#really need to utilize that system blog ..

[thatonegaybrit]

coolest thing I ever did was say "oh cool I .. don't care" life is so much easier when you stop caring about random peoples opinions on you I like promise

[revuestarlight-pbta]

Revue Starlight PbtA Playbooks

Hello, everyone! I've moved stuff from the Revue TTRPG onto its own blog, to keep everything neat and orderly.

You might guess from all of the updates I've been writing that I've been really excited to work and think about this RPG. I hope that everyone can look forward to it, and that I can create a system that can allow everyone to create their own Revue Starlight stories with friends, whether with existing or original characters.

The TTRPG will be a Powered by the Apocalypse system, following a long and storied legacy of narratively-focused RPGs that enable robust collaborative storytelling. To help facilitate the portrayal of unique characters, it utilizes what are called Playbooks. (You might consider them an analogue of "classes" from other RPGs, whether on the tabletop or on a video game.) However, these Playbooks don't represent how you look on the outside, or what your weapons of choice might be. Instead, they define a character archetype, highlighting your character's core emotional conflict. For this TTRPG, the question they ask is: "Why did your character become a Stage Girl?"

Playbooks can shift between sessions as your character advances, signifying your character's growth and how a new core emotional conflict may come into focus for them. Stage Girls are too varied and complex to be defined by any one thing, after all.

Here's some examples of some Playbooks I've written up so far! (Everything subject to change.)

The Challenger

The path to becoming a Stage Girl wasn’t handed down to you in your youth. Maybe you discovered it later in life, or your family expected you to tread a different path. You seek to defy those forces who seek to dictate your life’s path for you so that you can take hold of the reins of fate yourself.

You might have a variety of different opinions on the world of theater you’ve found yourself in based on your unique outsider’s perspective. Maybe you aspire to be just like the greats, hoping to, one day, fit in with all of the people you looked up to when you started this journey. On the other hand, you might see the flaws in the restrictive, antiquated system, and aim to prove by example that it can be changed for the better.

Examples of Challengers are: Aijo Karen, Hoshimi Junna

The Exile

You’re running away from something. You were already smitten with theater back then, too, but you were in a different troupe, or maybe even a different country. However, one day, something changed: perhaps tragedy struck, or you failed at the moment when it mattered most. Whatever may have happened, you’ve spirited yourself away somewhere else where no one remembers your greatest shame.

You’re still working to pursue your goals no matter what, but your past haunts you. You’ve found new friends and family, but the fact that the people you left behind are still living their own lives scares you. You might hope to one day reconcile with the people in your past, or perhaps prove once and for all that you don’t need them to live your life.

Examples of Exiles are: Takachiho Stella, Yumeoji Fumi

The Guardian

Though it is you who stands upon the stage, you know that there are better reasons to act than just your own self-interest. You have taken on a Charge, which consists of the people or things you’ve sworn to protect—perhaps the members of your class, a childhood friend, or a memory that’s on the verge of fading away.

If your Charge consists of people, you may sometimes stand behind them to support them. Other times, you may stand by their side to work alongside them. Other times still, you may stand against them—because no one else will help them realize the errors of their ways.

If your Charge is a thing or idea, you’re likely one of its last bastions. It needs protecting—otherwise, you wouldn’t be a Guardian, after all. It’s your reason to be a Stage Girl, and you won’t hesitate to sacrifice yourself to protect it… or, perhaps, others.

Examples of Guardians are: Daiba Nana, Ogami Shiro, Tomoe Tamao

The Trailblazer

Forget what anyone else says about being a Stage Girl—you’ve become one just because it’s fun! Others train day in and day out to be at the top of their field, but compared to them, you live more in the moment. What’s wrong with that? Those stuffy girls with all of their high standards never catch a break, while you spend your time expressing yourself and having fun with the people you love most. It’s certainly more exciting than whatever you were doing before!

However, being a Stage Girl isn’t always fun and games. When hardships arise, you might find yourself questioning why you chose this life without much of a strong external force to tie you to it, relying on only your fickle whim and motivation to drive you forward. You may be searching for such a reason to stay—or, rather, pushing back against those who try to tell you that you need a better one. At times, however, you might ask yourself the most difficult question: is your personality the true you, or just a glib facade?

Examples of Trailblazers are: Otsuki Aruru, Otonashi Ichie

[h0neytalk]

Mango v. LingQ v. Anki

I’ve been using the above apps for a while now and I couldn’t find a ton of somewhat easy to understand comparisons/explanations of how to use these various cult favorites. I figured I would make one if anyone is wondering where to start or making a departure from Duolingo.

Standard langblr disclaimer: I am ultimately just a person on the internet, I’m not an expert in language learning or a world renowned polyglot. I’m not even an expert in any of these apps/programs. These are all just thoughts and opinions I have about the value of each app to myself as an average consumer trying to learn a language and intended to help other people decide where to spend their time.

Anki

Anki is an open source spaced repetition flashcard program. It has an incredibly loyal fan base of med students and people who just want to learn things. This is also the one I have the least experience with so I recommend diving into forums and other blogs who go in depth on all the ways you can use this program. The web version is completely free and there is an official paid mobile app. There are also unofficial paid apps, this is the source of great drama and discourse and I’m not touching that here. Spaced repetition essentially means that the program will present you with cards at intervals designed to maximize your retention. When you flip over a card, you have four options that boil down to: fail, hard, good, easy. This is how the program determines what to show you and when.

Key Features:

The main draw is obviously the spaced repetition system. It’s much easier and more effective than sorting manually.

Because it’s open source, there is a way to customize the settings and cards to do basically whatever you want. There are also tons of premade decks to import and either use as-is or use as a base.

The online web version is completely free.

You can add really any media type to the cards. You can add sound clips of pronunciations, images, even drawings and diagrams.

Having the four options is particularly useful for the nuances of learning a language. For example, for general vocabulary decks I’ll assign one “point” to general meaning, tense/part of speech, and pronunciation. Getting the general meaning but not the other two means I select “hard” when I flip the card.

Best uses:

Vocab or learning a new alphabet. Specifically for drilling any of those “slippery” words. I don’t know if this happens to anyone else, but there are some vocab words that just refuse to stick with me. I’ve found the Anki SRS does help pin them down.

Potential downsides:

While there are decks to import, there could always be errors that you won’t catch just seeing single vocab words with no context.

The available customization is labor intensive.

The UI for the official app and web version isn’t super slick and intuitive.

Even the best flashcards are ultimately just flashcards and have limits to their usefulness.

Mango

Mango is similar to Babbel or other programs that focus on speaking (and doing so quickly). I much prefer Mango to Babbel or any other similar app and find that it does what it says it will. Languages are split into units. Each unit has chapters and each chapter has lessons. A lesson will start with an optional pre quiz and a brief recording of a conversation that you will be able to follow by the end of the lesson. Each lesson concludes with a listening and reading quiz. It also utilizes spaced repetition and gives you daily flashcards to review.

You learn based on phrases rather than individual words. A long sentence will be presented in its entirety. The lesson will then go through each word individually before combining them into phrases and, finally, the full sentence from the start. Then you will learn vocabulary needed for variations. The activities are fairly standard for a language app: speaking, listening, multiple choice. You can also turn off the interactive feature and have the lesson run as a “speak and repeat” style podcast. It tracks the hours you’ve spent learning a language and there is an activity log, but no in depth stats.

Key features:

It is focused on speaking immediately.

Has a ton of languages and several dialects for those languages.

Focuses on phrases and patterns that are most useful if traveling or having brief, friendly interactions.

Presents information in a digestible way and isn’t overwhelming.

Includes culture and grammar notes.

$12.99 a month but most public libraries and schools give you free access. You can also set up a household account for multiple people and split the cost with friends/family.

The first lesson of any language is free, and some rare and indigenous languages are completely free to access.

Audio is native speakers. When you record yourself, your vocal wave pattern appears that you can compare with the native speaker.

Best uses:

If you are traveling soon and want to navigate basic, friendly interactions, this will get you there quick. Within 1-3 months easily, depending on the language and how often you practice.

I also recommend this as a starting place when you are totally new to a language or to learning a language in general. The structure is excellent for getting a feel for things.

This is also great if you studied a language previously and need to refresh your memory or get back into it.

Potential downsides:

The “record yourself” feature is fairly buggy and often freezes up. It can also be annoying to try and match the timing of the native speaker, but you don’t have to record audio to progress past those lesson points so it isn’t too much of an inconvenience.

