#its been ages since ive actually done poetry
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sock-kaleidoscope · 5 months ago
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Y'all have no idea the lengths I am going for this mf fic
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c1oud999 · 11 months ago
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hi
i just wanted to come on here and talk about my experience with spirituality. warning: longggg post ahead.
basically ive been in the spiritual community for YEARS now. ive had existential crisis since the age of 11 and ive gone through many phases of many different spiritual trends. from law of attraction, to witchcraft, to religious devotion, to law of assumption and now finally non dualism. i read books, meditated for hours and hours, talked to spiritual ppl from all walks of life and watched all the episodes of ganga upanishad (a show i still highly recommend, you can watch on youtube). all this childhood trauma and mental illness made me crave for sweet relief. but nothing really made sense until law of assumption. i thought that that would be it yk. i thought i was done searching but i think that was when i was searching for things the most. i do know i have it in my 4d, when will i see it? i thought i would get all my desires but did not meet success. and then the non dualism trend began and i hopped onto it like pretty much everyone else. i was bewildered at the stuff teachers kept saying. what do you mean everything's an illusion? there's no way that's true. my very real surroundings are causing me VERY real pain and suffering. oh no no there must be a deeper meaning behind all this. and so i read all the books in 4dbarbies drive, but nothing clicked. yes it made sense intellectually, but i didnt want to believe it bc where is the materialisation satisfaction here? also i felt none of the euphoria that was supposed to come with self realisation. which means i must not be a realised being. and then i cried and cried and cried, isolated myself, literally stopped going to school and just lay in bed all day. but ofc, i continued to read the tumblr posts like i had been doing for the past several years. and yesterday i read 4dkelly's post about giving up. it made sense. by the time i had finished reading the post i had truly given up on everything. on wanting, hoping, fearing, striving etc etc. i was SO tired. so i gave up. fell asleep. i woke up really late as usual and missed the school bus. i ate breakfast in silence, switched the tv on and lied down on the couch like always. and like always out of compulsion and force of habit i reached for my phone and looked up non dualism on twitter. and then i came across a tweet that said a simple sentence only- "nothing is ever actually happening." woah. that kinda drove me to the edge of the cliff i desperately wanted to jump off. i turned on some dnb background music and turned the shower on. i stood under the boiling hot water like some dramatic bitch and started piecing together the "puzzle". it all made so much sense now. i got out of the shower and left the house for the first time in months with a cute outfit and makeup on and everything. i went to the mall, bought candles, stickers, eye masks, coffee, and a doughnut with absolutely no social anxiety at all. i sat by window, read some poetry on my e-reader, cried, peered down at the floor below me and cried some more at the sight of little kids sitting on santa's lap and taking pictures and marveled at all the christmas decorations around me. it was insane. i decided i was going to be neutral towards everything but im in love. maddeningly so. in love with this dream that i thought did not love me back. but love is all there is. I AM ALL THERE IS. and i need you to take this literally. there is nothing happening. there is nothing here except you. nothing to fear, nothing to desire. ik a lot of people are going to dismiss this post because it's not a "materialisation success story" but i honestly dont think i can ever want anything physically bc in all its true essence, what is there to materialise? i am already whole and complete. i am lying on this cold hard floor, but i have never felt warmer. also ik there may be a lot of things ive written you might not agree with but again, this is NOT REAL. I AM. i hope this post helps you.
thank you to all the blogs ive come across and all the pointers they have shared: @se1f @realisophie @itgomyway @4dkellysworld @4dbarbie-backup @infiniteko @iamthat-iam and many more i cannot thank enough.
lots and lots of love (more than you can ever imagine), and good luck.
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theskyexists · 4 years ago
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ive bought harrow the ninth and am now attempting to reread act 1 so that i may understand it better
ianthe clearly proposes that Harrow not get herself killed trying to bring Gideon back - reading it over again. instead to take the future and somehow?? be really powerful together and forget about their cavaliers. but harrow says no
im once again struck with how offhand this book introduces the concept that the empire goes out to deliberately kill planets over a couple of generations
now im not sure....there also seems to be an implication that there’s no aliens - because they say only humanity has a soul - but client planets were said to rebel - i guess the human colonisers rebel against central solar system command sometimes? but then what enemy does the Cohort fight? possibly it’s just bigotry that they think aliens dont have a soul
but like - they find LIVING PLANETS and then - kill them slowly. to the extent that they need to move the entire population. WHAT? why do they do that??? just so they can do some bone tricks???!
what the fuk
so how did the planets get murdered again? and which solar system planets could really have been said to have had enough life to have a soul?? cos like, only one of them is really known for that
why did God give Harrow the choice to go back home TWICE if he was never going to let her?
once again, why mess with the Hand candidates if God was always gonna come for Cytherea? just to mess with him more?
yeah - harrow keeps hearing and saying ortus ninegad but the rest of the world remembers gideon.
Harrow truly is totally mentally shattered AND time is totally fucked up
but sometimes in the fake-ish timeline Harrow remembers but doesn’t remember Gideon - like how she notes that there were two womb-bearing members of the Ninth who were the right age...but only elaborates on herself
for some reason - Harrowhark remembers Ianthe’s arm ripped from her by Cytherea - but now it’s whole. for some reason
that letter is still so what the fuck
‘like you did the last time’ - hm harrowhark sewed Ianthe’s lips shut? how did she come by the power?
is ianthe - calling Harrowhark God?
throughout the first act, they keep referring to time, having too much time, or not mastering time, or not having enough time, ‘this time’ etc.
the eggs you gave me all died - that’s DIRECTED at Harrow, is my theory
ok but the planet revenants come after Lyctors and also God (- God became God when? at the Resurrection) before the Lyctors happened - God was still at Canaan House - despite the Revenants already coming right...
is Teacher criticising god and lyctors for leaving Canaan House lol?
ok so yeah Canaan House WAS part of a ‘last sacrifice’
ok so - Harrowhark is a little resurrection miracle. This implies that God killed a lot to resurrect the Houses.
wow God is being a very dad to Harrow
Blood of Eden - BOE - they turned their back on the solar system. now they hate necromancy. in other words - when the solar system died, God resurrected it - but before that point some humans had fled - lived. and they can see what absolute fuckin horror necromancy is ACTUALLY
so what im getting is...maybe...god resurrected humanity by killing the planets...?
i just realised that Ianthe has taken Gideon’s place as the smartass in the room - the counterweight to Harrow’s portentousness
what the fuck do augustine’s comments to Mercy mean???? why is she unloveable? why would he say that God doesn’t need her? and why is it obscene that Augstine calls God John? What is the dangerous game she’s playing? What was the foul implication??
‘Then that is your downfall’ OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Harrow BURN!!!
what i don’t get is - the Cohort is an army - when they land they die because they’re being killed by an enemy at the front - NOT in pure sacrifice for thanergy. so why does only the death of humans and planets produce thanergy. why is the death of the enemy not good enough? they don’t have fuckin souls?? they MUST be complex life. and doesn’t a planet produce a constant stream of thanergy? but i guess it’s not dying enough - generally its life maintains itself in ecosystems.....unless a fuckin lyctor ‘makes the juice flow’ i guess!
sometime in the next book there IS gonna be a ‘are we the baddies’ meme. muir loves memes and she stuck skulls on absolutely EVERYTHIGN. Like WHY THE FUCK would you colonise planets if you gotta kill them for it? LOL????
huh? augustine just said that they can’t use necromancy when in the river - but mercy mocked harrow for having hypothermia ? implying her fundamental failure was not being able to necro while in the river? Harrow’s inability was what was wrong partly right?? oh no ok it’s how Harrow tried to compensate for her body going lights out while in the river. alright. that was written confusingly
how and why is this a completely different story???
The Sleeper.......is Harrowhark? the suit is too close to what she was wearing killing the asteroid. and the sleeper is lying on ‘something’. oh they just straight up say it lololol
ortus got into trouble 19 years ago...hhmmmmm wasn’t Gideon 19??? huh? which is why Mercy started at Harrow’s peculiar YELLOW eyes that Harrow can’t see herself i think
‘i do things face to face’ ortus says after stabbing harrow. HUH? why go for a stab if decapitating would have done the job? just to give her a small chance to fight back? (face to face?)
why not tell God that ‘his’ attack dog is trying to kill you?
why does Ortus the First want me dead? ‘who?’ ---uh. has she forgotten him completely (time shit) or is she saying the wrong name? mercy wouldnt reply like that then right?
she told him and he’s like - oh well guess you gotta just get through repeated almost-successful attacks on your life. ???? THANKS GOD!!!
‘you, with your unfortunate memory for poetry’ HA! i love how we are reminded that she knew all the fuckin damn books nearly by heart which is insane!
Teacher suggests his dying at least three times a day?? hahaha what?.........................is this purely a meme reference. is that meme the mental image im supposed to have of Teacher??????????? is this trying to say that this meme was preserved in the amalgamation of human life that is Teacher?? oh my god....
no.....palamedus and camilla....did old Harrow really kill them.....
seems like all the murders were consensual maybe?
it’s probably too straightforward that Harrow created and alternate timeline and made for a Harrow Lyctor without Gideon dying and kicked her to the original? maybe she took Ianthe and Coronabeth with her bc she needed Ianthe’s help
is this Cytherea or Dulcinea? Pro seems real this time. why does Dulcie call Pal and Cam strands and cords?
did muir put in a fuckin secondary school S - muir’s just like - im gonna put in all the memes as a nod to ancient human culture
still no idea what the messages are that Harrow is getting
This Harrow is so goddamn sick. I mean she was sick before, but at least she had Gideon. Really do feel that that helped her. now she didn’t have that -- AND she’s getting slapped with trauma another five times
if ortus can undo the thanergy of her own bone then why not simply crumble HARROW into dust? cos there’s a core of thanergy fusion in her that he can’t undo?
FLKJDFKLJSDLFSD fucking IANTHE ‘Wow! Not how I imagined this happening, at all.’  FUCKIN HELL
Harrow with her fucking fucked up dramatic inner monologues about weakness and Ianthe comes in with this shit. she really is doing Gideon proud here.
Did love Harrow’s musings about how only a truly idiotically obedient Cavalier would be the only one to keep to a vow of silence. HAH! nice one muir
‘have you taken the time to rest lately?’ asks God, YOUR FUCKING SAINT IS TRYING TO KILL HER IN THE FUCKING BATH YOU IDIOT AHAHAHAHA
JEZUS FUCKING CHRIST - try and be normal Harrow! try and make some soup and read a book! Harrow: *does and then hyperventilates hidden under her bed after 86 hours of zero sleep*
she was trying to remember what cutlery did. why is this so goddamn funny hahahaa. this book has ONLY been Harrow being in extreme states of misery ALL THE TIME both mentally and physically to the point of death
GOD IS HAPPY THAT SHE MADE SOUP AND DOESNT EVEN FUCKIN NOTICE SHE’S NOT SLEPT FOR A WEEK SOMEHOW THIS IS THE MOST HILARIOUS SHIT
thats what you fucking GET you piece of shit god! you push a prodigy teen to the brink and she fuckin explodes your lyctor and feeds you her fuckin marrow. maybe you shouldn’t have ignored her goddamn fucking understandable distress
SHE FUCKIN HITS HIM WITH THE FUCKIN TRUTH what an IDIOT of a God. he truly doesn’t understand mortality anymore huh
I LOVE HOW MERCYMORN CONTINUES TO MAKE HARROW YOUNGER IN HER HEAD AHAHAHAHAHAHA she’s only nine years old!!!hahahaha
naturally God focuses on how - wait- actually harrow is truly an INSANE necromancer - INSANE
still no idea what the fuck is going on in the not-past
aww. ianthe’s scent soothes harrow now. begrudgingly of course.
i thought this was gonna be lovely angsty harrow/gideon but naturally that did not happen
harrow is comfortable! first time in the whole book! one moment of comfort!!!
‘love my twin, also murder’ tridentarius pffjlfjdljf
‘how i crave your honeyed words’ hah
wow this scene sure is weirdly sexual with these similes lol ‘as though she had shyly undressed for you’ ok there Harrow you about to chop her arm off calm it probably sex repulsed thirsty teen
i do love how....there is this theme again that’s everybody underestimating the main character - who is actually a prodigy. Gideon had that with the sword and Harrow also has it with being a Lyctor now
it’s so telling that these Saints would rather be shits to these babies than help Ianthe grow a new fuckin arm
i dont see why Ianthe can’t work off this bone construct which is her own stuff and put some flesh on it since SHES A FLESH NECRO?
Ianthe that’s super gay
wow muir really never delivers on full gay does she??? i dont mind but i think it’s so striking hahaa
how are Harrow and Ianthe still hung up on the Saint of Duty? i mean, if they dont have him against the RB they’re dead anyway
why is the First going through rain and ice?
Harrow haunted? naawwww
i cant help but like mercymorn though - she cares. it’s soured ages ago but she cares.
awww Harrow needs Ianthe to sleep
Ianthe constantly poking Harrow for her prudishness is so goddamn funny.
‘It’s the type of energy i wish to take into my future’ AHAHAHAHAHAAH IANTHE MY GOD
‘i always forget you were an honest to go nun ... and six years old to boot if you listen to mercymorn’ HAHAHAHAHAHA
‘you look good enough that im proud of my handiwork but not so good that i’ll be consumed with lust and ravish you over the nut bowl’ fpdfjsdfkjsd this is what harrow means with crude japery and yet....
mercymorn has started to call harrow three years old. i will NEVER tire of this gag
all of the blood of eden stuff happened in the past 25 years??? god was on the erebos, but he also remembers ortus kicking the commander out of an airlock? that was in the last 25 years??
Ianthe‘s carressing the nape of Harrow’s neck. hmmhm
its honestly super weird if you think about it for more than 10 seconds that theyre talking about their cavaliers whom they murdered (im still not sure if all consensually) ten thousand years ago (!) and how hot they were that just seems.....fucked up
Harrow is like WHAT THE FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!! basically all the time but especially now. yep well that was to be expected i guess lololol
Harrow being painfully frozenly fascinated by (god having) sex and deeply repulsed is very Harrow
oh nooooo well that was a perfect kiss between them really
the funny thing about Harrow is that though she is so completely fucked up - just like Gideon - she is fundamentally a helper.
why wouldn’t Harrow have thought of blood wards! she knew he could only bleed thanergy! it;s the first thing i thought - just use not bone wards then!
ortus thinks anastasia is in Harrow - which makes me think - why does he think that’s possible?
mercymorn now calls Harrow a two-year-old. i am waiting for embryonic genius
so did they use the river to get to the planets theyre killing?
Harrow feels the peace and pleasure of a stroll through nature that she has come to kill
oh my god - Harrow somehow saved Cam and Pal is still attached to the mortal plane!!
Harrow helps Cam risking herself entirely just like that. yknow as she does
i wonder if Pal has realised that Harrow is not who he remembers
i think he realised once he realised haz mat suit was Harrow also...
ianthe xo’d harrow.....lol
im sad that original harrow is definitely dead.... :( loved her. guess gideon’s not coming back either. not sure how the second adept survived. she didn’t survive in the original timeline either. but she was ‘killed’ in the other - just like coronabeth..so that means soemthing
this whole ‘flashback’ stuff to Canaan House is Harrow being in the River the whole time. the cold temperatures, the blood, the creatures theyre fishing from the sea that apparently abominations
after all, we’ve just learned about river bubbles and a haz!harrow that can change their parameters.
all the people ‘dead’ she’d not spoken to much or at all beforehand. like they’re NOT real, in the River. the only one not like that is Dyas...
the fact that the narrative keeps calling Dulcie, Dulcie means she’s really Dulcie.
there’s giant organs falling from the ceiling. this is definitely the river
they talk about time AGAIN
the Body is the devil who let herself be used to complete the work of Teacher and the Lyctors in his mythology....hmm. and when they realised the price (AFTER? the work was done?) they wanted her dead but he buried her....SHE allowed them to become Lyctors?? I still don’t understand why the heck that was necessary
the king is dead, long live the king. hmmmm
Harrow comes onto a hallucination of the devil who was her first crush with the voice of her parental figures and the eyes of a love interest she can no longer remember - which is actually not precisely a hallucination probably - and gets summarily rejected lol OUCH (the Body didn’t mean it that way ofc)
Harrow is so repressed on every single front but definitely sexually
I love Mercy
so there is death beyond death. does everybody go into the river and become a mad horrid ghost? like - is that everybody’s fate? how awful
ok so God DID resurrect the planets also. ? but like. then why are there resurrection beasts?
what does resurrection mean? and who killed the planets in the first place?
