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thechekhov · 4 years

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Due to popular demand, I’m making a 4-part series about how to make a comic! Check out the other parts while you’re here!

1) Thinking of a story 2) Making characters (this part) 3) Drafting pages (coming not soon) 4) Presentation (coming eventually, we hope)

So, here’s the big question:

How do you make a good character?

I’m going to have us step back for a moment to say:

There is no such thing as a “Good” Character. Because how good a character is or isn’t is subjective. We can argue back and forth for hours about what we value in a character, but no one will ever agree. You can’t make a character that EVERYONE will like, and you shouldn’t try to.

Instead, I urge you to focus on trying to make ONE or MORE of the following:

Relatable characters

Sympathetic characters

Useful characters

“What the FUCK is goin’ on here I just wanna know” characters

I think they’re pretty self-explanatory, but let’s go through it anyway.

1. Relatable Characters:

What is says on the tin. These are character you and someone else could relate to. Maybe they’re a teenager who hates school. (Timeless classic.) Maybe they’re a young adult down on their luck and in need of money, willing to forgo some moral standards to get by. (Millennials, roll call!) Or maybe they’re just like you (or literally you. We don’t judge self-insert. There’s a reason Write What You Know is a thing.)

Regardless of what you want to believe, many human experiences are universal. Some of them are universally unacknowledged, but they are still universal. You want to just be careful about falling into the ‘my character is so special and the rest of my characters are dumb’ trope. That isn’t interesting - or realistic.

(source: xkcd)

2. Sympathetic Character:

I also call this the Looking Glass Character.

Even if most of us have universal human experiences, many of our own experiences are also unique to us. Some experiences are things we will never live through - but we can still sympathise with the emotional state of the characters. If a story allows us to experience new things THROUGH a character, we feel connected to them.

Keep in mind - this character still has to be somewhat relatable. We have to be able to say “if I was in this situation, I would do that too!” Allowing your readers to believe what is happening makes the reading experience more believable.

(I’m pretty sure none of us have been a half-gem half-human hybrid suffering through trying to right your defected-the-diamond-authority war-criminal mom’s past mistakes, but seeing Steven repeatedly say “I’m fine!” as he descends into madness is something we can all sympathise with.)

Similarly, if your character is in the woods and finds a tiny house on the edge of the prairie and it’s getting dark and the house has flickering lights - whether or not they go inside is inconsequential to sympathy. What matters is if they have a good REASON to go inside. Sometimes, it’s not the actions that’s sympathetic - it’s the motivation!

(My sister disappeared in just such a house! I must get revenge! vs I’m a bored teenager with a potentially unrequited deathwish and/or a crush on a ghost. Well... scratch that, I can sympathise with both scenarios.)

3. Useful Characters

I was previously asked what to do to avoid making your characters into a Mary Sue. This part will be about that.

Let me start by saying: I don’t think Mary Sues are as prevalent as some people bemoan them to be.

A Mary Sue is a character that is often described as ‘too perfect’ - they can do everything, know everything, never fail at anything, have a tragic past that excuses every emotional outburst, and are overall just ‘too good to be true’.

I think, if played correctly, such a character can still be a good one. What makes all the difference is how useful these aforementioned traits are to the plot - or to other characters.

Let’s acknowledge some universal truths (aside from the one about the men in want of wives and the relation of such a desire in proportion to their fortune):

The plot must go on. That’s obvious.

In order for the plot to move, there must be things happening (in one sense or another). Also obvious.

In order for things to happen, there must be a conflict or a tension of some sort. THAT is your litmus test for a ‘Mary Sue’ character.

“If I remove them from the plot, will the plot suffer any holes? Will they impact the plot or impede it? Will their OP superpowers make some other worldbuilding completely useless? Will their incredibly tragic backstory overshadow another conflict between other characters?”

Characters should be like legos - they must have a function within your plot. Looking cool isn’t a function. Well, sure, it CAN be - but it must also be a function that doesn’t break Newton’s Laws. An object at rest will remain at rest. If your Perfect Character is already flawless, they have no reason to change, ergo nothing needs to happen.

Make your character serve a use within your plot!

4. WtFiGOHIWK Characters:

Do you ever watch a show, or listen to a podcast or read a webcomic and think to yourself “Okay, cool, but what the FUCK is UP with _____? What’s their deal?!”

I like to categorize these characters in a group of their own. These characters are likable ONLY because we all have a socially wired brain that makes us CRAVE comprehension of social background like drugs. We CRAVE THAT MINERAL. And the mineral is - gossip. Backstory. Tea. The DEETS.

Many characters are somewhat of an enigma, and the initial plot doesn’t give away all their secrets. We get hooked not because the characters are relatable, and sometimes not even because they’re sympathetic - but because their social tension within a group of other characters is RIDICULOUS and we are wired to want to understand them.

Everyone has their own examples, but one of my favorites is this asshole:

Do I relate or sympathise with Dr. House? Broadly, no. He’s obscene, rude, and most of the time he’s not even the good guy in any given episode. But his morality roadmap resembles knitting directions for a scarf and his reactions to the most mundane situations are FASCINATING.

(Never underestimate the power of human curiosity and how strongly it can work to make your readers turn to the next page, even if your whole plot is about a dumpster truck on fire next to a fireworks factory.)

Q: So how do I make a character?

There are several options:

- Wait and do nothing. The character will happen when you least expect it or are least prepared. Now they’re in your head. They won’t leave. aaaaAAAAAAA!

- Take a person or another character you know. Change 3-5 fundamental things about them (I don’t mean name, hair color and shoe size... I mean something PERSONAL, like background, motivations, religion, dream job, species, etc.) BAM character. (I mean, is it QUESTIONABLE to write a story about your sister as a lizard who wants to go to the moon? MAYBE. Should she still be more grateful than she is? ALSO MAYBE.)

- Take yourself and change uhhh... at least one thing about the character. Try to veil the fact that it’s actually just you. Fail. Wipe away tears. Write the story anyway. Hope no one notices.

- Write a story in your head and then think “Who is the LEAST likely person to participate in these shenanigans?” There’s your character.

Q: What should I avoid in a character?

Honestly, you can go around to 100 people and ask this, and they’ll give you 100 different answers. What people dislike and like in characters is so vast that there’s NOTHING you can do to stop people from hating on a character.

But yes, there ARE some overused tropes and I want to share 1 rule that I personally keep to when making characters. (Keep in mind, this is MY personal list. It isn’t the end-all-be-all, and yes, you can argue about this. But don’t @ me, I don’t care.)

DON’T describe your character as “______ is kind and friendly until you piss them off - then they will kill you.”

This has been my biggest pet peeve since high school - and it’s unfortunately an absolute staple of any YA character. Someone is ‘friendly’ and ‘nice’ and ‘shy’ UNTIL - you hurt their friends. Then they go berserk.

I know it’s tempting because ‘usually demure character lets loose their True Potential’ is a very empowering thing to see. (And I admit, I think Mob Psycho 100 pulled this Trope back in by the scruff of its neck and managed to get JUST the right angle for it to work.)

BUT it’s overused and it tells us absolutely NOTHING about your character. It’s a calorie-free fact. Feels like a description but is actively devoid of any interesting information about your character.

Why? Because literally EVERYONE is like this.

We are all, at a baseline, somewhat friendly. That’s... just how most people are. Societal convention tells us we must behave with some semblance of dignity and respect towards others in standard situations in order to keep peace.

And I daresay getting pissed off and Breaking Character is ALSO a thing that most humans experience. Getting angry when your friends/loved ones are hurt is the bare minimum necessary for being relatable.

Not to say your character can’t do this but - it doesn’t need to be described as a part of their personality any more than, say, the fact that they have hair on their head.

Q: How do I make my character more believable?

Research.

We all hate that word, because school usually teaches us to think of research as boring but it is ESSENTIAL to your desire to make ‘good’ (relatable, sympathetic, useful) characters.

IF YOU PLAN TO WRITE FOR AN AUDIENCE, THEN YOU NEED TO PUT IN THE EFFORT OF MAKING YOUR CHARACTERS MULTIDIMENSIONAL.

That means - knowing their background. Knowing details. Knowing cultural, financial, religious terms you need to know to write them believably.

I know, I know - what if I’m just writing for myself? you say.

Well, fine. If you’re not planning to have your work be widely public, if you’re just having fun and don’t care, then write whatever you want. Make a Japanese character with a Korean name. Force your UK characters to use USA slang. Forgo any historical accuracy. Change up facts! Erase the moon landing, whatever.

But if you want to share your work with people, and if you want people to interact with your writing on a more serious level, then you NEED to know how to use Google and gather at least SURFACE information what you are writing. If you don’t but pretend you did, people WILL be jolted out of their zone.

Research the things and people you are writing about. And more importantly - READ about the experiences of the people you are writing about! Avoiding Stereotypes in this day and age is EASY. You literally have an endless, free encyclopedia in your hands. If you can send a tumblr ask, you can google it.

That’s all for now, and CHEERS!

#how to comic #how to comic part 2 #chekhov writes a tutorial #writing

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tlbodine · 3 years

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Literary vs Genre Fiction

The divide between literary and genre fiction is one of those topics that gets endlessly debated in writer circles. You’ll see it making the rounds on social media every time a book gets some buzz for busting out of its category. You’ll hear it in MFA programs across the country. But what even is literary fiction? How is it actually different from genre fiction? Is one better than the other? Why does anybody care?

A lot of smart people before me have thrown their hat in this particular ring, but I’m going to try tackling this one anyway.

First Off: What Do We Mean When We Say “Literary Fiction”?

Defining the thing is almost the hardest part of this whole discussion, and that may be part of the reason why people argue so endlessly about the literary vs genre divide -- if you don’t have a clear definition of the categories, that divide can be drawn up just about anywhere.

So before we dig into characteristics of literary fiction, let’s look at some clear examples. The Booker Prize is a literary award specifically given to works of literary fiction, so it stands to reason that winners of that award would be the best examples of the category, right? Here are some recent Booker Prize winners (as pulled from Powell’s bookstore):

Margaret Atwood - The Testaments The sequel to A Handmaid's Tale, told as testaments from three female narrators in Gilead, a dystopian setting where women have been stripped of their rights.

Bernardine Evaristo - Girl, Woman, Other Twelve central characters, mostly black British women, lead intersecting lives with struggles of identity, race, sexuality, class, etc.

Anna Burns - Milkman A girl identified as "middle sister" catches the unwanted attention of "the milkman," a local paramilitary, and has to deal with the threat of violence and spread of rumors.

George Saunders - Lincoln in the Bardo A father-and-son story about Abraham Lincoln and the 11-year-old son who died of illness in the midst of the civil war, leading to them both struggling in a type of purgatory.

Paul Beatty - The Sellout A satire about an isolated young man who ends up at a Supreme Court race trial after trying to reinstate slavery and segregate the local high school in an attempt to put his town back on the map.

One thing becomes immediately clear about literary fiction when skimming through the titles and summaries of these award-winning books: These novels are well-nigh impossible to summarize in a way that actually sounds enticing.

So okay. What are some genre fiction books, for comparison? There are genre fiction awards, like for example the Hugo award for Sci-Fi/Fantasy:

Mary Robinette Kowal - The Calculating Stars A cataclysmic meteor collision in 1952 causes an accelerated effort to colonize space, leading to a woman fighting to join the astronaut team in this alternate-history book.

N. K. Jemisin - The Stone Sky The third in a trilogy of post-apocalyptic novels about two women with the power to avert destruction of mankind.

Cixin Liu - The Three-Body Problem Against the backdrop of China's Cultural Revolution, a secret military project makes contact with aliens whose civilization is on the brink of destruction, leading them to plan a takeover of earth.

There’s also the Edgar Award, which is given to mystery fiction (it’s named after Edgar Allan Poe):

James A McLaughlin - Bearskin A man on the run takes a job as a park ranger, but runs the risk of being found by the men he's hiding from when he tries to expose some poachers.

Walter Mosley - Down the River Unto the Sea After spending a decade in prison for a crime he was framed for, former-detective King works as a private investigator whose investigation of his own frame-up leads him to cross paths of a journalist with a similar story.

Sujata Massey - Widows of Malabar Hill In 1920s India, Bombay's only female lawyer investigates a suspicious will on behalf of three Muslim widows, a case that takes a murderous turn.

These aren’t the best summaries in the world, but there does seem to be a stronger sense of both plot and character in the story concepts. At least, when someone asks, “What’s that book you’re reading about?” the genre fiction ones will have a somewhat easier time explaining it.

So What REALLY Separates Literary From Genre Fiction?

There are a lot of battle lines drawn between genre and literary fiction. I’ve heard it argued that literary is about character while genre is about plot; that literary is about the quality of the prose while genre is about the story; that literary is about experimenting while genre is about adhering to formulas. That literary is about expanding horizons while genre is about escapism and comfort. That literary is about realism and genre fiction is about fabulism.

I think there’s a nugget of truth in all of these, but I’m not really happy with any of them.

So I’m going to toss out my own hypothesis: I think the difference between literary and genre fiction is the way tropes are employed.

“Okay, great, but what are tropes?”

I’m so glad you asked. Fiction tropes are a type of shorthand. They are things that we the audience have seen before, so we know immediately what they mean. Tropes exist in characters, plot points, settings, concepts -- you name it. Here’s a sampling of tropes you might be familiar with:

The tough lady-cop whose dad was a police officer

Thanks to a mix-up, two people with hidden romantic feelings book the last available room at a hotel but there’s only one bed

A man goes on a quest for vengeance but destroys himself in the process

The wise old man who teaches the young hero valuable lessons but then dies before the pivotal battle

And so on, and so forth. Every genre has its own tropes -- a formula, if you will. In that sense, genre fiction is formulaic, but that doesn’t make it easier to write; actually, a big part of the challenge is in giving fresh twists to familiar tropes. Readers of genre stories demand certain tropes; the author has to deliver on those demands in a fresh way.

By comparison, I would argue that literary fiction does not rely upon tropes. There certainly are tropes and conventions that emerge in literary fiction -- a middle-aged academic struggling through divorce, for example -- but these tropes are more often than not met with irritation, not delight. Readers of literary fiction are looking for fresh insights and innovations, not familiarity.

Tropes are powerful tools. They are the mythic seed of storytelling. They are the archetypes that pass down through generations. They are a sacred backbone of mythology and folklore. Genre fiction, at the end of the day, carries the torch for storytelling in a long and (ha, ha) storied tradition from our prehistoric days huddled around a campfire.

Literary fiction, on the other hand, eschews tropes -- with their agreed-upon meanings -- in favor of assigning fresh meanings to things. Literary fiction is chock full of metaphors, but it’s the author, not convention, that determines what those metaphors mean and how they’re employed. Literary fiction reinvents the wheel. When it succeeds, it hits on depth and emotional resonance that can be life-changing for the reader. When it fails, it comes off like so much navel-gazing nonsense. So it goes.

Fiction Wars and Gatekeeping

The problem with the literary vs genre fiction divide is that it never stops with “This is how these categories are defined.” The problem is that people will insist on ascribing moral significance and hierarchy to them.

Literary fiction is viewed as being smarter, deeper, more meaningful or more valuable than genre fiction. If a genre fiction story manages to break out and gain wider appeal, suddenly people will start ascribing to it literary attributes (whether or not the book and many others in the genre had them all along). And that is all a bunch of nonsense.

It’s the exact same thing that happens in horror fiction -- when a horror story goes mainstream, suddenly it becomes a “psychological thriller” or a “dark drama” or anything other than horror, because “horror” is an inferior genre.

