#maybe my only option is to expand on this with sources and publish

[rachaelwilterdink]

The Top 10 Best Benefits of IIBA® Membership

I joined the IIBA® a long, long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away – well, maybe not – just kidding). The organization has grown enormously since its inception 21 years ago. As the institute has expanded, so have the benefits it offers its members. I would not have achieved what I have in my career without the knowledge and support of the IIBA®, so it’s with gratitude that I share my favorite Top 10 Best Benefits of IIBA® Membership. Free digital copy of the Business Analysis Book of Knowledge First and foremost, the IIBA® is the publisher of the Guide to the Business Analysis Book of Knowledge®, what I and other Business Analysis call our “BA Bible.” Now in its third major version, the BABOK® is the definitive source of knowledge for practicing the profession of Business Analysis. As a member of the global organization, you have access to a free digital copy of this standard, which is foundational to become a business analysis professional. It's also available in multiple languages.

As an IIBA® member, not only do you have access to the BABOK®, but there are many other digital publications at your disposal, including the Agile Extension (2nd version), Product Ownership Analysis, and others. Online digital library Access to the online digital library is one of the most overlooked and undervalued benefits of IIBA® membership. The cost of membership is worth of every penny even without this perk, but with access to so 11k+ books, this benefit is, well… priceless! You’d be a fool not to take advantage of FREE books!

The library covers so many topics relevant to our profession - everything from agile to leadership, to (God forbid) project management. If you want to learn something new, the IIBA®’s digital library should always be your first stop. You might be surprised at the quality of content you may find. Membership to a local chapter of your choice Recently, the IIBA® introduced a concept they called “harmonization” which merged the global organization with the local chapters. Now, when you become a member of the worldwide institute, you can join any local chapter of your choice. There are local chapters across the globe, and they’re your closest community resource.

Local chapters have boards that you can volunteer to participate in, or if you just choose to be a member, you can enjoy in-person and virtual chapter meetings, study groups, mentoring, and more (depending on each individual chapter’s offerings). Ability to attend ANY chapter’s events, worldwide! When you join the IIBA®, even if you elect to join a specific local chapter, you are still able to attend any chapter’s meetings (whether virtual or in-person). This is a HUGE benefit! If you are certified, you can earn CDUs by attending, and the variety and options of topics are limitless!

I have attended chapter meetings from coast to coast of the United States, and Canada. But that’s just Northern America! The IIBA® is truly a worldwide organization, and if you want to attend a meeting anywhere, you can! Member-only webinars to continue your education and earn CDUs In addition to many webinars that are open to the public, the IIBA® also reserves some of its best speakers and content exclusively for its members. Members-only events provide relevant and timely topics that can help you continue to grow and expand in your own Business Analysis career.

Their calendar is chock-full of engaging opportunities to learn new tools and techniques, along with the opportunity to network with your fellow business analysis professionals from around the world. The IIBA® sends out regular reminders with upcoming topics, so there’s no excuse to miss a chance to learn something new! Reduced cost for certification application, exam, and renewal fees It’s not cheap to pay for a certification, especially ones as respected as those offered by the IIBA®. As a member, you’ll get a discounted rate for all certifications offered, and the savings are substantial! I have three different IIBA® certifications, and I have saved a ton over the years, thanks to my membership.

I should also mention that from time to time, the IIBA® offers even further discounts, whether for a specific certification or for all their offerings (usually toward the end of the calendar year). If you’re looking to get maximum savings, be on the lookout for these special prices. - Online jobs board for both employers and potential employees I haven’t had much need for a job-hunting tool during my career as a Business Analyst, but if you want to go directly to the source, you couldn’t do much better than the job boards that are available as part of your IIBA® membership.

While it’s obviously a third-party service, like the online library, it’s worth the effort if you’re looking to find your next business analysis job. You can create your own profile and rest assured that the job postings are from companies that understand what Business Analysts do! - Competency model to gauge your level of experience An excellent addition to the many other benefits offered by the IIBA®, their competency model can help you figure out where you are in your professional development. Their assessment tool can help you identify your areas of strength and weakness. You’ll know exactly which areas you need to beef up in to grow your career.

As a member, you have access to the competency model as an individual; companies can also license this tool to help their overall Business Analysis practices mature, as well. - Discounts to attend the IIBA®’s global annual conference I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that IIBA® members also get early bird and membership discounts to attend the official annual conference of International Institute of Business Analysis: Building Business Capability (BBC). This is a “can’t-miss” event that brings together the global community of Business Analysis in one place (usually alternating between Florida and Las Vegas, USA).

I have attended this conference more than once, and I can absolutely guarantee that it is some of the best money a company can invest in growing their Business Analysis capabilities. Analysts of any level will learn new skills and techniques and grow their professional networks. - Access to annual Business Analysis Survey Finally, the IIBA® conducts an annual survey on the profession of Business Analysis, and a periodic salary survey. If you want to understand the state of the profession and assess whether you’re fairly compensated for your professional skills and experience, the IIBA® conducts a very thorough survey and analysis of our profession.

As an IIBA® member, you can access the results of the surveys; you can also participate as a contributor. The surveys are extensive, so there is a time commitment to taking a survey, but trust me, it’s well worth your effort.

Final Thoughts

Well, that’s it. Those are my Top 10 Best Benefits of IIBA®Membership. If you’re a member, I’d love to hear what you think. Do you avail yourself of all these benefits? Are there other benefits I neglected to mention that are worthy of note? Let me know in the comments below! Read the full article

[mrsgojosatoru]

so i’ve had the theory of daenerys’ story being coded as a woman of color’s story for a while now. for a character routinely accused of being a colonizer, imperialist, and white savior, she has a lot of fans who are in fact women of color. (very often from or with family from formerly or currently imperialized or colonized lands. myself a member of the palestinian diaspora included.) i actually started thinking about this back in like 2016, before i went to school and really got a lot of the language to talk about what i was seeing. 

i have a background in popular culture studies, my BA and MA are both in popular culture. i received a minor in film studies. i also have a graduate level certificate in women’s studies. in the fall in will be a phd candidate. likely in american culture studies. i tell you all of this now to firmly root myself as an authority in this position. i have six years of formal education in media studies. 

i maintain this position, that her story is one that belongs to a woman of color. daenerys is white in art and casting because white is an unmarked identity, to even the author he feels that if daenerys were anything other than white it would need to be remarked upon. (though at one point he does describe her as dark enough to be mistaken for dothraki, that is largely ignored by both audience and author.) despite the fact that daenerys is not racialized via race characteristics in text, her story is familiar to so many women of color. 

she is a young girl, sold into bridal slavery. part of a diaspora. a refugee forced from her home after the few remaining members of her family are killed after war and conquest in her homeland. while these traits aren’t necessarily racial ones, they are familiar to many people who have or their family members have been brutalized by western imperial powers. 

it goes deeper than that though, though these few markers make her relatable to those of us who have been or have family who has been brutalized by the west, daenerys is also orientalized within the text. and the fandom reaction is to quite literally hate this dragon lady. 

daenerys is contrasted to sansa within the fandom often, and i do think these contrasts are interesting because sansa reads as very white. she is protected by the author in ways that daenerys is simply not. this is most glaringly obvious in the ways that george sexualizes daenerys and does not do the same to sansa. 

the girls are only a few years apart in age. daenerys’ body is remarked upon almost immediately. viserys makes comments about her breasts and touches her, and almost immediately in her story the reader is given a sexualized rape scene with daenerys. throughout agot where daenerys is 13-14 she is consistently exoticized with her white silver hair, and violent eyes, and eroticized through the spectacle of her body. george writes about her breasts and vagina in scenes where that is often not even necessary (such as bathing scenes.) 

this is contrasted sharply by sansa, who by asos is the same age as daenerys, and forced into a marriage against her will, but is not raped. nor does george spend time lingering the gaze on her breasts or gentiles. sansa’s body is protected in a way that daenerys’ is not. this is particularly telling as white womanhood is worth protecting, while the other then has to function as the site of desire. the only other characters eroticized the same way daenerys is arguable are arianne and taena of myr. even catelyn and ygritte who have sex scenes within the book are not constantly eroticized the way daenerys is. (to my knowledge i can’t recall a scene where cat thinks of her breasts moving under her dress the way daenerys does about the painted vest at the end of acok.) 

this exotic/erotic spectacle is not uncommon in the orientalism of women of color in 19th century paintings and stories. 

further more along the lines of orientalizing the targaryens in text, most people in westeros treat the targaryens as if they are other worldy gods, or mad barbarians. that every targaryen has the potential for “madness” which always translates into inferior intelligence and violence is not unlike the way white people have thought about people from the orient. they are less civilized in position to the rest of westeros who is much more civilized. 

fans have internalized this “madness/greatness” paradox and consistently use it as an attempt to brand dany as a foregin invading threat. they argue she has no right to the country (even though targaryen blood is what the baratheons claim allows them the throne), and consistently paint her as a threat. once daenerys comes she will burn the water gardens, she’ll burn king’s landing, she’ll burn the whole country down. this is not a far cry from similar rhetoric we see about refugees and immigrants coming into the country. white people consistently paint people of color as a threat to their country, one that must be stopped from “invading” at all costs. 

it’s this orientalism both in and out of text more than anything that codes daenerys as a woman of color. because she is not offered the protection of white womanhood, because she is written as an erotic / barbarous other, women reject her in favor of clinging to sansa a proper representative of white womanhood. 

[that-disabled-radfem]

Happy back-to-school y’all

I’ve attended and worked at a couple of super liberal universities. I avoid the gender studies departments for obvious reasons and I still had a lecture in which the female prof gave a brief overview of TERFs and proclaimed her hatred of JKR. Being openly critical of gender ideology, the porn industry, kinks, and ‘sex work’ are the kind of things that can ruin your future in academia. Not to mention the fact that any speech or actions that could be labelled transphobic (ie. defining woman as adult human female) can get you a suspension according to many universities anti-hate-speech policies. 

So, here’s a list of small and smallish (small in terms of overt TERFery, some may require more effort than others) radical feminist actions you can take as a university student:

(this is a liberal arts perspective so if you’re a stem gal this may not apply. but also if you’re in stem maybe you can actually acknowledge that women are oppressed as a sex class without getting kicked out of school. idk)

(Note for TRAs hate reading this: One of the core actions of radical feminism is creating female networks. This is not so that we can brainwash people into being anti-trans. This is because female solidarity is necessary for creating class consciousness and overturning patriarchy. It is harder to subjugate the female sex when we stand together.)

Take classes with female profs. Multiple sections of a class? Pick the one taught by a woman. Have to chose an elective? Only look at electives offered by women. When classes have low numbers they get cancelled. When classes are super popular, universities are forced to consider promoting the faculty that teach them

Make relationships with these female profs. Go to office hours. Chat after class. Ask them about their research. Building female networks is sooooo important!

Actually fill in your end of year course feedback forms. Profs often need these when applying for tenure or applying for a job at another university so it is very important (especially with young and/or new profs) that you fill out these forms and give specific examples of how great these women are. Go off about what you love about them! Give her a brilliant review because you know the idiot boy in that class who won’t shut up even though he knows nothing is going to give her only negative feedback because he thinks any woman who leaves the house is a feminazi b*tch. 

(note: obviously don’t go praising any prof - female or male - who is blatantly racist, homophobic, etc.)

(Also if you have shitty male profs write down all the horrible things they have done and said and put it in these forms because once a shitty man gets tenure they are virtually untouchable)

(also also, leave a good review on rate my profs or whatever other thing students use to figure out if they want to take classes. idc if you copy paste your feedback from the formal review. rave about the class to your friends. do what you can to get good enrolment for that prof for reasons above.)

Participate in class. Talk over the male students. Say what you mean and mean it. Call out the boys when they say dumb shit

Write about women. If you have the option to make a text written by a woman your primary text in an essay, do it. Pick the female-centred option if you’re writing an exam-essay with multiple prompts. (Profs often look at what works on their syllabus are being written about/engaged with as a marker of whether to keep those texts the next time they teach the class. If there are badass women on your syllabus, write about them to keep them on the syllabus) Use female-written secondary sources whenever possible. 

(pro tip: many women in academia are more than happy to talk to you about their papers. expand your female networks by reaching out to article authors through email and asking them about their cool shit)

Get your essays published! Many departments have undergrad journals you can publish in. This will ensure more people read about the women you write about and will demonstrate to the department that people like learning about women

Consider trying to publish your undergrad essay with a legit peer-reviewed journal. If you can do it, your use of female-written secondary sources boosts the reputations of the women who wrote those secondary sources. Also this helps generally to increase scholarship about women’s writing!

Present your papers at conferences! Many schools have their own undergraduate/departmental conferences that you can present at. Push yourself by submitting to outside conferences. Bring attention to women’s works by presenting your papers. Take a space at a conference that would otherwise be reserved for mediocre men

Talk to your profs and/or your department and/or your university about mandating the inclusion of female works in classes if this isn’t something they do already

Sit next to other women in your classes. Talk to them. Make friends. Form study groups. Proofread each other’s essays. Give each other knowing looks when the boys are being dumb. Just interact with other women! Build those female networks!

Be generous with your compliments. A female classmate and I were talking to a prof after class and the classmate told me (out of the blue) that I always have such interesting things to say. I think about that whenever I’m lacking confidence about my academic skills. Compliment the women in your classes for speaking up, for sharing their opinions, for challenging your classmates/profs, for doing cool presentations, etc.

Talk to other women about sexist things going on on campus. Make everyone aware of the sexist profs. Complain about how there are many more tenured men than tenured women. Go on rate my professor and be explicit about how the sexist profs are sexist

Be active on campus and in societies. If a society has an all male executive or is male-dominated, any women who join that society make it less intimidating for more women to join. Run for executive positions! Bring in more women! 

(Pro tip: Many societies’ elections are super gameable. You can be eligible to vote in a society election sometimes just by being a student at that university — even without having done anything with the society before. Other societies might just require that you’ve taken a class in a particular department or attended a society event. (Check the society’s governing documents.) Use those female networks you’ve been building. If you can bring three or four random people to vote for you, that might be enough for you to win. Societies have trouble meeting quorum (the minimum number of people in attendance to do votes) so it is really super achievable to rig an election with a few friends. And don’t feel bad about this. The system is rigged against women so you have every right to exploit loopholes!)

(Also feel free to go vote “non-confidence”/“re-open election” if only shitty men are running. Too often people see that only candidates they don’t like are running and so they give up. But you can actually stop them getting elected)

Your campus may have a LGBTQIA+alphabetsoup society. That society definitely needs more L and B women representation. It may be tedious to argue with the nb straight dudes who insist that it’s fine to use “q***r” in the society’s posters and that attraction has nothing to do with genitals, but just imagine what could happen if we could make these sorts of societies actually safe spaces for same-sex attracted women and advocated for our concerns

Attend random societies’ election meetings. Get women elected and peace out. (or actually get involved but I’m trying to emphasize the lowest commitment option with this one)

Write for the campus newspaper. Write about what women are doing - women’s sports, cool society activities, whatever. Review female movies, books, tv shows, local theatre productions. Write about sexism on campus. We need more female by-lines and more stories about women

Get involved with your campus’s sexual assault & r*pe hotline/sexual assault survivor’s centre/whatever similar organization your campus has if you can. This is hard work and definitely not for everyone (pls take care of yourself first, especially if you are a survivor)

(If your campus doesn’t have an organization for supporting survivor’s of sexualized violence, start one! This is probably going to be a lot of hard work though, so don’t do it alone)

Talk to your student council about providing free menstrual hygiene products on campus if your campus doesn’t already do this. If your campus provides free condoms (which they probs do), use that as leverage (ie. ‘sex is optional, menstruation is not. so why do we have free condoms and no free pads?’)

If you’re an older student, get involved with younger students (orientation week and such activities are good for this). Show the freshman that you can be a successful and well-liked woman without shaving your legs, wearing heels, wearing make-up, etc. Mentor these young women. Offer to go for coffee or proofread essays. 

