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the-firebird69 · 5 months

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If you want things but we're putting wanted notices on John Riva Lord and we are reviving them on others but this guy is going to go

-besides the pseudo empire pushing them back off the bunkers and they're bombing campaign which is going to start a moments we found out that the blockade was successfully holding them off and they are interested to see if there's a correlation between them holding them off the bunkers and the blockade holding them out and it is weeding out some higher ups too but there are a lot less of these idiots here and they are checking to see if that's the case. There's more news

-John remillard was hit in the face with a baseball bat and stuffed into a trunk and he went missing a little bit. He was also in the watchmen movie and if you recall in the beginning of the movie he was arguing with Rorschach and then he was found dead sitting at a table and Rorschach I guess got blamed and we know that it was Ozymondais and he came to him and not too long ago and it's a pain in the ass again after getting shot in the head he's a dick unbelievable it's very strange that he would blame someone who's wearing a mask and their son says that he's stupid it might be afraid of BG. There are a few more things to know about today

-these little girls got themselves in trouble last night and trying to set off a bomb now several bombs all over the place and they're not good positions for Tommy f he doesn't like where you're placing them and he took half of them. So John remillard wanted our son to start yelling about Tommy f and they're not just his by the way they're also bja and the pseudo empire had placed a few there trying to stop that warlock but they're also trying to stop the clones and it's going on now that the clothes are beginning to attack both and they usually do in moments they're going to be a Counter-Strike against him all over the world by the morlock and the empire is going to hit them too. Have areas in cities and outside them and they're not very big and they're going to be very small now

-there's a couple more things we have low or zero patients for this imbecile Trump and we do not want to see him ever and people cannot figure it out you're jamming is moron into our face and you're going to pay with your lives anybody doing it I would not seeing we are now seeing that you are a defined pile of crap because you say you're going to and that's fine we're eating them alive and taking all their stuff and you won't be here. You got us to hate you you got us to do that and you're going to follow you and pull you in and get what you're doing now you're going to get us to get rid of you good job.

-there's other things too we can't stand about you idiots you think your son is going to join you and help you you can hardly communicate with you on a basic level about basic things you're so dumb we mean you bja you're an utter fool you look like one too you should know even half normal people look at you with disdain cuz you're so stupid looking what you're doing is so dumb. We want you out and need you out because we're fighting to get you out and tonight you're going to learn a lesson for me tonight we meant it pseudo empire and send some caption any idiot dumb enough to come back here you're so freaking stupid you people never know what time it is or what's going on you think your arm is so huge and it's not. You lost a lot of people and 14% is nothing to be proud of and it was a lot more than that and the on island people are stuck there. They had to do anything the occupying space getting necessities and not building weaponry as much as one would think and the whole island is going to go away pretty quick someone wants to take it over

-there's a few other things happening one of them is the whole world is sick of seeing this Trump a****** in the news and they plan on shutting them down they're going to start the new year off and get him out of there who wants to see this buffoon this is stupid as a freaking chip running around with his hands flapping his wings and a lot of people say it on the hill and they're demanding it and the guys nuts a son says you're doing it cuz of me cuz you're an idiot and I don't care in the end you're going to get killed pretty soon too you can say it as much as you want screaming into the microphone probably blow your head right off

-we're also going after your son the good guy and we're going to take the stuff tired of him doing that and he never learns you guys can lose huge sectors and you just won't shut your face we've taken giant areas from you with your stupid idiot s*** here you think we're going through it and we're going to keep enduring it for you for some reason you're absolutely insane really you are insane but what we mean is we're taking your stuff and your territory for what you're doing and saying here yeah you're nuts what you're saying now Dan AKA Dave we're going to hang you for and we mean it and you too Trump I'm going to get you hung for putting weapons out there of mass destruction and this is the country that went after terrorists like you in Iraq and I ran Afghanistan and now they're going after you again.

-they had the first episode of The watchmen it took place last night several of them died and one of them died fully and you can watch the movie you can see who it was it was not the Vietnam scene was in the bar and they died fully and that person was here and Trump is the guy who did it and his people are going after him and it is a grandson and you're going to kill him fully and the comedian witnessed it so talk to Manhattan tricycle after him and he is really not even a scientist in the Manhattan project he wasn't there as a scientist or anything as a matter of fact he was not general groves and he's calling himself the guy who invented it and he is a nut and a loser I got to tell you that he sounds like Garth and Garth is a complete loser and the guys have to be put down there so stupid.

-the second installment begins tonight no it starts today and two more of them are going to be erased it's after the Vietnam scene well maybe I've seen it doesn't happen yet last night in the movie and fully so he's going to look at it it's not the other scene but several of them die in the Vietnam scene which happens during the day today and tonight in New York City there's a bunch of events that lead up to the nuclear weapons being used tomorrow and several of them later on in the night and they're arrested and they get hung for treason and your body's going to display and they get they get freed but really it's after like half a day of being dead and it's cold out but that's what happens

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marshmallowprotection · 3 years

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Serendipity

Pairing: Kang Jaehee/Main Character

Bio: It's been nice to get into the groove of working in the café with Jaehee, but the two of you keep butting heads over the little things. How will you settle it?

For the Mystic Messenger Reverse Big Bang Project. @mysme-rbb

[Read on AO3]

[Check out my Partner here.]

It wasn’t as easy as you thought to get a business up and running. Well, you certainly didn’t think it was a cakewalk, but it was a lot more involved than you assumed.

But, you supposed that was how anyone felt about their business. Jaehee knew the in’s and out’s well after spending so much time working with Jumin, however, there were still so many factors to consider that she had to take note of as you two were working hard on the business model for the café.

She had taken care of so much without even batting an eyelash. From making sure that things with the renovation were going properly, to ensuring that all the little touchings for the interior were to your liking as you had decided upon after making countless sketches, and that wasn’t at all to disregard how she’d been working on brewing the menu of drinks.

Jaehee was astounding, frankly.

Every single day you were able to learn something that you hadn’t known about her and it just drew you to want to be closer to Jaehee. She was passionate and it showed in how much thought she put into the smallest things. It could be as simple as trying to make sure that the napkins had the right color and energy.

Or, it could be as big as picking which tables and machinery to use. As long as she was there, you knew that you had nothing to worry about in terms of getting things to stay on track. You had a bit harder time trying to schedule things and make sure that they were following the path that they needed, so having Jaehee there made things possible without any messes!

To clarify, you thought, messes that involved construction and order were things you didn’t have to concern yourself with.

If it was in regards to a teeny mess in the kitchen?

That was kind of another thing entirely to talk about with your partner. There was plenty of work to be done and you were busy most of the time working to make sure that you had everything you needed for the day to clean up right as you worked.

Which, often led to Jaehee clicking her tongue and sighing at your work ethic. You just beamed whenever she came around and found just a bit of flour or other ingredients resting against the chopping block or the sink. You would get to things just as soon as you rotated through your fast cycle. It was how you functioned and how your brain layered your tasks.

While she thrived on order and structure to get things done, you had moments of relishing the freedom of the moment and letting your creativity wander. Some people would say that it was a partnership that had stormy seas ahead; but, honestly? Having someone willing to work outside of the box with someone who danced closer to the lines meant you had perfect harmony.

You didn’t have to always see eye to eye to be close to someone, nor did you have to agree to get things done.

Opposing views, as you had experienced, had allowed you and Jaehee to be able to find a lot of middle ground that would benefit more people than just yourselves. It opened the shop to more than just one crowd of people that wanted to drop by.

You both wanted this café to flourish with which meant putting your heads together to make progress!

Though, while your differing views had blended just fine thus far, the one thing that the two of you were having trouble with had to do with the menu of the café. She had carefully crafted the brews from the roast to the cup. However, where you two had a problem was trying to find that staple item on the menu.

It was that one thing that people would always drop by to try or were buzzing about when they talked about the place. After all, just focusing on drinks wouldn’t quite attract just anyone to see the place for themselves. You had a few ideas yourself and so did Jaehee, but you just couldn’t agree at all on what you should go with.

Your mind told you to go for gold by something big and flashy and Jaehee was focused on something simple, but not too plain.

It was seemingly the only thing that you couldn’t agree on. There were far too many pastries and cakes to pick from to settle on just one thing to be the centerpiece. Which, is what led the two of you to come to the conclusion that you had reached today.

In the kitchen of the café with loads of sweets on the counter for no reason other than the fact that:

“Well, if we simply cannot settle this by looking at our notes, then we should make everything that we believe to be a strong contender, [Y/N].”

“A good ol’ fashioned bake-off, then, huh?”

“I think those terms are agreeable.”

“Bring it on.”

Of course, neither you nor Jaehee set a limit on how many things you had in mind, which meant that the kitchen had way more snacks than you could eat by yourselves in just a day or two. That would certainly wind up going to the rest of the RFA when you were done if they were fool-hardy enough to walk into the café today.

You wouldn’t deny that it was fun, though.

To be in the kitchen together while the low hum of the radio echoed throughout the room, your eyes lingering on Jaehee when she thought that you were caught up in reading your notes and pausing to stir something with careful ease. These were the moments when you got to see a side of Jaehee that nobody else ever got the chance to view.

That side of Jaehee warmed your heart and brought warmth to your face. She was always so cute when she worked like this. She pursed her lips just so and would tap the tip of the pen against her lips whenever she made notes and correlations to her plans as she sampled and changed her final goal.

She didn’t know how adorable it was.

Not that you let a day go by without reminding her how much you appreciated having her in your personal space. She would always blush and cough to compose herself, looking away before she slid her hand into your own before you headed home for the evening after closing up the shop for the day.

One of these days she would be able to face you and tease you back without hesitation, but you were okay waiting for that day. These moments where she challenged you and kept you on your toes were just as fun and interesting to you to have and to hold. Though, this time, you wanted to be able to show her that you were capable of being able to prove that your choice was right.

“How’s it going over here?” you asked, continuing to stir the bowl in your hands as you made eye contact with Jaehee. “Ready to admit defeat, Jaehee?”

She chuckled. You knew that sound. She was always ready to stand her ground. You knew that whatever she had planned might’ve upstaged whatever you were thinking. So, you knew when she smiled, it was time to test the waters to see, “I assure you that I won’t be giving up so easily.”

“Well, it wouldn’t be a battle if you didn’t give it your all,” you countered. You took a few steps into her side of the kitchen just to get a little glimpse at her plans. You just needed to give her a little push to get on her good side. Setting down your work next to hers, you caught her hand in your own with a wink.

“And what do you think you’re doing?”

You brought her hand to your lips and brushed them against the palm of her palm. “Oh, nothing, I just wanted to make sure that these things were in working order,” you said and watched as the heat rose from her neck to her cheeks in a matter of seconds. “Don’t you think you should take a little break?”

“And let you get ahead of me?” her narrowed brow told you that she knew what you were trying to do but she wasn’t going to stop you. “We both know where that game goes at the end of the day, [Y/N.] So, what are you playing at?”

“Nothing, I just wanted to get you to take a break. I love this song, I thought you earned a dance for your hard work. We can’t take things so seriously that we forget to have a little downtime in the meantime, you know?”

“...No funny business, got it?”

“No promises.”

Jaehee allowed you to pull her close into a slow and swaying dance. She was light on her feet and kept her eyes on you the entire time. You knew that you could count on her to be watching your every move. She was always acutely aware of every detail.

So, you were more than happy to twist and turn around that kitchen without a second thought.

The heart-strung melody of a familiar song was the only thing that you needed. That, and having Jaehee close to you. She made you feel at home and alive. You hoped that she felt the same way as it was often difficult for her to express those thoughts aloud. It wasn’t that she didn’t feel like you did, she was just…

Still getting used to sharing her emotions with others without feeling like she needed to ball them up and away. Her home life had taught her to keep herself withdrawn and learning how to let go of that was like learning how to ride a bike. It wasn’t impossible but it was tedious and one of those things that took time and patience to work out.

You dipped her back and she sputtered but trusted you not to drop her on her butt. You never would… unless there was a cushion there to brace her fall from grace, anyway. The look in her brown eyes never got old and you craved to see it every time that she shared it with you so tenderly.

As you helped Jaehee back onto two legs, she could feel you moving her back and back until her hip bumped against the counter. She glanced between you and the ground before you caught her face in your open palm, leaning over to brush your lips against her cheek.

She instantly reacted to your affection by moving back a smidge, her hand knocking into both of your bowls, mixing the two.

“Oh, no!”

“[Y/N], you got carried away again!”

“I didn’t mean to!” You laughed it off as best you could. Though, you couldn’t help but think the pink shade of the batter you had created was turning a deep blush thanks to Jaehee’s handiwork of her own creation. She huffed and puffed as you tried to make sense of the mess and see if it could be mended.

Curious, you dipped a hand into the batter to give it a taste. It reminded you of something sweet and fruity, but you couldn’t quite discern what was in it.

It tasted really good, though.

“Jaehee, wait, come and try this,” you nudged her to come back to your side, bumping a spoon next to her lips to let her try. She tried only due to your insistence on the matter, pausing as she took in the flavor and nodded. “I think we’ve figured out what we’re going to have. Instead of red velvet, we can have a pink velvet!”

“We should’ve done this to start with,” she said, with a little laugh. Her warm cheeks were still reddened with embarrassment. “I guess it’s not always wrong to put things together to see if they work out.”

“Of course not, that’s why we work so well together.”

“Pffft, hahaha. I think this is going to turn out great.”

“Us, or the cakes?”

“Both.”

#jaehee kang #kang jaehee #mm #mysme #mysticmessenger #mystic messenger #mystic messenger jaehee #mysme jaehee #mm jaehee #jaehee mm #jaehee mystic messenger #jaehee x mc #jaehee x reader #mysmerbb #mod kait #long post

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hoardcloneheadcanons · 3 years

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The Season 1 Villain: Mr. Blackwood Part 2

Summary:[After Bullying Martin and Jon into getting together Mr. Blackwood takes down Elias Bouchard with the aid of allies from the sketchiest of places]

A loose structure of ides for an AU of the fanfic Yesterday is Here by CirrusGrey

-Mr. Blackwood tries to wait for Mr. Sims, he really does. He’s done this before. When Jon was in a coma and he thought he was gone for good Blackwood threw himself in the Lonely and an alliance with Peter Lukas. He’s trying not to assume that Jon is dead. He’s trying not to make drastic decisions without him again.

-But Elias is noticing that Mr. Blackwood is preventing his archivist from reading statements. Elias proceeds to try and get rid of Mr. Blackwood, and influence the archive staff to not trust him.

-At a point where Elias tries to get Blackwood arrested (for either impersonating an employee or for some crime he pins on him) Martin vanishes.

-This is the first the Archive Staff of Mr. Blackwood’s spooky powers, and it doesn’t help the trust.

