#i saw the quote from the book on tiktok and i need it i think

[honeypleasejustkillme]

“the little girl in me still craves the love my father could not give”

god,, now THAT has a sting

[ninetailedfoxmanchi]

What is Simon 'Ghost' Riley actually like in a relationship (according to me)

A/N: I know this isn't anything like the things I usually write fics about but if I don't get this out of my system, I will spontaneously combust into flames from thought overload. There is a lot of great fics about him out there, 100%, but there is a steamy pile of garbage as well which makes Simon "an abusive asshole" to quote a TikTok I recently saw - and I couldn't agree more. So, here is my soft take on this tough guy and I hope you can enjoy reading this despite it being pretty far away from everything else on this blog.

Warnings: mentions of torture, violence, weapons, PTSD, profanity, explicit sexual themes but also so much fluff and softness

A/N pt. 2: I base this on Ghost's backstory according to the comic books as well as the video games but this is just my take so if you imagined him differently, that is totally valid!

* * *

Firstly and most importantly, Simon is a very different in his private life compared to his work; meaning he is good at separating the violent side of his work life from the life he has with you.

He must be the softest, the most gentle person there is when he is with you. I think he is very shy in the beginning as well as in early relationship given how his father treated him growing up. It is not that Simon wouldn't trust you, it's more that he would not trust himself. After all, after the Manuel Roba operation, he was tortured for months and came out with severe anger issues.

However, he was able to resolve this when he re-joined the military and engaged therapy but the scars remained: both mental as well as physical.

The reason why Ghost never takes off his mask is because of the scars Vernon and the lot left on his face (and the rest of his body). They are healed now but whenever he sees them in the mirror, he is reminded of everything he has been through, especially the loss of his family.

After Simon had told you why he keeps his mask on even in private life, at least the bottom part, you would not mind it as much but you would also reassure him that the way you feel about him could never be changed by some scars.

Needless to say, Simon would be very, very protective of you. He has lost everyone he has ever loved and cared about and he would never allow the same happen with you. It must be said though that Simon is not possessive. He above all knows the importance of freedom, especially when it comes to making choices about yourself and your comfort.

Still, Simon would face some control issues when you'd go out on your own. At work, he is used to being in charge of everybody, making sure everyone is safe and manning their positions. But with you, he needs to remind himself you are not going to war but just out with your friends, out grocery shopping, out to the library or somewhere. The thought of losing you drives him insane. He could never forgive himself if it happened when he could be by your side instead.

It goes without saying though that Simon prefers the comfort of his home to just about any other place. Clubs give him anxiety and the loud music triggers his PTSD, bars and restaurants are okay here and there but there is no place like home.

He does enjoy hiking and walking with you though.

Simon is romantic by heart so picnics in the nature would be his go-to dates. A bottle of wine, cheese and olives, a blanket in a spot with a view... You'd trace his features gently with the tip of your finger; the curve of his nose, his lips where he'd take your hand in his and kissed it softly as you would lay together in a secluded spot somewhere.

Bonus: when you decide to go home, Simon would never let you help carry any of the things he'd brought. Maybe the blanket but everything else, he'd pile up in his massive arms and carry them all the way home while barely seeing over the heap.

When it comes to sex, Simon would be just as reserved as with taking off his mask in the beginning. He would need much assurance from you that you really wanted to be with him intimately before trying anything.

Contrary to popular belief, Simon would never do anything that could even remotely hurt you when you had sex (or otherwise). On the one hand, he is well aware of his size and strength, and on the other, it is his childhood trauma that keeps him from trying anything that could potentially hurt you (even choking, spanking, etc. is not something he is comfortable with) even if you'd ask him to experiment.

Simon has seen, felt and inflicted too much violence in his life to have it included in his love life as well. All he wants to do is make you feel safe and loved especially when you have sex because this is one of the ways he expresses his love to you.

His sex drive is not that high but when you do have sex, he likes to make it special and intimate. Simon is very serious about it and wants you to enjoy yourself more than anything. To be honest, just seeing you climax causes him do the same.

He enjoys going down on your very much; the intimacy, the softness of your moans, his arms locked around your thighs when his fingers are not intertwined with yours.

Simon's favourite part though is the aftercare. He loves cuddling with you. Physical touch is yet another of his love languages although he was very reserved in the beginning of the relationship.

He is the big spoon the majority of time but sometimes (his favourite) Simon lays his head on your chest, wraps his arms around your waist and lets you play with his hair. He can fall asleep almost instantly.

It cannot be stressed enough that Simon never ever EVER raises his voice at you. Even when you are having an argument (which is not often), he never yells much less gets violent in any way.

He is a great listener and despite not saying much a lot of the time, Simon communicates well although he struggles very much to word his feelings.

After an argument or just for no particular occasion at all, Simon gets you flowers (a lot) - and different kinds every time. Another way for Simon to apologize is to cook for you. He is not very good at it but it is the effort that counts.

When he is away on a mission, Simon calls you a lot just to hear your voice, especially when he is too stressed to fall asleep. Your voice calms him down and help him get some rest but also reassures him you are alright whilst he is not there to keep you safe.

Simon likes to listen about your day, your feelings and your ideas. It keeps his mind far away from dark places. But every now and again, he would trust you with a fragment of his memories when his thoughts are just too loud. You know how precious and how rare it is that Simon opens up to you.

You don't say anything when he talks about his memories and his family but you always hold his hand, brushing your thumb across his calloused knuckles or drawing gentle shapes against his broad back.

You pepper his skin with soft kisses when his voice quietens and lead his head to rest against your chest as you pet his hair.

He likes to listen to you sing too, even if your voice is not the greatest. Even just humming a random melody and feeling your chest vibrate softly beneath his cheek will ease his heart.

Random bonus: Simon drinks English breakfast, no cream and one cube of sugar and has an occasional cigarette with it (Marlboro).

[the-most-faithful]

It's Snape's fault

I share with you the latest madness I found on TikTok to attack Snape as usual. Now the Snaters have no more grip and are starting to deny the canon and invent things but this one made me laugh too much. I think we need to take the situation with irony.

One user (James Stan) created a video with Harry's quote after he saw Snape's worst memory. Harry questions his father. A mature behavior that gives depth to the character, you might say. But no, for the Snaters this is not conceivable, Harry is questioning James here, he sees him for the first time objectively for what he was, precisely a bully. But no, the James Stans want to convince the world that James was a perfect, sweet little angel so what do they do? Of course they blame Snape. It's his fault that Harry saw that memory.

It's not James who was wrong to bully Snape, but Snape who was wrong because he remembers it. But it doesn't end there, many snaters are so engrossed in fanfiction that they don't know the canon and end up saying things like these:

Do what?

Now it's clear, they don't know the canon, they haven't seen the films or read the books, otherwise it can't be explained. But luckily someone else said what I thought without me having to get into this discussion.

Obviously here the person is referring to the film that is less wors . In the book I would like to remind you that Harry invades Snape's privacy voluntarily, he secretly looks into the pensieve, it's not that he falls in there by mistake, he DECIDES to look at Snape's private memories.

In the film they certainly changed the thing where Harry, also a little angel, defends himself from Snape who is only doing his job by teaching him occlumency. But even in this case what would be Snape's fault, he didn't choose to show Harry that memory.

