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#i try to only watch the positive book recommendation videos
kairologia · 9 days
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How to start your day according to your rising sign.
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Your ascendant/first house represents the sign that was rising above the eastern horizon on the moment of your birth. However, within a broader cosmological framework, where houses each represent a different time of the day according to where the sun is, the First House represents the time of the day where the sun had just risen above the horizon. After a bit of experimenting, I have come to the conclusion that the best way to start your day is to align your early morning activities with those associated with your rising sign’s ruling planet. Here I explain how.
· Aries rising: start your day with a stimulating activity, something that gets you fired up and ready to engage with the day ahead. A workout session, a morning run, some stretching, or something as simple as a walk under the sun. Either way, you’d better get moving as soon as you get out of bed. Avoid getting your most challenging tasks of the day done as early as you wake up — rather, start with the simplest tasks and work your way up as a form of motivation.
· Taurus rising: take as much time as you need to get up. You have your entire day ahead of you, so make sure your morning remains a leisurely time — though I advise you to write a list of tasks down to make sure you have a roadmap of your day planned ahead. No matter how busy things get, make sure you at least start your day with a generous breakfast while enjoying your surroundings by eating in a balcony or somewhere you feel cozied up and relaxed. Investing in a morning skin care routine that works for you can only prove to be beneficial.
· Gemini rising: immediately engage in some mental stimulation. read a few chapters of a book, listen to a podcast, read some news, watch a video. Hell, even scrolling through social media wouldn’t hurt. Give your brain some much needed dopamine shots to get it going. If you’re learning a new language, try to memorize a couple words every morning. If you’re a student, try to study a bit right after waking up. If you have some manual tasks planned, get them done first thing in the morning.
· Cancer rising: schedule your morning routine around moon phases & transits. There are certain lunar transits (cardinal signs) or phases (new moon) where I would recommend starting your day with a workout and energy demanding activities, whereas on other transits (fixed signs) or phases (full moon), I would recommend taking things one step at a time, waking up gently, having a warm cup of your favourite drink, taking a bath, cooking, doing some gardening, and enjoying a relaxing morning before starting your day.
· Leo rising: Make sure that each morning is «you» time and let nothing get in the way of that. Soak up some sun light, start your day with positive affirmations, do 10 minutes of dancing, listen to music, meditate, draw a bit. Get yourself in the mood where you feel most confident and yourself, as there’s one watching you — you’re performing for no one but yourself. Self-care can mean many things and you need to find the form that works best for you. If you enjoy doing make up, do a creative look. If you like reading, read. You can even adapt your morning routine according to the sun’s transits.
· Virgo rising: it goes without saying that starting off your day with some journaling, list making, intention setting, tidying your place up and task planning can prove to be globally beneficial for everyone, but even more so for Virgo risings. You need as much mental stimulation as Gemini risings, if only with some added structure to it. Put yourself in the right mood where you can be productive instantly, get your tasks done starting with the most difficult ones so you'll have the rest of entire day for yourself, and remember to take breaks. It’s still early in the morning, after all!
· Libra rising: your mornings set the tone for the rest of your day — so make sure your day starts off on a harmonious note. Create a classical music playlist & play it every morning, have a nice breakfast – a nice drink and your favourite treat, do some pilates, read a couple page of a book you love, set your intentions for the day, do some bird watching, take a walk in a nearby green space or riverside and enjoy the aesthetics of nature & the scenery, choose an elegant outfit and pair it up with some jewelry & a nice perfume. Harmony is a balanced act that can easily be disturbed so make sure you keep your mornings free of external disturbances.
· Scorpio rising: you will benefit from starting your day gradually, & at a very measured pace. Try to weed out the eventuality that unexpected disruptions may arise (as that might disturb your inner balance & emotional state) by establishing firm boundaries and prioritizing activities that bring you joy & contentment. Any activities that promote focus, introspection, and empowerment would be great — namely journaling, meditation, deep breathing exercises to center yourself, or a 30 minutes workout session. If you enjoy writing, write down your feelings in the form of prose or poetry. Lists will also help you stay structured throughout the day & ensure you won’t spend it entirely inside your head.
· Sagittarius rising: start your day by doing some manifestation. Pick a method you prefer, and make sure you spend at least 5 minutes manifesting and setting intentions for the day ahead, as well as some long-term goal you’re working on. If you’re into philosophy, read a few pages of a philosophical book of your choice first thing in the morning. If you enjoy language learning, spend ~30 minutes learning new notions teaching yourself a full lesson. Drawing or making a moodboard can also help you manifest for the day. A morning walk where you take in your surroundings will also help you get into the right mood.
· Capricorn rising: buy a planner, and start your mornings by writing down your to-do list. Make sure you also have a couple pages dedicated to short term projects, and long term projects — try and check out a case from either every so often, every morning. Doing so will fill your mornings with intention as you will feel like you did something great for yourself (and you did indeed). And as is the case with every other cardinal signs — include a physical activity into your mornings. A 15 minutes run, a 30 minutes walk — whatever you deem best.
· Aquarius rising: write down your dreams & ideas fresh out of bed. Your mind comes up with the best scenarios & concepts early in the morning, so write them down — you never know, maybe one day you’ll find the resources, energy or will to expand on one of them. I have noticed that Aquarius risings come in two fixed archetypes, the type that enjoys socializing fresh out of bed and the type that needs 3 business hours before being able to utter a single word to others – so my advice is simple: if you’re the former: start your day with some socialization, text your friends, post on social media, and if you’re the latter: put your headphones on, read something (anything) and block out any and all external noise.
· Pisces rising: the transition from the realm of dreams to the waking world is a tougher challenge to you than most, so try to start your day slowly and gently. No abrupt and aggressive tasks, no strong drinks, no heavy food. Pressure is of 0 benefit to you so do not put yourself in your “awake” mode until you’re about to go outside. If you’re working on an art piece, draw some of it right now. If you’re writing a book, write down a couple lines as soon as you leave bed as your dreams might provide some extra insights & creativity you wouldn't be able to conjure up while awake. If you have plants, water them. If you have a balcony or garden, spend some time there just sitting & doing absolutely nothing.
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If you’d like a reading, more details can be found here!
Have a nice day!
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oceane4loveu · 5 months
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☾𝕄𝕆𝕆ℕ𝕃𝕀𝔾ℍ𝕋 BEAUTY ☾: 1 week to glow up
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I really need a quick and simple glow up because I'm starting my job soon so I created a program to glow up in 1 week and really get to know myself and improve myself physically and mentally. You can do this program in 2 weeks or more if you want.
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day 1: lunar preparation
★shadow work: It’s time to work on yourself, answer their questions to get to know yourself better.
1. What did my childhood need most?
2. What am I avoiding?
3. What am I addicted to?
4. What secrets am I hiding and why?
5. Am I honest with myself and others?
6. What are my biggest misconceptions about myself?
7. What are my biggest fears?
8. What should I give up?
9. Am I a victim of trauma? Have I done enough to heal?
10. What do I need to forgive myself for?
11. What lessons do I still need to learn?
12. What do I want most in this life?
13. What are the first signs you notice and know that your mental health is deteriorating?
14. Do I try to hide parts of myself from others? Why ?
15. What was I like when I was a child?
16. What's the worst way someone could describe you?
★moodboard: makes a Moodboard that reflects your aspirations and your inspirations that you can look at every morning; you can put it as a wallpaper or hang it on the wall.
★ Do a major cleaning: tidy your room, delete numbers, sort through your phone, sort through your series and films, social media and my playlist, cut off toxic people.
★make a list of all your goals, choose 4 big goals in your life and separate them into smaller goals to make them easier to achieve.
★create a morning and night routine: you can copy that of someone who inspires you or simply create your own.
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★do 1 hour of sport per day
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day2:inner radiance
★ start Journaling: write down your thoughts, your emotions, your thoughts for the day and also positive affirmations.
★make a list of things you like about yourself
★become softer:
1. When someone calls you, first turn to the person and smile: This helps you to be gentler and more polite towards the person you are talking to and after smiling it gives you the opportunity to speak in a kinder tone.
2. think before you speak: this is very important when learning to speak softer because it gives you time to pay attention to the tone of your voice and also be careful with the things you say.
3. Avoid yelling at others out of frustration: Yelling is the most important thing you should avoid when trying to speak softer. When you're frustrated or going through a tough time, try doing something you enjoy to calm yourself down like music, drawing, etc. instead of taking it out on others. if someone tries to make you angry, politely tell them to stop and don't let your anger control you.
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day3:educational brilliance
-listen to a podcast: I only listen to podcasts in French but if you don't like listening to podcasts you can watch videos from tam kaur, thewizardliz, simonesquared and more
-read a book: I recommend atomic habit, ikigai, the why cafe, the other books that I read are in French.
-learn a new language: on YouTube there are plenty of videos that you can find on the language of your choice.
-learn another skill: I chose to improve my computer skills but you can choose any skill it can be drawing, cooking whatever you want.
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day4:celestial radiance
-work on self-love
-work on self-esteem
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* ੈ✩‧₊˚day5:lunar dream
-spa day at home
-meditation
-listen to your favorite music
-watch your favorite series or films
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day6: lunar flight
-find your ikigai: that is to say your reason for being, explore your passions, your values ​​and your talents to really find what motivates you here is an example:
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-Black Swan mindset: the Black Swan mindset is about knowing your value and not letting others tell you your value, it is a mindset of trust and knowledge of your value.
* ੈ✩‧₊˚day7:moonlight beauty
become more feminine
1-have good posture: gives you more elegance, you seem taller and more confident.
2-smell good have a characteristic scent: could remind someone of you, smell good shows that you care about your hygiene.
3-Getting Your Nails Done: Getting your nails done could make you look confident and well-groomed.
4-style your hair: hair is a key point of your appearance and a good hairstyle could automatically make you even more beautiful.
5-wear jewelry: simple jewelry can enhance your outfit a lot and bring out your features.
things to do every day
☆ Workout
☆ Learn a new skill
☆ Listen to subliminals
☆ Meditate
☆ Read a book
☆ Do Journaling
☆ Listen to Podcasts
I'm going to start tomorrow and to stay organized and always have an idea of ​​what I have to do I created a simple Notion if you want it's right here જ⁀➴
𝕄𝕆𝕆ℕ𝕃𝕀𝔾ℍ𝕋 BEAUTY
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hunkybeans · 5 months
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I want to have this exchange I had on youtube on here as well.
