#i really do feel bad for being negative about it

[milkoomi]

⋆˚࿔ a new canvas means a new you 𝜗𝜚˚⋆

a mini series on the art of becoming a better you

previous chapter

chapter two — THE ART OF SELF CONFIDENCE

i’ve touched on this topic before, but i wanted to do more of an in-depth deep dive into it! self confidence isn’t just about how you feel about your physical self, but it’s also about how you feel about your mental and emotional self; how you feel about your soul and the aura that surrounds you. self confidence can start at your physical self, like your looks, your style, etc. but reaching a true, deeper meaning of having confidence you have to dig deeper into your mind, heart, and soul.

references on self confidence:

“a guide to building confidence” - by me!

“study yourself to become confident” - thewizardliz

“the ultimate guide to becoming confident” - alessya farrugia

“rewiring your subconscious: guide to becoming your dreamiest self” - @glowettee

“building confidence” - @goddessinnerglow

ᥫ᭡. different types of confidence

in alessya farrguia’s youtube video, she discusses the 3 different types of self confidence: physical, social, and authentic confidence. i highly recommend watching her video! she makes really phenomenal points in her discussion!

i’d like to highlight some key points she made in her video:

physical confidence: “stop comparing your behind the scenes to everyone else’s highlights.”

social confidence: “confidence isn’t thinking ‘i know someone will like me’, it’s ‘i know it won’t bother me if they don’t’.”

authentic confidence: “true confidence means trusting yourself”

but i’d like to add mental & emotional confidence. the mentality that you have and how you feel about yourself plays a huge role in self confidence. having a mindset that makes you feel secure and having emotions toward yourself that are positive will help you become more confident. it also helps, immensely, to be in a headspace that makes you feel comfortable being you, that brings you joy, and that brings you peace. being able to have a good relationship with your own emotions can uplift you!

mental confidence:

destress & decompress — when your mind is weighed down by stress, you start to feel overwhelmed. that overwhelming feeling can cause your mind to break down and make you think that you won’t be capable of recovering from that stress. it’s important to manage your stress and remind yourself that you are capable of overcoming anything that’s causing you those feelings! stress is one of those things that make you feel like everything is impossible, but that’s only a feeling. it’s like having a bad dream, while you’re experiencing that dream it might feel too real and sometimes it may even be scary, but then you wake up and you realize that you’re safe. think of stress as just a bad dream, the feeling is only ever temporary and as soon as you manage it/overcome it you’ll be safe again. and, as a bonus, once you overcome that stress, you feel more secure within yourself and you’re reminded that, yes, everything is going to be okay and you are more than capable of overcoming those feelings!

practice mindfulness within yourself — “mindfulness is the practice of paying attention to the present moment without judgement.” with that being said, practice paying attention to yourself without any judgement. focus on how you’re feeling, what your current thoughts are; focus on you without judging yourself. learn to accept yourself as you are within that present moment and try to steer away from making quick, negative judgements about yourself. yes, you can judge yourself, but do so in a way that’s productive! judge your mental and emotional state, are you in a headspace that is ideal to you? judge your health, do you feel like there needs to be any changes in your lifestyle, diet, or activity level to better your body in a healthy manner? judge yourself, is there anything about yourself that you still need to work on or are there characteristics of yourself that you take pride in?

emotional confidence:

emotional intelligence — this is key to gaining emotional confidence. i recommend this video by The Glow Up Secrets Podcast on youtube! the host brings up so many wonderful and insightful points on becoming emotionally intelligent! being able to self-regulate and to understand exactly what you’re feeling can help you gain confidence in yourself. people will always pride themselves in their intelligence, so let being emotionally intelligent be the intelligence you pride yourself in!

ᥫ᭡. self-acceptance

people have this idea that self-acceptance is just settling for who you are, and well, that’s not really the case— at least in my eyes. learning to accept yourself as you are now will make it easier for you in your self improvement journey. we all want to become the “it-girl/person”, but a lot of us will look for quick fixes or even go towards trying unhealthy habits. allowing yourself to accept who you are right in this moment can be a first step towards becoming the person you strive to be.

accept your insecurities. accept your failures. accept your body as it is right now. accept your faults. then take all of that acceptance and turn it into a learning experience for yourself. learn that your insecurities only become insecurities because of that negative self-talk. learn that you cannot grow without any failures. learn what exactly it is that your body needs to become healthier and better for yourself.

accept yourself, then learn from yourself.