Come to class looking like a human being. Be visibly make-up less, unshaven, unfeminine, etc. to show off the many different ways of being a woman

Talk to the custodial staff and learn their names. (I know there are men who work in this profession, but it is dominated by low-income women) Say hi in the hallways, ask them about their lives, show them they’re appreciated

Be explicit with your language. When you are talking about sex-based oppression, say it. Don’t say ‘sex worker’ when you mean survivor of human trafficking. This tip is obviously a bit tricky in terms of overt TERFyness, so use your best judgement

That’s all from me for now! Feel free to add your suggestions and remember that feminism is about action

[squarecarousel]

Challenge 144: 10 Years, Looking Forward: A-Frame Studio Life Buckle up-- this is a long one! Wow, ten years. It’s hard to believe a whole decade has passed since Square Carousel began, and since I graduated college. In some ways, it feels like another lifetime, and in others, it feels vastly shorter than the decade before that, from ages 12 to 22. Time is fascinating that way. College was such an incredibly impactful time period, but just a measly 4 years-- I could have done college 2.5 more times back-to-back in the years since I graduated, but somehow those four, from 2007-2011 were monumental.  It’s hard to believe I’ll be in a post-college world without Square Carousel, since the group has been a constant in my life these last ten years. I’m really proud that we made it this far and are able to choose to end the journey, rather than it fizzling out or dying from lack of interest. Sometimes it felt like that might happen, but other times it felt like we were blooming. There have been many ups and downs over the course of this journey. And damn, it was a lot of hard to work to keep running, but I am so grateful for the learning experience. I know so much more about leadership now than I ever would have before-- the delicate balance of having rules to keep the group running (deadlines, participation requirements, our dreaded “strike system”) and keeping up morale (knowing when to forgive slip-ups, keeping challenges sufficiently entertaining and well...challenging, making sure the group feels like it’s a community). Elizabeth and I were reluctant leaders, just naturally having to take those roles as other original members of the group left and were replaced by folks who needed guidance. We definitely didn’t seek it out, but we knew that if the group were to stay alive, we had to put some structure into the system. Pretty early on we made our rules and guidelines, extended the challenges to 3 weeks from just 2, and worked on our visual image online. Our awesome logo was made by former member Casey Crisenbery, and we switched from Wordpress to Tumblr, purchasing a URL, and Casey using special code for custom organization on the site. Sketch critiques were now a halfway point through our 3 weeks-long challenge, which helped a lot with the community aspect and engagement. We started doing interviews for each member, reaching out to other illustration groups, blogs and submission sites and had our work featured on a few of them. Some of us even got jobs from the connections made through Square Carousel!  There was a bad stretch several years ago when I wasn’t sure we’d make it through, with toxic behavior and a few folks petitioning for removing deadlines and structure, making everything optional. One thing I can tell you with certainty after ten years of working with artists is that 95% of us require deadlines to do anything, and incentives/obligations for meeting those deadlines, or it just isn’t going to happen! Elizabeth and I, along with a few other solid members, were able to keep the structure we’d worked hard to create, but the toxic culture had already killed group morale and we lost a lot of members simultaneously. That was a sad and scary time for Square Carousel, but I didn’t want to go out on a sour note. So the small group of us picked the pieces back up again, did a little refocus on our goals as a collective and created an “Admin” so Elizabeth and I didn’t have to carry the entire burden alone. I am forever grateful to Sayada and Jordan for stepping up into these roles to help us get the train back on track. Sayada especially picked up a lot of responsibilities that a newer member shouldn’t have to worry about, and was a total rockstar for Square Carousel. I wish we’d had her with us for the whole ride. I’m so happy that we’ve had a few really great years with some really loyal and talented artists to round out the experience at Year Ten.  There is nobody I’m more thankful for than my Good Cop, Elizabeth, though. She was so reliable, always able to provide balance in our leadership roles, and such a wonderful shoulder to cry on when things got too stressful. Elizabeth, thank you for this journey and for being my SC Wife all these years! It’s so funny because of all the original members, you were one of the only ones I hadn’t really known from SCAD classes, yet you’re the SCAD Illustration friend I have remained most connected to most consistently. Nothing bonds you quite like running an illustration collective does! It also cracks me up that in all these years, we hadn’t ever facetimed or talked on the phone until a few months ago--I didn’t even know your mannerisms or voice, but knew you so well anyway. My greatest internet friend! I love you dearly and it truly won’t feel right, the absence of our weekly SC conversations. Thank you for all of the memories! As just a member and artist, this group has helped me grow so much professionally. It was my client when I didn’t have clients. It was my motivation to paint when I didn’t feel creative. It was my source of portfolio-worthy work, but also my safe place to experiment and fail when I was trying something new. The girl who started as a Square Carousel member freshly graduated in 2011 was working part-time at Urban Outfitters, had basically no money, and no clue how to promote herself. The “studio” was a corner of the bedroom and nobody took her seriously. But a stubborn dedication and the security, purpose and structure of Square Carousel helped the slow change from that lost girl to a full-time freelancing woman. Now, in 2021, I have been doing freelance illustration fully for six years, through contract jobs, editorial, publishing, advertising, commission and local work, as well as selling prints and products online, in local shops and events. I am not making the big bucks, certainly, and I still have goals I’m working towards, but damn, if that isn’t a glow-up, I don’t know what is. Thank you for helping me achieve my impossible dream, Square Carousel, and always being a place with the right amount of advice, support and critique. Ten years, 34 artist interviews, 38 artists, and 144 challenges. I’m the only member to have completed every single one. 144 illustrations through the years. Some were game-changers for my style and my portfolio. Some were total stinkers and I hope you don’t go looking for them. But all were an important step in my career.   So, in ten more years? I’ll be 42 years old, which is very weird because I have never imagined myself that old before... it’s hard to honestly say what that would look like, especially considering the world we are currently living in and how the last 4/5 years have proven that anything (awful) can happen. Jordan and I have a goal to move to Colorado in the next 4 or 5 years, and I’d love to have a little A-Frame in the mountains with a loft studio, shown in my illustration here. Texas has become extremely problematic, especially after the winter storm in February of this year, and will be impacted greatly by climate change, both environmentally and economically. Right now, Austin is still booming, but at some point the lack of foresight in this state’s government is going to screw over the residents and it will be one of the places from which climate refugees run. Is that tomorrow? No, obviously not. But I want to already be settled someplace more stable, having grown some roots, before other folks start to roll in. But, to be able to do that, I need to rely less on my local jobs and connections and be able to have an “anywhere career.” So right now I am focusing on expanding in that way, particularly with book cover illustration and design. I’ve been doing a lot of portfolio work and self-publishing jobs, and hope to get an agent that can shop my work to big-time publishers sometime in the next year or two. Let’s say I succeed at all of those things in five years-- we’re in our Colorado A-Frame, I’m illustrating book covers (and I’ve also convinced my parents to come with me, and maybe a couple friends!). The next five years after that? I don’t know... hopefully a lot of adventures. Hopefully a lot of cool jobs, but also a lot of work/life balance. Right now, I don’t want kids, so the A-Frame will be filled with cats. Maybe we’ll have an old camper van for regular road trips around the western National Parks. I’d love for my work to reflect those passions-- more jobs with outdoor brands, parks, organizations. More book covers for stuff I’d personally love to read and keep on my overflowing shelf. That’s the vague goal for me in ten years, but I don’t want to plan any further than that, because life just also needs to happen the way it’s going to happen. There are parts of my current life I planned for in 2011... and there are parts I never, ever would have guessed. I hope there’s some fun surprises in 2031, too. Thanks for the decade, Square Carousel. Joining illustration collectives will always be the first bit of advice I give fresh graduates. Caitlin

[snowdice]

Lessons From a Book [Part of the Sometimes Labels Shift Series]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Virgil & Logan, Virgil & Patton, Patton/Logan

Characters: Logan, Virgil, Patton

Summary: Virgil cannot get anywhere in his training. He guesses he finally manged to piss Logan off.

From the prompt “Virgil accidentally gets hit by Patton or Logan and thinks it’s a punishment.”

Notes: Past Child Abuse, Superhero AU, accidentally striking a child, self deprecation

This is a dealing with events set after my story Sometimes Labels Fail.

This was part of my 100,000 word special event that I did on my blog. This fic marks 100,000 published words in the Labeled Universe. Thanks again to anyone who prompted, voted, or read this as I wrote it yesterday. The event marked this milestone better than I thought it would! Thanks for to anyone who’s been reading this series!

Training had started to not be as fun as it used to be. At first it had been all about messing around and testing the abilities Virgil was good with. That had been cool! Logan would have him do different things with his shadows and they’d basically just try a whole bunch of experiments.

Then, Logan had gotten The Book. It was an introductory book about light manipulation powers that basically explained different techniques light manipulators could do laid out in order of difficulty.

The introductory section was basic things kids usually did automatically like glowing and manipulating the direction of already existent light sources. Virgil could do those things already and they were mostly used as warmups every session. Then, the first 10 chapters were supposed to be the standard basics that most light manipulators learned early on. After that, there were 5 optional chapters each with different directions one could take their powers. Those were things like learning to separate white light into different colors, beginning to expand into other powers like fire-starting and sound wave manipulation, and different ways to influence common technology. It was an awesome book.

Virgil absolutely despised it.

They were currently on Chapter 1: Making Light Beams, Section 1: Location Control of Bodily Glow. Currently, Virgil’s entire torso and one foot was glowing. His fingertips were supposed to be glowing. He’d been working on this for almost 2 weeks and hadn’t gotten any better.

There was a small frown on Logan’s face as he scrutinized Virgil’s latest fuck up. He glanced back down at the stupid book. “I think you are perhaps focusing too hard making more of your body light up then necessary. The book suggests thinking of ‘the light as running water flowing through your hands.’ Whatever that means.”

Yes, Virgil knew what the book said. He practically had the section memorized at this point since Logan wouldn’t stop reading it out loud to him. He was probably hoping repetition would get it through Virgil’s unbearably thick skull; Virgil wondered how long it would take him to figure out he was too stupid for this.

Probably not long considering the crease between his eyes as he looked at him. “Perhaps we should take a short break,” he suggested.

Virgil nodded miserably.

“I’m going grab some supplies from my office upstairs,” Logan continued. “Please consume an adequate electrolyte replenishing drink while I’m gone.”

“I will,” Virgil promised. He nodded, still seeming lost in thought about how much of a fuck up Virgil was as he walked toward the stairs.

Virgil sighed and walked over to the mini fridge to grab one of the small purple Gatorades and took a few sips. He glared at the book, but then his shoulders slumped. It wasn’t the books fault. He set the half drank Gatorade down next to the fridge and walked over to the table where the book was propped open. The section was only a page and a half full of the most basic steps possible and a fucking picture. He couldn’t even do it with fucking pictorial instructions.

He bent over the book to slowly read the passage again. Maybe if he just kept reading it, it would stick. After a few minutes of staring at the open page, he heard footsteps descending the steps. They were only about halfway down the stairs when the book that he’d been leaning over suddenly rocketed up and slammed into his face, shoving him back as it went flying through the air. He fell back onto his butt, stunned for a millisecond as his face smarted from the impact.

Oh. He guessed he really had managed to piss him off.

It wasn’t the first time Virgil had been smacked in the face with a book for being stupid. He had hoped that since Logan had kept saying it was okay that he was taking a while to figure it out that maybe this wouldn’t happen, but he guessed everyone had their limit.

“Apologies Virgil,” Logan said from the foot of the stairs. “I did not want to hit you.”

Of course, he didn’t. Virgil was just that stupid and pathetic that he’d made Logan hit him.

“Yeah,” Virgil replied.

“Are you alright?” Logan asked.

“Fine,” Virgil said, steeling himself before shakily pushing himself to his feet.

“Do we need to stop for the afternoon?” Logan asked not unkindly, but Virgil could guess at the concealed resentment behind his tone.

“No, it’s fine,” Virgil lied. It was easy, actually, to just say what an adult wanted, like slipping into an old worn t-shirt.

“Very well,” Logan said. “I brought some diagrams that I’d printed off.” He was looking down at the book in his arms now. “There seems to be a few other schools of thought about what exactly the move feels like.” A paper floated towards Virgil and he managed to not flinch. It hovered in front of him. “This diagram seems to compare it more to heat as though imagining there is a fire between your palms.”

Virgil looked at the paper. It was a picture of a featureless body and there were arrows and words, but Virgil had trouble understanding what they were trying to say. He stared at it blankly for a few moments. “Okay,” he said. The paper fluttered away.

“Very good,” Logan said. “Go ahead and try again.”

Virgil nodded as he walked past him to sit on his usual bench; his eyes tracked him all the way there.

Virgil looked down at his hands. He took a breath and tried to make his fingertips glow or even just his hands; that would be progress.

He didn’t even glow at all, not even in the wrong places.

He felt himself want to tear up, but he repressed it harshly. He just had to make his fingertips glow. It wasn’t even hard. It was for babies. He was such a fucking failure if he couldn’t even do that. Virgil was surprised that he hadn’t gotten more than smacked in the face with a book.

“Virgil?” Logan questioned.

Just do what he wanted. It would all be okay if he just did what he wanted.

Why couldn’t he just do what he wanted?

“Virgil,” Logan repeated, louder and closer and Virgil flinched.

There was a beat of silence.

“Okay,” he said softly. “I think we’re done for the day.”

“No!” Virgil said, eyes jerking up to meet his. He was really, really close. “No, I can do it. I can.”

“Virgil,” he said one more time, firmly. His hand came up to rest on Virgil’s shoulder.

“No!” Virgil yelled, crumpling down and away onto the floor.

Virgil was surprised to see his feet move away a bit so he was out of Virgil’s space. His arm moved and Virgil curled even more into himself, but nothing happened.

Well, something must have happened, he realized a couple of seconds later, just not to him because he heard footsteps all but running down the stairs from the kitchen. Patton appeared at the bottom of the steps out of breath. “What happened?” he asked.

Logan just made some sort of awkward gesture toward Virgil.

Patton came to his knees in front of him, hands placed flat on his own thighs. “Hey, kiddo. Can you tell me what’s going on?”

“Sorry,” Virgil breathed. “I’m sorry. I’ll do better.”

“Honey, can you tell me what you’re talking about?”

“I made Logan mad because I’m so stupid,” Virgil said, trying not to cry.

“I’m not mad at you,” Logan said, sounding confused. Virgil curled up tighter into a ball. Patton made a hand motion and Logan slowly came over to kneel in front of him.

“Why would you think…” he said and then he paused, seeming to mull it over. “Virgil, I think we may have had a very large communication error. You seem to be under the misconception that I intended for the book to hit you, but that is in no way the case. I simply had wanted to check on something in the book and was unaware you were in its path when I summoned it. I would never purposefully harm you. Not for any reason and especially not because of something as minor as struggling with learning a concept. I am very sorry for hitting you and for not noticing there was a misunderstanding earlier.”

Virgil looked at him. He was on Virgil’s level, Virgil noticed and maybe it was a weird thing to notice right now, but it felt nicer than looking up at him. He looked serious, his eyes sad and worried.

“Really?” Virgil asked tentatively.

“Yes, of course.”

Virgil thought and both Logan and Patton gave him time to think. Logan had never hit him before. He hadn’t even done anything close or even threatened to do anything, and it was an accident that could happen. Virgil thought… well maybe he could believe that. He hoped it wasn’t just because he wanted to believe it.

“Okay,” Virgil said at last. “Okay.”

“Want a hug?” Patton asked.

Virgil bit his lip and nodded.

“From Logan?”

“If that’s okay,” Virgil mumbled.

“It is,” Logan confirmed. He scooted forward slowly on his knees and opened his arms in offering. Virgil leaned into him and arms were wrapped around him snuggly.

Virgil rested his check against his chest. The familiar scent of their laundry detergent hit his nose as well as the faint sent of chalk that always lingered on him even when Virgil hadn’t seen him use a chalkboard that day. Virgil relaxed into hug with a slow exhale.

Patton’s gentle fingers touched his forehead and he started to stroke though his hair. “Oh, baby, it’s okay,” Patton said softly which is when Virgil realized he’d started to cry. “You didn’t deserve any of that.” Virgil just held Logan tighter and got a gentle squeeze in return. Patton moved forward to press a kiss to his forehead. “We should go upstairs,” Patton said. “Dinner is probably burning.”

“We can order in,” Logan said.

Patton nodded. “Virgil can pick where.”

“I don’t know any places that deliver.”

“Don’t worry,” Patton said. “Logan has a list of all approved places as well as updated menus for each. Even though we order out once every 3 months.”

“It’s good to be prepared.”

“I know, dear.” Patton leaned forward to kiss Virgil’s forehead again. “Logan might even let us eat on the couch if you give him puppy dog eyes. We can watch another Disney movie while we eat.”

Virgil chuckled softly. “Sounds good.”

“You have to give him the puppy dog eyes though!” Patton insisted.

Virgil pulled away from Logan and Logan let his arms drop away. Virgil bit his lip looking at Patton and then looked back at Logan unsure what he was supposed to do.

“Yes, yes,” Logan said. “You’re adorable and you get anything you want.”

Virgil giggled and Logan gave him a fond smile.

“We really do have to go upstairs though,” Patton said. “I left the stove on.”

Want to read more? Click below!

Labeled Master Post.

My Masterpost.

