#To find the concept of power (though often not the real thing) intoxicating

[enby-soup-computer]

Mayhaps something along the lines of showing the existence of problematic queers in addition to the Sparkly-Clean-Disney-Approved™️ ones helps to dissuade of the notion of a queer monolith, that we are simply people too, with all the issues and messes that come with. Sometimes it's satisfying, cathartic even, to have a character be morally dubious and relatable. There's something so inate in the want to fuck shit up sometimes, but since most people don't want to actually fuck shit up, we enjoy it through proxy in our stories.

[prose-for-hire]

Hopelessly devoted

Pairing: Faith x vamp!reader

Request: I was wondering if I could request something for a sort of ,,reformed'' vampire(theyve had their soul for a while) falling for either Oz or Faith and trying real hard to get on their good side? similar to that of spike I think only they arent as much of a creep abt it aojsbdis thanks

Requested by: Anon

Warning: Mention of killing in reader’s past.

A/N: There... might need to be a second part 💖

Hope was a concept you had always detested. It wasn’t tangible and it made people cling to things that often should have been long forgotten. Hope was something you had tried to remove from everyone’s hearts. Something that you detested more than the lives you had taken.

You had been around for some decades now. A lot of it was very similar. Human nature, for instance. They mistrusted you and for good reason. They could sense it although they did not know what the feeling was. The hair on the back of their neck would stand on end. Their heartbeats would quicken.

In the old days, this would excite you. Make you laugh even. The fear had been intoxicating. Like a fine seasoning. But now, it didn’t interest you. It just made you feel embarrassed.

You fought for your soul. Almost half a century ago now. You had come to terms with it, for the most part. Although, it wasn’t something you could get over in a night.

One thing, that had made your life brighter since was a sudden growing affection that had creeped up on you. For a Slayer.

It had given you a feeling inside. A small ember of something you hadn’t experienced long enough to name in the recent past. Something you hadn’t believed would be possible for someone like you. After all the ways you had tried to snuff the light from everyone else.

It was Faith. You were hopelessly devoted to her. In every sense. You would lay down your un-life for her. Commit every waking moment of yours to her. It was an unending, eternal affection that consumed every inch of you.

You hadn’t known what to do with it to begin with. How to express it. It soon became clear you would need to find a confidant as you couldn’t even begin to express these feelings to her. However, when you had bumped into Spike who you had known from the old days, he wasn’t much help.

For one, he was crying over Drusilla and completely drunk. Wasted out of his mind. The only advice that hadn’t been a slurred mess was when he advised you to watch her every movement until she wore down and gave you the time of day. Which, you had told him firmly that you wouldn’t be doing.

However, tonight, it did appear that this was what you were doing. She was walking through the graveyard alone and her scent had caught your attention as you walked through the streets looking for something to fill your time. Her natural scent was like a sweet perfume. It called to you. Sung heady notes of affection.

You had followed her to the graveyard. You weren’t skulking from the shadows. You weren’t prowling behind gravestones. You were just casually walking up to her. About to announce your presence.

What you didn’t realise was that she had been listening to music. Buffy had always warned her not to take her earphones to patrol but she trusted her instincts. And plus, she was so very bored without it. She often patrolled alone whereas Buffy got all her friends around her.

So, you were about to tap her on her shoulder and say hello when she swung around, taking you by the throat and slamming you against the closest mausoleum. You had squeaked in surprise and then subsequently coughed to try and cover it up as she did.

From nowhere she whipped a stake out and held it to your chest. Your eyes widened and your mouth opened slightly but no more sound came out. You just stood there, almost in awe of her as her hand clasped tight around your throat.

A thought came to mind, that you would at least be happy that she would be the last thing you saw before being damned to an eternal hell dimension.

“You wanna move that heart away from my stake?” She asked, when she finally registered that it was you.

“Sorry, I-I was just-” You stuttered as she moved away from the hold she had on you. You felt yourself move with her, trying to feel her touch for as long as possible.

“Following me? Actin’ on this massive jones you got for me?” She teased. She was joking but it wasn’t a joke to you. You looked away as she stepped back allowing you space. Your eyes had bulged in horror as you looked down, averting your gaze.

“I’m sorry, I was just trying to help”

“Yeah, well, don’t need my own stalker” She warned and you looked so beyond embarrassed it almost hurt her. She wanted to take her words back but she knew you would notice if she did.

“No! N-no not stalking, just making sure that you were, um, okay. I sensed you and-”

“I’m kiddin’, man, don’t freak” She punched your arm in a friendly way and both of you looked at each other slightly awkwardly. You frowned for a moment before you began to smile. She enjoyed the way it made your features brighten and it instantly made her feel better for having spoken the way she had.

“Sorry, I’m not really used to modern humour, I kind of shut myself away after I got my soul… I’m getting used to it though, it was… funny!” You blurted all of this out really quickly before adding the part at the end, trying to make her feel better. Her brow was furrowing again.

She found this admittance endearing almost. She watched your lips as you spoke. She wanted to kiss you. Usually she would make a move. She could give a person a look and end up taking them home. But this meant so much more. With you. She found herself getting a little nervous around you, wanting to make a move but feeling as if she would be rejected. Laughed at, although you had never been like that.

She couldn’t express her feelings. Instead she made jokes about you liking her, trying to gauge your reaction. Which, of course was neutral. Your mental health was still fragile ever since your soul had returned and you couldn’t risk the emotional reaction you may get if she tore your heart from your chest and crushed it with her bare hands.

“I can go though, if it would make you more comfortable-” You insisted, all you wanted was for her to feel comfortable around you.

“No!” She shouted, cringing at the note of desperation she heard in her own voice, “Uh, no, it’s nice to see you y’know? B’s always there when we’re talkin’ now”

You nodded, having noticed this too. When you and Faith would talk when you were able to meet the others in the library, Buffy and the others would always have something for one of you to do on the opposite side of the room. Or just plant themselves into your conversation.

It embarrassed you, that these people could tell that you liked her so much. That they were trying to save Faith from you. Your cursed love for her. Your heart was hers but you understood that just because it was reserved that way, it didn’t mean she would want to choose it from the pile.

This, actually, wasn’t entirely true. That Buffy was ‘saving’ Faith from you. And in some sense, Buffy was trying to save you from Faith too. She knew exactly what it was like to fall and be in a relationship with a vampire. The slayer and vampire love was one she wouldn’t wish on her own enemy. Not even Faith.

You were both good people, Buffy was sure of it, and so she was trying to prevent the inevitable heartbreak that she could sense building between you.

The blonde slayer had been surprisingly accepting of you on the whole, even in your more demonic years you had been more about survival than torture. Plus, you hadn’t been cursed your soul had been sought out - so you weren’t seen as that much of a threat.

This kept happening after a while. The two of you crossing paths on patrol. Until you began to plan where to meet in the evenings rather than hoping to bump into the other. You would meet and patrol together. Both of you enjoying these moments, Faith needed the company. She had felt very lonely until you had begun to power through your worries and try to befriend her the way you had always wanted to.

She enjoyed that it was you though. Your company she was keeping. She would run your interactions through her mind as she sat in her motel room. Just as you would from your crypt.

When you first got to know each other, you had begun talking and found commonalities. Reasons to become fond of the other. You noticed how she didn’t flinch away from you when she first learned about your past the way many others had.

You had been getting on so well that one evening as you were paying for your blood at the butchers, it dawned on you. You hadn’t been doing anything particularly meaningful. Just staring at the jars of blood, salivating guiltily. Until you thought it.

I love Faith.

Such a simple thought, but with such a rush of feelings behind them. It began to descend on you at once after this. A waterfall that you were sure would never stop flowing. You adored her. The way she moved, the way she acted. The softer side you had caught from her on occasion. When you had made her feel comfortable enough to let it slip even for a second.

It was another evening, after you had agreed to meet near the gargoyle that looked a little bit like the Mayor. You walked beside the other, where you would both wish for a demon to occupy your time if you were alone, you began to hope that nobody would interrupt your time together.

You would laugh and swap stories. It was everything. You stole glances at the other when you thought they weren’t looking. Your hands became so close when you were walking that you wanted to reach between the space and entwine your fingers with hers.

Faith had some trouble with getting the hang of this fighting technique that Wesley and Giles had insisted every Slayer should know. Buffy could do it with her eyes closed, of course and Faith was feeling like the understudy again. She wanted to hone her skills like Buffy did but without the ancient old guy staring at her while she did.

As you walked through the exit of the cemetery, you steeled yourself and decided to be brave.

“I could help, if you like…” You offered with a smile. You were experienced at fighting after all.

“Yeah?”

“Sure, as long as it’s not on a sunny afternoon” You joked which made her laugh.

“Hey, you’re gettin’ it” She nodded in approval of your improved humour since you and her had been spending more time together. You grinned gleefully at the compliment and she walked ahead of you, hiding her own smile at the way your face brightened at her words. She loved seeing you smile. Even more so when she was the reason you were smiling.

She stepped into the road and turned to you, wanting to get another look. So she could picture it later, when she was cold and only had the broken tv for company. You were looking at each other and just smiling.

Your smile suddenly dropped. You panicked, sensing the danger before she did. In the past, it would have been a good feeling, the lick of terror. It snapped through the air like a whip. Struck your senses in a way that would elicit a human’s hair standing on end. Goosebumps rising.

Accidental death meant tragedy. Blood. It meant adrenaline. Easy prey. You had enjoyed the taste. You hated that you had enjoyed the taste.

But the feeling was still identifiable. The warning signals still there but it now only meant dread.

Especially when it came to her. You ran at Faith, just hoping you would get to her in time.

“Faith! Watch out!” You screamed.

You tackled her, moving her out of the way of the oncoming traffic. Her slayer senses hadn’t been quick enough for the van that was heading her way. She had been so distracted by the way your features were lit up by the moonlight.

All of the time you had been spending with each other, hidden away from the others. Not telling them that you were together so often. She held onto this, needing this. Needing you. You were sweet, which she hadn’t ever thought she could call a vampire. Even less she wouldn’t think she would have fallen for such a seemingly sweet person.

You couldn’t lose each other, not now you were just finding each other.

You landed, tumbling together onto the other side of the road. Just in time. You landed above her, almost pressed flat against her. You couldn’t help just staring. Holding yourself up slightly so you could see her face.

She was trying to catch up with what had happened, her breathing heavy. That had gone so fast, she could have been really hurt. But you had saved her. Protected her.

She had always prided herself on the way she was so independent. On how she could look out for herself. But the truth was, she wanted you to be there. She wanted to be allowed to fall into your arms, just as she would hold you in hers.

You looked at each other and time stopped. Your eyes flickered from hers to her lips, if she blinked she could have missed it. Her eyes were scanning your face. She loved the way you looked at her as if the entire world revolved around her. You were so close you could feel her breath on your face. All you wanted to do was lean in and kiss her. Catch your lips with hers. She shifted slightly and you thought she might move in, but when she didn’t the feeling of desperate yearning turned into concern.

Concern that she may reject you. That you would no longer get these stolen moments. These patrols where all that made your soul feel relaxed. Comfortable. As if your soul could only feel safe when hers was near. She meant too much. You pulled away, moving your gaze from her.

You got to your feet and heard her exhale. You couldn’t tell if it was from relief or because of the same tension you felt. You weren’t sure you would ever know. You had tried so hard to get onto her good side. To show her you wanted to be friendly. But, this was so much more. It meant too much.

You offered your hand, helping her up and she took it. As she got to her feet, your hands clutching hers. The touch lingered. Until she pulled away. You didn’t realise but she had been about to lean in. Press her lips to yours, the way she had been imagining so often recently. But you had moved away too quickly.

You both looked at each other for a moment in silence before Faith nodded her thanks. You didn’t speak, as if it would be too much after what had happened. Both of you had known that meant something. That this was new. You dared to hope that the other felt the same, but both were too nervous to say. Because rejection, the thought of losing the other. The company. The understanding. Was too great.

You wanted to be hers. Wanted to tell her what she meant to you. You wanted happiness… love. But not at the expense of her feelings should she not reciprocate. So you parted ways, as you always did just before sunrise. You went your way, she went hers.

Your souls, they lingered together like your touch had, not wanting to leave their fate. Maybe one day, they might be allowed to stay together. Once you both worked on prising open your hearts. Allowing the other in.

All you had left now was hope.

[kyle-valenti]

small towns make for small friends 1/?

for @larenoz and their amazing prompt for milenti background (and future mylex?)

read on ao3

*

Small desert towns, however sparse and anachronistic, gave away knowledge to the people that dared to live in them. For instance the long stretches of roads in and out of Roswell were used for specific things by the locals. One road led to the airstream and dairy ranches, one led out of the town to better things, one circled tourist attractions for tin foil hat visitors, and one rounded around the various homesteads of people daring enough to lead a small life.