ᥫ᭡. manifestations & affirmations

we can make our dream selves become the reality. there’s so many amazing posts here on tumblr about manifesting, so go look into them! if we believe it, we can have it. you have to believe that you have confidence. you have to affirm yourself that you are confident. people, myself included, talk about “faking it til you make it”, but when you really think about it, the more you repeat these manifestations and affirmations the more it starts to feel true and real to yourself.

this also ties into positive self-talk. we have to speak to ourselves kindly, we have to uplift ourselves in a world that brings us down. talk to yourself with grace, gratitude, and genuine appreciation. you have gotten yourself through countless hardships. sure, there were probably people who helped you out on the way, but at the end of it, it was mostly your own doing that got you to a better place. so appreciate and love that about yourself!

grab a journal and write down all your manifestations and affirmations daily. writing it all down is like setting it in stone. be consistent, and soon enough all that you want for yourself— including self confidence— will come into fruition.

ᥫ᭡. take pride

think of it this way: no one can be you. people can try to imitate you, but they can never truly be you. take pride in how you look because no one has features like yours, take pride in your work because no one worked the way you did, take pride in your accomplishments because no one worked in the same way that you did to achieve those things; take pride in yourself. as cheesy and cliché as it all sounds, there’s literally no one else who is like you.

ᥫ᭡. find a deeper understanding for yourself

this point is heavily inspired by thewizardliz’s video “study yourself to become confident” (linked in the beginning of the chapter). i just want to reiterate her points and expand on them a little bit! her beginning statement includes: “once you know who you are, no one can tell you anything”.

i feel like we all understand ourselves to a certain degree. but understanding yourself on a deeper, more personal level will allow you to truly feel confident. in her video, liz talks about understanding and even studying ourselves to understand what we like/dislike, what we accept/don’t accept, etc. and i genuinely feel like she brings up a really great point in doing so!

we, as humans, feel like we know what we want for ourselves rather than actually knowing what we want for ourselves. we feel like certain people bring us joy, we feel like certain hobbies make us happy, we feel like we understand ourselves. but, in reality, most times we don’t actually know those things about ourselves.

people we surround ourselves with

we think that certain friends/partners bring us joy because we’re taught, sometimes unintentionally, to allow people to make us feel like we have to conform to them and their wants and needs. we don’t know that some of these people in our lives might actually be bringing us and our confidence down.

hobbies people partake in

we think that doing certain things, like drinking or hook-up culture, make us feel happy or satisfied with ourselves. but we don’t know or we’re not aware of how those hobbies, or even habits, might be destroying us physically, mentally, and even emotionally.

behaviors we accept

we think that if we accept certain behaviors that we’ll get more people to like us or get brownie points with a specific person, but we don’t know that accepting bad/poor behavior diminishes our strength and respect for ourself.

this all takes us back to chapter one: THE ART OF LETTING GO. the toxic people we surround ourselves with unknowingly, the hobbies we take part in unknowingly, the behaviors we accept unknowingly; that all needs to be let go of!

we have to truly understand ourselves and truly know exactly what we want for ourselves to gain the confidence we long for. without knowing yourself, you won’t understand how to find and feel genuine self confidence.

ᥫ᭡. final notes

at a certain point, confidence should feel like it comes naturally, but to even get to that point there’s a lot of work that needs to be put into ourselves. especially when a lot of us start off with almost no confidence at all, it can be extremely challenging to even wake up in the morning and think, “i can do this”. you have to be willing to put in the work for yourself. you have to be willing to have patience with yourself. you have to be willing to advocate for yourself. you have to be willing to do all of this for you, and you alone. you can be confident— and confidence will come to you! you’re more than capable of doing so, babe. believe in yourself like you would believe in someone you love and care for.

with lots of love, juno 🌷

[drdemonprince]

I’m part of a large kink group on Facebook. Like 40k+ people. I love it because people ask for help about anything and everything and members of the group are supportive and positive and it’s like “trading cookie recipe” level normal regardless of what is asked. Except like when there is obvious dubious shit going down with bad boundaries, lack of clear consent etc. people are honest and give good advice about that.

However I saw a post a few days ago that kinda stumped me. It was in response to another post that got taken down and I didn’t see it so not sure of context but basically post was about feeding fetishes. And how that OP who removed their post should not be encouraging something that is so inherently bad for someone’s health. It talked a Lot about being fat and the toll on the healthcare system and how this person should be asking why they’re attracted to that and doing some inner work. Then went on to say it is basically the Most harmful form of kink or fetish because it makes people unhealthy and then a burden on the healthcare system. It tried to come off like out of concern for people’s health and wellbeing but really just stank of fat phobia and shaming people for being into kinks that involve fat people, therefore shaming the fat people themselves.