[joshfornerwrites]

Navigating the COVID-19 Reality

How our scrolling habits and sources of information are changing amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

Editorial by Josh Forner (www.joshforner.com)

In our new reality post-COVID-19, it's easy to get lost in the torrents of information being spewed out from the news and media platforms daily. Figures, graphs, charts, new lingo like “flatten the curve,” and “social distancing;” but one thing that hasn't yet been spoken about in any great depth is people's reactions with their devices.

I – for one – have certainly noticed a heavy increase in my social media use and news scrolling, and I figured that surely, I wasn't alone.

The reason for spending so much time on social media may be obvious to some, as we begin our lives in isolation, it only makes sense that we turn to the most convenient option available to keep in contact with loved ones. Yet, I am one person who is still out at work in the public, and I too see my social media scrolling hit an all-time high.

For me, I presume it is the worry for friends and loved ones, the fear of misinformation penetrating the communities that I am involved with, and certainly a way to release my over-arching worry.

Facts and education are the main reasons behind one Victorian's recent habitual scrolling. AJ - a 51 year-old educator and business owner from Victoria's Grampians region - had strong and immediate reactions to the first news of COVID-19 becoming a problem in Australia.

AJ has a non-functioning adrenal gland which puts her in the highly susceptible group of the population who are immuno-compromised, and therefore have a much higher risk of both contracting the infection, and inevitably dying from it.

��Considering my position, I had to find the hard facts,” she says, “and I feel it is my role as an educator to speak the truth at the time and educate others”

Having not really ever been a news follower, and living in an area with no television reception, AJ had to start her fact-finding mission somewhere, and it just so happened that her husband's PC had the ABC News website as its homepage. “I had to ask him if he trusted ABC News as a source, because I know a lot of these mainstream media outlets are biased towards their own agenda. He said yes, which was good enough for me”

This has led to a daily scroll-and-refresh habit that was never part of her life prior to the virus hitting Australian shores. She says that her social media use has also seen a strong increase during this time.

There has, however, been a resistance to scrolling.

Cara (real name withheld) is a 34 year-old musician and disability support worker from Melbourne's North-East. She claims she has weened off social media due to the concerning responses she was having to the constant blast of coronavirus news.

“I'm hardly looking at my phone any more. I'd been trying to spend less time on it anyway, but I just found [that] reading a million people posting about this virus made me feel pretty shit”

This poses the next invisible casualty of the COVID-19 pandemic, which is likely to be a spike in mental-ill health. The reactions that people are having to the news and the virus in general is usually quite full of anxiety and fear, if not for themselves, for their loved ones that may be susceptible to infection, and the fate of the world as a whole.

It may just be that a social media detox is exactly what the world needs right now, and there are certainly a number of people leading the way in that regard.

“I'm still keeping enough of an eye [on COVID-19 news] that I know what's happening, but not reaching for my phone all the time like I often do out of habit.”

AJ applauds this measure as she delves deeper into the misinformation being spread across these channels, “I'm specifically seeing a lot of negative responses from people on my friends list to a lot of either what I post or what is posted by news outlets,” she says “This forces me to go and investigate some of their previous posts, and anything else they may be contributing about coronavirus, and the non-truth that is being put out there is astonishing.”

“I think it's really bringing out everybody's true colours.”

Paul is a father of 3 in his 40's who up until recently was employed in customer service within the insurance sector. Whereas he left his job voluntarily before the pandemic had hit, he empathises with others who now find themselves in this situation.

“I have been scrolling and refreshing my mailbox at least 10 times daily,” he says in relation to job applications and newsletters which arrive through his email. It extends to social media use as well: “Once I would have been content checking these platforms maybe five times daily each, however now it is up to 15 times, in order to give me the sense of being updated”

It is my belief that the current crisis highlights how much we unfortunately rely on the wrong media to attain our information. Ever since the Cambridge Analytica saga, the spotlight has well and truly been on social media outlets to try and curb the amount of 'fake news' content and 'data skimming' of people's personal information, but COVID-19 has shot that in the foot in two ways:

1. The vast and ultimately unending articles being published with unsubstantiated claims, incorrect figures, concentrating on the wrong factors or even giving the population a premature sense of hope, and;

2. The keyboard warriors spinning whatever information they find interesting, without checking sources or facts against respected publications. Not to mention that Facebook’s algorithms (for one of the many social media platforms) have remained largely unchanged.

“I'm worried that it took so long for us to start taking note of community transmissions,” says AJ, “I want to draw people's attention to this as being the key number. Not the infection rate or the fatality rate, but community transmissions. This means that we don't know where the virus has spread from, and no idea where it goes”

All in all, whatever your reasons for scrolling more often, it is quite apparent that social media is going to have a heavy influence on our lives over the coming months, if we indeed choose that path. Maybe it is time we all took a leaf out of Cara's book and took a more conscious approach to where we get our information, and also to alleviate our minds from both panic and overload.

I've certainly been bickering and arguing with people over quite a few topics related to the virus, including the government's apparent lack of a plan (prior to the rolled out measures over the past few weeks), schools remaining open and people not adhering to physical distancing and isolation requirements in our major cities – particularly those who are still at work in the public. This may be useful to get off my chest, but it does nothing at the overall level but heighten my frustration and destabalise my current mental state, as well as 'poke the bear' for others to retaliate.

One of the silver linings in this whole episode may be that a good chunk of the population begins to re-think the way it uses and relies on social media, however on the downside we know that the spread of farce and misinformation will no doubt expand and deepen as we sink further into the COVID-19 crisis.

[theonyxpath]

More Q&A – because YOU requested it! Well, maybe not you personally, but we sure did get a great response to last week’s blog…So We’re Doin’ It Again!

“But seriously, why is International shipping so high on the KSs?”

What backers are seeing from us on the Kickstarter pages are the shipping numbers we have received from our fulfillment partners, and no, they aren’t inflating them and we aren’t inflating them – those are what we are hearing from shippers like Fedex and USPS and others.

The fact is: we are not Amazon. We aren’t C’Mon Games or other companies that send out a massive volume of packages. We’re in the same boat as a lot of TTRPG companies, many of whom are dropping international shipping entirely. Instead, we made the call to give our backers the up-front info so they can make intelligent decisions, while we continue to search for less costly shipping options.

“Why aren’t all Storypath Games the same?”

I’m assuming that this is in reference to the Storypath System, and not the settings for each game line that uses it. Because that’s the only way the question makes sense to me.

One of my goals with the Storypath System was that it be flexible enough to work as the basis for any game we care to create with it, and part of that design was that the basic system would then have additional rules attached to it depending on the game line’s needs.

Or, here is more from Eddy Webb, who has been overseeing the Storypath games, as well as doing design work on the system. He sez:

Each game takes the core system and tweaks it in a variety of ways to better emphasize what’s important in that game. A game about myths like Scion doesn’t need comprehensive weapon mechanics, but a game about salvaging equipment like Dystopia Rising does.

Basically, Storypath was never intended to be exactly the same with every line that uses it, like a generic system, but to allow a base level of familiarity so players just need to look into specific, game line intrinsic, additional rules.

“Why won’t you publish all the Clan/Tribe/Tradition/etc books again?”

OK, that’s a multi-part answer, so let me unpack a bit on this one.

First, and very specifically, we aren’t recreating the “Splat books” as we do new editions because those lil’ books aren’t cost-effective to create with our current publishing model. We do however, love to gather the “splats” into larger books like we’ve already done with Lore of the Clans, or Lore of the Bloodlines.

Which brings us to the second part of this, which is what I touched on in last week’s blog, which is that we don’t have carte-blanche to create just any WoD (or CofD or Exalted) books that we want to create. We have to have their pitches approved by our licensor, White Wolf/Paradox, before we can do any work at all on projects.

So what I’m saying is that we wouldn’t just recreate the old splat books, but we would do a differently formatted version, and that version still needs to be greenlit by our licensor. And right now, that has not happened.

Aeon Aexpansion art by Pat McEvoy

“Why are there approvals stages for Scion or Scarred Lands- don’t you own those?”

The business productivity answer is that we try and keep our processes the same in game book creation to make them go through the stages consistently.

The RichT answer is that I want to be able to review, tweak, and fine-tune the game lines my company owns. I mean, I do it with our licensed game lines, so by crackee, I’m doing with my own durn games!

“What stores carry your books?”

Y’know, I don’t actually know all of them at this point! What we hear from our sales partners at Studio2 and Indie Press Revolution, is that more and more stores are ordering as they become aware that we are putting select books into the distribution/retail channel.

So the notices I see are focused on which distributors have ordered what, although I do still get a chance to chat with retailers who pledge during our Kickstarters. Some of those folks have been with us since our first KSs, like our friends at Trollune in France, and more come on board with each KS.

Mighty Matt McElroy is a lot more hands-on with stores and retailers, and maybe we’re at the point where he’d be willing to pull together some sort of Retailer list we could post on this site. I will ask him very, very, nicely if such a thing could be added to his already massive workload.

But be sure that we truly appreciate each and every order from retailers that our sales partners receive. A Friendly Local Game Store is one of the best places to learn about all sort of games, new and old, and we’re glad we were able to figure out a way to once again get books into those shelves!

And if your FLGS doesn’t yet know that they can order books from their favorite distributor like Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition, or Scion: Origin and Scion: Hero, or Pugmire and Monarchies of Mau and others, with even more yet to come like V5 Chicago By Night and the Trinity Continuum books, then please, let them know, let us know, let the world know, that you want them to order our books for you!

Witch Queen art by Nate Pride

“What are YOU excited about that’s coming from Onyx Path?”

Scion: Demigod and Titanomancy to continue the core Scion mythological experience, and Dragon and Mythos to show how Scion has potential beyond that experience. Trinity Continuum: similarly, very excited to bring back Aeon and Aberrant as lines and especially to revisit Adventure! and deliver an exciting game that emulates all the Pulp Genre excitement that I’ve loved during countless hours reading Doc Savage and The Avenger, but in a way that’s compelling for a modern audience. Then, to finally expand from the three original game lines to other time periods and genres with new games that we’re working on but haven’t announced yet.

Legendlore is another game line I’m really looking forward to. In fact, I think the developed text should be coming my way later this week, or next week, and I can’t want to see what Steffie De Vaan and team have done to take this long-established world and bring it up-to-date and relevant like I mentioned about TC: Adventure!

White Wolf gamelines: For CofD, I’m champing at the bit to start sharing Deviant: The Renegades during its Kickstarter. I’ve loved the concept of the wronged seeking revenge for what was done to them since the project was conceptualized, and Dave and Eric and crew have really delivered on that premise, and more! It’s gut-wrenching, horrific, but also empowering!

For Exalted 3rd, I’m really glad we’re finally doing the Storyteller’s Guide, which combined with another book we’re waiting to hear back on from WW, will provide players and prospective Storytellers with a lot of answers and material that fill in some of the blanks in the core EX3 rulebook. Hopefully, these sections will allow even more players to “get” Exalted 3rd, and so they’ll all want to GET Exalted 3rd!

And, of course, I really can’t expand on much for WoD without the OK from WW/Paradox, but we’ve been so thrilled by the reaction to the V5 Chicago By Night Backer PDF that I’m really looking forward to the next WoD projects from Matthew Dawkins, as well as finally delivering our outstanding 20th Anniversary projects!

Distant Worlds art by Rutledge

They Came From…!: Speaking of Matthew, he is gravely hard at work digging into new sources of fun and inspiration for the follow-up They Came From game, and I’m such a fan of the whole genre/time period it covers that I can’t wait to read it!

Creature Collection 5e: for Scarred Lands looks to be gorgeous! I’m both jealous that Johnny Hodgson was able to pull together so many fantastic artists, and thrilled that our efforts with his Handiworks Games is producing such a fantastic book. Look for its KS soon!

These aren’t advertising blurbs here folks! I truly am excited to be able to bring all of these game lines to life, and to be part of bringing them to all of you – as well as those poor misguided souls who don’t yet read this scintillating blog, or know of our:

Many Worlds, One Path!

BLURBS!

Kickstarter!

Keep an eye out in this space as well as on our social media for the Deviant: The Renegades Kickstarter that will be launching after August wraps up!

Onyx Path Media!

This Friday’s Onyx Pathcast features an interview with one of the unsung new talents of Onyx Path and one of the nicest people working in the TTRPG industry: Meredith Gerber! Go to https://onyxpathcast.podbean.com/ or to your favorite podcast venue!

No Onyx Path News this week, with Matthew having been away at Tabletop Scotland! But here’s a nice photo of his group at that convention enjoying a session of They Came from Beneath the Sea!

Here’s our upcoming Twitch schedule, and as you can see, it’s getting very full of content! Between Travis Legge’s Myths & Matchmakers for Scarred Lands, Near Dark Studios‘ Chicago by Night, our very own Pugmire: Paws and Claws and Aberrant: Collateral Damage, and more, we think you’ll find something to entertain you! Even if you don’t, we’d very much appreciate a follow on www.twitch.tv/theonyxpath!

Outside our Twitch channel, the Botch Pit have started up a new chronicle for Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition! And if you’re not into actual plays, they also do breakdowns of lots of our other games: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQfcGvYILEV1vznP5__bOWg

Did you check out the www.gamerstable.com for their actual play of A Slippery Conspiracy? No? Well, now’s the time to catch up and give their actual play of They Came from Beneath the Sea! a listen!

Devil’s Luck Gaming continues with Pirates of Bloodwater for Scarred Lands right here: https://www.twitch.tv/DevilsLuckGaming Also check them out for an excellent Shadowrun actual play they’ve started. We know it’s not our game, but we’re happy to promote such a fine cast of players.

If you’re a fan of Scion, check out https://ragnarokandroll.podbean.com/, a podcast that tracks all the way from first edition Scion: Hero to Scion: Ragnarok, but is now looking into the second edition of the game!

We’re going through Wraith: The Oblivion character creation over on our YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/jflNxrN3i6o And part two will be uploaded this week!

Drop Matthew a message via the contact button on matthewdawkins.com if you have actual plays, reviews, or game overviews you want us to profile on the blog!

Please check any of these out and let us know if you find or produce any actual plays of our games!

Electronic Gaming!

As we find ways to enable our community to more easily play our games, the Onyx Dice Rolling App is live! Our dev team has been doing updates since we launched based on the excellent use-case comments by our community, and this thing is awesome! (Seriously, you need to roll 100 dice for Exalted? This app has you covered.)

On Amazon and Barnes & Noble!

You can now read our fiction from the comfort and convenience of your Kindle (from Amazon) and Nook (from Barnes & Noble).

If you enjoy these or any other of our books, please help us by writing reviews on the site of the sales venue from which you bought it. Reviews really, really help us get folks interested in our amazing fiction!

Our selection includes these fiction books:

Our Sales Partners!

We’re working with Studio2 to get Pugmire and Monarchies of Mau out into stores, as well as to individuals through their online store. You can pick up the traditionally printed main book, the screen, and the official Pugmire dice through our friends there! https://studio2publishing.com/search?q=pugmire

We’ve added Prince’s Gambit to our Studio2 catalog: https://studio2publishing.com/products/prince-s-gambit-card-game

Now, we’ve added Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition products to Studio2‘s store! See them here: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/all-products/changeling-the-lost

Scarred Lands (Pathfinder) books are also on sale at Studio2, and they have the 5e version, supplements, and dice as well!: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/scarred-lands

Scion 2e books and other products are available now at Studio2: https://studio2publishing.com/blogs/new-releases/scion-second-edition-book-one-origin-now-available-at-your-local-retailer-or-online

Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Try this link! http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Onyx-Path-Publishing/

And you can order Pugmire, Monarchies of Mau, Cavaliers of Mars, and Changeling: The Lost 2e at the same link! And NOW Scion Origin and Scion Hero are available to order!

As always, you can find most of Onyx Path’s titles at DriveThruRPG.com!

On Sale This Week!

This Wednesday, we’re offering our monthly Exalted 3rd Edition PDF for Hundred Devils Night Parade!

Conventions!

Save Against Fear: October 12th – 14th GameHoleCon: October 31st – November 3rd PAX Unplugged: December 6th – 8th 2020: Midwinter: January 9th – 12th

And now, the new project status updates!

DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM EDDY WEBB (projects in bold have changed status since last week):

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)

M20 Victorian Mage (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Exalted Essay Collection (Exalted)

Dragon-Blooded Novella #2 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Exigents (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Many-Faced Strangers – Lunars Companion (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Contagion Chronicle: Global Outbreaks (Chronicles of Darkness)

Player’s Guide to the Contagion Chronicle (Chronicles of Darkness)

Contagion Chronicle Jumpstart (Chronicles of Darkness)

N!ternational Wrestling Entertainment (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Creating in the Realms of Pugmire (Realms of Pugmire)

Redlines

Tales of Aquatic Terror (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Kith and Kin (Changeling: The Lost 2e)

Wraith20 Fiction Anthology (Wraith: The Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition)

Crucible of Legends (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Lunars Novella (Rosenberg) (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Yugman’s Guide to Ghelspad (Scarred Lands)

Vigil Watch (Scarred Lands)

Pirates of Pugmire KS-Added Adventure (Realms of Pugmire)

Second Draft

Tales of Good Dogs – Pugmire Fiction Anthology (Pugmire)

Dragon-Blooded Novella #1 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Across the Eight Directions (Exalted 3rd Edition)

One Foot in the Grave Jumpstart (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2e)

Scion: Demigod (Scion 2nd Edition)

Titanomachy (Scion 2nd Edition)

Trinity Continuum Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum Core)

Terra Firma (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Monsters of the Deep (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Development

M20 The Technocracy Reloaded (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Creatures of the World Bestiary (Scion 2nd Edition)

Heirs to the Shogunate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Scion Companion: Mysteries of the World (Scion 2nd Edition)

Legendlore core book (Legendlore)

City of the Towered Tombs (Cavaliers of Mars)

TC: Aeon Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition core rulebook (Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition)

Masks of the Mythos (Scion 2nd Edition)

Scion: Dragon (Scion 2nd Edition)

TC: Aberrant Reference Screen (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Manuscript Approval

Creatures of the World Bestiary (Scion 2nd Edition)

Cults of the Blood Gods (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

W20 Shattered Dreams Gift Cards (Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th)

W20 Art Book (Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th)

Post-Approval Development

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

V5 Chicago Screen (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Deviant: The Renegades (Deviant: The Renegades)

Let the Streets Run Red (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

WoD Ghost Hunters (World of Darkness)

Scion LARP Rules (Scion)

Geist 2e Fiction Anthology (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition)

Oak, Ash, and Thorn: Changeling: The Lost 2nd Companion (Changeling: The Lost 2nd)

Editing

Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed (Mage: the Awakening Second Edition)

Lunars: Fangs at the Gate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

TC: Aeon Ready-Made Characters (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Hunter: The Vigil 2e core (Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition)

Chicago Folio/Dossier (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

City of the Towered Tombs (Cavaliers of Mars)

Post-Editing Development

Memento Mori (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2e Companion)

DR:E Jumpstart (Dystopia Rising: Evolution)

Pirates of Pugmire (Realms of Pugmire)

Indexing

ART DIRECTION FROM MIKE CHANEY!

In Art Direction

Contagion Chronicle

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant

Hunter: The Vigil 2e

Ex3 Lunars – Contracted.

They Came from Beneath the Sea! – Contracted. Sketches still coming in.

TCfBtS!: Heroic Land Dwellers

Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed

Ex3 Monthly Stuff

DR:E Threat Guide – Helnau’s Guide to Wasteland Beasties – Contracted.

Deviant (KS) – Contracted. LeBlanc’s art already in.

Trinity RMCs – Contracted.

Cults of the Blood God (KS) – Sending out art notes.

Chicago Folio – Art notes going out this week.

Mummy 2 (KS) – Got Matthew’s notes.

In Layout

CoM – Witch Queen of the Shadowed Citadel

Dark Eras 2 – Files with Aileen

Trinity Continuum Aeon: Distant Worlds

VtR Spilled Blood – With Josh.

DR:E Jumpstart

Aeon Aexpansion

Proofing

C20 Cup of Dreams

V5: Chicago – Inputting errata.

Geist 2e – XX’s and then Indexing.

Signs of Sorcery – Inputting errata.

M20 Book of the Fallen

DR: E – Inputting errata.

At Press

Dragon Blooded – Deluxe at Studio2, shipping wrapping up.

Dragon-Blooded Cloth Map – At Studio2, shipping wrapping up.

Dragon-Blooded Screen – Shipped to Studio2, shipping wrapping up.

Trinity Core Screen – At Studio2.

TC Aeon Screen – At Studio2.

Trinity: In Media Res – PoD proofs coming.

Trinity Core – Printing. PoD proofs ordered.

Trinity Aeon – Printing. PoD proofs ordered.

Shunned By the Moon – PoD proof coming.

Today’s Reason to Celebrate!

On this date in 1346 – Hundred Years’ War: The military supremacy of the English longbow over the French combination of crossbow and armored knights is established at the Battle of Crécy. Thus spawning whole rafts of longbow lovin’ moments in gaming! (Also can be seen as a victory for the common man that will echo through history and turn out even more badly for the French nobility 400-some years later).

[uhlexsuhmuhchel-blog]

Abortion and the Ban in Ireland

My topic is abortion and the banning of it and I am doing an analysis because I’m passionate about women’s sexual health, rights and the process of which laws get put into place and are formed. In this analysis, I am going to explain the use of pathos, ethos and logos and The NY Times’ use of these rhetorical devices in this article. 

When it comes to the Climate of Fear: When Part of a Country Bans Abortion, one of the main points of the article is that Belfast and Northern Ireland have banned abortions, similar to the laws being set up in Louisiana. Another important main point is that women are traveling outside of the country to have abortions for a variety of reasons because of the laws in place. These women are forced to carry the fetus full term, no matter the conception whether it be rape, incest or even if the fetus could not and would not survive outside of the womb. When it comes to getting caught trying to have an abortion, even if you are pregnant because of one of the previous reasons, women can face life in prison as there doesn’t seem to be an addendum to the law that states otherwise.

The purpose of this article is to inform people of the problems that are occurring in different countries with abortion bans and how this may affect those that are in a place where abortion bans are being put into effect around the country and in other countries. I believe the intended audience are those potentially affected by the abortion ban as well as those who may be in a position to help anyone affected. This also may just be an article that sheds light on the subject as a whole as well and can explain what the women are doing in response to this ban, bringing attention to the illegal abortions as well. Overall that feels like the main purpose of the story. 

Ethos is the use of credibility or trust to influence the reader and allows the source to give the reader confidence in the source they are reading and gives the reader faith in the journal as a whole and leaves little room for a reader to feel they need to question the information or the source. One piece of information in the article that could be pushed when it comes to ethos is the statement that says “activists worry that even if abortion is decriminalized, the anti-abortion movement will become more aggressive” which doesn’t expand on that statement and doesn’t give any back up for the statement, giving me the idea that the New York Times generalized the statement and spoke for a vast amount of women whether this was the truth or not because readers would trust the statement. 

Another statement that could rely on the use of ethos when it comes to the credibility that the New York Times has is the statement “Several women have been prosecuted after police officers have raided their homes or workplaces” which doesn’t give any support for this information. The lack of back up information causes me to question its validity and the source. 

The next thing I want to analyze for this paper is logos which is the use of logic, reasoning or proof, one of the examples being the same as one of the last ones I used, being the statement that claims that many upwards of 10 women have been arrested for seeking out a medically-induced abortion. This specific statement makes a large claim but doesn’t back it up with any form of arrest records, or names, maybe even if for confidentiality reasons, this statement should be backed up. There is no proof of these women being arrested for seeking out an abortion or for any reason and doesn’t give the reader any option to do their own research either. 

The next statement I want to include when it comes to analyzing logos is a statement that does include the use of reasoning is the statement that discusses the other choices for women who are looking to have an abortion, stating that there are fully funded abortion services in England, though not all women can make the trip, citing reasons such as disability, domestic abuse or a lack of childcare. This statement presents the solution to the problem these women face then immediately answers the question of “why is this not valid for everyone?” 

I want to analyze the use of pathos now which is the use of emotion and I have two statements in mind as I do so. The first one being the mention of the abuse women face and one woman in particular because she explained her want for an abortion to a counselor while her husband was present. She believed that this would be safe but once they got home, he beat her with a metal spatula and threatened worse but didn’t follow through as she was pregnant. This is an intense statement and a point of tension for a lot of people, men or women when explaining that someone has been subjected to this type of treatment. I believe that the New York Times uses this to tug at the readers’ heartstrings and to gain sympathy from the readers, even those who don’t agree with abortion.  

Another statement I want to analyze is the statement that includes the fact that women are banned from having abortions, even when it comes to death, rape or even incest. I believe that this statement alone shows that no matter the reasoning, there is a reason to be upset about the fact that a woman can not freely choose to abort no matter the reason, but even those in the most intense and dangerous of situations are stuck with carrying a baby to full term and only then can they take the situation into their own hands by choosing to put the child up for adoption or have to attempt to abort illegally. 

Overall, this piece used ethos, pathos and, logos to intrigue the reader as well as keep their attention on the main point of the article. I believe that overall this is a well written, informative piece by the New York Times, meant to bring attention to those who are unaware of the current struggles women in other countries, and soon our own country will be facing. 

                                               MWA 1 Reflection 

Some general concepts I learned during this sequence was how to write sentences effectively and in a way that makes them less bulky as well as getting to the point more effectively. I also learned how to analyze how sources use pathos, ethos, and logos to influence their readers as well as how to use pathos, ethos, and logos to make an effective argument. 

When it comes to the student learning objectives for this sequence we are meant to learn how to compose effective arguments with different sources of information and we’re meant to use writing o explain our personal beliefs, making effective arguments as we do so. It also taught us to provide relevant and important information only, getting rid of any unnecessary fluff that may not be helpful to the points we want to make as writers. 

When it comes to learning how to analyze arguments, I have learned how to see what rhetorical devices the author is using to either break down their argument or strengthen it effectively and I learned that there are certain aspects you need to have in an effective argument, such as effective and correct sources, correct information and a professional and unbiased tone. The use of images, audio and text can help strengthen an argument as long as they are valid and vital to the argument. They can hinder the argument if they don’t correlate well to the information trying to be pushed and spoken about. For example, if talking about climate change, adding graphs of the amount of CO2 being put in the atmosphere could help you make the claim that CO2 is hindering the health of the planet but if you added a comic style photo of a “sick planet” it may be relevant but not all that professional and can hinder the argument. 

My opinion on the argument that I made is still the same, SWA 2 and MWA 1 didn’t change my viewpoint but did make me feel as though I can talk about it more effectively and in a way that seems more educated than it would have been before these writing assignments. I still believe that women's sexual and reproductive health should not be hindered by the government and that no matter the situation, it should be a woman’s choice to make, not politicians. I did learn more about the topic than I did know though I was already well versed when it comes to the topic overall. 

Publishing my work publically didn’t change my perspective on my perspective because my feelings about the topic are ones I have discussed publicly and this is a view that I would keep myself from discussing as it can affect many people in ways that can be life-threatening and fatal. I know that not everyone is going to agree with my views and they are free to do so, which is just a part of having opinions and if someone disagrees with me after seeing the piece, I wouldn’t take offense to it. The only aspect that changed was that I did want what I said to be accurate when it comes to my writing and feelings as I wanted to give my opinion and thoughts in a well thought out way as well as an effective way. 

The technology didn’t change how I formatted this writing because I have previously used media to publish my writing, even if it isn’t something I’m comfortable with it is something I’m used to. 

I can apply using what I’ve learned in this sequence when I go on into the work field and need to form unbiased and professional opinions as well as professional and clear arguments in my career field. I also know that I can observe the ethos, pathos, and logos in many arguments as well as different pieces of writing now that I have learned how to do so and I can use those to form informed opinions based on what I am viewing whether it be the news, social media or even writing. I can use it to make sure that I am informed and know how the author of a certain piece is trying to inform the audience or even to tell if they may be trying to manipulate an audience in a certain way.

Yeginsu, Ceylan. “Climate of Fear: When Part of a Country Bans Abortion.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 10 Aug. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/world/europe/abortion-northern-ireland-roe.html?searchResultPosition=11.

[qm-vox]

So You Want To Play A Beast

(Meme version of Queen Ramona Rabbit provided by cantankerousAquarius, character by me. Catch her in New Avalon.)

Here I am, back on my bullshit again. As I mentioned in So You Want To Run A Spring Court, a series of Seeming articles are starting up next. Unlike Courts, Seemings are not political or religious bodies, and are only loosely social identities; rather, one’s Seeming is part of who and what one is. Lost develop a Seeming because of the abuse they have survived, the labors they were forced to undergo, and what they did to survive both. It can be a complicated and hurtful subject for Changelings, but also a source of pride; the things you learned to become a Beast, a Darkling, an Ogre, are also the things that ultimately helped you to escape.

At this point you may be wondering why I started with the Courts when Seemings are more fundamental to an individual character, as well as less optional (you can have no Court, but it’s hard to have no Seeming). I’m gonna be real with you, it’s because there’s six of these damn things and each of them is about to be as complex, if not more, as the Court articles.

The following article draws primarily on Changeling: the Lost core and Winter Masques, with additional information drawn from Swords at Dawn (that last book has come up a lot because it deals with the Lost in change and conflict). Other books, where used, will be cited. And so, without further ado:

A Miserable Menagerie - Beast Overview

Beast is the first Seeming presented in Changeling: the Lost, and is well-represented in the published material and the fanbase alike, being one of the most popular and therefore most common. Stripped of their human reasons, Beasts had to remember how to think like human beings again before they could escape and seize their Homecoming. It’s never exactly a complete reversion. Aside from this common loss of reason, and a certain surprising sociability (more on both of these later), few experiences unite Beast to Beast, a reality that can make their fellow Lost mistakenly think that their Beast peers lack common strengths and common bonds. It’s true that many Beasts have strong similarities to Lost of other Seemings that share similar functions (a Truefriend kept as a loyal and loving hound has a lot in common with a Playmate forced to serve as an ornamental factotum and the Chateline condemned to maintain her Keeper’s house), but it’s also true that any Beast has more in common with their fellow Beasts than with the troubles of their non-Beast peers.

Release the Hounds - Homecoming as a Beast

Compared to Beasts, only the wretched Wizened have a higher disparity between those who are taken by the Fae and those who manage to return. Anyone at all might become a Beast; the process of transformation is a sort of corruption, one a mortal prisoner might catch from being forced to live among animals, from being treated as subhuman, by deliberate malice, alchemical transformation, or even deliberate pact - but not anyone who becomes a Beast can manage to achieve their Homecoming. The first and most difficult step is to find their reason again, some powerful trigger or memory that reminds the Beast that they were once human and that the Fairest of Lands (Arcadia) is not their home. Though not all Beasts degrade in intelligence in the same way or to the same degree (one might be seemingly wholly feral, condemned to live as a rabbit or a rat, while another has memories of being a hunter-gatherer among a pack of others, with axe and bow to hand and no thought but the kill and feast), no Beast can escape without remembering what it was like to be mortal. It’s more than just a matter of cunning or intelligence; indeed, the actual physical act of escape is often shockingly simple. It’s that without human intellect, human memory, the Beast cannot yearn to return home, and thus cannot escape the Fairest of Lands.

The second obstacle is having something to come back to, and believing that you deserve to have your Homecoming. This is easier, in some ways, than regaining your mind, but infinitely more insidious. All Lost need mortal memories to make their way home, of course, but for Beasts they need something to focus on that keeps their reason anchored while they’re still trapped in the lands of unreason. It can be all-too-easy to slide back into the animal’s mind, especially if your moment of clarity and your opportunity to escape don’t coincide. The hound knows how to survive the mad lands when the man might not.

Memories of loved ones to come back to help, but for many Beasts the light that guides them home are distinctly human places, places where they felt that they belonged and which in some way belonged to them. The library where a Beast spent her childhood, full of her fond memories and imagination, can help her cling to her human half long enough to get home, as might the memory of the funeral home where her father’s wake was held, or even the stadium where she was cheered on by adoring fans. These human places hold significance that can be understood on some level by the animal (safety and contentment, loss and sorrow, joy and thrill), but require human reason, human perspective, to be wholly understood. That reason, and the shining light of the mortal world, draws the Beast back home.

Beasts are among those Seemings least likely to escape with someone else’s help. It’s not that they’re asocial or incapable of cooperation, but rather that need to find human reason. Most of the time if someone is making their own Homecoming and stops to rescue their Keeper’s favorite catgirl, that catgirl’s mind isn’t her own. Maybe on the way home something shocks her memory back into place, but all too often that doesn’t happen and you end up with a hob or a catatonic victim rather than a free Lost. On the other hand, Beasts freed by their Keeper can make almost ideal Loyalists; their ability to produce great Composure on demand, and the general prejudice of other Lost against them, mean that a Beast still enslaved to her Keeper can often go years without being detected, if she ever is. For an example of such a Beast, check out Maya Sharptongue in Night Horrors: Grim Fears.