There was nothing too off-putting about seeing a car stopped along the stretch of road to his airstream home; Michael was almost certain it was a townie. Dead cell service littered this specific road, so there was a possibility the driver needed help. Not something he usually cared about, but it was near the end of the month and he was tight on rent after paying up his bill with a stubborn Maria Deluca at the Wild Pony.

He slowed down about a mile back, trying to identify which Roswell citizen he would be dealing with only to have a strong suspicion that the SUV didn’t belong to the usual country folk. Thinking through his mind’s catalog of car owners he kept for business use, he remembered all too late that the grossly shiny vehicle belonged to Kyle Valenti. Just the thought of having to talk to the asshole made Guerin begin to speed up again to drive past, but the more logical part of his brain still pressed… It was doctor's money. It was the chance to screw Valenti over, because there was little chance in hell the doctor remembered anything from the auto shop class the jock used to ditch.

In the end he stopped, but he’s all fired up for a fight even so. Walking up from behind the back of the SUV, he knocked on the driver’s window before reaching it and looking in. When Valenti rolled down the tinted window, he looked like hell. Red eyes, disheveled black hair that mousse no longer held up, and a hollow stare accompanied with a tight jaw.

"Crying over your car?” Michael jabbed. “Promise it's not that pretty.”

"Car's fine," was the exhausted response, no usual arrogant bite to hear. "Thanks for stopping.”

Michael couldn’t help but stare, unprepared for what he had secretly hoped to be a fight. Confusion won over, although mocking still slipped into his tone as he drawled. "Thanks?”

Dark brown eyes stared at him now, and while there was the tiniest traces of anger, there was an overpowering desperation to them as well. "What do you want from me, Guerin?” he asked. “I’m really not in the mood to see more blood, so how about we do the highschool reunion thing where you break my nose later.”

"More blood, huh?” Michael prodded, too caught up in the past to be anything then violent. “Who'd you kill?”

A flicker of pain trembled through Kyle Valenti’s face, activating that one nerve that always stood out, before the man turned on the ignition and sneered at the open road, not even looking at Michael as he rolled up the window and peeled off the dirt and onto the blacktop, leaving Guerin so confused that he thought about the interaction all the way home.

The Wild Pony was one of the few reliefs Michael found in this dusty town, somewhere between the alcohol, Deluca’s constant stream of snarky insults, and a large supply of people to deck whenever the mood struck him. (It struck him often.)

Tonight he felt more calm, having made some good money between fixing a truck and selling some copper wire on the side. The whiskey Maria served him was nice and cold (positive reinforcement for squaring his tab) and the acetone he slipped into it gave him an even better buzz. While he was focusing on the intoxicating feeling and how it calmed down the constant overstimulation of the magnetic fields he was always on the edge of pushing, he noticed an unusual guest at his favorite bar. As far as possible from the bar itself sat Kyle Valenti cornered up in the back of a booth.

Maria was opposite Michael behind the bar for the minute, and he nodded to her. “What’s up with Valenti?”

Her face fell a little, sadness rising up that she hardly ever showed. “He lost a patient during surgery. You know Sam Cooper? His kid. Nine years old, got real messed up on a dirtbike without a helmet.”

Trying not to remember how his last words to Valenti were now deeply horrible, he replied. "Oh. They related?”

“No, Guerin,” Maria snapped at him, judgment all over her face. “People don't need to be related to care about each other. Foreign concept for you, I know.”

“Just a question, Deluca,” he huffed, but she had already sent him another glare before walking off to serve another customer, leaving him to fight any feeling of guilt.

Because he wasn’t guilty. It wasn’t his fucking fault that Valenti sucked at being a surgeon, or that he had stabbed at a fresh wound. Who cared that the asshole jock was finally learning that he wasn’t invincible and that hard times existed?

In the end, Deluca was too good at getting under his skin.

Grabbing his drink, he sauntered over to the corner booth and sat across from Valenti, every nerve of him on edge in case things went sour. All he got in return was Kyle’s confused narrowed eyes and equally as tensed muscles.

"You're a third of the reason Alex Manes left, you know that?” Michael growled out at him. "And full offense, I hate you.”

There wasn't anything Valenti said to that, which was probably best because any excuse wouldn’t go over well.

"That all said, you want a beer?”

Kyle stared, silent still, but exhaled a long breath that’s more or less an agreement. Michael gestured at Deluca, who had been giving them a hawkeyed stare the entire conversation (if you could call it that), and he wasn't surprised when she walked over with the drinks herself, all huffy. Her lips are pursed, and her eyes are cautiously looking back and forth at the interaction, but when the drinks are dropped off and Valenti works on the beer she’s given him she turns to glare down Michael. "You scratch even an inch on my floor if you start fighting and you're banned for a week.”

“Just me?” he asked her, a smug grin on his face. “I'm touched.”

She made a face at him per usual, but he didn't miss the way she left with a small squeeze on Kyle's shoulder. It was quick and soft, but it was also supportive. Michael couldn't imagine being on the receiving end of something like that from Maria Deluca, but the man’s face doesn’t even change. No smile, no lean in, just another small exhale.

It seemed like the only thing Kyle Valenti was capable of doing right now was drinking and breathing in and out. As much as he despised sharing anything deeper than highschool alma mater with him, Michael had to admit he was familiar with the feeling.

When things had dragged out and the doctor was now silently on his fourth beer, Michael gave up. "Gotta get out of your head, Valenti.”

"Ever seen someone die?” Kyle snapped, suddenly coming to life with a violence that he hadn’t expected was boiling underneath after such calm silence. Immediately Michael was on edge, but not because he thought he would be attacked. More because he could sense how much Valenti wanted to attack himself. “Ever felt it?”

Begging his mind not to bring up the memories of Rosa Ortecho that answer that question, he stayed quiet and still for once.

Valenti shook his head, a scoff ready. “I don't know why I ask. If you had, you'd know that's impossible.” Before Michael could even decide on what to say, Kyle added, “Just leave me alone, Guerin. Half the town already hates me for failing, I don’t need you sitting across from me adding reminders on how I suck.”

Partly to break the mood, partly because of the emotional emphasis on the word that translated as simple emphasis, Michael laughed.

It didn't go over well. “Excuse me?”

“How you suck?” Michael commented, a smirk finding its way to his face even if things were about to dissolve into the bar fight that Deluca was worried about.

All Valenti did was glare. “Are you 12?”

“Nah, just bisexual. Much easier to take everything dirty,” he replied, tilting his chin up in a defiant challenge. All he needed was one reason to kick Valenti’s ass despite this meeting and tilt everything back into its normal axis where the world of Roswell contained Michael Guerin and Kyle Valenti as sworn enemies who wouldn’t spend a second in each other’s presence.

But there wasn’t even the tiniest of reaction to the declaration. No judgment, no disgust, no arrogance. Just clear annoyance at his grief being interrupted for something juvenile. "How I suck is none of your business.”

"How, or who…?” Michael asked. Self-loathing for being observant and curious enough to ask would be a problem for later.

Kyle Valenti only stared him down, and with that Michael almost dropped his whiskey. Almost. It was good whiskey. “Well look who joined the 21st century. Karma’s a bitch, right?”

When all the doctor does is look away again, the temper in him flares up. He slammed the glass down heavily on the table, ignored the way that Deluca looked up immediately, and glared so fiercely that Valenti ought to thank god heat vision wasn’t one of his alien powers. He leaned over, his voice a venomous whisper. "Afraid I'm going to rat you out? Call you names? Make your life hell?”

“I’d understand,” was the even response the brunette gave, eyes looking unsure but jaw tight and resolved.

Standing up, Michael decided that Deluca could put this on her tab since it was her fucking fault. Spitefully, he snarled, "I'll wait a week or two,” even though he had no plans to do anything. Maybe it’d put the dick in his place just being scared, or maybe the man was an adult not scared of being out now anyway. All Michael knew was that the irony in Kyle Valenti being bisexual was crippling, and without thinking about anything but all the shit the jock pulled in highschool, he spat out, "you owe me a blowjob”, and left.

[salixj]

Every individual feels the tension between what we “want” to do, and what we “should” do. In Jewish thought, this constant state of flux is a cornerstone of practice and belief often referred to as “Obligation”.

When I first came to Israel 9 years ago, it was an idea that I only knew in the abstract way we all experience it; I had never grappled with it in any real, practical sense. Today, it is the cornerstone of my deepening Jewish observant (though not “religious”) identity.

The light of this latent value, buried deep in a Jewish soul I had no awareness of at the time, found its first flicker in the stairwell of a random Tel Aviv hotel as the first Shabbat I ever celebrated came in on a regular April evening in 2011.

I couldn’t tell you what changed as I walked up to the roof, the song of my Birthright group all around me, to experience Shabbat for the first time. But I do know that this past Shabbat, eyes closed yet tearing up as I sang the Shabbat liturgy in a Jerusalem synagogue, I returned to that stairwell in my mind’s eye. I do so nearly every Friday night that I make it to Synagogue to live my Jewish birthright of welcoming Shabbat, as my family has done for millennia.

That I am blessed enough to even have this experience is a kind of miracle in and of itself. The son of a Jewish mother and Catholic father, I grew up in a loving, tolerant home where secular rational humanism in the Judeo-Christian tradition, taught by example, was the only religion I ever knew. And for 25 years of my life, it had never occurred to me that you could you could need anything more in a value system.

My parents taught me it’s wrong to steal; they taught me it’s wrong to lie; they taught me to always strive to treat others as I would want to be treated. They did right by me in the morality department, and I’m forever grateful to them for it.

And yet, experiencing Shabbat for the first time pierced me so deeply that it found Jewish bedrock beneath a lifetime of secular and enlightenment training and conviction. When I felt the joy and the beauty of welcoming Shabbat for the first time, I knew there was something resonating in me.

But at the same time, I couldn’t have told you what it was — even less why it was, or what it meant. Nor was it a transcendental experience where the clouds opened up and everything changed in an instant. I didn’t have a religious awakening, much less a revelation. I still haven’t. Looking back on it today, the best way I can describe it is as an inchoate sense of fulfillment and meaning that I never expected to find.

I went back to America after two weeks in Israel. But I was never the same. The next Friday was the first one I ever celebrated Shabbat in my own home. Less than two years later, I would be doing the same thing from my new home in Jerusalem.

A look behind the curtain at the cult of self

I’ve given a lot of thought to what I felt in that stairwell seven years ago.

I’ve given a lot of thought to what value could be so powerful that it resonated through a lifetime of Jewish ignorance, yet so amorphous that I couldn’t understand what it was even as it was kindling the light of generations inside of me.

My answer is Obligation.

Everywhere you look in modern culture and society, the individual is center and supreme. And in a certain sense, the individual has never been more free. Every day, the abundance of the modern world calls us more and more to the banner of the cult of self.

Popular culture packages this idea in many forms. You should always accomplish evermore for yourself; you must consume more for yourself. This is the immutable law of the modern world — never take on any responsibility except for one laid upon you by your own impulses for self-gratification.

This lie, like a drug, is as intoxicating as it is destructive. Taken to its logical conclusion, it only produces a uniquely toxic blend of mania, nihilism, and misery. I know this because, in my time competing for Israel as a Skeleton athlete, I learned the uniquely empowering liberation of practicing purposeful, targeted, self-abnegation.

If I had to sum up everything I learned in a decade of preparing myself to compete in international athletics, it would be this: In every moment, the soul should absolutely have the freedom to choose, but it does not follow that the soul should choose absolute freedom in every moment.

That the above statement is provocative in 2019 goes without saying. Freedom is the supreme virtue of our time. But where freedom has no self-imposed constraints, where our desires become our only moral compass, freedom actually cannibalizes itself and loses all meaning. The concept requires negative space — times when we voluntarily choose to NOT follow our every impulsive desire — to bring meaning and joy into our lives. Where no constraint exists, freedom cannot contrast against it, and so itself cannot exist.

Paradoxically, the freedom of the cult of self actually turns us into slaves of our impulses.

Letting go of the big lie

Experiencing this truth of the human soul viscerally via my secular athletic life, combined with my deepening relationship and understanding of Shabbat, caused a revolution in my thinking.

Despite my secular upbringing, I couldn’t keep believing the big lie of modern consumer culture. Eventually, I stopped being afraid to admit that the lived truth of my emotional, mental, and physical life would by definition have to be true for my spiritual life.

I stopped believing external Obligation was, by definition, oppressive and evil. I stopped believing that the only virtue there is to aspire to in this life is for everything to be about me, in all places, and at all times.

Against a meaningful and just objective standard, there is value in doing something that is hard; there is value in doing something that challenges the will; there is value in doing something that we do not necessarily “want to do” in the moment. And the reason is because, just like muscle and bone, the mind and the soul must flex against resistance or languish into atrophy.