-Elias uses the opportunity to convince them that the rituals they should be worried about are the one of the Corruption and the Stranger. He also convinces them that Mr. Blackwood is allied with the Lonely and was simply trying to attempt his own ritual behind their backs. He adds that keeping the Archivist powerless was part of that plan, and that the Archivist’s job is to prevent rituals, citing Gertrude Robinson as evidence.

-In this circumstance Blackwood decides to take out Elias on his own. He’s not quite giving up on Mr. Sims coming back, but he’s not relying on him returning either. And he determined to stop the Watcher’s Crown before Elias can kill him.

-Knowing that the Archive Staff no longer trusts him, Blackwood starts using invisibility to grab old Gertrude tapes from the police station and Elias’s office and leave them in convienient places for the staff to find. Instil a healthy suspicion of Elias in them. He’s trying to find the Gertrude Tape for Sasha.

-They don’t suspect him because he’d made it clear to them before that he doesn’t trust the tapes. He hadn’t let Jon record on them.

-He’d actually thrown them out the window only for them to appear in a drawer a few minutes later. An action which helped the archival staff believe the tapes were supernatural. Jon remained skeptical only for Blackwood to repeat the action two more times only for the same effect.

-Meanwhile Blackwood starts transposing his knowledge of what his Mr. Sims couldn’t see to Elias’s blind spots. Assuming that what his Mr.Sims couldn’t see, Elias can’t either.

- He knows his Jon couldn’t see in the tunnels, the dark, or in the doors of the Spiral.

-So he talks to Michael and Leitner to get to the panopticon and puts C-4 in the tower.

-Then he makes a deal with Either Michael to remove Jonathan’s eyes

- Specifically he tells him that at 17:00 (when he’s planning to kill Jonah Magnus) that the Archivists and his assistants will probably start screaming in pain. If they don’t, leave them alone. If they do, stab Jon’s eye’s out. If they look like they’re still dying, stab out the eyes of the archival assistants. They’ll be blind but they’ll be alive, seperated from the beholder.

-Sometime around 14:00 or 15:00 Mr. Sims shows up [SEES ALL] and is confused that he can seem to find his Mr. Blackwood or the present day Archival assistants.(One is in the tunnels, the others are kidnapped by the Spiral) He is concerned.

-Luckily the Archival assistants, due to the machinations of both Elias and Mr. Blackwood are paranoid of everyone that is not eachother. Tim, Sasha, Jon and Martin trust eachother and no one else. Unbeknownst to Elias or Blackwood they raided artifact storage for things that might help them against supernatural threats, researching correlating statements in order to use them. Tim’s research on Smirke told them about places they could use around the city that would hide them from the eye, the tunnels included.

-His connection to the Lonely may be affecting him. He’s fully accepted they’ll hate him. He’ll even let Michael tell them Blackwood sent him.

-They manage to escape the spiral long enough for Mr. Sims to SEE them.

-Sims blackmails a taxi driver to get to their location, saying he’ll reveal his affair unless he gives him a ride.

-Mr. Sims gets to them in time to get Michael to go away. They’ve all escaped his doors by this point. He’s just there to make Michael stop trying to stab their eyes out.

(”You shouldn’t be attacking me here archivist. I’m here to help.”

“I fail to see how trying to kill my younger self and my friends helps me.

“I wasn’t here to kill them, just take their eyes. Your Blackwood was very specific on that point. But if you’re going to cause me this much trouble, I won’t do it. I’m happy as long as the Eye is stopped.”

“Martin?- Oh no.”

“But if you wish for them to die with your archive, go ahead, take them. Your funeral. Your Misfortune”)

- Being saved by an older, scarred version of Jon, with glowing green eyes smattered on his skin and hovering over his head like a crown was a plot twist that the archival staff was not ready for.

-They’re shouting questions at him left and right as he’s trying to drag them toward the Archive to Prevent Blackwood from killing them all.

-Sasha has to pay for the uber. The archival staff are crammed in the back while the scarred scarecrow that is Jonathan Sims tries to answer questions from the passenger seat. The driver stares straight ahead and pretends he doesn’t understand english while hoping these crazy people will get out of his car soon.

-(Sasha: Where should I tell him to go?

Sims: To the Archive, we need to prevent Martin from killing Elias.

Tim: Blackwood. This is Martin.

Sims: Excuse Me?

Martin: So is Elias the good guy? Was he right about the Archivist stopping the apocalypse-s?

Sims: No Elias is decidedly not the good guy, and he’s trying to start the apocalypse using the Archivist. He already did in my timeline, that’s why Martin and I came here. Speaking of which, younger me, you should really avoid recording the statements.

Tim: Blackwood!

Sims: Is this really the time, Tim?

Sasha: So why didn’t Blackwood just kill Jon when he got here?

Sims: Because Martin- Blackwood, wouldn’t enjoy killing a younger version of me, or any of you. That’s why he was trying to have your eyes removed. Removing your eyes would remove your connection to archive allowing him to kill Elias without killing you. Which I will still try to do if we don’t get there in time.

Jon: Why couldn’t he just tell us that?

Sims: I DON’T KNOW! I assume it’s because he thought Elias would find out his plans, which I understand. But after all the lectures he gave me about not being paranoid and trusting people this is rather hypocritical of him.

Sasha: Is it possible that Blackwood is attempting a ritual for the Lonely?

Sims: “What- no. Is he using his powers of the Lonely again? That’s- oh. Oh that explains some things.

Sims proceeds to put his face in his hands.

Tim: So do you really eat people’s trauma?)

-Mr. Blackwood goes to Mr. Bouchard’s office. Just to see the fear on his face. Just to see his reaction to soft little Martin being his killer. It’s an indulgence. Its his revenge for tricking Mr. Sims into the apocalypse.

He also came with a gun, just in case blowing up the panoptican doesn’t kill him.

It takes him a moment for Elias tries to talk him out of it, he even tries to use the image of Blackwood’s Mother against him.

(Mr. Blackwood winced, but it didn’t stop him from looking Elias directly in the eyes.

“I’ve already seen it, Jonah.”)

-It’s then that Elias tries to tell him that the archive staff escaped, that they’ll die. (small price for the survival of the world) That his Jon is back, that he can see them. That you don’t have to do a last desperate act for a man that is still alive. Martin at first thinks that Jonah is lying and is ready to set off the bomb.

-But Mr. Sims does dramatically burst in, archive staff nervously behind him.

-He then proceeds to snog Mr. Blackwood for an obnoxiously long time.

-Sasha is stuck standing there wondering if this is really the time. Elias is at first a combination of grateful and disgusted that ranges into incredulous as they just keep going. Tim is impressed.

-Jon and Martin are shocked that anyone could like Mr. Blackwood so intensely. They then realize they’ve been staring at a version of their future counterparts make out for a very long time and look pointedly at a corner of the wall and the carpet respectively.

-When Elias tries to talk to them, saying that he was glad Blackwood could see sense, Jon proceeds to threaten him using all of his spooky archivist powers, not only getting the company credit card, but also getting the archival staff a good two weeks off to cope with their trauma.

-(”And if you attempt the Watchers Crown again I’ll turn the Eye to look upon you so that you may feel every pain, every terror you ever caused and watch it shrivel you for the inside out. I will drink your fear of the end as you disintegrate into a half-forgotten memory.”)

-Things de-escalate from there. The archive staff attempt to go to their separate homes before they jump at the shadows and slowly congregate. Sasha calls Tim. Martin calls Sasha. Jon calls Martin. They end up congregating at Tim’s, Staying awake watching lifetime movies until they can’t keep their eyes open.

-Sims and Blackwood reorganize the power structure of the archive while the archive staff heals. They also eliminate Jane Prentiss as Blackwood catches Sims up on what happened.

-Sims does find it funny that Blackwood managed to bully their past counterparts into getting together. He also cannot help finding it hilarious that he got to be the Straightforward and trustworthy MR. SIMS while Blackwood was a cryptic bastard.

-It still hurts. Jon didn’t mean to die on Martin again. He didn’t want to hurt him like that ever again.

-When the archival staff return, Sims goes out to lunch with them and slowly builds up trust with them. He eventually takes Blackwood with him to a lunch with Tim and Sasha, where Blackwood apologizes and explain himself. Martin and Jon aren’t ready.

-Tim excitedly checks about 15 points off his list of “accurately guessed anti-Jon” list.

-Sasha insists he can’t include the one-sided relationship one, “I know he’s besotted Tim, but It’s clearly not one sided and that’s barely an anti-Jon trait anymore.”

-Tim also notices, that with Mr. Sims by his side, Blackwood is a lot more relaxed and friendly. He fusses over him and acts, well, a lot like Martin.

-Tim comes back from the meeting declaring to Martin and Jon that, for the safety of everyone, Jon cannot be separated from Martin.

(Sasha points out this is ridiculous.

“It’s classic transitive property Sasha. If Blackwood can become Martin with a Sims, Martin can become a Blackwood without one.

“It’s not just Sims, Tim. They also defeated their big evil, and according to both of them we died in their timeline. It’s more like... if we died and Jon and Martin end up being the only ones left, Jon is not allowed to leave him.

“You heard her Martin, none of us are allowed to leave you for fear of you turning into a scary. dark, evil-mirror version of yourself.”

“We’re not allowed to die or get replaced by evil clones. Speaking of which, I’m going to go put a spooky table in cement with our local apocalypse couple. Want to come with?”

-Things settle, Monsters are killed, trust is rebuilt And the future continues unstopped by an apocalypse.

#The Magnus Archives #Yesterday Is Here #Mr. Blackwood #Martin Comes First AU #Fanfiction #Archive Of Our Own #Fanfic of Yesterday is Here #Mr. Blackwood AU #weaponizing My own writer's block

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versegm · 4 years

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Anyway. As some of you might know, last month was Self-Published Fantasy Month on twitter, which meant, among other things, many giveaways and sales. It's during this time that I acquired The World Maker Parable by Luke Tarzian.

Guilt will always call you back... Rhona is a faithful servant of the country Jémoon and a woman in love. Everything changes when her beloved sets the ravenous Vulture goddess loose upon the land. Forced to execute the woman she loves for committing treason, Rhona discovers a profound correlation between morality and truth. A connection that might save her people or annihilate them all. You are a lie... Varésh Lúm-talé is many things, most of all a genocidal liar. A falsity searching for the Phoenix goddess whom he believes can help him rectify his atrocities. Such an undertaking is an arduous one for a man with missing memories and a conscience set on rending him from inside out. A man whose journey leads to Hang-Dead Forest and a meeting with a Vulture goddess who is not entirely as she seems.

TL;DR: Rhona, our protagonist, is forced to execute her lover for treason, as said lover freed the Vulture goddess across the land. ...But what if she was right? What if freeing the goddess was the correct decision? These thoughts will haunt Rhona through the whole book, as the guilt will eat her alive.

It's a novella, so pretty short story by fantasy standards (around 30k words iirc) and the prequel of a serie I have not read. As for what I thought of it, here goes:

GOOD POINTS:

- cool worldbuilding

- the plot??? slaps???

- i did not expect that twist at the end wow

BAD POINTS:

- I, viscerally, cannot stand that writing style. It keeps flipping wildly between "awkward exposition" and "purposely vague" and it is especially annoying for me.

Now lord knows I'm picky about writing styles, so while I didn't enjoy it that much, I still recommend anyone with a taste for uncommon fantasy to check it out. Most websites nowadays let you flip through the first few pages, so really, check it out, and if the writing style doesn't bother you, buy it. I guarantee you the plot is worth it.

FINAL RATING: 3/5, BUT REALLY, CHECK FOR YOURSELF THE FIRST FEW PAGES BECAUSE IF YOU DON'T MIND THAT WRITING STYLE THE PLOT IS REALLY GOOD

#bookblr #book rec #book review #fantasy #book recommendations

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hecallsmehischild · 3 years

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Heads up. #Wrestling with God stuff under the cut.

Background: I do believe that God takes an active role in our lives. I do believe that there is an enemy force, and for lack of better words and more information I say “demons”. I grew up on the road with my parents, who have a small Christian music ministry, and I have had a front row seat to several rounds of what has been termed “spiritual warfare” meaning, an attack from said enemy in some way (on equipment, on mood, on health, on circumstances) and ensuing prayers for protection and to send them off. No, not EVERYTHING is an attack, bad stuff happens all the time and I don’t see any point in trying to cast out the flatness of your tire, however truly bizarre and perfectly timed things are highly suspect. One more thing, I believe that mental illness and a demonic attack are two separate things and should not be confused with each other or addressed in the same way (that’s actually EXTREMELY damaging). However, there is an overlap that I believe goes like this: the mental illness is like extra large cracks running along a wall that protects you, bigger than the normal cracks in other peoples’ walls, and if there is an intelligent enemy then those cracks are very enticing tactical targets.

The situation: Things have been kind of weird for over a week now. At first I was pretty convinced the anxiety was me, but it’s not normal even considering my diagnoses. I’ve never experienced that excessive level of anxiety that wouldn’t stop for days. I know that’s a thing that happens for people, but it’s extremely abnormal for me in particular, which is a red flag. This did not correlate to a Bipolar swing in either direction, and the fear I was experiencing didn’t have a stable root. What I was terrified of would move from topic to topic, as if it had nothing to do with the topic itself and I was just trying to figure out why this was happening and latching onto The Most Likely Reason. At one point, I couldn’t even finish one of my favorite meals., I was picking at it and only ate half because I forced myself. I’d become terrified I was going down the road to an eating disorder.

Sergey and I consulted with the pastor who married us. He is someone who has pastored a tiny church in a bad area for 40 years and didn’t leave it because that was where God told him to be. This is a guy who has seen way more spiritual warfare in way more facets than I care to ever encounter. After talking with him and getting some guidance, Sergey and I prayed together. We prayed for ourselves and for the house. And the next day I was full of joy and strength and I was pushing all my projects forward and feeling like I could celebrate being alive every day. That is also not a state of mind I am capable of inducing, for the record. If it were, that would be how every single day goes.

The anxiety has not returned to the level or intensity that it was in the first three days. But for the last couple of nights, anxiety of slightly lower level (half to three quarters the intensity) came back. Two nights back, it left as soon as Sergey and I prayed. I can describe the feeling no other way except that fear and mental confusion rolled off and receded, and I suddenly realized how cramped my lungs had been and I was gasping for air. And I had mental clarity, where a moment before, I couldn’t think straight. Again, these are things I can’t induce.

Last night it hit again. I was desperately tired, but I couldn’t sleep. Every thought was like a hot stove that I couldn’t get too close to, or rest on, or I’d be burned. I went from thought to thought, trying to find something I could rest on (because my brain literally cannot do “nothing”) and I couldn’t, everything was full of anxiety, and the worst thoughts were about food and eating disorder fears and being institutionalized.