All Creatures Great And Small - Beast Kiths

The magical bonds that unite Beasts as a Seeming are subtle and often overlooked. All Beasts can spend Glamour to flare their Presence and Composure, a capability that makes them second only to the Fairest for sheer sociability even if the Beast in question shares the essence of a decidedly non-social animal. Additionally, all Beasts have an affinity for all animals (that 8-again with Animal Ken though) which, while seemingly limited in modern application, has a lot of impact on their day-to-day life. A Beast will rarely have, say, rats in her home unless she prefers those rats be present; her pets will be well-trained and well-behaved (and likely well-loved) and her ability to just walk up to and befriend any given animal is not to be underestimated.

Psychologically, Beasts regardless of Kith tend to be territorial, a fact many Lost don’t think about a lot despite it being somewhat odd on its face. After all, not all animals are particularly territorial, and yet a swan-like Windwing, a lupine Hunterheart, and a Swimmerskin mermaid all display a similar concern over their spaces, their places. This is the Beast’s human nature at work; just as the places of human connection draw them home from Arcadia, so too do they stake claims over such places in their new lives, creating spaces where they can feel safe and in control, and able to indulge in both their animal instincts and their human desires and sorrows. For those Beasts with an especial affinity for their physical environment, Contracts of the Den and Contracts of the Wild (the latter being shared with the Elemental Seeming) can go a long way to creating and safeguarding their personal places of power.

And then there’s the back end. Beasts genuinely struggle with their Intelligence; compared to a human whose Intelligence attribute is equal, a Beast will always achieve worse results, and can’t benefit from the flashes of inspiration and intuition that sometimes characterize human thought. They struggle more with unfamiliar intellectual processes, though putting in the time to learn can solve that problem. The end result is that Beasts, regardless of Kith, tend to be some of the smartest dumbasses their friends know, who provide better results when they have to think at speed or under pressure than they do outside of the moment. Still, this perception of stupidity haunts Beasts, and in all too many Freeholds they can find themselves gently shunted away from power or complex duties or responsibilities that others believe they’re incapable of handling.

When it comes to Kiths, Beasts present an odd combination of being greatly defined by their Kith (in much the same way that Elementals or Wizened are) and their Kiths having very little relation to the folkloric archetypes that inspire Beasts. The overwhelming majority of the options for your Beast character concern themselves solely with the physical properties of one or more animals, which is great for the fantasy of playing an animal-person and completely fucking useless for the fantasy of a fae animal-person. More than most other Seemings, a Beast character meant to invoke a figure from folklore might want to consider the Dual Kith merit, with an eye towards Fairest and Ogre Kiths to snag most of what you might want.

Some expanded thoughts on the individual Beast Kiths follow.

Hunterheart - Arguably the quintessential Beast, Hunterhearts are infused with a predatory nature expressed through deadly fangs and claws. They tend to be reshaped in the vein of mighty wolf-men, cunning cat-people, or as archetypes of Beasthood or the hunt - mighty Hunters with racks of stag’s antlers, or even near-Ogrish beings like the Beast of French legend, whose price for a stolen rose was a bride to soothe his burning heart. Almost any predator might lend its nature to a Hunterheart though; a tarantula, for instance, is more appropriate here than as a Venombite, and Summer’s smallest and most surprising berserker may well be a Hunterheart with the soul of a shrew and an unshakeable lust for blood. Hunterhearts tend to be very physical people, who have a lot in common with Darklings - including an inability to escalate violent confrontation in an appropriate manner. Among the more thematic of the Beast Kiths, Hunterhearts might benefit from a Dual Kith into Flowering or Whisperwisp if you’re looking to embody a predatory trickster figure.

Windwing - Perhaps the poster child for Kiths that deal solely with the physical attributes of an animal, Windwing is a prime candidate for the other half of a Dual Kith concept if you’re after a more folkloric concept rather than looking to explore a more straight mixture of human and animal. A graceful Swan Maiden might look towards Dancer or perhaps Artist, while a Mothman type might lean towards Shadowsoul (a wise owl, on the other hand, might be an Antiquarian on the back end). Most carrion birds will also be Roteaters, but especially corvids of all stripes. Regardless of their nature, a Windwing is an incredible asset for a Freehold, and can expect to be courted aggressively for their abilities as a messenger, guard, spy, and scout.

Skitterskulk - I have no god damn idea what the writers were thinking on this one. Skitterskulk is, in theory, supposed to represent hard-to-exterminate vermin such as mice, flies, cockroaches, or mosquitoes; things that move fast and bother people with their filth, thievery, and pestilence. Unfortunately not only does their blessing of Impossible Counterpoise have almost nothing to do with this (and almost nothing to do with the perception of Skitterskulks as spies presented in Winter Masques), it is shamefully fucking useless. If you find yourself looking at Skitterskulk for the animal natures it’s associated with, consider some combination of Roteater, Windwing, Truefriend, Venombite, and/or Runnerswift instead. Don’t use this Kith.

Roteater - Speaking of, meet what is probably my favorite Beast Kith. Roteaters embody those animals that scrape, scavenge, and feed on carrion or refuse. Crows and vultures are obvious candidates (and probably Dual Kith’d with Windwing), but Roteater is also great for Beasts in the vein of Rat Kings (fleeing from the gnawed halls of a Sugarplum Fairy), raccoons (whether sly thieves or powerful tricksters) and even for social insects such as ants when used in combination with Truefriend. Roteater strikes a very good balance of the physical properties of its animals and their folkloric qualities, with the power of the Beast Seeming itself filling in the back end. Given that Lost tend to struggle both with money and with legal access to certain goods, the propensity of a Roteater to scavenge, salvage, and scrape can be a godsend to their Freehold and especially their Motley, if they can put in at least a minimal effort to clean themselves up.

Truefriend - Truefriends have a lot in common with Fairest; as “beloved” pets, they had a lot of their Keepers’ personal attention, and their memories of Arcadia may be cut through with the bloody consequences of the kindness and discipline of the True Fae. Regardless of what kind of animal they are (and they can be most of them; Truefriend is rife for thematic Dual Kith opportunities inside of the Beast Seeming), they tend to be, well, friend-shaped; Truefriends are often well-groomed, sleek, colorful (or with an interesting color pattern in their fur or scales) and might even be cute or drawn from a twisted branch of pop culture as embodiments of more ‘modern’ takes on Beasthood such as catgirls or animal mascots. Like Fairest, Truefriends may take to manipulating others in order to feel in control of their own life, and given the lack of suspicion that attends to Beasts they may get away with it for a whole lot longer.

Broadbacks - In a Seeming marked by a tendency to be kinda dumb motherfuckers, Broadbacks are the guys that make dumb ideas work by outlasting their consequences. Their bonus to Stamina rolls is most famous for satyr-like partying, but it also means that they can guard a door for hours on end without so much as a bathroom break, run marathons long after even the Runnerswifts have keeled over to beg for the sweet release of death, and brave hazards or traps in the Hedge that might force back other Lost. Aside from the (again rather famously represented) satyrs and fauns, Broadbacks might also take after minotaurs, be infused with the essence of camels or llamas, or even Dual Kith into Swimmerskin (as mighty whales) or Windwing (with Contracts of Hearth or of Omen, embodying the albatross).

Swimmerskin - The lines between Beasts and Elementals blur with Swimmerskins, especially those who take after mermaids, selkies, and nixies; Elements (Water) is a popular enough buy that it can be hard to tell the difference. Mechanically, Swimmerskin is a case of a Kith that sorta has to be about the physical properties of its animal nature; it’d be a strange sort of mermaid who couldn’t swim. Consider investing in magical Merits such as Siren’s Voice, specific Contracts (Elements was already mentioned, but Omen for a powerful sea-witch or Wild for a storm-brewing sea dragon can be equally striking), or investing in the Dual Kith merit to bring out further specific animalistic or folkloric traits, such as Hunterheart for a sharp-toothed shark, Tunnelgrub for octopi and other escape artists, or Farwalker for an ambush predator or a Thing From The Deep, emerging to prey on the ignorant and innocent.

Steepscrambler - The opposite of Swimmerskin in some ways; Steepscramblers are all about the physical act of climbing, but they really did not have to be and as a result they’re a big whiff on the folkloric elements of the animals they embody, including and especially the specific ones spoken of Winter Masques. Still, in a lot of ways Steepscramblers have the same practical uses as Windwings, especially in highly urban environments, so for concepts that are looking to invoke those folkloric trickster elements, eat the Dual Kith into Whisperwisp, Drudge, Farwalker, or Flowering and live ya best life. If you’re more interested in direct physical animals but are looking into something like a spider, fly, or beetle, consider Dual Kithing inside the Beast seeming to pick up the other aspects of your animal.

Runnerswift - For when you absolutely, positively have to GO FAST, there exists the Runnerswift. Though most famously associated with prey animals such as rabbits and deer (which are also common fertility symbols, go fucking figure), consider Runnerswift for more predatory concepts as well; as hunting hounds, cheetahs, or man-eating horses straight out of Greek legend, Runnerswifts can make terrifying pursuers and hunters. Though it can be tempting to Dual Kith in the latter case, it pays to keep in mind that the human side of your Beast definitely remembers how guns and baseball bats work, and those are probably going to be a better option than fang and claw if you’re already in a situation where you feel comfortable running down your frightened prey. Like quite a few Beasts, Runnerswifts skew towards being tricksters in much the same way as Hunterhearts, though in this case the prey animal often comes out on top rather than being made out as the villain.

Venombite - A cool concept with a bad case of being a late bloomer; Venombite’s Blessing is nearly useless until you start punching up into high Wyrd, at which point you are a POWERFUL MAGICIAN who can also fang people to death if they get too close or you can catch them unawares. Still, Venombite can be quite attractive for many concepts, especially spiders, deadly nagas, and treacherous scorpions. Their tendency to be associated with small and easily overlooked animals make Venombites surprising brokers of information and dealers of death; it might be awhile before your own poison can kill the human, but the brown recluses that obey your commands can kill one now.

Cleareyes - What if you had Contracts of Fang and Talon 2 but all the time? Cleareyes is an odd Kith; mechanically they’re solid, but also redundant with one of the game’s more attractive Clauses in one of its most attractive Contracts. There’s a few ways to split this difference, though I tend to suggest either making that Clause and/or their Blessing free if they have both (similar to how Gravewights get a discount on Contracts of Shade and Spirit) or permitting Fang and Talon 2 to give them a different sense the animal is known for (a cat-eyed Cleareyes able to see in the dark might invoke her Clause to also gain cat-like balance or perhaps a cat’s sensitive hearing). Thematically, Cleareyes is great for a lot of concepts and can hold down a lot of the same niches as Roteater and Runnerswift in a different way. It Dual Kiths well with almost any other Beast Kith if you want to double down on animalistic aspects, but as a task-driven Kith it also goes surprisingly well with those outside of Beast; Draconic (feral drake guardsmen, or perhaps a ‘failed’ Fairest), Antiquarian (wise owls in a different vein from Windwing), Oracle (a churchyard grim, or a cat kept as the familiar of a terrible witch), and Farwalker (straight-up werewolves or, with Contracts of Mirror and a nasty disposition, vicious rakshasas) are just some of the potential combinations on the table.

Coldscales - Not the flashiest, but they get the job done; Coldscales (typically but not necessarily reptilian in nature) benefit from a further bonus to Composure that makes them unusually hard to manipulate, a boon not to be underestimated given just how much fae magic attacks people emotionally. Though this Kith is intended to represent cold-blooded reptiles, consider it as well for animals famous for their sloth and endurance; a sleepy Bear Prince who can’t be bothered might display the calm endurance of a Coldscales, as might a terrible wyrm that must be roused to wrath (perhaps Dual Kith’d with Fireheart or Draconic), or even a big cat, deadly only if hungry or disturbed and otherwise content to feed on the carrion left behind by those who flee before him.

Riddleseeker - The Kith, the myth, the legend; Riddleseeker is the closest you get to a Mental-focused Beast (for, ah, obvious reasons) and is introduced in Night Horrors: Grim Fears. Its sample character, the loyalist Maya Sharptongue, has a sphinx-like aspect to her but Riddleseeker is also a great choice for ravens and crows (perhaps clutching fragments of lore stolen from their Keepers that their human minds could understand when their beast ones could not), legends of oracular serpents, and tricksters like the fox who made Mighty Miko a king. Riddleseeker holds down thematics on its own, but if you’re looking for the physical aspects it doesn’t do on its own it Dual Kiths inside of Beast pretty easily.

The Animal Kingdoms - Beasts in the Courts

As alluded to earlier, Beasts are often the backbone of the Freehold. Wizened do the thankless jobs that everyone relies on, but often it’s Beasts that fill in the miscellaneous roles. Messages and packages need carried? You’re probably calling a Beast. Loyalist needs his shit kicked in? Beasts are ready. Need to connect with a lonely mortal and see if their dreams are poisoned? Whistle up a Beast. Obviously not every single job a Freehold wants or needs will be filled by a Beast even if in theory it could be, but given how diverse the Seeming is and their combination of on-demand sociability and poise, they’re attractive for many duties. After all, even the most standoffish Venombite or Coldscales can put on a charm face with the best of them if you can keep a steady supply of Glamour on the table.

Given their difficulties with abstract reasoning, Beasts tend to relate to the ideals of their Court on a practical level, which can make them either sorta-kinda bad at being Courtiers on a formal level or paragons of their Court’s ideals, without a whole lot of in-between. Both perspectives are valuable; there’s not a whole lot of point in constantly debating the ideals of, say, Fear, if no one is going to go out and spread fear. For those Beasts who place great faith in the ideals of their Court, their commitment can serve as an inspiration and example to others, and a living reminder that sometimes living up to high ideals means making choices that aren’t easy for you personally or politically.

Beasts are surprisingly common in leadership positions, especially in Summer (where their physical focus and access to talented officers can carry them far) and Spring (where their instant sociability and diverse spread of talents can help them catch the eye of the Court). Unlike Fairest (who have a steadier and stronger social focus), Beasts aren’t prone to losing their entire goddamn minds in singular, shattering moments, which can make them more stable officers, nobles, and Crowns than their more glorious peers. They can also make surprising spymasters and even money-makers. Depending on the Court, though, a Beast in a leadership position may require an assistant to help with the paperwork (or the math), or else be prepared to work a lot of overtime patiently making and decoding ciphers on her own.

Like Elementals, Beasts can be somewhat more sensitive to the physical temperament of the Seasons than other Lost, to the point where it may be surprising to find, say, a snake-like Beast bundled up in layers beneath her Winter Mantle (gently muttering ‘fuck snow’ under her breath every so often). Those who choose to endure such discomfort are often some of their Court’s most avid members, and known as such.

Spring - Insofar as any Lost are natural joiners of Spring (typically a Lost’s second or even third Court), Beasts make for natural Spring Courtiers. They’re sociable, hard to visibly ruffle even if they’re screaming internally, often physically striking, and talented at living in the moment. Unfortunately that same talent can feed into a Beast’s difficulties balancing their human and animal aspects and leave them stuck in the middle between healthy and toxic even worse than Spring generally gets stuck. Despite this, Beasts can go quite far in Spring and often end up as movers and shakers who influence opinions.

Summer - Most people think of predators as Summer’s Beasts, but herd animals are much more common. Sure, every now and again you get a canine Beast who goes far, or a would-be King of Cats that remembers the twisting alleys of his Durance and the silver nets of Arcadia’s animal control enforcement, but Summer’s brotherhood and focus on physical defense is much more appealing to Beasts whose natures are shaped by animals such as deer, oxen, and dolphins. Those Beasts whose Durance was defined by fear and flight also sometimes flock to Summer, seeking the strength the Iron Spear offers to ensure that they will never again be Arcadia’s prey.

Autumn - Where most of the predators actually end up; human nature turns an animal’s innocent hunger and instinct into cruelty and schadenfreude in places, giving rise to Beasts that take after vicious werewolves or treacherous serpents. Though they can have a hard time fitting into the scholarly aspects of Autumn, Beasts go quite far in the Leaden Mirror through practical applications of sorcery and being quick on the draw. They may not necessarily understand the nature of their power, but Beasts definitely know how to hammer it home.

Winter - The Coldest Court is as pragmatic about its Beasts as it is about everything else; Winter tends to recruit Beasts by openly asking them to serve in jobs the Court believes they’re suited for, and paying them for that work. Summer might be content to make, say, a Runnerswift into a mighty Knight, but Winter is going to ask them to run (and, at times, to hide). The ability Beasts have to crank their Composure on demand can make the talented and discreet candidates for Winter’s higher-level social positions, and as the keepers of important information or Tokens.