Zeke I don't know you but you're my hero right now, you've had way too much patience. So it's clear folks, the Snaters don't know the canon at all and even when faced with the evidence they have an answer that puts an end to any discussion:

Very mature.

[iriascend]

I think I found new insight into purity culture. Hear me out.

I've recently stumbled upon TikTok videos from Christian Francis, a fiction author that shared his experience as a person with both aphantasia (no visual imagination, i.e. no mind's eye) and anauralia (no verbal imagination, i.e. no inner monologue). It was exciting to see, because I never saw anyone else that has both like I do! For him, thoughts were 'subconscious' and silent, and like for me - happened entirely 'under the hood' and only the end result of a thought process was expressed outwardly. Feeling a sense of connection, I went through his videos. Some were Q&A answering basic questions like "how do you write fiction, then?" and "do you dream???".

But the more videos I watched, the more of them were just replies and reactions to frankly... bonkers sentiments left by commenters. People would say he's lying, not believing that this set of conditions is even possible, or even accuse of being a psychopath that's just farming responses for views, clout or as source for dialogue in his books (?). Folks would say that doesn't have a soul and even get angry at him like it personally offended them that some stranger on the internet doesn't use words or images in his mind.

What caught my attention most, though, are the people who said it's impossible to have neither words nor images nor anything else in your mind, because he's speaking - people who said that an inner monologue of some kind is needed for expressing yourself, for thinking at all. Someone even referenced the famous quote from Descartes - "I think, therefore I am" - implying that Christian is an NPC, because he doesn't think.

As Christian noticed, these people seemed to be conflating an inner voice with the act of thinking, and were under the impression that that voice in their heads was their thoughts, as opposed to just a way to express them.

This reminded me of how often people mischaracterize intrusive thoughts. Internet tends to romanticize them as quirky desires, like the urge to dye your hair neon green at 4am in the morning, and then gets offended and horrified when people admit that their actual, clinical intrusive thoughts are more akin to "stab your neighbour's toddler with a knife 32 times". People online tend to be all "positive and accepting of psychiatric disorders" and say it's okay to have delusions/intrusive thoughts until people start actually having violent delusions and unsightly intrusive thoughts, because then that's "wrong" and "evil" and "crazy" to think those things.

And those two approaches melded in my mind to create a theory - people think that, contrary to what psychiatry says about it, your thoughts are you. With a worldview like that it means that whatever appears in your mind, whatever's part of your stream of consciousness and inner monologue - is you, is your thoughts and opinions, even if it appears against your will/without your input, even if you're horrified about it. With a worldview like that, perceiving violent or immoral things means having violent or immoral thoughts which makes you a violent and immoral person.

And that would explain a bit about purity culture's approach towards erotic or problematic fiction, wouldn't it? If you read a book that depicts violence and have an inner voice, you narrate it in your inner voice as you read it. The violence becomes part of your thoughts, part of you. If you believe that your inner monologue IS you, then reading 'problematic fiction' makes you a bad person, because it mixes in 'problematic' things into your inner monologue. Watching porn becomes functionally the same thing as sleeping around, because it has the same effect on your "soul" - it makes you have sex thoughts.

All because they took "I think therefore I am" a little too literally.

[ac3-76]

Lloyd Garmadon Headcannons

warnings: none😋

General

He's been doing graffiti since he was 9

he started when he saw a guy doing it while Darklys was on a field trip in Ninjago City

he thought it was really cool and left the group to talk to the guy

His Tag is either Neon Dragon or Neon Echo

He decided it had to have Neon in it because he uses neon in all of his works

People speculate that he's Neon Dragon/Echo but it's not confirmed, not even the other ninja know

He has a graffiti account on Instagram that has 37.8 million followers and is verified

He also really good at painting and sketching

He's just good at art in general

He watches personal attention ASMR to fall asleep

He's good at sewing

He pretty much never posts on his socials, but when he does they get more likes and views than the other ninjas posts

he's the quote "short guys have the prettiest faces and the sassiest attitudes"

he's so sassy

when the Ninjas do interviews people always talk about his sass attacks

there are compilations of him being sassy on tiktok, Instagram reels, and YouTube

Kai's the fan favorite for his looks and how often he posts, but lloyd is the fan favorite for personality and level of cuntiness

Literally everyone in Ninjago loves Lloyd(except the badguys but yk)

Out of all the ninjas he has the 2nd biggest arms(Cole has the biggest)

Girls go crazy for his arms

He's so respectful towards women

He can start a conversation with anyone about anything

He is SO SO SO good with kids

A mom of 2 will be taking the bus home from somewhere, her youngest kid is a couple months old and her oldest is 4 years old

The older ones throwing a tantrum and the youngest is crying and the moms stressed and embarrassed bc this is happening in public and she can't get her kids to calm down

Enter Lloyd "do you want some help?" Garmadon to offer his services

the mom gives him her oldest and in a matter of seconds the kid is happy and smiling

he's not even sure what he did to get the kid so happy

THEN, bc one is never enough🙄, "I can help calm that you down too if you want"

So the mom gives him the newborn and again in a couple seconds the newborn isn't crying

kids just love him🤷‍♀️

He has really unique insults

"your personality is like a wet napkin at a party"

"your fashion sense if like a blindfolded toddler picking out clothes"

"Your ideas are so dull, they make beige look vibrant"

"Your sense of humor is drier than a desert in a drought"

"You're as useful as a screen door in a submarine"

and you best bet they all make it into the Lloyd Garmadon sassy compilations

He has FAST comebacks, he never misses a beat with an insult

Dating

He does a HARD launch

people will be chilling thinking he's single and then one day BAM

he posts something on Instagram announcing he's in a relationship

its 10 pictures of you, him giving you flowers, you guys kissing, you guys cuddling

it's like if you searched relationship goals on Pinterest

and the caption is something like "Happy 1 year babe🫶🫶 I can't imagine my life without you"

everyone in the comments is shocked that he kept your relationship secret for a year

Except the ninjas

who are commenting things about being happy he's finally announced it

I know for a fact Kai would commet "I'm glad you finally announced this, I have hundreds of pictures of you two I've been needing to post🙄"

You're his muse

He does graffiti pieces inspired by you

He also tells you he's Neon Dragon/Echo

He tries to teach you how to do graffiti

He's the type to read and annotate books you like

Collarbone kisser

Helps you figure out fits

MATCHING OUTFITS.

He would embroider a little heart in your favorite color, or your favorite flower into the cuffs of all his hoodies

He doesn't care if you're taller or shorter than him, just don't be the same height as him and ur good

After what happend with Harumi he would struggle to believe you actually like him for a while

Even after you prove you really do like him, he still struggles to express how he feels about you and be completely honest with you

Secret or forbidden relationship trope

he fell first and harder

also soulmate trope

he pays attention to everything you do and knows ur needs, wants, and actions before you do

(yk when Elenor anticipated Chidis sneeze in The Good Place, yea he's Elenor, you're Chidi)

"No I have a partner" instead of "Sorry, I have a partner"

he has awful abandonment issues so he's either really clingy or he pushes you away and doesn't talk to you

He doesn't do sass attacks or insult you(to often)

Kai will be recording a vlog to post to YouTube and you'll say something stupid, Lloyd will look at you like he wants to insult you but be doesn't

The fans see that clip and go crazy

"Lloyd holding back his insult is how you know he's in love"

The ship edits go HARD

[saywhatjenn]

Take some advice from a grizzled old shipper, Bonrad girlies: it’s going to be ok. I’ve shipped a lot of couples and they’ve all been endgame. (Ok maybe there was one that wasn’t but it’s kind of ambiguous thanks to a death. This is why I don’t watch stupid zombie shows anymore). Anyway…

First, there’s the books. Yes, there have been rumblings of not following the book ending, but with the exception of a few tweaks, the major plot points have all followed the books. It’s a 3 book, 3 season story and we’re only 2/3 of the way through. (Also, there are some quotes floating around where the cast talks about how season 3 will follow the books). Jenny saying she could choose to not follow the books was a ploy to keep people invested, thinking they have to watch in case she does change it. She said the same thing during To All the Boys movie promos and Lara Jean and Peter were still endgame. John Ambrose McWho?