I really don’t know what is going on lately. I have a couple hunches, but the truth is I’m pretty new to dealing with this away from my parents. I’m used to it whenever I go on a tour with Mom, but it crops up in my new home setting now. The last time we really dealt with anything remotely similar is after we asked my abusive friend to leave almost two years ago. Since then... I mean, if this is warfare, it feels like a siege with intermittent attacks on the wall. It hasn’t gone on for months or years, so maybe it’s premature to call it a siege, but I’ve never had one go on like this. It’s just. Very strange. And I don’t know all the ways one is supposed to deal with this.

It is time I learned, though. Mom won’t be around forever, and neither will our Pastor. And I have glaring cracks in the wall that I’m incapable of mending. I may be talking about this from time to time on here. Reminder that the #wrestling with God tag is there for blocking if it bothers you, and I’m overly conscientious about tagging posts with that.

#rlchild #wrestling with God #spiritual warfare stuff

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ori-flails · 4 years

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Rewatching Guardian - Episode 03 Part 3/3

Episode List || Part 1 | Part 2 || Episode 04

SPOILERS for upto episode 40, SPOILERS for the novel.

No, Shen Wei gets you. He understands all too well. Zhao Yunlan to Shen Wei is what Zhang Ruonan is to Wang Yike.

This had me so confused the first time. Why did she attack Shen Wei? Is it that he was close to Zhang Ruonan but had no idea what had happened/didn’t help her? Or is it that she thinks because they’re close Shen Wei would take advantage of Zhang Ruonan in the future? Why did she think that and she decided to kill him on what basis?

But then I got it. Earlier in the episode, when Zhang Ruonan had run up to Shen Wei to talk about switching for the engineering 4 class, Shen Wei had offered her the cake he got from that class because he doesn’t eat sweets.

At that time Wang Yike was watching. Giving cakes is a normal, nice gesture in Haixing. But Wang Yike is new to Haixing customs and stuff. The only correlation to “giving cake” she has is what happened to Zhang Ruonan. And the cake was being given to Zhang Ruonan again.

That’s why she decided to come for Shen Wei.

I only realized after noticing the blurry red blob on the stars in the background and then the strange camera angle in the next shot, which turns out to be from Wang Yike’s perspective.

From that distance, she probably couldn’t hear what was being said. So she didn’t know that Shen Wei didn’t get this cake to specifically give it to Zhang Ruonan. This doesn’t help with the misunderstanding.

... Such acting, much wow... (Not you, Zhu Yilong, you did great <3)

Zhao Yunlan, careful, your Concerned Boyfriend is showing. xD

W-Where did her lipstick go...? And the eyeliner and mascara?? Did Wang Yike suck that up too???

And, like... that’s some awful old-person makeup... It’s so bad I can’t. You can tell the wrinkles are drawn on. TT~TT

I’m sorry, but I just cannot deal with this. Why would her lipstick disappear?! xD

“I don’t know”, not “It’s not possible”. Hm. Okay.

Let’s remember this for later.

Zhang Ruonan! Did not! Deserve! Any of this!

QAQ

A lot of people see these two as being romantically involved, and to those people I say: Your opinion is valid. V_V *sage nod*

I see it now that I read someone mention it in a comment.

I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT THIS

So I think this means that Zhu Jiu sowed the seed of vengeance in Wang Yike’s mind. It’s been a month since the incident and Wang Yike only started to take revenge now. And it can’t be that Zhang Ruonan just didn’t share it with her until now because the two are obviously very close.

And Zhu Jiu’s involvement could also have something to do with Wang Yike attacking Shen Wei. It might not have been just because of the cake giving.

Zhu Jiu didn’t know that Shen Wei was Hei Pao Shi at this point though. He still could’ve instigated Wang Yike to overthink the gesture and kill Shen Wei because the more trouble there is, the better it is for him apparently.

Idk. The villains’ plans never made much sense to me tbh. I got the general idea but why they’d do small stuff like these, I have no idea.

But how did Zhu Jiu know Professor Shen neutralized Wang Yike’s power?

Here’s a horrifying thought. Everytime there’s a view from outside the office into it from an odd place, that’s Zhu Jiu’s spy’s POV.

You could argue that Shen Wei would notice with his Dixing senses, and to that I say: Dixingren powers.

Anyway, just a thought.

Ugh Zhu Jiu stop, you’re cringey.

Lin Jing is right.

That’s exactly what happened, Zhu Hong. xD

Yayy! They get a happy ending!

... Kinda. See, Zhang Ruonan is still very “old”. Unless her condition is fixed, she’s gonna die very soon because she’s just a regular human.

And I was pretty bummed out about it before I rewatched the episode. But while watching I realized that the show ended Zhang Ruonan and Wang Yike’s story with an open end instead of a sad one like I thought it did.

Earlier Zhao Yunlan told Wang Yike that if she can take it, she can give it back too, and she said she didn’t know how to.

If at some point Shen Wei ‘learns’ Wang Yike’s power with his own, learns the ins and outs of it, then Zhang Ruonan can be cured.

I assume that because Shen Wei probably learnt so many powers over the course of his life, he would find it easier to figure it out than Wang Yike.

There are other factors like if Shen Wei learnt the power, would he be able to pause it or would he not have any control over it like Wang Yike., or like if there is a limitation to what kind(s) of powers he can’t learnt, etc.

This is the first case where we get to see Hei Pao Shi daren let Dxingren under his watch go. ^u^

Something that keeps bugging me, though, is that in every other cases, Wang Yike’s powers seem to take effect and kill immediately. So how come after getting touched, Zhang Ruonan still stayed alive for long enough to be shifted to the sofa, exchange touching words and loving touches, share precious memories and for Shen Wei to save her?

Had Zhang Ruonan really developed some level of resistance to Wang Yike’s powers after having spent so long with her? Or was this a sloppines from the writers?

Xiao Guo is so precious.

Shen Wei... Q~Q

Zhao Yunlan... QAQ

XIAO GUO...! TTATT

Famous last words from Zhao Yunlan lmao.

(I’m so sorry, I put the screenshots in the wrong order when making the collage asdfhjkl I only noticed now that I’m making the post. The mere thought of putting in the work to making another one on my phone and getting it to my computer is draining me so please excuse this. Dx)

Shen Wei putting on his glasses to shift to Professor Shen mode.

This made me so tense the first time.

Zhao Yunlan just had to go and get a crush on someone as suspicious as Professor Shen didn’t he. xD Poor thing. V_V xD

He looks so upset and done at the end lol

I’m only laughing now cuz I know what happens next. But even so, I’m tempted to start episode 4 RIGHT NOW cuz the suspense is bothering me.

Zhu Jiu, congratulations on being somewhat intimidating again!

Oof. This episode was an absoulute nightmare when it came to taking screenshots. The characters, specially Zhang Ruonan, move so fast that the screenshots are either blurry and awkward when there are suitable subtitles, or I just miss something because it gets too fast to take a screenshot of.

#镇魂 guardian #guardian rewatch #guardian episode 03 #Shen Wei #zhao yunlan #weilan #zhen hun

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anxiety-trademark · 3 years

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The week in review:

Raw 11/09 NXT 11/11 NXT UK 11/12 Smackdown 11/13

Raw:

Shayna vs Lana?? God poor Lana. Preemptive “rip”

Lmfao Lana is so damn extra.

Okay but WHY is Asuka facing Nia later? And where has Asuka even been the past few weeks?

Yikes. Lana is so friggin useless in kf.

Rofl Nia mocking Dana’s voice, I cannot with her.

Did Dana and Mandy actually save Lana from #8?? They got half a point. I get why they’re reluctant to help Lana, but they’re nearly coming off as the mean, popular girls, and I know that’s not their personas. I get she fucked them over, but it was inadvertent. Buy some goodwill guys.

Are they the Gucci girls now? Honestly flashforward to current times, Charlotte fits right in with them. If you were gonna have Charlotte head a stable, Dana and Mandy are the perfect people to put with her.

“We totally saved your butts... Lana.” :/ Dana. Dana plz. With all the work you put into your craft, HOW are you still the weakest promo in the division?

“Okay listen, thank you, you’re welcome,” just let Mandy and Dana practice wrestling cuz their promos are fucking painful.

Lana No-Friends.

Why is Alexa happily destroying flowers??

Lol has no memory of seeing Nikki the week prior. Yikes. Are we still sure it’s not drugs???

“Lexi I’m not playing.” “That’s too bad, Nikki.” What she means, Nikki, is there are 2 options: play or pain. You should just play. Actually side note; wasn’t that Nikki’s whole damn character when she debuted? ‘Nikki wants to play’? ‘Play with Nikki’??

Omfg Alexa is god damn stellar. Nikki tells her to choose either Fiend/Bray or [Nikki]. Alexa thinks about it for a moment, “okay. I choose... *blows the flower petals in Nikki’s face* him!” Then fucking claps, giggles and walks away. Imagine if you had a whole damn roster that could be this entertaining.

Also Nikki is really talented in her own right. Working with Alexa did wonders as far as promos and acting go.

Survivor Series team is supposedly at ringside because Asuka is about to go one on one with Nia. I’m not seeing the correlation.

Shayna officially playing the role of henchman now, I see. That’s interesting.

Asuka does a lot of things worth praising. Her Octopus is not one of them.

It’s always nice seeing Nia bump like she does for Asuka.

Oh that kickout into an armbar by Asuka was BEAUTIFUL.

Asuka said “fuck all y’all we’re busy rn”

I hate Shayna’s hammerfists SO much.

This Survivor Series team is a fucking disaster in kf.

aaaaand there’s number 8. Jeeeeze. “You don’t belong here, you’re gonna drag us down. Just quit.” This is a bullying story done right tbh. No personal petty bs insults, no body shaming. Just straight up physically assaulting the weakest link that has zero friends. It’s a good story. I feel sympathy for sure.

Highlight: Alexa & Nikki backstage segment

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NXT:

See I don’t mind Shotzi’s backstage promos at all. She exudes passion. I can feel her emotions. But 9 times out of 10 she ends it in a howl and I want to scream.

Weak final thought though. There was really nothing better you could end it on? Okay.

So Xia calls out Raquel and then doesn’t show. Not sure if it’s for kf or meta reasons.

I like Raquel speaking Spanish while brawling. She should incorporate that more, especially with Zelina gone. We need more Latina talent (no disrespect to Bayley or Sasha, if they wanna start speaking Spanish then good on them)

“Everybody better take their-- my name out of their mouth.” SIGH can I get a non-awkward speaker that isn’t Nia? Anyone? Anywhere? Hello??

What the hell does any of this Xia stuff mean? Fine I’ll be patient.

So is Toni a face? I thought she was a heel. Did I misinterpret the heel turn pre-covid era? That’s even worse, she’s even more the same now.

Ugh rough day when I’m here cheering for Toni. God I hate Candice.

Do you really have the right to call anyone a ‘punk rock poser’ Candice? I mean... REALLY?

It’s not that I hate Toni’s headbutt, I just hate it when people take themselves out delivering a headbutt.

Anticlimactic sequence. Toni says fuck your second rope neckbreaker to Candice, then Candice says fuck your second rope leg drop to Toni, just to follow up with a mere kick to the jaw and a pinfall attempt. Missed opportunity to really get something going.

Sad attempt at putting her feet on the ropes by Candice.

Good let Toni be a “sore loser” fuck Candice.

So the masked figure is Indi, right? Why are they keeping her masked? What’s the purpose? Yeahhh that’s really not a surprise. Anyway.

It’s a damn shame what happened in 2020, the whole world has felt it. And it’s a damn shame that you didn’t get to show out in front of 80k people. I truly feel for you. Your loss, however? In kf I can’t feel bad because you sought HER out on HER show. In a meta sense? She did you a favor taking that title. You were 5 seconds from being called Charlotte 2.0, and you deserve better. You deserve the opportunity to grow and make a name for yourself without being handed everything before the age of 25, and you’re SO much better off for it.

The downfall of “nxt’s hottest new act” was a great story. It sucks to be her, but it was a great story. Rhea’s gonna be a fucking STAR on the main roster. She will thrive. She will exceed expectations. She will make a name for herself. She had to eat that humble pie first, though. Obviously I know how this match ends already, and rightfully so.

Highlight: I guess the Io/Rhea Prime Target

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NXT UK:

Kind of a bummer that there’s only ever one women’s match/segment every week on UK. I want to ponder whether it’d be different sans a pandemic, but I’m not certain it would be.

Xia Brookside is too animated in her moves, and her moves are always too slow for it to mesh well.

They compliment Xia’s “technical work” but she just comes off as someone who has learned the absolute basics and has no idea how to utilize them in a match.

Interesting to note that they seem to be building up 2 heels in Nina and Jinny, yet the champ herself is a heel. Not quite making me believe either of them have a chance at defeating her in the future.

Nice I always love a good codebreaker. Points to Xia.

That was a nice cartwheel off the turnbuckle using the ropes. One would assume the tweak to the knee was a farce.

Stupid small package. Stupid result. At least Nina got some heat back, but she should’ve won, lesbireal.

Side note: I see UK does in fact have a pc. No excuse for these women to get gassed so quickly then, get it together.

Highlight: The network exclusive video package for KLR vs Piper

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Smackdown:

What a racy outfit. I don’t hate it, Sasha wears it well.

There’s like a million things you can do with Sasha that doesn’t involve a live promo in the middle of the ring. Explore them plz.

Carmella’s not a technical master by any means, but having her superkick and then finish with a facebuster is super weak.

What’s also weak: where the fuck did Bayley go?

What’s even weaker than that: Carmella had like the best theme music and now it’s gone. Tragic.

Lol why is Nattie stomping her feet like she’s throwing a tantrum? She’s hilarious tbh.

“If team Smackdown is going to win,” lmao let me cut you off right there. Imagine the SD women actually winning at SvS. Good joke.

Omg Chelsea is alive? We gave her a tag match in nxt with the women’s champion Charlotte Flair... Charlotte fucking Flair... and then kept her off tv for like 6 months for this? Is this her grand debut?? Is she even ready for the main roster???

Wait hold on. Back up. So Chelsea touched Adam’s shoulder and had some off camera conversation to make her way into this triple threat match? *sigh* okay.

I don’t quite remember who this team consisted of, but if I had to guess, I’d assume Liv wins this match since Ruby is already on the team.

Love Chelsea’s theme music, love that a giant picture of herself is no longer her titantron... HATE the flowy wedding dress veil that she wears on the bottom half of her outfit.

Should stick Chelsea with Nattie tbh.

What the hell was that by Liv? A fake out standing crucifix turned into a ddt? Fucking beautiful.