Until Proven Guilty - Beasts and Changeling’s Themes

Beast is in an awkward spot compared to the other Seemings. In a game that is very explicitly about abuse, trauma, and recovery, Beast lacks a clear connection to those themes. Core introduces the idea that Beasts are united by a sort of innocence, a refutation of corruption that protects them from Arcadia on some level, but literally none of the rest of the game did anything with that theme. Their other primary theme - the mix of literal or folkloric animal instincts with human ones - is engaging and interesting, but disconnected from that central aspect of the game in a way the other Seemings aren’t.

You don’t necessarily have to address this. If you aren’t looking to deep dive into the nature of your Seeming, or your Chronicle doesn’t have a strong emphasis on those themes of abuse you can probably just let it ride. If you are looking to focus on those themes, one idea that’s gotten me personally a lot of mileage is to look at how your Beast relates to Seemings that had similar functions and asking yourself why are are not that Seeming, exploring your Beast’s trauma through comparison and contrasts.

From life experience though, there might be something to that dropped ‘innocence’ theme. That idea of an innocent, damaged and transformed by circumstances beyond their control, trying to build a new life in a world they weren’t prepared to live in has some strong similarities to children raised in cults or by survivalists and conspiracy theorists. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve connected with someone only to watch their entire worldview fall apart as they realized the world they’d been raised to live in doesn’t exist, and that everything they know how to do only works in the context of that fictional world. Fairest can also be strong candidates for depicting this kind of abuse, but I’d still encourage you to consider Beast if you’re interested in engaging on this concept directly.

We Don’t Bite People, And Other Lies We Tell Children - Coping With Beasthood

To be a Beast is to be caught between worlds twice over (three times, for Swimmerskins and Windwings, which, y’know. Sucks to be you guys); like all Lost they are influenced by both fae and mortal nature, but Beasts are also caught between instinct and reason. The animal within is entirely comfortable in the now in a way humans just aren’t, but their human half treasures things the animal can never understand. In the heat of the moment, though, when it comes down to instinct or reason, instinct often wins - sometimes to the Beast’s benefit, and sometimes to their great sorrow.

This balancing act defines the Beast’s life, and generally starts at home. Beasts usually live alone if they can, even if they’re otherwise sociable, so that they have a space in which they can entirely be themselves and decide who is welcome, when. Rarely does this influence stop in the physical bounds of a Beast’s house, apartment, or sewer drain though; any place the Beast thinks of as their turf (the broader neighborhood or apartment building, their office in the Freehold’s Commons, even their job if they have enough pull to get away with it) is going to be shaped to let them express some part of both sides of themselves. How that comes out varies from Beast to Beast. An affable satyr might become the neighborhood darling, doing favors and bringing food to their neighbors in unspoken payment for letting odd behavior slide, while a spidery Venombite might be more likely to trade on passive intimidation or even adopt a performative identity (it’s strange if a pastor’s wife is creepy, but no one thinks twice about a goth gal that’s spooky). Having those safe and/or welcoming spaces available is vital for a Beast’s ongoing mental health, and without them a nervous breakdown is only a matter of time.

Outside of the matter of their home and places of power, Beasts have a tendency for straightforwardness that has little to do with their particular animal (though it might) and everything to do with the fact that as a Seeming, Presence is their strongest source of social prowess. Dealing openly, for good or ill, plays to their strengths and has the added advantage of keeping their social life relatively straightforward, even if it’ll never quite be simple.

Stability, ultimately, has to be the goal of a Beast looking to build a new life after their Durance. They need to find a way to live their life that acknowledges and nurtures all parts of their divided nature; even those Beasts dumb enough to favor one side over the other can’t do it for long without losing their entire god damn minds. Few Freeholds are without stories of would-be Cat Kings (Autumn Nightmares) or Riddleseekers who turned into crows one day and just never turned back. Having escaped Arcadia only by finding their minds again, Beasts tend to be among those Lost most cognizant of what their issues are, and most willing to face those issues on direct terms. They did it once already, after all; the hard part is showing up to do it again every day.

Sample Beast - The Toy Taker, Autumn Riddleseeker/Windwing

Margaret Bellman is called Maggie by her Freehold and the Toy Taker by an increasingly mystified local media. Her memories of Arcadia are more like a gap than the usual splintered and fractured recollections of the Lost; one minute she was a teenage girl staring in fascination at the twisting figure in a mirror, and the next she was a grown-ass woman with crow’s feathers for hair and tiny, somehow functional wings, staggering through that same mirror and bleeding all over the place.

It didn’t take long for Maggie to swear herself to Autumn, though she’s an odd bird for the Leaden Mirror. Though she adores and practices magic, Maggie’s primary profession and hobby is theft. She steals things the Freehold needs stolen and sometimes robs homes for money, crimes the media has yet to connect to her other persona.

For Maggie also steals toys.

It’s never often. When her life is at a low point and spiraling out of control, Maggie slips into a child’s bedroom and takes one of their toys. She rips the shiny bits from it to add to her collection at home (displayed this way and that in her room, in shadowboxes, on strings, glued to the walls, dangling from coat hangers), crucifies the remainder, and leaves it on the kid’s door. Though the Winter Court disapproves of her methods, her hobby sows Fear and Sorrow in equal measure and her dedication to it has earned her some small formal appreciation from the Coldest Court.

As with all of my articles, I welcome questions, comments, discussion, feedback, and criticisms. Please, feel free to reblog if you’re feelin’ it!

Next up: Wizened

[theibgirls]

CAS is an essential part of the IB programme, but coming up with ideas for it can be very challenging, especially if money is tight. Therefore, I present to you 99 Free (or at the very least, inexpensive) CAS ideas!

Please like/reblog if this helped you, and so that it can help others! ❤︎

Creativity

1. Learn a new language: Free apps or websites like Duolingo or Mondly can help you learn a variety of languages. Here is a post about the language availability on various apps. You can even practice by manually translating song lyrics, which really is just an excuse to listen to Bollywood hits, K-pop, or even Shakira- there’s no reason to not have a little fun with it! If you do just 10 minutes a day you’ll get over an hour of CAS done every week. If you do 20 minutes a day, you’ll get over 2 hours a week, and by spending a little more than 20 minutes on one or two days you can easily get 2 and a half hours of CAS a week. 10 weeks of this and you’ll have 50% of your creativity hours done, and all while having fun listening to songs, and not having to spend a penny!

2. Making gifs or edits: You’re already on tumblr, why not use it as an opportunity for CAS? Making original content takes time, and will quickly fill up those 50 hours! If you don’t want your CAS supervisor see which fandoms you’re a part of, make school related content, for example making subject moodboards (self spon), edits of your required reading (maybe typography for your favourite quotes?), or giffing your favourite historical figures. If you’re experienced you can mass produce content, and if you’re a beginner you can check that “new skills” box! GIMP is free, and Photoshop has a free trial. After that you can either pay for it, or perhaps scour the internet for alternative ways to keep it (though you didn’t hear it from me). If you fulfill requests then it counts as service as well.

3. Art: You can either create digital art using the programs listed in the previous suggestion, or you can do it the old fashioned. While art supplies tend to cost a lot, there is no shame in making sketches or comics using good ol’ ink and lead pencils that you already have in your pencil case, and doing it in a notebook. If you’re willing to splurge, there are tons of ways to go with your art!

4. Photography: While a good camera is expensive, you probably already have a camera in your phone. The quality won’t be ideal, but you can easily practice photographing different motifs in different styles. You can also retouch and enhance the photos with GIMP and Photoshop, as mentioned above.

5. Join or create a low maintenance club: Baking and music may be fun, but ingredients cost money, and so do instruments. A debate club or film club won’t cost anything, except maybe if you buy popcorn! Regular meetings will ensure regular CAS hours.

6. Write poetry: Writing a good poem can take many, many hours, which in the context of CAS is a good thing! Take a stroll in the forest or by the seaside and feel those creative juices flowing!

7. Write a book: You know that idea for a novel you’ve had for ages? Write it down. It may feel awkward to show to your writing to your supervisor, but think of it as a free editor or focus group. This is a great excuse to fulfill your dream of becoming an author. Who knows? Maybe the final product is good enough to send to a publisher, or to self-publish on amazon so you can make some money!

8. Make Redbubble designs: A spin-off of the digital art suggestion. Whether it’s simple text or intricate fanart, Redbubble is a great place to display your creativity, and can even make you some money if you’re lucky!

9. Join a choir: Privately owned choirs may cost to join, but your local church will probably let you in for free.

10. Play an instrument: If you don’t already own an instrument, this isn’t a great option on a budget. However, some of you will already own a keyboard or a guitar, and may even already be taking lessons. If you are, then there is no reason not to use it for CAS. And if you own an instrument but don’t go to classes, simply practice on our own or watch tutorials on YouTube.

11. Dungeons and Dragons: Shocking, I know, but it is actually quite easy to justify D&D as creativity. A friend of mine succeeded in doing this, stating that it involved team work, initiative, commitment and problem solving. It goes to show that most things can be justified as CAS if you word everything well enough.

12. Makeup, nail art, or body paint: I highly doubt that applying mascara in the morning counts, but there are certainly many ways to express yourself with makeup. SFX, intricate patterns and new techniques certainly require creativity.

13. Dance: Dance will be expanded on in the Action section, but dance is not only exercise, but a form of expression which requires passion and creativity.

14. Learn coding: Coding has become a valuable skill in the recent years. There’s an endless amount of sources online, many of them free. Not only is it an interesting skill, but it’s an impressive skill to see on a résumé.

15. Make a game or an app: Game development is certainly not easy, but that just means that there will be plenty of hours for you to log! It also has the potential to make you money, which of course is a plus!

16. Start a YouTube channel: Buying a microphone and camera is expensive, but unless you’re aiming to become a YouTube star there’s no reason to spend money on equipment. CAS doesn’t discriminate between a $500 camera and a built in webcam, or between Adobe Premiere and Windows Movie Maker, so utilize what you have.

17. Join the school newspaper: The school newspaper is a great way to ensure regular hours, and can even count as service. There are many different types of articles, so you can get some variety in it too.

18. Send in articles to a newspaper: If you think the school newspaper is aiming too low, you can always submit articles to local newspapers or online magazines such as Buzzfeed. Your submissions may not always be published, but it’s worth a try, and the hours will count anyway!

19. Make a PSA video: There are tonnes of important causes you can promote, and a PSA video is a great way to do it. Furthermore, the service aspect will count for service hours, and if you do it with a friend it can count as a CAS project.

20. Acting: There are plenty of auditions around, whether it be to a school play or primetime TV. You don’t even need to get a role, simply auditioning is enough as you’ve been a risk taker (your coordinator will appreciate you using the IB learner profile in your reflections), and been creative.

21. Making a short film: Combining he last two points, making a video and acting, take this chance to make a short film (or a full length one depending on your ambition) and Kenneth Branagh’ it as producer, director, writer and lead.

22. Learn animation: Self-explanatory, and a very impressive skill to have.

23. Free online courses: Whether it be public speaking or anthropology, there are many free courses online which can be justified as creativity. Some courses may even look good on your résumé.

24. Make a board game: Board games are a lot of fun, but harder to make than they seem. Your creation might not be the next Monopoly, but it may provide some entertainment when you’re meeting your friends, and wouldn’t playing games with your friend be a great way to get CAS hours?

25. Gardening: A beautiful garden is a challenge to create, but challenges are a part of CAS! From a terrarium to a full scale English garden, there are many options for gardening. Here are some cheap ideas.

26. Make a podcast: Podcasts have become quite popular in the last few years, so try it out for yourself! There are many different topics you could cover, some which could count as service. Discussing one of those topics with a friend could be a great idea for a CAS project.

27. Make a website: This one is quite self-explanatory. Like the podcast, you could easily add a service aspect into it, and working with a friend could make it a CAS project.

28. Translating transcripts of spoken word poem: this one comes from @kahvia, who says “I found the transcripts of the poems on the Internet (some are hard to get, so once I just messaged the author on Facebook) and translated into my native language. It's hard and time consuming, but can be done on the go, so you can do CAS when commuting.”

29. Calligraphy: I must confess that I don’t know a lot about calligraphy, but I assume that amazing tools can cost quite a bit. But remember, CAS isn’t about quality, it’s about quantity, so screw expensive tools and just go for it!

30. Create your own font: Like with most things in life, wikihow has got your back.

31. Make an interactive story: Cool and largely uncharted territory, and definitely a unique experience. This will help you out.

32. Learn origami: Origami is beautiful, and the possibilities are endless. Although origami paper is preferred, it is possible to use regular paper too, which will save you some bucks. Google and YouTube have a million tutorials, so they got you covered.

33.  Make a Studyblr: Do you have any idea how many hours I’m getting just by making this list?

Action

1. Go jogging: Perhaps the most obvious free exercise is jogging. All you need is a pair of sneakers and you’re good to go (jogging)!

2. Play Pokémon Go: If you are still one of the few people playing Pokémon Go, walk until your eggs hatch. You could simply walk, but games make it a bit more interesting. On your CAS worksheet you can simply say you plan on walking 2km a day, but in your head and your heart it’s an epic quest for Pikachu.

3. Yoga: Yoga has numerous health benefits and is a great choice for those who don’t like exercise. Power yoga is an option for those who prefer a challenge, but beginner’s yoga isn’t too strenuous and can easily be done at home. Although a yoga mat is preferable, a lot of the moves can be done on the bed or just the floor. YouTube and the app store have thousands of free options, so there’s plenty to choose from, from 10 minutes to an hour. Half an hour before bed each day will have you finishing up your activity hours in no time!

4. Swimming in a public pool, lake or ocean: There are some public pools, but many pools require an entrance fee. The ocean does not. It’s not as easy to swim laps as in a pool, but it will do in a pinch.

5. A 30 day exercise challenge: The internet is full of 30 day exercise plans. Although they’re usually not an ideal fitness plan it will challenge your commitment, and you can get a month worth of CAS.

6.  Biking: Assuming you already have a bike, biking is a very cheap method of exercise, but very efficient. Biking to and from school will count, and if takes about 20 minutes back and forth a day, you’ll get 100 minutes in a school week. It’s regular exercise, and therefore it’s regular CAS.

7. Free apps: There’s an almost unlimited amount of exercise apps in the app store, and many of them are free. Try them out! Even a 7 minute exercise app can be useful. 49 minutes every week can be rounded up to 50 minutes, which is a great place to start if you’re new to CAS.

8. Dog walking: If you have your own dog, good for you! Take the adorable little pupper out for a walk. And if not, ask a neighbour if you can steal their dog take their dog for walks. Another case of regular exercise resulting in regular CAS hours.

9. Dance: Not all dancing has to be taught in class. Online you will find numerous tutorials for various dance styles, from belly dancing to hip hop. And if you choose to learn a dance style from another culture, like India’s kathak or the Latin samba you get to learn about other cultures and therefore be a global citizen (as the IBO likes to tell us to be).

10. Dance apps or games: This activity isn’t as focused on independent learning as the previous dance suggestion, but it works nonetheless. Games like DDR or Just Dance are found in many households, so you might already have access to them at home. Just Dance includes an exercise mode, so give it a go! And if you don’t have them, there’s always the free Just Dance app, which should do the trick, memes aside.

11. PlayStation or Wii games: Certainly not a cheap option if you don’t already have the consoles or games, but if you have Wii Sports or PlayStation 3 Sports Champions you have a great way to exercise without leaving your living room.

12. Self-defense: When you can’t afford to go to a self-defense class, we have the internet. Learning proper self-defense is sadly very important, but since it’s important to learn, why not learn it for CAS? Practice with a friend until you’re a ninja, or until you have 15 hours of activity completed.

13. Celebrity workout tape: You know the ones. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a Jane Fonda tape from the 80s which you recreate in a leotard, but then again, why not? You could use a random person’s workout tape, but I think Jane Fonda can be trusted (I mean she’s 80 and have you seen how good she looks?). Cheesy as celebrity workout tapes are, especially the ones from the 80s, there’s something special about them. Many of them can be found online, so give them a go, leotard or no!

14. Jump rope: Chances are you still have a jump rope lying around the house from when you were a kid. Rope jumping is actually very good exercise, so try to find your old toy again- it will come in handy!

15. Chair workouts: Fulfill your dream of becoming Britney Spears with some chair exercises. There’s no need to buy fancy equipment when you can just go to your kitchen instead.

16. Basketball: No need to join a team as long as you have a hoop at home. Many people still have a hoop over the garage door from when they were children, why not utilize them?

17. Join a school club: Of course, any club works, but most clubs will require an entry fee. School owned ones are unlikely to ask for one.

18. Hiking: Fresh air, breath-taking views, and all that crap.

19. Running competitions: 5k runs are frequently put on, why not join one?

20. Walk home: Is it cheating? Probably. But walking is activity, so why shouldn’t you take advantage of it? You don’t need to specify that you’re walking home, you can simply say a daily walk of x minutes.