It isn’t meant for total fluency. As stated, the lessons (at least that I have done) are focused on speaking while traveling and making small talk. Some of the early lessons teach you to say “sorry, I don’t speak [x]”. Which is very useful if going abroad soon, but less so if you would rather just be able to speak that language.

The regimented nature can make it feel slow/too easy if you are also using other methods.

The review flashcards only have a binary “yes/no” option which feels annoying for longer phrases or after using Anki-style cards.

With any course like this, you aren’t going to have much choice in the vocab you learn or prioritizing topics.

LingQ

I am honestly surprised I don’t see more about this. I think they have been making a bunch of updates recently so maybe the version I’m using is miles above previous ones, but it is shockingly powerful. It’s also the hardest to explain (which may be why I don’t see much written about it and why this is going to be a long section.) LingQ (pronounced “link”) operates on a hybrid comprehensible/massive input model. While Anki prioritizes memorization and Mango priorities speaking, LingQ focuses on comprehension and listening. LingQ is comprised of courses which are made up of lessons. There are pre-built courses made by LingQ but the real goal is to make your own (more on that later).

Each lesson within a course has an audio recording and a written transcript. Words you haven’t seen before are highlighted blue (when you start, that’s every word). You click the word to see the definition and assign it one of 5 statuses: ignore, new, recognized, familiar, learned, or known. “Ignore” is used for things like names or borrowed words, they won’t be counted in your stats. “Known” is for words you knew before seeing them. You likely won’t have any of these if you’re starting a new language with no prior experience. Levels 1-3 highlight the word yellow and it becomes a LingQ. You can create a LingQq using as many words as you want. You can manually change the status of a word when you see it. You can also do various review activities similar to Mango, and if you get a word right twice in a row it will automatically bump up a level. You can always adjust it back down if needed. LingQ is very focused on the value of listening to a language. You can add lessons to playlists and listen to them like a podcast.

My personal favorite part of LingQ is the ability to import lessons. Especially YouTube videos. The site has a browser extension that will import any content in your target language into a lesson as an embedded item. You can then read/listen to/watch that content right in the app and get “credit” for it. LingQ’s statistics are some of the coolest/most motivating I’ve seen. You get coins for completing tasks but those are really just to see a number get bigger. It also tracks the words you’ve read, how many words you know, the hours listened, and speaking/writing if you utilize their tutor marketplace or writing forum.

The free trial is very limited but it’s enough to poke around and get a feel for things before signing up, not necessarily to learn anything substantial. The monthly membership is $12.95 and there’s a $199 lifetime option as well. I definitely recommend spending some time playing around at the free level and then upping to monthly if you like it.

Key features:

The ability to import lessons. It will also create a simplified version of shorter content. This is an AI generated summary of whatever you’ve imported. I use this for videos where natural speaking cadence can make it hard to parse things sometimes. It’s easier/more productive if I know generally what’s going on.

The creation of LingQs. I just think it’s a really cool and useful way to approach comprehensible input. You can visually see the yellow fading as you understand more and more of a lesson.

You can export LingQs to Anki (theoretically). I’ve never done this myself and I’ve seen some forum posts saying it doesn’t work super well all the time but it is a built in feature.

In-depth stats tracking and the ability to consume all the content easily in app. The stats would be annoying if it wasn’t literally easier to watch a video via LingQ than on YouTube.

Community features. There are community challenges (like Duolingo) but also a forum to submit writing that will be corrected by native speakers and a marketplace of tutors to easily sign up for speaking lessons. The forum is free and volunteer based, but scrolling through I didn’t see anyone who didn’t have at least one reply. The tutors are paid at an hourly rate and you can also pay by the word to have them correct written work.

Super flexible. There really isn’t any one right way to use this app so you can structure it however you like and set your own goals/metrics.

Playlists and focus on listening. It really does help to constantly be immersed in what a language sounds like, and being able to read and listen to the same thing has been so nice.

Actually decently helpful emails and not just spam.

Best for:

Hardcore language learners. The app/site provides some guidance on how to get started and the basic idea, but you’ll need to play around with it and spend some time reading forum posts or the emails they send to find what works for you.

Getting to higher levels of fluency after maxing out other apps/self study methods.

People looking to spend a lot of time on language learning because they enjoy it. This isn’t snarky, but there’s a difference between wanting or needing to learn Spanish to communicate at work or on vacation and just really enjoying learning languages. This is an app for language nerds.

Potential downsides:

Very overwhelming. They technically say you can jump right in with 0 knowledge of a language and be good to go, but I think it would be hard to make a lot of progress unless you’ve learned other languages before. If you’re looking to learn a new language for the first time, I recommend starting with Mango to get your bearings.

Doesn’t teach new alphabets. This isn’t a huge issue for Mango since it’s speaking focused, but I wouldn’t jump into Arabic or Russian on LingQ without spending some time learning the alphabet with other methods.

User generated definitions. This is a double edged sword. The definitions being linked to sites like Globse can lead to wrong definitions, but because you’re seeing things in context it’s easier to catch. And looking into what a phrase means is a great way to learn if you are really into languages.

The import feature isn’t 100% perfect when it comes to videos. It will only create a transcript when the video has captions enabled or a transcript provided, otherwise it just shows up as an audio file. It will also sometimes randomly just not be able to import a video which can be annoying, but in the grand scheme of things these are very minor annoyances.

Time commitment. The method doesn’t require a ton of actively sitting down and reviewing vocab or reading new words, but it does assume that you’ll swap out listening to music or podcasts while going about your day with listening to content in your target language. This is all well and good unless you really enjoy listening to specific content while doing tasks or need help not getting distracted. It’s going to be a lot of incomprehensible noise for a while before you can parse it. This might not be a downside as much as something to keep in mind when considering how effective it’s going to be for you.

Not as active of a community. Maybe it’s just for my particular languages, but there definitely aren’t a ton of people actively doing things like challenges. This really doesn’t matter much to me but it could be a bummer if you’re looking for that.

tl;dr just tell me how to learn things

If you need to learn a new alphabet, start with that. Otherwise, Mango to get your bearings, Anki to add to your vocab as you get bored with Mango, and LingQ to realistically get “fluent”. Then start writing and speaking either using tutors or people you know or local language groups.

[vixenanswers]

Love what youre doing in this blog <3

Do you have any tips of staying organised, specifically keeping a tidy wardrobe and desk? Usually it takes me a long time to clean but normally whenever I finally tidy the things they never stay that way for long..

Thank you o2studies ♥️

I’m always really happy to hear that people are enjoying my stuff and it’s helpful to them!

I also really relate to struggling to keep your space organized as I used to struggle with that a lot when I first moved out. So I collected some tips that helped me and I hope they will do so for you too.

General tips:

Find a place for everything: The most important step in staying organised is to create an organization system that works for you. I think the things you need to keep in mind are 1. where do you need your things? 2. where is it easy to grab your things from? If you found a place that accomplishes both these points, try to keep your things in

Containers!: Putting things in containers prevents them from just laying around and thus reduces visual clutter. You can also just have a bucket where you put things that you need to put away later -> makes the tidying-up-process less overwhelming. This works both with containers for pencils and papers on your desk and for organizers in your closet

Put things away after using them: This is ofcourse one of the most basic tips, but it can be very helpfull to keep your place tidy. If you put things away after using them they don’t pile up.

Take time every day to de-clutter: If the last tip doesn’t work for you try this instead. For me this time used to be after coming home from school and now its in the morning before I start studying. Instead of taking a lot of time to clean everything, take a little time each day to for example put away the papers you worked on or the clothes you wore yesterday

Desk organization tips:

Keep only what you need on you desk: A cluttered workspace can be distracting and make it difficult to focus on the task at hand. It’s also helpful too keep open desk space, so you have space to work.

-> Keep things you need often nearby: Keeping the things you need most near your dominant hand makes it easier to grab them. This also makes it easier to put them back where they belong and you don’t have to shuffle things around because they’re hard to reach

Utilize your wall space, the space under your desk and stack vertically: A floating shelve/a pegboard or drawer organizers can be helpful to have more storage space and stacking things vertically is a more efficient use of space

Organize your desk according to your work process: Again if things already are where you need them to be, you don’t need to put them back and it’s also just more efficient. For example; a lot of people work from left to right, so they put documents they need to work on on the left of their desk and the documents they finished working on on the right

Wardrobe organization tips:

Clean out your closet: It can be hard to keep your wardrobe organized, when it’s overflowing so start off with downsizing and decluttering. Selling some off your stuff on websites like Poshmark or eBay or donate it to give it a second live

-> Make future clean outs easier: Place a distinct (i.e., brightly colored) hanger at the front of each section of your closet. Every time you wear something and wash it, hang it up in front of that hanger. After a few months, it’ll be pretty easy to see what got worn and what didn’t

-> Pack away seasonal clothing: Try to store the clothes you don’t need at the time somewhere else (like in another storage space/boxes or vacuum packs) to make place in your wardrobe

Create Zones: You could divide items by type, by color or based on how frequently you use them. Put high-use items in the front so they’re easy to grab and you don’t have to go through all your things. Zones also help to get an overview of everything you have so you again don’t have to go through everything

=> Hope that helped, thanks for the question!

