#to yourself and to her own personal growth towards being someone better

[absentlyabbie]

i've developed some interesting methods of handling having a relationship with my mother who made my childhood/teen years misery and committed more than a little abuse.

as an adult, we have a very different dynamic, her daughters (sister and i) have confronted her with a lot of her bullshit and the things she both did and enabled. for some she has been sorrowful and even sometimes apologetic. she's a better mother to me now than she ever was when i most needed one. so i'll never actually trust her again, and she'll never be much deeper than surface level in my life, but we have something mostly good now, and on my terms.

however, she is very definitely one of those "i don't remember it that way" and "i did the best i could" mothers in a lot of areas, and has also always been the type to (probably unconsciously) emotionally manipulate the people she's hurt into catering to her hurt feelings about it instead.

over the years i've learned to get really comfortable with just not indulging it.

is she having a bad day, seems sad and upset? i'll give her a hug, try to make her laugh. if she throws broad hints it's a surge of hurt feelings about having driven one of her children to cut her off? well i'm just gonna stand there and not acknowledge or entertain it.

"well, apparently i was a bad mother" or shit like that? i'm just gonna look at her for a second, and i might either shrug or even nod, but i'm not saying a damn thing. i'm not awkwardly, uncomfortably, painfully contorting to her guilt trip nonsense. i'm not apologizing or trying to soothe her or reassure her or minimize it.

like, yeah. you really were. you know it, glad to hear it. we've definitely had that talk.

best kindness, most generosity i can offer her in times like that is not maintaining eye contact to bluntly tell her "yeah, you were." she can go ahead and feel bad about it.

it's not on me to make her feel less bad. she should feel bad. and i am definitely not someone she gets to seek comfort from about it.

hopefully someday she'll inch past just "poor me, i'm so sad and angsty about it" towards, like, examining the whys and acknowledging what she actually did wrong and work actively to be be better. in a few places, some of that has happened.

but that's her work. her job and responsibility. she can do that shit on her own time.

i say all this to offer a shoulder of solidarity to others like me. if you maintain a complicated relationship as an adult with the parent who hurt you and did you wrong as a child, that is okay. you get to choose how and if to thread that needle.

but you don't have to accommodate emotional manipulation and guilt trip garbage. stonewall it. walk away if you need to. don't apologize. don't try to make it better. that's not on you and it doesn't have to be. it's okay.

[madlori]

On Tommy and narrative threads

So some fans who are vehemently anti-Tommy frequently use the talking point that they need to have Buck confront Tommy about his past behavior while under Gerrard, or have him find out about it if he doesn't already know, and that he should break up with him about it. Or they need some kind of reckoning to happen with Hen and Chim in order to move forward.

I'm 95% sure neither of those things are going to happen, and here is why: the show considers that narrative thread to be closed.

It has run its course. It's done. It's been resolved. As fans and viewers - and as many of us are fic readers and writers - we always want to see things hashed out onscreen in exhaustive detail but that's not practically possible. The narrative sometimes has to signal that threads are resolved in other ways, in the way characters act towards each other and speak about each other.

Throughout the course of the three Begins episodes in which he appears, the writers clearly selected Tommy to represent the "firefighter who acted kinda jerky but got better through personal growth and friendship with new people" narrative. By the end of Bobby Begins Again, this narrative is more or less complete, as we've now seen Tommy act to support Hen and also be accepted into a friendly relationship with both her and Chim, not to mention Bobby. When he reappears in season 7, nobody acts like he's anything other than a friend, and Chim outright admires him.

This is the conclusion of this thread, as far as the show is concerned. Did he ever sit down with Hen and Chim and make some big speech or have some big discussion about how he's learned and changed? Probably not. Those kinds of direct conversations sometimes do happen in reality, but more often than not, you just spend years working with someone and your opinion of them shifts as all of you change. And remember, Hen and Chim worked with Tommy for years before Bobby even showed up.

And ask yourself this question: if Hen and Chim have both moved on, and have accepted whatever direct or implicit apology Tommy offered, how is it Buck's business to decide that no, that's not good enough, HE'S going to demand some kind of restitution on their behalf? That's patronizing as fuck. These are people with their own agency who don't need Buck to advocate for them and exact some kind of retroactive revenge for something they're not even mad about anymore. Would he be upset that Tommy ever made off-color remarks, or was less than welcoming to people who are now his friends? Maybe. Is he upset that Eddie nearly killed a man? Is he filled with moral outrage and disappointment that Hen cheated on her wife? Chim physically assaulted him, and so did Bobby. Is he still holding that against them? Is he upset NOW that nobody's speaking up on HIS behalf when Gerrard targets him? Buck's an adult. He knows that people frequently look back on their past behavior and cringe at what jerks they were, himself included.

Tommy has several times alluded to being ashamed of his past actions. He knows the score. The message we're meant to take from those comments is that he's taken steps to not be that guy anymore. Need he flagellate himself forever? Does this need to cost him and Buck a relationship they both value? It can't have been easy to come from a terrible father, go into the army, then into the LAFD with a terrible captain, and then to meet people who challenged your behavior and made you want to be a better person. The fact that he became a better person is something he should be admired for, not punished.

[forfucksakesniall]

"Car's Outside" - part 1

Pairing: Lewis Hamilton x Driver!Reader

Summary: You're a struggling Formula 1 driver who joins Lewis Hamilton's family on a holiday, discovering unexpected connections and a sense of belonging that transcends the track and redefines your perspective on family and racing.

Word Count: 3090

Trigger Warning/Content Advisory: Contains mature content and explores complex themes. Please be aware that it may also include scenes of high-speed racing, accidents, intense emotions, emotional conflicts, personal growth, and intimate moments. Reader discretion is advised.

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Masterlist

You're a driver for the Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 team and your teammate is Lewis Hamilton. Lately, you've been experiencing a string of bad races with incidents like DNFs and collisions with other drivers. It's been frustrating for you and affecting your performance, and it's becoming apparent to everyone around you. After the worst race of your life, you're heading back to the paddock.

"For fuck's sake, why does it always have to be me?" you mutter.

Lost in your thoughts, you didn't notice Lewis's dad, Anthony Hamilton, waving at you on your way. You walk right past him until someone grabs your arm. Irritated, you shoot them a glare, but your eyes soften as you realize who it was.

"I've been calling out to you from a mile away. Where were you?" he chuckles.

"I'm not sure... I've been distracted by something," you respond, avoiding mentioning what happened earlier.

"Do you have a moment to talk?" he asks, seeming eager to share something.

"Um, yeah, sure," you reply, not fully engaged in the upcoming conversation.

He extends his arm in a gentlemanly way, and you take it, walking together toward the paddock. He leads you to a table where you both sit down.

"So..." he begins, looking at you and rubbing his hands.

"Um... hi?" you greet with a smile, unsure of what's happening.

"I know you've had a rough start, and I was thinking I could offer you some help."

"Oh, I'm fine. I don't think I need anything... um... yeah," you respond, feeling embarrassed and frustrated that Lewis Hamilton's dad has to address this with you.

"I can see it's been challenging for you, (Y/N). It's not about more training or spending time on the simulator. It's about finding a genuine love for what you do," he explains, pausing briefly and then smiling at you.

"What I'm saying is... I'm inviting you to join us for a little break from everything. It's Easter soon, and I know you usually prefer to have some time to yourself, but wouldn't it be better if you got closer to your teammate and have a change of view?"

You and Lewis have never been close friends, perhaps due to the chaos you've caused on the track or because you weren't good enough to be on the team, making him not even acknowledge your existence. You've never had a conversation or even exchanged a nod. Everything people see online is just PR to avoid any controversy.

What confuses you is the fact that you're being invited to their family holiday. You! Someone who has no connection to them whatsoever. Well, you and Anthony had formed a father-daughter bond. He would motivate and encourage you during race week. Your own family has never been close or supportive when it came to racing. Since then, you've worked hard for everything you have and have become independent, not relying on anyone.

You simply blink at his offer, lost for words.

"Lewis!" Anthony calls out as Lewis enters the paddock. "(Y/N) and I were just talking, and I invited her to join us on our holiday."

Lewis looks at his dad, eyebrows furrowed. "Um... Did you ask her, or are you taking her hostage?" He glances at you and then back at his dad.

"You can say no, you don't have to do everything he says," Lewis tells you without even looking in your direction.

"Um... yeah, I don't think I should disturb your family matter," you say, standing up and making your way to your driver's room.

Anthony lets out a disappointed sigh upon hearing Lewis's comments. "I told you she needs our support," he tells Lewis, his eyes filled with sadness.

"You don't know her well enough to know what she needs," Lewis retorts sharply, then turns and heads to his room.

✧*̥˚ Timeskip *̥˚✧

As you prepare to leave and head to the parking area, a smiling Anthony calls out to you from a distance. You jog over to him, not wanting to keep him waiting.

"Hey, I'm sorry for turning down your offer. I thought it might be awkward for..." you begin to explain.

"Oh no, you're coming!" Anthony interjects.

"What?"

"We're leaving right now," he informs you.

"Huh?"

He gently puts his arm around your shoulder and guides you towards a van. You spot Lewis sitting by the window, and Anthony nudges you to get in, making you sit between the two Hamiltons.

Initially, your thoughts race:

Wait... Where did he say we were going?

I don't have a bag with me...

Wait... Where is my passport?

Lewis remains silent, engrossed in his phone as you sit beside him. Anthony wears a smug smile, satisfied that his plan is unfolding as intended.

"Um... Thank you. I guess, for having me... I'm still not sure what's happening," you express, uncertain.

Anthony chuckles in response.

"Here." He hands you your bag. Opening it, you find your passport and other essential items for the airport.

"We are leaving?" you ask, staring at the contents of your open bag.

"But I don't have any clothes with me," you point out to him.

"I've already taken care of that. You'll get some once we arrive in London," he assures you.

"London?"

He smiles at you once more.

You glance at Lewis, who continues to ignore you, still fixated on his phone, unwilling to address the situation.

You take a deep breath.

Well, at least I'm getting a free getaway, you think to yourself.

You arrive at the airport, a crowd of flashing cameras blinds and disorients you. Unsure of where you are standing, someone suddenly appears behind you, guiding you through the airport. Despite being trailed by a swarm of cameras and paparazzi, you manage to make it inside. Curiosity pokes you to turn around and see who helped you.

To your surprise, it's Lewis, and you hadn't realized how close you were standing to each other. Embarrassment flushes your cheeks as the realization sinks in, and you take a step back. Both of you lock eyes, and he gazes back at you with disregard. The words fail to escape your mouth, leaving an awkward silence hanging in the air.

Should I say something?

He probably wouldn't care if I thanked him.

"Alright, that was one step closer to home," Anthony exclaims, breaking the uncomfortable silence, his words drawing attention away from the awkward encounter.

You all boarded the plane, found your seats, and finally allowed yourself to relax. You settled in, trying to create a cozy space for yourself, determined to block out any distractions or disturbances around you. It was time to take a well-deserved rest after everything that had happened.

You round the corner, fully focused and determined, a sudden jolt of impact from behind throws you off balance. The unexpected collision shatters your concentration, and the car swerves off its path, rushing toward the barrier at an alarming speed.