BECOMING NONE HOUSE, LEFT GRIEF
oh.....my god.
ARE YOU AND IANTHE BEING SAFE!!?!?!?! HHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA
HIS BODYGUARD IS THE DEVIL??
so the destruction of Earth somehow made God? as though it was something that simply followed from it
A.L. was destroyed in the first assault? Of an RB
so the RB’s were happily running off in the other direction until they decided to fuck around and kill their mates to become immortal and powerful - then the RB’s turned around and came towards them - which meant leaving the planets God had resurrected forever.
what the fuck god??? hahahahaa
God always seems so likeable goddamn.
Harrow is such a dramatic bitch. Affection??? JUST KILL ME!!! KILL ME!! LET ME SMASH THE GLASS SO I CAN KNEEL IN IT AND BLEED ALL OVER THE FLOOR!!!!
Harrow goes into her fun kid's game of not dying to traps.
But she instantly calls him father. OH MY GOD
HE DOESNT BELIEVE HER!!!
'then that will be your downfall' - is what Harrow said to Augustine AND IT WILL BECOME TRUE FOR THEM ALL
to be dismissed like that where it hurts most - to have God Dad dismiss her only slip of comfort her only pillar of truth in this crazy old world
'nobody had watched you leave'
SOMEBODY HAD - I love all the deliberate references to Gideon
Temporal lobe!!!! Again the temporal lobe!!!
So why was it again that Harrow refused to be locked in with the Emperor?
So isn't God gonna check out Harrow's temporal lobe? He's just gonna let that mystery go to its death?
WHAT THE FUCKKKKKKKKK
Muir what the fuck??!!!!!!!!
Oh it was.....a hallucination?
Always love how this dips into genuine horror sometimes
What's weird is that Lyctors seem made for the task of going into the river and killing Resurrection Beasts - instead of the other way around.
So say - that the sword somehow holds Gideon's soul (we've just learned that that's possible from Pal and also Ortus trying to get Pent to summon his grandma by his sword) - does it not make sense that Harrow 'for some reason' stabbing Cytherea's corpse with it transferred it to her? Or maybe it's SOMEHOW Anastasia if Ortus was macking on her. But Ortus thought HARROW had/was Anastasia.
IANTHE WANTS TO MARRY HARROW - HAHAHAHAAHAHAHA
Every fucking chapter doesn't make things any clearer. This is worse than Gideon the ninth
Hello???? Am I reading a canon alternate universe roleswap au??? What the FUCK is going on. This is like - if they hadn't gassed the 200 and her parents instead adopted Gideon for her clear necromantic gifts which nobody noticed somehow the other time round
I do love how Aiglamene was the sole source of slight comfort in Gideon's life. And Crux was Harrow's - apparently in any sequence of events.
Harrow is tumbling through timelines. But how can you do that just by messing with the lobe?
WHAT!! WHAT!!!
Is this...is this what I think it is??? Is thi
The fanfic roots are STRONG in this one. In fact I believe I've READ this fanfiction
Harrow's temporal fever dream (in the river?) HAD HER (Decidedly Not) VYING FOR 'HER DIVINE HIGHNESS' hand, which is either the Body or Gideon or both lololol. Seeing as the previous had Gideon as the main unnamed titled character - I bet it's Gideon ahahaaga
A fucking. COFFEESHOP AU. OH MY GODDDDDDDDDDDDD
We've had roleswap, 'ball' au, and coffee shop au populated by the ghosts of the dead LOLOL,
I knew it!! I knew that they were ghosts and that they were in the river!!
Ok so but when did Harrow shoddily create the bubble? When she adjusted her memories at the start? When is this. Ah Harrow has the same thought hahaa
So the stage is a - she was building her memories while sleeping?
Why is that she cannot access her lyctorhood like this...
I just realised that Harrow's mind made the party food taste like SALT based on Ianthe's cooking!!!! Hahahaha
THE NARRATOR IS GIDEON. But it doesn't sound like Gideon though
There's more to the work than simply preserving Gideon's soul though. There are next steps that Harrow prepared for that Harrow doesn't know about yet
Who was the sleeper and why was it in Harrows riverscape of memories that she ACCIDENTALLY??? made
Ok she sounds like Gideon NOW
Gideon no it's not because she didn't want you! It's because she wanted you to live!!!!!
And she succeeded....your soul is INTACT in her body!!!! You're protecting her with full consciousness!! How the fuck. And why didn't that happen before when she went to the bubble?
Are the ghosts of the contestants happy that they got pulled out of the River briefly? Or were they so briefly in there they couldn't remember?
She returned them to the RIVER???? is that really such a kind fate????
Something has gone wrong in the River - yeah because why r all these ghosts going insane and stoppering it up like slib
Do love how Muir has found a way to give these characters more screentime
I actually said 'oof' when Harrow screamed at Ortus - oof that really is embarrassing. GodDAMN Ortus you stepping up with the emotional support!
I've EVEN read the damn fanfic in which they switched bodies. My god.
A. L. apparently is thought to wander about still. I think she's the body....I do believe she's the body. That's why the Lyctors are scared of her
She thought - what. Mercy is talking about blood of Eden's commander. What is going onnnnn still!!!! Mercy is the traitor I guess. But how is blood of Eden connected to the ninth house and the body?
Why is Mercy awake on the mithraeum and not in the River anyways?
Gideon.... And the commander were in cahoots? So did A. L. and Anastasia an the body and the commander all have the same eyes?????
What the fuck is going on indeed.
Cytherea seems to have had a plan B for getting revenge on the Emperor. Or something had a plan B with her corpse as the main weapon.
If guns are so effective against people why aren't they still used.
The messages are from the commander. I.e. Gideon's mother. I.e. Anastasia? We never explicitly did learn how she met her end no? Gideon was convinced that Anastasia had taken the baby. It just seems incongruous how the Emperor spent like 80 years on the Erebos and the Lyctors were faffing about - meanwhile there was this drama going on in the last half century?
I love Abigail Pent. Love that I got to see more of her.
I'd honestly forgot that Judith was alive by the end of all of that shit
The sleeper is -the sleeper is Gideon's mother. Also. She's haunted by her mother. SOMEHOW. what the fuck? They couldn't drag her spirit back from the river they said!
'you wizards never learn' there's a whole modern regular sci fi world and culture out there! Or maybe it's just a. L.
Is it? Or is it Anastasia? Or is it the commander? Or are they the same thing?
The sleeper wants Harrow's body. Somehow invaded it - probably from the river? - which means its Anastasia or the commander. Which means that whatevers possessing Cytherea is someone else.
In retrospect - Harrow's coldness to Ianthe talking about - to what her - seemed nonsense at the time - in the very first part - doesn't quite fit.
Oh my fucking GOD Gideon is fighting Ianthe for messing around with her fucking girlfriend - who is HARROW, who actually, Ianthe wants to marry.
They just went from ramping up to a serious fight to Gideon dropping Corona's name and suddenly they're like - ah we got more important priorities actually.
Augustine's first thought at thinking a.l./the body (?) is in Harrow is John - and the Second is Joy!(mercy?)
'How I was gonna have to take showers with all your clothes on.' fuckin Gideon hahahaha
Wonder if Ianthe truly believes what she's saying - that Harrow was trying to rid hersel of Gideon. It's preposterous. It's just hurtful talk.
GIDEON REALLY THOUGHT THAT LOOK TO MEAN THAT HARROW DIDNT LOVE HER??? THIS IS A CONSTANT BARRAGE OF ALL THE ANGSTY DRAMATIC SHIT IVE BEEN YEARNING FOR
Oh my fucking god Gideon calling Ianthe out for being in love with Harrow in the most iconic way ufsojdjdodnd 'she wants the D - the D stands for dead'
Crazy brain-mutilated Harrow sure made it seem that way I can tell ya that!!
Hahahahahaha Ianthe remembering Harrows prudish Ortus/Cytherea shit. Amazing
Aw Gideon really went and fell right into the cavalier/bone mistress shit huh. And trying to shield Harrow - well as noted before - very necessary because harrow has been having a godawful miserable time - mostly because of herself.
Gideon appreciating Ianthe's pun xD
Love how neither of them position themselves as the love of Harrows life but instead as inexorably attached to her by the sheer role they play in her life - they don't dare aspire to what they think they can't get.
Muir realises this is gonna end up as a Gideon/Harrow(/theBody)/Ianthe ship right?
Oh WOW THIS IS AMAZING. nonius the legendary nonius!!! Come to protect Harrow!!!
For some reason the Sleeper can manipulate the rules of this River bubble and doesn't seem surprised about it
If all her cavaliers were this excited for death, she was definitely the problem.lololol. somehow Harrow, you inspired undying loyalty in even a person that you treated abominably
Yeah Harrow you slowpoke. If the Sleeper can adjust the rules - so can you
If the sleeper was not Harrow's invention - but planted itself - then they're very lucky it got to the ghosts that weren't actually there - first.
So it was the commander....a portrait in a shuttle of blood of eden - can only be the commander. And redhaired? There are too many red haired people in this book!!
It's nice how all these ghosts got to have lasting impact from beyond the grave
NONIUS KNEW ORTUS/GIDEON?
Ok so ....there's the bed of the River with stoma. But there might also be the other side.
Did Harrow really not account for steps beyond her plan to mutilate her brain?
Is this book really gonna go: fuck you Gideon will die anyway ?????
But.wait. the sleeper had a two-hander. Where did that go???
I don't get it. If they go into the river - won't they also go insane?
SO NYAH!!!!!???
Ok but - what? The Commander ALSO -somehow - took over Cytherea's body?
'did the ten billion give you that too' I KNEW CANAAN HOUSE HELD EVEN GRUESOMER EXPERIMENTS AND SACRIFICES THAN LYCTORHOOD. God is made of ten billion souls. I think they killed humanity on earth to spare it 'slow inexorable apocalypse' and used the power to make the Empire from the resurrected. There was an extremely vague implication by Teacher to the amount of souls violated in Canaan house in the first book.
So God knows the commander went for the ninth house? Firstly, how. I don't understand how Anastasia fits in here!!! It would explain though how the commander
So the commander found the ninth house - and she died right? They tried to call her spirit but couldn't. But she became a revenant?
Ah. God THREW the bomb.
A fuckin wake me up inside joke jskdjskdnd
So Mercy and Augustine ( not Gideon ?) had all turned against God? And they were working with the commander to -... Make a baby????? And then evacuate the houses???? (For when God dies - there being a risk that Dominicus would go out I guess)
Make a baby/body to lever the one who lies in the tomb into....?
Love how the book foreshadowed Mercy and Augustine manipulating and lying to God - and turns out they did that on much bigger scale
They....meant to kill the baby to break the blood ward?
'The woman who I was pretty sure was my mother, wearing the body of the woman I'd had a crush on, who in turn had been wearing the identity of a woman she'd murdered -' KSNFKDJDKFJJFC
So why did they want this consistently characterised as kindly and humane god dead?
GIDEON THOUGHT IT WAS HIS!!!! But he called Wake Anastasia then????
They really are the same???
Oh my god I know what they're gonna say. Gideon is the daughter of God. WHICH HARROWS FUCKIN ROYALTY AU FEVER RIVER DREAM FUCKING FORESHADOWED HAAHAHAHAHHAA
Isn't it fucking ironic that God told Harrow that - HE WANTED HER TO BE HIS??? WHILE GIDEON HIS ACTUAL DAUGHTER WAS SPINNING INSIDE HER CHEST LIKE A LITTLE NUCLEAR FUSION REACTOR
They've been trying to kill him for more than 500 years???? Did mercymorn actually genuinely learn the extremely fine knowledge of the body for THIS purpose? How many thousands of years ago did they decide to kill god?
A fucking DAD JOKE
GIDEON REMEMBERING HOW SHE USED TO TELL HARROW HOW HER OTHER PARENT MIGHT BE THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN THE WORLD SO STOP PICKING ON HER
I am fucking DELIGHTED I AM SO GODDAMN OVERJOYED
It segues into a reminder of how shit their childhoods were and how their suffering had them lash out at each other endlessly and how it made Harrow suicidal and shit though - which is great
ALECTO'S EYES. THE A. FOR A. L.
A. L. The cavalier of God....but she walked. She had a body.
Ohhhhh. That's why they betrayed him. That age-old hurt. Ten thousand years old but still the bane of their existence, the seed of their madnesses. The loss of their cavaliers. Oh how did they manage to keep that from him?
I honestly thought - is Mercy saying she knows he killed humanity? But that's not what she couldn't have forgiven?
But why did he hide it? Why did he hide the perfect way? ('it would be easier' why???)
Ah. Yes. The expansion, why would the Emperor do that?
Uhhhhh. Couldn't Mercy have done that all along??????????????????????? Couldn't Mercy have killed God all along? That was both a trick and utterly sincere.
Augustine and Mercy were trying to do the right thing..... Mercy.... :'( Augustine was right. God is much less sentimental than he seems.
'im not even mad that you failed to either fix or put down Harrow' hm guess the constant kill quest HAD come from God after all. What a goddamn bitch of a man
What was the original plan? Unleash a. L. ? And then what? How would that help with the whole Dominicus going out problem?
Had God ever really thought to make up for all the bullshit he put his Lyctors through. He seems so affable and human but he's caused so much suffering. He's as good at manipulation at them - better!
The resurrection beast can't kill him, but he let his Lyctors die to them one by one anyway. So why??
Why are they punching each other in the River? They can use theorems right? God could blast Augustine to pieces same he did mercy?
Yes! It's true! Pyrrha and Gideon both exist in the same body - foreshadowed by his cavaliers build. There was something so fishy about it.
I love how Gideon has exactly the same response as me: what the fuck. Pyrrha??? Gideon??? What the fuck??? Why did they BOTH have an affair with their enemy??? So ok. Pyrrha stayed underground from Everybody for the thousand years. SOMEHOW their compartmentalisation let her pop up in his body regularly and not just when Gideon remembered her - because the hadn't fucked up his brain. But then how did THEY do that.
This absolutely galactic balsiness
The stoma thinks John is a resurrection beast. Might it be.....because he's..... A revenant. A 10 billion souled kinda- revenant ? A bit like.....Harrow is? Which is why he felt kin to her? Which is why he compared her creation to Resurrection?????I've really gotta reread those messages from commander wake.
A fucking jail for mother meme. Jail for one thousand years. Gideon how do you know this one????
I KNEW Ianthe would do that. Knew it. She doesn't want the system to die. Coronabeth is still out there. Well guess what - she's on the opposite side babe. Ok I realised that Gideon's mum apparently stuck to Gideon and then the sword? But also did Harrow manage to break the blood ward because of of her proximity to Gideon? Did Harrow uhhhh get put into a pocket in the river? But the emperor wasn't murdered!!! Fuckin chapters kept lying. They're on a hold planet. Finally - we meet the people. Alecto and Camilla and Corona? And Judith.? Did Alecto somehow do a time twisty around to come save Gideon at that moment in the river? Once again nothing much more is clear.
