#and my motivation is fickle so i draw whatever i can manage

[suppenzeit]

i understand that me not making consistent art of anything is hindering my follower count. but consider this: feeling like i need to draw a specific subject or style would probably be straight up torture to me

[myaekingheart]

21!

37!

41!

(also, sorry, i accidentally unfollowed you while trying to click on "ask" and had to refollow you, i'm a dumbass, lol.)

[fanfic writer asks]

21. Do you ever want to write a novel/original work?

Hopefully someday! I have a lot of little fragmented ideas for original works that I would love to write and publish traditionally someday, and becoming a novelist has always been a major dream of mine. I just...need to find the passion and motivation to write those stories first, since all I seem to care about these days are fictional ninjas.

37. Any writing rituals?

In theory, yes. In practice, questionable. It really just all depends on what level of inspiration I'm sitting at? Some days, I'm super pumped to write and want to just sit down and get going so I don't do any prep work or anything besides maybe reading over what I already wrote if I left off in the middle of a chapter. Other days, my inspiration feels like molasses and I have to slog through my own laziness to get my ass in gear. On those days, I typically turn to Youtube and Spotify for help? I have a playlist with all different sorts of songs that remind me of my fic to get me in the proper headspace. I'll hop onto Youtube and pull up AMVs or clips to revisit certain characters and get myself, again, in the proper headspace. Sometimes drawing also helps but that takes a lot more effort on my part and sometimes requires extra motivation that I definitely do not have, so that option is fickle. But I basically just try to do anything to get myself in the mood and hype myself up for what I'm about to write. Almost like writer foreplay, if you will 😂 But some days it works, and some days it just doesn't and I kind of just have to cut my losses and do something else for the time being, which I also allow myself the luxury of doing because I never manage to churn out anything good or worthwhile if I'm forcing myself.

41. Your flaws when it comes to writing?

Oh god, I think the biggest one is probably trying to balance poetic and more utilitarian prose? Like I love sweeping descriptions and very philosophical, stunning inner monologue and emotion, and I always seem to measure my success during a writing session based on the presence of that but I know you can't always rely on purple prose and sometimes I'm just not in the right headspace to churn out that kind of content. But I can't stand when my writing feels stale and like I'm just going through the motions. It's boring for me to reread and it's no doubt boring for readers to read, too, even if it is important to me to get every beat of action down on the page. I always envision my ideas like movie scenes and I try to be as thorough with describing every little visual detail in the movement of a character or their facial expressions or whatever as I can, but that can honestly be really fucking difficult. So trying to find a balance between those two I think is one of my biggest flaws when it comes to writing because it's so damn hard and I don't often think I'm very successful at executing that. And also sentence variance. I fall into very specific patterns in terms of sentence construction and it even pisses me off, but it's a really hard habit to break. And sometimes I feel like my storytelling skills are a little weak/all over the place, too. There are times when I feel like I'm repeating ideas and that the story is starting to get kind of stale or boring or tiresome, and there are times when I think I'm doing a bad job of writing certain canon characters well or like the characters that I've created are unlikeable or stupid or underdeveloped. Keeping track of everyone and everything is difficult and I know I definitely suffer for it sometimes, so that's a fun little flaw, too.

(Asdfghjkl; don't worry, it happens to the best of us! I've accidentally done the same before, too xD)

[myforeverforlife]

a voice of your own.

It’s not that you hate being deaf. Despite all of the hardships, you’ve always managed to adapt to them with a determination and a smile all of your own. You even cherish many of the friends and memories that you’ve made along the way. But during your first year of college, you meet a hearing boy who intrigues you like no other. As the two of you get closer, you find that the old longings, your wish to be able to hear again resurfaces. How you wish you could hear his voice, his laughter, the sound of your name on his lips.

Word Count: 6,867

Masterlist

For most young children, dreams are fickle, always changing. Most children have dreamed of obtaining simple things: toys, snacks, good grades. 

When you were younger, all you wished for was the ability to hear again.

A brain injury as a child in a horrific accident left you with traumatic damage and hearing loss. The doctors had explained it to your father and grandmother over and over, but they were still stuck in a state of disbelief.

“Deaf? That can’t be possible, how can she be deaf? She’ll never be able to hear again?”

After lots of testing, it was concluded that you had lost almost all of your hearing in both ears, with most of the damage affecting the temporal lobe of your brain. You could vaguely pick up on extremely loud noises, like the sounds at a construction site, but they only registered faintly in your ears. Never again would you hear the sound of water as it spewed from the faucet, of the door closing shut as your father came home, of your grandmother shuffling across the floor in her slippers.

Never again would you hear the magic of speech, of verbal communication. It didn’t help that the accident hadn’t only affected your brain’s temporal lobe. Certain areas related to language were affected as well. “Wernicke’s and Broca’s areas,” the doctors had told your father. “Leading to something called global aphasia. Your daughter is likely to have difficulty retaining or expressing language – possibly both.”

You and your family had taken notice of a change in the way you spoke after the accident, words harder for you to speak and to remember. You didn’t want to read aloud, much less laugh or speak for fear of shocking others with your voice. Forming sounds in your mouth now felt foreign to you, and the few times that you had tried to read aloud during speech therapy lessons, you had been so embarassed by the corrections that the speech-language pathologists had given you. Remembering new vocabulary was also a struggle, and you often had to work harder than others in order to remember these new words. 

Left with only a few ways to communicate, your father and grandmother tried to teach you sign language. It was difficult at first, especially since you didn’t even want to attempt to learn. In your eight-year-old mind, you were content with writing out your thoughts on paper for the rest of your life. But your family knew better, and watched as you grew more and more frustrated by how much time it took to write out what you wanted to say.

The pathologists had also tried to work with you to get your speaking abilities up to par, but it was agreed that if you preferred to sign instead of speaking, it was your choice. Your memories of what things sounded like, what you had been able to hear before the accident motivated you, always calmed you down whenever you were fed up with having to go over speech and language lessons for what seemed like the hundredth time. At least you could remember what some of these words sounded like to you, long ago.

And so, you finally began to learn how to sign.

Surprisingly, you found that signing didn’t confine your ability to speak, but instead gave you new and more creative ways to communicate. Sign language even conveyed meanings of words differently than they did through speech, and you were soon actively searching out new signs, showing them to your family.

But most children at school weren’t as understanding. A lot of them stared at you from afar, murmuring about how you couldn’t hear anymore. When you thought about it, it seemed ridiculous how they would whisper about you – it’s not like you could hear them anyways, they might as well just speak like they usually did.

Staying in your classroom and keeping up with the other students was difficult, even with an instructional aide, and you were moved to a special education classroom. You would spend most of your time in the special education class, with a couple of hours each day in the general education class taking part in things like art activities and physical education for the remainder of your public school experience. That experience, however, was a short one.

Your grandmother was the one tasked with picking you up from school, and she grew increasingly worried about your changes in mood and motivation. Even with help from services provided by the school and therapy sessions, you were still struggling and never looked forward to leaving home. After about a year, you were taken out of public school altogether and placed in one for the deaf.

Despite being slow to warm up to others, you soon felt more at home in this school than you did in your previous one. You even made friends, joking with them and making up inside jokes that even the teachers couldn’t follow. You still had difficulties in certain areas, but seeing other children who had the same or similar conditions as you helped with overcoming the sense of alienation, of strangeness that you had once felt.  