[stormwaterwitch]

I'm not the anon who you were responding to, but I found your blog through the thing about your 12-element paradigm. I'm fascinated, largely because the non-traditional 8 are (mostly) all aspects I work with, but I hadn't considered them as elements?

Idk what I'm asking specifically, but I would love to know m9re about how you came to look at things this way and how you use it in the day-to-day practice!

Thank you for your time!

Heya!

When I started really thinking about the elements I was drawn to things that I interacted with on a daily basis to make it easier to incorporate into my day to day practice (ie: thinking about things and stuff)

I think I went into this a bit more on this post but I broke them down into three categories: The Touchables, The Untouchables, and The Effectors. Touchables is pretty standard as it encompasses the elements you can reach out and touch. I mark them as Fire, Water, Air and Earth (Disclaimer: Fire Hot. Please don't touch fire okay? lol) but these are the elements you can actually touch and have a physical reaction register as you connect with them.

Untouchables are the elements are kind of a mixture between the effectors and the touchables as they CAN effect you but you cannot reach out and touch them the same way you could the first set.I mark them as Light, Dark, Time and Space. These are more sensations as you can feel the presence of Light or the absence of it in Darkness. You are aware of the passage of Time and your presence in a physical Space that your body occupies.

Effectors are the elements that can change the directions of a person's path but cannot be truly influenced by a practitioner overall. I mark them as Luck, Fate, Order and Chaos. They effect and influence the way our lives go. It can be tricky to discern between them when starting out: Was it Luck or Fate that you met the right person at the right time to get the job of your dreams? Do your rituals for your practice really need to follow the Order of the steps as written or would you get the same result winging it in the Chaos?

As for how I work with them it's very casually. Mostly notating how and when I feel them around me in my day to day life. Sometimes its squinting into the halogen light bulbs at work (or admiring the chandeliers) the quiet that takes over in the dark when I curl up in bed with my Kindle to read before bed. The whoomph of my gas stove lighting up, or sitting on my front porch swing to listen to the rain. the uneven rocks under my bare feet as I go to check the mail to the whips of wind that race along the parking lot as I walk to my car after my shift at work.

To me the elements are a lot of little experiences adding up over time and the balances they maintain when working all together. :) -oOo-

Now as for discovering your own elemental set(s) to work with, I would suggest taking some time every day to really pay attention to the things around you. The sensations you feel and take in as you experience life.

Next I would say investigate some Pop Culture influences and see what other people have utilized in their elemental systems. Why does Pokemon use Poison/ Fairy/ Steel Type? Why does Avatar include Metal/Lava/Blood Bending? Would Gravity, Ink, Blood or Sound be a viable element for you to work with?

I say this because I almost included Blood into one of my elements to work with but I couldn't find a way to make it work with the sets that I had so it didn't make the cut.

Some examples found below vvv

Some Ideas of things to consider as Elements: +Metal/Steel +Spirit/Aether +Gravity +Sound +Wood +Color/Light Spectrum +Gasses/Plasma +Energy +Crystal

Some questions to ask yourself: +What do I think is missing from the four elements that most people work with that I am looking for in my own practice? +How many Elements would be too many for me to feasibly work with? +Could these elements combine together? What elements would they make if they did?

I hope this helps! Feel free to send more in if there's anything else I can answer :D <3

Tagging @arisprite since they were interested!

[retphienix]

Forget if I said what I'd found or not since I'm not really doing a full blog playthrough:

So each reset I see the probe launcher launch in a different direction which told me that THAT is likely the purpose of the resets- a last ditch effort to pump all resources toward finding the Eye. Basically launch the probe so hard it blows up the launcher, research for 22 minutes (I think is what other notes were saying, I haven't really timed it), then reset and try again.

I had wondered exactly why the star was going supernova and why/how the statues blah blah.

I now know the sun does that because of the Sun Station- a "generator" that converts its energy specifically because they needed "as much energy as possible."

I also, after a long while of going "But why? To launch the probe? What do you mean it's for the Ash Twin? The Ash Twin's projects seem to be based around setting up teleporters?" but I found more details.

Namely, the 22 minutes thing. Warps can break time- more energy = more time break. They wanted enough power to make a warp that grants 22 minutes-

(the significance of which is only assumed to be related to the probe but I don't rightly know. Maybe a self fulfilling prophecy of sorts where they asked for 22 minutes because the Nomai (I have attributed very few of their names to memory) who asked for the 22 minutes KNEW the strongest power source would be the sun and that they would develop a doomed sun generator that would destroy the system in 22 minutes, so they asked for a power source that would destroy everything and wanted to use that time as effectively as possible? Hell if I know yet.)

-and at first I thought "Well, they are using those 22 minutes to repeatedly warp us all backwards and try the probe again" but "how" and also "The sun station's 22 minute warp isn't being utilized by ANY of the ash twin towers so where is it?"-

well now I know how more or less-

I have found one of those visual pools for the room described multiple times now. A room in the heart of the ashen twin (if memory from notes serves as I type) that has 3 lit statues.

Finding this note closed up a lot of my guesses. That dark room is where the storage for the memory statues hide- I want to say that's the room they describe as being mega protected by a shield (which would allow it to survive, momentarily, when the sun engulfs it I suspect)? I forget but can check on my in-game computer later.

So basically what I gather is, the statues work by imprinting the memories of the first person to interact with them after being activated.

It saves their memories in a storage vault that they mega protected under the surface of the ash twin.

I believe they then use the energy from the sun station to send the statue storage masks back in time 22 minutes, something something, overwrites our memories, we get to try again and whomever the 3rd mask is (since we know who the 2nd mask is) launches the probe in a new direction out of desperation for the Eye.

So the energy isn't for the probe, it's to send our memories back 22 minutes which is "conveniently" how long it takes for the sun to go supernova when it's tapped into by the station to power the storage warp to send our memories back 22 minutes which is "conveniently" (jokes over).

Now am I right? IDK. I feel like I have that part of it figured out but maybe the other questions I'm lacking answers to will debunk and shift things enough to make me wrong :P

Anyways, I /think/ that's what the sun station is powering (a warp for the statue storage devices), I think that's where the 22 minute warp is being utilized rather than on any physical bodies (considering how many times we've died, sending bodies rather than a form of consciousness doesn't make any sense lol), I still think this is all for the purpose of the probe for the Eye.

I still don't know who the 3rd mask is or why they decided to enact this effectively doomed cycle over the Eye (I mean.... there's no out here. If they find the Eye we remain trapped in this 22 minute cycle until we opt to cancel the warp and allow ourselves to die for good).

Anyways anyways:

I think it's cute how science and art intertwine in importance for the Nomai so much so that when they create literal 4th dimension breaking warp technology and incorporate it into a fast travel system of towers- they say "Oh Oh Oh! Let's make each tower's architecture match where it sends you because that would look nice :)" and they are so right for that one.

[chelledoggo]

RAISING FUNDS FOR UNFINISHED COMMUNITY CHURCH IN ASHIYA, JAPAN! ✝🏳‍🌈

sorry if this seems out of left-field for my blog, but i want to help raise funds for the online progressive church that i am a member of! they've been an integral part of my spiritual healing after growing up in a conservative environment, so i really want to help them out! ✝🏳‍🌈

Unfinished Community is an independent bilingual (English & Japanese) hybrid physical/online church based in Ashiya, Japan. An organizing congregation of the Reformed Church in America, Unfinished Community is a worldwide community of progressive, affirming Christians coming together from all around the world for a common goal: to create a safe, affirming space for Christians from all walks of life. Unfinished is pro-social justice, LGBTQIA+ affirming, anti-fascist, anti-racist, and open to believers of all different denominations and spiritual systems. Since Unfinished is a highly experimental church which is trying to find new ways of bringing people together in Christian community, we are looking for donations to help the church community grow, expand, and find new ways to sustain itself. Your gift can help Unfinished Community develop new and innovative programs for worship, study, and community growth both online and offline, support for members in need (such as refugees, immigrants, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and other oppressed groups), as well as with equipment and utilities for the physical church in Japan. Please consider donating, and helping this budding church experience blossom into something beautiful!