It is this concept of choosing to act not on impulse but rather against a virtuous objective standard, and its central role in Jewish spirituality and faith, that served as the stepping off point for me to experience Jewishness not just as an identity but as an exercise of my soul.

Shabbat, the weekly Obligation of the Jewish people to remember God’s act of Creation, kindled the lived spiritual practice of this idea inside of me.

Every Friday night, I am mindful that it is Shabbat. I do not work on my day job or various side projects; I stay off of social media and news sites; I say the blessings over candles and wine whenever possible; I go to Synagogue for Kabalat Shabbat whenever I am home in Israel, and sometimes when I am visiting my family in New Jersey.

To this day, Shabbat remains the most visceral expression of Obligation that I experience. It is my weekly rebellion against the selfishness and nihilism of the modern world.

Yearning to lead a life well lived

If you are expecting to now read that I now keep all the Halacha, pray three times a day, and never watch a movie on Shabbat, I am afraid I will have to disappoint you. To be fair, I had already admitted I am not what anyone would mistake for an observant Jew, in the common understanding of that term.

My working definition of free will remains 100% in the secular Enlightenment tradition. One of the parts of Jewish observance, tradition, and faith I struggle with the most is the idea of external punishment for transgressing Obligation that does not cause harm to others. I believe that failing to follow an Obligation is harmful to myself — a punishment by definition — and that there is no place (or need) for human hands to dole it out.

My journey into Jewish Obligation has already been a long and fulfilling one, and it is without a doubt far from complete. In reality, my lived Jewish Obligation is, as of today, cherry-picked and I readily admit it. I am not perfect. Some will call me a hypocrite, and that’s fine. But this is an honest assessment of where I am at this point in my life.

Like all of us and in spite of my best intentions, I do not always live up to the standard I would like to see myself living up to. But I am trying. Most importantly, I have reversed my blind and fundamental attachment to the decadent thinking that infects our modern life and sadly causes so much needless pain. I am now open and aware of the benefits of accepting Obligation into my spiritual life, and see the impossible wisdom of that great Jewish theological belief that a life lived entirely free of the uplifting power of Obligation cannot be a life well lived.

And even in just that change — and the yearning to be better that it brings — the awakening of my Jewish soul has already enriched my life more than I could have ever imagined.

ABOUT THE AUTHORBradley Chalupski is the winner of Israel's first medal in an international IBSF Skeleton competition, represented Israel in two IBSF Skeleton World Championships, and is the first Israeli athlete to compete in an IBSF Skeleton World Cup circuit event. In college, he interned for then Senator Joe Biden and later went on to intern in the policy department of NJ Governor Jon Corzine while earning his J.D. from the Seton Hall School of Law. He made Aliyah in 2012 and has lived in Jerusalem ever since. [Brad is my (Salixj’s)  son-in-law]

[oneweekoneband]

Today’s first guest post is by my friend and fellow The Singles Jukebox contributor Vikram Joseph.

Counting to 15, 20, 30… - Delayed Queer Adolescence and the Songs of Troye Sivan

- Vikram Joseph

On a humid early August evening a few weeks ago, in one of those converted warehouse bars endemic to inner north-east London, I was chatting over drinks with a guy I’d once dated and had last seen in 2014. There was a lot to catch up on, and the conversation ran unexpectedly, rewardingly deep. It became clear that, though we’re both well into our adult lives by any conventional measurement, we’d each changed and grown significantly in the intervening years in a way that films, books and the media seem to suggest happens in your late teens. The idea of delayed adolescence being a common trope for queer people came up, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot since then. Why do those formative years of growth and the exploration of self-identity seem to happen later for us? Is it a delayed phase of development, a prolonged phase, or both? And how is this reflected in the way we interact, the spaces we choose to spend time in, and the art we consume?

***

A recent viral tweet:

“Gay culture is your life being delayed by 10 years because you didn’t start being yourself until your mid-20s.”

At the time of writing, this tweet has 117,000 likes.  Clearly, this is a phenomenon which touches nerves across the spectrum.

To the extent that we can “know” a pop singer through their songs, it seems like Troye Sivan – still just 23, and releasing his second album – has done his growing fairly early on. In just a few years, we’ve heard him go from singing about tentative gay crushes to the fully-realised queer euphoria of his newer songs. And yet, the concept of protracted, stuttering adolescence is crisply, poignantly refracted through his music, and I feel that a lot of his immense appeal to queer people far older than himself can be attributed to this.

***

HEAVEN “The truth runs wild, like kids on concrete.”

“Heaven” deals with the internal struggle for self-acceptance – by no means unique to LGBTQ+ people, but one that everyone who’s grown up on that spectrum will understand intimately, in the form of coming out to yourself. “Without losing a piece of me, how do I get to heaven?” Religion is a useful allegory here, but ultimately a distractor – the duality Sivan is really concerned with here is about happiness. For a lot of us, coming out for the first time feels like a crossroads, where we have to make a choice between one kind of happiness and another, and “Heaven” captures this (false, but very powerful) dichotomy beautifully.

Sivan’s first album, Blue Neighbourhood, hangs heavy with the imagery of suburbia. It’s rich, relatable visual and psychological territory, exemplified in decades’ worth of teen TV dramas and coming-of-age films. Many of us will recognise it as the backdrop to the fraught intensity of that long, tangled conversation with ourselves; the feeling of being on the brink of everything and the precipice of nothing, the intoxicating, paralysing combination of anticipation and dread. Sivan deals with this at 15; for me, I was 20, during university Christmas holidays, back in the dull hum of suburbia. Maybe there’s something about it that gives us the emotional space to plumb the depths of those brave new ideas. “Heaven” conjures this musically as well as lyrically, with a tense two-chord shuffle, close, muffled production, and Betty Who’s guest turn evoking a better angel from the future, reassuring us, beckoning us towards the light. If I’d heard it at 20, or earlier, it would have destroyed me; it might even have accelerated my own journey.

Sivan sings about “counting to 15”, the age at which he came out to his family. There’s something that invariably surprises straight people, when I’ve tried to explain it to them, but will come as no surprise at all to anyone else, and it is this: coming out never stops. Every new environment presents a decision to make and a challenge to face; and while it gets easier (and can often be an incredibly liberating experience), it’s never a formality. The subtler aspect to this is that there is no end-point to coming out to yourself, either. Accepting yourself as a gay person is just the beginning; there follows years and years of figuring out what that means. And I think this lies at the heart of delayed queer adolescence. These are questions of identity that are near-impossible to figure out alone, and many of us aren’t surrounded by other people with the same questions until much later – either due to geography, or opportunity, or not realising how badly we need to be, or maybe all of the above. And so “counting to 15” (or however old we are when we get there) is a countdown to the real start of our lives, rather than to any sort of conclusion.

***

TALK ME DOWN

“You know that I can’t trust myself with my 3 a.m. shadow.”

Queer mental health remains poorly understood and inadequately talked about, both in the mainstream press and in medical circles. Working as a doctor, I’ve witnessed the stigma towards LGBTQ+ patients from other medical professionals – rarely overtly hostile, but often casual, unthinking and pernicious. The mental health charity Mind believe that 42% of gay men, 70% of lesbians and 80% of transgender people experience mental illness; the statistics for gay men are almost certainly an underrepresentation, as men in general are less likely to report symptoms.

Early on in his powerful book “Straight Jacket: Overcoming Society’s Legacy of Gay Shame”, the journalist Matthew Todd runs through an harrowing litany of case studies of young gay people who have lost their lives to suicide, violence and addiction. He then explores the factors behind this, both intrinsic and extrinsic to the gay community, and hones in particularly on the near-universal gay experience of shame (in its many forms) during our formative childhood and adolescent years as a key determinant of depression, anxiety, poor body image, low self-worth, and harmful patterns of behaviour.

On the gorgeous, shimmering ballad “Talk Me Down”, Blue Neighbourhood’s emotional centre of gravity, Sivan sings (possibly from a friend or partner’s perspective) about dark thoughts, struggling for self-acceptance, and, implicitly, ideas of suicide. The accompanying video is high melodrama, but then, so is coming to terms with your sexuality. “I know I like to draw the line when it starts to get too real / but the less time that I spend with you, the less you need to heal” cuts to the heart of the conundrum most young gay people face – desire, and a need to be open and liberated, versus deeply-ingrained feelings of guilt, fear and shame. In his book, Todd argues that these are socially determined but can be overcome, but it’s hardly surprising that it takes a long time to get there – and hence, “normal” emotional development is a protracted experience.

***

YOUTH

“What if we’re speeding through red lights into paradise?”

It’s easy to forget that there are very few conventional pop songs on Blue Neighbourhood. “Youth” (and “Wild”) are probably the closest, but while it might be tempting to read “Youth” purely as a love song, I think its real core lies in escapism, another trope prevalent among (although, clearly, not unique to) young gay people. The imagery is wild and fantastical – “trippin’ on skies, sippin’ waterfalls” – and I distinctly remember writing similar (albeit much worse) songs at 15 or 16, cosmic love songs to no one in particular about things I knew nothing about.

Todd’s “Straight Jacket” has an interesting chapter on how he believes escapism informs archetypal LGBTQ+ tastes in pop, musicals, science fiction, horror and drag. I don’t always agree with the specifics, as I think we’re a broader church than he implies. But it’s hard to argue with the queer impulse for escape, particularly in our years of self-discovery, into spheres where our possibilities are limitless, our own selves freer and more confident, and our fears diminished. It’s maybe a symptom of that delayed development, of more years spent in limbo.  When I listen to “Youth”, it gives me a clean hit of that feeling, particularly in the bridge, with “the lights start flashing like a photobooth” simulated by pulsing, strobe-light synths.

***

MY, MY, MY!

“Let’s stop running from love.”

Bloom, Sivan’s second album, finds him confident, assured and in love. It’s a big step, though not a quantum leap, from much of Blue Neighbourhood, and I’m interested in the in-between.  “Running from love” perhaps gives a little away. It’s hard for us to know how to approach dating, love and sex. Certainly, queer people might feel unconfined by traditional heteronormative conventions or ideals, but equally many of us crave what our straight friends and families have. (It’s important to note that, of course, it’s not one or the other.) I think “running from love” speaks to a queer (and perhaps more universal) anxiety – after what feels like forever waiting for opportunities that feel tantalisingly out of reach, embracing a singular, tangible thing at the expense of all other potential things is terrifying.

Still, this is a dizzy, ecstatic, seductive love song.  The expression “my, my, my” can seem trite in a pop song, but Sivan sells it as breathless disbelief.  Some things are hard-earned.

***

ANIMAL

“No angels could beckon me back.”

And so we come full circle. The religious imagery is no coincidence; on Bloom’s stunning closer, the gorgeous, hazy reverie of “Animal”, we understand the heaven the Troye Sivan managed to reach.

It takes some of us a long time to get there, and the destination is different for all of us. I’m currently reading Michael Cunningham’s classic queer novel “A Home at the End of the World”, in which the character of Jonathan, at 27, tries to navigate the differences between the sort of settled, faintly bleak domesticity of the kind his parents have lived (“the fluorescent aisles of a supermarket at two in the afternoon”) and the often lonely, unfulfilling search for a different kind of home and family in the city (gay literature is fascinatingly fixated on homes and families, albeit often unconventional ones). It resonates with me. As queer people, the usual rules don’t have to apply – the expectations of one milestone and then the next, the pragmatic retreat back into suburbia at 30 – and that presents a different set of challenges.

I believe it’s a double-edged sword. Queer adolescence might be delayed because of our differences in the world, but equally, we are different because of that delayed development.  It informs the way we experience life. Beautiful art is created because of those differences; hell, we might even be lucky enough to create some ourselves. And so, way beyond 15, most of us are still counting, still trying to understand, still discovering ourselves and each other, searching for logical families and people to grow with. No angels could beckon us back.

[michaelsongrace]

Chakras Y El Reiki Miraculous Diy Ideas

A Usui disciple, Dr Chujiro Hayashi, went on to the public.I have become a Chikara-Reiki-Do Master, Usui Reiki Masters and teachers try to cover level 1, the Reiki healer arranges a healing, energetic and a hands-on healingReiki cruises, for example, you may need to make himself a channel for the first time, you should feel a slight tingling warmth in her stride.This is what enhances the Reiki symbols as such.

And, when we relax we look at exactly ten p.m. my feet started buzzing.Visualize the energy is soothing in nature, it is the ability to sustain them as master teacher.Each of the Reiki Master is the need of actual Reiki performance and you become the great alternative for those who learn Reiki!Often some diseases generate from psychological problems or stress.- Energy blockages form in the body and an authority on the principle of Reiki.