Nattie and Liv work together nicely ngl. Liv really does have a lot of potential, but she’s god awful on the mic. Tag team wrestling is best for her for the foreseeable future.

“This is a fatal 4way,” Cole reminds us, because Chelsea and Tamina have seemingly died.

Should’ve just made this a singles match between Liv and Nattie, jesus.

Lmfao Liv pinned Tamina. What took Chelsea out? A dropkick off the apron. A dropkick off the apron took Chelsea out for 3 minutes, and she got maybe 3 moves of offense. Yikes, what a debut.

So when does Bayley get added as captain?

Highlight: The match that totally wasn’t a singles match between Liv & Nattie

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*Bad week in wrestling, but yet again, Raw shines the brightest because as small as their roster may be, they’re being utilized decently well.

#wwe #issa review #feel free to ignore these #cuz who tf cares lesbihonest #today's props goes to:#alexa bliss

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wnterflower-a · 4 years

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so yesterday i posted what my personal werewolf lore was and so today you’re getting my vampire lore . like i stated in my wolf lore , this is open to tweaking and picking and choosing if things don’t match up with your lore . we can make things work between our lores ( :

also like my werewolf lore , i will more than likely add as i go on and more things come to me .

✚ unlike lycanthropy , vampirism is a disease alone . you cannot pass it down .

✚ there is no known information as to how the first vampire originated . the oldest known vampire is from the early 1100s , and he’s become so decrepit and crazy from living such a long life that nobody has ever gotten a straight or same answer . ✚ the only way someone can become a person is if they’re killed with a vampire’s blood in their system . this is usually done by drinking a vampire’s blood but it can’t also be injected , or poured into an open wound . ✚ vampires who sire new vampires often have a connection to their fledglings in the first couple of days . this can influence a fledeling’s habits . for example : a vampire on a binge who sires another vampire during this time will usually result in the fledgling going on a binge as well . ✚ a sire can also feel when a fledgling has been killed and vice versa . however the other passed , the other feels similar effects and pain , though at a muted level . unless they’re older , the moment incapacitates the vampire for at least a day .

✚ vampires are strongest during the full moon and weakest during the new moon .

✚ if a vampire is well-fed during a full moon , their strength . ✚ on the other hand , a vampire during a new moon often has a larger appetite and have less self-restraint when it comes to feeding . during new moons are when turnings are usually at their highest rate .

✚ vampires live in what are called covens .

✚ covens are usually led by one head , though larger covens have been known to have more than one . ✚ covens tend to house together or in the same area ( ie : all in the same apartment complex / neighborhood ) . they feel a pull to the members to stay close by one another in case of any sort of threats . ✚ covens often are very selective and exclusive . siring is something you get permission from your head and if you don’t , older covens are known for kicking the member out . ✚ ‘ lost covens ‘ are covens that are mainly made up of around ten older vampires and abandoned fledglings . they’re considered ‘ modern ‘ covens and sneered at by the older generations .

✚ attributes to vampires include : inhuman strength , senses and grace , supernatural healing abilities , and immortality as well as certain physical appearance changes .

✚ vampires are stronger than werewolves . their strength allows them to jump higher and further . as they age they become stronger . ✚ they’re extremely graceful and are light-footed . their footsteps are silent , and since they don’t actually need to breathe you can’t usually hear them come up behind you . ✚ their sight , smell , hearing and taste are all enhanced ; all stronger for the hunt . their hearing they can kind of control like one would the volume on their headphones and their sight can span up to about a half mile away . they can smell and taste things like , alcohol and drugs in someone’s blood system . ( this often gives a vampire similar side effects and seeked out at times . ) ✚ they’re immortal but can be killed . the easiest way is by staking them , but you can also decapitate them or burn them alive by stranding them in direct sunlight . ✚ a vampire’s eyes are usually a reddish-brown color ( #762700 to #6A2300 for html color reference ) . the younger the vampire the lighter the eye color . ✚ they’re skin is normally a lighter than when they were human but their don’t lose all of their melanin . ✚ their fangs are retractable , but their canines are sharper than the average human beings . ✚ they are very attractive beings . if you weren’t attractive as a human you sure as hell are now . ✚ they give off a natural pheromone that lures humans in unknowingly . to werewolves they just smell like they put too much perfume / cologne on .

✚ even the oldest of vampires cannot walk in direct sunlight .

✚ sunlight burns them , and can cause second to third degree burns . ✚ a vampire can walk in direct sunlight with the help of daylight jewelry . these are often in the form of rings and necklaces , though bracelets , watches and hair pieces have also been seen . the most common stone used is lapis lazuli but moonstone harvest during a full moon also works . ✚ they cannot walk around without their daylight accessories in cloudy or rainy weather . it’s thought that the uv rays are what effect them not necessarily just the sun’s rays .

✚ their bodies only receive nutrients from blood , but they can eat actual food .

✚ while they can eat human food for the sake of looking normal , they will end up throwing it up later on in the day . their bodies cannot digest actual food anymore . ✚ fresh blood is the best option when feeding , though bagged blood and even the blood of the already deceased and animals will work . much like produce though , the fresher the better though .

✚ a majority of vampire ‘ weaknesses ‘ are all fake .

✚ mirrors : vampires can see their reflections in the mirror as can others . ✚ garlic : it doesn’t keep them away but it does smell and they don’t like it . it’s not going to keep them away . ✚ holy water & religious symbols : holy water stings , but does not burn . ingesting it in large amounts will make one sick though . religious symbols burn , but some vampires will grow immune to it if they wear it long enough even then though ✚ invitation : a vampire does not need an invite in order to enter a residence .

✚ vampires can feel pain , though in a very vague sense

✚ major and minor cuts and stabbing ( with anything other than a wooden stake ) feel usually no more like a papercut or a cat scratch ✚ direct sunlight will give second to third degree burns depending on how long one is exposed to it . it feels like a very , very bad sunburn . if exposed for too long though it will kill a vampire .

✚ this are a few ways you can kill a vampire .

✚ it must be to the heart though in order to work . otherwise you’ve got a very irate vampire . any sort of wood will do for the job . ✚ decapitating a vampire will result in death . ✚ prolonged exposure to sunlight . ✚ starvation will eventually kill a vampire , though it is a long , slow , painful process and usually a vampire’s choice of killing another vampire .

✚ they do not have any correlation with bats and honestly don’t know where that thought came from .

✚ they don’t say bleh , bleh , bleh .

✚ vampires are able to have children , but as stated in the first bullet point , the vampire disease does not carry over .

✚ females are not able to have children .

✚ because of this , females are known to turn children as young as three years old . ✚ vampires who are turned so young , and up to age thirteen are often killed off early on because while their minds mature and grow their bodies do not and they often go mad because of it .

✚ many older vampires ( around as young as one hundred depending on self-restraint and work ethic ) are financially well off . this is just due to being able to save for so long .

✚ many vampires know how to play the system such as the stock market and pull out before anything crashes . ✚ many are in new technology . it isn’t uncommon for a vampire to be the founder of a new social media platform or app , especially in this day and age . ✚ some just spent the early days looting .

✚ vampires are able to compulse somebody to do something .

✚ this is normally how vampires get consent to feed on live humans . ✚ this is always a temporary thing . you cannot influence somebody for an extended time into the future and fades the farther you move away from said person . so you can’t tell somebody to do something in the future past an hour ( or up to six hours later if you are particularly skilled in this area ) ✚ while most people have a fuzzy recollection of that happened , most don’t remember it at all . the feeling is similar to being blacked out . ✚ you can warp a memory from the influence but it doesn’t extend past changing your appearance in the case the person remembers . ✚ older vampires can use this on younger vampires as well . in this case it’s usually with younger fledglings who are messengers .

✚ vampires are very territorial .

✚ this differs slightly from werewolves . while werewolves are territory in a land sort of sense , vampires are in a feeding ground sense ??? ✚ basically werewolves don’t like each other on their property at all . sure they have to co-exist in the same area and often cross pack territory lines on a regular basis but it doesn’t necessarily like it . ( take my muse jimin for example . the guy HATES non-pack members stepping foot into his house and if he could avoid walking into another pack’s territory he wold ) . meanwhile , vampires don’t care where you go as long as you don’t feed in their area . ✚ a vampire marks their coven’s feeding ground�� perimeters by usually leaving a ‘ blood mark ‘ on things such as telephone poles , fences , etc . ✚ a blood mark is exactly what it sounds like . the coven leader uses an open wound to stain the object with their blood . even when washed away or dried , a vampire can smell the blood and usually knows to steer clear . ✚ these marks aren’t permanent though and usually need to be redone every month to month in a half depending on what the weather is like . in the winter they can last up to almost three months . ✚ crossing feeding lines and feeding there commonly results in death . the coven of the vampire who crossed lines doesn’t hold it against the other because it’s viewed as SUPER disrespectful .

#❝ ooc » lore specifics ❞#❝ ooc » vampire lore ❞

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elisaenglish · 4 years

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How We Grieve: Meghan O’Rourke on the Messiness of Mourning and Learning to Live with Loss

“The people we most love do become a physical part of us, ingrained in our synapses, in the pathways where memories are created.”

John Updike wrote in his memoir, “Each day, we wake slightly altered, and the person we were yesterday is dead. So why, one could say, be afraid of death, when death comes all the time?” And yet even if we were to somehow make peace with our own mortality, a primal and soul-shattering fear rips through whenever we think about losing those we love most dearly — a fear that metastasises into all-consuming grief when loss does come. In The Long Goodbye (public library), her magnificent memoir of grieving her mother’s death, Meghan O’Rourke crafts a masterwork of remembrance and reflection woven of extraordinary emotional intelligence. A poet, essayist, literary critic, and one of the youngest editors the New Yorker has ever had, she tells a story that is deeply personal in its details yet richly resonant in its larger humanity, making tangible the messy and often ineffable complexities that anyone who has ever lost a loved one knows all too intimately, all too anguishingly. What makes her writing — her mind, really — particularly enchanting is that she brings to this paralysingly difficult subject a poet’s emotional precision, an essayist’s intellectual expansiveness, and a voracious reader’s gift for apt, exquisitely placed allusions to such luminaries of language and life as Whitman, Longfellow, Tennyson, Swift, and Dickinson (“the supreme poet of grief”).

O’Rourke writes:

“When we are learning the world, we know things we cannot say how we know. When we are relearning the world in the aftermath of a loss, we feel things we had almost forgotten, old things, beneath the seat of reason.

[…]

Nothing prepared me for the loss of my mother. Even knowing that she would die did not prepare me. A mother, after all, is your entry into the world. She is the shell in which you divide and become a life. Waking up in a world without her is like waking up in a world without sky: unimaginable.

[…]

When we talk about love, we go back to the start, to pinpoint the moment of free fall. But this story is the story of an ending, of death, and it has no beginning. A mother is beyond any notion of a beginning. That’s what makes her a mother: you cannot start the story.”

In the days following her mother’s death, as O’Rourke faces the loneliness she anticipated and the sense of being lost that engulfed her unawares, she contemplates the paradoxes of loss: Ours is a culture that treats grief — a process of profound emotional upheaval — with a grotesquely mismatched rational prescription. On the one hand, society seems to operate by a set of unspoken shoulds for how we ought to feel and behave in the face of sorrow; on the other, she observes, “we have so few rituals for observing and externalising loss.” Without a coping strategy, she finds herself shutting down emotionally and going “dead inside” — a feeling psychologists call “numbing out” — and describes the disconnect between her intellectual awareness of sadness and its inaccessible emotional manifestation:

“It was like when you stay in cold water too long. You know something is off but don’t start shivering for ten minutes.”

But at least as harrowing as the aftermath of loss is the anticipatory bereavement in the months and weeks and days leading up to the inevitable — a particularly cruel reality of terminal cancer. O’Rourke writes:

“So much of dealing with a disease is waiting. Waiting for appointments, for tests, for “procedures.” And waiting, more broadly, for it—for the thing itself, for the other shoe to drop.”

The hallmark of this anticipatory loss seems to be a tapestry of inner contradictions. O’Rourke notes with exquisite self-awareness her resentment for the mundanity of it all — there is her mother, sipping soda in front of the TV on one of those final days — coupled with weighty, crushing compassion for the sacred humanity of death:

“Time doesn’t obey our commands. You cannot make it holy just because it is disappearing.”

Then there was the question of the body — the object of so much social and personal anxiety in real life, suddenly stripped of control in the surreal experience of impending death. Reflecting on the initially disorienting experience of helping her mother on and off the toilet and how quickly it became normalised, O’Rourke writes:

“It was what she had done for us, back before we became private and civilised about our bodies. In some ways I liked it. A level of anxiety about the body had been stripped away, and we were left with the simple reality: Here it was.

I heard a lot about the idea of dying “with dignity” while my mother was sick. It was only near her very end that I gave much thought to what this idea meant. I didn’t actually feel it was undignified for my mother’s body to fail — that was the human condition. Having to help my mother on and off the toilet was difficult, but it was natural. The real indignity, it seemed, was dying where no one cared for you the way your family did, dying where it was hard for your whole family to be with you and where excessive measures might be taken to keep you alive past a moment that called for letting go. I didn’t want that for my mother. I wanted her to be able to go home. I didn’t want to pretend she wasn’t going to die.”

Among the most painful realities of witnessing death — one particularly exasperating for type-A personalities — is how swiftly it severs the direct correlation between effort and outcome around which we build our lives. Though the notion might seem rational on the surface — especially in a culture that fetishises work ethic and “grit” as the key to success — an underbelly of magical thinking lurks beneath, which comes to light as we behold the helplessness and injustice of premature death. Noting that “the mourner’s mind is superstitious, looking for signs and wonders,” O’Rourke captures this paradox:

“One of the ideas I’ve clung to most of my life is that if I just try hard enough it will work out. If I work hard, I will be spared, and I will get what I desire, finding the cave opening over and over again, thieving life from the abyss. This sturdy belief system has a sidecar in which superstition rides. Until recently, I half believed that if a certain song came on the radio just as I thought of it, it meant that all would be well. What did I mean? I preferred not to answer that question. To look too closely was to prick the balloon of possibility.”

But our very capacity for the irrational — for the magic of magical thinking — also turns out to be essential for our spiritual survival. Without the capacity to discern from life’s senseless sound a meaningful melody, we would be consumed by the noise. In fact, one of O’Rourke’s most poetic passages recounts her struggle to find a transcendent meaning on an average day, amid the average hospital noises:

“I could hear the coughing man whose family talked about sports and sitcoms every time they visited, sitting politely around his bed as if you couldn’t see the death knobs that were his knees poking through the blanket, but as they left they would hug him and say, We love you, and We’ll be back soon, and in their voices and in mine and in the nurse who was so gentle with my mother, tucking cool white sheets over her with a twist of her wrist, I could hear love, love that sounded like a rope, and I began to see a flickering electric current everywhere I looked as I went up and down the halls, flagging nurses, little flecks of light dotting the air in sinewy lines, and I leaned on these lines like guy ropes when I was so tired I couldn’t walk anymore and a voice in my head said: Do you see this love? And do you still not believe?

