#it fundamentally rewired my whole brain i think

[villtura]

wolfwood

#i have so many feelings about him after reading maximum #i have a lot of feeling about trimax in general #was literally unwell for a few days after reading volume 10 and then again after finishing the series #it fundamentally rewired my whole brain i think #wolfwood #nicholas the punisher #nicholas d wolfwood #trigun #trigun maximum #also very obsessed w how nightow draws ww obscuring half his face when he smokes #the way he depicts lil character mannerisms is sooo #(incomprehensible sounds)

[ambrosiagourmet]

thistle for ask meme!

Thistle :0

First impression

No joke I was convinced early on that Laios & the party were making like a huuuuge leap in assuming that Thistle was the Lunatic Magician TM like guys you can't just go accusing every random person you find in a living painting of being the manager. Alas... he was, in fact, the manager.

Impression now

He's so jester coded👍

I think Thistle is very interesting and a great foil to Marcille, which I looove. They are both magic elf(-ish) advisors, they both get caught up in wanting to help the people around them live longer, they both become dungeon lords in pursuit of that... I think Thistle's story as it is works well for the narrative and I don't necessarily think he was underutilized exactly, but it is a little hard not to want A Bit More sometimes. Even if I do think it would be hard to add that more in without sacrificing some of the pacing overall :')

Favorite moment

I was initially going to say the ending for them, because I do love it, but you know what? I've got a more interesting answer. My favorite Thistle scene is.... this:

This fundamentally changes the trajectory of the story. In trying to find someone to stop the Winged Lion, Thistle launches Marcille into becoming the next lord of the dungeon. The next victim of the Lion. If Thistle hadn't resurrected Marcille, then the plot would have played out totally differently. She wouldn't have been able to finish unsealing the book. Laios would have been on his own when the canaries came. Would they have just cleaned everything up more easily? Would it instead have become something worse? Would Laios somehow have unsealed the book and become the lore of the dungeon right away?

I dunno. But this action reshaped Marcille's life, and Laios', and so many other people's. And it was done out of a desire to keep fighting. To not give in.

Augh idk. It's good. Their connection is good.

Idea for a story

Thistle & Chimera Laios.

But not just a "Laios gets eaten by the dragon instead," I think it would be cool to explore an AU where for some handwavy magic reason, Laios gets his soul bound up w/ the dragon during Falin's resurrection, and he gets poofed into a dragon form.

There's a note somewhere that says that chimeras start popping up the more the lord of the dungeon starts to lose their hold on things, but having met Laios before might help Thistle eventually realize that something is Off about the dragon. From there... well maybe he starts to ask questions and gives Laios more freedom to actually answer, and things could continue from there as Laios gets enough humanity back to start to understand what's happening, and also Thistle takes more time to question the Lion's plans rather than just continue to act. They'd be stuck together, probably with Laios still under Thistle's control, but maybe as they figure out more of the truth, they'd actually work together? Need to rely on each other? I'd like to see how each of them would deal with that situation...

PLUS then on the flip side I think switching Falin into the group part way through the story (rather than at the start) could be really interesting. So the adventures on that side would be fun too.

Unpopular opinion

umm idk. Is Thistle widely regarded as a Marcille foil? Because if not then why. They are so inchresting. funky little mages.

Favorite relationship

Hmmm okay so like obviously Thistle & Marcille, but also as seen in my story idea I want to explore more of Thistle & Laios bc their interactions were fun, soo... I'll just say the Dungeon Lord quartet as a whole. I like when people draw art of them all together. Let them bond through shared trauma. And also all of them have tried to kill at least one other person there at some point. It's great. They should go on brunch dates.

Favorite headcanon

This post about Thistle's goal to eat a meal with Delgal fundamentally rewired my brain

#ask #ask meme

[quaranmine]

The Background People of Firewatch AU

There's a couple of oc characters in firewatch au that diverge from this, but early on I knew I wanted the majority of people (originally everyone) Grian encountered to be nice to him. I wanted the story to be full of people that, whether Grian saw it or not, cared enough to help. Probably because the closing lines of The Martian by Andy Weir permanently rewired my brain ever since I read it like 9 years ago:

“If a hiker gets lost in the mountains, people will coordinate a search. If a train crashes, people will line up to give blood. If an earthquake levels a city, people all over the world will send emergency supplies. This is so fundamentally human that it's found in every culture without exception. Yes, there are assholes who just don't care, but they're massively outnumbered by the people who do.”

Grian's client in the first chapter, the rich guy he's not very fond of, actually releases Grian early from a meeting because he can tell he's distracted. He's a little rude about it, but he lets Grian go because he recognizes Grian is worried about something.

The lady who accepts Grian's call when he reports Mumbo missing is sweet and calls him darling. She's the same person at the desk when Grian appears the next day to join the search, and she gently directs him to a motel to get some sleep in. She sees a man she's never met, and wants him to rest.

Scar, of course, is the whole point of the story. He was always determined to care.

The unnamed ranger who tells Grian they have to suspend the search because of nearby fires does so both candidly and kindly.

It's not a direct interaction with Grian, but the lady in the Forest Service office gives information to Scar (possibly at risk of her job since it was not allowed) to help him out on behalf of Grian.

Pearl and Jimmy, of course, are trying desperately to support Grian in their respective flashback sequences.

We learn in Pearl's flashback sequence that Grian's acquaintances in Colorado were also hoping to help support him before he ghosted them instead.

The pair of seasonal employees that come to collect Mumbo's bike are both stated to be super friendly to Grian, and try to help him with information even though they're new.

Linda, the woman working the desk at the District Ranger station, is actually nothing but nice to Grian the entire time. His perception of her is only negatively colored by his own paranoia/suspicion/grief, but reading between the lines all her actions are either kind or highly reasonable given the circumstances. Like, of course she's critical of Grian when she catches him breaking into the office, but even then she tries to gently defuse the situation.

Martinez the hotshot wildland firefighter is very happy to help save Grian, and does his best to keep trying to reassure/cheer Grian.

There's a few exceptions for people who the narrative doesn't paint in a good light. Idiots with fireworks will be idiots. Scar's boss reprimands him, but only very reasonably: Scar had been accessing information he wasn't cleared to (a massive no-no in government.) Grian's former boss is terrible towards him—rightfully upset at Grian's failure to show up to work, but expressing it with zero empathy or regards to Grian's situation.

Larry the District Ranger is displayed in a fairly bad light, but his response is mostly measured exactly with Grian's. He starts off understanding toward Grian, but as Grian begins to be more hostile, he reacts to that energy while still maintaining his professionalism. He's meant to be genuine in the scene above when he apologizes to Grian for not finding Mumbo, it's just Grian who doesn't believe it.

But like? Does this all make sense? Do you see it? There's people at every turn who want to help Grian. Nearly everyone he meets is actually kind. Grian may think that the world is out to get him, or that people are hiding things from him, but they're not. I like to think it seeps through the cracks in this story, despite the narrative being influenced by Grian's persistent self-isolation and suspicion. He may be a cynic, but I'm not.

One of my reviewers said this wasn't a story about how unfair life was, but that it was a story about love. I think that's true. I think it's about our connections to people and how we lean on them in the worst of times.

#hc_firewatch_au #more details and this time it was 100% planned from the start

[malinaa]

TOP 9 BOOKS

tagged : @hmsharmony ty jennifer this was SOOO hard oh my god like. genuinely agonized me for days to think about what to choose but it was SOOO fun tho <3 tagging : @rosesau | @evcndiaz | @pendrgcn | @gayarthur | @the-tenth-arcanum | @oretsev | @wherepoetsdie | @bellamyblakru | @ryekat & anyone else who wants to do it !!! rules : list your top 9 books obviously. i cheated a little and put series as as one option because that's just who i am as a person. most of these i chose at random from my 5 star reads from the past few years btw

1. percy jackson and the olympians (series) by rick riordan

i was never a big reader in elementary school—or at least not to the extent that my classmates had been. my sixth grade english class required us to bring a personal book from home for silent reading and i stole my brother's spine-cracked copies of pjo and brought them to class. i finished the whole series in less than a school week (i had to scramble to the library to pick up another series because the single novel should have lasted me at least three weeks). pjo literally kickstarted my love for reading as a hobby and i truly don't know how to state the importance it had on my little ten-year-old brain fr

2. on earth we're briefly gorgeous by ocean vuong

i have never read a book more beautiful in prose and so uncommonly human than this. there's just something so incredibly heartbreaking knowing this whole book is the narrator's letter to his mother who can't read! like what the fuck

3. alone with you in the ether by olivie blake

this came as a surprise to Me when i first read it. i meandered through the first quarter, loving the writing style but feeling disconnected from the characters until the Church Hand Scene™ and it was hook, line, and sinker at that point (i have since come to love the disconnectedness in subsequent rereads, knowing that the feeling was the Point). i have read this book four (4) times since i read it first last year. LAST YEAR!!! olivie has like... fundamentally altered my brain chemistry or something because i feel like everything i have written since having read this book has been somewhat influenced by it.

4. much ado about nothing by william shakespeare

what can i say! this is theeeeeee romcom ever. i have watched so many adaptations of this play, read it countless of times and can recite some iconic lines, and still the banter between benedick and beatrice is sooo elite. cannot be topped!!

5. a place for us by fatima farheen mirza

fun fact: seed rec'd this book to me and has been reccing it to anybody who would listen. the prose is so lush and melancholic. it's one of those books where nothing Really happens, but you feel Every Emotion Under The Sun and you're just like. altered by reading it

6. the song of achilles by madeline miller

obviously.... OBVIOUSLYYYYYYY this had to go here. if i had two nickels for every greek myth retelling i read during school that fundamentally changed me etc etc u get it. i read this as a junior in high school when we, yet again, had to bring a personal book to read durin class. i think at that point of my life, i've never read something that tragic yet so beautiful at the same time and now i am always looking at the beautiful and tragic in media. so! there u go! brain cells rewired and whatnot!

7. the grisha trilogy by leigh bardugo

this is funny because i . technically did not rate any of these books 5 stars i'm sobbing. but like, considering the fact that my url is what it is and the way i always have them in the back of my mind, it's no wonder that i put them here. i have such an odd attachment to these books and these characters. i had copies of these books since their release but didn't touch them until ... before the sab tv release which is so fucking funny. like i don't know what i would be like if i read this as a t(w)een. i would've been so fucking insufferable ngl

8. when my brother was an aztec by natalie diaz

i actually read this for an assignment and had to write a report on it and i had SO much fun doing it. diaz plays a lot with hunger and her imagery is literally unmatched. i think about the way she contructs sentences and am filled with such envy. my beginning sentence for my paper was a nod to her style (though i failed miserably). it was: "in a paradoxical sleight of hand, hunger feeds in natalie diaz's debut." she is just. so fucking good at words i need to CHOMP on it

9. sharp objects by gillian flynn

you know the thing where you see a really popular author for a really long time and they have their work adapted to the screen and it's so good but you still haven't read their actual writing? yeah, that was me with gillian flynn (specifically about gone girl). i read gone girl, i read sharp objects, i read her short story the grownup, i'm currently reading the last novel of hers that i haven't read, dark places, and flynn is just so... incredibly good at constructing harrowing stories. it's no wonder why all three of her novels got adapted to the screen! her prose is so grounded. vivid. there's this ease to her writing that, whenever i concurrently read another novel, i always find the other piece to be lacking. i slink back to flynn's prose and immerse myself in her awful, human worlds.