But even if the books weren’t a factor, the past two seasons have been very heavy handed with the signs that Belly and Conrad are endgame. Even in a season that’s supposed to be Jere’s or episodes that’s supposed to be his, the unresolved feelings between Belly and Conrad are front and center. They’re infinite and the show isn’t letting us forget it. (This is a common storytelling mechanism with love triangles. It’s never about the 3rd person in the triangle. Look at Jim and Pam and Karen or Roy, or Nick and Jess and Sam or Reagan. The main ship and how these other relationships affect it are always the focus). I saw a tiktok comment that said “Jere is the rebound,” and that makes total sense. He’s the in between while Belly and Conrad figure their shit out. Belly needs to mature and figure herself out, have a few adventures before she can be with the one and Conrad needs to deal with his mental health surrounding his mother’s death and everything with his father. They’ll grow and change apart to be stronger together one day.

And purely from a storytelling standpoint it just makes sense. It is becoming clearer each week that this season will end with Belly and Jere together. And then what happens in season 3? Them just happily planning a wedding isn’t good TV. Season 3 needs drama and it’ll be the downfall of the relationship and Belly realizing she’ll never get over Conrad.

We’ve got this. Now we just need the studios to give the actors and writers what they want so we can season 3 made and aired so we can all find our zen.

[gege-wondering-around]

Hello lovely person! I liked the question so much I am sending it back!

Do you have any favorite quotes? why do you like them?

And, if you feel like they are incomplete or missing a bit, how would you complete them and why?

As always, no pressure or rush and whatever you do manage today I hope you manage something for yourself!

Hi there @dontcallpanic, forgive me for taking so long to answer but i had to dig through my memory (which is filled with holes and poor, fading things) to get to the quotes...

So, let's get started!

and I have some little categories too!

From... tiktok trends (I know, sounds silly, but I do love them)

I know love/gentleness exist, cause I exist and I'm full of it

I mean, this makes me able to believe love (or anything good) exist. Among all the cruelty, brutality, pain and sorrow of this world, there's still hope cause I believe and I know I have it in me, I can carry (and I do carry) love, gentleness, care, affection and so much more and it reminds, at the end of the day, even if there's pain, there's still something good among all of it.

to be loved is to be changed

I firmly believe this cause I've seen it times and times over, in my relationships and in other's, I saw it happening and I was also one of the reason it happened (for my exes, loved them deeply and still care for them despite all). But. I've seen it in good and bad faith, I've seen my friend's ex go the miles to 'ruin her life' and manipulate her into get back together. Yet, he claimed it was always done because of love...

Love can change you, but you both have to be in love to make the change good (cause it will happen anyway, whatever you like it or not, you'll change)

I'll peel oranges for you - I peeled my oranges today

This is two pieces, 'before' and 'after'.

I love this so much cause cause the first one, is when love fill in the blanks for you, when you don't need to do something cause someone you love will take care of it for you. And they do it with such a tenderness, like it's some sort of privilege to 'peel oranges for you' because they get to do something for you and they know the gesture might be little, but it's surely appreciated.

the 'after' is the same when you break up. You have to learn how to 'peel the oranges' cause no one is there to do it for you. cause you like them peeled the way they did and you don't really want anyone to replace their gesture. so you learn, you learn how to 'peel the oranges.'

Jupiter was supposed to be a star, but failed...

Kinda sad, I admit. but let me 'complete it' before explaining it.

...yet it's fascinating

this reminds me of when you wanna be something, but you end up not fitting in yet it doesn't mean you failed completely. maybe you now know where to go, maybe you understood how wonderful you are without having to do anything different, and you just need to find your people.

failing doesn't mean being a failure. it means it's not for you (maybe) but you are still an amazing, fascinating person.

From... Tv shows/films

my mercy prevail over my wrath

The walking dead

it reminds me, any time someone do me wrong, to let it go and have mercy. to chose my battles wisely and the fool have it their way if it means i keep my peace. and if you have watched the show, it was the last string breaking, letting out everything and telling the world, 'I might've won to my people, but I've lost to myself.'

not all monsters do monstrous things

teen wolf

this just says it all. whatever is a monster, maybe it isn't...

From... books

we accept the love we think we deserve

the perks of being a wallflower

shutters my heart, cause it's so damn true. it talks to me deeply as I've always 'pointed low' (?)... I don't accept compliments, i believe the bas stuff people say about me, i don't believe I'm a good person cause I've been 'bad' to 2 people and all the other 20 means nothing... cause hate prevails over love, cause it's what i think i deserve, and the little love i let myself have is so small i starve on it...

From... says

o la va, o la spacca

it literally means, 'or it goes, or it breaks'

i say this all the time cause it's either a success or not (i say this every time i hand in a text in school) but i think about this any time i take any kind of risk.

or it goes, or it breaks... no other way

pace amen

I don't think I've heard anyone else say this as much as i do, maybe it's just something i made up but I'll still put it in.

it means, 'peace amen'.

anytime something doesn't go right, or it fails, or it doesn't even sail to begin with, i say this cause it doesn't really matter. it's futile to me cause i kinda knew it was a failure from the start.

my italian teacher 'hated' me because anytime i got a lower grate than my usual and she'd ask me about it, i always said pace amen, cause i didn't really care, i still passed but with a lower grade.

or when i didn't (and still don't) have any plans for the future for myself, and she'd try to make me see all the infinite possibilities and stuff i already knew i couldn't do it, and then she'd say "you can't think so lowly of yourself" or "you're gonna fail like this" I'd always say pace amen

cause to me, it doesn't really matter...

grades are never deserved. I've seen people cheat in all possible ways and never get caught, and even when i busted my ass studying, i somehow got a lower grade then them... so it doesn't matter

my future... well i don't care, for as long as I'm alive and at peace with myself, enjoying my time, i don't care about what job i end up doing.

to me, this 'pace amen' means be at peace with myself and the consequences of everything I do or say. to me, it's complete acceptance of my way of being...

From... 'the last days of Juda Iscariot' by Stephen Adly Guirgis

I wanna read this book (which is a theater play script) so bad! it's all so real, like this is how it was...

I'm not religious but religion fascinates me so much...

so...

this is all I've got from my scrappy memory so I hope it was somehow interesting and not boring!

thank you so much for ask @dontcallpanic, you're sich a ray of joy in my rainy days, always so joyful and amazing, you're truly wonderful! 🩵🫂

hope to hear more from you anytime you want, have a wonderful day and wish you amazing things 💗🫂

and please, forgive any typos...😅

[jewishvitya]

Content warning: a picture of Nazi propaganda

Okay, so, I had a couple of replies from someone who seems genuine. These are all points either I or other people made before, but I'll try to collect them in a way that makes sense.

