#i need the focus off of me

[xerospaced]

So... maybe it's time to address the elephant in the room

My low self esteem.

My confidence was stripped away in every aspect and I have yet to regain it

Between my lack of productivity and nothing to show for myself

The requirements of others that I am so far from meeting

And my ma's consistent negative perception of me and energy toward me

I feel... completely worthless and devoid of value.

And ofc I tell myself otherwise and such.

And I do mantras and affirmations

And I look for the good in myself

But

I dunno

I cant see one shred of evidence to support the concept that I'm worth something

There is one exception. I'm useful.

I'm incredibly useful.

Call me and I'm there.

Make a request and I'll fulfil it.

Ask something of me. Even if I find it difficult. I'll see to it that it gets done.

For those I care about.

I am available. I am the person you turn to. I am the voice of reason. The source of sound advice. I am a positive energy. A calming presence. A bringer of peace. And the person who encourages you to honour yourself above all else.

I am very useful.

I am a tool.

Literally

But when it's just me. Not fulfilling some use just... existing

I'm taking up space.

A drain on resources.

A useless entity waiting to be put to use.

I don't see myself anymore.

I'm so familiar with depression and anxiety and self hate. And I've come so far from that.

I'd made it to joy and love and appreciation!

But so accustomed to the darkness that being in this space...

I didn't notice that it's actually... Not good.

I'd have the odd self criticising thought and then I would correct it and go about my day

And ive felt lacklustre. And I've had very little pride. And more and more I find myself wanting to avoid talking about me.

But im not depressed. And I don't hate myself and I AM correcting those thoughts. And my comments on myself do always end on a positive note.

A forced positive?

An empty one?

A shell of the thing I am telling myself. The thing I used to be but no longer am.

I do not feel good about myself.

And being that I'm not treating myself poorly. And that I'm am still approaching myself with kindness and patience. I've been ignorant to the fact that I don't feel good about myself. I don't see any significant good in myself.

By which I mean, yes, I see and acknowledge the good. But it's minimal. Its nothing compared to what I'm not. What I'm lacking. What I'm supposed to be. What I'm capable of.

I'm basically just a "nice" person. With some good words.

I have a kind heart sure sure

But what of it?

What makes me meaningful?

What am I really but a fleeting fancy? Enjoyment for the moment?

Because when I really look at me. When anyone looks at me. There's just not much to see.

I endured far more critical damage than I had realised

I've been impacted far more deeply than I'd considered up til now.

I knew I'd been wounded deeply but I thought I was in tact.

I'm not

I feel like a wound. Barely bandaged. Oozing. Never quite healing.

And completely unattended.

[strangertheories]

I really despise the Marvelification of Stranger Things, because all the interviews nowadays are constantly referencing how fast paced and epic and big the finale will be but the reason people fell in love with the show wasn't special effects or long episodes; it was the plot, it was the characters, it was the mystery. Stranger Things 1 may have been a story about a government conspiracy and a monster, but that's not why we stuck around. The show can throw amazing CGI, Russians, a battle within the American army and an apocalypse at the audience with the biggest budget known to man but if they forget to ground it and keep it central, it'll just get lost amongst a plethora of other "epic" blockbusters. We want Steven King, not Avengers.

[ilonacho]

Sad book club📚

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Danse Macabre

[Commission]

[localguy2]

I find it highly amusing how in situations where the ninja are separated/it's just the OG four, Kai and Zane immediately assume control/start spearheading the team because apparently no one else is sane enough or in the right mind to do so.

Your honour, they literally have one of the best dynamics in the show, with how they're probably the most protective people in the team. And it makes me mad how this is overlooked by the fandom and the show.

[mayasdeluca]

Lets play a game. Truth or Scared.

[bacchuschucklefuck]

❗❗Official Class Swap Sorcerer!Kristen Post Alert❗❗ you can: look at her

[icewindandboringhorror]

I know this is just a silly bad quality random screencap of a screencap that I found on facebook lol, BUT it's a succinct enough image to easily describe the concept in a quick/accessible way hopefully :

-

(and of course, feel free to elaborate in tags, etc.! (especially elaborating about other senses as well.. can you "hear" in your mind just as well as you can "see"? taste? etc.) It's an interesting topic to me, as someone who's like a 4.5 at MOST lol. I'm curious what option will be the most common :0c )

[s0ap-bubbles]

Making Sektor soft for bi-Han was the worst decision NRS could’ve possibly made and yet they made it.