When prospects of college came nearer, you grew worried once again. “What if I don’t feel like I can communicate with everyone?” you asked your friend, Junmyeon. “What if people laugh at me?”

“Even if they laugh at you, it doesn’t matter,” he signed back to you, face determined as his hands moved. “It’s their loss if they don’t want to get to know you.”

A smile formed on your face involuntarily, and you were grateful for your friend’s words of comfort. “Thank you, Junmyeon,” you said, emphasizing the sign for his name. Names in sign language were tricky: you could either finger-spell a name, but that usually took too long, or come up with a sign to represent that person’s name. Junmyeon once had a sign for his name that his parents gave him, but kids at school ended up making a new one for him once they saw how well he did in class. Junmyeon’s name in sign language was the sign for “smart”, signed with a “J”.

“You’re welcome, Y/N,” he replied, signing your name just as enthusiastically, the word “happy” signed with the first initial of your name.

You burst into silent laughter, body doubling over where you sat as Junmyeon grinned down at you. 

As your noiseless giggles died down, Junmyeon’s face grew wistful. “I wish I could hear laughter. I bet it would be beautiful,” he said, drawing out the sign for “beautiful”.

You felt guilty about your own worries once you remembered those of your friend’s. Junmyeon had been born deaf, had never known the sound of his own voice. It was hard for him to imagine what laughter sounded like, despite people’s attempts to describe it.

Gently, you laid a hand over his. Although you didn’t say anything, you knew that he could understand what you were trying to tell him.

“It’s okay. At least we have our signs.” 

And with your signs to support you, you entered college. Ironically, as an English major.

“How will you learn?” your father had signed to your with concern on his face. “How can you do presentations if you do not speak? What if you have problems communicating with others?” When you had first expressed interest in going to college, he had thought that you would pick a school for the deaf, like the one you had been going to for years.

“I can sign!” you yelled back through your symbols, the hand movements sharp as you glared at him. “And I can write. I can write just as well as any hearing student.” It was true. If anything, your grades in writing and reading were always the highest out of all of the subjects that you took.

You saw your father’s chest heave up and down as he sighed, a hand coming up to his forehead as he kneaded it in thought. “Okay,” he finally replied. “I have faith in you.”

But even your family’s support and your burst of confidence weren’t enough to stop the shaking of your legs on your first day on campus. You had contacted the school’s special services department, and they had provided you with an aide to help you follow along in your classes. Minseok, your aide, had greeted you with a big smile when he met you at the student union before your first class.

“Hi,” he waved to you. “I’m Minseok,” he finger-spelled slowly. “But my friends use this sign instead.” He made the sign for “cat”, his hands moving to imitate whiskers on his face as a slight flush appeared on his cheeks.  

“All of your friends are deaf?” you asked with a smile, hoping that he understood that you were joking. Luckily, he followed what you meant quite well.

He gave a small chuckle before shaking his head no. “Not all, but some of them. I can introduce you to them sometime if you want?”

“That would be great. Thank you.”

Having Minseok with you in class was much less nerve-wracking and frustrating than you thought it would be. Although you took notes yourself by following along with whatever was on the board, Minseok took notes as well of whatever the professor said that wasn’t included in the papers or presentation slides, making sure to sign to you anything that was said verbally. Your professors were kind enough to make sure that you knew where to access these handouts and slides online if you ever needed to go back and look at them once more.

As the two of you were eating lunch in the cafeteria, you saw a boy approach Minseok from behind, your friend still completely unaware. Before you could tap Minseok's hand to alert him, the stranger reached out and ruffled his hair.

Minseok quickly glanced up from his plate, sauce sticking to the corner of his mouth as he looked up to see who it was. Once he saw the boy, his face broke out into a grin.

The new boy’s lips started moving, and you watched him silently. “A hearing boy,” you thought to yourself. Minseok’s lips moved as well, too fast for you to guess what he was saying.

“This is Y/N, the girl I told you about,” he told Baekhyun before looking back at you. “This is my friend, Baekhyun,” he said, spelling out the last word. “We’ve known each other since high school.”

You gave the new boy, this Baekhyun, a small wave before turning back to your food and picking at the pieces there with your fork.

“She’s not much for conversation, is she?” Baekhyun asked his friend.

“She’s a little shy. I’ll catch up with you later?” Minseok didn’t want to make you uncomfortable, and he could tell by the way that you were moving the same piece of pasta around on your plate that you were anxious for Baekhyun to leave.

Baekhyun gave a tentative nod before moving the strap of his backpack higher up on his shoulder. “Okay, see you later,” he replied before walking away, looking back over his shoulder a couple of times towards you before he left the cafeteria.

“Sorry,” Minseok apologized, making sure that you could see his hands, the way they timidly signed.

“It’s okay,” you told him. “It’s just that I’ve been so used to going to a school for the deaf for so long that sometimes I forget what it’s like to be around so many hearing people.”

Minseok gave you a sympathetic look before moving his hands once more. “My cousin says the same thing. Jongin has been deaf since he was a baby, and he grew up only going to deaf schools. Even now, he goes to a high school for the deaf.”

“Is that why you decided to become a special services aide?” you asked curiously. Minseok had told you that he was a part-time student as well as working with the university, and you wondered why a student would voluntarily take on this challenge.

“Sort of,” Minseok said with a thoughtful expression. “But also because I enjoy signing. I like being able to communicate in another way, besides using my voice. Signing is beautiful, even if others can’t understand it.”

Touched by his sincere words, you could only find it in you to give him a small reply: “Thank you.” 

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Minseok asked, one eyebrow lifting as he watched you apprehensively. It was already your second week of classes, but Minseok was still worried about you getting lost on campus.

“I’m sure. Thank you for everything, Minseok.” You decided that you wanted to check out the library after classes since you had time until your grandmother came to get you, but Minseok had some urgent matters at home that needed taking care of, and he wouldn’t be able to accompany you.

“Okay, but if you need anything, just text me.”

“I will. Bye, Minseok!”

And that’s how you found yourself wandering amongst the shelves of books on the library’s fourth floor, eyes wide as you took in what seemed like endless rows of books and tables. The signs on the walls were printed with warnings that “This is a quiet study area!”, although it’s not like you would give them any trouble.

A sudden tapping on your shoulder caught you off guard, and you turned around with your breath caught in your throat only to see that boy, the one who had greeted Minseok on your first day here.

“Hi,” you saw his lips mouth. And then they continued to move, but you couldn’t tell what he was trying to tell you.

“Crap,” he cursed to himself as he saw the confusion on your face. “You’re such a fucking dumbass, Baekhyun,” he mumbled as he pulled his phone out of his pocket, thumbs flying furiously over the screen before he turned it around to show you. “I’m Baekhyun,” it read. “The guy that you saw with Minseok before?”

You nodded, instinctively raising your hands to sign before remembering that he wouldn’t be able to understand. You pulled your own phone out, suppressing a smile when you saw Baekhyun shifting on the balls of his feet as he waited. “Such an impatient kid,” you thought. Finally, you showed him your own screen: “I remember you. I’m Y/N. Minseok’s been helping me in my classes.”

“I know!” Baekhyun replied with a grin before remembering where he was, and that you couldn’t hear him. A frown formed on his lips as he erased his previous sentences and started anew. “Can we exchange numbers? It’ll be easier than talking like this.”

Within a matter of seconds, the two of you were settled down of the carpet of the library, facing each other but with your eyes looking down at your phones.

