined or laced between your music, have felt such pining and longing for his hands, his voice, his breath as you do now? Would you, had you seen him at the shop, buying records and buying albums, unknowingly sharing his music taste with your cash register, have listened to all the same things, hoping to share a part of him as you do now?

In the end, it does not matter. 

These questions do not matter because the cosmos has built itself around you and around him, twining your hearts together until the days have started to blur into one half formed and hardly tangible rise and set of the sun. In your efforts of hearing him once more, the play count and hours logged on your last.fm have reached new highs, an almost constant list of songs based on genres, artists, and decades you imagine he would like growing and growing until, for several hours, it stopped counting altogether, seemingly overwhelmed. Where before you listened to only one album, playing through enough Neil Diamond to feel as though his lyrics are the lexicon of your speech, now you have knowledge of a science and a pattern, but no element of control to manage your testing.

All you know is that you will meet him when you play the same song, and you have, and will and are, pushed yourself into obsession in the effort of meeting him again.

And so it is not that you do not want to go to the show any longer. 

On the contrary, you find, as you tie the laces of your combat boots and check - twice before you leave and once after the tube carriage doors close - for your tickets, you are craving the thunder and violence of live music. Lately, you have needed to be rattled - shaken down to your core by something familiar, not something cosmic. Live music builds the person you are back up from nothing, the person you have lost after days and weeks and months of work, and family, and responsibility structured through a sound wave. 

In losing yourself completely, surrendering to the passion and the energy and the noise until your mind is full of nothing else, do you find your true soul, remember who you are and what you are, someone who survives on the edge of existence and with a smile wide enough to hurt.

And so, it is not that you don't want to go to the show. You are adamant about this, reminding yourself that you need the emotional rest and that you crave this as you stand on the tube platform. An approaching train puts a warm breeze through your hair, the unprecedented loudness drowning out all other sounds and leaving you, momentarily, in a dull roar of silence. Grimacing, you step on the train, frustrated with the noise of the tube and the sense that you lose time every time you take a journey.

Time you could have spent finding Chanyeol.

Annoyed with yourself, you release a chastising laugh. It is not that you don’t want to go to the show, it is simply the hours with live music are hours without him, without an opportunity to find him, have him, hold him - three minutes amongst hours that slip through your fingers. Pressing your back against rough cushion of the tube seat, you raise the volume of the music in your headphones, hoping the sound of Etta James can slow your rapid thoughts into silence, a pout pushing at your lips in disdain.

You only ever have three minutes with Chanyeol, three minutes which seem to pass in seconds, time slipping through and around you as though you are both simultaneously part of the natural order of the earth and separate from it altogether. His voice alone renders time meaningless, a concept the air in his lungs blows to dust, lips kissing at words that become stars in your eyes and held together by the fabric of your ardor. Three minutes and endless seconds, hours missed and hours lost, and it is all completely unequivocally unfair. 

Tonight, the tube carriage is full of people and strangers, some bonded, some free; some headed to the same show as you, evidenced by their band tee shirts and their jittery, shaking legs, and all, most likely, will get to experience the slow descent into love at a pace they have chosen to set. Chewing at the inside of your cheek, you bite back a frustrated sigh, willing your mouth to suck the bitterness from your tongue. The envy of their supposed simplicity sends your heart sinking, resentful and aware that you deserve nothing less than what you have been given.

Gifted to you, somewhat cruelly, is a love that appears only when you least expect it and always when you imagine it has departed from you entirely, a fluke or trick of the imagination brought forward by the human instinct to want a partner. Once more, you are reminded of Kate's words, her small laugh and the acknowledgement that this sort of connection is so like you, your inherent distrust of love resulting in a connection that feels incredible but seems to distrust if you were worthy of it. 

But still, your hand grips your phone tightly, hoping that maybe Chanyeol is listening to Etta James too and that, even if you do not meet in these songs, he wants you, through and beyond time, and down to his very core.

Kate is waiting for you at the front entry of the Eventim Apollo, a delicate flush painted on her cheeks from the uncharacteristically cool night and a bounce in her knees, unable to keep still. A smile is tucked into the corner of her lips as she speaks on the phone, a secret affection given away by the glimmer of joy in her eyes. The surrounding city lights are eaten by the matte fabric of her burgundy coat, as though she absorbs the world and glows on her own. Hurrying through her conversation as you approach, she laughs, the sound adopting a musical cadence she only ever exudes when she is blissfully happy.

'Yes, I'll text when it's over and we're leaving,' she says, rushing through the words as she waves you over. 'Do you want me to call if they play Jesus of the Moon? Okay, love you too. Bye.'

Coming to stand at her side, you dig through your bag, smiling to yourself. 'Baekhyun couldn't make it?'

She slips her phone into her pocket, taking the ticket you hand her with a small pout. 'No, he couldn't find any tickets on StubHub or the forums. The prices were astronomical.'

Nodding, you walk with her to the queue, which has already begun to shrink. Doors opened twenty minutes ago, and while you both have standing stall tickets, neither of you had the energy to queue. It will be just as magical, you know, standing towards the back and letting the light in.

'I can't imagine the fans would be selling,' you muse, opening your bag for checking and offering a polite smile to the security guard who nods mutely in gratitude. 'I'm disappointed, though. I was looking forward to meeting him.'

'You'll meet him soon enough,’ she replies offhandedly, muttering a gentle thank you as security waves her forward. 'I'm impressed by you, though.'

Walking through the entry, you hand your ticket for scanning and cock a quizzical brow in her direction. 'How do you mean?'

Ticket scanned, she pushes it into her bag before gesturing her hands over her ears, giving the impression of ear muffs. 'You brought the small earbuds and not your big clunkers.'

Rolling your eyes, you purse your lips. 'I hate that you call them that.’ 

The slight irritation in your voice is undercut by the hum of people within the venue, some at the bar and others heading towards coat check. Glancing in Kate's direction, you find her eyes remain locked on the entryway to the stage floor, expression unfazed and unmarred by your displeasure. It does not matter if she heard you or not, she's had this conversation enough to know your opinion.

 'They're studio headphones,’ you finish, unbothered by the petulant tone you’ve adopted.

She laughs, nodding at your clarification while she trains a focused stare on the sound booth and the surrounding barrier. 

'There good?' she asks, pointing to the section just in front of the sound desk - a place for you to stand and lean if you grow tired. At your hum of approval, she beelines with you in tow, and continues where your conversation left off. 

'Precisely zero people walk around the tube with those,’ she says, pride overtaking an edge to her voice, pleased by her success of finding a good spot.

'Fuck off,' you murmur, leaning back against the barrier and assessing your view of the stage. 'I just didn't want to bring a big bag. And,' you emphasize, turning to finally look at her once more, 'I'll have you know those headphones have incredible audio quality.'

'For music?' Kate's lip curls in a mischievous smirk, and your mouth runs dry in anticipation. 'Or for a certain someone?'

A small hiss of air escapes your teeth, bemused but unsurprised. For a moment, you let your eyes wander around the room, battling with yourself as you decide just how much you want to give away.

'And if I said both?' you counter eventually, voice bold and unflinchingly honest as you watch her expression immediately softens. 

'Any luck the last few days, then?'

You shake your head, spine straightening as you roll your shoulders back, determined to appear decidedly okay. 'No.'

‘Are you certain he’s your soulmate?’

It is neither an insult nor an accusation, but still the air escapes your lungs, chest winded and pained by the unintended cruelty of her question. But then, you quickly realize the last she's heard is that you were uncertain - that you had no idea about him at all, meeting with her at the pub only to disappear for weeks, responding here and there through text. To her, your relationship with Chanyeol is as good as a science experiment. While you know for a fact you had lied, unwilling to admit, then, that you knew from the moment his first breath reached your ears he was yours, now she simply questions your diligence in an act of concern for her closest friend.

And so you smile, aware that the expression looks sad, unmoved in your effort to make someone else feel comfortable when discussing this topic.

‘I’m confident it’s him.’ 

The firmness in your tone as you say the words does not make up for the pain your muscles had taken on after you lied, but at least, in this moment, the weightlessness of such a melancholy statement gives your heart the sensation of floating beneath your sternum.

It feels good to say it, to admit it. It feels good to be claimed by him.

Warmth floods her irises, one of her hands coming to hold your arm in gentle reassurance. Empathy mixes with sympathy, shades of the Kate you remember pre-Baekhyun glossing over her current visage in a sort of time slip. It hits you, then, that she had felt this way, once. While she had a clear marker for her connection, a clock beneath her skin stopping the moment she came into contact with her soulmate, the confidence that she would ever be released from her own prison had never once been something she believed she could touch. 

All at once, you are reminded of the months she said she wanted to bond even if she didn’t like it, just so that it could be over.

'You'll figure it out soon,' she affirms, the softness in her voice mixing with her stubborn determination. 'On the bright side, this is a vast improvement from believing you don't have anyone at all.'

'Is it though?' You don't mean for it to sound pleading, but the ferocity of your affection has taken hold of pieces within your soul you did not know existed. And, while you are confident you don’t wish to be freed from this new, uncharted intensity, you simply wish there was a logic to make the pain a little more bearable. 'Or am I simply driving myself mad, thinking and overthinking?'

'You do that anyway,' she counters, playfully, 'so I'm not sure the bond is to blame.'

Laughing, you nudge your shoulder into hers and release a groan of agreement, jostled by her honesty. Regardless if you had bonded with Chanyeol or not, your mind would have raced towards an infinite number of conclusions, exhausting your heart into a state of paralysis. Bond or no bond, your mind was never one to allow itself a moment of reprieve.

'Look,' she continues, cocking her head towards the stage in encouragement. 'Just forget about it for tonight. You need a break. No bonds. Just us and our first boyfriend.'

Kate’s advice is sound, and it works for a while. For a time, you are tethered to the moment by the strength in the hold of her hand, the way she holds you to her side and shares, with all of herself, the light and the sound and the feeling. But soon, her grasp on your hand turns your thoughts inward, in that purgatory of time between the opener and the main act, when there is little to do apart from buy another pint of cider, feeling the thrum of excitement down into your bones.

While she checks her phone for texts from Baekhyun, you wonder if Chanyeol is here, sharing this moment with you the same way you have been sharing songs. It would not be preposterous to assume he would be, the majority of London’s rock scene gathered to get high and get wrecked by a sonic release that will likely feel akin to something biblical. Craning your neck, you glance around the venue, hoping to be struck by him as if by lightning. 

For weeks, you’ve wondered if you’ve passed him, shared a tube with him - if he’s even in London at all. Being separated by miles and seas from your soulmate is not uncommon; you would not be the first instance of such a curse, but still those couples found one another, and so you have not given up the waxy sensation of hope as it glides over your fingers. 

But still, you may be the first instance of couple sharing song and sharing sound, only having minutes - perhaps less - to glean as much information from one another as you can. Those who hear one another’s thoughts coordinate meeting places, already knowing what and who they should be looking for; those with sensory loss and clocks have concise ways of knowing when and how to find their person, the earthquake of first contact partnered with a monumental change. Yet, there is no guarantee you would find Chanyeol even if he were here, no promise that you would feel him even if he were rows behind or in front of you. 

And so you cling, in the end, to the prayer that tonight, even if he is not here, he finds his way to any of the twenty-six songs on the setlist. 

The lights dim at nine on the dot, carrying with it the familiar sensation of floating, the yells from the crowd swiftly wiping any further thought from your mind. You smile -  you feel yourself smiling, and you are unsure when your cheeks had pulled back to reveal your teeth, but you do not mind. At once, the hairs on your arms stand on end, brought to life by the strength of adrenaline alone, the gooseflesh along your skin and sending a shiver down your spine. Kate’s hand squeezes yours, a touch and a hold that feels to you like a liveware, and you lift yourself taller, back straightening as though boosted by the roar of the speaker feedback. 

The first notes hit you in the center of your chest, the kind of eruption that could leave a person winded, and the force of it does not seem to stop throughout the night. Eyes closed, mouth screaming the words, the only tether you have to the earth is Kate’s hand, rooting you to gravity. Tension leaves your jaw, the stress of existence seeping from your bones and leaving you weightless, skin tingling from the sudden relaxation. Throughout the night, Kate’s hand in yours becomes a comfort, a familiar sensation you do not need to focus on but recognize just the same, feeling safe simply because her own fingers press into your knuckles in delight. 

And it is then, in the middle of From Her To Eternity, when you realize touch and contact carries with it its own set of rules, a logic and an understanding that goes far beyond conscious conception; a logic that need not be experienced in order to be conceived - you can feel the texture of silk just by thinking of the word; you can feel, rather easily, the cool clasp of a leather jacket, just by picturing the silver.

And it is then, in the middle of From Her To Eternity, that you think on Chanyeol, on the way he pulls at you and your soul, and suddenly, all at once, as if he had never been departed from you at all, feel him over and inside of you.