All I’m saying is if Sektor was still male they wouldn’t hesitate to make him stab bi-han in the back but because she’s a women they had to make a romance between them and I just UGHHHHH it’s so annoying

[writeouswriter]

Two people with the exact same brand of ADHD and shared intense hyperfixation clicked too hard, 100 dead, thousands injured, 3 million new timelines unlocked, a single starting line of conversation ending in 400 new novel length messages sent and one month between reply times

[wiggly-round-worm]

I’ll be honest i HATE the way the QSMP fanbase is treating Gegg and Tallulah. Like Gegg literally just appears, bro hasn’t done a single thing and people start talking about how they want him to die 😭 ?? And Tallulah starts feeling insecure trough no fault of Gegg and the Gegg tag just EXPLODES with hate. I’m a big petty baby and i don’t like seeing /neg in the tags bro. It just kinda feels like tallulahs the golden child who can do no wrong and Geggs the scapegoat who’s blamed for everything, and i feel like people are already taking it too far

[littlespoonevan]

rewatching s1 this time around has actually left me sooooo fascinated by buck and abby's relationship??????? bc what we know of it in its aftermath is actually completely visible on screen during the season???

in episode 6 when abby is talking to carla about a potential valentines day date with buck she outright says she's fine with him being a boytoy and it just being something casual so she can feel good in herself again and is almost complaining that buck is taking it so seriously by trying to go slow. and the thing is, i don't think her stance on that ever changes???????

she absolutely cares about him and appreciates him for everything he does for her (both in helping support her with her mom and what he does in helping her find her way back to herself) but i don't think she ever really wanted or needed him to be more than that????

on the flipside, you have buck who's experiencing feelings he's never felt before and is so totally overwhelmed by this woman who's making him realise real connection is possible and it feels a million times better than the way he's vied for people's attention before. and there's something a little heartbreaking in the way he questions if he's ready for it to be something real. because bobby encourages him to step into the relationship fully and in the end he does do that

but abby doesn't really want him to???

so you have buck, fully committed and ready to be the partner he thinks abby needs, and abby, who is so completely unable to be that partner in return because she wants to navigate the next stage of her life alone

and aksdjfh it's just!!!! so!!!!! interesting!!!!!!!!! and i am once again BEGGING someone to make a gifset/video/edit/anything for them with reckless driving by lizzy mcalpine

[aingeal98]

I think there's a misconception among some fans who mostly get their characterisation from ao3, that the reason Cass and Jason wouldn't get along is that Jason kills people and Cass hates murderers. And like. You're 50% right but the key context being ignored is that Cass would literally fight to defend the right of a serial killer to live and change like she believes desperately in second chances no matter how far gone the killer is. She'll knock a man out and break his hand so that he can never shoot and kill someone again but if she sees someone feel bad about their kill or even like. Hesitate to hurt a child. She is all over that like she will fight the world just to save this one kind of shitty assassin and give them a second chance at life where they can do better.

Whereas Jason believes that sometimes there are bad people that are simply too far gone, too much of a force of evil hurting and draining actual innocents. And the best way to deal with scumbags like that is a bullet. He feels that some people don't deserve to live, and he's comfortable ending their lives. Judge, jury and executioner. Because no one else is going to kill these people and they deserve to die so that they can never hurt any victims again.

Of course all of this is kind of irrelevant in current canon since dc basically skipped over the reconciliation and development and went yeah Jason is a batfam member and he doesn't kill anymore. So currently in canon none of this conflict of ideals is likely to be addressed. But a lot of people are interested in writing fics that actually detail the steps of reconciliation which is great and I love those fics. I've just also noticed a trend of fumbling a little when it comes to Cass.

Because the root cause as to why they wouldn't get along is not just because Jason kills people. If Jason was a random crime lord Cass would probably try to help him get free of Gotham and start over somewhere else. Killing people and having conflicting emotions about it is the easiest way to get Cass willing to be your number one sponsor at murderer rehabilitation anonymous. It's Jason being someone personal to the family, and someone who believes that some deaths need to happen, as long as the person is sufficiently repulsive enough to Jason. Or even just as a means to an end to prove a larger point, if they're pathetic and evil enough. That's what would make Cass see red, because she projects herself on every single killer and Jason dismissing the possibility of redemption for them, writing them off as deserving of death, clashes fundamentally with not just everything Cass believes in, but also her whole sense of self. Of course it's not that deep for Jason like he's not going to believe Cass should die because she killed someone as a child. But for Cass is simply IS that deep and you throw in the fact that they're both Bruce's kids and yeah. They can maybe be civil in a room together with the family right up until one of them actually talks. Because like 99% of what they could say is guaranteed to touch a nerve for the other.

