Scatterbrain

what you were will not happen again. the tigers have found me and i do not care.

[blackcoffeebluez]

Best thing I've read this year

1. If you can do something about it, fight like hell. If you can’t? Take a deep breath, and accept it. Even if that means accepting that you don’t like it and you won’t ever be okay with it. Acceptance doesn’t mean being happy with everything.

2. “We are spiritual beings having a physical experience.”

3. Practice non-resistance. Go with the flow. Let the tides take you where they may. There’s a plan; trust it.

4. Listen to your heart. Try to slow your racing thoughts for long enough to focus on how you feel. If and when you can do so enough to just listen to your feelings, solely your gut and your instinct, you’ll have the answer you’re looking for.

5. There is always a way. There is never a reason to feel hopeless. As long as you are willing to do your part to make your life what you want it to be, there will be people there to help you along the way.

6. Stop comparing.

7. Judging others doesn’t define them. It defines you as someone who needs to compartmentalize people.

8. Don’t bash what you hate, promote what you love.

9. This too shall pass. That means that whatever problem you feel as though you’ll never get over will be completely irrelevant in a few days, weeks, months, years. You’ll have new problems to fill your time. But do you know what that also means? The wonderful things that you’ve been neglecting to enjoy right now will also pass. And you’ll miss them.

10. What you need to concern yourself with most is the love and compassion you give to others. All others. The people who seem like they least deserve love need it most.

11. The past and the future are but illusions in the present moment.

12. When you start caring about what “people” think, think about someone in particular. Someone you are very close to, someone whose opinion actually matters. Does this person care about what you think “people” are judging you for? Chances are, no, they don’t. And guess what… that person would classify as one of the “people” in the world. Think about who these faceless judgmental demons are that haunt you. You’ll find, many times, they’re figments of your imagination.

13. People are more jealous than you’d think. Of what they can’t have and can’t be. Don’t let ‘em get you down.

[skeleton-warrior-deactivated201]

I’ve heard/seen several people mention how the Steubenville case should remind us all to speak to our daughters about parties and drinking.

Thing is, we already fucking do that. We’ve been doing it. You think I won’t be a paranoid mom about this shit with my daughter? You think every time she goes out to a party I won’t ask the universe to protect her? We already worry about and lecture our daughters endlessly. By the time our daughters are 16 they’ve already been told what a cruel and dangerous place this world is for them.

Guess what? They still get attacked.

So maybe, just fucking maybe, we should shift the focus to talking to and lecturing our young boys and men in our communities. Maybe they need to hear from their adult male role models and peers that there is never ever a time when they can assume consent or force themselves on a woman. Maybe we need to stop our boys before they walk out the door to that party and say, “You be careful, son. If she doesn’t say “YES” then you leave her the hell alone, you got it?” or maybe “You stick with your friends, son. Make sure you look out for each other. If one of your buddies is thinking about taking advantage of a girl, you help him home, ok?”

Our young women don’t need anymore lectures. They hear them from childhood on up.

Stop blaming your daughters and start educating your fucking sons.

[mlcli-deactivated20210820]

Don’t fall in love with a curious one. They will want to know who you are, where you come from, what your family was like. They will look through your photographs and read all of your poems. They will come over for dinner and speak to your mother about how their curiosity has taught them things of use to her. They will ask you to rant when you’re angry and cry when you’re hurt. They will ask what that raised eyebrow meant. They will want to know your favorite food, your favorite color, you favorite person. They will ask why. They will buy that camera you liked, pay attention to that band you love in case there’s a show near by, they will get you the sweater you smiled at once. They’ll learn to cook your favorite meals. The curious people don’t settle for your shell, they want the insides. They want what makes you heavy, what makes you uneasy, what makes you scream for joy, and anger, and heartbreak. Their skin will turn into pages that you learn to pour out your entire being in. Don’t fall in love with the curious one. They won’t let a sigh go unexplained. They will want to know what they did, exactly what they did to make you love them. Year, month, week, day. “What time was it? What did I say? What did I do? How did you feel?” Don’t fall in love with a curious one because I’ve been there. They will unbutton your shirt and read every scar every mark every curve. They will dissect your every limb, every organ, every thought, every being then walk back home and eat their dinner and never return your calls. You will never be their lifelong expedition. The heart is a mystery only for so long. There is no ache like loving a curious one who chases every falling star and never catching one. Who comes and sees and conquers and leaves. I’ve fallen in love with a curious one. Maybe one day he will take the train back home and be curious enough to read one last message from me carved on a seat. “There’s a curiosity in you that will move mountains some day as effortlessly as you’ve moved me for years.”