What kinda got to me was that no one was challenging them. So I didn’t feel comfortable jumping in like maybe I’m in the wrong and this is the general consensus out there? I am fat, enjoy kink although not into the whole feeding thing personally.

The idea that someone should sit down with someone else and ask a bunch of questions about their fat kinks and why they feel this way when it’s generally accepted that even things like cnc and rapeplay etc are not questioned (because it would be weird for people to act like your therapist before wanting to fuck you) is so strange to me.

I guess their point was that feeding kinks are encouraging over eating and obesity which is bad, but other kinks could arguably be also inflicting physical pain and also reinforcing emotional distress and yet we’re not all out there trying to be doctors for each other…

I don’t know it was just weird. Wondered what your thoughts are on it.

Nah, they're full of shit and fatphobic and you can tell that by the fact they're spreading the usual concern-trolling unscientific nonsense about *besity and health. They're disgusted by fat and by the idea a person might actively want to become fat and couching it in the language of concern, replicating the exact disgust-as-morality cueing that the sex negative Puritans would against them. It's bullshit but it's incredibly commonplace. Even some fat people wring their hands against feedism/gaining/fat fetish stuff because of their own internalized respectability politics, but it's bunk, because if there's nothing wrong with loving fat people or finding them desirable, or with enjoying being fat, then there's no shame in wanting to become fat or wanting the world to have more fat people.

Feedism, gaining, fat fetishism are all great. It's great to derive sexual pleasure from being fat or being with fat partners, and it's lovely to want to become more fat. More people should do it.

[the-100-days-of-junkan]

Day 95 (Warning: This Fic has a whole load of sensitive subject matter throughout it, so check the tags and go in at your own discretion)

Burning Lungs by Oxidize

Alrighty I’mma be perfectly honest, I have no idea how to approach this one. This might be the . . . darkest? No. I think the best (but still not best?) way I could describe this fic as would be, the most openly graphic story. Not in a super brutal descriptions of gore kind of graphic, just in the sense that when talking about the darker aspects of these characters backstories it’s the most in your face. I’d even argue it’s kind of overboard at points.

This is Burning Lungs! Another multi-chapter story, and unfortunately, another Unfinished one. 

You know those posts talking about when you binge read a fic and get super invested only to hit the most recent chapter and realize that it hasn’t been updated in a super long time?? For me, this is THE fic I think of when that kind of posts comes up. That and a Tokomaru fic I read years ago as a young teen but that’s not Junkan so it’s irrelevant here. 

A short summation of the fic for those who chose not to read it given the warnings. Junko catches Pneumonia and has to stay in the Nurse’s Office at Hope’s Peak, where her caretaker is, unsurprisingly Mikan! Initially she hates Mikan, partially because of her sickness. However through the combination of Mikan’s kind nature, and constant nightmares of her childhood, she eventually comes to start loving Mikan.

Now of course, because the fic is unfinished, we don’t get to see these feelings fully come together, just snippets as Junko slowly finds herself more and more fond of Mikan.

I love this fic, like, a lot. While I could do without the at times kind of excessive flashbacks going over how bad Junko (and Mukuro’s) childhood was, everything outside of that is so good that I’m willing to overlook my minor gripe. And even then the last flashback actually is what makes me wish this fic had continued. Since (And yes we’re getting into spoilers from here on out) it reveals that Junko and Mikan had unknowingly met as young children, and like, god i fucking love that trope. Especially in the context of this fic. 

Something I find myself fond of which is only possible with these dream sequences is the way the author lets both characters slowly bond because of their trauma. We only ever get to see Junko’s side of things of course, but I still really like the vibe. My favorite moment from this story is in the last chapter, when Mikan talks to Junkan about some of her own personal history, for a lot of reasons! For one I just like seeing Junko having grown a bit further since for a decent portion of the fic she’s had a very negative opinion of Mikan due to being stuck in bed and sick, with that outlook being chipped away by Mikan’s kindness (along with recognizing her struggles).

It also involves Mikan’s bandages! I’ve said previously that I’m just like, obsessed with those and the ways they can be used when portraying Mikan. Here it is, definitely uncomfortable but I’m pretty sure that’s the point. And it’s the hardest indicator for Junko that Mikan and her are the same, deeply damaged girls who deserved better. 