The video is OSP's Trope Talk: Personifying Death
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx4ByQpIMBE
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Transcribed:
ME:
Reaper Man goes so unbelievably hard. “No one is finally dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away, until the clock wound up winds down, until the wine she made has finished its ferment, until the crop they planted is harvested. The span of someone’s life is only the core of their actual existence.” Big recommend for discworld to anyone, thank you Red for promoting it.
OTHER PERSON:
I'm sorry for this comment in advance, I've been having a bit of a death related spiral recently and am trying to talk myself out of it, but most people that have ever lived are still finally dead. Everyone who knew them is also dead. They probably haven't made art or music that is remembered to this day. The ripples of most peoples lives will still die away within the next few generations after their death, right?
ME:
Here's how I like to think of it.
Most people who have ever lived are forgotten. The goal of life isn't to be remembered by the world. You need to live for yourself first. What "living for yourself" means is different for each person. Some want to build a legacy and be remembered by the world, but that isn't the default purpose of your life. You get to decide what you want to be about. Almost always, people want to be loved by those around them. To have a positive impact on their friends and family.
The purpose of the Terry Pratchett quote isn't to compel you to try to be remembered by the world at large. It's not telling everyone to try to become the next Shakespeare or the next Casesar. It's condolence for people who are grieving the loss of loved ones. So long as you remember them, the advice they gave, the comfort they provided, the love they had for you, they are still with you. In spirit, they live on with you, because you remember them. You can continue to draw on their love even if they're dead, so long as they are remembered. You will die some day too, but you will be remembered by the people you affected, and in them you will live on. Eventually you will be forgotten, but the goal isn't to evade death by being remembered forever by the world at large. The world needs more mothers and brothers than it needs playwrights and generals.
This Pratchett quote comes from Reaper Man (spoiler ahead), a book in which Death is fired from his job. He becomes mortal, and takes a job working as the only other farmhand on an old widow's farm. Over the course of their interactions Death gains a new appreciation for life and the time mortals have to spend, and ends up sacrificing his remaining lifespan to save a young girl's life. The Widow and her farmhand both ultimately die at the end of the book, but they comfort each other and change each other with the time they get to spend together.
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thebettybook · 11 months
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🎀 Cosplaying with Leona 🎀
🌸: My entry for the @briarvalleyarchives “New Beginnings” spring event
🌸: During this spring season, with new beginnings blooming left and right, Leona learns about and enters the wonderful world of cosplay with his gn!reader S/O who is a cosplayer
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🍓 Characters: Leona Kingscholar x gn!reader who is a cosplayer. Leona and gn!reader are in an established romantic relationship. Other characters mentioned are Cheka Kingscholar, Idia Shroud, and Ortho Shroud.
🍓 Note: This headcanons + drabble post came to life because hi, I’m a cosplayer outside of Tumblr and if I was dating Leona irl, I would absolutely make him do couple cosplays with me >:)
🍓 Song rec I highly recommend: “SHOCK!” by Ayase
🍓 Other notes: Text borders used from the website Cute Kaomoji
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𓈒𓈊 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊𓈒
🌸 The first time Leona saw you in cosplay, he did a double take. He’s not one to be surprised easily, but for a second, he thought that a whole new and random person broke into Ramshackle (that’s how good your cosplays are ;)).
🌸 He’s not into animes, Webtoons/webcomics, books, or any fandoms really. The only “fandoms” Leona’s even remotely a part of are those of Pro Magift teams, so he’s not familiar with cosplay. You have to explain to him all the cosplay terms, like “cosplan” (your future cosplay plans/projects), “costest” (testing out a cosplay), or even “con-crunching” (putting together your cosplay near the date of/or even the night before the convention).
🌸 Leona’s also not one to care about clothes much in general, but he knows the time and dedication you put into your cosplays…from the hours you spend putting together your cosplay to angling your phone camera just right when you film your cosplay videos.
🌸 If you’re trying to film a video in cosplay for TwstTok or Magicam either in your room in Ramshackle or Leona’s room in Savanaclaw (Leona’s room has better lighting tbh), Leona’s just laying on the bed on his stomach with his cheek resting in his palm as he gazes at you the entire time with a smirk.
🌸 He kept showering you with a ton of one-worded compliments such as “Breathtaking,” and positively relished seeing you break character while filming as a flustered expression creeped up onto your face at his compliments.
🌸 “Leona, can you please go outside for a few minutes?” you mumbled, your cheeks warming.
🌸 “I don’t wanna miss a second of your creative process,” Leona winked, to which you responded with a loving eye roll. He’s so down bad for you. Whenever you post your cosplay videos, he watches all your videos, likes them, and saves them on his private, never-active TwstTok account.
🌸 When you feel more comfortable with filming cosplay videos or doing self-photoshoots in cosplay around Leona, he becomes your cosplay partner-in-crime.
🌸 For example, fixing cosplay wigs are a pain and for a while, you didn’t have a wig mannequin (they’re expensive and Sage Island isn’t the best place geographically to receive online packages via shipping). Thus, you had the brilliant idea of using Leona as your wig model (even though his head shape and your head shape are completely different). He found cosplay wigs weird at first, until you asked him to try on one of your long and fluffy wigs, and the soft material of the wig made him fall in love with cosplay wigs right then and there.
🌸 “Just gimme a few minutes, herbivore,” Leona patted your cosplay wig on his head and laid down on his bed, out like a light and sleeping with his hands folded together on his stomach like a storybook princess. The flowy and wavy strands of your long wig fanned out around his shoulders and arms, and for a second, Leona really did look like one of those storybook princess cursed into eternal slumber. You couldn’t help but laugh, leaning down to kiss him on the forehead.
🌸 Cheka, on the other hand, likes to use your cosplay wigs as disguises of sorts whenever the cub plays hide-and-seek with Leona.
🌸 Your and Cheka’s giggles filled Leona’s room as Leona turned around from facing the stone wall after counting to ten with one hand over his eyes. “Sigh…ready or not, here I come,” Leona indulged his five-year-old nephew in a game of hide-and-seek.
🌸 It didn’t take long for Leona to spot Cheka crouching down next to his bedside table. The cub took one of your long cosplay wigs earlier and wore it; the wig comically and practically covered the cub from head-to-toe. You tried your best to stifle your laughter as you sat on the right side of Leona’s bed, sewing a button onto your cosplay.
🌸 “Gee, I wonder where the furball could be,” sarcasm oozed from Leona’s voice as he sauntered over to his study desk just a few feet away from his bed. “Is he over…here?” Leona clicked his tongue and made a show of ducking under the desk to check.
🌸 Cheka’s adorable laughter grew in volume, to which Leona turned towards you. Leona winked at you, lifting a finger to his lips, before walking over to you. “I just can’t seem to find my beloved nephew anywhere,” Leona sighed. He perched at the edge of his bed, making sure he didn’t sit on your cosplay. “Where could he be? Got any ideas, herbivore?”
🌸 “Beats me,” you hummed, looping thread through the button’s hole. You and Leona were planning to attend a spring anime convention in Sage Island the next day (your first anime convention in Twisted Wonderland and with Leona), so you were officially “con-crunching.”
🌸 “Hm…” Leona rose from the bed and made his way over to Cheka. “What’s this? A furball?” Leona leaned down and scooped Cheka up in his arms.
🌸 “Oji-tan, you found me!” Cheka squealed, your wig almost falling off the cub as Cheka moved the strands of your wig away from his tiny face to look at Leona.
🌸 “Uh-huh, now it’s time for your nap,” Leona gently took your wig off of Cheka’s head. As if on cue, the cub let out a cute yawn and closed his eyes. After tucking Cheka in on the left side of his bed where your cosplay materials were well out of Cheka’s reach, Leona went over to you and gave you back your cosplay wig.
🌸 “We should do a family cosplay with Cheka someday,” you shot a soft smile at Leona. Leona went over to his study desk and plopped down onto the wooden chair in front of it. He sat backwards so that he faced you.
🌸 “Yeah,” Leona hummed, watching you secure the button in place on your cosplay. For the rest of that spring afternoon, you continued to work on your cosplay while Leona helped by handing you more thread, scissors, glue, etc. as Cheka napped.
🌸 The next day, you and Leona attended the “con” (short for “convention”). The two of you were decked out in a couple cosplay (you as a plumber and Leona as a princess from a popular video game). Even though it was barely noon, Leona was already annoyed by the con attendees who pushed past him or almost stepped on his toes in their cosplay heels and boots. He was intrigued, however, by some cosplayers’ extravagant props, and he appreciated their craftsmanship.
🌸 Leona’s usually not one to strike up conversations with strangers, but when you complimented fellow cosplayers’ outfits and props, Leona also chimed in with questions on how they made their props (and that just led to the cosplayers’ enthusiastic and lengthy answers about the materials they used and Leona listened with interest the entire time).
🌸 Leona found the Artist Alley and merch booths to be too crowded, and nothing really piqued his interest. Leona bought some prints and keychains of your favorite anime characters and fandoms for you. Artists gave you and Leona a lot of mini freebies like stickers and gushed over “how cute” you and Leona looked together in your couple cosplay (which Leona would respond with a grin and, “You got that right”).
🌸 Leona also couldn’t help but quirk a proud grin when a little kid with cosplayer parents ran up to you and asked you for a picture because you and Leona “looked so cool.” You noticed that Leona posed in-character for the picture with you and the kid, which made you love Leona all the more.
🌸 Leona took a ton of pictures for you at the con, both cool and professional-looking photos of you in cosplay (you taught him how to take better pictures lol) and off-guard derpy photos of you in cosplay when the two of you rested a bit in a tiny corner (Leona grumped about the lack of resting/sitting areas in the venue) after traveling around the convention venue for hours.
🌸 Even though this was his first con, Leona came to the con prepared (“Be prepared” is his motto, after all). Leona had a bag on his shoulder the entire time with your sneakers in it because he knew those uncomfortable shoes you wore with your cosplay would hurt your feet (for Leona, underneath his cosplay, he wore his everyday sneakers). After you changed into your sneakers and the two of you took a water break, the two of you traveled around the con some more.