I couldn’t deny the voice.

Now I think: That was exhaustion.

But at the time the love, the love, it was like ropes around me, cables that could carry us up into the higher floors away from our predicament and out onto the roof and across the empty spaces above the hospital to the sky where we could gaze down upon all the people driving, eating, having sex, watching TV, angry people, tired people, happy people, all doing, all being—”

In the weeks following her mother’s death, melancholy — “the black sorrow, bilious, angry, a slick in my chest” — comes coupled with another intense emotion, a parallel longing for a different branch of that-which-no-longer-is:

“I experienced an acute nostalgia. This longing for a lost time was so intense I thought it might split me in two, like a tree hit by lightning. I was — as the expression goes — flooded by memories. It was a submersion in the past that threatened to overwhelm any “rational” experience of the present, water coming up around my branches, rising higher. I did not care much about work I had to do. I was consumed by memories of seemingly trivial things.”

But the embodied presence of the loss is far from trivial. O’Rourke, citing a psychiatrist whose words had stayed with her, captures it with harrowing precision:

“The people we most love do become a physical part of us, ingrained in our synapses, in the pathways where memories are created.”

In another breathtaking passage, O’Rourke conveys the largeness of grief as it emanates out of our pores and into the world that surrounds us:

“In February, there was a two-day snowstorm in New York. For hours I lay on my couch, reading, watching the snow drift down through the large elm outside… the sky going gray, then eerie violet, the night breaking around us, snow like flakes of ash. A white mantle covered trees, cars, lintels, and windows. It was like one of grief’s moods: melancholic; estranged from the normal; in touch with the longing that reminds us that we are being-toward-death, as Heidegger puts it. Loss is our atmosphere; we, like the snow, are always falling toward the ground, and most of the time we forget it.”

Because grief seeps into the external world as the inner experience bleeds into the outer, it’s understandable — it’s hopelessly human — that we’d also project the very object of our grief onto the external world. One of the most common experiences, O’Rourke notes, is for the grieving to try to bring back the dead — not literally, but by seeing, seeking, signs of them in the landscape of life, symbolism in the everyday. The mind, after all, is a pattern-recognition machine and when the mind’s eye is as heavily clouded with a particular object as it is when we grieve a loved one, we begin to manufacture patterns. Recounting a day when she found inside a library book handwriting that seemed to be her mother’s, O’Rourke writes:

“The idea that the dead might not be utterly gone has an irresistible magnetism. I’d read something that described what I had been experiencing. Many people go through what psychologists call a period of “animism,” in which you see the dead person in objects and animals around you, and you construct your false reality, the reality where she is just hiding, or absent. This was the mourner’s secret position, it seemed to me: I have to say this person is dead, but I don’t have to believe it.

[…]

Acceptance isn’t necessarily something you can choose off a menu, like eggs instead of French toast. Instead, researchers now think that some people are inherently primed to accept their own death with “integrity” (their word, not mine), while others are primed for “despair.” Most of us, though, are somewhere in the middle, and one question researchers are now focusing on is: How might more of those in the middle learn to accept their deaths? The answer has real consequences for both the dying and the bereaved.”

O’Rourke considers the psychology and physiology of grief:

“When you lose someone you were close to, you have to reassess your picture of the world and your place in it. The more your identity is wrapped up with the deceased, the more difficult the mental work.

The first systematic survey of grief, I read, was conducted by Erich Lindemann. Having studied 101 people, many of them related to the victims of the Cocoanut Grove fire of 1942, he defined grief as “sensations of somatic distress occurring in waves lasting from twenty minutes to an hour at a time, a feeling of tightness in the throat, choking with shortness of breath, need for sighing, and an empty feeling in the abdomen, lack of muscular power, and an intensive subjective distress described as tension or mental pain.”

Tracing the history of studying grief, including Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s famous and often criticised 1969 “stage theory” outlining a simple sequence of Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance, O’Rourke notes that most people experience grief not as sequential stages but as ebbing and flowing states that recur at various points throughout the process. She writes:

“Researchers now believe there are two kinds of grief: “normal grief” and “complicated grief” (also called “prolonged grief”). “Normal grief” is a term for what most bereaved people experience. It peaks within the first six months and then begins to dissipate. “Complicated grief” does not, and often requires medication or therapy. But even “normal grief”… is hardly gentle. Its symptoms include insomnia or other sleep disorders, difficulty breathing, auditory or visual hallucinations, appetite problems, and dryness of mouth.”

One of the most persistent psychiatric ideas about grief, O’Rourke notes, is the notion that one ought to “let go” in order to “move on” — a proposition plentiful even in the casual advice of her friends in the weeks following her mother’s death. And yet it isn’t necessarily the right coping strategy for everyone, let alone the only one, as our culture seems to suggest. Unwilling to “let go,” O’Rourke finds solace in anthropological alternatives:

“Studies have shown that some mourners hold on to a relationship with the deceased with no notable ill effects. In China, for instance, mourners regularly speak to dead ancestors, and one study demonstrated that the bereaved there “recovered more quickly from loss” than bereaved Americans do.

I wasn’t living in China, though, and in those weeks after my mother’s death, I felt that the world expected me to absorb the loss and move forward, like some kind of emotional warrior. One night I heard a character on 24—the president of the United States—announce that grief was a “luxury” she couldn’t “afford right now.” This model represents an old American ethic of muscling through pain by throwing yourself into work; embedded in it is a desire to avoid looking at death. We’ve adopted a sort of “Ask, don’t tell” policy. The question “How are you?” is an expression of concern, but as my dad had said, the mourner quickly figures out that it shouldn’t always be taken for an actual inquiry… A mourner’s experience of time isn’t like everyone else’s. Grief that lasts longer than a few weeks may look like self-indulgence to those around you. But if you’re in mourning, three months seems like nothing — [according to some] research, three months might well find you approaching the height of sorrow.”

Another Western hegemony in the culture of grief, O’Rourke notes, is its privatisation — the unspoken rule that mourning is something we do in the privacy of our inner lives, alone, away from the public eye. Though for centuries private grief was externalised as public mourning, modernity has left us bereft of rituals to help us deal with our grief:

“The disappearance of mourning rituals affects everyone, not just the mourner. One of the reasons many people are unsure about how to act around a loss is that they lack rules or meaningful conventions, and they fear making a mistake. Rituals used to help the community by giving everyone a sense of what to do or say. Now, we’re at sea.

[…]

Such rituals… aren’t just about the individual; they are about the community.”

Craving “a formalisation of grief, one that might externalise it,” O’Rourke plunges into the existing literature:

“The British anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer, the author of Death, Grief, and Mourning, argues that, at least in Britain, the First World War played a huge role in changing the way people mourned. Communities were so overwhelmed by the sheer number of dead that the practice of ritualised mourning for the individual eroded. Other changes were less obvious but no less important. More people, including women, began working outside the home; in the absence of caretakers, death increasingly took place in the quarantining swaddle of the hospital. The rise of psychoanalysis shifted attention from the communal to the individual experience. In 1917, only two years after Émile Durkheim wrote about mourning as an essential social process, Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” defined it as something essentially private and individual, internalising the work of mourning. Within a few generations, I read, the experience of grief had fundamentally changed. Death and mourning had been largely removed from the public realm. By the 1960s, Gorer could write that many people believed that “sensible, rational men and women can keep their mourning under complete control by strength of will and character, so that it need be given no public expression, and indulged, if at all, in private, as furtively as... masturbation.” Today, our only public mourning takes the form of watching the funerals of celebrities and statesmen. It’s common to mock such grief as false or voyeuristic (“crocodile tears,” one commentator called mourners’ distress at Princess Diana’s funeral), and yet it serves an important social function. It’s a more mediated version, Leader suggests, of a practice that goes all the way back to soldiers in The Iliad mourning with Achilles for the fallen Patroclus.

I found myself nodding in recognition at Gorer’s conclusions. “If mourning is denied outlet, the result will be suffering,” Gorer wrote. “At the moment our society is signally failing to give this support and assistance... The cost of this failure in misery, loneliness, despair and maladaptive behaviour is very high.” Maybe it’s not a coincidence that in Western countries with fewer mourning rituals, the bereaved report more physical ailments in the year following a death.”

Finding solace in Marilynne Robinson’s beautiful meditation on our humanity, O’Rourke returns to her own journey:

“The otherworldliness of loss was so intense that at times I had to believe it was a singular passage, a privilege of some kind, even if all it left me with was a clearer grasp of our human predicament. It was why I kept finding myself drawn to the remote desert: I wanted to be reminded of how the numinous impinges on ordinary life.”

Reflecting on her struggle to accept her mother’s loss — her absence, “an absence that becomes a presence” — O’Rourke writes:

“If children learn through exposure to new experiences, mourners unlearn through exposure to absence in new contexts. Grief requires acquainting yourself with the world again and again; each “first” causes a break that must be reset… And so you always feel suspense, a queer dread—you never know what occasion will break the loss freshly open.”

She later adds:

“After a loss, you have to learn to believe the dead one is dead. It doesn’t come naturally.”

Among the most chilling effects of grief is how it reorients us toward ourselves as it surfaces our mortality paradox and the dawning awareness of our own impermanence. O’Rourke’s words ring with the profound discomfort of our shared existential bind:

“The dread of death is so primal, it overtakes me on a molecular level. In the lowest moments, it produces nihilism. If I am going to die, why not get it over with? Why live in this agony of anticipation?

[…]

I was unable to push these questions aside: What are we to do with the knowledge that we die? What bargain do you make in your mind so as not to go crazy with fear of the predicament, a predicament none of us knowingly chose to enter? You can believe in God and heaven, if you have the capacity for faith. Or, if you don’t, you can do what a stoic like Seneca did, and push away the awfulness by noting that if death is indeed extinction, it won’t hurt, for we won’t experience it. “It would be dreadful could it remain with you; but of necessity either it does not arrive or else it departs,” he wrote.

If this logic fails to comfort, you can decide, as Plato and Jonathan Swift did, that since death is natural, and the gods must exist, it cannot be a bad thing. As Swift said, “It is impossible that anything so natural, so necessary, and so universal as death, should ever have been designed by Providence as an evil to mankind.” And Socrates: “I am quite ready to admit… that I ought to be grieved at death, if I were not persuaded in the first place that I am going to other gods who are wise and good.” But this is poor comfort to those of us who have no gods to turn to. If you love this world, how can you look forward to departing it? Rousseau wrote, “He who pretends to look on death without fear lies. All men are afraid of dying, this is the great law of sentient beings, without which the entire human species would soon be destroyed.”

And yet, O’Rourke arrives at the same conclusion that Alan Lightman did in his sublime meditation on our longing for permanence as she writes:

“Without death our lives would lose their shape: “Death is the mother of beauty,” Wallace Stevens wrote. Or as a character in Don DeLillo’s White Noise says, “I think it’s a mistake to lose one’s sense of death, even one’s fear of death. Isn’t death the boundary we need?” It’s not clear that DeLillo means us to agree, but I think I do. I love the world more because it is transient.

[…]

One would think that living so proximately to the provisional would ruin life, and at times it did make it hard. But at other times I experienced the world with less fear and more clarity. It didn’t matter if I was in line for an extra two minutes. I could take in the sensations of colour, sound, life. How strange that we should live on this planet and make cereal boxes, and shopping carts, and gum! That we should renovate stately old banks and replace them with Trader Joe’s! We were ants in a sugar bowl, and one day the bowl would empty.”

This awareness of our transience, our minuteness, and the paradoxical enlargement of our aliveness that it produces seems to be the sole solace from grief’s grip, though we all arrive at it differently. O’Rourke’s father approached it from another angle. Recounting a conversation with him one autumn night — one can’t help but notice the beautiful, if inadvertent, echo of Carl Sagan’s memorable words — O’Rourke writes:

“The Perseid meteor showers are here,” he told me. “And I’ve been eating dinner outside and then lying in the lounge chairs watching the stars like your mother and I used to” — at some point he stopped calling her Mom — “and that helps. It might sound strange, but I was sitting there, looking up at the sky, and I thought, ‘You are but a mote of dust. And your troubles and travails are just a mote of a mote of dust.’ And it helped me. I have allowed myself to think about things I had been scared to think about and feel. And it allowed me to be there — to be present. Whatever my life is, whatever my loss is, it’s small in the face of all that existence… The meteor shower changed something. I was looking the other way through a telescope before: I was just looking at what was not there. Now I look at what is there.”

O’Rourke goes on to reflect on this ground-shifting quality of loss:

“It’s not a question of getting over it or healing. No; it’s a question of learning to live with this transformation. For the loss is transformative, in good ways and bad, a tangle of change that cannot be threaded into the usual narrative spools. It is too central for that. It’s not an emergence from the cocoon, but a tree growing around an obstruction.”

In one of the most beautiful passages in the book, O’Rourke captures the spiritual sensemaking of death in an anecdote that calls to mind Alan Lightman’s account of a “transcendent experience” and Alan Watt’s consolation in the oneness of the universe. She writes:

“Before we scattered the ashes, I had an eerie experience. I went for a short run. I hate running in the cold, but after so much time indoors in the dead of winter I was filled with exuberance. I ran lightly through the stripped, bare woods, past my favourite house, poised on a high hill, and turned back, flying up the road, turning left. In the last stretch I picked up the pace, the air crisp, and I felt myself float up off the ground. The world became greenish. The brightness of the snow and the trees intensified. I was almost giddy. Behind the bright flat horizon of the treescape, I understood, were worlds beyond our everyday perceptions. My mother was out there, inaccessible to me, but indelible. The blood moved along my veins and the snow and trees shimmered in greenish light. Suffused with joy, I stopped stock-still in the road, feeling like a player in a drama I didn’t understand and didn’t need to. Then I sprinted up the driveway and opened the door and as the heat rushed out the clarity dropped away.

I’d had an intuition like this once before, as a child in Vermont. I was walking from the house to open the gate to the driveway. It was fall. As I put my hand on the gate, the world went ablaze, as bright as the autumn leaves, and I lifted out of myself and understood that I was part of a magnificent book. What I knew as “life” was a thin version of something larger, the pages of which had all been written. What I would do, how I would live — it was already known. I stood there with a kind of peace humming in my blood.”

