#need about 3-5 business days of mental recovery now damn

[jester-step]

hhh playing d&d with anxiety is such a rollercoaster of emotions

it takes up a LOT of mental energy but it’s worth it when you end up with cool players/DMs

[illegiblewords]

5 Questions for Writers!

               5 Questions for Writers                                                        

I got tagged by @kunstpause, it looked like fun so figured I’d go for it! THANKS TO KUNST!

Tagging @wouldyouliketoseemymask, @nilim, @azwoodbomb, @peregrineroad, @frostmantle, @autumnslance, @strangefellows, @redbud-tree, @nozomikei​, and @rivenroad​. No obligation to anyone but full permission to steal granted to anyone else who might like to. I’ll literally be delighted if you pick this up spontaneously and blame me as an excuse lmao.

1. Do you have a favorite character to write? Who and why?

2. Do you have a favorite trope to write? Or one you want to write?

3. Share your favorite description you’ve written?

4. Share your favorite dialogue you’ve written?

5. Scene you haven’t written, but want to?

I made long answers so have a cut!

1. Do you have a favorite character to write? Who and why?

It depends heavily on what fandom and where I am mentally, but I’ve figured out I tend to love writing angsty lameass dudes with blonde hair who are prone to doing really silly things despite taking themselves entirely too seriously. Honestly, I have a pretty huge track record at this point. Harvey Dent, Vexen, Dmitri, Lahabrea, probably more besides. Every one of them fits the right balance of lameass to angst. I like seeing them grow and find fulfillment as people and they are very very cute while still having an edge of badassery and cleverness. Also they’re funny.

Lahabrea is my favorite at the moment, and him reaching that position is an accomplishment considering how stiff the competition is in FFXIV. Loser tricked his way to the top while I was busy laughing at him.

2. Do you have a favorite trope to write? Or one you want to write?

I really, really, really love redemption arcs and people recovering from fucked up experiences. Latter case especially I love seeing characters in those situations successfully connect to the people and world around them, especially if they get to grow together with a partner. I also LOVE “hero saves the villain and villain takes it to heart”.

(You may be sensing a theme here haha.)

There are a few reason these concepts resonate with me, the first being I think they’re really hopeful, inspiring, and something I always wanted to see growing up but rarely did.

People fuck up in life. People get hurt in horrible ways that bring out the worst in them. Sometimes when that happens they dig themselves deeper and deeper into ugliness. The more a person’s bad side comes out, the more hopeless it can feel. And for mental illness especially I’ve found this can be a major issue.

Everyone makes mistakes and everyone has flaws, but I think there’s something really significant in seeing someone who has hit rock bottom, who can no longer imagine a way out, get offered a hand for support and take it. While recovery and redemption (not synonymous of course) ultimately need to be carried by the individual struggling, I really can’t understate how important it is to know in those situations that you’re not alone and someone believes in you.

I think a big part of why this theme is important to me is because mental illness, both genetic and due to trauma, is something unbelievably difficult and painful not only for the sufferer but those around them. The most mentally ill characters in fiction tend to be villains, and are disproportionately more likely to be suffering severe trauma. It frustrated me since I was pretty young to see over and over again cases where a mess could have been avoided if there was any support system in place.

Seeing compassion and connection given that kind of power means a lot to me, as does recognizing that villains are people before they are villains. It’s also very reassuring in the sense of “If this person fucked up that badly but still tried to better themself, I can too. And odds are I’m also worthy of love and compassion, even when my issues make things harder for others. I just have to keep working to improve.”

3. Share your favorite description you’ve written?

Eff.

Straight up I think I’ve written too much to have just one favorite description. It’s been a lot of years and I have hundreds of fics and I’m lame. So I’m going to put a few of my favs.

Anytime there’s a gap in block quotes it’s a different section within the same fic.

22 - A Batman Fanfic

He trembles beneath the weight of their expectations but his smile never fades flashes before cameras microphones under his nose crowds screaming questions bleeding together he answers like clockwork the District Attorney who must bring justice to us all paying tribute to false idols with golden hair and silver tongues we the people bow down in worship to this guardian of the law with words and deeds I believe in Harvey Dent so he swears in hallowed halls to bring prosperity to smite the wicked to damn the criminal with authority invested in him by Gotham’s dutiful children and himself.

***

On the precipice of victory we stand united our voice raised like a torch like a spear like a golden arrow against the beast of Lerna we are gods and monsters we are so much more than good and evil we are order in the court cauterizing corruption our head held high and mighty manifest in Harvey of the doubletalk Harvey who writes himself into the fabric of Gotham’s history Harvey who will not bend before the Roman we command you the unworthy we condemn you the unrighteous we will not be merciful and you will fall before our eyes.

***

I am Dionysus divided at the altar of Tyche O Fortuna O Fortuna give me guidance in the light of the moon you dance sacred silver dollar I see and obey the wax and wane your whim Wheel of Fortune the card I am dealt your servant your slave venerated puppet of flesh blessed is your wisdom bestowed upon I am your disciple wine-mad twisted chanting your word becomes law holy splendor against gavels desecrating your name defiant in denial extend your will through me and we shall strike the innocent enlighten the ignorant or spare them all for now.

Doppelganger - A Spider-Man Fanfic

She asks him to tell the story of himself, and like Scheherazade he begins anew each day.

As with many other things, this comparison is imperfect. The Ravencroft Institute is hardly a palace and neither of them could pass for royalty. She sits in a chair across from him over a carpet the color of sawdust. Her walls are lined with insects pinned on display. Not many butterflies, quite a few beetles. On a bookshelf Dmitri sees The Metamorphosis nestled between non-fiction texts more relevant to her profession. He thinks maybe it's an inside joke she has with herself, but doesn't say so.

He's received an invitation to call her Ashley instead of Dr. Kafka and doesn't know whether to accept. It might be to make him more comfortable. It might be something else. In her late fifties Kafka is built from delicate features, and he suspects the lines around her eyes mean they crinkle when she smiles. Short black hair, beige suit, only jewelry a pair of diamond stud earrings. Dmitri thinks she looks like a mother, but not his.

Her weight sinks into leather, darker than the floor. The couch he rests on matches. He finds himself leaning forward with one elbow propped on his thigh, the other locked in a cast suspended by his neck. There is something reassuringly empty in the gray fabric of his uniform, cheap and utilitarian and harmless. Dmitri’s wrists are thin, but then he's lost a lot of weight recently. He probably wouldn't be able to run as fast as he used to, but then circumstances would be the same anywhere he went so that really doesn't matter. His espionage days are over. His free arm is shedding in flakes but at least his skin is dry. Clean.

Dmitri no longer looks like anyone, unrecognizable to himself. A face without much in the way of edges, short nose. Weak chin. Mismatched eyes that shift between green and blue and brown and every other natural hue as moments pass into minutes pass into hours. Dark blotches interrupt his forehead and chin. They will peel in new patterns across a span of days. For the most part though, he is pale enough to trace veins where his body seems on the brink of spilling out.

It's been a while since he shaved his head and the hair that grows back is almost foreign. An unruly mess of black, blond, brunet, and red—strands as unlike in texture as anything else. The mask that made him Chameleon was white plastic embedded with hardware. Left deformed after trying to resemble others in flesh too many times, it allowed him to duplicate any face, any body he could remember. More than holograms, the most complete sensory illusions technology could perform.

Without it, Dmitri feels stripped.

When Kafka looks at him she’s receiving constant signals and missing none of them. The moments he needs to turn away, flat monosyllabic turns of phrase he chooses or resorts to or blankly accepts as his own. It doesn’t have to be this way. It isn’t comfortable and he doesn’t even trust it’s not calculated. But she’s going to notice no matter what he does at this point, and lying about it doesn’t do anyone much good. They both know why he’s here.

***

“We were poor. We worked hard to keep ourselves fed and clothed and less than an embarrassment. I probably could have worked harder. Mother,” he begins before stumbling over himself.

The story he’s telling isn’t hers. Whatever else she was, Sonya Smerdyakov wasn’t Mrs. Bates. He remembers her voice as the beginning of an echo, forever following someone else’s lead.

And so he followed her.

She was bright like a light going out. She was gentle without being kind. Her fingers were short and delicate and she touched him as little as possible. He found her attention in the way she avoided his name.

***

In the privacy of his room, Dmitri began talking to himself.

Celebrities. Teachers. Children. The flat, steady rhythm of his father’s voice. The words and intonations favored by mother. Sergei’s laugh. He lost himself in a fantasy of conversations, strode through space to mimic confidence he didn’t feel, flashed teeth in front of his mirror like other people.

Once, Dmitri raised his voice. And when his older brother came, eyebrows knitting in confusion, he found himself full of stammered explanations, hands fumbling at his elbows, stumbling over his tongue to make sense of it.

Just making stories for himself. A game with no ending. That was all.

***

He would have died in that town under the eyes of speechless parents. Dmitri remembers the confusion that took his peers when he found a job for people who spoke for themselves. They thought he might be growing up.

He could lie. And when he began he understood it would always be a game with no ending.

Dmitri lost himself in a fantasy of conversations with real people and a voice that didn’t belong to him.

They asked a stranger to sign their yearbooks without even realizing it.

And then he was eighteen, and he left to continue elsewhere.

He didn’t announce his departure.

From Umbra - A Final Fantasy XIV Fanfic

It was probably a dream.

Lukewarm water crept down his throat, nearly making him choke. A skin pressed to his lips, insistent. He coughed, and for the first time there was moisture enough for resistance.

The face that obscured his vision was shrouded in white cloth. Cenric found he couldn’t focus on it. Mismatched eyes, one light and the other dark. Impossible to say if blindness caused the inconsistency.

A string of shells dangled from the figure’s neck, rattling gently. The skin pulled back for a moment. Careful. Patient.

It returned only once he'd grown quiet. Cenric drank for as long as he could. Impossibly, a great deal remained by the time he relinquished his hold.

There wasn't enough of him present to say thank you. Cenric barely registered being dragged, being carried onto a cart. Awareness was altogether gone by the time they started to move.

***

…to the blessed traders who enrich our lives we’re bound to pay with our lives in turn aether born fire-walker your will sees us to rest we entrust ourselves to your sight forged of oschon for peace and prosperity and an ending you do not weep for father azeyma lives in the earth with you her fan brings no breeze the air is hot and thick and breathless your domain a silent place that does not stir have you forgotten the sound of your own voice have you known what it is to live and fail have you been alone do you know what it is to die how can a god pass judgment without being judged nald’thal lord of departures of flame and sand whose coin purse overflows who knows not what it means to starve what it means to spoil the legacy of one who loved you nald’thal who holds shells and souls and precious stones as if their worth were equal nald’thal who cannot know mercy without knowing pain who are you to weigh mortal affairs?

***

In darkness he unwinds the black bandana, steps first from his slops and then his kurta. Yuyudana has provided robes, which rest neatly on a small rock nearby. It crosses Cenric’s mind that the bones of his knees, his hips, his wrists, even his face have all started to protrude strangely. He looks less hyuran than before, maybe less than he ever has. Closer to something priests would exorcise than anyone deserving aid.

He wonders if this idea has occurred to them.

The water, when he advances, is cold. Goosebumps raise across his skin as slowly, gingerly, he wades in to his waist.

Cenric ducks under.

His hair is a long and tangled wreck. Being wet only disguises this slightly. It drifts past his neck, comes to float near the surface. Cenric holds himself in silence, eyes open, watching the silver scatter of light over stones and plants and fish. He remains for as long as he can bear.

His vision stings afterward. Gasping, he can’t tell if the cause is exposure or something else. For a time he simply waits, breathing hard through his nose, hunched so that his lips are partially submerged.

He thinks of nothing, pretends that this time instead of no future he has no past.

Only one moon remains. Maybe the sky aches for losing Dalamud, but better that than the blow which scarred Eorzea.

Stalemate - A Final Fantasy XIV Fanfic

He is presented with impressions of a horse, gaunt and fetid and decayed. Spreading ruin wheresoever it goes. Occasionally it sloughs off portions of its own flesh, which collect flies and blacken any land that surrounds. On its back rests a world, and alongside it does the herd struggle under their own burdens. But even beasts of such endurance have limits. Theirs are reached. When the rotten steed lags, its companions cannot afford to falter. Cannot turn. Without its ability to bear loads, this aberration has no place. Falling is inevitable.

Yet a heart still beats and lungs yet swell.

The Ascian shivers in his grasp, but does not attempt escape.

Here, something festers. Something bleeds. An old wound exacerbated over time.

Fevered, coated in a film of self-disgust, the core of Lahabrea convulses.

 Don’t…

 Don’t leave me like this…

***

Teeth and tongue. Lingering, wet, disembodied. Another finds his hip. Another his thigh, slipping beneath what clothes remain.

And another.

And another.

Warm, human, seeking. The Warrior tightens his hold, uses the moan crawling from his own chest as incentive. Barred by naught but fabric, driving close as he can manage. Lahabrea makes a strangled sound, his gasp crushed empty. A new mouth finds the dark knight’s ear in response.

These are parts of him no one dares touch, no one dares acknowledge. Slick now, attended with something like reverence. Supplication.

He resolves to fuck the Ascian senseless for this, presses his intent deep into Lahabrea’s aether. He is going to steal all his fancy words away. Make him squirm.

“I… I…” Tight, airless, like a plucked string. The Warrior feels Lahabrea’s voice reverberate against the roof of his mouth.

The feeling is difficult to describe. Cracked ice. A fraying rope. Such is Lahabrea's response, fumbling and disoriented as it is.

The Warrior lets go.

4. Share your favorite dialogue you’ve written?

Just imagine me weeping over here lmao. Same deal as before, I’VE DONE TOO MUCH SHIT.

Spare Change - A Batman Fanfic

"Stop," he gasps, "I wouldn’t—"

"You would Harvey. You did. It’s what makes you such a damn good instrument. You had to test yourself, prove that you’re not a real person.” He can feel fingers grinding against bone. His knees bend. Harvey kneels, shuddering, gazing up into the destruction of his own visage. Two-Face meets his eyes, blue on blue. “People are weak. People are ruled by what they want and don’t want. You’re capable of anything if the wind blows just right. You can’t even stop yourself.”

"I wouldn’t," he repeats, numbly.

"Did you," demands Two-Face, forcing him down further, "or did you not flip for their lives, Harvey Dent?"

"We…We aren’t the same people anymore."

"Of COURSE we’re the same people!" Another shove and he’s on the ground, Two-Face sitting on his chest, teeth bared, coin clenched tight between them. "Do you really think you can close your eyes and pretend you aren’t capable of these things? They’re alive," and there is something hideous in his expression, something certain, "because they were lucky. No other reason.”

"The coin is gone! Even if I wanted to listen to it—I can’t!”

"If you’re so sure," says Two-Face, "then how about you improvise?”

And with one motion the silver dollar is under his tongue, forced back so hard he feels himself gag and begin to choke before his eyes open.

The Inquisitor’s Letters - A Dragon Age: Inquisition Fanfic

To His Worship Inquisitor Mahanon Lavellan of Skyhold, My name is Isell from Amaranthine and I’m seven. My mum is helping but says I can send you all by myself. Thank you for fixing the hole in the sky and also the one by the dead man’s house. There were demons but they’re mostly gone now and people are going outside now. Da says Amaranthine has been through too much and can survive anything and he says you’re an elf like us and the Hero of Ferelden was an elf too. He says people used to think elves can’t be heroes but now they don’t. Have you met the Hero of Ferelden? Also I heard that even though you’re Dalish Andraste helped you in the Fade and that humans let you be in the Chantry because anyone Andraste likes must be a really good person. What’s Andraste like? The Chant says a lot but it’s different meeting someone I think. Also I think I saw you a little before but Mum wasn’t sure because you had a helmet on and we were far away and there were a lot of people but I bet it was you. Da wasn’t sure I should write because he says the Dalish don’t like city elves like we are but I think you must be nice and Mum agrees with me. I’ve been playing demon hunters with my brother Arrion (he’s just five still) and Da said templars are who fights demons usually and elves can’t be templars. People thought elves couldn’t be heroes and inquisitors though and we are so I bet I could too. Is it hard fighting demons? Da says they’re real scary but I’m not scared. Thank you for helping us and everyone and I hope you kill lots of demons. Sincerely, Isell U’venlan

From Umbra - A Final Fantasy XIV Fanfic

Cenric sits on the floor, draped in a white cotton tunic. It might have been snug on a Roegadyn but anyone else would find ample room. Behind him, Memesu stands on a cot holding shears. Gold earrings dangle on either side of her face.

“I fought at Carteneau, you know,” she mentions casually. There is a soft hsssssshhhh. Click.

Hair hits the floor. Coils.

He starts to shake his head, aborts the gesture partway through. Stills. “…you saw Bahamut?”

Memesu snorts. “I’m sure everyone this side of Hydaelyn saw Bahamut.” Click.

“That’s probably true,” he concedes. The dragon is what everyone knows, everyone remembers. He can't imagine the proximity. “What about the Warriors of Light?”

“Pff.” Gentle tugging at his scalp. Cenric does not open his eyes but leans into the motion. “I wasn’t of rank to see their like. Not that I’d remember. Stop moving.” Click.

Cenric hesitates.

“What do you remember, then?”

For a time, the only sound comes from blades and a thousand strands cut short. This lasts for several minutes. Cenric resigns himself to secrets.

Then, “I used to think I was special too. As a twin. My sister was Memeni. We studied together.”

 Was.

The exhale hits him slowly, quietly.

“She died?”

He can feel the shrug in her hip against his shoulder.

“It was Carteneau,” says Memesu. “Of course she died.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Click. “It had nothing too do with you. If you keep trying to claim responsibility for every misfortune you find, you’re going to get self-important.”

Cenric only grunts, quiet and non-committal.

 Click.

 Click.

 Click.

“Carteneu was so much worse than people remember. Only four years later and already we hurry to dispose of details.” There is a hard undercurrent to Memesu’s voice, but what contact she makes remains light. Careful. “I remember the arcanist from Limsa who didn’t dodge a magitek canon in time. Miqo’te. Spells come faster in that discipline, so there’s less stress on distance than thaumaturgy. Girl got careless.” Click. “The mess smelled like rotten eggs and charcoal. Her face was… melted.” Click. “I try not to look in those situations. They only make casting harder. But she was so close.”

Cenric doesn’t move. Doesn’t say a word.

Memesu continues. “One of our own gladiators, an Ala Mhigan, took to mutilating any pureblooded Garleans he could catch. The man had a string of eyes hanging around his neck. I’m pretty sure one enemy officer wet himself before he started to beg. Not that it particularly mattered.”

 Click.

“Memeni… didn’t anticipate what she was getting herself into. She saw magic as a way of being useful to craftsmen. My focus has always been theoretical. Right side.” Startled, Cenric lets her guide his jaw to get a better view of his profile. Click. Click. “Meni used to think I was a priss. She preferred to develop magitek kettles alongside alchemists. See if she could find a way to capture light like the Mhachi did. She still enjoyed fishing when she could, even though it smelled awful. Never outgrew the braids she wore growing up. ” Memesu sighs. “…just understand she died afraid, in pain, and with things left undone. My sister didn’t even resemble herself at the end.”

Cenric is very still. Thinks carefully.

“…I wish it could have gone differently,” he says at last.

Memesu’s mouth slides up in a small, crooked smile. She tousles the neat, ear-length hair before her. “So do I.”

Eclipse - A Final Fantasy XIV Fanfic

It ends at Elidibus’ untimely arrival.

“Lord Zodiark,” he says, so smoothly that were he not searching for it that the anger would be undetectable, “appreciates your attentions.”  His gaze does not waver from Lahabrea as he speaks. “But there is work to be done and I’m afraid there are words I would have with your Speaker.”

They disperse.

Nabriales, careful and curious, folds himself out of sight beyond the chamber then makes his way back to its edge.

Lahabrea, farthest from the exit, attempts to steal some small dignity. Turns to face Elidibus.

The Emissary makes him wait. Expressionless red masks matched by those who wear them.

Then, with more speed and force than typical for his demeanor, the Emissary closes distance to trap his colleague against the wall.

“It was my error,” hisses Elidibus, leaning in, “to have stayed silent upon rescuing you. A mistake I will remedy now, so we can be on no uncertain terms.”

Lahabrea lowers his eyes. Nabriales notes that despite the dread they all share of such reprimands, the man does not brace.

“You know as well as I that these words offer less succor to our Lord than action,” continues Elidibus, his fury quiet and no less sharp for that, “just as we both know your thoughtless action is the cause of repeated missteps these past centuries. Make no mistake—for all the strides you’ve made, your fixation and your impatience have cost the rest of us considerable time.”

Silence.

“Do you truly think this is your best service to Him?” asks Elidibus. “To us? Compromising your ability to fill the hours? Even Emet-Selch agrees these displays are disgraceful. You have ever borne them poorly, but being a 'paragon among paragons' naturally you continue ignoring your own better judgment with ours to continue this exercise in futility. Idiot.”

A twitch of the head. Almost a flinch.

It is one of few moments Nabriales has seen the Emissary express his anger so openly. Even after the Thirteenth fell to Igeyorhm’s error, Elidibus allowed the Angel of Truth to lead and voiced his own reproach with a more typical icy demeanor. Scathing though it was.

“I can be of use,” says Lahabrea softly. “Only three of us remain, and I—“

“You,” Elidibus snaps, “cannot follow the most simple instructions for the good of us all. Not for Him, not for Amaurot, not even for yourself. Your pride has made you not simply an embarrassment but a liability.”

Neither man speaks for several moments after that.

And then, at length, Elidibus exhales.

Says the Speaker’s name.

Receives his attention.

“What would you have me do?” the Emissary asks. His tone now is almost weary. “Clearly it would be unreasonable to trust you’d simply listen. Must I mind you like a child?” This is what breaks Lahabrea’s composure.

Knowing the man’s temper, Nabriales had expected him to lash out. Even on the back foot their orator is perfectly capable of defending himself from insults.

Instead, he embraces Elidibus fiercely—face just within the bounds of his pauldrons. Jaw locked shut firmly enough to hurt. Expression downcast.

Elidibus remains perfectly still at first. In the absence of conversation it is possible to hear the rush of Lahabrea’s breathing. Only through the nose, withheld briefly between each inhale as if that offers some means to steady himself.

As if that would make it better.

Tentatively, Elidibus holds him back. Lahabrea's fingers contract, and though he remains upright when his knees begin to give it is the Emissary who helps him kneel.

“Easy,” he murmurs, and Lahabrea removes one hand to run it reflexively over his face—coming against the mask.

Nabriales finds himself staring, searching. A puzzle with missing pieces whose image he may yet divine

“It was not,” says Lahabrea roughly, “my intention to…”

Elidibus reaches beneath the other man’s cowl, finds the hair and skin beneath. Draws him in once more.

Naught that would be shared with or among the Sundered. Nothing so personal as that.

Nabriales has worn his own share of flesh. Bedded lovers, adopted companions and families of vessels to fulfill a purpose. Passable enough, perhaps, but never for him. Not in truth.

It’s as if he looks upon two strangers.

Parched - A Final Fantasy XIV Fanfic

The door closes behind them. Lahabrea, projecting his preferred likeness over the host, waits on a couch within.

It’s admittedly a surreal sight. Ishgardian finery with its gilded edges, its elaborate wallpapers and marble floors. A collection of creams and blues and greens, fine furniture with velvet seat cushions. All ostentatious in the extreme… and then Lahabrea. Masked and cowled. Pouring three glasses of La Noscean arrack.

Elidibus freezes, and though none of them can see his eyes the confusion is clear enough.

“What is this?”

“Your turn,” says Emet-Selch, lightly but less flippant than he might have been.

Lahabrea proffers a cup from where he sits.

Elidibus neither moves nor speaks.

Emet-Selch approaches. Takes the drink. Presses it carefully into the other man’s hand.

“Don’t think,” he says smoothly,” that I won’t let you drop it.”

Mercifully, Elidibus has a good grip.