[equalityspotential]

"The 4 Qualities Of Potential" Rediscover The True Meaning Of Potential.

Hello reader!

Thank you for your interest in reading my blog post, "The 4 Qualities of Potential". I assure you, you will not regret it and you will realize why shortly. As I am far from near to officially establishing my ideal non-profit organization, it is still the inspiration for the E-book I will be publishing on February 1, 2025 called, "The Unknown Potential". If you are interested in learning more about the E-book and or non-profit visit, our facebook page for "The Unknown Potential" by clicking the link below.

This blog has a slightly different purpose than what the E-book is purposed for. My E-book is meant to spread awareness and present a solution in hopes of gaining support as well as developing a group of people with relatable opinions to mine and willing to pursue the visions we have in common. This blog, on the other hand, is meant to strictly educate, inform, and update anyone who may be unsure of the reality of this idea, needs to understand more clearly what my mission is, is lacking knowledge on the information I provide, wants to watch and keep track of the progression, or even just want to read and learn about any specific approach, method, strategy, policy, challenge, concept and anything else that is requested of me to inform about. Now let's move on to the subject dedicated to this specific blog post...

[The 4 Qualities of potential]

This concept, and the information I share about it in this specific writing, is a concept I developed myself and is based on my personal logic and perspectives. This post is only meant to be perceived as a personal perspective with factual information to back up my belief of this perspective and not as a factual known concept that has been proven. Therefore, I would like to present to you this blog post as a literal example of itself and the "potential" (HINT-HINT) concept I talk about in it. Note that I hinted at the word "potential" above. This is because this article "has potential," "displays potential," "inspires potential," and "is potential." There is nothing but potential from pretty much every aspect of the perception of this blog post, and this potential can be harnessed and Utilized to anyone's advantage or even disadvantage, along with pretty much anything else you come across in your life journey. But only if the reader can perceive the potential that surrounds them in their personal life and unique situation.

*The Unknown Potential Fundraiser promotion*

Hey there! I’m excited to share a project I’m passionate about: The Unknown Potential. It’s all about promoting equality here in the United States, and my goal is to offer quality support to those in need in our community. I truly believe we can make a difference by focusing on fair treatment, equal opportunities, and reliable systems to help combat the corruption that affects so many of us every day.

I’m working on an ebook aimed at raising awareness and encouraging unity among people. This is just the first step towards building a supportive community. If you’re interested in helping out and can contribute to the project, I’ve set up a fundraising campaign to cover the marketing and publishing costs. I want to get this book into as many hands as possible!

The campaign will officially launch on February 2nd, but you can still visit the fundraiser page to find out more details about it. The link is below! Thank you so much for considering this! I hope you’re enjoying the blog post on Potential that I’ve created for you. Take care!

So , simply what I am trying to say is, that the information in this blog post, is to provide you with a logical perspective of what potential really is, how to identify and perceive it, and how to utilize the potential that is always surrounding you and every little thing that you do depending on the type of potential it is and the unique situation you're harnessing it for. I am also using this blog as a direct example of my perception of this idea or concept I am speaking about. You see, potential can be good or bad, it can come and go, it can be used or ignored, it can be large or small, it can be mine or yours, it can even be easy or hard. The cool thing is, no matter what, if properly educated, we can utilize it, no matter what form it is in, to our advantage. So, to make it more simple; I've categorized the main forms of potential into 4 categories.

[Personal Potential]

Now, for most of us, personal potential is the quality of potential we think we know the best. As for me, I've come to the conclusion that personal potential is what allows us to overcome challenges and even the smallest obstacles in our daily lives that can affect our ability to be productive and even influence us to be unproductive. Sadly, it is the quality of potential that we are the most blind to regularly. We seem to notice other forms of potential easier in other people, and situations than the potential we personally carry and play a direct role in our Dailey lives and challenges. [For example], We might see a friend of ours perusing a certain objective and be able to understand the reasons they are perusing that objective because it makes sense. On the other hand, when we try to reason with our own objectives and make sense of the importance of the steps it will take to complete an objective, we tend to get confused and oversee the reasons and likeliness for achieving our goals which causes us to lack the perception of our own potential for completing the objective."

The Oakland Raiders, for instance, have been the worst team in the NFL for over 20 years now. This is because every year, every new player that is drafted by the Raiders has to live with the perception of their opportunity to play on the Oakland Raiders team as only being good enough to be drafted by the NFL's worst team. These kinds of mindsets are the ones that deteriorate the chances of the Raiders pulling off a year of redemption and lower the level of potential they have to thrive as a team.

A good way of understanding our true personal potential is to relate it to our reputations. Similar to our reputations, our personal potential depends on the choices we make throughout our unique individual lives and how we choose to deal with our problems. Another important subject that affects our personal potential is our realization of how the smallest bits of change can act like invisible obstacles that we are completely blind to. Here's a quick example to demonstrate to you the importance of recognizing the small changes that affect our personal potential,

A friend of mine is always utilizing our friendship to vent about the problems in his daily life, which I have no problem with. One day I recognized that he had been dealing with the same challenge regularly. I noticed that several days in a row, he had mentioned that he was late to work because he kept forgetting to set his alarm clock to the new time he was scheduled to work." Now, there is potential that can go both ways here, and no one can change what way the potential goes except for my friend himself because it is his personal potential that is affecting his personal position. He can either keep allowing the potential to be late to work run his ability to do so, or he can utilize the potential to be at work on time by just taking the time to change his alarm clock to the correct time to be at work on time. The littlest configurations to our ability to achieve simple goals are the personal potential we most often lack awareness of.

To Utilize the personal potential surrounding us we must,

FIRST- Acknowledge the objectives we are pursuing daily.

SECOND- Develop a strategy for achieving those objectives.

THIRD- Configure our ability to implement the strategies we develop.

The personal potential is the likeliness of the configuration to our ability to implement the strategy. In other words, the likeliness of our ability to follow through with changes that alter our daily routines and obstacles is personal Potential. A good way to better understand personal potential and become familiar with how to utilize it is to try learning about people who are famous for being successful at what they did. And try to understand what their advantages were before their success and how they used those advantages to earn their success. Take Tesla, for example; once you start learning about his methods of operating and his ability to understand complex ideas, you will start to notice how he recognized these qualities about himself at a fairly young age and was able to start utilizing his unique talents early enough to maximize their potential. For a starting point, just start recognizing the problems and challenges in your life, especially the small ones, as opportunities to grow your potential by using effort and self-will to eliminate them or overcome them.

[Skilled Potential]

Moving on to skilled potential, it is relatively similar to personal potential. Just the same as someone's personal potential being very high or very low, or it can be mine or yours and so on... The difference is that personal potential refers to a specific person and the likeliness of a specific person's capabilities based on their personal traits. Whereas skilled potential suggests the likeliness of someone's capabilities based on their experiences, accomplishments, and obstacles they have overcome. Skilled potential is different and stands out from the other qualities of potential because it literally "stands out" like a soar thumb.

Now, the thing about skilled potential is the same as having a skill; it can be at just about anything. I know many people who are very skilled at being lazy. They have mastered the skill of sitting on their butts all the time and doing the least amount of stuff possible through every situation they come across. On the other hand, someone can be very talented at drawing or art in general. For example, a tattoo artist. It takes a lot of skill to become a well-known tattoo artist, with a good reputation. For someone to become this, it would take a lot of skilled potential. So, not only is their skilled potential for the lower aspects of life but also for the higher and anywhere that meets between.

There are many ways to recognize someone's skilled potential. In fact, I find it to be the only quality of potential that is hard to miss. The thing about skilled potential is it can be hard to recognize in ourselves. You may see your friend who has developed tons of skills in a variety of things and think of them highly because of their skilled potential. But usually, it is difficult for us to recognize how many things we have mastered ourselves and are very skilled at. This is important to realize because we need to be able to recognize when we have mastered bad habits as skills that give us a lower level of skilled potential. This refers to the example I gave in the last paragraph about the people who are skilled at being lazy. Here's a scenario that can help you understand a little more clearly...

Positive Skills

Negative Skills

[imagine you are in high school, you and your "special other" have just recently taken an interest in each other, and it is the first potential relationship you have ever attempted, but you really like this person to the point that you always catch yourself smiling when dazing off in deep thought about this person. Shortly into this pre-relationship with this person, this person suddenly changes their mind about you and starts seeing someone else. This breaks your heart, but the pain soon starts to fade, and a few months later, there's another opportunity to pursue a new relationship. This one works, and it is officially your first relationship, but another few months go by, and after feeling deeply for this person, this person's parents decide they want to move to an area far away, and your new special other is forced to leave you by demand of their parents needing to move so far away. This breaks your heart even worse than the first one. Right then, you start developing a defense mechanism by rejecting relationships, which turns into a habit. The next thing you know, you've gone through college, and you can't even count how many relationships were avoided to the point where you have perfected a system to keep anyone from being interested in you.]