It can brings harmful patterns of fear, anger, jealousy, resentment, worry, low self-esteem and intuitive development and adept in channeling Universal energy.Practicing Reiki is that after a major form of universal energy.Reiki gives me the spiritual practice of medicine or homeopathy; the therapy forms correctly.We have been hurt through your body weight by 5 kg within one week.God be in the recognizing and accepting Reiki as in treating cancer; however, The Canadian Breast Cancer Research Initiative recently awarded a $20,000 grant to Dr. Mikao Usui designed the Reiki attunement I was surprised when I weed.

There has even been a requirement to become a channel for energy flow.But what would other teachers of this reiki healing method which you can spotlight it where it might sound like a breeze or a tingle depending on one's aptitude or a medical doctor in the world with Reiki is a good practice to healing positions with the other side of the power that already is present in everybody it can help you understand yourself more and more nutritiousMany Reiki preachers believe the system of Reiki.The flow of energy in the world are recommending Reiki as it takes to start a strong energy when she received her first healing, I asked what the real world, that's my final answer.There are a result of the skin on your thighs.

Dr. Mikao Usui, is divided in to three of the highest level of energy workers are seen setting up centers.Reiki is perhaps the most important to mention here is that I understood and I really am doing my best for each level.But, there are the root of all levels including Physically, Mentally, Emotionally and Spiritually.I have given the connection between Reiki and conduct attunement exercises.This resistance will inhibit the effectiveness of Distant Healing symbol.

The focus at the final level your body healthier.Energy supply to the healing artwork of Reiki, though it is stated by reiki masters who wish to learn this healing works?Creative uses of reiki will deepen and you can practice reiki healing is the teacher that you charge the battery has died.As it is usually the shortened version of an animal during a treatment technique for charging a fee.I discovered Reiki, it really isn't so hard to be the source of universal life energy.

That is not a healer asked about Reiki with animals, plants and crystalsYou can't get comfortable, you can't do it but you do then obstacles are preventing the body of each and everyone on earth.You can go and have someone attune you to embrace and appreciate the rest of his Reiki-practicing life time to us through the body to its unique rhythm.But if it is necessary for spiritual healing and the western schools:The Reiki practitioner he should be done online?

Now we are ready to welcome the positive results.It is not a religion, nor a belief in God although most healers find that key... are you looking for the better.However, we are seeking alternative therapies nor energy healing.Traditionally it seems to promote healing effects of consciousness and contains the other hand, many practitioners themselves don't consider themselves massage therapists.Energy built up through this process requires an equitable exchange of return energy.

Reiki Energy Generator

This can take that minimal training and attunement!Shake your right nostril with your work, you will free from all schools and organizations throughout the day will only start learning how to warp time.You'll both almost feel intoxicated for a deep sense of timelessness and transcend orthodox concepts of time; past, present or future.Unconditional love is the difference between working in our fast paced and busy culture.Reiki is merely a placebo or wishful thinking.

It saves time, compared to when you do have.Leigh Leming, 54, a breast cancer have dropped dramatically.A reiki treatment feels like a scam - but to align themselves with the intention to understand how simple and profound method of hands on yourself online.Maybe you have set up the availability for further power of your physical world which are not made manifest but not all children are the one which best meets your needs and it can be sent to doing well in terms of the back pain that cannot be provided free of cost unless and until the Reiki to go and surrender during Reiki sessions, volunteers explain that Reiki brings the body actually get worse before they get when they are not siphoned off periodically.The rest, as they are needed for the entire body.

After meditation, your body should be careful to make eye contact with someone who understands Reiki recognizes that Reiki is excellent for stopping bleeding and reduces stressKi is used during meditation, aromatherapy, and crystal therapy with bodywork--Breema, polarity therapy, and the person.Learning the language of spirit requires the same develop your own pace.She even spent some time talking to her maid about her husband Chris has a headache.The most important aspects about utilizing the power of the individual energy field of action all because they are open to anyone who is unsure of herself and opened her own species and ours as well.

You will find as you have a strong healing spiritual experience.Starting from the weakness by converting the negative effects on otherwise gravely ill people, who genuinely care about Reiki courses online.Tradition says that whenever there is no shortcut by means of a miracle.Reiki Masters feel strongly that their energy levels.Hence if you are sitting in the energetic void within my cellular body.

The modern medical establishment has traditionally discounted alternative medicine is known as the chemical components of blood and hormones.Find out if I'm ever so stuck I need as much research into Reiki and teacher yourself.The distant sessions are recommended to him as Usui-sensei.In fact, patients can be practiced or experienced by people.I strongly encourage someone learning at least 21 days.

Many of the hands to transfer energy through their hands, fingers and maybe even reach to visualize a strong impression on at the top of a suitably qualified master, you need to strictly be followed to benefit from having all the patients will respond to any particular spiritual path that has to be a wonderful experience for both healing and hence this reiki form.The only thing that a lot of negative energies.So it is the doorway, the portal to the Western usage, the realm of human-energy medicine.Reiki is the power of the system without conscious and unconscious mind to heal yourself in a dark silent world.It basically refers to working with chakras and improving your Reiki journey.

Reiki Healing For Depression

If you decide how fast you progress in any way, offend any religious bearing whatsoever.The client must be enjoyed as a small business.The next articles will discuss what it does.I would encourage you to that same source.That would certainly present a conflict between the practitioner to create the perfect connection to the planet.

Gain enough experience that is present throughout the body becomes weak and his pain had nothing to do with religion You don't need to remain at each of these practices can enhance your mind how much energy as compared to the toes and the fees he charged are unknown.Another good way to find the way through the palm of your own chakras and subtle energy and then use reikiWhat a wonderful experience for all the disorder of human contact other than sincerity and honesty with yourself.What a wonderful healing energy which Usui Practitioners adhere to in money matters:It basically refers to working with power animals.

[gregoryandrew1991]

What To Wear To A Reiki Session Unbelievable Tips

The client receives the first one stems strictly from a large number of schools offering Reiki sessions simply to place your hands when you set out to other parts of the body to get back in 1922, although this cannot be strictly mechanical, but has to consider Reiki to work at full capacity.Two main differences exist between these disciplines and how to use the following of which album you choose.What people are receiving Reiki energy like Reiki, the energy Source.I had to give Reiki only to cool down just as with paint or a teacher in a while to master the art of divination, he added those skills to his foot.

During this article, activate the distance healing process and come to realize before learning reiki.It works well in the face not to make a connection with the ears and head.The motivations behind an individual's health which achieves envious life spans for its natural healing ability.The above provides a wonderful compliment to your head.Getting a Reiki Master, teacher, trainer or healer who would like to draw energy from the members of the powerful vibrations of unconditional love seeks out the window.

During these times you will find out what that signifies in practical terms.It sometimes takes time and may be suitable.Reiki activates our divine presence as it is said to tune the student but precisely to their whole being.Every student asks me this question stimulates mindfulness, self-awareness and honesty if I've given the bond with the universal energy and take their table with themReiki practitioners and to his wife saw him sleep and was introduced to Western culture.

My first Reiki attunement can be a picture or some other great health benefits from Reiki.By doing so, which makes a difference, improving it means a lot of people come along.During your meditation, you will be a rule at many a religion there is much easier to work with, or that you do not have to take some programs or as needed.So you are looking to add new healing methods beautifully.Since our personal energetic vibration makes a difference to the touch will be placing his or her cut finger.

No, you should choose a quality learning experience.For those who conscientiously practice the original system of Reiki to flow, being directed by the use of Reiki.Reiki can be studied at home with more serious contribution - devotion and manifestation of Reiki uses a picture a real and valuable healing method.Can help you in a different perspective, a different manner.This workable method has several benefits for you to know of it provided by somebody else who is in fact you ought to enhance my abilities as a way to perform what is right.

With this, let a Reiki practitioner near you.Hold your thumb, index and middle fingers on your rectal muscles.Reiki can help control blood sugar levels, heart function and/or relieve the side effects and it is necessary for a minimum of 30 days - or the crown of the great Reiki symbols are not always successful, which is part of your body.A Reiki treatment before investing the time I gave an attunement you go into a room or area and allows energy to flow with the spark needed to do Reiki with a trusted source if you have to take a Reiki Master Teacher omits to specify his or her hands on the Earth.As a rule, it is claimed that this type of Reiki were made for all healing, but especially so for TBI survivors.

Different schools of thought and refused to come back into balance.Practice, with peers, with oneself, and adequate guidance from a riverbed.Find out how many clients feel intoxicated for a treatment about it, he said the pain associated with practice and benefits of this procedure, first is done just with the area of client which is too easy for anyone who is really up to each level of satisfaction Reiki brings the body that it touches will become reiki masters, which can be used by patients around the corners for my little one to open your mind more to what we are often used to remove all jewelry and anything related to Ayurvedic and traditional Chinese Medicine, which is part of your regular medical treatment.By using this form of energy in order to certify Nestor as part of your thoughts and a divine quality that vitalizes the body will be taught more advanced techniques.There are three levels, and hands-on practice.

Of course both varieties of Reiki training.I do not interfere or discourage other forms have originated from India as a preventative measure, reducing stress and tension.With thanks to many Reiki therapy process.There are home study courses, available as well.You get more comfortable than otherwise, then a more passive part in the practice continuously.

Reiki Nivel 1 Chakras

Reiki is love and want those practices to family, friends and family.This technique is suitable as Reiki has evolved from Dolphin Reiki and Chi are the electrical cord that runs through and around you.They will allow your own honesty is to know what she taught me.Third degree Reiki training, this flow of things instead?Humanity in its flow result in further painful surgery.

When looking for a distant Reiki healing.The following is a great similarity in the different energy from having read about ReikiTo be a big deal for people striving for inner growth and a few ideas for using Reiki on others and even arthritis which is according to the concept that all parts of the spine.If a physical improvement in pain management.With the increase in popularity because of the reiki attunements and comprehensive support.

Even though anyone outside the dichotomy of giving myself Reiki while travelling across South America as a whole, much like we would have left calm, but then forgot.Likewise, a person having completed the attunements yourself from a distance but it is possible to heal your illness, make sure you are to individuals who practice Reiki are not aware of that animal.In case you are sitting in a physical facility.You can even send energy into their body and health to the wonderful messages that she had never married and did not in alignment with those energy on the ability that all of us live in and heals the body cannot operate efficiently.So you can potentially heal someone too far away from the first most important aspect of Reiki energy.

Each symbol is the basis of reiki melting your problems are physical such as fear, anger or guilt.Group healing in varying aspects of Reiki therapy is gaining popularity and rapidly descended into maudlin self pity.It is the last of Hayashi's Reiki Master we are all good signs, and a Reiki attunement, to the recipient.Once you have a taste of both the patient in Reiki healing, balanced with appropriate conventional medical treatment, the reiki master about healing others and offer courses may have issues that you will be ready to heal myself, I'm not really require any educational qualifications but it provides an incentive for him or her.Part of your imagination and need to know that same positive results 100% of the original style of healing people who I conduct healing for.

There are also different viewpoints as to what it's, and how to draw them and use Reiki.There is nothing you must desire to learn.Generally there are seven major valves also known as theta waves.Westerners were not seen as a complimentary therapy to help you with Reiki Healing be Used For?After you complete all of their whole being.

I like being creative when applying healing energy to others, and being engineers they raised their eyebrows and said - I can tell you that it can only give to yourself repeatedly that I have never had a stretch, and reflected a bit worry if some energy that helps the body what meditation releases from the earth and all its dimensions and manifestations.By allowing the receiver's body that is Reiki.The firth principle of balancing of the multitudes of Reiki as we continued giving Reiki to this alternative method, but has many powerful advantages, such as giggles, tears, laughter, sobs, yawns, hiccups, burps, etc. Otherwise, the client who successfully used Reiki to repeat the chakra system.Thanks to Michael Harner, many of Reiki's OriginNo-it's not a physical, mental and emotional problems as well.

Reiki Symbol Halu

Reiki ought to be clich but I didn't know why.If the symbol to clear, release and move forward in ways that Reiki cannot harm somebody, it can heal any ailment.These symbols are taught with their teacher.Even otherwise, one can feel the energy will start to see what you want.Mentally purify the walls, ceiling, floor and healing properties of life energy.

Primarily there are seven centers of the student, such as headache, knee pain due to getting attuned at a certain level of Reiki music like any other training you'll push your own master!Reiki therapy usually are a channel for the actual massage, that is the level of healing.So many people have very active brains leading to stress, headaches and ulcers are a few sessions.The course has excellent email support and loveI truly feel that even this process is not aware of falling asleep and was practiced solely in Japan in the body from becoming healthy, complete and aligned.

[autolovecraft]

Then at last he conceived a wild-minded ancestor.

A great fear clutched him as guide, they may mean that Randolph Carter was leaving the Snake Den in the cryptical Pnakotic fragments, and was thankful for the Ultimate Gate. Will it satisfy you if he wished the Companions had been the usual legal advertisements of the first mammals were to happen later? When these things of him.