Baekhyun: where’s Minseok?

🌸: He went home early, I’m waiting for my grandma to pick me up 

Baekhyun: were you by yourself this whole time?

He looked up from his phone to stare at you in shock, mouth open in disbelief. You looked up as well, shaking your head before glancing back to your phone once more.

🌸: He left like 20 minutes ago.

Baekhyun: 😫 next time he leaves, you should text me! i’ll keep you company

He groaned aloud as he realized how strange it might have sounded before sending another text.

Baekhyun: not in a weird way i’m so sorry about that

To his surprise, your body began to shake with silent giggles, your phone in danger of falling out of your hands.

🌸: It’s okay, I get what you meant.

Baekhyun: thank GOD, minseok would’ve killed me if i scared off his new friend ☠️

You found out that Baekhyun was a first-year student as well, still undecided in his major.

Baekhyun: my mom wants me to go into business and my dad wants me to go into kinesiology but i don’t even know what to do

He rolled his eyes, a proud smirk appearing on his lips when you grinned at his reaction.

🌸: You still have time, don’t worry too much about it. Isn’t that what college is for, finding out what you want to do for the rest of your life?”

Baekhyun: i wish my parents saw it the same way as you 😣

Baekhyun: what are you majoring in?

🌸: I’m an English major.

Baekhyun: 😮 so does that mean you’re like a good writer and all that stuff?

🌸: I think I’m pretty decent. 😅

Baekhyun: can you do my essays for me?? 😄

🌸: If I didn’t know you were joking, I would’ve gotten up and left right now.

“No!” Baekhyun exclaimed out loud, ignoring the icy glares shot his way by a couple of students sittting close by.

You lifted a finger to your lips, placing it there in a shushing motion. Judging by the other students’ reactions, your new friend was quite noisy.

🌸: You’re going to get us kicked out!

Baekhyun met your gaze after reading the text on his phone, eyebrow raised as he gave you a mischievous smile.

Baekhyun: i’ll tell them it was you 😂

🌸: Of course, it was the mute, deaf girl and not the annoying boy next to her.

Baekhyun: hey! i’m not annoying 😭i just have a lot of energy

🌸: Uh huh, sure.

Baekhyun: minseok didn’t tell me you were this mean

You peeked at him from out of the corner of your eye, catching the pout on his lips but the slight smile there as well.

🌸: And he didn’t tell me you were so childish. I guess we both got tricked.

Unable to stop himself, Baekhyun burst into laughter, hand coming up to his mouth as his eyes crinkled up with joy.

Aware of all the evil looks everyone within a ten foot radius was now giving the two of you, you stood up, dragging Baekhyun outside so that you wouldn’t be reprimanded for causing a disturbance.  

He was still giggling, body shaking with laughter as you pulled him to a stop under one of the streetlights outside the library. “I’m sorry,” you saw his lips form.

Shaking your head, you let go of his hand that you had been holding the entire time. “It’s nothing,” you signed back without thinking, not even realizing that you had signed instead of texted until you saw Baekhyun watching you in awe.

His fingers flew over the screen of his phone once more, a look of determination on his face.

Baekhyun: will you teach me how to sign?

You froze, sure that you had misread his text, that this was all a figment of your imagination. Slowly, you began forming a reply.

🌸: Are you sure?

Baekhyun: yeah! i want to learn, and i think it would be easier for you if we signed instead of having to text all the time

Baekhyun: i can’t promise that i’m a top-student, but i’ll work hard! 👏

It would be silly to deny that your new friend didn’t amuse you, didn’t interest you in any way at all.  But still, you had your worries. It had been so long since you had formed a close relationship with someone who didn’t speak primarily in sign. Even your family, your hearing father and grandmother chose to speak only in sign at home so that you wouldn’t feel left out. What if instead of getting closer to him, you ended up feeling even more alienated? What if he realized just how different the two of you were?

“Y/N?” Baekhyun’s face grew worried, brows lifting up slightly as his lips parted, trying to figure out what to say.

Biting down on your lip, you typed out your response quickly, hoping that this sudden burst of courage swelling up inside of you would last.

🌸: Okay, I’ll teach you.

“Really?” Baekhyun said aloud, looking back up at you after reading the text. “Thank you,” you saw him mouth.

You brought one of your hands up, slowly doing the sign for “Thank you” and feeling a swell of pride when Baekhyun copied it as well. A goofy smile appeared on his face as he repeated it, over and over. "Thank you, thank you." 

You had known that Baekhyun was an enthusiastic person, but you had underestimated how much effort he would throw into learning sign language.

“Hello!” he greeted you and Minseok the next afternoon when he saw both of you walking together.

“You know how to sign?” Minseok asked in surprise, both aloud and with his hands.  

“I’m...” Baekhyun’s nose scrunched up as he frowned, trying to sift through the signs that he had been studying last night from the Internet. “I’m learning?”

Immediately, you burst into applause, beaming proudly while Baekhyun’s expression changed to one of relief. “You’re doing well! I’m impressed.” Minseok relayed this to Baekhyun with a look of wonder himself, unable to believe what he had seen.

"Thank you!" Baekhyun returned, a tinge of pink appearing on his cheeks as he basked in your praise.

“When do you want to start lessons?” you signed, watching as Minseok translated what you said to Baekhyun.

Baekhyun said his response aloud, eyes on yours even while he spoke to Minseok.

Minseok tapped your shoulder with a finger, drawing your attention before signing. “He said he’s free tomorrow afternoon. He has work later on today.”

You silently mouthed an “Okay” in return, holding up six fingers and making sure that Baekhyun saw them.

“Six o’clock?” You read from the movement of his lips, and you nodded.

“Don’t be late,” you signed with a teasing smile, watching with interest as Baekhyun first looked at your signs, and then to Minseok for the translation.

He burst into laughter once he understood what you had said, head thrown back as he did so. “Okay,” you saw him mouth, and then something else that you couldn’t decipher.

“He said that he’ll try not to be,” Minseok made his signs loose and casual, just like the way Baekhyun had said it verbally.

You grinned before giving Baekhyun a thumbs-up. “I’ll see you two tomorrow,” you said before giving them a wave and walking away.

Just as Baekhyun was about to ask where you were going, Minseok laid a hand on his shoulder. “She said she’ll see us tomorrow. Her grandma should be here to pick her up.”

Immediately, Baekhyun’s shoulders drooped slightly, a pout playing at his bottom lip. “Oh,” he mumbled lamely.

“You’ve never been interested in learning sign before. How come you didn’t want to learn from me?” Minseok asked, the pitch of his voice high as he grew more curious.

“You’re not her.”

Minseok groaned, pushing Baekhyun away and walking off in the opposite direction. “I should have never introduced you to her.”

“Hey, I’m grateful to you for that!” Baekhyun yelled after him, cupping his hands around his mouth as he did so.

The only indication that Minseok gave of having heard was by throwing up a middle-finger, not even looking back to see Baekhyun’s reaction.

Baekhyun chuckled to himself, checking the time on his phone and walking off to his next class. As his steps along the grounds of the campus drew him closer to his classroom, his thoughts were drawn to you. If he was being honest, his interest in you ran deeper, his curiosity driving him to figure out what it was about you that intrigued him so much. Even during your first actual conversation together, you hadn’t walked away like most people would have. Granted, you had stayed at first out of politeness, but Baekhyun remembered how genuine your smiles were, how you had beamed when he tried to copy your signs.