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revol-lover · 4 years ago
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i know i have become a shit post queen but this site is a good place to just dump thoughts when i’m too lazy to actually write them down so don’t mind me. also i’m “ok enough”. like i’m not ok-ok but i’m not like badly not ok. 
ok? anyway.
so idk what it is. being raised by emotionally distant parents esp my mom or the depression thats probably also related to that but man i just feel so empty for such long periods of time. empty, or maybe detached is a better word. and just really really restless. and also that when i have good emotions, i dont feel them all that much. idk. sometimes i feel like i’m on the outside looking in on my life. i have a lot of feelings but then at the same time i dont. maybe because i repress a lot then it all builds up and explodes. idk. its awful though. 
i also feel like i have two very distinct sides to me. half of me is like fuck this shit i just want to self destruct but i wont because i’m too responsible to do that and the other half is like wow life is so interesting i am a spirit not a body and i want to be an enlightened being. neither of those sides of me is less me than the other. neither is a farce or anything but its fucking hard for those two sides of me to coexist. the only middle ground, which is probably like 1/3 of the time how i feel, is blah. neutral to absolutely everything.
and i think ive talked about this before but before the whole corona/quarantine thing i was at this extreme level of DONE with feeling isolated in my life, esp as a sahm. done with falling into the trap of believing being a mom was my whole identity (and its definitely a part of it, of course. but i think its unhealthy for moms to think its all we are) like i totally lost myself for a while. my daughters birth being traumatic and her having potential life long complications (and ‘potential’ meaning, her diagnosis is so complicated. theres never going to be a time where we get a real “all clear”. some kids have developed seizures again way down the road, especially at certain ages where kids go through a lot of development.) and then ofc just raising a child with all of that going on, plus normal toddler craziness, plus having a kid who is super hyper and smart and amazing but parenting after having a difficult relationship with your own mother is one of those things that is really hard and not talked about enough. i never feel like im doing enough. i never feel like she likes me.i know thats so stupid but i really am that insecure about my parenting, no matter how hard i try. i just want my child to love me and sometimes toddlers do things that make you feel like crap (ex ‘i dont want u mom i want daddy!’ and i can rationalize it, dad’s the exclusive parent. i’m just here all the time like the furniture. i get it.) and its just a big complicated thing with my emotions. not what i was trying to say tho i got off track.
anyway the isolation thing. so i had a plan. a plan!!! i have this one awesome long time friend, honestly my only friend outside of my husband who knows me like the good bad and ugly, has known me for a very long time, and has been there for me through some really tough shit. he’s like the brother i never had, truly. (i have a biological brother but we dont really talk.) so i talked to him about things i was going through and he’s also been going through a challenging time in his life and he told me he’d help me get out there. we were going to force me to learn to socialize and make friends in “real life” by putting me in those situations. we were going to go to some poetry club. a show downtown. like i was ready. then corona happened. and my already crawling out of my skin isolation got worse because hey we cant do anything now, not even see my one friend. 
so yeah. i was fine in the beginning of all this because i figured, hey by may itll be over! then hey by june! then maybe 4th of july. which has become, my daughter is so excited about her birthday party in august and i dont even know if i can throw her one and i dont know how to deal with this or explain it to her.
i know this is major first world problems and im all over the place and i document this dumb shit because i hope one day i’ll be so far past it and be able to look back and think well wow i made it through 2020  but yeah idk
i think part of it is i’m turning 27 in two weeks and my saturn return thing is just getting so close and i’m starting to see the beginning of shit in my life crumbling underneath me. like i know what i gotta do. i  have to put myself out there. i have to get out of my safety zone. and i have to use my gifts to help others not just sit here drowning in my self pity but obviously its hard to challenge yourself and put yourself out there, literally, during a pandemic. 
and the last point which is just something that boggles my mind about myself that i dont understand. like i’m definitely depressed. i have very bad anxiety too. and even though i can be extremely self pitying and go into like a black hole of sadness, i still dont let myself do bad things. which is good, obviously. but its iike i’ve been recovered from self injury for probably about ten years but some days i am so deep in my shitty feelings or empty feelings that i just want to do it again but i cant. theres something in me that wont let me. and i guess im glad for that, obviously. i guess my life/universe/guardian angel is trying to force me to face shit for real and not just have shitty coping mechanisms but idk. like it was a bad outlet but idk. sometimes, just sometimes, i feel like it did more for me than just writing things out. which is bullshit because it did nothing for me except give me a bunch little permanent reminders of shitty times. but idk. that’s my brain for you. sometimes i want to just let it all go and be a mess in my feelings and not care if i’m ok but then my brain is like nope bitch you cant do that. youre not 17 anymore, get up.
and i know some people would read this (well no - no one would read all this lmao but in a theoretical sense) and think like, oh did you try therapy or oh maybe try meds and the thing is 
therapy - i tried it. i liked the idea of it. bad fit with the therapist tho. didnt like being kicked out after 45 min (which i understand but bitch i need more than that to explain one problem) and it felt weird to be told by her, that she felt like i had a good handle on things. cause i dont really feel that way and i feel like she didnt have much to tell me  in terms of how to idk fix myself besides journaling, which i’ll give her. it helps
meds: i i dont really want to go that route yet because my body is really sensitive to medication. like i dont even take bc or anything like that. however i think ive decided that since its super legal and obtainable i might try pot once we are able to move into our own place. so if anyone did actually read this far and have experience with that (esp w anxiety) please enlighten me. i had some samples of some cbd stuff and it was amazing for my anxiety but it’s way too expensive for me to use consistently.
this has been a very long shit post but i feel better so theres that.
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ms-camucia · 5 years ago
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Footnotes’ Chapters
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So in procrastinating getting this second-to-last chapter of Footnotes finished, I went back and did something I meant to do ages ago, and actually gave each chapter a title and pull quote summary. I know for me writing-wise, this instantly made going back and figuring out when/where something happened a whole lot easier, it’s a lot more reader-friendly, and it’s something I’ll be better about in the future - I mean, for god’s sake, Alternative Methods managed to have chapter titles from the get go.
Before you call out my first two chapter names as super lazy, it’s because they parallel each other, and really should have just been one chapter, but oh well. Here they all are, for anyone interested, including the Song of Solomon quotes I’m using for the last two chapters, since they don’t have titles yet:
1. The Jedi Alone
2. The Leader Alone
3. From A Certain Point of View
4. A Guardian of Hope   
5. The Ghosts of Yavin IV
6. Forbidden Insights and Stolen Thoughts
7. The Wayward Prince
8. Inebriated Negotiations
9. Fumblings of the Repressed
10. Repercussions and Resolutions
11. The Prince in Disguise
12. A Dance With Death
13. Passions of the Jedi
14. The Leader’s Possession
15. A Mother’s Machinations
16. Lessons in Trust
17. A World Between You and Me
18. The Return of a Certain Jedi
19. Resistance is Peace, Chaos is Order
20. “I belong to my beloved, and his desire is for me.”
21. “All night long on my bed I looked for the one my heart loves; I looked for him but did not find him.”
22. Epilogue: Footnotes’ Footnotes (Come out, and look, you daughters of Zion. Look on King Solomon wearing a crown, the crown with which his mother crowned him on the day of his wedding, the day his heart rejoiced.)
Pull quotes under the cut:
1. The Jedi Alone
Rey felt warmth travel down her spine, and her stomach tied in knots. This… this was not what she was expecting to find at all. Beneath the hurried notes, Rey found - in a much more deliberate, calligraphed script - poetry.
2. The Leader Alone
In the end, that was all they were - just glimpses. Visions just brief enough for his chest to clench - in anger? That was certainly the easiest one. After all, she was the one who left him, when she, of all people... Was it anguish? Sorrow? Those seemed closer. Regret? Best to not examine those feelings too closely.
3. From A Certain Point of View
How did this turn around so quickly on him? How did she know exactly how to rip him apart every time? Rey was right, his ambition, his drive, his dreams - his visions of her - had distracted him yet again.
4. A Guardian of Hope    
Rey took a shaky step back from the podium, and right into a large, warm body. 'I've got you,' came a whisper at her ear as a black, gloved hand slowly ran its thumb down Rey's arm, leaving her shivering in its wake.
5. The Ghosts of Yavin IV
Call it attending a fundraiser, call it giving a speech - Kylo knew what was happening here. They wanted her to be a rallying cry. They wanted to turn her into a weapon. They wanted her as an attack dog. They wanted her face as the one people associated with the power of the Resistance. They wanted to do to her exactly what Snoke had done to him.
6. Forbidden Insights and Stolen Thoughts
These were not the flowery, fanciful words of Ben Solo. This was not a boy extolling the beauty of the world around him, longing for the girl in his dreams. This... this was him becoming someone else altogether, Rey realized, her heart in her throat.
7. The Wayward Prince
For so long, it had been Kylo Ren who had protected him. Kylo Ren, who shielded the tattered remains of the boy who had been Ben Solo. But here, surrounded by opulence and aristocracy - the crusader, the warrior was useless. He needed to be the Prince.
8. Inebriated Negotiations
“You know I’m not going to agree to... whatever it is you have in mind. You’re clearly trying to set something up here for you to win.”
Ben allowed a small smile to cross his face as he twirled her shoe on his finger. “You’d think that. But for you, Rey, I’m willing to give you everything.”
9. Fumblings of the Repressed
Ben Solo currently had the literal girl of his dreams strewn across his lap, he had just confessed more to her about how he felt than he would have ever admitted sober, and instead of her recoiling in horror, she felt compelled to seize his shirt and bite his lip. He was quite convinced that he had never, in his entire life, had so many things go right.
10. Repercussions and Resolutions
As much as Rey found honesty in his declarations last night of only wanting to ‘figure things out’ between them, and claiming that he was only here to discuss terms of ownership with his journal, she knew that it was ludicrous to assume Poe and Finn would trust his intentions.
And now they were all planning on showing up here at the same time.
11. The Prince in Disguise
“That’s - that’s the rest of the Resistance! They can’t see you here!” “Why not? It’s my damn apartment!” “It’s - it’s too hard to explain right now, and it’s the General’s-” “Got my name on it.” “Kriff, Ben, this is not the time for a lesson in property ownership!” “I’ll give you a lesson in property ownership.”
12. A Dance With Death
“Clearly,” Ben hissed, glaring down at Poe as the shard moved closer to his skin “-we have different views of last night’s events. I saw a very real, and very capable threat. I saw a man who had obviously been manipulated with the Force. I saw Rey inches and milliseconds from dying. And I will not allow them a second chance.”
13. Passions of the Jedi
“Please, Rey. Let me know that I’m - I’m not alone in this. That it’s not just the Force, that it's not just our bond - that it’s us - that there’s actually something - something more here.”
14. The Leader’s Possession
"Ben would have died a happy man without Rey discovering that, in his weakest moments, all he could fantasize about was her absolute acceptance of him, and her sincerity in promising to never leave. Why couldn’t he just imagine simple, baseless sex like a normal person?"
15. A Mother’s Machinations
“From what I’ve read so far… I’m not sure... I... want to be a Jedi?”
An ashen look came over Leia’s face, suddenly making her look years older. Shakily, she took another long drink from her tea, the silence filling the air between the General and the would-be Jedi.
“That’s… That’s not the first time I’ve heard - you sound just like Ben.”
16. Lessons in Trust
Quickly, before she could get distracted again, Rey broke away from him - “Ben Solo, you do not get to just… Just kiss me and act like you didn’t- mmmf!”
He sealed his mouth to hers, his hot tongue softly imploring she just… oh. This was so much easier than being mad at him. Ben groaned, and Rey could feel it vibrate through his whole massive body as he crushed his chest to hers.
17. A World Between You and Me
“Stay here. They’ll come back for you.” the lie was like ash in his mouth, his voice dead as he delivered the damning words. The words that would trap her here for years of struggle and starvation. The words she would repeat to herself over and over until they lost their context and meaning, twisting them until they came from her parents, not some stranger in the desert. She would forget who said them, and convince herself that somewhere, she had parents who loved her.
18. The Return of a Certain Jedi
“Wait - Rey, I don’t understand - you called me-”
“Kylo? I know. His - your voice guided me.” She raked her fingers through his hair, holding his gaze as though imploring that he understand. “Ben Solo, Kylo Ren - it doesn’t matter. It was you. It was always you, wasn’t it?”
19. Resistance is Peace, Chaos is Order
"Ben, knowing the full scope and potential of their power here, insisted that they command the Force in bringing varying minds together, making them agree and come to a consensus. Rey was adamant that they take a more passive role, merely showing the path and letting people decide for themselves how, or even if, they wanted to find compassion in their enemy’s soul."
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lavellane · 5 years ago
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5 + 10 for emeraude, 14 + 18 for effie, 19 + 24 for arylene and 30 through 45 for imogen bc i love her so much ? 😏😏😏
fdjkfjkfdk thank u SO much maia i absolutely Treasure You !
EMERAUDE HAWKE - DA2
What does your OC normally wear? What would your OC wear on a special night?
emeraudes fashion sense is probably my favourite out of all my ocs, so uh if u havent looked at her pinterest board yet u should do that bc its Very cute hehehe
anyway for the most part she sticks to dark, practical clothing whenever she's out and about in kirkwall or doing merc work, etc. she picks clothes that convey strength and power, but she likes having a little bit of colour somewhere on the piece, just to keep things interesting. she's not much of an embroider, but was a good way to keep herself distracted during hard times, so she tends to add little patterns here and there whenever she gets the chance!
as for special occasions, for her this would actually just be. a quiet night at home or a relaxed gathering with her friends. bc its so rare for her to have that lmao. anyway for events like that she usually wears light colours and soft fabrics, simple but always decorated with flowers or colourful patterns.
What does your OC keep in a special drawer?
she has a collection of gifts ! that kids from lowtown would give her over the years she spent in kirkwall. she's a very community based person and wants to do right for her city, and shes very nurturing (in an ironical, Cool Big Sister way) so she likes making sure all the kids are safe and being looked after. she gets a lot of trinkets and strange gifts from some of the kids as a result, but she does treasure them (even if she laughs about it with her friends) and keeps them all !
EFFIE RYDER - MEA
Who is the mother and/or father figure in your OC’s life?
effie's maternal rolemodel has always been her late mother, ellen. nobody could really fill that role in her eyes, since they had such a close, positive relationship before she passed. her relationship with her dad was a lot more strained and it really impacted a lot of her relationships later on in life too ! she tends to.... see an older man who is Vaguely Nice to her, and then think “ oh, youre my dad now?” which isnt fair to anybody obviously but yeah she,,,, has a lot of unresolved issues regarding alec and tends to unintentionally project so. We stan !
How many times did your OC move as a child? Which area was his/her favorite?
oh constantly lol. With her dad being an n7 and her mother working so hard on her research, they tended to move around wherever her parents work required. she actually enjoyed it this way. she was never good at making long term friends, but she lived meeting new people, and obviously with the move she got to experience a lot of different cultures which really put the idea of adventuring and travelling in her head at a young age.
ARYLENE TORR - TES IV
What does your OC think of children- either in general or about having them?
she likes them ! she tends to keep her distance with most communities and groups of people in particular, but she does like enjoys having the odd conversation with the odd street urchin here and there, either sharing with them some strange, ridiculous life advice or – if shes feeling particularly chaotic – telling them the scariest stories she can think of. as for having them, arylene isnt AGAINST the idea, but she has far too much for the foreseeable future for that to ever be a good idea
Who are the people your OC dislikes/hates?
outwardly, arylene is an almost unbearably easy going person, so you would assume she doesnt hate anyone lol. but she does DEEEPLY dislike cults and groups of ignorant people who are arrogant enough to start messing with the balance of life, or making deals with gods, etc. she believes that people like that can do an unbelievable amount of damage, so she invests a lot of time and effort it sabotaging any group or plot she happens to find !
 IMOGEN FOSTER - RDR2
Did your OC participate in extracurricular activities, and if so, what were they?
hmm idk if this even EXISTED in 19th century london lol, but she would have done some very tame version of girl scouts as a child! She barely remembers any of it, but she liked the classes on what plants did what, which were safe to eat, and the likes. its something that helps her a lot when on the run with the gang, and something shes always had a personal interest in, as a nurse !
other than that, she’s done a lot of independent study on history, classical literature, and she speaks fluent italian we stan !
What is your OC’s opinion of school? What kind of student was s/he?
imogen comes from a very wealthy aristocratic family, so she was very fortunate that her privilege afforded her the education she got at the time. she is VERY grateful to have attended the schools she did, and she made sure to make the most of it, paying attention in class and studying harder than most of her classmates. she's a smart girl with a very active mind, so knowledge is something she can't get enough of. she was actually petitioning the board of education to allow her to attend university before she left for america – already their had been women accepted into universities at that time, but obviously it was still a very scandalous thing lol, especially since imogen wanted to study medicine.
What subjects did your OC excel at?
imogen is a HUGE overachiever and did pretty well at basically everything from science, mathematics, language studies and later on, in her studies as a nurse. i can tell you what shes bad at though lmao
anything physical really dkdkdks she is TERRIBLE at horse-riding since she usually just went by carriage everywhere in the city. art and poetry and writing in general she was never great at, because she's a pretty logical person and was told she never put enough emotion in her work lol !!! sports...obviously was very limited anyway as growing up in like? the early 1870s lol. and as for the traditionally feminine lessons in like ?? sewing and cooking and stuff well ! she was very average at them which made her  feel worse than if she was actually bad bc she's so used to excelling and making a name for herself oof
What subjects interested your OC?
Imogen loves greek literature and mythology !! the iliad is her favourite book and she keeps her heavily annotated, dog eared copy – a gift from her late father – on her person almost constantly. needless to say its why dutch admires her as much as he does lol.
obviously, as a nurse-trying-to-be-a-doctor, she has a great love for medicine in all its forms. she's always been fascinated in natural remedies, and even moreso when she's running with the van der linde gang and is really relying on the land to survive.
