The Tao of Sara

An illustrated diary.

[quotespile]

The world’s continual breathing is what we hear and call silence.

Clarice Lispector, The Passion According to G.H. (via quotespile)

[chibird]

[chibird]

Your version of a good day can evolve over time too, and that’s okay. 💛

[silver-and-ivory]

[galaxy brain] common fantasy conceptions of magic are transphobic, queerphobic, and ableist because they involve reifying arbitrary societal categories as immutable and innate to avoid the terror of possibly experiencing prediction error

[universe brain] and this is a good thing

[silver-and-ivory]

statements that match this feeling:

things should be their perfect forms everything should match the model in my head? every idea should be taken to its absolute greatest degree if the world does not match my model, the world, rather than my model, should change, by force if necessary

[silver-and-ivory]

there is no beauty in the merely real

[silver-and-ivory]

am thinking about how in geometry doing constructions I worried because I could not possibly get a perfect circle that the dimensions would always be off and if by chance they weren’t then there was no way I could possibly tell so I had to make peace with error. and even by computer making constructions could be off by a few pixels. no idea survives contact with the Real - even if it might have been perfect in the abstract ie if you typed in coordinates and the computer models it as perfectly there - I don’t even know whether my imagination of where the center of my vision is is correct - but ideas should survive contact, they should dominate, they should be the only thing that exists? everything should be perfect. everything should be perfect. everything should be perfect. everything should be perf

[silver-and-ivory]

it’s not really about predictions, is it? because I’m not basing this off of making predictions, I’m basing this off what it would be if the pattern continued. but that’s sort of a prediction too? but realistically I don’t actually expect the pattern to continue. like I have freehand drawn way more lopsided circles (current estimate: lots) than perfect circles (current estimate: none) in my life and if I went and freehand drew a circle I would obviously expect for it to be lopsided. but I would still be really sad about it if I let myself stew on it. the same with the messiness of humanity and its inability to be gestalt aestheticized into easy categories that make sense to deal with in a pretty and platonic-type kind of way.

[silver-and-ivory]

I know someone who wants things to be perfect and to their perfect hilt and words to mean their most extreme most self-ful things who…. does not mind prediction error and who likes movement. why is this and why am I not like them?? what is the difference here?

here is a list of ideas we have in common:

words do correspond to ideas when people say that words don’t intuitionally correspond to concepts but just to whatever society Decides {en masse, somehow, through ssc’s kind of bastardized understanding of the categorical imperative, where all people use words in the same meanings in all circumstances}, this often makes people feel gaslit you can usefully think about ideas by drawing out words to their most them-ness. ie by completing the pattern from {lopsided circle, lopsided circle in a different direction, less lopsided circle, even less lopsided circle, …., …. }

maybe they think that words should map the territory? and if your words don’t match the territory, you should acquire new ones and map the territory with those words. I wonder how their ocd works and if it works like mine. I wonder if they aestheticize people like how I do.

[silver-and-ivory]

i know this is Bad ™ and this is why I put it in the mouth of my Bad headmate personality

but it is also very good and i want to protect it and my Bad headmate personality is after all only me wearing a funny mask and ???

[silver-and-ivory]

tototavros says-

“i know this is Bad ™” it doesn’t seem bad at all to me? idk where you’re getting that

uhhhhh it’s bad for a few reasons

-it displays the opposite of rationalist virtue, ie, it betrays the principle “when your models of the world diverge from the world, change your models instead of trying to change the world” and the principle of finding beauty in the merely real

-it involves reifying models, ie, seeing them as essential and absolute and ontologically basic. notably this is also how lots of people see gender and race- it leads to errors like “if black people on average have lower IQs, then that means that Black People as a Whole Are Stupid and so we should discriminate against black people as a whole” and “women are pretty and modest, whereas men are handsome and proud” and “people look you in the eye and have empathy and whatever that thing is, it’s not a person”

-on the same kind of tack, this is the aestheticization thing that I almost constantly do and that results in idealization and devaluation and dealing with other people as the stereotypied versions of themselves. this is very lossy and makes bad predictions because it deliberately forgets information about them that isn’t in line with my aesthetic vision of them.

-it involves wanting the world to hold still and obey what you want and be silent and cold and golden and beautiful and unmoving and perfect and exactly in their roles, with no leaky edges and not spectrum, full of aestheticized discontinuous absolutes

-it’s totally counter to effective treatment for and attitude around ocd, which involves feeling okay with pollution and Wrongness and accepting that the world should not be controlled

-when taken to its most extreme, this idea makes me a nervous wreck besieged by Mundum

[exaybachay]

This is a phenomenal description.

I think what you are describing is something most people (everyone?) experience to some degree.  Our brains seem to function in such a way that we look for averages and patterns and then generalize.  This evolved, I believe, because it enabled us to solve problems with abstract thinking, which is what has allowed us to succeed.  But you’re right; the “ideal” doesn’t actually mean the same thing as the “predicted.”  The ideal is somehow cleaner and easier to remember - the reality is extremely complicated and requires a lot of memory (to borrow the computer definition of the term).

I think it’s understandable to have those tendencies, and that you can be gentle with yourself for having them, while at the same time paying attention to when that tendency causes problems for you.  Then you can consciously ramp up your memory for those tasks that most call for it, while being forgiving of yourself glossing over the less important intricacies.

[softlywlw]

I rarely see asian wlw representation on this website so let’s change that!

[softlywlw]

THIS POST ISNT FOR TERFS!!

