anyone else always feel like a shit friend listening to friends talk abt their interests bc u end up only being able to say 1 or 2 words bc u want to show ur listening but u were raised being told 'shut up while im talking' and being abused if u didnt even tho ur memory was shit so even while u were listening u cant remember anything u wanted to imput after theyre done so u just cant physically think abt anything interesting to say and u know they feel like u werent interested and also feel like shit even tho u were so they dont ramble abt their interests to u anymore and u just have such a hard time trying to get over this and work on it even tho ur over 30 and should know how to fix this by now ?
A character trait/dynamic that I'm endlessly compelled by is someone dealing with (or, like, failing to) being the child of people who were too busy being good people to have the time and attention to be good parents. This can be anywhere from 'was a public defender who gave a shit working 60 hour weeks with basically no vacations' to 'left their family behind to join the revolution/war effort and is now a universally beloved martyr-hero who saved/remade the world with their final breath' on the groundedness spectrum. The important thing is a viscerally felt but confused and ugly mess of longing, resentment, and guilt about feeling the resentment.
#the idea that someone can simultaneously be a bad parent and a good person is one that seems to escape a LOT of people#I see far too many people who insist that if someone is a bad parent they're also a bad person#because being a bad parent MAKES them a bad person#“well they never should have had kids if they were going to be bad at it!” cool cool so I don't know if you know this but#not everyone is able to see how things will play out before they happen#also someone may be a GREAT parent for one kid but a mediocre one for another kid#because (and I know this is another pretty alien idea to a lot of tumblr) everyone is different#what one child needs is not necessarily the same as what another child needs#anyway#it's much more fun to explore this concept in fiction than in reality#when it happens IRL at least one real person gets screwed over; in fiction it's an interesting story to explore
So fucking true
I know people who are great as friends for example, but they shouldn't be parents.
You can really tell who’s never experienced poverty and food insecurity when it comes to discussions around food costs and how unhealthy food is cheaper. Some fucker always comes in with the price of like… lettuce or… apples. And it’s like yeah bitch but can you work an 11 hour shift after eating some salad and an apple!?! Find me something cheaper, and more filling than the broke ass staples of boxed mac and cheese, hot dogs, noodles, bread, beans, and rice. I’ll wait.
It also ignores the mental toll that poverty takes like maybe your home made veggie filled recipe isn’t crazy expensive but it also involves prep time and cooking time and organization in terms of fresh food that a lotta poor people can’t manage.
Not to mention if you can only afford to get to the store once every couple weeks via bus or cab then you can’t keep fresh veg on deck.
One of the many stupid feelings humans are capable of having is the private, repulsive rage of seeing someone getting support and sympathy for a problem no one helped you with when you were having it, either because you didn’t have anyone or because it never occurred to you that you could ask for help. Suddenly the world seems to split into two – the realm that contains people like them, the connected and loved – and the realm that contains you, the miserable and the alone, who must suffer in solitude. This is sufficiently horrible that you grasp for reasons or world-understandings to make this reality acceptable, and a mentally available one is that it is superior to be in the miserable solitude realm, that the problem is one that should be solved with self sufficiency and dignity. That this other person is pathetic for being aided and loved when you were not. Scorn is more palatable than confronting the notion that you could have received aid (if you had made different choices or been luckier), that you desperately wish you could have been aided but were not. Scorn is more palatable than the howling hunger for things to have been different for you. So your mind chooses scorn.
It is also a bad place to be. Human existence is full of such traps.
to add to this: there’s also cases where a lot of people ARE legitimately abandoned by their previous support groups even when they do reach out and ask for help. or passively ignored when they’re obviously struggling. nevertheless, this does not make the bitterness and scorn good
If you experience any changes in body control (switching, possession, etc.), then establish some form of consistent, asynchronous external communication with your system. External communication has a major benefit: you can still talk to each other across switches (asynchronously) even if the inside of your mind is a mess.
You might set up a journal, whiteboard, calendar, a "single user, multi-account" app like Mytter or Antar, sticky notes, etc. Anything goes as long as your system knows to check it occasionally (or at the least, in an emergency).