It's like: Damian says something hilarious and rude towards Jason and Jason jokes about that time he shot him and Cass immediately connects that with him not feeling bad about shooting Damian and starts grilling him as to why. Because Damian's Bruce's son? Or because he's a killer? Or just to get to the rest of the family? And Dick, Duke and Tim are so tired like Alfred cooked a nice meal can we all just eat pie for one night without having to listen to you two go at it.

Tim: I've literally shot you before do you think maybe we can cool it on fighting about Jason's personal ethics tonight. Because generally that ends with me in pain even if I do nothing but sit here.

Cass: You shot me with consent. Different.

Jason: How are you even more obnoxious than Bruce? Do you ever get tired of being so exhausting to be around with your bullshit righteousness?

Cass: If you're tired I can knock you out. Nice nap for you and fun for me.

Dick: And that's ten minutes in a room together before any threats of physical harm start flying around! Great job you two, a new personal record.

[yuwuta]

I LOVE UR BRAIN SO BAD 😭😭😭 YOU ALWAYS POST THEBBEST HEADCANONS AND THOUGHTS LIKE. WORK HUSBAND GOJO. AND JUST HAVING A WHOLE IMAGINATION OF THE OFFICE W NANAMI AND HIGURUMA AND TOJI I?????? I WANT TO LIVE IN YOUR BRAIN

TEEHEEEE you’re so sweet <33333 the work husband to actual husband to househusband gojo pipeline is so so real to me and the office au that comes with it truly does take up space in my brain, so here’s some more loosely established points 

satoru has been your work husband since you got your first job in undergrad. you two met in your dorms, and became friends, and eventually you thought a job would help with your time management skills, so you got a very low-maintenance position at the front desk of the library. satoru applied right after you and schmoozed the two little old librarians into giving him the same shifts as you. that was probably the first moment satoru knew he was a little bit in love with you—because he had no reason to have a job while in school, but this small change in your schedule made him miss you so much that he was moved to get his very first job, probably ever, just to spend more time with you. 

he wasn’t bad at his library receptionist job, but he technically wasn’t good at it, either. if a student asked him for a laptop charger or to check out a book or something, he could do that, but anything else he’d just smile and say, “oh, you’ve gotta ask the pretty girl right there about that, she knows way more than me,” and bat his eyelashes at you. except, then, when you did need to get up to grab something for someone, satoru would just spring up instead, and tell you he’s got it. it’s like… he was incapable of helping anybody else unless he got to flirt with you, and then help you out to help them out……… strange boy 

anyways, satoru makes it a habit to assist you through your student jobs throughout undergrad, and then follows you to the same law school and repeats the process there. (also not to elle woods-ify him a bit but his father heavily questions him going to law school btw because satoru has never showed any interest in working, let alone following in his footsteps to be a lawyer, and now he’s going to law school? his mom is a bit sharper though, because when satoru tells his parents he’s going to the same law school as you, she just smiles and sips her tea and wonders if her son has already made a trip to their family jeweler). 

the firm is large, but the floor you work on is a pretty close knit group. there’s hiromi’s office at the tail end, which is the largest because he’s managing partner and he practically lives in there. on the other end, both you and nanami have decently sized offices. satoru doesn’t like hiromi at first because he thinks he’s mean. then satoru watches him play a little prank on kento, and suddenly the two of them are best friends. it would be a surprisingly wholesome friendship if their common denominator wasn’t irritating kento, and acting as guard dogs for you. 

kento’s office used to be just the bare necessities—law books, his degree, basic furniture, maybe a fancy paperweight, until satoru got his hands on it and decked it out. which is not something kento asked for, nor he thinks is necessary, but that doesn’t stop satoru from continually adding little trinkets and decorations and art to his office to make it livelier. when kento first meets you, he’s surprised when you tell him satoru gojo is going to be your secretary because kento interned for satoru’s father for two summers during law school, but when kento sees you and satoru together for the first time, it answers all of his questions. satoru couldn’t be more of a lovesick fool if he tried. 