#tag games #book recs #text #tais toi lys

[deep-space-lines]

Have you ever wanted to draw something but you fought due to your skill level at the time you decide not to do it

Honestly I don't think there's been a time in my life where I haven't experienced this. There's a file on my ipad I've had on the backburner for like probably over 4 years now; there's a really clear image in my head of a poster showing the detailed anatomy of an astronaut from the perspective of aliens who believe the spacesuit to be part of its body, and every time I come back to it, I keep saying I'll do it later because I just can't pull it off yet :') so yeah the struggle is real

That being said, I've personally found that apart from just 'don't draw it and let it haunt you for years until your confidence improves', there's two solutions that work for me

1: Just draw it the best you're able now, with the knowledge that it might suck (in your eyes) but there's no rule that says you can't come back and re-draw it a few months or years down the line once you've learned more, if you still want to. It can be super frustrating if you have a really concrete awesome image in your head that you know you can't execute the way you'd like, but treating it more like a rough draft than something that has to be perfect the first time around can help get around this. Genuinely I think about this post all the time now, I think it rewired my brain chemistry as an artist. Just accept it'll look bad, who give a shit!!!! If you draw the rough draft now, it'll either turn out better than you expected, or you'll figure out what you struggled with for next time. Either way you'll at least temporarily get The Image out of your head and satiate the Art Beast.

Which leads into...

2: Figure out if there's a specific aspect of the Thing that intimidates you the most and put some time into low-stakes practice with the skill that's blocking you. Usually it's gonna be something like perspective, anatomy, rendering/painting, struggling with dynamic poses, etc.

Starting a completely new skill from scratch sounds intimidating, but you're not starting from scratch, and if you sit yourself down and give it some dedicated practice, you WILL see improvement within the same day. Keep it up for a week or a month and you'll have learned a lot. If it's dynamic perspective, tell yourself "ok I am GOING to learn how to draw with perspective" and mess around with references, look up tutorials, draw other art pieces with perspective until you feel like you have a somewhat decent grasp of it. If it's anatomy or dynamic poses: (once again, cannot stress enough) use references. Trace and then copy references until you get a feel for the shapes (AdorkaStock is really good), practice figure drawing (Quickposes, Line of Action), watch Proko because they have really good videos on these things (1) (2) (3).

'Practice makes perfect' is simultaneously very correct and very unhelpful advice, but if you've got a good grasp of the fundamentals of art, picking up specific, individual skills to a 'good enough' level is not nearly as time-consuming and frustrating as trying to just get better at 'art' as a whole. It can be really good motivation tbh (at least for me), to have an image of something I want to create and telling myself "I am going to intentionally practice [indoor environments]/[perspective]/[faces]/[painting with unrealistic colors]/[insert specific skill] for a few weeks until I feel confident enough to draw this thing".

anyway sorry that was so long. idk if this is any help, just my personal experience

#asks

[glitterdustcyclops]

oooh fun tag game @swirlingflight did and i want to do too

Rules: name your favourite movie, character, animal, drink, song, season, book, colour and hobby.

Movie: Pacific Rim first and foremost because that shit rewired my brain on a fundamental level. still holds up years later. too bad they never made a sequel, it would have been cool to see how they could have further developed the incredible world-building the first movie teases at (AHEM) the second answer is sofia coppola's marie antoinette cuz it fully lives in my brain rent free even now, 17 years later. that movie is my EVERYTHING.

Character: right at this moment it's a tie between izzy and astarion and no we're not going to be discussing any parallels moving on

Animal: jellyfish!! but really all sea creatures, especially the tentacled ones. they're all absolute freaks in the best ways.

Drink: generally tea (i think my blood is more tea than water by volume at this point) but especially boba tea but only if it's good, i'm outrageously picky about my boba tea

Song: ooof this is impossible. groove is in the heart is the one that feels most like "me" like if i were a wrestler that would be my walk on music, but there's SO many songs that i love it feels cruel to pick favorites. anything by queen, rhiannon by fleetwood mac, flamingo by kero kero bonito, blinding by florence but also every other song by florence, and lately francesca & first time by hozier and like a million more besides.

Season: summer because that's my birthday, but close second is fall cuz halloween and pumpkin spice and the best seasonal treats

Book: sooooo many but the arden st. ives series by alexis hall was the one where it did so many things i've wanted to read in stories for forever and it got its hooks in me so deep i immediately re-read the whole thing after i had finished. i think i've re-read it like four? or five times? at this point?? i want to print those books out and eat them page by page.

Colour: minty green!! the color of baja blast and pacific oceans and everything good and bright and happy and lovely in the world.

Hobby: i'm gonna take swirl's answer for this and say creating too :P most often writing but just as much painting or drawing (badly) or caligraphy-ing and a billion other various crafts and such

as always no specific tags but do it if you want to and tag me so i can see your answers!!!!

#about the chocolate

[hellshandbasket]

You just have to elaborate on the “I mean like even the apple seeds” tag on your Dennis’ pain and how Mac takes care of it post because I am very intrigued and can’t infer on that myself!

haha you guys should stop enabling me. anyway. yes i will humanize even the apple seeds joke and make it about macdennis + pain. (tw for light/vague discussions of disordered eating)

my favorite thing about this particular unhinged take is that it focuses on how dysfunctional the macdennis dynamic is instead of just the sweeping romanticism of mac being able to see dennis’ pain and attend to it, because it highlights how mac sometimes does that to an unhealthy/incorrect degree.

but i digress. sorry to keep you waiting. the apple seeds: it’s about the way mac takes dennis’ distress over the thing seriously, and offers dennis genuine and caring counsel.

in fact, if i use the tidy little “mac is the only one able to attend to dennis’ pain and dennis can’t let go of that” theory it explains why dennis would allow himself to believe something so fucking dumb as “cigarette smoke smothers the poisonous apple seeds in your stomach.” we all know dennis has issues with food. both mac and dennis have body image issues, and mac has fluctuating issues with food himself. but about dennis—mr undiagnosed eating disorder himself. i don’t think he has just a restrictive/body image based eating disorder, but something like arfid or ocd, where he has innumerable neuroses and anxieties around his food intake.

this is where it gets toxic because mac is aware of this and takes it upon himself to be like, dennis’ food bodyguard. he’s actually trying to love and care for dennis, but he doesn’t know any better and ends up enabling dennis’ instead (macdennis i’m obsessed with you). gang chokes is like, about this. but md break up talks about it and the apple seeds thing are the greatest example for me, and a huge manifestation of the macdennis + pain thing imo.

there’s the apple skin thing to start, which is a great instance of how this would work. it also gives us a nice glimpse into how macdennis + pain is reciprocal because (and i haven’t even gotten to do a whole thesis on this but i could) mac struggles with wanting to feel needed, wanted, of value, etc and as much as he can get bitchy and mean, overall dennis makes mac feel all of those things. especially in peak macdennis years (3/4-9). but i’m digressing again—just pointing out how and why this works so well for mac too, because it’s more than just being stupid in love with dennis (it fulfills something personal in him too, it soothes a hurt in him too).

but for me, the apple seeds? another instance of dennis showing negative, painful emotion, and mac being the only one to respond in a way that matters to dennis. i mean yes a moment to thank glenn for his comedic genius in the sound of that fake retching, but also dennis was so distressed over the thought of potentially eating something bad. that was panic! that was repulsion! that was fear! food is just such a fundamental thing for dennis.

the rest of the gang kind of brush him off when he scurries over, totally distraught over these stupid apple seeds. charlie validates his alarm over the toxicity of the dumb seeds (<3), but no one has time for dennis and his hysteria. and it is hours after the whole ordeal has passed, and they are still kind of fighting, but the minute dennis sees him he tells this to mac because he knows mac will take him seriously and fix the hurt. he looks so relieved when mac doesn’t brush it off or question him or roll his eyes, he just takes it in stride and asks dennis if he tried x to solve the problem.

i know this kind of thing happens regularly and i know it rewires things in dennis’ brain! he must be so scared and yet so comforted! he must be so confused and in love and embarrassed and mac is mine and mac cares and oh god what if mac leaves who will give a shit if i cry over apple seeds then no one can know apple seeds scare me like this ahhh!!!

#answered #sunny is in my synapses turning them rotten #meta

[trash-mammall]

eight shows to get to know me

thanks @h3rmitsunited fr tagging :)

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER

1. BBC MERLIN

i watched this show when it was first airing as a kid, and then returned to it 10 years later. it has completely rewired my brain and absolutely had lasting effects on how i view character and relationship building. it’s made me cry so hard i thought i was going to vomit

2. DIRK GENTLY

i think i first watched this in 2018, and then continued to rewatch it like 5 times, got 8 pages into writing an essay on why it shld be renewed, fell off a bit, and ever since i’m pretty sure every year i’ve fallen back into it. right now i’m off of it, but i miss it and it’s only a matter of time. fundamentally changed my perception of how plot and story can work, how weird you can get with it

3. MYTHBUSTERS

i fully grew up on this show. i haven’t watched it in years but it lingers in the back of my mind and it helped me continue to love science and math even though school sucked. also explosions and weird myths i got to learn about. simply iconic

4. TED LASSO

this one’s a newer one but it very quickly shot into my top shows of all time. it’s so compassionate in its writing and so genuine in its acting and i simply adore it. also i ted is my dad now

5. OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH

this one’s pretty straight forward. beautifully created, emotionally powerful, i can’t wait to see where it goes. i hyperfixated and wrote like 5 fics for it during exam season. i love frenchie the most

6. SCRUBS

another one from my childhood — i don’t remember a Ton from it but the parts that i do i Know this show effected some stuff. also it’s the best hospital drama and i’ll die on that hill (this does not include the final season. fuck the final season)

7. MALCOM IN THE MIDDLE

and ANOTHER one from my childhood. watched this whole show w my family, it’s absolutely iconic. so funny, so loving, probably mentally effected me more than i care to admit or can articulate. i need to rewatch it since i haven’t since i was like 10

8. WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS

this show is a masterpiece in its writing but i love it Particularly for its practical effects, i love them so much. the story and characters are so compelling tho, and even the characters that suck are so unique and personable that you enjoy their screentime regardless, it’s fantastic

this was hard bc i don’t actually watch very much TV but :) welcome to the inside of my brain if anyone has any questions i would love to be enabled to talk more on any and all of these shows

EDIT: honourable mention to camp camp i will not explain further

#i’m so sorry to all of these fandoms getting this post in their tags #also not tagging anyone bc i’m scared <3 #trash.txt #tag game

[spindrifters]

H: How would you describe your style? + G: Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order? + F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

:))) forgive me im greedy

no forgiveness needed, please be so so greedy.

H: How would you describe your style?

I don't know why this one's so tough?? maybe it's hard to see my own style from inside of it. but it's definitely character-driven via emotional arcs before anything else. I think it's pretty clean and straightforward, though maybe occasionally veering towards poetic when I'm in the guts of something emotionally ineffable.