A non-believer who had prayed for the first time in her life when her mother died, O’Rourke quotes Virginia Woolf’s luminous meditation on the spirit and writes:

“This is the closest description I have ever come across to what I feel to be my experience. I suspect a pattern behind the wool, even the wool of grief; the pattern may not lead to heaven or the survival of my consciousness — frankly I don’t think it does — but that it is there somehow in our neurons and synapses is evident to me. We are not transparent to ourselves. Our longings are like thick curtains stirring in the wind. We give them names. What I do not know is this: Does that otherness — that sense of an impossibly real universe larger than our ability to understand it — mean that there is meaning around us?

[…]

I have learned a lot about how humans think about death. But it hasn’t necessarily taught me more about my dead, where she is, what she is. When I held her body in my hands and it was just black ash, I felt no connection to it, but I tell myself perhaps it is enough to still be matter, to go into the ground and be “remixed” into some new part of the living culture, a new organic matter. Perhaps there is some solace in this continued existence.

[…]

I think about my mother every day, but not as concertedly as I used to. She crosses my mind like a spring cardinal that flies past the edge of your eye: startling, luminous, lovely, gone.”

The Long Goodbye is a remarkable read in its entirety — the kind that speaks with gentle crispness to the parts of us we protect most fiercely yet long to awaken most desperately. Complement it with Alan Lightman in finding solace in our impermanence and Tolstoy on finding meaning in a meaningless world.

Source: Maria Popova, brainpickings.org (9th June 2014)

#quote #women writers #love #life #loss #grief #existential musings #all eternal things #love in a time of...#the places you have come to fear the most #the same deep water as you #laid bare #intelligence quotients #depth perception #melancholy skies #this is how it feels #stands on its own #elisa english #elisaenglish

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yourhealthandexercisetips · 4 years

Text

Health and Exercise Tips

You may disagree with these facts, but that's what keeps the myths alive.

And away we go...

1. The healthiest method to gauge your progress is weighing yourself: MYTH

You think I'm about to say that the answer is to get frequent body fat tests, don't you? Nope! The healthiest way to gauge your progress is to make sure your strength levels increase when performing resistance exercise, make sure your endurance improves through cardiovascular exercise and make sure that your clothes fit exactly the way you want them to. When did we stop trusting ourselves to the extent that everything has to be successful by a measurement? Don't we have enough pressure in our lives?

2. Women will get big if they weight train: MYTH

A woman has approximately one-third the testosterone compared to a man, so putting on a ton of muscle is not going to happen. The women you see in the magazines that look big and manly are on steroids, growth hormones, etc. You may look bulky if you're carrying excessive body fat and building muscle. However, if you're reducing body fat, you'll eventually be able to see those lean, defined muscles.

3. You must work out five to six days per week to make progress: MYTH

I see a lot of people in the gym five to six days a week and they'd be better off playing ping pong. Consistency and level of effort is the key. I'd rather see someone work out three days per week with enthusiasm and intensity, than five inconsistent days of lackadaisical effort. In fact, for those clients that have trouble with motivation, I recommend only two days of workouts per week, but they must do it every week.

4. Spot Reducing Is Possible: MYTH

The human body loses fat over the entire body at various rates of speed. It's impossible to spot reduce. If you're focusing on only losing fat that sits on your hips, it won't work. Generally, the first place you gain fat is the last place you lose it.

5. If You Exercise You Can Eat Whatever You Want: MYTH

The big message in the nutrition and personal training world today is that most people need to eat more to stimulate the metabolism. The truth is, you need the correct amount of total calories to lose body fat. Exercising will burn calories, but if you're eating anything you want and you're over maintenance calories, you'll most likely gain fat.

6. Stretching prevents injuries: MYTH

After analyzing the results of six studies, researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention could not find any correlation between stretching and injury prevention. According to Dr. Julie Gilchrist, one of the researchers involved with the study, "Stretching increases flexibility, but most injuries occur within the normal range of motion." Dr. Gilchrist goes on to say, "Stretching and warming up have just gone together for decades. It's simply what's done, and it hasn't been approached through rigorous science."

Make no mistake; a stretching program is not without benefits. Seven of nine studies suggest that a regular stretching program does help to strengthen muscles. However, it does not appear to actually prevent injuries. Warming up prior to exercise and increasing blood flow to the muscles is actually more conducive to injury prevention. I'm not suggesting that you eliminate stretching. It is valuable and flexibility is certainly important as we age. However, we may be off base assuming it's an injury-prevention technique.

7. There is a 'Best Workout Routine': MYTH

There is no best and only way to workout. I get a multitude of questions concerning the efficiency of super slow-rep workouts, "the best video tape" workout, "best number of days to workout," etc. In reality, it's good for you if it works for you, but don't stay with any of it for too long. Don't let the body or the mind adapt. The body will adapt to any exercise routine in approximately four to six weeks. Vary volume of sets, time between sets, reps, exercises, cardiovascular exercises, exercise tapes etc. Manipulate your routine every three to four weeks and view change as your key to efficiency and results.

8. One should lose weight before they begin an exercise program: MYTH

There is no physiological reason to lose weight prior to beginning an exercise program. Exercise is the best thing for your health and there is no time like the present to start. There are too many benefits of exercise to list here, but you're doing every system and cell in your body a world of good by exercising. Any amount starting with 5 minutes a day is beneficial.

Fat loss and muscle gain are only two of the many benefits that your body will experience from exercising. Each day will get a little easier as you become more fit. There is no justification for waiting to begin - unless you have orders from your doctor.

Whether you exercise with 20-percent body fat or 30-percent body fat, you'll still be providing your body with the same benefits. Of course with less fat, you can move a little easier and it may be less strenuous on your heart, but you can be more fit and efficient at 30-percent body fat if you are exercising than if you wait to get to 20-percent body fat without exercising. The goal is to gain or preserve muscle and lose fat - not just lose weight (which implies both muscle and fat).

9. When working out with weights, very high reps (over 15) will help me to get defined muscles and very low reps (8-12) will make them bulky: MYTH

You're not going to improve your strength or effect muscle definition if you're choosing a weight that is too light. Muscles respond to overload. It's the only way to get the cosmetic and strength benefit from weight training.

Muscular definition is the result of a calorie reduced diet, overall body fat loss and weight training with challenging poundage's. Add cardiovascular exercise and you have the body you've been dreaming about - over time, of course. The guidelines used for selecting a weight are to choose a resistance that allows you to do between 8 and 12 repetitions. If you can't do 8, it's too heavy. If you can do 12 repetitions, then increase your resistance by 5 percent. Keep in mind that all of your muscle groups are not equally as strong. For example, you may be able to use 7 pounds on a lateral raise, but need 15 pounds to be challenged during a squat.

10. Lifting weights very slowly is the best way to weight train: MYTH

Lifting super slowly produces super long workouts - and that's it. University of Alabama researchers recently studied two groups of lifters doing a 29-minute workout. One group performed exercises using a 5-second up phase and a 10-second down phase, the other a more traditional approach of 1 second up and 1 second down. The faster group burned 71-percent more calories and lifted 250-percent more weight than the super slow lifters.

The real expert says: "The best increases in strength are achieved by doing the up phase as rapidly as possible," says Gary Hunter, Ph.D., C.S.C.S., the lead study author. "Lower the weight more slowly and under control." There's greater potential for growth during the lowering phase, and when you lower with control, there's less chance of injury.

11. Eating a lot less or going on a crash diet will get the results you seek: MYTH

This was a dietary strategy popularized prior to the 1980s. People would go on crash diets like the grapefruit diet and lose weight - meaning muscle and fat. They assumed just eating less would take care of everything. Today, we know total calories important, but so are the amounts of protein, carbohydrates and fats in the diet.

A slight caloric deficit (less than maintenance) must be adhered to as well as eating small meals and snacks every two to three hours. This helps to control blood sugar; and it is a fact that blood-sugar control will help you to lose fat. It may look confusing, but eDiets.com takes all the planning and hassles away by doing it for you. I always recommend some sort of structured nutritional program. Just guessing doesn't work.

12. You must be 100-percent perfect on your nutrition program all the time: MYTH

Sure, this is a great thing to do if you have a strict time frame for fat loss, but it's a disaster waiting to happen for most people.

Haven't we learned that we love food and we need to find a way to build in modest amounts of treats that we enjoy? I trained a client several years ago who asked me to design a nutrition program for her. She was somewhat depressed as she told me she just knew she had to give up eating the four chocolate-chip cookies two to three times per week that she had with her kids. She was overjoyed when I told her she didn't have to give them up. However, I mentioned that I was going to reduce the number to two cookies and it would fit into the overall nutrition solution. Yes, she did lose body fat with this realistic approach, and she also enjoyed her treat. We need to make progress, but a sane approach encourages consistency and avoids that dreaded denial feeling.

13. Performing countless abdominal crunches thinking it will get rid of the 'pooch' area on the lower tummy/abdominal area: MYTH

I see this comment or get a question related to this issue approximately 20 times per week. It is not possible to spot reduce any area of the body.

The real solution is to reduce overall body fat through a slight caloric deficit, add resistance exercise (weight training) to stimulate the metabolism; and, cardiovascular exercise to burn additional calories. That's the way to fat loss. Performing crunches will never reduce the abdominal area because it only serves to strengthen muscle, not flatten a specific area. Just as 200 bicep curls will not make the arm smaller, nor will 200 abdominal crunches make the waist smaller. You cannot spot reduce any part of the body. It's just not physiologically possible.

14. Performing a lot of cardio is the best way to lose fat: MYTH

Some people go up to 90 minutes and longer on a cardio machine. The problem with this strategy is it's completely ineffective. It's a poor method to lose body fat and a real time waster.

You can workout for long sessions with moderate intensity or use shorter sessions with higher intensity (based on your fitness level). You can't do both! The shorter, more-intense session will burn more overall calories and preserve muscle, which will make you look tight and lean when you get to your scale weight goal. In addition, the shorter/intense sessions will have a more profound effect on the calories you continue to burn 24 hours after completing the session. Want to lose fat efficiently through cardio? Pick up your pace a bit and try to get a more intense and efficient 30 to 45 minutes. You don't need to be huffing and puffing for dear life, just increase the intensity a bit and keep it sustained at a higher level within your target heart-rate range.

15. Calories are the only thing that counts when trying to lose fat or gain muscle: MYTH

Ratios of protein, carbohydrate and fats are also important. The key to losing fat and gaining muscle is controlling and manipulating insulin levels. In simple terms, when we consume excessive calories or excessive amounts of high glycemic carbohydrates at one meal, the body's blood sugar rises. When this happens, the pancreas secretes insulin to lower blood sugar levels.

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bellsadventuresworld · 5 years

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Metabolism

You’ve probably heard about a little thing called metabolism that gets a lot of hype in the weight loss world. You’ve probably also heard something along the lines of “I have trouble losing weight because I have a slow metabolism”, “My eating disorder has destroyed my metabolism so I’ll be fat forever”, or even the most cringing of all, weight loss adds boasting: “Boost your metabolism by using this simple trick…”.

With all the propaganda and misinformation posted carelessly online, how do you know what to trust? A simple Google search on the topic can be misleading and overwhelming as research is often long, tedious and conflicting in nature. Below is a compilation of slow, methodical research from scientific journals and other sanctified, credible sources. Please note that the information in this post should never be used as a substitute for medical advice from your doctor. This is simply an attempt to evaluate the correlation between weight loss and metabolism. More specifically, this post is intended to explore what eating disorders do to the metabolism and bust some dangerous myths about increasing the rate of weight loss. Strap in my rexy friends, you’re in for the long haul with this one. Let’s educate ourselves and reach those goal weights! (If this is too long to read in one go, I get it! Book mark it for later and digest in sections)

Note that there is a lot of physiology, systems and different topics that contribute important, valid information to this particular discussion. Without writing a text book sized post I cannot possibly cover all of it. The goal of this post is to give you a brief understanding of metabolism. As I grow this blog I will break down subtopics for further explanation.

Section A: What is metabolism?

We hear about it often but few of us know what it really is or what it actually does. Your metabolism is defined as the sum total of all biochemical reactions that take place in the body over time. This includes basic life-sustaining functions like breathing, circulating blood (I.e. vasomotor tone, heart rate and contractility), repairing damaged cells/ mounting immune attacks on foreign bodies, halting cancerous cell production, supplying glucose to the brain in order to think, and a multitude of other cool, autonomic things your body does to keep you alive. Just like a car, In order to keep a metabolism running we have to supply the body with gas. In this case the currency is the dreaded calorie. Those autonomic functions we just talked about that allow us to laugh over memes or ogle over thinspo have a base need for calories called the basal metabolic rate. Your basal metabolic rate, or BMR, is the number of calories your body needs to survive everyday if you don’t do anything….seriously. All you have to do is lie in bed and stare at the ceiling and your body will burn calories. Pretty neat. Everyone’s BMR is different and is based on factors like height, weight, gender, and body fat percentage. Your personal BMR can be calculated easily online. We will get to why this is important in a bit or maybe in another post, but first we need to finish building some foundation. Your metabolism works like this:

There are two main functions of the metabolism: anabolism and catabolism. To illustrate this, we will describe them as construction teams. Think of anabolism as the building team responsible for installing a new skyscraper. Anabolism is the process that takes protein building blocks synthesized from the food you eat to make new materials and cells to maintain your tissues. Think of catabolism as the demolition specialists. In other words, this team is responsible for breaking down the old skyscraper to make room for the new one. Catabolism is the process that breaks down existing body fat and carbs to recycle into new energy (the bodies chosen energy source is ATP but we will discuss this topic another day as this post is already extremely long). In fact, It is estimated by some researches that as much as 10% of the calories from carbs and proteins you eat are used during digestion, meaning you don’t store those calories as body fat. One by-product of breaking molecular bonds is heat, and therefore catabolism helps regulate body temperature too (hence why most of us are freezing ALL THE TIME when heavily restricting or fasting). So all of this is great, but what does it mean?

Let’s talk about what would happen to the skyscraper if our teams didn’t work right. If the demolition team didn’t have enough usable materials from the tower they torn down to give the building team and no new materials were provided, the new tower would never get built and the project would fail. If there is no excess body fat to burn and no caloric input, catabolism processes begin to attack vital organs, muscle and bone in order to free energy. This is why eating disorders cause your hair to fall out, your skin to chap, become wrinkly and irritated, your bones to become brittle, your organs to die and you to live in a perpetual state of cold. You might be reading this thinking “I’m not underweight yet and I still have some of this happening”. You’re right. You probably do, so what’s going on? The body is really good at surviving on very little (thank you cave man ancestors) and has lots of safety guards in place that are very inconvenient to our disordered approach to weight loss. When we severely restrict and regulate our caloric intake, the brain sends signals to the body that sound all the alarms and we enter a state of starvation (we will talk hormones another day). Just like a chipmunk over the winter who doesn’t know the next time he will find food is, our metabolism gets greedy and stuffs its cheeks with copious amounts of calories to store. This is why long periods of fasting are proven to slow the metabolism and cause weight gain. Other methods like intermittent fasting are more effective weight loss techniques (again we will discuss this in another post). Note that the posts you see about fasting for ten days and losing 20 pounds may be real but are dangerous and unrealistic for most people. At that point in a fast weight loss may become rapid because the body is being forced to use the last of the reserves it has to keep you breathing. Remember that these reserves are your organs and muscle tissue- the things that keep you ALIVE.

