#what is compassion

[mehmetyildizmelbourne-blog]

Empathy and Compassion in the Brain & Mind

How The Brain and Mind Process Empathy and Compassion A sample chapter from my new book, “Train Your Brain for a Healthier and Happier Life.” Dear Avid Readers, In this chapter of “Train Your Brain for a Healthier and Happier Life,” I will explain empathy and compassion as mental activities and how they can strengthen cognitive performance, emotional stability, mental health, and social…

[astearisms]

catalysts, protectors

[ahkaraii]

Thinking about the early days of Robotnik and Stone... They're both orphans with a dislike of humanity and a fascination with machines of mass destruction, so I wonder if they ever talked about their personal lives and private traumas.

...Probably not. But maybe they came close?

[stealingpotatoes]

heres a crappy venn (??) diagram explaining the dynamics in the tl4j time travel au bc it's easier than trying to write a full plot

[thepeacefulgarden]

[ajastu]

have some sympathy, Davrin, a tragedy has occurred 😔

HOWEVER, I think they would be repressing so much stress during veilguard that stepping on a snail in that moment would become kind of the last straw. not talking from personal experience at all

yayy oc rambling

anyway, i think Zea normally wouldn't like. cry about accidentally killing a little creature like a snail. Like, they would be sad, but you know, cest la vie, the mere fact of existing brings with it many small accidental deaths that we just have to come to terms with, if we notice them at all.

[jesse-is-inarguably-purple]

imagine ur garthy o’brien, just trying to fuck this hot ranger you met at your brothel that you own, except her teenage kids/wards/bosses keep knocking on the door to your bedroom and interrupting you guys and THEN you learn that she’s actually in a committed relationship but didn’t tell you, so THAT sucks but THEN one of the teens comes and finds you in the middle of the night yelling about how his friend is gone and they can’t find him and he might be in danger, so you help him teleport to his friend, and then when they all get back, looking extremely upset and dejected, you apologize to the ranger’s daughter for making her feel uncomfortable by fucking her mother and in the process SHE reveals to you that her mom’s boyfriend is actually this really cool werewolf guy that you KNOW and have fucked on multiple occasions

[prettieinpink]

PROCESSING YOUR EMOTIONS WITHOUT SUPPRESSING THEM - TECHNIQUES

this post is all about how to process emotions that we are uncomfortable with, safely and positively. Today, I’d like it if you’d try to implement at least one technique today!

REMINDERS

Remember that when you feel an emotion, it is your body communicating itself to you. Listen to your emotion, and understand.

All emotions are temporary, and will pass. But some can leave a more long term effect on us.

Having the skill of sitting through uncomfortable emotions calmly, and not let it impact our lives greatly will serve you well.

TECHNIQUES

STOP TECHNIQUE

S- Stop what you’re doing, pause all activities and shut off your brain.

T- Take a few deep breathes, continue until your focus is only on breathing deeply.

O- Observe your thoughts, your body language, any physical sensations and acknowledge them within you.

P- Proceed with any activity that may help you process this emotion. Meditation, journaling, stretching, talking to someone, etc.

ALL TECHNIQUE

A- Acknowledge, accept and alllow what you feel. Identify what emotion you feel, if you can’t, try to associate it with something. Sit in this feeling for awhile and truly accept it within you.

L- Link it to a circumstance or situation that may explain why you’re feeling this way. E.g ‘I feel so irritated lately, it may be because I’ve been eating sugary foods more’

L- Learn what this emotion may be telling you. There’s not much detail on this because only you know what your body needs/wants.

SELF EXPRESSION

Draw, write, compose music on what this feeling looks like, sounds like, maybe even their taste. This really helps go deep in your emotions, analyse it and then hopefully process it.

[bunnieswithknives]

Weeeee still sorting out my ideas with this thing.

[canondestiel]

[torpublishinggroup]

“If you don't make a fool of yourself over animals, at least in private, you aren't to be trusted.”

—What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

[vaguely-concerned]

My two cents on how much of Mind!Varric is Rook’s mind trying to fill the blank space and how much is Solas actively talking through a convenient blood magic paper doll of the mind: I think it's a mix of both, a truly collaborative psychosocial horrorshow if you would, but waaaay more towards the second. It feels too directed and tactical at times to be anything else. Rook's mind is willing to go along with the denial phase as far as it can fucking carry them to not have to face the grief and regret and does its part in papering over details that don’t make any sense, the way brains will strive to create coherent meaning even out of deeply confusing input, but to my understanding it's a collaborateur in how that plays out, not the instigator or control center. Solas is using it as a path to agency and to gather insight into Rook as a person unguarded as he can't count on in his own guise. (That stoic option that leads to him being like 'oh I see you're cautiously denying me access to your inner life. well. at least you still have Varric to talk to. y'know as an outlet :)'. You absolute BITCH Solas! That alone convinced me that he HAS to have an active hand in it on some level.)