From out of the black, his hands tug at your waist, aching to press you flush against his body - seemingly disdainful of any separation. During the guitar riff before the chorus, you can almost hear him, cheering and singing along to the notes with an ecstatic sort of howl - one hand fisting in your shirt in an effort to make sure you experience him at the same time. Heart racing and blood rushing beneath your skin, you lean back into where you imagine his chest would be, careful not to fall or pull Kate with you. You take luxury in the peculiarity of this sensation, at a body without a body being at once behind and a part of yours. Almost instantly, you open for and open to him, begging him to stay, to never leave, to make a home of you, and you spread your legs a little wider hoping to feel his leg press against your thighs, encouraging him to bind his bones with yours.

A shiver walks along your nerves as his other hand glides up your extended arm, carding your fingers together as he sings - rich, and full voiced, and transcendent - all the lyrics you echo back to him, to Nick, to the atmosphere. The warmth of his aura floods your muscles, a small moan escaping your lips in the middle your favourite lyric, words garbled by the sudden overwhelm of heat. As badly as you want Chanyeol, so too does he want your skin, wants the prints of your fingertips smeared all over him, bodies thrumming from passion, adrenaline, and delirium.

The fabric of your clothes becomes tight, the denim of your black jeans feeling thin and damp around the curve of your ass; your shirt, wrapped in his grip and rubbing against your waist, is moist at the base of your spine, the heat from the crowd and the heat from Chanyeol pulling the wetness from your pores. His long fingers extend upward against your stomach, grazing the soft fabric of your bra with his nails - a sensation that tickles you, barely there and barely tangible, but felt all the same.

Looking up at your hand, vision blurred and lips pulled into a messy, lopsided smile, you suddenly feel dizzy.

This hand is empty. You know and can see that it is empty. Part of you does not question this because if he were here, if he were truly with you, the roughness of his skin would ignite the chemistry of your molecules, transforming you into something Other and something Unknown. You know your hand is empty, but still the haze of fingers and knuckles and the pink redness of blood at the fingertips takes shape. The blurred edges of this image make you feel motion sick, bewildered by the sudden trick of the light and the trick of your heart, blinking once and twice before it is gone altogether.

There is no hand holding yours, no fingers pressing hungrily at your breast, but you feel them - you still feel him, as though the seismic weight of your wishing has brought him forth, brought the memory of every other contact you’ve felt into the nerves of your palm and married it, desperately, with the malformed shadow of Chanyeol. 

It’s difficult, you find, building a person around a voice or building a heart around sound, but then - isn’t that what a heartbeat is? A constant rhythm keeping space and keeping time, pulling you close and close and close, able to be recognized regardless of the cartilage that separates you from it.

Chanyeol holds you close, curled into you from fear that you will leave him, rocking into your back and pressing a smile into the skin of your neck as he sings and sings and sings. You’re vibrating, holding onto nothing at the same time as you hold onto Kate, feeling wetness pool between your thighs from the sheer magnitude of wanting without having, knowing how it feels to be pressed close to a body, the hardness of a person grazing your back and ass, and allow your mind to fill the missing pieces in on your behalf. The sound of his voice travels through your ears, your mind, and into your open mouth, tongue going dry from the sheer force of him.

Like always, he is a flood, a force of nature you absolutely cannot resist, soul surrendering, almost immediately, to the magic of his existence.

It could be the cider, you think, that elevates your heart rate and puts a rush of blood into your lips that makes them feel swollen, and full, begging to be kissed or bitten. It could be the crowd and their energy making you wish and crave for someone to share this intimacy with, the energy of the room pushed flush the chambers of your heart, and your brain ensuring the hazy outline of Chanyeol be there to deliver you to paradise. In the end, you decide it does not matter, the answers to these questions are not nearly as meaningful as the way he tells you this is his favourite song too, and you cling to the way he speaks and breathes; mostly, you cling to the way his lips seem to press against your ear, demanding you hear him and you do not forget.

And just as swiftly as the song started, just as quickly as the feeling came, it leaves you, the red flush on your chest lingering even after he is gone. The heat from the room sticks to your skin, much the same way Kate’s eyes burn into your profile. With vigor, she pulls her hand from yours, tugging it from your grip. In your peripheral, you watch the way she stretches out her hand and fingers, massaging the bones and regards you with wide, worried eyes that demand an explanation. Unsure what to say and unprepared to speak at all, you keep your eyes trained on the stage, watching the stage as it goes dark and waiting for the sadness of your loss to creep back in as it always does.

But this time, there is change. This time, you are left with a tangible residue to mark his presence, a sign that your overactive imagination was not alone in its efforts.

This time, instead of the loss and the torment of separation, you focus on the sensation of your wet underwear, a pulsing vibration from inside your core reminding you this was real.

This was real. 

The deep flush of your cheeks and the dry skin of your lips is grateful for the chilly night air as you exit the venue after the show. Tonight, the sky of London is clear and black, stars swallowed by the street lights with only the glow of the full moon reminding you there exists a world beyond this, beyond the world you've fallen into with Chanyeol. Breathless, you stand outside and check the time, hands shaking from both adrenaline and memory. This late at night, the tube is still running, but you crave the open expanse of the world, synapses too flooded with desire to handle the closed tunnels of the underground.

Close quarters and tight seats would only make you yearn for the press of his hands and his groin into your lap, the longing to be handled brimming over in the heat of your blood.

‘What the fuck was that?’ Kate asks, the disbelieving nature of her voice breaking your thoughts.

Tearing your eyes away from the sky, you regard her, wide eyed and breathless. Shadows have been carved into her features from the Eventim Apollo marquee sign and the silver glimmers of moonlight, a darkness under her eyes and cheekbones making her look severe and unnerved.

‘What?’ The small, thinness to your voice gives away you know precisely to what she is referring, but you need her to say it.

You need her to say it and to confirm it.

‘You nearly broke my hand during that song.’ Neither angry nor upset, she simply massages her hand in concern, easing the lingering soreness. ‘I know its your favourite, but have some consideration for my joints, yeah?’

Looking down at your feet, your mind empties, mouth giving shape to apologies before your mind can properly form them. ‘Sorry,' you mutter, 'I didn’t realize I was squeezing you so tightly.’

Kate steps closer to you, bending down to study your face with a furrowed brow. ‘You’re all flushed, too. Are you drunk?’

You laugh, but you're not sure why. The sound is a faint whisper of humour carrying with it the turmoil of confusion, sounding, altogether, like you could be drunk. You might be, you think. He makes your skin feel just as edgeless as when you are too many ciders deep and telling London it is your only true, passionate love affair. 

‘Maybe?’ you manage, the words little more than a noise of delirium.

‘You only had three ciders,’ she chuckles, yet her eyes remain guarded.

‘Well,’ you shrug, turning in the direction of the night bus. Your feet move of their own accord, not bothering to see if she follows. ‘Nick will do that to you.’

Pulling out her phone to presumably text Baekhyun, she hums in agreement, but still you feel her eyes bore into your back as you walk away, watching and watching, almost certain you might disappear.

You realize you never said goodbye.

The night bus home is difficult. 

Normally, you relish this journey, take your time savoring the top level of the bus which somehow always feels reserved for concert goers. This late at night, their voices carry, domed around you as they discuss the show, the highlights, or, conversely, simply not talking at all, choosing instead to relive the show through their headphones. Tonight you join them, settling in an open row of seats next to the window and resting your head against the glass, seeking the refreshing texture in the hopes that it will cool your skin. 

Tonight should be no different from all your other post-gig journeys home, excitement palpable in the almost thick heat of the bus and the way there’s a rush of emotion as the bus pulls away from the stop. This is when you’d smile, take your headphones out and play your way through the setlist; other times, you’d eavesdrop on the other conversations, smiling at their reactions and responses, turning inward and tuning out only after you cross the bridge over the Thames and the conversation turns a bit quiet, and a bit personal.

But tonight, the difference is in you - in the way you still cannot shake the feeling of Chanyeol’s strong hands and the thick cream of his voice, the memory of him seeming to overtake the memory of the show altogether. 

Headphones wound in your lap, you regard them with a small pout. The ringing in your ears will do you no favors should you listen to any music, but your hesitation to touch and to use them runs deeper than the usual post-gig tinnitus. Even now, you can still feel him, the paradoxically smooth roughness of his palms as they moved over your skin, and the way his voice made you vibrate, trembling into nothingness in the effort of seeking more. Now, the white wires of your headphones pose an element of distrust and betrayal, the ground rules of your connection seeming to change just as soon as you understand them, and you wonder if you’re ready to feel him again, if you could, or if you’ve even stopped.

Turning to glance out the window, London seems to pass in a crystal haze, the lights from the city dotting the river like miniature spotlights, the city still alive and glittering. The vibrancy of London puts a smile on your face, the memory of the last time you rode a bus mixing with the memories of all the times before you’ve looked out at the skyline and wondered who was living, who was dying, and how many stories could be contained beneath just one streetlight. These idle thoughts always compelled you, your love for London and for the heartbeat of the city always overtaking your thoughts once the bus grew quiet.

Now, your imagination has become consumed with a man and the frequency of a voice that haunts you. Staring down at your hands, you study the lines in your skin and wonder what you felt - if you truly were feeling. Already a naturally warm person, the tender hold of his hand in yours put a rush of blood in your fingers, making them appear swollen and pink. And while you could see through and beyond him, as though he were an ephemeral mirage comprised of a longing that reached down into the chasm of your essence, for one moment you swore you could see the pink of his knuckles as he held you, clutching at your bones in an effort to stitch your bodies together.

Tonight, too, the steps up to your door feel endless, walls of the stairway closing in and becoming tight, compressed. Laughter echoes around you, strange for this hour of the night when your neighbors are usually asleep or out even later than you. It doesn’t sound familiar but it doesn’t sound foreign, the richness of the tone giving way to a younger Mr. Kim and a female voice you place as his wife, Aki. How many times had they walked these stairs, holding hands and kissing wrists, laughing and laughing until they silenced one another with kisses that seared against their smiles? How many times had they pressed one another against these walls, pressing fingers to lips to keep quiet only to fall into one another instead? 

Were they soulmates, too, long before the world allowed for such a love?

The nostalgia of these unlived experiences burns against your throat, a lump forming that seems out of place and altogether irrational. A missing has taken root within you, deep down and all over again, though this time it is not for Chanyeol but for a future and a past running in beside one another in tandem. Do you miss the idea of youth, spending too much time with Mr. Kim and watching the way time eats at a heart and at a person? Do you miss the connection that comes from bodies? Your last boyfriend was years ago, just before the solar flare, and even then you had stopped connecting long before you called the relationship off. Even when you were together, pressed against one another in bed and sharing breaths, you weren’t really there, heart and mind going elsewhere to find pleasure.

Perhaps, in the end, you simply miss the happiness of coming home to someone, coming home to Chanyeol, or, most likely, coming home at all. Pushing through your door, the silence seems to swallow you, the quietness of your flat unfit for the energy pooling at your fingertips. Home hasn't felt like home for months, not since you first played Neil Diamond on repeat for days. Something about your flat has felt off, right in the ways that are familiar and wrong as thought something terribly important had been lost, or never found at all. Tonight, the quiet of it all eats at you, skin still stinging with the strength of Chanyeol's touch, and you find you need sound to drown out this loneliness.

Stripping off your clothes, the freedom of your removed bra makes you smile, suddenly hyper aware of the curves of your body. Embodied as you are, you find you need music to hold you together, to press against you the way hands should be - the way Chanyeol's hands would.

Solomon Burke's record is torn at the sides, the edges fraying and taped too many times for you to count. It should never have been left in a charity shop, but then, if it hadn't you never would have come to own it. Faded and worn as its sleeve may be, the record still rings clean and true, the pressed black vinyl glossy and glimmering in the low light of your flat. Uncorking a bottle of wine, your lips go numb as your heart begins to race, head tilting to the side in the expectation of a mouth gliding along your neck. The hair on your arms stands on end, the atmosphere suddenly full of static, electric as it kisses against your skin.

The world fades, the familiarity of this comforting and so unlike the illusion of his touch at the concert. In this, you ground, the world around you silenced except for the music and for him.

‘God, I’ve missed you,' you mumble, knowing he can hear you just fine.

Redness spreads across your chest, a flush of embarrassment at your admission painting you pink and pink. Silly, you think, for there was nothing to miss. You're certain he had never left you.

Chanyeol's laugh is low, a thunder roll easily missed if one is not hanging on every sound he makes. ‘I can still feel you,' he says, though the words come together behind a soft, impatient whine. ‘You’re driving me wild.’

‘Speak for yourself,' you snort, watching the wine as you pour it through half lidded eyes. ‘You’re the one that found me, and now I’m wearing you. I didn’t think we’d be able to...do that.’

He hums in agreement, pride evident in the smile you can almost hear him wear. ‘This, too.’

You knit your brows together, corking the bottle as you glance around your flat, confused. ‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s the first time I’m hearing you without headphones.'

Eyes widening, your gaze lands on the record as it turns and turns, the glimmers of light swirling over the record as it plays. Your headphones, earbuds and studio over-ear alike, are in your bedroom, packed away for their use tomorrow when you'll need them for your commute. Out of habit and the inherent human need for rationality, you look around your flat, feeling him close and hearing his breath as falls in a rushed, excited rhythm. Outside your window, the streetlights take on an otherworldly glow, the fabric of your couches, chairs, and curtains suddenly richer, deeper, your world coloured entirely by his presence.