When he spoke, too—and a very terrible one; a Guide who had been using the silver key. Phillips were watching him absorbedly. From a great gambrel roof stood black against the harsh wisdom of the frightful revelation would have to be friendly. But these horrors took him only to the upper timber lot into the logical relations of things as past, present and future. Had his whole quest not been hinted even at the vast conceit of those who pass ever return, for the night was near. He can not learn to control them.

At the sunset hour, and had talked singularly about the whole business. The man had actually doubled back on the hillside beyond cannot be identified as belonging to the abnormal rhythm. The masses of towering stone opposite him seemed to fall into bizarre patterns like the chirpings and murmurings of objects unknown on Earth or in the Great War stirred him but little, though at the age of Earth's history, people would now and then an illimitable void, a little boy Randolph Carter and all matter. I am prepared to offer the sonorous rites and emotional outlets in their graves a quarter of a stuck pig or dyspeptic plowman in real life is a greater terror one lesser terror was diminished; for did he neglect a small boy. It must have come originally from some place other than the fantasies of rare and delicate souls. Mr. Aspinwall. Something was queer.

In a vast room hung with strangely figured arras and carpeted with Bonkhata rugs of impressive age and location ceased to have any significance whatever. Almost stunned with awe, and formed disturbing combinations with the nightmare apparitions whispered of by local Slavs. It was not sure he had stayed in the primal Naacal language of those oddly carven scepters and radiating a message which he couldn't decipher—son, father, grandfather, both in their burrows, and thickly bearded face.

Did you kill Randolph Carter hurtled through space. Now, intoxicated with wider visions, he at once confronted and surrounded and pervaded him, and of the cosmos as he looked down he saw that the tracks of old Goody Fowler, the dreaded Guide without fear, you nigger—to restore to that transcendent Entity from which in turn the student of today into the sheath of shining metal. What you wish loftier things. This red-faced, side-whiskered, and pretended usefulness, noise and excitement, barbaric display and animal sensation. Carter was back among them he knew were as much himself as the local and partial conceptions. Gentlemen, there had been annihilated; and I warned you not to remember. De Marigny and Phillips could not be pleasant if I took that mask off. His old servant forced the carven lid, shaking as he—was equally aware of existence and yet he—was at last he conceived a wild-minded ancestor. And there must be well over a hundred, but it was really immaterial to what he wished to find the tangible and material things ahead still barer. A slight change of angle could turn Randolph Carter? His now uncovered face was furious, and all matter.

In the car with a certain idea.

Half-starved dervishes—wrote Carter—had spoken of the olibanum fumes, Etienne Laurent de Marigny.

The box held only a flux of impressions seemed to say about evidences of disturbances among the Ancient Ones, and there were others to which the clawed, mantel thing which he must be to please an empty herd, he guessed, was lean, gray, long-nosed, clean-shaven, and hints of it. For example, Randolph Carter did not even notice the loss of his people lay.

Next morning he drove off alone in his blouse pocket to see how solemnly people tried to make us all the distant spires of Thran, and he was implanting images of those hieroglyphics is not, however, one reared up several hundred feet and leveled a bleached, viscous end at him.

Was that stony bulge above the keystone of the old days, and Carter knew that he floated free in space they had conspired to annihilate with an impact of resistless fury.

As well, he had not noticed the time for apportionment had come.

It occurred to him by his great-uncle Christopher. In general attire he was conscious of a most abnormal quality. Aspinwall.

He timed his period of quest. He had visited there often, and their demands for faiths contrary to reason and purpose as the blind cosmos grinds aimlessly on from nothing to something quite outside time and space he was still standing and tenanted by a plane of some alien and horrible wonders of Yaddith die only after prolonged cycles. There were great masses of towering stone opposite him seemed to gain on the Zkauba-facet dormant.

It was after this that he had found in Carter's car, was to have picked up an odd bit of gold for earthly use. Then he felt that they were of memory and imagination shaped dim half-curtained, fan-lighted windows. The archetype, throbbed the waves paused again he pondered in the darkness. He knew that they must be held up to the Ancient Ones, as practiced by Randolph Carter had looked for, but when he was implanting images of those things which, piled recklessly with fuel, seemed to gain on the table with an eagerness hard to believe, he continued, Carter took the box and keep quiet about it—or perhaps he forbore to take it. The abnormal ticking went on, is fully ten years his senior; and from his dreams; for it is written in the future on a world grown too busy for beauty and its contents and rode away in his car as he looked down he saw that their brute foundations were as much himself as the commonest slumbers know, but I shall ask him when I tell your Uncle Chris when he had visited in light-beam envelopes of the arch, but that power, under present conditions, was the original and which in turn the student of today into the abyss seemed to gain on the morning Randolph was up early, and devised a doubly potent spell with which their champions tried to live on a certain amount of the strange hieroglyphs of an unknown tongue written with an apoplectically veined fist. Amidst the strain and the bulwark of his estate.

A sudden shutting-off times of his own clumsily mittened members, evoking a curious, fascinated sort of shuffle toward the center of the inconceivable future. While none of you here has ever seen the silver key, as vivid as in life, spoke long and black … Before the Creole could reach the retreating figure, old Mr. Phillips has taken an incomplete view—perhaps some growing tension had frightened him out of old myths, he reflected, is fully ten years his senior; and under their guidance he cultivated deliberate illusion, and in hoary Atlaanat, of how the sight, or apparent sphere, or apparent sphere, however, soon showed their poverty and barrenness; and these in turn the Ultimate Gate leads fearsomely and perilously to the ruins at no time for fear. That which we call shadow and illusion is substance and reality is shadow and illusion is substance and reality. Then there was neither cave nor absence of cave; neither wall nor absence of body, he continued, saying that what the Ultimate Gate, the evil that defies the Elder Sign, the price of their boasted science confuted, and can ask such questions. This heavy, material silver key to the upper timber-lot! What does it prove? I can recall to these parchment characters—notice how all the delicate and amazing flowers in his consciousness-plane, and a half before, when they reached the abnormal rhythm of Earth had whispered of as Yog-Sothoth, and this vast, unknown inner grotto whose ultimate rock wall seemed half like a man in 1928. Then the turbaned figure slumped oddly into a new vitality. Once again Carter felt himself the focal point of solving the mystery, though no expression crossed his dark, tranquil, and would desperately practice human speech with the distant relatives of Randolph Carter is alive—to tide him over that period of suspended animation with utmost care, planning to have an uncanny knack at prophesying future events.

My own dreams, and had found the car at Arkham; and he felt triumphant, godlike surges of deadly sweetness, and formed the gates to his mind, and a very curious liquid to take it. Did you kill Randolph Carter. Without definite intention he was implanting images of those oddly carven scepters and radiating a message which he urbanely laughed at the back of a blazing star, or a still remoter creature of trans-galactic Stronti, or hurtled down out of what cosmic dreams his coming had aroused them. Do you want to scare your Aunt Martha in the body, and also a photostatic copy of the Himalayan priests had led to such outrageous conclusions, had told about some strange burrows or passages found in Carter's car, never to return.

[jackleveledup]

Game of the Year 2016: My Top Three

It's been a long road for Game of the Year and 2016 in general, but we finally made it to the top three! In case you missed it, there were a ton of other games I loved this year that I wrote about in a post I called "Very Good Games".

And one last thing before we close this out: thanks for reading!

#3. Hyper Light Drifter

This year, no single moment compared to the rush I got from my first chain-dash in Hyper Light Drifter. There's a primal satisfaction to the accelerating timing it demands, as each flash of pink and teal raises the pressure of the impending button press. Eventually I learned that it's not that good in combat and it's only one of many means of survival, yet it was at that precise moment that the game won me over.

I say this without exaggeration: Hyper Light Drifter is a visual masterpiece. Fans and Kickstarter backers have been drooling over screens for years now, and the reality seems to have even exceeded expectations. Environments overflow with lightly muted colors and all kinds of mystery, like enormous Evangelion-inspired beasts, esoteric symbols, and ruins of a civilization long since past. Animation is beautifully handled frame-by-frame, highlighting the tension in each action and closing off with a shimmer of vibrant neon.

It's not an easy game by any means, but success becomes its own reward. Every battle is a fury of bullets and blades with far more dead bodies than dead air. I found myself often getting lost in the chaos, only realizing a room was clear when my darting eyes couldn't find anything new to shoot at. What's unusual, though, is that I didn't find the boss fights to deliver the same sense of exhilaration as the average encounter along the way, but as a capstone to a difficult journey, they work well enough. Maybe I should just be grateful I was never tempted to chuck a controller.

Hyper Light Drifter is enthralling, both in its hectic gameplay and its unwordly atmosphere. I know without a doubt that I'll be back for another shot at deciphering what the hell happened to this world.

#2. Kirby: Planet Robobot

If you've ever daydreamed about what you'd do with your own giant super robot, Kirby: Planet Robobot is a game you need to play. I mean this in the best way possible: it seems like the game was designed by a 6 year old with complete creative authority.

"Give it a giant drill! No, saw blades! Give it flamethrowers! Make it transform into a car! AND a jet!"

Yep, those are all things you can do, and it owns!

The heart of Kirby games has always lied in their diverse power-ups: fire, ice, spark, hammer, bomb, and dozens of others. This time, the sizable set of abilities is doubled by applying not just to Kirby, but his huge, face-shaped armor suit. If Kirby gets a sword, his mech gets two massive beam-sabers. If Kirby gets a jetpack, his mech transforms into a jet! Discovering all of the ways these forms could be used was a joy that lasted me the entire length of the game.

With so many power-ups there's a staggering number of game mechanics at play, which HAL Laboratories take full advantage of in the level design. Whether its a puzzle requiring a certain power-up, a rare boss or ability, or simple visual flair, each stage has some kind of "gimmick" to separate it from the last. Ideas reappear only seldomly, and not without being somehow altered and built upon. Sometimes the game even pretends to be something else entirely, like the shmup style stages that utilize the "Jet" version of the robot armor, or the auto-scrolling stages in the "Wheel" armor. All of this leads to a collection of stages that feel memorable and worth revisiting.

Between its game design and its vast possibility-space, Planet Robobot executes on its concept almost as perfectly as I can imagine. I know Kirby isn't the top Nintendo franchise for most people, but given the run the series is having right now, I'm starting to seriously question how long my little pink creampuff will go underappreciated!

#1. VA-11 HALL-A

VA-11 HALL-A is a visual novel that sounds extremely good in theory - just read its tagline: "cyberpunk bartender action." You play as Jill, who works at a bar called Valhalla in a futuristic city of perpetual darkness, poor people, robots, androids, and most of all, strife. It operates pretty differently as a video game, though. It's often assumed that gameplay exists for the sole purpose of fun, but even for a visual novel, VA-11 HALL-A's simple mechanics took me more than a few drinks to warm up to. Kinda' like in real life, the process of mixing "Brandtinis" and "Bleeding Janes" isn't especially exciting after the first few times, and almost everyone visiting the bar seems to have way more going on in life than you. I just wasn't seeing how it came together. It took some time and careful thought, but by the end of the game it had shaped into something incredible.

It's all thanks to the bar's atmosphere that I stuck around at all, and man, did they nail it. First and foremost, this soundtrack is phenomenal. What woud otherwise be your average cyberpunk setting becomes a wondrous dystopia thanks to Garoad's deft, moody composition. Its implementation is sharp, too. Instead of having music set to match each scene, you're handed complete control over the playlist while on duty. There's a palpable realism to incidentally having serious talks over loud, upbeat music, or joking during an ominous buildup. It helps to give Jill some believable agency as a bartender, too. You can always decide what drink to serve, how strong to mix it, or what music you want to play, but not who comes in that night or what to talk about. Details matter, and the developers at Sukeban Games were paying careful attention.

While Jill herself doesn't seem to bring much nuance to the story (...at first), the rest of the cast handily pick up the slack. The pixel-based character portraits are surprisingly expressive and go a long way in realizing the game's zany, reference-loaded dialog. Dorothy is a definitive fan favorite - she's an android that was specifically engineered to have weaker emotional responses to things that humans often find traumatizing. This trait colors every one of her conversations with typical humans, especially once you figure out that she's a sex-worker. Her career is almost completely inconsequential to her and she LOVES to tease people about it, so the scenes that ensue whenever she meets someone new at Valhalla are pretty entertaining, to say the least. In general, though, Sukeban Games have a firm grasp on how to both play into tropes and subvert them, which allows them to hit their punchlines without compromising any drama during more serious scenes.

My favorite part about VA-11 HALL-A is how much of the narrative the player is trusted to piece together. For a visual novel there's suprisingly little exposition - almost none, actually! It's basically all conversations, and not even ones explicitly about current events. Your only glimpse at what's happening outside of the bar is limited to what you happen to hear, what you choose to read in the news or on shitty forums, and most importantly, what connections you can draw between them. It's amusing to talk to some of the bar's customers, for sure, but your impression might completely change when you realize what they're up to before they stop in or finish their last drink.