listen the ex-convict to single father to janitor to lawyer toji pipeline is so real to me. while toji is working as a janitor at the firm, satoru slips once and then jokes that toji shines the floors too aggressively on purpose to make him slip, toji tells him to fuck off and he can sue for harassment. they truly don’t like each other at first, but once satoru steals toji’s masterkey to get into your office one night after you’re gone to leave flowers, and handle some paperwork to lighten your load in the morning, toji is sort of impressed. he still almost hits him with a broomstick, but even someone as gruff as him can see that satoru had pure intentions. toji is a lot of things, but he’s not immune to or devoid of love or passion. so, eventually he and satoru develop a weird sort of banter and respect for each other. one day someone actually tries to accuse toji of not putting the wet floor sign down and how it’s gonna be a lawsuit because some lowlife janitor fucked up his $3000 suit. satoru catches the argument as he’s heading upstairs and recognized the schmuck as the stuck up lawyer on the other side of kento’s case. satoru’s ready to jump in, but toji’s displaying an impressive amount of physical restraint and legal knowledge that when the dust is all settled, satoru asks him if he ever considered being a lawyer. toji laughs at it at first, but after a month of serious consideration (and megumi becoming a college freshman), he figures it can’t be all that bad. and turns out, toji’s a half-decent lawyer—once you’ve spent so much of your life skirting (or blatantly breaking) the law, you become pretty good at getting people out or around it, too. and with his life experience, he’s a pretty good judge of character; so when it comes time to lock up the bad ones, toji makes sure they get the maximum sentence.

except he has a bad habit of sending out emails with “URGENT: NEEDS ATTN” in the subject, which prompts you, kento, and hiromi to rush to his office, just to see toji with his feet up on his desk tell you that, “the emergency is i hate the opposing counsel, and now that i work on this side of the law i’d really like to not kill him, so somebody else should take this case.” 

anyways back to work husband secretary satoru. he pulls you out of boring meetings under the guise of an urgency, just for him to admit that the emergency is that he missed you, and you two were gonna be late for your lunch reservation. because he’s actually a licensed attorney, he can actually carry out duties an associate otherwise would, which saves you a lot of time and trouble; and it means that satoru gets to work even more closely with you, which is always an upside for him. sometimes you ask him to hand you documents and instead he just hands you his hand. and then pretends to blush and preen like a schoolgirl which always draws way too much attention to the two of you, but there’s no way to stop him either. he takes your coat off of your shoulders when you arrive in the morning, and helps you put it back on in the evening. when you tell him you’re looking for an apartment closer to the firm, he has eight places lined up for viewing, and one surprise at the end which happens to be the other vacant penthouse suite in his apartment building; which, conveniently, would make you satoru’s neighbor. he claims that it’ll be just like in college, but it certainly doesn’t feel that way when you finally move in and satoru can now loudly and proudly proclaim, “see you at home!” in the halls at work now. 

[isatohlee]

Forced Compliance

[inke-ri]

So I couldn't help but browse the THG tag bc those books own my whole heart. I actually check it now and again, and it's been interesting see how opinions have changed over the years, especially in regards to Gale and Peeta. Going through the evolution of them as just potential love interests to being far more complex than I could have expected has been a wild ride. Crazy how this reads different than from when I was a preteen.

That said, I wanted to give my unsolicited two cents on my boys, because though I have been enjoying the discussion on Peeta and Gale and what they mean to the story, I also feel like reducing them to Peeta = peace and Gale = war is far too simplistic... and oftentimes unfair to one or both of them.

See, I don't think Peeta and Gale are peace and war/destruction. They're compassion and indignation.

Peeta worries about the other tributes, or their families, or how to repay people like Rue and Thresh for what they did.

Gale is indignation at how the Capitol treats its citizens, it's anger at the injustice of inequality and brutality.

Both are needed in a story like THG. You can't have people like even Peeta not say something like "maybe we're wrong about keeping things quiet in the districts", you can't have him not drop the baby bomb, you can't start a revolution without Gale's indignation at the status quo. At deserving a better life but being denied it, at having your kids be mercilessly killed for literal sport.

However, if you start a rebellion and loose sight of your compassion, you end up no better than the people you're fighting against. Gale wasn't a bad person, imo. His heart was in the right place. He was flawed, yes, but so is everyone in this series. Gale, most importantly, lost sight of the line between fighting for the people he cared about and fighting against the people who hurt him.