Then, your car slams into the unyielding concrete barrier in a sickening crunch. The impact is overwhelming, causing the car to jolt violently. The immense force propels you forward, pressing your body against the seatbelts and contorting you under its unrelenting pressure.

You awaken from the nightmare, your throat dried and your back drenched in sweat. Gasping for breath, you gradually return to reality, only to find Lewis sitting in front of you, a concerned expression on his face. You scan the surroundings for a water bottle, but none is within reach. Unexpectedly, he offers you his bottle—the one he always keeps close, guarded from anyone else's touch.

You hesitate to accept it, but the dryness in your throat triggers a fit of coughing. 

"Just take it," he insists. Reluctantly, you grasp the bottle, bringing it close to your lips, and you glance at him again. His gaze remains fixed on you, carefully observing your body language.

"Were you dreaming about the crash again?" he asks you, his tone empty of emotion.

"Why would you care?" you snap, a touch of bitterness seeping into your words.

So now you can talk?

He simply stares at you, his silence carrying a weight of its own.

"Yeah," you finally admit, looking down at your lap, feeling the lingering pain in your head from that fateful day, as if it wants to force you to relive. You place your hand on the back of your head, swallowing and exhaling deeply.

Lewis abruptly stands up and departs without uttering another word.

Hmm... He left me his beloved sippy cup, you think to yourself.

Finally, you arrive in London after what feels like forever, and you retrieve your suitcase, realizing that you'll be spending a considerable amount of time with the Hamiltons. On the way to the car, you find yourself once again sandwiched between the Hamiltons.

I can't escape this situation anymore. Well, I'll be surrounded by them regardless, so I might as well get used to it.

Sitting there in silence, it dawns on you that you haven't bought anything for them, feeling a pang of embarrassment. "Um... Anthony? Is it okay that I didn't bring any gifts for your family? It's already embarrassing enough to join you on this holiday. I could have at least gotten you guys something..."

"Oh, don't be silly," he reassures you, a warm smile on his face. "You are part of the family now, so don't worry about those things."

His words bring a smile to your face, and he reciprocates the gesture.

Gazing out of the car window, you take in the sights of Stevenage, London. The vibrant town envelops you, with a blend of historical and modern buildings lining the bustling streets.

The journey through the streets of Stevenage, London immerses you in a sensory delight. The blend of sights, sounds, and scents creates a vibrant tapestry of city life. Every step fills you with a growing excitement and curiosity, as you eagerly explore the streets, eager to uncover the hidden treasures that lie within.

Arriving at their house, you're greeted by a charming, quaint home with a small garden decorating the front. You can't help but admire the beauty of it all, puts a smile on your face.

"Let's go inside," Anthony invites you, breaking you out of your trance.

Before taking another step, you turn around, quickly checking yourself in the reflection of your phone. You make a few adjustments to your hair, brushing off any specks of dust from your clothes. Taking a deep breath, you give yourself a pep talk, “Don’t be awkward or say anything weird, okay?”

You hear a chuckle behind you and turn to find Lewis smirking at your words. "Can't be helped," he remarks casually.

Wait, did he just make a joke? You're taken aback, his demeanor seemingly different from what you expected.

He walks into the house, leaving you standing there with your mouth slightly agape. Lewis appears to have a new side to him.

You step into the house and are warmly welcomed by Anthony's wife. She greets you with a hug and expresses her hopes that you will enjoy your stay. Grateful for their hospitality, you thank her sincerely.

"Come in, come in," she invites you further in. As you make your way through the hall with your luggage, you enter the living room. There, you see Lewis playfully interacting with his niece and nephew, laughter filling the air. The room is decorated with family photos and cherished remembrances, giving you a glimpse into their close bond.

The children catch sight of you and excitedly run toward you. 

"We know you!" they exclaim. "We see you on TV all the time!"

Surprised and touched, you engage with them. "You watch the races?"

"Yeah! We see you and Sir uncle all the time!" they happily reply, embracing you tightly. Their genuine affection warms your heart.

"You guys are too sweet," you say, unable to contain your smile. They giggle mischievously before returning to play with Lewis.

Anthony appears from the corner of the room. "Alright, would it be alright if you stayed in Lewis's room for tonight?" he asks.

"Oh, umm... sure. But where will-"

"Don't worry about him, he's a grown man," Anthony reassures you, leading you to Lewis's room. He opens the door and gestures for you to enter first.

"This isn't his room, but since he visits us often, we call it that and some of his stuff are here," Anthony explains.

"Anthony," you pause, looking at him gratefully.

He meets your gaze. "Thank you for having me stay here. It's nice. I promise I'll make it up to you."

"You better," he responds, playfully teasing you.

You chuckle, appreciating the lightheartedness of the moment, and walk around the room, ready to make yourself at home in this new environment.

At night, the Hamilton family has a nice dinner together. The room looks cozy with soft lights. The table is set nicely with fancy dishes, shiny silverware, and colorful flowers.

The food smells delicious and makes you hungry. It tastes great, with different flavors from juicy roasted meats to tasty sides and salads. Everyone is happy and talking, creating a joyful atmosphere.

The Hamiltons are excited about their upcoming trip to Bali. They talk about the beautiful beaches, nature, and culture there. 

You see how close the family is and how they take care of each other. They listen and understand each other, showing the importance of real relationships. Being here teaches you that family is more than just blood. It's about the connections we make with people who appreciate us. At this moment, you feel like part of their family, embraced by their warmth. Seeing their passion and support inspires you to pursue your interests. Their belief in you boosts your confidence.

In this special moment, You vow to nurture and cherish the connections that bring care and passion into your life. As you feel accepted at this table, you realize that you're never truly alone because a family can be found in the hearts of those who care for you unconditionally.

"What does your family do on holidays?" one of the kids asks you.

"Oh, umm..." you begin to respond, but Lewis interrupts you.

"You don't need to answer that," he says, tickling the child to divert their attention from the sensitive topic.

"It's okay," you say, smiling at Lewis. "Well, usually I go on solo holidays because my family is usually busy." You still cling to that excuse, even though deep down you know your family wouldn't care as much.

"Where did you go last time?" the children ask, their innocent eyes filled with genuine curiosity.

"I went to Japan, and it was absolutely beautiful," you reply convincingly, even though they are just children who would believe anything you say.

They continue asking you questions, and you answer them sincerely until...

"I heard from the TV that you got in an accident," they say, unaware of the weight of their question.

Suddenly, your ears ring, and your hand instinctively goes to the back of your head.

"Okay, I think it's bedtime," Lewis declares, diverting their attention.

"But she hasn’t told-"

"Time to go," Lewis effortlessly carries them out of the room.

✧*̥˚ Timeskip *̥˚✧

You find yourself sitting on the bed, possibly due to jetlag or simply because you're in the room of a seven-time world champion. A mischievous thought crosses your mind, urging you to snoop around, while another voice suggests taking something valuable and selling it on eBay. The conflicting thoughts leave you undecided.

Realizing your phone battery is low, you desperately search your bag, hoping to find a charger. However, to your dismay, there is no charger to be found. Frustrated, you grab your luggage in the hope of finding a charger there, but your search proves wrong. Defeated, you let out a sigh.

Perhaps someone is still awake and you could borrow a charger from them. With a glimmer of hope, you open the door and notice light coming from the living room. Your spirits lift momentarily, only to deflate when you see Lewis sitting there with his laptop, absorbed in who knows what.

"Hey, umm... I forgot to bring my charger. Could I borrow yours?" you ask Lewis, keeping your gaze on his laptop.

"How do you forget your own charger?" he responds with a hint of sass.

"Well, I didn't know about this trip until recently," you sassily reply.

"And someone else packed my bag for me," you add, realizing that arguing won't get you anywhere when you really need that charger. He reluctantly hands it over and returns to his laptop.

As you turn to leave, the tension between you both becomes real. In a moment of vulnerability, you express your concerns to him, "I know we aren't friends, and maybe you hate me or something," you begin, your voice filled with a hint of vulnerability.

"But I hope I don't make this trip uncomfortable for you. If you want me to leave, I will, so I don't disturb your holiday..."

Lewis pauses for a moment, surprised by your unexpected words. The honesty in your voice catches him off guard, making him reconsider his preconceived notions about you.

"No, it's okay," he responds, his voice softer now. "I don't hate you, and I don't want you to leave. We can try to make the best of this trip, even if things are a bit awkward between us. Let's just focus on enjoying the holiday."

You nod, a flicker of relief crossing your face. "Alright then. Let's try to make it work."

With a small smile, Lewis bids you goodnight and retreats to his room, hoping that this newfound understanding will help ease the tension and be comfortable for the rest of the trip.

You return to your room feeling baffled by your conversation with Lewis as if you were speaking to someone entirely different. Nevertheless, you lie back on the bed and plug in your phone to charge. You can't help but think about selling this charger later.

As fatigue sets in, you gradually drift off to sleep, caving to the embrace of slumber.

🌟 Attention, fellow readers! 🌟

You have the power to shape this story too! Share your questions, predictions, and ideas. Let's dive deeper into this journey together.

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@omgsuperstarg @copper-boom @notleclerc

[radical-revolution]

"Impermanence, the Buddha said, is the source of all suffering. Therefore, if you can stop the source, challenging times take on a whole new reality. But how do you do that as a lay Buddhist? During a challenging time, we need to have three things: faith, effort, and practice"

Impermanence can cause intense suffering when we lose our loved ones, financial security, our homeland or inner sense of security, our joy etc. Impermanence can also bring relief when we know that our problems are impermanent and that mistreatment will sometimes come to an end. Of course, we can't take away impermanence, we can only remove our negative perspective towards it and fully appreciate the present moment as it appears, seeing it as an opportunity for spiritual growth and development.

It's easy to think that it would be better if we didn't encounter those people who direct negativity at us, lower our self-esteem, want us to feel bad with, for example, nasty comments and gossip. However, a wise, mature individual understands that no one really wants us to suffer, even if they cause suffering. They themselves don't want to suffer, they escape their bad feeling by wrong means or are temporarily ignorant and therefore self-centered. It is wrong and also sad for us all and for themselves.

Growth includes great understanding about impermanence, cause and effect, forgiveness, understanding that everything we've experienced has shaped us. Everything experienced makes us stronger, we understand ourselves and others better, we love stronger, we learn forgiveness, humility, tolerance, patience, great compassion.

We can truly care about all sentient beings and their well-being. I experienced that already as a child when I had to face many difficulties.

We must also care about ourselves and understand that individual who talks bad about us, lies or otherwise hurts us is not right, we are not what he/she claims. We ourselves know what we are, we will continue progressing steadily forward with loving kindness. Loving yourself is certainly important, but loving others is even more important, (Bodhicitta).

Maturity is facing things with compassion and never with rage and gossiping around even when others are gossiping about us. If we don't regret our own wrongdoings, we don't improve. If those who do not correct their wrong actions towards us continue to do so, they may not have time in this life to correct their karma. So instead of holding grudges or seeking revenge, let's have compassion. One must see deeper into the true nature of things, phenomena.It also dispels the emphasized or clinging thought about oneself and others so that the experience of oneness is strengthened.