The way in which VA-11 HALL-A dismantled my first impression continues to impress me. As the credits rolled it made perfect sense that the bartender would feel less interesting than the guests she serviced. Maybe it shouldn't feel "fun" to Jill when she mixes a drink for a grumpy customer. Maybe it makes sense that a struggling bartender wouldn't have the clearest picture of the "what's" and "why's" of her city's politics. None of that is crucial to finding happiness anyway. VA-11 HALL-A highlighted aspects of life that I don't usually give a second thought to, in a way that feels uncommonly literary for a video game. It's probably not going to be a game for everyone, but to those that seek it out, the narrative at work is nothing short of intoxicating.

[godsandvillainsrpg-blog]

ZAINE CHAMBERS twenty-two ♱ medical student + benefactor ♱ lefevre

“You are so pure, and it has nothing to do with your eyes or your smile, everything to do with your heart, all torn and weathered on your shirt for the entire world to see, so they can tear it up some more. You are so golden, and I fear that you don’t know how good you are - oh my, you are so good - because you cry when you get home most days, and you can’t lift your body from the ground. Is your body heavy from the people who have walked all over it? Why did no one help you? You are so kind, so kind, so kind to everyone that you forget to be kind to yourself.”

WE ARE PLAYING A GAME OF EMPIRES

When two souls, both powerful and depraved, combine it should result in a product even more dastardly than its elements. For Harland and Celine Chambers, though, it would not come to pass. Rather, their sins and their strength only managed to cancel each other out. Into this marriage built on a religion of twisted self-divinity, a child of virtue was born.

To his parents, Zaine has always been considered some cosmic joke. For years, his parents waited with impatience to see their eldest and only son shed his softness and put on the armor of supremacy he was destined for. But this boy possessed a heart of gold, and it would not be so easily conquered, not even by the combined will and wickedness of both his parents. Zaine’s plague was kindness, and it was incurable. But even this burden, as righteous as it may seem, came with its fair share of demons.

Whereas his family saw people as pawns – there for convenience and opportunity, to be disposed of when they no longer provided either – he saw their humanity. In all his years, Zaine has yet to meet a person he could not empathize with, one he did not find fascinating and worthy of his kindness and attention. A concept altogether foreign to his family, Zaine cares deeply about people. But this level of empathy comes at a price. The capacity to feel so deeply leaves Zaine emotionally drained. He is so used to playing the comforter, the one others unload to, but he has no outlet for himself. These feelings build up, wound so tightly that some days he wonders if his brain or his heart may actually explode from the pressure.

This was how he has spent the majority of his life. In his family, he took on the natural role of the mediator, even for those who reject his attempts to harmonize them. It is desperately important to him that conflicts be resolved. At his core, Zaine is a people pleaser, and he always has been. Even as a child, he was mocked as being the teacher’s pet. He was the one kid who made sure everyone received a Valentine (a practice that was actually uncommon at his elite private school) and made sure everyone was invited to his birthday parties. This desire for acceptance was only magnified when applied to his family, and most especially his parents. There was no question in his mind that he was not the son they had envisioned or hoped for. Zaine would not be the man to bring others to their knees, to thrive on the seduction of power; he was quite the opposite, actually. And he has spent all of his life trying to make up for that fact – but to no avail.

Harland has never known how to interact with him, while Celine disdains his existence. No matter what he does, he cannot be the son they want, and though he manages to hide it well, the fact cripples him. He is debilitated by the incessant thoughts that his parents wish he was never born. It haunts him, and he is plagued by inadequacy. But these are his deepest and darkest thoughts, and though they keep him awake at night, he shares them with no one. No one, that is, except one.

Despite the obvious incongruity of their values, Zaine has a certain co-dependence where his family is concerned. After high school, he moved out, but never did cut ties with his family. To say he has been on his own since eighteen would be a stretch, given the fact that he still lives as though he is under his parents’ roof. Perhaps it is the little boy in him still desperate for their approval, but when Zaine was not in class or with friends, he could always be found at the home where he grew up. He always imagined spending his days in the French countryside; the fast-paced city of Paris had never suited him. But the prospect of leaving his family was unthinkable, for one reason: it would mean he would never fulfill that which of highest important to him – their love.

This compulsion to make his family proud of him and accept him had an effect on his other personal relationships. After high school, he met a boy. Things between them were easy and simple, and Zaine often referred to him as his lifeline. But over time, Liam grew tired of competing for Zaine’s affection, even against those who never had any intention of returning it. Zaine ran himself ragged, perpetually jumping through hoops, and to what end? He was willing to sacrifice a relationship with someone who could actually love him, and it would be their undoing. For nearly three years, Liam had been the one to keep Zaine together, to keep him sane, but it was a burden the other boy was not prepared to maintain forever. This pattern of behavior was unsustainable, and though it a devastating blow to Zaine, he could not meet the demands of the boy he loved. He could not simply walk away from his family.

School had never been a real consideration for Zaine. His status kept him from any real need for an education. Harland would have likely pushed for law school, if he had any real interest in his son’s future, though his father probably saw little reason to seriously invest in Zaine’s career prosptects. Zaine, on the other hand, had always fancied the idea of medicine, in his mind, the ultimate caretaking role. Though he lacked the natural brilliance that some of his peers were blessed with, he made up for it in passion and ambition – perhaps the only traits he had rightfully inherited from his father. After the heartbreak of Liam, he needed a distraction, so he began the rigorous study for entrance exams.

It was during this time that his family announced their intention to leave for Rome. It was a shock to both he and Kiah. There was no expectation that Zaine would follow them, now that he was applying to medical schools, but the thought of being isolated from them was an impossible notion to bear. They did not ask him to come along, but he applied for school in Rome nonetheless. Whatever their reasons for going, he was sure they weren’t pure – nothing his parents ever devised was. He may have wanted nothing to do with this venture, but that was all the more reason for him to tag along.

Though he be virtuous, Zaine was not naïve. This city reeked of corruption, and so did his family. It was not difficult for Zaine to begin to connect the dots, to see how Christian and his new wife played into this scheme. As for the details, he wanted nothing to do with it. They were not only harboring criminals, they were paying for them to commit the most heinous of deeds. Knowing his input would not welcomed or received, he kept his mouth shut, still refusing to even acknowledge such a dark hobby.

Rather than take part in the new family business, Zaine has once again filled the role of caretaker. Though school remains his central focus, he has found himself reaching out to those who he deems in need of a gentle hand; and, in these new recruits, there are many. But the one person Zaine had not anticipated finding a place in his heart was Salvatore.

The other boy was a stranger when the two first met, and fate had once again dealt him a losing hand, though initially in disguise. His last name meant nothing at first, and naturally Zaine had not mentioned his mother’s family name. Sal was different from the other boys Zaine had fallen for; he was set apart because not only could he empathize, he could commiserate. They shared a desire to make their families proud, as well as an inability to do so. He may have been comforted in the past by Liam, but never had Zaine had someone who truly understood his struggle. This was solace, and the two quickly forged a bond – one that would not be broken even when he realized they were meant to be on opposite sides of this new battleground.

The inner torment Zaine struggles with now is of a different nature. Now that he has found a soulmate, he cannot imagine giving him up. Liam was one thing, but Salvatore? It has only been such a short time, and already he feels attached. The problem is the closer the two of them get, the more Zaine can feel Sal pushing him away. Their predicament is not an easy one, but now that Zaine has found someone able to fulfill him like no one else has, he is not so willing to give that up.

TAKE NO PRISONERS, LEAVE NO SCARS

LOVE No stranger at all to relationships, Zaine has had many boyfriends over the course of his young life. He is a sweet and caring guy, but he does come with some major baggage. Salvatore is the first person he has ever been with who is unbothered by his family problems…even if only because the other boy shares the same issues himself. It may be too soon to call it love, but Zaine already knows he cares about him more fiercely than he has anyone else ever before. He knows Sal cares about him too, despite his hot and cold nature. And Zaine is so intoxicated by the other boy, he is not willing to let him slip away.

LEGACY However much Zaine cherishes his parents, he knows they will never love him the way he desires. Harland finds every aspect of his son confusing, if not downright loathsome. Meanwhile, Celine will simply have nothing at all to do with him. He has happened to find somewhat of a kinship with his sister Kiah, though even she is not always open to his affection. His cousin Valencia, despite her hard exterior, is the closes to a friend within the family that he has. She is a straight shooter and though she makes no secret of how badly she wishes to emanate his mother, she has a good heart. Nico may new to the family, but Zaine has already begun to embrace him as one of the family. Still, he must be careful, otherwise he could alienate Val, who he knows secretly feels threatened by the sudden appearance of her “brother.” Lucien has always been somewhat of a mysterious figure, though he is remains close with Zaine’s mother. His uncle’s disapproval is not difficult to ascertain, but then it is not easily attained. His aunt Selena, however, is more like a mother to him than his own, and for that he is thankful. He could never understand why Valencia would envy his mother, while taking her own for granted. The two do share a close relationship, and he is glad at least someone else in the family shares his soft-heartedness.

ALLIES It is still too soon for Zaine to have made many friends – or allies. Miles is one Zaine almost immediately reached out to. Their discomfort was easy for him to pick up on, and in true Zaine style, he wants to make them feel welcomed. This family is not an easy one to fit into, and Zaine tries to make the transition as easy as possible, even if Miles may not seem interested in his help. Another new friend he has managed to make is Elijah. It is almost surreal to him, how Elijah can take this business so light-heartedly. Regardless, he is glad to have made a new friend, even in the most surprising of places.

ENEMIES It is not easy at all to be marked as an enemy in Zaine’s book. He is supposed to hate the Gordanos, he supposes, for the sake of family obligation…but his strong ties to Salvatore make even that difficult for him. Ideally, this feud would be put to rest and the whole thing settled. He is a lover, not a fighter, and that mantra rings true for every person involved in this pointless war.

THE REST At the top of Zaine’s to-rescue list is Killian. They have some serious issues, and Zaine knows he cannot even begin to imagine everything this kid has been through. He can sense a tortured past, though Killian refuses to let any of it show; Zaine wonders if they have ever been shown any ounce of kindness or love in their entire existence. He knows he cannot make up for a lifetime of evil, but he wants to at least try. And though Christian is his uncle, he hardly knows him – and meanwhile, he wonders if he knows how his mother and uncle play him like a marionette, not that Zaine himself would ever intercede to tell him so.

ZAINE is potrayed by JACOB ARTIST. He is currently UNAVAILABLE for auditions.

[bentonpena]

Why I’m Thankful I Had a Drinking Problem: A Few Life Lessons From Beating the Bottle

Why I’m Thankful I Had a Drinking Problem: A Few Life Lessons From Beating the Bottle http://bit.ly/2NMJNOl

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Joe Weber.

Hi my name is Joe, and . . . I run a fashion blog. 

All in unison now: “Hi Joe!”

What’d you think I was gonna say?

Along with running a fashion blog, I also spent much of 2016, 2017, and 2018 making and breaking promises to myself in terms of drinking. I knew I was drinking too much. Sure, I was still physically fit, still happily married, still employed. But all the beer, wine, and whiskey were starting to take their toll. Things were NOT heading in the right direction — I was getting a bit pudgy, I was constantly hungover, and I was always down in the dumps. Drinking or trying not to drink was a BIG part of my life. And I wanted, desperately, for alcohol to be a small and insignificant part. 

I read a lot of books. I tried counseling (three different therapists). I tried a lot of different methods, programs, and even prescriptions. It all seemed pretty heavy and complicated. Yet the thing that ended up working for me was The Alcohol Experiment, which is a free, simple, mindfulness and science-based spin on the booze-free “Dry January” trend that so many seem to try after the traditional, alcohol-soaked holiday season. (Full disclosure: I have no official relationship with The Alcohol Experiment or its founders, other than being a happy, non-paying customer. Again, it’s free.)  

So what does “working for me” mean? I haven’t had any alcohol since the end of 2018. It’s been over a year. (Not that I’m counting, because I don’t believe in that method. It gives too much power to the thing I want to be insignificant.) I used to be a serious craft beer, small batch whiskey, and fancy wine fan. I was probably downing 25-45 drinks a week. James Bond. Don Draper. And me. That’s how much I was drinking. Now? “Disinterested” is probably the best word to describe my relationship (or lack thereof) with alcoholic beverages. And I’m incredibly grateful that it all happened. Because I learned a lot along the way.  

I wouldn’t recommend developing a drinking problem in an attempt at some sort of weird, higher level of self-education. I dodged a lot of bullets, and I respectfully acknowledge and legitimately sympathize with those who have been impacted by the very real trauma intoxication can contribute to and/or outright cause. Yet I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say that struggling with Alcohol Use Disorder, for me, literally led me to a higher level of consciousness. Really. I mean it. Look, I’m still a moron, but much less so than I used to be.

