#I know everyone has imposter syndrome with varying degrees but

[alienfangs-mov]

"There is freedom in being cringe! By embracing cringe, you unirionically become not cringe, but also still be cringe." -Saberspark

"Yes I am cringe but I am free." -Lizzie Freeman (Pomni TADC)

It's all so true

Literally just

So happy rn

God

I needed this

[saintmachina]

What were some parts of seminary that you liked, versus ones you didn’t? I’m thinking about my future (read: freaking tf out) and I know I want to study theology in some way, I’m just not sure how exactly, ya feel?

Thanks for the question! Your mileage may vary: I went to a Princeton Seminary, which I would categorize as a theologically/politically moderate, academic, traditional Western-style seminary. Seminary culture varies WIDELY from school to school, so keep that in mind when choosing between, say, a Princeton, which may be a more insular academic community focused on research and internships, and a Fuller, which may be a larger community more integrated with the surrounding city concerned with practical training for missionaries, worship leaders, and Christian artists. This is NOT to say that you can’t learn to be an awesome worship leader at PTS (I know them) or an awesome theology professor at Fuller, but make sure you shop around for your particular cultural, career, and academic needs. 

Things I Loved

The residential experience. Nearly all students at PTS live in beautiful on-campus housing or in apartments specialized for families with children just a few miles away. Living a few minutes walk from the library, my professors’ offices, and the chapel was amazing, especially since students at PTS tend to be sociable with the others who live on their hall. I would often spend my evenings studying with friends in their dorm rooms, and since everyone on campus at any given time tends to eat their meals in the cafeteria together, I formed a strong clique of ten or so people who unpacked my readings + spiritual crises with me at the lunch table. 

Spiritual friendships. I was able to make deeper friends than ever before in my life from a variety of denominational and theological backgrounds. We saw each other through vocational shifts, prayed with each other, administered the Eucharist to each other, celebrated birthdays and ordinations together, and stayed up late into the night when anyone needed us. I would literally drive across the country to bail any of them out of jail at a moment’s notice.  

The emotional crucible. Seminary is bootcamp for the soul. You get exposed to so many new ideas and theologies, learn how to preach, sit at people’s bedside while they’re sick, pull together responses for every new act of violence in the news, and most of the time, are thrust into a leadership role at a church that is either going under and begging you to save them or so large and thriving that it nearly swallows you whole. Nothing will grow you up like that. I have an insane amount of poise now dealing with other people’s crises, rage, or grief, and that wasn’t the case when I matriculated. Pastors are all making it up as we go along, but seminary gives at least the appearance of sage wisdom under pressure. 

Academic engagement with theology. This one seems obvious, but after spending four years in a secular liberal arts university that was tolerant of my enduring interest in religion but didn’t offer me an outlet for it, seminary was balm in Gilead. I loved being able to dig into what I really cared about directly, be that metaphysics, church history, or the Bible as literature, and I thrived being surrounded by other people who cared about it and did the reading and wanted to explore together. 

Freedom to research what I wanted. There are plenty of demanding intro-level courses that throw you to the ground and kick you while you cry into your notecards (New Testament, what’s good) but it was fun being on that ride with the rest of your small cohort, and upper-level classes offered chances to research what you cared about. I got to present research on astrology in the book of Daniel, queer American Muslim communities, IVF treatments and theology in Ghana, overlap in myths about Odin and Jesus, and I did an independent research study linking the emergent church to the spike in Millennials re-discovering the Episcopal and Catholic churches.The library was stuffed to the brim with books I would kill for. What a treat.

The melting pot. PTS DEFINITELY has its ideological and admissions biases but they do work hard to create a diverse student body, and I was close with students from so many different counties, denominations, ethnicities, and political leanings, which was enriching beyond belief. It was one of the big reasons I chose a seminary degree. That said, not all schools skew diverse, and I was very specific about choosing a seminary that was explicitly affirming of women in ministry and the goodness and wholeness of LGBTQ+ folks, so I knew that I would be supported by general school policies. Getting that information up front is important. 

Access to university resources. This one is PTS specific, but I went to a independent seminary closely linked to and basically on the same campus as Princeton University (they were the same school back in the 1800s until an amicable split, but we’re still cozy). This meant that I had access to Princeton U libraries, free events, lectures, and religious life, and I was a member of the Episcopal Church at Princeton U for most of my time at seminary. People bribe admissions officials or work themselves to nervous breakdown to get access to the resources I had at my fingertips, and I don’t take that for granted. 

The aesthetic. If I’m gong to take tens of thousands dollars of loans out for graduate school you bet you’re ass I’m going to be sitting in American Hogwarts while I do it. 

Things I Did Not

The cliquishness. This one is a double-edged sword, because I thrived on having a clique of high-functioning. highly-educated pastors who ate at the same lunch table and gossiped about the same people and showed up to campus parties in a gang, but that’s not always healthy. People tended to fragment off by denomination or where they fall on the liberal-conservative scale, and differences can fester that way. Students of color were often implicitly excluded from certain spaces through this behavior. Humans skew towards tribalism to begin with, but when you put super socially-oriented people with strong beliefs in one space where they have to live on top of each other and are looking for low-effort socializing after a long day in the trauma ward, confessional, or picket line, it gets worse. 