“Sit,” says Lahabrea, gesturing with his own glass to the sofa across from him.

Elidibus sits.

Emet-Selch sits.

Takes his own glass, perhaps a bit pointedly.

Elidibus’ mouth is pressed tight. It opens briefly, as if to speak. Shuts again.

“Explain,” the Emissary manages eventually.

Lahabrea meets his co-conspirator’s eye. Downs his arrack in a single attempt.

It is a long attempt.

It lasts several moments.

The other Ascians watch.

“Elidibus,” says Emet-Selch as Lahabrea endeavors to catch his breath in the aftermath, “Lahabrea and I are concerned that you may be experiencing some difficulties in recent years.”

“I’m fine,” replies Elidibus coldly. Holding his drink. “Why did you think this necessary?”

“Because—“ wheezes Lahabrea.

“Because you’re practically a mammet,” says Emet-Selch, picking up Lahabrea’s glass. Moving it just out of reach. “Truly. It’s been what, two hundred years? Three? Neither of us can remember the last time you so much as spoke of matters unrelated to the Rejoining.”

Lahabrea reaches. Elidibus pours his arrack into the other man’s glass before nudging it back toward him.

Elidibus makes eye contact with Emet-Selch.

“I remain focused,” he says evenly. “Nothing more.”

Emet-Selch gestures to the bottle.

Elidibus sighs.

Refills his own glass.

“There are matters I must attend myself. As is the case with each of you.”

“Undoubtedly,” replies Lahabrea more evenly. “But with few exceptions, you haven’t done so.”

A hard stare from behind the mask.

“What would you have me do? I can’t very well take time off.”

Emet-Selch sips.

“A negligible amount of time,” he says, “taken sparingly, may be forgivable.”

5. Scene you haven’t written, but want to?

Lmao see this is a plus side/minus side deal. Minus side, it’s being asked just before I embark on a MASSIVE ASS FANFIC. And I basically am excited for all of it. Plus side, there are things I refuse to spoil.

So... putting it vaguely, in no particular order:

- Lahabrea and Hydaelyn meet a second time after Praetorium.

- Moonfire Faire

- Thancred

- Conversations over mulled wine

- Silvertear Lake

Some of these are sex scenes. Most aren’t. But I am very hyped.

[sunnibrownink]

not so sure

I am not so sure, right now, about this Zen thing. In fact, I have aroused suspicions and feel skeptical, quite side-eyed, at this stage in my practice. My newfound doubt didn’t come out of nowhere. It’s directly related to freshly dug earth roiling through my psyche, a necessary but unpleasant healing season that only recently became available. This rich emotional processing was utterly unexpected but I’m discerning what’s needed to support its cycling through and this knowledge has suddenly made me leery of Zen, an odd experience since the practice has been a refuge over the last 13 years. But I’m leery these days because my healing process is colliding unhealthily and directly with a core Zen practice, that of abandoning fixed views.

 You see, Zen teaches the human mammal to methodically unearth and examine fixed views. It trains us to develop the ability to hold all views lightly, to become facile at surrendering points of view when they cause unnecessary suffering. This is an exquisite skill to have and I’m grateful for it. That said, in this particular phase of my recovery, the practice of relinquishing fixed views has become riddled with problems. The fact is that mammalian bodies have static and fixed views for exceptionally good reasons, and these reasons are worthy of respect. There are numerous instances in which fixed views should be embraced, even cherished, rather than challenged. I won’t belabor the first and most obvious reason which is, of course, survival of the body. Most of us hope to delay our physical death, and to do that we need to tacitly hold on to our perceptual equipment. We need to cling to those sensory systems that give us a fixed view of stairs, for example, expressly so we don’t topple down them. The Tathāgata would hardly fault a student for being uneager to separate from the very skandhas[1] that make her navigation of the material world possible. I also doubt he would expect students to legitimately divest in the machinations of biological life itself: the production and maintenance of our organ cells, for example, or the reliable engine-beat of our hearts. I do believe that the Buddha, as an accomplished inner scientist, did relinquish tethers to the operations of his own physical body in an absolute willingness to let it drop, to die, but I think he knew that truly dropping the body would be an enormous ask for a typical person and so would have regularly ceded us the comfort of clinging to our organic activities. Point being that I’m not suspicious of Zen for inviting students to practice detachment from the body as I don’t imagine that most students, until we’re in the late-stage dying process, would be confronted and therefore rattled by that request.[2] We’re unlikely to be undone by the treacheries of death meditations[3], so I don’t perceive working to let go of the longings of the body as dangerous per se. What I am experiencing as dangerous are attempts to relinquish fixed views in the emotional and psychological landscapes. Currently in full-body contact with my own tragic history, it’s very clear to me that there are times in the lifespan of a human being when we can and damn well should cling to a perspective—even if that perspective is uncharitable, even if it is skewed, even if that perspective can cause someone else profound, unnecessary suffering. Let me explain.

I came to my first zendo bleary and shattered, a feral adult-child washed ashore after decades of psychological, and often physical, torment. In the zendo, I sat in earnest with the awful texture of that experience and held my seat courageously, almost nobly, refusing to give up on myself. I wanted to see the contents of my mind no matter how ugly or painful, and I wanted to liberate as much of it as I could. I was willing to inquire into any and all of my views on reality so I could stop habitually living them out, thrusting them onto the world without seeing, hurting myself and others. After years of devoted practice and countless fruits from it, I’m now facing a different practice, one in which I do not become disloyal to my thoughts and perspectives but instead I stake them into the deepest and hardest of ground. I declare the absolute incontestability of their existence, without regard for any other actor and without apology for my egoic and binary thinking. I’ve realized in short order that survivors of brutality, torture, manipulation, neglect, and abuse should not be in the immediate business of challenging or relinquishing the points of view of any part of us that bore witness to our trauma. If you’ve been gaslighted for decades, if the truth about what you’ve experienced has been disconfirmed, obfuscated, denied, or distorted throughout the course of your life, you do not need to practice disbelieving your own story. You do not need to drop the narrative. Those of us who’ve endured these kinds of experiences already struggle acutely to have our realities come into focus. A clear view of events is desperately hard won. It takes us years, sometimes decades, to swim out of the murky waters, look back at our early life, and identify and vocalize our version of events. Many of us were children when the trouble began. Many of us were loyal to our predators because we were dependent on them. Most of us felt instinctively, at a primal level, that something in our environments was amiss but we didn’t have words for it. We didn’t know what “normal” was supposed to be. We only knew something important was being lost. Sadly, we couldn’t name it.

My work these days is to fully believe my story. To finally declare that my observations were spot-on, that the awful experience was real, and my knowledge of it accurate and true. I don’t need to doubt my point of view, second-guess myself, or hold my perspective lightly. I don’t need to soften my anger by lingering on causes and conditions. I do not need to examine my expectations around parenting, wondering if they were too high. I do not need to practice compassion for the family abuser or attempt to see the world from her eyes. What I need to do is stand on the ground of my fixed view of pathological behavior. I need to have unshakable faith in my insight into what happened—to me and my father and my siblings. I will continue to be a dedicated Zen student, but at this time of healing, I will not ask what pieces of my self-centered dream to let go of. Instead, I will let those pieces reveal themselves and when they do, I will hold them tightly so they can finally be witnessed by someone who loves them and believes them. Even if every single thing I experience in meditation is a projection of my own mind, I will cling to parts of that projection like I would cling to a tree in a hurricane. Doing anything otherwise—at this stage in the process—would re-injure me. This would be not only irresponsible but cruel, a form of unwholesome self-abandonment. For now, I will let my story be immobile. I will let my view, as partial as it is, become fixed, solid, permanent, hideous and real. I hope one day to be able to hold it lightly, but I’m not urging that day forward. I won’t step into that kind of groundlessness until my system is ready for it, genuinely able to welcome the transformation forgiveness and aperspectivity can offer. That gift may never come to me in this lifetime. Until it does, however, I will drop none of my thoughts on this matter. I will witness them, cling to them, hold them near. I will believe my story.

__________________________________________

[1] Sanskrit: aggregates or heaps: 1. Form: the physical body. 2. Feeling: the sensations in the body. 3. Perception: the sense organs and the models of objects they provide. 4. Mental formations: concepts and thoughts, abstractions. 5. Consciousness: awareness of the composites of the other skandhas.

[2] Although I think there must be a serious psychological problem with detaching from the body as well. Sexually abused or physically violated human beings, many of whom have already learned to disassociate from the body as an act of survival, surely need to practice coming home to the body, not abandoning it again.

[3] Most students will go an entire life of practice without doing meditations on bodily death.

[writinginstardust]

After The War | Chapter 3

Pairing: Dorian Havilliard x reader

Warnings: mention of injury/death

A/N: Welp, that took a while but like it’s done so that’s all that matters as far as i’m concerned. Look i’ll admit i’m not 100% happy with this chapter but I don’t actually hate it and I really enjoyed having more of Yrene to write so that’s where we’re at. In case it’s unclear there’s a just over 2 week time skip from the last chapter. Word \Count: 2908

*

“Holy gods that feels amazing,” I groaned out as Yrene's magic soothed the aching muscles in my leg, the tension washing out of my body on waves of relaxation. She looked up at me and smiled, pleased to be helping, before frowning as her magic probed further.

“This isn't as good as I'd hoped it would be by now. You really need to remember to use the salve I gave you. Have you used it at all since you arrived?”

I averted my gaze guiltily. I hadn't in fact used it once since leaving Orynth and probably hadn't for about a week prior, too busy preparing for the journey. She could read all that easily on my face and fixed me with a look that could probably scare a Valg Prince into submission.

“(Y/N), you have got to take care of yourself. This is never going to heal properly if you don't look after it when I'm not around.”

“I know. I'm sorry. I'll try and remember to do it more often.”

“I'm getting your maid to remind you every night, it's the only way.” I sighed and rolled my eyes but she was probably right. “Oh, and no over-exerting yourself, especially once we start more therapy in a couple of days. Yes, that does mean no long evening walks with Dorian, you two will just have to find some other way to occupy yourselves.”

I tried not to show it but I felt myself deflate at that. Those walks had become my favourite part of the day. I could still spend time with Dorian I supposed, but it wouldn't be the same. The gardens were peaceful in the evening and I found myself more relaxed than I had in a long while with nothing but Dorian and a light spring breeze for company. Again Yrene noticed and couldn't suppress her smirk, she had become far too intuitive to my emotions.

“Alright, I'll take it easy for a while.”

“Good. We can get started in a couple of days, Chaol said it's practically back to back meetings until the Eyllwe royals arrive but that you'll all have a lot more time after that. Trust me, you're not going to want to be doing much between sessions.” I shuddered at the thought of what might be coming but it was a necessity if I was ever going to be rid of the last remnants of the war. “Relax, you're undoing all my work worrying about it.”

“Sorry.”

“And stop worrying so much anyway, it's not good for you or your recovery.” She sent a fresh wave of healing magic through me pulling the tension from all my muscles rather than just my leg.

“I'll try, though it's a bit difficult when I'm in charge of my Kingdom's foreign affairs at the moment.”

“That's understandable but you're doing an amazing job, you really needn't be concerned about messing up. Nox won't let you and neither will Dorian or Chaol, they're on your side in all this and they don't plan on letting anything go wrong for you and Terrasen.” She smiled reassuringly and withdrew her magic, resting a comforting hand on my shoulder. “And neither do I.”

I felt myself welling up at her kindness and had to swallow a lump which had formed in my throat before I could choke out a soft “thank you”.

“Don't mention it. You're like a part of the family now and family looks out for each other.” The soft smile she'd been sporting spread into a mischievous smirk. “Another thing family does is tease each other about their love lives. So with that in mind, how's everything going between you and Dorian?” I almost choked on air at the question and tried to fight down a blush at the knowing glint in her eye.

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

“I think you do. You forget I was there when you were out of it and you had no filter. You may have confessed some secrets to me, and guess who some of them involved?” Stomach dropping, I hid my face in my hands and peaked at her through my fingers.

“Oh gods, tell me no one else heard?”

“Don't worry, no one heard most of it though I think you should know that you told Dorian he was pretty the first time you two met.”

“Please tell me I didn't.”

“Unfortunately for you, you did. Dorian appreciated it though, he was unbearably smug about it actually.” Yrene herself looked pretty smug about it too.

“Well that's got to be just about the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to me.” Before Yrene could reply, Dorian strolled in, his smirk making it evident he'd heard my last comment. I just hoped that was all he'd caught.

“Now that's a story I'd love to hear.”

“Oh you already know it, better than she does actually.” I shot a betrayed glance at Yrene, feeling my cheeks heating up even more now that the star of said story was in the room.

“Ah so we're talking about the time she ran around naked and shouting her undying love for me?”

“I may not remember most of what happened but I know I didn't do that,” I said around a laugh. “Aelin would have never let me hear the end of it.”

“That's true. I assume you're talking about her calling me pretty when we'd only just met then?” Yrene nodded. “That's not embarrassing, in fact it's a rather common occurrence. You get used to it when you're as pretty as I am.” He winked and flashed us both a charming smile as we rolled our eyes.

“Pretty damned full of yourself maybe.” I muttered under my breath, as Yrene made a similar comment. Playing along, Dorian clutched a hand to his heart dramatically.

“Such cruel words from such lovely ladies, however shall I survive the wounds you inflict?”

“Drama Queen,” Yrene teased.

“I am not! Tell her (Y/N).”

“I'm with Yrene, you have a rather large flair for the dramatic.”

“Not you too!” He groaned in mock despair, “I thought we bonded, how could you betray me like this?”

“You call that bonding? Yrene saved my life and nursed me back to health, you're going to have to do something spectacular to top that and get me taking your side.”

“Well it looks like I have some catching up to do.”

“Good luck with that.” Yrene fixed him with a challenging glare, clearly not ready to lose my favouritism yet. This little battle was going to be most enjoyable.

“I don't need luck. Bonding starts now, (Y/N), you ready to go?” I blinked at him in surprise.

“Go? Go where?”

“It's 5:30, thought you might like a walk in the gardens like normal.”

“No. She's not allowed until I'm done with her leg so no walks for a while.” She smiled a deadly sweet smile at him. “I know that's your bonding time...how unfortunate...Are you sure you don't need some of that luck?” He scowled back at her but reached for my hand to help me to my feet anyway.

“You underestimate me Yrene. Come on (Y/N), I have another idea. You like reading, right?”

“How ever did you know? It's not like I've ever spent an hour gushing about books with you.” I somehow managed to keep a teasing tone despite my internal freak out that he kept ahold of my hand and mentally congratulated myself on that achievement.

“No, that's never happened, I must just have excellent intuition.”

“Yes, I'm sure that's it.” I rolled my eyes. He was still holding my hand!

“Glad you agree.” He smiled and pulled me towards the door, calling out behind us, “See you at dinner Yrene!”

“Bye!” I added with a little wave, “and thank you!” A quick goodbye from Yrene followed us out of the room and I giggled as Dorian continued to pull me down the hall, a determined look on his face.

“What's the rush for?” I asked, for Dorian had yet to slow his pace and I was struggling to keep up.

“What? Oh, sorry, sorry!” He slowed to a more regular pace and I smiled my thanks. “That better? I didn't realise I was walking so quickly.”

“It's fine, I just don't think Yrene will be pleased if I mess up my leg right after she told me to take it easy. She's scary when she wants to be.” I felt Dorian's shudder through our clasped hands.

“She certainly is.”

We arrived at the library and only then did Dorian seem to realise he'd been holding my hand the entire journey. He stuttered out a surprised apology and I could have sworn I saw a light blush spread across his cheeks as he pulled his hand away and pushed open the library door. I silently mourned the loss of the comforting warmth from his hand in mine. It had felt so natural to have them slotted together like that. It felt right. As if it was a basic fact of existence that they were meant to be together. ...Maybe that was a little excessive. But those weren't the kind of thoughts I was meant to be allowing myself though so really it didn't matter. At all. My heart certainly wasn't leaping at the thought that maybe this was meant to be something more all along. Well maybe it was but my head remained in control...for now at least.

“So, I was thinking,” Dorian's voice brought me well and truly back to the moment, “with all the meetings and dinners and everything going on, I've had almost no time at all to just relax with a book and I doubt you have either.”

“You're right there.”

“Which is an absolute travesty, and since I treasure our time together I thought what better way to solve this little problem than by reading together? I'm a genius, am I not?”

“Not far off I suppose, I see one flaw though if your plan was ‘bonding’.”

“And what might that be?” He raised an eyebrow, which seriously, how does he do that?, and I flopped down onto one of the plush couches in the centre of the room.

“Reading is usually a solitary activity, we can't bond just sitting in silence.”

“And that, my dear, is why I'm going to read to you. You can make all the delightful sarcastic comments you like and keep me entertained while I read.”

“Does that mean I'm allowed to make fun of your horrible romance novels then?” I couldn't keep the grin off my face at the thought of that.

“They're not horrible,” he said with a scowl, “but yes, just this once you can say whatever mean and untrue things you wish about them.”

“Excellent! Get reading then pretty boy.” I smirked as he rolled his eyes and wandered off to find some suitable reading material.

2 hours later I was woken by a gentle shaking and the searing heat of Dorian's hand on my shoulder. I blinked at the dim light of the room, unable to recall the afternoon light fading into the darkness of another evening.

“And finally she wakes. Gods, (Y/N), you sleep like the dead.”

“Wha-? When did I...fall asleep?”

“About ten minutes after I started reading. I’m disappointed, you only managed two snarky remarks before you drifted off, am I really that boring to listen to?” In my state of only semi-wakefulness I didn’t register the joking in his words and quickly tried to stutter out an apology.

“No-no, sorry. You’re not...boring, you’re- you’re actually very pleasant to listen to. I just- Yrene’s healing tired me out a bit...I think...maybe… But you’re not boring, I promise. I like listening to you, you have a,” a yawn interrupted me and I let my eyes stay shut as I shifted to get more comfortable on the couch, “really nice voice, very soothing.” It took a few seconds in the silence that followed for my mind to realise what my mouth had just decided to say without permission of my rational thought. When it finally registered my whole body tensed and i could barely bring myself to crack open an eye and gauge Dorian’s reaction. Why did you say that!? That’s weird! ‘A really nice voice’? (Y/N) why would you say that!? Well at least that finally woke me up fully.

....Actually, that was not a good thing. Being totally aware brought to my attention just exactly what position I was in, pulled into hyper-focus how close Dorian was to me and everywhere his body touched mine. Legs draped across his, sides practically pressed together, a hand still resting on my shoulder and the fingers of the other brushing lightly against my own on the couch. His face and that heart-stopping grin were way too close, mere inches away from me and the ridiculous notion that it would be so easy to just lean up and kiss him flitted about in my otherwise currently empty mind. That was a dangerous and ill-advised thought and I tried desperately to push it out but with Dorian so close it was impossible to do so entirely.

“Dorian! (Y/N)! Are you in here? Are you sure they haven’t left for dinner yet, Yrene?.”

“Of course they’re still here, you think either one of them would willingly leave the library unless there was some kind of emergency?” Yrene and Chaol’s voices broke our silence before Dorian could say anything and we quickly moved a little apart before they rounded the last book case and spotted us.

“What did I tell you? They’re predictable.” Yrene had a triumphant glint in her eye as she addressed her husband before turning back to us with a raised eyebrow. “Are you coming?”

“Of course!” I quickly stood and walked towards the couple, jumping on the excuse to get out of such close proximity to Dorian before I did something foolish.

Together the four of us made our way to dinner and with every step I felt calmer and less inclined to act on any of the impulsive thoughts i’d been struggling more and more to control. The closeness to Dorian was always easier to bare around the others and I sent up a thank you to the gods I knew listened no longer for their presence. That had been too close in the library. Too. Close. I had a sense that my emotions were only going to get more difficult from here on and that instilled in me both dread and a strange excitement. Gods, why did I have to go and fall in love?

*

Dear Aelin,

Oh things are getting too good! I mean, slightly unbearable for the rest of us because they're both oblivious and also refuse to do anything about it, but still good. Dorian even told Chaol he likes her but he's worried so that's something we're going to have to deal with and (Y/N) all but admitted it to me today. And...gods, they think they're subtle, they think no one notices the way they can barely keep their eyes off each other, how they go out of their way to spend time with each other, how they're so obviously happier when they're together. It's so frustrating but obviously no one really wants to pressure them into anything so we'll see how it all plays out (we're not going to stop meddling when we can though!).

Although, saying that, I'm not sure we need to meddle much. Chaol and I walked in on the cutest scene in the library earlier, (Y/N) and Dorian were pretty much cuddling while she slept (my fault, healing takes it out of you) and gods you should have seen the way Dorian looked at her, it was so gentle and loving and I swear if they don't get it together and get together I might have to smack them both. Anyway, she woke up and I'm sure I literally saw Dorian ascend because he found her so cute but we all really needed to get to dinner so we had to interrupt. Honestly if we'd left them long enough I think they seriously might have given up and just kissed but alas the timing was terrible. It's going to happen though, I'm sure of it.

I'm rambling too much about them but my point is we definitely did a good thing, they're perfect for each other, Even Nesryn and Sartaq have said so and they've not even been here a week. They say hi by the way!

Oh and you'll be happy to know (If (Y/N) hasn't already told you), you've got yourself a nice little trade deal and it's worked out well for you as far as I can tell (I'll admit I don't pay a whole lot of attention to the more boring matters).

I hope Ren and Evangeline got back okay, tell them we miss them and we miss all of you too, I'll keep you updated with the Dorian/(Y/N) situation when anything good happens but I doubt they'll be anything for a while as I'm finally going to fix up her leg properly. Still, with them you never know! Everyone sends their love and hopes you're still well.

Love,

Yrene

[poptarts-and-rainbows]

Life Update, 16 January 2019

This is a very VERY long post.

I mostly just needed to type some things out to make sense of them for myself and to put it somewhere, feel free to read it if you’ve got some weird morbid curiosity about my hot mess of a life or something, lol- but I got on to my actual laptop (very rare) just so I can add the cut to this to try to spare as many people as possible. 

Thank you for your patience, you will be returned to your regularly scheduled content shortly!

So yesterday was the day from absolute SHIT! Which is not a real saying, but work with me.

Anyways, it was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, right? Like I got home and threw myself down on my bed and cried a little bit, legit like a Disney Princess.

BUUUUUT, after I logged off for the night, some surprising and good things happened!

At one point, after pouting for a couple of hours, I left home to go grab food and ran into two of my roommates very briefly as I was walking out, and then saw them again when I came home. During both of these instances we exchanged only the most basic of pleasantries (during which I was V E R Y anxious).

I’ve talked a little about it on here before, but I’ve been more or less avoid them for… close to a month (oops), because I was in a little bit of bad headspace/very stressed out about my perceived place in their lives/if they wanted me around anymore or if they would be better off without me, etc., TYPICAL garbage stuff that my stupid trash brain loves to over-analyze about and drive me crazy over.

Isolating is one of my favorite bad habits. I’m very good at it and have done it to various degrees many many times, even since I’ve moved to Washington (less than a year ago). Typically, an episode doesn’t last an entire freaken month (ok, 3 weeks), but on prior occasions I also normally had work 5 days a week, and we were just on winter break at school during this go around (ergo, no responsibilities to force me out of bed). But 3 WEEKS with like… 10 minutes of in person interaction every fifth day?? That can get to even the most introverted of persons.

Going back to last night- I ran in to two of my roommates twice, they acknowledged me and I did the same to them and made the general statement that the rest of the pizza I was leaving downstairs was up for grabs, and then scurried off to my room again, my tail between my legs, feeling like crap and a total TOOL. It’d been 3 weeks, I didn’t know how to just starting talking to them again, eventhough I have wanted to for a while.

I ate my pizza in peace (it was very disappointing… I ordered the wrong type of crust), and then I honestly think I blacked out a little.

One second I was standing by more door, trying to hype myself up to take my plate down to the kitchen, and the next thing I knew I was at the sink! With everybody else!?!! 