🌸 The two of you even ran into Idia and Ortho, the former carrying multiple bags of merch (fan art, official merch, body pillows, what have you). You and Leona didn’t chat with the Shroud brothers long, since Idia scurried away to catch a panel hosted by his favorite anime voice actor and Ortho flew after him.
🌸 You and Leona returned to the Artist Alley near closing time, where there were thankfully less people. At a booth that sold more general trinkets than fandom-specific ones, Leona picked up some stuff like a donut keychain for Ruggie and a succulent keychain for Jack, and some other keychains or charms for other members of his dorm. You smiled to yourself; Leona always thought about others even if he wasn’t the best at showing it outright.
🌸 The last booth you and Leona went up to was a booth selling inexpensive rings (both fandom-specific and general rings). You noticed a pair of matching rings with a slim gold band. The rings’ gems were transparent water-drop ovals with teeny dried-up blush, marigold, emerald, and ivory flower petals inside.
🌸 “Leona, what do you think about getting matching rings?” The ring would pair perfectly with your spring outfits, and the dried-up flower petals in the rings’ gems reminded you of one of your and Leona’s favorite places: NRC’s Botanical Garden.
🌸 “Not too shabby,” Leona grinned as he leaned down to look at the rings with you. “Plannin’ on proposing to me already, huh, herbivore?” Leona then made a show of looking at his left hand, which made you laugh. He liked the rings too, and didn’t care that they weren’t made of real gold.
🌸 “Wouldn’t be the first time someone’s proposed to their partner at a con,” The seller, a fae cosplaying a popular blonde spy character from an anime about spies and families, chuckled as they rang up your order.
🌸 Leona thought about the seller’s words as the two of you left the Artist Alley and ultimately the con after you bought the rings. As the two of you made your way through the venue to the exit, Leona thought about how he couldn’t imagine proposing to you or you proposing to him in front of hundreds of people at a con.
🌸 Leona knew himself well, and he knew two things at the moment: 1. He values his privacy and 2. If he was ever going to propose to you, which he planned to do so in the far, far future, it would be a private, intimate, and special moment for just the two of you.
🌸 Leona’s head then filled with thoughts of his proposal to you in the far, far future. He wondered what the two of you would wear during the proposal, whether it would be fancy clothes, pajamas, or even a couple cosplay. The quiet yet gushy smile on his face was apparent as he thought about all this.
🌸 “What’re you smiling about?” You smiled at Leona before unleashing a yawn. After a whole day at the con, you were ready for dinner and rest.
🌸 “Nothin’,” Leona replied with sly nonchalance. “Just that I like the rings you picked out for us.” He held out his right hand, where he wore his new ring on his right pinky.
🌸 You held out your left hand with your new ring on your left pinky before intertwining your left fingers with Leona’s right fingers. “I like them too.” The gems on your and Leona’s rings cast tiny rays of multi-colored light from the dried petals in front of the two of you as the sun began to set and its golden rays made their way through the glass building of the convention venue.
🌸 Hand in hand, you and Leona left your first (and definitely not last) con together.
𓈒𓈊 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊𓈒
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Important:
🍓 I don’t own any of the characters I mention or write about; they belong to their original and respective creators.
🍓 All content on this blog is created by me, @thebettybook (excluding posts I reblog that aren’t my own posts and unless I state otherwise). Do not modify, claim, repost, or translate my work onto this platform and any other platform.
🍓 Reblogs are appreciated :). Want more Leona romance fluff? Check out my masterlist
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bluedalahorse · 2 months
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A highly incomplete introduction to AuDHD for YR fans who want to write more Sara Eriksson
Greetings, friends! In my time in the Young Royals fandom, I’ve seen a few people mention they were interested writing Sara but they didn’t know how to approach her neurodivergence, or that they find it intimidating. I figured it might be worth compiling a post where I share both ADHD and autism resources I’ve found helpful, as well as elements of my personal experience I draw on when writing Sara.
This post is by no means exhaustive, and I could probably say a lot more. But I figured I’d get it out there in case it was helpful to anyone else.
Part One: Resources and Such
Yo Samdy Sam is an AuDHD vlogger who talks about her experiences, and I find her video about how autism and ADHD show up together pretty informative. Since Sara is both it’s good to have a grasp on these nuances! Yo Samdy Sam’s other videos are also ones I’d recommend.
I’m autistic, now what? is also a good channel to check out for someone talking about their day to day experiences of autism. Her videos are a little longer, but she focuses often on how things have changed from her childhood to her adulthood, which can be helpful if you’re thinking about Sara at different ages/writing flashbacks/working on fic set in the future/etc.
Chloe Hayden, who stars in another teen drama called Heartbreak High, is both autistic and ADHD, and very fun and positive. She presents quite differently than Sara does—lots more talking and energy—but I think she’s a good example of every neurodivergent person presenting differently. Also, people should watch Heartbreak High and write me some fic where Sara and Quinni meet because I want it.
How to ADHD is mostly geared toward practical life skills when you’ve got ADHD, but it doesn’t neglect the way those interact with emotional well-being. Sara might try some of these strategies while working on her school work and chores, either because an adult recommended she do so or because it’s part of a system she worked out for herself. Also, the videos are perfectly designed for ADHD brains, and i have acquired many ways to self-accommodate by watching them.
Jessie Gender is autistic and does commentary about lots of nerdy things and trans rights. I really liked her video on The Queen’s Gambit where she talks about autistic girls and sex. If you’re planning to write spicer fic about Sara (which people should write more of imo) then Jessie might be a good resource!
Marieke Nijkamp is a multiply disabled author, and one of her disabilities is autism. I still have to get around to reading her novel length books but her short story “Better For All the World” made me cry and is one of my formative sargust mentor texts. I really recommend it if you can get a hold of the anthology The Radical Element. (Although, heads up, the story deals with the Buck v Bell case of 1927, which is difficult subject matter.)
Disability in Kidlit has some great resources on writing autistic characters from a craft perspective. If you’re going to write specifically from Sara’s point of view, or even if you’re not, it’s worth reading this article about the autistic voice in fiction and this article about humanizing autistic characters. Other articles on the site are also great!
I’m going to talk more about my personal experiences under the cut below…
Part 2: My personal experiences & takeaways
Sooooo if you’ve met one AuDHD person, you’ve met one AuDHD person. I can’t really claim to speak for all AuDHD people, and I’ve only recently gotten my diagnosis anyway. That said, a lot of my own personal experience colors how I write Sara. So in the interest of transparency, I’ve gone ahead and listed some of the things I’ve thought about when I write her.
An important note before I get started—this is not, actually, meta or analysis of the show. I’m not trying to tell you want I “really” think is going on with Sara Eriksson, or what the writers intended, or what the show is saying. You may read her differently, and I’m sure your interpretation is just as informed by your own experiences as mine. So please don’t take this as a criticism if your interpretation is different.
What I am explaining here instead are the ways that my personal experiences as an AuDHD person have influenced my perception of Sara, which in turn translates to how I’ve made sense of her storyline and written her in fanfic. None of these are “excuses,” but they are explorations. You can look at it as me examining my own thinking and writing process. I’m also opening up about some of my experiences and being a little bit vulnerable. If you have questions about any of these things below, or you want to know more for your own fic, you are always welcome to message me. I may not be able to get back to you right away but I can help however I am able. There are also some things I might feel more comfortable discussing in depth one-on-one, so direct messages might be better in that case, too.
Anyway, let’s begin…
Polarized strengths and weaknesses: In my own experience as an AuDHD person there are some pretty dramatic contrasts between what I’m good at and what I suck at. I’m in the 99% percentile in some skills and the 2% percentile in others. This adds up to stuff like, I read the Sherlock Holmes stories for the first time when I was eight and Les Misérables when I was eleven, but I cannot drive a car or learn a choreographed dance no matter how hard I try. This is inexplicable to some people because they’re like, omg but you know all these advanced words! Surely if you can’t drive a car, it’s just because you aren’t trying hard enough! Likewise I think it makes sense to write Sara with a spiky profile of her own, and have characters react to that accordingly.
Perceptions of maturity: AuDHD adults aren’t children. AuDHD teenagers aren’t children either. And yet part of ableism is the infantilization of AuDHD people. I don’t have a lot of huge narrative squicks, but this is one of them, and it’s rooted in frustrations I’ve had over people treating me like I’m still a child. I always write Sara as the age she’s intended to be in the fic. If I see fanfic scenes or headcanon scenarios where someone is treating Sara like she’s five, and that’s spun as positive or never questioned, it can make me really upset and it’s an immediate back button. This is something I would recommend writers be on the lookout for if they’re incorporating Sara into a scene. Maybe this one bullet point is spinning a little far into criticism of other folks, but I think if I could communicate one thing to other people writing Sara, this would be it.
Special interests/hyperfixations: The thing about special interests is that autistic people often turn to them to replenish their energy and get their nervous systems back to a state of equilibrium. (For instance, me writing this post right now about my blorbo Sara Eriksson is me engaging with a special interest to put my nervous system in a state of equilibrium and put energy back in my body.) Sara’s time spent with Rousseau isn’t just wonderful because she loves horses, it’s also something that’s probably helping her recharge after a complicated day of navigating social situations at Hillerska. This is why she panics at the thought of losing Rousseau. Now, there’s still issues here in that Rousseau isn’t actually Sara’s horse. And I do think many teenage and adult autistics with low support needs, like Sara, understand that they can’t engage with their special interests all the time. But in order to write and understand Sara, I have to understand that she’s counting on Rousseau and horses more generally as something that helps her self-regulate and stay grounded. (In Heart and Homeland I also added art as one of her hyperfixations, so she often draws to recharge and make sense of things.)