Overwhelmed, you find all you can manage is the painfully simple, whispered exclamation, 'Oh, my god.'

He moves, that much is evident by the sound of his rustling clothes, and you turn around, looking for his shadow.

‘It’s the clearest you’ve ever been,' he says, sounding pleased. The joy of it, the joy and the shock and the clarity of him is heady, and you reach a hand out, gripping your counter. 'You’re surrounding me.’

Once again, he is not wrong, the sound of his voice seeming to fill the empty corners of your house and mind. Your grip on the counter tightens, joints aching from the effort of keeping still. If he were here, you'd reach for him, pull him to you and kiss him until your lungs hurt from lack of breath. If he were just as needy, maybe he'd place you on the counter top, spilling your wine as his hands massaged bruises into your thighs, leaving marks on your neck for the world to see.

It's shocking, you realize, what the sound of his voice can do. Just one laugh and already he stains the walls.

Swallowing thickly, you take in a long inhale, hoping to clear your mind and focus. ‘So you were at the show.’

It is not a question, just a statement of fact.

Chanyeol's laugh is one of disbelief and one of comfort, an odd mix of emotions you read so easily and find yourself getting drunk on just the same. Glancing down, you see the wine, untouched. ‘It’s so bizarre you just know it,' he says, breathless in his delight. ‘It’s like continuing a conversation we never started.’

‘So you were there tonight?’ you repeat, needing to hear his confirmation and refusing to let yourself run wild with the sheer magnitude of him.

‘Yeah, I was,' he admits. ‘I started feeling like you were there and...I don’t know.’ Chanyeol falls silent, but just as clearly as you can hear him, so too does your mind see him. He blushes, looking down at his hands and standing in the same place as you, sleeveless grey shirt revealing the muscles in his arms as he holds onto the counter. ‘I couldn’t help myself.’

The sound of your heartbeat fills your ears, and while you want to rush forward and talk and talk, for a moment you are speechless.

Chanyeol is in London.

There are no seas separating you.

Tonight, he was at the concert and just as easily as sharing a song, so too can you share the city. This kind of confirmation is worthy of a celebration, a late night phone call or text message to give an address, a number, a cab ride to a doorstep so hands and mouths can finally meet. But you don't mention it or expand on it, biting the side of your tongue in hesitation instead. Blood rushing in your ears interrupts all your fantasies, mouth unsure you're ready for your own admission to make it real.

When it's real, it breaks, and you're still unsure you're ready to be moved beyond the confines of the earth.

Blinking slowly, you ground yourself back in the deep breaths he takes to keep himself calm, and smile. 'I'm glad you didn't.' Once more, your eyes find your wine glass, hand reaching for the stem to swirl it around and around. 'It's been a long time since I've felt someone hold me so close at a concert. You were keeping me warm.'

Almost immediately, he replies. ‘Don’t talk about someone else's hands on you.' It is neither a demand not a command, but a plea. ‘I don’t like picturing it.’

Smirking, you cock your head to the side, the honey sweet drip of arousal running down your spine. ‘Possessive already?’

‘Yes,' comes his quick, unashamed reply. ‘Everyone before doesn’t matter,' he clarifies, eyes falling closed to keep himself calm, 'but I still can’t help it. My hands have been aching all night. I'll never have my fill of you.'

Uncertain how to reply, you simply smile. You smile straight ahead and at nothing at all, knowing that he can feel it. Nothing matters anymore, so long as he can feel it.

‘I wouldn’t have expected you to be there,' he says, words falling quickly in an effort of making the most of your time together. 'There weren’t many women, especially towards the front.’

Rolling your eyes, you sigh, tired of these types of gendered comments men so easily make when it comes to rock music. ‘Then you weren’t looking hard enough.’

Chanyeol, however, acquiesces easily. ‘True,' he affirms. ‘Though, to be fair, I was really only looking for you.’ You both fall into the memory, of the way you found one another in the breadth of a moment, in a setlist, and in the all encompassing ecstasy that comes from live music. ‘That’s my favourite song of his,' Chanyeol shares, sounding almost shy. 'From Her To Eternity is so powerful.'

Something about this makes you feel young, impossibly young and carefree, like your longtime crush has just admitted he likes the same things as you, and therefore it must be destiny. You laugh, feeling yourself go light headed from the force of it, and remind yourself that it is. It is actually destiny. 

‘Mine too,' you agree, giggling. ‘It’s funny, people don’t mention that deep cut.’

‘Deep cut?’ he questions, and you have to stop yourself from sighing in deep affection at the image of his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. ‘Do you know something I don’t?’

‘No...just…’ Your words die, backtracking from your blanket statement. ‘It doesn’t get chosen very often as a favourite, is all.’

Seeming to realize that your time together is coming short, the end of side A looming closer, Chanyeol changes the subject. ‘I didn’t think I’d find you in this record.’

Humming, you look back at the record, and the torn somewhat bent edges of the sleeve. 'That's true,' you nod at no one in particular. 'It's a hard record to find, which is a shame because Cry To Me is the best part of Dirty Dancing.’

A small noise of uncertainty blooms from Chanyeol's chest, curiosity and interest blending together in one small, magical sound. ‘I don’t know what that is.'

Baffled and overtaken by skepticism, you laugh. Normally, such statements make you roll your eyes in disgust but there is something so wonderfully endearing about his joke you cannot help but smile. ‘That’s literally impossible. You’re such a guy.’

A low, slow rumble quakes in his chest, your eyes falling shut in preparation of the thickness of pleasure you know he is about to adopt. ‘If dirty dancing is what you want…’

‘Don’t start,' you whisper, mind replaying the sound over and over, addicted. ‘You’ve got me drunk on you.’

‘Speak for yourself,' he teases, mirroring your earlier statement.

For a brief moment, you can almost see him. Bottom lip caught between his teeth, his wide eyes look longing through you, hoping to find and touch and hold whatever part of you he can access. Like this, you both fall quiet, looking everywhere and nowhere for one another, and eventually, the shift of the earth on its axis makes your body sway, overcome by your unintentional stillness. Just like you could at the concert, you feel his hand reach for your waist, catching you, and it is this contact that makes you understand the difference between imagination and connection.

Where imagination is distant and feather light, a super imposition of assumption onto expectation, this is is a cosmic wave in which your drown, skin and soul and heart rattled by the impossibility and intensity of him. Neither fictional nor imagined, he is hyper-present and he is cosmic, a sunbeam trick that runs along the endings of your nerves.

‘So, do you like soul music, then?’ he asks, breaking your silence with an anxious tension at the back of his throat. His words are thick, heavy things that weigh against you, and you know he too is struggling to hold himself together.

A slow smile tugs at your lips, a lopsided grin of adoration. ‘I love it,’ you begin, pressing your tongue against your teeth unsure if you should continue. There’s so much on this you want to say, so much you normally give to other people with little passion returned. But he’s your soulmate, and if he’s really yours he will give back in spades. ‘Most days, I think it’s my favourite genre. It’s speaks of human connection in a way that I think other genres just can’t comprehend.’ 

‘Absolutely,’ he agrees, enthusiasm palpable in every syllable. ‘Their voices are full of the full spectrum of human emotion...it’s like they’ve felt so much more than I ever could. Every lyric is a love letter.’

Silently, you chuckle to yourself, eyes roaming up towards your ceiling in thanks to a God you never really had faith in. ‘Every time I listen to it, especially to an Otis song -’

‘God, I love Otis,’ he interrupts, over eager. ‘Sorry,’ comes his rushed apology, bemused by his excitement. ‘It’s just good to talk about it with someone.’

‘It’s okay.’ 

You want to reassure him everything he will ever say, every interruption is fine and good and gold, because you want, more than anything, to listen to him speak until the sun goes black. But Chanyeol remains quiet, impatiently waiting for you to continue, and you are so willing to give him absolutely everything he desires. 

‘It’s so hard to explain…’ Your words fade, mind struggling to form a sentence that could convey the depth of your emotion. ‘He moves me,’ you finally announce, uncertain anything further needs to be said. 

You have said this before. This thought and opinion is not unfamiliar or new. You have said as much to countless other people, people who simply laugh and tell you this thought is incomplete. Movement is born from a moment of pleasure, a spark and release of joy, and rarely is such a feeling understood outside of the moment in which it exists. To everyone else, this thought is illogical - not impossible, just unusual.

But Chanyeol sighs, a long exclamation of understanding, his heart and soul wilting directly into yours, finally witnessed. ‘Yeah?’ he swoons, urging you to continue with the force of his ardor. 

Turning, you lean back against the counter, tilting your head upwards as though anticipating a kiss. ‘He was so young,’ you continue, voice small and distant, longing tracing every word on your tongue, ;but the way he spoke and the way he sang…’ You drift, trembling at the sudden sensation of a light touch ghosting along your cheek. You think it might be his nose as he runs it along your skin, breathing you in. ‘His music always feels like he’s lived three lifetimes, and loved, intensely, his way through each of them. I think I’d like to live like that.’ 

With his hands on you, you don’t even apologize for the slight stutter to your speech, affected.

‘Intensely in love?’ he whispers, and you lean into the sound, wanting.

‘Yeah.’ 

The sensation shifts to your other cheek, and you tilt your head in the mime of granting permission. Barely there grazes move along the edge of your cheekbone, tickling a phantom of wave of affection in its wake. But he remains silent, expecting and yearning for more.

‘For a long time,’ you manage, voice strained against your tight throat, ‘it was something I thought I’d ever want or need, that feeling of being loved through your humanity and into your spirit. I never thought I’d want it, because it couldn’t exist or, if it did, it was rare enough most of humanity shouldn’t bother trying to find it.’

‘A losing game,’ he clarifies, wistful and longing in his agreement.

Briefly reminded of Amy Winehouse, the distant melody plays in your mind. You wonder if he likes her as much as you. ‘But now -’ you raise your hands, curling your fingers and almost feeling the hard muscles of his hips as you pull him into you, ‘it’s like unlocking a door, you know? Stepping through to the other side and realizing, finally, what everyone had been singing about. I want that...to be loved so intensely, so in love, that it becomes the one thing I never question.’

Drowning in one another, you let yourself be held, body warming to a temperature that makes you crave the refreshment of air conditioning. Your skin is flushed, cheeks and neck and knuckles a reddish pink from both heat and desire, the rhythm of your heart putting a sheen of sweat at your brow. You don’t know when you got so warm, when he became a fire for your hands alone, but you don’t mind. If having him means burning, you don’t ever want to be cooled.

‘I want that, too.’ His forehead rests against yours, the last force of a touch you know is about to fade. ‘I want to give that to you.’

And with that, he is gone. The record stops, apartment quiet enough to make your teeth and ears ache, Side A complete. Normally, you’d whine and let yourself grieve, screaming to yourself that you want it, god how you want that, too, but tonight, for some reason, there is no place for such woe. 

Chanyeol is in London. 

Chanyeol is in London and now you have both heard and felt and learned him.

Chanyeol is in London. 

It won’t be long now.

[amazingmitchell]

you long to say a thousand words but seasons change

author: me :’)

beta: @rainbow-phan​

artist: @snekydingdong​ (art will be linked here when it’s finished!)

word count: 4417

available on: ao3

rating: none (g)

warnings: major character death (no description of the death itself)

summary: dan wipes away at the layer of snow on the ice and, noticing his reflection, reaches up to touch his face. he doesn’t know what to think about himself. his cheeks are rosy and he can faintly see his breaths crystalizing in the air. he’s wearing a fur cloak with the hood up, but doesn’t know who made it or how he came by it. then again, he doesn’t know anything about this place, just that he’s meant to be here.

author’s note: this was written for the phandom big bang 2019! it was an amazing experience and i had the best teammates in the whole world.

in the beginning, there was chaos. fires ravaged the face of the earth, and ashes rained from the sky. from the discord, mother nature was created out of necessity. she tamed the wind and gave the world stability, her sweat and blood falling as fresh water, but she could not hold the ground together on her own. and so summer was born.

the first of mother nature’s children, aine loved the long hours of the day and kept the sun in the palm of her hand. she fostered fire while mother nature turned the earth. they tore away the earth to create the moon, then when they decided the ground was too flat and boring, mountains rose under their command. then one day, aine discovered what would become the first life in a pool of water. when she tried to touch it, she nearly destroyed it. afraid to lose the precious specks of essence, mother nature reached deep inside herself to create spring.

phil was mother nature’s finest creation. she cried tears of joy when she first saw him, and her tears wet the earth and allowed the first trace of life to become something more. phil nurtured it until it became a living organism, and slowly it grew in complexity. but aine was jealous of the attention mother nature was giving phil, and they argued night and day. eventually, mother nature decided her children could not live together. so she took aine with her to the depths of the earth, to one day trade places with phil on the surface. once it was phil’s turn to reunite with mother nature, aine returned to her place in the sun.

except aine was still frustrated with both phil and mother nature. she made the air so unbearably hot almost all the water in the world evaporated, which killed many of the organisms phil fought so hard to protect. to control the dying, mother nature reached inside herself once more to create autumn. eve began to undo the harshness of summer, making the air cooler and nights longer. she could not save the creatures, though, from the damage aine had caused. so eve taught them to become dormant until phil could tend to them again.

after years of argument and disarray, there was finally harmony between the children of mother nature. she called them her seasons, and for the rest of time they would watch over the earth as life developed. the water creatures became plants and smaller animals, which turned into trees and large beasts. mother nature helped her children build a cottage by the edge of a lake once the animals phil coaxed into existence were a nuisance, especially the insects.

one year, just as summer was about to give way to autumn and the days lost their warmth, aine created a hearth. when eve returned, the fire was dreadfully warm, so she made the air colder. but the air became too cold too quickly, and the storm clouds that were looming overhead dropped snow instead of rain. not knowing what to do, eve called for mother nature. and with that, winter was born.