G: Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

start to finish! I wish I could write out of order, there are certain scenes I can see so clearly in my mind but if I don't know what's leading directly into it, it feels impossible to start. something something about a theater background, idk.

F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

“Remus. Moony,” Sirius says, all at once feeling wildly desperate, because he’s meant to have the answers. He’s meant to throw himself between danger and the people he loves. And he doesn’t know what to do here. He doesn’t know where the danger lives, because suddenly it seems to be closing in at all sides. “How do I fix this? Just… just tell me how to fix this and I will.” Remus shakes his head. “You can’t.” “There has to be something. I should’ve been able to stop him, before this all got out of hand. I will, next time.” “Oh, will you?” Remus asks, and there’s the ghost of an almost hysterical laugh in there. “So what, should I spend the rest of my life hiding behind your robes? You’re not always around, Sirius, and even if you were, I… I’m a person, alright? I'm my own man. I can handle myself, and buggering Christ, you’re always fucking smothering me.”

This one. I'm really fucking proud of this whole scene, basically the entirely of marginalia, chapter 19. Because this is the moment where they're both finally allowing themselves to say the quiet part out loud about every bit of subtext that's existed in their relationship up until this point. It's also the first time Remus is really, truly allowing his defenses to come down in front of Sirius. (It's also, we will learn later on, the moment Remus realizes he has feelings for Sirius and promptly rewires his brain into just being mad at him.) I had to put into dialogue some harsh truths while juggling some funky relationship dynamics, all through the perspective of Sirius, who is fundamentally still Realizing Things™. So this whole scene could have ended up being wildly overwrought and melodramatic, but I think it came together in a really realistic and satisfying way.

fic ask game

#ask meme #marginalia blogging

[hmsex2023-rorys3965039]

HMsEx Blog Entry 4

HMsEx Blog Entry 4

At the beginning of Week 4 I set up a plan using Microsoft office planner; I’ll use this to set short-term and long-term goals and check them off once complete.

I was quite happy with my pitch. I’ve never had a course with two lecturers before but I’ve been really enjoying the disagreements on some topics or experiences that Nik and Darrin comment on. The feedback I received was great, hearing Darrin’s opinion on the skateboarding psychology idea possibly being too informative or information driven. In that moment I totally understood, it was a risk I thought of beforehand as well. Then, Nik’s feedback telling me that using a narrative to drive the experience would be a good base for the information to sit on, and nicely maintain engagement. Very useful stuff that’s given me a lot to think about, thanks guys.

Research - Academic

Fear Extinction

A fundamental process within the realm of psychology and neuroscience that involves the gradual weakening and suppression of a conditioned fear response. This phenomenon occurs when an individual is repeatedly exposed to a previously fear-inducing stimulus in a safe and controlled environment, leading to a reduction in the fear response over time. The process of fear extinction is closely linked to the brain's ability to form new associations and rewire neural circuits, facilitating the gradual replacement of fear-related memories with more adaptive and less distressing ones. Understanding fear extinction has significant implications for treating anxiety disorders and trauma-related conditions, offering insights into therapeutic approaches aimed at diminishing irrational and debilitating fears.

What I’m concerned with is how one diminishes rational and reasonable fears; does it involve more than typical fear extinction?

Self – Affirmation Interventions

Positive Self-Affirmation Statements: Individuals create and repeat positive affirmations about themselves and their abilities to counteract negative self-perceptions.

Visual Reminders: Watching yourself do a trick on flat ground and thinking about the feeling of landing that trick is a method used for mentally preparing yourself to do that trick down something big/scary (Collins)

Self-Affirmation Exercises: Personal favourite, if I’m about to do a trick on some obstacle or terrain I’m not entirely comfortable with I’ll do it on flat ground as clean as I can, directly before my run up for the obstacle; this gives me an umph and a reassurance.

Social Affirmation Statements: Seeking and appreciating positive feedback and validation from friends, family, or mentors (Sherman & Cohen 2006). I can confirm that there have been a number of times where I’ve been greatly motivated by skater’s superior to me and have landed tricks that I otherwise wouldn’t have attempted. In Suzhou, where I started skateboarding, there was this one OG (mid 30s skater) who is the owner of a skateshop and skatepark. He always told me that he thinks I’m on the right track to getting sponsored, and as I know how skilful of a skater he is and can only imagine how good he was in his prime, I really valued his words. He always let me in his skatepark for free. When we’d go out together at night for a street session with other shop/park homies, his presence and instruction motivated me like nothing ever has before. He’d see some wack obstacle that the whole group would’ve just walked past and say “Yo, jump down that.” In a very chill manner. So, I’d get up sceptically and think like “damn I don’t know about this” but for him and the homies I had the confidence to at least give it a shot. Social affirmation statements, verbal or not, have lead me to do some of my best skating.

“The first couple techniques Collins mentioned are things that skateboarders already do, like working up from easy to progressively more difficult tricks, or getting positive affirmations from friends. Collins also agreed that taking a slam could be a good way to get over your nerves. “You might call it the Dr. Pepper argument. Like, what’s the worst that can happen?” he said, referring to a slogan Dr. Pepper uses in the UK.” ( NOTENS & COLE KOMMA)

What is a “Liminal Space”?

Streets are commonly regarded as “liminal spaces” as seen through edits on social media.

I didn’t truly understand the meaning of the word I’ve been using to describe places that give me this exhilaration. On social media the way “liminal spaces” in speak never explains what makes these spaces liminal or even what the word liminal means; we’ve just put a title on a place that gives us a feeling.

Both these definitions are relevant:

“1 occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold: I was in the liminal space between past and present | the paintings in this exhibition are the result of recent investigation into liminal states. 

2 relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process: that liminal period when a child is old enough to begin following basic rules but is still too young to do so consistently.”

(Oxford Dictionary of English).

The Street as a Liminal Space – (Hugh Matthews 2002)

Matthews observed that time spent on the streets was an important part of the day for much of youth is. The word street is broad, it can mean “out and about”, outside of the home or a friend’s home.

For many kids the street is the only place where they can meet informally; unlike adults who have clubs, pubs, residences, etc.

“As such, streets are places where adultist conventions and moralities about what it is to be a child that is, less-than-adult - can be put aside. They are spaces that are temporarily outside of adult society, particularly with the withdrawal of adults at particular times of the day (Sibley 1995), fluid domains or a thirdspace set between childhood and adulthood, where the process of separation can be played out (Matthews et al. 2000c). Within these interstitial spaces young people can express feelings of belonging and of being apart and celebrate a developing sense of selfhood. In essence, therefore, streets can be grouped among those places where the newness of hybrid identities, no longer a child not yet adult, may be articulated (Rose 1995).”

(Next paragraph not crucial but interesting potential way of understanding why some people may consider some spaces liminal where others wont)

“Yet here is a cultural dilemma, for whilst streets appear to offer freedom away from adult mores, occupancy of the public domain is rarely uncontested, particularly when young people come into contact with vigilant adults who are not prepared to relinquish their overarching control. In order to remain on the street, therefore, young people carve out their own cultural crevices, and create their own social fissures. Often these are places where adults are not commonly found: in this study children regularly congregated in back alleys, on derelict land, around lock-up garages, at the rear of shopping parades, in pockets of green space within neighbouring scrub woodland, in essence, within the forgotten and redundant spaces of the adult world.” (Mathews 2002)

Now if we refer back to Liminal’s oxford definitions earlier we see through Matthews’ reasoning that neighbourhood streets are inherently liminal.

Research - Creative Practice

Definition of the Liminal space aesthetic:

Schyguyy’s videos are exemplars of what I call Liminal Exhilaration. His most recent video really hit me with how I must look when I’m walking home at night and staring up at starry skies or dim street lights. https://www.instagram.com/p/Cv0C7EBNi0F/

Look at his face. This is how I imagine I look when starring up at nothingness. It’s this somewhat voluntary (I wouldn’t say deliberate) relaxing of your face muscles which often feels mindless, thoughtless and consumed by the simplest sensory stimuli like an infant. 

Here are some comments. They wrap up what I feel for his work quite well. This kind of exhilaration is not the type that makes you say “oh my god” in excitement; it’s better enjoyed through feeling rather than comprehension.

In the eternal seas of narrative or “meaning”-rich content we’re drowned with today, one can stand up and realise that the understandable is merely a pool we’re addictively submerged in.

In a citadel, high above the slums sits aristocrats who find beauty only in the glisten and shine of gemstones; comfortable in the instant gratification palace of their own incarceration, they will never come down and appreciate the beauty in what wasn’t made to be beautiful. 

Although very woke, the above is how I feel about a lot of content on social media and its viewers who’re stuck in the scroll.

Research - Technical

The Use of Color in Liminal Spaces – Shookey

Shookey’s Youtube video on his methods of determining what makes a space “liminal”.

“Liminal Spaces are art. No matter what the medium may be. Because of this, artists will make efforts to frame or shape said mediums to make them actually feel Liminal.” (Shookey 2021)

Monochromatic Colour

Always having a clear standout colour can make an image that looks real feel fake or unnatural.

Contrast (Between colours, shapes, or light)

Red outside this laundry room gives the feeling of danger. This is a literal contrast from the relatively normally lit and coloured inside, to the outside which looks as though it may be day time but with an unnatural red haze. The only time this would be visible in reality is supposedly during a dust storm, however, he say’s that in liminal space imagery this could be something much worse.

He says the lighting outside has either been altered or naturally balanced with the inside, so the contrast is not with inside-outside light but with the blue and purple. Purple gives feelings mystery and the unnatural.

Washed

This method is likely most useful for my project and the type of liminal spaces I want to display.

These examples have all been the uncanny side of “liminal spaces” that I still have to classify as “liminal” because of the fact that they play around the boundary of the real and the surreal. The above image is bizarre in how there is almost nothing visible other than this exit sign. The exit sign points to the fog but staying on the same path leads to fog as well; other than that, the exit sign is strangely lacking in information, no distance, no name, just exit and an arrow. This type of contrast is between the clear and unclear, ironically making the clear subject very unclear in a figurative sense. This technique could be very useful in controlling the viewers focus, hopefully in a way that can add nostalgia. Even though the exit sign’s meaning isn’t clear, the creator has utilized a very recognizable and understandable object to be the subject; I too will pick out objects that our brain has strong existing neural pathways to. However, my choices will not merely be recognizable objects amongst a bleak background (because almost everything today we see we have seen before) but objects shapes or environments that many people have attributed memory to.

I want to be able to make the viewer feel like they’ve seen this before, like they’re getting back part of a memory.

The type of liminal spaces I want to film are empty locations of our childhood (like streets as proven earlier) described as having an elegiac aura. Because video creators refer to this aura as particularly saddening, I will chose spaces that have general relation to childhood or adolescence but aren’t obvious; this way I hope to evoke that feeling of familiarity, to provide comfort, but not the eeriness of seeing your childhood memories in such empty lifeless states.

Exhilarating Project 1 - Skate fear edit

Just been thinking about how I might film this. I want the video to have this interesting 2d platform to it. It’s obviously 3D but the camera keeps the subject in the centre of the frame and at the same angle, requiring the camera to move exactly as the subject does.

Exhilarating Project 2 – Liminal Exhilaration

Exhilarating Project 3 - Upside-Down People

Still discussing.