What is your OC’s dream job and/or current profession?
hmm okay so. Technically she's a nurse – she worked in her father's hospital for almost 10 years prior to his death, and she was sort of his unofficial understudy, as in she knows a LOT more than her job description requires lol. but after her father past away, another, less progressive man took his place as chief of surgery and made a lot of changes to the way the hospital operated, and imogen was let go. she and her mother were fighting against it, however, under the ground of unfair dismissal, but obviously given the time period it didnt get them very far. so ! i mean technically she's unemployed rn. but she still has dreams of being a doctor, or at least continuing her career in medicine.
How is your OC working towards their dream job and/or achieved their current profession?
Oh VERY direct action up until she got disheartened and chose to take her sabbatical. she had been working in her role for nearly a decade, and was very obviously one of the most experienced nurses there. even younger doctors would sometimes ask her for her medical opinion dksksks anyway what i am saying is Brain Very Good. she had been fighting to gain admission into a university – any, she wasnt picky – to study medicine officially, but it didnt get very far and she put it on hold after her father got sick. after he died and she was laid off, she fought even harder against the city to reinstate her title, and continues to fight after she returns from america a year or so later.
What are your OC’s thoughts/opinions of his/her current profession?
helping people is her entire life, and she wouldn't know what to do without it. she loves being a nurse enough to fight to be a doctor, but also in BEING a nurse, she is hyperaware of all the things current medical standards seem to get wrong, and she has a lot of ideas about how else to go about things. her father, a shockingly progressive and worldly man for the time period, shared her sentiment, but he wasn't able to make the changes he wanted to before he passed, so imogen hopes she can be the change herself, and make her father proud
What is your OC’s biggest dream?
being a licenced doctor, babey ! preferably at her father's hospital, but at the point she will take what she can get.
How does your OC react to and handle stress?
imogen  handles stress very well , which is partially why she makes such a good medic, and also how she managed to survive the first week of being with the van der linde gang lmao. she is very good at shutting out EVERY distraction when things get dicey, and her brain tends to move at a million miles an hour. all traces of english etiquette and politeness go out the window, though, so you'll usually catch her barking orders at people, and yelling at anyone who prevents her from doing the work she needs to do. it.....is a big wake up call for people like dutch and micah, and gets her into a LOT of trouble on multiple occasions.
How does your OC handle anger?
ooo......not great. she’s grown up with parents who maybe encouraged her to speak her mind a bit....TOO much given the historical circumstances lol. she really doesn’t stand for ignorance or prejudices in any capacity, and if she has a problem with someone and it gets in the way of her trying to do her work or help others - she will ABSOLUTELY be having words. she also overestimates her own strength quite a lot. she’s tried to throw hands with micah MANY times, often forgetting she’s this tiny 70kg englishwoman and he’s .... Him sdjkdcjkf. she has a big mouth too so she often says snide remarks without even meaning too, which tends to get her in trouble as well. on the bright side, it also helps her fit in with the gang quite well, because for the most part they all appreciate how wild she is lmao
How does your OC handle grief?
hmm i guess it depends on what you would class as “well”? she doesnt cry very often - being stoic and handling your emotions is important when your a nurse - but she does tend to shove her feelings down far longer than she should, and tries to pretend they don’t exist by simply focusing on other things. she also blames herself when a lot of things go wrong, because she’s a perfectionist and wants to FIX everything, so when she finds something - or someone - she can’t save, it feels like a personal failure. like she let them down :(
What is your OC’s greatest fear?
probably being trapped in an unhappy, unfulfilling marriage with someone who undervalues her. she’s not much of a homebody and doesn’t have too much of an interest in being married, but the idea of feeling FORCED to marry someone in order to have a decent quality of life makes her blood run cold oof
What makes your OC happy?
helping people ! meeting new folks ! learning about other cultures and ways of life! learning about NEW THINGS in general ! proving people wrong ! insulting micah !
as tough and high-and-mighty as she sometimes seems, she’s a pretty easy person to please, honestly. treat her with respect, give her space to do the things she wants to do, and don’t get in the way of her opportunities to learn new things, and she’s mostly very happy !
What kind of sense of humor does your OC have?
she has a fairly macabre and sardonic sense of humour, something she picked up from her mother. she says a lot of Shocking things for the time period, and she’s not shy of dirty jokes either. the first time sean heard her, a soft, well spoken english Lady, make some filthy, crude joke, he nearly had a stroke right there on the spot kjkjkfdjkf
What are some things that greatly upset your OC?
senseless violence, suffering or cruelty. she really hated the gang at first and hoped to escape the first chance she got, because all she could see was the crime and disregard for human life she assumed they all held. fortunately, as she got to know them, she realized this wasn’t exactly the case, but she still has a lot of anger in her heart for a few key members of the gang who seem to enjoy bloodshed more than anything. she also hates any form of social prejudice, and people who gatekeep knowledge and opportunities from others.
What are some things that annoy your OC?
i guess all of the above, but she also dislikes misplaced arrogance, and people who talk down to others. she tolerates dutch, but often gets frustrated with the way he speaks, using as many big words as he can to manipulate and confuse others. she believes that really intelligence doesn’t require obscure jargon and big, fancy words - she likes keeping things simple, so everybody can follow along.
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austennerdita2533 · 6 years ago
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Hi, Ashlee! I didn’t want to mess up our messaging system (and I’m going to get back to you soon, I promise!), but I have questions and I think you’re the right person to ask. Plus, I *think* you won’t mind if I start a discussion on Neruda’s work, haha. I’m going through Cien Sonetos de Amor and I’m a intrigued with the repetitive use of some words, especially “clavel” (not sure what’s the word in english for that lol). Any thoughts on the meaning of it? I’m curious about your opinion!
Hello Luiza. :) First, take your time getting back to me. Our messages to each other are long since we have so many different things to chat about, and it took me an abominable amount of time to get back to you last time so you’re totes fine. Second, I AM SO EXCITED you came to talk to me about Pablo Neruda!!!! It gives me a justifiable excuse to pull out and peruse this poetry anthology of his again: 
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^^This book is one of my most prized possessions. No joke. It’s his entire collection of poetry in both English and Spanish. If there was a fire set to my bookshelves, and someone told me I could save merely a handful of titles,  (theoretically speaking only, because if this happened I would bawl my eyes out for years and years; probably forever lol), this collection would be one of the first things I’d grab.^^
Not only is Neruda one of my favorite poets of all time, but I often revisit his work whenever I’m in need of inspiration for my own writing or want to remind myself how figurative language and imagery - in either language - can be wielded in beautifully creative, unconventional ways. Just ahhh! His words fill me with an equal amount of warm and fuzzies and writer’s envy. The way he strings phrases and meaning together never fails to astound me. I mean–wow! Consider me an unapologetic Pablo Neruda fangirl. 😂
His100 Love Sonnets, in particular, are among those which I flip through over and over again, partly because I’m a romantic sap who aches to read about love in whatever form, and partly because his portrayal of it is so evocative and poignant that I shiver any time his words leap up at me from the page. 
As for your question, I believe “clavel” translates most closely into “carnation” in English? (That’s what I found through a Google search, anyway.) So that’d be a fragrant, double-cloved flower which is usually pink, but can come in other color combinations, too. I think a more archaic meaning of the word “carnation” has something to do with the color of flesh as well. Which makes me think of Sonnet XXVII in “Morning,” specifically, since he describes nakedness pretty heavily in it. More than that, the color pink/light red radiates from that poem and can be linked to both meanings of the word, imo. He describes a naked hand which is “transparent” with “apple paths”; he talks about naked wheat, which can be light-toned and/or burnt with color; he adds vibrancy to the bed of a nail in these lines: “naked you are as small as one of your nails,/ curved, subtle, rose until day is born”–and all of these bring to my mind the imagery/meanings of a carnation, if not the word itself. I love how - through his descriptions - he often alludes to certain words like that, too, without using them overtly, because when you look closely, you can see how he saturates his stanzas with them figuratively instead. It gives them more substantial weight and gravitas, you know? Carrying them from stanza to stanza and sometimes even from poem to poem. 
(Does the translation “carnation” make sense in the context of where the word “clavel” appears for you, since you’re reading in Portuguese? I hope I’ve hit upon the right-ish one.)
You are so right that Neruda weaves certain words or images repetitively throughout these sonnets, though! It’s one of my favorite things he does, actually, because not only is it purposeful but it’s done in a way that progresses from section-to-section, from “Morning” to “Midday” to “Evening” to “Night.” To be more specific, flower and earthen/nature words feature prominently in his love sonnets and what’s fun for me is recognizing how he flourishes them differently in each subsequent section in an effort to demonstrate the stages or cycles/maturation of love. 
For example, throughout “Morning,” Neruda overloads your senses with pomp, vivacity, pungent aromas, and thirsty sensations in order to highlight the “spiky passions” (III) “where sweet aromas rose and trembled” (IV) “hunting for you, for your hot heart” (XI) that often take place at the beginning of a new love - also known as the “morning.” It is the kind of love that is raw and visceral, pervasive, “fiery with its long red rays” (XVI) because it’s brand spanking new and has no roots as of yet. So almost everything he describes is budded and sweetly fragrant. The sensations feel fresh in this section; they taste pure and powerful, overwhelming ever part of you. 
Then, in “Midday,” he hits you with love’s growth and maturation where everything is still green yet will be “fed [to] the roots” (XXXIX) so that “little by little [love] turned into fruit” [VLVII]. There’s a lot of water and ripening imagery in this section, sodden with feeling, so as to show the ways in which love continues to change or continues to twine like roots which will “cast two shadows that flow together” (XLVIII). This is where and when and how love sinks into a heart. Twisting and curling into knots that cultivate in a way that’s meant to make it more and more difficult to snip them away.
Once you arrive in “Evening” after this, therefore, Neruda adds a profound sense of tangledness and “eyes squeezed shut in love that doesn’t help” (LV) because he wants you to feel how - at this point - love is embedded in you like poison. Living inside you in a way that “can no longer [be protested]” (LIX). In addition to that, he makes sure to mention some darker emotions like sorrow, troubles, stubbornness, etc. which attach themselves well to the fading of the day and to the expiration of a love that’s comprised only of “honeyed contentment” (LV). I think it’s meant to show how love is not always happy or delightful, that it can feel like a “craw full of teeth” (LIX) sometimes, but how that’s okay because those feelings are part of love’s fire. They belong to the heart’s wasteland as much as the sweet and savory stuff, too. 
Finally, in “Night,” I think his sonnets arrive in a place that’s equal parts reverie, reflection, and ethereal revelation. There’s this restless, intangible quality to the way Neruda describes love in this section, whereby he combines imagery of nature in a way that neither entombs aged sentiment in the life it’s already lived, nor bleeds it dry once the fruit’s been consumed in death. Love is “stubbornly transient” (XCVII), “waiting, raining on the dust, eager to erase even absence”(XCI). It’s eternal and beyond the corporeal at this point. Something that cannot be given up because it’s passing in silence “through an eternity of buried mouths” (XCV). It exists beyond the bonds of time, seeps back into the earth when it’s empty only to rise again and again and again. Effectively living multiple lives. Suggesting it never ends. 
It’s fascinating to me to see the variety of ways Neruda manipulates, or puts into startling context, words like “blood,” “fruit,” “earth,” “kiss” etc. and how he embeds the theme “love is a flower” no matter the stage - Morning, Midday, Evening, or Night - you find it in. In short, I LOVE IT SO STINKING MUCH.
Do you have any favorites, btw? It’s always hard for me to choose specific sonnets because I always fangirl over perfectly phrased lines, but as a whole, I love love love Sonnet XI ad Sonnet XXVII from “Mornings” and Sonnet XC from “Night.” The last one in particular gives me MAJOR Klaroline feels any time I read it, especially now with how they ended in canon. *cries* 
I’ve been dying to find a way/excuse to use this one in a fic:
I thought I was dying, I felt the cold up close
and knew that from all my life I left only you behind:
my earthly day and night were your mouth,
your skin the republic my kisses founded.
In that instant the books stopped,
and friendship, treasures restlessly amassed,
the transparent house that you and I built:
everything dropped away, except your eyes.
Because while life harasses us, love is
only a wave taller than the other waves:
but oh, when death comes knocking at the gate,
there is only your glance against so much emptiness,
only your light against extinction,
only your love to shut out the shadows.
ME:
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Anyway, sorry for my longgg and effusive analytical spewing which I could continue for goodness knows how long, but I couldn’t help myself because I mean–PABLO. NERUDA. IS. AN. INSPIRATION. Sometimes I want to curl myself into the complex splendor of his words and never crawl back out, you know?? I read his stuff and I experience this rampant instantaneous fluttering that morphs into a squealed, “Omg, why can’t you write like this?”
What are your thoughts about Neruda in general? Or about his Love Sonnets specifically? I’m so curious to hear what you think of his writing even if you disagree with me, my analysis, or my estimation of him, completely. Like I said before–totally unapologetic fangirl here haha. xx
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xeno-odyssey · 7 years ago
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Get to Know Me Tag
1. What is your name and does it mean anything? You can call me by my nickname Jae. At the time when I was born, my mother gave me my full name thinking it was unique. Nowadays, it’s a common name among many boys and girls.
2. How long have you known your best friend? I’ve known two of my best friends since elementary school before I moved to Calgary. One is loud and she loved Flipnote Hatena, and the other loves Pokemon and is the best bro ever.
3. What position do you normally sleep in? I sleep how I want. I’m constantly tossing and turning.
4. Were you part of a “clique” in high school? Yes, actually! I joined a group of friends as part of the Gaming Club. Every Friday we borrow a classroom during lunch hours and play various fighting games.
5. Who was your favorite high school teacher and why? It was my homeroom teacher who is also my gym teacher. She’s the nicest person I’ve ever met. I see her more than just a teacher, but as a friend.
6. Do you travel a lot? Not much these days. I’ve been to Vancouver a bunch of times, America as well.
7. Did you participate in any sports in high school? Yup.
8. Hand writing example:
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9. Have you ever given blood? Yes, I’ve donated several times. But now it’s been ages since I’ve done it.
10. Did you like the way you grew up? Yes. I’m glad to have parents that are not like their parents.
11. Do you like your siblings? Why or why not? Unfortunately I don’t have any siblings. If I had some today, I’d have an older brother and sister. Though I see my younger cousins as siblings, so yes I do like them.
12. How did you meet your best friend and why did you become friends? I met him in elementary school, and our interests align. I wonder how he’s doing now...
13. Name one movie that made you cry. Coco. ;w;
14. Do you prefer to read poetry, write poetry, or neither? Neither.
15. Things about someone that you find attractive? I think it has to be their features and personality. It doesn’t matter what they are, I’ll find them handsome or sexy.
16. What song are you currently listening to? Boombayah - Blackpink
17. Have you ever broken a bone? If so, how? When I was just a baby, I broke both my arms. At 2 years old, I broke my right arm falling off my bed, a year later I broke my left arm the same way.
18. A random memory from your childhood: When I was 13-14 years old, I went camping for 3 days on some islands as part of my final elementary school field trip. All the counsellors were so nice, we explored forests, and played so many games. Talking about this sort of reminds me of Kingdom Hearts’ Destiny Islands.
19. Where did you grow up? Winnipeg, Manitoba
20. What was the last thing you watched on TV? Voltron: Legendary Defender - Season 5 (JUNE 15, SEASON 6 IS SO CLOSE, UGH.)
21. Do you think you’d make a good parent? Maybe! I’ve babysat my cousins several times, and I and them see myself as an older brother.
22. Would you like to meet any of your Tumblr friends in person? Possibly! I wanna meet most of my mutuals, and if fate has its way, I wanna meet them at some convention like Comic Con or Otafest.
23. What was the last dream you remember having? I actually don’t remember.
24. When is your birthday? January 28
25. How many pillows do you sleep with? Only 2.
26. Do you wear glasses? No, but I do have a pair of reading glasses and sun shades.
27. What color is your hair? Black.
28. Name 5 facts about your appearance: - I’m 5′8″ - I have brown eyes. - I have a natural tan skin since I’m Filipino. During summer when I’m out in the sun, my skin gets darker. - My skin is sensitive, specifically my hands. It’s always rough like I was working for hours, I have cuts on my cuticles, and I have eczema on the tops of both hands. - Apparently I have natural good looks, according to friends and family.