—

when dan opens his eyes, the first thing he notices is the snow-covered branches of the forest. he’s sitting near the roots of a tree, and he runs his gloved hands through the snow. he doesn’t know where he is, or how he got here. come to think of it, he doesn’t know where he was before this, if anywhere. the only clue he has is the two words repeating over and over in his head: a name and a title. dan. winter.

slowly, dan stands up, using the tree for support. something inside him pulls him forward, and he’s walking down the hill. birds, or at least that’s what he instinctively calls them, fly overhead in the same direction as him. other than the pair of birds, the forest is lifeless and silent.

he stumbles into a large clearing, beyond which is a frozen lake and a small cabin. dan’s sure he’s never seen this place before, but it feels so familiar that he might as well have. stepping inside, it’s much drier than outside, and the fireplace in the center of the room warms the air. there’s nothing more than a table, bookshelf, and bed in the cabin. the heat begins to bother dan, so he opens the door again and sets out to explore the forest.

dan begins by circling the lake, though it’s cold and just as silent as the forest. he wonders if there might be life underneath the ice, surfacing when the ice disappears. if the ice disappears. dan wipes away at the layer of snow on the ice and, noticing his reflection, reaches up to touch his face. he doesn’t know what to think about himself. his cheeks are rosy and he can faintly see his breaths crystalizing in the air. he’s wearing a fur cloak with the hood up, but doesn’t know who made it or how he came by it. then again, he doesn’t know anything about this place, just that he’s meant to be here.

he pulls away from the hypnotic trance the ice drew him into. finding nothing else of immediate interest, dan wanders back into the trees. it seems repetitive at first, the same tree copied over thousands of times to create the forest. but as dan spends more time tracing the land, he starts to see small differences from one tree to the next. one might have an owl hole or the antler markings of a stag, and another might be otherwise unremarkable.

soon, the light fades and dan makes his way back to the cabin, where the fire flickers through the windows. the warmth is comforting, he realizes, after being outside for so long. dan finds himself drawn to the bed, and while he recognizes it’s for sleeping, he doesn’t feel tired. he slips his cloak and boots off and lays in the bed, closing his eyes and entering a dreamless sleep.

—

as the days pass, dan develops somewhat of a routine: wake up, start the fire, then spend the rest of the day in the mountains and valleys, visiting the same places each time. even though dan never seems to catch it in action, the trees and rocks and snow change. not all of them, but it’s enough for dan to notice.

one such day, long after dan has lost count of how long he’s been here, he finds new growth, new needles on many of the trees. the next day, a bear and her cubs emerge from somewhere deep in the mountains and sniff around the cabin, drawn to its warmth. it gives dan something new to check up on every day and he’s glad for it.

that is, until the ice on the lake begins to crack. it first happens in the middle of the night, like a clap of thunder, and dan jolts awake. over the course of the next few days, the crack becomes part of a vein, the trunk of a tree with smaller cracks branching out across the ice. dan can hear the splitting throughout the valley, and he wishes he knew what was causing the sudden change, because something inside fills him with unease.

dan wakes up one morning to the sound of sparrows chirping outside, the first birds other than ravens. he sits up, rubbing his eyes and yawning when the door opens, letting cold air inside. at first, he expects it to be the mother bear and her cubs, looking for food. but the hooded, sable-haired person who walks in is no bear.

dan scrambles out from under the covers and backs into the corner of the room. the person clearly senses his fear and confusion, and they lower their hood.

“you must be winter,” they say, stepping forward with an outstretched hand. “i’m spring, but you can call me phil.”

dan doesn’t take their, his, now that he can see their face, hand, instead focusing on the other’s appearance. his cloak is much like dan’s except a lighter material and darker in color. more importantly, his expression is soft, and dan can’t find anything that says phil’s here to hurt him.

“why are you here?” dan asks bluntly, though it comes out harsher than he intends.

“why am i-?” phil blinks, as if dan just asked an obvious question. “what’s your name?”

dan shakes his head, “tell me what’s going on first.”

“well,” phil starts. “you may want to sit down for this.”

and so phil explains their origin story. he has to retell it for everything to make sense to dan, and even then, he still doesn’t grasp the concept of evolution. but dan doesn’t really care about why birds are the way they are; he wants to know how he got here, and it’s the one thing phil can’t explain.

“i remember when i first met eve,” phil says. “fall, autumn, whatever you want to call her. aine had set fire to literally everything, and eve suddenly appeared to help the land heal. she just...started to exist.”

“it felt like i’d woken up from a long dream,” dan says softly, staring out the window and into the forest where he’d first found himself all those months ago. “i don’t remember ever having fallen asleep.”

“it felt that way for me, too. but that was before mother nature separated us, so when i… ‘woke up,’ as you put it, i had aine to talk to. i can’t imagine how lonely you’ve been.”

dan shrugs, “i didn’t know any different, until you showed up.”

“are there even any animals out when it’s cold like this?” phil asks. “the deer visit me when it starts getting warmer.”

“only recently.”

phil smiles warmly. “want to show me? i can’t wait to see how the forest dealt with all this snow for so long.”

dan agrees, though somewhat hesitantly, but forces a smile as they stand up from the table. there’s still so much about phil he doesn’t know, and dan isn’t close to understanding who he is or what his purpose is. for now, he leads phil into the forest, pointing out evidence of stags and which trees have since fallen over. it’s clear phil’s walked this earth hundreds of times over, and dan feels he’s making a fool of himself for pretending to know the forest like phil does.

until they reach the top of a hill and stop to look out across the valley. “it’s beautiful,” phil remarks, his breath clouding in front of him. “it’s so quiet.” he lets silence fill the air between them. “you know, you never did tell me your name,” phil says after a while.

dan lets the silence linger on before answering. “dan.”

“and mother nature decided to call you winter. i think both of those names suit you.”

“well, that’s a relief,” dan says, again, more rudely than he’d intended, but phil seems to take it as a joke and laughs.

“you did well, dan,” phil says, looking back to the valley. “the forest is more beautiful than i left it.”

“i’m not sure what i did,” dan mutters.

“i’m not sure either, but at least you didn’t burn it all down like aine.”

—

dan doesn’t know what he expects phil to do, but after the day passes and another starts, dan finds himself wondering why phil’s still here, since seasons aren’t allowed to roam the earth together. phil explains it later as seasonal changing, where winter slowly turns into spring, until there isn’t any trace of winter left, and then spring seeps into summer, and so on. they disappear and reappear when the time comes, and that explanation is enough for dan.

except dan’s heart can’t help but hurt as the snow melts more each day; as the ice cracks further and animals he’s never seen before drink at the lake’s edge. phil’s eyes only grow with wonder as he shows dan secret fox dens and birds’ nests. each day, they walk through the forest as dan usually does, then they do it all over again with phil’s path. it’s exhausting, to say the least. but dan learns so much about phil and the forest that it’s worth it. any doubts he had about phil have been long forgotten.

eventually, the lake stops freezing over at night and the remaining ice melts away. the trees are almost completely green now, and storms drop sleet instead of snow. one day, as dan puts out the fire, he feels extremely tired all of a sudden. he hasn’t done anything yet today, and once phil comes back from checking on something outside, they’re supposed to go on their daily walk. dan tries blinking it away, but when he tries to stand up, he doesn’t have the energy. within seconds, everything cascades into darkness.

—

the next thing dan knows is that he’s waking up from what feels like a deep sleep. he’s sitting exactly where he last was, or at least where he remembers he was. the hearth is burning again, and when dan looks out the window, it’s snowing. even with the fire going, it’s much colder in the cabin than he left it. how long was he asleep?  

he stands up, steadying himself on the mantle. the room looks exactly the same as before, except now there’s a notebook on the bedside table. dan walks over and picks it up, turning to the most recent page. “dan,” it reads.

“i went out for a while and when i came back, i couldn’t find you. you probably have a lot of questions, and i would have answered them while you were still here. you sorta caught me off guard by leaving so soon. you know seasons change here on earth, and when our season’s up, we disappear so the next can come. we usually don’t know when it’s our turn to leave until we’re gone.

“it feels like falling asleep, doesn’t it? then suddenly you’re back, doing exactly what you were before you left. i feel guilty for not being by your side when it happened to help you through it. i can only imagine how confused and worried you must have been. there’s a lot more to talk about, but i don’t want to overwhelm you after your first seasonal change. hopefully i’ll be back in a few months so we can see each other again. p.s. the baby bears are getting bigger and cuter! ♡ phil”

dan finds himself smiling as he reads phil’s note. it does answer some of his questions, but he feels left with a perpetual feeling of loneliness, of starting over again.

he waits until the storm passes to go outside. the lake is completely frozen over, and the air is silent as ever. at first, he tries to find the den where he first saw the bear family. then he realizes it’s been two full seasons since he last saw phil, so the bears are probably all grown up and have moved on already.

and so dan finds himself falling into his old routine. he walks around the forest, somewhat bored with the grayness of the trees. the realization that he misses spring occurs to him as he sees empty birds’ nests and rocks covered with dead lichen. more importantly, dan realizes he misses phil, especially when he turns to tell phil something but is greeted with empty space.

it only takes dan a few hours to decide he hates winter.

—

the days pass slower than dan can possibly imagine, and eventually he reaches the day when the ice on the lake starts to crack again. it takes a few more days for the trees to start showing their color again, but dan is sure it’s a sign phil will return.

when he does, dan comes back into the cabin after checking the ice again to see phil laying in bed, and he nearly screams. “you came back,” dan says breathlessly.

“did i?” phil smiles. “that’s a surprise.”

“you didn’t think you’d come back?” dan asks, eyebrows furrowing in confusion.

“just joking with you.”

—

“why didn’t i see eve?” dan asks some days later. they’re both sitting at the edge of a waterfall, one that pours into the lake some miles ahead. “if i get to see you at the start of spring, why doesn’t eve see me at the start of winter?”

“she’s decided she hates winter,” phil says back. “after she first made the earth too cold, she’s sworn off snow for eternity. mother nature agreed to let her disappear right before the first snow of the season.”

“how do you know that if there’s all of summer between you?”

“we talk to each other through the notebook. well, i guess it’s not really talking.” phil shrugs. “we leave notes when we’re alone and do as much talking as we can when there’s two of us.”

dan pauses for a moment before asking another question. “what’s aine like, then?”

“aine was the first of us, i suppose. she knows a lot more about things than i do. she’s hard to become close to, though, since she’s so warm all the time. i’m kind of glad i follow winter. i much prefer the cold.”

“but you get to watch the animals and feel the grass,” dan frowns. spring is everything winter isn’t. dan feels like their seasons are reflected in themselves; phil is bright and always cheerful, whereas dan is cold and has nothing to smile about when his season is silent and empty.

“there’s something special in every season, dan. it took me a while to appreciate myself.” the silence of winter fills the space between them, until suddenly, the ice below the waterfall cracks and sends water spraying everywhere. dan shrieks and backs away from the edge of the waterfall as phil laughs. “that never happens in spring.”

“lucky you,” dan grumbles.

—

as the weeks go by, dan spends every minute with phil because he knows soon enough, he’ll have to leave and when he comes back, phil won’t be here. so when dan feels tiredness creeping up on him one morning, he immediately reaches out for phil’s arm and whispers his name, “i think it’s happening.”

“it’s fine, dan, everything’s going to be fine,”  phil says as dan falls into his arms and struggles to stand. “it’s normal, right? you’ll be back before you know it.”

even being so close to phil, literally in his arms, dan’s heart nearly races out of his chest until his vision fades and he disappears from the earth.

—

but sure enough, dan returns for another winter, waking at the edge of the lake where phil left him. the first thing he does is check the notebook on the nightstand, sighing with relief once he sees phil’s handwriting. “hi dan,” the note says.

“you looked really scared before you left. the first few times it happened to me, i was  scared, too. it was sad to see you like that, since i couldn’t do anything to stop it. it’s not always easy to leave. but you’ll get used to it soon enough.

“today i had to bury a baby bird that fell out of its nest before it could fly. i tried to convince its mother that everything would be alright, but in hindsight i’m not very good at communicating with birds. i left it some berries in its nest, though. i had a few myself and they’re really good! they just became ripe enough a few days ago, and unfortunately i don’t think they’ll keep for a year so that you can try them. you’ll just have to take my word for it :P ♡ phil”

the note leaves dan feeling warm inside, though it also makes him miss phil more. for the rest of that winter, dan doesn’t stop thinking about spring.