Don’t Fall In Love With The Curious One (via impchris)

[likeafieldmouse-deactivated2015]

Martin Roemers - Metropolis (2011)

The world’s megacities, “A crush of citizens who appear as ghostly bits of fabric swirling around sidewalk vendors’ displays like unharnessed energy.”

[lnthefade]

Breathe.

I crave cigarettes. The act of smoking. 

It’s been four years and still the craving has not left my mind or body.

Pull out a fresh cigarette. Hold the lighter to the tip. Inhale deeply as the flame takes hold. It’s best if you are outside at dusk and the red embers sparkle and fade against the darkening sky. 

Breathe.

Smoking was a calming influence for me. I was acutely aware that the act of taking in toxins was the thing that was keeping me breathing when I felt like I had no breath left. But I needed that ritual to survive. Even if it would kill me later.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Inhale.

Feel the smoke work its way down your throat, feel it deeply, the burn, the sting. Feel it in your lungs, a foreign object invading your most precious space. 

Exhale.

In with the good, out with the bad. The smoke as nerves, anxiety, irrational thoughts. Watching it exit, rise, dissipate into the night air. 

Poof. Gone.

Caught up in something, feeling like the world is closing in on you, like you’ve got no breath left to give, you are suffocating, drowning, you have forgotten how to breathe.

Walk outside, find your corner, the place where the misfits who still light up sticks full of cancer go. 

Cigarette to lips. Flick of the lighter. The glow and the smoke.

Inhale. Exhale. Breathe in. Breathe out. A ritual that gets you in rhythm again, gets you taking normal breaths, blowing out smoke like you’re exhaling all of life’s woes.

Watch the cigarette burn, watch as it gets smaller, until you can feel the burn between your fingers. 

Take that last, long drag then do what you do. Flick it, grind it, stomp it. 

Exhale. Breathe out.

How did I ever learn to breathe on my own?

Four years. And still, I crave. I want to feel that smoke burn my lungs. I want to exhale all of life’s woes as if it were that simple. 

But I know it’s not.

So I’ll just breathe.

[gogohhhoh-deactivated20190302]

BAD GIRLS DO IT WELL

The Gulabi gang is a group of women vigilantes active across North India. It is named after the pink saris worn by its members. The group was founded as a response to widespread domestic abuse and other violence against women. Gulabis visit abusive husbands and beat them with bamboo sticks. In 2008, they stormed an electricity office and forced officials to restore the power they had cut to extract bribes. The Gulabis have also stopped child marriages and protested dowry and female illiteracy.

[werocksocks-deactivated20130302]

The whole “*insert type of criminal here aren’t real men” argument is a really played out and pathetic way to try to separate men from people who make them look bad. They’re real men. Real men beat women, rape, murder, steal, and do other horrible things. It happens. Instead of trying to separate them from the group to help you sleep at night, educate your kids to be real men you can be proud of and not have to worry about being linked to.

[blackcoffeebluez]

Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.

Carl Jung

[mrsjohnson2013]

Men Against Abortion,

I applaude you. You stand up for the injustice forced upon those unborn, those who are mute. And that is exactly what God has called men to do. So thank you to those who do not take a back seat because “they are male and can’t understand.” Thank you to the men out there who speak for the unborn children of the world. We need you. So thank you.

[blackcoffeebluez]

Wow. I can't believe that this was written by a woman. What I fail to understand is why people who cannot have an abortion, let alone get pregnant, would be obsessed with the idea of "standing up for the injustice forced upon the unborn". What about the injustice faced by women who get pregnant as a result of rape and are expected to not get an abortion? If abortion is murder, then every time a man jacks off, he's committing murder too. If life starts at fertilization, then any woman who has had more than one period is a serial killer. A woman's body is never the same again after giving birth and forcing someone to exist in a state which they don't agree with for nine months is a violation of human rights. No man, woman, or "god" has the right to tell a woman what she can or cannot do with her body.