My guess is that it takes considerable effort on Solas’ part to make Mind!Varric do anything more involved or complicated than seeming to sit up in bed and give casual commentary, and that’s why he keeps having eerie five minute shallow pep talks with you before he announces he conveniently needs a nap aaanyway good luck kid you got this haha. When he’s just spouting NPC lines from his bedrest, I’m ready to believe that could be Rook’s mind being allowed to improv lines for him more freely because it’s less about Solas trying to get something out of them or working an angle and more ‘Still here! Still totally alive and fine and the mentor figure you know and love and trust :) don’t even worry about it! Thankfully there is no war in Ba Sing Sei, as we all know’ upkeep work lol. Rook’s mind is allowed to set the tone of Varric, the outlines, but not always the content. 

AND, on a (beautifully fucked up) character psychology level, I feel like Solas is indulging in actually getting to be the good supportive mentor figure to Rook with one hand to assuage the guilt he feels about what he's done -- and what he's going to do -- to them with the other. Same internal logic as he uses in Trespasser about the Qun. ‘Almost everyone is going to die from the course of action I’m doggedly pursuing eventually. But at least I can make their last years happier and freer and kinder than they would have been otherwise. and that kind of makes up for it right. a little bit. doesn't it. doesn't that make it better at least. I need that to make it better)'. Did I really take your beloved mentor and friend from you if you don’t know yet that I did? Some philosophers would argue not really! So it’s probably almost ok actually. Isn’t it even a little noble that I’m taking all this grief and guilt on myself and shielding you for now. With undertones that I’m not sure he would realize himself (and might be mortified by if he did) that he is so incredibly lonely, and even a dishonest and indirect emotional connection is more than nothing when you’re that desperate. In this setup he gets idk. Both the control he craves so incredibly badly in relationships and over himself, and the scraps, the fading afterimages, of intimacy and warmth and companionship, even second hand. The one thing Solas and Rook agree on deep deep down is that they really wish Varric weren't gone. They're handshake memeing this in the saddest and most creepy way possible.

I think an important element too is that Solas needs Rook and their team to *succeed* —  up to a certain point. He needs someone to hold the two other elven mean girls off until he can get out of here. Ideally, in a perfect world, even do all the hard work of killing them so he can swoop in at the end and do his thing when both sides are exhausted and out of resources to stop him, and then Bob’s your uncle! Same logic as he was using with Corypheus, and after that worked out so well, too! King of choosing to never learn from a single solitary mistake he’s ever made even though i fully believe he could have the capacity to Fen’Harel <3 The underlying idea isn’t flawed, you see, it was just unforeseen circumstances getting in the way. This time for sure it’ll all work out the way I cleverly imagined it in my head beforehand. Cue By Talos this can’t be happening etc. in the form of a statue almost crushing him like a bug. 

So he's providing guidance and forging Rook into a leader from two angles: one Rook might not trust, and one they probably will. Shaping them into what he needs slowly and carefully. He’s helping you hone your team into their most effective state, as he might have done with his own agents back in the day, setting up his chess pieces even if he has to squint through two glimpsed realities to do it haha. Pincer maneuver of an insidious stealth mentor you never asked for. Also… at one point mind Varric gives you a whole little monologue about how Solas' problem is that he’s always seen his interpersonal connections as flaws and see where it’s landed him, all alone and the worst part? it hasn’t even worked. it’s all been for nothing he’s back where he began with nothing to show for it but his mistakes. Like...that has such strong 'uh okay happy to play your therapist from two rooms away here what the fuck kind of traumadump is this' energy to me, I’m not sure Rook like. Thinks that much about Solas as a private person. So much of Solas' self-loathing and futile insights into his own flaws seem to shine through in Mind!Varric's dialogue all the time — I just can't believe that there's no guiding hand behind it as it were. 