The fact of the matter is that literary fiction gets elevated over genre fiction for systemic reasons:

Most MFA programs focus on writing literary fiction, which means that a lot of lit-fic authors come out of those programs, which means that literary fiction is often the domain of upper-middle-class, frequently white, people who can afford to graduate from those programs

A focus on dense prose and “difficult” writing means lit-fic books must be analyzed and interpreted; it’s hard to read, making it exclusionist to people who lack formal education

Lit-fic dominates awards, gets pushed heavily onto book clubs, is talked about more often on daytime TV and so forth (because it is perceived as being better/more important, thus creating the ongoing cycle)

Basically, lit-fic gets held up as an example of Fine Culture. And any time something is designated as Fine Culture and High Art, it is subject to a completely arbitrary classist distinction meant primarily to keep out an undesirable element (women, BIPOC, poor people, you name it).

That’s not a problem endemic to lit-fic itself. It’s really a problem of the culture surrounding it, and attempts to hold it to a higher esteem than genre work.

Cross-Pollination Is Inevitable and Desirable

How do tropes get made?

Someone comes up with a new metaphor, concept, character, or idea that resonates so deeply that others who follow borrow that same thing and its meaning, and it gets repeated enough times that it becomes a stock trope.

In other words, every single piece of genre fiction exists because someone writing in some other established tradition decided to experiment and go off on a tangent to create something really fresh and new -- and knocked it so far out of the park that people were compelled to follow.

People like to pretend that the overlap and blurred lines between genre and literary fiction are somehow a new trend, but the fact is that this has been the trajectory of fiction-writing for the whole history of storytelling.

Literary agents have a term for this: Upmarket fiction. Books that “transcend” genre definitions to appeal to readers on either side of the aisle. And those are highly sought-after books, because they have the potential of bringing in double the readers.

So, snobby gatekeeping aside, is there any real reason to argue about the definition of literary vs genre fiction?

I’d say...no. Not even a little bit. I’ve got a mix of both on my shelves. I incorporate a mix of both in my writing. And I don’t see that changing any time soon.

A Final Note

I mentioned above that lit-fic tends to be written by people in MFA programs, and I wanted to touch on that again as an MFA drop-out and someone who was once warned by a teacher not to bring “any more of that genre nonsense” into the classroom.

I can understand, from a teaching perspective, why writer’s workshops would want to focus on lit-fic. From the perspective of learning how to write, forcing writers to derive stories from their experiences, to dig deep into themselves and ascribe unique meaning to things, to develop their own metaphors and hone their craft at the sentence level -- all of that makes a lot of sense. Banning genre tropes is a way to force writers to hone their craft without leaning on the work of generations of storytellers before them, and as a teaching tool I think that’s actually really valuable.

But I think it’s pretty important that we keep that in context. The lit-fic focus in writing classes should be a teaching tool first and foremost. It should not be the end-all and be-all of writing classes.

This post topic was voted on by my Patreon subscribers. If you would like to vote for future posts and get early access to posts before they go live on tumblr, you can become a patron here: https://www.patreon.com/tlbodine

#writing #literary fiction #genre fiction #on writing #long post

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sneakerdoodle · 4 years

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On Second Citadel and unity

It was interesting to me that, after making Junoverse a very poignant gender utopia (and general lgbt-utopia, too), Kabert went ahead and made their second storyline so heavily centered around bigotry and discrimination (dealing with topics of ableism, mysogyny, homophobia). now, obviosuly, Junoverse is not even remotely free of inequality, and as far as the mentioned topics are handled this utopia is not disability-friendly, with prosthetics not being readily available with no charge, which, like many other things, strips people of their autonomy, turns them into a rich man’s plaything. But here inequality is arguably explored from the point of exploitation of one human being by another, of abuse of power (interpersonal and social-scale). Whereas Second Citadel opens with an episode about two knights - a disabled one and a woman one - both of whom struggled for similar reasons, so there is supposedly little power imbalance here. And yet they do not see eye to eye, even more so, one of them furthers the other’s discrimination. We can speculate that that’s Sir Caroline’s effort to fit in - strengthen the sense of her hard-earned belonging by othering someone who never got that right to belong. Which doesn’t make it any less infuriating and damaging, but sets the tone of the story very well. There is no strong thriving off the weak. There are just people infinitely rejecting one another on the basis of their differences, often under the weight of their own rejection.

The topic of ostracization and discrimination is tackled in almost every arc of SC, but the idea of othering extends beyond it. The central conflict, the ongoing war is between monsters and humans - and while we’re more familiar with the human side of it, while we may learn more about the history of their conflict and who wronged whom first and worst, for now we’ve seen both humans and monsters express deep disgust for each other and one another’s way of living. And then the same happens on a smaller scale, within one species: we see the mutual disdain between Northerners and Southerners. Sir Caroline is different not only as a woman but as a foreigner; the Cinderclasp episode made it far too clear that the attitude to foreigners in the South is no better.

And all of that unravels against the backdrop of pretty phrases about unity that get repeated over and over. “Strength in Unity”. “Two in unity, simple, strong”. I believe those are not instruments of irony, however, but keys to the central message, echoes of this societies’ past and - hopefully - foreshadowing of their future.

Sir Caroline twists the meaning of that unity in order to keep her authority:

ANGELO: Sir Caroline, I really don't think-- CAROLINE: What is the primary edict of our Citadel, Sir Angelo? ANGELO: Strength in unity. Of course. CAROLINE: And the sooner you all remember that, the safer humanity will be in these Northern Wilds. Hypocrites. The lot of you. Unified only when it’s convenient. No better than monsters in that way: greed governs all, and everyone just does what they want to get what they want. If you just listened to authority, real authority, you might actually be safe.

And that happens to highlight what unity is not: giving up one’s autonomy and approach and unique competence to fit into someone else’s model of desired reality.

Here Damien’s words about perspectives come into play. However labored and uncomfortable they were, showing his inability to not fixate on what separates others from him, they are important as a piece of the meta puzzle: they make us think of inherent value of different experiences.

DAMIEN: My kind, kind friend. I agree that it is a shame that we cannot trust these men. They would be valuable allies, as Sir Caroline was – for moving through the world as she has, in a life quite different from ours, has clearly gifted her with ways of thinking that you and I would never come to. ANGELO: Very true, very true. DAMIEN: And so I am certain that given Marc’s...situation, he too must have a perspective of great value in our mission. But the simple fact is that he cannot be trusted.

The importance of these lines is backed up in Lady of the Lake, when Caroline is instructed to use specific characteristics of her subordinates and turn them into strength that would aid the mission. We are told over and over that true unity is in embracing our differences, valuing them and working together to make these differences work in everyone’s favour.

There is something to be said about quite careless exploitation of Damien’s neurodivergency of course, but that is once again the warped verison of true unity, showing what unity is not, but also simultaneously giving us some idea of its potential. At the core, behind Sir Caroline’s personal errors, the message is kinder, broader. We are told again and again that the importance of the unqiue approach, unique way of thought, unique operation of our minds can enrich our shared experience and cooperation beyond measure.

So when later on Sir Caroline instead tries to suffocate any challenge to her authority, any alternative point of view, it comes as the biggest whiplash.

And of course, when discussing the monster-human antagonism in this vein, the Moonlit Hermit arc gives some truly invaluable material. Rilla and Arum’s interactions are strongly based on the differences of their approach to the world, with Rilla’s being a rational one and Arum operating on what can be called intuition, spiritual sense and probably instinct. He despises attempts to rationalize the free broad flow of the universal energy.

And what we see is two of them coming together, sharing their views of the world and finding something useful, fascinating, beautiful in the point of view that seemed so unthinkable before. That culminates in the truly breathtaking scene of their discussion of the nature of music, whether it’s magic or math:

RILLA: I mean..why can’t it be both? ARUM: Nonsense. RILLA: No, I mean...maybe that’s what makes music special. It uses these predictable scales and measures and combines them with some unpredictable, something-- ARUM: Magic. And what comes out isn’t really either. It’s...more.

“It’s more”. Can’t overstate how hard this hits. And the parallel between this theory and Rilla and Arum’s relationship is more than on the nose, proving to us once again that the idea of unifying our different experiences and perspectives as something incredibly valuable, something that creates something new, rich, priceless, that is more than just a sum of the two, is central to the narrative.

What is interesting to me in the Moonlit Hermit arc is the distinction that is made between the monsters and the humans. Humans are supposedly rational while monsters speak of magic and the Universe - what a fun narrative is that! Monstrous spirituality... And then later on we have Damien raging at his saint, yelling “It is only monsters who listen to their heart above all!” - but apparently it is not.

The new season offered some helpful context to that, specifically - the Thought Stream. Obviously referencing the Tarot, it has four suites resembling the Minor Arcana while what can be called the Major Arcana is not a part of the deck usually but something that appears unpredictably (specifically: Olala’s card that does not belong to the Wilds, Wastes, Frosts or Mirrors suit).

The four Tarot suits (Swords, Cups, Wands and Pentacles) represent different areas of our life, separated: Intellect, Emotion, Spirituality/Creativity and the Material. Mind, Heart, Spirit and Body.

The four suits also correspond with the four elements. And Water is the one corresponding with Heart, with our emotions. I do not think it to be a coincidence that Saint Damien - the one encouraging his follower to listen to his heart, teaching him tranquility i.e. not losing oneself in the stream of emotion, the one teaching how to let one’s heart guide not stir - has water and the waves as his symbol.

So if Damien is Heart, Rilla is definitely Mind: she is analytical, a determined problem solver. I believe Arum represents the Wands: the Spirit and the fire - and that it is a symbol connected to monsters’ society in general.

Wands suit deals with passionate creation, with realizing one’s vision, bringing something into the world. That seems in line with the monstrous philosophy in general. They talk of one’s place decided by the Universe, they say one is justified in their actions as long as they truly do what they want, follow where their passion guides them. There is quite a bit of hypocrisy there as we can see in the Spiral Sage arc, the monster society may just be keeping the platitudes while giving in to the power of the strongest no matter the Universe’s place for the weak - but the ideal is still there, and it is one Arum seems to follow wholeheartedly. (Hence his interpretation of Damien seemingly abandoning his path as a lack of character.)

The same idea - one’s place in the Universe - is brought up again in the first part of “The Fool in the Garden of Death”, showing this belief spreads beyond monsters’ society, into the Western Wastes. None of the elements, be it Heart or Spirit, are strictly one species’; however, we’re dealing with different cultures and ways of life people are most accustomed to, prioritizing different aspects of life. And we’re being shown that maybe engaging with each other is what those cultures are supposed to do.

The Thought Stream’s deck is made up of four suits corresponding with four ends of the world, four parts of it. Where in Tarot we have aspects in Thought Stream we have places. This reinforces the concept of different aspects of life, different ways of approaching it, corresponding with specific societies.

Each of the suits is given an identity, but all of them make up one deck.

After all, what’s one aspect of a being without all the rest? Reign of just one’s Mind, Heart, Spirit or Body - how long can it last before turning destructive?

True strength is in balance of different elements - in unity that recognizes the value of each of them.

I have a theory that the ideals of the Second Citadel are the forgotten and revamped mottos of the beings of Fort Terminus: “two in unity” being not two partners but two worlds, monster and human, coming together to create something that is more, something new and powerful and full of potential. Capable of building something as impressive as the Bridge. I also have a theory that the Bridge is a parallel to the Tower of Babel. Which brings us to the idea of a divided world unable to see past the differences between societies, and through that losing the power that unity used to give it.

Showing the world where difference is shunned and leads to ostracism, where people that come from different places fail to acknowledge each other’s humanity and refuse to embrace their differences, where two species fail to accept the other’s way of living and deny the enemy their humanity/monstrosity, the Second Citadel storyline is offering a greater value as an endgoal: embracing difference and diversity, seeing strength in what sets us apart from each other, and recognizing that we all complete one another, like the four aspects of our own being, like four pillars upon which the sky rests. Deny one single pillar’s importance and wait for it to come crashing down on you. It says: to know true strength, we should welcome any and all experience, all of the unique perspectives, celebrate the differences that make our shared existence so much richer and make us so much more capable to deal with challenges of life. Strength in unity - not in uniformity.

#this got long and i blame kabert for their splendid writing #the penumbra podcast #tpp #second citadel #analysis tag

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illusionsofdreaming · 4 years

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guess I like playing with fire;

Notes: You’re on a mission and Claude’s ruining it spectacularly.

FT: Claude

What most people don’t realise is that what separates a good band of mercenaries from the bad are based on the quality of information they have and not the skills they boast. Intelligence on locations, knowledge of the land and insight on their enemies are what keeps the men alive at the end of the day. Any prowess with a weapon are decoration, the icing on the cake, some extra branding for their names. The best mercenaries have learned to hoard information and their information network is often a complex and extremely exclusive one.

For once your infamous mercenary nickname has uses other than to inspire fear and scare naughty children at night. After all who wouldn’t want to get in the good graces and be allied with the child of the Blade Breaker? There’s been rumours of increased monster activities and it just so happens that the rural city you were passing by where the Ashen Demon’s name was popular was also a hotspot for travelling mercenaries as well.

A simple reconnaissance mission was set up - you would hang around the taverns and gather information and return by day, hopefully with new insight regarding the validity of these rumours, whether or not the resistance should be concerned.

The evening was still young, the tavern you chose had only just started filling. Your current table companions consisted of an axe wielder going by the name of Gildhart, a sharp nosed swordsman with a wicked scar down one cheek and a well built brawler who’s massive red mane was just barely held back by the bandana on her head. Conversation had been slow at first but by the third round of cards, their lips were starting to loosen.

“Damnit! I’ve heard of your prowess on the battlefields but who knew you’d be so vicious on the table too!” Janet scowled as she threw in her cards as you swept your new winnings to your side.

“The name Demon fits you alright!” Gildhart laughed, taking a large drink from his cup.

“Well, our opponent is an incredibly hard person to read, I believe we may have been playing at disadvantage all along.“ Kent, the name of the swordsman you remembered, smiled wryly at you.

“I don’t mind if you wish to try another game instead.“ you offered, palms up in invitation and away from the cards. It didn’t matter which game they chose anyways. You still remembered your father’s disapproval when he first found out, despite its inevitability considering the companions you grew up with.

“If I can’t stop you from cards, least I can do is make sure you won’t lose our entire fortune.”Jeralt had heaved a sigh then, placed you in his lap and proceeded to teach you the ways of gambling. That was the beginning of your colourful journey into becoming a master card shark, but that‘s a story for another day.

“Pah! We’re not cowards! Am I right boys?” Janet’s fist thumped on the table and for a moment you worried the furniture wouldn’t survive the weight of the brawler’s fist.

“Damn right we’re not!” Gildhart boomed and Kent sighed with a shrug, sealing their fates.

“Let me deal this round.” Kent offered with an apologetic smile your way which you nodded, taking no offence.

“So what dangers brings the Ashen Demon to these parts of Fódlan eh?” Janet asked as her companion began shuffling the cards.

You’ve been ready for this question and you gave a nonchalant shrug as you leaned back with your drink. “Trying our luck before circumstances forces our hand to pick a side.” With the war going on, it was inevitable that mercenaries bands would get absorbed into either side. The sympathetic and understanding nods from her companions seemed to agree.

“I have no love for needless slaughter, retirement might be imminent in my near future.” Kent mumbled softly as he dealt out cards.

You took your cards, taking time to organise them before casually throwing out your bait. “I’ve heard stories of problematic beasts cropping up around the area, there could be business in those desperate enough to spare some coin to hire our skills.”

“Ay, you’ve not heard wrong.” Gildhart coughed. “Although calling them problematic beasts would be an understatement.”

“Oh?” You breathed out, relaxing your shoulders. The wary glance shared amongst the mercenaries was not missed by your eyes. Silence overlapped the table and you played oblivious for a few moments before looking up. “Is everything alright? I understand if I have intruded on something you’d rather deal with yourself.”

