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thatfreshi · 8 months

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I Want to Mean It - Astarion x Reader

Your wedding is fast approaching, and you have one last preparation to make.

Recommended Song: Sick of Losing Soulmates - Dodie

You and Astarion are set to get married tomorrow evening. After nautiloid crashes and illithid parasites, you never really thought you'd get to do some romantic ritual like this. After all, both of you should have been long gone by now, yet Lady Luck stuck around.

Despite how soon the ceremony is, you've been quite busy working with Gale, who just so happens to be your best man. A powerful wizard like that is good to have on your side, especially when marrying a vampire. After yet another long day of perfecting spells and testing magical methods, you return home to your lover, who is making last-minute stitches into his wedding outfit.

"If it isn't my soon-to-be spouse, come here my love."

Despite his cold skin, it's a warm embrace. You're tense though, and he can sense it.

"What's the matter darling?"

You try to swallow the nervousness, but it sticks in your throat.

"I'm sorry I've been so busy this week. I just wanted to make sure everything was perfect for us."

"Why of course. It has to be a night to remember after all. Wouldn't be our wedding if it wasn't."

You go to grab something out of your pocket, wrapping your hand around a small vial, almost shattering the glass with your grasp.

"What have we here?"

He slips his hand past yours, easily removing the vial from your hand. To his surprise, it's empty. There is a slight coating of what used to be a liquid inside.

"Astarion, I love you so, so much."

He investigates the vial further, almost ignoring your sentence.

"Well of course my love, I know that."

He uncorks the vial, and is immediately hit with a sickeningly sweet smell, a scent he can't quite place.

"My god, what is this. Or better yet, what was this?"

You're shaking, unsure of what he'll say if you tell him. Instead, you move to your other pocket and grab a rolled-up piece of paper from Gale's journal. Putting it in his pale hand, you go to sit on the bed, head in your hands. He begins reading.

"On the sixth day of attempting to perfect my spell, I have confirmed the following:

It was successful

The research I found was accurate and correctly documented

The subject has gained immortality."

There is more listed below, but he doesn't read it.

"Tav, you idiot. You absolute fool I-"

Astarion is unable to speak, both dumbfounded and emotional.

"Ambrosia, you're playing dangerous games. Games you don't know the rules to."

He's angry, you expected him to be. As someone who has lived for centuries, he knows what you've asked for, what you've done. Ambrosia, a liquid of pure joy, one of the only things that can grant immortality. You spoke to Gale for weeks on end, trying to figure out the safest way to live forever. Turns out, there are very few, and this one was quite difficult to perform.

"Astarion I-"

"No, we have to reverse it, we have to go to him right now and figure out how to stop this."

"Aster, my love, you know as well as I do that's not possible."

"Well damn it he'll make it possible!"

You shudder a little. He doesn't raise his voice often, usually only ever out of fear. Then the tears roll.

"Why would you do this to yourself."

You get up from the bed and wrap your arms around his shoulders. He turns away, almost as if he's ashamed of your choice.

"Because when we say our vows tomorrow, and I tell you I want to be yours forever, I want to mean it."

You begin to sob too, not out of fear, but out of how much you love this man. Years ago you never would've drunk something like Ambrosia, you never would've asked to live forever.

"But you'll be stuck with me forever. Hells, I'm stuck with me forever and sometimes I wish I wasn't."

You don't know what to say, how to tell him you knew this was right, how you and Gale fought about what you were asking for, how he said that Astarion would react this way. While you try to gather the words, he turns to look at you again, still overwhelmed by this information.

"What if... what if you get sick of me?"

You wipe a tear away from his eye, and give him a bittersweet smile.

"You know damn well we're already sick of each other."

You chuckle, he does too.

"You should've told me."

"Well, I wanted my wedding gift to be a surprise."

While the mood lightens, he loses some of the tension, all of the anger dissipates. He realizes he's not alone anymore, that he won't have to watch you pass on into the afterlife without him.

"Well, it's a phenomenal gift my sweet."

You both become enraptured in a deep kiss, something ravenous behind his lips, something relieved in his heart. That kiss multiplies, until you're both out of breath.

"Save some of that for after the ceremony dear."

You wink at him, and you both burst out laughing. The hysteria in the air, it's something you've never quite felt before, and you'd get every chance to feel it again, alongside with Astarion, and you realize you've never felt more sure about anything in your life. This is one decision you'll never question, as long as he's yours, and you are his.

#astarion #astarion x reader #astarion x tav #baldur's gate 3 #baldurs gate astarion

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malusokay · 2 years

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How to get better

The first step to living the life of your dreams is being in-tune with yourself. Getting on track can be challenging and confusing, so I made a list of suggestions that might help you start your journey! <3

Body :

Drink a large glass of water first thing in the morning. Gotta stay hydrated!

Take vitamins. I personally like taking my vitamins on an empty stomach. If you can, go get a blood test to see what your body actually needs.

Don't skip meals! Food is fuel. You also DONT have to earn food through exercise.

Try going on morning walks. Feeling the fresh morning air always makes me feel better.

Cut down on caffeine. We all know that too much caffeine is bad.

Start including more vegetables and fruits in your meals. If you guys want a 'what I eat in a day/week', let me know! :)

Stretch regularly. I try to stretch for 10 to 30 minutes a day; it helps me with my migraines and overall makes me feel better.

Get some sunlight. You don't have to spend hours tanning if that's not your thing, just a bit of sunlight will already help you feel better.

Track your water intake. I'm guilty of being constantly dehydrated, so keeping track of my water intake really helps me!

Use lotion. Your skin will thank you.

Mind :

Read more. I've been neglecting my book lately... don't be like me.

Get rid of clothes that don't fit. There is no need to keep them, especially if you struggle with your body image.

Use your phone less. Weekends mean Phone free evenings/nights for me. It really helps you reconnect with yourself.

Focus on something you're passionate about, and invest all your efforts into developing it.

Write down things that you are grateful for. Journaling is great too!

Establish a propper morning/night routine. Taking care of yourself should always be your main priority.

Listen to more music. Listening to music helps me to get out of my mind when I'm overthinking.

Plan your days. I started planning more about a month ago, and it's actually really fun!

Get a Cat. Adopting my rescue kitten Charlie and slowly helping him heel and get comfortable really pulled me out of my worst depressed phase, and I've been doing a lot better ever since. Would totally recommend haha.

Soul :

Watch more Sunrises and Sunsets. I try watching one of each at least once a week.

Go for walks in nature. Going on walks in the forest/countryside really has become one of my favorite things.

Meditate. It doesn't really do much for me, but I recommend giving it a try! (maybe I'm just doing it wrong, lol)

Learn to say No. Still one of the hardest things for me, but it's getting better day by day also, remember that you DONT have to explain yourself when saying no! <3

Try reading poetry. You can also check out the App 'Motivation'.

Get a Plant. A year ago, I planted an avocado seed, and now I have a really cool plant! Slay.

Say goodbye. Don't surround yourself with people who don't bring positive energy into your life.

Complain less. It can be tough to stay positive but try to focus on the good things, even when they are really small. <3

As always, please feel free to add more suggestions in the comments! <3

✩‧₊*:・love ya ･:*₊‧✩

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hiswitchcraft · 1 year

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I am a witch who's trying to get back into witchcraft after an immense amount of burn out. The burn out wasn't due to the witchcraft, it was due to things piling on my brain in general. What sort of things do you suggest to ease myself back into it? If you don't have an answer that's okay, just thought to ask

I've been dealing with this myself and I actually just made a video on it that I really like not too long ago, so I think I can help you!

How to Come Back to the Craft After Burn Out (+ A Guide to doing Witchcraft with Low Spoons)

I was burnt out in general and because of the craft, particularly because of the way I was filtering my personal practice through social media. I realized a lot of my burnout was tied to pushing myself, and shame. I feel like maybe this is common. This is a mix of both personal and witchy advice, and I may be projecting, but I think you have to focus first and foremost on not rushing back in and getting overwhelmed by adding a bunch of stuff to your routine at once and trying to do everything right or perfect. A good practice or routine is sustainable, not perfect. Perfect is the enemy of good, and also the enemy of done. I've had to focus on this a lot recently.