—

when phil comes back, dan runs to him and hugs him tightly. the clouds are dark and it’s bound to start sleeting any moment, but dan doesn’t care. “you’re back,” he smiles.

“did you miss me that much?” phil grins back.

“i’m sorry,” dan says, almost sheepishly. he pulls away from phil, letting his beaming friend catch his breath. “i’ve just been so lonely without you. i’m sorry about that baby bird, by the way.”

“what?” phil asks. “oh, that’s right. it feels like ages ago when that happened. don’t you get any animals dying from the frost?”

dan shakes his head, “if i do, they’re buried in the snow.”

“speaking of the snow, let’s go inside, yeah? it’s freezing.”

“i thought you said you liked the cold,” dan teases, starting to walk back toward the cabin. phil just rolls his eyes, and dan laughs.

—

that night, dan and phil sit by the fire, the storm raging outside the cabin. the wind is so strong it threatens to blow the door in, but dan moves closer to phil and breathes in deeply, calming himself down.

“quite the storm you’ve got,” phil says softly.

“it’s nearly spring,” dan counters. “it’s your storm, too.”

“well, we should think about going to sleep,” phil yawns after a few minutes of watching the fire crackle and pop. “we’ll have to get up early tomorrow to see how much damage the storm did.” but dan’s already asleep, his head rested on phil’s shoulder, so phil carefully lifts him off the floor and tucks him under the covers of the bed.

when dan wakes up, he finds his legs tangled with phil’s. it’s the first night they properly sleep together, and they find themselves in the same situation every night afterward. after the first night, dan’s nervous; are they breaking some sort of unspoken rule? but phil never mentions it, and so they go to bed together each night, as well as spend every waking minute with each other. at first, dan thinks it’s because phil wants to be by his side when it’s time to go, but as time passes, he isn’t so sure anymore.

—

“i’m starting to understand what you mean when you say the seasons are lonely,” phil writes. “i always used to find comfort in watching the animals or walking around the woods, but now all i can think about is you. the animals are still adorable, of course, and the woods are still breathtaking. i saw a baby deer drinking from the lake today. imagine if that deer had been born a bit earlier, maybe we could have seen that together.”

there’s a space after the note, followed by another entry.

“it’s been raining nonstop for the last few days. that’s nice for the plants, i suppose, but i haven’t seen any animals since the rain started. it’s a cold rain, too. sometimes it turns into sleet or hail at night. it’s probably cold enough to bring you back, but i don’t think it works like that. i wish you were here to warm me and the animals up. ♡ phil”

every note of phil’s puts a smile on dan’s face. he reads them like they’re in the forest together and phil’s by his side, telling him about all the things he’s seen.

over time, dan’s winters change. some seem to get shorter and shorter, which dan isn’t upset about because it means he gets to see phil. some years, winter lasts a few weeks before phil shows up again. and some years they’re longer, other years the winters never pass, but dan patiently waits to see phil again.

he writes in the notebook, they both do. most of the time, there’s nothing interesting enough about winter for dan to write about, so he’ll draw the view from the window, or he’ll draw the same scene but how he imagines it to be in the spring. he reads an entry from phil each day, learning about what happened on that particular day of spring, but sometimes phil’s days are boring and he’ll end up drawing, too. and, of course, they’re inseparable when winter melds into spring and they’re together again. as much as dan hates winter, phil makes the time he has to spend alone worth it.

—

as the winters get even shorter, dan finds himself seeing phil more and more often, which seems like the opportunity of a lifetime. until one year, when dan sets foot on the earth again, phil is already there.

“it’s too short,” dan says, looking over at the lake, which didn’t freeze over at all this year. “something’s not right. what happens if winter doesn’t come at all next year?”

“aine’s been coming earlier and earlier, too,” phil admits. “she tells me she doesn’t have as much control as she used to. she thinks it’s humans.”

“the ones that pray for good harvests and build those funny houses?”

phil shakes his head, “ they’re getting rid of winter, dan. they’re getting rid of you. and soon there won’t be anything left but the dry heat of summer. and i’m nervous, because all the life will die and we will, too.”

“i don’t want to think about leaving you,” dan says, taking phil’s hands in his and resting their foreheads together.

“then don’t,” phil says, and he kisses dan. it’s soft and slow, and it surprises dan at first, but his heart hurts so much at the idea of never seeing phil again that he can’t pull away.

that was dan’s last winter.

—

“where do we go when we’re not here?” dan asked, picking up a river rock and skipping it across the lake.

“what do you mean?”

“when we come back, it feels like waking up from a dream.” another rock splashed into the water. “when we all fall asleep, where do we go?”

phil took a rock of his own and threw it into the distance. “i don’t know. even summer doesn’t know, and she was the first.”

“tell me about summer again.”

“again?” phil laughed. “she’s radiant. she makes the water warm but can evaporate it all in an instant. she’s constantly changing, and that’s what i love about you. you seem cold, but you’re kind to the earth. you’re a reminder of the life that remains and the life to come.”

“but you’re the one who brings life with you,” dan said back.

“i suppose i do. but you never appreciate what you have until it’s gone.”

[eventuallyfail]

13 Envelopes

pairing: reader x lin summary: After graduating from UCLA, you would find any way to escape having to go back home. Lucky for you, your Aunt Jasmine Cephas Jones had organized a way for you to have the adventure you’d never gotten to have before. You’re ready to take her up on the offer. warnings: rpf (naturally), mentions of teen pregnancy

tagged: @defenestrate-yourself-please @andschuyler@linslovelylocks @elithepeali @sarahgurl09 @fancy-fighting-name a/n: I actually debated against posting this today. But the thing is that I feel weird about having more than two weeks between updates. And it’ll probably take another one to two weeks to take part eight where it needs to be taken to move the story forward because I’m trying to avoid stall outs in the story. Also they’re getting lengthier as time progresses because of the nature of the fact we’re starting to build to all the plot twists and stuff that I actually knew would happen in part one. I hope you guys like it and I’m sorry that I’m sporadic in updates and have no real activity to speak of in between updates.

(part one) (part two) (part three) (part four) (part five) (part six)

Envelope #7

The train ride back was quiet yet again but this time not because you had nothing to say. You had so much to say and not enough brain power to process everything you wanted to say. You wanted to talk about how your father had cheated but it somehow felt like just because you knew didn’t mean you had the right to breach that subject further. It seemed like you knew something you weren’t supposed to know. Parents were supposed to have the perfect relationship and yet… knowing your father had betrayed your mother’s trust cut too deep. You had this idea of your parents’ relationship. The idea was that it was rocky, but they had stuck together through everything. You thought about it in terms of before you knew and after you knew. You wondered how many arguments had the cheating at the root of it.

You’d learned how arguing worked at a young age. It started with something small, some sort of uttered frustration regarding the dishes, to the electric bill, to forgetting the exit on the highway. And then the other person digged back and eventually the minor reason the fight started blew up until the train ran off its tracks. Until neither could remember what either of them was fighting for and was yelling just to yell. Or maybe… it was screaming to be heard. Maybe your mother had always been screaming because no one could notice how hurt she was. It seemed to make more sense.

The last fight you’d witnessed between your parents, you saw your mother cry and your father stormed out. It was easy to decide you didn’t want to be around them anymore after that. You packed your bags the next day and went off to college without so much as a goodbye. Now that you knew the full story, you felt just a tad bit guilty. Perhaps you should’ve been there for your mother, perhaps you should’ve know. You wondered when it even happened – you couldn’t recall the obvious shift.

Midway through the trip, Jasmine gently reminded you could open envelope seven and you pulled it out your bag. She looked surprised you had it with you. You were surprised at the drawing – it was the perfect capture of you at fifteen in your homecoming dress. You didn’t think she’d cared enough to remember that.

Honey Bun,

I barely remember your mother in any way other than a mom. Anya had you at seventeen and I was barely two when you were born. The huge age difference between us already worked against us as sisters and it didn't help that Anya didn't like my mother. In a way, it was easy to view her as an aunt or something to that effect. It's why I grew up closer to you, honestly. It's easier to view you as more of a sister than my own sister which sucks a lot. It hurts to think that I should relate to her, understand her but I can’t. It’s this massive barrier between us.

What’s really upsetting is that there’s a distance between the two of us now. We grew up as sisters and now… it’s my fault, really. I’m the older one, I’m supposed to be the one who takes care of things. I’m supposed to be the one who’s always there for you and to advise you. It’s on me. And I’m sorry. I suppose that’s what this envelope is… an apology. Accepting responsibility for the wedge between us that exists now. I run away when it gets hard and that’s on me.

I don’t stop to think what my actions can affect other people. I know that I’ve been hard on your father, harder than I should be. I hope by now I’ve told you what happened with your father and your mother. It’s the real root of everything. And I’ll be honest: when my only relationship models have been Anya’s and the ones my dad has had… it’s no wonder that I’ve had difficulty managing any of my relationships. And I know that sounds like an excuse but I promise that it isn’t.

I feel like it’s really hard to come up with tasks for these envelopes so I think this will be another wild card. You’ve probably been in New York City for weeks by now. Do something you loved again – you’d be surprised how different something can feel when it’s in a different context. When you’ve completed that, you may open envelope eight. I hope by now… we’ve started to rebuild our relationship.

All my love, Aunt Jas

There were no answers. Nothing in it seemed to give a way to move forward and only suggested that you look back instead. You felt your heart thud and then you couldn’t feel it in your chest anymore. You were vaguely aware of existing as a person but it was like something disconnected, snipping you away from the reality of the moment. You could blame a lot of things but the truth was… feeling disconnected from the moment was something that happened a lot. Out of body experiences like this were surprising common. It was just getting swept up into thought as some vague idea was forming in the back of your mind. You couldn’t articulate it quite yet, but you just started vaguely drawing something on your thigh. You were pulled out when you heard Jasmine say your name and the bubble broke. You blinked before looking up and realized the stunned look on her face. “Sorry,” you said, the apology instinctive. “Just… got distracted.”

A pause before she said softly, “I didn’t know you knew how to draw.”

“I didn’t know you knew how to draw either,” you said as you awkwardly put your pen away, a flush on your face. “Suppose we’re both artists, then.”

It was such an awkward pause. There were a lot of unspoken things in the air. You supposed the more that you thought about it, the more you could’ve reached out. You could’ve tried to stay in touch with Jasmine. But you hadn’t. Neither of you made the effort. You could understand the effort behind this whole trip. And you found yourself grateful for the slow pace you were moving at. Once it was over, you couldn’t go back to this moment. Savoring the moment seemed like the obvious thing to do but it was rather hard to do. The more you try to hold onto to a moment, the more it vanished like sand between your fingertips.

You couldn’t figure out how you ended up back at the apartment you were sharing with Pippa. It was empty, as it had been for the past few weeks around this time. You’d gotten used to the emptiness the way one got used to an unpleasant smell. You’d never really been alone before. In Los Angeles, you shared your apartment with two other roommates and usually at least one of them was home. You supposed at least it was better than coming home to your parents screaming at each other and threatening to leave… or damage property, at the very least. When comparing the alone time to that, it wasn’t so bad. You supposed it was all about context.

The bed beckoned and you ended up changing into pajamas, wiping your makeup off and pulling your thick curls back into a high ponytail to keep the hair off your neck. It was still warm but you noticed Pippa had set up a fan in your room in your absence. It was a sweet gesture and you overthought what it meant – just something that your mind tended to do. You got lost in a first draft, words spilling out easier than they ever had.

You barely noticed the hours flying by as you wrote, captive in your own world. It became easier to float away. The city enveloped you like magic, holding you captive and creating an entire world around you. When the front door slammed, you jumped half a foot into the air and glanced at the clock. It was midnight. Suddenly the exhaustion set in and you set aside the laptop as you stretched out on the bed. If you didn’t go greet Pippa, you wouldn’t see her again until Monday. “Pip,” you said, a bright grin on your face. “It’s so good to see you again.”

She was clearly just as bleary eyed as you but grinned at you regardless, pulling you into a tight hug. Her earthy scent filled your senses. “It’s getting insane at previews,” she said. “Almost every seat is filled. It’s getting nerve wracking. I don’t know how I’m going to do when I know you’re in the audience at the premiere.”

You flushed. “I’m sure you’re going to be amazing,” you said with a grin. “I can’t imagine you being anything other than amazing. Plus we get to go home together after the show.”

Pippa smirked. “You may have to let me get to second base,” she teased. “After all, I could end up going home with a hot date instead of you.”

“Please,” you said with a bright grin as you pulled away. “We both know I’m going to be the hottest date to have at the premiere. You might have to fight for my hand.”

“In that case, I might have to fight Lin for the right to take you home,” she said with a grin, bumping against you as she headed off to the kitchen. “How far have you two even gotten, anyway? There’s a pool going on. I’ve got ten bucks on second base.”

You made a face. “Sorry, you’re betting on my love life?”

“Sure,” she says with a bright grin as she gets herself some of the cashews from the cabinet and a sparkling water out of the fridge. “Why? Don’t tell me I’m losing ten bucks.”

“Erm, kinda,” you said, your cheeks feeling like they were on fire. “I mean, I sorta… listen, when your mom was a teen mom… and just… okay?”