My boy roommate, Austin, teased me a little bit about seeing me outside of my room (he is my favorite, even though his girlfriend, Michelle, and I have known each other for 5 years and she is why I moved to Washington when I left the Army in the first place), and I made some, admittedly weak, comeback, and then busied myself with doing the dishes while they talked. I reacted at the appropriate conversation junctions and even occasionally I pipped up, but always very quiet and TERRIFIED.  

When I finished I could have scampered away back to my room again, just being downstairs with everybody else was more than I’d done in 3 weeks- every other occasion I had only run into each of them individually and only long enough to refill my water bottle- and I wanted nothing more than to go hide under my covers again, but I FORCED myself to go sit at that damn table and join them.

Simple enough, rationally, right? Not something a person is normally proud of… but that is something that is actually incredibly difficult for me, even at the best of times. I am close to unable to join any established social situations without a direct invitation because I always feel like I’m intruding- yes, even in my own house. Maybe a couple of surprised looks were exchanged, but they didn’t all immediately get up and leave, so I took it as a good sign.

It was mostly still them talking amongst each other, but I managed to add a few comments, and Michelle even talked to me a little bit (she isn’t always… super understanding of when I have these sort of issues, so I know she’s definitely mad at me at least somewhat, which is understandable and totally fair). Eventually she did go upstairs to do homework, but that wasn’t entirely unusually because she is a huge nerd/pre-med.

However, Austin ended up hanging out with me for a while! At first we just talked about school, but then I opened up a little and managed to explain, somewhat, that it wasn’t anything against anyone in the house, as to why I had been being a hermit, but that I’d been struggling with myself a little bit again. I didn’t elaborate too much, but there have been conversations about some of the issues I have sometimes before, so he told me he was just glad I’m feeling better.

I don’t know, this was really long (sorry if you’re on mobile and can’t skip the cut), but I’m just feeling really good about it and wanted to share somewhere. It’s not much, but it’s definitely an improvement over how things have been going.

One of the major reasons I’ve decided to give sobriety another serious try (besides that I come from a long lime of alcoholics and I definitely have a problem as well), is because I’m just… sick of feeling terrible and having to fight all of the time.  I’ve struggled with depression since I was probably 12, and alcohol typically makes those feelings worse- the depression, plus a genetic predisposition and turbulent childhood, etc., increase chances of alcohol abuse, and then the alcohol abuse can worsen depression, so on and so forth… it’s a vicious cycle, and I’m almost thirty.

I’m tired. I know some of it I won’t be able to fix, depression will probably be my little terrible asshole buddy forever, but I want to take responsibility for how I sometimes make my position worse (whether through self-sabotaging on “purpose” or by not putting in the effort to help myself in the places I have the power too). I want to move on to a healthier place, so I can not only maybe be happy, but also so I can maybe eventually share my life with somebody someday. I’ve never dated, because I put my friends through enough- this recent stunt evidence enough... I’ve never trusted myself not to hurt somebody I love like this too, and, you know, like I said, THIRTY. (Ok, I’m “only” about to turn 29, but close enough!)

This roommate stuff began like… just two days after my last drink (maybe that even influenced my perception of the situation that caused me to think it would be better if I just didn’t bother anyone, idk), but, because I’ve been exceptionally stressed about the roommate situation and potentially losing a very good long time friend (which may still happen, we’ll see), I’ve felt a little discouraged about giving up drinking. 45 days is the longest I’ve gone since I was 21 (with the exception of Basic Training, when I had no choice), and I don’t really remember how I felt at that time, but I hadn’t been feeling any better this time. Typically it takes 3 months for a person’s mental health to full recovery from the affects of alcohol abuse, but I expected to feel something and hadn’t been, but now I finally think I do.

I finally believe there just might be sunshine on the other side after all.

[barneslives]

Masterlist of Other People’s Fanfics

I HAVE A REALLY HUGE LIST OF FANFICS. I NEED IT ORGANIZED. THIS IS IT.

NONE OF THESE ARE MINE.

One-Shots that I plan to read sooner or later:

(Since this is getting some notes, just wanted to clarify that this list changes as I read it. I have a favorites list here, which I only add more fics. This masterlist changes pretty much everyday)

1 4am :  it’s four am and he’s left wondering if he should call the girl across the hall. (582)

2 kiss me again : (993)

3 Truth or Dare :  Seb fluffy and giggly smut where the reader is his best friend and they're doing the nasty out of curiosity and boredom (1,242 / smut)

4 The Times Sebastian Referred to You as His Wife and the One Time Where He Does It on Purpose :  Sebastian keeps calling you his wife. (1,449)

5 Greek Days : (1,540 / smut)

6 Wasted Times :  Seb smut based on Wasted Times by the Weeknd (1,600 / smut)

7 Touching In The Air : (1,923 / smut)

8 I Know That You Don’t :  Sebastian is in love with his best friend; that much is obvious. For a while now, he’s been watching Y/N give her love to someone who isn’t worth it. After being there for her when said relationship is in shambles countless times, it began to feel like a routine. A routine that Sebastian did not want to be part of anymore. (2,000)

9 Anything For My Girl :  You come down with a fever, and Bucky takes care of you. When you’re feeling better, he puts your mind at ease about your relationship and then really takes care of you. (2,200 / smut)

10 The Fabric Of A Soul :  Bucky wrestles with what state his soul might be in. (2,300)

11 Loopy Love :  Sebastian has finally come back home, but instead of finding his fiance waiting for him at the airport, he gets some bad news. (2,317)

12 Enjoying the view :  Your mission is going perfectly. Target is charming, receptive… Then you notice the balcony door is unlocked. Hmm. (2,664)

13 Facesitting : (smut)

14 Music :  Bucky doesn’t really understand ‘modern’ music. The reader is there to help. (2,818)

15 Lucky Fan : (2,900 / smut)

16 Soft :  A more sure and confident Bucky, enjoys the softness in life. (3,283)

17 Staying In :  Bucky and you had plans for the evening but neither of you really want to go (3,800 / smut)

18 Risky Business : A mission in Stockholm. A shared hotel room. And a secret. (3,898 / smut)

19 Countdown to White :  The countdown of your life. Five more days until you marry Bucky Barnes and begin the rest of your life.

20 Going Slow : (4,067 / smut)

21 Euphoria :  In which bucky discovers your stash or in which you and bucky get high as balls and fuck each other’s brains out. (4,153 / smut)

22 Stay the Night : “What did I say?”“You told me to behave.”“And what did you do?”“The exact opposite.” (4,300 / smut)

23 Colors In The Dark :  The world is without color, and that’s never bothered the Winter Soldier. The Fist of HYDRA didn’t have time for love and soulmates. At almost a century old, what are the odds that his soulmate was even still living? (4,400) 

24 Softly, Gently :  Bucky hated the dreams that haunted him every night. But they weren’t always too bad. They can sometimes lead to good things, especially if there is a someone that can help him through the aftermath. (4,560 / smut)

25 Hey, Stranger :  Bucky and you have broken up but you run into each other at Tony’s wedding (4,800)

26 A Soldier’s Sigh :  A series of memories told through Bucky’s eyes. (4,800)

27 My Dearest One :  Reader is Shuri’s best friend and meets the White Wolf one afternoon in Wakanda (4,980 / smut)

28 Give Me Love :  Prompt: Can you please write a fic where Bucky has a nightmare and reader wants to help and he fucks her but in between he look at her and stops bc he doesnt want to hurt her. (5,800 / smut)

29 Die A Virgin :  When things are not looking good on Y/N’s and Bucky’s mission, Y/N admits that she’s a virgin. Bucky, being the gentleman that he is, offers to help her out, if they make it out alive. (5,879 / smut)

30 Love Is For Children 1 | 2 :  You’re a former mercenary turned Avenger who joins the team after fighting, and defeating, each member that tried to recruit you. You’re confident in your abilities and even challenge the man formerly known as the Winter Soldier. A battle of egos ensues and it’s Bucky that fights to get your attention but you’re a professional and won’t fall easy for his charm. (8,500)

Series I am trying to keep up with

1 Do You Remember : You remember nothing from the past ten years that you spent working for Hydra - they wiped your memories only days before the organisation imploded - but after meeting Bucky Barnes for the first time in your new job at the Avengers facility you can’t seem to get rid of the feeling that you know him from a deep, dark and violent past the two of you happen to share - but what role did he play in it? (On-Going / 3)

2 First And Last Time :  A collection of one-shots describing the first and the last time the reader and Bucky did something - it’s not a coherent story. (On-Going / 3)

3 Daffodils :  When Bucky’s mental health starts to spiral out of control, and worsen beyond anything he’s experienced before he’s put on lock down in the compound for his safety and the safety of others. It’s then that he finds a familiar necklace that leads him to memories and a mysterious woman born of water who might hold the secret to his deteriorating mental health. (On-Going / 3)

4 What Have I Done :  A bad break up between Bucky and his ex leads to a new friendship with the quiet tech he never had the chance to get to know. Relationships grow, feelings are caught, and boundaries are explored. Bucky thought he found his happy ending, but old memories haunt his future. He knows what he’s doing wrong, dangerous eve, but he can’t help it. Can he fix the wrongs he’s done? (On-Going / 4)

5 Rome, 3am :  Before he was found in Bucharest, Bucky lived next door to you in Rome trying to evade remnants of Hydra. Every night at 3AM you find Bucky smoking his usual cigarettes and trying his best to flirt. However, as time goes on he becomes more careless about staying hidden. (On-Going / 4)

6 Pretend : There’s a person who won’t stop bugging me will you pretend to be my partner so that they’ll fuck off? (On-Going / 7)

7 Espresso : In which your best friend’s brother begins to set you up on dates when you mention that you haven’t been in a relationship in years, but things don’t go as expected. (On-Going / 7)

8 A Series Of Vignettes :  A series of episodes and events in the reader’s and Bucky’s relationship. Big and small, sweet or angsty, these stories lay out the moments in time they carved out for themselves in the crazy world they live in. They all take place in the same universe, but do not need to be read in any particular order. (On-Going / 10)

9 Golden Hour :  A series of moments when everything sparkles, shines and glitters, just like it’s gold. (On-Going / 10)

10 My Neighbor’s A Jerk :  Modern-Day (AU) There’s this mutual feeling between you and your neighbor, called hate. And since your first meet you both commence that feeling with a burning passion. You don’t know the reason behind his hate and you know for damn sure that he will never tell you. But what happens on the first day of your job, when you find out that you even work together? Maybe you will learn to co-operate? (On-Going / 10)

11 Shadows :  After spending a month imprisioned, you were finally rescued only to find out that you were apart of something much greater than you could ever imagine, in the worst way possible. (On-Going / 13)

12 Blue : James and Y/N take a road tip across the country to help Bucky’s recovery process. A question Y/N asks at the beginning of the trip sets Bucky searching his memories for an answer, one he finds he needs if he can move forward. (On-Going / 15)

13 The Things We’ve Done :  All you wanted was simplicity. You had moved to Washington, DC for a better start - to get away from what you were, to get away from what you were expected to be. You never thought you’d meet the Captain America in a bar just three days after moving. You never thought there would be a dangerous person in your apartment just hours after meeting him. (On-Going / 15)

14 I’m No Hero :  When Y/N is caught in the crossfire of a HYDRA raid gone wrong, the Avengers take her in until she heals. Bucky is fascinated with her, and helps her find the courage she’s had inside all along. Plus, you know, a lot of other stuff. (On-Going / 15)

15 Ready to Comply : The reader was taken as a teenager by HYDRA and turned into one of the most dangerous weapons ever created. On a routine mission to take out their remaining bases, the team stumble across the reader and Bucky finds himself face to face with a ghost from his past. (On-Going / 19)

00 Bittercoffee | Duck&cover

1 Let’s Play Pretend : Bucky agrees to be your fake boyfriend for your brother’s wedding to appease your family.  There’s only one problem - you want him to be more than just a fake boyfriend.  (Complete / 3)

2 Rescue me : A strange man had come out of nowhere and grabbed your arm. He told you to, “Play along,” as he hauled you along with him. Next thing you knew, he had opened a door and pushed you through it. Once you were inside, he had bent low and told you that he, “Wasn’t going to hurt to you, and will explain in a minute.” You had only caught a glimpse of him, but you were pretty sure you saw the light glint off a metal arm. (Complete / 3)

3 One’s Promised : Living a double life was not a choice when one was the daughter of Alexander Pierce. Y/N was the youngest agents of SHIELD and one of the most respected threats within Hydra’s empire. No matter her allegiance, she was feared by both. Y/N Pierce would’ve tried to escape it all… if it hadn’t been for The Winter Soldier. (Complete / 5)

4 Peach Scone : In where Bucky has it so bad for you, he cannot find the words to confess his feelings. After an entire year of failed attempts, plus a declaration of love for scones, he decides it’s about time the words come out of his mouth. Only Bucky knows himself and is certain it’s gonna be one hell of a challenge. (Complete / 6)

5 Mad For You : Nat hosts a costume masquerade. Bucky meets the Alice to his Hatter. Shenanigans ensue. (Complete / 6)

6 Movie Night :  Being an assistant to Tony Stark, you never felt like you fit in… that is, until Bucky invites you to an Avengers movie night in the compound. (Complete / 7)

7 Help Us : Bucky is in the process of recovery when a new Avenger causes his world to come crashing down again. (Complete / 8)

8 Fallen : The same haunting dark figure, surrounded in crisp white have plagued you since early childhood. For a while the dreams have stopped until you move to New York and they come back full force. You get a once of a life time vacation to a remote place in Russia and jump at the chance.Then you come face to face with the man of childhood nightmares. (Complete / 10)

9 Another Winter Soldier :  Y/N spends most of her life away from people. She has a secret to hide, and there are people who are looking for her. After an assassination that confuses the world, will she be able to escape from the Avengers? Or will she join them and try to clear her name? (Complete / 13)

10 Delta : Reader is a rare being in the a/b/o cycle and finds herself along side the Avengers. She manages to hide her true nature successfully until she catches the eye of a certain blue eyed super soldier. (Complete / 13)

11  The Subtle Redemption of Lance Tucker : Lance is a perfect fixture in your past. Suddenly, he’s roaring into focus as your younger sister’s National Coach. As warning signs scream around you, resistance is almost futile. But you’re an adult now. You’re stronger than the silly little kid you were before, right? Right? (Complete / 13)

12 Remedy : When a woman is found at an abandoned Hydra base, more dead than alive, Bucky takes it upon himself to help her in any and every way he can. He doesn’t have much of a choice, being the first to approach her without the intention of hurting her in a long time, she doesn’t trust anyone around but him. (Complete / 15)Z

13 Me, Her, and You :  For the last sixl: months you’ve been living in New York with your ten old year old daughter. After one failed job after another, you’ve almost given up. Then someone extends a helping hand, next thing you know you’re living in the Stark tower as a live maid. As you begin to get close to Bucky the truth about your incredibly gifted daughter comes out. Will your past come back to haunt you? (Complete / 18)sz

[icharchivist]

eh okay so it's gonna get extremely personal despite it looking like i'm rambling about a game, and there's.... mentions of how bad my mental health had gone, so s.elf h.arm and such,  so. ye. Fair warning.

I've been crying for five minutes (edit: it had been 5 mins when I started writting this post, now it's been half a hour, fml) over Sera's "Do everything for everyone, get sick. Not right." when she comments on the inquisitor's hand getting worse in worse and how she's worried for her and how she needs to make everyone know how great the inquisitor is.

Like istg d/ai may be the da game with the least interesting /plot/ but the companions had hit such cords with me and that fucking line. That. Fucking line. I started playing Da when I was having a very bad mental health episode. Like, I was seriously being miserable when I started d/ao.

Things... hadn't calmed down, but DA gave me a real distraction from everything. Mental breakdowns happen less often. I have less episodes. When they happen they are truly bad, but it's not as often as it was before.

Playing those games gave me a sense of purpose and made me want to wake up in the morning and do stuff. And put myself a goal. That hadn't happened to me in ways too long. Which is kinda why i fell this deeply into da and how much I want to cherish it no matter what, that i don't want to let negative stuff ruin that.

Lately..... no in general, over the course of this last year, reflecting on my mental health - the main point I keep thinking over and over again is how much I basically wasted my whole life taking care of people around me, and how those very people pushed me to my limits to the point of breaking.

I don't know when my d/epression really started - my therapist told me i had symptoms since i'm 7 because of some occurances that happened to me, I can pinpoint my 13th yo as probably the biggest point I couldn't ignore it anymore since it's when I started self harming to cope with all this frustration I had inside me. But up until my 19yo, I tried. I was thinking that no matter what I wanted to be stronger than this, to overcome this. And help as much as I could meanwhile.

It's not like I could ignore the problems around me, I had to fix my parents's mess, my parents's mental health, I had to fix everything, and I had very few friends before high school, and I was always doing emotional labor for everyone I met. Before meeting my High school friends, it's not like i could rely on anyone - and it took me years to rely on my high school friends, after years of being close to them. And even know, I don't rely on anyone I trust as much as I could. as I should.

Then I had that major mental breakdown. The Infamous one lmao. Too many things accumulating at once. Before I turned 18, all I was thinking was "at least live until you pass your diploma", and once it was done I realized I spent my whole life fixing so much shit I hadn't projected myself further. I've been terrified ever since. That mental breakdown happened while i was having this crisis, and my studies, my father and some friends pushed my limits further, and suddenly I couldn't take it anymore.

Ever since that, I had felt like a failure. Like I couldn't even act properly, I couldn't even be a proper person. That no matter what I do, I can't even stand the pressure.

I got physical sickness out of my shitty mental health. Eczema, one of those instance that turned into a deadly sickness that I hadn't treated correctly because I was busy fixing others stuff- still now I have that fucking eczema on my hand I can't seem to get rid off, for years now. Because of stress, my stomach is barely functionable. I had a lot of panic attacks, flashbacks, intrusive thoughts and s/uicidal idealization, big zoning out episodes that had put me in danger (multiple time I was.. coming back from school, and I just. zoned out in the middle of the street and I almost got ran over by a car. Very close. And it was shaking me back into reality and i was breaking down crying at the corner of the street. It happened about 3 times a day which was one of the reasons i dropped school since i was having panic attacks in class and those stuff happening when out of class).

And I felt like a failure. So damn much. That everything i've done, everything i've tried to do to help the world get better around me wasn't enough. That I wasn't strong enough.

I'm taking medications that almost completely negated the nightly panic attacks at least, most of them anyway - which makes that when they happen, they are a hundred times worse than before. My spiral downs are even worse because I try to balance it out.

And I felt terrible for years. Recovery scares me because at this point I don't know what to "recover".

And....... This past few months i've been thinking. A lot. Instead of feeling like a failure, what I end up thinking now is that it's the world around me that failed me. I've done everything for everyone. I was 7, my sister ran away from home, and I was the one trying to hold the family together, being there for my mother, being there for my other sister who was closing of to me, defending them against my father's mean comments about it, while i was being bullied at school. And no one was there for me. I was 13 when my parents divorced, and I was there for my mother, who was lamenting, in her worst mental state, while my father was planning to strip her from everything, ruining her reputation, and I was managing it so he wouldn't be ruining her life, all while my sister blissfully ignored all of it and decided to cut ties with us for over a year - while i was bullied in classes, and had to move out, adapting to a new environment when i was bullied again, in a step family that was snarky, always degrading. And No one was there for me.

I was almost 15 when I got that fucking deadly disease spreading over my chest. Took months to be able to talk it out to one of my parents, for one of them to care. a fucking disease born out of stress, because I was managing another moving out, because I was adapting to a new school where, news flash, I was bullied, while my mom was always lamenting, asking me to do everything for her, while i was fighting another trial my father planned for us, aptemping to make our lives even more difficult, degrading us, while my sister was still blissfully ignoring us despite the fact we were in contact again. I got yelled at by the doctor because I was close to be hospitalized because of how much I neglected my own physicaly health. And all I was thinking was that I couldn't just stop because of that.

I was 17 when I ended up in a toxic, emotionally abusive relationship who changed me for the worst, pushed me to isolation, and had me lost everything i had built before that, along with part of myself. And I was alone. Couldn't speak to it to my family bc they acted extremely homophobic at the idea i was in relationship with a girl, the couple of friends i had back then were too hurt by my actions that they never talked to me again, and my ex was blackmailing me all the time. And I had to get out of it alone.

And it goes on and on and on and on. I can't remember a time i wasn't actively struggling with keeping everything around me from falling apart.

And at this point, i'm so angry. Those last few months, i've felt so angry, and frustrated. I've done everything, for everyone, all my life, and it ruined me mentally and physically. And I don't even know why I should want to carry on. what I should want to live now.

I feel like I lost about 20 years of my life trying to keep everything from falling apart to the point I barely know how to keep myself together now. That I can't project myself, that I can't see further than my own private bubble.  And i'm too tired to try to fix things again. Even if it's fixing myself. I'm just tired.

For months I've been frustrated now. I guess i still consider myself a bit of a failure, but I end up thinking it's everyone around me who failed me. Everyone who should have been there when I needed, who should have let me be someone. And now I'm asked to find my path, to do my studies, find a job, and i'm terrified.

"Do everything for everyone, get sick. not right."

This had been the center of all my frustrations those past few months and i'm actually still crying right now, what the fuck. Y'know, funnily enough, that's also why I hadn't forgiven BW's "you make saving the world look easy. the rest of us can only dream of matching what you've done" - because if there's anything i've managed to do with Laena as a character, is making a balance of showing she feels like she's falling apart, but will try to be cheerful so people don't suspect she's terrified of having to handle everything. This is probably the most personal thing I managed to ever put in a character, the game allowed me to create this balance that is extremely personal to me. So when he said that, i took it personally. Because if anything, I never let anyone see how I was falling apart. I would crack a joke and cheer someone up.

And I think about it because I remember I've been so upset at this one line, that it made me actually cry the first time i heard it.

And now it's Sera's. "Do everything for everyone, get sick. not right.". It had to hit right where it hurt. Right where it was too personal.

honestly d/ai is.... so flawed, but the companions had been such a strength to me, and I mentioned once that seeing them playing Wicked Grace had me cry because it looks like how we play games with my friends. My close friends. Those I took years to be able to rely on, and that are now probably my only driving force. Even if i don't rely on them as much as I should, as they tell me to. So also the fact Sera adds a bit later "i will make them know she had- has friends" i'm just.

Damn i didn't think i'd be crying for 30  minutes over pre-written letters in a game that hit right the cord. They got to hit the most personal part of myself in a few lines.

I don't even know how bad this dlc will get, but man. Nothing will top that.

God i have such a violent headache after crying this much istg. gdi Sera.

[daphnegeeksout]

The Silence Between Us (7/7) [Steve x Reader]

Read it on AO3

By: daphnethewriter

Everything would be different if you hadn’t been there. Maybe you would be normal. Instead, you’re dangerous, a threat to be contained. You don’t want to be powerful. You don’t want to be special. You don’t want to be an Avenger. But there’s something about the way Steve looks at you–warm and soft and trusting–that makes you feel like you’re still yourself.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

Words: 3,758, Chapter: 7/7, Language: English

Coming to Forson was stupid. Sure, it's your only option if you're going to escape the ever-tightening noose that is the Avengers' Compound. That doesn't mean trusting Forson isn't dumb and desperate and a betrayal of Sam and Wanda and Bruce and… Steve. Your heart wrenches.

You wait in a standard examination room and look, unseeing, at the mass-produced, abstract art that somehow finds its way into every hospital and clinic. Medical facilities are all the same. The same white walls, the same year-old magazines, the same expressions of polite concern. Follow me. Can I get you anything? How do you feel? Eyes filled with questions you can't answer, even if you could speak.

Forson comes into the room, adjusting his glasses as he does. "I'm glad you contacted us." His smile is a little too broad, more like a dog baring its teeth. He squeezes your shoulder, a touch too familiar for your comfort.

Forson does some preliminary work, drawing blood and making a thorough examination of your throat. He chuckles a little when he slips up and asks you to say 'ah'. You don't smile. This isn't a game to you. You want to find out what treatment he has in mind and get it over with as soon as possible. And the longer you stay here, the more you think about leaving all together, cure be damned.