Works Cited

Collins, D. 2019, THE SCIENCE BEHIND OVERCOMING FEAR IN SKATING [Interview], Jenkem Magazine with Nic N & Cole K.

Christensen, P.M., O’Brien, M. and Matthews, H. (2002) ‘The street as a liminal space’, in Children in the city: Home, neighbourhood and community. 1st edn. Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge.

Sherman, D.K. and Cohen, G.L. (2006) ‘The Psychology of Self‐defense: Self‐affirmation theory’, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, pp. 183–242. doi:10.1016/s0065-2601(06)38004-5.

The Use of Color in Liminal Spaces (2021) YouTube. Available at: https://youtu.be/xza58OeSSYo (Accessed: 01 August 2023).

[notjanine]

2020 in books!

the only kind of new year’s resolution i made as a naive baby last january was to try to read 40 books for the year. (i read 37 in 2019, for context.) well, with all of my commuting time eliminated and an increased need for immersive escapism, i ended up surpassing that goal three times over lmao (thanks library ebooks!)

idk how to summarize my year in books in a way that makes sense but

(f) = fiction, (nf) = nonfiction, (p) = poetry.

books that rewired my fucking brain:

braiding sweetgrass by robin wall kimmerer (nf)- GOD?!?!?! good. dr. k is right. ostensibly a book about plants, but actually a book about shut up and go outside. consumerism and capitalism are doing their damnedest to fuck you up, but you can just choose to value different things. take care of yourself by taking care of your environment. etc etc.

wasp by richard jones (nf)- lissen. when i got this book, my wasp-phobia was so severe that i had to put it away face down on a high shelf because there are wasps on the cover and i couldn’t bear to RISK even GLIMPSING them. now i am like... a wasp evangelist. (also due to the bugs 101 course on coursera it’s so good.)

wag by zazie todd (nf)- i have a dog, but i am NOT a Dog Person (i.e. i love my dog, but please keep yours away from me, thanks.) this book helped me understand my little guy better, plus it gives actionable tasks and activities to do with and for your pup! plus, y’know, learning about things you’re scared of helps to lessen that fear. i’d recommend this to anyone who has, wants, or regularly interacts with a dog.

a closed and common orbit by becky chambers (f)- is this series complete fluff? absolutely. am i fundamentally different after reading this one? maybe.

the best we could do by thi bui (nf)- this is so far outside of my personal experience but somehow still made me come to peace with my relationship with my mom?? and it’s barely even about that?? idk. this is probably objectively the best book i’ve read this year.

books that were just fun as hell:

mexican gothic by silvia moreno-garcia (f)- this book made me YELL out loud

death on the nile by agatha christie (f)- i grew up on agatha christie shows, but never actually read her before this year! she really was That Bitch. read this before the movie comes out

cosmoknights by hannah templer (f)- i read this in one sitting through the worst headache i’ve had in years. it is a goddamn DELIGHT. this book has everything: spaceships. mech suits. fighting the patriarchy. a perfect otp. fun art in bright colors with clean lines. onomatopoetic WAPs from before the song gave that hilarious context. 800 lesbians. this is an antidepressant in graphic novel form.

stiff by mary roach (nf)- ms. roach is like the 4th most represented author on my bookshelf because she 1. stays writing about shit i’m interested in and 2. manages to talk about gross and ridiculous things without resorting to sensationalism. it takes skill to write a hilarious book about corpses.

black sun by rebecca roanhorse (f)- excellent sexual tension between a horny siren pirate and a hot doomed... monk, kinda? set in the pre-columbian gulf of mexico with magic and shit.

cuisine chinoise by zao dao (? n/f)- this graphic novel about chinese food history/mythology is BEAUTIFUL.

the color of magic by terry pratchett (f)- you’d think a hardcore douglas adams stan would have gotten to this sooner, but no, i had to date a nerdy white boy to get here. it’s fun though! i’m not gonna read them all, but this one was good. bonus: contains one (1) great himbo.

gideon the ninth by tamsyn muir (f)- like 500 pages of action and mystery and jokes and space necromancy. harrow the ninth gets a special mention bc it has a meme reference that took me out so hard i had to close the book, lie down, and groan for an entire minute before continuing.

other minds by peter godfrey-smith (nf)- i love octopuses. on one tma bonus ep, jonny sims says that if a creature can choose to do evil, then it’s a Person. octopuses are People. but anyway frfr this has an explanation of the evolution of consciousness that is cool af. (this one is much better than the other recent popsci octo book which i will not name out of politeness.)

the perfect predator by steffanie strathdee and thomas patterson (nf)- i read this bc my microbiology prof recommended it and it’s cool as heck! it’s got adventure, drama, mystery, Science-with-a-capital-S. i’m biased bc i’m a bit of a microbes nerd, but i had a blast with this. (but only bc we know going in that everything works out okay; if i hadn’t known that, i would have been TOO stressed!)

books that were a little less fun but still very readable:

my sister, the serial killer by oyinkan braithwaite (f)- i couldn’t find this as funny as other people bc i, too, have a beautiful sister who’s an insufferable narcissist, so it hits a little too close to home, but. it is a wild ride.

piranesi by susanna clarke (f)- idek what to say! i went into this one blind just bc it had a cool cover and title, so i guess i’d recommend that for other people too.

the sixth world series by rebecca roanhorse (f)- monster hunting! a post-apocalyptic take that doesn’t feel tired.

the shades of magic trilogy by v.e. schwab (f)- easy escapism. some ideas feel a little first draft-y, but idk, it’s also a pretty simple premise (which isn’t a bad thing). it’s a decent urban fantasy set in ~georgian?-era london. very actiony. suffers from a bit of i’m-not-like-other-girls disease, but i didn’t even notice until book two or three, so.

the only good indians by stephen graham jones (f)- starts off a little ??? (and reeks of being Written By A Man) but picks up. the pacing’s great and there’s just a super fucking cool monster.

robopocalypse by daniel h. wilson (f)- this reads like a tv miniseries so much that i can’t believe it isn’t one yet.

confessions of the fox by jordy rosenberg (f)- not my usual cup of tea, fiction-wise, but still compelling. a fresh take on the white-male-english-professor-self-insert? but not insufferable. gets weird!

spinning silver by naomi novik (f)- rumplestilstkin, but make it interesting! a great, richly-told fairy tale, but like, large scale. good to read on a cold day while you’re wrapped up in a blanket with some hot tea.

interior chinatown by charles yu (f)- compulsively readable. a couple things bugged me, but not enough to make me dislike it. a fun companion piece to how to live safely in a science fictional universe. i like this guy’s style.

cannibalism by bill schutt (nf)- COOL. mostly covers the animal kingdom (fun), spends too much time on the donner party (less fun), ends with a SPICY take on prions that i cannot get out of my head!!!

buzz, sting, bite by anne sverdrup-thygeson (nf)- BUGS! broad but not overwhelming, neither dumbed down nor overly scientific, short enough to finish in a day or two. recommend this to literally everyone.

books that made me want to read everything else in the author’s ouevre:

the time invariance of snow by e. lily yu (f)- this FUCKS but it’s too short!!!

an unkindness of ghosts by rivers solomon (f)- okay this book is SO good and so well-written and interesting and blah blah blah all the good things, but... the whole time, i was just like?? why???? why is this what you’re choosing to write about??? (i did also read the deep and blood is another word for hunger after this one, and i did like them both, especially the latter, but i think they can do better! like i think they could write a perfect book and i am gonna be *eyes emoji* until then.)

the space between worlds by micaiah johnson (f)- a fine debut novel, but i want to see her do something a little more... idk, refined? i think she overreaches here, like it’s a little... idk looper? this is how you lose the time war? there’s a better comparison, but i can’t think of it, but you get the idea. and then halfway through it shifts gears to mad max. there’s something weird about one of the central relationships, like it’s not complex enough to take as long to resolve as it does. idk idk. there are just a lot of little nitpicky things. it’s not bad! but i think she can do better and i look forward to finding out.

postcolonial love poem by natalie diaz (p)- thinky! like i tried to read this before bed, but it’s not the sort of thing to parse out while you’re falling asleep, it requires more attention than that.

books that Learned Me Somethin:

smoke gets in your eyes by caitlin doughty (nf)- i am a self-professed death obsessed weirdo, fascinated by death and mourning, but i didn’t know all that much about what happens to a body between the dying and the funeral! this book isn’t big, but it covers a lot and doughty’s writing style is engaging and honest. it’s very memorable.

queer by meg-john barker and julia scheele (nf)- i’m gonna be totally honest and say Queer Theory is above my intellectual pay grade, but this book takes you by the hand and explains the basics.

vitamania by catherine price (nf)- LMAO my fellow americans, never take a supplement. this book is great and well-researched, but normal folks don’t need to read it, just listen to season two of the dream podcast, which definitely cribbed from this.

vegetable kingdom by bryant terry (nf)- this is a fine cookbook, my favorite of his that i’ve read so far. gets a special mention bc i had a religious experience just reading one of his kohlrabi recipes. absolutely gutted that i didn’t have an opportunity to try it this year, since the pandemic put the kibosh on all family bbqs.

the best american food writing 2020 edited by j. kenji lopez-alt (nf)- this really is just a great collection.

are prisons obsolete? by angela y. davis (nf)- yes.

i moved to los angeles to work in animation by natalie nourigat (nf)- before reading this, i had basically zero knowledge of how the animation industry works. now i know like three things.

the secret lives of bats by merlin tuttle (nf)- BATS! okay this book is more about the adventures of being a bat scientist than it actually is about bats, but there are bats in there. insectivorous bats basically shit glitter, you should know this.

books from valuable perspectives:

hood feminism by mikki kendall (nf)- a breakdown of who’s getting left out of feminist spaces, why that’s happening, and why it shouldn’t be happening.

all you can ever know by nicole chung (nf)- a (transracial) adoptee’s take on adoption and learning more about her birth family. the personal storytelling of this one really stuck with me.

motherhood so white by nefertiti austin (nf)- a single-mom-by-choice’s take on the foster system/adoption process. walks you through some things i always wondered about and some things i wouldn’t even have thought about.

this place by kateri akiwenzie-damm et al (? n/f)- i, like a lot of non- native americans, only know that history in broad strokes. getting this many highly specific stories in one dense and beautiful book felt like a lucky find. and taking that perspective into the future in the context of that history is v good.

empty by susan burton (nf)- eating disorder stories are important to me bc i care about food so much. this one is so relatable- not in its specificity, but rather its generality. it’s easy to empathize with her perspective because it’s like, Oh, i don’t have that exact problem, but i struggle with different problems in a very similar way. (feels like the opposite of roxane gay’s hunger, in a way.)

obit by victoria chang (p)- this exploration of grief is... woof.

short story collections are hard to evaluate bc you’ll never read one where every single story hits but i generally enjoyed these:

a thousand beginnings and endings edited by ellen oh and elsie chapman (f)

how long til black future month? by n.k. jemisin (f)

her body and other parties by carmen maria machado (f)

books i revisited:

the broken earth trilogy by n.k. jemisin (f)- i read the series backwards this time and like... i can’t really find any faults in these books, man. they’re just the best.