Imposter syndrome. Maybe it’s grad school in general that does this, but I spent most of my degree fighting off the feeling that I was dumb, lazy, not serious enough about my “calling” or my research, and probably a heretic. Part of my character growth came from learning not to give a fuck about what people who didn’t share my passions thought of them, and from realizing that I wasn’t on the ordination or PhD track like most of my peers, and that was okay. So I grew from this, but it stung like hell. I cried a lot.

No handholding. The professors at PTS were, by and large, old school, and they were busy as hell. While there was opportunities for office hours, most engagement with professors came in the performative form of “a question, well, more of a comment really” during lectures. Students, (mostly men, I’m not going to lie to you) scrambling for a good letter of rec for a PhD tended to monopolize whatever time professors had. I can think of exceptions (Ellen Charry was exceptional and made time for me in her home when I was struggling to unpack antisemitic theology) but it was a far cry from the literature department in my undergrad, where professors were accessible and knew me personally as mentors and friends. 

Caregiver burnout. This is my big one, and is the reason I’m still in recoup mode doing the office job thing instead of working in formal ministry. Everyone at my school was a pastor, hospital chaplain, activist, or social worker. We are the people who care so much, and who are constantly doing emotional labor for those around us with no time off and usually, poor personal boundaries. Working in a field where it is your job to hold everyone’s hurt and be the face of God to them while their life falls apart is….hard. It was not unusual for me to work ten hours at Penn on my feet in campus ministry, helping people sort through whether or not they wanted to report their sexual assault, holding mini-interventions about excessive drinking, and scrambling to re-schedule worship night after my volunteer went to the hospital after a suicide attempt, and then ride the train home while my phone blew up with news of a new mass shooting that I would have to help host a candlelight vigil for. You hold your parishioner’s hand while they die in hospice. You watch social services take your client’s children away. You stand still while someone screams at you for being too political in your sermon, or not political enough. You sit down to do the budget only to realize the beloved pastor who just retired had been embezzling. Typical Tuesday. 

A lot of the items on these lists are specific to my temperament and the culture at PTS, but by and large I would say it was an amazing experience well worth my time, effort, and money. I pushed myself academically beyond what I believed I was capable of, made the deepest friends of my life, found a home denomination, learned how to effectively care for others and myself, and was met by God in transformative ways again and again. Someday I may get that ordination or work for a ministry nonprofit again, but I have skills now that no one can take away from me, skills I use every day in some capacity. 

Good luck in your discernment process, and I pray you find yourself in exactly the place you need to be!

[emberkyrlee]

I don’t have much to add on Allison, as I tend to focus on content about other characters more than hers. So I don’t actually interact as much with stuff that focuses on her. But I do occasionally see some pretty awful treatment of her by some fans as it goes by, and it makes me sad. I actually do still quite like Allison. I love the complicated relationship she has with Vanya. I love that due to her powers, she has terrible imposter syndrome. I love that while she seems to get everything, she still deep-down knows that its quite possibly not for real most of the time. I was very proud of her during her S2 arc, as she struggled to find an ethical balance in using her powers. Fully fleshed-out female characters who get to fuck up and try to do better? Fuck yeah! The siblingcest with Luther weirds me out. Like, I get that it was probably more of a mutual attraction based on their shared-trauma. But I don’t necessarily think that makes it a good idea for them to pursue or obsess over. That goes for all the siblings. Just...feels ew.

Yeah, I’d say Diego’s impulsive outbursts of some emotions, and repression of others, are partially due to being emotionally stunted. Cause C-PTSD will do that (especially to a boy child thrown into combat situations and facing a shit-ton of toxic masculinity). I also have a very strong headcanon about him having ADHD, which would also explain a lot of his behaviors. (This headcanon comes from me having had to learn to manage extremely similar traits in myself over time, because I’ve grown up with both ADHD and childhood C-PTSD. I relate to Diego a LOT, and I’m neither Latinx or a guy.)

David Castañeda has said that he doesn’t consider Diego as being particularly connected to his Latino heritage. That he just didn’t really grow up with or around it. So seeing a lot of people do the “spicy latino” trope with him is indeed cringe-worthy at times, especially given there are VERY likely reasons for those behaviors that have NOTHING to do with race or heritage. (Though I understand when it’s from fans who ARE Latinx, and identifying with him in that, projecting it through their fanfictions or headcanons. As you said, those do come across differently and more authentically.)

From what I’ve seen, a lot of the “Ben is shy” stuff in fanon comes from a “Making of TUA” book that I believe shares bits of Vanya’s book. In which she describes him as the nicest of her siblings, and the easiest for the others to manipulate. As well as being the least interested in taking part in a superhero team. (We do get a flashback example of that one during the bank heist scene at least.) I have not seen much of said book content myself, so I can’t say I’m an entirely reliable source on that. But I believe that’s where a lot of people are actually getting that from. I do wish they’d shown or mentioned more of those details in the show itself by this point, but alas.