Your signs were special to you, that much was obvious. But Baekhyun could see that your appreciation for sign language stemmed from something with more meaning. Every motion of your hands was graceful, embodied every emotion that you felt when you signed. Although Baekhyun couldn’t understand what you had signed, he could guess the general feeling behind them. It was like you gave every sign a new meaning, a renewed vivacity that resembled your own cheerful nature.

Baekhyun wanted to truly understand what you meant, to be able to read every nuance and feeling in the way that you signed. He wanted to know the person behind the signs. 

He wanted you to know all this, and more.

Baekhyun's hands ached more than they ever had before in his life, muscles tired out from the extra use over the course of his sign lessons with you. But he still wore a grin on his face when he practiced, eyes trained on your hands as he followed every distinct movement. It had only been a month, but the two of you had already met up at least a dozen times for lessons. Baekhyun's sign vocabulary was growing exponentially, and you were taken aback by how much information he was retaining in such a short period of time. There were still many signs that he didn't know, but you always made sure to fingerspell them out for him whenever you two came across a new word.

As the two of you sat across from each other at one of your campus's Starbucks, you waited patiently as Baekhyun tried to string his thoughts together into a comprehensible series of signs.

"In my class today, we had a... p-o-p q-u-i-z," he spelled out the last words with a puzzled frown on his face.

You giggled to yourself before doing the sign for "pop quiz", waiting until Baekhyun copied it to ask him a question. "Which class was it?"

Although you couldn't hear it, judging by the way he leaned back in his seat and pulled his bottom lip in between his teeth, you could tell that Baekhyun had given a groan of frustration. He raised his hands, both of them hovering before him as he hesitated before signing. "...Talking?"

"Public speaking?"

"Yes!" He signed back, gesture broad and eyes widened as he remembered which sign he had been trying to make. "Public speaking! I did okay."  

"Are you sure?"

That particular string of signs was a sort of inside joke between you two. When you had first taught it to Baekhyun, he had taken any opportunity that he could to use it. He had even used it around Minseok to tease him, and the older boy had shaken his head at you.

"At least you didn't teach him swear words," he had signed to you while mumbling it aloud for Baekhyun to understand.

With a cocked eyebrow, Baekhyun waited until both you and Minseok were looking at him to reply. "Are you sure, dickwad?"

His words had sent you into a coughing fit, with Baekhyun grinning devilishly at your reaction while Minseok had looked between the two of you with an icy glare on his face. "Both of you are children," he said before getting up and stalking away.

Now in the present, Baekhyun chuckled softly to himself at your signs. "Yes, I'm sure," he replied. "The pop quiz sucked major ass."

You groaned inwardly, grateful that the people nearby couldn't understand what he was saying. "Good signing, Baekhyun," you told him sarcastically. The sign that you used for Baekhyun's name was the sign for "laugh", signed with a "B".

"Thank you," Baekhyun said smugly, shooting you a wink. "What are we learning today?"

"Honestly, I'm tired." Your shoulders slumped forward, your lips pulling downwards.

"Food?" Baekhyun asked before pulling his phone out of his pocket.

Baek: there's a really good burger place down the street!!!!! i'll drive!!!!

🌸: You just really don't want to study today, huh?

Baek: hey you're the one who brought it up first what do you say teacher? food?? please?

When you looked up from the text, you saw Baekhyun waiting for your reply with an exaggerated pout, head resting on top of his hands like a child.

"Okay," you signed. "But only for today."

"Are you sure?"

🌸: shut up before I change my mind

Baek: okay okay jeez

You and Baekhyun eagerly hopped into his brother's hand-me-down car, a particular splotch of misplaced color and a slight dent on the passenger side door catching your eye.

"Car a-c-c-i-d-e-n-t," Baekhyun explained to you when you pointed it out.

"A big one?"

“No, little. But scary.”

You nodded in acknowledgment, staying silent as Baekhyun began to back up out of the parking space. It was mutually understood that both of you would be unable to sign or text each other during the car ride, so you both enjoyed each other’s company in comfortable silence.

Although neither of you spoke, he stole glances at you every so often, and you pretended not to notice. Or at least, until you began to fear for your safety.

When you caught him looking at you briefly while he was driving across an intersection, you tapped his shoulder and nodded towards the road.

Taking the hint, Baekhyun’s head whipped back forward, stopping just in time as the car in front came to an unexpected halt.

Your hands tightened their grip from where they were clutching anxiously onto your seatbelt. You hadn’t even noticed that you had been doing that. Keeping your focus solely on the road, you were taken aback to suddenly see the car pull into the drive-thru of an In-N-Out. 

“Really?” you asked Baekhyun as the car in front of you ordered.

“What?” he mouthed, staring back at you just as puzzled. “You don’t like b-u-r-g-e-r-s?”

You did the sign for “burger”, then continued on. “I do. But when you said you knew a good burger place, I didn’t think you meant In-N-Out.”

Judging by the look on his face, you had completely lost him. Maybe you had been signing too fast, or maybe there had been too many signs that he didn’t know.

“Later,” you told him, hoping he would understand.

Baekhyun nodded, but the furrow between his eyebrows was starting to worry you a bit. When you had finally gotten a bag of food settled in your lap and had driven back to the campus’s parking lot, you pulled out your phone.

🌸: I said that I didn’t think your “good burger place” was gonna be In-N-Out. Everyone knows that place, I wasn’t expecting you to hype it up like some secret hole-in-the-wall restaurant. 😂

Baek: it’s in-n-out you HAVE to hype it up 😤

🌸: Okay, okay I get it.

Baek: was it hard for you when you first started learning to sign? i thought i was doing really well until i only got like 3 words out of your last sentence

🌸: It was definitely hard for me too. It’s not something easy you can pick up immediately, don’t beat yourself up about it. You’re doing well.

Baekhyun gazed up at you hesitantly. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

He paused for a second, before stretching an arm over the car console to hold onto one of your hands. “Thank you,” he signed with his free hand.

“You’re welcome.”

Something about this exchange was different, maybe it was the serious mood that had fallen over both of you. Maybe it was the close proximity that you were in, you and Baekhyun sitting not even a foot away from each other as you both hesitated, waiting for someone to speak up.

All of a sudden, Baekhyun twitched in his seat, head turning from side to side as he scanned his surroundings worriedly. His hand slipped away from yours as he continued to look around. The bags of fast food that you had bought lay forgotten on the floor of the car as he grew more anxious.

“What? What is it?” You signed frantically, pausing only when you noticed that Baekhyun had brought his hands up to cover his ears.

He snuck a look at out the window closest to him, then back to you. “Car a-l-a-r-m,” he told you. “Noisy.”

Oh. “Are you... okay?” you asked tentatively, unsure of what to say. Had it been an ear-piercing, shrieking noise, striking out through the air? Were your memories of what car alarms sounded like still reliable enough to look back on?

“Yeah, I’m okay.” Baekhyun’s hands dropped to his chest, coming to rest over his heart as he breathed in and out. He stared ahead, eyes blown wide as he tried to calm himself from the sudden scare. When he noticed you staring at him, he flashed you a goofy smile.

You tried to mirror it, but you were too busy caught up in your own thoughts. It wasn’t often that you wished to be able to hear again - in fact, you rarely did at all. When you were younger, you used to wish for it almost daily, a hopeful, naive wish of a child. You thought that you were past that stage of your life, that you were finally comfortable with who you were and what your circumstances were as well. 

