Goose Candy

This site is cheaper than therapy, and makes me laugh way more

[chaoticgoosecandy]

It’s been a second but some life events have taken place

•moved from the apartment and bought a house

•quit soul sucking job and have been at a much better job for little over a year now

•adopted a house panther

•have decided that the general public is insane and I’m going to start posting stories because why not

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

I think people get mixed up a lot about what is fun and what is rewarding. These are two very different kinds of pleasure. You need to be able to tell them apart because if you don't have a balanced diet of both then it will fuck you up, and I mean that in a "known cause of persistent clinical depression" kind of way.

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

When people say they enjoy things, they usually mean one of two things. The first is that these things are fun; that is, they satisfy immediate emotional needs or desires for pleasure. Candy Crush is fun, for people who are into that sort of thing; waterslides are fun, watching TV is fun. Fun, in the way I'm defining it for this post, is the party food of pleasure; immediately and usually temporarily satisfying, and after that, mostly satisfying only as a happy memory (although some of these activities, like watching a TV show, can generate further opportunities for pleasure down the line like daydreaming, discussion, and making fanart). Like party food, this kind of fun is a good thing to have, and someone who doesn't get enough of it is at high risk of stress-related health concerns. Also burnout. A lack of fun is a major contributor to burnout.

The second kind of pleasure that most people talk about is rewarding activity. The lack of rewarding activity in one's life is a major contributor to depression. It creates a sense of purposelessness and worthlessness and generates a low attention span, sapping the ability to feel long-term motivation or pleasure. People usually try to pick themselves up with the first kind of fun, which is a band-aid but not a very sticky one; the lack of rewarding activity grows and festers over time. Rewarding pleasure involves working on something long-term that feels worthwhile. There are usually also spots of fun (or you wouldn't have gotten into the activity enough for it to become rewarding), but there also tends to be long slogs that aren't that fun. Nevertheless, when people report on doing said activity, they will speak about it with great enjoyment and remember it being enjoyable and claim they like it. (I like being a writer. Writing can sometimes be boring as shit.) (Look into Csíkszentmihályi's work on experience sampling and flow states for more info on this, it is FASCINATING.)

In Reality is Broken, Jane McGonigal sums up what she thinks are the most important contributing factors to rewarding activity. These are not the only factors, but I agree that they're a good baseline of the critical ones. I'm going to paraphrase them using different language. The four big contributors are:

Satisfying work. This is the vaguest one because different people find different things satisfying. Basically, the task itself should feel productive, and you should not feel bad about doing it to the point where it causes you distress. Satisfying work involves clear goals with actionable steps and a clear product, preferably something that you can see, touch or use. A clean house, a new high score, a freshly built table, a happy child.

Mastery. Rewarding pleasure is often something that you can get better at. There are things to learn, practice, improve. Improving your ability to solve tricky code problems, getting better at painting landscapes, figuring out fun new strategies in Magic: The Gathering, being able to build computers better or faster or cheaper. Mastery does not require becoming the best at something (although some people enjoy that specifically also), merely seeing progress in yourself and being able to take pride int he fact that you are better than you were.

Social connection. Rewarding pleasure often involves social or community connection. A long-term social group that discusses fan theories of their favourite show. Your weekly tabletop rpg. Teaching a room full of kids who to make leather belts. Working at a small bookshop and making small talk with all the tourists. Some people find social activity to be fun in the 'immediate pleasure' kind of way, some don't, but it is a critical factor in mental health and in the long-term... rewardingness (?)... of a hobby. Animals can also partially fill this niche, but be warned, they are far, far less effective than people. Your cat might be able to stop you from committing suicide today. You cat alone will not make your life satisfying.

Contribution. Humans are community animals and have a need to be something larger than ourselves or, more specifically to be of service to something larger than ourselves. Looking after kids, cooking big meals for others, creating art or physical products for others. Teaching the next generation how to read. Serving your God. Saving a species of small fish from extinction. Volunteering at your local charity shop or soup kitchen. Being a member of a crowd to reach the Guinness World Record for "most people fit into a storage crate". Making useful tutorial videos, being an entertainer, joining your local queer support group or political organisation. Humans fucking love to be part of something bigger than their own brain and they fucking love to help people.

The world is full of rewarding activities, and not all of them rate high in all four categories. The woman working in the charity shop warehouse and chatting with her coworkers isn't necessarily all that interested in mastery of her job (although I've worked in these places and some people do take pride in learning to be as efficient as possible), the musical hermit training to become the best violinist in the world might not be all that interested in social connection or how the audience actually feels about him. You might have noticed that I've listed hobbies, jobs, and non-employed but important life work (volunteering and childrearing) as possible rewarding activities; you can find rewarding activities everywhere. (In fact the lack of rewarding pleasure in our work lives is a very serious problem that companies keep trying to condescendingly band-aid over. The late David Graeber had a lot to say about this and I highly recommend his work, particularly Bullshit Jobs, which is a book specifically discussing the lack of above points 1 and 4 (satisfying work and sense of contribution) in so many modern workplaces and its distressing psychological ramifications). Rewarding activities are not 'fun' all the time; in fact, Csíkszentmihályi's work found that many of them are quite unfun most of the time. They do, however, create long term pleasure, and are emotionally and psychologically critical.