29. What is your favorite soda? Japanese strawberry ramune.
30. What is a strange talent you have? Besides my natural skill of playing video games when I was 4 years old (thaaaat was oddly specific, even for me), I used to imitate voices. Nowadays I’m unable to thanks to puberty. But hey, I’m self-training myself to possibly be a voice actor one day!
31. How’s the weather right now? (As of 2018, March 2nd...) CONSTANT. SNOWFALL. I want to move to Vancouver dammit. I hate snow and winter. Barely any snow there, and it’s only cold rain.
32. Why did one of your friendships end? We used to be friends. He was the bully that always picked on me and always agitated me and constantly got on my nerves. He always picked a fight with me, yet I never fought back because I was weak. I hated him. Since I was the victim, the teachers and staff were on my side. He hated me even more for that. It was not long until he got transferred to a different school. I’m glad I never saw him again. If he kept bullying me for the rest of my life, I’ll probably be not the same person I am today.
33. Who do you miss right now? My aunt, every single day. She passed away a few years ago. She was so young. Coming up soon is a special marathon run my family and I participate in every year for victims of Lupus.
34. Why did your last relationship end? We never were in one. I try to forget him everyday, but the memory of him haunts me every now and then. That bully is forever burned in my memory. I guess this is what a trigger feels like, should his name be mentioned around me.
35. Are you still figuring yourself out? (As of 2018, March 2nd...) Yes, everyday. I’m currently looking for jobs, but no luck for anyone accepting me. I have no plans for college nor do I want to go to college. My 3 years of high school was nearly wasted, and I don’t want to experience near-failure again. I don’t have a particular interest as of now, so I don’t know what I want my career to be like.
36. Have you ever been admitted to a hospital? Why? Several times. The broken arms incident, and there was one time I had to go when I got an allergic reaction.
37. What is your favorite restaurant? I don’t have a particular favorite, but if I had to choose it’d be the dining section in The Rec Room.
38. What is a word you always seem to spell wrong? Definitely. Just now my computer auto-corrected me.
39. Would you ever adopt kids? One day, if I ever get married. I don’t have any plans to have actual kids.
40. What is your favorite kind of pizza? Two kinds: Margherita, and a Philly Cheese Steak.
41. What was your first thought when you woke up this morning? (As of 2018, March 2nd...) Shovel the snow.
42. When was the last time you got really really happy and why? When I finally got the Nintendo Switch. Seriously! Those things are hard to get!
43. What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten? I don’t remember. Though I’m not entirely picky with what I eat.
44. How do you start a conversation? I usually don’t, too shy. If it’s in their interest, I try to talk about video games.
45. Do you come from a family “of money?” No.
47. What is your favorite series of books? During middle to high school, they’re graphic novels called Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Bone.
46. Do you have a bucket list? My plan is to travel to Japan by 2020 for the Summer Olympics. If not, I can still go.
48. When was the last time you laughed so hard your stomach hurt? Watching Deadpool.
49. Where do you go when you’re sad? Usually the Internet, and sometimes I listen to my music to calm myself.
50. 5 facts about yourself: I - I formerly owned French Garfield comics when I used to understand French. II - I taught myself to read at a very young age. III - I own a fair collection of books, a lot of video games, some amiibo, and tons of Lego. IV - I have over 200+ hours on Xenoblade Chronicles, Xenoblade Chronicles X, and Xenoblade Chronicles 2. V - I’m able to finish Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions in a single day (not counting breaks, speed running, or 100% completing the game).
I did not create this tag.
I was tagged by @all-shall-love-me-and-despair
I’ll tag @curvishsundown @peachyflan @d-manaceattorney @paintedrocket @taulun @kiibos-ahoge anyone else that reads this can do it too! EDIT: I had to re-tag the people I tagged since it didn’t tag them properly.
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thespace-dragon · 7 years ago
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Writers Tag
I was tagged by the lovely @princedeadend haha thanks Wrenn, I didn’t even know you read my stuff xD thanks friend! :D
1) How many works do you currently have in progress?
hnnnnnnnnngggghhhhhh welll, ummmmmm whines, I have 7 fics im writing? Currently? *sweats nervously* yeah im trying xD
2) Do you/would you write fanfiction?
well, i currently do-- wait shit, I have 8 fics, cuz one of them is original. haha xD but i do a little bit of original works and a ton of fanfiction
3) Do you prefer paper books or ebooks?
Doesnt really matter to me, but i have the hardest time actually sitting down and reading an actual book. and meanwhile i can sit and read a fic at any time because its just on my phone.
4) When did you start writing?
welllllll.... id say the cringey age of 13. it was really bad and i swear i never want to find that binder ever again. (it was all handwritten too, an absolute mess)
5) Do you have someone you trust that you share your work with?
I usually send my stuff to a range of people really. theres @girlskylark @isassifras @chronolith @hippotron @voltronhastakenovermylife @fe-niks @littlepennycandy i pretty much shove my work at them and be like tell me where its terrible and ill fix it, and thats how i get beta’ing done xD
6) Where is your favorite place to write?
anywhere. i just plug in my headphones most of the time and go
7) Favorite childhood book
uhmmmm, eragon. like hands down, i read it like 4 times when i was growing up
8) Writing for fun or writing for publication?
totally for fun, but if i get published some day thats totally chill by me xD
9) Pen and paper or computer?
either. sometimes i can jot down notes in a notebook while other times i can basically write to my hearts content on a computer.
10) Have you ever taken any writing classes?
i never had any formal creative writing class before i started writing for fun all the time, i was just always into it since i was younger. its always been the more formative type of writing in my english classes and we hardly spent time on anything like writing our own short stories or poetry really. 
11) What inspires you to write?
other fics, listening to other authors talk about their ideas. I get a ton of inspiration from songs and movies tho. like im pretty sure at least 3 of my fics are based off a movie in some way. but i use a lot of music to get my groove going and to really crank out some huge chunks of content. ive been sorta on a dnd kick lately and im about to start a campaign, so we will see if any fic starts from our shenanigans with that xD
welp, i feel obligated to tag people, so all the people i tagged for my beta readers, uhm @mermaidlorelei @mikiri @pitchgold annndddd @maternalcube
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perfectperalta · 7 years ago
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1-50 you're welcome
you son of a bitch haha. i would do that read more thing but i have no idea how to do that so im really sorry!
1: What is your name and does it mean anything?
my name is harmony and i dont think it has any meaning. i mean it probably does my mum chose it bc she just liked it!
2: How long have you known your best friend?
i dont have any friends lol. however i had a best friend a while ago but we kinda just stopped talking! i knew her for a few years and only over the internet. i think i was in love with her too.
3: What position do you normally sleep in?
on my side. whichever feels comfortable at the time.
4: Were you a part of any “clique” in high school?
no. we had a big group thou and they merged with other groups a lot of the time. like someone would be in our friend group but also another! 
5: Who was your favorite teacher in high school and why?
my btec sports teacher. btec sport is the written aspect of sports. i didnt like the lesson but he was so fun and easy going. also my maths teacher. she was so boring and monotone but she was an amazing teacher. i learnt a lot from her which is now all gone haha
6: Do you wish to travel a lot?
yes!! i want to go everywhere but no one to do it with and no money!
7: Did you participate in any sports while in school?
nope. 
8: Show a sample of your handwriting:
ive been tagged in the handwriting tag so i’ll link it when ive done it
9: Have you ever given blood?
no but i should
10: Do you like the way that you grew up?
yeah. it was alright. nothing bad happened!
11: Do you like your siblings? Why or why not?
yeah i have 3 sisters. 1 older and 2 younger. i think the older of the younger ones is my best friend. sadly.
12: How did you meet your best friend and why did you become friends?
my best friend is my sister. my old best friend is from the internet so weve never meet. shes in canada. we became friends from being in a group chat together for troye sivan and connor franta. 
13: Name one movie that made you cry.
ps i love you
14: Do you prefer to read poetry, write poetry, or neither?
neither. 
15: Things about someone that you find attractive?
that they can make me laugh
16: What song are you currently listening to?
too good at goodbyes by sam smith
17: Have you ever broken a bone? If so, how?
nope 
18: A random memory from you childhood:
i had speech therapy and couldnt say ship. in year 2 (aged 6/7) i came back from the lesson thing and one of the boys asked if i could say it and i did and he got real happy. 
19: Where did you grow up?
south west england. on the coast!
20: What was the last thing you watched on tv?
actually on tv. doctor foster on tuesday 
21: Do you think you’d make a good parent?
i reckon so
22: Would you like to meet any of your Tumblr friends in person?
HELL YEAH
22: What was the last dream you remember having?
i wanted to be with someone and no one would let me. something along them lines
23: When is your birthday?
november 6th
24: How many pillows do you sleep with?
3
25: Do you wear glasses? If so, how long have you been wearing glasses?
no
26: What color is your hair?
blonde/brown so i guess light brown?
27: Name 5 facts about your appearance:
hair to just below my shoulders
blue eyes
light brown hair
big nose i reckon
im pretty boring so idk what else
28: What is your favorite soda?
fanta fruit twist
29: What is a strange talent that you have?
i can touch my nose with my tongue 
30: How’s the weather right now?
sunny actually but i bet it changes later
31: Why did one of your friendships end?
most of them end bc i just stop talking to them. 
32: Who do you miss right now?
my old best friend from canada
33: Why did your last relationship end?
oh gees. its got a very long and sad back story but long story short, he was an ex and we got back together. he ended it bc he said he didnt have the same feelings from before. 
34: Are you still figuring out who you are?
yeah defo!
35: Have you ever been admitted to a hospital? Why?
i dont think so. ive been in and out of hospital since i was 2 for my hearing but thats from appointments never been admitted?
36: What is your favorite restaurant?
oh idk. five guys is good!
37: What is word that you always seem to spell wrong?
im not sure
38: Would ever adopt kids?
yeah why not
39: What is your favorite kind of pizza?
four cheeses is good and love a pepperoni one!
40: What was your first thought when you woke up this morning?
to check tumblr and twitter
41: When was the last time you got really really happy and why?
oh dear i cant remember :(
42: What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten?
of the top of my head all i can think of is a snail from when i went to france at school :L
43: How do you start a conversation?
depends who its with. someone new i would wait till i find something theyve said that i think i can make a conversation out of
44: What’s a band you’ve been obsessed with lately?
no on specifically. i just listen to pre-made spotify playlists
45: Do you come from a family “of money?”
nope
46: Do you have a bucket list?
not really
47: What is your favorite series of books?
i dont read. 
48: When was the last time you laughed so hard your stomach hurt?
AGES ago that i cant remember
49: Where do you go when you’re sad?
to my bed
50: 5 random facts about yourself:
1. im hard of hearing
2. i hate having my picture taken and dont take selfies. the last selfie i took was way over 6 months ago
3. im not very interesting
4, i cant think of anything else!
5. im sorry!
im glad this is done with. took ages!!!
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abstractlesbian · 7 years ago
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oh right i forgot to send u an ask game ask uh my emojis dont work but 1- what was your best hospital stay (if any) 2- whats ur pain metaphor and 3- what/how do u experience mania and actually also 4- is there anything u want to signal boost? if all of those are irrelevant or dont apply to u then whats ur most surprising diagnosis
tw: abuse, fathers, hospitals, suicidal ideation mention, medication, disordered eating, self harm, addictionBest hospital stay: uh honestly the time I was in the psych ward for suicidal ideation/effexor withdrawal/avoiding my dad who was screaming at me and breaking things BC my effexor withdrawal symptoms angered himIt wasn't a wholly positive experience but I met some older nd / mentally ill women who were very sweet and encouraging and I also met this really nb person my age and they would write me messages on post it's and hand them to me through out the day (anything from encouraging statements to random thoughts they wanted to share)While I was staying there people were very supportive of me calling some of my experiences traumatic/abusive and it was so helpful and validating to finally start using hose words And i also met an older gay man who told me that things I said in group therapy about feeling guilty for participating in and not objecting to homophobia when I was a closeted kid/teen really helped him and we talked about internalized homophobia a bitI really liked the meal plan there and just... Having someone else being in charge of my food intake was super helpful for me BC I skip meals a lot for various reasons and I often really miss being in a situation where people were making food for me and making sure I ate and eating with other people who were struggling and chatting with them at meals Pain metaphors I use: um I guess I use drowning a lot ? I have a lot of physical symptoms from anxiety and i guess a lot of the pain metaphors I use are based on those ? So drowning, my chest feeling foggy / full of water / like it's being crushed, feeling like my stomachs on fire, feeling like I'm sinking in quicksand, feeling like I'm floating away from my body etc Ive written some (imo) pretentious poetry about my trauma and symptoms and I've used like lots of weather metaphors (uncontrollable shaking anxiety/panic response = earthquakes, stuff like that) And one time I took that chart from lilo and stitch where lilo draws stitches food and badness levels and I replaced it with "trauma level" and "space reserved for future trauma" Mania: so uh not sure if I've experienced mania. Every therapist/doctor/psychiatrist since seen since I was 15 has asked me about it (usually after I talk about something I I've been experiencing an they pull out the Mania Checklist™) and that makes me wonder if I might experience it? But I don't think I have? Based on the times I've been asked about it by professionals, the times I've done self diagnosis tests, and hearing about my friends experiences with mania/hypomania/bipolar disorder. I hit some of the symptoms of mania at times but not enough I think? Things I want to signal boost: I'm really enjoying the book "organizing solutions for people with ADHD" it's already make lots of big improvements in my life! I also recommend looking into ADHD and rejection sensitive dysphoria, learning about that was life changing tbhAlso the Loop Habit Tacker app on android has been very helpful. It lets you create as many daily/weekly/monthly checklist items as you want and helps you track your streaks. I use it to track meals, my medication, sleep habits (wake up time and hours of sleep etc), how many sick days I take at work, and loads of other stuff. I also list every day as good or bad. I've been using it for over a year and it helps me see how healthy behaviours improve my mood and bad behaviours worsen it (which should be obvious but it helps to see "oh I skipped my meds and three meals in the past two days no wonder I'm so messed up, time to get back on track" ) Sober Time is also a good android app, its good for tracking addiction / self harm recovery goals. It has an optional social feature if you want support from other users, it's fully customizable and you can track as many different addictions as you need to, and you can set it up to send you notifications when you reach milestones and/or occaisonal encouraging messages
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pointdotph-blog · 8 years ago
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From Selfies to Tyrants: A Series of Conclusions Jumped To
I.                    
2015 – “Okay sana na maraming tao, but it’s not like they know how to appreciate art properly.” These were the first things out of M’s mouth the moment we had separated ourselves enough from the crowd bottlenecked at the entrance of the National Museum. M is a long-time friend who has always been into art. When we found out that the National Museum was removing its entrance fee for the entirety of June, we immediately decided to go.
     We had just spent the last couple of hours almost lost in a crowd of air conditioned-sweat, murmurs too loud to be murmurs, and children bugging their parents for things I really didn’t care about, – a crowd which, like us, had decided to avail of the free entrance the museum was offering that day, so I brushed off what he had just said as a result of stress.  I mean, who doesn’t say stupid shit when hassled by the summer heat?
    Except that wasn’t the last time that day that M said something I found rather elitist.
    In the shadow of Juan Luna’s Spoliarium, I had asked M, who apparently had been here multiple times just the previous year and was no longer impressed by the mural,  to hold up, as I found myself amused by the throng of people trying to reposition themselves to get better pictures of and with Luna’s most accessible masterpiece.
    I was furiously thinking of a joke that would bridge the difference between the furious bobbing and weaving of the crowd in front of the Spoliarium and how (western) tv shows and movies set in museums almost always only provide reflective, dramatic scenes, when M decides to drops a bomb, “Why go to museums just to take pictures of paintings, you can do that over the internet?”
    Something about his insistence on appreciating brush strokes up close and personal, as well as enjoying “the much livelier blending of colors in “real life” had me thinking that this was less about redundancy and more about an insistence on a more technical, or as others would put it, [theoretically] “informed” way of appreciating works of art. More importantly, his remarks were too on point to be simple results of the entry hassle we had gone through just a few minutes before.
    Just like that, the trip to the national museum I had looked forward to for over a week had begun to sour.
II.                  