21. Basic gymnastics or acrobatics: When I say basic, I mean basic. Somersaults, cartwheels, the works. It’s technically exercise, and you can say you’re doing acrobatics without going into further details.

22. Tree climbing: An alternative to rock climbing, only it’s free.

23. Use stockings as resistance bands: I honestly don’t know how well this works, but google said it works so it must be true.

24. Water gymnastics: Once again, doing things properly is overrated. Go to a pool and try to figure it out yourself, or with a friend. It may look ridiculous, but you’ll be trying. Another option is to do it some meters away from an ongoing class, because stealing exercise kinda works according to an episode of Will and Grace.

25. Badminton: When I say badminton, I don’t mean fancy professional badminton, I mean “get a gas station badminton racket and play in the park or your lawn”.

26. Foraging: Go look for mushrooms in a forest and keep track of how long you’ve been out and how long you’ve walked.

27. Orienteering: Although I personally despise orienteering with a violent passion, I have many friends who enjoy it, one who even does it for fun. Orienteering can be planned with friends, and can take place in a forest or a city.

28. Treasure hunt: Almost an extension of orienteering, you can plan a treasure hunt in a city or a forest. With the added element of the treasure hunt, there’s a case for creativity, and doing it in a group can work as a CAS project.

29. Frisbee: Frisbees are cheap and can be bought at a gas station, and work as a fun group activity.

30. Help the elderly: As you will see in the Service section, elderly neighbours might need some help cutting grass or shoveling snow. And as anyone who has ever shoveled snow knows, it’s a surprisingly efficient exercise.

31. Gym trial: Many gyms offer a free trial for a day or a week, or even a month, which is easy to take advantage of. Use the free days to their full extent, and if that isn’t enough, go to another gym chain and use their trial. Obviously this won’t be a long term thing, but if you work long, and not necessarily hard, 15 hours should be manageable.

32. Pilates: An alternative to yoga that works as well at home as at a gym.

33. PARKOUR: … don’t die.

 Service

1. Join Amnesty: Amnesty is an organization that raises awareness for a number of important issues, and often collect signatures for their causes. Be the one who hunts for signatures and watch the service hours roll in.

2. Join the Red Cross, or any other charitable organization: The Red Cross needs no introduction. It is perhaps the most famous charity in the world, and does a lot of good. However, there have been controversies surrounding it in the past, so if you want to support another charity instead, go for it! Find a charity that is important to you and the service hours will feel even sweeter.

3. Blood donation, or spreading awareness for it: Donating blood will often get you a small payment, and you can’t do it often, so it isn’t ideal for service. However, going to your local donation center and asking for pamphlets and sign up forms to bring to school or a stand at the mall is a great way to raise awareness and encourage other people to go donate blood. It’s one of those things people talk about doing but always put off, so be the person that changes their mind-set!

4. Helping out at school events: School discos, bake sales, or bazaars always need volunteers, and it’s a great way to get many hours done at once. Contact the PTA at your school or other schools in the area and see when upcoming events are taking place and you’ll easily get at least 15 hours of service done. If you really phrase things well you might even be able to get some creativity hours.

5. Dog walking: Expanding on the point in Action, you can walk other people’s dogs as service. Ask a neighbour if they need help, or post an ad at the grocery store. Service hours and spending time with dogs, what more could you want?

6. Volunteer at an animal shelter: Like the previous point, this really is just a great excuse to hang out with animals. Check the local shelter to see if they need any helpers!

7. Volunteering at a senior center: Senior centers are always in need of more hands. Whether it’s cleaning the resident’s rooms, walking with them or just making sure they have some company, there will always be something the center will need help with.

8. Volunteering at a hospital: Not all hospitals allow untrained volunteers, but some hospitals do. If you volunteer at a hospital you will not perform the duties of a nurse, but instead simply provide some company for the people staying there.

9. Homeless shelter: Homeless shelters always need more volunteers. There’s a variety of roles you can fill, from handing out food to collecting donations. No matter what it is you do, it will have a great impact on the people who rely on the shelters.

10. Make a PSA video: As mentioned in the Creativity section, making a PSA video is a great idea for a CAS project as it combines creativity and service, and results in lots of hours.

11. Bake sales: Baking yourself will obviously cost a bit, but most ingredients can probably already be found in your home. Set up a stand in the school corridor, and find a charity to donate the profits to.

12. Volunteer at a library: Most libraries have a variety of volunteer opportunities, from tutoring children to teaching seniors how to use technology. Go to your local library and see what volunteer programs they have!

13. Shoveling snow: Winter doesn’t treat people who live in cold places well. In case of snow you might have several neighbours struggling to clear the snow from their lot. Offer them a hand and feel the CAS hours piling up!

14. Cutting grass: Like shoveling snow, cutting grass is something people need to get done, but it’s backbreaking and time consuming. Go around the neighbourhood and see if anyone needs any help with it!

15. Assisting elderly neighbours: If you have any elderly neighbours, offer to do chores for them, like cleaning and cooking. They’ll be sure to appreciate it, and it can get you semi regular CAS hours.

16. Car washing: No, this does not have to include a red bikini, but it does give you two options: either offer to wash cars for free as service, or to set a price so you can give the profits to charity. All you need is a sponge and some water, so get scrubbing!

17. Scouts: Most scout groups require a member fee, so it’s not ideal to become a scout if you aren’t one. However, if you’re already a member, being a scout leader will get you many, many hours, so take advantage of it!

18. Student union: Student unions work hard, and can therefore get you many hours. There will be a wide range of activities to organize and participate in, so you’ll have some much needed variety.

19. Prom committee: If you’re not interested in joining the student union, there may be some committees that are separate from the union. Prom committees, graduation committees, etc., are all great options that can get you plenty of hours.

20. Babysitting: Give your neighbours a night off by offering to babysit for free. Remember, it doesn’t count as service if you get paid, so make sure the only money you get is to pay for dinner.

21. Tutoring: Some schools have study halls, or a homework club, aka after school homework help for the younger kids. And if your school doesn’t offer it already, ask if you can start it. It’ll be a chance for you to tutor younger kids, and if nobody shows up and wants your help, so what? You offered the service, and even if no one came, the hours count.

22. Start a club: Being a member of a club will get you creativity hours, starting one will get you both. Do it with a friend and you’ve got a CAS project.

23. Join a big brother/big sister organization: There are several of these organizations going around, and a popular one in the US is bbbs.org, which states that their mission is to “Provide children facing adversity with strong and enduring, professionally supported one-to-one relationships that change their lives for the better, forever.” A noble cause for sure, and one which your CAS coordinator will adore. It will tick most outcome boxes, and you will gain something from it too.

24. Volunteer in a political campaign: If there are any elections happening in your country soon, get involved for the good of your community, and your CAS hours!

25. Volunteer at a hotline: Many countries have crisis hotlines that often need more volunteers, why not help out?

26. Start Kiva team: kiva.org is a great website that revolves around microloans. It has the option to make or join teams of lenders. Make a team and try to gain members, spread awareness and get donations to lend money to people in need around the world. As they are loans, you get money back in kiva credit which you can then donate to someone new, thus creating a circle of good. Team meetings to decide which individuals, countries or field partners to donate to next will get you many CAS hours.

27. Plan an athletic event for charity: Whether it be a 5k, orienteering, a treasure hunt (all as mentioned in the activity section), or anything else you can think of, it’s a great way to involve a community, and any entrance fee can be donated to charity. By participating yourself, you can tick all three CAS boxes, and doing it with one or more people makes it a great CAS project.

28. Writing letters to soldiers: This may not be an option everywhere, but some countries have organizations where you can write letters to the soldiers overseas who don’t have anyone writing to them, which is sure to be a morale booster.

29. Host a free workshop: Workshops are a great way to learn new skills, or to teach your skills. Maybe you can teach something you learned from/for your creativity hours!

30. Neighbourhood watch: Neighbourhood watches are a great way to help ensure safety in your local area, so either join one or start one.

31. Volunteer to help immigrants and/or refugees: There are many organizations that work to help immigrants and refugees become integrated in society, whether it be activities for children or events to help newly arrived people learn the local language. Look up any local organizations and see if they’re looking for volunteers!

32. Park maintenance: Many parks need help with a lot of maintenance, from cleaning to repainting benches. Contact whoever is in charge and see if they need any volunteers.

33. Studyblr: Coming up with 99 free CAS ideas is surprisingly time consuming, and so is everything else about a studyblr, so give it a go and get those hours!

[your-dietician]

The Future of Alternative Pain Therapies

New Post has been published on https://depression-md.com/the-future-of-alternative-pain-therapies/

The Future of Alternative Pain Therapies

The need to find alternative therapies to opioids to treat both acute and chronic pain is critical for a number of reasons.

With the population aging and individuals living longer there will be a need to develop new therapeutics that are beneficial for the geriatric population.

In addition, our understanding on the opioid epidemic and the addictive nature of the treatments continues to expand.

In an interview with HCPLive®, Tobias Moeller-Bertram, MD, chief medical officer of Desert Clinic Pain Institute, explained why alternative therapies have been slow to take form, but how our growing understanding on both patients and treatments could lead to some positive changes in the near future.

Moeller-Bertram is the co-chair of the Evolving Approaches in Pain Management conference in San Diego on August 14, which will feature several experts discussing opioid use, alternative options for post-surgical pain, and how to best treat addiction.

HCPLive: Since pain is something that transcends different medical fields, how important is it to bring individuals with different expertise to come together and talk about some of these topics?

Moeller-Bertram: It’s of utmost importance. Pain is something that affects all aspects of human experience. It affects physical, mental and spiritual aspects.

If you look at the different varieties of specialties that enter the pain field and can be certified, to see experts really from anesthesia, focusing more on physiology and better blocking the pain with medicines to psychiatry, which is really more focused on the emotional experience of pain and emotion.

You start with the definition of pain that is a physical and emotional experience. And the whole concept of the biopsychosocial experience really shows that pain is the ultimate combination of whole person care.

So all specialties that are focusing on the physical, mental and spiritual aspect of pain are not only welcomed but necessary to really relieve pain from its origin, but also from the burden of pain and the suffering that comes with it.

A multidisciplinary or transdisciplinary approach is needed for meaningful treatments.

HCPLive: With the population aging in the way that it is, how important is it to come up with some pain alternatives that could help the older population?

Moeller-Bertram: This is a problem that’s going to affect a lot of us and not only is the population living longer, I think the hope of living a meaningful life is very high. People want to stay active. people want to stay engaged, and people want to contribute to society.

Finding a means of increasing mobility and quality of life and avoiding the risks of current medications, particularly opioids, I think is going to be very important.

There’s some exciting opportunities. We’re working closely with our surgical and orthopedic colleagues trying to address osteoarthritis. In general, when you look at the newer evolving therapies, I think there’s some hope that some new therapeutics going to be able to reduce osteoarthritis pain, and not have those side effect profiles of opioids.

HCPLive: For cannabis, do we have a firm grasp on what areas it should be used for and what maybe it is less effective for?

Moeller-Bertram: I wish I could give you the answer. I think in a few years, we will be able to do so. I think that we have a sound understanding of the usefulness, I think that the evidence so far, is convincing enough, that is shown it’s a good product for pain, in general.

I think that before we even can go to which specific pain areas will respond well to the cannabis derived and treatments, we have to probably get a little bit of understanding of which compounds to watch.

Cannabis has more than 100 cannabinoids and there is something known as the entourage effect, where the combination of different components works differently than each other components alone.

So I think we have to get a little better understanding of what in the plant material having which kind of effects.

And once we can explain that a little bit more, we can see for example, a certain combination is better for reducing inflammation in the body, one could expect that any inflammatory driven pain would respond well to that combination.

If it’s something that has a more muscle relaxing combination, one could imagine a therapeutic that consists of these components will be better when it comes to a musculoskeletal pain.

I think it’s going to be a combination of clinical data feedback that we get from patients that are taking these medications, indicating for which pain concerns and complaints, it was helpful.

And then us on the other hand scientifically understanding which compounds and combinations of compounds have one effect on the body, and therefore combining them to hopefully, be able to really come up with specific subsets of therapeutics for specific pain indications.

HCPLive: Did the pandemic shed light on any of the gaps that need to be closed in terms of pain management?

Moeller-Bertram: My immediate response would be I can tell you that a substantial portion of my patients in my clinics has realized that what’s the dependence on particularly opiate medications meant for them.

Going through the anxiety and making sure that they have access to their medication, which I think wasn’t necessarily in front of their mind prior to the pandemic.

A lot of those saw that as a negative rather than a positive because their motivation of not relying on a medication that they have to get on their feet to get because there are withdrawal syndromes and of course increased pain.

Particularly the withdrawal symptoms is something patients didn’t normally report prior to the pandemic. So I think that might be one aspect where people reflect more on do, I really want to expose myself to this living scenario were having access on a regular basis to these medications is not only important for me to treat my pain, but also important for me to avoid withdrawals.

To which degree that’s going to translate into the willingness to look at alternatives, or, to which degree is going to make it easier for us to have conversations around reduction and limiting opioids will be seen, but at least that is something that comes to mind initially.

HCPLive: You are also presenting during the meeting about opioid addiction therapy options, how has this field grown in recent years?

Moeller-Bertram: I think this is a field that is continuing to evolve. And we do have options on the medical side, then has been brought more to the forefront, particularly the probuphine type of therapeutics.

The fact that it’s easier for physicians to prescribe than at this point, I think has made a big impact.

There’s always room for improvement.

On the non-pharmacological side, I think access to trauma informed care, and really working with patients with addictions on those areas is something that I hope we want to improve on and increase that.

HCPLive: How challenging is it to balance the addictive nature of some of these substances with their medicinal value?

Moeller-Bertram: I think this is an ever-present issue when it comes to treatment. You want to have a beneficiary risk benefit profile; you don’t want to expose people to unnecessary risks. Also, the individual nature of how you respond to a pharmacologic compound plays a role here, too.

I think that we probably can learn more about predictive measures and predict the factors who’s responding how to certain drugs.

It’s not liked every person is responding the same way when it comes to addictive behavior to certain drugs. But I believe that in medicine, we often just think about the average patient, which is not in existence.

Some compounds absolutely have higher potential for addiction than others and we have a pretty good idea about that. But I think the predictive measures when it comes to the individual patients actually taking their medications, there’s something that we can learn more, and hopefully, you’re going to be able to improve that.

So I hope that we as physicians and healthcare providers will in the future have better towards to increase the benefits and reducing the risk when we are using therapeutics that have a benefit for the patients but also the known problems.

HCPLive: Are we close to achieving the balance needed in treating both chronic and acute pain?

Moeller-Bertram: I hope so. I think it’s driven by the understanding that the simple transition of one works for acute pain apply to chronic pain does not work. I think the realization around that is really driving the change in thought process and change in approach of treatment.

I continue to hope that this whole person care and the idea of really individualizing treatment is going to continue, which has to mean that we look more at the circumstances, which person has what disease, for what reasons.

I think the trend is continuing. It’s going to take a while, there’s a lot of factors involved.

It starts with the healthcare practitioners understanding, the patient’s acceptance of the shift in paradigm, and then the insurance apparatus and everything that’s behind the reimbursement models and those kind of things to really adapt to that.

It’s going to be a process. But I think that we are at the point that we know this, this path has to be walked we there’s really no turning away from it. So I hope that every stakeholder in both stays motivated and, you know, takes this path one step at a time. And maybe next year when you ask me, you’re going to have more tangible changes already.

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Small Business Loan Options in Texas

Did you know that there are 2.8 million small businesses in Texas? Or that these small businesses employ 4.8 million people? Texas is a fantastic place to start or grow a business, whether you are in Austin, Dallas, Houston, or one of the hundreds of other cities in the Lone Star State … but not without a little help. Here is what you need to know about small business loans in Texas.

How A Loan Can Help Your Texas Small Business

When I say “help” I am referring to small business loans, which can be useful in many ways. They can help you buy what your business needs to run on a day-to-day basis and make sure you have enough cash flow to survive slow times in your business.

Taking out a business loan can also help you build and expand your business loan, as long as you pay your monthly installment on time each month.

Find the right financing for you

Don’t waste hours looking for and applying for loans you don’t stand a chance – get matched today based on your business and credit profile.

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Small business credit options in Texas

When it comes to corporate finance, you have several options. Some you may qualify for, especially if you have good credit, while others may offer you finance at higher rates.

COVID-19 pandemic loans

In addition to two federal loan programs, the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program, Texas has several COVID-19 grant and small business loan programs, including loans from PeopleFund and various city governments. Check the links for the latest information.

Bank loan

If your credit rating is excellent, you can qualify for a long term loan with loan interest rates from a bank or credit union.