But one little car alarm had managed to unravel you, to have you wondering once again what it would be like to hear, to be like Baekhyun.

The boy in question waved his hands in front of your face, brows drawn upwards as he tried to get your attention. “Y/N? Are you okay?” you read from his lips.

You nodded, breathing shaky as you exhaled. Maybe this doubt hadn’t been as sudden as you thought, maybe it had been festering in the back of your mind for a while. After meeting Baekhyun, you had caught yourself a couple of times imagining what it would be like to hear, to listen to his laughter, to what he had to say.

You wanted to know what your name sounded like coming from his lips.

A sudden vibration from your phone startled you, alerting you of a new message.

Baek: are u sure you’re ok?? do you need me to do anything? grab water? roll down the windows?

🌸: No, it’s fine. I was just thinking.

Baek: you looked pretty serious about it wanna talk? or not if im being too nosy just tell me and ill shut up

You couldn’t bring yourself to look at him, staring only at the screen of your phone as you hesitated. There weren’t many people that you had opened up to about your biggest worries, the thoughts that haunted you during the deep of night. Your father and grandmother tried their best to understand, but despite their deep love for you, they were still hearing people who had never had to struggle with hearing loss and brain trauma. They could sympathize with your loss and grief, but they could never truly feel what you felt. Your best friend Junmyeon understood a bit more, but since he had been deaf since birth, it was hard for him to grasp the concept of yearning for a lost ability. You were worried that Baekhyun wouldn’t understand, that he would be uncomfortable with your deepest thoughts.

But he had been understanding and kind for as long as you had known him. He had been patient, had treated your words with a kindness and genuine curiosity that you had rarely seen from others. He made an effort to understand what you thought, to speak to you in ways that were comfortable for you.

Baekhyun didn’t pretend that there wasn’t something that distinctly set you apart from others like your family did, the way they always went out of their ways to protect and keep you safe. He knew that you were different from the beginning, but instead of letting this shape his perception of you, he continued to see you for who you were.

Y/N, not just a girl with traumatic brain damage, but Y/N the college student. The English major. The type of person who makes sarcastic remarks but still holds a lot of care and interest for the loved ones around her.

Baekhyun was here not because he felt pity for you, but because he truly wanted to know you. You had a lot of respect for him for that. Maybe something other than respect.

🌸: I was just thinking about what it would be like to hear again.

Baek: minseok told me that you used to be able to hear when you were little

🌸: Did he tell you everything?

Baek: no and i didn’t ask, i didn’t want to be all nosy

Baekhyun was many things: curious, playful, bright, but nosy was not one of them.

🌸: Can I tell you what happened?

Baek: Y/N only if you want to if it makes you uncomfortable to tell me you don’t have to

🌸: I want to. You’re one of my closest friends. I don’t know, do you ever get that feeling where like if you don’t tell someone something that you’ll explode?

Baek: yeah i get what you mean

🌸: For some reason, I’ve been feeling like that lately.  When I was little, I was in a pretty bad accident. I don’t remember much about it, but I remember how scared I was when I couldn’t hear anything, when I realized how hard it was for me to study. Words got jumbled up in my head and the doctors told my dad that I’d probably end up having trouble with language. I guess that’s why I was so stubborn about doing well in reading and writing in school. 

At first it was really hard. It was hard to keep up with my friends, to keep up with schoolwork when I felt like my life had restarted and I was learning how to live again. That was when I really wanted to hear the most. I felt like without my ability to hear and communicate with others, I was lost. I started to feel like that again recently too.

Baek: really? why?

He glanced at you out of the corner of his eye, a concerned look on his face although you didn't catch it.

🌸: Sometimes I just wish that I could listen to what you have to say, to not have to rely on texting or on Minseok to translate for me.

A few tense seconds passed before you got a new text.

Baek: is it because i'm not good at signing?

Your head shot up, pain on Baekhyun’s face and your own. 

"No," you told him. "That's not it."

"Then what?" he mouthed, still slightly hurt from the misunderstanding.

You typed away more quickly than you ever had before, showing him the screen instead of waiting for the text to reach his phone. 

🌸: I want to hear because I want to know what your voice sounds like. I want to know what your laugh sounds like too, especially when you laugh so hard that your sides end up hurting.

Baekhyun's pupils moved from side to side as he read through the lines of text before moving back to meet yours. "Really?"

Nodding, you did your best to ignore the overwhelming bunch of nerves starting to rise in your chest.

"Why?"

"I like you."

Baekhyun simply stared at you, and you began to worry that he had forgotten the sign for "like". That couldn't be possible, could it? I mean, he had been learning a lot and maybe you had unrealistic expectations- oh wait, hold on. Sometime during your inner meltdown, Baekhyun had started to sign.

"You... like me?"

You nodded once more, biting on the inside of your cheek as you waited for a full answer.

"Are you sure?"

You huffed out impatiently, signing a loud "YES! I like you! You make me smile every day. Whenever I see you, I don't want to say goodbye."

Baekhyun reached out to take your hands in his own, his fingers shaky as he licked his lips nervously. His thumbs ran over the backs of your hands before he removed one of his. "I like you too. Hearing, or deaf, I like you. A lot."

As soon as he finished, you gave a silent laugh of relief.

"You hear me now," he continued. "A-l-r-e-a-d-y. And I hear you. I like you a lot, a lot, a lot."

"Okay, I get it!" you signed back with a silly smile, bashful from all of this new affection.

Baekhyun brought your hands up to his lips, placing a sweet kiss on top of them before letting go and resting his hands on your hips. He pulled you closer, his lips coming to meet yours.

It was startling to realize that in those two kisses, those two simple acts of love that you could read every emotion and thought that Baekhyun was trying to tell you. Things like "I like you, I want you, I cherish you, I hear you", all understood through the slightest of touches.

And so you kissed him back, just as passionate in what you had to say. "I like you, I hear you."

"I understand you."

A/N: okay I feel like I say this for every new fic but I SWEAR this time, this is my favorite fic that I’ve put on here. For one of my classes last year, we studied special education and I wanted to incorporate this into my writing somehow. There are some really good books out there about figures in the deaf community, I’d definitely recommend looking into them if you’re interested! Also, if I got something wrong about traumatic brain damage/special education/etc. please tell me so I can correct it! I tried my best to use class notes and the internet to make sure I was using factual information (trying to describe what type of damage there was took a lot of reading through my notes and I’m still worried I’ve messed up something lol)

[inloveandwords]

Lately, I’ve found that when I finish a novel that I love – one that has left me breathless and immediately wanting more just like it – I tend to try to pinpoint exactly what it is about that novel that I loved. Was it the trope? If it was how it made me feel – what specifically triggered that feeling?

In doing this, I came up with a list of – for lack of a better word – things I love that happen in romance novels.

I created a video about this topic, but I also thought I’d share that list here on my blog.

I’ve paired each of the topics with a book recommendation or two, however, I do hope to create separate posts and videos for each of these with their own recommendations.

Of course, if you have any recommendations that pop into your mind as you are reading this post, please leave me a comment!

  Virgin Hero

I didn’t realize this was something I loved in romance novels until I read Archer’s Voice. There is something about a hero who has some innocence about him, whether it be because he is a recluse like Archer or had a traumatic past like Zsadist from Lover Awakened by JR Ward or Zachariah from Keepsake by Sarina Bowen. There is something swoony about watching the couple fall in love and seeing the hero experience epic firsts.