This isn't the best example scenario, but it's the first thing I came up with. I do hope it at least gets a point across to you though. Anyways, it demonstrates how we can turn on our instincts to protect ourselves from emotional trauma and replace it with unnatural habits, and when we take it to the extent of mastering these unnatural habits, it becomes a skill and affects our level of skilled potential. Skilled potential, the same as all potential, surrounds us as if it were the air we breathe. The most important thing is to make sure that it does not become polluted and full of impurities but instead full of purity formed from our drive to succeed.

One way you can be sure you are not equipping yourself with the wrong type of skilled potential is by practicing to confront your fears. This allows you to deal with your fear in a more natural way instead of building techniques to avoid them that eventually turn into a wrong use of skilled potential. It also allows us to focus our attention on creating benefiting skills and habits that up our level of skilled and personal potential at the same time. If something goes wrong in life embrace it because it always has the potential to better you as a person.

[Team Potential]

Team potential is where it starts to get exciting. It refers to the likeliness of an outcome for two or more people or entities (organizations, corporations, companies, and so on) actively working together to pursue a common goal or objective. Team potential can be very effective and can be taken advantage of to create results quickly. The potential a team has depends on the potential of every member of the team, both personal and skilled, but it also depends on the ability each member has to work together. For example,

Someone who is known for their skills at cooking and holds a high level of potential when it comes to crafting a delicious meal but is not the best when it comes to working with others, could jeopardize the cooking crew's potential to provide quality food to its costumers if this person is recruited by the crew.

This example refers to the fact that it only takes one person on a team who is not a team player to mess up the flow of a team, which then negatively affects the amount of potential that team has of achieving their goal. So, basically team potential can be very effective and produce results rapidly, but only when everyone on the team is pursuing the same goal and is more than willing to work with others to obtain the result they are after.

Many different scenarios could be considered to have team potential; in reality, only some of these scenarios are actually utilizing team potential. The others are portraying like they are using team potential, but sometimes it's worth digging a little deeper to understand the true source of their potential. For instance, a relationship is often viewed as a team effort and it very well could be, as both sides of the relationship are after the same outcome of the relationship. If both sides are pursuing the relationship in hopes of different outcomes, then this is not team potential. And can actually be considered external potential, which I talk about in the next section of this blog post. To make things simple, team potential may not exist where there is a labeled team or assumed team at hand.

To recognize when a team you are a part of, (whether it is work, Hobbie, or personal life) is being jeopardized by one or more members of the team because of a lack of team awareness and by separating their selves from the rest of the team with goals that don't inline with the team's goal... I suggest tracking your team's potential. Develop a system that allows you to create stats on the likeliness of your team's ability to accomplish its objectives. To do this, you can observe each member's participation in the team and evaluate each one based on their effort, their curiosity, and their commitment. If someone seems less committed than they were last month and their curiosity has drifted to subjects that aren't in line with the team goals, then more than likely, they are negatively affecting the team's potential to succeed, and adjustments could be made to elevate your team potential to its maximum capacity.

To utilize the amount of potential your team has, it is important to know the strengths and weaknesses of the members and the vulnerability and advantages of your team so that you can place each member in the position that suits their skills and traits the best while at the same time strengthening the team as a whole. There is a lot of potential that can be harnessed and used when it comes to team potential but it is almost like gambling in some situations because there can be a lot of risk and opportunity for failure if a team is not structured correctly or lacks any bit of team participation by any of the teams members.

[External Potential]

Now that I’ve explored personal potential, skilled potential, and team potential, it’s time to focus on the final and arguably most powerful quality of potential: external potential. This is hands down my favorite. The external potential is not something that exists within us; rather, it resides in the external entities that surround us in our lives. We can view these as incredible opportunities because they reflect the possibilities that various objects, times, places, and ideas have to offer us. Every experience and event throughout our lives holds hidden bits of potential that many might overlook—until now. This topic has inspired this entire post, and I strongly believe it’s the one aspect that everyone should fully grasp and appreciate.Since becoming aware of external potential, I’ve leveraged it to transform my life in ways that words cannot fully capture. To clarify, external potential refers to the likelihood that a specific object, time, place, or idea can produce concrete results or influence the outcomes of future events.

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When considering external potential, think of it as the pronouns of potential. Instead of focusing on language, envision it in terms of external resources or value. Just as a pronoun in language relates directly to another word for efficient communication, external potential relates directly to a person’s personal potential and serves as a resource to yield more accurate results. Essentially, external potential presents us with opportunities to use to our advantage, helping us achieve the results we desire as we navigate through life’s challenges.

To illustrate what external potential looks like, I’ve provided five compelling examples:

[Example 1] - *An updated version of a translation dictionary.

(Note: This offers immense potential for individuals seeking effective communication with those who speak different languages, eliminating the need to memorize a new language.)

[Example 2] - *A creative product idea for a store owner's inventory.*

(Note: The novelty of this idea positions it to directly influence the desired results for the store owner.)

[Example 3] - *A long-forgotten dessert recipe that has been rediscovered.*

(Note: This recipe could dramatically enhance the popularity and growth of a struggling restaurant, significantly impacting its stability.)

[Example 4] - *A carefully chosen location for a surprise birthday party for your favorite aunt.*

(Note: The chosen venue can profoundly affect your aunt’s feelings on her special day, offering the potential to create a memorable experience.)

[Example 5] - *A change in the timing of an annual community meeting.*

(Note: This adjustment can either help certain individuals attend who otherwise couldn’t or potentially cause others to miss out on the important event.)

As you reflect on this blog post, assess how external potential can serve you, your family, or your friends in generating the desired outcomes. It’s essential to be aware of the external potential surrounding you every day, much like the irresistible treats offered on Halloween night. Seize these opportunities; they are available to you, but only if you actively pursue them. Recognizing and utilizing external potential is the closest we can get to accurately predicting the future in our current era. Master this concept, and you can actively shape the ideal future you desire for your life.

[Summary]

To sum things up " The 4 Qualities Of Potential" are Personal potential; The likelihood of an outcome based on your own capability and personal traits, Skilled potential; The likelihood of an outcome based on one's experience and accomplishments leading up to a specific outcome, Team potential; The likelihood of 2 or more people or entities ability to achieve desired results based on each person's or entities ability to work together and each one's mindset, External potential; various sources of potential that reside within the outer aspects of our daily lives, which can be harnessed and utilized to our advantages. Each quality of potential serves an important role in our personal and professional lives. If able to recognize the potential surrounding us and within us we and utilize them to our advantage and use them to manifest the desired results we work for everyday.

[Glimpse Into The Next]

In my next post, I will explore the natural laws of potential. I will delve into the roles that potential plays in manifestation and explain some of the dos and don'ts when it comes to the use of potential once it is mastered. I will also dive into the topic of the science of potential to point out the effects of using potential on yourself, others, and the world in both positive and negative perspectives as well as to demonstrate different methods of accessing external potential depending on your unique circumstances. Be sure not to miss the next post on potential by following me and if you enjoyed this content, please do like and share!

Until next time,

Codie D Wilkinson, founder of, The Unknown Potential.

Here is the information you can reach out and learn more about us as.

Phone number : (541)441-0380

Email: codiewilkinson369@outlook.com

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Telegram: t.me/CodieWilkinson

[roleplayhonestybox]

I have decided that for the sake my own mental health, I am going to just start taking everybody and the things they say at face value. If you tell me that you enjoy roleplaying with me, and you love my muses and everything, and yet you take weeks or months to respond to me while replying to everyone else every day, and never interact with any of my headcanons posts, and never send me any asks, basically your actions never reflect what you've told me...?

Okay. I still believe you.

If you are just trying to let me down gently and can't be bothered to either tell me you aren't interested anymore or outright block, I'm not going to make the effort of doing mental gymnastics to make that conclusion for you.

On the other hand, if you do really enjoy roleplaying with me and I am just not your focus and for one reason or another you don't care to interact with anything on my blog, then I will settle with one reply every few months from you. I will do what I need to do on my end to curate my dash, such as utilize xkit and the tag blocking system, to ensure that I don't see any of your posts so I can move on until it's time to interact with you again.