[fly-chicken]

ADD THE COUPLE FROM THE BACHELOR VIETNAM YOU COWARDS

[moami]

When an intergalactic mission reaches a critical point that threatens the life of the crew, when all is hopeless, and no other option is in sight, the captain of the crew must - if the crew includes a “human” - activate the WT protocol.

This measure should only be used in extreme circumstances, as its consequences are, despite impressive effectiveness, destructive and highly unpredictable.

If, however, the crew’s life and wellbeing are in danger, then the captain should turn to the “human” and clearly speak the following words:

“This is it. We will die here. There is no way out of this.”

The “human” will immediately direct their attention to their captain. Their answer should approximately be: “There’s always a way”, or “I’ll find something.”

It is crucial, then, that the captain performs the next sentence with as much condescension as can be mustered. They must look at the “human”, and say:

“What can a weak human like you even do?”

Immediately, distance must be brought between the remaining crew and the “human”. The protocol, if successfully initiated, will begin with a show of the “human’s” teeth in something called a “grin”, and the protocol words:

“Watch this.”

[thatdiabolicalfeminist]

controversial opinion

you are not better than fat people!

even REALLY fat people!

even fat people who don’t put a lot of time into their appearance!

even fat people who wear clothes you think are unflattering!

your appearance literally does not make you better than a fat person. you are not more fun to hang out with because you’re not fat. you are not funnier, smarter, or more interesting by virtue of not being fat. you aren’t harder working, you don’t have more self-control, you don’t have your life more together.

the only difference between you and fat people is that they have to put up with a lot of harassment, discrimination, exclusion, and other bullshit that you don’t even think about.

try not to add to it.

[exaybachay]

Absynthe makes the heart grow stranger.

[stuft]

[naamahdarling]

Even better, the comments to this Twitter post were an absolute FIRESTORM of mostly dudes explaining to her that dials can’t only have 2 positions (not true) and that it wasn’t a very good piece (not true) that she was being disrespectful to her teacher (don’t care) and that it was a sign of her stupidity/rabid feminism/intellectual laziness/misandry/etc. that she couldn’t see any “middle ground.” It became, in its way, a performance piece. I was absolutely mesmerised, even as I wished I could cock-punch people through the internet.

[bracelet00]

“Dials have more than one settimg” is the most hilarious response to this piece, because the implication of that statement is “just be a scootch more implicit in your own dehumanization. Not ALL the way. But like… a little more.”

[zforzelma]

Beatrice and Benedict are same-sex leaning disaster bisexuals who are both extremely surprised when they end up falling for someone of the opposite sex.

[zforzelma]

exeunt-pursued-by-a-bear said:

hot take: beatrice saying “he hath EVERY month a new sworn brother” about benedick is her teasing him for just having an endless string of boyfriends

Yes. Good. Excellent. Just as Shakespeare intended.

[measuringinlove]

@toomanyfeelings5

[aprilslady-deactivated20181029]

YES. YES. ALL TRUE.

I would also like to add that ‘And a good soldier to a lady. But what is he to a Lord?’ is Beatrice asking for confirmation that Benedick is a bottom

[aprilslady-deactivated20181029]

David Tennant and Catherine Tate best encapsulate the bi disaster vibes each of them give

Look at these dorks

[corpsewizards]

i have heard tell that @sharkboy460 once called them “two kinsey 5s making it work”

[labelleizzy]

This makes my little queer Shakespeare nerd heart so HAPPY

[eljayetc]

- Andrea Gibson

[flippyspoon]

[sketchesinstillness]

Buddha Frog-

[quotemadness]

“The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.”

— William James (via quotemadness)

[bentlharam-deactivated20191125]

[mleannegibson]

I wonder if anyone ever stopped to think about language and how one cannot escape the male gender. We are fe - male, s - he, wo - man, we are man - kind and hu - man. We are always a “girl” even in our own thoughts, told to be a lady, act like a lady, and when we bleed we are wo - man. Why couldn’t the Hulk be He-Hulk like She-Hulk, or must the defining words of our own super heroes, must be like Super Woman, Cat Woman? Right, we are still part of Man, half a rib, bow your head Mary mother of Jesus, bow your head Magdalena, the whore. Hello Princess, Hello Angel, greets the stalker man who is a demon in disguise, ready to harm, to cause fear, did it hurt when you fell from heaven? No, for the sweetest taste for us has always been the Fruit of Knowledge. No, for we crawled our way out of hell, empowered by our sisters and mothers, the generations before who educated us, who scream “Lift your head up, bow to no man!” Yet we women, mothers and maidens, burnt and accused for serving the Devil, the stepping stone for Man and God, demonized because of their own Greed, their own Lust, and Wrath, who cannot seem to control themselves, always always ignoring the wisdom of Maiden, Mother, and Crone, the women who they suckled wisdom and love from the breasts of. Yet even God would sum us up as less than man, less than a boy, only half a rib, always mistaken for less when we should be a Goddess. Really, don’t blame us for the inequity that is found in you, the Devil never made you do it and we never asked for it.

c.k. | Half a Rib ko-fi | instagram | website |    (via cielknight)

[kelpforestdwellers]

here’s a useful expression: “i don’t have a preference but i’d be happy to choose.”

sounds a little odd or maybe contradictory? but i spend a lot of time around people who, for various reasons, often run up against choice paralysis, that agonizing state where making a decision seems impossible.

so i use this sentence to clarify a few things.

1. are you just being polite and offering me the chance to choose first? if so, i have given you the go ahead to decide for us

2. are you having difficulty deciding? if so, i have made it clear that even though im not invested in any particular option, i am willing and able to make the decision for us.

thought i’d share it since i find it helpful.

[oneheadtoanother]