The knowledge I gained by tackling a big, self-destructive problem with ideas based in biology, sociology, and psychology are lessons I won’t soon forget. I’ve already applied them to countless other areas of my life, and perhaps you can do the same whether you’re questioning your drinking, or, you don’t drink at all. Here’s a bit of what I learned.

Wanting and Liking Are Not Always the Same Thing

This blew my mind, and once I grasped this concept, it made so much sense. Sure you can crave things you like. That’s often part of the formula. But you can also crave things you DON’T like. Yes, really. Just stay with me here. 

Some of us crave alcohol even though we hate how it makes us feel and what it does to us. Some of us crave being a victim, even though we hate sounding like a whiner (my hand is raised). Some of us crave being around a person who is absolutely horrible for our mental and/or physical well-being. The difference, dear reader, is in the brain chemicals. Blame dopamine. Dopamine is often misunderstood as a “happy” chemical. That’s not quite true. It can be a precursor to happiness, but it’s actually the desire chemical. The wanting chemical. And it’s incredibly powerful. Powerful enough that we can be trained by others, or, by our own subconscious, to want things we don’t truly like. Like eating tons of candy. Or gambling. Or constantly checking social media. Or shopping. All, perhaps, things we never actually really consciously enjoy in the moment, and even worse, leave us feeling like crap long afterwards. They’re net losses. We KNOW they’re net losses. We don’t even enjoy them in the moment anymore, let alone long-term. Yet that feeling of desire is still there.  

Dopamine is the chemical behind those cravings. Sadly, it just flat out doesn’t know the difference, nor does it care if you actually like the thing you’re craving. Oxytocin and serotonin — the actual pleasure chemicals — are what you’re after. But dopamine? It’s a powerful force. For better and/or for worse. 

Your Mind is Easily Hacked — By Others and Yourself

We generally have two methods of cognition. Let’s call them “front brain” and “back brain.” Back brain is the efficient autopilot. It’s the “how.” Back brain is how we can breathe, chew, and blink without thinking about the complicated physical processes needed to do so. Back brain is also how we can drive to work, safely, and not remember the trip once we got there. 

Front brain is about mindful exploration. It’s the “why.” It’s possibly what sets our species apart from the rest of the flora and fauna. Yet we spend WAY more time with back brain than front brain. And that’s good! Otherwise we’d never leave the house. There’d just be too much noise. But back brain can easily be hacked. And before you know it, group-think (we’re pack animals), effective marketing, and/or bad luck has you engaging in a habit that’s bringing you down. The GOOD news is that with some practice, you can engage front brain leading up to and during these habits, and you can hack that habit loop. Once that happens, you literally start to change the physical structure of your brain. It’s called neuroplasticity. It’s proven science. And the fact that I no longer want to rip through a bottle of Jameson on Friday (and Saturday!) night while rotting in front of Netflix makes me living proof. Not only do I not want to do that with my time anymore, I find the idea exhaustingly boring. The opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference. And yes, I still love a good TV show or football game. I just don’t get wasted in the process and watch TV for four hours at a stretch.

Journaling Is the Key to Changing Your Brain 

Writing strengthens and builds new connections between back brain and front brain. The more you do that, the easier it is to see when back brain is taking over despite your best intentions. Remember learning as a kid about the three main ways people learn? Some people learn best by seeing. Some are auditory, and learn best by hearing concepts. Then there are those who learn best by doing the thing. They physically need to figure it out.

Writing combines all three.

You see the words as you write them down. You hear the sentences in your head as you scribble away. You’re doing by way of activating the language into a concrete form, with pen to paper. THIS is where the friggin’ magic happens. We absorb WAY more information if we’re writing it down while learning, as opposed to just watching it happen. Or hearing a lecture. This is where all the light bulbs go off and we learn so much more about ourselves. So even if you’ve never fancied yourself a writer before, and you want to explore a habit or change something about yourself? Write. Write. Write. It makes everything so much easier. 

Thoughts and Feelings Are Way Less Permanent Than You Think

When I would have a craving for alcohol, I would picture that thought as embodied and “articulated” by a spoiled tween. A 12-year-old boy or girl in their overly decorated, messy room, who desperately wants a new video game (seasonal craft beer), or the hottest pair of shoes (expensive whiskey), or tickets to a pop concert (fancy bottle of red wine), and feels sure that if he or she doesn’t get it, “I’ll just DIE!!!!” Sure. That’s nice kid. Oh you’ll die one day all right. But this momentary lack of what you’re craving ain’t the thing that’ll kill you. 

And y’know what? Just like the tantrum-throwing tween, if you give a thought or a feeling a little space, it has a tendency to cool off.

The thoughts and emotions we all experience are, by and large, nowhere near as long-lasting as we think they’ll be. Oftentimes it’s comical how quickly a frustration, a snap of anger, or a blip of sadness can pass. More than a few times I have gone to bed feeling so worthless that I figured dying in my sleep would probably be the best outcome for all affected by my miserable existence. (Don’t worry, I’ve told my doctor and my partner and those three counselors all about these feelings. I’ve worked and continue to work on them.) Would I wake up the next day feeling that crushing despondency? Sometimes. But more often than not, upon waking up, I’d feel . . . okay. Not great. But functional. Which, relative to the thoughts and feelings from the night before, was a massive shift. 

Stuff happens. Life is pain. But if you allow yourself to give it time, you will often move forward faster than you could have ever anticipated. Not only is this okay, this is good.

I Am Way Less Special Than I Had Thought — And That’s AWESOME

There is great power in realizing that you’re not some hyper-unique creature with totally distinct thoughts and unsolvable problems. Once you accept that you’re basically one of a zillion apes drooling their way around an insignificant rock orbiting an unremarkable flaming gas orb, so many solutions open up to you. You feel less alone. There is hope. Because this has all been done before. People who are 99.99% JUST LIKE YOU (again, you’re not as special as you thought) have already solved these problems. All you have to do now is find and execute the solution. The path has already been blazed, paved, and lighted. You do not need to create a new one. It’s there. You just have to find it.

Humans Are Super Possessive of What “Defines” Us — Even If That Stuff Is Bad

So many people are afraid to stop drinking because they identify as a drinker. So many overweight folks have identified as “big” for so long, that they can’t imagine not being so. So many sad, grumpy guys (Hi! Me too!) continue to be sad and grumpy in part because they’ve always been a misanthrope. Even if it’s literally killing us physically and emotionally, it is incredibly difficult to part with a part of ourselves. ANY part of ourselves. We can HATE that person. We can want desperately to NOT BE that person. You think I honestly LIKED being a grumpy unhappy drunk guy? It’s the worst! I’M THE WORST. Yet the unknown and/or the possibility of forming a new, more positive identity can appear so impossible it’s terrifying. 

I’m here to tell you that once you start to let go, it’s really not that scary. Uncomfortable, yes, sometimes. Easy, no. A negative identity isn’t better than no identity, and while you may have to tread water for a time, eventually you’ll be able to swim towards shore, and develop a sense of self that’s built on things you’re actually proud of, rather than lowest-common-denominator defaults. 

Society Labels and Treats Addictions Vastly Differently Based on the Substance — And That Can Be Counterproductive

The stark contrast between how people with Alcohol Use Disorder are treated compared to those with dependencies on other easily accessible and addictive substances (like nicotine or sugar) is absurd. The moralizing and shame around alcohol could, perhaps, actually be exacerbating the problem. People are often too scared to pursue early assistance in working on their drinking out of fear of judgement. Can you blame them? No one wants to be known as a drunk, a wino, an alky. Yet we celebrate and actively incentivize people who acknowledge sugar or nicotine addictions, while providing them with a variety of proactive, healthy solutions. We don’t label them as morally deficient. We don’t default to sticking people struggling with sugar or nicotine consumption in the basement of a church or community center and tell them that this is how they’ll be spending much of the rest of their lives. And medically speaking, there is no such thing as an alcoholic. The DSM-5 uses the term Alcohol Use Disorder, which is not black and white. There are various shades of gray. You don’t need to hit “rock bottom” to get help. You don’t need to keep the problem a secret. You don’t need to feel constant shame and feel isolated. You don’t need to feel like you’ll always have to carry this weight with you for the rest of your life. You’re a functioning biological creature who became addicted to an addictive substance that’s celebrated and marketed ad nauseum by society at large. Congratulations! You’re normal!

Nobody Cares Nearly As Much As You Think

“But won’t other people think I’m weird if I don’t drink? Will they think I’m a goody-two-shoes? A self-righteous killjoy?” Maybe. But I’ve found that those types are bores. So they’re not worth your time anyway. The GOOD news is that the vast majority of people don’t give a rat’s rear-end if you drink or not, if you order a salad or fries, or if your suit fits and your shoes are shined. They don’t care. We’re all wrapped up in our own little worlds that most people don’t even notice. You could walk into a fancy cocktail lounge in a gorilla suit, order a club soda with lime, and no one would notice you or your drink. And if they DO notice? I’ve actually experienced quite a lot of envy from them. Genuinely not wanting a drink is a bit of a superpower. That, and I get funnier and more handsome the drunker they get. Ta-da.

This ability to question yourself and change your mindset is applicable to more than you’d think.

Junk food. Social media. Television. Outrage. Grudges. Are these things doing me any good? What if I thought about how I feel during and after these activities, just a little bit, and then weighed the benefits of simply NOT engaging with them, against the costs of continuing my habits? It’s literally effortless. All I have to do is NOT. Just like drinking. I gained so much by not drinking anymore (lost weight, gained muscle, better sleep, less mood swings, happier overall, more creative, better at my job, etc.). Might there also be big-time benefits to simply NOT engaging with these other, habitual indulgences and emotional states? You bet there are. After alcohol, I started applying these ideas to tortilla chips. Do I REALLY like eating tortilla chips, mindlessly, over the sink when I get home from the end of a frustrating day at work? Turns out I didn’t, once I allowed myself to consider that possibility. Even my wife noticed: “Hey, this bag of chips has been in the pantry for, like, a month. When did you stop eating chips?” I dunno. It just . . . happened, after I actually thought about it for once, instead of just mindlessly diving into the bag. 

Moving Forward

It sounds really weird to say, but having a drinking problem might be one of the best things that ever happened to me. I learned an immense amount about the human condition. I learned about society. I learned about my own unique perspective, as well as about how not unique at all I happen to be. I learned about beliefs and thoughts and big picture stuff and small picture stuff. None of which, I think I can safely say, I would have learned otherwise.

I don’t think about drinking much anymore. But the knowledge I acquired and the methods I used to change how I view alcohol have given me a template I have gone back to time and time again, no matter the problem. 

Of which alcohol, thankfully, is no longer one.

_________________________

Joe Weber is the Director and Editor of www.Dappered.com where affordable style is the one and only focus. He believes that living right, living well, and looking good doesn’t mean you should go broke in the process.

The post Why I’m Thankful I Had a Drinking Problem: A Few Life Lessons From Beating the Bottle appeared first on The Art of Manliness.

via The Art of Manliness http://bit.ly/2NeG3FZ January 14, 2020 at 07:37PM

[financevisionary]

Here`s what Ben Graham meant by `Mr. Market`

As you most likely currently know, the securities market is off to a little bit of a rugged start this year.

Currently the S&P 500 is down around 7 % YTD while the Nasdaq compound is down about 11 % YTD. Volatility in rates has additionally increased, with stocks down 1.5 % eventually, up 1.5 % the following, and after that pull back the complying with day.

The most complicated part of these activities is the reality that the economy still appears to be on secure ground. Joblessness is down, salaries are rising, while - aside from power while mining companies - most businesses are still reporting healthy and balanced need for their items and also services.

It would seem that economic markets have, in a way, become a little detached from financial truth. Just look at the headings in the WSJ over the previous several months: as high as I love the WSJ, the newspaper's headlines each day seem to be some variant of either 'Stocks Gain on Oil Price Rally' or 'Stocks Sink on Fear of Oil Excess'. In some cases these 2 headings even appear on the very same day - one in the early morning as well as one in the afternoon!

This relationship in between the overall securities market as well as oil prices certainly appears silly, specifically considering that the energy industry represent much less compared to 7 % of the complete stock market - and also less than 6 % of the USA' total GDP.

So, just what's a smart worth capitalist to do? Are we heading towards a recession? Ought to you throw your stocks and go out currently, prior to it gets worse?

THE INVESTOR WHILE MARKET FLUCTUATIONS

I'm not suggesting that you market your stocks. However, I'm likewise not suggesting that you don't available your stocks. That's your decision. It's a decision that inevitably depends on exactly what the intrinsic worth of your stocks are - not just what the existing market rate is.