I'm not going to reiterate the list of antisemitic issues in the goblins narratively, I did that twice, here and here. I'm going to talk about why it's antisemitic despite this being a fantasy race with traits that commonly go together. I hope you'll forgive me if I'll repeat or quote things I said in other posts. I'll also use examples I've seen given by other Jews, like I did with theineffableshe (from tiktok) before. So, credit to her.

Fantasy and SciFi are speculative fiction. They take us out of our own world and our own familiar reality to allow us to explore ourselves. All stories we tell are stories about people. We only understand our own minds. You can't imagine a color that you never saw, you can't create a reality that isn't grounded in human experience.

That's why very often the struggles and the traits of a fantasy race are pulled from the real world. Either the real struggles of real people (with some exaggeration or magical/futuristic elements), or the caricaturized traits that were applied to a real group of people.

This is not inherently bad. This is just how stories work. All stories are derivative - they all pull from the stories we told before.

Here is what you said:

If you seriously connect jews with generic greedy goblin characters with huge noses that work in banks, then it honestly sounds to me like YOU are the one being filled up with these prejudices.

But here's what I need you to understand: we don't think we look like the goblins. We don't relate the goblins to ourselves. We relate the goblins to how we were portrayed in the past, to demonize us.

Goblins in other pieces of media can look very different. Because those are fictional, they can be made to look like anything. And they look like antisemitic caricatures.

To illustrate, here's a comparison between the game and Nazi propaganda.

The first picture is from theineffableshe. She traced some of these from stills of the game, and some of these from antisemitic Nazi propaganda.

I know which is which - because I've seen all of the originals. But if you never saw them before, do you think everyone would be able to tell which ones are from HL and which ones are 1930's propaganda?

And the two on top? One of them is the trophy you get for killing Ranrok, the main antagonist of the game. The other, is again, antisemitic propaganda.

Just a reminder that I'm not blaming Rowling of writing intentional antisemitic caricatures into her books. This is more complicated than that, and that complexity is what this post is about.

I showed in two posts the narrative similarities between the goblins and antisemitic propaganda. Here, I showed a bit of the visual similarities.

It's the collection of all the traits that creates the problem.

And you understand this. I felt encouraged when I saw you say:

This discovery honestly makes me feel uncomfy. Sure, it's just a generic animal horn, which isn't solely special to jews, but it kind of does start piling up.

Which is exactly the point. You get it. I just want you to see that it's still true if you disregard the horn.

You also said this:

Most greedy characters are portrayed ugly, which oftentimes includes large noses. And greedy people working in banks isn't a huge jump.

Greedy characters being ugly, ugly characters having large noses and greedy people working in banks are all stereotypes that are portrayed in media fairly often- How exactly is this case in particular offensive?

So. I'll start by saying again that the original books had no problem with the goblin's noses. They weren't even described. The antisemitism was in the other traits. But in these messages from you, there are a couple of issues: what we consider ugly, and equating beauty with goodness. For that, I'll get into the issue of the noses.

Beauty is cultural. I have a Chinese friend and we had long conversations about it, because it's something that fascinates me. The beauty standards around them are very different from those around me. We spoke about how it influences art and fashion and make up. You can see similar things throughout history. What we consider beautiful or ugly is not neutral.

I'm not talking about personal taste right now. I'm not saying "if you have certain preferences, you're a bad person and there's something wrong with you." I'm saying that culturally, some beauty standards come from racism. Others come from classism and prejudice towards poor people. Others, from ableism and prejudice towards sick and disabled people.

That's why the idea of ugliness being tied to evil is not neutral. People in reality treat beautiful people better. They're more likely to be assumed kind, to be assumed innocent if accused of crimes. It comes from a concept of purity, an assumption that moral corruption will be visible on you.

And it wasn't invented by white supremacists, but it aligns with their ideology. White supremacists put on a pedestal traits they consider better and purer. And traits that don't fall into that idea of racial purity, were the ones seen as ugly. If marginalized people's traits are considered ugly, and ugliness is equated with immorality - marginalized people are seen as immoral.

Exaggerating the phenotypical traits of a marginalized group to dehumanize it, is common. It's how racist (and transphobic, etc) caricatures are created. In terms of phenotype, Jewish people can belong to any race. There is no one way a Jewish person looks. But Jewish people tend to marry other Jewish people, so sometimes we don't completely look like the non-Jewish populations where we live. This was the case for Ashkenazi Jews in Europe. We were more likely to be shorter, to have darker and curlier hair, darker eyes, and there's much more. The "Jewish nose" is part of that.

European Jews were not considered white, they were racialized, and being racialized meant being subhuman. So the traits that the Nazis associated with us were demonized.

"They're shown as ugly, and that includes a big nose" is not a neutral thing. It has a very heavy history of white supremacy and antisemitism.

When you ask "it's a well established trope, so how is this case in particular offensive?" you assume every other case is harmless. I'm not accusing every single creator who made hooked-nosed villains of antisemitism. I'm saying that the pattern has pretty bad origins.

These traits that you listed commonly go together - but why? Most real rich people who hoard money don't fit that collection of descriptions. So where did this come from?

We pull narrative tools from the stories told to us, and we do that without always thinking about how those tropes interact with the real world. The idea of greedy bankers has been tied to the demonization of Jewish people for a very long time.

Rowling wanted to write a bank, and she wanted to make it magical, and she reverse-engineered her fantasy bankers from there. But when she did that, she did write an antisemitic fantasy race.

Goblins are portrayed in many different ways in folklore and in media. Goblin is originally a term used for a collection of creatures that have different traits, not all of them associated with love of treasure. They can be tricksters, but not necessarily bloodthirsty. And since it's such a varied mythology, there's no reason for them to look like this. There's no reason for them to be only loyal to each other. To either not care about human lives or enjoy the idea of humans getting hurt - which we see in the books.

She pulled more from antisemitic stories than she pulled from real folklore. And it was enough of a problem that antisemitic producers were able to pick up where she left off and make it as bad as they did.

So you're exactly right. It's how it piles up. I just hope you can see that the issue goes very deep.

[shouldhavestayedawayfromhere]

A few days ago I found an "old" notebook in my drawer (forgotten since 2022). I used to write down my spiritual & personal insights in there. I found a few gold pieces I wanna share because damn?? Okay some of it feels "cringe" now but that's normal right, cringe culture is dead.

People want you to believe they are happy; because then you'll get jealous; and you will think you need what they have in order to be happy. But you only need yourself; and they only need themselves. We would all be so happy if we stopped comparing our happiness to others'.

Seriously this is such a cool quote. I probably felt like a little philosopher writing that. Tho I would now probably change the part of people wanting you to believe they're "happy". I don't think most people are out there lying about being happy. But certainly about other things sometimes. But it's still very apparent for me, also in the occult community.

Being on here and getting an insight on other people's practices is so cool, but it can tempt me (and I'm sure I'm not the only one) to feel bad about my own practice. I tend to feel like I'm not doing enough, or I wanna do everything all at once. Like I could be doing this and that and everything, and I take my own craft so much for granted that I don't even see what cool and unique things I do myself. So it's nice to see I already considered this two years ago.