With this in mind, you might be wondering where you should even begin when it comes to actually practicing again. Remember to go slow. I’d suggest thinking about what you were doing and interested in before and start practicing and researching whatever sounds the most fun when you’re ready. You could also go over any notes you had about your practice before, if you had a blog or something look at that, etc. You get the idea! It will help you remember and might inspire you. If you really enjoyed tarot for example, you could do that when you feel inspired to. Starting slow is important. if you want go slower you could just do whatever practices you were doing before, or like now, whenever you feel like it. You could also try working witchcraft into your routine. Routine is hard for a lot of people but it doesn’t have to be intense. It can just be adding one thing. That’s all it needs to be. It could be something you do once a month, once a week, when you wake up, after you brush your teeth, only some days or whatever you think will make you feel the best.

Of course I don’t know anything about your practice but to inspire you and others, here’s some ways you can easily introduce magic into your life.

Daily divination A tarot card every morning is what I like to do but you could use any kind of divination you like!

Meditation Meditate for a few minutes every morning/evening. Even 2 minutes makes a difference. Also, despite popular belief meditation does not have to be emptying your mind.

Dream interpretation Interpret or just journal about your dreams! Honestly journaling in general I think is great for witches.

Witchy items of the day Pick out some items to carry on you for the day. This could be crystals or herbs you want the properties of, a hag stone, or other items with properties you want to draw to you or use in your practice.

Intention in drinks & food! If you have coffee or tea every morning or day you can stir intention into it. Clockwise for things you want in, counterclockwise for things you want to banish. Or that’s the typical belief/way people suggest doing it. You can also stir sigils into it or add items to your drinks/food with or by intention.

Enchanting personal care Another way you can bring magic in your everyday life is enchanting personal care products. I’d do this for added layers of warding but you could get super creative with this and do whatever intention you like.

Sigils sigils sigils Sigils are fun to make. You can use them for a ton of other things on this list. Stir them into your drinks. Draw a sigil on your skin using lotion. Write them on your walls for warding. Sigils, sigils, ... sigils!

Spritz cleansing If you have a hard time cleansing or not a lot of energy right now when you DO have energy you can put together a mixture for cleansing using a spritz bottle and then you have it done and ready to go ahead of time for many cleansing sessions. Beware of herbs and things you add if you have any allergies/pets. Actually just research any plants you handle anyway.

Layering your wards If you’re struggling with burn out right now you probably don’t have a lot of energy so this is a tip I like for when this happens and just the long term overall. Always add small layers using different methods to your personal and spacial wards. An example of this I love is some of the above, carrying an item with strong protective properties or writing sigils on the bottom of your shoes/sewing them into your clothes/etc are some other ideas I love. Customize as needed! Be creative!

Basically just think of things you do everyday and try to make it witchy! Or think of practices you want to do more, like maybe cleansing, and figure out how to make it easier.

Also I did mention research. I think in addition to picking a practice to try again or add to your routine, picking a topic to research that sparks interest may help too. Here are some ideas for that!

Intention

Cleansing

Charging

Grounding

Warding

Circle casting

Consecration

Visualization

Meditation methods

Divination types (some are listed below)

Tarot

Oracle cards

Lenormand

Pendulums

Runes

Scrying

Astrology

Palmistry

Dream interpretation

Spell types & spell construction

Taglocks

Sigils

Other symbols & what they mean

The Theban alphabet

Color magic

Moon phases

The Elements

Correspondences of days, times, etc

Crystals

Moon water

Black salt

Plants, herbs, and spices in witchcraft

Local plants

Local history & folklore

Pantheons & their deities

Deity work

Spirit work

Astral projection

Hope this helps 💕

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cookeybg · 2 months

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Unexpected Cohabitation a JonDami fic

Before we get to the story I have a few words to say...

First of all, Hello!

Not sure if this will reach anyone, but I had an itch to write, so I did. I almost never post anything. I have reposted a couple things but I'm mostly a lurker and enjoy others creativity and thoughts, I like to think of myself as a cat with few brain cells.

Anyways, I read a manga YEARS ago and enjoyed it greatly and thought to myself, "Wouldn't it be funny/interesting if Jon and Damian were stuck in this situation?" Let's see if anyone eventually gets what manga I was reminiscing.

Now, this is the first time I've ever posted anything I've written and I am not confident AT ALL if this is going to be any good, but I really hope someone out there enjoys reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it...Also not sure if I should post it on Ao3???

Well enough of my ramblings on to the story.

Title: Unexpected Cohabitation

Main Characters: Jonathan Kent and Damian Wayne (some of the others show up too, the list is too long)

Eventual relationship: Jonathan Kent/Damian Wayne (my fave)

Stuff to know: No capes, reverse robins, high school AU, no smut, no Brucie Wayne, I know nothing about sports but it will show up, (aaand I think that's it, will add more if it comes up)

Part 1 - Chapter 1

Jon placed his lunch tray next to Kathys’ as he discreetly looked around the lunch room trying to catch a glimpse of his crush. He had only briefly seen him at the mall during summer break and in a panic hid from him behind a rack of clothes. He had regretted not saying hello and had daydreams of himself going up to him, all cool and complementing the brown eyed boy’s pink fluffy hair and then asking him out to watch a movie at the mall theater. Sadly, the daydreams would come crashing down when he remembered his mother placing shirts in front of him and trying to measure him up before heading into the dressing room. It’s not that he was embarrassed of his mom its just, he was wearing sweats and an old hoodie since none of his clothes fit him anymore due to his growth spurt and, well, his mom could be a bit much, sometimes. Throughout the whole shopping trip when she would meet an acquaintance or friend she kept gushing about how quick kids grew and how she wished they would just stop sometimes. Jon would have to bury himself if anyone from school had been exposed to that.

“Looking for Jay?” Kathy asked. Jon looked at Kathy like a deer caught in the headlights and immediately turned red. He sat down abruptly causing his tray to nearly tip unto him. He scrambled to right his milk carton before it fell. Once settled, he sighed and mumbled, “That obvious?” Kathy smirked and bit into her carrot stick making a loud snap. Jon squirmed while opening his milk carton, he took a big swing, pointedly ignoring Kathy’s stare. “Why don’t you just confess?” Kathy asked. “Confess?” Jon spluttered, “He doesn’t even know I exist!” “Jon, you two were in the same history class last year. He knows who you are.” “Yeah. But we never talked.” “Then, how about you talk to him?” That would be so awkward…” Jon bit into his chicken strip. Kathy rolled her eyes and sighed in exasperation. Jon smirked and leaned in conspiratorially, “But I have a plan.” “And that is?” “I’m joining the journalism club.” “What!” Kathy yelled in surprise and then moderated her voice when some people who she startled glared at her, “ I thought you were going to join the baseball team this year, since, you know, your not in a cast anymore.” “The doctor has given the all clear and physical therapy is all done. The doctor was very impressed with how quickly I healed.” “Will they even let you do both clubs?” “Yep, I asked!” Their conversation was cut short when a murmur spread through the cafeteria like a wave. The main players of the baseball team stepped through the open double doors, all nine wearing their letterman jackets. In the lead was the most popular guy in school, Damian Wayne. Whose father was nicknamed the Prince of Gotham. Who in turn married an actual princess from some far off land, giving Damian actual royal blood. Girls wanted him and guys wanted to be him, but from what Jon had heard, guys wanted him too. Damian’s bright green eyes stood out against his brown skin, his gold earring glinted under the florescent light. He scanned the cafeteria with what looked like a sense of boredom. Colin, Jon called him Damian’s second in command, had one arm casually draped around Damian’s shoulders gesticulating wildly with his free hand. The group laughed at whatever the Colin said, but Damian only smiled as he started walking towards their unofficial table. Colin and the rest of the group broke off shoving and cracking jokes at each other while making line to pick up food. Kathy whistled beside Jon, “Now he’s someone who doesn’t know you exist.” “He looks and probably is, conceited.” Jon said offhandedly. “Look at him, he has reason to be.” “Doesn’t mean it’s cool.” “Doesn’t mean he’s not hot.” Jon turned to look at Kathy, but she wasn’t paying attention to him. Instead she was looking in Damian’s direction. Jon looked around and noticed that many were doing the same. He dragged his eyes back to look at Damian. The dude sat straight backed, elegantly eating his homemade meal from some fancy lunch bag that was probably more expensive than anything Jon owned, and scrolling on his phone completely ignoring the many eyes staring at him. Colin returned with the rest of the group nudging Damian and dropping his lunch tray with a loud smack, receiving an unimpressed glare in return. Colin smiled and placed a fruit cup in front of Damian. Jon personally didn’t get the allure. The couple of times he had seen Damian interact with others it was usually acerbic. Somehow that did not lessen his popularity and it left Jon dumbfounded. I good person should be good to others and being polite was a given, his Grandma said so and she was never wrong. Jon shrugged and went back to eating his school lunch. The rest could keep Damian he very much preferred Jay.