I DO hate that a lot of his fans have taken this to mean he’s “100% Baby who is perfect and never does anything wrong ever.” And getting upset when he DOES do something shitty or questionable, because they think its OOC, rather than Ben just... being a Hargreeves. (They are ALL assholes of varying degrees. He may have been the nicest, but he still had a fucked up childhood that left a very strong impression on who he is. I knew seeing more of Ben in S2 meant we’d see him fuck up and occasionally be a dick, like everyone else. And indeed we did.) Or that the rest of fandom often tends to write him off as the “emotional support Asian”. Whether in reviews, analyzations, or fanfiction. An annoying number of people barely mention him, or actually just overlook him altogether when discussing the siblings. Either group tends to portray him as a pretty boring and basic archetype with one or two very basic traits, rather than as a full and complex character with strengths and flaws just like everybody else in the family. And it drives me nuts.

I love that I can identify and easily empathize with multiple characters in this show, regardless of their race or gender.

Anyway...This wound up longer than I originally intended.😅

The TUA fandom needs to be more self-aware of all the racial stereotypes and biases they hold. Like, I have seen too many "Vanya and Klaus never hurt anyone and are always so bullied" takes, or "Diego being irrationally angry or possibly violent", or "Allison has it easy, she should have been a support object to Vanya", or "Ben is actually abusive to Klaus and Klaus is just perfect". Like who you like, but please stop playing out harmful stereotypes again and again.

Honestly? You are so right. 

The really bad one is the blaming of Allison for her getting her throat slit and acting like she was the one in the wrong for rumoring Vanya (while manipulated, AT AGE 4) and the one offense was worse, like are you for fucking real? Or the not blaming her per se but saying “Allison deserved to have her throat slit”. And being mad at Luther for locking up Vanya, which yeah it was a bad decision... but if it was Klaus whose throat she slit, it would be the COMPLETE opposite reaction.

Diego being irrationally angry or possibly violent, I don’t know about. That’s kind of how his character is in the show is the thing -- he has a short fuse and picks fights a lot. I mean, he and Luther both were boxers at time, and Diego in particular is pretty quick to violence and tries to pick fights (at least in season 1). But I see it more like an immaturity/emotionally stunted thing. I haven’t really seen people acting like he’s bad or anything. I will say though: I like when people have him acknowledge that he’s Latino and “act” Latino in fanfictions, but only when it is done authentically. But most of the people who write him like this are clearly not Latino, and it is very obvious and extremely uncomfortable to read. Like they take only the biggest stereotypes you can imagine, and incorporate them in the most obvious ways.

And about Ben, I agree that it’s fucked up when people act like he’s abusive -- but I don’t think that has anything to do with race. I think it honestly has more to do with them trying to woobify Klaus and act like he’s a Poor Baby all the time, and everyone else is “out to get him.” Even Ben, who stayed by his side for years and constantly helped him, was his only consistent friend, etc. Anyone who doesn’t treat their fave (Klaus, Vanya.... mostly Klaus) like an angel, is bad.

Anyone who acts like Ben is abusive to Klaus, I just...HOW!??! The possession storyline brought up issues of consent, yes I understand that (although, I think Jill was the one who we should have been more concerned for in that situation). But if we’re discussing their relationship at large, how and when is Ben “abusive?” I hate when people throw around terms like that, they act like someone saying one mean comment makes them abusive -- as if Ben telling Klaus one time that his pants are ugly makes him abusive (I kid, but this is truly how people act in this fandom). If anyone, Klaus has been the one who was using Ben for his own gain for 16 years, and you know based on how they talked that he never said thank you.

There is a very potent racial stereotype people use with Ben though, and it’s how the biggest Ben stans have treated him in fanon. With very little to go off in terms of his personality from season 1, everyone decided Ben was this super shy kid who was smart, just read books all the time, was very quiet -- basically, an incredibly passive kid. In season 1, in his very few lines, he is sarcastic with Klaus all the time, always has some sardonic comment, and is very vocal given his situation. In Vanya’s flashback to their childhood when she walks by Klaus and Ben, Ben rather aggressively tells Vanya to get out.... I’m pretty sure.that’s our one example of child!Ben having dialogue.

Like, am I the only one who finds it a bit telling that the fanon version of child Ben is the stereotypical passive/nerdy East Asian kid? Because canon does not show him like that at all, yes he was a good kid, but nothing in canon suggests he was shy, quiet, passive, etc. Vanya was clearly presented as the shy/quiet one, due to her isolation. Also, the comics don’t show Ben’s character to be like that at all either, so don’t try that.

Also, I don’t ship any of the siblings, but I don’t judge people for it. However, I’ve seen people who really hate on Alluther, only to ship the other siblings... it’s hypocritical as fuck, and you can’t convince me that it has nothing to do with them being an interracial couple.

[indomitablespiritfingers]

Back to basics

If you’ve been following me for a while you may know that I recently made a big geographic move that involved leaving my club. Finding a new place to train in my new (significantly smaller) city has been a big challenge over the past year. There are exactly 3 schools in my new city that teach in my art, and after trying each of them I found that their teaching styles all differ to varying degrees from what I’m used to and I was just going to have to deal with that.

I trained at one place for about 6 months, then switched to a different club this spring when they transitioned from a casual part-time gig to a full-time TKD facility (and moved literally next door). Both had pros and cons - the former was bigger and had a better facility, but the newer one is more into competitive sparring (my jam) and includes some complementary training in other arts like BJJ, boxing and Muay Thai.