Is it perfect? No. But it beats me trying to figure out whether you actually mean it when you say you enjoy rping with me and then your actions don't really reflect it to me. It's not on me to assume anything from what you've said or what your actions show, because in the tumblr rpc, you are damned if you do, damned if you don't. If I don't "get a clue" from your "apparent" lack of interest despite what you are telling me, then apparently that makes me pathetic and stupid and a weirdo. However, if I assume from the other direction and drop someone because their words and actions don't align, suddenly I'm "impatient" or "pressuring them" or even "ableist" if they're someone who has a neurodivergency. You can't win.

So I choose inaction. I choose to believe what you tell me, and you get to make that decision. The onus is on you, not me, the person who does want to roleplay with you.

.

[cloudgremlin-creations]

Grafted Branches: Fight!

By this point maybe I should make a turtle blog. ANYWAYS

Because GB is a separated au, not all of the sibs grew up with Splinter. So their fighting styles and experiences are quite… mixed.

From oldest to youngest:

Dona has the most formal training, learning aikido and later ninjitsu from Oroku Saki. It was rocky going at first, but once Karai and Casey found out that Dona reacts faster to sounds than movements when fighting, the gang were able to design a system that prompts Dona with audio when fighting (different sounds are connected to different katas, and Don will instinctively do the kata Don has connected to that sound when it’s played). Because of this handicap and Dona’s inherent speed, Don has developed a fighting style that is vicious and fast- but very, very predictable. Don relies on surprise and speed, which does actually make Don a very good ninja!

Rafa was (partially) raised by Splinter and so has a spattering of aikido and ninjitsu training. Mainly, though, he uses kickboxing and wrestling techniques learned from Beebop and Rocksteady any time they weasel their way back into the Red Heart Sanctuary’s good graces. He will also just sit on you, my boy is 6 foot 1 of pure muscle, fat, tail, and shell. He’s definitely a contender on the battle field, but tends to focus on protection and de-escalation unless things get Really Bad, in which case. He has the strongest holding bite of the sibs (Dona might have the fastest and most force, but Don’s jaw is relatively weak and can be held open really easily if you jam it even slightly past Don’s release point).

Michael is a street brawler at heart, my lil terror <3. Sun begged saber training from sun’s uncle and learned keysi from sun’s dad (strictly for self defence! And to keep the terror from trashing the store with sun’s never-ending energy) but has also just picked up everything and anything sun thinks might be useful, which includes a lot of parkour. Michael fights dirty and will lead you on a merry chase around whatever area the fight is taking place in, utilizing the environment to deliver powerful blows from every direction. Anything to Michael is a weapon, and will be used accordingly! Just don’t let sun get close to water, sun is literally too dense to float TwT

Lee is an odd case. He’s extremely analytical and a perfectionist, but this doesn’t translate to “amazing fighter”. Although the way he fights is loose and flexible like Michael, he doesn’t have the same careless gusto to just try out new things. A lot of what he was taught was twofold: learning both how to be flashy and please the crowd while also viciously and discreetly taking the wind from your opponent’s sails. He relies a lot on intimidation and misdirection when fighting, and while his actual fighting skill is good, he doesn’t have the confidence to really push for the win, being a fairly defensive fighter instead. However, Lee is incredible at quickly analyzing the situation and pointing his sibs in the right directions, and often takes over from Dona once the action starts and there’s too much chaos and unpredictability for Don to handle (and if Karai isn’t there).

All in all, each of the sibs has a different way of contributing in fights- and in other types of confrontations. Want to make a business alliance with someone, get an accidentally inspiring speech, or plan an intricate heist? Dona. Wanna calm someone down, gain loyal allies, or fix a refrigerator? Rafa’s got it. Wanna confuse and embarrass the enemy, or maybe need some random super rare information? Send Michael! And for a special treat if you want to ruin someone psychologically, or if you need an on-the-fly plan that will Definitely Work, or if you need someone to become a meat puppet, Lee’s gotchu covered <3

[coming-up-with-usernames-is-hard]

PhD Blog Week 8

Courses

CFT: More messing around with correlators, radial quantisation, lots of things that are almost vertex operator algebras without ever saying that

Diff Top: Main complaint this week is that he keeps mentioning bundles without defining them, but I finished the assignment so that's good

Lie Algebras: Root systems, mostly just linear algebra, should finish the classification this week

Talks

Integrable Systems Seminar: Spherical double affine Hecke algebra, still don't really know what it is but despite that the talk was actually one of the most understandable seminars I've been to

Algebra Seminar: More Yangians, still don't know what a Yangian is, followed for about ten minutes before getting lost. The preseminar was good, but didn't help follow the main seminar

Example Showcases: Mostly pretty good this week. The first was on geometric applications to number theory, simple start showing that some equation has no solutions over the integers, then the schemes appeared and I was lost. This seems to be a common occurrence. I should learn what a scheme is. Second talk was on Feynman diagrams and how they arise in QFT, it was a good explanation of a lot of physics in just half an hour, and it was nice to be back on familiar ground after the étale fundamental group. Third one was on the Witt and Weyl algebras, a good explanation but I felt that the talk lacked a conclusion. The final talk was on topological data analysis, very interesting application of things that I don't know that well, and a little bit of rep theory.

Reading Groups

Complex Geometry: The Weyl group part 2, I missed part 1 but it still mostly made sense

Infinity Categories: Really interesting this week. We looked at how to define monoidal categories, the approach taken was to move away from the notion of a biniary product and phrase symmetric monoidal categories as co-cartesian fibrations, then the monoidal structure is naturally induced from maps in FinSet_*, and replacing finite sets with ordered sets gives a non-symmetric structure. Then this (much more complicated) definition generalises to infinity categories.

Categories: The 2-category of categories, after infinity-categories 2 feels like a very small number! I've also agreed to give a talk in a couple of weeks so I need to brush up on universal properties

Supervisor Meeting

Finally heard from my second supervisor as we discussed Wronskian solutions to differential equations, not my favourite area of maths but hopefully once it's related to the algebra I won't have to deal with the differential equations much

Teaching

Two tutorials this week, the work sheet was harder this week as they've just started graph theory, the final question was to prove that the utilities problem has no solution which was a pretty big ask

[ira-407]

How to School Me Better: Universal Changes

This will be the first in a series of blog posts about me reflecting on my schooling experience. Each of them will be posted under the "school" tag on my tumblr.

I graduated college two years ago. I haven’t been back in school since then, though I do plan to return about a year from now. My overall school experience was, I’d say, pretty decent. I was certainly not without many personal struggles, whether it was academically or socially, though. Many of my teachers were great and really did the best with what they had. There were a few teachers I had who I didn’t think were good teachers and who failed to really reach me. Regardless, the public American education system is an absolute mess and I think it needs to be fundamentally reworked from the ground up. I don’t think I can find that many people, including current teachers, who would completely disagree with that sentiment. So what I am going to do here is brainstorm ways in which I think said system could be reworked, though more to the point, I am going to list ways in which I think specific subjects could have been taught to me in ways where they actually would have stuck and have been meaningful to me. Now that I am an adult, I have recognized that I definitely don’t have a dislike for learning-in fact, I think most people like learning in some form or fashion-but the way a lot of subjects were handled in the classes I took was in a way that was not very conducive to actual learning. It’s actually pretty wild, thinking back at it, how the people who design these curriculums thought that they were. I don’t mean the individual teachers I had here, for the most part at least. There was a large looming force over most of the courses I took, whether it was standardized testing or having to do grades in a specific way for the school. So these are more systemic suggestions than they are levied at any specific teachers I had, though certain teaching styles and philosophies worked better with me than others. 

Universal changes

More federal funding across the board

Smaller student-to-teacher ratio

The abolishment of homework

More recess/unstructured break time for all grade levels

No standardized testing

No self-contained special ed classes for *anyone*. Actually meaningfully include students with disabilities.

Shorter school days in general, though doing this without also shortening the work day for most jobs would not be optimal

Minimize traditional testing in general

Apply a strength-based approach to how mastery of the subjects are assessed

A lot of these are things already done at private schools and via homeschooling. Which is great! However, most families cannot afford these things. I don’t know that mine could’ve. Private schools and homeschooling are at best, band-aids on the current system we have, and at worst are shelters from the real world for parents who want to mold their children into their particular image of them. Tutoring also definitely helped me, but again, it’s a band-aid. Private schools also tend to have horrific things happen in them because they’re not beholden to the same rules as public schools, though they can also be great for that same reason. Regardless, those are not going to help the most people as opposed to more systemic changes. Other obligations can get in the way of homework if one is involved with extracurricular activities. Now yes, there’s the “school comes first, extracurriculars second” doctrine but I really don’t think it’s that simple.