"After that mess at the gala," he says, "I wasn't sure what had happened. Then seeing you all over the news… I thought for sure the Avengers would have their paws on you. But, I really think we can help. Gamma radiation really isn't a toy."

Gamma? How did he know about that? Bruce said no one at the hospital had run your samples for radiation. You hadn't mentioned it. But during your recovery… Forson pushed you into using your voice, into revealing your powers. How could he have known? But… he had. From the first day he came to your hospital room. What was a specialist from New York doing in an L.A. hospital in the first place?

Oh god—you recognize him. Not just from the gala or your recovery. From the hospital. Walking past the fountain. Before the explosion. Before. That's not—that doesn't mean—but he had been there! You saw him walk in. There was no way… He was inside the building for the first explosion. He should have been injured. Unless…

Forson leaves and you make a circuit of the examination room. Then another. Your stomach twists. There's nothing out of the ordinary here—nothing that would tip you off that something is wrong—but something is wrong. You feel it under your skin.

They never found the cause of the explosion. No one took credit for the terrorist attack. Because it wasn't a terrorist attack. What had Bruce said? That gamma by itself might cause changes. Unpredictable changes. What if someone like Forson knew that? What if that's why they flooded the hospital with radiation?

You try the doorknob—no luck. Not that you were hopeful. You think of Forson's overly familiar smile. If they're trying to keep up appearances… You knock on the door and wait until you hear footsteps in the hall. You give the nurse that answers an apologetic smile and hold up a post-it. Bathroom?  

Her face falls, but only for a second. The smile is back in place before you can process the look that had replaced it. She leads you down the hallway, past dozens of closed doors, to a room with a single toilet. You smile politely when you close the door. Then you wait. You've been a nurse; you know it's coming. So you wait and wait and wait for the inevitable to happen.

A commotion erupts further down the hall. Someone screams incoherently. Doctors yell for help. There are a few seconds before your nurse's footsteps hurry away from your door. Yep, unruly patient to the rescue. You slip out of the room and down the hall. Locked door, locked door, locked door… Aha!

The room is dark and you leave it that way. No telling how long you have before the distraction runs out. There's a computer terminal in this room, its screensaver softly lighting the shadows. Not that you know what you're looking for, but seeing their patient files can't hurt, right?

You sit on the rolling chair in front of the monitor. There's a log in screen, but where isn't there? Okay, medical IT is not that secure, this shouldn't be too hard.

Password: password

PASSWORD INCORRECT

Password: admin

PASSWORD INCORRECT

Password: 12345

PASSWORD INCORRECT

Worth a shot. You rifle through the contents of the counter around the computer. Scrap paper, notebooks, stray pens—post-it note! "C#x23d&" looks like a password to you.

And you're in. You make a mental note to burn your password notebook when you get home. Home… if you still have one. Would the Avengers let you back into the compound after this? Would Steve talk to you even if they did?

You push the thought aside; it's not helpful to dwell on that right now. Instead, you busy yourself with opening files. Weight, blood pressure, lots of standard medical information. It takes a few minutes to get past the basic memos and notes and into the real meat of what they're doing here, what they plan to do to you.

Oh.

.

.

.

.

Oh no.

 +++

 Steve downshifts the motorcycle and zooms around an SUV on the highway. Tony's voice filters through the speaker in his helmet. <I don't think she was taken from the theater by force.>

"She wouldn't have just left, Tony."

<Camera footage is telling a different story, Cap.>

"Do you have a line on where she went or not?"

<Other than 'north in a taxi', no, not yet. F.R.I.D.A.Y. is piecing together camera footage from thousands of different security cameras all over the city. It's going to take time.>

"Give me anything."

Tony makes a disgruntled growl. <If the cabby used some sort of GPS to get to the address…>

"Where is it?"

<Working on it. I have to find the right—>

"Tony!"

<Patching it through to your helmet.>

When did Tony mess with his helmet? Steve doesn't have time to dwell on it. The face shield lights up, directing his route through traffic. Schematics of the facility at the address display on one side. It's an ordinary office building, at least from the outside.

Tony swears in his earpiece.

"What?"

<The building is owned by Andrew Forson, Advanced Idea Mechanics.>

Steve doesn't respond, but adjusts his grip on the handlebars and presses the engine faster.

 +++

 Radiation poisoning. They had exposed their patients to gamma on a massive scale. Like, a catastrophically massive scale. The kind of levels that liquefy internal organs. And for most of the patients, that is exactly what had happened. Something like 99.9% of them.

They had catalogued their patients over years, intentionally poisoning people. This wasn't mercy. It wasn't even medicine.

It was research to destroy Captain America.

Bruce was right; the same circumstances that had resulted in your abilities had created Steve. The Vita-Rays Howard Stark used to spur the physical change that created Captain America were nothing more than repackaged gamma radiation. These people—whoever they are—they know how to give powers to people. At least, sort of. They don't know yet what makes a person capable of surviving the process. They're still trying to figure out how to remove them. Because that's the goal: remove the powers of those with special abilities, turn Captain America back into plain Steve Rogers. Not to mention Wanda, Bruce—hell maybe even Thor—anyone with the ability to stand in their way.

The lights flick on.            

"Did you get lost?" Forson still wears the same smile, the one that doesn't reach his eyes. You stand, hands balled into fists at your side. "I'm guessing no." He pushes his lips together and puts his hands on his hips. "You know, you're our first success in a while, and the first one from a field test, so I'd hate to hurt you." You take a step back as he advances toward you. "I didn't lie when I said we could cure you. We're very close to a breakthrough. We just needed one more test subject." You back into the wall and he continues into your space. "I'm sorry it had to be this way, that it took so much sacrifice to get the right result. All those people… but we have you now. This is good. You can help us." He stops a foot in front of you. "Wouldn't the world be better if there had never been super heroes?"

[fuck you]

He smirks. "That didn't look friendly." Green light radiates from his arms, arcing between his fingers in electric spurts. He sees your gaze go to his hands. The smile becomes genuine. "Just a little gamma radiation. My specialty." He lifts his hand toward his face to watch the effect. "Don't worry. You've survived it before."

 +++

 When Steve arrives, the facility doesn't look like the image that Friday had patched through to him. In fact, it doesn't seem much like a building anymore at all. Wiring and lights spark in the open space where the south wall of the building should have been.

An explosion shakes the ground and Steve jerks to the source of the noise in time to see you running out of the building under an assault of rubble. You turn around, eyes trained toward the building. You favor your left side, holding one hand to your ribs, but your face is set, fierce anger burning in your eyes. You shout and the sound knocks over a concrete wall. Steve's never seen you use your powers like this. Never on purpose. Never offensively.

His feet move under him before he gives them the command. You're so focused that you don't notice Steve until he's by your side. Your look of shock turns to relief. You reach to him to squeeze his hand in yours.

"You need to go," Steve says.

You shake your head.

Steve doesn't get to argue the point. The wall you knocked over flies back with a burst of green light and Steve gets his first real look at what you're facing. He glows green all over, like a radioactive rod. Smoke rises from his clothes where holes have burned through the fabric. Well, that's certainly something.

"Forson?" Steve asks. You nod.

Forson throws back the rest of the rubble in a burst of green light, shaking the debris from his body. The energy around his hands condenses, pulling into a tight ball.

Crap.

Steve dodges to the side, pulling you along with him, as the fireball flies in your direction. You tumble over each other as the ball explodes against the pavement where you'd stood.

Steve stands first, rising to a protective crouch over you. He rests his hand on your shoulder, keeping you out of the line of fire. Now would be a great time for backup to arrive; he could really use his shield. How was he supposed to know a date would turn into a rescue mission? Without his gear, Steve is exposed. He can handle that, he's been in tight spots before, but he won't take chances with you.

"Stay down," Steve warns you. "Get somewhere safe when you can."

He doesn't wait to see your response, instead taking off at a cautious jog across what is left of the parking lot. He ducks behind the larger pieces of debris as he goes, keeping cover where he can.  The ground shakes under the assault of more fireballs, the radioactive heat licking at Steve's heels. They explode against his cover, spraying him with debris.

A manhole cover sticks up from what's left of the drainage system. Steve grabs it as he breaks into a full run. He launches it across the space left between him and Forson. It's heavier than the shield, but heavy isn't a problem for Steve. It'll do. It hits Forson squarely in the chest, knocking him backwards into the building. Good. Steve hopes it breaks his sternum.

He doesn't wait to find out, though, pursuing his makeshift weapon into what is left of the facility. Forson staggers to his feet in time for Steve to land a kick to his chest. From this close range, the air shimmers in the heat. Steve connects with a few more hits, each burning as if he's punching lava, before Forson rallies.

The first punch catches Steve across the jaw. While Steve's guard is down, Forson follows it up with a series of hits that send Steve stumbling back, then unleashes a fireball that blasts Steve back twenty feet. Steve hits a column and the concrete splits against his back. He collapses along with the pillar. Super soldier serum or not, stars spin in front of his eyes.

When he looks up, Forson approaches, green light flaring from his center like a fire burning out of control. Steve pushes, but the concrete weighs him down, pinning his legs. The green glow pulses and Steve makes a Herculean effort to pull himself free. The rubble shifts, but not fast enough.  

A shout shatters the air and Forson stumbles back, the surge of energy that built around him shrinking back into his body. You crouch by Steve's side, tearing at the rubble that traps him.

You help him to his feet and Steve grabs your hand to pull you toward the front of the building. "What are you still doing here? You gotta get—" The rest of his sentence is cut off by an explosion of concrete from above. Steve shoves you one direction, dodging in the other. He rolls to his feet, ready. A green glow advances from the depths of the building. Steve landed outside. You did not. You're still in the building, trapped between Steve and Forson. The radiation grows, licking at the pillars around it.

You stand, swaying unsteadily, and look back at Steve, a long, sad, desperate gaze. Then you plant and feet and face Forson.

Steve's heart drops into his stomach.

No.

You wouldn't do that to him.

You can't.

Steve lurches forward, too focused on you to process the danger. Your scream rocks the building, the ground, the air itself. Everything shakes under your assault. With a tremendous crack, the supports of the building give way.

You flinch as the concrete rushes to the ground, smothering everything in its path. Steve pulls you into his arms before the first of the rubble strikes around him.

 +++

 You sit in the conference room with Stark, just the two of you for the first time since the day you met him at the hospital. Your shoulder is dislocated and your throat is sore and you have more bandages than anyone should, but you're alive. Alive enough to be debriefed.

"Officially," he starts, "you were sent on a mission to infiltrate and neutralize a terrorist facility involved in the creation of a bioweapon. So, between you, me, and the Department of Defense, this all went according to plan."

Well, that's better than jail.

Stark fiddles with a pen on the table, then looks to you. "What actually happened?"

You give him the details as well as you can, supplementing writing where you don't know the signs. About Forson before the explosion, at the hospital after, at the gala. About what he said he could do and what the files had revealed. Stark watches you through inscrutable eyes. Not judging—not exactly—but appraising.

"Why did you do it?"

The knife of shame that's stuck in your side ever since you left Steve at the movie theater twists. Answering the question means admitting your betrayal. [said he could cure me]

"How?"

[don't know] Forson had interrupted you before you could see the details of that part of the process. [you find computer files?]

"Everything was destroyed before we could get to it. Between you and Mr. Boom Boom, there wasn't anything to salvage."

[F-O-R-S-O-N dead?]

"We didn't find him."

[others?]

"No bodies."

You think of the dozens of staff that you'd passed in the building. Had they all really gotten out? Or had someone removed their remains? Forson had destroyed everything rather than have it fall into the Avengers' hands. Whatever he was planning, it didn't end with that building's demise.

You fidget, then get to the question that is most pressing. [what now?]

"I thought that was obvious. You join the team."

You cringe. [not hero]

Stark's lips press into a thin line. He takes a deep breath. "Let me show you something." It takes a few taps on his phone to find what he's looking for and put it onto the monitor. You recognize the building, the hospital where you worked before Forson blew it to hell. People move in and out of the doors, oblivious to what will eventually become of them. A figure sits on a bench in front of the fountain. You.

"You know what I like about this video?" Stark asks.

Your heart clenches as you watch the explosion rock the image, smoke and debris billowing out from the crippled building. You shake your head.

"You can actually see it happen." The figure in the video looks up from the ground and pushes herself to her feet, her eyes already trained on the hospital.

[see what?]

She staggers forward, touching whatever she can to regain her balance, but still moving toward the chaos. Stark watches you. "The moment you became a hero. You had the chance to turn back. You could have run away. No one would have blamed you. No one would have even known. Instead, you went toward the danger. No backup, no plan, no powers. You chose to be a hero."

[not choose] you argue. [not think]

"Exactly. You didn't think about it. You just did it. Powers don't make you a hero. It's who you are."

He sits down across from you, a weirdly friendly gesture from him. "You have a choice this time. It's all up to you. I'd like you to stay here. You don't have to. If anyone asks, we'll deny knowledge of your whereabouts. You can go your way." He pauses. "Or you can be what you already are: an Avenger."

 +++

 Steve waits for you on your bed when you get back to your room. He sits at the very edge, like he might need to leave at any moment. You pause in the doorway. You haven't been able to be alone with him since… well, since everything.

Since you betrayed him to meet with someone who wanted to kill him.

Since he came to your rescue.

Since you saved his life.

Since he saved yours.

He watches his hands, something he does when he has more on his mind than he knows how to say. You kneel at his feet, afraid that he won't look at you if you aren't right in front of him.

[really sorry]

He nods.

[I didn't want to leave you]

He nods again. You take his face in your hands, forcing him to look at you for the first time. His gaze meet yours and you forget to breathe. God, you can see everything he's thinking, every flicker of emotion that crosses those blue eyes. Pain and relief and anger. It hurts to see it, a naked soul in front of you, like he has no secrets.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asks.

There is so much more in that question than the mere words he speaks. Why did you leave? How could you do this? Why would you betray me? All the other thoughts, half-formed, hover in the air between you.

[I don't want to be broken]

"You're not broken."

Your teeth scrape over your bottom lip. How can Steve understand? His powers were a blessing to him; yours are a curse. [you want to help people] you sign. He nods. [your powers help people] He strokes your cheek with his fingers. [I want to help people] His thumb smears something wet over your skin and you realize that tears are sliding from your eyes.  [my powers hurt people] He opens his mouth to cut you off, but you forge ahead. [if I can't help people] you sign, [I am not me]

"That's not true. You help people. You help us—me and Bruce and—"

You turn away, unable to bear the intensity of his eyes. [I don't want to hurt people] Tears stream down your face in earnest now. You wipe them with the back of your hand. [I don't want to hurt you]

"You can't, sweetheart. I promise. You can't hurt me."

[not fair to you]

"How? You're perfect."

You struggle to put words to the thought, the sheer unfairness of the situation, how much he's missing by being with you. [I can't laugh] you sign. [I can't talk] He shakes his head. [I can't tell you I love you]

Steve drags you into a crushing kiss, your body pressed flush against him. He's not careful this time and for once you can feel all the super soldier power that he usually holds back.

You're left breathless when he pulls away, gripping your shoulders hard enough to leave bruises. "Don't, okay? Please? Just… don't." he says.  He tugs at you until you relent and let him pull you onto his lap. He wraps his arms around your waist and lets his forehead fall to your shoulder. You can feel his heart race through the material in his shirt and your heart does a little flip flop at the knowledge that it’s because of you. You stay that way for a few minutes, soaking up each other's presence.

He lets you go, but only far enough to rest his forehead against yours and brushes his fingers through your hair, letting his hand linger over the back of your neck. "I don’t know what I'd do without you. Don't run off and put yourself in danger."

You smile a little sadly. [not always safe] He looks like he's going to argue with you, but you cut him off. [I told T-O-N-Y I would be an Avenger]

He stares at you, a myriad of emotions flickering over his face. "Is… that what you want?" His hand tightens on the back of your neck.

[I want to be cured] you sign [until then I’m an Avenger]

He pulls you back into his arms and buries his face in your neck. Muffled through your hair, you hear, "What am I gonna do with you?"

Well... 

If he's looking for suggestions…

.

.

.

.

End.

Thank you so much to everyone who has read and enjoyed this story. I appreciate each and every one of you! The Silence Between Us is the first part of a series of Avengers x Reader stories called No More Heroes. Below you’ll find an excerpt from If You Were Here, the next fic in the series. 

If You Were Here [Tony x Reader]

F.R.I.D.A.Y. has a bug.  

Not just any bug, the buggiest bug in the history of bugs.

The coffee machine is supposed to turn on at 7:00am. Instead, it turns on at 7:05am. 7:05. Which is five minutes after Steve gets back from his run—just long enough for Steve to think that the machine won't turn on and make coffee himself.

Seven-fucking-oh-five.

Tony reset the software. He rewrote the software. He bought a new coffee maker. How could replacing the machine not fix the problem?

It's a nightmare. Tony's own personal hell. The coffee gods have a vendetta against him, he's sure.

Finding the damn bug is like inspecting a shadow with a flashlight. Every time he thinks he catches it, it vanishes into the binary from which it came with nothing but a smattering of loose code in its wake—a goddamn Cheshire cat, disappearing except for its smile.

Tag List:

@ganesh1234  @netflixa   @ryverpenrad @abovethesmokestacks  @winterboobaer 

As always, if you would like to be added to (or removed from) the tag list, please let me know. 

[romancevsreality-blog]

the bachelor, season 21, episode 1: i most certainly am not here for the right reasons

I’m pretty sure I’ve never been so excited in my life for one thing.

I’m also pretty sure no one has worked harder to make one person happen than ABC did for Nick. They’re not claiming it’s “The Most Exciting Season Yet”, thank god - it’s “Unlike Anything You’ve Ever Seen Before”. God damn it, ABC. You are not clever.

Nick is uncomfortable saying he’s The Bachelor, and we get a full on montage of him half-naked and even FULL NAKED!!!! I still can’t decide if I think Nick is cute, and this will be my personal journey this year - Is Nick Hot, Or Is He A Body And Good Facial Hair? I just know that Nick has more personality in his pinky finger than Manila Envelope and Water-Based Oatmeal1 ever could. We get a montage of Nick’s terrible hair2 and terrible experiences on this franchise. He also talks with his hands in front of his mouth and has communication issues. Apparently, his family is thrilled with him being the Bachelor, which is hilarious because anyone else’s family would talk them out of doing this show for the FOURTH time. But instead his sister gives him some shitty advice about picking girls up in cars, and we get the obligatory Kiss From A Rose/I’m The Bachelor Now photoshoot montage. Nick’s gonna give us all happy endings, and my friend Katie is pumped.

Speaking of Manila Envelope and Water-Based Oatmeal, they join Sean Lowe, who’s season I’ve seen but barely remember except for Tierra the Tierrable for a chat about the fact that Nick is considered to be an asshole and make jokes that he’s done the show four times. I love that this is going to be A Thing this season. Nick’s afraid of failing on TV AGAIN and all of America is sadly rooting for this too. Not out of dislike for Nick, but wouldn’t it be interesting if SIX people rejected him? Manila Envelope or Water-Based Oatmeal (YMMV) manages to give Nick some good advice about not changing for the show ‘cause everyone’s gonna love him!

When I’m The First Black Bachelorette, my advice to the incumbent will be:

We’re greeted with the first shot of The Artist Formerly Known As My Mortal Enemy, Chris Harrison. Now that I’m enemies with James Kennedy, I had to replace Chris. He was super cool about it, though. He still knows what he did, though. Trust me. He knows what he did. He’s going to introduce us to our Final Four and Others! This is an actual trope of this show - the final four is always featured in the opening segment, along with the two or three others who are topics of discussion this season. You know you’re gonna get a good or bad edit depending whether or not you’re one of the Chosen Six.

WE MEET SOME OF THE LADIEZ!!!!!

Rachel, who I already decided will be Our Real First Black Bachelorette, is an attorney from Dallas. We get a montage of her vacuuming and dancing and talking about how she wants love, but doesn’t believe in love at first sight, but hopes to feel a connection straight off the bat. Rachel, at 31, is one of the oldest contestants this season, and I adore Rachel. Danielle is 27 and owns 3 nail salons. She’s kind of bland. Vanessa, who’s from Quebec3 and speaks English, Italian, and French, and is a special needs teacher. She’s more of a unicorn than Joelle on Ben’s season. She’s far too perfect and Ben is gonna love her. Jacqueline is a lonely nursing student who loves cats and talks to animals. It takes a “certain kind of guy” to handle Jacqueline, which means he’s going to hate her.

Raven reads her bible and watches football in Huxie, Alabama. She’s the second small business owner on the show, and... yeah, i got nothing for Raven. She’s another one who’s just there and probably makes it to the end as The Shocker. Corinne is glamorous and lives in Miami. She’s a 24-year-old woman with a fucking nanny who she needs to live. She runs a “multi-million dollar company” that he dad is passing over to her, and Corinne is this season’s villain and probably final four. Alexis is weird and embarrassing, Danielle is a nurse. GOD these women are... bland.

Taylor is a mental health professional and is fucking gorgeous. She psychoanalyzes Nick, which scares me, considering she’s never met him. Not a huge fan of armchair psychology, even though that is literally the basis of this blog. She talks about being biracial and I’m glad this is a discussion being had on this show. Colorism is so real and such a problem - most of mainstream America probably has zero clue about the internalized hatred within a lot of the black community when it comes down to the actual color of your skin. Liz and Nick fucked at Jade and Tanner’s wedding, where Liz was the maid of honor. They call it “hooking up” but they refuse to admit they bangalanged. Liz refused to give Nick her number after the torrid affair and regrets it because now he’s going to be rich, famous, and have over a million Instagram followers, the dream of every person who participates in his mess of a series.

Note: There has been almost a week between the above paragraph and the rest of this blog. Last week was crazy, sorry y’all. I’ll do better for you this season, I promise.

Anyway, we resume with the Meeting of The Women, also known as the Limo Introductions. Chris Harrison welcomes him back because this is the second time Nick’s doing this - how many times are we going to reference that this is Nick’s fourth go-around???? - and they talk about how Nick is controversial. Remember when Madonna kissed Britney Spears was controversial? Now, a former Salesforce representative-turned-model is “controversial”. Words mean nothing and I am losing more of myself every single day. Nick hopes to finally meet The One, because... that is literally the point of this show.

A GIF Interpretation of My Reaction To Meeting The Bachelor If I Were to Compete on This Show: 4

Danielle is the first from the limo, which combined with her opening segment places her heavily in the top 4. Elizabeth is 24, wearing white lace, and is nervous. She’s basically wearing a wedding dress, and that’s all I got from this. My Queen Rachel shows up, looking gorgeous in a red dress and a red lip, and then makes a football joke. RACHEL, YOU ARE THE BEST. I LOVE YOU. Christen does a fan dance, wears a yellow dress Reese Witherspoon5 is dying to wear to next year’s Golden Globes, and much like everyone else, is excited.

Taylor The Mental Health Professional is only 23?! She calls him a piece of shit (blaming her friends), which is... not the best note to start on and things get weird quick. Nick does not want to meet her friends. laughed so hard because as someone who has also insulted someone upon initial meeting, it’s all in your recovery, and Taylor The Mental Health Professional flubbed. Oh, Taylor. You probably will go home tonight. Kristina wants to get to know him for him, Angela is a model who’s there because El Bachelor is Nick and wears a two-piece gown. Lauren shows up in ALL SEQUINS and her last name is “Hussy”, and makes a solid “Viall-Hussy” joke. Lauren, I already like you. Who are you, Lauren? Can we be friends? I’m down with your sense of humor6.