Alexithymia: Alexithymia is essentially a trait people can have where they struggle to read their own emotions. It’s pretty common in autistic people and other neurodivergent folk; I have a mild version of it. For me, tuning into my emotions is a bit like trying to figure out what song is playing on a staticy radio. I might have to wait and “mess with the dial” a bit before I can fully understand what I’m feeling in a given situation. The question “how are you?” is a bit of a nightmare for me sometimes. Because my alexithymia is mild, I usually can figure out what I’m feeling in time, but I still often need extra effort to discern the nuances. I tend to apply this trait to Sara when I write her, mostly because she seems to need to sit with her feelings to understand how they’re affecting her. This is most evident when she’s trying to figure out if she like-likes August, though it comes out in other ways, too. Sara might just need a lot of time to process her emotions. Even when she’s showing her emotions and in them, they might take a lot of time to leave her system, and she might not catch on to how they’re affecting her right away. In Heart and Homeland, part of the reason Sara keeps a diary in the first place is so she can sort through what she’s feeling.
Heightened empathy: There’s an old stereotype that autistic people don’t have any empathy. This is not true, and some autistics even have an excess of empathy. I would argue that Sara (at least the way I interpret and write her) is one of them. This may seem counterintutive to some, as I have seen people argue that she is insufficiently empathetic to Simon and/or Linda. I see it differently, however. In my own experience, having an excess of empathy doesn’t always mean that I come across as loving and sweet to the people in my life. Sometimes it can make it so you’re so full of feelings toward others that you can’t act. I often function clumsily in conflicts, and feel like I’m caught between different parties, especially if it’s a situation where everyone appears to be hurting. It’s enough to make me shut down and not do anything, or even side with the person who to everyone else is obviously wrong. Especially when I was a teenager, the answer about “who to side with” in a conflict wasn’t always clear to me. For instance, in college, I dated a girl who constantly belittled me and many of my friends, and I let her get away with it because I was sensitive to the ways she was genuinely hurting about life. I am not proud of it now, and I did break up with her eventually and made efforts to patch things up with my friends when I could, but it also took me two and a half years to get there. Thanks to life experience and therapy, I am now better at recognizing red flags and overriding my excess empathy to call people out on their shit when they need it. It took me time, though, and I can’t help reading a lot of that into Sara. In a way, I tend to think her hope that August will own up to his actions is born out of heightened empathy for both August and Simon. She pins her hopes on this solution because, in her mind, it meets Simon’s needs because the person who harmed him has come forward and is willing to be held accountable for his actions and it meets August’s needs because he can find relief in owning up to his shit and stop drowning in regret. Now, yes, Sara is absolutely misleading herself and ignoring crucial details of the situation because she’s in love, and she does misread what Simon actually needs in the situation. This is very typically teenage. At the same time, when I write her in fic, I see this as tied to an excess of empathy, and not a lack of it.
Inertia/Executive Functioning Struggles: Building on what was said above… some AuDHD people (like myself) can really struggle with making a plan and getting started on tasks, and the bigger the task, the bigger the struggle. “Tasks” is a word we usually apply to things like doing laundry, so we tend to think of executive functioning as an unemotional thing, but it can also apply to emotional stuff like, say, having a big conversation that needs to be had or breaking up with someone you know you need to. (Like I said above. Two and a half years with that shitty person in college!) In fact, I would say inertia can even make things harder with social/emotional stuff, because math homework is at least consistently math homework, but social/emotional situations can shift and become more complicated over time. At Hillerska, we see Sara get involved in ever-shifting social politics, and it takes things escalating to the field scene for her to take action at the end of S2. (In a more minor example, Sara taking a while to get ready in the parents’ weekend episode, and Linda rushing her out the door, is a great example of Sara being affected by inertia.)
Menstrual ick: Increasing numbers of studies show that people with uteruses who have ADHD, autism, or both are way more likely to have painful periods and PMDD. This is true for me—one of the biggest signs that my period is coming is that I am absolutely convinced everyone hates me. I don’t know how to apply this to Sara directly, but periods are part of life and if you happen to write about her dealing with menstrual nonsense, this might be something to keep in mind.
Sensory issues: A lot of people are aware of sensory issues for neurodivergents, and every neurodivergent experiences sensory issues differently, and not always in ways that are immediately apparent to neurotypicals. For me, I hate vacuums and car horns and bananas, but for my roommate, she hates any lights on after 7 PM and finds chocolate overwhelming. Sara doesn’t mention any particular sensory issues, but presumably she has some and masks her reactions, so uh… make up the ones that make sense to you, I guess. Or, don’t make them up, but maybe read about a bunch of different people’s experiences of sensory issues and work from there. External stuff like being tired, sick, or being on one’s period can heighten sensory issues, so think about vulnerability factors that might increase them for Sara.
Rejection sensitivity: Many people with ADHD feel rejection or criticism from others with a high level of intensity, even as physical pain. (Fun fact: PMS makes my rejection sensitivity even worse!) I don’t know if we see Sara feeling rejection sensitivity onscreen much in YR, but I can’t help but imagine she’s dealt with it in the past, based on the way she says she sometimes feels like the worst person in the world, when she’s talking to August in 2.3. If Sara’s had therapy (which I assume she’s had in some form because she knows breathing exercises) then maybe this is something she’s worked on coping strategies.
Accommodations in school: I don’t actually know how this works in Sweden specifically or at a school like Hillerska, but I’d love to hear how it works! Someone else should weigh in if they know things. But I would not be surprised if Sara has the legal right to certain accommodations in school such as extended time on tests, guided notes, etc. (Not being Swedish myself, I’m not sure what the equivalent to the Americans With Disabilities Act would be in Sweden.) One thing to note here is that Sara would get to decide herself whether she actually uses her accommodations or not. I would say, based on my observations of teenagers, is that some neurodivergent teenagers tend not to use their accommodations so they can avoid sticking out among their peers. This seems like it might be the case for Sara, since she wants to make friends at Hillerska and not stand out. The other thing she might encounter at Hillerska specifically is teachers who don’t want to meet those accommodations because they’re “old school” and, frankly, ableist. Accommodations are something one should take into account when writing Sara’s academic life, though.
Double empathy problem: This is something that the psych community is talking about more lately, and essentially the idea here is that neurotypicals communicate best with other neurotypicals whereas neurodivergents communicate best with other neurodivergents. That doesn’t mean both groups can’t communicate with one another (and even reducing it to two groups is kind of oversimplifying things, because obviously culture and other things impact communication too) but there are different patterns of communication at work here. In my own life, I vibe well with people whose neurotypes are similar to mine—this is exactly why @coruscantrhapsody and I are such iconic roommates. The Double Empathy Problen is theorized to have played a role in stereotypes about autistic people not having any empathy. (PS: I don’t actually think August has undiagnosed ADHD in canon, at least not according to the writers. Still, I think it would be pretty interesting to write him in fanfiction as someone who has a missed childhood diagnosis given the way he struggles with rejection sensitivity, impulsivity, and emotion regulation, and the way that the adderall addiction could be a form of self-medication that has gone awry. For that reason I think it’d be interesting to see a fic where the sargust relationship is viewed through the lens of the double empathy problem. Obviously not in a way where the ADHD excuses August’s harmful behaviors, but you know. An added layer of delicious nuance. Alternately, I know some folks like to headcanon Wille as autistic. Sara really clicking with autistic!Wille when they finally get a chance to talk is something I’d like to see!)
Neurodivergent community: As far as I can tell, Sara doesn’t really have neurodivergent community. This makes me sad, as someone who strongly benefits from friendships with other neurodivergent people. I would like her to have some in someone’s fic, please! Let me know if you write it.
That’s all for now… maybe I’ll add more in a future post.
For any other AuDHDers, do you have any elements of your personal experience that you incorporate into how you interpret or write Sara’s character? Feel free to reblog and add on, if you feel so inclined. (But also, no pressure.) Like I said, every ND person experiences this stuff differently, so someone else may have completely different experiences than me.
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h0neytalk · 5 months
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Practicing the Arabic Alphabet
I honestly lucked out so much taking Arabic in college and learning basic MSA reading/writing/grammar from an excellent professor but I’m gonna compile the most useful things we did in class here to help people learning on their own (this isn’t focused on resources, just strategies, might do a separate post with worksheets and videos but they’re pretty easy to find):
Get the alphabet in front of you. We had a packet with a page for every letter with the letter written in the three positions, pronunciations, names, and lines to trace and write like 100 times. And then a page with all the diacritics. These sheets abound for free online. Make yourself an alphabet packet. Watch copious videos/listen to recordings going over the letters and how they sound. Repeat it back. Work in chunks and don’t move to the next set until you can recognize and write the current set.
Tracing! Learn to write the letters right to left and with the proper order from day one. This sounds obvious but people in my class were still drawing letters left to right as isolated shapes next to each other so idk maybe it’s not. Having nice handwriting in Arabic is both satisfying and absurdly helpful. Learn how the letters connect. Spend more time than you think is necessary on this.
Write English words and sentences phonetically using diacritics and Arabic letters. Do not worry about translation and spelling. Just make the connection between shape -> sound. Use anything you have. Lists of names, entire pages from books and magazines, texts from friends, menus. Literally anything. Work through how to make those words with the new alphabet. You will learn a surprising amount about the language and pronunciation by doing this. How do you translate sounds that don’t exist? What about multiple sounds where English only has one? Read it back with the accent.
Transcribe English phonetically. Same as above but do it without the English in front of you and just listening. Make that voice to visual connection.
Hand write word lists once you get to vocab. Then type them on your laptop and phone (if you want to be able to type in Arabic, also highly recommend a keyboard cover with the letters next to the Latin alphabet). Copy all the diacritics even though that’s not necessarily how native speakers do it. I have a notebook that looks like it belongs to lunatic toddler because it just has the same words and snippets written over and over again lmao.
Finally, transcribe Arabic. If you can use something with a transcript or captions to check your work even better! But don’t check for perfect spelling, check you used mostly the right letters and marks. You will definitely smash some words together and miss a silent or elided letter or something but try and hear the difference between ع and ا or ق and ك etc. The more sources you use the better.
We did this for one full semester of 50 minute classes 3 times a week while sprinkling in some basic vocab towards the second half. It felt like forever at the time but I never lost my ability to phonetically read and write in Arabic despite 4 years of complete non-use while living in America in an area without any significant Arabic-speaking population or language presence. It is absolutely CHISELED into my brain.