Section B: I have control issues- so how do I make metabolism my slave?

Bottom line: You don’t, you can’t, and you never will be able to…mostly. Sorry friends, this one hurts but unfortunately your metabolism is greatly determined by your genetics, body composition, and natural sex…. All things you don’t have control over. It’s obvious we can’t change our genes or inherent sex (even if you transition into the opposite sex, you were still born with hormones and reproductive organs specific to one gender or the other. Your chromosomes don’t change even as you become who you were meant to be). Men generally have a greater proportion of muscle to body fat and therefore a faster metabolism than women. Women generally have a slower metabolism and carry a greater amount of body fat than men because we are tasked with supporting child birth. It’s also important to understand that as we age, our metabolism generally ages with us and slows down. Now let’s chat about body composition. When I was first putting together information for this post I refused to believe that I don’t control my body composition. I mean if exercise more and eat less I will have more muscle and less body fat right? There. I changed my body composition! Not quite… while that statement is true in some regards, that’s not the kind of composition we’re talking about here. We are talking about your frame and body size. I am 5 ft 1in tall and labeled as “petite”. I have a set amount of muscle on my body that is very different than a person who is 6ft tall. Regardless of how good of shape I am in and the amount of muscle mass or tone I have, the 6 footer will always have one up on me. The taller you are, generally the more calories you will burn in a day because you physically have more mass (not fat) to move. The same concept applies to animals. It will take a giraffe more energy than a Chihuahua to move its body every day because the giraffe is 49 times bigger than the Chihuahua. Does this mean the Chihuahua is fat because it uses less energy and burns less calories that the giraffe? Does it mean the giraffe is fat because it needs to consume more calories than the Chihuahua just to get out of bed? Of course not! We can’t compare the two because they are inherently different, but as humans we like to compare everything about ourselves to everything about everyone else. This leads to a lot of disappointment, binges, purges and tears. Trust me, I know this first hand as I’m sure you do too. Understanding your metabolic needs and ignoring others will help you reach that goal weight so let’s stop comparing as it just tears us down.

Section C: Are you sure I can’t increase my metabolism?

Your metabolism can be altered for short periods of time but generally stays at a constant rate. In other words, drinking your black coffee can give you a boost in calorie burning power for an hour or so but will not add significantly to your daily caloric burn. Oh, and did I mention that when the body is used to getting certain foods or stimulants it becomes dependent on the item and it loses its super power? That’s right, not only do you have to drink coffee every morning to function, but that bitter black stuff you force yourself to drink stops boosting metabolism altogether. Win-Win right?

Contrary to popular belief, your metabolism plays only a minor role in weight loss and should not be the main focus of your journey. Instead you should focus on lifestyle choices like what you eat, when you eat and how much physical activity you are doing. At the end of the day, regardless of where our calories come from, weight loss, in a nutshell ,comes down to caloric deficit. You will not lose weight if you don’t burn more calories than you eat. Below is a list of popular ways to “increase” your metabolism as well as the truth behind them.

Myth #1: Exercise boosts your metabolism long after you stop- AKA “the after burn”

Exercise will increase your metabolism in proportion with the amount of muscle you gain. The more muscle you have, the more calories you burn, the faster your metabolism. The concept of after burn is a novel thought that you continue to burn calories long after your work out stops. This is only half true. Exercises that elevate heart rate like swimming, biking, running and high intensity workouts burn lots of calories while you’re doing them but not so much at rest. Metabolism is kind of like breathing. You breathe hard and fast while you’re running and for a few minutes after that but then your breathing becomes normal again. The metabolism works the same way. You may continue to burn an increased number of calories for a couple hours after your workout ends but eventually metabolism will return to a resting state. Keep in mind that your brain, heart, kidneys, liver, and lungs account for most of the energy used in a day as they never get to rest. Exercise is important but is not the main source of energy consumption.

Be sure not to overindulge in calories after a workout thinking you will burn them all off. You won’t. That being said, you do need to refuel the body with some sort of clean protein after a workout if you would like to gain the muscle you worked for. You might be thinking “but I don’t care about the muscle….I care about the skinny!!” I’m here to tell you why you should care.

We aren’t talking muscle like the body builders and Instagram fitness models sport. We are talking lean, functional muscle that is vital for holding your bones together. More importantly, your heart is a muscle and needs to be maintained.

I personally aim to eat a light, healthy meal within an hour after my work out, especially if I trained hard that day. An example of something I might throw together post workout would be a bed of spiralized zucchini with homemade marinara sauce and broccoli (broccoli is high in protein) or a salad with a variety of fresh veggies, toasted nuts or seeds and a light vinegar dressing. If I really can’t stomach a real meal after working out I at least try to heat up a cup of green peas with salt and pepper. The salt is an electrolyte important for muscle contraction and green peas are surprisingly high in protein and low in calories: one cup of frozen peas has about 130 calories and contains 8.6 grams of protein not to mention vitamins A, C, calcium and iron. I like these options because they are low calorie, high volume so I feel full and I am able to sleep without hunger pains.

Eating after a workout also helps avoid binges (have you ever fasted and worked out like crazy? The hunger is 10,000 times harder to control). I cannot stress enough how important it is to avoid a binge, purge, restrict cycle. It wreaks absolute havoc on your metabolism. Eating disorders confuse the body and force it into a state of reduced function so we have to do our best to provide nutrients where we can.

Regular aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is the most efficient way to burn calories and includes activities such as walking, bicycling and swimming. As a general goal, include at least 30 minutes of physical activity in your daily routine.

If you want to lose weight or meet specific fitness goals, you may need to increase the time you spend on physical activity even more. If you can't set aside time for a longer workout, try 10-minute chunks of activity throughout the day. Remember, the more active you are, the greater the benefits.

Safety reminder: if you are fasting or heavily restricting (below 500 cals per day), don’t work out. If you feel the need to do something, a simple walk will suffice. You wouldn’t try to run a car without gas, don’t try to run your body without food. Be smart. Life is a balance, learn to listen to your body and hear it when it tells you how much it can take.

Strength training. Strength training exercises like weightlifting a couple times a week are really good for bone structure. You don’t have to left heavy and become bulky, but putting the bones under strain and weight is a good way to strengthen them. Over time, as you continue to lift, the body will remodel your bones and they will become physically thicker around the areas under the most stress. These areas are your joints and connection points. Strengthening and thickening the bone won’t make you appear any bigger then you are, it simply offers protection to your frame. Lifting is good for everyone but a critical consideration for my female Anna’s reading this. Women are already at a greater risk of developing osteoporosis (a painful condition where the bones become weak and brittle and break easily) and adding an eating disorder on top of that more than doubles the risk of developing early onset osteoporosis. Strength training and making sure you are consuming calcium are vital for saving yourself from a lot of pain and irreversible damage to your joints and bones.

Lifestyle activities. Any extra movement helps burn calories. Look for ways to walk and move around a few minutes more each day than the day before. Easy things you can do that help keep you active without having to slave for hours in the gym or eat large amounts to keep up with heavy exercise are as follows.

Taking the stairs more often and parking farther away at the store are simple ways to burn more calories. Even activities such as gardening, washing your car and housework burn calories and contribute to weight loss. When you’re making food or tea, do some calf raises, stretch while reading a book. Movement is medicine. Include it however creatively you can

Myth #2: Eating certain foods can boost your metabolism.

Let me step on a soap box real quick. Friends, you have to believe me! Downing cups of apple cider vinegar, cold water and green tea really isn’t helping as much as you think! And really, who actually likes the taste of pure vinegar? Eating foods like green tea, caffeine, or hot chili peppers will not help you shed excess pounds. Some foods and drinks may provide a small boost in your metabolism that help jump start the body, but not enough to make a significant difference in your weight. Here’s the skinny on some popular metabolism boosting tricks.

Tea: Tea, namely green tea, is a popular go to for weight loss but slow down before you make tea time all the time. Below is a statistic that can be a bit confusing:

“Studies have found green tea contains a compound called epigallocatechin gallate, which may increase the calories and fat you burn. A 2011 meta-analysis published in Obesity Reviews found that consuming about 250 milligrams of epigallocatechin gallate (the amount in about three cups of green tea) helped boost metabolism enough to burn an average of 100 extra calories a day.”

This study talks about how green tea was found to increase the metabolism and aid in weight loss. 100 calories a day seems like a pretty good trade-off for drinking a few cups of hot, naturally flavored water. Buts lets break this down. First, this study was conducted with overweight individuals. The higher your starting weight, the easier it is to drop pounds quickly. Without further research, it’s hard to say if individuals staring at a normal weight or underweight would see the same results. Likely not. Second, this quote fails to reveal the sample volume that was used or discuss moderators of weight loss. In one review of multiple different studies on green tea and weight loss, it is clear that the correlation between dropping a few pounds and drinking tea is complicated by factors like the amount of caffeine in the tea and the ethnicity of the individual consuming the beverage. Caffeine is an appetite suppressant and can likely add to short term weight loss. It’s hard to say if caffeine free green tea helps burn fat as efficiently as caffeinated varieties. Then there is the issue of caffeine dependency and resistance. Just like coffee, eventually the caffeine loses its fat melting capabilities.

I’m not saying not to drink tea. I personally drink a lot of it because I simply enjoy it. I try to stay away from highly caffeinated teas and beverages because caffeine makes me personally feel pretty sick. There is a tea for everything. I do a post about it soon.

Cold Water/cold showers: Okay, let’s talk H2O and ice baths. Water is an extremely important part of life. We hear it every day- drink more water, drink cold water! Stand under a cold shower! Etc. But let’s take a closer look. The act of being cold does cause the body to generate heat which in turn does speed up the metabolism. The human body has a very narrow set of ranges it can survive in known as homeostasis. In order to maintain homeostasis, the body must stay balanced in PH, electrolyte levels, temperature etc. The reason cold water does technically increase metabolism is because the body has to actively burn calories to warm the water up to an acceptable temperature. In cases where you are not consuming the water but instead surrounded by a cold environment, the body induces shivering to mechanically warm itself. Shivering also actively burns calories because the muscles are contracting hard and fast to generate heat. The amount of calories burned by drinking cold water or submerging yourself in ice water is negligible and varies greatly from person to person and therefore is not a great or pleasant way to burn fat. Drinking cold water on an empty stomach can be really painful too, again I know because I’ve tried it. Last thing I want to mention is the danger of ice baths and eating disorders. If you are underweight it can be dangerous to make yourself really cold because your body doesn’t have the energy to keep you warm enough. The result of a core temperature that drops too low is unconsciousness, malfunction of organs and eventually death (that is if you don’t drown in the water after you pass out).

Spicy foods and cayenne pepper: The idea that spicy foods burn excess calories comes from a compound found in peppers and other hot foods called capsaicin. Studies have found capsaicin to burn around 10 additional calories per meal if consumed in high doses. Most people can’t tolerate the amount of spice needed to increase the metabolism by any significant degree, and even if you could, assuming you ate spicy food in appropriate doses at every meal, every day, it would take you about six and a half years to burn one pound of fat (math based on a healthy weight male individual). My point is this- if you like spicy food, by all means eat it, but if you’re forcing yourself to do cayenne pepper and lemon juice shooters in the morning, stop. It’s really not worth it and can cause more harm than help- no one wants burns in their stomach or down their esophagus.

Superfoods: Be careful what you read and trust as reliable information. “Superfoods” are often packed with nutrients, antioxidants and other beneficial compounds but no one food or drink is going to make you thin….especially not overnight. We all hate to hear this but weight loss comes with consistency, clean foods and exercise. Patience is a virtue we can all learn to appreciate on this journey. The 2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends cutting calories by 500 to 700 calories a day to lose 1 to 1.5 pounds (0.5 to 0.7 kilograms) a week. If you can add some physical activity to your day, you'll accomplish your weight-loss goals even faster and keep yourself out of harm’s way.

Myth #4: Eating small meals during the day increases your metabolism.

Unfortunately, there is little scientific evidence that eating small, frequent meals boosts metabolism. Even though eating small snacks instead of large meals isn’t proven to boost the metabolism, spreading your meals out may help you avoid binging. A more constant intake of food can make it easier to stop once you start eating because the body is no longer worried it won’t be feed for hours on ends. Snacks should contain mostly fruits, veggies and lean proteins. Gold fish are tasty but carry no nutritional value. How much you eat is a factor in weight loss but it also matters what you eat.

Myth #5: Getting a full night's sleep is good for your metabolism.

A good night's sleep will NOT boost your metabolism but neglecting to sleep can trigger weight gain. The chronically sleep-deprived in general tend to consume more calories than necessary, possibly to deal with feeling tired. Sleep deprivation can cause your body to produce too much insulin, which can lead to increased fat storage. We’ve all been there staring into the fridge at three in the morning trying to fight off the urge to binge because we can’t sleep. Sleeping with an eating disorder can be hard. I am naturally an insomniac and sleep very little, so being a hungry insomniac is even worse! The goal is seven to nine hours of sleep per night but shoot for what you can. Some things I do to help with the sleeping issue:

-No napping during the day: If I nap, I don’t sleep period.

-No technology 1-2 hours before bed

-No food an hour before bed: Eating too close to bedtime leaves me feeling bloated and prevents me from sleeping

- Having clean sheets and a tidy bedroom: I find it easier to sleep in a clean environment. I also enjoy sleeping with a weighted blanket

-The bedroom is only for sleeping and sex. I try really hard not to do other activities in my room including playing on my phone, watching Netflix, reading etc. I want my body and my mind to understand that when I slip into bed I wish to sleep, not lie awake staring at the ceiling.

-Daily exercise: like I said, personally I naturally have loads of energy and have trouble sleeping. I find that when I exercise throughout the day it’s a bit easier to catch the Z’s at night. This being said I like to meditate and stretch before bed as well. It’s a nice peaceful way to wind down, calm any nervous energy and banish any negative thoughts that haunt you in your slumber.

-Drinking hot tea: There is no research or Proof behind this one. This is only my observation but sipping on hot herbal tea (un-caffeinated!!) helps me relax and wind down for the night. I like peppermint tea before bed because it is gentle and helps settle my stomach.