It is poor spiritual hygiene to give everyone access to you. Access to you is a privilege. You gotta treat it like it's golden.

This one is a quote from a tiktok I saw I think, but it's so real. From this one I can tell that I definitely grew in that area since writing down this quote.

You stopped showing me love and affection; and I said it was okay; because I loved myself and thought it was you.

Seriously that's such a raw line. I opened the book and saw this line and I was gagged. I know who this was about but fr— this was true so many times??? Every single one of my "close friends" in my past was just an idolized person inside my head. I made myself feel appreciated and gave them credit for it. This is by the way the same reason I used believe in the Christian God. It was the same concept to me. I'd help myself and then give credit to someone else. I hope we're all done doing that.

You will find someone who is right for you and aligns with you once the time has come. And the time will come once you don't need anyone anymore to hold you up, because you can do it yourself.

This was something I took away from a meditation with mother Isis, who was the first deity I've ever tried working with. I don't anymore, but I still value her and I'm thankful for her introducing me to deity work. This is definitely something that became true for me. I found my person. I found multiple people, actually. And Isis was right – I don't need them to hold me up. I can do that myself now. But I'm grateful for those people in my life that don't need me to depend on them in order to be a good friend to me. It's really beautiful to see the things I once hoped for became reality in such a short time.

Love yourselves, ave Satan! 🫶

[no-where-new-hero]

Having finished A Study in Drowning, hopefully to the amusement of you all, here's my final review:

My biggest props to Ava Reid are as a promoter of her own work. Those Instagram posts with elegant posters of each of the colleges at the university--which by the way we never saw, because we left the university after two chapters. The character profiles telling us about the height and star sign of each of the mains--redundant, considering the fact that both of the men are tall and Effy is TikTok girlie Tiny™ never influences either the plot or any of the descriptions. The moodboards and the Taylor Swift "cardigan" music and the choice quotes--they all painted a much more immersive world than she actually delivered. In that, I give her 10/10.

As for the novel itself? It's a trauma story more than anything else, portrayed through the plot of Possession by A.S. Byatt. I always find it hard to evaluate books like this in the whole, because on the one hand, I don't want to be one of those people saying that the trauma in question is "incorrectly" portrayed, or that the author is a "bad" survivor or something. But this reminds me of when I read My Dark Vanessa and realized that there is a difference between writing an experience of trauma and writing a novel. A novel demands arc, contrast, catharsis, and all of these things need to be earned. Often, real life doesn't provide those things, but that's why we go to fiction. Sometimes it doesn't do to write a novel that's "too" true to life (I feel like this is a Dean Priest quote but whatever).

But even beyond this, there's something sloppy about the entire execution. The characterization is patchy at best (I'm going to have a whole 'nother post drubbing down Ianto) and everyone uses the same metaphor of the sea and water and drowning ad nauseum. The prose is a bit affectedly purple. The ending was painfully predictable. It had to be a YA, as I said before, because it couldn't be a grown-up novel, but it reminded me so much of Reid's Juniper & Thorn, which trammeled over much of the same territory (a bit better, I'd say, though I think they both suffer from the same flaws).

We're meant to believe that the love story between Preston and Effy is healing and cathartic and the way Effy regains control of her body and desires, but also--they knew each other two weeks. Even though they attend the same university, they have never spoken before they decide to join up on this literary analysis crusade. This is not a long-term, friends/acquaintances to lovers situation where you assume a deep measure of trust and affection could be reasonably built on an existing relationship. It reminds me of the critique of the central romance in Juniper & Thorn, where there was a complaint that it's less a romance than a trauma bond response. It's written sweetly, but considering Effy automatically flinches away from the presence of every man, it's kind of unbelievable that she would lower her guard so immediately for this boy.

The two week span of the novel is also problematic considering the aforementioned problem that academic work takes A FUCKING LONG TIME. Even if you have a ton of primary sources, this isn't the kind of thing you can produce overnight. This isn't the kind of mystery you can solve overnight, either, especially if no one has ever thought to probe that deeply before.

Basically, this novel was trying to do too many things with far too limited a vocabulary to execute it. Lowkey, I feel like Reid would be a better short-story writer than a novelist. She can be very good in small doses, but over the expanse of an entire novel, it just gets...dull.

[fimproda]

Author talks: (Negative) Opinions and reviews

(Grab some snacks and a drink. This is a chunky boi.)

This post was a long time coming.

I wrote a version of what you're about to read back in, like, 2019, on my Italian Wattpad profile, after years spent dealing with ungrateful authors and being called rude, wrong, and whatever negative adjective you can and cannot think of.

It's time to address this topic yet again, in English, here on Tumblr, hoping to reach as many people as possible and, the writing gods willing, change a mind or two.

The straw that broke the camel's back (or rather, my back) was a series of TikTok videos, made by a bunch of Italian booktokers, either in support or in opposition to another booktoker who had dared to review a pretty popular book that had made its rounds on Wattpad before being self-published on Amazon.

It so happened that I, for one, knew the author from our shared time on Wattpad, and I also knew the book, which wasn't good back then and is not any better now; moreover, I saw the video review and I agreed with the booktoker's every word, especially with the way this girl kept an even, calm, almost professional tone and justified every critique.

So you can imagine my surprise when a veritable swarm of detractors began stitching this booktoker's video, saying that her opinions were wrong, that she was bullying the author, and yadda yadda yadda; thankfully, some other booktokers were on her side, but this also meant that this back-and-forth shitstorm went on for days, and maybe it hasn't even ended yet.

I need to add that the author blocked this poor girl on every social media, and the book's most passionate readers (the ones that the author brought over from Wattpad and the author's friends/family, I assume) flocked to the booktoker's other accounts to keep blaming and disgracing her.

All this over a negative, yes, but overall objective and respectful review.

And it doesn't end here.

Many other straws continued to destroy the camel's back.

For instance, some accounts I follow for fandom content on Instagram or even here on Tumblr, who for the most part are not authors themselves, make a point to regularly remind people not to tag authors in their negative reviews of those authors' books.

On the other side of the coin, I've seen some authors, especially on TikTok, flip their shit over a "negative" review (and I should add even more quotes around the word negative, to be honest). Some even stated that a 3 out of 5 stars rating is a negative one, saying, "What would you think if a person called you 3/5 cute?!"

I don't know about them, or about you, but I would preen like a peacock if someone called me 3/5 cute.

(It'd be different if they said I was 3/10 cute, of course, but we can't really expect basic maths from some people, can we?)

Back in my Wattpad days, I've even stumbled upon someone who said that, seeing as all content on Wattpad is free (which is not even true nowadays, but whatever), no one has any right to leave a negative review. @zoyalannister can vouch for this; in fact, I believe it was her who sent me a screenshot of that comment, and we're still shocked about it years later.

I'm sure that some authors among you will understand how utterly pissed I get when I read, hear about, or get otherwise involved with such things.

So, with all this in mind, let's clear up a few things, shall we?

None of us is writing because we've got a gun to our head. We're writing, posting, interacting with readers, and everything related to this, because we want to.

In wanting this, we make our works public.

Some websites like AO3 allow us to choose if we'd like to "protect" our stories by keeping them out of reach of the unregistered users, but for the most part, everyone can search for our works, read them, and comment on them.