The line in the inner monologue that strikes my mind the hardest is “Not Tsumiki” because that feels like the hardest shift in Junko’s brain where she begins to not just wish for Mikan’s happiness, but also when she starts falling for her (Even if she tries to fight back that notion in her mind as just a need for affection.) Like everything after that between these two specifically I love. 

Mikan doing Junko’s hair (both times) is lovely and gives me a similar energy to why I love the idea of Mikan’s love language coming out through medical care. Oh! Nother thing I like (Sorry I’m focusing so much on Chapter 3, it’s really good), Junko doesn’t just like, instantly switch to only being nice with Mikan. She’s significantly kinder to her, but she’s just like, reflexively a bitch sometimes. She’s gotta work through it, and I like to imagine she would have if the series continued (and I do have thoughts on that, but that’s for the future) 

This is a small thing but I also like the background of Mukuro and Sayaka getting together in the background, just something cute that does my heart good. I’ve always wanted to try out the cold spoon trick since this is where I learned it from. Alas, my relationship is long distance, so I’ve yet to get a nice hickey- Oops that got off topic.

I believe that’s all the notable stuff I wanted to mention here? I hope those who choose to read have a good time with it! Because I certainly did.

To the author (who I tried to find outside of AO3 ((also checking its profile reveals it uses it/its pronouns. Hopefully that remains accurate should you be finding this post, apologies if not and I’m willing to edit this if necessary!)), but it doesn’t seem to have any other accounts under the same username), I sincerely hope that wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, you’re doing well. I always wish the best to these authors when I come across a long unfinished storyline that may never continue (And in this case it noted on its profile that the fics it made during this release year won’t be finished). I made art based on this fic both out of love for it, and in hopes that you’d find this! Not out of a desire to see the story finish (Even if I do), but to let ya know that what work you did put into this already is wonderful! Thankyou! Oh right. Should talk about the art.

Hey guess what, it’s more Chapter 3 stuff, another adaptation of course. I tried hard to get Mikan’s outfit correct based on the descriptions from earlier chapters. It was very weird getting to draw Mikan in an outfit that’s well, realistic? I’ve drawn her in sweaters and the like before, but I struggle to describe the sense of realism described in this fit. It’s now that I realize with a reread that her outfit in this chapter might have been different, as it showed off her bandages more (unless I missed a line), meaning she might have been wearing something closer to her Nurse Uniform? I’m still happy with this despite that!

Oh! Slight extra note, I like Mikan wearing more bandaids (the tiny kind) across her face and fingers rather than just her arm, leg, and knee like normal. Adds a sense of uniqueness!~ 

Anyway, I felt very confident in the choice to adapt the scene when Junko wakes up from her first nightmare of the chapter. Held in Mikan’s arm as she’s being calmed down. You know me, I like the role reversal with this ship, and Mikan comforting Junko ALWAYS gives me life.

Coloring and shading this was super hard, but super fun! I wanted this to be a much more desaturated and dull looking pic in terms of the presentation, since this fic always gave me a vibe of being a lot more realistic in its interpretation of Danganronpa Characters. It wasn’t easy, but I think it was worth it!

As always, Reblogs, Comments, and Little Notes in the Tags are appreciated!~ They always make my day!~

[andr0nap-wf]

god i feel bad for not enjoying this quest but it was just... LIKE IT HAD POTENTIAL??? I THINK??

A PREGNANT WARFRAME WAS THE LEAST OF ITS PROBLEMS

i just. god. im just so confused

[sergle]

man, you know, nobody asked me, but I have such conflicting opinions on some of the fat falin art, where on one hand: it's always nice to see A Fat Body in fanart anywhere + it's being done in positive ways, for funsies and on the other hand, there is something so familiar about how you are automatically The Fat One if you are a woman simply standing next to a more petite woman, bc I've had a 0% hitrate in seeing people change Marcille's body type and keep Falin's, or change both of them. it's just Falin

[vaguely-concerned]

my capacity to see a bad fandom take and just blithely say 'okay! I disagree' internally and move on because it's not my responsibility or concern that someone else thinks that has leveled up so tremendously over the years. I haven't quite escaped the pit of misery yet but I think I'm getting there

[crownedwille]

.

[isa-ah]

crick is a few years older than isaiah... what if he had very faint i was a little boy memories of isaiahs mom before she died oxo

[salty-software-engineer]

Man I just finished Babel and I was excited to read discussions online because there's so much going on in it with so many little things and just....angry white people. Everywhere. Truly a dead dove moment.