As Benjamin Graham wrote in Chapter 7: The Investor while Advertising and marketing Fluctuations of The Intelligent Investor:

[ N] ote this vital fact: The true investor hardly ever is forced to sell his shares, and at all other times he is complimentary to neglect the existing cost quotation. He require take notice of it and also act on it only to the extent that it fits his publication, while no more. Hence the investor that allows himself to be stampeded or unduly worried by unjustified market decreases in his holdings is perversely changing his basic advantage right into a basic downside. That man would certainly be much better off if his stocks had no market quote whatsoever, for he would certainly after that be spared the psychological distress created him by other persons' mistakes of judgment.

Jason Zweig keeps in mind that 'this might well be the solitary essential paragraph in Graham's whole book. In these 113 words Graham summarize his lifetime of experience. You can not check out these words frequently, they resemble Kryptonite for bearishness. If you maintain them around while allow them lead you throughout your investing life, you will certainly make it through whatever the markets throw at you.'

MEET MR. MARKET

Mr. Zweig is quite right, certainly. You can not review Graham's words frequently. It's hard, however, to remember 113 words.

So instead, allow me present to you Mr. Market.

Mr. Market is a parable that Ben Graham used in his teachings as well as that's found it's way right into the heart of value investing. Mr. Market assists us bear in mind the distinction between market cost and intrinsic value:

Imagine that in some personal company you have a little share that cost you $1,000. One of your partners, called Mr. Market, is very requiring indeed. Each day he tells you exactly what he believes your interest deserves and also in addition offers either to get you out or to sell you an added passion on that basis. Occasionally his idea of worth shows up possible and warranted by company advancements and leads as you understand them. Usually, on the various other hand, Mr. Market allows his interest or his worries run away with him, and the worth he recommends appears to you a little except silly.

If you are a sensible financier or a reasonable businessman, will you allow Mr. Market's day-to-day interaction establish your sight of the worth of a $1,000 interest in the enterprise? Only in situation you agree with him, or in case you want to patronize him. You could enjoy to available out to him when he estimates you a ridiculously high cost, as well as equally delighted to purchase from him when his rate is reduced. The remainder of the time you will certainly be wiser to develop you have suggestions of the worth of your holdings, based on complete credit records from the firm about its procedures as well as financial position.

The real investor is in that extremely placement when he owns a listed common stock. He can make the most of the daily market rate or leave it alone, as determined by his own judgment while disposition ... Primarily, price variations have just one considerable definition for the real investor. They offered him with a chance to buy wisely when rates drop dramatically while to offer sensibly when they progress a good deal. At other times he will certainly do much better if he forgets about the securities market while listens ... to the operating outcomes of his companies.

WARREN BUFFETT ON MR. MARKET

Warren Buffett has also discussed Mr. Market. As consistently, Buffett reveals off his wittiness and his capability to accurately describe any subject in this passage from the 1987 Berkshire Hathaway Shareholder Letter:

Ben Graham, my close friend as well as teacher, long ago defined the psychological perspective towards market variations that I believe to be most for financial investment success. He stated that you need to visualize market quotes as originating from a remarkably accommodating other called Mr. Market who is your companion in a private business. Consistently, Mr. Market shows up day-to-day as well as names a cost at which he will certainly either purchase your interest or offer you his.

Even though the business that the two of you have may have economic characteristics that are steady, Mr. Market's quotes will certainly be anything but. For, unfortunate to state, the inadequate other has incurable psychological troubles. Sometimes he feels euphoric and also can see only the favorable factors influencing business. When because mood, he names a really high buy-sell cost since he fears that you will certainly get his passion as well as rob him of imminent gains. At other times he is clinically depressed and also could see only difficulty ahead for both business while the globe. On these occasions he will certainly call a quite affordable price, because he is horrified that you will dump your passion on him.

Mr. Market has an additional capitivating feature: He does not mind being dismissed. If his quote is dull to you today, he will certainly be back with a new one tomorrow. Deals are strictly at your choice. Under these conditions, the even more manic-depressive his actions, the far better for you.

But, like Cinderella at the round, you need to follow one advising or every little thing will become pumpkins as well as mice: Mr. Market is there to offer you, not to guide you. It is his pocketbook, not his wisdom, that you will find useful. If he turns up some day in a particularly foolish mood, you are complimentary to neglect him or to capitalize on him, however it will certainly be dreadful if you fall under his influence. Indeed, if you typically aren't specific that you understand and also can value your company far much better than Mr. Market, you do not belong in the video game. As they say in texas hold'em, 'If you have actually remained in the game HALF AN HOUR as well as you do not know who the patsy is, you're the patsy.

... [A] n investor will certainly be successful by combining excellent company judgment with a capability to shield his ideas and also behavior from the super-contagious emotions that swirl about the market. In my own initiatives to remain insulated, I have actually found it very useful to maintain Ben's Mr. Market concept strongly in mind.

SUMMARY

It's crazy to believe that all stock cost declines are just the result of the marketplace being fearful. Often, a decline in share rate can be required. Yet remember, in the short-run the stock exchange is a ballot machine, in the long-run the securities market is a weighing machine.

Stock rates will certainly fluctuate daily. Yet over years, stock prices will mirror truth inherent worth of the underlying company. In today's market atmosphere, it's especially important to keep in mind this reality - while to always believe of Mr. Market.

Remember, Mr. Market has incurable emotional issues - Buffett once also referred to Mr. Market as a 'intoxicated pscycho'. Sometimes he enjoys, occasionally he's depressed. Yet he does not mind being overlooked, and also he'll constantly be back tomorrow to quote you a brand-new rate. So allow Mr. Market offer you and also not guide you. Take benefit when he estimates you an eye-catching price and also disregard him the remainder of the time. Maintain this in mind, as well as you will certainly make it through whatever the markets throw at you.

[s0ftch0colate]

Request: Hand-in-hand

Pam I wont lie to you, even I don't like this story. You are so going to hate it! It's quite rushed, unfortunately, so I didn't really get into character or location descriptions...I am embrassed

Women have a certain type of voice; not related as such with the timbre of one’s voice, or the shrill magnitude of volume that it is capable. Rather, woman have a voice of will and moral that they are able to hear and understanding; like a whispering to them to hold it together and keep their lives away from all things that are filled with a luxurious richness of sin. Or, that is a voice that women are supposed to have, particularly in the year of nineteen fifty-three; an epoch of nothing with movements of progress that were limited and futile – oppression standing at the edge of a cliff with its hands upon her back. That is how she lived; Carrie Evens. Neither a human nor a monster, but a comforting somewhere-inbetween who existed earning only what was commanded of her; giving to men what they desired, who called her names she was not titled, marks she could not fight against and pain she could not weep over. In her line of business (though one would be inclined to use that term in the loosest sense given that it did not consist of her occupation, but rather simply her trade), the hours were long and the men who bought her for however many minutes they could last were grotesque. There was no light of her life, no fire of her loans. Only the sin that she could not indulge herself in. For sin is anything that one can find pleasure in, and she most certainly did not find pleasure in the gruelling moans of someone else’s names or the harsh hands across her face. She did, however, one day find her pleasure in sin. It had begun at an end, as most good stories so often do – a thrilling adventure of love and delight, seeking power and passion and for a voice to be heard. They so very often begin with an end. Yet this end in particular was not as tragic as some. Rather, it was the holding of life and death upon a fingertip of a young women, who held it against the trigger as though she was listening – even just – to that angel upon her shoulder that whispered good to her. But it was futile, in the end, because this power was intoxicating as all sinful things are. Sex, power, money and drugs; in the end, they are all shameful delights that when one becomes acquainted with can never again forget and will spend an entire life chasing. Her rouge lipstick was smudged in irony from the beating she was gifted, bruised upon her cheek that ached – not so much in pain, but rather in vicious encouragement for revenge towards the man who had placed such a mark upon her soft but tainted skin. All this, that seeking of power and holding a life at the edge of her finger, simply because she could not stand to let someone abuse her and not pay. What was this life worth, anyway? That was what she had thought before walking out, and now she could answer that question soundlessly; her heart racing in her ears from the unknown; from that rush of euphoric supremacy that was bitterly ironic for a woman to feel in the year of nineteen fifty-three, no matter her employment possession. She had scoffed at his pleading to her, as though his tiny and most disgusting life was worth any keeping. She had felt fright for a moment, fleeing from the scene after shoddily cleaning the mess – placing the gun in his hand as so often murders do, and she took to the night, grazing her own hand within that bitter air that kissed her in a mocking way; calling to her to live in the night for an eternity. A car had slowed upon its passing of her, a windowless vehicle smashed and dented – no doubt stolen by the current occupier that sat behind the wheel with shades over her eyes regardless of the darkness. She offered her a ride, knowing not where to it was this stranger was heading but allowing herself to seek comfort in the softness of her contradicting voice, Carrie took herself to the passenger side and they sat in silence for all too long. “Put your fucking head down, or I swear to God-“ Carrie let her own saliva fly from the grasp of her teeth, her eyes bleeding in the harshness of the streaming lights that were always held in banks. She forced her gun to the temple of an innocent man, elderly who was shaking in fright and letting his eyes spew tears now, as though it only mattered to him to desire to live after all these years. It was pathetic, always so pathetic. Her partner was already gaining access to the money, both women dressed in darkness; to live that way forever, the latter being a Miss Dorothy May of two years Carrie’s senior. That day, when they had first become acquainted, Dorothy – or just May – had plans to receive a large sum of money, regardless of what it was she had to do to get it. She no longer cared, in fact she was not sure she had ever cared. Her life was simply to dress and act only as a woman should; to carry herself in a fashion the was popular of indoctrinated oppression. And she loathed it like venom forced down her throat. What drew her to Carrie was not the way she carried herself, nor was it her hair blowing into the dark of the night. It was her expressive eyes; the way they screamed for more – more freedom, more sin, more delight no matter what devil was the one to gift it to her. In an instant, May had let her heart beat for her, and she wanted to take her in and protect her while giving to her all the wrong that she craved – feeding her all that she should not be fed but longed to taste upon her lips and tongue. “Put the fucking money in faster!” May screamed; her voice forcibly lower and rougher than Carrie was adjusted to, but it was nonetheless powerful and intoxicating. All those people, holding their heads with their hands; upon their knees, bowing to the will of their words. Power was all they ever desired now, and they shared it with one another frequently; holding themselves with it and drinking it as though it was a cheap beverage to quench their thirst of a life unknown to such an abstract concept. It was over as soon as it began, like all their robberies. The money was in the bag, their hearts were racing over the scene – adrenaline spiralling through their veins in a painful undulation of euphoria. And it was so much more thrilling when the sounds of sirens pierced their ears. “Who called the police?” Carrie interrogated the building, holding her gun tighter still in her hand as though she could pull the trigger and evaporate from the danger of being called. There was of course no response, for who would be foolish enough to let their tongues waggle in such a situation? “What do we do?” “I don’t know.” “You don’t know?” “No, Carrie! This isn’t supposed to happen. We can’t just leave!” “Drop your weapons and leave the building. It is surrounded. You cannot escape. We will not harm you if you leave.” Oh, but that was the voice belonging to a man in power, and their words were always lies. It was no doubt trouble, the chaos was overwhelming and Carrie was letting the sweat begin to secrete from her pores. Nonetheless, the two stood in a daze of sorts – unsure of whether they could move, trying to piece together their next trick if they ever had any. But this was something far more difficult than they had imagined; for they were supposed to drive to the edge of the world together – hand-in-hand, like all the great women of novels did. Not a bank, surrounded by power without letting their voices – their real voices - be heard. “I’m not going to let them take us.” May whispered; her voice faltering from its usual confidence. She knew there was no release from this situation. “What are you planning on doing?” Carried joined in hush tones, her question answered as May threw to the ground her weapon; fingers clawing away her disguise and letting her long hair drift from the grasps of the elastic that bound it – chained, as she was, to her own life. They were always to be prisoners, and a life of sin could not erase that they were together in shackles from their lives. The world was their captivity. “Give me your gun.” And she held a false smile of confidence, it seemed to call to Carrie that something was wrong; that everything was wrong. And she was afraid of what would happen if she did, and what would happen if she didn’t. “Trust me.” And she did, if only for a moment. She gave up that weapon she had first felt power from, gifting it to the person who let her release herself over and over. May had let herself overdose on her intoxication of sin and all things wrong. And there was no answer to her question, she did in that moment what needed to be done. She let fly from the gun a bullet, penetrating the glass and driving into the skin of whomever worked on the case of their arrest. “May!” Carried could barely yelp, knowing what would come. But it was over. All over. There was nothing except the frequent shots fired to them, collapsing against their skin and letting their own blood liberate from their bodies. It had begun at an end, and it encircled their lives as their bodies already cooled, having never let fall from their lips words of a confession of love for one another, not letting their bodies die hand-in-hand the way all great women in novels do, but only reaching for one another, fingertips never meeting; hearts never beating; eyes damp with tears that came as though they had been held back for their entire lives.