These are the terms and conditions. And yes, nobody really reads the terms and conditions before accepting them, but this doesn't give us a right to bitch about the consequences when they come a' knockin' at our door, does it?

Fuck around and find out, am I right?

Granted, there's comment and comment. If I, reader, come to you, author, and start insulting you, your family, your cow, and the interior designer who remodeled your kitchen, you have every right to call me all kinds of names (I wouldn't do that if I were the author, as it would mean debasing myself to the reader's level, but anyway) and slam-dunk my opinion into the trash.

(Yes, this happened to me. I've been insulted. One girl went as far as offering to, and I quote, "shit on your head, so that you close that sewer of a mouth". Context: I had commented on a story—not this girl's story: she was another reader, the author actually agreed with me—saying that I thought something was cacophonic; in Italian, this word sounds very similar to the verb cagare, which, indeed, means "to shit".)

Same thing if I, reader, come to you, author, and correct your grammar when there's absolutely no reason for me to do so, because your grammar is already correct.

(This happened to me, too. Many, many times. I know I've got an impeccable grammar in Italian; I even scored third in my age category at the nationwide Italian language Olympics when I wasn't even sixteen years old. I've been reading since I was, like, three or four, and "seriously" writing since I was thirteen. But people didn't like when I corrected their grammar, so they felt the need to come and correct mine. One memorable occasion was when a girl declared, in all seriousness, that the second singular person of the imperative of the verb fare must be always written as fa', with the apostrophe, and that my writing it as fai was wrong, because that was the second singular person of the indicative of fare. She ignored both that 1. the indicative and the imperative are the same exact thing in most cases, and 2. fa' and fai are the exact same thing as well, with the apostrophe representing the elision of the final i.)

Or, same as above, but exchanging grammar for, I don't know, a historical event, or a certain piece of information, or that kind of stuff in general, when you author were in the right and it's my sources that were wrong.

(An author, who was in university at the time, told me that she didn't know what inflation and spending power were, and so she hadn't accounted for them in her story. This happened after I mentioned those things when I pointed to her that you wouldn't hire an assassin in the 1960s with the same amount of money you would use nowadays. If I recall correctly, that author was majoring in a STEM field.)

(As a counterpoint, I was positive, for a long-ass time, that the hip bones were in fact a hip bone—meaning, that I should use the singular word, cresta iliaca, instead of the plural version, creste iliache. A reader corrected me on this, and I'm still thanking her today.)

You understand what I mean, right? Don't let me insult your intelligence by spoon-feeding you the meaning of my words.

But.

But.

If I, reader, come to you, author, and either correct your grammar when it's wrong, or a certain piece of information you chose to include in your story that is wrong, or whatever I decide to comment that could be perceived as negative—

—but I justify my point, cite my sources, maybe even linking them if possible, and keep my opinion contextualized and objective, you must at the very least lend me an ear and listen to what I have to say.

Never, in my nine years of roaming the fandom part of the Internet, have I ever written a comment on a fic saying something that I just pulled out of my ass, without checking first if there was any merit to my words. Never.

@zoyalannister can also vouch for this, as she's known me for eight of those nine years and witnessed many, if not all, of my altercations with my fellow Wattpad authors over my opinion of their story (which, allow me to clarify, they had literally asked me for—but again, even if they hadn't, their works were public and open for anyone to comment on, and I still would've been in the right).

Alas, it appears that many authors lack the self-awareness and self-criticism I believe are needed if you want to try your hand at writing, especially if you want to do it professionally.

And, good God, so do many readers.

Why, oh, why do some readers (some non-authors) go around proselitizing that people shouldn't tag authors in their negative reviews?!

Are they close personal friends with an author who doesn't like to be tagged in negative reviews of their books? Are they being paid to push this agenda? Do they have such a terrible relationship with criticism in every way, shape, or form that they feel like it's okay to get mad on someone else's behalf and dictate other people's actions?

These people like to say—parrot, is more like it—that negative reviews either don't benefit anyone, which is such an enormous pile of bullshit that I don't even know where to start dismembering it, or could only benefit the reader, essentially working as a way to help someone decide whether or not to read and/or buy that particular book.

I think negative reviews benefit both the author and the reader.

As an author, particularly as a Wattpad/AO3 author (but, if I understand correctly, self-published authors on Amazon can edit the digital version of their book with more or less the same ease), I cherish each and every correction comes my way, precisely because I can edit my text right away and, by doing that, make it better.

Aside from "small" corrections with regard to grammar or some other objective aspect of my fics, good, chunky, lenghty, justified, contextualized negative reviews in general help me rework my stories and make them better, both retroactively and for the future.

What I just said also applies to the flip side of the coin, when it's me, as a reader, writing the negative review.

Instead, with regards to reading negative reviews, even though I myself never look at reviews when deciding whether or not to add something to my already gargantuan TBR list, I can see why some people would rather read the reviews and survey the ratings before making that choice.

I should warn you, though, if you're one of these people, that very few reviews, be they positive or negative, can be taken at face value.

(In what follows, I will be talking almost exclusively about negative reviews, but everything I say can be applied to positive ones, as well.)

In my twenty-two years of age, I've come to the unfortunate conclusion that not everyone can truly read, and even fewer people can truly write, so the first problem you could run into is this: the person behind the review either understood fuck-all about the book they just read, or they did understand something but cannot put their opinion into words, or they didn't understand the book and cannot put their opinion into words.

The second problem is that some negative reviews are written with a specific purpose in mind, which is entertainment in some cases, clout in some others. Yet again, @zoyalannister knows how many times I barged into our Whatsapp chat to tell her that a SJM detractor on TikTok straight-up invented some stuff to rant about, subsequently getting views and likes and comments and general activity on their account.

Moral of the story: don't believe everything you see or hear about on the Internet, and always, always form your own opinion based on facts, not hearsay.

(Funnily enough, this is how I got hooked on SJM: I wanted to form my own opinion about her books. The rest is history.)

And, moral of the whole story:

Readers: as long as your opinion is not a personal insult to the author or even threatens to spill into that territory, and as long as the author didn't explicitly say that they don't want to be tagged in a negative review, don't ever restrain yourself from writing one and/or tagging the author, whatever other people might tell you.

Readers: stop speaking on authors' behalf. Not every single one of us will lose their mind if confronted with a negative review. Some of us are searching for just that. Let it be, as it should, an individual decision.

Readers: contrary to popular belief, you do not need to suggest an alternative route for all the things you comment negatively on. You do not need to sweeten the pill for the author with the proverbial spoonful of sugar. You do, however, need to explain the reasoning behind everything you say (or at least that's my opinion).

Readers: I will never block, slander, or insult you if you write me a negative review, even if you don't use the same courtesy towards me and your opinion is not justified in any way. In that case, I will only get mad and refute your every point, as I believe is my right to do.

Authors: don't be a bitch and listen to your readers, if they're making sense. Don't try to convince yourself that they're not making sense when they are.

Authors: look at your works with a judging eye. Be your first critic, be your own critic.

Authors: when facing a negative review, don't hide behind half-assed explanations or apologies or, God forbid, suspension of disbelief. If you fucked up, you fucked up. Cherish the reader who told you that, who maybe even told you how to fix it.

Authors: some reviews have to be destructive before they can be constructive. If there's mold on your bathroom ceiling, you don't just paint over it: you remove the mold first, and then paint over it.