    By the end of the day, all that talk of shoulds and so-called “proper ways” of appreciating museum pieces had left me in a terrible mood. I spent most of the shared portion of our long commute to our respective homes not talking to M, instead selfishly brooding about all the things that had been bothering me since the incident in the shadows of the Spoliarium:
i.) M’s undeniably normative approach to the consumption-qua-appreciation of art;
ii.) the implicit arrogance that comes with such a standpoint, as if to imply that the deadlock of  a millennia-old debate regarding the proper purpose of art, and by extension the proper ways of receiving it (interpretation vis-a-vis appreciation), if it even has one, has finally been definitively solved;
iii.) the concession that M, regardless of actually being at fault or not, cannot actually be faulted for this expressed arrogance in so far as he himself is only a product of the dominant modes of  generational (and always class-related) discourse that he’s found himself enmeshed in – his stance only symptomatic of a greater widespread attitude towards art;
iv.) lastly,  my own indignation with such a “claim” which reveals an own personal reluctance to concede to M’s claims (perhaps pride?), perhaps brought about by tangential complicity, or arrogance, or both.
    What was I so riled about, that wasn’t just brought about by my own arrogant refusal to take M’s word as they were. In an age where most of the people I know are millennial scared of commitment, shouldn’t it actually be a nice breath of fresh air to see someone so starkly committed to their opinion, even if it’s on something as simultaneously banal and important as the consumption of art?
    I found the answer in extending the millennial analogy I had (accidentally) already begun (as an inside joke with myself): everyone’s allowed their own opinions regarding the appreciation of art, but the usual lines have to be drawn, between the responsibility to voice out and fight for your opinion on what is right, and what isn’t, and at the same time making sure that your expression of your opinion does not commit the same sets of mistakes generations of bigots and fascists have committed, on the other, between positing an answer and refusing to close the question to the possibility of alternative responses, to,  perhaps, even better answers.
III.                
    I do not wish to claim that I have somehow found the definitive answer to  the question of art, its purpose and existence in this universe, a question that has consistently, without fail, stumped great thinkers all the way back to the Classical period, from Plato to Pope to Deleuze and Guattari’s Plateaus, but, and I proceed with this assumption with a diligent recklessness, I do not think that any of them would even as much as turn in their graves when I assert that the very development of art hinges on the very act of response.
    One does not have to be well versed in art history or hegelian dialectics to get the general feel that the development of art, like practically everything else in the world that has seen some form of improvement, hinges on the sincerity of response, either from the winds of the time, or to art posited before it, from poetry as a response to the unassailable hunger of the heart, to revolutionary art in response to state censorship and violence, from impressionism as a revolt to the dominance of, well, expressionism, to postmodernist architecture as a reflection of the logic of late-capitalism. After all, what work of art has been produced that isn’t a response to something that has come before it, that hasn’t been, in some way, necessitated by the world before it? This, without even taking into full consideration that no artist has ever lived a life untouched by the greater logic of the world surrounding him.
    And yet art is a response asking for another response, as is the very principle governing the act of sharing a work of art, be it guided by ancient ritualistic functions, or by modern commodifying logic. Whether or not a piece has lost its aura or not, it is always already having asking for a response, be it an emotional, economic, or even a physical one – indeed, it is this very space provided by the act of readying itself for a reaction that what Benjamin calls as the work of art’s aura assumes, from installments opened for public consumption, to images shared as alternative to the written word. Even paintings kept in the closet are made for the self that cannot help but respond with a feeling or two.
IV.
    To personally align oneself to a particular way of responding to art isn’t a bad thing in itself, indeed, it is necessary, as a form of providing oneself direction, guidance, as he tries to navigate his way through the chaos of this universe, towards enjoying it further, in the guise of living an enjoyable, fulfilling life.
    But it is one thing to posit this personal inclination towards how art is to be responded to, is to be consumed, as the best way, and quite another to say that it is the (implicitly, only) proper way, as if to close the very dialog opened by the question. Where the former is to personally wrestle with the question, the latter is nothing short of dialogic tyranny.
    The claim here is that such a closing, or even a mere attempt thereof, of the very dialog on the existence and purpose of art, whether or not it should even have one, and so on and so forth, is not only contrary to the very historical development of art as a medium, but also, more disturbingly, that it is counterintuitive of today’s (millennial) attitudes towards art, revealing an underlying paradox between this millennial façade of openness, on the one hand, and the implicit class-related (redundant, I know, it always is) cultural territoriality, a widespread problem that M represents, but is not entirely representative of.
V.
    Walter Benjamin talks of art in the age of mechanical reproduction as having undergone a process of liberation – taken from the limitations of its ritual function, and transformed into something more social; what was once limited to the temple for consumptions of the priest has been moved to the museum, for the greater public to behold.[1]
    In recent decades, this stripping of the aura of authenticity, towards this so-called process of democratization, has been furthered by the advent of the digital, with the classical now just a few clicks away. Of course, where an attempt at democratization exists, capitalism shortly follows, seeking to reestablish order – and this it does largely at the back of one of its greatest weapons in history: through the academe, largely agreed upon as one of the capitalist state’s strongest, most effective ideological apparatuses.
    What advanced art school has done to art today is akin to what Frodeman and Briggle, in a previous issue of The New York Times, argue, that the University has done to Philosophy: it is here, in the academic institutions of the elite, that art and its long-time search for liberation, for response, in a sense, lost its way [2]
    As more and more theories on art production, and more importantly consumption, are taught in thy hallowed halls of the paid-for-classroom, there arises this trend to resist liberation, to return to a new form of authenticity. With the increase of so-called culturally literate graduates, the museum, or the gallery, continues to replace the temple as the new home of the work of art’s ritualistic function – the new priests that take it upon themselves to dictate the function or art, no matter how hard they deny it.
    And here I must return to cannibalize Benjamin’s warning, in order to take it further. Where mechanical reproducibility once worked to shift the work of art’s dependence on ritual towards the political, it now instead uses the political to revive the new ritual – which in itself is never devoid of politics.  This foreclosure around the new ritual mandated by the academe is nothing short of a survival mechanism: for they must maintain the rules of the field, in this case the rules of art, or otherwise risk falling from their position at the top – exclusivity, control of its premises, as the principle of autonomy.
    Yet is it not this very same principle at work now that I find myself rather guilty of the same sins: that I am using the very same theories I learned in the university to assert a way of consumption in this very composition and at the same time protect my imagined position in the field’s hierarchic logic?
    Perhaps, perhaps not. But even at the risk of patting myself on the back too early, I remain steadfast on my insistence that one can assert without looking to oneself off from the promise of the response, and that this should at least be enough to let the dialog press on.       For it is this very foreclosure that is at the heart, no, core – for a heart here simply does not exist – of cultural elitism.
VI.
    Art, and issues of its consumption, like everything else, has always been closely tied to matters of class difference, from writing as a sign of the privilege, to the Germans undertaking the question of popular art, even up to matters involving the MMFF. This is nothing new, and indeed dominates all forms of art production and consumption.
    Why do you think a vast majority of men and women who consider themselves to be “well-read” find it necessary to diss on Lang Leav’s poems, poetry they somehow consider as not up to par with what the highly political, yet ultimately arbitrary hierarchies of reading that they subscribe to categorize as good poetry? Even the so-called “liberal” ones are complicit with this elitism: “At least they’re reading”, “Well, I suppose it’s a good stepping stone towards “actual” poetry.”
    Who the fuck cares if majority of today’s concert-goers insist on video recording the performers on their smartphones instead of just “losing themselves in the moment?” Well, these essence-purists certainly do, because apparently only they know how to properly enjoy a concert.
    Why is it that every time the MMFF rolls around and the movie that many “serious” filmgoers like ends up hardly being peopled at the cinemas, or even worse actually pulled out for whatever reason, the immediate response is almost always that the whole festival is stupid because it caters to a stupid audience? Or, if you happen to be talking to someone with a kinder tongue, then it becomes an issue of educating the apparently (good) film-illiterate masses. Except it’s almost always a vertical issue, and hardly addressed horizontally: education as sophistication, because diversification entails accepting their taste as valid, the movies they like as anything more than trash. All because the non-Film educated Filipino would rather enjoy a film by losing himself in the jokes and sketches, instead of concerning himself with “good writing” and “amazing cinematography” that’s supposed to “reflect the ails of 21st century life.”
    Even bullshit maxims like “don't collect things collect moments” that offer unsolicited advice on how to best enjoy your vacation are symptoms. God forbid there actually exist people who want to preserve their moments in the form of souvenirs.
    And God forbid I ever have the desire to supplement a personal trip to the National Museum with a selfie with Juan Luna’s Spoliarium. Thank God for memes that serve as our new site of struggle.
VII.
    Among the upper echelons of society, where the so-called “culturally literate” people reside, is where this cultural tyranny manifest in one of its most potent form – hidden under the veil of formal education. For years now, people have used academic/theoretical rigor as a way to limit other people’s wonder, if only because they do not like other forms of curiosity.
                                                          ***
    “I don’t understand why people are in such a rush, you’re not actually supposed to finish a museum in one go,” M tells me at some point in our tour. I don’t understand why people are so adamant on telling other people how to eat their food.
[1] Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1936) [2] Briggle, Adam and Robert Frodeman. When Philosophy Lost Its Way (New York Times, 2016)
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vibrantmattah · 8 years ago
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an essay about writing an essay  “Critical Engineering ≠ Hacking“
 am writing an essay comparing & contrasting The Critical Engineering Manifesto & The Hacker Manifesto , the former, for our times, more to the point, effective, forceful (at pure speed moving towards its own perimeter alien other innermost self); poetic in the sense of poiesis’ meaning of making, formation, & more importantly, in the words of Samuel Coleridge (1722 - 1834; three syllables, the e gets one as well), in that it manages quite efficiently and effectively to use “the best words in the best order”.
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The Hacker Manifesto, i find beautiful and moving, & yet for this moment in our timeless timespace, carries, for me, a whiff of romanticist, dated, clearly coming from one particular socio-cultural-historical moment & identifying & carving out a certain niche in that particular moment. In contrast, parenthetically, and ironically, i suppose, to the romanticism of Coleridge, one of its “founders”, “finders” perhaps a better - in that sense more poetic - word. What i mean to say is that Coleridge’s oft-repeated claim, Prose: words in their best order; poetry: the best words in the best order.” is of a logical, mathematical, geometrical, precision, succinctness. Further, this very precise, concrete wording, imbibes the phrase with a more universally resounding truth.
Alain - “mathematics = ontology” - Badiou, hardly a romantic, for his deployment of set theory in Being & Event (2006) & category theory in the follow up Logics of Worlds  (2009) (conceptualizing a creative, pragmatic, elegant, variable, theory of among other, the subject(ive) position & processes of subjectivication (& how these may or may not continue, to display a Kierkegaardian leap of absolute militant fidelity, throughout time undetermined, both temporally as ethically, until after that fact, the event, has ebbed out, & can be critically solicited, prodded, as any other old object, system, thing.
Unfortunately - or from another perspective, simply in accordance with Gödel’s incompleteness theorem, which holds that any system cannot fully describe itself - Badiou, in a moment of self-indulgence, a catastrophic confusion of his individual, corporeal human animal being (to use his own words) with the universal truths that speak through him, describes always having known, now and at the time of writing, that this book was and would be and remain a “‘great’ book of philosophy”:
Soon it will have been twenty years since I  published this book in France. At that moment I  was quite aware of having written a   'great' book of philosophy. I  felt that I had actually achieved what I had set out to do. Not without pride, i thought i had inscribed my name in the history of philosophy, and in particular, in the history of those philosophical systems which are subject of interpretations and commentaries throughout the centuries. (Badiou, Being & Event: xi)
For a philosopher who argues that a human animal does not become a subject, until subjecting fidelity to an as of, in present undetermined, but possibly, when all is said and done, universal Truth Event; Badiou sinks his incisors hard, fanglike here, into an absolute static, hierarchical, teleological corporealization of his own being as a human animal. An argument, in other words, proposing a requisite manner and mode of radical, militant, absolute, self-negation, a becoming-indiscernible (Guattari / Deleuze) , in order to , paradoxically (but then, name me one thing that is not paradoxical) become, return to, emerge as a true Subject to Truth (2003 book by Peter Hallward on Badiou, who with his own Out of This World: Deleuze & the Philosophy of Creation wrote a, no less skillful, or parroted version of the same. in an argument derived, on might say, from Badiou’s example. Hallward put forward the notion that Deleuze (& for Mozes’ sake when will we remember to remember Felix Guattari. . . ) is an out of this world thinker, who dreamily proposes, prescribes even, becoming ever smaller, more molecular, indiscernible indeed, until now difference but difference remains between the perceiver & perceived).
Both Hallward & Badiou’s readings are super knowledgeable, lucidly, concisely, convincingly written. & yet they are for me immediately and all over drenched in a subtle, yet cheap therefore oppressive anyway, cologne, of reactivity. Somewhere there lurks some micro-, miniscule-, a-corporeal, dark precursor of resentment, friend of all of us; a resentment, however light its odorous, affective whiff, enough, perhaps, to leave an unGodly afterscent to both their books. But then unGodly is what they are all about (they shy away from using the word God, if i am not mistaken, where Deleuze sprinkles, his joyful effervescent flow of words, with the occasional God, calling the God a Lobster, how typical).
A shame, that for all its elegance of clarity, mathematical appeal and rigour, extra-individual passion, shifting yet uncompromising swarming constellation of ethics, the Magnus Opus, chef d'œuvre, delightfully superlatively heavy feast of book, to go down in ages, will be helped, by being dragged down, by the author’s own (sense of) gravity. A moment, the very opening paragraph of the book’s preface, intended to convey precisely conversely, a sense of levity, a seldom sigh away the weight of the atonal (Badiou)(1) “prose of the world” (Merleau-Ponty).
Alain Badiou, i expect would disagree - or stumble and fumble in finding a way to see things not always his way - but he might learn, or have learnt, it is never, but very nearly too late - from the poetry of Gilles Deleuze (& also Felix Guattari) (as Dutch composer and poet once movingly and aptly and accurately, described in an interview, not exactly this one, but close,
https://is.gd/knQWKP
 Badiou, from early on until his Deleuze and the Clamor of Being (1994), would and does insist that The One Is Not, & that Deleuze, contrary to his own, and most other readings, is in fact, finally, a philosopher of the One, in his collecting, with his term the One-All, the chaosmatic, multiplicitous, in each timeless timespace moment, ever self-differentiating, endlessly into its own darkest crevasses folding, beyond its horizon blossoming play of ever & always nearly already have repeated differences, differences, mere reflections of a play of repetition.
