#but i've clearly been stewing on it for a while now for therapeutic purposes

[askdacast]

a bit of a personal ramble here...actually no I’m about to be really cringe as I kind of rant about the anxieties and issues I’ve been going through lately in a super roundabout way

but in the long ago days (by which I mean like 10 years ago) and when I was an even louder Persona fan, I made a Shadow version of my main OC/blatant self-insert Alyss Baraen and it was therapeutic to some extent

(more under the cut)

Shadow Alyss even had a cringe name and design - Gerhild, the Witch of Destiny (very long story), and was kind of a representation of my suppressed anger issues and general teenage angst at being different. One could say, a manifestation of the Id.

You can actually find that name in the really old posts of this blog but...please don’t “orz

All that was kinda based off the issues that a teenaged me knew of herself, but I feel rather ashamed to say, those issues haven’t 100% gone away, they still ebb and flow and take different forms, and I gotta smash them all the same

What I am saying is that I’ve been gnawing on the idea of re-doing the “Shadow Alyss” idea with the updated knowledge of myself now and the more recent anxieties I’ve had to deal with. And the hilarity is that the motif is completely the opposite of what I did as a teenager while somehow still being thematically the same.

Given the witch/Carmen San Diego design motifs the regular Alyss already has from the red and hat, I couldn’t help but also notice how much like a Spanish Inquisitor (insert Monty Python joke here) she looks like, and the moment I thought of that given Alyss being a very religious character, everything just completely fell into place

(Fun fact: Years ago when I was into imagining what kind of Personas my characters would have, Alyss’ was supposed to be Agustina de Aragon, Spanish folk heroine who is drawn with a big hecking cannon. It all comes full circle.)

(Inquisitor from DFO, danbooru link warning)

The Inquisitor would be all of Alyss’ self-depreciation and anxieties that she isn’t good enough at...well, anything. Mostly not being a good enough person or Christian. It’s not like she resents her faith, but she absolutely does feel like she’s been put under a microscope her whole life and she needs to scrutinize her every action as to whether it is moral or not. Chalk it up to her emotional nature and sensitivities that take her every action as reflecting on her moral character. A mistake or a failure to do “the right thing” isn’t just one bad act - it’s a stain on her very identity as someone who professes to follow God. Or a good daughter. Or a good friend. A good person.

Of course, this is a self-inflicted wound in many ways. She hates being criticized, and the expectation to always be ‘good’ or following the standards of what makes a moral religious person causes a lot of guilt in her when she does wrong, or anxiety that she might do wrong. A lot of what I imagined about The Inquisitor isn’t just the religious motif, but the motif of fear and punishment. The Judge and Executioner who instills the fear of God in sinners. A horribly apt symbol, imo, of what anxiety feels like, of that looming darkness that constantly beats down on you. The voice that says “this is ABSOLUTELY a terrible idea” even before you take a step.

Heck for extra factor on the monster of fear part, throw in the white eyes on a completely shadowed face a la Scarecrow from the later Batman TAS episodes

(this is the least disturbing picture I could find of him)

All these fear motifs are, of course, painfully ironic when you consider that not only this image is Alyss’ exaggerated idea of her faith, it’s also 100% contradictory of what her faith truly stands for. What she herself has constantly told others. That God isn’t an angry God who judges sinners, but a gentle one who forgives, and justifies not by adherence to laws, but faith in a greater power. In fact, the power that forgives and lets people not be punished for what they deserve.

And though this is a totally cheesy idea...I would like to imagine if you face the Inquisitor in a dungeon, in like a medieval-style execution grounds, you would see those crumbling old walls with broken carvings that have the words “Condemnation in Christ” on them, and then noticing the walls were broken, you’d eventually find the missing half of the wall which must be attached before the initial wall, with the words, “There is No”

Look, I’ve already spilled my guts out with this “I have a friend”-type post, I can afford to be cringe about something that means a lot to me

Especially since...it’s very obviously been weighing on my mind a lot lately

No matter whether Alyss Baraen thinks herself a “witch” or feels tormented by an “Inquisitor” the root cause is still the same - she fears that she isn’t worthy or that God possibly is angry at her for whatever sin or failure to be human/good she’s committed. And despite her own beliefs, or the love and support of others, being a clear evidence to the contrary, she finds it hard to trust that that love is real.

Many times, it’s terrifying to trust people you love, or to have any hope at all. Because what if you’re disappointed? Worse, what if you’re just plain wrong? You could say to yourself how much good you’ve done or how much people clearly love and care for you, and have it still mean absolutely nothing. Because the evidence for your imperfection, the world’s imperfection, and the hurts you bear feel so much more real than the idea that you might deserve happiness.

And the more you think that way, the more you inevitably project that idea onto a higher power, like God. Because how could it be true that He offers you all things for nothing? Less than nothing - you’re a “terrible person” who deserves to be punished, and yet He isn’t. In fact, He’s saying all’s good, you just need to do better and keep loving and trusting Him, and He’ll do the rest.

Without any obvious proof, except the life you’ve already lived, and the words He’s said.

A tall order to believe in, isn’t it?

Trust is never easy, and in fact, often seems far less logical than just continuing to remain on guard, always.

To believe in there being good and kindness in your future often seems too good to be true. And soon we start to believe it can never be true.

So I’ve spent a long time rejecting any kind of grace or kindness because I’ve convinced myself there’s no way it’s true. The truth, to me, had to be a harsh revelation of my inherent sinfulness and failure to follow God. Those were obvious ‘proofs’ in my life, after all. It could be nothing else. If I received a kind word, I must have been selfishly trying to avert my eyes from the truth, to what I wanted to hear.

But, you know.

That wasn’t the truth at all.

In my heart of hearts, I KNEW it wasn’t.

Well, no one ever said Faith was easy.