One thing I’ve struggled with at both clubs is the awkward position I find myself in, being an experienced black belt but utterly clueless about other things (e.g. club-specific curriculum like hoosinsol and one-step routines). I find this especially challenging in my newer (smaller) club, where I’m one of just a handful of black belts and am expected to step up and help out with the junior students with the stuff that is familiar to me - general techniques, poomsae, terminology - even as I learn the basic curriculum right along with them.

It feels like being a beginner all over again, but this time without the reduced expectations that come along with being a true white belt. I battle with imposter syndrome daily - does everyone else think I’m a fraud? Am I a fraud? Why should a student trust me to teach their pattern correctly when I can’t keep my one-steps straight?

I know this is temporary and I’ll get there eventually, but in the meantime I just can’t get over how bizarre it feels to be both a black and white belt at the same time. Have any of you ever been in this position? 

[upennanthro]

Advice for First Years

The first year of your graduate program will be difficult, but it doesn’t have to be miserable. As part of building our stronger departmental culture, we want to foster greater inter-cohort solidarity. One way to do that is to facilitate the passing on of accumulated experience and wisdom from students at every stage in the program to you, the incoming students. We sent out a short survey to the listserv, and this is what people had to say. We hope you find it helpful!

1) What's one thing you know now about graduate school that you wish you had known during the first year?

You don't have to read everything. But you should definitely attend colloquium every week unless you’re at a conference. Don’t sign up for a course Monday at noon. Come, pay attention, work on your listening and note-taking skills, and pay attention to the questions that professors ask during the Q&A and how the speakers answer them. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

It’s ok to not have a dissertation project right when you get here.  IT’S OK. It’s also fine if you do have one and it changes. Just don’t be worried if it seems like everyone else has a topic and you’re not sure yet, because you’ll have time and proper guidance to help you figure it out. (3rd year, physical anthropology)

There's not as much hand holding as you think, and a project doesn't magically fall into your lap. Be thinking about what you'd like your dissertation project to look like on day one, and start trying to make this happen in your first year. The actual shape of the project, and perhaps the personnel involved, will change, but you have to be the one to take the reins on your dissertation and start trying to make things happen. Think of your PhD as your own "Choose your own adventure" novel. Its pace is totally dependent on how fast you move and how early you start thinking about it. (7th year, physical anthropology)

I've got more than one thing. I wish I had known that writing "think sheets" or "précis" or "reading responses" is a skill that comes with time (a semester or more) and practice; that I can learn a lot from scanning the bibliographies/references and acknowledgments of ethnographies and that the introduction chapters are the roadmap for the entire book; that even bad advice is good advice because it teaches you what your work isn't and what you don't want to be/do; that I should attend as many dissertation defenses in my field as I can; that I'm a terrible ethnographer when I'm not taking care of myself so whatever I do to stay sane (family/friend time, dates, resting, working out, movies, walks...) has to stay a priority; that I'll always feel like I haven't read enough, like I'm chasing the train instead of riding in it; that Annual Reviews of Anthropology and Oxford Bibliography of Anthropology are good starting points when i'm trying to gain familiarity with a subject within my discipline. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

Not to buy books but instead get them from borrow direct or interlibrary loan (2nd year, physical anthropology)

It can be a very solitary experience, so build relationships, writing groups, social time into your schedule and stick with it!  Use any and all networking opportunities, and have people read your stuff even if they aren't in the same sub-field. Different perspectives can only help!! (4th year, archaeology)

It is important to develop skills. The department is overly theory-heavy, and unless you take it upon yourself to gain practical abilities you will be unprepared when it comes time to start dissertating. Take courses that will teach you how to use film/audio editing software, Adobe Illustrator, R, SPSS, GIS, mySQL, python, Excel, etc. Not only will these serve you well in your academic path, but these are also handy things to have in your toolkit if you decide to pursue an alt-ac career after you’re finished. (5th year, archaeology)

If you haven't been in graduate school before, you might be really overwhelmed by the amount of work you're asked to do -- especially readings in class. They are physically impossible to complete for every class, every week, and your mental and emotional health will likely suffer if you try to do all the readings, word-for-word. Grad school is an exercise in trying to find out what is important to know (for yourself and for the purposes of the professor) and strategizing to get as much of it as you can while also getting a basic grasp of the breadth of your readings. (2nd year, cultural anthropology)

2) What's one of the best decisions you've made that either eased your transition to grad school, made your life easier, or helped your career?

Papers, responses, and etc need to be good enough, but not perfect. Having priorities is important. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

To build in time on my schedule for exercise, sleep, healthful eating, breaks/vacations- and to hold myself accountable for actually doing these things. And then to remind myself that no one is allowed to make me feel bad for taking care of my mental and physical health. It's easy to overlook that hour you wanted to carve out of your day for yoga because you have a pressing deadline, or to fall into the trap of pulling all nighters to send out a grant in time. A disciplined work/life balance and an unapologetic approach to reasonable self-care, regardless of the tongue clucking your boss/PI/advisor may do (this includes trying really, really hard to not feel guilty when you take vacation time - yes, much of the rest of the U.S. gets two weeks, and yes, you should allow yourself this, too) were actually skills I had to develop but have really helped me maximize my productivity and enjoy the process of grad school. (7th year, physical anthropology)

I'm the wrong person to talk to about this because I somehow made my grad school transition as difficult as possible and had a rough time. That being said, it's all good now so even if your start is rocky, you'll be fine. Hmm, actually, do your best to make friends with people who are ahead of you in the program. It makes a world of difference. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