I hope you enjoyed it! Will post more soon, hopefully.

#damian wayne #jonathan kent #jon kent #damian al ghul #damian and jon #high school au #no capes au #jondami #supersons #fanfic #fanfiction #should I post on ao3 #first time writing #i hope someone likes it #be gentle

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t00thpasteface · 5 months

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hey sorry i’m sure it’s a little dumb but how did you find a community/make mutuals on here? i swapped from twitter to here last year & haven’t been able to make friends like i did on twitter ;v; sorry if this is all silly but figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. love your art & blog !!!

as i like to say, it's like lifting an anvil: it's very simple, but that doesn't mean it's easy. as someone who's a 12+ year veteran that lurked for a couple years and remade a little while ago, really it all comes down to putting yourself out there!!! don't just sit around twiddling your thumbs and lurking. it's tough to do it without coming off as a pandering tryhard, but honestly as long as you're polite, upbeat, and posting regularly, then you're golden.

if you want a big list of wordy bullet points, here's what i've got, and i think you'll find it's pretty applicable to basically any site/community you want to get involved in:

post a lot. this is number one with a fucking bullet! POST! POST LIKE YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON IT. but crucially...

post GOOD STUFF. don't bash yourself in the caption/tags, don't say "sorry this is shit" or whatever, don't self-deprecate, and don't admit to posting low-effort stuff just to hit a quota. imagine it's open mic night and go crazy. this is a good site to use like a journal and a scrapbook, but if you want to actually get some traction, you need to bring something interesting to the table. of course, just being funny and nice goes a very long way.

encourage audience feedback. people LOVE to tell you about themselves and give their opinions. get them responding and make the questions and calls for engagement so interesting or fun they can't help themselves.

tag effectively. use both fandom/content tags for searches, and organizational tags for your visitors' use. the tagging system is tumblr's bread and butter, so make it work for you.

follow a lot of blogs you like. then see who they follow, and add those to the list. build a good circle of engagement and keep your finger on the pulse of the site culture for whatever niche(s) you're in... or want to get in.

reblog a lot and be funny/kind in the tags. generally leaving a lot of comments/replies to post is kind of hit-or-miss, but tags are a good harmless "inside voice" to use that doesn't clutter the post itself and yet still engages with op and people seeing the post

engage with people when they ask for engagement. things like polls, ask games, etc... scratch people's backs and they'll scratch yours. and it's just a nice thing to do regardless :)

panhandling is not always the best route. people will balk if you look desperate or openly beg for engagement, like directly asking people to reblog something or being passive-aggressive about how much engagement you are/aren't getting on something. a genuine joke about it is fun and relatable, but snarky comments just kill the vibe and scare people off.

REMEMBER THERE'S NO ALGORITHM. lurking will not put you or any of the stuff you like out there!! REBLOG POSTS! SEND ASKS! this site will NOT SPOON FEED YOU ANYTHING. like taming a wild stallion, you can make this work for you, but you have to put in the effort first.

some people will think you're annoying, and that's okay. probably not very many, but they'll be loud. this is an unavoidable part of Being Known. you can be the sweetest peach in the world but there'll still be people who just don't like peaches. don't take it to heart, and if you do happen to drop the ball or rub a few people the wrong way, don't let that keep you from trying again :)

i've enjoyed the many friends i've made on this site in the past decade-and-then-some, even though both this site and my blog are both something of a ship of theseus. here's hoping you can make it work for you and your interests, too!

#shebbz shoutz #ask

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northwindow · 2 months

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love your blog so much! and im wondering how you archive/document your day-to-day life and the information that you take in — whatever form: books, lyrics, trees, etc etc — ? im struggling so much w forgettttttting

i love this question! i’ve always longed to have a beautiful and consistent journal, but it’s something i struggle with maintaining organically so i’ve tried some different structures over the past few years. long-winded answer under the cut 💗

back in 2021, i was making a monthly journal on google slides which i really liked because it's so natural to integrate images. i just made a month of it public here as an example of what it was like.

from 2022 - now, i've been doing a new concept where on the last day of every season i write long, list-y answers to these prompts:

art that has been resonating with me (includes music, books, movies, visual art, anything really). i'll usually write a few words about it... "Decision to Leave dir. Park Chan-Wook—the eye shot! the eye shot with the ants crawling on it" or "'Train Ride' by Ruth Stone: 'Release, release; / between cold death and a fever, / send what you will, I will listen. / All things come to an end. / No, they go on forever.'" or "Chunky misshapen pearls and other organic, shiny shapes"

my favorite memories from the season... examples from past lists include "Swimming hole with Zoë where I stuck a twig in my hair and we waded around on our hands like crocodiles" and "Walks in my snowsuit at night, one in particular where the Gemenids meteor shower was just starting"

a checkup on 5 of my current projects/goals. currently these are 1. learn to lift weights, 2. write 50 "identical" poems, 3. write a new syllabus, 4. practice mindful spending, 5. improve at woodworking.

a checkup on 5 of my core values. currently these are 1. adventure, 2. connection, 3. play, 4. sensuality, 5. sustainability.

reevaluating projects and values to focus on next

since you mentioned wanting to remember things-- when i'm putting this together i draw extensively from my tumblr archive/likes, calendar, photos app, recent playlists, and letterboxd and storygraph accounts. curating this kind of ephemeral data into a more permanent and thoughtful record is really satisfying to me. i privately call this method "wrapped" a la spotify... like i'll have a big entry for "fall 2022 wrapped" and then "winter 2023 wrapped" and so on. i do all this on the app notion and file the seasons on one big page so it's easy to click into one and remember what i was doing and thinking about. (i also converted my dream journal to a notion database. i've logged about 300 dreams in here and love that i can tag by character/feature.)

over the years i've also kept a more classic diary via text documents that's less structured, just spitting out whatever's on my mind with the date at the top. i tend to do this frequently for a while, then ebb off, then restart another doc, rinse and repeat. i also have a few physical notebooks (including these two) but the digital stuff is way more extensive as i prefer to write on the computer.

if i were going to recommend any of this, i would say the visual format of the slides journal was really compelling because i liked the aesthetic freedom but i also love the "wrapped" lists because they seem to cut to the core of an era's texture. in the future i'd like to try to integrate these aspects together! 📓

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lulifelog · 2 months

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Active study blogs, please interact 🫶🏻

2.15.24

Hello 👋🏻

I created this blog because i love to write, and i thought it would be a good way to motivate me on my daily life as i study and work.

This post is about my mini journal, where i write everything that i think would don't fit well on my main planner, so that's the reason why i write a variety of things such as brain dump, to do lists, song lyrics and more.

I've been journaling and using planners since 2021.

Today was a day where i felt very unmotivated to post for absolutely no reason, maybe i felt pressured of maybe i felt like i didn't really had anything interesting to post, but i ended up posting my latest setup:

the page on the left is my brain dump, and it works very simply: it's a brain dump because i literally just write down everything i have to do during the week and it helps a lot with my anxiety, so that's why i feel like it's a brain dump, and it works very well for me.

.𖥔 ݁ ˖ִ ࣪⚝₊ ⊹˚

the page on the right is a very special page because i wrote the lyrics of my favorite persons in the whole world, Astro 💜

the lyrics of Jinjin's rap part in Waterfall are speaking to me very deeply lately, because i've been taking steps to change my professional career so this lyrics came to me like destiny. I was listening to this song on a random day and suddenly thought "i don't remember the translation of the lyrics" and then when i read it i felt like it fitted me like a glove, so accurate with the current situation i'm going through, so one more time, Astro - and in this case, Jinjin - were my main motivational factor to continue!!

They always give me so much strength!!! and i always remember Jinjin's words in particular "do something that you wouldn't regret later" so i try to live everyday reminding myself of what he said so i can feel stronger on continue to persue my goal 💜

There are days where it's so hard to hold on to this thoughts but i guess that's very common.