Extracurriculars are supposed to enhance your learning in some way, and may even utilize skills you learn in classes. Why not leverage that more instead of expecting someone to not break under the pressure of having to juggle so many things at once? There seems to always be the underpinning argument of “this is how the real world works, Better Get Used To It” when it comes to this stuff. Yes, having to juggle obligations is part of adulthood. However, a lot of the time, even then, I feel like it doesn’t quite have to be that way. If this is what I needed to get used to, then why should I be excited to grow up at all? There’s also a point to be made about how a lot of what we even learn in school isn’t stuff we use in everyday life, though I think one way to fix that is to simply apply what we learn to real life more often. 

Strengths-based approach is a term often used in disability services, though I think in a lot of ways, it is applicable to learning as a whole. Some of the very best teachers I had used this approach. They were the ones who really valued growth and connection. The ones who didn’t simply feel like authority figures, the ones who didn’t care as much about the extrinsic value, but rather the ones who actually took time to meet students where they are, and make them recognize that they inherently have strengths that can be utilized effectively. They make the class feel legitimately connected, and the only people who may feel left out simply weren’t interested in the first place. I can tell the difference that makes for a classroom environment. A great example of this was a class I took two semesters in a row, which was for a storytelling ensemble known as Tellers.  One thing I really liked about Tellers was that everyone had their own thing they brought to the table. There wasn’t really a sense of, “oh, this guy is better than the other guy”. The director really has a way of making each performance feel special and becoming of the individual’s skillset. Does that mean nobody in tellers is better or worse than another or that all performances are equally good? No. What it does mean, is that there wasn’t a race to the top. There was simply being the best you. Bringing your best foot forward. Not creating a hierarchy or a sense of competition doesn’t mean nobody gets praised in a classroom. It means everyone’s unique talents and strengths are well recognized. What makes a teacher truly exceptional is the ability to fully realize that. 

Next, I want to go by individual subjects, since I had my own share of strengths and weaknesses in each of them. Generally speaking, I struggled the most with STEM subjects. I think some of this has to do with how my brain is wired. I’m definitely not a very logical point a-point b thinker. However, I also don’t at all think I am incapable of learning these things. Most, probably nearly all, of my former teachers and professors would likely agree that I was capable of learning what they taught me and I generally would absorb it pretty well. What I struggled with were the assignments themselves, and keeping up with the pace at which the content was taught. The most common ways most subjects were taught didn’t work for me. Some of what didn’t work about how these subjects were taught also affected how well I did in literature and humanities courses too, even though those were usually my stronger subjects. Since I don't want to put everything into one giant, long blog post, I am going to split these up into parts. Next time I will be discussing math, but for now, I would like to know what you think about what I have discussed so far, as well as your own personal experiences, should you feel comfortable sharing.

TL;DR: My schooling experience came with a myriad of challenges. Many of these were because of my disabilities as well as how the system is not properly designed for people like me, and is inherently flawed in general. There are many systemic changes that should be made that can improve the overall experience for everyone, students and teachers alike. There are also specific changes that could made which would benefit students like me.

[hallow-there]

Hi im terribly sorry! I just really need your help. I’m trying to raise some funds for little Olaf’s needs (my cat) as I brought him to the vet yesterday morning because of a really bad diarrhea and im trying to raise some funds as I cannot afford the estimate the vet gave us. 🥲Please help me share the post I made for him, I have pinned it on my blog. I’m hoping that you’ll consider, and sorry again for bothering you and for being this direct! Take care!

Wait, aren’t you apart of the wave of pet, specifically cat, veterinary bill scams????

And with further inspection, your account looks very suspicious.

Your first reblog was made 2 days ago and immediately after that reblog, you put up your first ad and then proceed to spam reblogs to give off the appearance you didn’t just make your account 2 days ago. Also, that breed of cat looks expensive but I don't feel like bothering my dad over a Tumblr post.

Look, I get it, times are hard and you're only asking for $300 but I don't think guilt-tripping people out of their money is the solution.

If you need help spotting rent, and or utilities, your state may have an emergency rental assistance hotline you can access here.

If you need groceries you look can look for a local food bank you can search on this databse here and USDA nutrition services here. (Some food banks may be able to spot you toothpaste and diapers but everywhere is different)

If you need clothes I suggest garage sales, clearance isles (specifically at Walmart), sometimes dumpster diving can yield surprising results. And to wash those clothes, laundry mats usually require a few bucks or less.

If you can't afford a car, let alone, gas, if it is possible for you, I'd use bikes and become very familiar with public transportation. They're a lot more cost effective.

I personally have a serving center near me that may be able to supply all of these if not more and I highly suggest you look into your area as well. Those places usually have more information than I can provide to you on how you can survive in this system.

I don’t think you’re a bad person, I think a lot of people end up being angry at desperate actions from people who are just trying to survive. What I am is worried for you. Please stay safe and know this isn't the only option. Quick cash is convenient, but ultimately, temporary.

[troblsomtwins829]

Finally Finished Reading the Design Bibles

I took a lot of notes, and while I do, unfortunately, have to keep my blog spoiler-free for my friend (who has not played 3 yet, but we're working through it) I did want to share some highlights!

Ring on Jak's chest noted to be an "Eco Ring" that channels and holds eco force, which it odd because the Warrior is the only other person that uses rings in their design.

Gameplay note: Lurkers are specifically told to only deal with anyone who strays too far from the village. meaning the village isn't a target at all. Just realized this whole thing is in comic sans

Samos the sage is noted to be a "Scholar" of Green Eco. Skin has taken on green skin after years of exposure. Elements of his design suggest a harmony and closeness with nature rather than the noted potential corruption the human body would inflict upon it.

Kiera wants to be a sage. She also likes investigating precursor technology. These are two conflicting desires that any normal youth would have, however her noted interest in tech and building is more utilized than any eco knowledge.

Samos clearly has no problems with her pursuing this path.

Piercings and tattoos exist in the time of TPL The Warrior wears Three (3) rings, pauldrons, vambraces, and leg guards. Has a similar wrapping style in his arms and wrists to Jak, and is, more or less, the only other person that seems armed and prepared for any form of combat. His hair is also green. Being defeated by Kull was a huge his to his pride. Encountering Jak and Daxter may likely have inspired him to learn form his failure and continue onward

Willard and Gordy are the only other characters with names. Names may be attributed to those in close relationships, whereas strangers or acquaintances use reserved titles exclusively

The gambler made a bet the Warrior would outlast the lurkers and lost. That's why he's poor now.

Mosquito design justified by the utilization of the snoot as a literal bloodsucking eco-eater. Design bible notates the functions of a robot for planet-creation, however the design is distinctly more battle/war based.

Overworld concept art is vibrant and much more elaborate than the prints can give off. Overhead shots give great detail on the overall look of the world, likely able to be pieced together to make a semi-cohesive map.

Personal note: Love the inclusion of stylizing the trees to keep everything on-theme Precursor temple in concept art leaves less that it was built into the mountain and more that it fell and then settled there

Jak's hair is barely up to the Warrior's shoulder.

Renegade Jak is not much taller than his younger self. Notably bulked out in some areas, but also painfully thin despite it. Could be chocked up to the dramatic style change between TPL and Renegade. May need to superimpose over feet vs head to get full scale of actual growth, if I really want to work that angle (I do not)

gets new goggles! Those are different ones entirely!

"Dark Jak is INVINCIBLE!" lol, okay fam. 'Dark Jak' taking an intense physical toll on the body makes sense, given the transformation is due to the over-abundance of dark eco in his system. Dark Jak may act as a release of excess energy as much as a dissociative defense mechanism.

Young samos definitely smokes weed. Sig apparently wears a size 18 boot. (13 inches from toe to heel) Vin wears a bowtie

Torn's Facial tattoos are asymmetrical. Both in concept and on model. (I will never draw them that way)

Torn still has many connections with the KG besides Ashelin. Left the Baron's forces for explained reasons, and wants to take the baron down for those aforementioned reasons.

Ashelin started in the KG as a recruit and "fought her way up the ranks to become a commander." Loyal to a fault, still in contact with Torn even after his desertion.

Note: The only known KG commanders are Erol and Ashelin, with Torn being a former commander himself. These two are the only ones that have unique armour tailored to their position and style. Erol with the racing suit, and Ashelin with a more "horse girl" style. Neither contain any colour consistency between them, suggesting that customized armour is a perk to being at the literal top of the military hierarchy.