SBA loan

The US Small Business Administration also offers low-interest loans like the 7 (a) loan or SBA 504 loan that can be used for things like business expenses, equipment, and commercial real estate. Learn more at SBA.gov.

Credit lines

When you need access to capital but don’t want to have it all (and don’t have to pay back everything at once), business lines of credit can fill the bill. Borrow from what you are approved for and only pay back that amount.

Equipment financing

If you are using equipment like computers, heavy machinery, or even company cars, there are certain equipment loans that you may want to explore. The devices you buy act as collateral that can bring interest rates down.

Credit cards

Having business credit cards to make purchases for your business can come in handy even when you run out of cash in the bank. Withdraw your balance in full to avoid interest fees and look for a card with rewards to earn on your purchases.

Short-term loan

But what if you don’t qualify for any of the above options, maybe because your business is new or you don’t have good credit? You can still qualify for short-term loans, but know that these tend to have higher interest rates.

How To Choose The Right Loan For Your Texas Business

Start with your fitness. Which financing options do you qualify for? Ideally, apply for the lowest interest rate loan to minimize the additional fees you pay.

Also, think about how you plan to use the funds. Some loans, particularly SBA loans, may have specific loan proceeds use requirements, and there are loans such as equipment finance that are designed for specific purchases.

How To Qualify For A Texas Business Loan

Financial institutions may have slightly different criteria for qualifying for a business loan, but in general you can expect them to look at how long you’ve been in business, your credit history, and your annual sales.

New businesses may struggle to qualify for bank or SBA loans as they typically approve applications from companies that have been in business for two or more years. A better option for a startup might be a business credit card or a short-term loan.

The higher your credit score, both personal and business, the better the deals you will qualify for. More on the subject of creditworthiness in the next section.

What is a Good Credit Score for Getting a Texas Business Loan?

Each lender has their own set of criteria for the credit scores required for small business finance. The SBA doesn’t have a published minimum credit requirement, however, but many lenders require a personal credit score of at least 640.

Some lenders may also check if you have business credit, which not all companies do. If you don’t have them, learn how to set up a business loan to expand your options.

And remember: even with bad credit, there are credit options for you, albeit at a higher cost.

Find out which financing options you qualify for

Get personalized credit and credit card reconciliations and access to your business credit report when you sign up for a free Nav account. The check won’t harm your creditworthiness.

Registration

How To Get A Small Business Loan In Texas

Lenders may differ in their application process but expect to be asked for details about your business, how long it has been in operation, your annual income, etc. And since you may be personally guaranteeing the loan, you may need to provide personal information such as your social security number specify.

After you are approved for a loan, review the loan terms, which details the loan amount, interest rate, and repayment schedule. Sign the agreement and the money should be deposited into your business account in less than a business day.

Ways To Use A Small Business Loan In Texas

The uses of corporate finance are as diverse as the small business owners applying for finance.

If you have slow phases in your business, you may just want to access working capital so your bank account never goes empty. If you want to expand, a loan can be used to purchase commercial real estate and renovate new retail space. You could use the funds to purchase larger inventory so you could save per unit.

An equipment loan could be used to purchase updated equipment that will help serve more customers or speed up your production line. You could use the funds to hire more help to relieve yourself a little.

A small loan for your Texas business can and should help take your business to a new level!

This article was originally written July 8, 2021.

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source https://www.cassh24sg.com/2021/07/10/small-business-loan-options-in-texas/

[dipulb3]

Bipartisan focus intensifies for crucial weeks ahead as path narrows on infrastructure

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/bipartisan-focus-intensifies-for-crucial-weeks-ahead-as-path-narrows-on-infrastructure/

Bipartisan focus intensifies for crucial weeks ahead as path narrows on infrastructure

“I’m meeting with my Republican friends up in the Congress to see number one, how much they’re willing to go for, what they think are the priorities and what compromises — I’m ready to compromise,” Biden said in Thursday remarks in Louisiana. “What I’m not ready to do is, I’m not ready to do nothing.”

The Democratic strategy is one that is equal parts sincere and necessity, aides and officials say. Biden has made clear in private conversations with Democrats he thinks there’s both a pathway to an agreement and overall value for the country to the effort, according to two people with knowledge of the conversations.

He also understands the political reality, they said.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has the barest of majorities and moderates like Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia have said they won’t support Democrats moving forward unilaterally without a substantive bipartisan effort first.

While Manchin has become the public face of that position, it’s one held privately by a handful of other Democratic senators as well, according to two Senate Democratic aides.

Sen. Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat up for reelection in 2022, has echoed the sentiment.

“We all recognize we have failing infrastructure,” Kelly said recently. “My preference is to do this in a bipartisan way. Work together and come up with a plan that can get both the support of Democrats and Republicans.”

Still in the early stages

The bipartisan push, to the extent it progresses, is one that is both still in its early stages and still drawing significant skepticism and caution from Republicans and Democrats, according to aides from both parties. Republicans still harbor resentment from the Democrat-only approach that led to Biden’s cornerstone legislative achievement to this point: the $1.9 trillion Covid relief package.

Democrats, cognizant of a rapidly closing pre-midterm election year window, are wary of going down a potentially fruitless path with Republicans given the scale of the agenda they’re planning to pursue. It’s a lesson from former President Barack Obama’s 2009 legislative efforts that is brought up repeatedly, particularly by progressives who are concerned that momentum and support for a Biden agenda that would largely reshape the US social safety net for families — one Democrats are keenly aware will garner no GOP support — could be sapped in the process.

Two separate comments from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell only served to exacerbate that dynamic this week. McConnell said changes to the 2017 Republican-passed tax law — the financing mechanism for Biden’s infrastructure proposal — are a non-starter for his conference.

He also made clear his primary focus was stopping a Biden agenda he views as far too progressive.

“One hundred percent of my focus is on stopping this new administration,” the GOP leader said this week in comments that quickly circulated through the White House and Democratic offices.

Both sides, at this point, say it’s up to the other to make concrete concessions on key issues in order to prove the talks can reach a conclusion. “That’s not exactly a recipe for progress,” one Senate GOP aide said when asked about the dynamic.

Biden, for his part, brushed off McConnell’s remarks, noting the Kentucky Republican had said similar things during Obama’s administration and the two still secured legislative deals. And McConnell said Thursday Republicans were “very interested” in talking about infrastructure along the lines of the proposal Capito has put on the table.

A necessary undertaking

In short, Biden doesn’t have the votes to pass any of his sweeping $4.1 trillion infrastructure and economic agenda without the effort to try and find a bipartisan path forward on the physical infrastructure piece of the plan in the coming days. It’s something White House officials and senior Democratic aides say they are keenly aware of as the coming weeks approach.

Still, the prospects for the current effort are, in the words of one official, “about as fluid as it gets,” with staff-level talks between the White House and Republicans described as positive, but also still in fairly early, if granular stages.

The primary focus has been on trading details on the spending side of the two proposals, saving the more complicated and politically volatile elements of how to pay for any deal until further along in the negotiations, one source familiar with the talks told Appradab.

Democratic leadership has also directed committee chairmen to work alongside their ranking members to try and find possible places of agreement on infrastructure, one Democratic aide told Appradab.

So far, members engaged in the conversations with the President remain upbeat about the progress, saying even if the plan were modest, it would still be a victory.

“I think the country wants us to work together,” Capito told Appradab last week. “I am not a cynic. I am going to believe that as long as this is moving positive, I am going to believe it can work. “

‘Roughly zero overlap’

Still, the scale of the task ahead is significant. There is some optimism that the top-line spending level for any such proposal could be reconciled, though neither side has signaled any bottom line intentions beyond their initial proposals, aides and officials said.

But even if that were the case — something that is far from guaranteed — how to finance that number is an area where, in the words of one administration official, “there is roughly zero overlap.”

Republicans proposed paying for their proposal through unspent funds from the Covid relief package and user fees, the latter of which has been explicitly rejected by the White House. Biden has proposed increasing the corporate tax rate to 28%, from 21%, among a handful of increases proposed on corporations to finance his proposal.

He’s also spent the better part of the last week using his public remarks to explicitly outline what he views as the merits of the tax increases, making clear he has no intention of dropping the idea any time soon.

Still, Biden has opened the door to paring that back, saying repeatedly he’s willing to compromise on it and, on Thursday, moving away from explicitly calling for 28% and instead swapping it for “between 25 and 28.” But with Republicans opposed to touching the 2017 tax law at all, it’s unclear whether that shift will garner any good will.

Aides on both sides acknowledge that anything that comes of the talks will be modest in comparison to the ambitious and sweeping plans Biden rolled out this spring.

So far, negotiations have centered on an infrastructure bill that tackles roads, bridges, broadband and water rather than the re-imagined definition of infrastructure included in Biden’s American Families Plan, which included an extension of the expanded child tax credit and paid leave for every American worker.

But congressional Democrats and White House officials working on the negotiations say there is nothing stopping them from picking up and passing those programs later using reconciliation.

That decision, while seen as likely, eventually, is for now being pushed back.

“I am keeping my powder dry on that only because I can see variables here. We should make every effort we can to make it bipartisan,” said House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, a central player in the legislative effort ahead. “There is an appetite here to do some things through regular order and then maybe using reconciliation if we have to, but I don’t think we want to state that as our first option.”

Biden also hasn’t settled on a preferred specific legislative process or sequence, officials say, and is willing to see how the next several weeks play out. But he does have one bottom line — one that he never fails to mention every time he talks about searching for compromise.

“I’m not ready to have another period where America has another infrastructure month and doesn’t change a damn thing.”

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Why Clarity and focus is Important in Business

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/why-clarity-and-focus-is-important-in-business/

Why Clarity and focus is Important in Business

Do you think you’re ready to become a full-time business owner? Few small businesses survive more than a couple of years, and everything that happens or doesn’t happen in and with your business is on you that’s.

A huge responsibility, but it can bring you huge satisfaction as well. For that to happen, though, you need to be clear on a few things from the outset. So let’s. Talk about those hello and welcome to the savvy corner, where we talk about managing your money, your business and your mind around it.

My journey to full-time entrepreneurship has been fairly uneventful, but looking back, there are some things I wish I knew at the beginning of my entrepreneurial journey, which would have made a transition easier.

That is what we will discuss in this post as part of the series ready for entrepreneurship, where I share practical tips and strategies for making the jump to entrepreneurship smoother. I’ve interviewed some amazing business owners on the things they wish they had known before making this transition, and I will share their wisdom and mine during the series today’s post will highlight why it’s important to have clarity in business.

What you need to focus on when starting out as an entrepreneur. I want to start by talking about expectations. Perhaps you’ve, been running your business as a psychic for a while or you’ve, read about what it’s like to be an entrepreneur.

Maybe you’ve watched some videos about it on Youtube. I can pretty much guarantee that you will experience it differently than what you expect it to be. Let’s. Just get this out of the way it’s, not glamorous, not in the beginning.

Anyway, if you’re, imagining waking up at 4 00 a.m and then meditating for an hour going for a run. You jump in the shower, come out, prepare yourself a rainbow breakfast ball and you do an hour of journaling before starting your day.

At eight a.m, then, I’m, swear to disappoint, but it’s, not always like that. Sometimes I work until 10 p.m. In the evening, and by the time i go to bed, it’s already midnight, so waking up at 4, 00 am the next day to do it all over again is simply not an option.

I’d, rather get a couple more hours of sleep and not be a zombie all day. Also, you need to be prepared to do other things in addition to your specialty and the reason why you started the business and by other things I mean admin, work, business, development finances networking.

Let me take the example of a coaching business, so i can illustrate this better as an owner of a coaching business, you will not be spending all your time coaching unless you have a team behind you, you can expect to spend up to 50 or even more Of your time in the beginning, marketing the business talking to potential clients, putting together programs and proposals, and so on and finally, with regards to expectations being the best at what you do and being an expert in your field.

Doesn’t guarantee that your business will be successful. You need to develop your business development skills, which we will talk about in a moment, but before we do that, however, there is something else we need to touch upon, and that is clarity.

Clarity has become one of those cliché words that gets thrown around all the time. So if you’ve rolled your eyes when I mentioned it, I know exactly where you’re coming from, but people refer to it so often for a reason – and that is because, without clarity you will always be in a limbo state Of figuring it out figuring out what you want, who your clients are, what they want, how much to charge? What is your positioning on the market where your business is going, etc? I’ve already hinted to what i mean by clarity.

So let’s dissect this even further. First of all, you want to have clarity around your motivation for starting a business in the first place as Simon Sinek would say what’s your? Why, without a strong motivation or purpose, it will be difficult for you to create a vision and a mission for your business and to maintain a sustained effort as a business owner to progress your endeavor.

Secondly, you want to be very clear on what you do and who you do it for and be able to sum that up in a concise way. I created an entire post on how to determine your niche and ideal client, which i will link for you on the screen and in the description box.

Below clarity in this area will require some research with regards to your target market, the problem that they are facing and how to put together an offering that helps solve those problems. You might be surprised to hear this, but this research will also involve getting to know yourself better and your preferred way of getting involved in helping your clients find a solution with this kind of research comes another benefit which is getting clarity on your brand.

What does your business stand for? What are its values, what words or phrases describe it, the best, what colors match the vibe of your business and so on? Once you have clarity on your, why your niche and your brand, you will be able to strategically look at your business and decide where you want to take it and how you will achieve that.

Some of the business owners i talked to mentioned the continuity of their business and it being able to operate after they. Retired clarity is hugely important when it comes to maintaining your focus to reach whatever objectives you have for your business and not be tempted to fall into the trap of bright shiny object syndrome.

In the words of an entrepreneur. I interviewed being clear on your what and your why matters most way more than the what ifs another important element that the people I interviewed mentioned, was to focus on one thing at a time. This doesn’t just refer to your day-to-day tasks.

To what your business is about, you might want to do coaching and consulting teaching, training and development all at once.  You think they complement each other and you don’t want to limit yourself and your sources of income.

I agree you shouldn’t, but in the beginning you must focus on one thing: only otherwise you will overwhelm your audience and potential clients and possibly overwhelm yourself too one entrepreneur I interviewed sum this up nicely dream big, but execute small. Until you start getting known for one thing, your efforts should not be wasted on doing everything for everyone. This is why it’s so important to have a niche.

When I started, I was known for financial coaching for personal finances, and I did that for a while, before branching out into coaching people on their business finances, doing business, mentoring, teaching, consulting, and all the other things that I do in my business.

It was only after people got to know me for my financial coaching work that i got the opportunity to expand my business with the advantage of adding on offers that i knew were in demand, because people were asking for those services.

Specifically, if you’re enjoying the post so far, please give it a big thumbs up. This post was inspired by the tips and advice shared by these amazing entrepreneurs. I will leave their contact details below if you want to check out their work, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank them for their contribution.

I promised we would talk about business development, which is something a lot of the interviewees mentioned when it comes to this. The first thing I want you to know is that there is no magic formula that you can apply, which will get you your dream business in record time.

So if you receive any offers to purchase programs or services that will guarantee six figures in six weeks or whatever nonsense, please be extra vigilant. Business development takes time and consistency, and it requires clarity which we’ve already talked about.

There are a few principles you need to know, though. Firstly, people buy the benefits, not the features, so your marketing content and your sales conversations should all be around the results of working together, and how you can help people or organizations solve the particular problems that they are dealing with.

Speaking about marketing content, the sooner you start creating content the better and knowing the next principle i will mention, will help you. You need to be aware of the fact that people are willing to spend money on what they want, not necessarily on what they need.

So your content should reflect this.

Don’t talk about what you think they need talk about, what they want, which is usually a solution to a problem. At the same time, whatever the solution that you propose is make sure it doesn’t overwhelm your potential clients.

This happened to me in the beginning, when I was trying to offer my clients so much to make my services and products really valuable to them, that, for some it was too much. I had to learn that something simple easy to follow and concise is sometimes more valuable than a complex, offering packed full of information with fancy, graphs and tools.

Just because I, like that kind of stuff, doesn’t mean that my clients will who would have thought right. So far we’ve talked about expectations, clarity, focusing on one thing and business development.

There is one more thing i want to touch upon in this post, and that is opportunities. Sometimes there are opportunities coming your way opportunities and you will need to learn how to sift through them.

Although you might be tempted to say yes to everything, we will talk about filtering opportunities, ideas and people in a future post. But sometimes these opportunities won’t come your way and you will have to create them for yourself, which is why networking is so important and having a support system around you, which I talked about in the previous post in this series.

I will link it for you on the screen and in the description box, you cannot create opportunities without clarity, without focus and without working on your business, not just in it. I hope this post was helpful and if it was, you’d, be pleased to know that there are other black kids in the ready for entrepreneurship series. Source : Youtube

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