Footnotes 1. atonal:  Badiou develops the notion of "atonal" worlds (monde atone), [2] worlds lacking a "point," in Lacanese: the "quilting point" (point de capiton), the intervention of a Master-Signifier that imposes a principle of "ordering" onto the world, the point of a simple decision ("yes or no") in which the confused multiplicity is violently reduced to a "minimal difference." That is to say, what is a Master-Signifier? In the very last pages of his monumental Second World War, Winston Churchill ponders on the enigma of a political decision: after the specialists (economic and military analysts, psychologists, meteorologists...) propose their multiple, elaborated and refined analysis, somebody must assume the simple and for that very reason most difficult act of transposing this complex multitude, where for every reason for there are two reasons against, and vice versa, into a simple "Yes" or "No" - we shall attack, we continue to wait... None other John F. Kennedy provided a concise description of this point: The essence of ultimate decision remains impenetrable to the observer - often, indeed, to the decider himself. . . insofar as world as such is sustained by a "point," is a point-less, atonal, world not a name for worldlessness?  Slavoj Zizek, “On Alain Badiou and Logiques des mondes” , in Lacan, 1997/2007 http://www.lacan.com/zizbadman.htm
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voiletflames · 4 years ago
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Indian music & gurus of India
Many a times, we Indians say that we have not preserved our culture or arts and classical traditions or music, dances, rituals, etc and youth of today’s India is responsible for it. Well this is just another Indian statement to cover our own faults. To reach the truth you might have to look into our history.Here ill talk all about what I have learnt in my music and my music education from my gurus and also by meeting many different ustads and pundits of different music families or gharanas. I started music from home. As I was interested in spirituality and reading religious books and texts, hence I was very much into deep study and love with music. Apart from that I belong to a musical family and all of us love music and have good collection. My mother is a “sangeet bhaskar” music teacher and I got lots of inspiration from her.Mainly I started learning from jaipurs kathak classical music family in jalandhar, then pandit jeetu kathak in delhi and ustad devender singh in jalandhar from Punjab bodal gharana. Since my music education period, I use to see and feel the way there is contrast in the words of different music directors, different gurus and many different singers. Somebody would say this is the right way and somebody would say that is right. However, my mind says that, there can be many diseases but health have only one type. In the same way there can be numerous ways but basic truth and basic rules are the same. We can’t just completely condemn a point of view. That is why singers singing and instrumentalists playing and improvisation is called “iraadee” in our music language. I’ve seen Funny people as music directors and artists who rarely would have knowledge but misdirect new age artists with their false ways of music which is wrong teaching and a black spot on our Indian wisdom. In my musical journey I met many different ustads of jaipur gharana of kathak dancers and tumri, dadra, khayal and folk singers. Among them, ive seen such ustads with the most elite musical wisdom and hidden musical teachings. I have got great lessons from my gurus but I am forced to think, why this wisdom is not transferred to further generations or any disciples. In ancient Indian history, classical music and its training was like divine spiritual training. It used to be based on Vedas, mantras, chants, breathing, yog. Hence, music was called naad yog. It was such a wisdom which use to be given to the students in sacred teacher student relation “guru shihsya parampara”. Ancient Indian classical music was singing praises of 5 elements of nature, the supreme force, devotion, singing praises of saints and kings of that time. Hence, it use to be kind of yog. However, slowly there was time when its real meaning was lost and it became more like big classical ustads eager to sing in the courts of kings of that time and its very spirituality started getting lost in money or big titles given by kings. Old Indian pundits of music who were actually ecstatic or sages use to train music as form of devotion but later the pundits lost their duties and their sense of musical responsibility got lost in kings courts and big stages. “guru shishya parampara” got lost. I have seen pundits and ustads who would just keep their students to do their household work. The students would spend their precious time with gurus not actually learning anything but just serving them as servants.   Then, I have seen and compared the western classical musicians and composers and their training style. They, treat it professionally. There may not be “guru shishya parampara” like Indians but when they train the students, they give thorough trainings and not just spiritual jargon or big talks. They train the students and they don’t waste their time. Result is they produce elite quality artists.India has seen lots of invaders coming and giving their culture to India. Hence, our culture is a melting point of many worlds.First India use be called as "jambudveep", then Aryans invaded India and India became “Aryavrat”. Prior to that it was called “bharat” too with name of one king of raghuvansh called “raja Bharat”. During the rule of old kings, the music was totally related to devotion and divine wisdom of Vedas. Classical composers use to sing the praises of gods and nature forces and their saints and gurus. Most primitive compositions were-1 Shivpadi2 Vishnupadi3 Bhramh padi4 Mantras5 Shalok6 Chalisa7 Chaupadi8 Ashtpadi9 bhajans10 natya geet & sangeet11 padtaal style12 Drupad & dhamaar style13 Folk Music14 Raag mala “ramayan” and mahabharat” are also great work of tulsidas ji and rishi valmiki ji. Classical composers use to sing these compositions in different ragas.After a long time mughals invaded India starting from babur. After the arrival of mughals many additions and changes were done in Indian classical music. Poetry was changed, qawali singing and sufi singing was brought by sufi mystics. The family of khwaja’s and the family of gaus paak, bulle shah, warish shah etc. many sufi saints gave lots of compositions and a different way of singing and dancing. There were many muslim ustads who learnt Indian classical music and many Arabic or Persian styles and ragas or composition styles were mixed and added in Indian ragas and Indian classical. However, during the mughal times music flourished a lot. Lots of disciples learnt from ustads and many different gharanas or families were formed and gharana culture basically in northern India is created by mughal or muslim ustads.During meetings and learning sessions from my gurus and many different gurus, I have found that Indian music have succeeded generations after generations by mere listening to ustads and following their styles of singing and playing. Even those who were not students, they use to listen, sing and follow their ustads or any favorite artists or classical pundits or ustads. Also, I have learnt that in older times in india music, martial arts, devotion, technical skill, or good posts were only available to the higher cast people. The lower casts or the less privileged created either their own new art or music forms or just listened and followed the arts and music and practiced on their own. This ridiculous tradition of pundits and old india was broken by invaders and especially during mughal rule. There can be many reasons of true music of India not getting promoted but the main reason is that, our blood is dark and seditious. We, the Indians have never been truthful to our own countries.Like in old times Brahmins only use to teach all music , martial arts , yoga, bhakti etc. to high class students not the tribal’s or schedule casts of that time. This thinking of India never left the brains of ustads or especially pundits of Indian music too. Muslim ustads still have taught many students and given teaching of music but pundits never use to give their music to any one and rather use to treat their students like servants, who just use to do their household work for long time and then if the classical pandit or trainer use to feel like, he use to train that student. I met pandit jeetu kathak ji of jaipur gharana and found him immensely talented & wise during those times I was studying and researching on the history of Indian classical music. He told me to talk to his guru “pandit chote lal ji” of jaipur gharana tradition, a devotional classical and folk singer.“Chote lal ji” a very saintly man and great master in music. He told me how the materialistic and sex crazy kings use to keep only those pundits or ustads as their court singer, who use to give their female students to the kings for their amusements, so that the kings can keep those girls in harem to keep many women for sex, music, dance and amusements. A detailed talk with “Krishn Kant ratawa” who started a group in Rajasthan dedicated to jaipur gharana’s “baba bihari lal kathak” an immensely wise and master singer. After talk with me I found out that, such great artists and singers and instrument players are there in Rajasthan. They do shows but don’t get enough money. Neither Indian government not local government promote them. Even “baba bihari kathak” was such a great artist that pandit jasraj, bollywood music directors appreciate him but this great artist and gem died in depression and waiting for the actual name and fame he deserved. I had a talk to my Punjab bodal gharana guru “ustad davinder singh ji” who is the student of ustad fateh ali khan saab of Pakistan. They confirmed that they themselves have found that muslim ustads have still taught a lots of students but Indian pundits or gurus have never taught their music to any other cast person or even a deserving candidate of so called lower cast. Likewise, you can see for yourself. Any classical or music student you ask especially in classical field “whom have you learnt from ?”, you will mostly get names of muslim ustads. I won’t say this with happiness and I am not being judgmental but I am writing only what ive seen in music field myself and ive seen other students struggling for the same.  Our Indian blood have always been mean to our own countrymen and have never promoted or taught their true arts to the new generations. I’ve myself seen many new learned young classical , sufi, light music students learnt from different sources like- books, their peers who are musicians, music teachers, academy, or different classical ustads etc. I’ve seen many young artists who truly want to learn the true Indian classical and traditional way but the “gurus of today” don’t teach or give their wisdom to anyone & are not more than thieves and I will call those people anti-country. They treat students like servants just to do their household work. This is the only reason that Indian classical music is popular more in abroad not in India because the institutes in abroad actually give the right teaching and right way of Indian classical music but here in India it’s still looting and plundering going on. New age students want to learn but rotten attitudes of gurus discourage students of classical in India. Those elders who don’t encourage the youth but discourage are the true culprits. The masters who don’t teach are robbers. I as an artist love Indian music but I know why it was not flourished. My words for new artists would be make your own ways. Listen and follow from heart, make notes. Find true gurus and don’t just trust one person meet many musicians and good artists and learn from them. Don’t ever stick to one person as we still can’t trust Indian blood. Practice and Reaaz would make you the true singer or musician you want. Amandeep Singh #SwarAdi Singer composer arranger
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t-shrt · 4 years ago
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100 q tag
no one wud read it but ima do it anyways cos fun tag by @dubblebubble
1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk? more cereal than milk cos i love tht crunchy crunch
2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a wintery day? LOVE
3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books? receipts, pen lol
4: how do you take your coffee/tea? coffee=basic latte/hot tea, no sugar
5: are you self-conscious of your smile? sometimes, not too often tho
6: do you keep plants? no but i want to but ill be terrible at it so no
7: do you name your plants?
8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings? digital art
9: do you like singing/humming to yourself? yes very it keeps me sane
10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach? side/back, back esp nowadays
11: what’s an inner joke you have with your friends? lots lol
12: what’s your favorite planet? earth? hahahah it used to be jupiter cos i loved sailor jupiter as a child
13: what’s something that made you smile today? friend + nct + fics
14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like? two separate bedrooms, a balcony, good amount of plants, separate fridge for alcohol, sizeable kitchen
15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is! it rains diamonds in jupiter and saturn $$$$
16: what’s your favorite pasta dish? bolognese hahahaha im boring
17: what color do you really want to dye your hair? i just dyed my hair a darker ash brown n i quite like it ive been light for awhile
18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up. one came 2 mind cos we both recently talked ab it, a longtime close friend of mine n i used to have the biggest fight where he threw me a pair of scissors n i threw him a basketball in retaliation lmfaooo it still became a running joke more than a decade later...
19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it? not really...prolly shud
20: what’s your favorite eye color? i actually like brown hahah, maybe a slightly lighter shade of brown
21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces. it was a gift from my parents, a simple small messenger bag with a lot of slots, brought it with me literally everywhere, during my hookups, my night outs, been stained with questionable things (its been cleaned lol!).... almost lost it in a club only to be found by a friend... it has foundation stains tho lol
22: are you a morning person? n o
23: what’s your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations? sleep, listen to music, watch stuff, not reply to messages
24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets? no
25: what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into? nothing rly comes to mind but im p sure ive been somewhere like tht lol
26: what are the shoes you’ve had for forever and wear with every single outfit? LOL my adidas superstars
27: what’s your favorite bubblegum flavor? ermm the red colored ones?
28: sunrise or sunset? hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm very good question
29: what’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? hmm what comes to mind is the way both of us sometimes exchange goodnight msgs w nct farm emojis heheeh
30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared? lol ofc....
31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks. unfortunately im rly basic on socks, u wud most likely find me wearing black ankle socks or black ballet(?) socks nothing more nothing less.......
32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. a lot has happened usually during that time lol. duno which story to pick honestly hahahah. i think a memorable one might be when we were drinking n played games and we talked and talked and joked n nek min one by one we fell asleep in the same room hahah... im sure there are other stories tht might be more eventful but fr the life of me my memorys fuzzy rn lol
33: what’s your fave pastry? i love strawberry shortcakes! or mille crepes
34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it? i kept a LOT hahah. prolly named a few, but nothing was too special. i think it rly reflected how i managed my relationships then, n evn yrs aftwds, like i ws always lonely n my instincts were to gain quantity cos deep down i cudnt trust ppl n cudnt get too committed lololol
35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often? i wish i was cos sometimes ppl wud make pretty colorful notes, but i usually just buy ones tht i wud use cos practicality.
36: which band’s sound would fit your mood right now? mmmmm is it cheating if i say nct cos they cover a range of genres lmao. but their ballads i guess yeah.
37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean? i mean i prefer to keep it clean, but its always really messy HAHAHA ;_;
38: tell us about your pet peeves! 1. someone rude 2. someone who doesnt know how to respect others’ boundaries 3. someone self-entitled n takes themselves 2 seriously
39: what color do you wear the most? black on black on black on black baby
40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what’s it’s story? does it have any meaning to you? an evangelion ring, its the black (lilith) moon with lcl gem in it, to me i guess symbolizes my struggle with human relations, n how eva as an anime illustrated tht n the fantasy of having everyone’s consciousness merged into one--n the fact that lilith in itself (in astrology) signifies the darker side of a human being? i guess n the fact that evn if u acknowledge ur darker side u cud still use it to further urself
41: what’s the last book you remember really, really loving? hmmmm i guess last was a self help book, unfuck your boundaries, helped me support my need to strengthen my boundaries
42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it! little rogue :) its in a small alleyway, a little quaint shop, easy to miss... small potted plants, with an amaaazing matcha latte
43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? siiigh a guy i was involved with lmfao i cut him off tho
44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? hmmmmm good question i guess lately ive been very thankful tht i could feel comfortable taking my own time and space, n accepting the positive energy others wn give 2 me. being single really, really does help evn tho id feel lonely sometimes, bc the only weight i carry is the weight of my own soul n i wn learn how to nourish that
45: do you trust your instincts a lot? very i think
46: tell us the worst pun you can think of. i have a lot HAHAHA if u were a friend of mine ud prolly get tired of them. a genuinely bad one wud be haha youre so punny lmfao
47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe? nothing rly lmao if theyre healthy n someone derives happiness frm it i wudnt want it to be banned
48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today? probably not lol, i mean i think i retained similar fears since i ws a kid but now obviously my biggest fear(s) would be more...specific to me
49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought? its the digital age baby spotify ftw (in all srsness i wish i collected vinyls tho hh)
50: what’s an odd thing you collect? i used to collect ramune bottles lmaoooo
51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them? hmmmm nah lets not do this right now lol
52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far? LOL too many but i love shitpost quality memes tbh
53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them? pulp fiction. i actually loved it, i think i still do, its entertainment value is kickass, havent taken the time to dissect it in any other way
54: who’s the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face? oh man i think it ws the dude i ws seeing lmao fk him
55: what’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point? a lot, n most of them im not proud of, cos some involves self harm
56: what are some things you find endearing in people? kindness n genuineness, someone’s courage in being vulnerable
57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics? dont feel like it rn but everytime i do 10/10 will dramatically reenact the lyrics right to the guitar riffs
58: who’s the wine mom and who’s the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why? im definitely the wine (aunt) lmfaooo im already one tbh 
59: what’s your favorite myth? Eros + Psyche, Icarus and the sun
60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves? i love poetry hahah...cant think of any rn
61: what’s the stupidest gift you’ve ever given? the stupidest one you’ve ever received? id love any gift given 2 me as long as they wont harm me or anything lmao n i dont think ive evr given anything too stupid. well.. idk if this is stupid tho like i sent flowers thanking my ex for ‘helping me live’ well aft we’ve blocked each other off cos the end to the relo was js daaamn toxic lmao
62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind? nope
63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be? music i do spotify n im pretty particular ab organizing my playlists i guess. my books im alright with as long as theyre just stacked properly no problem
64: what color is the sky where you are right now? prolly rly dark blue cos its 12 am
65: is there anyone you haven’t seen in a long time who you’d love to hang out with? a lot tbh cos ive rly been focusing on stuff internally
66: what would your ideal flower crown look like? daisies, sunflowers, n baby breath here n there
67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel? somber i guess maybe a tad bit nostalgic?
68: what’s winter like where you live? heeella cold not cos of the temperature itself but the winds thooo, if it drizzles evn in the slightest it feels like needles piercing through ur bones literally
69: what are your favorite board games? i like the game of life, ummm cards against humanity?
70: have you ever used a ouija board? no n never will lol
71: what’s your favorite kind of tea? the fruity kinds
72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you’ll forget it? yea def lol
73: what are some of your worst habits? disappearing from people when i feel strong emotions
74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns. they’re small but they’re so full of love, full of life, full of strength, and full of care for others, they’re the type of person who will seek their goals till the end despite obstacles and still be able to not lose their warm heart on the way. they put so much thought and care to every aspect of their life even when in the past they have been handed some bad things, and i adore them for that.
75: tell us about your pets! none :( wish i have a cat though
76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren’t? hahahhaah
77: pink or yellow lemonade? pink!
78: are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub? neither sometimes i think theyre weird sometimes cute sometimes weirdly cute lmao
79: what’s one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you? write up 24 things they love about me to stop me from hating myself
80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? white. no but if i had to id say white anyways lol cos its a blank canvas
81: describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. i dunno uhhhh her rounded eyes which seemed to at first glance, harbor plenty of wonder seemed to be weighted by many untold secrets, the traces of which could be found when she erupts into laughter where the wonder would manifest itself in the form of small stars in the dark of her eyes.
82: are/were you good in school? meh. i try
83: what’s some of your favorite album art? weirdly i like cigarette after sex’s one cos its so simple yet telling
84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? planning on getting an evangelion one, another heart one, a sunflower one, and prolly a ghibli related one
85: do you read comics? what are your faves? manga? naruto 4evr LOL
86: do you like concept albums? which ones? hmmm thinkin of dpr live’s IAOT
87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? lord of the rings, harry potter, one of ghibli movies lol
88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? i think impressionism is very cool evn tho i dont do it myself
89: are you close to your parents? eeeeee
90: talk about your one of you favorite cities. Melbourne is a wonderful city where many things could coexist in one--happiness and sadness, camaraderie and loneliness, hot and cold, quiet and full of life, productive and relaxed, bursting with unfocused energy yet incredibly organized, and for many reasons it’s become one of my favorite cities, and definitely my favorite to live in.