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is-the-owl-video-cute · 2 months
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Hi!! i found your blog via looking through the falconry tag. I see you talk a lot about Ben Woodruff, a falconer from Utah. I want you to know that i’ve apprenticed with Ben Woodruff for years, and have worked extremely close with him for about a decade. Ben is not what he seems in person. Don’t let his charisma fool you, he’s an awful falconer who used to be great 20 years ago but has been black listed by many on the falconry scene in the state. he has killed dozens of birds, has shoddy paperwork, and his ego is what drives him to continually try to be relevant in the falconry community. i’d love to talk more in-depth with you about him if you’ll have me, but he was the worst sponsor i’ve ever had in falconry. he never took me out flying with my birds and encouraged illegal activities constantly. i was his close personal friend for years and defended him for a long time until he killed two eagle owls via neglect at a park i worked at with him and i finally had enough and cut all contact with him. even this past weekend i was at a falconry event that he continually broke the rules on. he makes decent educational content but i only have to speak up about him having “competent care” when i know he has anything but- his neglect has killed dozens of birds and im shocked he hasn’t lost his licensing forever with. he was recently fired from his educational job at Evermore Park because of improper licensing. He talked me into breaking the law so many times with my birds, i’m ashamed to say :/ i don’t practice falconry right now since he ruined it for me, but im hoping to get into it soon with a proper sponsor who actually practices what he preaches. ben is not that person.
my intention is to not put you down personally or make you feel bad, but rather to highlight ben as a charismatic and manipulative person. his educational content may be good but the person he truly is is far from what you see him put out on youtube. i’d love to talk more in depth if you’ll have me but if not, take care, keep chatting about birds and falconry!
Believe it or not, this is not the first message I have gotten about him in the past few weeks. It’s disheartening to hear, I was hoping he would be the one falconer one YouTube to not turn out to be a total bellend. I enjoyed some of his theories and historical anecdotes, and he does post legitimately good informational content on his channel. I had a bit of a funny feeling when his book said something about starling harnesses not being “politically correct” or perhaps it was “this trapping method is not for the easily offended”? Some weird phrasing like that which rubbed me the wrong way. I found myself watching fewer of his videos after I read that because it felt off, but I didn’t have anything else negative to say against him previously as I’ve never met him, so I didn’t really stop recommending his videos, just stopped posting his content unless prompted.
I’m going to say that my most sincere advice for you would be to find a sponsor who is not a white man. I have dealt with many falconers and I say with no exaggeration that every white man I have met in the sport has either been unethical with birds or abusive to people, not uncommonly both. Something about falconry attracts the most obnoxious men on the planet, the Trump variety typically, but the Andrew Tate variety isn’t exactly rare among them either.
Not to say every woman in falconry is a saint, I know more than a few who are just horrendous people all around, but usually you have better odds of a positive experience.
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zsakuva · 2 months
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saku! i have two questions:)
i’m p sure mentioned your favorite book was lotr, but do you have any other recommendations? oh or maybe an anime/manga you really like? anything is fine hehe
my second one is, what inspires you to write? i’m sure it’s something you’ve been doing for a long time, but in general, it seems like whether it’s through your videos or your degree, you’re always trying to tell some sort of story? it’s amazing to me how you treat your characters as real people, if that makes sense? it’s almost like you’ve met them and they’re not just words on paper. i know a couple of artists treat their characters/work as such, but i’ve never really seen it like i have with you. i’m just a bit curious about what exactly makes you tick? please ignore this ask if it’s too personal haha i’m just genuinely interested:)
have a good day with many crumpets, tea, and cat cuddles!!!!
My favourite film trilogy is LotR, but I don't read! I'm in the middle of reading The Fellowship of the Ring, but reading makes me tired so I seldom do it! Unfortunately, that means I can't recommend any books or manga, and I haven't watched anime in a long time either~
Everything inspires me to write! It's a way of escapism for me, and for as long as I can remember, I've loved creating fictional stories. Characters themselves are the vessels in which the story is being told, and they drive everything. There is so much in a life that occurs which defines one's sense of self, and it's ever-changing. I love exploring internal conflicts, the tug-of-war over nature vs nurture, and the long-lasting effects many of us carry.
Almost all of the characters I've made have attributes of someone I know, a fictional person, or myself. It's also through this medium where I can test decisions some people might make in intense situations. A prime example would be Isaac Rhoades, a man traumatised by a past that dictates his every decision until he learns how to loosen the reins--if only by a little. The listener challenges his beliefs while also providing him a way to confront what it means to love, to trust, and to hope.
Another would be Alex (a taboo name for many of you, I know haha). The events of his past fuel his insecurities of the present, and that powers his decisions for the future. A lot of my characters act this way because I believe many of us are the same. His listener is no different. One has dealt with their trauma in one way, the other in another way, and then they clash. Sometimes, it's easy to put the pieces together, but not always. And that's why I like to base actions on character because humans themselves are contradictive, stubborn, and in many cases, illogical.
Then, there are other characters who I use to explore certain themes, such as Niall. His story is heart-breaking yet relatable; I wanted to delve more into his self-perception which was crafted by bullying and homophobia, and how he could possibly shift towards a positive direction.
Audio roleplays are great for my creativity, but they only scratch the surface in terms of how I would normally develop characters and their potential arcs. Novel formats are more my forte, but I do enjoy the platform that I have to fan the flame of angst, fluff, and everything in between!
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thorraborinn · 1 year
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sonneve
How might you describe or define animism, or alternatively, do you have any recommendations for reading about it?
Graham Harvey defines it as understanding "that the world is full of persons, only some of whom are human, and that life is always lived in relationship to others." This is definitely a better definition than "the belief that everything has a soul" but you might also notice that it's vague to the point of including practically everything that doesn't include Aristotle's rational soul as a distinctive feature of humans. Harvey is aware of this (he even includes things like yelling at your computer as an animistic behavior). As soon as you start to narrow the definition more than that, it starts to exclude peoples and customs that it's trying to include.
Nordic Animism has a good short video that does like a drive-by description of animism and history of its study that comes from the same sorts of books that I'm going to mention: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_j9oPCE-Ns
Harvey edited a book called The Handbook of Contemporary Animism. If you were going to pick a single book to start with, you could do much worse than this. Very many of the authors are ones that you'd see recur frequently if you were to go deeper into studying recent anthropology related to animism. If chapters stand out, it would be a good idea to find that author's other works.
My personal favorite single book on the subject is How Forests Think by Eduardo Kohn. He has a lecture on YouTube that introduces some of the ideas in the book: https://youtu.be/mSdrdY6vmDo?t=102.
Kohn draws heavily on the works of Eduardo Viveiros de Castro. Viveiros de Castro is one of the most important recent anthropologists in terms of him being the guy that everyone writing after him has to have an opinion about, whether positive or negative. It's a good idea to read him because he's going to come up in others' works. I personally find his stuff on Amazonian "perspectivism" very good. There's a collection of his essays called The Relative Native.
The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram is a good book about animism and phenomenology, kind of using ideas from Western philosophers like Husserl and Merleau-Ponty to derive something compatible with non-western animistic ideas. He has another book called Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology that I wasn't into but might be a good intro for some people.
There's like this whole scene of books about "entanglements" and use words like "response-ability"; it's not a bad idea to read one of them but I don't think it's necessary to read all of them; my favorite was The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins by Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing. Donna Haraway has some books in this category that I know some people love but didn't do as much for me, admittedly possibly because of stuff I'd already read that was influenced by them. Here is also a good critique of these authors that I think preserves the positive while pointing out limitations: https://par.nsf.gov/servlets/purl/10180270.
Though only tangentially related to animism, Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World by Zakiyyah Iman Jackson is not only good on its own but I think is important to read if you're also reading stuff that focuses on distinction or non-distinction of human from non-human.
Pantheologies by Mary-Jane Rubenstein isn't specifically about animism but intersects with and includes it. I think just reading through the first chapter is worthwhile (the rest might be better for others but it drew heavily on stuff I'd already read). She also has a bunch of stuff on Youtube.
I dunno if she uses the word, but some of Gloria Anzaldúa's work intersects with it, e.g. Light in the Dark/Luz en lo Oscuro.
I am a big fan of Katherine Swancutt, she has written a lot of articles and done a lot of book editing; her book Fortune and the Cursed: The Sliding Scale of Time in Mongolian Divination is not really about animism per se but is a very good read.
Also not about animism, but a good thing to read for anyone interested in it, is The Invention of World Religions or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism by Tomoko Masuzawa.
This is probably getting overwhelming so I'm cutting myself off even though there's other stuff that I would list otherwise. This stuff is currently very popular and well-funded in academia which means they are actually fairly widely available, including as audiobooks, for those who prefer those.
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dogesterone · 8 months
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Fellow HEMA gal here!
Any recommendations for good videos/visual how-tos of solo practice exercises (German longsword ideal, but i'm open to anything helpful). My instructor is great and all, but I need some more resources for outside of class and our club is not super 'online' so I don't really have any video or photo guides handy for the stuff we do during practice and the books/written guides he recommends/made only go so far when I usually need to watch someone do a movement to properly grasp it.
I've been getting over a leg injury for a few months, so I'm hoping to brush up a little so I don't totally embarrass myself when I show up again in August after missing most of March-July 😅
okay i got around to answering this WAY LATER than i hoped to but here are a few things that immediately come to mind that you don't need a sword for:
Cat toy (Point control) - Attach a tennis ball to a string and hang it from high up, like on the ceiling or in a doorway or something. Have the tennis ball at around chest or neck level. Using a sword of your choice or any approximation of said sword, try thrusting at the tennis ball. If you hit it, great! do it again. You can let the tennis ball swing to increase variability and difficulty in this exercise, and you can tie knots in the string to raise the tennis ball up to head level, if you'd like. Start from close enough that you can hit the ball with just an extension of your weapon with your arms, then back up enough that you can use a small step once you're comfortable with that. As you get more comfortable, you can increase your distance so you're taking larger and larger steps to hit the tennis ball. The idea behind this drill is to help train your ability to hit the target you're aiming for while thrusting.
Shrimping (Hip movement) - Start by lying on your back on the floor. Make sure there's plenty of space around you. Keeping your knees together, bring your feet up as close to your butt as you can, keeping them flat on the ground. From there, push up with your hips to lift your lower torso up off the ground as high as you comfortably can. The soles of your feet and your upper body should be the only things touching the ground. Then, quickly pull one side of your hips back down. If you do this right, your butt will shoot off to the side opposite of the hip you're dropping, your legs will straighten, and your body will curl into a shrimp-like position with your body on its side. The point of this drill is to train your hips to be the main driving force when cutting with a longsword. While cutting, you should see benefits from pulling back with the side of your hips opposite of the side you're cutting from, just like how you dropped one side of your hips during this exercise.