We can walk away or stay, it depends on the situation and the seriousness of the matter but it also depends on the extent of our compassion, on our ability to tolerate some unpleasant habits that sometimes appear in others, just as we hope others will tolerate if we have a bad day or something in another's behavior triggers us (e.g. because of our past, karma or his karma ) and we don't behave, act as we normally do. It's a different matter if we ourselves have a habit of overreacting, it can create unnecessary discord in our lives and in the lives of others. If someone e.g. comment on our words, our new clothes, our our preferences regarding food, lifestyle, travel, our bad habits etc. surely that's not a reason to label him/ her an enemy, gossip by labeling him/ her as bad person. That would be very immature. There are really serious things in the world that many struggle through. Maybe someone who is used to have mainly small problems continues to exaggerate those small things. Others go through real difficulties, fight for their lives when experiencing diseases, hunger, oppression caused by others or by karma, conditions.

The ego does not really understand what is serious and what is not. The ego gets hurt, gets angry at everything connected to it's self image and finds it all serious, wants others to believe that a serious wrongdoing happened. There is imagined grave injustice and real grave injustice. If someone destroys your/our good reputation with their gossips it is a serious injustice, as well as if they hurt you physically, threaten your life, drive you from your home, steal your property or something else that we generally understand as serious. However, egocentric individuals maintain the idea of ​​wrongness which is not true but mainly created by their delusions. In their opinion, you can only praise them, the rest is injustice. I have to ask: How do anyone learn anything other than to grow their ego if they are only praised? One might do wrong to others, such things that they themselves would not want to experience, if we only praise and support, we also encourage or allow that behavior to continue. Especially if we allow ourselves to develop like that, we will not develop.

Of course, loving yourself is very important, but

we can't just focus on self love and forget the unfair things we've done (if there are any) and continue doing so. It would be the opposite of growth, as well as if others do so in relation to us. We wouldn't call it growth. Growth is bearing responsibility, it includes correcting one's own behavior and understanding things holistically. A narrow-minded person sees the mistakes of others, labels others, gossips about others and brazenly continues with his/her own negative patterns of behavior. It is not growth by any means.

We grow with mindfulness, mind training, great effort. It does not focus on shutting out things and people for insignificant reasons, but above all on shutting down one's own overreacting behaviors. It is meant to really transform us into better versions of ourselves without any arrogance, blaming others or mocking with wrong definitions. If we continuously behave badly like that, others will certainly behave as well, but even if we only want good for everyone and behave well, someone will behave badly towards us, maybe because of karma, maybe because of their bad mood, or because of their ignorance. We can always bear our responsibility and do/ behave better.

Being reminded of our own responsibility is not blaming you/us for anything. One must know the difference. The Buddha also did not blame when he reminded, Guru does not blame, I do not blame. I repeat the reminders of the Gurus. It is part of the mind training, mindfulness practice.

Let love, let the truth win, never the distortion of things. May we never listen to those who talk, gossips about other people's motives, wills, essence as if they know better than we know ours. Everything is impermanent, and no one can define others permanently. No one else knows who we are better than we know.

I believe you are good. Don't let anyone take away your belief in yourself. When our will is good, our faith is firm, it creates miracles around us and liberates. Impermanence is a comforting, beautiful thing when understood correctly, when living as a conscious, loving being in this moment which is Now. To truly understand impermanence is the key out of suffering, into deeper happiness.

May all mother sentient beings be happy, Mother Tara bless you, protect you 🌟

Om Tāre Tuttāre Ture Soha

***

[keytomind]

INSPIRATION 101

This post will be two-fold. You shall see.

Have you ever felt inspired to do better for yourself because someone that you cared about did not see the best in you?

We can dissect all of the flaws in such a person’s thinking, but rather than doing so, let us use such a scenario as fuel for our growth.

When another person whom you cared for begins to say negative things about you by either hurling insults in your direction or invalidating your beliefs, they are only verbalizing their own insecurities and attempting to weaponize them against you. They will call you weak, soft, stupid, and litany of adjectives that will either bring you to tears or bring you to laughter as they do not know you as well as they think they do.

I have been single for going on six years now. There are times that I am incredibly bored and dissatisfied with my life, but it beats the option of being stuck with a person that you are miserable with, just to have a warm body laying next to you in bed at night.

Shortly after this dissolved relationship, I made the greatest purchase of my life: hold up, that was buying a dog… several dogs, actually. OK, the next best purchase that I ever made was investing in a Peloton. I am at the age where running and other cardio becomes too much wear and tear on my bones and joints, and cycling has become the perfect alternative for me. Rather than purchasing a mountain bike to hit the roads, a stationary bike works best for me as it allows me to avoid making any bullshit excuses, because if I was stuck with only an outdoor bike, it is too easy for me to say that it’s too late, it’s dark outside, it’s cold, it’s raining, it’s snowing, etc. When that stationary bike is staring at me in my living room, it holds me accountable from not getting the work done, and consistent accountability is the determining factor towards achieving results, and results are so fucking addicting.

As I rode my bike tonight, I was planning to only do a short ride to break a sweat. I manicured an incredible playlist to get me going and with each mile that logged in the odometer, it only fired me up to keep going farther. And as I rode, all I could think about was that one person who did not value me in the same light that I valued her. She thought that she knew me, but the truth is that she will never get to experience the best parts of me, and as I continue to work and I feel my core burning and my weight dropping to return back to where I want to be, all I could think was “keep fucking going… don’t stop now.”

The second fold of this piece…

In honor of arguably America’s greatest holiday tomorrow, the Fourth of July, I am only reminded of the greatest man that I have ever known and who I miss in more ways than I can efficiently put into words: my mother’s father, whom I called Pappy.

Pappy was a 17 year old boy when he went to war. He lied about his age because his best friend (his brother) was drafted and he wanted to enlist in order to fight alongside him and protect him. (Do they still make men like this anymore? I fucking doubt it.)

As his grandson, I used to ask him all the time “Pappy, what did you do in the war?” and Pappy always downplayed his role, saying that he was nothing more than a truck driver. He told me that he fought in Germany and that he never saw any true battle, but he had scars that said otherwise and he claimed that it was shrapnel that caught him here and there.

When he passed away at the age of 92, we studied his DD214 (his discharge paperwork) when applying for his military benefits and his paperwork stated that he was the recipient of four bronze stars. This honor is only given to soldiers who exhibited incredible valor in the field of battle. When I shared this information with some of the local veterans that I knew, they were all amazed and eager to learn how he earned them, and they were equally disappointed to learn that he never shared those stories with us, although they understood why. Some of those boys left those stories behind because they just hurt too much and they wanted to forget about them.

As a civilian, even I knew that a soldier is not awarded four bronze stars for being “just a truck driver”. My Pappy was so much more than that. Knowing who he was and what he stood for, I know now that my Pappy was a bad mother fucker who somehow had a heart of gold. He didn’t take any shit from anyone because he learned that life was too short and it could be taken from him in a heartbeat.

As I ride my bike, and as I grow tired in my rides and I consider cutting the ride short or taking break, I remind myself that there were times that people like my Pappy were not afforded such breaks. When he was charging unprotected into battle with artillery flying aimed in his direction, did he get a break? Fuck no. Did he complain? Again, fuck no. This is a man, or a young boy, who lied about his age to fight for his country and to protect his older brother from our enemies. If they weren’t given a break, do I deserve one? Arguably not.

On this Fourth of July, and with an incredibly important election on our horizon this November, make sure you thank a veteran for the freedom that you have today. Work a little harder and give thanks for everything you are blessed with in your life, even if it isn’t much, because you could have so much less, and most importantly, none of us deserve it. We aren’t as special as our parents may have conditioned us to believe as innocent little five year old children. There is always someone out there who has it much worse than we do, so quit your bitchin’ and count your blessings because you woke up today and you are still here.

I will end on this note. When I was a youngster, there was a popular TV show called MASH. It was about a medical unit stationed in Korea that helped care for sick and injured soldiers, and most surprisingly, this show was a comedy.

Pappy absolutely hated this show. It disgusted him to even see it advertised, and when it was, or if my grandparents left the TV on and MASH was about to come on, I used to tease Pappy and ask him if he wanted to watch MASH. Every single time that I can remember, he would get up from his recliner, throw his hand at the TV, and he would mutter the same thing: “there is nothing funny about war.”

These words have so much weight for me today, in ways that I simply could not understand as a child.

As a grown man, I feel horrible for every time that I unknowingly teased him about watching MASH. As I said earlier, my Pappy was a bad mother fucker and you could not convince me otherwise. Enjoy your life, count your blessings, thank our veterans (regardless of however you feel about any wars), and pray for America…. and work fucking hard, because nobody owes you a thing except for what you owe yourself, which is to live your best live.

Love you, Pappy 🖤🖤🇺🇸 and thank you for everything

[cirrem]

Read "Les Miserables" for my "intro to humanities" class and it was really good so I'm going to dump about it here. it was an abridged version, so i may have missed some things. I may be incomprehensible towards the end. SUPER MAJOR SPOILERS

also trigger warnings for death, suicide, and christianity if you care about that.

first off, Jean Valjean is one of my new favorite characters in fiction. he's screwed up but in a way that makes him a better person.

The romance between Marius and Cosette was my least favorite part of the book. it dragged on, but then you look back and they only had 2 conversations before getting married but it talked about the romance for soooooooo long. I'm not Victor Hugo, but I would have definitally trimmed that down and introduced a multi-month time skip between the resolution of the barricade and the marriage.

Eponine is really stupid, and her death was completely avoidable. First: there are plenty of fish in the sea, you could have moved on so many different times. Second: don't bring the man your in love with to a death trap so you can die together, especially if he doesn't love you, and especially if you tragically sacrifice your life to save his and he ends up not dying.

If you don't like religious discussions I suggest stop reading here because I'm going to talk about the religious themes and the suicide and I know some people on tumblr will get upset if I don't preface it

Javert is a coward. He owes Jean Valjean his life, he knows that Jean is not a bad person, and he pays the debt, letting him run free. What makes him a coward is how after this impulsive decision, where he let him free only to settle his debt, he decides "if my worldview is wrong instead of changing and growing I should just kill myself" and does so.

I know he's supposed to be like "the overabusive law system" or whatever, but killing yourself because the guy who is being sent to jail for life, (because of the heinous crimes of: escaping jail, not telling people he was in jail, and stealing 1 loaf of bread to feed his sisters children) may not actually be an irredeemably horrible monster incapable of change, growth, or being someone who you shouldn't send to jail is incredibly dumb.