I took a lot of walks?  I’m not from the area so it was nice to take time and go exploring on my own or with a friend to different parts of the city.  It allowed me to spend time away from school work and house work and it was relaxing.  Favorite spots include the Woodlands Cemetery, the dog park at Schuylkill River Park, Reading Terminal Market, The Waterworks, and of course wandering around in Old City. (3rd year, physical anthropology)

Getting a gym pass. Applying for the NSF GRFP. (2nd year, physical anthropology)

Take one night a week off, and every Saturday (or at the very least every other!!). You need time to process and recharge, it is just as important as the work, and might even make you more productive and give you better perspective if you step away from it for a bit! (4th year, archaeology)

Treat your academic work like a job. Figure out what hours work for you and set a schedule that will help you stick to them. It can be hard during the first year to set a rhythm, but graduate work has a tendency to expand to fill all the time you allot to it. So budget a specific amount of time for work each week and don’t go over your limit unless absolutely necessary. (5th year, archaeology)

Allowing myself to buy in to the fact that I belong here. We all feel like imposters to varying degrees, and even though you're warned about this, its very difficult to get to a point that you can really feel ok with that feeling and put yourself at some ease and comfort. In my opinion, fighting imposter syndrome is legitimate emotional work that is really important for your health. (2nd year, cultural anthropology)

3) What's one thing that you would like to share about your experience with the program that you think might be helpful for first years?

Take all four core courses if you can, but not necessarily all four comps. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

Make a network of peers and teachers that transects disciplines from day one, and keep building it. There are lots of people working in your topic of interest (or a related one) in other subdisciplines within anthropology and in different fields, such as the humanities, sciences, etc. These people can be committee members, advisors, and future contacts for field work opportunities and jobs. Example: My masters involved medical anthro and public health personnel, and my PhD committee is an anthropologist, a parasitologist, a population geneticist, and a microbiologist. From this, I've developed a broad range of mentors to give me advice and chaperone interdisciplinary projects through research pipelines, and I've been able to get on training grants outside of anthropology, to get tipped off about cool conferences and meetings, and to take teaching opportunities in other countries. ABN- Always Be Networkin'. (7th year, physical anthropology)

We don't get much formal training in methods, so before your first summer of fieldwork, talk to others about methods and track down some methods handbooks/textbooks to scan over (for example, “Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes” by Emerson/Fretz/Shaw).  Other people keep you afloat in this program so I suggest you prioritize making friends and staying connected. (3rd year, cultural anthropology)

Your mental health is more important than finishing all of those readings.  It’s easier as an undergrad to finish every assignment and read every paper so it seems like it will be easy to do it your first year too.  And you might throughout the first semester, but when you get to the second semester you kind of realize what is important to finish and what can be skimmed and what can be skipped.  That sounds terrible but save yourself the panic attacks and stress illness because you don’t get a medal for finishing every reading. (3rd year, physical anthropology)

The museum is a really wonderful place, wander around it once in a while.  When things get overwhelming wander the halls among the artifacts and remember why you are here in the first place! (4th year, archaeology)

Don’t take coursework too seriously. Perform well in courses taught by your advisor and potential committee members and focus on learning in language and skills-based courses. Your GPA will not be taken into consideration by hiring committees so just keep it high enough to stay in good standing with SAS. (5th year, archaeology)

We are in a very self-oriented industry and often-times there aren't great systems, or even communities, of support in the different stages of the program. However, nearly everyone is willing to support each other to the best of their abilities. It just may take some degree of reaching out to people in your cohort and those that you know in the program. Don't feel intimidated if they suggest you talk to older students or recent PhDs that you don't even know. We all have been in similar places with similar struggles, and generally everyone wants to be there for people in a way they maybe wished someone had for them. (2nd year, cultural anthropology)

"Graduate school is about learning about the impossibility of one person doing everything all the time and what you need to know to make it work" (Nikhil Anand, assistant professor, cultural anthropology)

[gremlinsae]

I see a lot of misinterpretations on anxiety manifestations in the yoi fandom so here we go:

-Anxiety and low self esteem are not synonymous.

-Anxiety is not always related to how comfortable a person is with sexual topics or situations.

-Not everyone with an anxiety disorder has social anxiety (and social anxiety itself has varying level of degrees so please be conscious of this!!)

-Anxiety does not only manifest out of trauma. There are many causes for anxiety disorders, including genetics.

-ANXIETY ATTACK DOES NOT = PANIC ATTACK

-Anxiety manifests in MANY different ways and not just as panic attacks (in fact, panic attacks are more in line with panic disorders but do note that anxiety and panic disorders sometimes come hand in hand.) Manifestations include but are not limited to obsessive behavior, self harm, disassociation, mood swings, jittery movements, paranoia, high energy, low energy, procrastination, distancing oneself from others, etc.

-Anxiety is triggered in MANY different ways and although we can list the most common triggers all day long, they do not apply to everyone with an anxiety disorder.

The reason why I say this is mostly because I see a lot of the fandom manifesting (canon) Yuuri’s anxiety as body dysphoria, severe social anxiety, issues with intimacy, and panic attacks when really it’s more like:

-performance anxiety (terrified of going first, but the longer he waits to go perform the more psyched out he becomes.)