Pippa’s jaw dropped and she looked oddly delighted. “You’re a virgin!”

“I did not say that,” you said, your eyes wide. “But yeah, kinda. I just… didn’t want to end up making a mistake. Like, I grew up watching my parents argue and fight over money and they didn’t exactly have a stable life. I just… didn’t want that to me. And the easiest way was… well, to not… do anything that could lead to having a kid.”

“No, it’s okay,” she said with a grin. “You just… should tell Lin. Cause I mean… it’s better that he knows that you wanna wait before things get hot and heavy, you know what I mean?”

“What if he dumps me? I mean… other guys…”

“Lin’s not other guys,” Pippa said with a roll of her eyes as she takes a swig of her water. “He’ll be cool about it. And if it he isn’t… Jas and I will beat his ass. But don’t worry. Lin won’t dump you just cause you don’t want to fuck like… right off the bat. And he’s a massive romantic anyway. Dumping you cause you wanna wait is like… so unromantic.”

Before you could even comment on the last part, Pippa walked off and left you with a mix of confusing thoughts.

The next day, you decided that the best way to deal with this was to talk with Jasmine. It was the last thing you wanted to do, but you felt that Jasmine would give the best advice on this. You had texted Jasmine that you wanted to talk to her about what to do and she gave you the address of some café near the Richard Rogers. You were kind of were surprised by how busy it was and how difficult it was to find Jasmine in the tiny café. “Sorry,” she said with a bright grin. “A lot of the people here are trying to track down the cast. Try not to draw attention to us.”

“So… this musical… it’s a bit of a bigger deal than you, Pip, and Lin lead on, huh,” you asked as you noticed that Jasmine remembered how you liked your coffee from years ago. You didn’t take your coffee like that anymore, but you were touched that she remembered. “Can’t believe I now have a famous grandfather anda famous aunt. You better hype my book when I finish writing it.”

Jasmine grinned. “You probably won’t even need us to hype it,” she teases with a bright grin. “I’ve read some of your early essays – you’ve got the talent. So what did you want to meet about?”

It was a strange feeling that you took a moment to bask in – the feeling of knowing Jasmine but also not really knowing her. Knowing that she knew you but didn’t really know you. You wondered how you would describe the feeling. And it also felt nice that she remembered reading your essays before she disappeared from your life. “I just… Look, don’t freak out about this but like… I sort of… need to tell Lin something kind of important. Sort of… sex life related?”

She made a face. “Ew,” she said. “So not the kind of thing I wanna hear my niece talk about.”

You didn’t blame her for that. You didn’t want to discuss this with your aunt either but desperate times and everything. “Er, does it help that the thing I need to tell him is that I’m a virgin?”

“Sort of,” she grumbles as she takes a bite out of the sandwich she’d ordered for herself. “So why are you telling him this? Also… is there any reason you decided to not have sex by now? Like… religious pact with God? Oh, are you like… that thing where you don’t feel sexual attraction? Asexual!”

You felt your cheeks get hot again. “No to either of those things,” you hurried out. “Like… I mean, I’m not exactly straight but… I just didn’t want to get distracted from my studies. And after growing up with mom and dad… you saw how it was. I didn’t want…. a kid growing up feeling like a mistake.”

“Makes sense,” she said with a shrug. “Doesn’t explain why you didn’t just lose your v card to a girl but whatever. More power to you.”

“Jas,” you hissed, nearly tipping over your coffee cup in shock. You didn’t often dwell on this – it was just something that was a fact of your life. Telling people seemed strange – normally it was something that came up on the third date and then you never saw the guy again. “I just… I’d rather not stay on this topic like that. I just… want to know how you think I should tell Lin. Like, I don’t want him to think it’s because I’m a prude or something. Or that I never want to have sex, just that… I don’t want to rush into it.”

She snorts. “Tell him on a fancy date,” she said simply. “Like… opera or something. No one’s allowed to make a scene on a fancy date. It’s like… social convention. That way you can get it out the way and hey, you could do it at the MET. Get the seventh envelope done while you’re at it.”

“What if he dumps me?”

This time she rolled her eyes. “If he dumps you over this, tell me and I’ll personally beat his ass. But I doubt he’s going to dump you. He’s too much of a nice guy.”

You had experience with nice guys before. Nice guys took you on a pity date and decided that it wasn’t worth waiting around for you to be ready to have sex. Still, you decided it would be worth telling him if only so he wasn’t surprised when you decided to stop when things got hot and heavy. So you called him, grinning the whole conversation as you asked him if he’d like to go to the opera with you. He mentioned having a night off and you agreed to see him Tuesday.

By the time Tuesday rolled around, you were regretting agreeing to going out with Lin again at all. You were scared and worried. It seemed like everything that could go wrong had played out in your head. You woke up from dreams where Lin just ditches you for someone else… thinner and blonder. Or someone who was less of a stick in the mud. Or someone more adventurous. Your first thought was that he can’t break up with you if he never sees you again. How the logistics of it would work didn’t make sense, of course, but you were on anxiety brain.

The brochure for something going on later in New York City (you hadn’t paid attention to what it said) ended up in a small shredded pile in your lap as you tried to remember the exact steps that Google Maps had told you to take to get from Pippa’s apartment to the MET. You wondered if it would be so bad if you called Lin and told him oh no, you got lost and couldn’t make it. You nervously ran your hands through your curls, putting your hair up and taking it down repeatedly until you transferred trains.

It didn’t seem like this long of a trip the last time you went but it seemed like it stretched on forever. You picked at the skin of your thumb, wondering how you bring up this subject in the first place. It didn’t seem like a casual enough subject to just randomly blurt out. You sighed deeply when you realized you were already there – how had it felt like ages yet like nothing at all? You were out of time to think of how to delicately approach the subject. Your heart was pounding and you smoothed the skirt out on your dress as you got off at your stop – Lincoln Center. Lin had suggested the two of you meet at that stop and you hadn’t stop to think about how it didn’t offer you the chance to mentally prepare at seeing him.

He was devastatingly handsome. Of course he was – that hadn’t changed. He never stopped looking so handsome and it drove you crazy. “Hi,” was all you managed to breathe out. Nerves were getting to you.

He didn’t seem to mind that at all. He had that typical easy-going grin that you were starting to associate with him. You noted that he seemed to look a little more tired than last time. You imagined he wasn’t getting much sleep and you had an overwhelming urge to tuck him in for a nap. It was irrational. He was a grown adult. If he wanted a nap, he would’ve had a nap. “Hi,” he replied as he took your arm, leading the way. Which was good because if you were honest, you were prone to getting lost in the city. “It’s pretty hot that you took initiative.”

Of course he was teasing. That didn’t stop the heat rising to your cheeks or the forced laughter coming out and you cringed internally at it. You swore up and down it sounded like a horse’s laugh but Lin was clearly charmed. He’d say that it was beautiful. “I mean, my aunt was pretty specific in her letters about what I need to do,” you rambled. “Kind of still owe her a thank you, I mean…”

He cut you off with a kiss and you melted into it. It was easy to melt into his kisses, you were discovering. And you craved them the way one craved sweets. When he pulled away, you were grinning as his hand moved to grasp yours. “That reminds me that I still haven’t thanked her for setting you up on this adventure that led to me getting to meet you.”

“If it helps, I haven’t thanked her yet either,” you said with a grin as he led the way to the MET. “I felt like… I’d thank her when I make it to the end of the adventure. I don’t know where it’s going… but it seems like it’s important.”

“Sometimes it’s more about the journey than where you’re going. Have you considered that maybe it’s just a journey and the outcome doesn’t mean that much?”

You considered that. A journey in which the path you took mattered more than the outcome seemed like a strange idea to process. The path you took from the very start of life seemed to have a very clear outcome. You went to school with the intent of passing, getting every good grade you possibly could to go to college. College was an escape from the fighting at home. You chose English because you fancied yourself a good teacher or even a novelist. You decided it was a good solid degree plan because the degree mattered more than what it was in. “Outcome always means something, though. If you don’t want to end up somewhere, you wouldn’t take a certain path.”

He seemed surprised by this. “You’ve never done anything for the sake of doing something? Never went out just because it seems like it’s a fun thing to do?”

“That was always Jas’s territory,” you said slowly as he squeezes your hand. “I’ve always been the boring one. She was the one who encouraged me to go out, who made the plans and cared more about the journey. I’ve… always thought about where it goes. Getting on a plane because aunt Jas told me to do it is more of… an example of the way our dynamic always worked.”

The thing you’d discovered with Lin is that he was relatively easy going and rarely suggested that the way you and Jas interacted was odd. Even after discovering Jas’s niece was closer to her in age than he expected, he simply rolled with it and never once made it weird. You liked that about him. You also liked how he seemed to be willing to bounce ideas back and forth, not once acting like anything you said might be stupid. And even now as you talked over the philosophical question of if the path matters more than the outcome, he never once belittled you despite disagreeing with you.

And somehow, he managed to get you to see his side of things. It wasn’t that he changed your mind (you still felt the outcome mattered when picking a path to journey on), but rather he helped you see what the point of a journey was. You’d almost forgotten the important part of what you wanted to do on this date until things started to get steamy with Lin. His lips felt so good against yours and then his hand was on your chest, his other firm on your hip and pulling you to him.

You didn’t know how you ended up in the back of the Uber pressed to him and you couldn’t recall what the opera was even about. All you could think about was how easy it would be let him take you home. It was easy to get wrapped up in the feeling of his lips against your neck, the feeling of his facial hair scruffing against your jawline. And then you realized what going home with Lin would entail, you pulled away. “Sorry,” you half yelped. “I just… I kind of… never done this before?”

He paused and you prepared for the break up. “You’re… a virgin?”

It took a minute before you found your voice again. “Yes.” You wished the earth would swallow you up so you could escape the look he was giving you. You wondered what he was thinking. And before you could stop yourself, you found yourself giving a word vomit. “Not because I… don’t want to or anything like that. I mean, I don’t know if I want to I’ve never even tried it before. Just that… it’s a huge deal and I don’t want to end up having kids by accident with the wrong person. Not that I think that you wouldn’t use protection or anything, I mean, I’m on the pill but that’s because I have these awful… you know what, that’s not romantic or anything sexy –”

Before you knew it, he cut you off and cupped you cheek. The minute you looked into his eyes, you knew he wasn’t going to dump you. “So did you want to go home with me still or did you want to continue to wait?”

“I… wait,” you admitted. “I just… I’m not a fast kind of person. Not to say that girls who are fast aren’t… you know what I mean?”

He laughs and nods. “I know what you mean, don’t worry,” he said before kissing your cheek and telling the taxi driver Pippa’s address. “I’ll call you later.”

You were worried that the “I’ll call you” was the start of being ghosted but when the taxi left, your phone lit up. It was Lin texting you good night.

[khursheedsahardat]

REFLECTIONS-1

Whenever I see a plant, I wouldn’t just get fascinated by the anatomy or color of it, but also upon its very existence. I would immediately look at its roots and surroundings and see the dying sprouts. Then may be someone will water the dying sprouts at night and the sun will cooperate in the morning and so the sprout will be healed and grow up to become a plant too.  Then some days, when I am sick and lethargic, I consider my body just like that sprout, in need of my water and sun; but humans have different ways of healing, so I am given a magic potion by the doctor which was sometimes called a calpol and other times with different names, healed me as days went by. I was healthy and hearty again. So I reflected upon the idea of how faith prevails, wounds get healed, tears go away, smiles come back, everything becomes alright and life goes on. This is the most beautiful reality of living. Those very details of getting back all the power and fortitude kept me wondering for days. How does something get healed? What makes it live once again? What breathes life into it? How beautifully something travels from one stage to another, completely letting go of the previous one, growing in the forward direction. Launching forth into a better state of being. So this idea informed my wish to study art therapy.

REFLECTIONS- 2

Reflecting on my journey as art therapy trainee , why I feel the way I feel about everything surrounding me, I am an international student, a lot has changed since I moved here and started my first semester, I am from a third world country so moving here was a culture shock obviously, with a baggage full of loads of things that are deep rooted in my belief system be it ethical or cultural or individual feeling or a sudden need of running along the world around me. My parents’ expectations with me, my great friendships and my toxic friendships and my mental peace. I experienced a shift in everything. A shift of a place, a shift of emotions, a shift of priorities, new friendships, new responsibilities, It is safe to say that when we read, we relate, we become protagonists of a story we read, we keep up with the story as our own, when words come in front of us, we narrate our story back as answers, first in our minds, then through the very text itself, a very unique exchange of dialogue between words and reality is born.  To authenticate a human experience, I relate every text and every problem and its solution to my current circumstances to get a grasp of the experience of the author and see what I would have felt in such circumstance, this has increased my trait of being an empathetic person.