T-Rex Arm Cutting (Hip movement) - Where the previous drill focused more on hip rotation, this drill helps train hip rotation and sinking the hips. Using an exercise band or even a long-sleeve shirt, tie it around your upper body so that your elbows are pinned to your sides. You might need an extra set of hands to achieve this. Then, using a sword or sword-length wooden stick, try cutting at a tire swing, pell, or even just an imaginary target in the air. You'll notice it's really hard to cut with your arms, what with them being tied down, and all. To get your cuts to work now, you have to really get the most out of your hips. As you cut, pull back with your hip on the opposite side from the side you're cutting from (so if I were to throw a cut from my right hand side, I would pull my left hip backwards). As you do this, also bend your knees to sink your hips downwards and lower your body. These two actions in conjunction with each other will really help you improve cutting power without relying on your arms, which are better for controlling range, angle, and alignment than for generating power. Once you've done that for a little bit, try it again without the restraint around your arms.
Here are some videos of other drills you can try if you have a sword:
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Make sure while you're doing cutting drills that you never lock your elbows at any point, as that is really hard on your joints.
Hope this helps!
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achillessulks · 4 months
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how in the depths of ultimate despair have you been able to read 6000+ books? what are your secrets? do you possess some pocket universe that suffers from time dilation?
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God I wish. I don't have any secrets, really, but here are some tips:
I'm very good at skim-reading. This is a skill I acquired in school, where I had to read a lot of books; I'd recommend Mortimer J. Adler's How To Read a Book if you're interested in figuring out how to do the same (mostly for nonfiction). In many ways it's very outdated, and a lot of the specific advice is lacking, but the skills I learned from reading that book, and then putting them into practice, really transformed how I approached reading.
I have a lot of practice. I started reading independently when I was two years old (give or take), but really that's unfair because I don't log most books I've read—only the more recent ones (unless specifically noted). Like any skill, reading is something that you can improve your ability to do. The more you read, the better at it you become.
I like books that make me work for it. This doesn't mean that I enjoy books that are badly written (although I sometimes do), or books that are intentionally confusing (although I sometimes do)... I mean good books, challenging books that make your brain have to try extra hard to figure everything out. I read a lot of nonfiction—far more than fiction. I read a lot of books for adults. I read a lot of dictionaries and reference works. The more tough books you read, the easier it becomes to speed through a light beach read.
Also, I don't play video games. This isn't a moral position or anything; I just don't enjoy them. So take however many hours you'd spend gaming, or watching TV, and translate that into reading time.
Hopefully some of that helps. Also I'm just built different 💪💪💪
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vex-cti · 3 days
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[LONGPOST] I just finished... Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth
I wanna write down all my thoughts before I delve into more in-depth online opinions. I'm writing this on the same day as having done the last two chapters of the game, so I may have not had time to process the story completely. However, I've been playing this game for the entire month and I got a lot to say. Obvious spoilers ahead, but I'll still try to keep some things vague enough.
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Okay Square Enix, you win, I'll use photo mode
Graphics in video games are like how attractive a dessert looks, it doesn't dictate how it will taste, but it makes you want to try it. Rebirth feels like one of those games that is finally showing what the PS5 is capable of, with environments extremely rich in detail, superb lightning that's both colorful and conveys the right emotion for each scene, this is the prettiest Final Fantasy has ever looked, even compared to 16 which had some optimization issues and dull lightning in some areas, specially towards endgame. No single location in Rebirth feels half-baked, what used to be single screens and flat textures in the original have been completely re-imagined to have their own identity. I will talk about more about the open environments when I talk about gameplay and exploration.
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Reliving the moments: Going above and beyond
The cutscene direction for this game is absolutely phenomenal, I love that they have amped up the campiness of the original 7, while also being faithful to the serious and emotional moments. What shines even more in Remake is the excellent writing when it comes to the characters, their performances are full of charisma, and it made it clear to me why the cast of seven ended up becoming so iconic to gaming as a whole. Every scene with these characters interacting, no matter if it was the dullest of sidequests, made everything entertaining. But the best part of Rebirth, like its predecessor, it's when it brings back the iconic moments we all wanted to see. The Junon Parade, Costa del Sol, Red XIII and Cosmo Canyon, Barret and Corel, and many more of these moments have barely altered from how they happened originally, reliving these moments feels like watching a high production TV Series based on a book you loved as a kid. If you love the original FFVII but have no intentions of playing the remake due to how things change, I at least recommend you look up the scenes that do stay faithful.
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Some things left me wanting
Still, Rebirth only covers up to the end of Disc 1 section of the story, and has some blatant teases from trailers and the game itself that left me wanting. The Planet's weapons are mentioned and different versions appear, but there's no Diamond or Ruby weapon superboss yet. Both Cid and Vincent make their debuts near the final chapters, but are not playable for now, which left me a little disappointed. And this lets me segway perfectly into the other best part of Rebirth...
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Can I just say I love the portraits in this game? Love me some PNGs
When I first played Part 1 of the Remake saga, I felt like I had no idea of what I was doing with the combat, I found the action-hybrid system too complicated and visually cluttered I felt like I was brute forcing every fight and not really enjoying myself. I finished the game and didn't come back to it until early this year where I decided to do Hard Mode for the Platinum, and this time I had a way better time, now understanding the combat system and each fight better. It makes for a flashy, semi tactical game with very visceral and satisfying animations, powers, character building thanks to materia, the importance of positioning, blocking, switching aggro, it felt like the realization of what games like FF12 and 13 aimed to be.
So imagine my surprise when Rebirth made it even better. Fundamentals are still the same, new skills were to be expected, but my favorite new addition are synergy skills. Not only do you get special commands you can perform with your partners in the party with extremely satisfying animations, you also have synergy real time action commands which reward you for being more reactive and agressive, now adding perfect blocks and counters, now every time you play with a different team composition you're gonna feel the difference of having Barret or Red or Yuffie as your partner, as you get access to different skills.
They also help you build ATB for characters not actively controlled at any given time, which is an excellent quality of life improvement. My only nitpick is that despite the menus allowing you to have 3 different party compositions and even allowing you to set the leader for each, Cloud is mandatory. Cloud is of course good at everything, so it's not the worst thing, but it does suck that I can't play as a team of Barret, Red, and Yuffie at any time in the open world. Though you can do that at virtual combat challenges or the colliseum. This feels like an oversight.
Fortunately, this meant I was playing around different characters all the time, because they're all great, and it feels super satisfying to set the right materia for each one according to what you envision them to be and complement their abbilities. Some are obvious: give Yuffie the steal materia, give Aerith healing materia. But who gets to be the mage, the debuffer, the buffer, the tank, that's up to you. I found Red XIII + Darkside materia works extremely well thanks to his Reaper Claw abbility and his health regeneration, sort of like a bestial Dark Knight, great crowd control and support all around. Cait Sith takes some work to get used to, and requires lots of setup, but his luck based gameplay can have some serious benefits, I'm sure he will come in handy in hard mode. Yuffie plays almost identically to her DLC, and she is excellent for handling boss fights with multiple parts or different weaknesses.
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Exploring will either be fun or tedious, depends on who you ask
I feel like the other primary component of the gameplay, which is the exploration and traversal, will be a bit more divisive. It takes tropes from standard open world games like towers, points of interest, fast travel, loot locations, hunts, there is nothing new or original about it. However, that doesn't mean it can't be fun. Completing areas feels like I'm playing a collect-a-thon akin to Sonic Frontiers, where while it may not be the most exciting thing in the world, it is very relaxing for me, as I take in the sights and look for ways to get to new areas and find the next rare fiend. What I enjoy about the world design is that areas are not large, but are very packed and designed in such a way where you can't get everywhere by just looking at markers on the map, sometimes you do have to look for clues on the environment to get to where you need to, meaning you're looking at where you're going more than your tracker, which is great, but you still get the benefits of one. So it's a nice compromise, not as open ended as BoTW or Elden Ring, but not as braindead as a Ubisoft game. However, completing these areas can take a while, and if you're like me and plan to do all of them, don't be surprised when each area can take you up to 10 hours if you want to do everything.
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"No seriously Cloud, I'm still waiting!" -Sephiroth, 100 hours into your game file
If you remember FF16 (I love that game too btw), you might remember how universally hated the sidequests were, not so much for their stories, but for their large amount and lack of variety. It seems like Rebirth is an active effort to avoid those same mistakes. Most sidequests in this game has you doing something different, have an entertaining story or character development attached to them, or even have you doing something dumb like bringing chickens back to their sweet innocent mother, or following an Ex Shinra employee in some brutal gold saucer challenges. I won't say every sidequest is a winner, at the end of the day, they're still busywork, and never will a game make you feel good saying "Congratulations on your progress, you have unlocked even more sidequests to do!". Still, I have to commend them, they do not bombard you with them, you can do a few at a time and be good for the next area, and the rewards allow your party to access more skills.
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They have some of the most fun music too
The sidequest also introduce an excuse to have you do more of the minigames and take on their harder difficulties. And BOY did they add soooo many minigames, I could not believe I was encountering a new one what feels like every hour. There's something both horrifying and admirable about the devs commitment to bring back the spirit of a ps1 classic in this way. Have you noticed that triple AAA games basicly don't do minigames anymore? Yea fishing games are still around I guess, but Rebirth is not ashamed to harken to those videogamey roots and sheer goofiness. Red football, Fort Condor (love the reinterpretation), Super Dolphin Sunshine, and so many more. Enjoy youself with these minigames, and pick your least favorites too because there will be at least one that will make you want to break your controller. Contenders for me are Glide de Chocobo for it's terrible camera, and Gears & Gambits for having an overwhelming amount of Gambits for such a simple minigame (even FF12 had you start with a small amount). Still, there is more bad than good here. What I was not expecting was a brand new card game, akin to Triple Triad in 8 and 14: Queen's Blood.