91: where do you plan on traveling this year? no plans tbh lol maybe home?.......japan? heheheh nahhh
92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? it depends lol mostly i guess drowns my pasta in cheese
93: what’s the hairstyle you wear the most? i always wear it down, either straight or wavy
94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? a friend of mine
95: what are your plans for this weekend? stay in most likely, do stuff
96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? 100% procrastinate lmaoooo
97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? ISTG, jkjk INFP, leo sun aquarius moon cancer rising, ravenclaw
98: when’s the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it? im alws meh ab hiking tbh lmao 
99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. Long Slow Distance - NCT 127, Four - Sleeping At Last, idontwannabeyouanymore - Billie Eilish, Stop This Train - John Mayer, Digital Lover - Crush
100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why? 5 years into the past so she’d stop focusing her life around anybody else but herself
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theattainer · 5 years ago
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What Are Your Rules for Life? These 11 Expressions (from Ancient History) Might Help
http://theattainer.com/what-are-your-rules-for-life-these-11-expressions-from-ancient-history-might-help/
What Are Your Rules for Life? These 11 Expressions (from Ancient History) Might Help
In one of my favorite novels, The Moviegoer by Walker Percy, Aunt Emily is famous for asking a question. It’s a simple one, but I think an eye-opening one. Aunt Emily, the wisest character in the book, likes to ask,
What do you live by?
As in, what are your principles? What are the Ten Commandments that rule your life? Who’s the animating force behind what you do and why you do it?
You’d think most people would know the answer to this question, but of course they don’t. Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll likes to tell a story about how long he managed to coach football without actually knowing what he believed in as a coach. It was only after another disappointing season with the New England Patriots—some 15 years into his career—that it struck Carroll that he had no real coaching philosophy, no real belief system. Inspired by John Wood, Carroll got to work, “writing notes and filling binders”—on nailing down his core values, his philosophy, what exactly he believes in. It was a transformative decision: He would go on to win two National Championships and win a Super Bowl with the Seattle Seahawks.
Now when he gives talks, he likes to open with that question: What’s your philosophy?What do you live by? He told me once, when I asked him about it, how shocked he is, on a regular basis, how many CEOs and generals and investors and coaches at the highest levels reveal, accidentally, that they have just been winging it.
That’s crazy!
In light of that fact, I thought I would look backwards to history, when the idea of a code—the Romans called it mas morium—was more common. The “old ways” come down to us in the form of some wonderful Latin expressions that remain, thousands of years later, very much worth living by.
Festina Lente (Make Haste Slowly)
From the Roman historian Suetonius, we learn that festina lente was the motto of Rome’s first emperor, Augustus. “He thought nothing less becoming in a well-trained leader than haste and rashness,” Suetonius writes, “And, accordingly, favourite sayings of his were: ‘More haste, less speed’; ‘Better a safe commander than a bold’; and ‘That is done quickly enough which is done well enough.’”
Faster is not always better. In fact, it’s often the slowest way to accomplish anything. Great leaders throughout history have known this. There is a quote ascribed to Lincoln about how the way to chop down a tree is to first spend several hours sharpening your axe. Kennedy used to talk about using time as a tool, not as a couch.
It’s easy to rush in. It feels good to start doing. But if you don’t know what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and how to do it? Well, it’s not going to go well. If you’re going quickly for the sake of speed, you’re going to make costly mistakes. You’re going to miss opportunities. You’re going to miss critical warnings.
Each of us needs more clear thinking, wisdom, patience, and a keen eye for the root of problems. “Slowly,” Juan Ramon Jimenezas put it, “you will do everything quickly.”
Festina Lente.
Carpe Diem (Seize The Day)
Locked in prison by Henry Bolingbroke (Henry IV) in Shakespeare’s Richard II, Richard II gives a haunting speech about his hopeless fate. One line stands out, as it captures perfectly the reality of nearly every human being—indeed, it sounds like it was cribbed from Seneca’s On The Shortness of Life.
“I wasted time,” Richard II says, “and now doth time waste me.”
Isn’t that beautiful? And terribly sad? It was some 1500 years before Shakespeare that the poet Horace wrote in book 1 of Odes, “carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero” (seize the day, trust tomorrow e’en as little as you may).
We think that time is ours to waste. We even say, “We have two hours to kill” or speak of dead time between projects. The irony! Because time is the one that’s killing us. Each minute that passes is not just dead to us, it brings us closer to being dead.
That’s what Richard II realizes in that prison cell. He had wasted time and now, by a stroke of bad luck and evil, he is now wasting away. Only now is he realizing that each second that ticks by is a beat of his heart that he won’t get back, each ringing bell that marks the hour falls upon him like a blow.
Seneca writes that we think life is short, when in reality we just waste it. Marcus admonishes himself to not put off until tomorrow what he can do today, because today was the only thing he controlled (and to get out of bed and get moving for the same reason). The Stoics knew that fate was unpredictable and that death could come at any moment. Therefore, it was a sin (and stupidity) to take time for granted.
Today is the most valuable thing you own. It is the only thing you have. Don’t waste it. Seize it.
Carpe Diem. 
Fac, si facis (Do It If You’re Going To Do It)
The painter Edgar Degas, though best known for his beautiful Impressionist paintings of dancers, toyed briefly with poetry. As a brilliant and creative mind, the potential for great poems was all there—he could see beauty, he could find inspiration. Yet there are no great Degas poems. There is one famous conversation that might explain why. One day, Degas complained to his friend, the poet Stéphane Mallarmé, about his trouble writing. “I can’t manage to say what I want, and yet I’m full of ideas.” Mallarmé’s response cuts to the bone. “It’s not with ideas, my dear Degas, that one makes verse. It’s with words.”
So yes, deliberation and patience are key. You don’t want to rush into things. That’s what festina lente is about. But at some point the rubber has to meet the road.
“I should start a company.” “I have a great idea for a movie.” “I would love to write that book one day.” “If I tried hard enough, I could be ______.” How many of those people actually go through with building the company, releasing the movie, publishing the book, or becoming whatever it is they claim they could become? Sadly, almost none.
“Lots of people,” as Austin Kleon puts it, “want to be the noun without doing the verb.” It doesn’t matter where we are; to get to wherever we want to go, to implement all 11 of these expressions to live by, it is works, not words, that are required. “You must build up your life action by action,” Marcus Aurelius said. You must get started.
Fac, si facis.
Quidvis recte factum quamvis humile praeclarum (Whatever Is Rightly Done, However Humble, Is Noble)
The youngest of five children, Sir Henry Royce’s father died when he was just 9 years old. He went to work to alleviate his family’s financial burdens, so if his dreams of being an engineer were to be realized, it’d be without any formal education. Royce took jobs selling newspapers, delivering telegrams, making tools, and fixing street lights. At the age of twenty-one he started his own company making electric fittings. At twenty-six his interests shifted to the emerging automobile industry, and soon thereafter, he created Rolls-Royce Motor Cars.
It might seem like there is an enormous difference between those professions but in fact, they are related. It was his experiences doing that manual labor, doing those seemingly insignificant tasks that cultivated Royce’s commitment to and understanding of excellence. In fact, he later had a version of it inscribed on the mantle over his fireplace: Quidvis recte factum quamvis humble praeclarum.
Whatever you do well, however lowly, is noble.
There is no such thing as a job or a task that is beneath us. How we do anything is how we do everything. And if we can truly internalize and believe that, it will help us do the important things better. That’s why we love luxury items and pay so much for them, isn’t it? Because of their insane attention to detail, because how they refused to settle, how they did everything right?
Quidvis recte factum quamvis humile praeclarum.
Semper Fidelis (Always Faithful)
Otto Frank was late coming home from the First World War. No, it wasn’t because he was injured. Nor was he detained by a girl he’d fallen in love with or waylaid by traveling he decided to do. He was delayed for weeks because during the war his unit had commandeered some horses from a small farm in Pomerania and, after the hostilities had ended, he felt duty bound to return them.
When the war ended, nearly every soldier wanted nothing more than to rush home and see their families. Otto Frank did too. But he had borrowed something that wasn’t his and he was determined to honor his obligation, even if that meant delaying the homecoming he craved so much. The farmer, for his part, was shocked to see the horses again. Otto Frank’s mother, who assumed the worst of his absence, was so angry when she heard why he was late that she hurled a coffee pot across the room. She couldn’t understand the selflessness of his actions because in her case, since it had deprived her of her son a little longer, almost felt like selfishness.
“Cold or warm. Tired or well-rested. Despised or honored,” Marcus Aurelius wrote. “Just that you do the right thing. The rest doesn’t matter.” It isn’t easy. It can mean adding on top of already considerable burdens. Other people won’t always understand or take notice. They may be exasperated with you. They might be driven into a rage which you can neither control nor assuage. But none of that matters, and that’s why Semper Fi is the motto of the US Marine Corps. “It is not negotiable,” one Marine puts it. “It is not relative, but absolute…Marines pride themselves on their mission and steadfast dedication to accomplish it.” Not just to the mission, but to each other, and to their country.
You do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. It is the ultimate tautology, but that’s the point. Doing the right thing is all that matters. It is its own reward.
Semper Fidelis.
Per Angusta Ad Augusta (Through Difficulties To Honors)
Look, nobody wants to go through hard times. We’d prefer that things go according to plan, that what could go wrong doesn’t, so that we might enjoy our lives without being challenged or tested beyond our limits.
Unfortunately, that’s unlikely to happen. Which leaves us with the question of what good there is in such difficulty and how we might—either in the moment or after the fact—come to understand what it is that we’re going through…today, tomorrow, and always.
This passage from Sonia Purnell’s wonderful biography of Clementine Churchill, wife of Winston Churchill, is worth thinking about:
“Clementine was not cut out from birth for the part history handed her. Adversity, combined with sheer willpower, burnished a timorous, self-doubting bundle of nerves and emotion into a wartime consort of unparalleled composure, wisdom, and courage. The flames of many hardships in early life forged the inner core of steel she needed for her biggest test of all. By the Second World War the young child terrified of her father…had transmogrified into a woman cowed by no one.”
The Stoics believed that adversity was inevitable. They knew that Fortune was capricious and that it often subjected us to things we were not remotely prepared to handle. And this is not necessarily a bad thing. Because it teaches us. It strengthens us. It gives us a chance to prove ourselves. “Disaster,” Seneca wrote, “is Virtue’s opportunity.” The obstacle is the way, was Marcus Aurelius’s expression.
And so the same can be true for you and whatever it is that you’re going through right now.
Per Angusta Ad Augusta.
Amor fati (Love Of Fate)
The writer Jorge Luis Borges said:
A writer — and, I believe, generally all persons — must think that whatever happens to him or her is a resource. All things have been given to us for a purpose, and an artist must feel this more intensely. All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art.
Everything is material. We have to learn to find joy in every single thing that happens. We have to understand that certain things—particularly bad things—are outside our control. But we can use it all—if we learn to love whatever happens to us and face it with unfailing cheerfulness. And again, not just artists. Issues we had with our parents become lessons that we teach our children. An injury that lays us up in bed becomes a reason to reflect on where our life is going. A problem at work inspires us to invent a new product and strike out on our own. These obstacles become opportunities.
The line from Marcus Aurelius about this was that a blazing fire makes flame and brightness out of everything that is thrown into it. That’s how we want to be. We want to be the artist that turns pain and frustration and even humiliation into beauty. We want to be the entrepreneur that turns a sticking point into a money maker. We want to be the person who takes their own experiences and turns them into wisdom that can be learned from and passed on to others.
Nietzsche said, “My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it…but love it.” Use it all. Find purpose in all of it. Find opportunity in everything. Love it.
You love everything that happens. Because you make use of it.
Amor Fati
Fatum Ingenium Est (Character Is Fate)
When he was in college and struggling to live up to the expectations of his illustrious family, Walker Percy wrote a letter to his uncle and adopted father, Will Percy. He probably expected to receive a lecture about his grades in reply. Or be admonished for letting the family down. Or perhaps to be sent money for a tutor.
But the reply surprised him. Because there wasn’t any of that. Instead, Will waved those concerns off. “My whole theory about life,” Will told his beloved nephew and son, “is that glory and accomplishment are of far less importance than the creation of character and the individual good life.”
It was Heraclitus who said that character is fate. Or character is destiny, depending on the translation. What he meant was: Character decides everything. It determines who we are/what we do. Develop good character and all will be well. Fail to, and nothing will.
It can be easy to lose sight of this. Because we know how competitive the world is. Because things aren’t exactly going our way. Because we want to reach our full potential. But ultimately, we only need to care about our character. The rest is fated from it.  “Life is short,” Marcus Aurelius said, and “the fruit of this life is a good character.”
It’s true in reverse too: A good life is the fruit of good character.
Fatum Ingenium Est.
Semper Anticus (Always Forward)
The wisdom of the ancient world comes down pretty hard and pretty universally against looking back. No one, Jesus said, who looks backwards as they plot is fit for the kingdom of God. Even before Jesus, Cato the Elder—the great-grandfather of the Stoic Cato the Younger—wrote in his only work, On Agriculture, “The forehead is better than the hindhead.” Meaning: Don’t look back. Look forward.
It’s easy to want to look back at the past. To reflect on what’s happened. To blame. To indulge in nostalgia. To wistfully think of what might have been. To inspect and admire what you’ve done. But this is pointless. Because the past is dead. It’s lost. We had our shot with it. Now, all that remains before us is the present—and if we are lucky, the future.
The name of Lance Armstrong’s podcast is called what? The Forward. Because he can’t go back and change what happened, just like in a race, you can’t go backwards and you can’t stop either. All you can do is keep going. All you can do is keep trying to get better.
We must seize this opportunity while we still can. We must give it everything we have. No matter what has happened before—whose fault it was, how much pain it caused us, what regrets we have, or even how triumphant it was—all we can do is move forward. All we can do is act now, with the virtues we hold dear: courage, temperance, wisdom, justice.
Semper Anticus. 
Vivere Militare Est (To Live Is To Fight)
Odysseus leaves Troy after ten long years of war destined for Ithaca, for home. If only he knew what was ahead of him: ten more years of travel. That he’d come so close to the shores of his homeland, his queen and young son, only to be blown back again. That he’d face storms, temptation, a Cyclops, deadly whirlpools, and a six-headed monster. Or that he’d be held captive for seven years and suffer the wrath of Poseidon. And, of course, that back in Ithaca his rivals were circling, trying to take his kingdom and his wife.
He fought his way home. Marcus Aurelius once described life as warfare and a journey far from home. That was Odysseus’s experience certainly. To the Stoics, one had to go through life as a boxer or a wrestler, dug in and ready for sudden assaults.
That’s life. It kicks us around. The stuff we expected to be simple turns out to be tough. The people we thought were friends let us down. A couple storms or unexpected weather patterns just add a whole bunch of difficulty on top of whatever we’ve been doing. Seneca wrote that only the fighter who has been bloodied and bruised—in training and in previous matches—can go into the ring confident of his chances of winning. The one who has never been touched before, never had a hard fight? That’s a fighter who is scared. And if they aren’t, they should be. Because they have no actual idea how they’re going to hold up.
We have to have a true and accurate sense of the rhythms of the fight and what winning is going to require us to do. We have to be ready for the fighting life. We have to be able to get knocked around without letting it knock us out. We have to be in touch with ourselves and the fight we’re in.
Vivere Militare Est.
Memento Mori (Remember Death)
A person who wraps up each day as if it were the end of their life, who meditates on their mortality in the evening, Seneca believed, has a super power when they wake up.
“When a man has said, ‘I have lived!’” Seneca wrote, then “every morning he arises is a bonus.”
Think back: to that one time you were playing with house money, if not literally then metaphorically. Or when your vacation got extended. Or that appointment you were dreading canceled at the last moment.
Do you remember how you felt? Probably, in a word—better. You feel lighter. Nicer. You appreciate everything. You are present. All the trivial concerns and short term anxieties go away—because for a second, you realize how little they matter.
Well, that’s how one ought to live. Go to bed, having lived a full day, appreciating that you may not get the privilege of waking up tomorrow. And if you do wake up, it will be impossible not to see every second of the next twenty-four hours as a bonus. As a vacation extended. An appointment with death put off one more day. As playing with house money.
”You could leave life right now,” Marcus Aurelius wrote, “let that determine what you do and say and think.”
Is there better advice than this? If so, it has yet to be written. Keep it close.
Memento Mori.
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The power of an epigram or one of these expressions is that they say a lot with a little. They help guide us through the complexity of life with their unswerving directness. Each person must, as the retired USMC general and former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, has said, “Know what you will stand for and, more important, what you won’t stand for.” “State your flat-ass rules and stick to them. They shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.”
Least of all to you.
So borrow these eleven, or dig into history or religion or philosophy to find some more.
And then turn those words…into works.
What do you think?
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