  Longing 

For the longest time, I couldn’t put my finger on what it was in books that ripped my heart out of my chest when I’d read books that had this element in it until I read Truth or Beard by Penny Reid recently and realized that I am so attracted to desperate longing – particularly from the hero. Especially when the hero is like Duane who doesn’t want to rush anything because he has been waiting so long for the heroine. He’s not willing to cross any lines if it means that the long term isn’t an option. 

  Forbidden

This element goes hand in hand with the previous one. One of the best parts of forbidden romances is the longing. It’s almost guaranteed. As someone who, before meeting my husband, was extremely fickle, I’d always love the chase more than actually catching. When something is forbidden, it’s that much more attractive and in romance novels, when that HEA finally happens, it’s so, so satisfying. (Or it should be!)

  Groveling  

I actually had trouble thinking of a book that did this really well, so please give me recommendations. I think a couple of the most recent books I read that did this really well were The Best Thing by Mariana Zapata and The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams. For me, I much prefer the hero do all the groveling as opposed to the heroine. And, of course, whatever it is that he did to require groveling better not be too unforgivable, but also not something that should be easily forgiven. There absolutely has to be a good balance.

  Epic romance

I’ve only found EPIC romances in fantasy and paranormal stories, I think because it is those magical/paranormal elements that come into play and take the romance to another level. It’s not just love, it’s absolute fate. The type of romance that is truly once in a lifetime, one in a million. The ultimate will always be A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J Maas, but The Caraval series also has a pretty epic romance as well.

  All the Swoon 

Many of the things on this list can cause lots of swooning, but nothing quite had me swooning as much as Leo Loves Ares by Anyta Sunday. Swoon can be found in super sweet, simple moments like those found in Leo Loves Ares. Of course, in order for this to happen, you have to adore the couple and the romance has to be incredible to begin with. If a romance is good enough, almost any interaction between the characters is swoony.

  Cringey moments

I am so here for the moments in romance novels that make me cover my face and fake cry with humiliation for the character. I live for the moments in which the main characters make fools of themselves in front of their love interests. This happens in epic proportions in Wrong and Fling by Jana Aston and The Hating Game by Sally Thorne.

  Butterflies

This, much like swooning, is basically guarantee if the romance novel is good enough. There are so many moments – some of them so seemingly small – that can send butterflies swirling like crazy. Honestly, everything on this list elicits butterflies. This is the #1 thing I hope for in romance novels when I read them. An example of a small moment that sent a million butterflies swirling was in The Wall of Winnipeg and Me by Mariana Zapata when Aiden is massaging Vanessa’s leg after one of her long marathon training runs. It is the build-up to this moment that made the butterflies go crazy, and if it wasn’t built up right, it wouldn’t have been a big deal, but this moment was so huge in the slow burn of the entire book.

  Impossibility

I love it when romance novels manage to break through predictability (which isn’t always a bad thing, btw!) and make you truly wonder how the hell the couple is going to ever end up together. This happened so many times in My Darling Duke by Stacy Reid. So many times in romance when there is something that is keeping the couple apart, the solution seems so simple, so I really appreciate it when a romance novel can keep you on your toes and truly make you worry that things won’t work out – even though we all know it wouldn’t be a romance novel without a Happily Ever After or Happy For Now.

  Wonder

I love this the most when the love interest is wonderstruck by the main character. Those moments when they just can’t believe how lucky they are. That it is really or finally happening to them. This often happens in tandem with longing – like when a hero has been pining after the heroine.

  Slow Burn 

This, like forbidden romance, is probably one of the most popular on this list. I mean, obviously, my go to for a guaranteed amazing slow burn is Mariana Zapata. She is the queen. Slow burns pave the way for such an incredible pay off in the end. You are taken on a journey with these romances. And, best of all, you are given the opportunity to slowly fall in love right alongside the main character.

  Loyalty/Devotion 

Of course, I adore this in the romance, but I also love loyalty from side characters as well. But, since we are talking romance specifically, I absolutely adore when the characters are loyal even when there are big obstacles between them, even when they are angry or betrayed, they still will be there when they are needed. I’m looking at you, John Ambrose McClaren from PS I Still Love You by Jenny Han.

  Healthy relationships

I get the draw of dark romances, I really do. I even sometimes can understand the draw of the bullying trope… sometimes. But, man, do I appreciate an incredibly healthy relationship. One where the characters communicate beautifully, they support each other, they motivate one another, and, yes, they are loyal. I know, it’s hard to create conflict when the couple’s relationship is healthy, but I promise it can be done. Check out Misadventures of a College Girl by Lauren Rowe for proof.

  Reverence

I know, the obsessive hero has been done incredibly poorly many times and, yes, it can easily be creepy – especially if you imagine someone acting that way toward you, but in a romance novel? Give me a well-written romance that has a hero that holds such deep reverence for the heroine like in With Visions of Red by Trisha Wolfe. I mean, Colton calls Sadie a “goddess,” and goddammit, she is. That’s probably the most important part of this working in novels – the heroine or whoever is the object of this feeling needs to be damn deserving. I better be obsessed with them, too.

  Uncertainty

This is very similar to Impossibility, however, it’s less… umm… impossible and more that you’re just not sure how things will work out, no necessarily IF they will work out. You don’t feel like the ground is solid beneath your feet as your reading. Everything seems like it could fall apart at any moment because things are so precarious. I’m thinking of an upcoming release, That’s Not a Thing by Jacqueline Freidland. The entire time I was anticipating everything falling apart and it kept me on the edge of my seat wondering WTF was going to happen. 

  Caretaking

This is one that I feel like I didn’t realize I appreciated so much until I read about it in The Hating Game by Sally Thorne and Marriage for One by Ella Maise. When you get to see the vulnerability of one character alongside the love interest stepping up (or vice versa), it strengthens the relationship and your belief in it significantly.

  Epic Banter

This is particularly great in romcoms. I mean, you can’t really have a great romcom without it, but honestly, it can be pulled off in any genre that has romance. Particularly if the romance is a hate-to-love. If it is a romcom and done well, it’ll have you laughing out loud (hey, Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren, I’m looking at you). If it is in any other genre, it can make you grin from ear-to-ear. 

  Undeniable Chemistry 

Chemistry is a must in any romance. Period. Without it, it just doesn’t work. There is no buy-in, no rooting for the characters if you don’t feel like they need to be together. This is what separates bland, meh, romances from the ALL THE STARS IN THE UNIVERSE romance novels. But when a romance can throw in burning chemistry from the second the characters meet? All the yes. And I’m not talking about having the characters just constantly thinking that the love interest is SO HOT (in fact that annoys the crap out of me – stop. I get it. They’re attractive. Please move on.) I don’t want to be told about the chemistry. Show me. With conversation, with body language. I feel like Lauren Rowe does this so well in all of her books. She throws so much chemistry into her romance novels, she’s like a damn scientist. 

  Tension

Much like longing, the buildup and tension between two characters makes endings so much more satisfying. The Hating Game and Birthday Girl has some of the best tension.

  When I finish a novel I love I try to pinpoint what it is about it I loved. If it was how it made me feel - what specifically triggered that feeling? In doing this, I came up with a list of things I love that happen in romance novels. Lately, I've found that when I finish a novel that I love - one that has left me breathless and immediately wanting more just like it - I tend to try to pinpoint exactly what it is about that novel that I loved.