everyone’s a aliebn when ur a aliebn too by jomny sun (f... but is it really?)- half of this book’s sales are from me buying it for other people bc it’s the only way i know how to say i love you. i reread it every time just to make sure it still feels right and it always does.

other honorable mentions:

white is for witching by helen oyeyemi (f)- not to pit two bad bitches against each other, but this book does what akwaeke emezi’s freshwater was trying to do. it’s a little weird, a little haunted, a little of a lot of things. read this only in the dead of winter. (and with stephen rennicks’ score for the little stranger playing in the background.)

homie by danez smith (p)- there’s a lot going on here, but this just made me crack a smile a couple times in a way that no other book of poetry has ever done.

the murder of roger ackroyd and murder in mesopotamia by agatha christie (f)- That Bitch!

blues by nikki giovanni (p)- she sure has some Things To Say

the three-body problem by cixin liu (f)- interesting concepts, but... idk something’s missing? felt weirdly soulless to me. i’m probably not gonna read the sequels. but it did make some points!

the sisters of the winter wood by rena rossner (f)- i’m a slut for shapeshifting, okay. but this is a good fairy tale, it works!

parable of the sower by octavia butler (f)- i read this in march, when the pandemic was just kicking off and boy that was not the right time. def my least favorite of hers so far, but an octavia butler i don’t love is still better than a hell of a lot of other books. no idea when or if i’ll get to a good enough headspace for the sequel.

faves:

saturnino herrán by adriana zapett tapia (nf)- i got to learn new things about my mans and see some of his paintings i’ve never even seen online! GOSH.

on food and cooking by harold mcgee (nf)- yeah yeah, i’ve already mentioned this book half a dozen times on here this year, but i don’t care. this book lives off the shelf in my home bc i reference it like every other fucking day. this book is a part of me now.

#long post #final total for the year will be 120 by the end of the day! #and i had a pretty good hit rate. would probably recommend at least half #and only outright hated four

[superdeepak-blog2]

Law of Attraction - Cooperative Reality

The Law of Attraction is one of many laws by which mankind has been operating consciously or unconsciously since the dawn of time. Most people are blissfully unaware of how these laws affect their lives and equally unaware that the power of these laws can be harnessed and used to great effect on a daily basis.

Since the release of the movie The Secret, the Law of Attraction has come to the forefront in peoples minds as the ultimate tool for changing your life and that is a good thing. I find however that many people after watching and reading information about the Law of Attraction are still somewhat confused as to how it actually works. There is a lot of talk about holding images in the mind, sending thought vibrations out to the universe, maintaining a state of expectation and gratitude, and waiting for the universe to respond by the Law of Attraction and provide that upon which you have focussed your intention, and so on. All of these things are very wonderful and I have found all of them useful in my own learning, but none of these ideas provided me with truly satisfactory answers about how the Law of Attraction actually works, both spiritually and scientifically.

Now if you're anything like me, blind faith just doesn't cut it, most people like at least to have some kind of decent explanation for why they should get involved with the Law of Attraction, otherwise we tend to reject the whole idea outright, which would be a unfortunate indeed.

Vital Knowledge

The trouble that I think some people have is that they hear about incredible success stories involving the Law of Attraction, amazing tales of people that have gone from having an average kind of existence to living a life that most people only dream about, and then set out in good faith to achieve similar results. Clearly not everyone achieves the results they had hoped for, why is this? Has the Law of Attraction failed? Are all of the success stories bogus? Are they just clever ploys to get us to buy books and movies about how to use the Law of Attraction?

There are many individual claims about the Law of Attraction bringing great abundance and the fulfillment of great dreams, and there are also charlatans in every area of life, religious, secular, scientific, but it would be a great mistake to reject a concept of such potential because of a few con artists, you might as well give up on all personal development right now.

As for the first idea that the Law of Attraction has somehow failed to work, my own experience tells me that this is simply not possible, the Law of Attraction is not a business plan, or a clever scheme that is subject to markets or the moods of individuals, it is as constant and predictable as the sun rise, all that is required is the appropriate level of understanding in order to leverage its potential.

This I believe is where a lot of confusion exists, why do some people seem to be able to apply the Law of Attraction with great affect and others struggle to see the smallest things manifest? The answer is knowledge, there is a basic lack of understanding about how the Law of Attraction works. Some people however seem to be able to easily apply the Law of Attraction and get results even though they have no more knowledge of what is actually happening than the next person, why is this? It is because some individuals have a mental pre-disposition to accepting the Law of Attraction, its requirements and outcomes without question, others don't and require further instruction about the fundamentals of the law of attraction before being able to apply themselves properly.

Its a bit like being given a kit for a model aeroplane without the assembly instructions, some people may have a natural understanding about how to assemble things, they may have watched their father assembling model aeroplanes in the past, but for others it will be an almost impossible task, time consuming and frustrating.

It is my experience that with a basic increase in understanding about the Law of Attraction and the underlying principles that govern it, any individual can begin to see real results in every area of their life almost immediately. So let's now take a look at some of that useful knowledge that will assist us in gaining a better understanding of how to apply the Law of Attraction to great affect.

The Most Important Thing

The first thing that I would like to say is that the Law of Attraction is not the most powerful law in the universe, contrary to popular opinion, there are a number of underlying principles that govern how the Law of Attraction works, and that is where we shall begin.

I want to start by making this statement; when we use the Law of Attraction, we do not attract things! this is also contrary to popular opinion. There is not a sports car with your vibration on it waiting for you to believe that it's yours before it appears in the driveway. This may seem a ridiculous statement, but there are many teachers of the Law of Attraction that state exactly that, it's about manifesting things, well it's not.

The Law of Attraction does not work by you putting out a thought vibration to the universe and somehow the universe, through the principle of the Law of Attraction, responds to that thought by sending you the thing that matches that vibration, yet unfortunately this is what is taught. Some people simply accept this explanation and get on with using the Law of Attraction to great success, you could call that blind faith, and I have no problem with that at all, but it won't work for everyone, and that does concern me because it can work for everyone.

The most important thing you will ever understand about the Law of Attraction is that it always involves other people, other minds, other realities, not things. I call this underlying principle Cooperative Reality and discuss it in detail throughout my book.

Put simply, Cooperative Reality states that in order to apply the Law of Attraction you require the cooperation of other individuals realities. Understanding this concept has been the single greatest step in my own personal growth, when I came to this realization it completely revolutionized my experience in using the Law of Attraction. It provided me with meaningful direction in the application of all the methods I was ignorantly using to apply the Law of Attraction.

I have been asked many times to explain my success in using the Law of Attraction, and I discover that it's not easy to summarise the concept of Cooperative Reality, and that is why I decided to write my book entitled Law of Attraction - Cooperative Reality. I will however attempt to summarise the book in order to give you at least some idea of the power of this concept in relation to the Law of Attraction. I must state however that there will be some ideas that may seem very unusual, but I assure you there is solid scientific evidence for everything I am putting forward, again, explained in detail throughout my book.

The Quantum Field

First of all we need to ask the question "what is reality?" and I will begin by taking a brief look at a concept within Quantum Physics called super position. Briefly stated super position is referring to sub atomic particles appearing in more than one place at the same time, in fact the same electron, if I may use this particle as an example, could appear in as many as 3000 different or potential locations simultaneously, this phenomenon is referred to in Quantum Physics as a wave function. So the entire universe being made up of the very tiny world of sub atomic particles exists in super position, or one of many potential locations, on a universal scale Quantum Physicists call this the Field of Potential.

This is great new for us all, it means that your reality is not fixed, it is flexible, changeable, it can be altered from one form to another, but who does the transforming and how?

The Observer

This brings me to the second point I would like to consider, also a concept used in Quantum Physics called The Observer, and this principle directly affect and alters the Field of Potential. So what is The Observer? Well, you are the Observer, along with ever other conscious individual on the planet. And what does the Observer do? The Observer is responsible for the collapse of the wave function. What does that mean? Basically it means whenever you consciously observe the Quantum Field you snap your reality into a single location in time and space. Scientists conduct complex experiments with particles that bare out this concept and it certainly aligns with my own experience.

So when we observe the Quantum Field, the world, the universe, what position do we collapse the wave function to? Where does our reality finish up? Well that is determined by what you believe, and I'm not referring to your religious allegiance, I'm talking about what you believe your reality should be with every fibre of your being, which is taught in the Law of Attraction, it's just not generally explained that well. Now you are not the only Observer collapsing the wave function to set reality by what you believe, everyone is an Observer, and that is of vital importance to understand. To properly apply the Law of Attraction we need to somehow alter the way other people view reality, and we will take a look at that shortly.

Rewiring The Mind

Finally we need to consider how it is that we change our fundamental beliefs about ourselves and about the world. Fortunately for us, the construct of our belief systems exist within the mind, in the complex structure of neural pathways that make up the different areas of the brain. I say fortunately, because recent discoveries in neuroscience have revealed that the neural structure of the brain is highly flexible, not rigid and fixed as scientists first thought. You are not destined to be locked in to behaviors and attitudes of the past, ways of thinking and patterns of belief that have been neurologically passed down to you by your ancestors through your DNA, you possess the power to reconstruct the neural pathways in your brain and create a brand new construct of reality in your mind.

This is a vital area of knowledge that most Law of Attraction publications do not go into, some of the common Law of Attraction methods such as, focussed intention, and holding an image in the mind of a new reality do have an affect on the neural construct of the brain, but the affect can be temporary, because we are not taught how to solidify the new construct for use over the long term. The human mind processes roughly 100,000 bits of information per second, yet we are only consciously aware of around 2000 bits of that information. What we need to do is begin to learn how to permanently alter the construct of our neural net in order to perceive a new reality, to become aware of things that we had never considered before and forever change our deep beliefs about who we are and what we are doing here.

Putting it all Together

So what does this all mean in relation to using the Law of Attraction more effectively? Your first goal when attempting to apply the Law of Attraction must be to alter your fundamental beliefs about what your own reality is in order to begin collapsing the quantum field to that new reality, but as I mentioned earlier, you are not the only one that sets reality through belief, and this is where the Law of Attraction really comes into its own.

As you apply all the methods around the Law of Attraction, visualization, intentions, gratitude etc, you create a stronger reality for yourself, and that reality connects with corresponding vibrations in the minds of those around you. You begin to alter other individuals beliefs in relation to you, and they also begin to collapse the quantum field in alignment with your new reality. Basically you create a stronger personal reality that affects those around you, this is no game of chance, but using the Law of Attraction properly does feel a little like stacking the odds in your favour. When I first began to really understand and apply the principles mentioned above, all the small details of my life began to change, my life went from 80 percent of the things that happened to me being a disappointment to 80 percent of things becoming truly positive and magical virtually overnight.

Conclusion

Your life consists in all the small details that make up your reality, you don't need to be somewhere else or do something else in order to be truly happy, using the Law of Attraction you can begin to quickly transform every area of your life from the mundane to the incredible, everyone has this ability, all you need is a brain and a choice.

As I said, it is difficult to explain this subject briefly, but I hope you have found this article helpful in your understanding of the Law of Attraction and how it works.

If you would like to learn more about properly applying the Law of Attraction and find out about the practical methods I use for changing my own fundamental beliefs and affecting the reality of those around me, I encourage you to consider reading my book Law of Attraction - Cooperative Reality, you will find simple practical methods for using the Law of Attraction and Cooperative Reality, along with clear explanations of all the concepts I have mentioned in this article.