-imposter syndrome (not full blown confidence issues…he knows he’s skilled but he has issues with seeing himself as being on par with his idol and peers even though he’s the number one skater in his country and performs well at international competitions.)

-adopts jittery mannerisms and succumbs to invasive and self depreciating thoughts - can logically navigate them but needs to distance himself from others in order to sucessfully do so (in other words, when he’s having an anxiety attack he does NOT want physical comfort, which is likely why he pushed that girl away in the story he told Victor at the beach. I think his issues in regards to intimacy has more to do with a cultural perspective of PDA and with how well he knows the person touching him.)

-getting so caught up in his own head that he doesn’t see the big picture (think episode 11)

Disclaimer: This is not to discourage other headcanons or to discourage works that have Yuuri’s anxiety manifest in other ways. I just wanted to make a psa to not only provide perspective to those who do not struggle with it but to also encourage thinking of other ways one can show Yuuri’s anxiety that’s not your typical cookie cutter manifestations - especially when one is trying to write Yuuri as in character as possible.

[carbonsequestrian]

man i dont even know if i should share this because it’s super weird/ poorly written/ doesn’t make any sense but i feel like i keep too much too myself so here is a block of text i wrote and didn’t edit and if you read it, i love you.

Well, id like to kick off my music blogging career with a piece about a song that has continued to inspire me since the moment I heard it about 5 years ago. Something about the song awakens this dragon in me… or rather, something about the song awakens a knight that is about to go and slay a dragon, and that feeling crashes into every fiber of my being resulting in me feeling fucking powerful. Idk what the secret is. I wish I had found this sound when  I did a song analysis project for my freshman writing seminar back in college. (I chose Sublime’s Santeria for that project… and it was a shit show. Believe it or not, trying to write 10 pages about a song that doesn’t inspire every fiber of your being is insanely difficult. Lesson – if you have to write a lot, write about something you fucking love and admire.)

 The song is Don’t Waste Time Doing Things You Hate by And So I Watch You From Afar of their self titled 2009 release. I think it’s their debut album. Anyway, the band makes instrumental rock music. Stuff that superheroes and supervillains alike would use as a theme song. I discovered them from Worldhaspostrock on youtube, so check them out.

 Of course, now that im sitting down to write about the song I cannot think of any words to say about it. Lovely how that happens. Especially after bragging about how easy it is to write about something you love. HA>

If you’ve ever done something you hate, you sure know how that feels. Part of you feels trapped -momma didn’t raise no quitter – and another part of you is too busy daydreaming about what you’d rather be doing to formulate a plot to get you there. Feeling stuck doing something you hate is exactly how I felt when I discovered this song. I chose my major at college based on what a guy who I’d met over the internet was studying, he called me pretty and would send me ‘good morning’/ ‘sweet dreams’ texts, so we were obviously super serious. And I was going to study the same thing as him and we would conquer the world together, duh. Lo and behold, I hated my major. And because I hated my major, I didn’t really fit in with any of the people I met through my major. There was one chick who I liked because she hated it too, but we were very different people. I did sports in college instead of joining a music group (being in an acapella group was a last minute goal of mine) because A. everyone in my family was super sporty B. no one in my family thought very highly of music and C. I was fucking terrified of it. Every bit of it sends anxiety chills down my spine and up my toes. Singing in front of people in a room? Singing with people? Having people rely on you to do your thing correctly in order to achieve a desired result? Fuck that’s anxiety inducing. And let me make this clear, I don’t have stage fright. But I do have Perfectionist Block (a totally real issue, created by me, ill discuss it further in another post) which makes me extremely hard on myself.

 So anyway, to paint the picture – 20 year old me is in the library for the 50th hour that week (no kidding, I went to Cornell, and seriously spent 6-10 hours a day in the library studying during regular term. Finals/ testing weeks, it’d double) looking for upbeat instrumental music that could make me feel like a bad ass and I find this band. The first song I found by them was The Voiceless, off the same album. That song fucking slaps. I must’ve listened to it 30 times before saying “hey, why don’t I check out their other stuff?” and thus gave this album a listen. I was so stressed that week, so tired, felt so lost and alone. I hated every fucking minute of my life but I was pushing through it because I wanted to make my mom proud. Every morning I would angrily get ready for class, pissed off that elitism and this desperate urge to prove oneself through menial shit such as ‘ivy league’ degrees would push someone to find the line of their breaking point and balance on it. All for what? If I died tomorrow, who could speak of who I am? At cornell, I was a cornell student. That was it. By being there, I wasn’t anything of myself anymore. I wasn’t strong, I wasn’t funny, I wasn’t good with animals, I wasn’t a hard-worker, I wasn’t smart – though, those last traits were implied – I simply became a product of an institution. One that I loved, don’t get me wrong. I had been looking for reassurance/ acceptance/ approval my entire life, and that letter that I got from a world renowned school was it – so I thought. But then I got there and my imposter syndrome went wild. I wasn’t truly smart, or good at learning. In fact, high school had been so easy for me that I was able to scrape by with great grades without ever working on schoolwork outside of school (I’d do my work during lunch, when I would eat in the chorus room/ my English teacher’s room since I had no friends.) at school, I thought I’d made friends, but they ditched me when I needed them most. In retrospect, I should’ve been more forgiving – no one’s perfect -  but ill blame my poor socialization through high school here. I saw kids who worked their asses off day and night. A 16 year old math prodigy lived in my hall. And I had nothing to show for my intelligence outside of the fact I was able to take enough HS classes in middle school that I’d manage to have 4 hours of school my senior year (typically, that time would be so that kids could take extra APs. But I said fuck that.)