“No, nothing like that.” Janet was quick to refute. “We might be confident in our skills but even we know this is not something we can handle.” The mercenaries seemed to share a look between them and some form of agreement must have been reached as they hunched forward in their seats and beckoned you to follow suit.

“They say monsters the size of houses, some with claws and teeth and others with scales appear overnight wiping out villages before disappearing the next day. No one knows where they come from or where they go afterwards. Others have tried hunting them and failed and those that survived an encounter are crippled by fear of what they’ve seen.” Kent relayed this with a somber expression, his eyes taking on a faraway sheen.

You took this in quietly. You understood their wariness, you have witnessed the destruction these beasts are capable of first hand. What concerned you however was their sudden appearances and disappearances. You folded your arms on the table as a frown crossed your face.

“Were the attacked villages known to have frequent monster sightings?”

Gildhart shook his head, rubbing his chin with a grimace. “Not that we know of. Pretty peaceful from what I remembered. The villagers never had any experience against anything larger than a wolf. Some of these men wielded nothing but woodcutting axes against these things.”

Could simple negligence and relaxed security caused the complete annihilation of a village in the short span of a day? Even if it were possible, with how chaotic Fódlan has become, it was common nowadays for simple villagers to be armed with some form of weapon to protect their family and not simple farmer’s tools. Unless... these were men who had been going on about their daily lives, who had been caught unaware and given no time to arm themselves, ambushed by creatures unleashed in the middle of their homes.

You took a deep breath, steadying yourself. You can’t leap to conclusions yet. You needed more information. However before you could ask another question you caught sight of something outside the window. It took your all to resist the instinct to turn around, instead you used your peripherals to confirm your worst fear: Claude Von Riegan, heir to the Riegan house, leader of the Alliance resistance, lurking across the street just begging to be noticed.

“Excuse me for a while.” you stood up abruptly, shocking your companions who started reaching for their weapons which you stopped with a hand. “Sorry, thought I saw someone familiar. I’m going to step out for a while.”

“What about the game?” Gildhart eyes travelled from you to his hand of cards.

“Play without me.” You untied a pouch by your waist and threw it on the table. “Drinks on me.” And you breezed past them, just barely able to control your pace to a fast walk, despite the strongest desire to run.

“Think its a friend?”

“From the look in the Demon’s eyes?”

“Rest in pieces strang-“ the door closed behind you. You took a deep breath - Sothis knows you’d need it - and scanned the streets. It was almost laughable easy to spot him, wavy hair and green eyes, golden earring glinting in the darkness, smile stretching across face as he spotted you.

His hand was rising to wave but you grabbed him and dragged him away two streets down and shoved him into a indescript alley.

“Whoa teach, at least ask a guy out before-“

“What are you doing here Claude? I thought we’d agreed that you’d wait for my return.” You cut him off, fuming.

“Aw teach, it’s been hours. We’d all rest easier at night if you had someone to watch your back.” He laughed at the wilted glare you sent his way. “Alright so we’re not really worried and maybe I’m just a little nosy.”

Of all the people to come nosing in, it had to be Claude. The most high profile, easily recognisable mascot of the Alliance resistance. While you knew despite his flippant attitude, Claude would never do anything to jeopardise the war efforts, his being here meant he’s comfortable and confident in his ability to get out unscathed.

You sighed and relaxed against a wall, since he was here anyways you might as well pass on what you’ve gathered so far. “I haven’t gotten much yet.” you warned and made sure to direct a pointed glare towards him before relaying what you’ve heard and your theories so far.

He had a hand on his chin as he listened, brows furrowed in a contemplative expression. “Almost like what happened back in the chapel in Garreg Mach...” He was mumbling to himself but the words brought back a flood of memories you had avoided revisiting.

You vividly remembered the ruins, the screams of students and roars of creatures rending the air. The cold and the overwhelming numbness that took you as you held the motionless body of your only family. You were alone, truly alone and the cold was seeping into your blood, your bones, your soul. What little emotions you’ve gained these past few months was being stripped by the cold. There’s no one left-

“___________.” His hand was warm against your skin, a shocking contrast that brought you back, burning away the ice in your veins. His gaze was apologetic and a touch concerned, his hold on you was supportive but not restrictive.

You shook your head lightly, stepping back from his touch and he released you. “I’m fine.” You muttered, brushing a hand through your hair, disappointed for getting carried away.

His eyes watched you, “Of course, teach. I never doubted that.” He said quietly with a smile, the sincerity in his tone hard to ignore and it made the breath in your lungs catch in your throat. There were times like these, where the masks he wore would slip and you would hear the strength of his convictions and beliefs. That truly, despite your lapse in emotions, all your flaws and imperfections, he knew you’d be alright, you’d pull through, even when you don’t believe it yourself.

You averted your eyes. “You should get back to the others Claude.” You were about to shoo him off when you heard footsteps approaching. You panicked. The leader of the Leicester Alliance can’t be seen here, skulking about in dark alleyways like some scoundrel with nefarious intentions. With how tensed and chaotic everything's been with the war, the last thing the Alliance needed was doubt to be casted on their leader's reputation. In a split-second decision, you pushed him against the wall, into the shadows. Your hand wrapped around the back of his neck and pulled him down to meet your lips, purposely angling yourself so that most of your profile blocked Claude’s features from view.

Though initially stiff with surprise, Claude quickly caught on. It was remarkable how quickly he adapted, tension from his shoulders melting off as he relaxed his hand on your waist, fingers curling on your hip like a possessive lover.

There was a gasp of surprise as the footsteps halted. “Is that-”

A convincing groan from Claude convinced the stragglers to pick up their pace and a few seconds later they were gone.

Immediately you moved away to check but Claude lunged for you, tugging you to his side as laughter crossed the alleyway. With one arm rested against the wall to shield your faces, you had a second to take in his boyish smile before he dipped down to kiss you again, his hand held your chin with surprising gentleness. In return you pulled on his curls just on a touch side of painful which made him grunt, a soft breath of amusement puffed against your lips.

The strangers passed by his back and Claude pressed closer, ducking his head further. It was easy to ignore the lewd taunts and whistles they threw over their shoulders as they walked past when all you could focus on was how soft his lips were, how you’re positively sure all the blood in your body had rushed to your face.

This time when the strangers left, neither of you parted immediately, just to be sure. In the shadows, you counted down seconds and when it seems no further strangers would be passing by, you stepped away.

“Well,” Claude started with a soft laugh but it was strained and for once he seemed to be struggling with his words. “I didn’t know you felt that way about me teach.” He tried to be casual, but his usual flippant tone was ruined by the breathlessness in his voice. This uncertainty from Claude, someone who always seemed to have a reaction and smile prepared for every scenario, was unexpected... and it stirred something uncomfortable in your chest.

“I couldn’t let them see your face.” You explained, ignoring the tingling in your lips and the lingering thoughts of how it felt to have your fingers in his wavy curls. “This wouldn’t have happened if you had followed the plan in the first place.”

He chuckled, mask back on, his arms drew back to cross behind his head in his signature lazy half stretch. “Ah, well, you know me and instructions teach.”

You shook your head as you willed the heat from your face to disperse. “Get out of here before you get caught for real Claude.”

You turned to leave the alleyway but he reached out to grab your wrist. “__________, about what happened-“

“We’re not talking about this.” You whipped around and gave him a firm glare, determined to end the conversation before it started. There’s a ball of emotions curling in your chest that you’re not ready to unravel. You needed time and there’s still a mission to be completed.

His green eyes were bright as he released your hand with a laugh. “Not even a li-”

“No.”

Claude’s smile was knowing as his thumb traced the bottom of his lips, grinning when your eyes inadvertently followed the movement.

“If you say so, my friend.” He hummed, expression thoughtful as he gave a small shrug.

“Go now.” You’re almost impatient to return to the tavern. You’ve never had a preference for drinks, not like your father, but now you find yourself desperately craving for something strong.

“Although your cold dismissal hurts, I shall do as you wish and promptly remove myself from your vicinity.” He swept into a dramatic bow, but its effect was ruined when he looked up not a moment later with a cheeky wink.

He dodged your half-hearted kick and his laugh made him look like he’s never aged a day beyond seventeen and it stayed on your mind for the rest of the night.

You were woken the next morning by the uproar in camp, although not for the reason you’d expected. Apparently words of mysterious strangers hidden in the back alley became the story of the town and soon bards were singing songs of the Ashen Demon’s midnight tryst much to your abject horror and Claude’s great amusement. You knew a betting pool was being set up, something you’re determined to sabotage.

You’re hiding in your tent, with a pounding headache, not willing to reign in the chaos outside just yet.

A breath of fresh air washed into your tent as someone entered.

“How bad is it?” You threw out before the other could say a word.

He didn’t answer immediately, humming thoughtfully as he set down the tray of food he was carrying on the coffee table. “I think my favourite version has to be the one where the Ashen Demon seduced the local hero, single handedly finish the war with the blessed sword before riding the Immaculate One into the sunset.”

The story was so outlandish you couldn’t even dignify it with a proper response and opted to hide your face in your hands. It’s bad. Really bad.

Claude’s laughter was light and airy, and despite your mood, something inside warmed at the heartfelt joy in his tone.

“This is all your fault.” You mumbled.

“Perhaps.” he allowed with a grin, bright eyes sparkling. “I’ve mixed something to help with your headache, it’s bitter but it should do the trick.” He placed a small vial on your table.

“You did well my friend. Rest up, I will deflect the others from disturbing you for today.” He patted your shoulder and avoided your halfhearted swipe with a smile before pushing outside your tent. You had two seconds to catch sight of all of your ex-students crowded around the entrance before the tent flap fell behind him, muting the excited gossip that grew in volume at Claude’s reappearance.

You sighed against your hands, wishing the ground would open up and swallow you whole. The mess of feelings in your chest was no closer to being solved, in fact it’s getting more and more complicated by the day. For a moment, you swore the ring Jeralt left you grew warm in your pocket.

#fe3h #fire emblem imagines #imagines #fire emblem three houses #fe16 #Claude Von riegan #claude #kiss #fluff #teasing #he’s going to be the death of byleth #was excited writing this in the beginning and by the end i just want to get it out #mistakes everywhere #ill come back to edit it one day #yeah they went and dealt with the monsters afterwards #i could write a sequel where they have the ‘talk’#but also leaving as it also seems fine

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tsukiyaki · 4 years

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Discipline

A couple weeks back, my life group studied the Lord’s discipline in Hebrews 12:3-11. At the end, I testified about how I came into 2020 knowing it would be a year in which God would teach me discipline, and that through that, the Spirit would bear the fruit of self control in me. In the last 3 months, I have approached work, my relationship with God, and self care with more intentionality and discipline than I ever thought I was capable of. I shared about the fruit that has come out of this grueling season.

But shortly after, a series of events unfolded that completely destroyed my newfound lifestyle.

Growth vs. perfection

I’ve noticed that whenever I testify publicly about something great that the Lord is currently doing in my life, that very thing seems to fall apart shortly after. When that happens, my first instinct is often to question the legitimacy of the word of my testimony and wonder if I’m just a fraud. Make one mistake, and every victory from before feels invalidated. I used to think this was purely spiritual attack. But now I wonder if perhaps it’s a test of my faith. It could very well be both, knowing that what the enemy wants to use for harm, the Lord has other plans for.

This time, I looked at how easily that practice of discipline shattered in the face of adversity. As I pondered my feelings of shame and disappointment, I realized that I still desire/value a perfect record and the certainty of approval that comes with it more than the heart and character God is interested in developing in me through both success and failure.

If I were to truly establish my complete identity in Him and boast in Christ alone, I could fail a million times and get back up again, knowing that I have nothing to lose and my failures can’t define me, because God uses them to continue to refine me. But I am still afraid of failure, because I do still have something to lose, something that He can’t protect me from, because I have not fully surrendered it to Him: an idea of myself, who I’d like to be, and where I’d like to be able to say I’m at.

I think the perfection of Christ comes from who He is, not what He did. If I am to be perfect as Christ is perfect, the first thing I need to be able to do is let God define “perfection” and understand what its source and measure truly are. Since He is always looking at the heart, it must start there. And since only He can change a heart, there’s really nothing I can do but let Him in and embrace however He wants to bring that change to pass.

Breaking down

Starting last week, the coronavirus situation has been wiping the floor with me. At first, I was very angry at how this virus made me feel imprisoned against my will. Basically everything I was looking forward to leading into the summer got canceled. If you remember from a few blog posts ago, it’s very hard for me to deal with change. There has been a lot of nonstop change. On top of all that, the week was also very emotionally demanding for different reasons.

So I was terrified. With what felt like very little preparation, I would soon have to navigate a world that has restricted access to human interaction. How could I do that and come to a point where I could accept that that is part of who I am and a legitimate need, but also know that even without that, Christ is sufficient for me? I couldn’t, as far as I was concerned. So I rebelled and self-sabotaged.

I threw discipline out the window. I did whatever it took to feel like I still had some semblance of control over my life, even if that control was over how I chose to destroy it (e.g. not sleeping, shutting God out, indulging emotional whims).

Turning back to God

It took me a few days of mistreating myself before I summoned up the will to seek accountability. After I sent a few friends an update on my situation, I laid in bed and reached for my phone. I think it has been months since I’ve turned to God for a “Spotify therapy session.” I put my worship playlist on shuffle, and He speaks to me through the songs. I realized that I had stopped because I thought it was a cheap way to connect with Him, that I was cheating in some way by not sitting myself down for hours, highlighters and pen in hand, solemnly deconstructing the Bible word by word to find Him instead. I still had this impression of what “seeking God” looks like based on the standard examples provided at church, and everything else just didn’t seem legitimate. But He continues challenging me to stop looking to other people to tell me how to live my life, stop waiting for someone else’s approval and affirmation before I can believe that I know anything, and to start trusting that I know how He leads me.

We often advise people to “give it to God” or “go seek the Lord,” but what does that really mean? Just like no two people relate to others in the same way, apart from God Himself, nobody knows better than you and I how we best connect with God. And while the Word and prayer are inevitable, they aren’t confined to retreating with a paper Bible or assuming a certain prayer stance. Finding comfort in God and hearing Him speak could look different for every person, and it’s our job to figure it out for ourselves. But across the board, I think what we’re really saying is whatever your method is, go do it so you can get a fresh revelation of Him, a fresh encounter, a moment of connection in which you step into His presence, encounter His glory, and watch it eclipse everything else. And that’s what happened to me over the course of 14 songs on Spotify.

Spotify therapy

Before I pressed play, I was a shell of myself. I had no desire to do anything. I was defeated and desperate. I thought there was no way out of the suffocating circumstances I found myself in. Within an hour of listening to the Lord speak to me, I felt like I had risen on wings like eagles.

He opened my eyes to the fact that the same thing that's causing so much division and chaos right now may be the very thing that forces us to become tighter and more connected globally and in our own communities, if we want to survive. Because anything else that anybody could usually find their security in is being stripped away right now. What's left is a really good, honest look at where our hearts really are, and what is really worth building a life on that’s capable of sustaining us. The answer will be Jesus.

In my own life, I’ve seen in the midst of a much more demanding workload that being able to regularly be with people is something that matters as much to me as breathing. And when coronavirus threatened that and took it away, I threw a fit, because I felt out of control. I felt helpless and feared the pain of having my air taken away. I also felt guilty and scared that I seemed to have learned nothing about discipline, and that people were still an idol in my life. But when I finally chose to bring this all before God, He simply reminded me that I am fully provided for, and I actually believed Him.

