are you feeling hopeless? lost? scared out of your fucking mind? there's a lot of self care stuff out there- drink tea, take a bath, meditate, etc etc. those can be nice i guess, but sometimes, when shit sucks, the only way to make it through without collapsing is to do whatever you can do to help people. to prove that you do, actually, have some control. that you can have a real impact on the world around you.
i am compiling a list of things that can be done RIGHT NOW at no (or very low) cost to yourself that have a direct and real impact on the state of the world around us. i am taking submissions as well- just send an ask or say something in the tags and i'll add it.
list under the cut (it is very long and continues to grow)
Report price-gouging in California: go onto zillow (or some other rental site), set the location to any of the affected areas in CA, sort to your choosing, and go through the price history for rentals. if it has increased by over 10% during the state of emergency time period, report for price gouging.
Drive someone for free (to vote, to get groceries, to the library, etc.)
Visit a library: that space is for you to use! loitering is okay too- you will only be asked to leave if you are disrupting the functions of the library for other visitors. while you are there...
Get a library card: libraries rely on community engagement for funding and to know what people want. check out books, movies, and games! participate in events! request more books! look into the resources your library offers! i promise there are more than you know!
Speak with a librarian: ask what resources they know about. ask what you can do to benefit your community. ask what can be done to help the library.
Get food from a food bank: they rely on numbers of participants to prove the programs are effective, plus you won't be financially supporting grocery store chains!
Volunteer: volunteer with an animal shelter, a homeless shelter, a kitchen, a community garden, park cleanup, political action (like canvasing, encouraging voters), a hospital, a church, or any other work that your area needs help with
Petition, vote, and submit testimonies for local elections: action in your city, county, or state can have massive impact!
Make art: make posters, zines, patches, bracelets, street art! make a visible mark on the world
Make art (cont): write poetry, music, fiction, non-fiction. make your voice heard
Make information accessible: share paywalled articles and academic sources for free, provide alternative text for photos online, share notes from class, post information that isn't easily available
Ride the bus: much like the library and food banks, use proves usefulness! riding the bus can encourage more funding and maintenance for them. it's also cheaper and more environmentally friendly than personal vehicles
Wear a mask: especially around vulnerable populations
Resist gentrification: keep property costs down with graffiti, protest the introduction of gentrifying businesses, support locals
Study self improvement: Read The Power of Practice By Ng’ethe Maina and Staci K. Haines, study conflict resolution, think about the ways you can improve your relationship with yourself through your relationship with others and vice versa, practice patience
Call/email your representatives: tell them what they need to do. there should be templates available. if something is happening, let them know how the people feel about it
Write a list of all the ways you can make an impact here and now.
the thing is that childhood doesn't just end when you turn 18 or when you turn 21. it's going to end dozens of times over. your childhood pet will die. actors you loved in movies you watched as a kid will die. your grandparents will die, and then your parents will die. it's going to end dozens and dozens of times and all you can do is let it. all you can do is stand in the middle of the grocery store and stare at freezers full of microwave pizza because you've suddenly been seized by the memory of what it felt like to have a pizza party on the last day of school before summer break. which is another ending in and of itself
i don’t mean this as a joke. i mean this as an expression of what queer means to me. this is the core of it: love, but radically. love, but in defiance. and i don’t mean “love is love” either; i mean love like militant solidarity between queer women and queer men and all other iterations and permutations of both and neither and something else. i mean love like trans self love. like decolonizing gender. i mean love like found families, like vows beyond and intentionally distinct from marriage. i mean love is a riot. i mean a love that transcends hunger. i mean love like disruption, like breaking concrete foundations like frost and thaw because to live otherwise is unthinkable or unlivable or simply and plainly unwanted
i mean queer like a shot-glass or a sledgehammer. something that shatters borders, that tears down walls and does not, cannot build them. i mean genderqueer queerplatonic we’re here we’re queer qpoc queer theory queer liberation queer Queer QUEER
message to all leftists: understand that landlords are bad because they are extorting you in exchange for a basic necessity of survival, not because they are "lazy" or "don't have real jobs"
you should really get comfortable believing in love and magic and whimsy or you’ll continue to live a half-life for the rest of the time you have on earth
Honestly, sometimes you need to do manic pixie dream girl shit as a fully 29-year-old man and it's literally okay. I still buy those little perforated Valentines they make for kids to give to each other at school and keep them in my pocket to hand out to cashiers and strangers the first two weeks of February, and it does not matter at all if people think I'm annoying for doing it because I could easily kill myself instead. Take it easy, keep it sleazy.