Readers and authors: conduct yourself with dignity. Keep your cool, be level-headed, turn on your brain. And always, always, tell the truth.

Aaand I'm done.

A huge thank you (and congratulations) to everyone who got this far. Unfortunately, I'm everything but laconic.

I'd like to hear your thoughs about all this!

[lokilysolbitch]

My new fixation is bad poetry

and its making me think about how to define art and poetry and what makes poetry good etc but I can't go back and find my sophomore english teacher and rant about it so I'm making it yalls problem. but mr c if ur in here pls read also what do you mean thats one way to skin a hamster. thats not how it goes what are you talking abou

first of all, ive finally figured out my current definition of art: records of the human experience or just experience in general. so yes paintings and poetry but ALSO tiktoks or a decorated room. idc if you think its stupid there are remnants and references to human experiences ALL OVER those. so basically if it left a mark at any point, its art. maybe not always "good" or skilled, deep, etc but it is art (to me)

secondly, what is poetry? the same sophomore english teacher asked this at the beginning of a unit and the class was struggling. every time we listed a requirement for poetry he went "is that necessary though?". "it has to rhyme" "does it?" "it has to be deep" "does it" "it needs to have words!" ".....does it?" man idk i was 15 and sleep deprived

but now im less sleep deprived and i have an answer. I would consider poetry a spectrum (but not necessarily flexible. i wouldn't say you have to bend it's meaning to make something fit) but also playing with language, to be playful with it and have fun with it, to use it as a toy in a way. using language in a way different from its intended use. so writing a personal narrative about a deep topic? not poetry. maybe you had fun with it but thats still its main use. to make words rhyme, to alliterate, to use words just plain wrong? probably poetry. its still a spectrum. and im aware this means that saying something like "yew nork/glass fork" would count as a shitpost and poetry while "Ill love you and ill never stop loving you" doesnt and um i dont care i said what i said--

this would also mean most books and speeches would have little bits of poetry in there and i stand by that too. maybe the entire thing isnt poetry but bits of it could count. i came to this conclusion on the meaning of poetry because i saw too many "aesthetic" free verse poems that were just. tweets. you coulda just made it a sentence and posted it for free. there was no attempt to play with language. you just used it the way you were supposed to. its just a quote.

im definitely going to add more onto this about what i think poetry critics miss sometimes and why formal teaching of poetry is flawed but not all in one post bc its a lot. However i have one last concept to attempt to define. this one has always made me the angriest

GOOD VS BAD POETRY/ART

where do i even start. maybe we should just get rid of these terms completely and make people say what they mean. is it good or did he just use literary devices correctly. is it good or is it genuine. is it good or is it deep. is it good or is it entertaining. is it good or do you like it. is it good or is it popular. is it good or is it complex. is it good or is it creative.

ive been saying since i was i was maybe 12-13 that even though good does not have a solid stable meaning, there is still a sense of what good is. We know what its supposed to be. classical music, Edgar Allen Poe, Da Vinci are good. sure most people barely know or understand or care about these things other than one piece of work they can recall because they had to look at it in highschool that time and the teacher seemed to appreciate it. and we know that reality tv, messily hand drawn animals, and half assed near unintelligible tiktok skits are bad.

but....wait we like those though

ive come to the conclusion that while still shifting, "good"'s meaning in scholarly settings tends to come down to whatever those somethingth century european dudes and what the modern smart looking guys deemed intelligent. and in colloquial settings, what everyone likes.

many pretentious types will say rap is bad and the subject matter is crude and the same way im sure some old european guy would have said or has said traditional african music is too weird and primitive to be respectable.

now. i dont really listen to rap intentionally. if its in there its in there. I used to be pretentious and after changing i just never got too deep into it BUT. i listened to a Nicki Minaj song one time just to see and yeah it was not family friendly but dear god was it clever. the way she'd drop the most genius alliteration-personification-allegory-englishvocabword and then just keep it moving like im not gonna have to stop and ponder the seven layer reference to bedtime hanky panky. its smart. its creative. its complex. and so many rappers can write about the same topics over and over and still come back with a new way of phrasing it. its genuinely impressive

but so many still wouldn't consider it good.

the term good when it comes to art, while having somewhat of a meaning is still useless. make your own personal standards for what is important for you to see in art. its kind of silly for us to collectively decide "okay this art? we like it. this is good" and then go to a different community (age group, culture, race) and go "were going to show you the new gold standard for good! its what we liked! you dont do it like this?? then yours is bad!". historically thats never been a good move

what i find important with poetry (and by poetry i mostly mean song writing bc i dont even read poetry like that) tends to be "is it a poem? or a sentence/paragraph". everything other than that just has to do with my taste and what I prefer in the moment. and it goes the same for everyone else. there's no universal good or bad with art. its just what a dominant or culturally respected group of people said was important.

limericks are bad tho jesus told me/j

TL;DR: i think anything that records an experience is art. i think toying with language mostly makes it poetry, and i think its weird people create little boxes for good and bad and make everyone else adhere to it

[stargirlfeyre]

just saw someone on tiktok saying "nesta never needed redemption, she needed healing" like MAN SHUT THE FUCK UPPP

i don't know why i still keep trying to understand why nesta stans resonate with her character so much when they say shit like this. they're always moaning about how they're the only ones truly get her and then they turn around and completely fail to understand and acknowledge that nesta was just as much of a villain in her own story and that her decisions and behavior are not something to root for.

their biggest argument against her antis is that we are biased and we view feyre and the ic through rose-tinted glasses and yet they can't even see that they're just as blinded by the shitty way they interpret nesta's character. they coddle her so fucking much and try to portray her as some morally superior, misunderstood angel wronged by the narrative when one of the biggest points of her story (no matter how awfully written it was) is to prove that she is not. she was an awful person who went through something awful, which made her worse, so she needed to grow and change.

her cult fails to understand that so badly its laughable. nesta stans are absolutely hopeless, miserable people i can't take it

She needed both. They think she was just a little “mean” when there’s literally quotes of this girl being misogynistic, ableist, classist, and just a downright horrible person. She was hated by majority of this fandom for a reason and it’s not just because people are “misogynistic”. People don’t hate you the way they hated Nesta just because you’re “mean”.

In real life behavior like Nesta’s isn’t tolerated so idk why they jump through hoops trying to defend it in a book. They need to separate their like for Nesta and their morals. In real life you wouldn’t agree with someone moving a disable person’s cane out of reach, in real life you wouldn’t agree with slut shaming, in real life you wouldn’t agree with looking down on poor people, in real life you wouldn’t agree with using a miscarriage to win an argument. So why not apply that same logic to Nesta? They let their love for Nesta blind them from understanding basic human decency then have the nerve to say WE read through rose colored glasses?

Atp I kinda feel bad for Nesta because no one in this fandom is actually a fan of her. Either people dislike her or people like a total stranger that goes against everything she stands for in canon.

[queibaahacer]

Journaling and how to start.

Recently I saw a TikTok on what you need for starting journaling, the video just covered on the items that are needed such as a dotted notebook, a black pen, some markers with brush tips, and a photo printer, and to be honest thats not all. So at this time I bring you more ideas on what to do for starting.

Items.

As on the video you need to star with a pen and notebook, these can also be the ones that you use for the school, your job, an Special Journal or the cheapest ones. If you prefer to invest in a dotted notebook and other things it's ok just don't forget you can also do it with these two listed items.