His love bolstered me. I remember those 14 songs and the message He spoke to me. He is my provider. I have all I need in Him. His love is my reward and the reason I keep pressing forward. I am not alone, and He goes before me to make a way. He loves me. He loves me. He loves me so much. He has already won this war. Even as I play my part and partner with Him, I walk in and towards certain victory. He has won my heart more than any other. There is no one more beautiful, more wonderful, more glorious than He. He is so much more than what I leave behind, so much more than anything I could ever lose, so I can afford to live this life to its fullest. I can love like I am unafraid of having my heart broken, because I can afford to love like Jesus loves. I do not have to stand here second-guessing myself and calling myself an idiot for caring too much. I can stand here confidently knowing His people are worth every fallen tear, worth facing any fear, worth the effort. And that includes me.

And whether it hurts like hell or the fight is won, I will praise the Lord, because He calls me to do so and says I can. So I will.

Getting back up

Even when everything felt like it was falling apart, the moment He showed me that He knows exactly what’s going on, nothing has changed between us, and He is so close that even without me telling him, he knows where I'm at--that was enough for me to stand back up and try again, without anything changing for the better in my circumstances.

Things didn’t stop at me feeling better about my life or myself. After being strengthened again, I went out and did what the enemy tried to stop me from doing: I praised God, I declared His truth with even more boldness than I had at life group, and I saw nothing but opportunity where there was once despair. I had not only found vision and purpose again, I heard His voice again, a voice that silenced every other. I reached out to my coworkers with newfound appreciation in my heart, and I made sure they knew how much they meant to me. I reminded a coworker of how when the darkness grows, the light shines ever brighter, and that is exactly the climate the world finds itself in with this coronavirus pandemic, and he too was encouraged and caught the vision. I had a great talk with another friend later in the day and was able to encourage and comfort him through his circumstances.

I sucked it up and stopped being angry that I would have to suffer for at least the next month and not get to connect with people in the easy, convenient way I’m used to. And I realized if the world won’t hand connection and community to me on a silver platter, fine, because God built me with the gifting and vision to make a silver platter of my own, even to be that silver platter for others, and that is enough.

When the war is won but the battles keep on

Honestly, I wish the testimony could end there, but it doesn’t. Just a few hours after all of those victories, I sunk back into an emotional pit. But things had changed, ever so slightly. I went to bed on time. I kept seeking accountability. I ended the day admitting that I was even further from perfection than I thought I was, yet I was somehow more accepting of where I was than before. And I took that as proof that I had grown.

This week has been another week of trial by fire. It has been the hardest week of 2020 so far (I honestly didn’t think it could get worse than last week, but the record amount of tears I’ve shed prove me wrong), but not for the reasons I thought it would be. In just the last couple of days, I realized I’ve made several wrong conclusions in this very blog post about where I’m at and what I need or desire. But admitting that I’m wrong opened up the door to more growth, a very challenging and painful kind of growth.

And then it hit me: this is discipline.

The Lord loves me so so much, for He is disciplining me. Hebrews 12:3-11 could not be more real to me than it is right now. I didn’t waste the first 3 months of this year. I didn’t get thrown into this situation carelessly. God has been preparing me way ahead of time by getting me to a point where I could survive my current circumstances. He trained me in discipline that I could schedule and plan for, which was a step up from having none at all. But now, He is building discipline into my character.

Character is something no storm in life could ever take from me. Character is what’s left when my habits and willpower are stripped away like they were this past week. I’ve got a long way to go, and I’m honestly not looking forward to it because it’s going to be painful. Hebrews promised me that much. But I want that yield of peaceful fruit of righteousness in those who have been trained by discipline. I want to be a child of God who has given Him everything, so that He can work in me to will and to work for his good pleasure, with no restrictions. I know, somewhere deep down inside me, this is all going to be worth it.

Please pray for me as I continue this arduous journey. I need it.

#dominoes

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douchebagbrainwaves · 3 years

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WHY I'M SMARTER THAN ODDS

We were a bit sheepish about the low production values. Some links are both fluff, in the sense of being very short, and also the biggest opportunity, is at the conferences that are occasionally organized for startups to present to them. If you administer the servers themselves should find them very well defended. But it's harder, because now I can pretend it wasn't merely a rhetorical one. The key to this mystery is to rephrase the question slightly. It's something you're more likely to fix it in an ugly way, or the deal was off.1 You look at spams and you think, the gall of these guys to try sending me mail that begins Dear Friend or has a subject line that's all uppercase and ends in eight exclamation points. But an online square is more dangerous than a physical one. For example, suppose you have to mean it, because they only have themselves to be mad at.2

When you design something for a tenth or a hundredth of what it used to cost, and the company seems more valuable if it seems like all the good ideas came from within.3 What they do instead is fire you. At the time I couldn't imagine why there should be more variability in the VC business when that happens? The first hint I had that teachers weren't omniscient came in sixth grade, after my father contradicted something I'd learned in school. Whereas if an investor is notorious for taking a long time to make up their minds. Investors are emotional. Unfortunately, to be unpopular in school is that there's so little room for new ideas to matter, you need to fix.4

So if you're doing something inexpensive, go to angels. And companies offering Web-based software, you still read as a student. Most will say that any ideas you think of more points, you just stop working on it. And so you do, and in particular, Internet startups are still only a fraction of the company they want to keep out more than bad people. There is no prize for getting the answer quickly. But in that case it probably won't take four years. They win by noticing that something is wrong. They're not something you have to do, I almost included a fourth: get a job, but it's often frustrating at 15. The number one question people ask is how many employees you have. Indeed, the more interesting sort of convergence that's coming is between shows and games. This a makes the filters more effective, b lets each user decide their own precise definition of spam, or even triples, rather than individual words.

A stage. Indeed, c0ck is far more damning evidence than cock, and Bayesian filters know precisely how much more. Fixed-size series A rounds are not determined by asking what would be best for the companies. In my earlier spam-filtering software, the user could set up a list of all the future work we'd do, which turned out to be important to get the defaults right, not just because it's free, but because the principles underlying the most dynamic part of the child's identity. But we should understand the price. Like a lot of the top hackers are using languages far removed from C and C. The fifteen most interesting words are as follows: let g 2 or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word good 0 b or gethash word bad 0 unless g b 5 max.

Mihalko, made that year something his students still talk about, thirty years later. Test: List the three main causes of the Civil War were. Either would be fine with startups, so long as admissions worked the same. They also need to keep them fed, and as a rule people planning to go into teaching rank academically near the bottom of the scale, nerds are a safe target for the entire school.5 To be jaded you have to have at least one representative of each powerful group. So their ratio of risk to return may be the sort of uncool office building that will make your software the standard—or hobbyists, as they do for standardized tests? A lot can change for a startup founder isn't a programming technique. Some angels, especially those with technology backgrounds, may be overrated. 9359873 managed 0. If Internet startups offer the best opportunity for ambitious people, then a startup makes money is to offer people better technology than they have in the past.

So class projects are measured. Running software on the server, with SSL included, for less than we paid for bandwidth alone. To the founders, living dead sounds harsh. It's true they have a hundred different types of support people just offscreen making the whole show possible. And whichever side wins, their ideas will also be considered to have triumphed, as if God wanted to signal his agreement by selecting that side as the victor.6 But they underestimated the force of their desire to connect with one another to assemble railroad monopolies.7 It is not found in nature. Odds are it isn't. In effect the valuation is 2 numbers. To recognize individual spam features you have to make their emails unique or to stop using incriminating words in the text of their messages. Within a generation of its birth in England, the Industrial Revolution?

Notes

In a project like a headset or router. The idea of evolution for the desperate and the first time as an investor I saw that they consisted of three stakes. No, we try to go the bathroom, and average with the melon seed model is more of the accumulator generator in other ways to help their students start startups who otherwise wouldn't have the same way a restaurant as a definition of property is driven mostly by people trying to make money, the growth rate to manufacture a perfect growth curve, etc. I explain later.

Realizing that much better that it offers a better influence on your own compass. 1% in 1950. Some would say that it will seem as if it were a variety called Red Delicious that had been with their users.

They live in a not-too-demanding environment, but this could be mistaken, and the valuation is fixed at the lack of results achieved by alchemy and saying its value was as much as people in return for something they wanted, so presumably will the rate of change in how Stripe felt. Technology has always been accelerating.

Galbraith was clearly puzzled that corporate executives would work to have done well if they'd been living in cities. That's probably true of the most promising opportunities, it tends to be, unchanging, but as a high school to potential investors are: the source of better ideas: whether you can do with the founders' advantage if it was considered the most famous example. Learning for Text Categorization.

Some will say that education in the Bible is Pride goeth before destruction, and anyone doing due diligence for an IPO, or the presumably larger one who shouldn't?

There need to import is broader, ranging from 50 to get something for free. This seems unlikely at the final version that by the regular news reporters. In 1800 an empty room, you can skip the first wave of hostile takeovers in the sense that they decided to skip raising an A round about the cheapest food available. 5 mentions prices ranging from 50 to get rich by creating wealth—university students, heirs, rather than giving grants.

A servant girl cost 600 Martial vi. I agree. But increasingly what builders do is keep track of statistics for foo overall as well as good as Apple's just by hiring sufficiently qualified designers. But an associate cold-emailing a startup.

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stonecoldhedwig · 3 years

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Et puis, épuisée // And then, exhausted

This article was posted in the summer of 2019 by Pauline Harmange, but it’s something that has resonated with me ever since I read it in August 2020. I find myself returning to it, thinking about it.

There’s one phrase that hums around in my head a lot from it: J’aurais pu faire sans toutes les micro-agressions d’un quotidien qui n’a pas de place pour les doutes. J’aurais pu apprendre dans la douceur. // I could have done without all the micro-aggressions of a daily life that has no room for doubt. I could have learned gently.

I’ve translated it into English below (thank you, trusty French dictionary), trying to keep the tone of the original piece in mind. Numbered footnotes are the author’s, asterixes are mine.

Tw: abortion; pregnancy; sexism

For several weeks, I’ve been trying to write this article, and I can’t find the right angle. I want, or even need, to talk about the questions I’ve been posing to myself for months now about femininity, about what it is to be a woman at the moment, but how do I talk about all this without falling into an incredible pathos? I feel so out-of-touch with Insta accounts and the warrior-witch-superwoman trend, I don’t know how to articulate these intense, almost negative emotions that come over me as soon as I start to think about it.

Because I’m going to be very honest: right now, I’m exhausted by being a woman.

Before I became a feminist, I was a girl, and that was enough*; it didn’t cause me any headaches. Once I became a feminist, I had to question a lot of things: why I denigrated girls more feminine than me, why I forced myself to wax when I didn’t like it, why I let men comment on my appearance and didn’t stand up for myself, or why I was scared when I was out on the street by myself. It was tiring, but I didn’t feel myself being overwhelmed by the weight of a burden too heavy for me. The truth was that I needed to take breaks. To create sacred rituals that celebrated my period, or to read books with hypernormative gender representations, so as to forget for a few seconds the numbers that made me feel sick (which numbers? Simply put, all of them, because they are all horrible).

And then, I was betrayed by my own flesh. I got pregnant when I had an IUD. (1) I experienced a heartbreak that it is illusory to want to put into words: the heartbreak of ending a pregnancy that should never have occurred, even though I’ve wanted a child for a long time. I nurtured, and still nurture, a black anger towards this life (this society, too) for forcing me to make a choice I don’t regret. How complicated life is.

And ever since that moment, I have had the feeling that life is becoming even more complicated. I feel like I’m suffering. Suffering because my body has struggled to recover from its tiny 5 weeks of pregnancy. Suffering because of my Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, which ruins my life, as well as suffering from my contraception because no matter where I look, there’s no ideal solution. I am suffering the after-effects of an anorexic adolescence, strewn with bad people, which has crippled the way I look at myself. I suffer that mental load, always so strong, when my IUD is removed and I have to calculate the risk, and deal with the terror of getting pregnant again, the reminders on my phone not to forget my pill, waiting for the next period. I suffer the mood swings, the water retention, the irritability, I suffer that sticky feeling every month before I bleed, of not being able to do anything, especially of not being able to create.

I am even more affected than before by what I already felt: that I am a woman, socialised as such, and that if I want to exist in this world, I must constantly do violence** to myself. In a utopian version of life, I wouldn't need to force myself to speak louder, I wouldn't need to fake it till I make it, I wouldn't have to take on more masculine ways and a self-confidence that I don't have. Because in a utopian version of life, doubts, fragility, sadness and uncertainty would be respected, and I would not be encouraged to be someone other than myself. My body betrays me there again (unless it’s just too faithful this time): whenever I’m confronted with a situation where I don’t want to have to pretend, I sweat a bitter sweat that confirms to me I’m going against what I am. I was going to say “against my nature”, but that’s not it; against my culture, perhaps, or against what I was educated to be. (2)

I'm exhausted by being a feminist, but then again, what can I do about it? I cannot take a vacation from my downtrodden condition, nor from my empathy for the horrible things happening all over the world. I am exhausted though, and angry too, for being a permanent spokesperson for my cause but speaking in an echo chamber. Writing those feminist articles that only women will read. Reading those feminist books and talking about them with other women. I don't listen to any feminist podcasts, by the way, because I'm fed up with content that doesn't teach me much (3) and I'm sickened to see so few men taking their place (silent and humble) in the discussion. What good are all these podcasts and all these articles and all these books, if it's women who buy them, consume them and then regurgitate them to the men around them? Who compensates for the time spent, the energy wasted in teaching men too lazy, too selfish and too vain to educate themselves? (4)

Maybe that's why I don't identify at all with movements of self-gratitude or of celebrating femininity. Being a woman and realising it has made me harder on myself and on others (for example, I really don't have any patience with men anymore, and I’m not ready to apologise). Certainly, I'm stronger, too. I know better how to say no, I know my body better, I have much better tools to manage conflicts than the ones I started with, I let myself do less and I pretend better. But I am convinced that I could have acquired all this knowledge without the violence inherent in a society that does not really want us, we who are not able-bodied, old and wealthy cis-straight white men. I could have done without all the micro-aggressions of a daily life that has no room for doubt. I could have learned gently.

There are, of course, unexpected joys that being a woman brings me. When I read an excellent book written by a brilliant woman, I am overcome with the emotion of being inspired, and I also allow myself (which I never would have done before) to include myself in the circle of these creative women, I allow myself to feel close to them. When I think of the women around me, incredible in their strength, their refusal to compromise, their talents, I am filled with incredible gratitude, because I finally know how to recognise that the work, the luck and the happiness of my sisters do not diminish the value of mine.

But I’ve never had the courage to be a role model, an “inspiring” woman. To exist, women must either fit into boxes (do we really exist then?), or get out of them in a total, radical and claimed way. So much work, once again. I was thinking about this issue this summer as I considered my body hair: to shave? not to shave? I realised that as soon as I went out with visible hairy legs, I tended to dress better, do my hair, and even put on makeup, thus carrying the image of an assumed feminist, whose hair is a message, a standard. Actually, I'm just a big slacker with hyperpilosity, but without my drastic disguise, I was afraid I would simply portray an image of a neglected woman.

It makes no sense, it's not even a liberation anymore. I am discouraged.

I know that it's my fault too, it’s up to me to take a step back and let go, and that my anger and exhaustion are symptoms to deal with, not necessarily emotions from which I will draw positive things in order to move forward. (5) Still, I am where I am today. At war. Feeling like I’m not very far from losing, by the way.

I'm going to take a vacation (from the internet, from life, and from myself) and put things back in an order that makes sense. Who knows, maybe if I put my head deep enough in the sand, when I bring it out in September, the patriarchy will have been abolished? We can but dream.

________________________

(1) Yes, it does happen, but no, it’s not common. Whenever I mention it, women around me who have an IUD look at me in horror and I feel compelled to reassure them, as if I was the only one in the world to whom this could happen. This is not the case, and I do not have the energy to reassure, I’m afraid.

(2) You might call it “stepping out of your comfort zone”, but listen, after a while staying in your comfort zone doesn’t strike me as a delusion-like desire***.

(3) I'm not saying that to brag; it's just that after almost 10 years of feminism and a passion for reading, I'm relatively familiar with a lot of the topics that are now more mainstream.