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*Insert Yugioh abridged reference here*
Not only did I not expect a new card game 2 hours into the game, I did not expect it to be so good, and have me thinking about different deck builds, deck synergy, strategies, and ways to one up your opponent with some smart plays. Queen's Blood is an extremely fun time sink and nice break from all the combat and normal exploration. It can be overwhelming at first, and having so many different cards with effects each is a hassle I've seen many not even wanting to bother with, finding some of its rules to be too confusing. I will say that if you're not constantly updating your deck with better cards you won't be making much progress, but you also won't know what cards are better if you don't play enough to get what your objective is, so it's best to start getting into it the sooner you start the game. Do make sure you take note of some of the later puzzles and challenges, as they can teach you strategies to make comebacks on hard duels.Screw the survival challenges, though.
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But the journey isn't quite the same, after all
Perhaps the stuff I have the least things to say about, are the new elements to the story, which are more prevalent during the beginning and ending sequences of the game. I was honestly intrigued at the start, the tension and anxiety felt in this unknown timeline Zack has walked into, and the mystery surrounding the true fate of our protagonists, as it shows you bits and pieces of more information the further you progress, I was curious to where things were going. Unfortunately, the ending provided even more questions than answers, and I still feel like it's not as emotionally impactful as perhaps it intends to be, maybe due to the lack of clear information. I understand it wants to keep itself vague with the idea of multiple timelines and universes colliding, or what Sephirot's actual plan is. But it does make things like the Whispers feel even more pointless than when they showed up in Remake, but at least their presence has been reduced, as expected. Areas where changes to the story were most effective were when they were not pointed out to be a product of a split timeline, like the conclusion to the Junon festival, or the Gongaga reactor sections.
But of course, what most people were more curious about, was how was the ending going to change, we all knew it was going to be different no matter what. And while I feel like these convoluted elements do take off some of the emotion of the original scene, there is one element which does seem to align these new events with the emotions of the original: Cloud himself. For he experiences the events of the ending differently from the rest, and it's left unclear how reliable is his perspective. Add Sephiroth's manipulation of Cloud's emotions and he becomes this genuinely creepy and ruthless shell of himself. This new problem does not completely go away by the end, as Cloud is not fully aware of it yet. But with how the new version of the ending has unfolded, it left me with these feeling of doubt and... hollowness, confusion, not sure if to be sad, or hopeful. Which I feel is exactly how Cloud feels as well, as his human nature is questioned.
Despite thinking a faithful story remake would have been more satisfying, I can't deny these new events had me thinking about the story of FInal Fantasy 7 in ways I could connect emotionally to it even more. Perhaps, what this game truly achieved for me, is remind me just how much I love this franchise, for its extremely creative worlds and creatures, to its unique stories and unforgettable characters. Rebirth is a celebration of Final Fantasy, a joy to look and play, to relive and to guess. It's got one more part to prove if these changes to the narrative were really worth it, nonetheless. And honestly, I hope they don't keep relying on vagueness as much.
But when they are not being vague, I promise you, every moment, old or new, will feel exciting.
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memento-morri-writes · 2 months
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joy list tag
I was tagged by the lovely, amazing @mysticstarlightduck! Thank you so much!! <3333
Rules: Make a list of all of the things that have made you happy recently! Then, tag as many people as you want that you think may need it to keep the positivity going ✨
D&D!!! This game is my special interest, so it's no surprise that it's my favorite part of my week. We had really long roleplay sessions for my Friday campaign last night, and the party finally got to learn a few things about Cyra, plus she got some... interesting news about her old gang... And tomorrow for my (usually) Saturday campaign I get to traumatize my poor boy Rook some more! (Poor man really is my punching bag... he's already been through so much...)
Playing video games! I bought Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous on January 1st, and I've played 98.3 hours since then, and am enjoying it immensely. I just hit level 20 yesterday! Cannot recommend this game enough, especially to people who liked BG3.
Seeing pictures of my parents' cats! My mom just got a new kitten a little over a week ago, and I'm so obsessed with her, I can't wait to meet her! And my dad's cats are still being their adorable, weird selves, and I want to see them again soon.
Watching Critical Role! I'm inching ever closer to the end of Campaign 1, and I'm not ready for it to be over. I can't decide if this ending will devastate me more than the ending of Campaign 2. On one hand, I preferred C2 overall, but on the the other, my favorite character dies at the end of C1. But either way, I love this silly little show, and it brings me so much joy. Watching Campaign 2 was literally a life-changing experience for me.
Daydreaming about my OCs! Even if I haven't been able to write lately, at least playing around with scenarios for them in my head at night while I'm trying to sleep brings me joy. These silly little guys (gender neutral) are truly the lights of my life. (This does include my D&D characters, btw.)
Buying books! While I was home over winter break I bought 7 books, and just yesterday I ordered 9 more, including a few from some writeblr people! I'm excited to read them whenever I get the chance.
Finding new music! In the past week I got really obsessed with Arrows In Action's latest album (Built To Last), and then WE MADE PLANS AND GOD LAUGHED by Beauty School Dropout came around and put me in a chokehold. It's fun finding new music that I like, and I'm excited to share it with my mom when I get a chance.
Getting tagged in posts / getting asks here on tumblr! This website is my only form of social media, and I truly adore all of the friends I've made on here. Even if I haven't done the thing you tagged me in, or I haven't answered your ask, the fact that you even thought to tag me or send me one makes me so happy.
I'm going to make this an open tag!! If you want to do this and/or need a reason to remember the good things in life, please feel free to say I tagged you!!!
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Onewe ‘They realise they love you’
Onewe Masterlist                                    Group Masterlist
Ask: Hi :) Can I request a onewe reaction to them realizing they love you? Thank you!
Yonghoon: 
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Music video shoots were incredibly difficult. As much as he tried to start off the day positive and full of energy, it was only natural that the energy dwindled throughout the day. Yonghoon was good at staying positive but this shoot was taking a lot out of him, he just wanted to go to bed. So he found himself trying to find somewhere quiet, just to nap between takes. 
Until he felt arms wrap around his waist and the familiar feeling of your face burrying into the back of his shoulder. “What are you doing here?” Yonghoon asked, smiling and turning around in your arms. “You sounded absolutely exhausted in your textss and I thought I would surprise you, maybe give you some energy.” You explained, gently stroking his face and being carefull not to rub off any makeup. “And.... I brought snacks for you guys.” You said, holding up a bag filled to the brim with treats and making Yonghoon laugh. 
He realised that you could easily tell when he was feeling down and tired, that you filled him with energy and made him feel alot better. Yonghoon loved you for that. 
Harin:
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You loved watching the gears turn in his brain as he had an idea. It was interesting to see how Harin got fully invested in an idea once he had it. Staff had asked the members to come up with ideas for their upcoming concert and he was having a plethera of ideas. 
“Okay so, how does this sound.” Harin explained his idea involving the opening of the concert. He was so expressive and excited about it and it was entirely valid, it was a great idea. “Ohhhh, maybe you can add some fancy lighting to that.” You added on and he pointed at you. “See! This is why we’re together. You made it better.” He said, making a note of the whole thing on his phone before returning his attention back to you. “What do you think about this to end the show, feel free to add ideas.” Harin said continueing to show you the things he had come up with. 
Harin realised that you always supported his ideas and played off on them to make them even better. You guys were a team and he loved you for it.
Kanghyun/Hyunggu:
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Hyunggu genuinely enjoyed to read and that was incredibly attractive to you, it was one of the reasons you connected in the first place. He loved that you loved to read too, loved being able to share stories and books with you. You were often recommending things for him to read as well, broadening his horizons. 
He was glad to see that you had left the book you recommended on his bed for him. Flipping through it, he noticed small scribbles in the margins. Your thoughts and feelings about things done in the book. “Hyunggu this is something you would do.” Your note caught his eye and now he was trying to find more. You had read the book with him in mind, leaving little comments where you felt you could. He was absolutely amazed. 
Hyunggu realised that you even read with him in mind, that you took the things you thought he would enjoy into consideration. He loved you for it. 
Dongmyeong:
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Getting up in the morning on busy days was always a horrifyingly difficult task, but not to Dongmyeong. He always enjoyed waking up and getting ready in the morning but never really found anyone that shared that joy, until he met you. 
Getting ready in the morning was like your own personal time in the day. With music softly playing in the background as you both washed your faces, Dongmyeong was smiling at you in the mirror. “What’s got you all smiley?” You asked, putting on moisterizer as you smiled back. “Nothing, just like getting ready with you.” Dongmyeong said, applying moisterizer himself. You shook your head slightly, carrying on with your morning routine with a smile. 
Dongmyeong realised how rare it was that you could find someone that enjoyed the small things the way he did. He really loved you for that. 
Cya/Giwook: 
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Music was the biggest part of Giwook’s life, it was his livelihood and it was his passion. It’s not that it was a demand for him to find someone who shared his love for music, but he did think it would be nice. Never in a million years did he expect to find someone who took as much interest as you did. 
“Ahh, so by layering the two it creates that full sound?” You asked, gesturing to the screen. You wanted to understand how it worked and well, you loved watching Giwook explain. “Yeah exactly, then if you insert the vocals you have the basics to make a song.” He added on, beginning to ramble about the process a little. It’s not that you understood everything but it was nice to just hear him speak so passionately, so you placed your head on his shoulder and simply listened. He had to hide his flush at the action, stuttering over his words for a moment before continuing. 
He loved that you took a genuine interest in his passions and that you didn’t mind him rambling off. It made him feel interesting and appreciated and he loved you for it. 
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highnoteds · 1 year
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*    𝐔𝐏 𝐍𝐄𝐗𝐓  ;      a  recommendation  by   aaron !
hold  your  f***  horses !    aaron  kim  has  just  been  spotted  walking  into  revolution  headquarters.  they  are  best  known  for  being  the  label’s  residential  personal  assistant  and  have  been  working  with  the  label  for  three  months.  they  share  a  lot  of  interesting  things  about  life  in  the  music  industry  on  their  social  media,  so  make  sure  you  don’t  forget  to  follow  them  at  @glacierboy​.  the  office  knows  them  for  being  irresponsible  but  i  swear  they  have  an  emotional  side  as  well.  maybe  that  explains  why  they’re  always  associated  with  pouring  out  your  emotions  in  a  song  that  will  never  be  released,   chipped  black  nail  polish,  &&.  the  scent  of  marc  jacobs  with  a  hint  of  jack  daniels  lingering  on  a  suit  jacket.  their  coworkers  even  voted  them  as  the  most  likely  to  win  a  bar  fight.  we’ll  see  how  they  live  up  to  that  reputation.