.𖥔 ݁ ˖ִ ࣪⚝₊ ⊹˚

I also studied art therapy today (wich i'm going to share more about in the future) and listened to Eunwoo's solo debut album with my boyfriend!

Even though it's summer, today's really cold (thanks Lord) so me and my boyfriend could share a cozy afternoon studying and drinking coffee and i loved it, specially because i HATE summer. At least i tried to focus while studying and i'm a little proud of myself for creating the text and the flowchart above!

I also had a little fun choosing the color palette i used to study and i ended up choosing green tones because green is my favorite color and it's Jinjin's color on Astro too 🍀

Thank you so much for reading ☕

#study blog #studyblr #study motivation #studyspo #study aesthetic #my journal #art therapy #planner #bullet journal #journaling #dear diary #diary entry #blog #first post #astro aroha #studying #cha eunwoo #Spotify

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doylldonmagar · 20 days

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Heyyyy i saw your post about writing your daydream to cope with maladaptive daydreaming. Do you have antimite tips that your therapist gave u ? ( cause therapy is kinda expensive for me right now)

Thanks <3

Hey, thank you for reaching out, I'm genuinely really glad you did. I'm afraid I'm not a great resource for this, honestly. Soon after that post I quit the job that provided therapy, so I don't have much more to offer. But I'll give you all of the things that I remember from therapy in case it can serve you!

(Assuming you're trying to stop disassociating,) look out for triggers. What makes you switch from being present to daydreaming?

When you initially notice you've switched to daydreaming, try to stop. This sounds obvious, but I've had to really keep it in mind, and there's usually a reason you switched to daydreaming (for me its usually anxiety or a lack of stimulation) and going back to reality isn't what your mind wants, so try to have something you are switching to. For instance, when I try to become present again, I usually start describing an object I see, and sometimes I shift to describe everything I'm experiencing, so all of the senses, things I'm seeing, hearing, smelling, feeling. And then once you're in the moment, then you can more easily switch to being actually in the moment as in conversations, etc, not just aware of reality but also a part of it. (Describing objects also helps with anxiety and spiraling, if you struggle with that)

Keeping a record of your daydreams can help if you are replaying a lot or if you have a story you are interested in building.

Setting aside time to daydream can help. It sounds counter intuitive, but if you stop yourself from daydreaming other times and say no I'm gonna daydream at 3 till 3:30, then when that time comes you daydream and then you stop yourself. This can build up self control and can break the urge to daydream whenever.

Trying to keep your mind occupied can help. If you daydream while you fold laundry, then maybe try playing music or a podcast or an audiobook and try to stay focused on it.

Doing yoga, or journaling, or something aimed at practicing awareness (physical, emotional, etc) can really help. Even stuff like spending 5 minutes describing everything I see and hear and feel can really help. A big part of getting away from MADD is just training your mind to be able to focus on the present.

Ultimately, what I've found is that maladaptive daydreaming is really just an addiction. And it's a coping mechanism. If you can find what you're coping with and can find a healthy way to deal with it, or find a way to cut it from your life, both are good options, but neither will necessarily stop the disassociation. If an addiction is narrowing activities you enjoy down to the one thing, then the way to break it is to find more outlets, more things you enjoy. If you have hobbies you don't do anymore, or things you used to be interested in, pursuing those can be good. Finding other things you enjoy doing can be super helpful.

On writing: (I didn't get this from therapy, just personal experience) it might help to write down everything from past daydreams that you remember (I personally would get really caught up in trying to remember all of the things. I had been daydreaming for about 5 years when I started writing, so I was trying to remember a lot. And I did forget a lot.) if you have a timeline, feel free to type it up. I write it down almost every time it comes up. I'll have clips of dialogue running in my head and I'll pull out my phone and type it up. Same goes for if I have a plot idea. I write it down to explore it later during the time I set aside for it. If I'm scared I'll forget it, then it runs over and over in my mind and it takes up time, and I don't want that. If I want to explore it, finish the scene, then I'm committing more time, and I don't want that. So it really helps me to cut it short by writing it down.

I'll add more to this list if I think of anything. Hopefully this helps in some way, feel free to reach out again! I tried to highlight my main ideas, sorry if it's distracting but I thought with so much text, it might be easier to skim.

#maladapting daydreaming disorder #maladaptive daydreaming #maladaptive coping #maladaptive daydreamer #immersive daydreaming #obsessive daydreaming #therapy tips #therapy

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coffeedrgn87 · 6 months

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Hai. I just wanted to say that LPK has ruined me for almost every other BDSM story. Now when I read any, I'm like "Where's the enthusiastic consent? Where are the loving and frequent check-ins with your sub? Where is the scene where you discuss whether this is something both of you want?" And I'm including original stories in the list too. There are very few stories that can satisfy me now. Even when the sex scenes are hot, the lack of a connection between the Dom and sub puts me off. There's a Sterek BDSM fic that kind of lives up to LPK, but that's the only one I've found. You have completely ruined me. I hope you're happy, you ridiculously talented author.

Hi! 💜

Funny you should say this, because this is, in part, how LPK came to life. I wanted kinky reading that really emphasised consent, communication, and negotiation.

And sure, there are some relatively good works out there (now at least) but they generally feature a) a hetero relationship and b) some rich dude who happens to be a Dominant and a submissive gal who wants to try out kink or is in the community (to some degree) but falls head over heels in love with the Dominant which changes the whole dynamic and leads to much unnecessary drama (my personal opinion, also mainly reference original works here…fan works very often do have queer representation).

While there’s nothing wrong with that trope, it doesn’t represent me in any way. I want queerness with my kink, I want munches and shibari and tough conversations, and trust. I want things to reflect reality with a scene going well and emotions changing the dynamic midway.

There are many reasons why LPK is so dear to me, and you mentioned some, the enthusiastic consent, the conversations, but also life getting in the way and finding ways around that, growing together, etc.

I grew a lot with the writing of the story which I absolutely expected I would (or at least hoped for). Never in a million years did I think so many people would read it, comment on it, favourite it, etc. I’m not in any community where people might talk about different works so I don’t see it happening…which is why I, for the most part, still have imposter syndrome about it all, but I think that can be said for all my other writing too, not that any of it comes close to where LPK went.

I have this recurring dream of wanting to turn it into an original work, but I’m daunted by my own word count thus far and the amount of rework required so I keep thinking that the perfect idea will eventually come along.

I honestly cannot thank you enough for you very enthusiastic support and your kind message. It means the world to me, and I know I say this to everybody who takes the time to tell me what LPK means to them, but it’s not some spiel, I truly mean it. The verse has done something special to me, even though I don’t want to believe it. I fear believing it may lead to me getting a big head about it all, even though I’m certain that I could never…ugh, look at this, not only do I digress but I’m also rambling.

I won’t lie, there’ve been many times I’ve wanted to take the verse down, and not just it but all my works, as I don’t especially feel connected to the fandom world, but then I remember that I primarily write for myself and anyone who would like to come along for the ride is more than welcome. As for the rest, I try my best not to care and if I do, I run to yell at my therapist.

Okay, this response is getting out of hand. And it’s also starting to sound a lot like a journal entry rather than a response to a very lovely and sweet ask. Let me close with this: I hope to have an update for book 3 soon. I’ve a lovely idea floating about my head…

#drarry #draco x harry #drarry fic #coffeedragon writes #lpk #lpk3 #little prince kneel #asks like this make me speechless #and yet a ramble like this #I don’t have the words to articulate how much kindness like this means to me #it makes my whole day

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starset21 · 4 months

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Disclaimer: I only own my original characters, I've done some research but there will likely be Navy/military inaccuracies, and I do not consent to the posting, translating, or publishing of my work to any 3rd party site, the only place it may be found is on tumblr and Wattpad under @.itswildflower

A/N: This story is heavily inspired by the hallmark movie of the same title and is very self-indulgent. I'm also trying a different format than I'm used to using so it may change in the future chapters. Hope everyone is having good winter holidays!

Looking for the other chapters? U.S.S. Christmas Masterlist

Summary: Kate and Jake take on New York City

Chapter 5: New York

“Oh! Look at this! Oh, I can't wait to see the rockettes and the the rockefeller Christmas tree, the decorations on fifth Avenue, but first, we gotta get New York pizza!” Elizabeth exclaimed.