One final point: research shows that computer stuff counts less. This isn't a 'hurr durr edison was a witch get off your damn computers and get a real job' point; plenty of people do most of their rewarding activity on computers, because the supply cost is so low (most of us already own some kind of computer) and it's so much easier to find an existing community. But it does, psychologically speaking, count less; your brain isn't very good at seeing computers stuff as as 'real', on a primitive sensory level, as things you can touch with your hands or people that are right in front of you. Your massive community of fellow fans on the internet are less effective at filling your social needs than the crochet club at your local library, even if you like the people on the internet much more. It doesn't have to be everything, but ideally you should have at least one physical meatspace social club and at least one physical meatspace hobby, craft, or volunteer job. (They can be the same thing. You can volunteer at a soup kitchen for both.) They don't have to be the most important thing -- I care way more about my writing (electronic) than my crochet (meatspace) and I do the writing a lot more -- but the meatspace thing should exist, if you can manage it.

[ironedorchid]

In education studies, similar ideas is often discussed using the Circle of Courage[1] developed by Larry Brendtro and Martin Brokenleg. This was based on research into what makes some at-risk kids resilient while others struggle to survive. The researchers worked with North American Indigenous / First Nations communities, and a lot of the imagery used in promoting the message was created by Indigenous artists and uses medicine wheel iconography.

via

The 4 parts of the circle are:

Belonging: a sense of community, loving others, and being [able to say "I am loved"][2]

Mastery: competence in many areas; cognitive, physical, social, and spiritual, responsibility, striving to achieve personal goals rather than superiority

Independence: Making one's own decisions and being responsible for failure or success, setting one's own goals, disciplining one's self.

Generosity: Looking forward to being able to contribute to others, being able to give cherished things to others.

These ideas are important in education because it shows teachers that when kids feel safe and accepted, when they are given work that is meaningful to them, and they have opportunities to make choices, then they are more likely to engage in learning.

Brendto and Brokenleg's work is also important because it shows teachers that kids who are considered to have behavioural problems are responding to their environment, and while teachers can't fix what is happening outside school, they can make their classroom a safe environment (belonging) and provide work which provides kids with ways to practise mastery, independence, and generosity.

[1] JStor link to "The Circle of Courage" (1991) Larry K. Brendtro, Martin Brokenleg, Steve Van Bockern and George Blue Bird [3]

[2] The image version does not include the whole sentence

[3] You might need an account to access the 1991 article on JStor, but you can read their 2006 paper which shows how their model compares to similar ideas from resilience research and positive psychology for free via Research Gate: The Circle of Courage and Positive Psychology

[chaoticgoosecandy]

No one really talks about the emotional toll moving takes on a person, and especially if they’re starting a new job with it. I won’t lie, these last few months have been hard and I still don’t feel settled

[mokeonn]

"But if college was free, then people would abuse that and get useless degrees" hell yeah I would! If I could go to college without debt I would make it my job to get a degree in every little thing that interested me. I'd get a doctorate in film studies. I'd have a bachelor's degree for every science I like. I'd try to learn at least 5 languages with varying results. I would learn something "useful" like coding and then follow it up with a ""useless"" degree like art history. I'd be the world record speed run holder for getting every degree possible.

But I can't afford college without going into massive debt, so instead I spent the last 5 years trying to figure out what I am passionate enough about to consider going into debt over, because unfortunately being passionate about everything is extremely expensive to pursue.

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

Can confirm, we have one free university place each and one funded part time course each year

My friend works in a call center and is using his part time credit towards a classics degree, writing Latin essays and reading books I've never even heard of

No intention of 'doing' anything with it, the call center is close to his kids school and the shifts work for child care, he just liked a Greek story a few years ago and thought he'd like to know more

Why shouldn't he get to know more?

[thedisablednaturalist]

Free would also mean people could retake classes and learn without fear of failure. Failing a class is an expensive mistake in places without free college. Students are cramming info into their brains and have to learn a ton of new information in only a couple of months. Students turn to destructive behaviors due to the stress and pressure. I've failed four college classes and am now in a ton of debt. Pressure to pass caused me to ignore symptoms and my health declined (which led to me failing MORE classes). It kills students and pushes them into further debt.

[chaoticgoosecandy]

Therapy was productive today. By productive, I mean I cried a lot and somehow walked away with homework

[purr-in-ink]

[chaoticgoosecandy]

I need some encouragement to ask for disability accommodations at work, because I can’t handle being told no

[thedisablednaturalist]

For disability pride month (and the rest of the year) here's a shout out to

- people who have to take "scary" meds like antipsychotics, tranquilizers, schizo meds, lithium, opioids, and steroids because they're the only things that work

-people taking medicinal drugs that may be illegal in some areas

-people who have to get dangerous procedures and treatments

-people who will literally die without their meds and can't stop taking them

-people who can't afford their meds or their meds are so expensive it puts them in poverty

- people whose meds cause undesirable side effects

-people whose meds cause them to be immunocompromised

-people whose meds damage their bodies, but improve general quality of life enough that it's worth it

-people who get told to get off their meds constantly by people other than their doctors (or their doctors didn't want to put them on the med bc they're "too young")

-people who can't take medicine other than ibuprofen or Tylenol due to allergies, interactions, etc.

-people who don't want to take any medicine due to medical trauma

-people who can't take medicine at all and have to cope in other ways

-people who are addicted to their medicine and don't want to stop taking it

-people who are addicted and want to stop taking their meds

-people still suffering from unforeseen side effects that still affect them even though they got off the meds

Our relationships with our medicines/treatments are complicated and no one body is ever exactly the same. Please be respectful of people's choices and feelings about their meds.

[chaoticgoosecandy]

My antipsychotics have even helped with my POTS, since my nervous system isn’t always freaked the fuck out now

[chaoticgoosecandy]

I need a weighted blanket that’s made for swaddling adults. If anyone out here can sew such a thing, lemme know, because I’ll buy one and be the happiest burrito

[purr-in-ink]

[chaoticgoosecandy]

The funny thing about being bipolar with an anxious attachment style, is using my manic moods to work on my attachment style and it actually working