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*  𝙽𝙾𝚆 𝙿𝙻𝙰𝚈𝙸𝙽𝙶 .           THE   BASICS
birthname :   aaron  kim  +  kim  youngmin  .
nickname(s) :   ron  (  close  friends  +  family  )  +  utp  .
birthdate  +  age :    september  25th  ;   twenty6  .
ethnicity :   korean .
gender  +  pronouns :   cis  male,   he  /  him  pronouns  .
orientation :    biromantic,   bisexual  .
birthplace :   los  angeles,  ca  .
current   residency :   new   york   city,   ny .
occupation :   personal  assistant  for  redacted  .
astrology :   libra   sun,   sagittarius   moon  .
language(s) :   korean,  english  .
height :   six  feet  [  6′0  ]  .
positive   traits :    flexible,  optimistic,  creative.
negative   traits :   irresponsible,  emotional,  conceited.
discography  inspo :   walk  the  moon,  dnce,  coin,  5  seconds  of  summer.
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*  𝙷𝙴𝙰𝙳𝙻𝙸𝙽𝙴 .           AARON  KIM,  SON  OF  FAMOUS  PRODUCER  /  SONGWRITER  K3,  GETS  KICKED  OUT  OF  NIGHTCLUB  AFTER  INITIATING  FIGHT  WITH   . . .
when  you’re  born  as  the  hidden  love  child  to  a  famous  90′s  singer  and  a  well-established  producer  /  songwriter,  you’re  bound  to  be  some  kind  of  star.  or  at  least  that’s  what  aaron  always  considered  himself  to  be,  anyway.
due  to  being  raised  by  his  father  since  his  mother  didn’t  want  to  “abandon”  her  career,  he  was  exposed  to  the  lifestyle  of  the  rich  &&.  famous  early  on  in  life.  celebrity  family  friends  gave  him  gifts,  he  sometimes  attended  award  shows,  he  got  thrown  extravagant  parties  and  had  the  best  toys!  he  couldn’t  have  asked  for  a  better  life.
growing  up,  aaron  always  knew  he  wanted  to  be  in  the  music  industry.  watching  his  father  work  rather  it  be  at  home  or  (  on  the  rare  occasion  )  at  the  studio  inspired  him  to  take  a  chance  down  the  same  path.  but  his  father  wasn’t  having  it,  instead  wanting  him  to  have  a  more  “stable”  career  while  music  sat  on  the  backburner.
he  reluctantly  agreed  --  not  left  with  much  of  a  choice  since  the  man  was  putting  him  through  college  debt  free.  now  a  sophomore  attending  berkeley  with  an  undeclared  major,  aaron  realized  he  only  had  one  life  and  was  going  to  make  the  most  of  it  no  matter  what.  so  he  put  together  a  band  with  some  college  friends  and  decided  to  test  the  water.
their  name  was  ON  THE  FLOOR,  and  had  a  dance  pop-punk  sound  that  was  meant  to  have  people  dancing  on  the  floor  and  letting  go  of  all  their  worries.  they  began  posting  videos  on  youtube  and  was  soon  playing  very  small  gigs  which  led  them  to  being  locally  known.
yet  his  ambition  of  proving  his  father  wrong  outweighed  his  education.  late  night  "promoting”  --  which  was  really  just  him  partying  with  other  up  and  coming  musicians  --  resulted  in  barely  showing  up  to  classes,  and  the  times  he  did  show,  he  wore  sunglasses  and  complained  before  leaving.  his  grades  dropped  drastically  and  soon  he  was  kicked  off  campus  whilst  the  other  members  were  still  enrolled.
aaron  thought  this  was  a  sacrifice  willing  to  be  made  for  the  group’s  future.  so  he  spent  his  free  time  trying  to  get  a  contract  deal  behind  his  father’s  back,  all  the  while  using  his  friends  as  a  coverup  for  school.  things  were  going  fine  up  until  they  booked  a  decent  gig  at  a  well  known  club.  the  whole  night  was  filled  with  small  mishaps :  their  mics  being  faulty,  some  of  the  sound  equipment  messing  up  but  overall  things  were  going  fine!  that  was  before  some  asshole  began  provoking  them  after  their  set  which  resulted  into  a  physical  altercation  and  them  getting  arrested.  
his  father  soon  learned  everything  and  man,  he  was  not  happy.  but  he  saw  the  ambition  aaron  held  and  gave  him  a  deadline.  he  had  a  year  to  make  things  work  or  else  he  has  to  give  the  group  up.  this  seemed  easy  to  do,  but  with  the  others  now  being  juniors  and  having  to  focus  on  their  own  studies,  it  wasn’t  long  before  everyone  just  said  screw  it  and  had  split  up.  (  also  aaron  did  fight  with  another  member  and  threatened  to  sue  in  case  they  ever  used  his  songs  without  him  soo ...  )
years  went  by,  and  aaron  had  nothing  left  to  his  name  outside  of  the  track  record  of  getting  kicked  out  of  clubs  and  the  many  partners  he  slept  with.  soon  this  led  his  father  into  getting  him  a  job  as  a  personal  assistant  to  a  friend  who  needed  one  at  revolution  records.  and  that’s  where  his  new  journey  began!
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*  𝙽𝙾𝚆 𝙿𝙻𝙰𝚈𝙸𝙽𝙶 .           HEADCANONS  +  FUN  FACTS
aaron  considered  himself  as  the  pillar  of  the  band.  he  supplied  the  name,  he  paid  for  the  studio  sessions,  he  made  quite  a  few  of  their  more  favorable  tracks.  he  felt  more  important  than  everyone  else  which  was  another  issue  discussed  during  the  messy  meeting  soon  turned  disbandment.
owns  three  cds  that  were  burned  that  hold  his  group’s  music.  all  are  labeled  with  black  sharpie  and  have  little  doodles  on  them  to  represent  the  theme  of  the  cd.  plays  them  on  the  anniversary  of  them  getting  together  and  occasionally  is  heard  singing  /  humming  his  old  music  absentmindedly.
kinda  envious  of  the  bands  signed  under  the  label  but  that  doesn’t  stop  him  from  peaking  into  their  sessions  and  watching  them  work.
is  definitely  almost  always  seen  with  his  legs  on  his  desk  and  hands  behind  his  head  trying  to  balance  a  pencil  on  his  upper  lip.
likes  to  keep  his  old  group  secret  so  unless  you  were  one  of  them  few  people  who  actually  knew  of  them,  there’s  no  way  you  know.
defender  of  pineapple  pizza.  he  does  not  care!!  
very  conceited  and  likes  flirting  but  really  it’s  harmless.  
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*  𝙽𝙾𝚆 𝙿𝙻𝙰𝚈𝙸𝙽𝙶 .           WANTED  CONNECTIONS  +  PLOTS
other  assistant  (  or  employee  in  general  )  friends  !!!    let  them  talk  shit  about  the  people  they  work  with,  rant  to  one  another,  have  lunch  dates.
out  of  work  friends ?   maybe  they  occasionally  meet  outside  of  revolution  to  just  de-tach  from  everything.  or  they  could  have  met  outside  of  it  first  and  then  found  out  they  were  working  in  the  same  building.  either  way,  could  be  fun!
aaron  could  be  a  third  opinion  person.  in  case  your  muse  is  working  on  something  and  feels  like  everyone  is  saying  something  biased  so  they’re  like  hey!  you  don’t  know  shit  about  music,  what  do  you  think  about  this ??
give  me  the  guy  who  started  the  club  fight  that  got  him  arrested.  i  want  beef!
he  definitely  hooked  up  with  a  revolution  artist.  he’s  utterly  embarrassed  by  being  an  assistant  instead  of  an  artist  so  he  tries  to  dodge  them  like  the  plague.
maybe  someone  who  does  know  of  his  band!  and  they  could  possibly  encourage  him  to  enter  back  into  the  industry!
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coinandcandle · 1 year
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Hi friend, how are you doing? I hope you're day/week is going well!
I was wondering if you had any podcasts recommendations for good witchcraft, magic, paganism content, or anything of the sort?
I have a really hard time with searching for stuff because since I'm super new to all this I'm always afraid to end up learning things from bad sources without realizing it's happening, so if you know anyone who's a good resource for learning via podcasts that would be great!! Thank you in advance, regardless if you can help me or not. 🧡
Despite listening to many podcasts, I don't actually listen to any witchy podcasts. I have heard good things about Hex Positive and BS-Free Witchcraft but I haven't given them a listen.
If anyone has any other recommendations please leave them in the comments or reblog for our friend here!
Just remember that most sources online, when talking about witchcraft, are coming from the witch's own experiences. Learning from others' practices is a good way to help create your own. If you're looking for historical references on witchy things then it can be a bit harder.
There is no pressure to get everything right all of the time. We've all slipped up dozens of times and we've learned from it.
That being said, I really like the following podcasts when it comes to myths, legends, and folklore, though:
Lore - "Lore exposes the darker side of history, exploring the creatures, people, and places of our wildest nightmares."
This podcast can be a bit spooky, focusing on a more "scary stories around the campfire" vibe but that's the fun of it! The creator, Aaron Mahnke, also wrote a few books inspired by his podcast.
Spirits - "a boozy podcast about mythology, legends, and folklore."
This show has hundreds of episodes and has been running for years. Not only do they talk about folklore and mythology, but they talk about alcohol and try to match up their beverages to whatever the topic of the episode is! The hosts are very fun and their bff chemistry is pleasant to listen to~
Myths and Legends - "This show brings you folklore that has shaped our world. Some are incredibly popular stories you think you know, but with surprising origins."
Exactly as it sounds, this show talks about myths and legends from all around the world. It's engaging and a genuine joy to listen to.
I also suggest the youtube channel Overly Sarcastic Productions as they have both mythology and history. You can listen to them without actually watching the videos, though the art in the episodes is very cute!
There is no pressure to get everything right all of the time. We've all slipped up dozens of times and we've learned from it.
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