I wonder how many times they’ll use the word “excited” tonight? Elizabeth wants to form her OWN opinions about him because she’s a Woman Who Does What She Wants. They all believe that Nick on Paradise is the real Nick, not the former Nick who was the asshole on The Bachelor. Ida Marie and Taylor show up, and Ida Marie does a trust fall with him - is this my middle school theatre camp? - and Olivia from Alaska gives him an Eskimo kiss, which feels... obtuse. Someone comes running in - Sarah - and makes a runner-up joke. I’d be pissed if I had to run in any kind of dress. I’d be pissed if I had to run, period. Jasmine G’s body is on point, she looks gorgeous in teal, and she brought Neil Lane with her. I guess Nick and Neil Lane will see each other FIVE TIMES over the course of this show. See? Even I can’t stop mentioning how many times Nick has been on this show. It’s all kind of pointless, and weird, and so is the following “I’m not wearing underwear” non-joke from Hailey, who is also 23. Some of the girls this season are showing their age early on, damn.

Astrid speaks German and gets hella sexy with Nick in a language he doesn’t understand. All the girls are trying to bang him already, damn. I love it. OH NO, LIZ HAS ARRIVED. I’M SCARED FOR HER ALREADY. Nick gives a stifled smile to her like he’s trying to place her - not a good sign, Liz The Doula - and doesn’t even acknowledge that the two of them know each other. HE HAS NO IDEA. I LOVE THIS PLOTLINE ALREADY. Nick “thinks he met her already” which is amazing because he’s literally not sure. Liz weirds me out - there’s a robotic thing about her that scares me. LizBot 2000 reminds me of a strange beauty pageant girl.

Corinne is here for Nick and gives him a hug token to cash in later. Corinne, I already dislike you. Vanessa speaks French to Nick, and I hate her dress. I really like her, though. Some girl brings maple syrup and my boyfriend went on a rant about bringing sticky brown water to a first date and I stopped paying attention to what was going on. Raven has a cute accent, and Jaimi is the second person in the culinary arts this season. Jaimi has “balls” as in she has a septum piercing? WHAT? HOW IS THIS A THING? There’s so much wrong about that. There are a few more introductions I pretty much ran through - Savannah, Josephine (who gives him a book with a hot dog in it?). Lacey arrives on a camel and makes a hump joke, and the girls can’t get over that they didn’t come up with that concept. It is a really good one. Alexis is an aspiring dolphin Trainer and wears a shark suit7, but considers herself to be a dolphin. Remember on Burning Love when Jennifer Aniston wore THE EXACT SAME COSTUME? REMEMBER THIS? MAGGIE, REMEMBER? I AM DEAD, BURNING LOVE AND THIS SHOW ARE OFFICIALLY THE SAME THING.

Everyone’s wearing red, and everyone is upset about it. Next season no one will wear red ever. The season after that, no one will wear red. Hailey, Rachel, Taylor, Lacey, Angela, and Dominique all wear red. There may even be more of them that I didn’t notice. Nick is greeted by the women with a cocktail and thanks them for being there because he’s done it 100 times.

Rachel gets the first time with Nick, and they flirt. Hard. She’s such a fucking queen, she’s a star from the get-go. She, like me, has more cousins than siblings, and she loves everyone in her family. She’s got goals and is good at her job. Christen teaches Nick to ballroom dance - for some reason, I feel like Nick is the rare white guy who can actually dance - and Danielle talks about how she really wants a rose that night. I actually think Nick is approaching this like an adult? With thought and confidence and a good amount of self-deprecation, which is nice.

Chris Harrison drops...

THE FIRST IMPRESSION ROSE!!!!!!!!

Corinne does something with tokens and really wants to kiss him tonight. Vanessa’s friend submitted her for the show and considers it fate that the only guy she wanted was Nick, and Nick’s now Le Bachelor. Vanessa wants to kiss him so badly and it seems like it might happen until Corinne, confirming her space as this season’s villain, comes in and interrupts him to kiss him. Everyone sees, of course, and everyone’s shocked. Corinne’s so gross, she’s all but smiling during the kiss which is so weird. This season is weird. Corinne is described as “the first one to kiss him, and the first one to double-dip.” They’re not wrong, but the season has officially begun.

Jasmine G is upset because she wanted time to talk to him and Nick asks her to wait briefly. The girls start drinking heavily to cope because this show and the environment is anxiety inducing. Everyone wants to be friends with Alexis the Dolphin Shark, who insists she’s a dolphin. Corinne makes weird references to her body being possibly ugly under there. Alexis is drunk and in the pool, and Nick finds her there and insists she’s a shark. It really is concerning that she refuses to acknowledge that she’s a shark. Her costume has a fin. Nick tells her she’s gotta keep it on all night long because he’s probably into that. Doesn't Nick Being a Furry seem like a thing that would happen in 2017?

LizBot 2000 cannot get over the fact that she’s met Nick before and is really excited that he doesn’t remember - girl, that is a BAD THING that he doesn’t remember. Nick admits that he does remember her7 and it’s been a while since they last saw each other. He’s basically confused as to why she wouldn’t give him her number but feels comfortable enough going on this show8. She still thinks he was a dick before she saw him on Paradise, and Nick is hella confused. He just calls her out on her bullshit time and time again and it’s incredible. They get interrupted and LizBot tries to stall but Nick’s like, “uh, hell no, I’m gonna talk to everyone tonight, sorry.” and ditches her.

Everyone’s nervous because the First Impression Rose is still out there, and everyone’s worried Corinne might get it because she kissed him first, and Corinne’s not worried. The girl who gave him maple syrup is Canada, of course, some girl has a Carrie Bradshaw quote? WHY DOES ANYONE WANT TO BE CARRIE BRADSHAW? Her boyfriend Danielle M. seems too shy and timid for this show, but I like her. She’s a nurse for sick babies and likes the challenge. They seem to have a cute rapport, and Nick comes for the First Impression Rose.

OMG. OMG. OH MY GOD9.

IT GOES TO MY QUEEN AND GODDESS RACHEL.

YES.

YES!!!!!!!!!

THIS SEASON IS ALREADY AMAZING.

A BLACK WOMAN GETS THE FIRST IMPRESSION ROSE, TRACEE ELLIS ROSS WINS A GOLDEN GLOBE, VIOLA DAVIS WINS A GOLDEN GLOBE, AND EVERYTHING IS BETTER FOR US ALL10.

Nick says it was “obvious” that he wanted to give the rose to Rachel by the end of the night, and they kiss. I am alive. You can tell she was genuinely shocked. They hold hands. This is true love.

We’re headed into the Rose Ceremony, but not before Nick confers with Chris Harrison. He's pissed at Liz.

Roses go to: Vanessa, Danielle, Christen, Astrid/Astird, Corinne (who thought she might not get a rose because she kissed him), Elizabeth W, Jasmine G (who cried when she thought she wouldn’t get time with him), Raven, Kristina (who also cried because she didn’t know what to expect), Danielle M, Sarah, Josephine, Lacey, Taylor The Mental Health Professional, Alexis (who still refuses to admit she’s a shark), Hailey, Whitney, Dominique, Jaimi11, Brittany (who seems like an irl Cecily Strong character from SNL), and LizBot 2000, of course.

That means we’re losing Olivia, Angela, Ida Marie, Briana, Susannah, Michelle, and Lauren, who never evolved past “Viall-Hussey”, which is so sad. I liked her. Can’t wait to see all of you in Paradise, though! We’ll certainly have forgotten you by that point.

This Season, on La Bachelor: NICK FREEZES TO DEATH, Into The Wild-style. Lots of dancing! Lots of kissing! Lots of adventures! Finland! Jaimi’s bisexual! THE FUCKING BACKSTREET BOYS. Corinne takes her top off for a photograph, everyone wants to fuck Nick, and Liz tells everyone about her and Nick banging. Vanessa cries, everyone cries, and Corinne is an immature villain. Corinne tries to bang Nick, and Nick cries a ton. Nick doesn’t like being The Bachelor? And the proposals happen in an elk lodge. Gross. Currently crossing my fingers that Nick gets rejected a third time, despite my current love for him.

See you tomorrow for Vanderpump Rules, and Wednesday for The Bachelor, and THE FIRST EPISODE OF MY PODCAST. I'll post details about it soon.

Random Assessments from The Desk of Amanda:

Initial thoughts about Nick: He’s great.I think he’s going to be a great Bachelor, maybe the best in Bachelor history, which is saying a lot. He’s charming, self-deprecating, and seems to be in it for real, which is strange.

Bachelor Fantasy Picks: Vanessa, Rachel, Danielle.

Vanessa looks like Brunette Jessica Chastain, Michaela Watkins, Andi Dorfman, Julia Roberts, Madeleine Stowe, Jennifer Love Hewitt.

Corinne and Sarah have the same face and different hair.

My boyfriend claims the key to making past the first night: asking the Bachelor/Ette how they’re feeling and if things are going well. Make it about them, y’all. Don’t try to sell yourself. Also, be super-de-duper hot.

I hate the voice-overs of people hoping to be called.

NO ONE GOT WASTED DRUNK ON THE FIRST NIGHT AND MADE A FOOL OF THEMSELVES. What a disappointment.

Nick and Kaitlyn really, really hate each other.

In this new year, I’m literally thrilled that Josh and Amanda are donzo for good and for realsies. BYE HEAUX.

Chris and Ben, disrespectfully. ↩︎

Was his hair ORANGE in Kaitlyn’s season? ORANGE? ↩︎

I hate the Quebecois French accent. ↩︎

Kim’s old face! ↩︎

Reese only wears yellow or purple on the red carpet, and it is so boring. ↩︎

I would totally be the girl who competes on this show with the sole purpose of making friends. I’m here to make friends, not to win. ↩︎

After some producer prodding, probably. ↩︎ ↩︎

It’s because she wants to shill weight-loss teas and go on Marriage Boot Camp like her best friends Jade And Tanner, The Golden Couple Who Got Engaged In Paradise And Married On TV Earlier Last Year, Remember Them? ↩︎

My favorite part of the FIR is that it sits in front of the girls, taunting them for hours. ↩︎

I also love the girls who are trying not to be like “... But she’s black????” It’s so obvious. #BlackGirlMagic is real. ↩︎

My boyfriend referred to her as “Septum Piercing”, so that’s her name. ↩︎

[sevdrag]

dreamwidth update: the sweet subtleness of time

...or some other shittastic ~~pensive~~ title because I'm so fucking out of goddamn fucks already it's the 14th half of january is gone jesus christ stop fucking moving so fast i would like off this ride thanks

I like the organization of "new year resolutions" not really because I believe you need to wait for a calendar year to make serious changes, but because there's something very neat about the way things can slot into having to write a new date on all your sign-offs and checks do people still use checks? i only have to sign them at work and lists and notes; to the excel spreadsheet that is my mind1, I like the way aligning change with change sorts itself.

This year I am returning to quantifiable goals in some ways, since the general vagueness of "do X more" may be more friendly but does not truly work in the lifestyle I have at the moment. I wanted to do a deep introspective post as a lead in but fuck that, I already have two truly severe horror stories about 20172 and it's the 14th, but I feel like I want to make a statement about the year before I devolve back into bitchcraft and wizardry.

As another change this year, I am looking for friends to help keep me accountable to these things. I've already roped and wrangled a couple people along with me, but if you have similar goals, let's discuss ways we can shame uh motivate SHAME each other into proceeding, or mainly just me, I require someone to - not compete with, but to keep up with, in a way, anyway, I am terrible so do stop.

So here is a list of my intentions for what I have labeled 12/52/365/20173:

Health. Rather than breaking this down into a tale of my woes and triggering an actual breakdown I will instead list the targets:

Get more than 4.5 hours of (good, deep, REM) sleep on average. According to my Fitbit, my average in 2016 was below 4.5 hours4. This involves a lot of things, including going to bed earlier and somehow figuring out how robots relax.

Working out. My goal for working out is to visit the gym - or otherwise work out - on at least 1/3 of the days of 2017: 122/365/2017. 122 visits. This is 2-3 workouts a week on average which should be doable for someone with fibro, assuming I keep them reasonable.

General. Continue stocking and making healthy food at home. Drink less at home5. Go back to packing lunches for work.

Weight/Size. Due to medication changes, 3 surgeries, and a major job change with severely increased my responsibilities, I gained 25-30 lb in 2017, putting me into the beginnings of an unhealthy place I don't want to be6. It's also fairly annoying to be at the upper limit of most of my clothing, to be frank. My goal is to use the above 3 points to try to lose 25+ pounds in 2017, OR return to the range of a size 8-107 where my clothing lives. 25/2017. A half a pound a week will do.

Writing. lassarina is my partner here; we have pledged to write a fic a week of at least 100 words using a list of prompts we gathered earlier. (Of course, I am already behind, although I plan to work on that immediately after this entry.) 52/2017. The hope, of course, is that writing small things helps to spur the writing of larger things. They will be posted on AO3 and linked from here.

subgoal: at least 1 entry a week on DW (52/2017), and 1 entry a week on my secret business blog which I will share once I have some substance (52/2017).

Art. justira is my partner here; we have, quite hilariously, pledged to draw a thing a day. For Ira, those things may be recognizable as art; for me, I reserve the right to draw a shit doodle with my finger on my iPhone, as long as it is a drawing of some sort. They'll be posted right here at the Feymarch Library where most of my art shame lives.

Home. Of course I have big statements to make about the first floor remodel I want to do, but honestly this is about habits, so my 2017 goal is to declutter my life. Every day I will do at least 1 chore dedicated to decluttering my home8 or otherwise making my life easier (cooking a big meal for the week, etc).

Mental. A few mantras I am focusing on:

Allow hobbies to be chores. This sounds counter-intuitive, but last year I got away from a lot of hobbies I love because I had "so much other shit to do" that was more important in my mind. This year, writing, art, knitting, gaming, reading; these are allowed to be chores I can give priority to. It's okay to write if I still have dishes to do.

Recharge your battery. If I have a night where I am truly in too much pain to do anything, I need to stop whining and griping about that, and instead focus on my own comfort and recovery, because self-care is allowed to be a priority, also.

Ground myself. I'm not a nice person by default9 so making a pledge to share the love or be kinder doesn't really mean anything to me; but I believe I can eliminate some of the negative energy by grounding myself more and letting it just pass on into the neutral environment rather than building up a static charge.

Be more of who you are. I lost my way at work somewhat this year faced with a gigantic new challenge with no lessening of my previous responsibilities, interpersonal conflicts, and some sporadic and questionable criticism. Moving forward I need to remember who the fuck I am and be that lady as hard as possible, because that's where I am awesomest.

Allow myself to unplug. I don't have to be tied to my phone - not just for work, but texting with friends or playing stamina games. I can leave it in the corner and just be for an evening.

Work. I need to focus on managing more: I am a manager, not a contributor, and I need to focus more on leading and guiding people in big-picture ways towards improvement. Too many people list me as a project leader or member, when I should not be a worker on anyone's project - and this is what makes my job so unmanageable. It isn't just me letting go; I need to make it clear to others that there should be more than one person who knows how to do the things I do.

Family & Friends.

See my nieces at least once a month. See my parents at least once a quarter.

Continue to work with my partner on this great relationship we have developed. Learn to ask him for help more, and learn where his boundaries are for asking help. Show love and appreciation better. Develop a good schedule for spending more time together - we are both very obviously happier and healthier when we do.

Try to visit someone or travel at least once a quarter -- traveling is really costly to me in terms of energy, but I have broken through some of my traveling-and-health fears last year (Japan!) so it would be cool to travel a bit with friends when the opportunity is there.

Stay in touch: post, email, text. Reach out in new areas.

Seven is my lucky number. That's 2017.

1 (mind palace?? nothing so fancy; my brain is a four-dimensional fully-formulated spreadsheet archive with tabs, complete with charts, graphs, and little programs that sort by categories and make a smiley face out of pixels.)

2 the first, about my fucking furnace; the second, about my fucking supervisor. stay tuned for more great literature on what makes my life a goddamned shitshow shitcom!

3 because I want to quantify it and report on things, see, like the project manager i am

4 Now, the reason I am not dead is because there is also some restless sleep in there, but the problem is twofold: (a) i only get 4.5 fucking hours of the good sleep (b) the good sleep comes in 30-45 minute spurts which is nowhere near what's needed for mental recovery (c) for fibromyalgia one of the most productive and healing things you can do is get REM sleep.

5 lolololoLLOLOLOLLOOLLOOLOLOLLLLLLLLLLL

6 lots of family history of pre-diabetes; I've already noticed my hypoglycemia and blood sugar problems are getting worse. I realize this isn't always correlated to weight but as there is some data pointing that way (scientific as well as family), I want to be sure to avoid it, because dude if you stack fuckin diabetes on top of this stack of medical bullshit I may just ravine myself

7 since women's sizes can never make up their damn minds

8 on bad days this might actually be something like "put dishes in dishwasher" but let's face it sometimes even that doesn't happen

9 nothing against anyone, I'm just kind of sociopathic and hate people in general; i've learnt to "play nice" and I can and do feel love for specific people, but i'm really just not friendly

comments Comment? http://ift.tt/2ixhKTU

[businessguide12-blog]

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

New Post has been published on https://businessqia.com/awesome/how-to-be-an-entrepreneur-the-ultimate-guide-for-2019/

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

Learning how to be an entrepreneur is simple- all you have to do is start a business!

Then why does it feel so damn intimidating?

Because most businesses don’t succeeded. In fact, they fail.

It takes a combination of mindset, ability, hard work, and sometimes luck.

The good news is you can change your thinking, learn new skills, and choose the right business idea to improve your odds drastically.

Follow these 9 steps to becoming an entrepreneur, and you’ll be well on your route to being your own boss.

Step 1. Think like an entrepreneur

How to be an entrepreneur: alteration your mindset.

Waking up one day to $20 k in repeat monthly revenue is usually the result of months( or years) of trial and error.

Successful entrepreneurs stick with their vision through the ups and downs, from one project to another. Their mentality enables action, growth, and quick recovery from setbacks.

Many entrepreneurs start side hustles while working full-time and slowly transition to being their own boss.

Cultivate these entrepreneurial mindset characteristics to think like an entrepreneur :P TAGEND 1. Decisiveness

Making a decision when you’re not 100% ready is still better than attaining no decision at all.

Entrepreneurs avoid the pitfalls of procrastination with decisiveness — both in starting a business and daily operations.

Without decisiveness, you can research your potential business for years without ever reaching a decision on one notion. You can delay launching your website while you deliberate over choosing a hosting service.

It’s easy to set decisions off indefinitely under the guise of learning more, while we’re actually just spinning in circles.

Get to work as soon as you know just enough to decide.

2. Confidence

Learning as you go is key is learning how to be an entrepreneur. So even if you’re not feeling confident, you have to keep going.

Every entrepreneur knows they’re not perfect, and they certainly don’t know everything there is to know.

But merely because they haven’t perfected a new skill, doesn’t mean they’re unfit to get out there and start using it.

As you improve, confidence will come naturally. Until then, feel free to download and publish some motivational quotes for your wall.

3. Accountability

Becoming an entrepreneur means forgetting about blaming the organizations of the system or the people around you for your situation.

When things go wrong, it’s not always your defect. But it’s always your responsibility.

Accountability means proving up and doing the work, knowing that you can only rely on yourself.

When you fail, the failure is yours to learn from. And when you succeed, the success is yours to celebrate.

4. Resilience

There are many obstacles on the path to becoming an entrepreneur, but if you really want to become one – you can’t let them stop you.

You will construct mistakes, and that’s ok. Resilience means you don’t let your failures define you.

Learn to handle failing as an inevitable part of life — and building a successful business. Even if you fall a hundred times, stand up the hundred and first.

5. Humility

It takes a certain amount of vulnerability to admit when you don’t know how to move forward. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to change the world or simply make money online, entrepreneurs have to be willing to admit when they need help.

Life-long entrepreneurs also understand that they must keep learning and growing to stay relevant. The world is changing fast, and there are always new things that are going to help them do business even better.

Humility entails understanding that you don’t know always know the answers, and you can’t always do everything by yourself.

Step 2. Act like an entrepreneur

Some people are born entrepreneurs, but most of us had to learn and practice.

Once you start thinking like an entrepreneur, it’s important to act like it. Imitating characteristics will help you alter your old mindset.

Practice acting like an entrepreneur in your everyday life, even if you’re not starting a business right now.

For example, make decisions rapidly, whether it’s choosing a restaurant or asking for a raise.

Act with confidence by trying that new workout class, even if you’re worried about appearing stupid.

When you catch yourself blaming someone else( a busy schedule, a sick infant, a mean boss) for your absence of progress, stop. Practice accountability by finding ways to move forward, instead of fixating on what’s keeping you stuck.

Facing a setback with your health, your personal life, or your job? Resilience asks that you shake it off, and try again.

To act with humility, address your weak spot. Ask for help, take a mindset course, or find a mentor to point you in the right direction on your entrepreneurial journey.

All of these things will help you prepare to start your first business. But nothing happens if you’re not taking action on your ideas.

That’s why the first principle of successful entrepreneurs is :P TAGEND

None of this works without action

So take the first steps.

Let’s say you’ve exhaustively researched your business. You know the ins and outs of your marketplace. If person awake you up at 5 am and asked you to recite your business scheme, you’d nail it.

But if your plan is still on paper – you don’t have a business.

Nothing is happening. Things just seem like they could work out.

So, how can you become an entrepreneur?

By taking action.

Taking action is the only thing that can tell you if you’re right. As James Altucher says,” without action, your business is still a dream .”

Building a successful business is a process of testing your ideas in the real world, and adjusting course as you go.

Step 3. Choose your market

Once you’re thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, it’s time to put your entrepreneurial mindset to good use.

The next few steps will guide you in deciding what kind of business you should start.

What are your skills?

Chances are, you already have some valuable knowledge, skills, and experience. To make an impact with a successful business, first consider what you can do.

When thinking about your abilities, consider everything. Not simply professional skills attained from formal education, or work experience, but pastimes, as well.

After that, it’s important to see if your abilities are in demand. Even if you’ve got obliterate abilities like crocheting, that doesn’t mean you can’t turn them into a business.

For example, people spend money to learn crafts like crochet. They buy furnishes, pattern books, and classes. Seeming at existing businesses is a clue — it shows you if a market for your abilities exists , no matter how unusual it may be.

Again, how can you become an entrepreneur? By being decisive and resilient. Even if you’re facing obstacles, find a way to overcome them- don’t mourn the fact that they’re there.

Why would someone come to you of providing assistance?

At this stage, it’s important to understand what your competitive advantage is.

Find something that differentiates you from everyone else in your niche.

Maybe it’s personality or style. For example, you could be a total badass who teaches leadership qualities.

Maybe it’s a unique situate of skills. For instance, a personal trainer who’s also a nutritionist has an edge in the health niche.

Or perhaps, you have special insight into what a particular group of people needs, from lived experience. Overcoming a personal challenge or achieving a big goal gives you first-hand knowledge that could set you apart.

Find what attains you special, and let that guide you towards the market you can serve.

Step 4. Look for problems to solve

As an entrepreneur, customer research should be your first priority.

Once you’ve identified the people you want to help( your target market) you should find out what problems they have.

For example, if you want to get into the web development business, guess beyond obvious needs, such as not having a website.

Think about the finer aspects of your prospects’ needs.

Maybe they don’t fully understand that they need your services, maybe their budgets are tight, maybe they want to work with someone who’ll understand them- even if they can’t tell the difference between a sidebar and a landing page.

Or if you wanted to teach people how to start a podcast, you would need to think beyond what kind of mic they need.

You can find out all of this( and more) by perform client research :P TAGEND

Take to social media and message boards. Explore your key terms and see what people need( and if they are necessary what you can offer) Create and share a survey Check out competitors’ customer research Research in your area, talk to your neighbors and your friends. What problems do they have? How could you help?

Be a painkiller , not a vitamin

People who have their needs mostly fulfilled are not very motivated to buy.

On the other hand, people who have a glaring problem are very motivated. They are looking for immediate help.

They are most likely to buy a product or service if it promises to ease their pain.

To help you generate business ideas in your marketplace, think about what’s make pain.

I’m not talking about profiting from people in physical ache. Being a analgesic also entails solving an inconvenience, a annoyance, or simply removing an obstacle.