You are an incredible, eternal being, full of power and potential, I wish you every success in your search for change through the Law of Attraction.

learn more=https://bit.ly/2C47y1u

#lawofattraction #manifestingmoney #manifestion

[thesimplyluxuriouslife]

327: How to Change Your Brain So Your Mind (and thus you!) Can Thrive

"Although your true nature may be hidden momentarily by stress and worry, anger and unfulfilled longings, it still continues to exist. Knowing this can be a great comfort."—Rick Hanson, PhD with Richard Mendius, MD, Buddha's Brain: The practical neuroscience of happiness, love and wisdom

The mind's default is dialed to 'survive', not to thrive. However, the wonderful 'gift' that our brain has within it is the toolbox full of tools (i.e. capabilities) to learn the skills to change the dial to 'thrive'.

There is a distinction, however slight between the brain and the mind, and while the two are often conflated, think of the brain as the physical entity within your skull and the mind, the conceptual idea maker that thinks due to the capabilities of the brain.

With that said, the title refers to the truth of what will change your life for the better. The author of Buddha's Brain, Rick Hanson is a neuropsychologist shares along with the contributor, doctor in neurology Richard Mendius, "If I know one thing for sure, it's that you can do small things inside your mind that will lead to big changes in your brain and your experience of living . . . you really can nudge your whole being in a better direction every day. When you change your brain, you change your life."

The secret that is often unknown unless we are taught, learn or observe it, is that we have to change the dial from 'survive' to 'thrive' and it is a muscle we have to keep toned. The question I have been asking for over two decades is How. And while I have been grateful to find books over the past twelve years, sharing so many of them and what I have here on TSLL, it was reading Buddha's Brain that provided the science that help me make sense of why my brain encourages my mind to default in certain ways that in hindsight are not helpful. (I will list the other previous books and their post/episodes below.)

1.Practice the three fundamentals of Buddha's teachings: Virtue, Mindfulness and Wisdom

Since our brain and how it functions is the reason we suffer, yet we can change the brain, then we can also cure the suffering. Hanson summarizes what Siddartha who over two thousand years ago, at the time not yet called Buddha, discovered as he trained his mind "thus his brain" while understanding the causes of suffering, also discovered the "path to freedom from suffering".

Let's take a look at what each of these three look like in everyday life:

Virtue: "regulating your actions, words and thoughts to create benefits rather than harm yourself or others"

Mindfulness: "the skillful use of attention to both your inner and outer worlds"

Wisdom: "applied common sense . . . first, come to understand what hurts and what helps . . . then based on this understanding, let go of those things that hurt and strengthen those that help . . . as a result, over time you'll feel more connected with everything, more serene about how all things change and end, and more able to meet pleasure and pain without grasping after the one and struggling with the other"

2. Prolong feelings of happiness

Did you know that as "you become a happier person, the left front region of your brain becomes more active"? Yep. And this is a very good thing because the left frontal region of your brain is where your skills for communication and thinking abstractly as well as understanding abstraction are rooted. When we consciously prolong and hold ourselves in moments of happiness, in other words, savor them deeply, we are actually rewiring our brain, and "when neurons fire together, they wire together". When we do this regularly, savoring what is good, what makes us happy, we are gradually, yet steadily and significantly changing our brains, and thus 'how we think' for the better.

3. You don't need more resources, you already have what you need

The key to changing our brains is not to have more money, more time or well, anything outside of ourselves, which is very good news. The key is awareness, knowledge of how to change the brain, and the will and restraint to do so. So, look back to #2, that is a great place to start - savor the moments of happiness.

4. Understand why we 'suffer' when we step away from what we know

From ending a relationship and moving on, to changing jobs and thus the colleagues you surround yourselves with, the first year at college away from your family after having lived with them your entire life thus far, leaving your home to travel and experiencing home sickness or even the Paris Syndrome, your mind defaults to 'surviving' and is not concerning itself with what is best for you to thrive.

Within our brain, the Lizard brain as it is often called, when we separate from what we have done, when we choose to be independent and start something new or go somewhere new, our brain will push back and "produce painful signals of disturbance and see your choice as a threat". Thus the struggle with the mind, and the emotions, for a temporary period of time. Often, people don't understand such feelings are temporary and retreat to what they've known which is what the Lizard brain and brain set to the default of 'survive' wants you to do, but that is not thriving.

5. Understand how past negative experiences trigger the mind in the present more powerfully than positive memories

"The brain is drawn to bad news."

Velcro versus Teflon.

Since our brain is set to default to survive, "the hippocampus makes sure [negative events are] stored carefully for future reference", our negative experiences tend to have more of an impact than positive ones unless we live consciously and understand why the brain does this.

I found this section of the book incredibly powerful because once I understood why the brain kept pulling me back to worry, doubt, anger, sorrow, shame, any negative feeling to prevent me from stretching, changing, growing, progressing, even hoping, I could then take the wheel and pause its previously unstoppable progression toward an unhelpful state of mind. Keep the following quote in mind if you too have a mind that you might right now think cannot be controlled (the good news, and why I am writing this post, is that it can):

"[The brain] highlights past losses and failures, it downplays present abilities, and it exaggerates future obstacles. Consequently, the mind continually tends to render unfair verdicts about a person's character, conduct and possibilities. The weight of those judgments can really wear you down."

6. Stop living in simulations

Simulations are moments that the brain plays, or replays over and over again. Whether you are rehashing an argument or situation that didn't go as you had hoped, or thinking ahead to the future and imagining every possible outcome, every single one is a simulation and it pulls you away from the present moment. Hanson calls simulations 'mini-movies', and shares, "Mini-movies keep us stuck by their simplistic view of the past and by their defining out of existence real possibilities for the future, such as new ways to reach out to others or dream big dreams."

Essentially when we let ourselves get lost and wander about in simulations we are putting ourselves into an invisible cage, and as Hanson rightly reminds, trapping ourselves in a life that is smaller than the one you could actually have.

7. Practice regular self-compassion

We often know how to give compassion or extend compassion to others. It is important to note that compassion is not pity. Compassion instead involves extending "warmth, concern and good wishes". In 2016 I wrote a detailed episode (#122) sharing how to extend compassion to yourself, and why it is important. When you practice self-compassion you are creating a refuge, an island of calm as author Dr. Kristin Neff describes it for you to just be - stepping away from all negative and positive energy that you may have running in your mind, letting go of self-doubt and extending kindness to yourself.

When we practice regular self-compassion, we are exercising self-awareness as we give ourselves what we need, and we are in that moment, in a state of true contentment because no matter what is swirling around us - in the outside world or within our mind, we are stepping back and finding stillness, observing, but not engaging, and providing care to ourselves so that we can respond well when we are ready, rather than reacting.

8. Stop throwing the Second Dart

Oh, oh, oh! This was a big aha moment for me.

Since we're talking about a Second Dart, there must be a First Dart, and there is. As Dr. Hanson explains, the First Dart is out of our control - a negative or unwanted experience happens, but it is HOW we react to the First Dart that creates a Second Dart, and we can prevent the latter from ever being thrown in the first place by becoming aware of ourselves and choosing to respond rather than react.

The reason Second Darts need to cease being thrown is because they are often more hurtful, painful and destructive. And here's the best news of all, Second Darts are entirely avoidable and never unavoidable. In other words, we need to stop hurting ourselves in such a way that is entirely avoidable to do so.

An example of what a Second Dart looks like: Your boss or colleague gives you the cold shoulder at work or doesn't consider your idea, or even invite you to share (first dart); immediately, in your mind, you rush to doubt yourself, become angry for being ignored and immediately assume their treatment must be all about something you did/lack/didn't do/are not enough of/etc. (second dart). The second dart lacks any evidence and takes in no context for any other extenuating circumstances, and causing unnecessary suffering.

Dr. Hanson warns that sadly, some second darts can be thrown that are a result of a positive first dart that we, refuse to see as positive because we are doubtful and distrustful of ourselves. Example: you receive a genuine compliment and immediately question (in your mind) how it could be possible that someone sees something good, or you are fearful they will see through you. Again, you've caused yourself unnecessary suffering and you are creating neural connections that actually decrease positive growth in the mind.

Long story short, refrain from throwing a Second Dart, ever, ever, ever.

9. Consciously create a life of more moments and experiences to savor every day

Our brain has a negativity bias as discussed above. Understand this and you understand the vital importance of savoring, savoring, savoring. I often repeat in triplet this verb and it's not on accident. When we savor, don't just do it once, hold yourself in the moment, create an imprint of this awesome moment in your mind. Your brain is changing for the better, and thus your mind thinks better and your life changes for the better.

Hanson shares ideas that I have a feeling will look quite familiar to readers and listeners of TSLL blog and the corresponding podcast. (1) look around you, throughout your day and your life for what you are grateful for, look for the good news in other words and so much of the good news is seemingly small and insignificant, but it is not insignificant at all - it is fuel to focus on to improve your life - beautiful scents, steady steps toward a goal, your favorite weather forecast, a healthy body!, clean water; (2) savor the experience for longer than you may have thought necessary - hold it in your awareness, drink it up - the longer you do, the "more neurons that fire and thus wire together, and the stronger the trace in memory"; (3) recall the journey of challenges you overcame to arrive where you are and are grateful to be - this rewires the brain, deepens savoring and adds to our list of what we are grateful for; and (4) take in all of the good sensations from past good memories and current ones - the warmth of the sun, the peace you felt when you heard the good news, the first time you laid eyes on [insert destination/person/outcome].

10. Understand the process to rewiring the brain so that the mind can thrive

Begin the journey of mind transformation by keeping this truth in mind (pun not intended): it will take regular practice, but your mind will eventually change for the better. It will get rather difficult in the middle of the journey before it gets easier, so stick with it.

Hanson delineates the four stages we move through (the goal being stage 4) to reach a state of full awareness and awakening of the mind, in other words, strengthening our mind's ability to thrive.

Stage One: "you're caught in a second-dart reaction and you don't even know it"

Stage Two: "you realize you've been hijacked and must engage with the second-dart, but cannot help it"

Stage Three: "some aspect of the reaction arises, but you don't act it out"

Stage Four: "the reaction doesn't even come up, and sometimes you forget you ever had the issue"

Hanson explains that we often get stuck in Stage Two, thinking it is impossible to move forward into stage three. Why? Often because we have the incorrect idea that the life around us must change to suit us, but that is faulty thinking. Remember, we live in awareness and how we respond to what we cannot control will determine our ability to either simply survive or thrive. It's important to state this again (as much for myself as for readers/listeners), don't throw the second-dart. Simply don't do it, and you're already well on your way to Stage Three. The goal for growth is to aim for Stage Three and Four, but if you are living consciously in awareness and practicing the above steps shared, you'll get there and your life will be be full of more 'happiness, love and wisdom'.

"Over time, through training and shaping your mind and brain, you can even change what arises, increasing what's positive and decreasing what's negative. In the meantime, you can rest in and be nourished by a growing sense of the peace and clarity in your true nature."