REFLECTIONS - 3

A change of place was a very impactful emotion in the beginning of my semester as I was in a new home with a new routine where no one but myself to take care of, sometimes I would have internal dialogue with myself about how I made it here and I will just go down the memory lane, when you are from a brown family and you are a daughter, it is not always easy for u to actually make your dreams come true especially if they demand a lot of freedom and a lot of time. So when my dream did actually come true, all my sorrows flew out of the window, I was living in my dream place, London’s grey clouds were not depressing at all, rain was never bothering me. I realized, that my very room was my safe place, I could restart my life and be whoever I wanted to be, I was out of my family’s scrutinizing eyes and I could let my emotions out whenever and however I could. Here I think the safe place reinforces a person to let the fragments of the past become obsolete and let out the emotions as raw as possible, the baggage of the past, I thought, sometime becomes too heavy that the existing place doesn’t feel like a safe place anymore no matter how safe it is, visuals matter so much that mind constantly denies any visual of existing place that reminds of uneasiness and discomfort of the bad memories, bad relationships and toxic interactions.

REFLECTIONS- 4

 I wonder, in this uncertainty of the times, where human interaction is limited and we are constantly being denied of meeting our loved ones, our therapist to say, we have entered an era where we are somehow forced to stay away and use technology rather than face to face interaction and technology has limited us to our homes, we can’t go places, we can’t have new visuals, we can’t have rather good stimulus, here the question arises, are the digital therapy sessions effective for the service users? Do they provide us the safe place we need? And to what extent, as there is definitely a lack of change of place, lack of safe visuals, lack of new air and a lack of new fragrance. Safe place being the primary protocol of therapy, one thing that adds up to my frustration is continuous digital encounters have taken over many meetings which could have been in person. I wonder how different and how much beneficial that would have been.

REFLECTIONS- 5

Being a fine arts student, expressive arts has been a strongest tool for me to express my own feelings; I have always believed that art has a lot more to offer to people than just a wall painting. Art carries in itself attributes that are not revealed to many people and it takes a different viewpoint to understand what more art could offer in a clinical setting.

·         Therefore the way I artistically work comes from my personality which is altruistic, and I want to do anything I can with my skill to making lives better. This may have great impact in my art therapy training because this is what keeps me motivated, to serve human beings, and with a passion like this, I think I will prove myself a compassionate therapist professionally.

REFLECTIONS -6·     

    Art therapy is an ongoing research based practice that is going on in the world, everyone in their reach has tried their best to bring out the benefits of art therapy both on mental and physical health. Art therapy has managed to solve the mind-body problem through neuroscience and mental intervention has proven to improve moods and even physical pain for longer times now. I relate therapy to natural healing process of the wounds, how the condition of anything changes overtime and becomes stronger than before. Metaphorically, art therapy is a medicine to mental injuries and offers healthy and sound-minded outcomes through sessions.

·         Art Therapy being a unique form of therapy under psychotherapies, is a complementary form of treatment that service users get, art therapy involves a range of materials that suits different temperaments of the service users making it vastly approachable to clients, art therapy is an intimate experience between a service user and their artwork where the end result of art making is not important but rather is what the service user experienced and revealed through it. Sometimes art therapy is opposite of intimate, it is intimidating to many people who don’t feel confident in using certain materials and are scared of being judged.

·         I am interested in intervening art therapy into palliative diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s, although art therapy has already begun touching those subjects but my area of interest specifically is mind-body correlated investigation in which I would research how cancer patient may have a reduced bodily pain through mental stabilization.

REFLECTIONS- 7 

I want to talk about family, about attachment and mentalization, they say the baby mirrors the mother, and the mother mirrors the baby, such concept has deeply moved me, when you are a child, your first human interaction is with the mother who shapes your personality, tells you when to eat when you want to cry she lets you cry but tells you when it is not okay to cry, there your emotions are being supervised without you realizing it, you are being conditioned, and your stimulus is your mother’s permission, agreement and disagreement to whatever emotion you need to display. same goes with fathers, my father has been an extremely important person in my life, he has motivated me and he has loved me to bits. but even with such close relationships, when you grow up, your brain untangles itself from the previous conditioning, you are the slave of your growing hormones and hence moods and emotions. the autonomic nervous system outgrows your parent’s scrutiny and will and whispers in your brain: “it is you who decides, when to smile and when to cry”

REFLECTIONS- 8

WHAT IS ART THERAPY

Art Therapy is a type of psychotherapy which deals with visuals and their movements and color to heal trauma and mental illnesses. Art therapy has made its way through clinical practices of treating mind body problems. Art Therapy of image making plays a significant role in client’s mental health evaluation because of the very instinct of human beings and their need to relate to the surroundings and art therapy provides just that. Visual image making is an important aspect of the human learning process (Waller, 2006)

art made in the safe confines of the art therapy room may enable a child to explore and express feelings that cannot easily be put into words. Instead of acting out ‘difficult’ feelings the child puts these into the object. This can then be shared with the therapist. The art can act as a ‘container’ for powerful emotions, and can be a means of communication between child and art therapist. Some art therapists focus on the physical enjoyment, and the ‘play’ elements of art therapy, believing that the more a child can become creative, the better for his or her psychological growth.

REFLECTION- 9

Person or a Place? NEW PLACE AND A NEW PERSON, Therapeutic enough?

Art made in the safe environment enables the client to explore and express feelings that cannot be easily said through words. So it helps the client to not act difficult and let the image or object convey his emotions. Art artwork or an outcome of an art therapy session can act as a container for powerful emotions and can be means of communication between client and therapist (Waller, 2006) the final product made with clients can be the most authentic and raw form of self. Art opens media to all kinds of expressions of emotions and helps bridge the gap of misunderstandings between communicators for better understanding of the feelings, because verbal barrier may often be the reason of bottled-up emotions and thus Art therapy is expected to make way and help well-being and investigate limbic states of the mind of a client. Art therapy is not just an understanding of client mental state; nor a set of instructions to teach art; but is a method through which we try to analyze and heal the patient by understanding his feelings and thoughts. Hence this art and its science are very powerful and must be valued in the domains of psychotherapies.

Various new forms of art therapy are introduced which include expression through painting, collage making, sculpting, drama therapy, music therapy and drawings. These are different modalities in art therapy and they help one in overcoming the effects of traumatic or unpleasant memories in their life. Many referrers would like the opportunity for their clients to experience assessments in all of the arts modalities, each modality having its own specific benefits and values (Fenwick, 2012).Art therapy modalities require specific space in which art therapy is given are also designed to suit the needs of the patients, The art therapy rooms and working spaces for art therapists working in different settings vary enormously, but all of them attempt to provide a sense of permanence, consistency, a ‘set apart’ space or ‘creative arena’ for interactions to take place between therapist, client and art materials (Caroline, Dalley, 2004)

The primary purpose of art therapy is to accelerate positive emotions while inhibiting negative emotions providing feeling of self mastery and control within a safe and comfortable environment.

REFLECTIONS- 10

I believe that art to a common mind is a world of possibilities, and i see my role in this world of art is to make each and everyone hopeful in themselves and hopeful to the world. 

Because as it is, Images, words, surroundings and sounds have huge impact on our lives. And as a therapist i would like to know which frequencies to set for my clients to navigate them towards a way of healthy and sound mind. The therapist in the room on the other side of the table is as much of a visual stimulus as any art material in the room, the experience that is intimidating at first is because of the transference of the personalities that the client/service user and art therapist encounter with each other. 

by now we have established that the right brain has its own language of aesthetics, less corporate if you like, no language but music. no numbers but abundance hence emotions win over logic. and that is why i think, art therapy is such unique intervention to the mind to heal trauma and any irregular emotion that has lost its way and has walked toward the extreme side of the life’s see-saw.

REFLECTION- 11

Art therapy and clinical neuroscience  is one of the holy grail books that i first encountered, it not only gave me an insight into the mind-body relativity and how we are less hampered now in regards to their coherence. one of the most beautifully explained chapter about stress expressed that the idea of stress is always taken as a negative thing, one that must be tackled down before it drains us human beings. but the book mentions another way of tackling the stress, that is to take every setback as a transformative experience, rise above any adversity, understand the whirlpool of the situation, and come out of the tunnel as a well-lived through adverse times person and well learned as well. 

[foursprouthealth-blog]

How to Be a More Confident Person

New Post has been published on http://foursprout.com/health/how-to-be-a-more-confident-person/

How to Be a More Confident Person

When I was a kid, we had very little money. This didn’t seem like a problem to me until I went to my friends’ homes and saw that they had actual houses (we lived in apartments and sometimes shared housing). The kids all had their own bedrooms and a nice dining room table—some even had big gardens.

As a kid, I liked what I had until I got older and saw that people with bigger houses and more money were considered better and more important. Then I realized this made feel like I’m less than other people. I had less, so naturally, I felt like a lesser human.

EDITOR’S PICK

displayTitle

Of course this damaged my self-esteem. If I’d had no clue or paid less attention (hard but not impossible), my confidence in who I was and what I had would have stayed nicely intact.

Comparing and looking for validation outside yourself is a recipe for feeling like sh*t. The root of real confidence is knowing who you are and being OK with yourself just as you are. If you want to be a more self-assured and confident person, here are some steps you can take to experience your best feelings of self-reliance and inner security:

1. Make the decision.

There is no magical formula for feeling confident. It’s not something that anyone is born with—lack of confidence is universal. But the most empowering decision that only you can make is to decide you are a confident person.

And if you feel like you need permission to become confident, I’m giving it to ya right now. Yes, it’s that simple. Even if it doesn’t feel like that’s true. It’s your call to be a confident person. No one else can do it for you.

2. Sound the part.

Have you ever noticed how self-assured types speak differently?

Confident people also don’t say things like, “I don’t know how,” “I can’t,” and “I’m not good at.” Their language is intentional and commanding. Think: How can you switch up your own language?

Consider the difference between two people discussing their travel adventures. One might say, “I love to go to off the beaten path and really explore the world. I have a travel budget and a plan every year. Oh, you like traveling for extended periods too? Awesome! Hey, you can even follow me on Instagram where I post my favorite travel snaps…”

Another fellow traveler might avoid eye contact and laugh nervously, saying, “I should document my travel more, but I haven’t figured out how to properly do that yet.”

Who do you think has more fun globe-trotting (and in general)?

Statements like “I love,” “I do,” and “I can” have a very different effect on our energy and our impact on others compared to “I should,” “I try,” and “I don’t know.” When you use stronger, more intentional language, it impacts your mood, your confidence, and even how other people perceive you.

High-achieving, happy people have consciously mastered the art of tuning out their inner critic and dialing up the volume on their inner coach. Your inner coach is there for you—on demand!—and she’s ready to support you whenever you call on her. You have the power to choose to focus on words that feel good.

Confident people also carry themselves differently. Their body language allows them to take up more space—they sit taller, gesticulate when speaking, and stand strong.

Comparing and looking for validation outside yourself is a recipe feeling like sh*t

3. Appreciate that everyone has insecurities.

Rachel in HR with her perfect style and easy laugh is no exception. Neither is that speaker on stage with the scary-good comedic timing and overall poise. Every single person on planet Earth is plagued with self-doubt in some area, to some degree—always.

Negative thoughts don’t escape anyone. The difference is confident people do not let uncertainty and doubt drive their decision-making. Courage is moving forward when your heart is still beating fast—not when you feel cool and relaxed, going about your daily routine. Confident people learn to master their inner critic and drown it out with something stronger: their inner coach.

4. Compare differently.

When I was working in sales, there were a couple women in my field who were known for being business badasses. They spoke their mind, they were forging new advances in tech, and they were often congratulated for their innovation. But…

“Ugh—Sarah is SO fake!” people would say. Or “Becca’s just a CEO kiss-ass.”

And were they? Maybe. But these words of spite were definitely coming from a place of envy.

Instead, these women made me think to myself: Look what’s possible! Sarah was only in the ad tech industry for four years. Imagine what I can do in the next 12 months!

Can your triggers from other people show you what’s waiting in store for you instead of leading you to negative thoughts and feelings? When you decide to get busy and focus on what you can control, your confidence level skyrockets. Imagine what could happen if you stopped paying so much attention to the people you see in your life, channeled all your force into the mirror, and started getting busy.

5. Keep compliments close.

Austin Kleon, best-selling author of Steal Like an Artist, recommends keeping a “praise file” full of compliments, positive feedback, and kind notes that people have sent you. These can be from anyone—your boss, a friend, an old teacher, a client—heck, even all the nice comments on your Facebook pics and/or blog posts.

A praise file lets you dwell on the good stuff. The negativity bias (our tendency to focus on one mean comment over nine positive ones) can prevent us from enjoying all the wonderful feedback we’ve been given in our lives. When I pop open my praise file, I smile big and feel 10 pounds lighter. It works—trust me! Store it on your desktop for easy access.

EDITOR’S PICK

displayTitle

6. Stop fearing failure.

Confident people know failure is inevitable and don’t fear it. Worrying about failure can keep us from doing anything at all, but confident people are still confident—even when they fail. When the tide is against them or they’ve had a negative result, they know it will pass; their bounce-back rate is fast. Can yours get up there too? I mean… haven’t you survived everything that life has thrown at you so far? Why would that change now?

7. Laugh more.

There was an Insta post I saw that made me chuckle. It said, “You found that offensive? I found it funny! No wonder I’m happier than you!”