Successful entrepreneurs lean towards making analgesic products- delivering immediate solutions to alleviate customers’ pain.

They can become vitamins later with upsells and extra services, but being the painkiller- the immediate solution to pressing problems- is a priority.

Step 5. Decide what business to start

Once you understand your market and your advantages as an entrepreneur, it’s time to answer the big question :P TAGEND What business should I start?

If you already have a promising business idea, that’s great. Congratulations!

If you don’t have the answer yet- don’t worry.

You can find the best business idea for you with the information you uncovered in Steps 3 and 4.

Basically, you need clarity on these three things :P TAGEND

Who are you helping? Identify your ideal client. How will you help them? What product or service will you provide to solve their problem? What induces your business different? Give people reasons to choose your business over the competition.

Your best business idea will leverage your skills and interests, and match them with a problem or need in your market.

Step 6. Execute on your notion

Remember: none of this works if you don’t take action.

By the time you reach this step, you’ve already done your research. You understand your market, understand your audience, and you know what your competitor is doing.

It’s time to start creating fearlessly. This can entail putting up a website and creating content to build an audience. Or it was able to mean starting to build a product.

No matter what you do, get started.

How to be an entrepreneur: Create something out of nothing

Why do people want to become entrepreneurs? Often, it’s out of a desire to create.

Entrepreneurs take ideas and turn them into communities of people making a change in the world. They take business plans jotted down on napkins and turn them into profits and delight.

Whether it’s a more fulfilling life, a thriving business, or selling online courses that help people, entrepreneurship is about creating.

That means entrepreneurs experience all of the ups and downs that come with creative work. Anxiety, anxiety of failure, and imposter disorder are par for the course.

What if it’s a terrible idea? What if nobody likes it? What if I’m not cut out for operating a business?

If you want to be an entrepreneur, put aside all that creative angst, and simply do the work.

Start with the end in intellect

Keep your aim aim in mind at all day. If you are looking to start online, you need to choose an online business model before starting- and stick to it.

Many businesses don’t get off the ground because the scope of the project keeps get bigger.

For example, the cooking blog you want to start turns into an idea for a recipe app. Then you decide the recipe app has to include shopping lists and video tutorials, plus you can’t think of the perfect lead magnet to build your email list.

All of this before you’ve finished constructing the initial notion — learning how to start a blog.

If you keep the end in mind, you’ll avoid scope creep– uncontrolled growth or demands of your project.

Scope creep can derail your entire vision, so it’s important to keep your end goal in mind for each stage of building your business.

Don’t be afraid of the blank space- the nothingness. Your job as an entrepreneur is to induce things happen in that space.

More importantly, don’t be afraid to launch.

Step 7. Launch and learn

One of the most critical steps to becoming an entrepreneur is launching and learning.

Most successful entrepreneurs have projects behind them that turned out less than stellar. But they don’t consider their early attempts failures.

Why?

Because every project that that doesn’t turn out right is not a failure — it’s a lesson.

If you aren’t embarrassed by your first version, you waited too long to launch.

The first version of any project or product is rarely perfect, but it has to be out there to become better.

Once there’s an existing version that customers can interact with, you have a chance to learn. You will find out what your marketplace needs and doesn’t need.

Without that first imperfect version, you’d still be theorizing. You might expend even more time( and fund ), on products or features that aren’t needed. Instead, you will get customer feedback that results you towards a better product.

Entrepreneurs taken any steps and launch before they’re ready , not because they’re risk-takers. They do it because they know that no research can replace the first-hand experience.

Your business will never be worse than it is today

Your project can’t get any worse by launching a version. It can only get better.

The same is true for you, as an entrepreneur. You will only get better at all of these steps by doing them. If your first idea doesn’t work out as schemed, you’ll know more about choosing your next one.

Launch and iterate.

That’s when you really start growing.

Step 8. Start small, but suppose big

Customers today want to interact on a personal level with businesses.

Big firms spend a lot of money trying to appear small and friendly.

Why?

Well, think about visiting your local small business. The owner knows you by name. They may even know some details of your life. They certainly know your order.

It’s such a pleasure to buy from them because they value each and every customer.

Then think about a big chain supermarket. It has low prices but it’s impersonal. It feels more like a warehouse than a family-owned shop.

If another big chain has lower costs, you’ll go there instead.

Small is irreplaceable. Small makes an impact and adds value.

So don’t worry about appear bigger than the competitor. That’s a lot of pressure you can set aside as you launch your first business.

Start small, and focus on your customers.

Entrepreneurs have a reputation as visionary, and yes, we do make outrageous goals.

Conserving the essence of being small will help you get there.

Step 9. Develop the habits of successful entrepreneurs

I’m bringing you full circle, back to Steps 1 and 2 with this final, essential step.

That’s right, I’m talking about thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, by learning some next-level mindset hacks.

Here’s the truth: Being an entrepreneur is hard.

When you have no boss, you get to decide how much you want to work. The flip side is that you have to motivate yourself, and your squad, even when you’re not feeling it.

Now that you’re an entrepreneur, you can define what success looks like and set your own goals. But you also have to decide where to focus your efforts each day for the biggest impact.

Here’s what assists :P TAGEND Constant learning

On my podcast, I’ve interviewed more than 400 entrepreneurs. They come from all kinds of backgrounds. Some have business degrees, and some never graduated high school.

The common thread is entrepreneurs tend to be lifelong learners. They read books, listen to podcasts, and take courses. They seek out mentors and hire business coaches.

Here’s how to develop your constant learning habit :P TAGEND

Daily reading: Here’s a list of the best business books to learn new tactics and remain motivated. Upgrade your abilities: This might sound obvious, but when you don’t know how to do something, seek out information and learn how. Many people struggle with a fixed mindset and believe they aren’t natural salesman, or technology is beyond them. Whether it’s writing a sales page or taking your business online, you can learn. Learn enough to be dangerous: Make sure you know enough about every aspect of your business to make good decisions — especially deciding when to hire an expert and when to do it yourself.

Stay physically and mentally healthy

Do what it takes to stay healthy, both physically and mentally.

I’m no health guru, but I know that entrepreneurs perform much better with :P TAGEND

Daily exercise and sleep: Make time for physical activity and get enough sleep. Connection: Running a business can be lonely, especially in the early days when it’s simply you. Start a mastermind group, or join forums where you can talk to other entrepreneurs going through similar struggles. Support: Sometimes we all need a little help. That’s why it’s a good idea to hire advisors, coaches, and even therapists when you need them. Don’t wait for burnout.

How to be an entrepreneur: Your next steps

Now you know how entrepreneurs are made. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a risk-taker or have a ground-breaking idea.

Just follow the steps to change your mindset, clarify your business notion, and maintain growing.

Your next step is to take our PROVEN course and learn to harness your entrepreneurial mindset.

The post How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019 seemed first on Hack the Entrepreneur.

Read more: hacktheentrepreneur.com

[craftsguide]

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

New Post has been published on https://craftsguideto.com/awesome/how-to-be-an-entrepreneur-the-ultimate-guide-for-2019/

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

Read more: http :// www.ifunny.com // pictures/ mami-can-you-read-me-story-no-baby /

Learning how to be an entrepreneur is simple- all you have to do is start a business!

Then why does it feel so damn intimidating?

Because most businesses don’t succeed. In fact, they fail.

It takes a combination of mindset, skill, hard work, and sometimes luck.

The good news is you can change your thinking, learn new abilities, and prefer the right business idea to improve your odds drastically.

Follow these 9 steps to becoming an entrepreneur, and you’ll be well on your way to being your own boss.

Step 1. Think like an entrepreneur

How to be an entrepreneur: alteration your mindset.

Waking up one day to $20 k in recurring monthly revenue is usually the result of months( or years) of trial and error.

Successful entrepreneurs stick with their vision through the ups and downs, from one project to another. Their mentality enables action, growth, and quick recovery from setbacks.

Many entrepreneurs start side hustles while working full-time and slowly transition to being their own boss.

Cultivate these entrepreneurial mindset characteristics to think like an entrepreneur :P TAGEND 1. Decisiveness

Making a decision when you’re not 100% ready is still better than inducing no decision at all.

Entrepreneurs avoid paying pitfalls of procrastination with decisiveness — both in starting a business and daily operations.

Without decisiveness, you can research your potential business for years without ever reaching a decision on one notion. You can delay launching your website while you deliberate over choosing a hosting service.

It’s easy to put decisions off indefinitely under the guise of learning more, while we’re actually only spinning in circles.

Get to work as soon as you know just enough to decide.

2. Confidence

Learning as you go is key is learning how to be an entrepreneur. So even if you’re not feeling confident, you have to keep going.

Every entrepreneur knows they’re not perfect, and they certainly don’t know everything there is to know.

But just because they haven’t perfected a new skill, doesn’t mean they’re unfit to get out there and start using it.

As you improve, confidence will come naturally. Until then, feel free to download and print some motivational quotes for your wall.

3. Accountability

Becoming an entrepreneur means forgetting about blaming the system or the people around you for your situation.

When things go wrong, it’s not always your defect. But it’s always your responsibility.

Accountability means depicting up and doing the work, knowing that you can only are dependent upon yourself.

When you fail, the failing is yours to learn from. And when you succeed, the success is yours to celebrate.

4. Resilience

There are many obstacles on the path to becoming an entrepreneur, but if you really want to become one – you can’t let them stop you.

You will induce mistakes, and that’s ok. Resilience means you don’t let your failures define you.

Learn to handle fail as an inevitable part of life — and house a successful business. Even if you fall a hundred times, stand up the hundred and first.

5. Humility

It takes a certain amount of vulnerability to admit when you don’t know how to move forward. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to change the world or just make money online, entrepreneurs have to be willing to admit when they need help.

Life-long entrepreneurs also understand that they must keep learning and growing to stay relevant. The world is changing fast, and there are always new things that are going to help them do business even better.

Humility entails understanding that you don’t know always know the answers, and you can’t always do everything by yourself.

Step 2. Act like an entrepreneur

Some people are born entrepreneurs, but most of us had to learn and practice.

Once you start thinking like an entrepreneur, it’s important to act like it. Imitating characteristics will help you alter your old mindset.

Practice acting like an entrepreneur in your everyday life, even if you’re not starting a business right now.

For example, make decisions rapidly, whether it’s choosing a restaurant or asking for a raise.

Act with confidence by trying that new workout class, even if you’re expresses concern about looking stupid.

When you catch yourself blaming someone else( a busy schedule, a sick infant, a mean boss) for your absence of progress, stop. Practice accountability by finding ways to move forward, instead of fixating on what’s keeping you stuck.

Facing a setback with your health, your personal life, or your job? Resilience asks that you shake it off, and try again.

To act with humility, address your weak spots. Ask for help, take a mindset course, or find a mentor to point you in the right direction on your entrepreneurial journey.

All of these things will help you prepare to start your first business. But nothing happens if you’re not taking action on your ideas.

That’s why the first principle of successful entrepreneurs is :P TAGEND

None of this works without action

So take the first steps.

Let’s say you’ve thoroughly researched your business. You know the ins and outs of your marketplace. If person woke you up at 5 am and asked you to recite your business scheme, you’d nail it.

But if your scheme is still on paper – you don’t have a business.

Nothing is happening. Things just seem like they could work out.

So, how can you become an entrepreneur?

By taking action.

Taking action is the only thing that can tell you if you’re right. As James Altucher says,” without action, your business is still a dream .”

Building a successful business is a process of testing your ideas in the real world, and adjusting course as you go.

Step 3. Choose your market

Once you’re thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, it’s time to put your entrepreneurial mindset to good use.

The next few steps used to guide you in deciding what kind of business you should start.

What are your skills?

Chances are, you already have some valuable knowledge, abilities, and experience. To make an impact with a successful business, first consider what you can do.

When thinking about your abilities, consider everything. Not only professional skills reached from formal education, or work experience, but hobbies, as well.

After that, it’s important to see if your skills are in demand. Even if you’ve get obliterate abilities like crocheting, that doesn’t mean you can’t turn them into a business.

For example, people spend money to learn crafts like crochet. They buy furnishes, pattern volumes, and classes. Looking at existing businesses is a clue — it shows you if a market for your skills exists , no matter how unusual it may be.

Again, how can you become an entrepreneur? By being decisive and resilient. Even if you’re facing obstacles, find a way to overcome them- don’t mourn the fact that they’re there.

Why would someone come to you of providing assistance?

At this stage, it’s important to understand what your competitive advantage is.

Find something that differentiates you from everyone else in your niche.

Maybe it’s personality or style. For instance, you could be a total badass who teaches leadership qualities.

Maybe it’s a unique set of abilities. For example, a personal trainer who’s also a nutritionist has an edge in the health niche.

Or maybe, you have special insight into what a particular group of people needs, from lived experience. Overcoming a personal challenge or achieving a big goal gives you first-hand knowledge that could defined you apart.

Find what builds you special, and let that guide you towards the market you can serve.

Step 4. Look for problems to solve

As an entrepreneur, client research should be your first priority.

Once you’ve identified the people you want to help( your target marketplace) you should find out what problems they have.

For example, if you want to get into the web development business, think beyond obvious needs, such as not having a website.

Think about the finer aspects of your prospects’ needs.

Maybe they don’t fully understand that they need your services, maybe their budgets are tight, perhaps they want to work with someone who’ll understand them- even if they can’t tell the difference between a sidebar and a landing page.

Or if you wanted to teach people how to start a podcast, you would need to think beyond what kind of mic they need.

You can find out all of this( and more) by perform client research :P TAGEND

Take to social media and message boards. Explore your key terms and see what people need( and if they need what you can offer) Create and share a survey Check out competitors’ customer research Research in your area, talk to your neighbors and your friends. What problems do they have? How could you help?

Be a analgesic , not a vitamin

People who have their needs mostly fulfilled are not very motivated to buy.

On the other hand, people who have a glaring problem are very motivated. They are looking for immediate help.

They are most likely to buy a product or service if it promises to ease their pain.

To help you generate business ideas in your market, think about what’s induce pain.

I’m not talking about profiting from people in physical pain. Being a painkiller also entails solving an inconvenience, a annoyance, or simply removing an obstacle.

Successful entrepreneurs lean towards making analgesic products- delivering immediate solutions to alleviate customers’ pain.

They can become vitamins later with upsells and extra services, but being the painkiller- the immediate solution to pressing problems- is a priority.

Step 5. Decide what business to start

Once you understand your market and your advantages as an entrepreneur, it’s time to answer the great question :P TAGEND What business should I start?

If you already have a promising business idea, that’s great. Congratulations!

If you don’t have the answer yet- don’t worry.

You can find the best business idea for you with the information you uncovered in Steps 3 and 4.

Basically, you need clarity on these three things :P TAGEND

Who are you helping? Identify your ideal customer. How will you help them? What product or service will you provide to solve their problem? What constructs your business different? Give people reasons to choose your business over the competitor.

Your best business idea will leverage your skills and interests, and match them with a problem or need in your market.

Step 6. Execute on your notion

Remember: none of this works if you don’t take action.

By the time you reach this step, you’ve already done your research. You understand your market, understand your audience, and you know what your competition is doing.

It’s time to start creating fearlessly. This can mean putting up a website and creating content to build an audience. Or it was able to mean starting to build a product.

No matter what you do, get started.

How to be an entrepreneur: Create something out of nothing

Why do people want to become entrepreneurs? Often, it’s out of a desire to create.

Entrepreneurs take ideas and turn them into communities of people making a change in the world. They take business schemes jotted down on napkins and turn them into profits and delight.

Whether it’s a more fulfilling life, a thriving business, or selling online courses that help people, entrepreneurship is about creating.

That entails entrepreneurs experience all of the ups and downs that come with creative work. Anxiety, dread of failing, and imposter disorder are par for the course.

What if it’s a terrible idea? What if nobody likes it? What if I’m not cut out for operating a business?

If you want to be an entrepreneur, put aside all that creative angst, and just do the work.

Start with the end in mind

Keep your objective aim in mind at all times. If you are looking to start online, you need to choose an online business model before starting- and stick to it.

Many business don’t get off the ground because the scope of the project holds get bigger.

For example, the cooking blog you want to start turns into an idea for a recipe app. Then you decide the recipe app has to include shopping lists and video tutorials, plus you can’t think of the perfect lead magnet to build your email list.

All of this before you’ve finished building the initial idea — learning how to start a blog.

If you keep the end in intellect, you’ll avoided scope creep– uncontrolled growth or demands of your project.

Scope creep can derail your entire vision, so it’s important to keep your end goal in mind for each stage of building your business.

Don’t be afraid of the blank space- the nothingness. Your job as an entrepreneur is to stimulate things happen in that space.

More importantly, don’t be afraid to launch.

Step 7. Launch and learn

One of the most critical steps to becoming an entrepreneur is launching and learning.

Most successful entrepreneurs have projects behind them that turned out less than stellar. But they don’t consider their early attempts failures.

Why?

Because every project that that doesn’t turn out right is not a failure — it’s a lesson.

If you aren’t embarrassed by your first version, you waited too long to launch.

The first version of any project or product is rarely perfect, but it has to be out there to become better.

Once there’s an existing version that customers can interact with, you have a chance to learn. You will find out what your marketplace needs and doesn’t need.

Without that first imperfect version, you’d still be speculating. You might expend even more time( and fund ), on products or features that aren’t needed. Instead, you will get customer feedback that leads you towards a better product.

Entrepreneurs take action and launch before they’re ready , not because they’re risk-takers. They do it because they know that no research can replace the first-hand experience.

Your business will never be worse than it is today

Your project can’t get any worse by launching a version. It can only get better.

The same is true for you, as an entrepreneur. You will only get better at all of these steps by doing them. If your first notion doesn’t work out as schemed, you’ll know more about choosing your next one.

Launch and iterate.

That’s when you really start growing.

Step 8. Start small, but think big

Customers today want to interact on a personal level with businesses.

Big corporations spend a lot of money trying to appear small and friendly.

Why?

Well, think about visiting your local small business. The proprietor knows you by name. They may even know some details of your life. They certainly know your order.

It’s such a delight to buy from them because they value each and every customer.

Then think about a big chain supermarket. It has low prices but it’s impersonal. It feels more like a warehouse than a family-owned shop.

If another big chain has lower prices, you’ll go there instead.

Small is irreplaceable. Small makes an impact and adds value.

So don’t worry about looking bigger than the rivalry. That’s a lot of pressure you can set aside as you launch your first business.

Start small, and focus on your customers.

Entrepreneurs have a reputation as visionary, and yes, we do make outrageous goals.

Conserving the essence of being small will help you get there.

Step 9. Develop the habits of successful entrepreneurs

I’m bringing you full circle, back to Steps 1 and 2 with this final, essential step.

That’s right, I’m talking about thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, by learning some next-level mindset hackers.

Here’s the truth: Being an entrepreneur is hard.

When you have no boss, you get to decide how much you want to work. The flip side is that you have to motivate yourself, and your squad, even when you’re not feeling it.

Now that you’re an entrepreneur, you can define what success looks like and set your own aims. But you also have to decide where to focus your efforts each day for the biggest impact.

Here’s what helps :P TAGEND Constant learn

On my podcast, I’ve interviewed more than 400 entrepreneurs. They come from all kinds of backgrounds. Some have business degrees, and some never graduated high school.

The common thread is entrepreneurs tend to be lifelong learners. They read books, listen to podcasts, and take courses. They seek out mentors and hire business coaches.

Here’s how to develop your constant learning habit :P TAGEND

Daily reading: Here’s a list of the best business books to learn new tactics and bide motivated. Upgrade your abilities: This might sound obvious, but when you don’t know how to do something, seek out information and learn how. Many people struggle with a fixed mindset and believe they aren’t natural salespeople, or technology is beyond them. Whether it’s writing a sales page or taking your business online, you can learn. Learn enough to be dangerous: Make sure you know enough about every aspect of your business to make good decisions — especially deciding when to hire an expert and when to do it yourself.

Stay physically and mentally healthy

Do what it takes to stay healthy, both physically and mentally.

I’m no health guru, but I know that entrepreneurs perform much better with :P TAGEND

Daily exercise and sleep: Make time for physical activity and get enough sleep. Connection: Running a business can be lonely, especially in the early days when it’s just you. Start a mastermind group, or join forums where you can talk to other entrepreneurs going through similar conflicts. Support: Sometimes we all need a little help. That’s why it’s a good notion to hire advisors, coaches, and even therapists when you need them. Don’t wait for burnout.

How to be an entrepreneur: Your next steps

Now you know how entrepreneurs are made. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a risk-taker or have a ground-breaking idea.

Just follow the steps to change your mindset, clarify your business notion, and keep growing.

Your next step is to take our PROVEN course and learn to harness your entrepreneurial mindset.

The post How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019 appeared first on Hack the Entrepreneur.

Read more: hacktheentrepreneur.com

[currenthealtheventsblog-blog]

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

New Post has been published on https://currenthealthevents.net/awesome/how-to-be-an-entrepreneur-the-ultimate-guide-for-2019/

How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019

Learning how to be an entrepreneur is simple- all you have to do is start a business!

Then why does it feel so damn intimidating?

Because most businesses don’t succeed. In fact, they fail.

It takes a combination of mindset, ability, hard work, and sometimes luck.

The good news is you can change your thinking, learn new skills, and choose the right business idea to improve your odds drastically.

Follow these 9 steps to becoming an entrepreneur, and you’ll be well on your route to being your own boss.

Step 1. Think like an entrepreneur

How to be an entrepreneur: change your mindset.

Waking up one day to $20 k in recurring monthly revenue is usually the result of months( or years) of trial and error.

Successful entrepreneurs stick with their vision through the ups and downs, from one project to another. Their mentality enables action, growth, and quick recovery from setbacks.

Many entrepreneurs start side hustles while working full-time and slowly transition to being their own boss.

Cultivate these entrepreneurial mindset characteristics to think like an entrepreneur :P TAGEND 1. Decisiveness

Making a decision when you’re not 100% ready is still better than constructing no decision at all.

Entrepreneurs avoid the pitfalls of procrastination with decisiveness — both in starting a business and daily operations.

Without decisiveness, you can research your potential business for years without ever reaching a decision on one idea. You can delay launching your website while you deliberate over choosing a hosting service.

It’s easy to set decisions off indefinitely under the guise of learning more, while we’re actually simply spinning in circles.

Get to work as soon as you know just enough to decide.

2. Confidence

Learning as you go is key is learning how to be an entrepreneur. So even if you’re not feeling confident, you have to keep going.

Every entrepreneur knows they’re not perfect, and they certainly don’t know everything there is to know.

But simply because they haven’t perfected a new skill, doesn’t mean they’re unfit to get out there and start using it.

As you improve, confidence will come naturally. Until then, feel free to download and print some motivational quotes for your wall.

3. Accountability

Becoming an entrepreneur means forgetting about blaming the organizations of the system or the people around you for your situation.

When things go wrong, it’s not always your flaw. But it’s always your responsibility.

Accountability means proving up and doing the run, knowing that you can only rely on yourself.

When you fail, the failure is yours to learn from. And when you succeed, the success is yours to celebrate.

4. Resilience

There are many obstacles on the path to becoming an entrepreneur, but if you really want to become one – you can’t let them stop you.

You will induce blunders, and that’s ok. Resilience means you don’t let your failures define you.

Learn to handle failing as an inevitable part of life — and build a successful business. Even if you fall a hundred times, stand up the hundred and first.

5. Humility

It takes a certain amount of vulnerability to admit when you don’t know how to move forward. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to change the world or only make money online, entrepreneurs have to be willing to admit when they need help.

Life-long entrepreneurs also understand that they must keep learning and growing to stay relevant. The world is changing fast, and there are always new things that are going to help them do business even better.

Humility entails understanding that you don’t know always know the answers, and you can’t always do everything by yourself.

Step 2. Act like an entrepreneur

Some people are born entrepreneurs, but most of us had to learn and practice.

Once you start thinking like an entrepreneur, it’s important to act like it. Emulating characteristics will help you alter your old mindset.