There is far more worth understanding and exploring in this book, Buddha's Brain. Today I wanted to introduce you to the fundamental science behind why our brains are not our friend if we don't know how they work and just let it lead us where it will. We cannot let that happen or we won't find true contentment.

I think it is also important to point out, by focusing on the good, celebrating the awesome moments in life, Hanson explains, "[It] is not about putting a happy shiny face on everything, nor is it about turning away from the hard things in life. It's about nourishing your well-being, contentment, and peace inside that are refuges you can always come from and return to."

When we understand how our mind is initially designed, but at the same time understand what it is capable of, we set ourselves free to no longer be stuck in a cage we have the key to unlock.

Buddha's Brain: The practical neuroscience of happiness, love & wisdom

Books, Blog Posts and Podcast Episodes previous shared about the Mind

Calm Clarity: How to Use Science to Rewire Your Brain for Greater Wisdom, Fulfillment and Joy by Due Quach

The Mindful Day: Practical Ways to Find Focus, Calm and Joy from Morning to Evening by Laurie J. Cameron

How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett

Happiness: A Philosopher's Guide by Fredric Lenoir

The Happiness Equation by Neil Pasricha

The Conquest of Happiness by Bertrand Russell

How to be the Master of Your Mind, episode #20

Taming the Overthinking Mind: 8 Ways to Maintain Your Creativity and Find Mental Tranquility

Awareness + Being Present = Deep Contentment and Peace of Mind

5 Ways Harnessing the Power of Our Mind Can Improve Our Lives

11 Ways to Live More Mindfully

Why Not . . . Let Your Brain Calm Down?

Petit Plaisir

—Maisie Dobbs mystery series

~The Simple Sophisticate, episode #327

~Subscribe to The Simple Sophisticate:  iTunes | Stitcher | iHeartRadio | YouTube | Spotify | Amazon Music

Tune in to the latest episode of The Simple Sophisticate podcast

#tsllpodcast thesimplesophisticate

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

FFWPU / Unification Church Matching by Moon video

Matching by Sun Myung Moon on June 24th 1982

Todd Harvey was at a 1979 matching in New York:

“... I was soon back in Manhattan. Virtually within hours, I was in a room with hundreds of other members who were being matched up by Moon, most often with a complete stranger. I went into that room full of excitement and happiness, but by the time I came out, I was one very confused boy. I saw all sorts of strange, pragmatic, and very unspiritual considerations, like leadership position, special considerations for favorites of the higher ups, and even visa status being taken into account in Moon's decisions. He was supposed to be able to look at you and see you aura and ancestry, (this is how he determined who would be a good match for you), yet he had to ask members what their nationalities were. I saw him strike a girl in the head with his fist when she dared suggest someone. We were told to take some time with our match to talk things over and come to an agreement about it, yet Moon angrily berated members in front of the whole assembly when they rejected his pick. He matched one talented, outgoing, intelligent and pretty girl in the rock group "Sunburst" with a poor guy who obviously had some mental impairment that kept him operating at a fourth grade level. I watched as my special friend was matched to someone else, and I wasn't even in the considerations, as the Japanese sisters, being so few, were matched first to the MFT "commanders". Moon didn't match any one together if the girl was taller than the boy, so when he paired me and my match up, he had us stand together to make sure. As we were standing there, it occurred to me that if she is just 1/2 inch taller than me, we will go on our separate ways, but if not, we will spend the rest of our lives together. In the speech he gave to us after the matching, he made the emphatic statement that "From now on, the most important thing is ABSOLUTE OBEDIENCE!", chopping the air with his hands for emphasis. And through it all I saw a lot of other confused, dazed members giving it their best fake it smile as they pretended happiness. But again, I buried my doubts, and went along with it. I didn't even consider rejecting my match, because I knew that good members didn't do that.

By now, I'm in a really, really weird space. I don't know what challenged my faith more, the deprogramming [I had recently experienced], or the matching. It's hard to describe the emotional and psychological turmoil of those days. You see, the dilemma of someone considering leaving, someone having a deep "crisis of faith" in such a group is very complex. It's even more difficult in the UC, due to the fact that you are not following just another guru, but the messiah himself. Someone on the outside says, "Look at what he does, look at how he operates – how can that be God's love, how can that be the messiah?". But if you really believe first that he is the messiah, then almost anything can be rationalized and accepted. It's like a "catch-22". And think about it – if Jesus were here now, would you second guess how he operated? Wouldn't you do anything at all he told you to do?

So, a struggling member is completely and absolutely all alone. I couldn't turn to anyone on the outside – family, friends, authorities, – because they just didn't understand. And I couldn't turn to anyone on the inside – after all, that was the whole question. They all had an agenda, and wanted something from me. I couldn't even turn to my own prayers, for once again, that was the whole question. Had all those prayers during the previous 6 years of membership been a mistake? Had I not been open to what God's will was? Was I doing God's will by staying, or leaving? No matter how hard I prayed, the answer to this dilemma wasn't clearly given to me. In the end, I just had to trust myself – my thoughts, my feelings, and my own gut instincts. That's all I could do.

It took another year of struggle and unhappiness until June, 1980, when I walked away from the group on my own, with a little more help from family and "exit counselors" whom I voluntarily met with. The day that I left was one of the most stressful days of my life. (Being stuck in Manhattan rush hour traffic and late for the plane flight didn't help!) Earlier in the day I had honored the request of my "match" to go talk to Mose Durst about my questions concerning the group. That did not go well. I found him to be manipulative and arrogant. He seemed unable to speak in anything but PR cliches, and we quickly came to blows, figuratively. His parting shot was that if I got on that plane, my "spiritual life was in danger", his exact quote. In the New Yorker hotel, the performing arts director, Mr. Pak, did his best to pressure me not to leave. I told him my intent was simply to go home for a while and think about things. I wasn't completely repudiating the group at that time, and in my mind I was still unsure what I was going to do, long term. But he still insisted I stay. When he realized that I wasn't going to be persuaded, he put his nose up in the air, turned and walked away without another word. No goodbye and best wishes, no thank you for the six years of hard work, no please stay in touch and call me anytime, nothing. I had ceased to matter to him. (This proved to be the pattern for my contacts with almost all the people I knew in the group. My "spiritual mother", my "spiritual children", and many others never contacted me after I got out, even though I contacted members of the band for at least a year, and anybody could have obtained my address and phone. In the ensuing years, I have concluded that members, for the most part, are reluctant to talk with former members.)

Of course, you don't just walk away from something as fundamental to your identity as that and just forget it happened. I spent a lot of time over the next years reading about the cult phenomena, writing reflections about my experience, and examining the doctrine from a new perspective, all in an effort to understand myself and find some peace inside. I felt like I was actually rewiring my brain. (This was an expression I remember hearing Moon use, telling us members what we needed to do to become good members).

What I'd like to do now is highlight a few of the main things I've distilled of concluded about all of this. I don't claim that all of the following insights are 100% my own, and I thank all the people whose work on cults and totalistic belief systems has lead to a deeper understanding of this extreme manifestation of religious faith, and also basic human nature. ...”

Read more of Todd’s story here LINK

Todd Harvey’s website

Moon used the Fall of Man story to control through guilt, and through the partners he “gave”.

Church member never allowed herself to enjoy sex because “sex was evil”

#Moonies #FFWPU #Unification Church #matching #mass marriage

[abbyklinkenberg]

12 February 2017

I’m living on campus at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. I’m writing from my dormitory of paper-thin walls, upon a duvet of loudly kitschy print, under lights of harsh fluorescence. I still find myself unable to write about my experience here in ‘travel’ terms (regarding the culture, the sights, the sounds, the people, etc.), but I am finding myself changing or, rather, aligning along a new axis that I’m enjoying very much. I do hope to write something proper about living here in New Delhi soon, but that day is not today, unfortunately, and I’m sorry because I assume that’s the big-picture stuff that most people want to read about as opposed to my internal mechanisms and their more mundane adjustments. Later, though, I think I’ll have the clarity to do so. For the moment, I’m too much inside my mind to think of myself as being ‘in India.’ Of course, none of the following could have happened without this change in location/backdrop to my existence. I’m constantly amazed at the effects of a change in scenery. 

Lately I’ve been working really hard--I wish that I had had this level of motivation earlier in my academic life. I’ve been focusing on learning German (in India, I know, it sounds stupid)--but I’m a rather quick study when it comes to applying rules and understanding concepts; it’s reassuring to know that my brain still works, that I can access this wildly intense level of concentration at will. I’ve always had the intention to study German this semester; the fact that the class clashed with others that I’m taking has made it a personal project and somehow gives me more motivation because I’m doing it on my own. It’s also a very cerebral and unemotional thing--learning a language--it’s basically just rewiring your brain and building parallel structures along different planes. There is no room for feeling, which is so refreshing and satisfying. It has been so long since I’ve felt like actually doing something, adhered to a self-directed schedule, and spent my time doing things I really want to do. Perhaps I’ve never felt like this. 

I’m usually so completely involved with my feelings (so sticky) and emotional state; the fact/realization that I can keep it in check (or at least limit its hold over me) by throwing myself into real theoretical work, into academia, into trying for my own pleasure as opposed to simply for a grade, is incredible--I can’t overstate the importance of this--I need to stick with it, I really do. This is productivity in the direction I really want to go--

And maybe I should acknowledge that I really do wonder what will happen with various tensions in my life; how they will release and in which particular directions they will take me. I really don’t see any situation as ‘bad’ (I can accept friendly detentes but, of course, I’m more emotionally invested than I’d like to admit). This month, the next few/couple weeks, really, will determine a lot. But on a deeper level still, I feel that I should be smarter than this, that I am smarter than this, that I shouldn’t settle for half-baked potentialities and instead only accept sure solidities. It’s true that I’ve gone through so much in these past years as a product of such faulty premises. I’ve endured so much that has simultaneously filled and emptied me because I’ve given people that power. I don’t know how to prevent myself from that--it’s an impulse that I’ve never learned to turn off ever since I ‘became’ a ‘person.’ And yet I can’t stand the idea of empty hedonism, worse still than the even greater specter loneliness that such a closure would invite. I can’t, won’t, don’t want to change the game because it’s fundamentally all I’ve found that has kept me. The players, the variables, do and requisitely (necessarily given the nature of humanity and of time) evolve, perhaps resulting in new situations. I do court difficulty, it seems--not consciously, I don’t think, but the fact remains nonetheless. 

I’m also thinking about people from the past these days--about the hard wall that I feel separates me almost wholly from my former self. I could cry just thinking about it; we’re so far from where we were, all dispersed in different directions, from that original seed of life that we sprouted and cultivated together. It hasn’t died, of course, it’s just divergent, which doesn’t preclude potential convergence in the future. That whole lifestyle no longer appeals to me, or at least I can see/recognize it for what it is now--there’s a place for it, of course, but I can’t live in that extreme anymore. This space of rigorous theory and protest and rebellion and effort to provoke change--this is so much more vital than the empty vitality of so much of the past that kept me occupied but never fulfilled to the same extent/measure. 