“Okay, she's gonna wear me out. Now, the ship leaves at 8 P.M. on the dot. Don't be late,” Jackson reminded them.

“2000 hours. Roger that. I think the historical building is right up here,” Jake told Kate, taking her hand in his.

“Do you keep records of all the performances?” Kate asked the lady at the front desk.

“We sure do. The older ones haven't been transferred to the computer, though. We've had all kinds of personalities to perform for the troops. You said 1965?” she asked.

“Yes,” Jake nodded.

“The Polaris, right?” she asked again and Kate nodded.

“Do you see a Dorothy in there?” she asked.

“Oh! Here it is. It looks like Dorothy Milne. It lists her employment as a dance instructor,” the lady told them.

“Just like the journal says,” Kate whispered to Jake.

“She actually worked at the ovation dance studio right here in the city,” the lady told them.

“I could hug you right now,” Kate grinned and they headed out.

“We might just solve this Christmas mystery after all,” Jake told her, nudging her shoulder.

“I can't believe it! The ovation dance studio is actually still around! Wonder if Jonah tracked her down there. I remember the last passage in his journal said…”

"I saw Dorothy perform last night with the uso. She's breathtaking. It was like she was floating on air. I got to talk to her again after the show, and she's truly everything I imagined. Sweet, smart… But when I went to find her this morning, her brother said Dorothy left on the cargo plane. It's crazy, but I feel like I've known her forever. I have to find her after we dock in Norfolk."

“We might just solve this Christmas mystery after all,” Jake told her, nudging her shoulder as they headed into the dance studio. There were little ballerina’s dancing around the room.

“They are so sweet,” Kate couldn’t help commenting.

“Aren't they? Today's the dress rehearsal for our big Christmas show. Can I help you with something?” the instructor asked.

“Yes. Hi, I'm Kayleigh Wells of the Norfolk register newspaper. This is Lieutenant Seresin,” Kate introduced.

“Nice to meet you both. What's this about?” she asked.

“We're looking for a woman who might be a military spouse. Her name is Dorothy Milne. Apparently she worked here years ago,” Kate told her.

“Yes. Dorothy was my teacher as a girl. I eventually bought the studio from the owner,” she crossed her arms.

“Could you tell us more about her?” Kate asked.

“She, uh, moved to New York to be a rockette, but her dreams never quite panned out, so she worked here instead, and would sometimes perform for the troops with the USO,” the woman told them.

“Any idea where she was from?” Kate asked.

“Kansas City, I believe,” she told them.

“Do you have any idea if she was married to a pilot named Jonah?” Jake asked.

“I remember there was a pilot she met on an aircraft carrier. He came to find her after the ship docked. Surprised her with roses right here in the studio in the middle of class! But she had a boyfriend at the time who she said was planning to propose, so I'm not sure who she ended up with,” she told them.

“Any idea what Jonah’s last name is?” Kate asked.

“It was so long ago. After that Christmas, we were told Dorothy moved to California. But that's all I know. I'm sorry I couldn't be more help.”

“Thank you,” Kate gave her an appreciative smile.

“I think we could use a snack right now, have you ever had roasted chestnuts?” Kate asked Jake.

“No, actually,” Jake told her. Kate smiled and went up to a cart selling them.

“We'll take two,” she told the man and went to pull out some money.

“I got this,” Jake told her, handing the man money.

“Thank you. All right. Let's see what this is,�� Jake said as they began their walk again.

“Mmm! Lot sweeter than I thought,” he told her after having one.

“Hmm. Kinda how I feel about you,” Kate teased.

“I'll take that as a compliment,” Jake laughed.

“So, have you ever been to New York before?” Kate asked him.

“When I was six my parents brought me here for Christmas,” he told her.

“Before the divorce?” she asked hesitantly.

“Yeah. It was our last Christmas as a family together,” he bit his lip and looked down.

“That's bittersweet.” Jake nodded.

“Yeah, but it was the best Christmas I ever had,” he looked at her.

“Well, I think it's nice that you have those memories. Whenever my dad would be home for Christmas, we'd always go to Picasso’s diner and we would get semi crispy bacon. It was kind of our thing. Semi crispy is the only way to go,” Kate told him.

“I know, right?” Jake asked and Kate laughed.

“That looks really familiar. New York model train museum annual Christmas show! I went there when I was here with my dad,” Jake pointed out.

“Yeah? Come on, you wanna go? It'd be fun!” Kate exclaimed.

“Uhh... I don't know…” he trailed off.

“Oh, come on! You said it yourself, best Christmas you ever had,” Kate taunted.

“All right, yeah. Let's do it,” Jake smiled.

“Okay. Perfect,” Kate smiles, taking his hand and pulling him along.

“This really brings me back,” Jake says as they wander through the train exhibits. “You okay?” Kate asks.

“Yeah, it's just, uh… I remember my dad taught me how trains worked when we were here. And after the divorce, that's pretty much all we talked about trains, planes… Pretty much anything with a motor. You know, we never went too deep. Stiff upper lip, you know?”

Kate nodded. “My mom was the complete opposite. I think after my dad died she was just so heartbroken all she wanted to do was talk about him, but… I couldn't do it,” she told him.

“Why not?” he asked.

“It was too painful,” Kate shrugged.

“I'm sorry. He died from an accident, right?” Jake asked and Kate nodded.

“I was 16… The day everything changed,” she told him.

“My dad says he was a great man,” he told her.

“He was. And he loved us very, very much. So all the times he invited me to go on the Christmas tiger cruise, I should have,” Kate sighed.

“Well, I'm sure he understood. It's not easy being a Navy brat,” Jake tells her.

“Yeah, well, it's something I still regret to this day.”

“Look, don't beat yourself up over it. Believe me, I get it. All the moving around, the uncertainty… Our dads were gone for months at a time,” Jake told her, nudging her shoulder.

“Well, you're lucky yours is still around. You should cherish that,” Kate told him.

“I do. You know, he… He bought me this little red train…” Jake trailed off.

“Yeah?”

“At the gift shop here. Ahh. I drove that thing around on every surface of our house until the wheels fell off,” he told her.

“That's really sweet,” Kate smiled.

“I'll never forget that moment we picked it out together. Cost five dollars, but… Nothin' meant more to me than that train.”

Kate paused at one of the displays. “Do you still have it?” she asked.

“Got lost in one of the moves,” Jake shrugged.

“I'm sorry,” Kate apologized, she knew the feeling of losing something in a move fairly well.

“It's the memory that matters, right?” Jake asked. Kate nodded.

“Hey. Let's go check out the north pole train!” Jake exclaimed.

“You know what? I'm gonna get us some hot chocolate, but I'll meet you over there?” Kate asked.

“All right,” he smiled and headed over to the display.

“This is flight 747 to JFK tower, comin' in for a landing,” a little boy is flying a toy plane around.

“Copy, flight 747. Proceed to runway one-zero-niner and wait for clearance. Psst!” Jake pretended like he was a tower operator.

“Psst! Copy,” the little boy responded.

“I brought Teddy here for the trains, but he's obsessed with flying,” the dad laughed.

“Smart kid. You know, Jake is actually a fighter pilot in the Navy,” Kate told them, walking up with two hot chocolates.

“Whoa,” the kid marveled.

“At your service,” Jake tipped his imaginary hat.

“Do you fly off aircraft carriers?” the boy asked.

“Sure do. But flying off the carrier is the easy part. Landing, that's the hard part,” Jake told him.

“That's so cool! I want to be a Navy pilot!” the kid exclaimed.

“Well, you certainly can if you put the work in. Here. This…” He pulls out a pair of wings that they give to the kids on the cruises from his pocket. “Is for you, eh?” he offered with a smile.

“Whoa! No take-backs?” the kid asked.

“No take-backs, buddy. Promise,” Jake smiled.

“You just made his Christmas. Thank you so much. Have a great holiday,” the dad told him.

“Merry Christmas,” Jake told them as they walked away.

“You know, you were really good with him. And did I just hear you say, "merry Christmas"?” Kate asked.

“Yeah, well, don't tell my shipmates,” Jake told her.

“Oh, no, they'd never believe me. Hey, we should probably go get something to eat, and I know a place that's gonna actually change the way you see Christmas forever,” Kate grinned.

“Mind games, huh?” Jake asked.

“It'll definitely mess with your brain. Come on,” Kate laughed and took his hand in hers.