[puppppppppy]

Atla live action 😐

[manycrows]

Really bad intrusive thoughts keeping me up and a google search on how to deal with them comes up with like. Be mindful and label them :) don’t worry about their contents :) which is Easy To Say When You’re Some Quora Bastard And Not Me (The Suffering Guy)

But I log into tumblr and see that I gotta live long enough to see the cybertrucks start rusting… thank you tumblr for knowing that when loving is not enough, haterism will keep me alive

[autisticlee]

sometimes people who struggle like to make jokes or find positives about their condition that causes them to struggle so they can escape the constant negative and struggle. sometimes autistic people will say things like "the 'tism" or use the "autism creature" or say their autism helped them have a *positive trait* to feel better about their struggles. because living your life only focusing on the struggles and negatives is depressing and makes it hard to want to live, even if those struggle take up 100% of your life and you can't actually escape them. sometimes any little seemingly positive thing can help a lot.

but there's so many other autistic people that hate when we do that and call it "reducing autism to a cute trendy thing" and say it takes away from *their* struggles and is bad and shouldn't be used. maybe *you* want to only focus on your struggles, but some people can't live in constant negative and need some positive or to find ways to make their condition more positive so they can feel better about living with their struggles. life is hard. I take anything I can get.

I cant get jobs. I can't make and keep friends. I can't get help and support for doing "normal" things so sometimes I go weeks without being able to shower and without eating more than a bowl of cereal a day. most times can't even do things I like. struggle to communicate. have meltdowns. i'll never be able to live independently. I struggle a lot. but instead of sitting here always depressed and having no motivation to live, i'd rather try to joke about "my 'tism is acting up again" when i'm struggling (just an example. don't think I ever actually used the 'tism thing but i saw others use it) or say "i'm just being a creature" when I need to stay in my dark room because everything is too much and I personally find it cute to be a little creature meant in a positive way. i'm not actually downplaying mine or anyone else's struggles. I still acknowledge them and that silly jokes dont make them go away. i'm not trying to be trendy. i'm not doing any of the things people say we do by making silly little jokes. i'm using the silly little jokes to convince myself life can be a little more than pointless, painful garbage all the time.

(continue in tags)

[diamondrib]

fun fact all those people who talk about how type 4 hair and dealing with it sucks are right but in a nuanced way where it’s actually systemic racism’s fault and not anything about our hair itself making it uniquely shitty

[selfinflictedgunshotwound]

sorry for only saying this type of shit lately but i kinda wanna drive a car straight into a brick wall at the highest speed possible

[rouge-fauna]

I think you’re talking about these posts [here & here], I don’t know if there have been others.

I'm not gonna say what I did was right, you are correct I should probably just not respond to asks getting me to talk about other people. I will say for these two posts those people had already blocked me I’m pretty sure, so it’s kinda hard to talk directly to them in that case. And I was not doing so anonymously and had not blocked them so I wasn’t hiding what I was saying. I did not follow them, I am not part of the innitor community, and not that that makes it right but I do think it is kinda different. Though you make a good point, perhaps we should stop this pattern of responding to asks about other blogs and such.

Still, the biggest thing to me I realized, back in elementary school when I first dealt with this, was that honestly all the time we talk about people behind their back. Talking about people when they aren’t always in the room is kinda just inevitable and part of socializing, however I think the important part is how you are talking about other people. It’s when you are insulting them, talking negatively about them to people they know, spreading false information and so on that it becomes not okay. Hopefully that makes sense.

In these cases I merely focused on the lore. I didn’t insult them or talk shit about them, as a person, as a blog or say their takes were stupid or they are stupid or speculate about their trauma or mental history. I just talked about reasons why I disagreed, or saw things differently and why we might see things differently. They were also not the only ones I saw to say similar things so I think in my mind I was making more of a general discussion, not trying to target them specifically. I didn’t post beyond that about them. But you are right, regardless it was probably not the right way to go about things.

But just to be clear, if I am a hypocrite it is not my intention. I haven’t vague blogged anyone or meant to vague reblog anyone. I think this week is pretty much the first time I’ve ever been not naming, passive aggressively talking about blogs, and even then I’m not trying to insult them, trying to cancel them. I’m just expressing that before you go off about how I’m stupid and unable to have a discussion about it, the very least you could’ve done was give me an opportunity to try.

[shikai-the-storyteller]

Hmm