Now heres where religion comes in: I think Victor Hugo is intentionally contrasting the laws of man with the laws of God (in the bible, new testament). (Specifically, the beatitudes and life/teachings of Christ. For those unaware, I can give a very oversimplified summery: Be kind and merciful to others, even if they suck or you dont like them or they hate you or you hate them. (if you want to at this point bring up modern or historical actions of those claiming to follow or speak for christ when that contradict this, please move on. I am aware that people call themselves christians without following his words))

to summerize my thoughts: javert represents the "laws of man" which are fallible, and not actually just. Specifically, there is 1) only punishment for the wicked, no blessings to the righteous 2) no allowance for change as a person in judgement, once wicked always wicked. Compare this to every time a religious person does something in the book: the bishop takes mercy on valjean, and sends him away with more gifts, valjean becomes religeous, forgives javert for suspecting him, saves the life of someone who hates him, later, valjean sacrifices his life, revealing himself to secretly be a convict to save a stranger from lifetime slavery, a nun lies to protect valjean (the narrative states she never had before, she did something at cost of her own standards to save his life), valjean finds and saves cosette from the theadears and they take refuge in a nunnery, and get in only because of the man whose life he saved earlier. Finally, Valjean has the chance to kill Javert, in the revolution (Javert is tied up, and Valjean has a gun) but valjean sets him free. The book is really emphasizing the importance of mercy, even when it comes at a cost to yourself, and it would be easier to punish those you dislike. Every time someone is merciful, it turns out fine, even benificial in the long run. (and specifically the mercy as outlined by christ, as everyone that acts mercifully is explicitly religious, and it follows what he taught pretty closely imo).

Gods law of mercy, allowing and helping people to change for the better, even if they don't deserve it, is constantly shown to be superior to and more benificial to society than the harshness of man's legal system, which treats a criminal as always a criminal, and never gives to those in need.

Except, hear me out: this isn't about legal systems at all, this is about how we treat ourselves and those we care about.

We need to have mercy, both on others around us, and on ourselves. Valjean revealed the worst of his past to marius, but he wasn't that person anymore. Marius had to learn that Valjean saved his life from Thernadair! What! He is wastes away and DIES because of his shame of who he was, and his insistence that he is still as guilty as he was then. He had mercy, even for those that would chase him down, toss him into chains, and force him to work until his death, but he had none for himself, and he suffered for it. However, because of how he was kind, he was able to save and touch many lives, and drastically improved the lives of those around him.

Compare this to Javert, who rather than be kind to anyone, or himself, threw himself into the sea, never improved anyones life, and would have been killed if Valjean didn't offer to kill him (then not kill him). I know who I'll rather be, and I think thats kind of the point of the book.

anyways, if I have to write an essay on this book I think I'll be fine.

valjean and the bishop are both incredibly based characters. Eponine was more interesting than Marius and Cosette combined.

[dropintomanga]

Wotakoi - Coming Out vs. Concealment for Otaku

When it comes to identifying yourself as a nerd/otaku/geek, there hasn’t been a better time to do so. We’re in the age where geeks have inherited the Earth to a major degree. Despite the growing acceptance of all things nerdy, there are people who don’t want to reveal their inner geek to others around them. This subject gets addressed in the very last volume of Fujita’s Wotakoi: Love Is Hard for Otaku.

Way back in the 1st volume of Wotakoi, Narumi Momose doted on Hirotaka Nifuji over her ex-boyfriends. All of them dumped her once she told them that she was an otaku. Narumi lamented her bad choices until Hirotaka makes the bold move of asking to be her boyfriend due to both of them being otaku. Narumi accepts with little hesitation after Hirotaka offers to help work on her Comiket booth. Narumi and Hirotaka carry on as a couple without anyone knowing about their otaku hobbies (with a few notable exceptions).

Narumi’s fear of rejection over being an otaku comes to a head near the finale of the series when she accidentally drops a pile of BL doujinshi at her office with her co-workers seeing them. A visibly distraught Narumi tries to talk to Hirotaka about her concern of being outed as an otaku at work. Hirotaka says it shouldn’t matter, only to bring up Narumi’s past pain with her first boyfriend rejecting her because of her otaku hobbies. Narumi feels it’s best to not let anyone know, but Hirotaka insists that she tells everyone at the office. Narumi yells at Hirotaka to drop the subject and the latter tells her sarcastically that she’s clearly more experienced in handling the problem than he is due to his own lack of interpersonal growth. Their first real fight as a couple leads Narumi down a path where she realizes that being stuck in her own head and fears led her to forgetting that Hirotaka is the one person who’s willing to help her when she’s in distress.

A while back, I read an article about coming out as members of the LGBTQ+ community and the nuance of whether to come out or not. The article discussed how some people may choose to conceal their sexual identity with very good reasons. Sometimes, the environment they’re in is hostile. Harassment of all kinds is sadly a thing despite growing acceptance. There’s also the fact that not everyone will understand and appreciate why someone might conceal their sexual identity in the 1st place. 

You can apply disclosure of your identity towards topics like revealing your mental illness and fandom. I sometimes have felt that once I told people who I thought were great friends my mental illness and fandom years before those topics became mainstream, I was slowly pushed aside for people who were more “normal” and had more popular interests at the time. Like how Narumi felt, that rejection still stings. Coming out personally brought a lot of anguish for me 20 years ago.

There’s also something Narumi said that made me think about coming out. While moping about Hirotaka trying to reason with her, she laments on why he doesn’t understand what she’s going through with regards to outing herself as an otaku. I think back to an online post called “I don’t want you to understand” (sadly, I can’t find it on Archive.org). It was a personal post from someone living with mental illness that they don’t want anyone to emphasize them and wouldn’t want anyone to hear about their struggles. All they really want in the end is for someone to just be there and be willing to stick by them through the worst of times. 

Narumi gets flashbacks of Hirotaka being there for her throughout her life and she sees that she’s letting her personal drama get the best of her. All of a desire to feel understood. It’s fine to seek validation for your thoughts and feelings, but people understanding your problems doesn’t mean that they can solve them for you. Wanting to be understood is often a result of poor self-esteem, which Narumi had regarding her self-confidence in her otaku nature. Plus, not everyone’s meant to be alike no matter what common interests we share. Hirotaka points this out to Narumi when they eventually make up and he explains that through genuinely listening to one another and being present with them no matter what, emotional wounds can heal.

Narumi does out herself as an otaku to her co-workers and much to her surprise, they aren’t bothered by it. One of her co-workers even points out that times have changed for acceptance of otaku in Japanese society. Narumi believes Hirotaka and her friends really helped gave her the courage to take that step to accept herself as an otaku towards people she cares about. While she won’t share her interests to just anyone, Narumi realizes that the people who do care about her will accept all parts of her.

It’s hard to come out as a closet (insert identity) or make a good decision to do so when you’re in some kind of crisis or feel as if you’re in one. You have to be in a really good place mentally to talk about it, just like Narumi with her disclosure about her otaku identity. I know from experience, one of the worst things you can do is overwhelm someone about your pain without giving them any context. I remember a time where I was rejected by someone I was close with and I doted on a friend of theirs I didn’t know well. I came out to them about my mental illness without a care because I was so sad. They replied that they didn’t need to know that. We never really spoke again after that. While it looks like I talk a lot about my condition on my blog, I don’t really talk about my mental illness to people in real life and/or am not willing to disclose a great deal of information about it. I’ll save that conversation for people I really want in my life.

The author Fujita stressed in a interview with Kodansha USA that she wanted to talk about Narumi’s internal struggle over otaku acceptance for the longest time, so I’m glad that she focused on it at the end of the series. I look at Narumi’s case and I think everyone has to decide for themselves on when to out themselves as proud members of a community that’s considered stigmatized. You can’t just force someone to do it all just because the pros outweigh the cons. I now wonder if Fujita wanted to talk about how otaku often struggle with internal doubt and how they need to let unconditional love (when it comes) open their perspective to new ways of thinking.

Like how Narumi’s friends (and the cast of Wotakoi) show, it takes all kinds of people combined with love to help make the decision of hiding vs. showing not so stressful.

Much love to Fujita for writing Wotakoi. I just got the complete U.S. box set after reading the series through copies I borrowed from my local library over the years. I’m very excited to see her next work! (which I hear will explore LGBTQ+ themes with regards to gender dysphoria)

[rainbow-crane]

Dangantober Day 8- Favorite Survivor (no repeats) (yes ik it's the 16th idc)

Adding in some yap bc I posted this and then immediately remembered I had a zoom meeting lol

Toko is a bit of a marvel within the DR cast as being the only character to be active for two games (speaking on a meta level and not an in-universe game ofc). And honestly, that's what lands her in this spot for me, because like many other of her fans, I found Toko to be insufferable for basically my entire first run of THH. She had some interesting points here and there, sure, but nothing that wasn't being done with someone else in the cast, and Genocide Jack easily had more charm to the point where I was actively disappointed whenever Toko was fronting. She was rude towards her classmates, a stalker, and doing nothing for basically the entire game, exhibiting no character growth and being unimportant to the point where her main role in the final showdown was shutting up and letting Jack take over, being the only survivor not to come to some sort of personal realization to choose hope. She was kind of just an accessory to Jack for me, which is hilarious because I'm pretty sure Kodaka in all his ableist glory intended them to be interpreted the other way around lol

Thankfully, UDG exists, and it rocket launched Toko into not only my top 3 survivors, but also my top 5 Danganronpa characters of all time. By playing off the fact that Toko felt like she did nothing in THH and actively wanting to be better because of the heroism she witnessed from Makoto, Byakuya, and the others, she almost immediately goes from ungodly irritating to relatively rootable, and pairing her with a character who takes a sarcastic "I'm allergic to machines" at face value puts the playing audience in a similar point of frustration and intrigue that Toko herself is feeling.

There are three Tokos that exist in DR- the Toko in THH, the Toko at the start of UDG, and the Toko at the end of UDG. Each one gets progressively more rootable as you not only learn more bits of her past that full in the gaps from THH, but also watch her self-reflect and find her own convictions in real time within UDG. She perfectly demonstrates how anyone, even the people that seem the most disgusting at first, can grow and change when given love and support, and that's some fantastically with her relationships with both Naegis, even if one is much more focused on than the other. You can feel the impact having that kind of support does for her, and inspires her to become a better version of herself the way any kind of healthy relationship does. It's admirable, and the only time we get a story like this in such a strong manner. Like, yeah, there are plenty of other characters that are inspired to change by others, but typically, the inciting incident is their loved one dying horrifically. Not so with Toko, who is inspired by their life rather than her projection of them after their death. Toko goes to show you can build your own change, that the people around you are worth the best version of yourself, and that you always have the right to be better. And I adore her for it.