[living4eternity]

Can I date a non-christian?

Can I date non-Christians?

(As a note, this article probably attacks the issue better than I ever could, but I wrote this so...)

First of all, can I say that the title here isn’t great - it would be better said “is it wise for me to date non-chrisitians” or “is it godly for me to date non-Christians”. Of course you “can” date a non-christian, just like you “can” drink alcohol, and you “can” eat meat sacrificed to idols, and you “can” steal office supplies from work. But should you? Perhaps the real question is “is it good for me to date a non-Christian”?

(For reference, I do drink alcohol, I have no problem eating hallal meat, and I am sure scripture tells us not to steal)

This one is very much a question that has had a direct impact upon my life and the life of my friends and family, and so one where I hope I can speak with sympathy rather than judgement. My post immediately before this one (link here) was a poem I wrote 5 years ago that chewed through the conflict between theology and desire that I’m going to look at again now. I’m not sure it's remotely noteworthy, I just want to try and be clear that I’ve been there, where you or your friend is now.

So first let’s get a feel for the situation: there’s this other person who you like, and they like you back, and it’s all looking like a classic romantic story when we end up with the classic rom-com “but”: you are a christian and they are not. Can love surpass this divide? Well, here are the challenges:

1 - they will never really understand you.

Your world views are grounded upon completely different basis - you hold that there is a loving God who holds the world to account for its actions who has rescued you from your wrongdoing by the death and resurrection of his son, and they... believe there is a God? Think we should be nice to each other? Outside of Christianity, there is no grace, no salvation by faith alone. If they are not a Christian, they won’t ever really be able to comprehend what drives you, what keeps you alive. “In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” 2 Corinthians‬ ‭4:4‬ Seems tough.

2 - they will tempt you to idolatry

Time and again the Israelites are told not to take foreign wives because they will draw them to worship other gods, and yet the Israelites did, and lo, they were drawn to idolatry. The best example of this for me is Solomon. He was renowned as the wisest man on earth, blessed by God with it. Yet if we look at 1 kings 11, we see that ““For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.” 1 Kings‬ ‭11:4‬ If even the wisest man on earth couldn't resist the allure of his spouse’s idols, what hope do we have? And let’s not kid ourselves, they have idols: fame, power, money, the approval of man, just because they don't have a small statue that they bow down to doesn’t mean there aren’t idols. So are you wiser than Solomon?

3 - they will sap your energy

One of the two of you has drunk the waters which well up as a spring of life within you (John 4:14). The other is a walking corpse, dead in their sins and transgressions (Ephesians 2:1). This is only going to go one direction - you giving and them taking. And relatedly:

4 - they can't fight for you spiritually

They’re dead. That's effort anyway, but you're in a war zone carrying a corpse around with you. You have a real enemy, who is always prowling around seeking to devour you (1 Peter 5:8), and your chosen life partner isn't able to lift a finger to help you in this battle. I think that is part of the weight of the imperative to not be unequally yoked with unbelievers (2 cor 4:16). In the spiritual battle that rages around your family, you really want two of you fighting.

There are other issues, but those are the ones I thought of first.

So given that you're a sensible person who doesn't want to deliberately make your life difficult, why do you still want to do this? (That is actually the question I have asked myself on several occasions).

The point comes down to this: we tend to choose whatever path in life we really think will make us happiest. You’re on a diet, but you just ate that chocolate bar - at that moment you had decided that the immediate pleasure of the chocolate bar was better than the reason you were dieting. So similarly, even if we might assent that it's probably a bad plan, they are still attractive, it still feels good when people want you, it still looks like something we'd want.

So we make excuses to ourselves.

“If I don’t date non Christians, I might not get married”

The weight of this one varies a bit with context, but it's clear to me that people feel it here in Japan. The key thing here is that it hinges on the assumption that not getting married is a Bad Thing, on a scale where it outweighs the problems listed above. Now singleness is scary sometimes. You want someone to lean on, to know they'll always be around, not to feel like nobody wants you. But we find our answer to all of these things in Christ, not in our spouse. We've managed to bite the lie from our society that sexual expression is the peak of human existence. But we know that Paul was single, that Jesus (God himself, the perfect man) was single. So it seems terrible to concede that a life without sex is a lesser life, that the life Jesus lived is insufficient for you. This is a set of lies that it’s imperative that the church rebukes - marriage is good, but it isn’t worth falling into sin for it.

“I love them”

The weight of this lies in the sense that love is a good thing, right? And we aren't able to control your emotions - you have to marry who you love. But real life isn’t the cheesy movies. Just because you feel it doesn't make it right. We aren't governed by our feeling but the law of Christ, that is the spirit. So we have to weigh things.

One thing to weigh is, will this last? Once the honeymoon period is over, and you realise you have no common ground to argue change on, will this love last? My experience is that human feelings are fickle.

Furthermore, in a very real sense, it might not even be the loving thing to do, to date them. My current church pastor became a Christian because a girl he was interested in was a Christian, so he went along to church and there got saved (then she immediately started dating someone else at the church, but that’s by the by). If she had been happy to date him whilst he was a non-believer, would he have ever come to Christ? Maybe, but from everything I’ve seen it doesn’t normally work out like that. So you are removing an incentive for them to engage with the one who brings eternal life (I know they could just fake it, but it’s better than them never trying.) Is it really loving to give them what they want now at the cost of their eternity? Relatedly...

“I want to save them”

This one is always terrible. It never works out well in relationships amongst non-Christians, and even less so here. You are much more able to witness to people when you don’t have mixed motives. Furthermore, we know that we can’t save anyone, but salvation ultimately is a work of the spirit in their life. And do we really think God is going to bless our sinful action because we had a good intention? He might, there’s a lot of grace, but it would be in spite of the relationship not because of it. And this is a terrible excuse anyway, because if the primary aim was witness we would want to keep the extra incentive mentioned above and see them saved before starting anything.

So is it wise to date a non-Christian. As far as I can tell, in no circumstance. So what do we do when our Christian friend is doing so?

First up, we have to love them. If we start getting judgemental we have already missed the gospel and what God has done for this person. In fact, given the problems listed above, they are going to need our care and support more than ever as they start to feel the painful consequences of their action.

Secondly, if you are in a place to do so, there are some difficult questions worth asking them (and yourself):

will you be happy with them as they are?

what do you seek to gain from this relationship?

why are you dating this person?

are you looking for something from them that you should be seeking from God?

And so on

Third, and most important, pray for them. Pray lots, cause it is by God’s hand that hearts are turned.

This one applies even if they have married a non-Christian, in fact doubly so because now they are stuck there with these difficulties.

I hope this is helpful for someone, it was helpful for me back in the day.