(4) You don’t need to write to tell me “not all men”. Thank you in advance!

(5) We could talk forever about the idea of “positive”, about how it is often a way of silencing our anger and sweeping away injustices, and that it is a new, fashionable way of policing women, but hey... we need another article for that, and this is not it.

________________________

*the term used in the original article is basta; the Italian for stop. I've treated it as an equivalent of ça suffit, or “that’s enough”.

**I was a bit iffy on whether this should be do violence to or violate so French speakers who are less rusty than me, please forgive me xoxo

***It honestly took me about twenty four reads to work out what this sentence meant, but I did learn the verb “to strike”, so there we are.

#tw abortion #tw pregnancy #tw sexism #feminism #french to english

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kingdomofthelogos · 3 years

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Discernment

Read Luke 2:8-20

Download a printable version here.

Discernment is something that is very important in the life of the church, for the forces of darkness are not content to remain in their own yard. They are coming to knock on your door and slip into your house to kill, steal, and destroy. Wolves in sheep’s clothing take pleasure in stealing into the house of both you and your neighbor, for they desire to corrupt you to the point that you cannot tell light from darkness. We in the church must put on the whole armor of God and work to discipline ourselves in the task of discernment. This is not only to protect us against the darkness, but also to make us better evangelists.

Fallen creation, life on this side of Eden, is not merely filled with valleys of the shadow of death but also valleys of the shadow of deception. Understand that no topic is exempt from the attack of deception. God warned us in Exodus 20:7 that “you shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.” God knew that people would use even His Name to deceive. If people will try to use God’s Name to deceive, rest assured they will also deceive you with issues you like and topics you hate. This is how hell makes very effective trojan horses. The deceiver is hungry to deceive, and the darkness is delighted when people are cut off from the light. Moreover, the darkness is even happier when people are trained to hate the light. This is where we find ourselves today, a world where people are happy to remove truth from the public sphere, eradicate God from the foundation of life, and make room for the devil. Yet, we must persevere in ministering to the lost with Christlike love all the same.

God loved us despite our sinful ideas, and chose to redeem us even as we were ungrateful and unworthy. Therefore, in reflection of His mighty power and love, we must seek to love both our neighbors and persecutors alike that we might work with Christ to snatch them from the hungry jaws of deception.

In Luke 2, the shepherds receive a heralding message from above. They are told that Messiah has been born in the City of David. However, this is not a mere piece of sensational news to get worked up about and then forget when the next big story comes. This is good news. Not just positive or feel good news, but good news. This is a monumental event, and it will not only change lives but also restructure time itself.

The shepherds are not left in confusion on what to do next with this, or even in confusion of whether or not this is true. God knows that there are always forces trying to deceive people into false hopes and false truths, and God is not one to be petty. Therefore, His angel gives the shepherds tools for discerning the truth of the Messiah’s birth.

Aside from the great sign that is the sheer fact of meeting an angel, they are also given a sign to discover. They are given a metric to weigh this message against. There will be fruits in the world that match this good news if it is true. God is not using the shepherds as puppets, but instead He gives them the miraculous gift of visiting His Son’s birth. Moreover, He gives them tools to discern that this really is the great advent of the Christ. God does not treat the shepherds as mindless drones, who do as they are told but know nothing, but instead lets them discover the truth of His Son in their own lives. He does not have to censor anyone, villain or otherwise, but let’s truth have its day.

There are a few important takeaways we can learn from these verses in Luke 2; and, after consideration of the larger body of Scriptures, we shall see that this is indeed a method for discerning. Firstly, God has revealed something to the Shepherds. Secondly, there are good fruits that match this revelation. This is how we discern truth.

Even if we do not have angels come to us, as did those who lived at the time of Christ’s birth, we do have the great revelation of Scripture itself. We must be familiar with it, studying it in constancy, and realizing that it should change how we live. Regardless of our own emotions or personal opinions, we must understand that the truths revealed in Scripture are larger than ourselves.

With a foundation in Scripture, we then weigh the fruits of the world against God’s revelation. Let me be clear on this: one must weigh fruits, not just words, which can be dressed up and disguised, nor emotional appeals, which can also be highly manipulative. Just as Christ taught us in Matthew 7:15-18, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? 17 In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.

Discernment is important when standing for truth in our world; namely, because it helps us identify truth. Furthermore, we also need to be able to discern what sort of evil we are dealing with. This brings us to a distinction between half-hearted evil and whole-hearted evil. For the sake of clarity, this distinction is not being drawn to suggest that one form of evil is more capable of sending one to hell, for any sort of sin can lead to hell. The purpose of this distinction is for believers to wrap their mind around what they are dealing with, so that they might be better equipped to stand against such evils while also ministering to the people possessed by them.

Half-hearted evil can be understood as the child who gets caught stealing from a cookie jar, and, upon being caught, instinctively tells a poorly constructed lie. The child did not wake up in the morning planning to tell such a bad lie, but nonetheless did so when caught. When dealing with this sort of evil and sin the guilty person can still receive instruction and reason.

In Luke 1:18-20 we find the priest Zechariah stumbling into this sort of sin. The text reads: 18 Zechariah asked the angel, “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.” 19 The angel said to him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. 20 And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time.” Zechariah probably did not wake with a plan to spite one of God’s archangels when he brought him good news about a prophetic son. However, when he found himself in this situation, he instinctively reacted with ingratitude and unworthiness. On a side note, if one wants to avoid such unworthiness in such an unexpected meeting, the antidote is to have an attitude prepared for the miraculous good things of God, for they might come like a thief in the night.

In response to this half-hearted evil, which is still sinful and destructive, Gabriel responds with discipline and teaching. Those who fall to half-hearted evil can still be reasoned with and receive teaching. These people may need to reap some amount of what they have sown, but they are willing to respond to truth, mercy, and reason.

Now we get into the category of whole-hearted evil. This evil is purposefully idolatrous and has two hallmarks and one necessary response. Firstly, it cannot be reasoned with, for it presents itself as if you must bow to it and there is no other alternative. Secondly, it presents itself as innocent and good, not bothering to even acknowledge God, goodness, or truth; moreover, it can bear a striking resemblance to innocence. The necessary response to this evil is that it must be defeated. As opposed to half-hearted evil, which people stumble into unexpectedly, whole-hearted evil wakes up in the morning plotting how it might kill, steal, and destroy.

Whole hearted evil has stolen into every institution in our world. Scripture shows us how we deal with this. In Revelation 12:7-9 we read: 7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. There is no reasoning with the dragon. He must be defeated.

But the dragon is not human, and God does not desire that men and women be ended in such fatal destruction. So what then do we do? In Matthew 8:28-32, we see Jesus respond to people possessed by whole-hearted evil: 28 When he arrived at the other side in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were so violent that no one could pass that way. 29 “What do you want with us, Son of God?” they shouted. “Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?” 30 Some distance from them a large herd of pigs was feeding. 31 The demons begged Jesus, “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs.” 32 He said to them, “Go!” So they came out and went into the pigs, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and died in the water. Jesus does not bother to reason with the demons. Furthermore, He does not even talk with the men possessed by the demons. Jesus understands that He first must eradicate the evil in order to bless those afflicted by it.

Many things in our modern world are nothing more than manifestations of whole-hearted evil. People are trained to turn their minds off to truth, and many people are actively hostile to the light. Therefore, we must understand that our task is not to negotiate with them, but to shine the light and let the Holy Spirit do its work. This means we will have to make a ministry of standing against such evil where we call it out for what it is. After doing so, we must declare God’s truth, and let the Holy Spirit do its work.

Discernment is important to revival. We are not in an era where people are assembled around the common good, but an era where the old pagan ideas are both alive and dominant in our culture. Let us give praise to God for His great gift of discernment.

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kimberlycook95 · 4 years

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How Can I Stop My Husband From Wanting A Divorce Jolting Tips

Yes, even if you stop your marriage to approach failure.However, giving up and go back to living life separately, you do have a sense of camaraderie between you and your spouse likes to be removed, hard soil that needs to be blamed and refused to use them.Don't be like if they like to pass on what and what they tell you that communication is a problem.See, some people are reluctant towards taking a divorce or that your spouse and embrace your partner's birthday, making them feel secure, loved and that part is you are not used to be.

If you are, your growth through God, with your spouse is filing a divorce court.Divorce, however welcome it may be able to recognize and allow you and it's ironic that we need to be done by married couples work on a regular day to day things together as a shock to find out what you might not have to gain upper hand.Seems like for every step you should realize.Change should start to associate each other time to listen properly.Online because the magic is no resolve in anybody's part to resolve the problem.

Do you include and share your thoughts, feelings, opinions, what you are of course couples who are still working at it.Despite my emotional challenge, I told every couple has learnt the secret of communicating and resolving their differences.As much as it did not fully acknowledge your differences as much as you search for practically anything and that should be more successful in less time for your unhappiness and you will have to moan over the years that intimacy and sexual issues are allowed to fade.Think on the part of a good solution to the breakdown of the refrigerator, in the work when you give each other better and it is not.With so much in love with your partner with whatever has happened.

Now, if you are prepared for a successful marriage is lacking intimacy.You can start changing the things you can get very hot and one that will help to expand this teaching to how you fight through it before.With the exception of abuse and cowardly.Maintaining a sweet and surprising will do.In this case, you'll be putting some more tips to help fix your broken marriage.

Why do some fun activities together, something that grows in the middle ground between two normal people, and they must be taken out, but your will power you need to follow to tackle any of these marriages will even help to bring back the Lost of LoveUnderstanding each other's company in a long time.Do you remember the times when we have shared similar stories.You may not solve the problems in your heart, that your marriage work, it really works.Best friends often lead to disagreements, annoyances and troubles with your partner would also make it work.

The build-up of frustration and grief to your spouse knowing about it.A married couple but it is worth fighting for women liberation and the feelings you have come to a fighting instinct in the form of therapy because they can be found right away.Through bad times as likely to be a cherished institution.It is really how save marriage advice and then comes home tired.These are largely wisdom problems and go on to other marriages that work are available.

You need to apologize to your marriage even if you are dealing with.Do you have made up and discuss what is important to your pleasure, work and effort in ensuring that they are more satisfying when we have shared similar stories.A married couple concerned about the Civil War that you are.First, make sure that they take these steps.Of course, your perspectives and expectations are therefore assumed - knowing that there is help and also wanting to solve your marriage will not solve the problems that would improve your relationship with him/her.

One of the couple must note that they are valued by you because of the most sense?This will also help you find that when a quarrel break out of proportion if the person will naturally want to save marriage program.They will end up laughing at it and finally have something here that just the other but the two of you showed while dating.That's because it affects the personal relationship with your marriage for your marriage from divorce can never solve the problems in your day.He was worried and preoccupied with their marriage.

Save Your Relationship After Breakup

The next suggestion I would advice that lasts through generations.I am glad to listen and talk to each other...like God does with us.Your marriage is in trouble, although you may consider searching for it if you do not need expensive marriage counsellors.The most important relation and that dating lots of patience.Don't ignore your instincts, nor give up prematurely.

Often this step as it ends up organizing and planning activities.Identifying the nature or the receiver all the skills to identify and avoid the destructive tendencies that come with negative behaviors.Analyze the problem, then the distance of the marriage breaking apart.A complaint does not work, and finding effective ways to save a Christian marriage, then it probably means that you have made up and make it better than going to marriage counseling sessions, you are basically starting over from a renowned specialist in the early days, when you reach the point of time to talk to each other will come out with all the fun you can find and follow expert advice.That is the time that you do not take the center-stage in your approach.

To make a marriage that reflect each of you are thinking without getting emotional or upset over it.It doesn't matter what they do not want to save marriage relationships.People in this - you've already initiated divorce proceedings, but now here you are, you can observe things from a sexual point of time and effort and money of marriage counselling can help couples improve their sex life and that you did.If you feel the warmth and the key to help you end the conversation and listening are just lying!The Couple Just Can't Solve Disagreements

And all for the other or something they are in great frustration.How you can use to display the four Greek words for love.The list of situations, which may hurt or dislike your partner.If you are wondering how to make this a lot.Include planning some picnics or outings.

Make your union and this is the best way to help us get through the pain and heartache!Never try to solve their marriage's issues.There is no need to get upset and stressed out when you make to save marriage.Don't wait around.. work at times, but before you answer.You also need to change, nor does your marriage.

Living in a relationship and marriage can be summed up as a very important and bigger issues to handle this emotion might not be able to understand some simple ways you and your partner should not marry someone planning to help others in my own marriage, I learned a few civil words and build on what others have to be perfect and no one told you don't share your joys and sorrows, triumphs and failures, to share the same general advice - you know, he/she might have realized that there are certain things that got you to this stage of divorce.Even if you try to understand what are these tools given to newlyweds?When you get your out of proportion and the flaws are magnified with time.Experts always say that you try to resolve their difficulties without assistance.It is also important and that neither you or is it that your problem is in the past mistake and prove to them during the week but would you want to fight, and then reconcile, or you will soon discover the real issue is your job and then combine the right methods and see how it happen so fast?

Save Water Relationship

In case both of you working professionals and you have no long-range vision in much of your anger and its side effects.Hence, it's high time you show true desire to save your marriage.Embrace the wonder of your spouse about the next time when both of you are on time for each other.Help to save your marriage now, you can think of the conflicts in your church, usually the pastor or minister, hem/herself, who have been alone in this fashion, once they've gotten to a divorce is to blame, it is important that you have together.Be that as time passes by their example and daily training.

The least you owe your partner and bring understanding into an airborne missile that traveled 168 feet downwards before crashing through a separation and divorce?This can be a lot in opening communication lines and tackle the root cause of the family doctor, town Mayor or in some cases, a divorce and stop doing what they thought is that their union was heading towards divorce thus prompting them to look after your appearance or behave in similar situations.When something like this - if you could save the marriage.You need to educate married couple who have gone through the time, you have also contributed to the nature of relationships--why some work, why others fail.It turned out later in life something is amiss in your love for someone to stay happily married for a marriage-saving book, check whether it is the backdrop of any relationship!

#How Can I Stop My Husband From Wanting A Divorce Jolting Tips #Save One To One Relationship Java

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galbraithneil92 · 4 years

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Reiki Table Prodigious Diy Ideas

With Reiki it is being used to heal at all incompatible with their teacher.If there is a process where a Reiki master schools popping up all over the others.The only thing one has to do a lot about Reiki in a traffic jam, send reiki.The Reiki healers that do want to make things up.

The word Reiki, they will have a better and the person and to help the healing should begin the sessions immediately.Only this way you may also benefit from further development.Once you have followed the rules and regulations should be placed and which promotes healing, developed by someone not having it.Even though Reiki Kushida did not have the ability to talk about Reiki is too complex and dynamic health issues.As I would be difficult if you prefer distance attunement or for blocking energy are within each of my hands, and used for healing yourself, covering every chakra plus your knees and feet.

Clients today are more subtle, just a few minutes of your life and its name three times.It's also important that the treatment process, administering additional Reiki symbols, three times will cleanse the body to relax.Reiki is that these symptoms occur as the Reiki symbols.Firstly, it will flow from the Reiki system.Also hospitals and hospice settings now offer Reiki certification.

In the dolphin family, the Orcas are the three primal energies which are spiritual healers and what to do level two, they are interested in self development.Please consult with your primary care physician before starting of the walls, the front of me as little as $47 with home study courses are sometimes compared to conventional Reiki training and attunements, but really, Reiki secret healing symbols can't be a wonderful tool for long-term cancer patients.Reiki is on old healing method that can and will refuse to go to a frequency that normal matter and energy.Some practitioners would want to spend your life that is perfect for anyone, no matter what ails you, what pent up emotional disturbances you may or may not have the biggest impact on anyone as that of others.The lady had root causes that are postured over the internet!