[365sylviaplath]

On The Unexpected Joint Slay of Family x Career (4th House x 10th House)

astrology blurb: A majority of my notable astrological transits at the time i started this journey seemed to be centered around abundance and career growth/shakeups and hopefully finally being recognized for my work (financially, socially, etc) and instead i was searching for obituaries with my full name on them (my paternal grandma's name) while at a job that continued to not recognize me, no financial changes (in fact, i had just paid the most i've ever paid for taxes in my life). There is something so mysterious and endlessly fascinating about the axes in astrology - when you’re looking into one particular transit, it will also be reflected somewhere else in your chart, which may come through more clearly. In this example, both jupiter and uranus were conjunct my midheaven/10th house of career (hence my blurb above about career gains), but something i later came to remember was the fact that this meant it was also opposing my 4th house of home/family.

some axes are obviously opposite but inextricably linked: 2nd is about what you have and 8th is about what you lose, you owe taxes for any money you earn and dying is the only guarantee when it comes to living life. you can only lose something when you have it! loss and gain are symbiotic lovers in the eyes of astrology in the same way that your home and family identity are tied to your career and public persona. i proceeded to be so stumped by this.

you can’t be a public figure without a private self. the self you think no one will witness, because how could they, is on utter display. much like how becoming a parent is a job (and one of the few things that can get you somewhat out of work in the American Traditional workplace), work will publicly out you for who you are and who you were raised to be. how you show yourself to the public is a direct result of who you grew up as. how do you act when someone blames you? if you have to do something independently? you will accidentally seek mentorship from people who remind you of your family members, repeat the same career blunders as your parents (or come incredibly close), wonder why you’re stuck in the situation you’re in and then remember you’ve seen it modeled more times than you can count. parents overly focused on their careers/work life and being seen by the public likely did not make as much time for their kids. family and work are constantly being put at odds as though they are complete opposites. but they need each other! private and public self are more stunningly similar than we realize.

sometimes it’ll really be 26 years on auto-pilot and then your new therapist in a new city asks you about your family history. screeching halt. most other years in therapy, i had more alarming and pressing personal issues i needed immediate attention for, but all of the extraneous material was stripped away this year. getting along with my friends, renewed my lease, physical recovery very much on track, not dating anyone, work same as its always been (not great, but the same) - one of my first therapy assignments was to look for my grandma’s obituary. Something about googling your own first name + last name + obituary after therapy on a Friday night and parsing through results. Something about realizing she had my name - my name was actually hers first - i am, because she was. I wouldn’t be myself if she wasn’t herself. at the time, i couldn't even mentally conjure an image of what she looked like.

i started therapy with far different intentions. my mental health was not the best at the time. lots of bizarre, seemingly psychosomatic symptoms (classic for me, but always indicative of a larger thing going on), a desire to pivot careers into something that better suited my interests and skills, generally just needed help figuring out my deal. career was pretty stable at that time, but i knew i had a lot of unresolved feelings toward my professional life that i wanted to sort out. even the idea of pivoting was challenging for me! i was struggling to even get myself out of the psychological hole. the concept of writing cover letters for jobs that wouldn't even have the decency to reject me felt like medieval torture. i genuinely couldn't bring myself to do it and felt more and more ashamed that i couldn't even start the process of leaving, thus furthering the spiral. i brought myself to a new city, i created an entirely new home life for myself, i had clear intentions of rebirth! why was it so hard to be reborn?

i thought about how many women had to give up careers they loved to get married and have kids. and all love to those who want to do this! but certainly not all of them wanted this. i wondered the forbidden question - did grandma really want to have kids and stop working? in the middle of the Bell Jar, she describes walking around boston with a man from chicago and thinking to herself about how she would reinvent herself if she moved to chicago. right before she receives the electro-shock treatment for the first time, she makes an attempt to escape the treatment (and massachusetts entirely) and run away to chicago. guess there really never is an original thought. i wondered if grandma ever considered running away to chicago. clearly it was on the map for some of the new england girlies! was i unconsciously doing what she wished to do? at the end of the day, i had a few very solid reasons for moving, but it still felt a little random. leave and create a new home for yourself if you ever wish to outwardly engage with the world in a way you're proud of. i wondered how many "random thoughts" of ours are actually the thoughts and feelings of our family members?

[sheepblood]

contradiction, prelude

Supposedly, my shepherd knew me well, though I was always on my toes, wanting to be loved and perfect all the time, bursting cotton at my seams.

These masks are my own. If I had been spoken to now by him, one month later, I would have been a foreign person. These realizations and galvanizations towards betterment exist now, but didn't then, and I'm still a thriving rabbit in the deep, behind dog's mercury, throat choked with watercress and blue brooklime.

&

I lived life quickly, scared, rushed, worried about every passing second, soft leg hurting from the thump, "I thought you were asleep, you took too long," (next time I'll be faster, spend less time working on things). "The food is taking too long, do the dishes," (no need for me to breathe, be swift). [My heart is racing, am I dying? I need to express my frustration when my heart races. The heart knows best. The heart knows pain, it will tell me where I'm wrong. It's not a beating vessel. She speaks for me. Is my heart telling me I'm lying? The clock is ticking, and I'm overdue for a confession. Oh, dear, her feelings are hurt. Blame her. Guilt yourself. Your irritation is sublime.] Did no one say the right amount of "It tastes delicious!" or "You look beautiful, beautiful, beautiful!" darling? So they didn't mean it. So you claim with a whole "heart" that you won't undermine the compliments, but you do anyway. Obsessively, you need more.

Love comes from labour, labour comes from love. I know you can't open your eyes and heart to pain and want fast results, but the world around you is moving fast, too, so you can afford to be slow.

&

I tried changing and sweeping the grime from your face because that is what I wanted: growth. I should have learned to accept it, but I was under the impression that I was here to serve you, here to create something new from old. The same way someone walks into a wreckage, hands on hips, nods, and asserts that there is beauty here. Should I have let you be? Loved it for what you were? Left the tarnish on your pocket watch?

My heart believes in your nuance, despite others saying otherwise, but I think your inability to tell me your thoughts as I do mine was a fault of your own. I want to believe you're multifaceted and aren't aware of it. Maybe I wasn't either, and I was biased, and every beautiful thing I saw in you was my own projection. Or maybe not. Or maybe not.

&

I have no reservations about my lovers. I sensed it from you, and my body could not take it. So I urged, suggested things upon you, and tried to move you in that approach.

You told me, lamb, you're so worried all the time. It'll be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Okay, it did end, like all things, and my soft, small hands weren't enough to stop it. I was right. Now what? Now what do we do? I was right. You're gone.

&

With every new lover, I seek replication of memories in all that I do. Nostalgia drives me. I can accept the nonexistence of repetition, but I still want to create new memories that nod towards old ones, the memories I want to overwrite, but the memories being more beautiful simply by nature of being full of life, better, new - is paramount.

The bubbling brook of rabbits and lambs cannot be contained or possessed by one person. I will not let the beautiful memories be lost because I am a dreamer of the past.

And I look towards the horrors, only the horrors, of the future.

But I do not want to be. I'd rather be a creature looking forward to its next meal, never what it ate.

But I bought your favourite video games today anyway. Just as the softly smiling, green-eyed little girl at school says: "mine, mine, mine." Shh, the baby is sleeping. I want all that was yours to be mine yet better. I used to say this and capitulate in my efforts, but now I won't. Now, I won't.

I made mine for every interest of yours. Only procrastination and the fear of the end stopped it from blooming.

&

I eagerly wanted to meet you in your shallow pools. Love doesn't need exact reciprocity, so why did I always, always want it back?

Transactional at heart because I feared being loathed and let alone. The regret of giving so much and receiving little. That is fear.

Oh, hey. In the end, I gave up everything anyway.

&

I analyzed your every breath, and I doubt anyone's ever looked at you so closely or ever will. I held you in my arms, begging to be held back every day, and when you had me, I felt like it was heaven and never enough. Reflect, darling - am I ungrateful? Was I a chore? A body to lean on?

I need reasons. Why do you love me? Just because is never enough. It will never be enough.

&

Maybe things were fluttering down due to outside opinion, something you resented, but something I needed to ensure I wasn't going mad.

See, I ask everyone alive to reassure my reality, to build it with me stone by stone. When people respond to my questions, it's as if they're telling me what to do in my universe, so I take it wholeheartedly. Suggestions are not truths; their opinions are not gospel, but how else do I prove that I think you are worthy?

(So if someone says you're doing wrong, are you? Am I, for believing them and not doing anything about it, except squeezing out my disdain, regretting encroaching upon something that could have been let alone?)

&

Why do you illustrate your life in broad strokes of detail? Before, I envied that way of thinking. Blurring out emotional details and giving soulless explanations seemed like something I could envy. I wanted to exalt you for it, but I became afraid of what I couldn't see.

The details, the details, the details. You skim over my illustrious depictions of things; keep what you can in reserved memory. Do you think? At all?

When you do, why do I become inordinately angry? Why do I ignore you? Why is it taciturn?

This lamb has lots of fleece to cycle through. Cashmere, where he is confident in his mind. Plain wool, where he cannot trust his own opinion, and determines the opposite. If perception is reality, then the opposite of everything the bellwether says must be true.

&

So, anyway, why did she leave you?

What happened in that half a decade from the emergence of youth to the toiling of your adulthood?

19 to 24 is a long time.

19 to 24, 19 to 24, the ages we met.

I thought you were different when you told me you didn't like having sex with people you didn't love, so why the fuck is that normal to you?

I feel guilt if I don't love someone. I feel resentment. I only do "it" because I'm in pain. You do it for hedonism. You do it for hedonism, so somehow I can be absolved.

I want to kill you. Using my body when you didn't love me anymore. And if you did, it wasn't the right kind of love. You're the worst. I can never take that back, but you never took anything, so here we are again.

I spilled my guts so you would, too. So you would, too, someday. Maybe someday. Maybe you'd agree that what happened to me was wrong. The way I agree with the people I speak to; their suffering is my own. As if it would fix anything.

Can't imagine suffering like that with you.

Five whole years.

We're all thinking about it. Or is it just me?

&

Around the world, I collected pieces of my heart to share with you, something I wanted us to enjoy together. Many needed to be displayed, yet were not, and I resented what I purchased.

Did I want you to change, or was it unreasonable for me to ask you to? Namely, material doesn't represent love to you, yet it does a little to me. Crows enjoy fetching glitter and gold in the same way I do. The crow in me bought you many meaningful items - in part, to overcompensate, but they were meaningful parts of a larger picture. I could lose it at any time.

My love language is everything. I need parts of material, I need your body, I need your time, I need you to serve me, and I need to give you everything with my whole blood all the same.

I lost you too. Then, were you material?

&

Despite my suffocating wardens, you were my first real lover I had the confidence to admit I wanted to enjoin with, though I was filled with hesitation and often remarked that I longed for our friend stage to have been more prolonged. I was under their heel, I risked everything for you. All I wanted was for you to meet them and lie about being okay with engaging in my practices.

But you are a complete person in that sense. You do not change. You prefer your lonesome, maybe a love vampire that seeks nourishment from my breast. I wonder if you were authentic in that.

Authenticity to me was you not responding with the overflowing energy as I did to things because you didn't have to. (In the same tow, authenticity was the opposite of that). I respected your gloom and tight-lipped speak. A part of me respects your refusal to change, but a true lover goes out of their comfort zone.

You told me you did not think you could meet my needs.

Honestly, I never would have expected such honesty. And I showed it by pretending you didn't say it, that you didn't mean it.

Honestly, not to be arrogant, but does intellect scare you?

&

"Sorry for the trouble," you tell my friend. A comment no one would think anything about except me, maybe.

It botches my mind that what could be your last words were to him.

We didn't have an official date where you asked me out. I wanted to try it again. (Will you continue to date me?) I'd said, but you dismissed me. I thought it would be beautiful to begin from nothing, in the middle of something.

Are you scared of how much one can remember?

"Obviously I want to see you, but there's nothing I can do about it."

The things that were not hurdles before have become hurdles now. The love drained, the skips in the forest alone and shielded from interference were churlish and a mark of a rebellion I never experienced in my youth. It was never fun to sneak out. I wanted to be yours for nights upon nights, and you'll never be able to now. Will she have you like that? I beg of you to tell me.

You never fucking will. It'll never be my business what you do now. I eat, I eat, I eat.