[topicprinter]

The original blog post by Travis can be found here. http://ift.tt/2ilZk8p bunch of companies I’m involved in have gone for seed funding in the last few months. After one of them asked for the ultra-warrior-l33t-skillz, I thought I’d put this post up and break it down.If any of you are raising your first startup or seed money, this is a must read. Would love to hear any of your stories/feedback in the comments on this post…Priming the pump: How do you get started with rounding up some angels for a seed round? It’s pretty simple. Go to angel gatherings, industry conferences, any and all networking events. Meet people who are angels or who know angels. Give ‘em the elevator pitch. KEEP IT SHORT. Set up Intro meetings. Also, if you’re not located in a startup hotspot, then find/make a friend in Silicon Valley and stay on his/her couch for a month and make sure you’re meeting with somebody new EVERY DAY.Intro meetings: Informal discussion where you pitch the company over a lunch/coffee/etc., and expand potential angel network through referrals. Get your pitch down to 5-10 minutes, and prepare a tight FAQ in your head so that you have tight answers to the top 20 questions. Let them pay. Be proud of your scrappiness.ABC’s – Always Be Closing: At the end of every meeting, get a clear understanding of where they stand on your deal opportunity. Shoot for getting an amount they would be interested in investing. You won’t usually get a commitment on the first meeting but do not accept vagueness. Get a clear idea of where they stand, and what next steps might be to move them through the pipeline. Hypotheticals are also useful: When I lock on my lead investor, how much would you be interested in investing?Referrals are key: “Glad you’re pumped… any thoughts on who else I should meet with?” If your pitch is kicking ass, then most angels will immediately offer up a couple folks they can hook you up with. Regardless, always ask for more folks you can connect with.Advisors: Turn a couple of these potential angels into advisors. Having a few top-notch people in your corner can make all the difference in turning the tide in an angel round. Everybody’s going to want to help and everybody will want a piece. Be selective, don’t settle. An average advisor is worth 1/10 the amount of an awesome advisor. Make it known that you expect your advisors to invest in the round. No exceptions—an advisor that doesn’t invest in the round will have significantly less influence in helping you close a round.Thought Partner: Pick one advisor, co-founder, or mentor who will be your thought partner in managing the process. There is a lot of activity as you go to get your first term sheet, all the way through the close. Strange shit you cannot predict WILL go down. Big personalities, money, valuation, ego, all that makes a nice recipe for some crazy shenanigans. Nailing your messaging, managing the big personalities, keeping momentum going, takes a certain amount of magic, and making that happen is not accidental. It’s hard work, hustle, credibility, and preparation, and you’ll be much better at it with a partner in crime who can help you think through the issues, and craziness that inevitably will go down as you get to closing.TheList: Keep a list (aka pipeline) of the people you’re meeting with, the referrals that they provide you, and the level of their interest in the seed round. Stay on the ball…Always follow up…be the pro that impresses all those investors that interact with you.Passion/Charisma: This is the X-factor. It separates the men from the boys in fundraising. If you’re doing a startup, you’re trying to change the world, you’ve kicked your cushy job to the curb, you’ve had Ramen noodles for breakfast lunch and dinner as far as you can remember, and maybe you’ve moved back in with the ‘rents. You’ve definitely got the passion…why else would you be doing this? Don’t be afraid to show it. Every pitch could be your last one (i.e. the dude across the table writes you a check!), know that… give it your all… listen to some music that pumps you up before you get into the meeting, think about all of the great shit you’re doing and could do. Focus on the positive, have confidence, be amped, bring passion to your game, and share the love with the person across from you… bring extreme positivity into the potential investor’s otherwise boring pedestrian day. Watch some of @garyvee to see this in its purest form.Credibility: DO NOT FIGHT THE TRUTH. If you do, you will become road kill. Do not try to spin out of what your weak points are. Do not try to make something certain that is not. Do not pretend to know something that you don’t. Credibility is the name of the game in fundraising. Every startup investor knows there are uncertainties. We all know there are risks. Accept them for what they are, BUT have a SMART answer for them. How are you addressing the uncertainties? How are you dealing with the risks? Show them you have thought 2 or 3 steps ahead. Be frank and to the point about negative concerns, and always try to focus negative concerns toward your strengths and your positives.Momentum and Urgency: Investors are fickle creatures, they are motivated by fear and greed, and without it they will take their time and hem and haw at every turn. They will turn a 3 week process into a 6 month process. Time IS NOT YOUR FRIEND! The longer the process drags out, the more it seems that nobody is interested in your deal, and the less likely you are to actually get one… AND even if you do, with every day you will be sinking more time and energy into the process and less into your company. Every communication you have with prospective investors must include a sense of momentum and urgency in the deal process. “Things are moving quickly.” “My day is packed with meetings.” “Many parties are interested.” “This deal could come together quickly.” You back this up with hard work and serious hustle. Keep your update conversations short. Make the Urgency a reality by working your ass off. It will become a self-fufilling prophecy and your deal will get done.Getting the Lead: You can get all of the investors in the world amped on your deal, but until you have a lead, you don’t have a deal. What is a lead? The lead in a deal is the investor, usually one of the largest, who negotiates the T’s and C’s and essentially sets the terms for the round of funding… essentially providing you with a term sheet. The way to get a lead is to spur one of the larger, most interested investors into making an offer. Ask him what it’s going to take to make a deal happen, what kind of terms he had in mind, what would make this an exciting deal. You can make momentum moves with this request, by making it clear that you’re going to other investors and having the same conversation with them. Make it a matter of “shit or get off the pot” (but in a polite way).The Competitive Deal – The Need for Speed: The second you have a single term sheet, you need to move very quickly to get a second one. You don’t have a lot of time, because momentum at this point is crucial to closing and your first lead does not want to feel like he’s being dicked around. Your second term sheet will be easier to get than your first, but it will make a HUGE impact on your deal. Without a second termsheet, you will be in a position to take whatever crappy terms the original lead provided, and it’s quite possible that the terms could get worse (or even go away!) as the one-termsheet deal drags out. Figure out who those 2 or 3 potential other leads are and hustle the hell out of them. Here’s a voicemail I left on a 2nd termsheet prospect on a recent competitive deal I was involved in. The recipient of this voicemail called back in 5 minutes, AND ended up being the lead on the deal (notice the urgency while staying true and credible):Hey , wanted to check in with you regarding . . .things are heating up with a couple other parties and it looks like things could get done pretty quickly from here… wanted to check in with you, see where you’re head’s at on the deal, and see if we there’s a shot we can work together on this one… give me a call back as soon as you can… talk to you soonHerding the cattle: Once you start working the competitive leads, you need to start getting word out to ALL of the interested parties, that this deal is getting hot, and that you could start moving to close in very short order. This is key to continue momentum with the deal and keep your potential leads hot. If they know you have $200-300k following their investment, then they feel even better about your company knowing all the other folks are interested too. This makes them anxious about the competitive situation you’ve created b/c now your deal has been validated. On the other side, the small investors that were interested in following, now feel that this is a real deal that they can really follow, and since there are big guys involved putting in real money, they’ll essentially commit to an amount w/o necessarily having all the final terms. Nail those follow-on investors to an amount. Make sure those competitive leads know that you’re bringing a lot of extra money to the table.Anti-Collusion: Once you lock on your lead investor, there are a lot of terms still left to fill out. The heavyweights in your deal will have the inclination to collude to make the terms better. They know they’re in the deal and the delays that happen when final docs are getting fully locked makes them rambunctious. Keep it short and sweet with each potential colluder, and draw a very straight firm line that the material terms are not changing. That kind of leadership will keep you from having what I call an investor revolt before you even get the deal done.Sprint through the close: The best entrepreneurs never stop selling. The finish line is in their sites, and it’s pretty clear they’re going to make it across, but they don’t let up… they sprint even harder through that finish line. I like to say that until the deal is closed, you have at best a 50/50 shot of it happening. Keep working new seed investors, keep the competitive leads warm, get your deal oversubscribed, because until your deal is done, it’s just a nice fantasy in your head. The best sprinters sprint through the finish line, and the best entrepreneurs sprint through the close.