Christmas music played quietly in the background.

“Brain freeze!” Jake groaned.

“They don't call it the colossal Christmas cocoa for nothing,” Kate laughed.

“We don't mess around here. We take Christmas very seriously. Two burgers coming up,” the waitress told them.

“Thank you. I feel like I don't have a care in the world right now. Honestly, that's not happened very often,” she told Jake.

“That's how I feel when I'm flying my jet over the ocean, those moments when I'm at total peace. Until I realize I have to land on a ship that feels like it's the size of a postage stamp,” Jake laughed.

“Does that ever scare you?” Kate asked and Jake shook his head.

“I love every second of what I do. The adrenaline and the rush… I don't think I'm scared of anything,” he told her.

“Not even Christmas?”

Jake raised a brow. “Christmas? Why would I be scared of Christmas?” he asked.

“I'm just sayin', it… Kind of seems like you've been running away from it,” she told him.

“What do you mean?”

“Based on what you told me earlier, it seemed like maybe your parents got divorced shortly after your trip here,” she said simply.

“Yeah, well, after that, it was mostly mom and me at Christmas. Just wasn't the same without my family together. Just couldn't really see the magic in the holiday anymore,” Jake shrugged.

“I'm sorry.”

Jake waved her off.

“And I'm also sorry 'cause I totally judged you,” Kate apologized.

“It's okay. I know I can be a bit of a Christmas curmudgeon,” Jake nodded.

“A bit?” Kate teased.

“Mmhmm,” Jake laughed.

“Well, it's okay. If I wave my merry magic wand, maybe you'd think about embracing some new Christmas memories,” Kate tried.

“Hmm? Like what?” he asked.

“Like, you know, today, we… You made the little boy smile at the train show, right?” Jake hummed in response.

“He met his hero. And we saw the world's most adorable dance troupe, and I wasn't gonna say anything, but it appears that you actually took a bite of your candy cane,” Kate told him.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Jake hid the candy cane.

“I haven't had this much fun in a long time,” he told her.

“Good!” Kate smiled.

“You're amazing.”

Kate tilted her head questioningly.

“The way you made me imagine our day like a living scrapbook. You really have a way with words,” Jake clarified.

“Well, I'm a writer. So…”

“You're much more than that,” Jake told her, and it felt like he was looking into her soul.

Her phone started buzzing and Kate smiled apologetically before reading the text messages.

“It's my mom. Oh, my gosh, we have to go. It's 7:30!” Jake’s eyes widened and then they were both collecting their jackets.

“Uh, sorry! Forget the burgers!” Kate called to the server.

“Sorry. Here you go! Merry Christmas,” Jake added, placing money down on the table.

“Yeah, merry Christmas! Sorry!” The two of them ran out.

“Taxi! Taxi!” Kate yelled and it only took a moment before one pulled up and they got in.

“Pier 90,” Jake told the driver.

“We're almost there,” Kate groaned as they got stuck in traffic with 10 minutes till the ship left.

“We're never gonna make it. Maybe we should run,” Jake suggested.

“Run?!”

“Yeah. We can do it. Come on!”

Jake was handing the driver money and climbing out of the taxi. He took Kate’s hand and they began running.

“Go, go, go, go!” he encouraged.

“You're crazy! Whoa! Excuse us! Sorry!” Kate yelled as they ran by people.

“It's this way! Hi, Santa! Oh, wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait,” Jake had to stop and put some bills in the santa’s bucket.

“Merry Christmas!” he exclaimed as they took off running again.

“You barely made it, Lieutenant,” one of the sailors greeted them as they climbed aboard the ship.

“I can't believe we just ran 15 blocks,” Kate panted, trying to catch her breath.

“I know,” Jake laughed.

“Thank you for today. You know, for all the memories. The new ones.”

Kate smiled.

“You're welcome, Jake.”

#starset writes #jake seresin x oc #jake seresin fanfiction #hangman top gun #jake seresin #jake hangman seresin #pre tgm #fic:// u.s.s christmas #au #top gun maverick au

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inkovert · 4 months

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Things I want to do in 2024

I've never been the type to make resolutions and I know we tend to put more weight on them than they actually are meant to have, hence why we never follow through with them. So! I am attempting to just make a list of things I am hoping to do in 2024. very low stakes. not going to think of these as goals, just things I want to do. and hope that I follow through with some of them.

Health-related

Planning my meals and keeping a food journal: I've been on a health journey for about the past year and I want to try to get back on track with that and be more consistent with it. I've been trying to be more consistent with preparing home cooked meals rather than relying on frozen meals/eating out, eating 3 meals a day etc, and that's been going well so far, but it could be better. I think one way to help myself be more consistent is planning my meals out (not like meal-prepping just literally being like this day I'm going to eat these things so I have a more structured "menu" vs throwing things together in my head the day of). I think I also want to start keeping a food journal. I peeped that iOS added a Journal app to the new software and I might try that out to see how useful it would be for food journaling, doing things like documenting my mood around the times I eat, what I eat etc.

Find a new dentist and start flossing: When I say I've been on a health journey over the last year I really mean in every possible way you can think of lol. Dental health was one of them. I've made a lot of improvements but I'm so prone to getting cavities that I think I could make a few more. I am one of the 60% of people who do not floss every day bc I found it hard/time-consuming/unnecessary. But I started doing it a couple weeks ago and... it wasn't so bad? I was pretty consistent with it until I went home for the holidays and that fell to crap bc I couldn't find the floss I had packed. anywho. I want to continue to be consistent with that and make that a habit, in addition to finding a new dentist bc the last one I saw was a bit too...assertive and I didn't like their staff so decided never to go back there again.

Personal/things that actually make me excited

Decorate my room: lol. Can you believe I've lived in my apt for two years and I've yet to decorate my room (even the bathroom has some stuff hung up on the walls). I literally have the decorations sitting in a pile by my bedroom door collecting dust. So yeah. I wanna actually do that. Tbf what stopped me before was that I wasn't confident I'd be able to stay in this apt for long. I thought for sure after a year they would jack up the price and I would be forced to move. But, we're now going on three years and things have been fine so I should actually properly decorate the place.

✨ Get a tattoo ✨ The sparkles are because this is probably the thing I'm most excited about on this list. I have wanted a tattoo for as long as I can remember. And I finally decided last year that I was going to say fuck it and get one. But unfortunately the finances weren't financing so it got delayed. But it's happening this year!! For sure!!! Hopefully in the next few months!! I need to stop delaying it and just do it!! So yeah. I've made my best friend keep me accountable each step of the way so I can stop procrastinating. So she gave me a deadline of Friday, 1/5 to at least have a list of tattoo artists I'm considering. We're doing this!!!

Actually leave my house and spend time in places I enjoy: Since my two closest friends moved away last year I haven't had a lot of incentive to go out and do things. So I've just been spending a lot of time at home by myself. And solitude is so nice. So comfortable. So blissful. But I need to end that. Or at least cut down on it a little. There are things I actively want to do in my city but every time the weekend comes I end up staying in my house doing nothing for 2 days straight. And it's been great. But I need to push myself to actually go out and do things by myself. Go to live music concerts, hang out at bookstores or coffee shops. Just something to have a change of pace and environment. I know I will be better for it. I'm gonna challenge myself to go out by myself at least once a month. If I do more? great. But we're starting small.

Writing-related

Track my writing: I'm not going to push myself to have word count goals or anything like that because I think that would be counter productive and take the fun out of writing for me. I actually wrote a lot last year (I just calculated it - 174, 817 words according to Scrivener; kinda insane can't remember the last time I wrote that much in a year) so I don't think I have issues with word quantity or writing enough and if it ain't broke don't fix it! But I do want to track my writing a little more closely. I just think it could be fun tracking the stats behind it and looking back at it at the end of the year. and also maybe help me continue this consistency with writing that I've suddenly developed?

Write something for fun: I can't tell you how much it hurts me that I don't have any fun/silly projects that I can work on on the side that I don't care about getting perfect. I think it will be nice and freeing and challenge my writing chops a bit to write something completely out of my comfort zone, totally absurd, and purely for my enjoyment. I've just been too crippled with fear to even try and idk why. I want to do it so badly but I struggle with coming up with ideas (and with working on more than one thing at once). We'll see it if it happens. this is just a list of things I want to do who knows if I'll actually do them.