 Truth is,  I was so insecure and unsure of myself that being thrown into the lava pit that is college – any college, not just an ivy league – was emotionally and mentally overwhelming. I found myself getting drunk to the point of almost dying most nights. Every time with strangers. I’d often go to the bridges, where so many had leapt to their deaths before, and ponder if that’s where I belonged. Crashing amongst the rocks and water in the gorges. Man, I was fucking depressed. And a ball of anxiety. I had no real identity, you’d ask me what I liked or what I wanted from my life and I’d have no real answer. My answer would vary based on what youtube videos I had been watching that week. I was so scared of being judged.

 Point is, I found nothing that I felt a connection to. Not my major. Not my peers. Occasionally my surroundings, but typically only in the morbid, I’d like to throw myself off this sort of way. Life is so much more complex than those things, and truth is, ill never really be able to explain away all of the different shit in my life that was bringing me down. Making me feel worthless. Dumb. Like I didn’t belong. And the first thing that I felt like understood this, was this song. Even writing that out I feel like it confirms my worst fears, that I am worthless/ delusional/ crazy/ not even a real person. How does one go through 20 years of life and can only feel connected to a pile of noises that a stranger has made and recorded? Wavelengths generated by someone else’s finger tips never felt so good. They resonated through my brain and spoke to my soul. It was like I was being sucked into a black hole and obliterated to nothing. And that was what I needed, because I was able to look at who I was and take a chance to rebuild. To change.

 With no one to talk to, no one who understood me, and no real goals or aspirations in my life/ being too crippled by fear to even take a chance to achieve my goals/ aspirations in life, I darted in the complete opposite direction. Left that ‘dream school’ for a state school 2000 miles away. I still waste plenty of time doing things I hate, but every day I try to do my best to find the things I love. It’s been a long hard road, and I am so unsure of myself. I realize I’ll never have the validation I seek, at least not externally. Still, going to cornell is my greatest achievement and those close to me hold a grudge that I left without fulfilling my diploma. And looking back, I could’ve done it. Taken some time off, sought a therapist outside of the free service offered, opened up to some of the people I had met. Hindsight is 2020. And im here now.

 This song means the world to me. The suspense of the guitar plucking in the intro is an emotion I was swallowed in. the anger and noise of the guitars from 1:11-1:30 was how I felt every morning when I looked at the day ahead. The desperation of the guitars at 2min how I looked at the people around me, who appeared to have their shit all together. Their heads above the water. Looking at me drowning below the surface. But I had a smile on my face, so I must have been fine. Then the clarity that comes at 3mins. The music starts to feel like it’s getting itself together. 3:35-4:15, when big changes happen. And the la la lalalalalas. That’s how I was, just “la de da-ing” my way through life, not really thinking about what I was going to take from this world and my short time getting to experience it. The song gets progressively happier, and calmer, as I hope my own life will be, though I’m still in my 3min phase when it feels like it’s starting to get itself together.

 Ill always hold onto the hard times I went through at school. And ill wish everyday for a time machine, so I could go back in time and tell 18 year old me to just chill and ‘discover yourself, man’ before going to a place that has so much potential. Because the truth is, I was too insecure to be successful at such an institution. I still think I’m too insecure. But at least now I know, and I’m not living under this idea that because I got into a good school I am a good person and good things will come to me.

[faizrashis1995]

Confidence

Confidence is both a strange and fragile thing. It is strange because there are two sides to it – how others might perceive you as being confident; and how confident you actually feel. I’m pretty sure that most people reading this will have had their confidence broken or damaged at some point so will not require any explanation of its fragility. In this non-technical post, we’ll look at various aspects of confidence in what we do, and some strategies that I find useful in building confidence.

  Confidence is not a tangible thing – it is a state of mind. That actually explains its fragility – if it is something that only exists within our minds then there is nothing to prevent it from being eroded or even destroyed very easily. It is not specific to working in software development, it affects everyone in both their working and personal lives, but some people are affected more than others.

 People often assume that I’m a pretty confidant person because I write a blog and speak at tech conferences but the reality is that I suffer from the same breakdowns in self confidence that most folks do. When writing blog posts I find it pretty easy to write in a confident voice if I feel that I understand the subject matter well enough, and I have the opportunity to review and re-write the posts if they do not come across correctly – I’ll discuss this more in a future non-tech post about my approach to writing blog articles. The same applies when it comes to public speaking, although there’s a little bit of back story that I feel is pretty relevant.