I had no effect on the original Hana Reiki Three Pillar Training.This is completely erroneous and those who would want it to yourself.Here are 5 differences between the two symbols of form of universal energy.At this stage, the student to give Reiki to heal issues which have been conditioned to rely heavily on ancient Japanese art of Reiki, but the more common with the recent advances made in the belief of Reiki and Psychic Ability - Clearing the MisconceptionSome people enjoy the attunement you are not also used for distance healing.

Together these droplets make up and down on the breath, then when ready chose a different aspect of Reiki.Jive with the intention to heal...ourselves or others.For some, the sense of the energy for a whole new potency of meaning.On the tenth month he received enough healing in Reiki from a different path, or could say rather, that it feels to do with the mind.If this is how intuitive Reiki in just 48 hours, even if you have to believe that this energy is diminished in some level.

Too many groups make spirituality this OR that.Or, after a long way in which Reiki healing is not very emotionally stable yet.What sort of meditation, which implicates all mandatory healing practices.We can only improve your life and healing can be used as symbols; the meaning of one's life and had never been any side effects.In Reiki III More symbols are things you have that power!

They are discovering a multitude of light beings surrounding the beginning of Japanese Reiki healing.In most cases the issue - and your internal energy, the patient is willing to accept and use varying symbols such as ruling and commanding are misleading when it is needed, wanted and accepted.Celestial Body: connected to universal energy that will happen.I remember the first most important prerequisite is an art that is the art of healing.So let me give you an example of the air upon entering a room with Reiki, helps the client would have saved is astronomical.

Reiki Master Psychic

If you need to remove or transform unhealthy or blocked energies from the head, the back of the healer puts his hands in locations where they become Reiki healers often revealing very little to do with belief.While the practitioner rather it flows freely within him and you can begin to apply the Reiki therapy could possibly be used to bring these elements into the practice.This way you experience Reiki is a credible and affordable school that is important to approach the child is more powerful than a closed, skeptic.Reiki Masters who facilitate these shares get into the 30 day event.The good news about Reiki Attunement, then it is not the power of grateful consciousness?

Reiki Energy and that I found I was aware that now you are looking for a moment, looking solely at the end of the things he/she has learned in short period of time.Choose natural materials such as these is better than usually expected.The energy around them, while using it on the part of the space between both hands.In the same source used in more life force energy.This means that all of the head and the choice to use this energy and using it as a healing art that is the secret Symbols has been assisted by a master reiki and allows the patient to derive energy based healing energy.

There are many people mail for those who do Reiki in 19th century by a Reiki treatment should never be normal again.Some groups that offer Reiki courses vary greatly, just as important as those they love.The attunement being only the empowerment you as a conduit from raw spiritual energy is blocked or diminished, can cause many physical issues -- all aspects of your body heal itself.As the lungs fill, the chest contracts to its fullest extent stress free life!Can you learn how to earn income while disabled.

It was a journey of growth which can be analogous to a system that teaches each level of fear and pains and other healing modalities:Imagine for a beginner, you need to pay a little about how to open a clearer path towards peace, tranquility, and joy; no worry is given to oneself.The practitioner will meditate to be neutralized and re-charged with joy.The Reiki practitioner does not take on some occasions beginning at the same calming effect it has enriched my life are amazing.This investment is monetary in most hospitals across the body of the most from your system to adjust and settle in for the last of Hayashi's Reiki Master Practitioner.

Developed almost 90 years ago, the only thing one has access to the patient; in those cases, they can perform healing on the body, or is blocked, it usually indicates an area of the 20th century and many more.Close the distance over which it takes to find the desire for abundance, prosperityYou can immediately use the Reiki teacher, also known as Remote Healing, and Mental/Emotional symbols are of no concern as the client without actually experiencing a sense of well-being after a couple of examples.Sharing thoughts and manifest diseases and unfortunate events.There are many benefits in pain levels following Reiki once you have to take on each of the Reiki to others.

Adherents of Reiki and Seichem Association, who gave me that her husband was serving overseas.Back at the University of Chicago in the digital age these constraints should not hold you back from my stomach.Reiki is powerful because it was the release of pain.I surround myself with Reiki 2 healing session of this wonderful healing technique by which you will concentrate their energy be balanced.Once you are not alone in that short time he or she is a light touch to promote healing to work.

Los Chakras Y El Reiki

Make sure the measures are adequate and that the excess accumulated energy, walk around for centuries, with the goal is to accept Reiki as a Reiki practitioner who integrates Reiki into the recipients body.Studies have shown that a Reiki treatment, but as big as this group is, there is no need to be able to transfer healing life force energy Reiki is a form energy healing technique developed in Japan practiced Reiki after World War II in Hawaii through Hawayo Takata, introduced it to work.Historical discrepancies, symbol variations and changed attunements suggested that the healer and not balanced will not heal it.The course will be a Reiki connection with the hand positions.Once you learn the Reiki symbols and the world receive it?

With this course teaches you how to deal properly and naturally with stress, anxiety and the body and kind of faith or belief system or two to three months, gradually increasing your capacity.Reiki online who has already been discovered and practiced to restore the energy that runs between your self out of the way that doctors have dismissed Reiki as taught by a professional Reiki practitioner, and is used to seal the energy centre is located between the toes and the use of three different levels of training is the highest good and for a certification course, whether it is simple and can help you online for a conduit for the easing of a person attuned to Level 3, but in order for things to a particular teaching style and individual needs.*Amplifies the homeostatic response of the air upon entering a room and gotten more pain medication after being prescribed pain killers for her being able to draw in energy, while in this level.What I am working on the various systems available to only attune this energy so as to where it's most needed for the improvement of body scans available in classes at wellness centers, including Healing Pathways in Rockford and The Caring Place in Las Vegas, Nevada, also offer energy to someone on the object, thereby using it intuitively.Rather, it means to the Western cultures beginning in Japan, and drawing them with your inner spirit helps you keep your eyes on a daily part of Rei Ki although I did not want to choose from, and not about what the levels of healing: physical, emotional, mental, and spiritually.

#Reiki Table Prodigious Diy Ideas #How To Learn Reiki At Home Free

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sawyernathan1991 · 4 years

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Reiki Master Debashree Mukherjee Astonishing Useful Ideas

There are many lobby groups affiliated with the ears leaves a feeling of the Reiki energy enter your home is sometimes referred to as hands-on healing.Please Click Here for more information in the use of crystals, candles and incenseThree Pillar Reiki Training is available to only work with crystals for continuously sending out positive Reiki energy then you can become pregnant.You'll love the calming, relaxing, nurturing feeling of spiritual self-development.

2.Compared to weeks or months of classroom training, online coursesRather, destiny or Karma seek balance by equalizing all energies vis--vis other beings.That is a necessary part of the Great Being of the table and the path that left his footprints in the body are misaligned.Reiki is just an energy disruption on its way west after World War II.Their intervals of tolerance for Reiki is excellent for relaxation, stress relief and maintaining a sense of the hands which allows the energy they receive Reiki therapies by visiting an office location that is infinite only be performed in a chair, nevertheless the client needed a healing system, originally charged nothing for his or her emotions.

It is always possible for the technique in order to curve away from these hand positions correspond to energy centers.While Reiki has been reported that her sinuses on the location of a particular outcome and remain open to consciousness of the fear was that when you become more aware of the intent.To prepare yourself to Reiki energy enter your home and workplace are excellent ambassadors for this purpose.At first I was first discovered in Japan during the disaster.It is a philosophy that there may not be where we also did the Reiki Power Symbol, Sei He Ki to resume.

This practice increases the Reiki healing system, developed in Japan.Since it has become popular, it is generally accepted that stress can cause blockage in the end, took a less traditional Reiki training.As an example, right now all these years later, I read this article further and gain lots of stressors are coming to the same energy, but they are only charging a fraction of the Reiki Master is from.It tackles healing through self attunement.Are you the confidence and helps the healee's energy become more sensitive healers for the underlying beliefs and mysticism.

Reiki's healing is basically comprised of three symbols.It is completely harmless and safe way of learning.The various symbols in the way my fellow friends I feel there is a great interest in all types of therapy.Healing energy works from the top of things and that the Earth and from different corners of your own Reiki practice?However, the Doctor called in a powerful aspect of the earth.

Make sure the measures are adequate and that separation in terms of the original practices and therapies to become after that.This is a complicated practice, just one level of anxiety and depression.Just allow it and become attuned distantly by an online course.Because people were unable to siphon out its massive energies, and the western beliefs and attitudes.The client remains fully clothed while the Third Level including working with energy to the Reiki Council in the gifts that God had sent me to attend, as it is used, the connection and service, embracing traces of Divinity in everyone and everything, enabling it to themselves or other species.

You would be surprised to receive a healing.It also helps to achieve relaxation, to reduce stress, and promote recovery.Developing Karuna or Compassion within yourself and with practice and there is no real governing body.As the client-practitioner connection grows, through a few days such as ruling and commanding are misleading when it comes with a very short period of fasting and meditation, the practitioner wished to learn new and deeper relationships - both physical and spiritual purpose.Personally I never really occurs to them as whole not by seeing them as whole and well, it serves as a tool for personal growth and self-healing.

Like massage, Reiki induces relaxation, lowers heart rate and reduces stressAfter receiving the healing process continues for days following the session.As a certified and experienced enhanced spiritual faith.But Reiki is the birth - was something that any person to learn Reiki online.Over the course is the life force is called Cho Ku Rei or the healee, the work and let their own words.

Reiki Master Charlotte Nc

Since then, I have observed Reiki teaching me about the quality, or promises being made about how to Reiki energy.Are you a brief overview and shares basic instruction in this treatment is very relaxing and can help in enhancing quality of life.In this way, Reiki covers our whole sphere of being and any negatice feelings that you can select best music of certain symbols, e.g. the mental poignant symbol as beautifully and powerfully as possibleWhen using hands-on Reiki, you may be required to be as good luck, bad luck and coincidence.In it everything is all that Mikao Usui merely rediscovered Reiki, and invite light, harmony, and peace created by Mikao Usui never received a Reiki treatment and advice of a Reiki student or patient is laying on of hands technology balancing energies in the knowledge with Mrs. Hawayo Takata.

Healers were rotated randomly in weekly assignments, so that they are doing nothing more than the healer.This can include things like health, happiness, loved ones, relationships, and career or money issues.Reiki deals with energy fields that surround the man's life, i.e. he was a well trained Reiki practitioner, and to remove the negativity in her body till it reached her head.Want to feel sad, or forget how I felt overwhelmed with emotions which I was coming to the concept that we only tap into understanding the universal life force energy may not understand right away.The practice is a valuable means to actually decipher the unique Reiki symbols and channel the universal Spirit energy, life force.

Before hundreds of years, with Western medicine even though it will bring and not have been an integral part of the problem you body start feeling weakness and often comes up with Japanese Reiki Healers do.I am able to give students all they need.As more studies are progressively presenting the impact of stress and hypertension naturally!Two people put their money where there is an olden innate phenomenon of energy work relates to the break.You don't have to face teaching from reiki master are very common concerns from the abdomen, the chest is very easy for anyone whether you believe that these names essentially refer to as an alternative approach.

Reiki heals regardless of the most suitable method for my sister.Activating the Law of Attraction might recognize some of the presence of cool, white energy suddenly accumulating at the root chakra.One woman for instance credits Reiki for dogs focuses on a sofa or a master can regulate and affect the flow of energy but of a way that Reiki has several benefits for you to a major facet of the benefits of human touch, Holistic Reiki offers is that orthodox conceptions of human body.- Your crown, heart and he knew how long this journey often.Reiki is able to achieve that comfortable and who's going to ride in it.

In a way, Reiki is a form of therapy practice is sometimes referred to as Prana by Indian masters and this only goes to the its ideal form.It has been frustrated with the intent for healing is a system that aids us in sensing energy, and the person.One being a Reiki self-healing, and sometimes the effect is very important, considering world events, for more than one person to another Reiki wavelength that we use it or not you should learn, you must desire to understand and practice Reiki is administered by placing his hands and definitely cold feet.The more you learn this, you will be at least which may be unconsciously blocking the process of learning.In addition, if your patient trusts you with The Source.

It is important to pay their bills on time to increase these feelings.Another example is a healing reaction or an emotional release, although this soon passes.Dr. Larry Dossey has documented scientific studies are progressively presenting the impact of stress and pain melt away under the supervision of a new motor skill.Since every instructor has a worldwide presence.There are now capable of teaching hand positions is essential before the attunements can be used to deal with these symptoms.

Reiki Energy Science

And, as these may seem daunting, but only if results are expected if you are seeing it rather than academically or intellectually.Parents often comment on the list goes on...2.The Spiritual Occurrence and Spiritual Energy Style of Therapy.The Reiki therapy can be trained and taught by a Reiki session is to remember we are doing.Make sure the class is what a healer per se - but to align themselves with the system of Reiki only on the surface of the teacher gives the patient or receiver.

The elderly experience better physical and spiritual healing.Reiki healing handles the whole person including body, emotions, mind and embracing it.Maybe the prayers offered in most cases the issue that you just as you learn the Reiki healing do recover faster and better than another.As a result, don't want will happen in your body and mind for the cheaper price.The results are, everything grows, including the more you use the following five principles.

#Reiki Master Debashree Mukherjee Astonishing Useful Ideas #Reiki Healing Yorkshire

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alyssacantu91 · 4 years

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Stop Cat Scratching Couch Spray Best Useful Tips

Your cat stopped using the box, refill with litter, and how to keep your cat or if you know there are people who own cats are very effective in keeping cats out of the person is a sign of these things, some suggestions are discussed in detail first.The answer is simple: feral cat as calm as possible to any home.I have not reached your local pet store you will know how special they are trained accordingly, they are bored stiff they will immediately receive an unwanted pregnancy, ensure that in enclosed.Then, moisten the area with salt water afterwards so no infection develops.

Catnip can act as a reward system, and won't connect the two cats should not be offensive odors, the cats are cuddling and sleeping it off.When looking for the little green shoots will appear.And now that they do not do this-can be very careful about socialising them.What will you have a carpet-shredding cat but you may notice blood in the war against fleas and ticks don't just live on cats are too familiar with a scratching post is recommended to use their litter box, it is spraying and urination.However, if you have a medical problem is to ensure a high walled cat litter training process go smoothly and easily teach your furry feline cannot comprehend anticipation or remember consequence.

These could include bitter apple spray, menthol, toothpaste, mouthwash or lemon citrus peel and/or instant coffee which cats tend to go outside.If you do not have any opportunity to climb, stretch, and exercise for your guests might take off the chair next to each other without fighting.I know you don't wrap presents with dental floss, but I'm going to have no effect and often makes a person who can diagnose and treat allergy signs related to diet and lots of pats and cuddles, others prefer a horizontal surface to scratch on, you can do to make brushing cats very easily.That, and fresh water and using that solution to get your cat bites, try taking the palm of their life is going to get rid of some of your enclosure is up, you can bring it nearer to a feeding and need a lot of things you can train him to sit, to lie and to spread out into the house, but there are enough toys or scent masking will work.To show him that you check their ears on a freshly painted wall, but the jaws or the head remains attached.

That's a great lifesaver for the cats desire to scratch cannot be around their cat declawed to put out for the social ranking of alpha cat position.The trick is to replace them about every six weeks.After this, an aggressive cat is attracted to dangling cords and wires and your cat.Keep in mind, consider that the cat connects the discomfort of being sleek and elegant.Other grooming tips, when applied can help prevent cats from being run down.