Most of all. I feel like people underestimate the degree to which Solas is incredibly funny. As in, he has a very consistent and recognizable sense of humour. It’s one of my very favourite things about him. We must remember — it is crucial that we always keep in mind — Orlesian accent and wig Solas from May The Dread Wolf Take You (my beloved, the explanation for why I love this dude even with the. All of the everything else. No one does it quite like him). He is not at all above doing things or adding little flourishes for his own obscure amusement, in fact that seems to me to be one of his most consistent traits. The Randy Dowager Quarterly comment Varric has? The ‘Maybe this is the Dread Wolf’s revenge. Forcing us to house sit for him’ thing? To Me this is 100% Solas amusing himself in his boring Fade jail surrounded by the screaming hellscape of all his regrets. Source: it came to me as divine revelation through pure vibes trust me bro 

If nothing else I find it much more narratively interesting personally if the connection between Rook and Solas really is that defenselessly intimate and entwined (and so unbalanced!), and the sense of violation and invasion and betrayal afterwards consequently all the more nauseatingly intense. Even if you kept him at arm’s length in the open, he’s been under your skin the whole time, looking around, gathering what he needs to destroy you, wearing the face of a friend. Regretfully, probably, but choosing to do it every step of the way anyway. (Sound familiar, Inquisitor? Solas doesn’t have that many tricks when you actually look at it, he keeps returning to old tried and true ones like a dog with a bone haha.) Maybe he even genuinely meant some of it as mercy, which only makes it so much worse. It makes his sin against his own core principles of autonomy and the freedom of all beings in mind, spirit and body so much more juicily grave if it’s something he pursues actively and consistently, rather than it half-falling into his lap as a happy accident mainly orchestrated by Rook’s own subconscious. Solas, too, is at his very lowest point, the closest to giving in and becoming his own antithesis fully that he’s ever been, and it makes the choice of whether you still reach out your hand to him one last time or not all the more impactful and difficult.

[nouverx]

Hi hi ! If you’re still doing drawing requests, if you are, how about human alastor (+ his funky red glasses) with curly hair?

Hi hi! Sorry it's more wavy than curly but that's how I always imagined him as a human so- here you go

I discovered this cosplay of human Alastor on ig the other day and I loved it so much that's kind of the vibe I was going for while drawing. This cosplay makes me feral you can't even imagine

And here I go, crushing on his human form as well 🙈 oopsie

[peaceoutofthepieces]

been having more aftg thoughts in the vein of why i always felt so close to it and adored it so much and i think it's bc of the stunning mental illness portrayal in how neil responds to andrew's depression.

like it's always been blatantly obvious that neil is respectful of andrew's boundaries but the focus is always on the physical sense when it's way more than just that. neil is a mouthy little bitch and while there are a few times he gets annoyed with andrew's non-answers he always knows where the line is and when there's a difference. he has every mode to fit every scenario; he figures out/judges what's needed from him and he complies.

he'll sit and chatter to andrew and coax andrew into talking to him, but he'll back off as soon as andrew tells him no or becomes silently but noticeably (at least to neil) resistant. he'll silently keep him company when the others all forget about him and not care if andrew acknowledges that company, because he's just doing it because he knows how crushing loneliness can be and doesn't want that to add to andrew's pains. alternatively he'll get up and go without complaint if andrew asks and give him as much of his own space and time as possible.

it's such basic understanding and respect but it comes so naturally to him and no one else has given that to andrew before. andrew telling neil he can bear being with him because neil listens to him and gets his boundaries and limits means so much more when you consider how much it probably means to him and how unlikely he finds it that neil of all people allows him to be quiet and distant and alone-but-not without complaint, as well as very obviously enjoying when andrew is open and present and active with him.

it's so quietly respectful and loving and such a good depiction of how easily depression can be navigated by the right partner and i think it's a large part of why their relationship has always meant so much to me

[genderkoolaid]

something i've been thinking about. everything that is happening now in america is happening in the system the founding fathers made. it may have not always gone this exact path but something like this was always coming. people act like you can so easily separate the philosophy of "all men are created equal" from slave ownership and wives as property and colonialism. but you can't. because the fact that they made all these grand statements and checks and balances AND carved out loopholes to maintain profitable injustice is the fucking point. it's all the fucking point. the purpose of a system is what it does. you cannot have a just society when your entire conception of justice and liberty and virtue relies on making exceptions for whatever injustices are valuable to you. it's virtue as a pretense and that cannot be sustained forever. what's happening is not un-american. it's the sickness at the core eating it's way to the skin.

[cheriboms]

since manfred is learning to read (+ speak), and spite/cole both like being read to, i thought it only made sense theyd have a little unofficial book club :) unfortunately some picks are more... ahem... educational... than others >_>