We recommend choosing an analog method for your fallback communication method if possible, as a power outage could take out a lot of digital methods. A spur-of-the-moment piece of paper left on a table is better than nothing, but it's less likely to work than a pocket notebook or bulletin board that every system member knows to use for communication if needed. You can always add an app or program once everyone knows where to go for your analog fallback.
Discuss how you want to treat each other. Keep it loose and informal for now- don't make any absolute Laws just yet. Think of it more like the quick agreements that roommates make with each other for practical reasons: "I'll do the dishes if you do the laundry".
A few classics: "try not to die, don't kill anyone else, don't get any tattoos as an impulse decision, and don't throw out things that don't belong to you."
Don't force agreements on anyone. If someone disagrees, then stop and discuss their concerns to find a better agreement. See: Consensus Decision Making.
Map your system, if it feels right. This can help you learn about each other, but it can also be soothing to feel like you have some understanding of who's in your head when you're being flooded with new system members.
Again, keep it simple. What do you actually need to know? What would help you in a practical sense? Start there, then branch out if you'd like to get to know each other better.
Consider making a simple guide to your life. If someone had to handle a day in your life with little to no prior knowledge of it, then what would they need to know?
Where should they check to see if you have any appointments? Are they responsible for feeding any pets? Where can they find money if they need it, and how do they know how much to spend? Do you have a job, and do they need to work it? Etc.
Hopefully you never need this guide, but it's a lifesaver for any unexpectedly amnesiac system members.
Focus on building bridges and trust. Get to know the folks in your head. Find ways to talk and just get to know them. Listen as much as you talk, if not more.
Learn to lean on each other for support, if you can. Trust is one of the most valuable things that you can have in a system. Trust gets you through a lot of tough situations. Give your system members every reason to trust you, and try to learn to trust them in turn.
If someone is hostile, then ask what's driving the hostility. Do they feel under-represented in your life? Does peace make them feel unsafe because they don't know where the threats are? Are they bored, scared, frustrated, or routinely unhappy?
What can you do to support them? What do they need to feel comfortable?
Don't worry about knowing everything. You're just figuring this out- give yourselves some grace for not knowing as much as everyone else seems to. (Besides, they know less than you think. I've yet to meet a system without a single mystery left in it, including folks who've known for decades, and many systems are forever figuring things out in one way or another.)
Ask for information when you need it and let your system explain itself over time; let your system set the pace. You'll get better information that way, and your system will learn that they can trust you to respect them when they say "no, don't touch that yet."
Screw plural community labels for now. Seriously. Screw figuring out origins or consciousness or whatever the linguistic dividing line of the month is. Don't worry about it. These words come and go. Get to know yourselves first.
Why am I suggesting this? Community labels will still be there when you've figured out how to work with each other in a practical sense, and your stronger understanding of each other will make it much easier to find whatever words you wind up needing. Hunting for words now is likely to get you stuck trying to cram a bunch of shifting unknowns into someone else's categorization system, and it might cloud your situation more than it clears it.
Given that you're still settling into the idea of sharing a head at all, getting into the nitty-gritty of labels is probably going to be less helpful than figuring out how to handle doubt and denial issues (or getting communication going, or learning to manage switching, or...), hence the recommendation not to worry about it.
That said: do use labels if you need them. Just remember that labels are tools. Don't let the tools use you.
Also, screw the discourse. If you listen to any one item on this list, make it this one.
Plural community discourse tends to be a little bit rancid in the "debating whether your experiences exist meaningfully in our spaces" way, and it will fuck you up as a new system. Get past the worst of your denial or doubt issues first to avoid worsening the "oh my god, am I faking without knowing it" hell brainworms. Please. I am actually begging you. Avoid the discourse until you've dealt with your own existential doubts.
None of these things are obligations, nor is there any rush to do them. It's just a cluster of things that I tend to suggest to newly discovered systems, and I realized that I don't think we've actually rattled these off on this blog yet.
According to fox entertainment this is who we should be afraid of. I didn't know who Francesca Hong was 10 minutes ago but thankfully now I'm aware of this monster and her monsterous policies
i love when a character’s worst traits become, against all odds and against their will, what saves them. when their irrational paranoia suddenly becomes right. when their obsessive vendetta suddenly makes them useful. when their cowardice leaves them the only person left to carry on
jacobvanloon
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amandla
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