All Krimson Guards have tattoos to show their loyalty to the city. Models are all copy-pasted, but it's reasonable to assume they earn/get more when ascending ranks or branching into specialized units.

Design note: Torn has a tall torso, Vin has droopy ears, and is taller than Jak

Mar's own legend has contradictory accounts of weither he died. Precursor stone was attached to his sword. Interesting design choice.

Jak is roughtly tit-height to a Rapid-Gunner Metalhead

racing vehicles are designed with a slimmer, almost body-width footprint utilizing aerodynamics and rudders over the fish design of Kiera's original model. Additionally, riders sit feet-forward in a slouched, almost laying position that puts strain on their neck to continue looking forward. Neither model displayed in the design bible have more than one rudder for mobility, which is understandable considering the high-speeds they reach. that can't be good on your back, though.

HAVEN IS PLACED THREE HUNDRED YEARS IN THE FUTURE. PERFECT. THIS IS THE FKING CONFIRMATION I NEEDED. world concept art shows land outside of haven's walls, and even more, ruined walls, beyond. small areas that look to either be stations or small inhabited areas denote life outside of the city is not only possible, but likely. The Pumping Station is NOT misty island, nor is it geyser rock. based on foliage alone, may be adjacent to the forbidden jungle.

Sewers were MASSIVE in concept. filled with metal-heads, and winding enough to get lost in easily. Would have made a great quick getaway point if there were multiple access points throughout the city Haven Forest is a sacred place, filled with stone effigy's and an offering stand in front of The Tree. A wall may have been intended to be grafitti'd

Stone carvings depicting Mar's legend would be a wonderful touch, if incorporated.

Mar buried at the crotch of a precursor robot behind a MASSIVE door that perfectly illustrates the force required to have protected the city from Metalheads. Port was intended to be a more bustling area, complete with actual BOATS. and common areas! I would have loved to see these get modeled into the game, they'd be spectacular.

The stadium was clearly the favoured child. Drill platform is one of many, sees regular activity during the day.

If Daxter's two feet tall, and each bar is a foot, Jak is Five Feet tall.

Baron Praxis is even bigger than Sig. But still shorter than the Warrior. Kiera and Jak are roughly the same height Onin's outfit is basically the ugly nike shirt Tess is Taller than Jak. Erol is shorter than Ashelin.

Jak continues to wear wrappings up to his elbows despite not strictly needing to. Other concept has his forearms free. Headcanon explanation: Hates looking at his scars, so he covers them up to avoid it being seen or asked about.

There is not explanation for the Precursors. I fking LOVE it.

Every wastelander is designed with their hair either put up or cut short to prevent it from getting in the way. Every one has a a design with a pauldron of some kind, and while their clothing isn't entirely practical, it looks light and airy enough to provide protection from at least the sun.

return of the precursor robot

the proto-names for all of the cars feature animal names! Which, while cute, clearly did not last to the final phase.

"Wastelanders love their off-road vehicles" Sir, THERE IS NO ROAD

lol, kg segway

Precursor ship is fking HUUUUGE

The planet is noted to be "unfinished"

Huge variety of flora and fauna in the wasteland. Despite being a desert, it boasts its own ecosystem of a variety of cacti and also fully fledged trees. Concept art suggests that people are able to tame and mount large desert lizards to traverse the sands (nomadic tribes, likely)

Just from the concepts alone, i can tell the entirety of the wasteland was meant to be much larger and more elaborate than the one we ended up with. More diverse life, maybe less marauders, potentially mounts outside of Spargus, the oasis is an entire area unto itself and in the game it's just a puddle. There is so much more love and care in the crafting of the ideas and concepts of this game that sadly got left to the wayside from either time or money constraints. Haven is in ruins, New areas previously unknown have been uncovered, and there's an entire world out there that has yet to be explored in full. Were this game made today, and given the time needed to make sure it was well-produced and as elaborate as they wanted, it'd easily give Nintendo's LoZ a run for its money.

[scp-chemist-claire]

Hi!

My name is Dr. Clarice Monahan. But, you can call me Claire! I'm a researcher in the Foundation Chemical and Pharmaceutical Department. We work on things like testing the chemical makeup of SCPs, and with attempting to recreate useful anomalous materials. I've been here ever since I made the self-healing polymer compound that keeps my hazard suit nice and sealed!

Oh, right. I've also got this really bad Autoimmune disorder. So, I stay in my hazard suit all the time. It's okay, though. I designed it to fit me perfectly! (Never know when you might need to wear another one!)

Dr. Clarice Monahan Clearance: LVL 4 Role: Chemical Researcher Physical Description: Dr. Monahan's physical appearance is currently unknown, as she all of her time either in a sealed cleanroom, or inside her suit. Her suit is similar to standard Level B Hazardous Materials suit, but is colored blue and tightly fitted to her figure, as per her personal specifications. Dr. Monahan possesses a severe autoimmune disorder that renders her immune system functionally inert, requiring total exclusion from potential outside contaminants. She communicates to her coworkers utilizing a speaker attached to the suit at the base of the neck. Personality: Dr. Monahan shows minimal psychological damage related to her affliction. However, she is noted to have severe aichmophobia (fear of sharp objects) She is described by her colleagues as a friendly, bubbly woman with a brilliant mind and a kind soul. They also noted that she has a habit of growing distracted and mixing chemical concoctions out of habit, resulting in semi-frequent minor mishaps.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------ RULES ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DNI: Minors, TERFs, Proshippers, etc. I do not have the patience to deal with you.

This blog is 18+ only. I don't plan on doing anything, but I like having that freedom. So, no minors.

Do not try to hurt Claire. Also, don't try to scare her by threatening her.

Magic Anons are allowed.

Art done by @username-rock.

Play nice. Don't be an asshole, and we'll be cool.

[destinyc1020]

I agree that tom shouldnt turn down roles because of the controversial subject matter but we also shouldn't diminish the real concerns that people have with how a show will tackle the issues concerning individuals who deal with DID systems. I also dont think its fair to judge a show before it comes out but those against the show do have valid concerns especially with how the media in particualry diminishes and demonizes inviduals with scziophrenia, DID, borderline personality disorder etc. Primal fear one of toms fav movie does a really bad job at portraying someone with DID and actually utilizes very troubling sterotypes and peddles very harmful misconceptions of DID.

In the same way that anon mentioned euphoria and the think pieces of underage sex and glamourizing drug abuse just because euphoria is acclaimed it doesnt mean those opinions aren't valid but that also doenst mean we shouldnt have shows that tackle these issues

Criticism is a natural part of the industry, tom shouldnt avoid roles beacause of the potential criticism or backlash, in the end some of these stories do need to be told but I also dont think we should be diminishing valid concerns.

Thanks for your input Anon. 😊 You make some valid points.

I don't ever have any problem with people having an issue with certain films/TV programs/series. I write freaking movie reviews on my blog all the time and share my personal opinion (good OR bad) about a certain piece of art I've consumed.

What I DO have a problem with however, is people making negative pre-judgments of a work that they haven't even watched yet. 🥴 THAT is what I have an issue with.

Now, if someone (for whatever reason) feels that watching yet another piece of work that deals with DID and/or murder isn't the type of project that they personally would like to watch, then I'm perfectly fine with that! I'm even perfectly fine with those in the DID community (or supporters) having concerns about how this series will portray those with DID. What I DON'T like however is people already automatically assuming the worst, and assuming that the series will paint people with DID in a negative light. If you haven't even seen not one episode of the series, how can you really make a fair assessment and judgement like that? 🤔 Some people were already making negative judgements about the series before it even started filming yet!

Everything I'VE been reading about this series seems to be trying NOT to make someone with DID seem monstrous, and it appears to really dig deep into the psyche and mental health issues that one might experience so that the viewer might have some empathy for people who suffer like this.

Now, I might be totally wrong, but this is the impression that I've been getting when reading the synopsis of this series.

RE: "Primal Fear".... I'm sorry, but have you actually SEEN the movie "Primal Fear"?? 🤔 Because I have. And [****SPOILER ALERT!!!!****] the whole entire point at the end of the movie was that Edward's character actually did NOT have DID (or, back then what was most commonly known as multiple personality disorder). The point was that he really was just an angry, EVIL guy...... The "nice guy" he was pretending to be WAS the fake him. HE didn't really have two different personalities.

Anyway....Good points Anon.... I don't think there's anything wrong with people having an issue with the series, but I wish people would WAIT first and see what the series actually portrays and the feel that audiences get from it before automatically assuming the worst about it. That's all. 🤷🏾‍♀️