Finish the second draft of MDE: just gonna throw this one in here out of obligation. refer to the last sentence of the previous bullet point. I wrote half of it in a year, maybe it's possible to write the other half in a year?

If you made it this far, thank you for reading. gonna come back to this in 6 months and see if anything I listed here actually panned out lol

#inkoverted thoughts #this is probably the most I've shared about my life and me as a person on my blog like ever lol #don't usually talk about personal things that are unrelated to writing #also writing the 'health-related' part of this made me realize just how much depression makes you stop taking care of yourself #like the way I have completely transformed my priorities and started working on things I didn't care to or have energy to work on before #kinda wild #2023 was a good year ngl

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ambiguouspuzuma · 2 years

Text

Out of the Loop

Journal entry 542 15th June 2022

Well, it certainly wasn't the ideal start to a working day. It turns out that the storm last night has torn some panels from the fence, so that's something I'll need to get fixed, no doubt at great expense. Judging from the drive to work, there's going to be a waiting list. The roads were awful, too, traffic stretched as far as the eye could see, just because some trees had fallen down as well. At least work was straightforward, although I had to show Jonas how to do his job again. The same stuff I told him just a few months ago. Brain like a sieve, that guy, honestly.

Journal entry 542 15th June 2022

I don't really know how to say this, but Jonas has finally snapped. I was just making my mid-morning coffee when he cornered me in the kitchen and started rambling some absolute nonsense, even worse than his usual barrage of stupid work questions. It's not like I was having the ideal start to my day as it was - it turns out that the storm last night has done for some of the fence panels, so that's a direct hit to my savings, and I had to spend an hour in traffic because it decided to take out some trees on the way. With all that stress going on, I was really hoping for a straightforward day at the office.

I managed to excuse myself and ignored him when we were back at our desk, but then later on I hear he's been escorted from the building because he kept prodding people and shouting. Prodding! I've always joked that he's a few panels short of a fence himself, but I always thought he was just a bit scatterbrained, not... whatever this is. I actually thought he might be showing signs of improvement when I came in this morning, remembering stuff I taught him a few months ago without needing his usual reminder, but I guess a few hours of competency was all that bizarre mind of his could take. I wonder what will happen to him now?

Journal entry 542 15th June 2022

I have no idea how to write this entry. I don't really have the words to do it justice, so I guess I'll just be frank and state the facts.

Jonas is dead. He didn't show up for work this morning, and we assumed it must have been because of the storm last night - I was delayed in traffic for a fallen tree, and the garden fence is in tatters, so plenty of reasons he might have had to stay home or not been able to make it in - but then someone said he'd been found dead.

Even then we guessed it must have been a fallen roof tile, a tragic casualty of the storm, but the truth turned out to be even worse. He took his own life. They won't say how, but I don't think I actually want to know. How long have we shared a desk now? It has to be the best part of a year. I won't pretend that we always got on, and I did find him frustrating at times, but this is horrible. I would never have wanted this for him.

It's awful to think that I used to make jokes about his intelligence, his sanity, and all the while he was actually struggling with real problems. He needed support, not my mockery. Did he know how I felt? Was that a reason that he did what he did? If that's the case, I don't think that I'll ever forgive myself, but I suppose that all that I can do now is try to be a better person in the future. It goes without saying that I'll never speak ill of Jonas again.

Journal entry 542 15th June 2022

God, that imbecile Jonas has been creeping me out all day. Having a moron for a desk buddy is hard enough when he's focusing on work, but today he seems to be trying out a new party trick: guessing what I'm about to say before I say it. I tried my best not to encourage him, playing down the accuracy, but he was actually getting scarily close. Sometimes almost word for word. I don't know how he was doing it, but I didn't like it at all.

He actually said that he'd been to the future, lived this day before, something like that, so he knew what I was going to say, but that was definitely the weaker part of the whole act. If he's training to be one of those amateur magicians, he really needs to work on his patter. Probably best to focus on guessing cards and facts and things, too, rather than jumping in to finish every sentence. Even children must find that annoying.

Then of course I have to come home to missing fence panels, a legacy of last night's storm (which also doubled the length of my commute, thanks to some fallen trees), but I've got no energy at all to try and get them fixed. I'll look for someone tomorrow, although I bet they're already fully booked by now.

Journal entry 542 15th June 2022

I'm worried about Jonas. He was weirdly efficient this morning, getting his work done in half the time it should usually take - and that means a quarter of the time it usually takes him, given the number of questions he has to ask - but then spent the time he'd freed up researching electricity and the storm last night.

I thought I was badly hit - a few broken fence panels, one nightmare commute - but it turns out his building was actually struck by lightning. He kept asking me questions about how lightning actually works, as if I'd have the first clue. I'm pretty good at answering him on work stuff, often because I've already given the same answer before, but he seems to think that makes me an expert on everything.

"How can I recreate it?" was one of them, which is such a weird hypothetical that I don't think it even makes sense. Nobody creates lightning - unless I'm even more ignorant than I thought. I assume he didn't meant literally, but I'm lost as to what he actually wanted. Besides, even if I did know how to summon another storm, I certainly wouldn't tell anybody - least of all a maniac like him. I'm not sure my savings could afford any more damage like last night.

Anyway, he left at lunchtime for a dentist appointment he'd forgotten to tell anyone about - that's classic scatterbrain Jonas for you - so I didn't get the chance to ask him what the hell he was on about. I do worry about him sometimes, you know - whether he's actually not all there, beyond the jokes I make along similar lines. Hopefully he's just a bit shocked and excited by living through a freak occurrence like that. I guess I can always check in with him tomorrow.

#writing #sci-fi #short story #original fiction #writers of tumblr

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ahsokaisawesome · 7 months

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HELLO AGAIN I've been very busy with personal matters including school, but figured a good way to ground myself was to get back to drawing. Decided to try and finish a new monthly challenge, been too long since I did that so I'm dedicating the next 31 days to a new prompt idea I'm doing called Hometober. I want to capture memories and feelings from various "homes" I've experienced. They won't be 100% accurate, but they will have some correct details based on real-life events.

This first prompt is "What does home feel like", I call this "Spaciously far away". More details under a read more.

This is based on one of my childhood bedrooms in Peru; I was a month from turning 4 when we moved to Canada so this bedroom I shared with my parents in my grandmother's home was the one I remember living in the most. The outfit I'm wearing is directly from a photo my dad took that I remember loving. The bed and window are where they are in my memories as a child, though having been to that room again for the first time in years showed me how small the room really was.

The door leads to a bathroom, it was small but functional and I remember the tub feeling big even though it would have been barely enough for two adults to stand in let alone sit down.

The window was small and peered into the tiny garden surrounded by concrete walls that was next to the dining room. It had lots of plants and a small fruit tree though I can't remember what kind. I could see the neighbours down that direction too and their yards, though calling them yards are kind, they were very much just rectangles with no ceiling. The view to some would have been grey, but I remember feeling like a big kid peering into the world. Maybe the next time I see the house, if ever, I'll feel that way again.

The bed was a toddler bed with plastic sides and I remember there being a safety wall on the side but I couldn't get it to look right. Pillows were always falling because I had a big head and I felt off balanced when I used them. I still loved it, I felt like a big kid being in her own bed, despite my parents bed being just a few feet away, if even.

The carpet is the least likely thing here, I can't recall much of there being one but I have the faintest feeling there was but perhaps my mom just took it outside to be cleaned more often than not. I had similar carpets in later bedroom set ups so I figured it wouldn't hurt to add it here all the same.

2003 makes it 20 years in Canada this December, so I suppose doing this challenge was good timing. I might do something similar in December baring what projects I have to do and exams, but I'll try.