Reducing Gale's indignation to just revenge and hatred ignores so much of what he stands for. Who hasn't seen laws passed that dehumanize people, who hasn't been angry and furious when someone is elected who fundamentally hates everything you are, who doesn't think some people need to pay for the atrocities they committed? There's a little bit of Gale in every single one of us - and it's important that it's there, because that's what gives us strength to challenge the status quo and make life better for the future generations.

But. You can't let it take over. You can't loose sight of your compassion or your empathy.

That's where Peeta comes in. Peeta is the voice in your head that worries about how many good lives will be lost when they give themselves up for this cause. Peeta is the worry about the people caught in the crossfire. Peeta is rebuilding when it's over and believing that the next generation will have a better life than your own. Peeta is being kind, even to people who may not deserve it.

And Gale... Gale looses sight of his compassion, and he doesn't realize it until it smacks him in the face when the bombs go off and Prim is gone and he's too far gone. Meanwhile, Peeta advocates for the end of the war even though it means the status quo remains - and regardless of what he believes himself, I don't think Suzanne chose him to say those lines by chance. It means both mindsets have their flaws: too kind and things that shouldn't remain will never be challenged and changed, too angry and you may loose sight of what you're fighting for.

And that's just how Suzanne uses her characters, both of them, all of them. Just look at who is with Katniss depending on the situation:

- Katniss chooses to "rebel" after Gale is brutally whipped. She kisses him.

- Katniss realizes that in order for D12 to rebel, everyone would need to be in on it, and she realizes most of them are not like her, that they're scared and she understands, emphasises with them. Peeta walks by her side.

- Katniss finally does it though, shoots the arrow at the force field, and Peeta is taken from her, it's now Gale by her side.

(You can't start a rebellion without indignation, and sometimes you HAVE to do it or things will never change, regardless of the inevitable pain that will come along.)

- Katniss is righteously angry at the Capitol bombing a hospital full of innocents to make a point. Gale remains there.

- Coin twists people's compassion into an army to fight for her own personal gain. Peeta is hijacked and looses his sense of self.

- Katniss and Gale go to District 2 and even though she tries to be like Peeta, she's still shot- reinforcing Gale's views, the person who was with her during that sequence.

- Katniss is angry at Snow, Katniss goes to the Capitol to kill him. Gale is there.

- Katniss gets in way over her head and realizes she is responsible for the death of most of her squad. She shares the lamb stew with Peeta, and later cleans his wounds.

- Finnick dies and she's at her lowest up until that point and all she wants to do is give up and give in to the anger. She kisses Peeta and begs him to stay with her.

... Claiming that Gale is destruction ignores the fact that he's with Katniss through her own moments of strength. Her desire to change things, to fight back, is as important as her compassion. Mockingjay just brutally shows you what war does to your indignation, to your compassion. How easy it is to cross a line between righteous anger and revenge, or how your sense of empathy and compassion can be manipulated into something monstrous by others, or by all the terrible, brutal, painful things you see.

How easy it is to loose yourself- and that goes for both of them.

Peeta and Gale aren't static characters, they go from representations of sentiments regarding an injust government to what happens to those feelings when an extreme situation such as war breaks out. All of that, by the way, while dealing with this duality themselves, because they are still characters who think and feel and struggle and have flaws of their own- and while I love what they stand for, I've seen too many comments that pin everything into what they mean, that they forget that Peeta and Gale are still people, they aren't perfect metaphors. They're human.

Ultimately, Katniss doesn't really choose peace. She wants peace, yes. But what she chooses is compassion. empathy. hope. There's a time and place for anger at injustice. There's a time when fighting back is the right thing to do. There are even times when you wanna give in to your despair and lash out. But if you want peace, then you have to choose Peeta, because Peeta represents what you need to focus on to achieve that peace. You have to let go of the anger or you won't ever rest. So Gale leaves, and does not come back... And yet, Katniss still has her moments of indignation, of making a stand, even as he goes - she still casts her vote at that meeting, she still shoots Coin. Katniss does not abandon that part of who she is. It's just not her main drive anymore.

So then she goes on to make the choice, every single day, to be compassionate to others. To have hope. To rebuild. Of course she chooses Peeta.

... Idk, man. These boys are so much more than what I see them so often reduced to. They're in all of us. There will be times to stand and fight, and times to show mercy and be kind. We just need to find that balance, as Katniss eventually did.