Summary:

Weight loss is a hard, frustrating journey- especially when you’re on an Anna fast track. Arming yourself with information isn’t going to make your disorder go away or make it easier to cope with but it can help you restrict safer and understand what it is you are doing to your body. If you have questions, comments concerns or topics you’d like me to discuss in further detail let me know! My inbox is always open to anyone.

As always stay safe and know that you are loved

Bell

Sources

https://www.nature.com/articles/ijo2009135

https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/the-truth-about-metabolism

https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/weight-loss/in-depth/metabolism/art-20046508

https://www.rush.edu/health-wellness/discover-health/how-metabolism-really-works

https://medlineplus.gov/ency/patientinstructions/000893.htm

https://muscleevo.net/cold-showers-weight-loss/

#anna #mia #ed #eating dissorder #not pro #knowledge #knowledge is power #ed blog #weight loss

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tinkdw · 6 years

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14x06: Toxic Love v Healthy Love

14x06 watching notes.

This episode we see our Cas stand-in (Jack) team up with Dean and ask him to explain what love is, with Dean explaining that he very much does know the difference between healthy romantic love and toxic romantic love (exposed this episode with the zombie boyfriend “don’t leave me, it’s better you be dead and stuck with me than leave to live your life” storyline which I’m sure has no correlation to Dean and Cas coming up where they may be separated but let each other go, I’m side eyeing you 14x08). With Yockey emphasising that the lesson he himself exposed last season of sibling toxic love (the witch sisters) has also been learned as Dean and Sam exhibit perfectly healthy, open, communicative sibling love.

And I mean... mirrors...if we get any more mirrors Dabb’s going to have to open up a funhouse on set.

- So the episode opens with a Cas visual reminder with Harper wearing a beige coat before she changes after that job of “remember Cas in this episode” is done into her *warning sign* red clothing. Beige trenchcoats in Vancouver are clearly in limited supply after SPN has decided to dress everyone in one for the Cas effect. Get yours now.

- “Mary and Bobby’s" well, that didn’t take long to be an established thing.

- To Jack nothing tastes right without his powers whereas to Cas nothing tastes right with his powers >....>

My theory as a firm endgame human!cas meta writer with the later addition that Jack is a mirror exposition of each of TFW’s arcs that Jack gets his power back because he wants and chooses it as a part of his identity and Cas decides to be human in opposition because of his own choices and identity feels like it’s being fed here. Excellent.

- Sam smiling at the fidget spinner gives me feels of a positive goof nature

- Jack feels guilty for not killing Michael while Dean feels guilty for enabling Michael and I have feels about them understanding each others’ guilt and not pushing each other to get over it but just being supportive.

- Sam and Dean COMMUNICATING! MARK THE CALENDAR! Dean knows Sam won’t be particularly happy about him taking Jack hunting but he doesn’t hide it, he calls Sam and lets him know. Sam in turn doesn’t forbid it but shows he is not happy with it. COMMUNICATION. Taking into account each others’ judgement but not stifling each other. I’m living. This is what I was saying about the toxic sibling relationship v healthy sibling relationship in my opener. Steve clearly has big feels about this just as we do and wow he’s done an amazing job at firstly highlighting it with mirrors and metaphors then slamming it home with text... side eyes all the current metaphors and mirrors being highlighted for *other themes*.

More under the cut...

- Lol @ the barn behind Dean in the diner while Jack fills in the Cas visual gap.

- Wait did they even explain where was Cas is?! Nope. Yockey didn’t even bother cos he knows how stupid anything will sound lmao. *Cas is *throws dart** is about right here lbr.

- Chuck Berry as Dean and Jack’s pseudos. I love it.

- DEAN TURNING THE COCK AWAY WHILE TALKING ABOUT SEX I CANNOT. WHERE ARE THE GIFSETS?! I NEED GIFSETS! I WILL REBLOG ALL THE GIFSETS! it literally goes from talking about courting, dating and specifically sex and dean gets awkward and turns away the cock. I MEAN. This ain’t even SUBTLE.

- Are we supposed to see the two women they interview as a couple, I’m not sure.

- Charlie’s story is A. sad AF B. Political AF. C. Super thematic to the show. She worked at Richard Enterprises as a nice callback to show Yockey knows his canon on OG Charlie, then her story is full of fanfic tropes an ultimately death. Now, I hate kill your gays as much as anyone but I don’t think this is what Steve’s doing here, he literally can’t have her gf alive here. Now could Charlie go off to find her in this world? That would be brilliant.

- Did dean just call sam Thelma lol

- So Jack says he has no understanding of romance despite seeing Dean and Cas doing “googly eyes” each other to death and saying he knows this means someone loves you.

So Jack is the one who doesn’t know as the Destiel romance GA stand in where they figure it out but so does he so they don’t feel stupid as there’s someone on screen who’s like oooooooh I see now! So Sam can have the role of “I knew all along I just didn’t want to force you out of your comfort zone or get involved in things that don’t concern me” just as he did with Mary/Bobby last episode and which explains all his “strictly into Dick” “maybe you’re overcompensating” “because it’s Cas” lines from previously. Brilliant. Please continue.

- “Old man” good cop bad cop with sass. Jack, I love you.

- Jack doing all the OG Hunter tricks I love it. Again Yockey telling us he knows canon and knows what he’s fucking doing. Good lad.

- Sam: “people need people, we’re social animals”. Yockey and Dabb laying down what BS it is that Sam and Dean want to be alone just the two of them nearly every episode now is just the best. Sam wants people around him, now imo he’s not necessarily telling Charlie she should stay a hunter, just that it would be a real shame for her to ostracise herself on top of a mountain with wifi all alone. He gets that, he gets the escapism after all the trauma but he wants to help her and thinks she would be better off surrounded by others, my family and friends and he’s offering this to her and well, he knows this is what helps from his own experience. He’s living this change and seeing the benefits for himself. Just. So much yes.

- I also love that Charlie’s personality is part similar to ours but also part totally different because she’s not the same. Good, thank you Yockey. She’s not a replacement for our Charlie. No matter how hard Bucklemming may try and think they “fixed” her original death. She ain’t our Charlie and they haven’t fixed it. We are grateful to have some semblance of her but you are not forgiven for your complete lack of credibility, writing skills and total problematic behaviour regarding both her and all the other things you’ve done just by giving us an AU version of Charlie.

- So Harper is evil, quelle surprise. She exposes a codependent and unhealthily toxic relationship where she preferred to kill her boyfriend and tie him to her, having him literally kill and eat others rather than just let him go and live his life. So, I will write a separate post about this because I think it is the theme of the episode but this heavily reminds me of Yockey’s witch sisters being a dark Sam and Dean mirror of toxic sibling love last seasons, emphasising their choice to be toxic or healthy, with them now exhibiting all the healthy and rejecting the toxic behaviours.

So who is Harper and her boyfriend a dark romantic love mirror of now then with them potentially soon to choose a healthy route instead in direct opposition and one of them letting the other go, hmmmm I wonder...

x Just getting this gif out again cos well I’m sorry but Cas wasn’t even in this episode or last or last last yet he’s all over them with not just human!Cas stuff here but also all the Destiel like wow... it’s impressive tbh.

- Meanwhile Dean is dishing out healthy relationship advice. Again this feels relevant to Cas’ recent admittal to Nick that he had to “eat” someone to live in a way ie possess Jimmy for his body. This feels even more like a metaphor for his giving up his grace and exposing Cas again as not this but having his own body now created by Chuck just as everyone else does. Just in case people want to continue to use this argument against him and Destiel with the necrophilia rubbish which is already totally disproved but again rears its head in a “clearly this is not the same as that” way with actual dark mirror necrophiliac toxic love going on.

- Okay so we have more blatant overt textualised metaphors with the word “metaphor” in the text with Charlie v the big fly. They really are hammering home the concept of “pay attention to metaphors and mirrors people” this season. Wowzers.

- Next week’s promo also gives us another mirror with Jack driving the impala and telling Dean “it’s like I’m you!” “no it isn’t”. Honestly, is this a memo that they have to do this every episode because I approve. Knock that memo home.

- I would also like to point out as @margarittet reminded me, the queer story in this episode (Charlie x her girlfriend) is beautiful and positive though tragic due to outside circumstances and the heterosexual story is toxic and gross with codependency, necrophilia and murder by Harper’s own choice. This isn’t to say it’s anti hetero it’s just making a point that it doesn’t matter who you love it’s what you do with it and who you are that counts.

And isn’t that a beautiful way to end this.

#spn 14x06 #spn 14x06 meta #tinks meta #watching notes #supernatural #destiel #salmon dean #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #human!cas #steve yockey #bi!dean

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theblackandwhitespacecadet · 5 years

Text

About my GoFund Me Campaign

Update: 22/09/2019

I am a proud Mummy to beautiful Miss Shyloh-Marie & Future Wife to Craig Daniel Van Oosten, A Rare chronic Illness Warrioress...

Excluding Certain area's of my childhood I feel a need to share with my friends what I could never say. Now 35+ year's on, the monster remains, hauntingly near me. I have battled, struggled & lost because of Eating Issues for the majority of my life. But more recently due to factors beyond my control, the choice to eat has no longer become of my volition. My entire GI system is progressively becoming paralysed. The consequences of this are not clear enough to be treated as they are a direct complication of both severe Anorexia leading me through both Cachexia & at times Sarcopenia & a rare condition called Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. Some no'one have guessed Would have anything to do with either conditions. But why? is this, it's because People perceive what that Will, Little is actually Told of the true insurgient truth's, People Don't take the illness Seriously due To how common or fashionable these illness's had become, apparently.... (that's not saying they don't care), they do, their feelings have been tuned out & their frequency has been muffled by their own pain in life. Eating Disorder's have dated back to when whale bones were used as corsage & before bra's were invented & "Eating" & "Disorder" are a poor use of words as the causes have very little to do with actual "Disordered" Eating & everything to do with accepting who we are which is a symptom of a very deep underlying problems with emotional health that have nothing do with eating at all. But what for me came first, the chicken or the egg???? I’ve spent time donateing my body as a guinea pig so to speak for invaluable research to discover a strong correlation with both GI disorders & Anorexia Nervosa, more research is on the way!

I recently was diagnosed with an umbrella of rare & debilitating illnesses Firstly Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, the types have recently been recategorised to help medical teams distinguish between the symptoms loft better as research is being done wherever it can be afforded. However, unfortunately many beautiful people have lost their fight whilst they have tried to seek appropriate treatment & management for this insidious condition.

I have the rare form of two kinds that crossover, an even rarer occurrence of when Vascular type is seen alongside the most common form of classical. Because collagen makes up at least 85% of our bodies in each systemic function of the body all organs, vessels & connective tissue are in effect "Falling apart" these two words have been said to me by many Dr's & yet at the same time they've said do everything you want to do. Do it now before you age more & subsequently lose more ability. Back when I was born so very little was known of Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, my parents cannot be blamed for not knowing about these conditions. Regardless, they just couldn’t have understood my behavioural reactions to the troubles I kept silent, but that has literally torn our family apart on so many levels, we are estranged & this crushes me in ways my existence could never have been imagined.

I have Dysautonomia which causes Gastroparesis & more recently Intestinal Dysmotility & paralysis, where I'm certain my years of anorexic behaviour, due to dreadful emotional trauma had a huge impact on the manifestations of my health.

haven't helped at all & strange in contrast now is the fact that now I want to live, eat & grow my stomach has given up on me & to do so isn't beneficial.

I can however feel hunger, so it's a form of torture. I've also been in CCU for many smaller scale MI's that have lead to being diagnosed with LongQTsyndrome (Brugada) which is frightening, because it is the same type of sudden Arrythmic death syndrome that sports people have been found to suddenly drop on fields from. Lately other conditions that are linked have been exacerbated by Each other genetically. Once the systems of the body are damaged From Starvation & trauma, they then start affecting the genes. Nervous system Starvation leads To Myeln sheath or epithelial Cells To be destroyed because the Complex fatty acids that protect the Nerves are eaten away Once the mitochondria has digested all available sources of fats in the body this then destroys Brain tissue which is fatty acids From Omega 3 amongst other's. As a result of Being starved/neglected as an infant, I developed Anorexia. As a consequence of Anorexia I now have autoimmune disorders, (Lupus) these flare Inflammatory responses to sugars & proteins making it even more difficult to stay reasonably healthy. Collagen cannot be replaced, restored by re-feeding, as I found out the hard way. Anyone That eats can become unwell, These conditions are extremely rare, estimated around 1/500,000 people will be born without the gene to make their own collagen.

Every living thing must consume to survive Life whether they are young, old, thin, gay, or ethnic background.

Ahhh, so that's done for now...

Regardless of what my physical vehicle in this life causes me though, I feel I'm growing stronger in my soul... I don't hold grudges or allow negativity to stop me chasing my dreams, I love theatre (I miss it) & have many similar media skills, a patent called ZeraphicGraphics© Aspirations to touch as many lives with humanity & unconditional love as possible & travel to spend time with the most inspiring people in the world! I love being where the thrill of art in many forms helps people live. My one dream mentor (of almost 20 years) still inspires me today, even more in recent times when with amazement she was cast in a wonderful show on pay TV.

I chose to not allow my illness to be the main focus though, It's hard with a feeding tube not to feel that this is what people see... I feel often that I'm invisable behind the stripes of these conditions. So escape is rather important in the form of Arts!

Update 5/04/2018

Almost a year ago, after being fed by tubes directly into my intestine (after some proper nutrition) I found out I was expecting my miracle baby, Shyloh-Marie... So many turns, twists & tribulations! But we are all alive, grateful & looking forward. Still being a warrior, being a pin cushion like a pro & trying to make things more visible for those like me in the world... We are currently struggling with bubs sleep pattern, but other than that she is more joy than life itself! I have been able to see my now “friend in the theatre” Pamela Rabe at least twice more since our first meeting in Melbourne & I’ve finally found one of the most important people to me from my Carramar year’s... I cannot believe it’s been over 25 years ago that I was a teen, I am very privileged to be able to say this. Maybe, I will write that book! Maybe it will be a best seller lol....

Sarah-Marie Seraphic-McFarlane (Van Oosten)

My darling fiancé is my rock, we are twin flames, we met in a children’s home for adolescents, we have found each other again as we always had hoped might be possible & if possible, we hoped to have healed in the time apart. In these times precious relationships for Craig, were formed & he had a beautiful son as well to a former partner in our time apart. To such pride he was a wonderful dad but sadly, his sweet first born son passed away from a rare condition known as Menkes Disease. Since we have formed our own little family & are wanting to be married next April, we have a fundraiser to help us, as medical cost are exorbitant with my being on peptide pump feeds for nutrition, medication & treatments for a blood disorder yet to be diagnosed officially.

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