 When I was a child, perhaps around 6 years old, I had a real fear of singing in public and now I realise that the fear was simply a lack of confidence. I could cope with singing as part of a group, but the mere thought of singing solo in front of anyone was the scariest thing imaginable to me. That was not just a passing fear, it continued in to my teens. However, I used to love music (I’m a heavy rocker at heart) and in my teens taught myself to play guitar and I would play and sing along to records in my bedroom. As I got in to my late teens I slowly began to overcome my fears by joining various bands mainly to play guitar, but slowly began doing backing vocals as well. As I got in to my twenties, open mic / unplugged / acoustic nights became popular in the UK where local pubs and clubs would host evening enabling amateur musicians to perform, and I started singing and playing solo. This was the very thing that I was so scared of doing as a child, but over time I was able to not only sing in public, but actually became confident at doing it. I think that I have quite a strong vocal style and I attribute that to not wanting to be timid about it – if I’m going to get up on a stage and do the thing that so frightened me as a child, I’m going to do it with strength and confidence because that is an important part of overcoming that fear. I progressed from performing at these events to actually running them and being the MC which means that you need to fill in if there aren’t many people turn up to perform on a given night, and this certainly built my confidence further.

 When I subsequently formed a band with a couple of fellas that had never performed live before, they commented on how I never seemed to be affected by nerves before we performed live. That isn’t true, I certainly felt nerves every time that we played live, but playing in a band feels much safer than when one is performing solo because individual mistakes are less obvious in a band scenario, whereas when you’re solo there’s nowhere to hide. This goes a little full circle back to when I was a kid and could sing as part of a group, but singing solo was really scary. Years of learning to manage the nerves I felt when performing solo is what my bandmates perceived as not experiencing nerves when playing in the band with them.

 There’s quite an interesting thing here. When we look at our own confidence, we know that it is on an analogue scale – confidence is . But in others we tend to see it as a binary thing – that person either has confidence or they don’t. We actually tend to see confidence in others if they are slightly more confident about something than we are, or at least appear more confident. That’s what my band mates saw in me, but it was just that I was slightly more experienced in performing live than they were.

 When I first spoke at a tech conference (AndroidConf in Rio De Janeiro – September 2011) I was extremely nervous, but felt that my experiences in performing music certainly helped me to channel that nervous energy in a positive way.

 I still get nervous when I speak publicly, and this is usually at its worst when I perform a particular talk for the first time – the unknowns about how well the subject matter will go across, and how well the talk will fit in to the available time slot always cause some anxiety, and this lessens as I get more familiar with giving that particular talk, and getting a feel for how far through the talk I am in relation to the available time enables me to speed up or slow down as necessary.

 Certainly my musical experiences have helped when it comes to managing nerves before public speaking, but they are pretty similar in that they are both public performance. The simple fact is that the best way to learn how to manage your nerves as a public speaker (or any kind of public performance) is simply to get out there and do it as much as you can. It can be quite astounding when people say that you don’t look at all nervous when really you’re a bag of nerves inside. But, as well as knowing the subject matter that you’re going to speak about, channeling that nervous energy in to a positive performance is what will make you appear as a very confident speaker.

 A common manifestation of a lack of confidence in the workplace is the dreaded “Imposter Syndrome”. For those unfamiliar with the term: this is where one feels that they are inferior to those around them and that they do not deserve to be there. For those starting out in their career this can seem to be something that they alone are experiencing, but it happens to us all from time to time.

 Imposter Syndrome is part of human nature, I think. We know our own failings, shortfalls, and flaws but don’t see them in those we work with a clearly as we see them in ourselves. When the difference that we perceive between ourselves and those around us becomes large, we begin to feel that we don’t deserve to be there on merit, and we’re an imposter.

 The strategy that I try to employ to deal with this is to actually try and be helpful and supportive to others. Although this may sound strange: “How can I help others if I’m not worthy to be here?”, the reality is that we can help people in many different ways. Sometime just being a rubber duck to someone can help them to understand a problem. But often people with different experiences looking at a problem with a fresh pair of eyes can often help to crack problems. Being able to help others in this way is extremely valuable to any team and can be quite a useful way to show yourself that you are contributing to the team in a valuable way. Don’t just confine this to the times when you’re experiencing some degree of Impostor Syndrome, either. If you are always trying to contribute to the team in this way you’ll find that the occasions when you feel Impostor Syndrome become fewer and farther between because you get constant reminders that you are useful each time one of your team mates thanks you for helping them.

 The other important thing to remember about Impostor Syndrome is that many of the people that you work with will also experience it from time to time. You can help your team mates to avoid it by taking the time to thank them if they help you, saying “well done” if they do good work (you don’t have to be someone’s senior to do this), and generally be nice and encourage those around you. The chances are that encouragement will be reciprocated, and it will help you to avoid your own Imposter Syndrome.

 I discussed earlier that we perceive others as being more confident if they appear more confident that we are about something. If we see all those around us as being confident in different ways, it can be easy to fall in to the Impostor Syndrome trap. It’s worth remembering that the best teams are made of individual with differing skill-sets, and varying areas of expertise. If you are experiencing Impostor Syndrome, try and identify the areas where you feel that you contribute the most, and understand the value that you provide to the team. Once again, this can be reinforced by actively trying to support and encourage others.

 So while we’ve only covered a couple of specific cases with regards to building confidence, and dealing with low confidence, these are things that I find incredibly useful. Confidence and be built by confronting and overcoming the things that scare you, and you can build on that to the point where you almost forget that you were scared in the first place. That initial fear was born out of a lack of confidence. We can also help ourselves and those around us by being helpful, supportive, and giving encouragement.[Source]-https://blog.stylingandroid.com/confidence/

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[mcfade]

Goodnight Kris

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