Notebook - as fancy or a cheap as you want and can, or something where you can write and gather with all your ideas. Some paper, a scrapbook, or letters on a box can do the trick as long as they are gathered together.

Pencil, markers, pen - anything you can use for writing or drawing, as long as it works for you and/or goes with the vibes of what you need to express.

Drawings, pictures, images - if you need to express yourself in a form of an image you can be prepared, it can be with stamps too as long as you have it there, don't struggle yourself on finding an image at an specific moment you can leave the space or make a simple sketch.

Extras - here you can be creative, as per the TikTok you can use a photo printer, leaves from the trees, napkins, tickets, flowers, you can also kiss the notebook and use your lipstick, post stamps, maps and basically anything that can be adhered to the paper.

Intent/time.

Another thing you need to have for this is the intention of doing it. This can be as strict and structured or as free and spontaneous as you want it. There is no correct way of doing it but you need to commit.

As checked you can set an specific day and hour to journal, the aesthetic, topic and the number of pages you will write, if this is something that works for you go for it! In the other hand if you cannot keep this pace my best advice is to take your notebook and pen everywhere with you and once the inspiration hits just write everything there.

Make sure you take some time to keep in check what you place in there either to delete it/ change it/ keep it as it is/ improving it. Personally I check it weekly now but also you can do it daily, right in the moment you do it or as I did a long time ago every time I finished a notebook.

Remember this is a big project for you and you need to give it the time, consider it a priority and make some space in your agenda and if not possible (just extreme and rough weeks) give it your dead time in between the other activities in your life.

Topics.

As it is intended a journal requires you to place what is happening with your life as if you are telling a story about it, everyone knows about the "dear diary" and this is the base so if you don't know where to start this is a good spot.

Starting small with what happened on your day or happening at this specific moment will get you to the point of emptying your mind as you keep going. Here is a list of ideas you can use in case you want to write but can't start.

List of your favorite songs/books

Mood/routine trackers

Drawings of your feelings, thoughts, visualization

Your values/goals

Quotes

Photos

Personal information

Week/weekend plans

Make the profile of a character or real people

QAs (you can find some to ask yourself all over the internet)

Wishlists

Messages from beloved ones

Intentions and manifestation

Recipes

Find what you want to remain in your memory or how you want to express your feelings, if you destroy a page at a given moment you can paste it on a new one and write a little note on what happened, what it made you feel, what you think now or whatever is related to that. As well with happy memories or sad ones. Or you can also make a collage or a visualization board. Remember this is for you and you set the rules for it.

Other options.

The fact that is a journal it doesn't mean it needs to look like a notebook, you can also record your voice, start an online journal or videos. There are many apps out there that can help you with this.

Leave you here the sheet I have used for my own journal to remember my favorite people, and on the back of the page I write a little story that reminds me about that person.

[florasolarsystem]

Us when we were a "singlet": what do you mean you think I have did? There's clearly only one person here

Also us constantly:

Someone singing aloud in the body: (I dunno insert a random tiktok sound here it normally was that)

Person co con (also aloud): SHUT UP ALREADY

Our poor partner on call: ....

"Oh? What book are you asking me about? No I've never read that! ....what do you mean you saw me reading it yesterday?"

I wonder what my aesthetic is. Why can't I have a consistent aesthetic. I just feel so different randomly??

Genuine quote from when I called a friend: "Sorry! I just finished watching Spiderman again and now I'm mimicking Peter Parker again, I'm trying to stop!" (Proceeds to pace around for an hour ranting about his interests)

Huh I wonder when I created all these Instagram accounts? Weird I don't think I'm interested in any thing I followed here? Why'd I say my name was Noah? ....oh well!

Texting a friend: hey don't worry about it, I dunno I just aren't upset over it anymore. It happens i guess.

Friend: ....you were just sobbing over -private problem-?

Yeah I dunno, I don't feel anything about that anymore. I think I'll go read a manga

I've become so known in my family for misplacing things that haven't moved from one spot in years no matter how many reminders I get

Once I spent three months using the words bro, king and comrade to describe anyone and everything. To my parents, friends and even teachers occasionally? And then suddenly stopped and would rarely ever use it unless I was in a "certain mood" (🌠 that would be my bad/lh)

Now apply the above experience to hobbies, more phrases, routines etc.

The host at the time was very sex repulsed asexual. Occasionally people would front and read stuff the host would not be able to, and then the poor host would see it in our search history or open on or phone and feel confused and guilty because "why would I ever read that?"

I had a list in my notes app of my interests. Because otherwise I would forget all the things I liked and assumed this was a normal experience

Genuine list in a notebook we carried around on us constantly during the divorce:

The way to our mum and dad's house

When to pick our siblings up from school and how

Addresses, phone numbers of parents

The names and ages of my siblings

(no I do not know how I thought this was all normal to need reminders about)

I could never learn my timetable, even after a year of consistently doing the same thing each day I would not know. Not even like oh I think I have this class today, every single day just no idea until someone told us

Using the phrase "the other day" constantly because I didn't remember when it happened

[mercuryytheraven]

HELLO YES HI AAAAAA

Yes I love Sherlock, I watched it for the first time a couple of years ago and then again with one of my friends and I’m about to hopefully start working on some art of it as a present for her. She made this gorgeous fanart of Sherlock for my birthday so this is my gift for her going off to college, a little locket with Sherlock art on one side and Connor from Detroit: Become Human on the other (she introduced me to it) and MATCHING QUOTES EEEE!!! I love this show sm and we’re also KINDA WORKING ON A FAN ANIMATIC OOPS WHO SAID THATTT :00 it’s almost done being lined and then it’s basically just color and a little editing left and I’m so excited but The Demons have decided to Afflict me today (got m period) so I will not be working on it at least for right now.

I saw a paper mache shark on TikTok a couple of weeks ago and went yes absolutely I will abandon all of the other things I’m working on right now I need one and then two coats of paper mache later (apparently you shouldn’t leave water and corn starch in the heat of the basement for a week or it will get chunky and smell strangely like popcorn and at that point I didn’t trust it anymore) SHARK!!! I started a Starly also, to hang from my ceiling so it looks like it’s flying, but it’s a lot more round and generally difficult.

Artemis Fowl was good I think, because I specifically bought the book at a used book sale after my kindle stopped working 4754739 years ago so I could read it again, but then I never got to it and it was the most beat up book I had on hand (cover falling off, stains I didn’t notice when buying it on some pages) so it became the sacrifice. I do not remember most of it. Though I did get some books for my birthday, specifically the Diamond and Pearl Platinum manga set and the first Warriors graphic novel so those will be exciting when I finally have a good day and the weather is nice and I can just sit and read!! DO YOU LIKE WARRIORS DK YOU HAVE ANY KNOWLEDGE LF IT WHATSOEVRR STARING YOU IN THE EYES

BITE. HELLO

What kind of things do you like/are you in any fandoms/you seem cool and I want to talk nto you but I don’t know about what!!! Hello!!!!!

BITE YOU BACK

HELLO!!

You also seem cool!! I noticed your banner (I think that's what its called lmao) and I love Falsettos, that seems like a good starting point!!

Peeking at your posts I also notice you have posts about Sherlock, and I'm fascinated by that paper mache shark, and your thoughts about Artemis Fowl?