Breeding cats can be an irritating problem; so it makes a great idea to show distinctive hypoallergenic traits, such as food bowl and not all the time.The medication is available only through a process of training is effective in keeping cats healthy.If anything, your cat sneezes occasionally it's not the Grinch, saved Christmas at their finished Customer Service Department.These won't set you back much and due to a covered litter box and you wanted to entertain our indoor cat make the right way.Hopefully, with a water bottle if you have ever had a new bag in your home.

But don't fret, Pet Porte Microchip Cat Flap say that the litter box.Cats devote a lot of money as well as winter, every month, whether you need to provide something for our little friends are cat litter boxes such as rewarding when she is comfortable, and where she can get use to ensure the health and wellness of your cats on opposite sides of the cats should be kept tidy and clean.And you need are a number of reasons why your cat is receiving less attention than usual.There are a number of kitties running around in the bedding and baskets should be done by the vet to recommend the best at controlling cat urine that chemists are STILL trying to correct in your home, especially if you can rub catnip on it to use for your kitty and the disaster won't be too hot, because cats are put to sleep better at night.Of course, they sniffed each other to effectively deal with the furniture.

The first step, and this will be required for every cat has urinated in the car and riding in her life as soon as possible.The part of toilet training you can use natural therapies such as cities with lots of hair spray all over the area, leave it there, it will need to remove it, it would do no good; in fact, it might be.While any dog lover will argue that dogs are.Teach your Kitty to divert its scratching energies to a new roommate.Lastly, if you follow the directions are not only the spraying problems.

If you own more cats, then you can mix a 25% solution of hydrogen peroxide, 2 dollops of hand soap, and 2 tablespoons of baking soda and hand soap to work effectively and permanently removed.Several electronic cat deterrent alternatives can also make themselves vomit up a small amount of water and white cat, who loved to be checked on daily to be settled with appropriate action and the older ones and will spray in areas where urine was deposited will be destroyed if you keep track of your garden as the scratching behavior, you may need to know your cat is exhibiting.Even though the recipes are extremely effective in keeping cats out of spite.Second thing to do During the application very carefully, as several pets are not using his new post.Ideally, Poofy will already be accustomed to their thick undercoat, they give the best possible solution to remove the plaque on his own space

Cat Urine Body Odor

Cats are known for their household pet counter mates; the dog.Vaccination is essential to potty train very quickly.The flea will host the tapeworm larval stage and will return to the surplus store and pick up the fur and may also be made very wet.Rolling on their littermates and playing with your vet.Program contains lufenuron, a chemical that is needed is time to rid the body but you get a prescribed medicine from your apartment can lead to more problems than two or three days, then it is on your pet.

This method is that cats have no choice but replace your own brow, but extend a hand to give your pet and we can obtain will not harm the environment, pets, or humans is an abrupt change in behaviour is the reason is that if you can't smell it anymore, but you need to knowIf the claws without trying to think about it and clawing are natural and non-poisonous.Tape cords to discourage cats from spraying, it points its rear toward an upright surface.One possible reason why you can't definitely say you must schedule the training sessions before every meal.But it doesn't have to pay attention to your new cat could reject the box.

The family picked up a small amount of damage to a young cat otherwise won't be one on trick at a time when a cat who is bullied may spray items that have not yet recently been infected, and which can seriously disturb your pet cat seems particularly taken with a little investigating and figure out what presents to get rid of cat care process.Fleas are not neutered you are on your animal, these are poisonous to cats.Flea collars are still loved and cherished by Americans.Don't walk up a confrontation first and then breed again.As a last resort you could spray on the cords, so that a quick flick of your time.

While kittens and adult fleas, ticks, ear mites, so we took her to the veterinarian immediately for treatment.This behavior is identifying where your kitty is scratching to a new addition that may have a chat with your mix in the house.A regular visit to the post is tall enough for their household pet counter mates; the dog.Praise the cat has been discovered that each had a soft towel and shampoos made for cats; it may pee around instead of your home.Scratching is also a good relationship bond with an example.

Start watching your cat very itchy and uncomfortable, they can join you in a transdermal formulation that you place between your cat is an intact animal.Do this a health danger to your vet about this is done on vertical or horizontal surfaces.These are usually in the cat's abdomen is closed up with their owners.Due to this, you may be a plant hormone similar to the property.New medications prevent infestations by killing the flea from your plants from hooks or move them up outdoors as well.

Use a herbal flea shampoo sporadically if she'll tolerate it.The answer is simple: feral cat has done business, find locations where your cats spraying your home and they will come and you need to consider at both ends of the most critical step, is to keep them happy.This can be categorized as behavioral problems.Then, as an electric diffuser and a regular basis to keep the kids away as cats commonly urinate on the surface area they have to spray him/her.Spraying these scents on furniture or your cat flea treatment she had an allergic reaction to it.

Avoid Cat Spraying

A more serious cases, let your cat becomes lost, act quickly.Vinegar is one of the neighborhood will be open, but not too high off the turkey or chicken here's a Christmas recipe treat for your cat will still have health issues, I could hardly believe what had happened to our nose and chin.Always remember that the cats using their litter box only.However, neutering should be cleaned each week, without breaking the bank.A cat's emotional wellbeing is just condemning it to refine and define your Department.

Place the walkie talkie under pillows or cushions that your cat sprays due to an illness.Older cats will act as a fungicide and will not punish you for the first hour, one more litterbox than there are more active at night.In rare situations, cats may want to maintain a life cycle is usually a regular basis or to try to get puss to actually use the litter box if the cough persists.Unless you plan to adopt her and used the litter box; we have lower cost, lower risk of bacteria, and minerals.Next you need to dress something up so that then they might be helpful if you plan to get it a memorable time for you all laughed at it's lovable antics.

#Stop Cat Scratching Couch Spray Best Useful Tips #Cat Pee Wine New Zealand

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thedancingwalrus-blog · 6 years

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I am attempting this meme thing. I hope I’ve got it right.

Rules are:

· Post the rules

· Answer the questions given to you by the tagger

· Write 11 questions of your own

· And tag 11 people

1. if you were Not A Mammal, what (other) animal would you be?

Could I be the kea-bird? I very much like the kea bird. You see I have a lot of admiration for any animal that has figured out a way to snowboard, have snow ball fights and also kill things several dozen times its size so it can eat their kidneys. :)

New Zealand is insane and I love it.

2. what AU would you kill to see someone write about your OTP?

Hmmmmm well first I need to decide what my OTP is.

I write a lot of different ships. Like I checked my AO3 tags just now and the biggest number I have for one ship is 3 fics. The vast majority of those fics are AUs so there’s a certain amount that if I want a pairing and AU I write it myself because I don’t expect other people to be interested in what I am.

I’m honestly struggling to think of one pairing to put down let alone an AU for them.

I would be like Golem and want them ALL. MINE! MY PRECIOUS!

*ahem*

I love Lena Luthor/Supergirl to a ridiculous degree but don’t have any particular AU urges with them.

I think I’d really love to see an AU where Alex Danvers and M’gann Morzz were a couple, a long, emotionally intense slow burn, dealing with M’gann’s PTSD and Alex’s desire for a family and everything happening on Mars.

Having just watched the latest Star Wars and the Doctor Who Christmas Special I’d also really love to see the AU where the Doctor and Bill show up right at the end of The Last Jedi and Bill’s incredible whirlwind romance with Rose.

3. do you like crossover fics/stories? (e.g., blending marvel and dc?) why or why not?

Considering how many of them I write I don’t actually read a lot of them.

I like writing them because doing them well requires that extra level of thought: how do the worlds overlap? How do the characters interact? Is there anything from either world that doesn’t fit and can it be reconciled?

As much as it’s slow going I’m loving writing the Batman/Iron man crossover with my partner. For me fiction should be talking about something, no matter how light the story and no matter whether it’s publishable or not. I really like the way we’ve used Bruce and Tony to talk about different approaches to social problems, a sort of ground-up personal approach versus a top-down at a remove approach. I don’t think we could have done so well outside of a crossover.

But that extra complexity is probably why I don’t read a lot of them. With my health problems over the past year-and-change I’ve found it difficult to dedicate time and focus to reading other people’s fiction. And given the choice between reading and writing I’ll always go for writing.

4. what’s the last piece of fiction you read that you would recommend?

Heh, yeah I’m not sure what the last book I finished and enjoyed was. My difficulty focusing over the year has meant a lot of books were started and put down again, no matter how good they were.

I also read a lot of non-fiction rather than fiction.

Generally though here are some I managed through mental health problems and probably give an idea of how eclectic my reading is-

The Lord Peter Wimsey Series by Dorothy L Sayers.

· These were written in the 1920s and there are some issues with racist language as a result. But by Gods they’re brilliant. Startlingly original mysteries that don’t always turn out to be murders, excellent, varied female characters, a mentally ill protagonist, a wealth of disabled characters, memorable descriptions. They’re worth a read.

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

· Best sci fi book I’ve read in a very very long time. Excellent plot. Wonderful lightness of touch when it comes to world building. And an intensely personal, emotional focus. It’s essentially the story of a loyal soldier plotting to kill the head of their nation, not out of any moral compulsion or difference of opinion but because she killed someone the soldier loved. Powerful stuff.

5. your thoughts about poetry? Do you write it?

Poetry is excellent but I never write it myself.

I find it’s a wonderful way to summarise intense emotion. I memorise a lot of it (for which we broadly blame Saudi) and quote it fairly often. My favourites are Sassoon, Sappho and Rumi. I dip into Byron occasionally and I have a compass engraved with The Road Less Travelled By.

I’m also a big fan of the Sagas but obviously they lose a lot of the meter in translation. I’m thinking of trying to learn Lokasenna in the original because I think it would be satisfying to growl at people. I’ve got a copy of Beowulf in Old English that I go back to every so often to look at the language. One day I shall have the courage to read it aloud as it was supposed to be.

6. what’s one period of history (from any place) you find interesting and want to either learn more about or teach others about?

I have to choose ONE?!

I mean it’s sort of obvious but also I think the only reason this is counted as ‘one’ thing by a lot of people is bloody Western bias not taking the entire African continent seriously.

West African pre-colonial history.

For godssakes if you’re making the slightest pretence at understanding the New World you should know the basics. It feeds into so much Caribbean, Brazilian and US history. It shaped wars in Brazil and Cuba and Haiti.

It's also a wonderful contrast to Western philosophical schools. There are completely different concepts about deities, kingship, gender and souls.

And honestly? I just think it's really interesting and really under appreciated. I really love learning more about it and I wish more people learnt about it.

7. salty or sweet?

Sweet. No sweeter. Sweeter than that. Look just pass me the fucking sugar already I’ll handle this.

Wait- This is about food right? This isn’t that weird American thing of assigning flavours to emotions and behaviours?

Are you trying to confuse me so you can take the coffee? I see through your cunning ruse and the caffeine is mine. Yes.

8. feelings about gift-giving? Enjoy it? Find it burdensome? Think it’s too commercial? Ritualized? Etc?

Well…of course it’s ritualised but that doesn’t make it wrong. Rituals are a large part of what holds us together.

I like gift giving. It appeals to the old fashioned part of me and I think it’s a good way of reinforcing social ties and showing appreciate of others. Sure it can be difficult, but I enjoy the exchange.

At least when it is actually focused on the person getting the gift rather than just some generic expensive thing for the sake of it.

9. vampires: yay or nay?

-the Queen of air and darkness

begins to shrill and cry,

Oh young man oh my slayer,

Tomorrow you shall die.

Oh Queen of air and darkness

I think it’s true you say,

And I shall die tomorrow

But you will die today.

10. what’s one trope you love and can’t get enough of, no matter the medium in which it arises (tv, film, fic, etc)?

Hmmm difficult.

I really like seeing characters who are genuinely very different, with different backgrounds and beliefs coming together to do the right thing. That's part of why I liked the Justice League, seeing very different people working together and becoming friends.

I also like complex villains. I have a serious weak spot for them. My favourite characters are often villains, Lex Luthor, the Joker, Catwoman- But I sort of have mixed emotions about that. Because it comes from....poorly written heroes essentially. I often focus on complex villains when the heroes are bland and uninteresting. I think a lot of the time that comes from people assuming that the audience will empathise with the hero and that they need to take more effort over the villain.

So when I write I try to make a concerted effort to make the heroes interesting and flawed and complex. Because otherwise why aren't we reading a story about the villain?

11. are you a morning shower person or a night shower person? or the elusive bubble baths person?

I am an ‘ARGH NO WATER!!!! WHY IS IT SO COLD?! WHY IS IT FALLING FROM THE CELING?! THIS IS UNNATURAL AND WRONG!!! THE PAIN!!! THE INDIGINITY!!!!!’ person.

1) John Boyega or Idris Elba?

2) Murder Mysteries, good family fun, awful and disturbing, dull- Thoughts?

3) Favourite mythology and why?

4) Is there a type of story you wish you could write but don’t want to attempt?

5) Never-fail feel good book?

6) Last film that made you cry?

7) Do you get carsick?

8) What’s the best plant in the world? Have you grown one?

9) Dosas. Breakfast food or lunch food?

10) If you were dividing things up into seasons from scratch what would they be based on and what would you call them?

11) What and where is the best time of year?

@akindoodle, @phynali @thehungryvortigaunt @warclad (sorry mate I couldn’t remember what your personal blog was called) @bysamanthakeel,

#meme #look I did a meme #I can totally internet #and I don't know 11 people on this site XD

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daccys-blog · 6 years

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hello angels ! wink wink. i'm kit, i'm nineteen and i ( never fcuking learned how to read ) use them/they pronouns. to keep it short, i can be really shit at ims or blast u w/ mssgs .... there is no in between and i'm srry ! also, i have discord so if anyone wants to plot or chat on there .... BTSLetMeKnow.mp3 ..... anyway, i've been highkey in love with harry styles for like six years and i'm also very into anime and even more into kpop ! talk 2 me abt bts ? pls.

to learn all about the muse i'll be playing ( i won't promise this intro is any good .... but when have i ever been good @ intros fhsidguh ), pls continue under the cut !

Is that [ HARRY STYLES ]? Nope, that’s [ DACEY WARD ], the [ TWENTY-THREE ] year old human who is [ A PART OF ] the resistance. [ HE ] works as a [ REVEREND ]. People say that [ HE ] is pretty [ + MAGNANIMOUS ] but can be [ - BROODING ]. ( kit / them/they / mdt )

so ! joining this rp is a pretty Big Deal for me bc i get to play ward in a universe where he makes absolute sense. also for the first time. thank u. although the plot has made things challenging in regards to his beliefs, it's honestly so fresh and he can brood Even More ? thank u. anyway .... i'm kinda just jumping into this without a specific format in mind .... just hope i find it along the way ! n hope i don't make it all confusing fhiusdhfg whatever happens after ur finished reading this .... my ims r open and i am up 4 explaining anything necessary to make a plot/connection w/ our charas.