&

I do not insist on lukewarm tendencies from men. I knew you had commitment issues and it wouldn't work for me, but maybe I needed to be more casual like you, so fine. I invested in potential, thinking my love could make you commit, but I had it all wrong. My heart was too heavy. I broke down for a month. Maybe I'll continue to.

But now I've learned to not remark or reply to everything, as scary as that can be. People can listen without showing it, but it angered me to think that was acceptable, once.

I am excessively in tune to your subtleties like they're the most elaborate things. Your eyes sung to me, your lips consumed me, and looking into your pale body was like a window. I ate every part of you. I eat, I eat, I eat.

Your next lover will be simpler, and you'll be relieved.

Is there a separation of the self in love? Why do we pretend we are awake together if we all sleep alone?

When you didn't want to meet my mother, I knew you'd been mourning for a while.

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Young!Max having a crush on you would include~

(Not my gif)(Requested by my brain who wouldn’t let this idea leave it)

(Ah yes, the bi lifestyle: loving both women and Robert De Niro respectively)

- Moving to a different borough during his late teens gave Max the perfect opportunity to start fresh and find himself a girl who didn’t know what he looked like during his more gangly and awkward phases of adolescent growth. And that’s exactly what he did; though whether or not he was still gangly and awkward is definitely up for debate. 

- A pretty girl is a pretty girl but Max definitely has an especially stiff hard on for girls; or boys, who are “sinners”. He likes rambunctious people who get down and dirty, and who can hold their own against his equally unsavory “business practices”. He doesn’t see himself leaving this job of his anytime soon so he’s looking for someone who can roll with the punches, or at least someone who knows when to duck. 

- Max adheres to a pretty hard ‘love at first sight’ policy, if he likes someone, he likes them the first time he sees them, and it only spirals from there. That’s what’s good about him: your personality will be a plus but it technically doesn’t even matter. Whoever you turn out to be is irrelevant; he loves you from the beginning and he’s determined to love you no matter what. 

- For obvious reasons, the way Max goes about his crushes all depends on the type of person he’s managed to fall for. If the girl is sweet then he’s gonna find it a lot harder to get close to her, but if they’re on the “sour” side, he’ll find it a lot easier. He just knows how to handle and appeal to those types of characters a lot better. 

- He doesn’t really know how to act like a gentleman without it coming off as awkward and insincere so he’d probably just play into the whole “rapscallion thing” and teasingly make himself out to be some sort of thug: all the while behaving in an obviously good natured way so you; the “good girl”, don’t actually see him as a threat or think he’s willing to hurt you. He might pull your leg or act unceremonious and uncivilized but that’s just his personality; and the personality of most teenage boys in your area so it doesn't scare you off. 

- Although, as I said before: Max is typically attracted to people who aren’t very innocent and sweet. You don’t have to be born with a “how to pick pocket” pamphlet in your brain, but having a mind that conjures up insults and quick comebacks will definitely help your case.

- When you meet him for the first time, he’ll undoubtedly manage to get a rise out of you and though you’re trying your best to scare him off; what with all your insults and other signs of verbal distaste for him, all you manage to do is draw him and make him want to know you even more. 

- Unfortunately for you, Max’s usual method for making new friends is trying to prove that he’s better than or just as good as them. Impressing them by triumphing over them and making sure that they don’t write him off too quickly; even if it means that they initially dislike him. 

- Max isn’t shy in the slightest: he’ll interject himself into your life as soon as possible and probably piss you off in the process, all before redeeming himself in one way or another; forcing you to drop your animosity towards him against your own better judgement.

- If you’re the type of girl who’s willing to do some terrible shit for some money, he’d probably tease you about being “just a girl” but wouldn't miss the opportunity to get close to you; either convincing you to join forces with him after seeing how much potential you have or taking you in under his wing/letting you join his makeshift business after you approach him yourself. 

- He uses this newfound relationship of yours to get closer to you and otherwise cockblock you. Oh, what’s this? You’re talking to another boy? Time to call you over when he really doesn’t need to and either divvy up your cash or brief you on your next set of shenanigans. 

- He’d make jokes about your “new romance” with another boy but would grow annoyed and act somewhat betrayed whenever you’d blow him off to hang out with them. He’d never come up with an arguably valid excuse; mainly because he didn’t have one, but he’d say something along the lines of how the two of you are partners and that you need to stick together and trust no one else. 

- Sometimes you’ll get into fights over his possessiveness or in your eyes; his moodiness/pushiness, but you’re never able to stay mad at each other for very long. You’ll walk down the street, swearing you won’t talk to him for the rest of your life but a few glances from across the road as he works for his mother; seeing the way he stops in his tracks to stare at you and the way his eyes hold a hope that you’ll approach him, and your resolve breaks little by little; even if you really want to punish him.

- Working for his mother gave him a surprising amount of strength and he likes to use it to his advantage from time to time: picking you up and helping you down from places regardless of whether or not you actually need him to; playing chivalrous. He always feels a wave of pride wash over him when you look to him whenever you need some help; especially if there’s other boys there that you could have or maybe even should have asked. It inflates his ego to consider the fact that you think he’s the strongest one in the vicinity.

- Whenever him and his mother drive around town; particularly if you aren’t very close yet, he likes to smile down and offer you a ride: helping you up happily if you shyly agree and sitting thigh to thigh as you ride on the little step in back.

- He walks you home and to school a lot as well; even though he doesn’t go himself (I think?). He gets up early to walk with you yet plays it off like he has things to do whenever you ask why he’s awake; even though his job doesn’t start for another hour or he took off just to come and take you. 

- His arm around your shoulders while he guides you around town. He always makes a joke out of it, slinging his arm around you while he makes some sort of teasing comment, but it allows him to be affectionate with you and scare off potential suitors all the same.

- He’s kind of a little asshole but he’s also sort of cute with it. Like yes, he pushed you into a pool of water; clothes and all, but he did jump in after you and the two of you did have a lot of fun. They’re the sorts of things that you brush off as stupid situations that all guys get into with their male friends; things you’d know nothing about since you’re a girl and always left out of them, but it’s definitely more of a “stupid things guys do when they have a crush” sort of thing and an attempt to tear down your walls and get closer to you. 

- He looks back at these moments fondly and thinks of them as proof that you have to like him back or at least be close to realizing that you have all along. He imagines that you can use them as evidence to choose him over someone else or that you’ll both be able to think back of them years down the line and reminisce about how the two of you fell in love. 

- He’s definitely stolen some kind of jewelry for you and though you have to hide it from your mother; knowing you’d never be able to explain or come up with an excuse, you still wear it every day and night. 

- If you’re particularly small or of the innocent variety then he’d definitely be fairly protective of you: acting like your knight in shining armor and keeping an eye on you, making sure you stay relatively out of trouble and always having your back against the dangerous fools of the city.

- Him getting into a fight over you is pretty much inevitable. The minute a guy disrespects or threatens you, he loses his temper and winds up rolling around on the ground with them; getting in as many punches as he can. 

- It isn’t often but he’ll occasionally get himself into worrying situations just to have you show that you care for him; especially if you’re a ‘play it cool’ type of person. He’ll pretend to drown or say something about him being in danger or he’ll purposefully scuff himself up to see if you’ll notice and care: and he’s always ecstatic to see that you do; even if you merely make a joke about it or pretend like you care a lot less than you really do. 

- There are definitely times during your friendship where you jokingly pretend to be husband and wife: jokingly because he’s absolutely only joking. He’s just calling you dearest for the bit haha. It’s so funny when you rest your head lovingly on his shoulder and stroll with him arm in arm. Finishing each others sentences really takes this comedic routine to the next level haha.

- Your ability to momentarily fluster him is unmatched; even if you don't quite notice the fact that you’ve made him nervous or the reason you've somehow attained this new skill.

- He’s got a lot of pictures of you on his camera. Most of them are joking, a sort of “oh, come and model for me” brand of over exaggerated poses, but he’ll also occasionally catch you off guard with a quick “look over here” and a flash of the light. Sometimes you’ll take them purposefully and try to look tough or cool; something he finds particularly adorable, and other times he’ll use the excuse of wanting to see how well it works to get close ups and candid photos of you. They’re some of his most treasured possessions.

- He looks you up and down and watches you under his lashes a lot: and if you were ever paying enough attention to notice or were just a bit more knowledgeable when it came to romance; you’d easily be able to tell that he was in love with you just from those little looks alone. 

- He spies on you but he’s a whole lot better at not being caught then Noodles is so sorry but you’ll probably never find out about his creepy occasional habit.

- At some point, he learns the usefulness of a bra and subsequently hands you things he needs you to hold and/or hide. Later looking at them like “oh dear, this has touched the tit of the woman I love” or sneaking glances at you as you dig everything out of your shirt once you've both gotten away from the scene of the crime.

- Okay, but him dressing you up in his old hand-me-downs in an attempt to keep you safe and make it easier for you to run and him falling even more in love with you as a butch, soot and sweat covered little girl; head over heels for you the same way a normal boy would react to seeing a girl in her Sunday best. 

- Speaking of clothes: at some point, you’ll find yourself in love with another boy; enough to where you’re attempting to dress up and make yourself more presentable, and though you insist it’s for another reason entirely, he’ll know why you’re doing it immediately and the thought of it will kill him. He'll feel betrayed and like the guy is unworthy and he’ll probably make comments about how “if a guy doesn't like you in your normal clothes then he wont like you in a fancy dress”. And though the comments bother you, you try not to take them to heart: responding with something like “I don’t know what you’re talking about” or how “if anyone if going to like [you] they’re gonna have to realize you’re a girl.”. 

- I don’t think that Max would confess, I think he’d just lay one on you one day and keep kissing you until you melted or wrenched yourself away from him; if only to look at him in surprise and ask what he “did that for”.

“Cause I wanted to.” He’d say out of breath and you’d pause before saying something like ‘oh,’ or ‘you could have asked’; as you took into consideration exactly what he was trying to tell you. 

“Can I” He’d respond and after a small pause, you’d agree and he’d grin; glancing down at your lips before crushing you to him once again. 

[mbti-notes]

hi mbti, entj with an exfj mother. whenever we get into arguments, she responds by yelling at me and blaming me and admittedly i respond by yelling back at her. she has been like this for the entirety of my life and when i try to communicate with her calmly after an argument she just ignores me. i want to have a better grasp on how to control my reactions during arguments as it takes a lot out of me to try and reason with her or even get an insight into other solutions i haven't considered. thank you

Why are you interested in personality type? Many people are merely in it for ego validation. Some people are looking to improve their relationships with different types. IMO, if you want to get something truly valuable out of type theory, you have to enter into the learning process with a clear intention to develop a deeper understanding of humans, to gain the kind of wisdom that helps you become more empathetic and compassionate toward yourself and others. In other words, do you genuinely want to understand your relationship with your mom and connect with her better, or do you just want a quick-fix to end the conflict and get her off your back?

When you seek to resolve a conflict for mostly egotistical reasons, you won't get very far, because it's easy for the other person to detect that you care more about your own comfort than their well-being. To resolve a conflict properly, you must approach it primarily from a place of care and love. If you aren't able to do that, you're signalling to the other person that you're not relationship-ready, so they won't have much motivation to meet you halfway, hence, the reluctance to engage with you. Why waste energy on a discussion that will go nowhere? Why waste energy trying to explain something when the other person doesn't seem to have the desire/capacity to understand? I'm not accusing you of anything or judging who's right or wrong. I'm simply making sure that you are aware of your intentions because they matter a great deal in conflict resolution.