If you've read this far, thank you! See you in the next drawing! <3 Prompts will be based on this list:

#october 2023 #october prompts #drawtober #monochrome #peru #bunart #estoy la #gotta blow the dust off my tags lmao #also trying out a secondary signature since my artist one isn't really legible haha #I think its clever but I'll workshop it #hometober #hometober 2023 #hometober day 1 #I have a lot of memories of Peru #I might revist more as the days go #my inbox is also open if ppl are curious so #okay thats enough tags blaaahh

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drdemonprince · 1 year

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Hey Devon. In your book you talked about how often, autistic people are more likely to face abuse. That’s very true in my experience. I’ve been in several abusive relationships and I’m in one again but at the same time I don’t want to leave because like you said, we fear abandonment. You didn’t really give tips on how to get out of abusive relationships unless I’m not remembering correctly and in that case my apologies. But I’m just wondering if you could give some tips on how to get out of a situation like that while having abandonment issues and not wanting to leave because you love the person. Thank you

A few years ago, I wrote an essay with advice for people who love someone who is currently being abused, and want to be able to support the abuse victim better. Ultimately though, the piece is also about what it's like to be a victim and to hide your abuse from your friends and loved ones while it is happening, and what slowly coming to the point of deciding to leave looked like for me. So I think you'll get something out of it:

On average, it takes seven attempts for a domestic abuse victim to make a lasting break from their abuser. If you aren't ready to end it yet, you deserve to be patient with yourself. In the meantime, keep a journal of your feelings and the worst of your experiences (if you can do so safely). Identify a friend or two whom you can really be honest about the abuse to, who will listen and not judge you or try to force your hand (a virtual friend is fine for this if you cant meet face to face). Begin contemplating some the specifics for when you do leave: where would you live, who could help you move, how would you spend your time, how would you like to decorate your own space. Having something to look forward to on the other side is essential.

Loving someone who mistreats you really is like an addiction in a great many ways, and so I have found a great deal of meaning from writings on harm reduction, as well as books on codependency, and dialectical behavioral therapeutic approaches to fears of abandonment. There are some codependency workbooks on my to-read list right now that a friend recommended after reading Unmasking Autism and seeing much of their own dating life reflected in the book. I'll report back once I've had the chance to try them out.

I wish problems like these had a tidier answer, but for me overcoming these tendencies is an ongoing struggle and I still yearn for my abandonment anxieties to be soothed in a way that I think they ultimately just never will. I have tried all my life throwing pursuits and people into the chasm of my own neediness, and never have I ever felt filled up. I'm starting to think these feelings and yearnings are just a life wound I need to accept living with, and that acceptance of that pain will bring me the closest to healing and peace that I'll be capable of. I think it is still possible to lead a meaningful life with many wonderful experiences while lugging that baggage around. I hope you find a way to carry that weight that works for you.

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thebiscuiteternal · 8 months

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I have a prompt I'd love to throw your way for the jam:

MDZS/Untamed post-canon SangYao, another character (e.g. WWX or a snooping Junior) discovers that NHS has a little shrine/memorial nook set aside with JGY's hat, a lovingly painted portrait by NHS, and whatever other accoutrements strike your fancy (e.g. maybe a journal NHS writes in every day where he 'speaks' to JGY) that make it obvious the relationship SangYao once had. What they do with that is up to you, I just thought it would be fun (and potentially heartbreaking)

After thinking about it a bit, I've decided that I'm gonna set this in the same timeline as this one, so Jin Ling already knows that things between Nie Huaisang and Jin Guangyao were a lot less simple than everyone would like to believe, but he didn't know they were in a relationship at some point. Mixed canon, as per my usual.

------------

~ I suppose I should be angry. Would it be easier for you that way? For me to roar and rage about broken promises the way Da-ge does instead of hiding away in tears?

Well, I can't. Just like I can't say I never saw this coming. As soon as I saw you in the Nightless City, I knew I had been set aside for someone better and more acceptable in numerous ways.

Before I even fell for you, I knew I would never be good enough.

So I can't be angry.

But will you be angry with me if I am too ill to travel the day of the wedding? I promise to send extra gifts in my stead, and to try to send Da-ge in a good mood. ~

---

Jin Ling frowned as he closed up the letter and laid it back among the dozens of other letters and notes and drawings from Nie Huaisang that his shushu had been keeping in an unassuming little box hidden deep within the protected room where all his other most closely guarded secrets were held.

It was dated a solid two years before Nie Mingjue had die- been killed, but even though he didn't remember the wedding itself, he knew from records that Jin Guangyao and Qin Su had married after the murder and Nie Huaisang had attended as sect leader and representative.

Had he already tracked down any of Jin Guangyao's secrets by then?

Jin Ling doubted that. Surely there would have been more mention of him other than the guest list if he'd made a commotion, as Jin Ling had discovered many, many records of indescretions by assorted cultivators and outside nobles and merchants that could have been used as blackmail as he went through the contents of the room.

And some of them had been about Nie Huaisang. Jin Guangshan had found it almost disturbingly amusing to catalogue the apparent downward spiral of his hated rival's little brother.

So if there weren't any from the wedding... no, whatever had been going on then must have been genuine.

Knowing what he knew now from having talked to Nie Huaisang and read everything he'd found in the treasure room, Jin Ling could only feel an aching sort of pity for everyone involved except his yeye.

His shenshen, not having any idea what horrors were lurking behind her happy day.

Qin-furen, knowing what she was unwillingly allowing.

Nie Huaisang, newly brotherless and forced into the role of playing smiling wedding guest as the man he loved married someone else.

He even felt sorry for his shushu. It must have been miserable trapped under the weight of his mistakes and the what-might-have-beens.

Wiping his eyes with the heel of his hand, Jin Ling leaned back against the wall and let out a long sigh.

Unlike the blackmail records -burned- and the demonic cultivation notes -given to his shijiu- and a number of other things he'd already gone through, he wasn't sure what to do with these.

They were far too personal to just be put back on the shelf, and yet-

He considered possibly giving them to Nie Huaisang, but he didn't know if that would be an insult. The other sect leader had been surprisingly kind to him in helping him sort out his grief over several talks and exchanges of letters, and Jin Ling didn't want to wind up pouring salt in an old wound.

But it felt wrong to simply get rid of them, and he couldn't think of any better place for them to go.

---

Though he couldn't go anywhere he pleased with impunity like his shushu once had, Jin Ling had discovered during his visits that he still had a surprising amount of freedom in the Unclean Realms. Whether it was because most of the disciples and staff still looked at him as a kid, or because Nie Huaisang allowed it as a side effect of their personal discussions, he didn't know.

But he wasn't going to complain about it right now.

His original intent had been to leave the box in Nie Huaisang's library or somewhere similar, but then he'd remembered That Room.

The one situated in the same hallway as the sect leader's room and Nie Huaisang's old room, that his shushu had indicated he'd lived in when he'd been part of the sect.

The one Jin Ling had never seen anyone else living in even when he was small, not even the current second in command.

Hoping he wasn't about to get himself in deep trouble for snooping, he tested the door latch and found it opened easily, as if it hadn't gathered any dust in the years since his shushu had left.

Carefully, he peeked inside.

Though most of the furniture was gone, a hefty three piece writing desk and a cabinet remained.

At first, he thought they'd been taken directly from his shushu's office, they were so similar. But as he looked closer, running his fingers over the wood, he found a few differences.

The beast head of Qinghe Nie adorned the drawer and door pulls, for one. The desk was missing the place where he'd accidentally nicked it with a toy sword. The spots where Rusong had tried to chew on the edge while teething weren't there.

This, he realized, must have been his shushu's desk and cabinet when he was still Meng Yao. A welcome gift from his sect leader and young master.

And Jin Guangyao had had it replicated more according to Lanling tastes when he'd moved.

Oh... things really had been complicated between them, hadn't they?

Curiosity overtook him, and he couldn't stop himself from looking in the drawers and cabinets one by one.

A hat that he couldn't bear to see for more than the time it took to open and then quickly shut the drawer. A set of finely made brushes. Some fresh notebooks. A set of beautifully-designed green and gold robes that had likely never been worn.

A painting of his shushu, looking younger and smiling brighter than Jin Ling had ever seen him.

Other bits and pieces he didn't understand the meanings of.

And, finally, a carved wooden box.

Jin Ling found himself relieved by that particular discovery, knowing immediately what had to be inside without even opening it. Taking the box he'd brought with him out of the pouch he'd stored it in, he carefully laid it down next to the one already there.

Then slipped out of the little mausoleum-of-sorts back to his room.

---

Jin Ling looked up from his breakfast to find Nie Huaisang staring at him over the rim of his teacup.

For a moment, he froze, afraid he was about to get laid into for his nighttime sneaking.

But Nie Huaisang merely tilted his head in acknowledgment, then went back to his tea.

And Jin Ling couldn't help but grin before taking his next bite.

#mdzs #cql #jin ling #nie huaisang #sangyao #implied #fanfic

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