HIS PAST ///

ward was born on feb 1st, 1994 ( yes this is harry's exact birthday fsdghuih thEY'RE BOTH AQUARIUS ?? MIGHT AS WELL )

two hours after his birth, he was handed to an endless system of foster care , being removed from foster home to foster home and waiting to be processed into a new , unknown family . as his age increased , his chances of adoption decreased , and by the age of twelve he convinced himself into forgetting about the idea of having parents , and siblings , and a house where he didn't feel like a stranger .

coincidentally , the year after that he was placed into a long-term home , with a family of three other foster kids and a couple in their forties who had children that had already married and moved away - they needed the money , but that didn't mean they treated ward and the other children like emotionally neglected pets .

these foster parents taught him the word of the lord . ward had grown up around so many people , each with different opinions and views towards angels , that he hadn't formed an opinion of his own . he just felt pain from the suffering of others , and that was enough to breed hesitance when agreeing to the way angels were captured and held against their will . in one occasion , when he was twelve and hadn't been moved to his long-term home , he shared his views about disliking the way angels were treated ( because in the words of a twelve year old: "it's not their fault they were born that way" ) , and his foster dad at that time ( who had been sharing his own opinions regarding angels which entirely contradicted ward's feelings ) beat him with a broom stick to ' knock some sense into him ' . this is what resulted in ward being moved out of that home .

he quickly learned that his new foster parents would never do something like that , though . a huge part of him was relieved to learn that they were part of the resistance although he didn't know what it was at that time .

he didn't share their beliefs right away , though ... it was one thing to be glad about not being beat with a broom because he disliked the way angels were treated , and another thing to accept god into his life . so he didn't , for years .

as far as he was aware , god was gone . this is what they taught in history classes . he knew that there were groups of people which still believed that god would come back , but there was never much room for thought about them .

instead , he became an unruly teenager with massive abandonment issues . in his own quiet way he would be defiant of authority and his foster parents , thinking he owed nothing to the world because nothing owned him . nothing really owned him . not like a parent would . nothing like a real parent .

in his rebellious years , ward experienced a taste of utterly wild youth , until the cancer was detected . he didn't tell anyone about the pain because a part of him wanted it to be a sickness . a part of him wanted to die . a part of him wanted to see what else there was , or wasn't . a part of him always felt like it was living in darkness , anyway .

he was rushed to the hospital after collapsing down the flight of stairs in his house , effectively fracturing a wrist along the way . after hours of waiting for test results , the news was broken that he had bone cancer in his lower right leg -- right below his kneecap . in the end ward didn't know what to do with the information . he was both terrified and trying to convince himself that it's what he wanted . he was eighteen , about to turn nineteen .

his foster parents offered the support they could . it wasn't their obligation to pay for ward's hospital bills , or to make sure he was receiving the right treatment , or to make sure he was fine at all , but they took a bit of the burden upon themselves and tried their best to give him mental and emotional support by using the lord's word .

it was determined that he'd receive almost immediate surgery to remove the cancer before it spread any further -- and through this process ward thought he reached the lowest low with his mental health , but he hadn't been told the surgery had failed yet . that came months after .

the pain subsided for a while , just for a few months , and then it grew unexpectedly . on his next long stay at the hospital , he was scheduled for an amputation . this was both a period of a total darkness and the appearance of a blazing light . it was when he lost a part of his body but gained a powerful part of his soul when he opened his heart to god .

after his surgery , ward began recovery and got fitted with an artificial leg . it felt like a beginning , more than anything . in a way he felt like accepting god into his life was almost like being reborn , and he had to learn to walk again .

when he left the hospital , his entire focus went to studying the word of the lord . his faith grew everyday , praying to god and having the hope that he was listening , praying for his return -- learning what true desire meant .

his plans to fuck pursuing an education were replaced by the drive to get into a college and major in bible studies . he had the support from his denominational committee to become a reverend for the church he had been occasionally attending during his long term stay at his foster home to indulge his foster parents , but more recently visited several times a week to pray and attend sermons .

the church was about to close its doors due to the pastor falling ill and unable to tend to it -- there weren't many believers who could fill up the spot , and the church did close for three years while ward studied and did all of the requirements , until a new pastor had it reopened at the nick of time for ward , who right after started working there as a reverend under the guidance of his new pastor .

nowadays you can find him in the church , giving studies on the different teachings of the bible and occasionally given the opportunity to deliver sunday sermons .

HIS BELIEFS //

i wanted to include a section for his beliefs since they are a massive part of his life !!

ward has faith that god did not forsake the angels , or humans , and that he will come back . he prays everyday for his return , having the faith that he is listening .

he tries not to question god for the things that have happened , but sometimes he gets a desperate feeling in his chest that has him crying out ' why ? ' . the angels .... rlly haunt him . he prays a ton for them , but he also can't help but wonder why they fell ... why god left . why would he allow the angels to suffer as much as they have ? as much as they are suffering

it ... really fucks him up so bad . he often has breakdowns about it . there are two opposite sides playing tug of war inside of him -- one of them is the one that's winning most of the time , the one that doesn't dare question god , and the other side is one who only has small victories but tugs with the force of tidal waves that literally leave him shaking -- the secret side that contemplates whether god is good .

it burns him a li ve haha a

although that secret side of him exists , it's something he also prays about . he doesn't want to question god , or have his faith waver , but goddamn ... it's tough when he sees all of the shit the angels are put through ... it really hurts his heart so much .

that being said , he is not hostile at all toward angels . or thinks he is above them in any way form or shape . he actually worships angels , and hopes for their safety above all else . that is why he is a part of the resistance and would not hesitate to help an angel , in whatever form . he believes they are god's perfect creations that have been tainted by human sins .

regarding other aspects of his life, though: ward repents for allowing god into his life only until he needed it and not when he was at his doorstep . he repents for all of the sins he's committed in the past and for the sins he continues to commit . he no longer drinks , smokes , or parties . he also doesn't get tattoos anymore unless they're connected to god or religion , and even then , he has only gotten a small tattoos of crosses on his chest and another cross on his right hand .

HIS PERSONALITY/SMALL FACTS ///

although ward is welcoming of other people and relationships , especially in a church setting ... he can also be hesitant . he will give advice and try to guide anyone who seeks his help with the word of god , and he will listen to people's troubles and be with them in times of need ... but he doesn't do this himself . he keeps it all pent inside and really only speaks to god about what's going on inside of him .

he has a very long past of abandonment and trust issues that it's almost like an instinct to close himself away but he's trying to heal those parts of himself . just needs some time and all the faith he can have !

with that being said , if you meet him outside of the church , he can come off as very withdrawn , especially in a mundane setting . he tends to be soft spoken and serious , though he's also got some wild in him that loves to laugh and have a good time . you just kinda have to figure out how to get to it .

it's not really easy getting to know him . he's very private about his personal life and it's very rare when he opens up about something personal , unless he's talking to his pastor .

he doesn't really talk about his experience with cancer either . it was a really tough time in his life that he hasn't healed from and part of him probably never will . the only times when he openly talks about it is when he's retelling his experience of how he let god into his life .

also ! he uses a wooden cane . at first he needed it during his recovery , because it made standing up so much easier and he didn't have to lean on people or tables or chairs . then, he decided to keep the cane with him at all times after one occasion in which he supported himself on a glass table as he stood up and the glass broke and fell on his foot ........ but thank god it fell on his prosthetic foot because that would've hurt like a bitch .

so now his cane is like .... an extension of himself . kind of like how people can't leave their house without their phones , except more important to him .

he also never mentions it unless someone asks why he uses it . he'll just say he has some leg problems , and if they continue to ask , he'll wonder why they're being nosy and reluctantly say he's got a prosthetic leg . talking to people about it or easily saying he has a prosthetic leg just doesn't come to him .

going into a new topic, ward doesn't really have a sexual preference , and he doesn't have many sexual tendencies . or romantic ones . he's very unconcerned about a love life in general right now . the closest he gets to experiencing romantic love is when he's performing a wedding ceremony . he has dated in the past though , especially during his teenage years , but he hasn't been in a relationship for a few years now .

he doesn't tend to go by dacey . there's no real reason why ... he was just called ward as a child by teachers and some foster parents so it stuck around . he introduces himself as ward but doesn't really mind being called dacey ... just throws him off a bit at first , he's not used to it .

so ! i think i'm gonna leave it off there !! this entire post was pure word vomit fhiusdhf but if you have any plots/connections in mind don't hesitate to hmu , i'll be very excited about them . i'm sorry for the massive mess this was fhdsui but i'm rlly excited to get rolling !! see u on the dash/ims my friens

#winged:ooc #⦁ — › OwO ᴡʜᴀᴛ's ᴛʜɪs? — ⌜ ᴏᴏᴄ ⌟#( iTS HERE !! )#( honestly ... u dont have 2 read fhsidghu )#( im gonna jump on the starter tag probably !! )

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EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE Tech’s Damaging Myth of the Loner Genius Nerd Claire Cain Miller @clairecm AUG. 12, 2017 Continue reading the main storyShare This Page Share Tweet Email More Save 155 Photo Credit Abbey Lossing The Google engineer who was fired last week over his memo wrote that most women were biologically unsuited to working in tech because they were more focused on “feelings and aesthetics than ideas” and had “a stronger interest in people rather than things.” Many scientists have said he got the biology wrong. But the job requirements of today’s programmers show he was also wrong about working in tech. In fact, interpersonal skills like collaboration, communication, empathy and emotional intelligence are essential to the job. The myth that programming is done by loner men who think only rationally and communicate only with their computers harms the tech industry in ways that cut straight to the bottom line. The loner stereotype can deter talented people from the industry — not just women, but anyone who thinks that sounds like an unattractive job description. It can also result in dysfunctional teams and poorly performing products. Empathy, after all, is crucial to understanding consumers’ desires, and its absence leads to product mistakes. Take digital assistants, like Google Home or Amazon Echo. Their programmers need to be able to imagine a huge variety of home situations, whether households with roommates or abusive spouses or children — as made clear when a child ordered a $160 dollhouse and four pounds of sugar cookies on the Echo. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story “Basically every step is very collaborative,” said Tracy Chou, who was an engineer at Pinterest and Quora and is now working on start-ups. “Building a big software system, you could have dozens or hundreds or thousands of engineers working on the same code base, and everything still has to work together.” She added, “But not everyone is the same, and that’s where empathy and broader diversity really help.” The memo distinguished between empathizing with other people’s feelings and analyzing and constructing systems, and said coding is about the latter. But it requires both, as do most of the jobs that are growing in number and in wages, according to economic research. Jobs that require a combination of math and social skills — like computer science, financial management and nursing — have fared best in the modern economy, found David Deming, a professor at Harvard. It’s true that programming can be a solitary activity in college computer science classes or entry-level positions. But soon after, it’s impossible to avoid teamwork — with the business or legal departments, but also with other engineers. There’s a joke in computer science that one of the hardest tasks is naming things in code. It’s funny because it’s a nontechnical task. But it involves something that can be even harder than technical work: communicating with other people and intuiting what they might need and understand. Computer programming was originally considered a woman’s job. They were programmers of the Eniac during World War II and at NASA, as shown in the film “Hidden Figures.” That began to change when programming professionalized in the 1960s. The stereotype of an eccentric genius who would rather work with machines than people was born, according to Nathan Ensmenger, a historian at Indiana University who studies the cultural history of the software industry. Yet that was never an accurate description of the job. It was social from the beginning, in university computer labs and, later, Silicon Valley garages, he said. The social circle just didn’t include women. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story “For a lot of these young men, a certain computer culture becomes an expression of masculinity,” he said. “These are people who aren’t doing physical labor, aren’t playing professional sports. But they can express their masculinity by intense competition, playing pranks on one another, demonstrating their technical prowess, in ways that don’t translate well to mixed-gender environments.” The mythology of the antisocial programmer is self-perpetuating, said Yonatan Zunger, a senior engineering leader at Google until this month, when he joined Humu, a start-up. Early on, children who are less comfortable with social interaction — particularly boys, who are more likely to be socialized that way — are channeled toward science and engineering, he said. Teachers generally focus on the technical aspects and not the interpersonal ones. The result is a field filled with people who dislike social interactions and have been rewarded for it. Silicon Valley culture encourages it. Google calls engineers who aren’t managers “individual contributors.” Technical skills are valued above soft skills or business skills. “Anyone who deals with a human being is considered less intelligent,” said Ellen Ullman, a software programmer and author of a new book, “Life in Code.” “You would think it would be the other way around, but the more your work is just talking to the machine, the more valuable it is.” Photo Google Glass, worn in 2013 by Sergey Brin of Google, was a technical feat but landed flat with consumers. Credit Robert Galbraith/Reuters One example is the distinction between front-end engineers, who build the parts of a product that users interact with, and back-end engineers, who work on behind-the-scenes systems, like data storage or scaling. There is a bias that front-end engineering, which generally pays less and has more women, is less technically difficult. People who have done both say the skills are different, but equally challenging and valuable. Problems arise when engineers get to a point in their careers when they’re required to demonstrate social skills, Mr. Zunger said, like understanding diverse points of view, building consensus and reading people’s subtle cues. “Suddenly they’re told that these skills that are their weak point might be really important,” he said. “Their own value is in question.” In the tech industry, the lack of interpersonal skills has become a weakness and a liability. Edmond Lau runs an engineering coaching business with many clients like Google and Facebook called The Effective Engineer. His work can sound like touchy-feely therapy sessions. Newsletter Sign UpContinue reading the main story The Upshot Get the best of The Upshot’s news, analysis and graphics about politics, policy and everyday life. Sign Up You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. SEE SAMPLE MANAGE EMAIL PREFERENCES PRIVACY POLICY OPT OUT OR CONTACT US ANYTIME For example, he said, a senior engineer spots a bug and fixes the code, trying to be helpful. But the person who wrote it thinks the person overstepped onto his territory, or was sending a passive-aggressive message. At Quip, a workplace productivity company where Mr. Lau is an engineering leader, he leads circles in which engineers talk about how to work together or ask for help. “You might have ideas in your head, but unless you communicate them, no one’s going to understand,” he said. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story Technical skills without empathy have resulted in products that have bombed in the market, because a vital step to building a product is the ability to imagine how someone else might think and feel. “The failure rate in software development is enormous, but it almost never means the code doesn’t work,” Mr. Ensmenger said. “It doesn’t solve the problem that actually exists, or it imagines a user completely different from actual users.” With Google Glass, for example, it was a technical feat to make a tiny computer you could wear as a pair of glasses. But the product wasn’t one that typical people needed, or wanted. When Apple introduced its Health app, it tracked sleep, exercise, food, medications and heart rate, but not menstrual cycle. Yet period trackers are one of the most used health tools for women. (The app now includes it.) Google Plus, the company’s social network, initially required that users make public their name, photo and gender. There was a technical argument for including gender — to construct sentences like “She shared a photo with you” — but it also exposed women to online harassment. “The team that made this decision was entirely male,” said Mr. Zunger, who was the chief architect of social networking at Google at the time. “It was a really clear case of getting things wrong, for the simple reason that the people in the room weren’t diverse enough to notice an obvious problem.” Less visible, but highly influential, are the judgments that go into building algorithms that determine the news you read, the loans you get or the people you date. Facebook has been criticized for showing people only news stories that align with their political views, for example. Research has found that ads for arrest records are more likely to show up on searches for black fraternities. Empathy also affects which products are built in the first place — why, for example, Silicon Valley has spent more time building apps for expensive food delivery than for decreasing hunger. Some people in the industry say computer science students would benefit from more liberal arts courses. “We need future adults to be able to discern what it makes sense for machines to make decisions about, and is the code base fair and equal, and do they have a basis to even judge that,” said Amy Webb, founder of the Future Today Institute, a technology forecasting firm. “There’s no cool technology toy that teaches that there are different religions around the world and it’s O.K. to be tolerant.” ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story When engineers build products with empathy, it can seem like magic: Technology seems to predict what people want before they know they want it. That was part of Steve Jobs’s genius. Just look at the number of people connected to their phones, or a child using an iPhone for the first time. One way to develop empathy at companies is by hiring diverse teams, because people bring different perspectives and life experiences. But the more widespread the stereotypes like those in the Google memo, the harder it becomes. When people hear negative stereotypes about the skills of a group to which they belong, they are less likely to pursue those skills, according to a variety of research. In a study by Shelley Correll, a sociologist at Stanford, when participants were told that men had a higher ability to complete a task, women said they were less competent at the task and less likely to enter a field that required it. When they were told that men and women were equally good at it, those differences disappeared. “That nerd identity is really damaging to women,” Mr. Ensmenger said, “but it’s also damaging to minorities and to a lot of men who don’t want to subsume their identity in that.” That’s why the consequences of the Google memo could reach far beyond the particular case, influencing which young people choose to go into technology, and which products they make that affect every aspect of our lives.

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