I don’t know, I think it’s all been important and relevant, but I had felt myself slowing down and no longer changing or evolving. Recognizing patterns (unintentional ones) in my own life really devastates me. Re-tilling the same soil, living in set loops, succumbing to stagnancy. Alas, again I feel the shifting of tiles under my feet, the creak of wind pushing open windows, etc. The grammar of my existence is again changing and relieving me of the stress of unsustainable and haphazardly arranged architecture. A more virtuous and aspirant set of structures--ones that can actually foster and allow for creative production, not just the façade or hollow intention of it--is slowly building. 

I want to do something--by that, I mean that I want to make something. Something good and resonant and meaningful, which can only happen if I am ‘ascetic’ yet eternally open, if I’m feeling and learning and reading and seeking. Always seeking the ideals that still haven’t even revealed their outlines or their shadows to me, of which I have only ever caught a distorted reflection--and, even then, only for a fraction of a second. And these efforts, these forever-efforts, can be made in the rigorous silence and fastidious environment of this library, among the probing and ravenous minds of my recent conversation partners, in the wake of the onslaught of critical and questioning words I find myself reading, in the polluted by clairvoyant atmosphere of these brick-walled classrooms. I’m not just saying that I’ll ‘make the best’ of it--I’m implementing it in practice. So I must maintain (erhalten) this tenacity towards shaping my brain in a virtuous direction--studying and following my schedule. This also gets me out of the room and limits my sleep--factors that have held me in their vice-like grips for too long now. So these are some resolutions. 

I really need to keep doing my own thing and indulging in solitude (genuinely and no longer simply to justify my isolation). And then to fully enjoy the challenging company of others. 

So I’m happy here, basically. I find myself, I feel myself, striving again--of my own volition, of my own accord. 

#new delhi #india #jnu

[essentialise]

Top 9 Tips for Your Success in 2020: A New Decade

Top 9 Tips for Your Success in 2020: A New Decade

These are my top 10 tips to ensure your success in 2020 and beyond!

  We have hit the year 2020, the start of a new decade. So far, it has been eventful and challenging in equal measures. Think about how far you have come since the beginning of 2010. And think about where you could be by 2030 if you implement just one of these value tips into your life from today.

1) Prioritise Your Sleep

Sleep is the fundamental driver of your performance, but this is only just starting to come to prominence. After a miserable night’s sleep, the likelihood of finding solace in a packet of biscuits is much more real. A whole series on Netflix becomes more appealing than the gym. And your attention and emotions tend to swing, making tasks that require focus considerably more challenging.

Sleep is also vital for your health. The repair and recovery that happens while you sleep is critical to your overall wellbeing. You are less likely to have accidents if you are fully alert and being under slept over time builds up a sleep debt equivalent to being drunk. Additionally, a lack of sleep dampens our immune system (oh no!), leaving us more likely to suffer illness and infection. If you cherish good health, you will prioritise your sleep.

Finally, your sleep makes the world a better place. You will be more empathetic and patient with your family, your friends, your colleagues and everybody you come across. You will have the capacity to be grateful, to find solutions, and to contribute more to the world around you. This compounds, over time, to give you more joy and fulfilment as you walk along the path to your version of success.

  2) Work on Understanding Yourself

Have you ever wondered why you were feeling a certain way? Or why you behaved the way you did in a situation? These are not uncommon thoughts to have, but how often do we think about delving into this as a student of our mind to try and understand ourselves better?

To be a student of your mind is incredibly liberating. And in the age of the internet, access to psychology resources is only a few clicks away. A deeper understanding helps you to navigate the world and gives you direction and purpose. This, in turn, gives you a sense of happiness as you have more control over your destiny.

Possibly most important, to be a success in 2020 and beyond, we need to have personal and creative skills that cannot be replicated by robots. The ability to understand yourself helps you understand others, how their perception may differ, and be more attuned to other people’s feelings. You become a more attentive listener and easier to collaborate with. These are the transferable skills of the future, and your toolkit will be weaker without them.

  3) Start a Nutritional Experiment

Nutrition is an interesting subject, full of contrasting opinions and conflicting viewpoints. In my work as a performance nutritionist, I advise clients to become a nutritional experimenter. Unfortunately, nutrition is dominated by belief systems, which, while helping with consistency, cause people to eliminate certain food groups based on other people’s advice.

Instead of listening to and conforming to the variety of opinions out there, we need first to understand that nutrition is a very young science, akin to surgery in the 1600s.

Therefore, the best advice I can give is to experiment with your diet. Add and eliminate foods and track how you feel. Find the foods that energise you for long periods and the foods that leave you feeling fatigued. Other foods will leave you feeling bloated, and some will trigger your immune system. Experiment and find what works for you, because we each have our own epigenetic expression, our own microbiome and our own enzyme makeup.

Once you have unlocked the balance of food that works for you, focus on eating those, in moderation, and never stop experimenting. Our bodies are continually evolving. To perform at a high level and be a success in 2020, you want to be powered by your own personal jet fuel, not somebody else’s diesel.

  4) Reflect on where you put your attention

How many times have you intended to do something productive, only to fall down the social media black hole? Have you ever stepped back and thought about how sensationalist news is always so negative? In a world where the attention economy is worth billions of pounds, and where most adults have smartphones, it’s not your fault that your focus is often diverted. The technology we use is designed with many psychological hooks built-in. They need to keep our attention on those platforms, as that’s how they make their money.

While there is a gradual increase in people looking at digital minimalism, the simple act of reflecting on what inputs we have is a great start. Consuming more positive content helps us learn about the world through a lens of abundance. And being intentional with what we consume helps us develop and perform at a higher level.

If we channel our attention into the great things that people are doing, especially around the challenges of Coronavirus, we feel inspired. And as a result, we are more likely to take action to make a difference in our own lives. If we want to be a success in 2020, my tip is to leverage the suggestions of successful people, such as reading, journaling, reflection and continual self-improvement. There is great power when you choose the destination of your focus.

  5) Be proactive with your work-life integration

In a world that’s always connected, it is very easy to let your work seep into every part of your life. This is especially true now that many people have to work from home. If you don’t action an intention to integrate work into ‘your’ life, then your work objectives will wrestle their way in. Whether it’s responding to email at all hours, regularly working beyond your time or task finish, or being constantly on Zoom on holiday, it’s essential to reflect on whether this fits with the life we would design ourselves.

Integration by design is also vital to allow us to detach from work, so we can reattach fully when we return. If we stay attached to work and are unable to disengage, our performance drops, we gradually become overwhelmed, and this can lead to burnout. The inability to disconnect also tends to lead us to attempt to force a state of relaxation, usually using poor quality food, alcohol, or low-value entertainment. We are unable to make the breakthroughs that typically come in the brain states of relaxing and reflecting naturally. And sadly, it takes its toll on our development, our relationships and the ability to do the things we love.

Work-life balance is a term much-touted by organisations as they look towards improving employee engagement and wellbeing. Balance means different things to different people, and it suggests that all areas of life can be balanced evenly. This commonly leads to the perception that we can do it all and should be able to balance it all. In truth, the areas of our lives are always in flux. As we prioritise one area, another will become less of a priority. While increasing performance can give you more capacity to manage this, we need to have the awareness that we can integrate our work to fit the design of our lives. Once you have this mindset shift, you begin to see how powerful being proactive can be for your quality of life and your happiness.

  6) Learn how to stack good habits on top of each other

The power of human habits is impressive. We can programme ourselves to do certain things at certain times, we can link ideas together, and we can run many tasks on autopilot with ease once established. Naturally, this system works for both habits that serve us and patterns that hinder us. But the fact that we are the master programmer means that we can rewire habits to enable us to perform at a higher level.

One of my favourite habit stacks to create is a morning routine. Firstly, I get my clients to stop looking at their phone as soon as they wake up and replace this with washing their face and rehydrating. Once this habit is established, we stack a 10-minute meditation/prayer/silence on top of drinking your glass of water and let the association between the two actions build. Once that is a regular practice, we add other self-improvement tasks such as reading or listening to positive audio, so the first thing we consume into our minds is positive. And from this base, we can build a bespoke morning routine that over time becomes integrated into your life. It can include yoga, visualisations, journaling, or walking. The compounding effect of these small changes multiplied together, can make the difference between being successful and staying stuck where you are.

To make these habits stickier, we make them easier to do, and more visible as a trigger. The phone is charged outside of the bedroom, the water is prepared the previous night, and the books are right next to your morning seat. We advise to keep these habits small to start with, so small they become appealing rather than daunting. We then build them up, linking them to improving a little bit every day. And this is a great way to move along the pathway towards reaching your potential.

  7) Learn or refine one transferable skill

In a world that is evolving and moving at such speed, we must keep adding skills to our portfolio. Being dynamic by continually learning, we get closer to our potential and become more agile as the world changes. Skills such as understanding psychology, public speaking, or learning a new language (let’s learn algorithms) give us another string to our bow. Often, we don’t even identify with the added value of keeping our minds learning, keep our brains plasticity ready for even more skill acquisition.

As we move away from the traditional career for life model, the continual learning and refinement of our skills become more important. Primarily the people-focused abilities, as these will shield us from the changes that automation will bring, and we can leverage these skills in everyday life. It also assists us in meeting new people, trying new things, and growing new neural pathways. And if we are to be successful, and follow our path, the skills we learn are excellent when we get lost or have obstacles to negotiate.

When it comes to our mental health, keeping our minds in the learning zone helps us feel like we are progressing. It also provides motivation and the clarity that we are part of something bigger than ourselves, and that we are working towards our fulfilment and happiness.

  8) Dig deep to find your underlying purpose

We all have an underlying purpose, but few people ever do the deep work required to identify it. It requires this deep self-work, but by identifying our values, and looking at why we have set the goals we’ve chosen, we can start to get an outline of what it might be.

Secondly, we then need to reflect on our lives. In both the negatives and the positives, there will be a theme that seems to keep appearing. Think about the things that you enjoy doing, the friends you have, and the memories that have stayed with you. When you do analyse these carefully, you will notice a pattern starting to emerge.

When you get clarity on your purpose, you wake up with a guiding star as your compass, and you know why you are setting out that day. Working towards your purpose requires undertaking many missions, each resonating with why your here and the change you want to make. For most people, it tends to focus on reaching their potential and helping others. If you need some guidance on finding your purpose, my book can help you, and best of all, today it’s FREE for you! Click here for your FREE download.

  9) Get a little bit better every day.

All this culminates in the biggest takeaway from this article. Once you have clarity on your pathway in life, and your facing in the right direction, it’s time to take those small steps towards the peak that stands in front of you.

Be prepared; there will be obstacles and challenges awaiting you on your path. But if you consistently, day by day, move a little further forward and make a little progress, you will build the momentum needed to start the ascent when things get tough. You will wake up in the morning with a spring in your step. It’s amazing how good life can feel when you’re progressing towards something more significant.

Just remember that the journey is one to enjoy, to learn from and to cherish the small wins you make along the way. Getting a little bit better is a lifelong pursuit, and there are no simple ways or shortcuts. I know, I’ve tried! But if you need help finding your path, or someone to help you stay on it, I know a coach who will help you, support you, and be an ally on your journey.

  If you are ready to find your success in 2020, your vision of success that takes you closer to your potential, contact me to find out how I can help and guide you to find your path, and become exceptional.

The post Top 9 Tips for Your Success in 2020: A New Decade appeared first on Life Coach Preston | Business Coach Preston | Essentialise.

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