Practice acting like an entrepreneur in your everyday life, even if you’re not starting a business right now.

For example, make decisions quickly, whether it’s choosing a restaurant or asking for a raise.

Act with confidence by trying that new workout class, even if you’re worried about appearing stupid.

When you catch yourself blaming someone else( a busy schedule, a sick child, a mean boss) for your lack of progress, stop. Practice accountability by finding ways to move forward, instead of fixating on what’s keeping you stuck.

Facing a setback with your health, your personal life, or your job? Resilience asks that you shake it off, and try again.

To act with humility, address your weak spot. Ask for help, take a mindset course, or find a mentor to phase you in the right direction on your entrepreneurial journey.

All of these things will help you prepare to start your first business. But nothing happens if you’re not taking action on your ideas.

That’s why the first principle of successful entrepreneurs is :P TAGEND

None of this works without action

So take the first steps.

Let’s say you’ve exhaustively researched your business. You know the ins and outs of your marketplace. If person woke you up at 5 am and asked you to recite your business plan, you’d nail it.

But if your scheme is still on paper – you don’t have a business.

Nothing is happening. Things just seem like they could work out.

So, how can you become an entrepreneur?

By taking action.

Taking action is the only thing that can tell you if you’re right. As James Altucher says,” without action, your business is still a dream .”

Building a successful business is a process of testing your ideas in the real world, and adjusting course as you go.

Step 3. Choose your market

Once you’re thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, it’s time to put your entrepreneurial mindset to good use.

The next few steps will guide you in deciding what kind of business you should start.

What are your skills?

Chances are, you already have some valuable knowledge, skills, and experience. To make an impact with a successful business, first consider what you can do.

When thinking about your skills, consider everything. Not merely professional skills attained from formal education, or work experience, but hobbies, as well.

After that, it’s important to see if your skills are in demand. Even if you’ve get overshadow abilities like crocheting, that doesn’t mean you can’t turn them into a business.

For example, people spend money to learn crafts like crochet. They buy furnishes, pattern volumes, and class. Looking at existing businesses is a clue — it shows you if a market for your abilities exists , no matter how unusual it may be.

Again, how can you become an entrepreneur? By being decisive and resilient. Even if you’re facing obstacles, find a way to overcome them- don’t mourn the fact that they’re there.

Why would someone come to you of providing assistance?

At this stage, it’s important to understand what your competitive advantage is.

Find something that differentiates you from everyone else in your niche.

Maybe it’s personality or style. For instance, you could be a total badass who teaches leadership qualities.

Maybe it’s a unique situated of abilities. For instance, a personal trainer who’s also a nutritionist has an edge in the health niche.

Or maybe, you have special insight into what a particular group of people needs, from lived experience. Overcoming a personal challenge or achieving a big goal gives you first-hand knowledge that could set you apart.

Find what attains you special, and let that guide you towards the market you can serve.

Step 4. Look for problems to solve

As an entrepreneur, client research should be your first priority.

Once you’ve identified the people you want to help( your target market) you should find out what problems they have.

For example, if you want to get into the web development business, guess beyond obvious needs, such as not having a website.

Think about the finer aspects of your prospects’ needs.

Maybe they don’t fully understand that they need your services, perhaps their budgets are tight, perhaps they want to work with someone who’ll understand them- even if they can’t tell the difference between a sidebar and a landing page.

Or if you wanted to teach people how to start a podcast, you would need to think beyond what kind of mic they need.

You can find out all of this( and more) by perform client research :P TAGEND

Take to social media and message committees. Explore your key terms and see what people need( and if they are necessary what you can offer) Create and share a survey Check out competitors’ client research Research in your area, talk to your neighbors and your friends. What problems do they have? How could you help?

Be a painkiller , not a vitamin

People who have their needs mostly satisfied are not very motivated to buy.

On the other hand, people who have a glaring problem are very motivated. They are looking for immediate help.

They are most likely to buy a product or service if it promises to ease their pain.

To help you generate business ideas in your market, think about what’s induce pain.

I’m not talking about profiting from people in physical pain. Being a painkiller also means solving an inconvenience, a frustration, or simply removing an obstacle.

Successful entrepreneurs lean towards creating analgesic products- delivering immediate solutions to alleviate customers’ pain.

They can become vitamins later with upsells and extra services, but being the analgesic- the immediate solution to pressing problems- is a priority.

Step 5. Decide what business to start

Once you understand your market and your advantages as an entrepreneur, it’s time to answer the great question :P TAGEND What business should I start?

If you already have a promising business idea, that’s great. Congratulations!

If you don’t have the answer yet- don’t worry.

You can find the best business idea for you with the information you uncovered in Steps 3 and 4.

Basically, you need clarity on these three things :P TAGEND

Who are you helping? Identify your ideal customer. How will you help them? What product or service will you provide to solve their problem? What induces your business different? Give people reasons to choose your business over the rivalry.

Your best business idea will leverage your skills and interests, and match them with a problem or need in your market.

Step 6. Execute on your notion

Remember: none of this works if you don’t take action.

By the time you reach this step, you’ve already done your research. You understand your market, understand your audience, and you know what your competitor is doing.

It’s time to start creating fearlessly. This can entail putting up a website and creating content to build an audience. Or it could mean starting to build a product.

No matter what you do, get started.

How to be an entrepreneur: Create something out of nothing

Why do people want to become entrepreneurs? Often, it’s out of a desire to create.

Entrepreneurs take ideas and turn them into communities of people making a change in the world. They take business schemes jotted down on napkins and turn them into profits and delight.

Whether it’s a more fulfilling life, a thriving business, or selling online courses that help people, entrepreneurship is about creating.

That means entrepreneurs experience all of the ups and downs that come with creative work. Anxiety, anxiety of failure, and imposter syndrome are par for the course.

What if it’s a terrible idea? What if nobody likes it? What if I’m not cut out for running a business?

If you want to be an entrepreneur, put aside all that creative angst, and just do the work.

Start with the end in intellect

Keep your end objective in mind at all day. If you are looking to start online, you need to choose an online business model before starting- and stick to it.

Many industries don’t get off the ground because the scope of the project keeps get bigger.

For example, the cook blog you want to start turns into an idea for a recipe app. Then you decide the recipe app has to include shopping lists and video tutorials, plus you can’t think of the perfect lead magnet to build your email list.

All of this before you’ve finished constructing the initial notion — learning how to start a blog.

If you keep the end in mind, you’ll avoided scope creep– uncontrolled growth or demands of your project.

Scope creep can derail your entire vision, so it’s important to keep your end goal in mind for each stage of building your business.

Don’t be afraid of the blank space- the nothingness. Your job as an entrepreneur is to build things happen in that space.

More importantly, don’t be afraid to launch.

Step 7. Launch and learn

One of the most critical steps to becoming an entrepreneur is launching and learning.

Most successful entrepreneurs have projects behind them that turned out less than stellar. But they don’t consider their early attempts failures.

Why?

Because every project that that doesn’t turn out right is not a failing — it’s a lesson.

If you aren’t embarrassed by your first version, you waited too long to launch.

The first version of any project or product is rarely perfect, but it has to be out there to become better.

Once there’s an existing version that customers can interact with, you have a chance to learn. You will find out what your marketplace needs and doesn’t need.

Without that first imperfect version, you’d still be speculating. You might invest even more time( and money ), on products or features that aren’t needed. Instead, you will get customer feedback that leads you towards a better product.

Entrepreneurs taken any steps and launching before they’re ready , not because they’re risk-takers. They do it because they know that no research can replace the first-hand experience.

Your business will never be worse than it is today

Your project can’t get any worse by launching a version. It is currently get better.

The same is true for you, as an entrepreneur. You will merely get better at all of these steps by doing them. If your first notion doesn’t work out as planned, you’ll know more about choosing your next one.

Launch and iterate.

That’s when you really start growing.

Step 8. Start small, but think big

Customers today want to interact on a personal level with businesses.

Big firms spend a lot of money trying to appear small and friendly.

Why?

Well, think about visiting your local small business. The owned knows you by name. They may even know some details of your life. They certainly know your order.

It’s such a pleasure to buy from them because they value each and every customer.

Then think about a big chain supermarket. It has low prices but it’s impersonal. It feels more like a warehouse than a family-owned shop.

If another big chain has lower costs, you’ll go there instead.

Small is irreplaceable. Small makes an impact and adds value.

So don’t worry about appear bigger than the rivalry. That’s a lot of pressure you can set aside as you launch your first business.

Start small, and focus on your customers.

Entrepreneurs have a reputation as visionary, and yes, we do make outrageous goals.

Conserving the essence of being small will help you get there.

Step 9. Develop the habits of successful entrepreneurs

I’m bringing you full circle, back to Steps 1 and 2 with this final, essential step.

That’s right, I’m talking about thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, by learn some next-level mindset hackers.

Here’s the truth: Being an entrepreneur is hard.

When you have no boss, you get to decide how much you want to work. The flip side is that you have to motivate yourself, and your squad, even when you’re not feeling it.

Now that you’re an entrepreneur, you can define what success looks like and set your own goals. But you also have to decide where to focus your efforts each day for the biggest impact.

Here’s what assists :P TAGEND Constant learn

On my podcast, I’ve interviewed more than 400 entrepreneurs. They come from all kinds of backgrounds. Some have business degrees, and some never graduated high school.

The common thread is entrepreneurs tend to be lifelong learners. They read books, listen to podcasts, and take courses. They seek out mentors and hire business coaches.

Here’s how to develop your constant learning habit :P TAGEND

Daily reading: Here’s a listing of the best business books to learn new tactics and bide motivated. Upgrade your skills: This might voice obvious, but when you don’t know how to do something, seek out information and learn how. Many people struggle with a fixed mindset and believe they aren’t natural salesman, or technology is beyond them. Whether it’s writing a sales page or taking your business online, you can learn. Learn enough to be dangerous: Make sure you know enough about every aspect of your business to make good decisions — especially deciding when to hire an expert and when to do it yourself.

Stay physically and mentally healthy

Do what it takes to stay healthy, both physically and mentally.

I’m no health guru, but I know that entrepreneurs perform much better with :P TAGEND

Daily exercise and sleep: Make time for physical activity and get enough sleep. Connection: Running a business can be lonely, especially in the early days when it’s simply you. Start a mastermind group, or join forums where you can talk to other entrepreneurs going through similar battles. Support: Sometimes we all need a little help. That’s why it’s a good idea to hire advisors, coaches, and even therapists when you need them. Don’t wait for burnout.

How to be an entrepreneur: Your next steps

Now you know how entrepreneurs are made. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a risk-taker or have a ground-breaking idea.

Just follow the steps to change your mindset, clarify your business notion, and maintain growing.

Your next step is to take our PROVEN course and learn to harness your entrepreneurial mindset.

The post How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019 appeared first on Hack the Entrepreneur.

Read more: hacktheentrepreneur.com

[batclevercandystudent]

Learning how to be an entrepreneur is simple – all you have to do is start a business!

Then why does it feel so damn intimidating?

Because most businesses don’t succeed. In fact, they fail.

It takes a combination of mindset, skill, hard work, and sometimes luck.

The good news is you can change your thinking, learn new skills, and choose the right business idea to improve your odds drastically.

Follow these 9 steps to becoming an entrepreneur, and you’ll be well on your way to being your own boss.

Step 1. Think like an entrepreneur

How to be an entrepreneur: change your mindset.

Waking up one day to $20k in recurring monthly revenue is usually the result of months (or years) of trial and error.

Successful entrepreneurs stick with their vision through the ups and downs, from one project to another. Their mentality enables action, growth, and quick recovery from setbacks.

Many entrepreneurs start side hustles while working full-time and slowly transition to being their own boss.

Cultivate these entrepreneurial mindset characteristics to think like an entrepreneur:

1. Decisiveness

Making a decision when you’re not 100% ready is still better than making no decision at all.

Entrepreneurs avoid the pitfalls of procrastination with decisiveness — both in starting a business and daily operations.

Without decisiveness, you can research your potential business for years without ever deciding on one idea. You can delay launching your website while you deliberate over choosing a hosting service.

It’s easy to put decisions off indefinitely under the guise of learning more, while we’re actually just spinning in circles.

Get to work as soon as you know just enough to decide.

2. Confidence

Learning as you go is key is learning how to be an entrepreneur. So even if you’re not feeling confident, you have to keep going.

Every entrepreneur knows they’re not perfect, and they certainly don’t know everything there is to know.

But just because they haven’t perfected a new skill, doesn’t mean they’re unfit to get out there and start using it.

As you improve, confidence will come naturally. Until then, feel free to download and print some motivational quotes for your wall.

3. Accountability

Becoming an entrepreneur means forgetting about blaming the system or the people around you for your situation.

When things go wrong, it’s not always your fault. But it’s always your responsibility.

Accountability means showing up and doing the work, knowing that you can only rely on yourself.

When you fail, the failure is yours to learn from. And when you succeed, the success is yours to celebrate.

4. Resilience

There are many obstacles on the path to becoming an entrepreneur, but if you really want to become one – you can’t let them stop you.

You will make mistakes, and that’s ok. Resilience means you don’t let your failures define you.

Learn to handle failing as an inevitable part of life — and building a successful business. Even if you fall a hundred times, stand up the hundred and first.

5. Humility

It takes a certain amount of vulnerability to admit when you don’t know how to move forward. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to change the world or just make money online, entrepreneurs have to be willing to admit when they need help.

Life-long entrepreneurs also understand that they must keep learning and growing to stay relevant. The world is changing fast, and there are always new things that are going to help them do business even better.

Humility means understanding that you don’t know always know the answers, and you can’t always do everything by yourself.

Step 2. Act like an entrepreneur

Some people are born entrepreneurs, but most of us had to learn and practice.

Once you start thinking like an entrepreneur, it’s important to act like it. Emulating characteristics will help you change your old mindset.

Practice acting like an entrepreneur in your everyday life, even if you’re not starting a business right now.

For example, make decisions quickly, whether it’s choosing a restaurant or asking for a raise.

Act with confidence by trying that new workout class, even if you’re worried about looking stupid.

When you catch yourself blaming someone else (a busy schedule, a sick child, a mean boss) for your lack of progress, stop. Practice accountability by finding ways to move forward, instead of fixating on what’s keeping you stuck.

Facing a setback with your health, your personal life, or your job? Resilience asks that you shake it off, and try again.

To act with humility, address your weak spots. Ask for help, take a mindset course, or find a mentor to point you in the right direction on your entrepreneurial journey.

All of these things will help you prepare to start your first business. But nothing happens if you’re not taking action on your ideas.

That’s why the first principle of successful entrepreneurs is:

None of this works without action

So take the first steps.

Let’s say you’ve thoroughly researched your business. You know the ins and outs of your market. If someone woke you up at 5 am and asked you to recite your business plan, you’d nail it.

But if your plan is still on paper – you don’t have a business.

Nothing is happening. Things just seem like they could work out.

So, how can you become an entrepreneur?

By taking action.

Taking action is the only thing that can tell you if you’re right. As James Altucher says, “without action, your business is still a dream.”

Building a successful business is a process of testing your ideas in the real world, and adjusting course as you go.

Step 3. Choose your market

Once you’re thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, it’s time to put your entrepreneurial mindset to good use.

The next few steps will guide you in deciding what kind of business you should start.

What are your skills?

Chances are, you already have some valuable knowledge, skills, and experience. To make an impact with a successful business, first consider what you can do.

When thinking about your skills, consider everything. Not just professional skills attained from formal education, or work experience, but hobbies, as well.

After that, it’s important to see if your skills are in demand. Even if you’ve got obscure skills like crocheting, that doesn’t mean you can’t turn them into a business.

For example, people spend money to learn crafts like crochet. They buy supplies, pattern books, and classes. Looking at existing businesses is a clue — it shows you if a market for your skills exists, no matter how unusual it may be.

Again, how can you become an entrepreneur? By being decisive and resilient. Even if you’re facing obstacles, find a way to overcome them – don’t mourn the fact that they’re there.

Why would someone come to you for help?

At this stage, it’s important to understand what your competitive advantage is.

Find something that differentiates you from everyone else in your niche.

Maybe it’s personality or style. For example, you could be a total badass who teaches leadership qualities.

Maybe it’s a unique set of skills. For example, a personal trainer who’s also a nutritionist has an edge in the health niche.

Or maybe, you have special insight into what a particular group of people needs, from lived experience. Overcoming a personal challenge or achieving a big goal gives you first-hand knowledge that could set you apart.

Find what makes you special, and let that guide you towards the market you can serve.

Step 4. Look for problems to solve

As an entrepreneur, customer research should be your first priority.

Once you’ve identified the people you want to help (your target market) you should find out what problems they have.

For example, if you want to get into the web development business, think beyond obvious needs, such as not having a website.

Think about the finer aspects of your prospects’ needs.

Maybe they don’t fully understand that they need your services, maybe their budgets are tight, maybe they want to work with someone who’ll understand them – even if they can’t tell the difference between a sidebar and a landing page.

Or if you wanted to teach people how to start a podcast, you would need to think beyond what kind of mic they need.

You can find out all of this (and more) by performing customer research:

Take to social media and message boards. Explore your key terms and see what people need (and if they need what you can offer)

Create and share a survey

Check out competitors’ customer research

Research in your area, talk to your neighbors and your friends. What problems do they have? How could you help?

Be a painkiller, not a vitamin

People who have their needs mostly satisfied are not very motivated to buy.

On the other hand, people who have a glaring problem are very motivated. They are looking for immediate help.

They are most likely to buy a product or service if it promises to ease their pain.

To help you generate business ideas in your market, think about what’s causing pain.

I’m not talking about profiting from people in physical pain. Being a painkiller also means solving an inconvenience, a frustration, or simply removing an obstacle.

Successful entrepreneurs lean towards creating painkiller products – delivering immediate solutions to alleviate customers’ pain.

They can become vitamins later with upsells and extra services, but being the painkiller – the immediate solution to pressing problems – is a priority.

Step 5. Decide what business to start

Once you understand your market and your advantages as an entrepreneur, it’s time to answer the big question:

What business should I start?

If you already have a promising business idea, that’s great. Congratulations!

If you don’t have the answer yet – don’t worry.

You can find the best business idea for you with the information you uncovered in Steps 3 and 4.

Basically, you need clarity on these three things:

Who are you helping? Identify your ideal customer.

How will you help them? What product or service will you provide to solve their problem?

What makes your business different? Give people reasons to choose your business over the competition.

Your best business idea will leverage your skills and interests, and match them with a problem or need in your market.

Step 6. Execute on your idea

Remember: none of this works if you don’t take action.

By the time you reach this step, you’ve already done your research. You understand your market, understand your audience, and you know what your competition is doing.

It’s time to start creating fearlessly. This can mean putting up a website and creating content to build an audience. Or it could mean starting to build a product.

No matter what you do, get started.

How to be an entrepreneur: Create something out of nothing

Why do people want to become entrepreneurs? Often, it’s out of a desire to create.

Entrepreneurs take ideas and turn them into communities of people making a change in the world. They take business plans jotted down on napkins and turn them into profits and delight.

Whether it’s a more fulfilling life, a thriving business, or selling online courses that help people, entrepreneurship is about creating.

That means entrepreneurs experience all of the ups and downs that come with creative work. Anxiety, fear of failure, and imposter syndrome are par for the course.

What if it’s a terrible idea? What if nobody likes it? What if I’m not cut out for running a business?

If you want to be an entrepreneur, put aside all that creative angst, and just do the work.

Start with the end in mind

Keep your end goal in mind at all times. If you are looking to start online, you need to choose an online business model before starting – and stick to it.

Many businesses don’t get off the ground because the scope of the project keeps getting bigger.

For example, the cooking blog you want to start turns into an idea for a recipe app. Then you decide the recipe app has to include shopping lists and video tutorials, plus you can’t think of the perfect lead magnet to build your email list.

All of this before you’ve finished building the initial idea — learning how to start a blog.

If you keep the end in mind, you’ll avoid scope creep – uncontrolled growth or demands of your project.

Scope creep can derail your entire vision, so it’s important to keep your end goal in mind for each stage of building your business.

Don’t be afraid of the blank space – the nothingness. Your job as an entrepreneur is to make things happen in that space.

More importantly, don’t be afraid to launch.

Step 7. Launch and learn

One of the most critical steps to becoming an entrepreneur is launching and learning.

Most successful entrepreneurs have projects behind them that turned out less than stellar. But they don’t consider their early attempts failures.

Why?

Because every project that that doesn’t turn out right is not a failure — it’s a lesson.

If you aren’t embarrassed by your first version, you waited too long to launch.

The first version of any project or product is rarely perfect, but it has to be out there to become better.

Once there’s an existing version that customers can interact with, you have a chance to learn. You will find out what your market needs and doesn’t need.

Without that first imperfect version, you’d still be speculating. You might invest even more time (and money), on products or features that aren’t needed. Instead, you will get customer feedback that leads you towards a better product.

Entrepreneurs take action and launch before they’re ready, not because they’re risk-takers. They do it because they know that no research can replace the first-hand experience.

Your business will never be worse than it is today

Your project can’t get any worse by launching a version. It can only get better.

The same is true for you, as an entrepreneur. You will only get better at all of these steps by doing them. If your first idea doesn’t work out as planned, you’ll know more about choosing your next one.

Launch and iterate.

That’s when you really start growing.

Step 8. Start small, but think big

Customers today want to interact on a personal level with businesses.

Big corporations spend a lot of money trying to appear small and friendly.

Why?

Well, think about visiting your local small business. The owner knows you by name. They may even know some details of your life. They certainly know your order.

It’s such a delight to buy from them because they value each and every customer.

Then think about a big chain supermarket. It has low prices but it’s impersonal. It feels more like a warehouse than a family-owned shop.

If another big chain has lower prices, you’ll go there instead.

Small is irreplaceable. Small makes an impact and adds value.

So don’t worry about looking bigger than the competition. That’s a lot of pressure you can set aside as you launch your first business.

Start small, and focus on your customers.

Entrepreneurs have a reputation as visionary, and yes, we do make outrageous goals.

Conserving the essence of being small will help you get there.

Step 9. Develop the habits of successful entrepreneurs

I’m bringing you full circle, back to Steps 1 and 2 with this final, essential step.

That’s right, I’m talking about thinking and acting like an entrepreneur, by learning some next-level mindset hacks.

Here’s the truth: Being an entrepreneur is hard.

When you have no boss, you get to decide how much you want to work. The flip side is that you have to motivate yourself, and your team, even when you’re not feeling it.

Now that you’re an entrepreneur, you can define what success looks like and set your own goals. But you also have to decide where to focus your efforts each day for the biggest impact.

Here’s what helps:

Constant learning

On my podcast, I’ve interviewed more than 400 entrepreneurs. They come from all kinds of backgrounds. Some have business degrees, and some never graduated high school.

The common thread is entrepreneurs tend to be lifelong learners. They read books, listen to podcasts, and take courses. They seek out mentors and hire business coaches.

Here’s how to develop your constant learning habit:

Daily reading: Here’s a list of the best business books to learn new tactics and stay motivated.

Upgrade your skills: This might sound obvious, but when you don’t know how to do something, seek out information and learn how. Many people struggle with a fixed mindset and believe they aren’t natural salespeople, or technology is beyond them. Whether it’s writing a sales page or taking your business online, you can learn.

Learn enough to be dangerous: Make sure you know enough about every aspect of your business to make good decisions — especially deciding when to hire an expert and when to do it yourself.

Stay physically and mentally healthy

Do what it takes to stay healthy, both physically and mentally.

I’m no health guru, but I know that entrepreneurs perform much better with:

Daily exercise and sleep: Make time for physical activity and get enough sleep.

Connection: Running a business can be lonely, especially in the early days when it’s just you. Start a mastermind group, or join forums where you can talk to other entrepreneurs going through similar struggles.

Support: Sometimes we all need a little help. That’s why it’s a good idea to hire advisors, coaches, and even therapists when you need them. Don’t wait for burnout.