It is indeed important to keep yourself in check when things get too heated, but that's really only the first of many steps. At most, it keeps communication going, but it doesn't constitute a full-fledged solution to the conflict. You haven't described or provided any representative examples of the sorts of things you argue about, which makes it very difficult for me to know what exactly lies at the root of the conflict. And perhaps that is the problem: You're not grasping what lies at the root of the conflict, so your ideas about how to solve it keep dancing around the problem at best. Dancing around means you have no clear direction or no clue about what the finishing move should be. What is your long term vision for this relationship?

In terms of ENTJ development, dancing around is likely related to underdeveloped Ni: your way of thinking is too short-sighted and superficial, so you're unable to grasp what's really happening beneath appearances, let alone set a long term vision to strive for. In the context of relationships, the superficiality of underdeveloped Ni is also linked to underdeveloped Fi: you are unable to recognize and address the underlying feelings and emotional needs in play, so you end up band-aiding the conflict only to have it recur in the future.

Every personality type has its fair share of challenges, difficulties, and weaknesses. If you don't understand what they are in your own type, you won't make much progress in personal growth. If you don't understand what they are in someone else's type, you won't be able to "speak their language" or frame ideas in a way that makes sense to them. Recurring relationship problems usually require a two-pronged solution of personal growth as well as growing your understanding of others. Developing Ni+Fi should help you with both.

The most obvious difference between you and your mother is T and F. By definition, feelings and emotions matter a lot to Fs and how they make decisions. Healthy Fe doms don't anger easily because they: don't like the stress of extreme emotions; are usually willing to give people the benefit of the doubt; prefer to see the good in people; hope for kinder ways of resolving conflicts. There are really only a few things that anger Fe doms, mostly involving:

lack of care shown to the things that are very important to them

ignoring/dismissing people's needs and feelings

taking them and their thoughtfulness for granted

violation of their personal rules/boundaries

antisocial/immoral behavior that causes harm or suffering

Have you done any of the above? If so, have you admitted the mistake, provided a humble and honest explanation for it, sincerely apologized, and made a promise to do better? That is often all it takes to get back in the good graces of FJs, but you'd be surprised at how often people simply can't or won't take the first step toward reconciliation.

It takes two to tango. When the lines of communication have broken down, it's sometimes necessary to step up and be the bigger person and apologize first, in order to encourage the other person to respond in kind. It's not about who is at fault or who is to blame or who started it (i.e. pettiness). It's really about acknowledging that feelings have been hurt and needs have been neglected, and then making a gesture toward repair. In essence, it's about ending all aggression and, instead, opening up opportunities to show love.

To be clear, this is not about rolling over, placating, or appeasing. You also need to address why you feel in conflict, why you feel upset. You wouldn't be getting into arguments without feeling strongly about something or other. Oftentimes, ENTJs are unable to speak about feelings and emotions directly because they fear being vulnerable and/or simply don't have that level of self-awareness. But vulnerability is precisely the gesture that is needed for the other person to feel more confident about reconciliation.

Vulnerability shows that you are finally ready and willing to get real, to discuss the very heart of the matter. Speaking honestly and authentically about feelings is quite difficult for most people, usually due to ego reasons, but it is necessary for building more meaningful and fulfilling relationships. Until two people can feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable with each other - to approach with zero intention to judge, shame, blame, accuse, or attack - they won't be able to resolve relationship problems once and for all.

Of course, one big reason people fear vulnerability is because it leaves them open to being manipulated, exploited, or attacked. You can't control other people, so trusting them always carries some risk. Give people a few chances to return your vulnerability in graduated steps, but if they can't reciprocate or they use it against you, it means they are not relationship-ready. At that point, feel proud that you were brave and put out your best effort, but acknowledge that the relationship has hit a hard ceiling for reasons beyond your control.

If you have a tendency to nitpick or debate the details of who's right and who's wrong in an argument, you're basically trying to establish dominance and doing the opposite of being vulnerable. And chances are, you're ignoring what matters most, which is healing the injury that was caused by the conflict. It could be injury to a person or to the relationship as a whole. In the midst of heated conflict, it's easy for feelings to get trampled, boundaries to get violated, trust to get betrayed, and painful memories to get dredged up. One reason people avoid conflict is because it's difficult to get past the injuries.

When someone's leg is injured, you don't tell them to get over it and keep walking only to make it worse, rather, you get them off their feet, reduce their pain, and then gently repair what was fractured or broken. Feelings and emotions are real. Emotional pain often registers in similar brain areas as physical pain. It requires time, sensitivity, the right kind of comforting, and a focus on fulfilling unmet needs to heal emotional pain. When you don't allow time and opportunity to heal emotional injury, you're basically leaving people to writhe in pain alone, so don't be surprised when they have zero mental capacity for anything else. Have you ever tried to reason through a difficult problem while experiencing intense pain?

One of the great things and also one of the most difficult things about being F dominant is that feelings and emotions always loom larger than other types. Are you able to understand and accept this reality about them? Fe doms deeply value loving relationships and are thus easily pained by unloving behavior. Fe doms generally find it difficult to bring up their own negative feelings/emotions because they don't want to cause a disturbance or be a burden. As a result, they might get into the habit of suppressing how they really feel, which might lead them to also develop a habit of exploding any time they are unable to suppress any longer. And once feelings get too big, they'll find it difficult to articulate what's really happening inside, due to inferior Ti.

The remedy is to provide them with a safe, nonjudgmental, and compassionate space to speak freely at all times. But this means you have to be prepared to hear things that you don't want to hear and/or things that don't make sense to you (and require tactful clarification). To get better at girding yourself, you have to deploy Ni+Fi to step back and see the bigger picture (i.e. don't take it personally), and to look beyond the surface content of their words and understand what they really mean, with regard to:

what exactly is causing them to feel bad

what you've contributed to their negative feelings

what it is they really need or which of their needs remain unmet

what rules/boundaries were violated and require repair

what unloving/immoral behavior needs to be stopped

what unfair/unjust situation needs to be righted

Once you grasp the underlying problem, you'll have a much better chance of negotiating the right solution. A simple but effective way to improve your conflict resolution skills is to be more curious and listen more, to ensure that you are in touch with the reality of the situation, rather than operating on faulty assumptions. Family relationships are often the most challenging relationships, but learning how to navigate them effectively can set you up with the skills you need to navigate all relationships effectively throughout life.

I have already written a lot about function development, emotional intelligence, and communication skills. I've also recommended books on the resources page. There's no shortage of information. What remains unclear is how motivated you are to improve your people skills and what end goals you have for this relationship.

[forfucksakesniall]

Teaser Trailer

"Car's Outside" - A Series | Inspired from the song by James Arthur

Pairing: Lewis Hamilton x Driver!Reader

Summary: You're a struggling Formula 1 driver who joins Lewis Hamilton's family on a holiday, discovering unexpected connections and a sense of belonging that transcends the track and redefines your perspective on relationships and racing.

Trigger Warning/Content Advisory: Contains mature content and explores complex themes. Please be aware that it may also include scenes of high-speed racing, accidents, intense emotions, emotional conflicts, personal growth, and intimate moments. Reader discretion is advised.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Masterlist

You're a driver for the Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 team and your teammate is Lewis Hamilton. Lately, you've been experiencing a string of bad races with incidents like DNFs and collisions with other drivers. It's been frustrating for you and affecting your performance, and it's becoming apparent to everyone around you. After the worst race of your life, you're heading back to the paddock.

"For fuck's sake, why does it always have to be me?" you mutter.

Lost in your thoughts, you didn't notice Lewis's dad, Anthony Hamilton, waving at you on your way. You walk right past him until someone grabs your arm. Irritated, you shoot them a glare, but your eyes soften as you realize who it was.

"I've been calling out to you from a mile away. Where were you?" he chuckles.

"I'm not sure... I've been distracted by something," you respond, avoiding mentioning what happened earlier.

"Do you have a moment to talk?" he asks, seeming eager to share something.

"Um, yeah, sure," you reply, not fully engaged in the upcoming conversation.

He extends his arm in a gentlemanly way, and you take it, walking together toward the paddock. He leads you to a table where you both sit down.

"So..." he begins, looking at you and rubbing his hands.

"Um... hi?" you greet with a smile, unsure of what's happening.

"I know you've had a rough start, and I was thinking I could offer you some help."

"Oh, I'm fine. I don't think I need anything... um... yeah," you respond, feeling embarrassed and frustrated that Lewis Hamilton's dad has to address this with you.

"I can see it's been challenging for you, (Y/N). It's not about more training or spending time on the simulator. It's about finding a genuine love for what you do," he explains, pausing briefly and then smiling at you.

"What I'm saying is... I'm inviting you to join us for a little break from everything. It's Easter soon, and I know you usually prefer to have some time to yourself, but wouldn't it be better if you got closer to your teammate and have a change of view?"

You and Lewis have never been close friends, perhaps due to the chaos you've caused on the track or because you weren't good enough to be on the team, making him not even acknowledge your existence. You've never had a conversation or even exchanged a nod. Everything people see online is just PR to avoid any controversy.

What confuses you is the fact that you're being invited to their family holiday. You! Someone who has no connection to them whatsoever. Well, you and Anthony had formed a father-daughter bond. He would motivate and encourage you during race week. Your own family has never been close or supportive when it came to racing. Since then, you've worked hard for everything you have and have become independent, not relying on anyone.

You simply blink at his offer, lost for words.

"Lewis!" Anthony calls out as Lewis enters the paddock. "(Y/N) and I were just talking, and I invited her to join us on our holiday."

Lewis looks at his dad, eyebrows furrowed. "Um... Did you ask her, or are you taking her hostage?" He glances at you and then back at his dad.

"You can say no, you don't have to do everything he says," Lewis tells you without even looking in your direction.

"Um... yeah, I don't think I should disturb your family matter," you say, standing up and making your way to your driver's room.

Anthony lets out a disappointed sigh upon hearing Lewis's comments. "I told you she needs our support," he tells Lewis, his eyes filled with sadness.

"You don't know her well enough to know what she needs," Lewis retorts sharply, then turns and heads to his room.

✧ ･ﾟ : * ✧ ･ﾟ * ✧ ✦ ✧ * ✧ ･ﾟ : * ✧ ･ﾟ :

As you prepare to leave and head to the parking area, a smiling Anthony calls out to you from a distance. You jog over to him, not wanting to keep him waiting.

"Hey, I'm sorry for turning down your offer. I thought it might be awkward for..." you begin to explain.

"Oh no, you're coming!" Anthony interjects.

"What?"

"We're leaving right now," he informs you.

"Huh?"

He gently puts his arm around your shoulder and guides you towards a van. You spot Lewis sitting by the window, and Anthony nudges you to get in, making you sit between the two Hamiltons.

Initially, your thoughts race:

Wait... Where did he say we were going?

I don't have a bag with me...

Wait... Where is my passport?

Lewis remains silent, engrossed in his phone as you sit beside him. Anthony wears a smug smile, satisfied that his plan is unfolding as intended.