When did life become so serious? Joan Rivers said, “Life goes by fast. Enjoy it. Calm down. It’s all funny.” Doesn’t that idea just provide some pretty immediate relief? And once you get to the point where you can laugh off life’s mishaps, everything becomes easier. You relax. Opening up allows more good to flow to you, and you become a magnet for more laughter. Like attracts like, and I can think of nothing better than attracting more laughter into your life.

8. Take baby steps when you’re scared.

My brilliant friend Ruth Soukup’s mantra is “do it scared.” Because we are all scared, almost all of the time. But you don’t need to quit your job tomorrow to start a business you love; you can start at the beginning. Get clear on what your passion is. Ask yourself some deep questions. Research others who share similar interests to you and speak to people in the field you’d like to be a part of. Find out who else is successful in doing what you want to do. Read all you can about the industry you want to enter.

The rest unfolds in time if you stay committed and allow it to. You don’t have to have it all figured out in order to get started. You just have to begin. Each small step—like one brick being laid after one another—can build something greater than you can even visualize in the beginning. And the good news is, the more action you take, the teensy bit easier the next action piece is. What can you begin?

Bonus: The confidence-competence loop works in your favor here. Put simply, this means the more you do something, the more confident you become in it, and then the more you continue to do it (more competently each time). It’s a wonderful cycle. Taking action builds your confidence, which then leads you to greater things that can make you satisfied. That means even if you don’t get the exact results you want, you’ll still have gained something valuable from the process of taking action.

You don’t have to have it all figured out in order to get started. You just have to begin.

9. Focus on what you want (not what you don’t want).

Confident people have a positive vision of the future—of their savings account, their body, their relationships. They expect good things to happen to them, and as a result, good things do happen more often. Expectation is a very powerful force. What are you thinking about right now? How can you turn it around to be thinking about the precise outcome or result that you really, really want?

10. Do YOU.

As a kid I would try to compete for first place in ways I could control (because I was not gonna have the biggest garden any time soon). I was top of the class. I did my best to be funny and popular and always in a good mood. These things “worked.” And they still work, to some degree. But when I’m motivated by an external limiting belief that I’m not enough, that leads me to believe I have to perform, whereas if I follow my natural human desire to feel good and authentic, I get a different result.

Whatever highs or achievements I experience don’t last when it’s coming from external prompts.

Doing me feels different. It allows me to be in a receptive mode—not just hustlin’ all day to impress my ex-husband’s new wife’s sister’s neighbor.

Doing you means feeling inspired, acting on internal instinct, and moving forward in your decision-making from a place of alignment and joy (not desperation, fear, and the old compare-and-despair mentality).

My friend Jim Kwik says development and growth are like an egg. When external forces break them, that means it’s over. When they break open from the inside, that’s life. That’s possibility. Are you allowing yourself to be driven by inside forces? Your intuition is your greatest advisor and a huge source of confidence—when you learn to trust it.

11. Live on purpose.

A mentor of mine says, “You had a purpose before anyone had an opinion.” Knowing your purpose—why you’re here—brings tremendous confidence. Are you in alignment with your purpose? Are you the friend, spouse, or boss that you know inside that you secretly could be? This is why plenty of people start side hustles—to allow their inner creativity to spark.

Holding back doesn’t feel good because it isn’t good. Confidence grows when we become who we really are, expand our comfort zone, and make progress in maturing and developing. How will you ever know who you really are until you explore it fully? Taking strides in living on purpose may be the most radical confidence-building act of all.

The magic of confidence is once you start to take control of your life—your inner narrative, how you feel about yourself, and what you spend your precious time doing—your life transforms. (And hey, you can still Netflix and chill sometimes!).

You are the chicken inside the egg breaking out. Deciding what’s next. Creating your future. And when you do that, not only do you move toward the highest manifestation of your life, you inspire other people to do the same. Confidence inspires and begets more confidence—so commit to it for you, yes. But also to the echo you create for everyone else.

Susie Moore is Greatist’s life coach columnist and a confidence coach in New York City. Sign up for free weekly wellness tips on her website and check back every Tuesday for her latest No Regrets column!

[foursprout-blog]

How to Be a More Confident Person

New Post has been published on http://foursprout.com/health/how-to-be-a-more-confident-person/

How to Be a More Confident Person

When I was a kid, we had very little money. This didn’t seem like a problem to me until I went to my friends’ homes and saw that they had actual houses (we lived in apartments and sometimes shared housing). The kids all had their own bedrooms and a nice dining room table—some even had big gardens.

As a kid, I liked what I had until I got older and saw that people with bigger houses and more money were considered better and more important. Then I realized this made feel like I’m less than other people. I had less, so naturally, I felt like a lesser human.

EDITOR’S PICK

displayTitle

Of course this damaged my self-esteem. If I’d had no clue or paid less attention (hard but not impossible), my confidence in who I was and what I had would have stayed nicely intact.

Comparing and looking for validation outside yourself is a recipe for feeling like sh*t. The root of real confidence is knowing who you are and being OK with yourself just as you are. If you want to be a more self-assured and confident person, here are some steps you can take to experience your best feelings of self-reliance and inner security:

1. Make the decision.

There is no magical formula for feeling confident. It’s not something that anyone is born with—lack of confidence is universal. But the most empowering decision that only you can make is to decide you are a confident person.

And if you feel like you need permission to become confident, I’m giving it to ya right now. Yes, it’s that simple. Even if it doesn’t feel like that’s true. It’s your call to be a confident person. No one else can do it for you.

2. Sound the part.

Have you ever noticed how self-assured types speak differently?

Confident people also don’t say things like, “I don’t know how,” “I can’t,” and “I’m not good at.” Their language is intentional and commanding. Think: How can you switch up your own language?

Consider the difference between two people discussing their travel adventures. One might say, “I love to go to off the beaten path and really explore the world. I have a travel budget and a plan every year. Oh, you like traveling for extended periods too? Awesome! Hey, you can even follow me on Instagram where I post my favorite travel snaps…”

Another fellow traveler might avoid eye contact and laugh nervously, saying, “I should document my travel more, but I haven’t figured out how to properly do that yet.”

Who do you think has more fun globe-trotting (and in general)?

Statements like “I love,” “I do,” and “I can” have a very different effect on our energy and our impact on others compared to “I should,” “I try,” and “I don’t know.” When you use stronger, more intentional language, it impacts your mood, your confidence, and even how other people perceive you.

High-achieving, happy people have consciously mastered the art of tuning out their inner critic and dialing up the volume on their inner coach. Your inner coach is there for you—on demand!—and she’s ready to support you whenever you call on her. You have the power to choose to focus on words that feel good.

Confident people also carry themselves differently. Their body language allows them to take up more space—they sit taller, gesticulate when speaking, and stand strong.

Comparing and looking for validation outside yourself is a recipe feeling like sh*t

3. Appreciate that everyone has insecurities.

Rachel in HR with her perfect style and easy laugh is no exception. Neither is that speaker on stage with the scary-good comedic timing and overall poise. Every single person on planet Earth is plagued with self-doubt in some area, to some degree—always.

Negative thoughts don’t escape anyone. The difference is confident people do not let uncertainty and doubt drive their decision-making. Courage is moving forward when your heart is still beating fast—not when you feel cool and relaxed, going about your daily routine. Confident people learn to master their inner critic and drown it out with something stronger: their inner coach.

4. Compare differently.

When I was working in sales, there were a couple women in my field who were known for being business badasses. They spoke their mind, they were forging new advances in tech, and they were often congratulated for their innovation. But…

“Ugh—Sarah is SO fake!” people would say. Or “Becca’s just a CEO kiss-ass.”

And were they? Maybe. But these words of spite were definitely coming from a place of envy.

Instead, these women made me think to myself: Look what’s possible! Sarah was only in the ad tech industry for four years. Imagine what I can do in the next 12 months!

Can your triggers from other people show you what’s waiting in store for you instead of leading you to negative thoughts and feelings? When you decide to get busy and focus on what you can control, your confidence level skyrockets. Imagine what could happen if you stopped paying so much attention to the people you see in your life, channeled all your force into the mirror, and started getting busy.

5. Keep compliments close.

Austin Kleon, best-selling author of Steal Like an Artist, recommends keeping a “praise file” full of compliments, positive feedback, and kind notes that people have sent you. These can be from anyone—your boss, a friend, an old teacher, a client—heck, even all the nice comments on your Facebook pics and/or blog posts.

A praise file lets you dwell on the good stuff. The negativity bias (our tendency to focus on one mean comment over nine positive ones) can prevent us from enjoying all the wonderful feedback we’ve been given in our lives. When I pop open my praise file, I smile big and feel 10 pounds lighter. It works—trust me! Store it on your desktop for easy access.

EDITOR’S PICK

displayTitle

6. Stop fearing failure.

Confident people know failure is inevitable and don’t fear it. Worrying about failure can keep us from doing anything at all, but confident people are still confident—even when they fail. When the tide is against them or they’ve had a negative result, they know it will pass; their bounce-back rate is fast. Can yours get up there too? I mean… haven’t you survived everything that life has thrown at you so far? Why would that change now?

7. Laugh more.

There was an Insta post I saw that made me chuckle. It said, “You found that offensive? I found it funny! No wonder I’m happier than you!”

When did life become so serious? Joan Rivers said, “Life goes by fast. Enjoy it. Calm down. It’s all funny.” Doesn’t that idea just provide some pretty immediate relief? And once you get to the point where you can laugh off life’s mishaps, everything becomes easier. You relax. Opening up allows more good to flow to you, and you become a magnet for more laughter. Like attracts like, and I can think of nothing better than attracting more laughter into your life.

8. Take baby steps when you’re scared.

My brilliant friend Ruth Soukup’s mantra is “do it scared.” Because we are all scared, almost all of the time. But you don’t need to quit your job tomorrow to start a business you love; you can start at the beginning. Get clear on what your passion is. Ask yourself some deep questions. Research others who share similar interests to you and speak to people in the field you’d like to be a part of. Find out who else is successful in doing what you want to do. Read all you can about the industry you want to enter.

The rest unfolds in time if you stay committed and allow it to. You don’t have to have it all figured out in order to get started. You just have to begin. Each small step—like one brick being laid after one another—can build something greater than you can even visualize in the beginning. And the good news is, the more action you take, the teensy bit easier the next action piece is. What can you begin?

Bonus: The confidence-competence loop works in your favor here. Put simply, this means the more you do something, the more confident you become in it, and then the more you continue to do it (more competently each time). It’s a wonderful cycle. Taking action builds your confidence, which then leads you to greater things that can make you satisfied. That means even if you don’t get the exact results you want, you’ll still have gained something valuable from the process of taking action.

You don’t have to have it all figured out in order to get started. You just have to begin.

9. Focus on what you want (not what you don’t want).

Confident people have a positive vision of the future—of their savings account, their body, their relationships. They expect good things to happen to them, and as a result, good things do happen more often. Expectation is a very powerful force. What are you thinking about right now? How can you turn it around to be thinking about the precise outcome or result that you really, really want?

10. Do YOU.

As a kid I would try to compete for first place in ways I could control (because I was not gonna have the biggest garden any time soon). I was top of the class. I did my best to be funny and popular and always in a good mood. These things “worked.” And they still work, to some degree. But when I’m motivated by an external limiting belief that I’m not enough, that leads me to believe I have to perform, whereas if I follow my natural human desire to feel good and authentic, I get a different result.

Whatever highs or achievements I experience don’t last when it’s coming from external prompts.

Doing me feels different. It allows me to be in a receptive mode—not just hustlin’ all day to impress my ex-husband’s new wife’s sister’s neighbor.

Doing you means feeling inspired, acting on internal instinct, and moving forward in your decision-making from a place of alignment and joy (not desperation, fear, and the old compare-and-despair mentality).

My friend Jim Kwik says development and growth are like an egg. When external forces break them, that means it’s over. When they break open from the inside, that’s life. That’s possibility. Are you allowing yourself to be driven by inside forces? Your intuition is your greatest advisor and a huge source of confidence—when you learn to trust it.

11. Live on purpose.

A mentor of mine says, “You had a purpose before anyone had an opinion.” Knowing your purpose—why you’re here—brings tremendous confidence. Are you in alignment with your purpose? Are you the friend, spouse, or boss that you know inside that you secretly could be? This is why plenty of people start side hustles—to allow their inner creativity to spark.

Holding back doesn’t feel good because it isn’t good. Confidence grows when we become who we really are, expand our comfort zone, and make progress in maturing and developing. How will you ever know who you really are until you explore it fully? Taking strides in living on purpose may be the most radical confidence-building act of all.

The magic of confidence is once you start to take control of your life—your inner narrative, how you feel about yourself, and what you spend your precious time doing—your life transforms. (And hey, you can still Netflix and chill sometimes!).

You are the chicken inside the egg breaking out. Deciding what’s next. Creating your future. And when you do that, not only do you move toward the highest manifestation of your life, you inspire other people to do the same. Confidence inspires and begets more confidence—so commit to it for you, yes. But also to the echo you create for everyone else.

Susie Moore is Greatist’s life coach columnist and a confidence coach in New York City. Sign up for free weekly wellness tips on her website and check back every Tuesday for her latest No Regrets column!