How to be an entrepreneur: Your next steps

Now you know how entrepreneurs are made. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a risk-taker or have a ground-breaking idea.

Just follow the steps to change your mindset, clarify your business idea, and keep growing.

Your next step is to take our quiz and find out if you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur.

The post How to Be an Entrepreneur: The Ultimate Guide for 2019 appeared first on Hack the Entrepreneur.

via Hack the Entrepreneur

[junker-town]

Jadeveon Clowney is the face of the Texans defense now and he's wrecking everything

Anyone wondering how Clowney would do without teammates J.J. Watt and Whitney Mercilus got their answer last Sunday. He’s retired NFL defensive end Stephen White’s Hoss of the Week, again.

Heading into this season I was really excited to see if J.J. Watt could bounce back from back surgery to play at even close to the level he used to play. If he could, then he, and Whitney Mercilus and Jadeveon Clowney had a really good shot at being the best defensive front in all of the National Football League this year. I allowed myself to briefly imagine just what kind of carnage those three would leave in their wake if they were all finally able to stay healthy play 16 games together.

I should've known better.

Football karma, being the disrespectful asshole that it is, decided it would be totes cool to knock Watt and Mercilus out for the season after just the fifth game of the year. Not only did that mean we would all be deprived of the joy of watching that group lay waste to offenses for the rest of the season, it also shifted a lot of pressure onto Clowney's shoulders as the last guy standing for once. The former number one overall pick has played well the last couple of years and has already been named Hoss Of The Week once this season, but I don't think think anybody would've described him as the leader of that defensive front group.

Until now.

The Texans blew the doors off the Browns in Week 6, but Clowney didn't flash much. In fairness they were up 24-3 by halftime, and Clowney didn't play much in the fourth quarter. With the Texans having a bye in Week 7, however, it gave them an opportunity to really adjust to life with out Watt and Mercilus in terms of their game planing.

It also, evidently, gave Clowney an opportunity to adjust his mentality to becoming the man. If the defense needed a big play, Watt and Mercilus weren’t available, so it would likely have to come from Clowney. If his performance against the Seahawks on Sunday afternoon was any indication, he is more than up to the job.

This was the Clowney many of us were expecting to see when he came out of college. He was all over the place, just living in the Seahawks' backfield and forcing Russell Wilson to run for his life all afternoon. It ultimately wasn't quite enough to bring home the victory for the Texans, but if he can continue to play at that level, the wins will certainly come.

Clowney got his day of big plays going with 3:15 left in the first quarter. The Seahawks were facing a third-and-2 from the Seattle 31-yard line.

Clowney lined up as the right defensive end on the outside shoulder of Seahawks left tackle Rees Odhiambo. On the snap, Clowney came off the ball and punched Odhiambo dead in his chest with both hands, got full extension, and then executed a nice arm over where he snatched Odhiambo's outside shoulder with his right hand and pulled it forward while throwing his left arm over Odhiambo's head to get passed him. Clowney then dipped and turned the corner, approaching Russell Wilson just as he was about to try to throw the football.

Clowney was able to reach out with his right hand and swipe the ball out of Wilson's hand before it started forward to throw the ball for what was ultimately, correctly, ruled a sack and caused fumble.

Unfortunately for Clowney and his Texans, the ball initially looked a lot like an incomplete pass squirting forward out of Wilson's hand. Seattle tight end Luke Willson was able to recover it relatively easily 11 yards down the field. It was ruled an incomplete pass at first but, ironically enough, the Seahawks successfully challenged that it was a sack, fumble, and fumble recovery by their guy which gave them a first down instead of it being fourth-and-2.

But that's ok because Clowney was just getting started, anyway.

With 47 seconds left in the first quarter, Clowney showed off the kind of crazy quickness that I'd seen constantly on his college tape.

He was standing up as the right outside linebacker, once again on Odhiambo's outside shoulder, when the Seahawks motioned Jimmy Graham over to his side. Seattle wanted to run a wide zone with their speedy backup running back J.D. McKissic, so Graham was supposed to chip Clowney inside to Odhiambo who would then try to get outside leverage on Clowney while Graham went up to the second level to seal the outside linebacker. In theory, it would create a clear path to the sideline for McKissic who has the potential to take it to the house any time he touches the football.

In theory.

Well, contrary to what you might have heard, Graham did do his job for the most part. He chipped where Clowney was supposed to be and then continued his track up to seal the linebacker inside like he was supposed to do. The problem is Clowney was so quick at recognizing the blocking scheme that as soon as Graham took a step outside, Clowney jumped inside, almost like a running back executing a jump cut in the hole.

Poor Odhiambo was anticipating having to get wide so he could reach Clowney. He took a long, wide first step on the snap of the football. Clowney flew inside of him so quickly I'm not 100 percent sure Odhiambo ever actually saw him before he was already beaten.

McKissic never stood a chance.

Clowney was on him so fast that about the only thing McKissic could do was make sure he didn't fumble as he was taken down for a 4-yard loss.

On Seattle's next drive, they opened the second quarter facing a third-and-14 from their own 39-yard line. This time Clowney was standing up as the right outside linebacker with inside linebacker Benardrick McKinney lined up inside of him as the three-technique.

Clowney and McKinney ran a nice TEX game on Odhiambo and left guard Ethan Pocic. The two offensive lineman tried to stay with their man instead of passing off the pass rush game which ended up forcing Clowney to fight off an obvious hold by Odhiambo just as he was about to sack Wilson.

Wilson ended up reversing out to try to escape the rush, but Clowney kept working and ended up getting a hurry after Wilson ultimately had to throw the ball away.

I bring this up because while Clowney had a big day, he would have had even more of an impact had the refs called all the obvious holds that saved Russell Wilson's ass all day long. It was so egregious, it got frustrating to watch after awhile. If I could, I would have credited Clowney with two hurries on this play because that was some bullshit.

But I digress.

On another note, for the announcers to (erroneously) call out Graham the way they did for that first Clowney tackle for a loss, I gotta think they must want Willson skinned alive for his whiff on Clowney.

With 9:34 left in the first half, Clowney was standing up as the right outside linebacker in a six-technique down the middle of Luke Willson. On the snap Clowney made that same kind of quick move inside as he had against Graham. This time, however, Willson was supposed to stay on Clowney because it was fullback lead play, and Odhiambo had to block the defensive tackle inside of him.

This was probably my favorite play of his on Sunday.

Clowney exploded into the backfield and absolutely crushed Seattle fullback Tre Madden, who went flying back into Eddie Lacy, who was just minding his busy trying to run the football. The force with which Clowney knocked the shit out of Madden was damn near enough to make Madden tackle Lacy.

Once he was able to maintain his balance, Lacy tried to spin out and continue on his run, but Clowney would not be denied. He kept working until he was, along with Kareem Jackson, able to take Lacy down for a six yard loss.

It was glorious.

Oh, Clowney actually had at least another half sack in that game, too, that they didn't credit him with.

With a little more than 12 minutes left in the third quarter, Seattle was facing a third-and-7 close to midfield. Clowney was was standing up again, but this time he was lined up in a three-technique on Pocic's outside shoulder. Clowney initially tried to swipe Pocic's hands and get up field, but once he got stuck on that move, Clowney made a spin move back inside.

At the same time Wilson was trying to climb the pocket to avoid Benardrick McKinney. Clowney reached around Pocic to grab Wilson while his teammate, linebacker Ufomba Kamalu, grabbed Wilson from behind as well to take him down for the sack.

Now, back when I was playing, our rule was the first guy to touch the quarterback on a sack was the one it was awarded to. If you couldn't tell which guy got there first, you divided the credit. Clowney certainly got to Wilson first, but I could understand someone questioning whether Clowney would have actually been able to take Wilson down had Kamalu not gotten involved. On the other hand, if Clowney hadn't done the spin back inside, Wilson would have had a lane to scramble away from Kamalu. Regardless, it looks like at least a half a sack for Clowney in my opinion.

We will see if there is a stat correction soon.

One other thing that stood out to me about Clowney's performance Sunday was how well he started using this out-in-out arm/over move. Odhiambo is obviously not a top notch left tackle,, but Clowney just killed him over and over with that move. Late in the third quarter, for instance, Clowney used it twice to help the Texans hold Seattle to three points after they had first-and-goal from the four.

On first down, Clowney hit Odhiambo with that out-in-out arm over while Odhiambo was trying to base block him. Clowney beat Odhiambo like a drum. Thomas Rawls, who was on a track as if he was going to run inside of Odhiambo's block, barely had the ball in his hands before Clowney was all in his grill. Clowney smashed him for a 5-yard loss and also hit Rawls with the Degeneration X "Suck It" celebration right after the play which gave me all the feels.

Two plays later, on third-and-goal from the 3-yard line, Clowney did something I've not seen very many edge rushers be able to do. Clowney beat Odhiambo so fast and so clean with that out-in-out move that he was able to get a hurry on a goal-line fade pass. Oh, and did I mention Clowney also jumped over a cut block attempt by Rawls on that play as well?

I can't know for sure if Clowney sped up that throw by Wilson, but what I do know is that had he waited a half a second, that incompletion would've very likely turned into a sack and that's good enough for me.

So earlier when I brought up obvious holds that the referees didn't call, that included one really big one that occurred with 1:39 left in the fourth quarter that may have changed the outcome of the game.

No, seriously.

The Texans had a 38-34 lead, and the Seahawks were at their own 20-yard line. Clowney lined up as the right defensive end again and came off like he was going to bullrush Odhiambo. Instead, Clowney did a stutter step to get Odhiambo to stop his feet and brace for power, then transitioned into a speed rip move.

Clowney had Odhiambo beaten around the corner when all of a sudden, Odhiambo goes down and just before Clowney is able to reach out and grab Wilson, he ends up on the ground too. Instead of that play ending in a hurry or a sack for Clowney, Wilson was able to flip the field and hit Paul Richardson for a 48-yard gain. Two plays later Seattle would score the winning touchdown.

That was garbage. The refs should be ashamed, but it was still good to see Clowney in position to make the game changing play. He did what he was supposed to do, and that's all you can ask of any player.

Even with the refs screwing him at least four times in that game on blatant holds that weren't called, Clowney was still able to rack up one and a half sacks, five hurries, two and a half possible tackles for a loss — I gave him credit for he play where he blew up the fullback — plus two other tackles against the Seahawks. He also only missed one play on defense for the game, which is definitely something new for him.

With Watt and Mercilus gone for the year, the Texans need Jadeveon Clowney to step up and be the man. That's exactly what he did, and that's why he is my Hoss Of The Week for Week 8 of the NFL season.

[girl4music]

Track by track review of Kesha’s ‘Rainbow’

This album has been highly anticipated for 5 years due to all the legal trouble between Kesha Rose Serbert and Lukasz Gottwald (known to the music industry as Dr. Luke). I won’t go into too much detail about this as it’s about Kesha’s music, but I will say that I’m so glad she got away from him. Personally, I feel she should of got away from RCA records as well since they were aware of what was going on between them and didn’t do a damn thing to help her. But anyway, that’s not my business to have any kind of opinion on. So long as she’s safe. I have actually never bought any material from Kesha at all. Not just because it’s Dr. Luke’s productions but also because it genuinely is terrible music. I’m someone that prefers real instruments, non-autotuned vocals and lyrics about something other than partying, drugs, alcohol and sex. That’s the main difference with this album now that’s she’s free to be as creative and expressive as she wants to be. It’s REAL, it’s HONEST, it’s AUTHENTIC and it displays Kesha’s surprisingly VERSATILE vocals. I’ve always considered her an artist with far more potential than what she was allowed to showcase as a singer/songwriter. I never blamed her for that. I knew it was down to Dr. Luke and the label why she was releasing rubbish. So that’s a big reason to support this album. It’s important. If you care about that, then please support it.

Fair-warning: There is a lot of swearing, profanity and explicit lyrics in this album, however, it’s used more as genuine expression than shock value. She’s clearly a swearer. I have no problem with that because so am I. For me it just makes it all the more real because I can tell it comes from a sincere place. And a swearer tends to be more honest and frank. People with a lot of integrity, which I respect. But I just put it here so you were aware of it if it’s not something you like. Now we’ve established my views on the album, let’s get into the review itself.

1. Bastards

It’s an acoustic. Right off the bat Kesha tells you she’s going in a completely different direction musically to what you know her for previously. It also seems to be a live recording but I could be wrong about that. It just sounds like it to me. It’s just a song about how you shouldn’t let the “bastards tear you down”. The haters, naysayers and doubters won’t change the way she feels about herself. It develops heavier and fuller instrumentation towards the end giving it a climatic and empowering finish. Good opener but a song that pales in comparison to some of the others on the album. It’s nice to hear her do something more stripped back for once though. 6/10

2. Let Em’ Talk

This is a collaborative effort with a band called ‘Eagles Of Death Metal’. Despite the name they are definitely a Rock band, not Metal. She has two tracks with them on this album. When I heard this song it was a shock to me. I never thought Kesha would touch anything Rock. This just exhibits how versatile she really can be when she is free to showcase all she’s got as an artist. Now I’m a Rock lover, especially Pop/Rock, so this track appeals to me more so over the first track. Kesha isn’t a powerhouse vocalist but she seems to be able to do Rock quite well. She vocalizes some ‘yows’ which is more appropriate for the Rock genre than Pop. It’s a guitar-driven uptempo where she’s just letting loose and having fun. Much more the kinda thing I’d listen to so I’m biased with this one. 9/10

3. Woman

Another collaboration. This time with ‘The Dap-King Horns’. A Jazz, Funk and Soul band. Very interesting choice there. She definitely isn’t going for the mainstream names. Some would say that was risky if she wanted to be successful, but I say this album isn’t about sales. It isn’t about having chart hits. This is her chance to showcase who she really is as an artist and change the general public’s perception about her and she really needed the opportunity to be as creatively involved as possible.  This album is for her. She’s certainly changed my mind about her, although I never really had a negative opinion to begin with. Like I said earlier in this review, I knew it was all Luke making the creative decisions and making her do music she didn’t really want to do. You’ll be surprised how often that happens in the music industry. It’s really upsetting. But I always say the same thing, if you are authentic to who you are as an artist, success will come to you. Never sell yourself out just to have a hit. It works but you will not feel accomplished whatsoever. It’s the easy way, not necessarily the best way. It really depends on you and what kind of music you are passionate about. This song is a statement of feminism. As the chorus’ lyrics say, ”I’m motherfucking woman, alright?” She absolutely SELLS that assertive, independent attitude. A true Amazon. Great song, very addictive. I can see this being played frequently on Jazz and Soul radio stations and appealing to adult audiences. Giving her that musical accreditation she deserves. 10/10

4. Hymn

This song really hit me hard. I will admit that sometimes I feel like an alien to my own planet. That I don’t belong here but somewhere in outer-space instead. A theme she comes back to at the end of the album. Lyrics such as “If we die before we wake, who we are is no mistake. This is just the way we're made” resonate with me so much that it made me burst out crying first time listening to it. The lyrics completely relate to my experiences on a daily basis going about my day in the society I was born in. Just feeling like I don’t fit in and nobody understands me. I am comforted with the thought that I’m not the only one who feels this way. This song reminds me that I don’t need to fit in because I’m meant to stand out and my individuality shines. Every negative experience I have regarding this makes me a stronger and wiser person. Musically the song is much more on the Pop/Electronic side which isn’t really my cup of tea but the lyrics over-shadow that for me. It’s a beautiful ballad and it’s not all electronic. There’s a lovely guitar instrumental in it that balances the electronics out. This one means a lot to me personally so it gets a high mark. 9/10

5. Praying

We’ve all heard this one by now. The power ballad and debut single from ‘Rainbow’. This is what initially caught my attention and made me want to check out the album when it released for what else she had. It’s empowering, inspiring, motivating and an all out absolutely stunning song musically, vocally and lyrically. A real stand out and deserving of being the debut single. I’ve never heard a ballad from her before this so it really shocked me to learn that it was Kesha. She had this emotive voice inside of her and was chained to Dr. Luke who would never let her expose it for all to hear. The song is about her battles with this monster and recovering from all the internal damage he caused her emotionally and mentally. Recovery albums are often cited for being “attention-seeking” and “sob-story” and therefore not taken seriously as true creative works. But I adamantly disagree with that because people who listen need to hear the message that it is possible to recover from addiction and eating disorders. Moreover, music is a Universal language and can be cathartic medicine for the mind and soul. It does more to help and heal emotional and mental trauma and turmoil than conventional therapy. Music about recovering from that is very important and needed to reach out to those who feel like they have no way out and are afraid to ask for help. This was the situation Kesha was put in and this is her finally expressing it and showcasing what’s she’s capable of as a vocalist while she’s at it. 10/10

6. Learn To Let Go

Another song that I relate to and resonate with to a considerable degree. The song is about learning to let go of the negative experiences of the past and the things you’ve done or said as a result of that. Chaining yourself to them and letting those lower vibes take control and define who you are as a person. The song basically tells you that you’re not a bad person even if you’ve done bad things. All of it just brought you where you are today and made you who you are now. It’s all been for a reason and it was a positive one. The song also mentions, that sometimes you will give this message to others but you won’t listen to it yourself. You don’t practice what you preach. You don’t try to make your life any better by changing the way you view and think of it. It’s an introspective and thought-provoking song that may help you recognize how you see yourself and the world around you and that it’s only weighing you down to feel resentment and contempt towards yourself. It’s not helping you, it’s hurting you. The song will make you look in the mirror at your own reflection and see the soul more so than the body, helping you to realize you’re no worse or better than anybody else. It’s also Pop/Electronic musically but again, the lyrics and real drums/percussion really make up for that. 8/10

7. Finding You

This track is another acoustic. Also one of the few songs on the album about love with another person and being in a relationship. Not anything to shout about lyrically. A bit repetitive but I like the whole future life line “I know forever don’t exist, but after this life, I’ll find you in the next”. Builds in production and tempo after the first verse when the guitars and drums come in. Tempo changes make this song much more interesting than it would without them. Not really much else to say about it. I like it but it feels more like a filler track that doesn’t really fit with the overall theme and throws it’s consistency off. It’s one you’d probably skip after a few times listening to the album all the way through. 4/10

8. Rainbow

The title track and the foundation to the concept of this new revolutionary era for Kesha. I was reading Kesha’s commentary about this song. She explains about where it started and how it led to her coming up with the entire theme and musical sound of the album and how writing it and playing it constantly on her toy keyboard in rehab saved her life. It was pretty much her way of processing her emotions and thoughts. Helping her to express her feelings and all the negativity that was plaguing her mind. Just like I mentioned earlier, music is a far more effective way to overcome pain and depression. ‘Rainbow’ was the beginning for a whole new life for Kesha. Born from the ashes of self-hatred and abuse came this beautiful song about loving yourself and caring for your mental health. She calls the song and the album ‘Rainbow’ because for her the colours of the rainbow represent freedom, hope, light and acceptance. All of which she needed to recover from her deep troubles. And according to her, it’s no coincidence the colours are the symbol for the LGBTQ community for they need those themes too. It’s a flowing orchestral ballad. There is a live orchestra which lifts the song into the stratosphere. If fact, if you close your eyes while listening to it, you can feel yourself being lifted above this Earthly plain and into Heaven. Watching and listening to Kesha recording it you can see just how joyful and free she is. Her face lights up and she looks like an angel. Just thinking about what the song makes me feel listening to it with my eyes shut, it probably feels exactly that way for her too. Like flying into Heaven, unrestricted and answering to no one but her own Higher power. 10/10

9. Hunt You Down

Kesha goes Country! This was really interesting change in the album. We’ve had Rock, Pop, Electronica, Jazz and Power Balladry thus far. Now we have Country. This album truly is versatile musically and vocally which I am extremely happy about. Versatility is my number one drawcard when it comes to any kind of entertainment, but especially with music. I hate hearing the same song over and over again with the same production, vibe, lyrics and tempo. Drives me crazy. This was a huge factor for me buying the album. Kesha shows off her Nashville routes. Americans do love their Country music so I could see her being successful with it there. Internationally however, it might be a bit difficult. I live in the UK and for some unknown reason to me, our music industry hates Country music. It will go as far as completely editing, remixing and mastering a track and giving it more of a Pop production just to be played on our radio stations. I don’t understand it myself because if it was a choice between mandolins, fiddles, harmonicas and steel guitar over DJ’s pressing buttons, messing with sliders on turntables and sampling the fuck out of tunes from the 80′s and 90′s that I adore as they already are ... I’d take it any day, at any time and for any price. Least Country music is real instruments. You know what I’m saying? That actually matters to me! Furthermore, Kesha has a natural twang to her voice which is perfect for singing Country. It’s definitely a musical direction she could look into more thoroughly in the future if she wants. 7/10

10. Boogie Feet

Here we have the second collaboration with ‘Eagles Of Death Metal’ and it has a much more funky and groovy sound to it than the first collaboration she did with them. It’s got a melody that is highly addictive. You’ll be playing this one on replay at some point, believe me. An all out Rock banger with driving electric guitars and thumping drum beats. Kesha sings it with such attitude and personality. You can tell she was having loads of fun recording it, completely happy and free. If there was another title for this album that would be most suitable to the concept and musical theme other than ‘Rainbow’, it’d be freedom. Because that’s what you feel from her singing these tracks. Complete utter freedom. Unrestricted and unlimited in what she can do with her voice and her performance. This song will make you sing, dance and feel that freedom along with her. 9/10

11. Boots

This one is a personal favourite for it’s progressive composition structure. It’s the first thing I noticed about it. It’s progressiveness. How the addition of production and instrumentation with each verse keep building the song to it’s climax. It’s full sound effects you and excites you beyond belief. At least it does for me. Completely up my alley. Another song about love and relationships. This time it’s about the person taking her in her au-naturel look. The way she is without her make-up on or fancy clothes. He loves her wearing nothing but his boots. Pretty self-explanatory I would say. Still sticking to that Country vibe. 10/10

12. Old Flames (Can’t Hold A Candle To You)

You cannot get more Country than Dolly Parton. Probably the most surprising collaboration of all. Mrs. Big Hair herself. An absolute legend in the Country scene. Once again, Country sounds so RIGHT on Kesha. She truly does suit it. Production is entirely real on this track. Layers of steel guitar and the typical Country sound. Country enthusiasts will really love this one. Not a personal favourite for me though. 5/10

13. Godzilla

This song is hilarious. Her attempt at the comedy/satirical genre. It reminds me of Katy Perry’s ‘Ur So Gay’. It’s got that nursery rhyme feel like that song does, however, far more appropriate for the children to listen to. I also feel like it has a darker tone to it. I’m picking up something a little sinister there with the use of the term ‘Godzilla’. I won’t go into it because I’m still working it out myself. But it’s probably the least interesting song on the album as far as the theme and musical sound goes. Nursery rhymes are never interesting when you’re an adult. But once again, the versatility is there, and it works for her so this only adds to it. 3/10

14. Spaceship

Now we come back to the most relatable and resonatable topic for me. That topic being of not belonging in the world, and feeling like you’re meant to be somewhere in outer-space. I always say that I’m too alien for the Earth, too human for space. That’s just how I think and feel. I don’t fit in. My mind level is just completely different to everyone else’s where I live. I hope I get abducted. The aliens can come for me and take me home. ‘Spaceship’ is also a Country song. An acoustic Country song. 7/10

That’s my track by track review. I hope you enjoyed reading it. Check out the album if you liked what you read about the songs. I’ll leave you with the ending monologue to ‘Spaceship’ that ties up the concept for ‘Rainbow’. Words I could of just as well have written myself as it’s something I would say and the philosophy I believe in.

"As I leave this Earth and sail into the infinite cosmos of the Universe, the wars, the triumphs, the beauty, and the bloodshed, the ocean of human endeavour, it all grows quiet, insignificant. I'm nothing more than recycled stardust and borrowed energy, born from a rock, spinning in the ether. I watch my life backwards and forwards and I feel free. Nothing is real, love is everything, and I know nothing."  - Kesha Rose Sebert