"Um... Thank you. I guess, for having me... I'm still not sure what's happening," you express, uncertain.

Anthony chuckles in response.

"Here." He hands you your bag. Opening it, you find your passport and other essential items for the airport.

"We are leaving?" you ask, staring at the contents of your open bag.

"But I don't have any clothes with me," you point out to him.

"I've already taken care of that. You'll get some once we arrive in London," he assures you.

"London?"

He smiles at you once more.

You glance at Lewis, who continues to ignore you, still fixated on his phone, unwilling to address the situation.

You take a deep breath. Well, at least I'm getting a free getaway, you think to yourself.

🌟 Welcome to the series! 🌟

You have the power to shape this story too! Share your questions, predictions, and ideas. Let's dive deeper into this journey together.

[foggyparadisecandy]

On Making a List for Living

As I've been moving ahead, cleaning up my shit inside my head, I made a list of things that fill me with joy and happiness.

Mostly to keep me busy and moving forward AND to help me improve my self-image.

NGL, at first, it was a struggle to start doing them. I was just so lost and depressed, living in the void that was left behind from my ex, yes, but also, the deeper void left behind by my parents dysfunctional shit they put inside my head.

But ... I made my list. I set my goals.

And each day, it gets easier and easier. And I'm honestly starting to feel better about myself - my present self and my wounded child.

The other day, I posted a one month summary of my progress and ... yeah ... I was surprised to see that I'm honestly crushing it. I felt like I was still moving in quicksand.

Maybe I set my goals too low? lol

Also true: I have to work it aggressively still.

I will catch myself being mean-spirited towards myself. I pause and course-correct when I do. Learning to be kind to yourself is ... surpisingly hard for many of us.

And I struggle with over-stepping boundaries. Boy is this a problem for me.

I've spent my life getting outside validation. So I have a burning desire to offer advice and help and guidance but ... I'm doing my best to correct this too.

It's grueling. I fall into agony trying to figure out ... is this kind? is it welcome? is it useful? is it necessary? Usually the answers are: maybe, not unless asked for, maybe, no.

With my ex in particular, it's so hard. Because ... I legitimately am impressed by her and can see her own growth. I believe in her more now than I ever did. She's going to be fine - I know that.

But *sad lol* ... I have this desire to nurture her and care for her. And give her advice and express concerns if I see them.

It's so ... frustrating. But I'm doing my best to learn about boundaries, set them for myself, and respect others. I ... want her to know how much I care for her and am there for her ... but I don't want to fall into unhealthy habits or make her think I feel I am there to "fix" her.

I struggle with "how do I show someone I care for them and accept them?" My go to method is "helping" them. But unsolicited helping and accepting are two completely different directions.

So ... what's the fucking answer? Ugh. It would be nice to know how "normal" people think. I guess the answer is ... just showing up. Showing that I'm interested. Showing that I appreciate her for who she is. I accept her. I understand her.

And ... honestly ... I do understand her a hell of a lot better these days than before. I have ... deeper empathy for her and her own struggles as I've learned to look inwards at my struggles.

I can see the progress she has made. She is inspiring in so many ways. Makes me want to fix my own shit even faster lol.

None of it is easy. But it's getting easier.

So yes ... I encourage anyone who is looking to become more secure and self-confident, happy with themselves, to make a list, work the list, check in with yourself and assess progress, and give it time.

The anxiety in my mind is slowly quieting and I'm feeling better about my life and who I am. I find I no longer need the external validation as much.

The odd thing is ... now that I'm feeling better about myself, I also feel like I see others in a more realistic, full light.

It's so ... bizarre to say it but ... I like her better these days than I did before. I feel like I was objectifying her before. Yes ... I knew she was a living breathing person but ... I had her on a pedestal. It wasn't realistic or healthy for either of us.

So it's funny to recognize that my "like" for her has grown while my insane love has diminished.

And my "like" for my friends is also growing. I'm seeing the world in new lights.

I have a good friend on Discord who has been out of touch. It makes my anxious mind go brrrrrrrrr even though she said she was going to be super busy. I heard her ... but ... my anxiety kicks in and plagues me with so much nonsense and doubts and feelings of "I'm a fuck up."

Obviously I am still a work in progress. I take deep breaths, I walk through my Pride Journal to build self-confidence, I remember that people can and will speak up when they are ready, and other people's choices are not in my control.

I am me regardless of whether or not other people accept or reject me.

It's probably so obvious to most of you.

It's a silly thing to have to say ... even sillier to have to learn that you lived a life without understanding that basic concept.

Oh well. Learning and growing. Fast as I can.

[coralhoneyrose]

The Princess and the Frog Chrobin AU... you don't know how hyped I was to read that.

I'm the exact opposite where I can't seem to write longfic. Do you have any suggestions for someone looking to try her hand at one?

Ohh I'm so glad that you're excited by the idea! 😊 Honestly there is such a tragic dearth of Birb!Robin content that I feel compelled to remedy it myself haha. And I think the fairytale-ish angle has a lot of fun / cute potential!

As for suggestions on getting into writing long fic, I certainly wouldn't consider myself an expert by any stretch, but I can tell you what has worked for me!

Find an idea that you *love* that just won't let you go

This, really, is the biggest tip I have. Obviously it's going to vary some based on the efficiency of the writer and just HOW long of a long fic we're talking about, but you're going to be thinking about and working on this fic for a long time. If that work isn't something you are extremely excited about, it's very quickly going to start to feel like a drag and become challenging to see through. Again, I can only speak to my own experience here, but I have thought about my long fics in some capacity for at least a few hours every day for the last two years (and often much much more than that LOL). Definitely I have days where I am not in the mood to write or I am not in a great head space with the fic and need to take a step back. But when all is said and done, it's still a story I am excited to tell and involves scenarios I *want* to have an excuse to think about all the time, day after day. If you're that excited about the ideas, I think that alone will carry you far!

2. Ask yourself why you want to write a long fic

To elaborate: what is it that a long fic allows you to do that you feel as though you can't accomplish in a shorter fic instead? Extensive world building? A more intricate plot? The answer to this question should drive a lot of your story conceptualization process. Honestly for me the biggest draws of long fic are how it lends itself to slow-burn, extensive opportunities for agonizing pining, and the ability to portray much more gradual character growth. Those are three of the things I love most in the fics and novels I read *and* three things that I love to write about. Because those things are such big priorities for me, the way I formed and built my story ideas around them was already very naturally geared towards long fic--I didn't have to try to fit it into that mold at all!

3. Find a good beta reader

Easier said than done, I know, but I genuinely think a fresh set of eyes / a brain to pick when you're stuck makes a world of difference. I cannot tell you how many times I have gotten myself into a deep rut with my long fics that I was convinced there was no way out of, or where I'd written a whole chapter draft that I thought was un-salvageable only for my beta reader to provide a very elegant solution / quickly pinpoint and direct me towards what wasn't working so that I wouldn't have to throw out the whole thing. One of the dangers with long fic is that you're working on it for so long that your sense of how things move and progress in the story and where they are going winds up being very divorced from the way readers experience it. Having someone else who can give you outside POV on what's working and what's not is invaluable during the drafting and revising process. Ideally that person would also have tastes that align well with your own and be someone who you can trust to be both honest and encouraging (even better if they know the characters of the world well and can give feedback from that angle too) but I do recognize perfect beta readers don't grow on trees. If not a full fledged beta reader, I think having a close friend or two who you can talk through the writers blocks or concerns with is helpful too!

4. Plan ahead but don't be afraid to change directions

Probably the most subjective piece of advice on here since I know different writers vary wildly with how much they like / need to plan ahead, but this is the combination that I've found has worked best for me. The reason being that if you don't do *some* more extensive idea generating and planning before hand I don't think it gives you anything to get hyped up about and look forward to. Having a big exciting moment in the story that you can't wait to write is a really good motivator, but unless you are very good at delayed gratification, brainstorming smaller moments along the way that are iddy and fun while still moving you closer to that big moment will be imperative for motivating yourself to stick it out long enough to get there. That being said, I don't think you have to feel locked into those early ideas either. Things are going to occur to you as you're writing that didn't during the planning stages. New ideas you like better, logistical bumps you didn't think to account for, the discovery that a character feels a different way about something than how you anticipated they would...there's a whole bunch of possibilities and all of them may wind up derailing your initial vision to varying degrees. And I think that's okay! Part of the writing process is re-discovering the world and characters from new angles...I honestly think it would be odd if that *didn't* impact the story's direction, at least a little! And generally I think those changes just tend to make the story even better in the end~

5. Let the fic be gratuitous and self-indulgent

Echoes of this are present in some of the previous pieces of advice, but I think it bears repeating as a separate (and final) point. Don't be afraid to pile on as many of your favorite tropes as you can!! Build your fic concept so that it includes lots of story beats and themes you're a sucker for every time. The more opportunities you find to load in things that you love, the more fun you'll have writing and thinking about the idea and the more likely it is that you'll both have an idea big enough to write a long fic for and that you'll be willing to stick it out and see it through to the end 💕

Okay...I think that's all I've got. This was so long and apologies if you were not looking for an answer anywhere near this detailed but, well, I did say I struggle to write anything short LOL Thank you for being interested enough in my perspective and experiences to ask in the first place! And I hope you'll find something I said here was helpful!

[vanishedschism]

Letting Go Of Love With Music

Letting go of someone you love can be one of the most painful experiences that a person can go through. It can feel like your heart is being ripped out of your chest, and every day can feel like a battle just to get through the day. Arolyn writes music about this. The truth is, letting go of someone you love is never easy. It takes time, patience, and a lot of self-reflection. You may find yourself constantly thinking about them, wondering what they are doing, or wishing things were different. But the reality is that holding onto someone who is no longer meant to be in your life will only cause you more pain and heartache in the long run. One of the first steps in letting go is accepting that the relationship is over. This can be incredibly difficult, especially if you were not the one who initiated the breakup. But the sooner you can come to terms with the fact that the relationship is over, the sooner you can start to move on. Another important step in letting go is to focus on your own personal growth and self-care. This means taking care of your physical, emotional, and mental health. You may find that exercising, meditating, or spending time with friends and family can help you to feel better and start to heal. It's also important to surround yourself with positive influences and people who support you. This may mean cutting ties with people who are toxic or who remind you of the person you are trying to let go of. Most importantly, be kind to yourself. Letting go of someone you love is never easy, and it's okay to feel sad or angry or frustrated. But remember that you are worthy of love and happiness, and that you will find it again in the future. Letting go of someone you love is a complex and emotional process that can take a toll on your mental and physical well-being. When you love someone deeply, it can be challenging to imagine life without them. It can feel like a part of you is missing, and every moment spent without them feels like a painful reminder of what you have lost. However, as difficult as it may be, letting go of someone you love is sometimes necessary. It may be due to irreconcilable differences, a lack of commitment, or simply because the relationship has run its course. Regardless of the reason, letting go is essential for your own growth and happiness. The first step in letting go is to accept the reality of the situation. This can be particularly challenging if you were blindsided by the breakup or are struggling to come to terms with the end of the relationship. Acknowledging that it is over and that you need to move on is the first step towards healing and recovery.

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