i don't know what else to tell you except to be brave and to be kind. take it day by day. go outside and watch the clouds paint the sky. call a friend.
we are still here, and furious. you are still here, and that matters. you can still do and make and be something important. i promise. stay alive. it matters, and you matter. i know it is easy to succumb to anxiety and exhaustion and defeat.
communities can start with tiny ideas. google "dnd meeting near me" or whatever your interest might be. google "volunteering near me." google "support groups near me." start journalling. start a discord. start a book club.
when you close your eyes and hear hamlet, answer his prayer: it's better still to be.
it's kinda comforting to me when my friends are a little annoying or longwinded or abrasive or tired and inarticulate, or they don't do the exact politest thing in every interaction, and stuff, because I know I'm sometimes annoying, or take up a more than my share of conversational space, or forget to ask them questions, etc etc, and... like, I'm always working to be nice to my friends and to get better and better at friend-ing, but it just makes me feel more human about it :}
anyway I love you friends plz know I'm not counting, in fact I feel great affection toward you even (especially) when conversations go less than Perfectly Ideal
hate when people are like "trust your gut! listen to your intuition!" like okay well my gut is telling me every person i lay eyes on is hunting me for sport and my intuition is saying i should find a secluded cave and live there forever so what do you suggest i do with that information
(Semi-serious answer to joke post incoming) If your gut is sending you endless “UNSAFE!” signals in a situation your logic brain knows is safe, then you trust it by kind of treating it like a conversation with a screaming parrot.
Like going “ok, Gut, what feels unsafe?” And it’ll say “PEOPLE IN THE GROCERY STORE”
and you go, “huh, ok. People in the grocery store aren’t usually dangerous…what makes them scary in the grocery store?” And it’ll go “LOUD AND RUSHED AND BUSY”
and you go “ok, people in the grocery store are probably not dangerous but they’re loud and rushed and busy. Loud and rushed and busy makes me feel stressed. How about we wear earplugs to make it less noisy and go at a less busy time of day?”
And then sometimes you try that and your gut goes “HMMM GROCERY STORE SAFER?” And you go, “yes, grocery store safer.”
Your gut isn’t necessarily correct that the SITUATION is unsafe but it’s usually right that your body/brain FEELS unsafe in the situation. You can trust it by approaching it with curiosity and usually learn something.
In highschool I wrote a story about a middle-generation of stellar travelers. Their parents were born on earth and left as children, and the middle generation will not live long enough to see their destination. They live their entire lives on the ship and I wrote about them trying to find their place in everything. They will never know blue skies and warm beaches and open fields with warm breezes. They’ll never know birdsong or crickets or frogs. They’ll never hear the rain on the roof of a dreary day. I never could find the right way to end the story. I wanted it to be a happy ending, but I didn’t know how to do it.
I realize now that it was a book about me dealing with depression before I even knew it. Looking back at how blatant the projecting was, it’s obvious now. It wasn’t then.
In the story, the middle-generation people are lost. They’re apathetic. They’re just a placeholder. The only job they have is to keep the ship running, have kids, and die. As the middle generation of people began becoming adults, suicide rates were skyrocketing. Crime and drug rates were jumping. This generation was completely apathetic because they felt that they had no use.
In the story, a small group of people in the middle-generation create the Weather Project. They turn the ship into a terrarium. They make magnificent gardens and take the DNA of animals they took with them and recreate them and they make this cold, metal spaceship that they have to live their entire lives on into a home. They take what little they have and they break it and rearrange it into something beautiful. They take this radical idea and turn the ship into a wonderful jungle of trees and birds and sunshine.
And I realize now how much it reflects my state of mind as I transitioned from a child into an adult while dealing with depression. You always hear “it gets better” and “when you’re older things will be easier” and I was so sick of waiting for it to get better. I was in the middle-generation stage. And I was sick of it. I was so sick of waiting.
When I was in highschool I didn’t know how to end the story. I didn’t know how to have a happy ending. I didn’t have the life experience then to finish the story in a meaningful way. I didn’t know how to make it better for these middle-generation characters.
But now that I’m older, I’m learning. That if you sit and wait for things to get better, it never will. You have to take your life and break it apart and rearrange it into something beautiful. You have to make the cold metal ship into the garden that you deserve. You have to make your own meaning. You have to plant your own garden.
You have to teach yourself that being happy is not a radical idea.
This is the most important post that I’ve ever made. Its for screaming out with every fiber of your being that you’re worth something. You’re worth everything.
The above image is a historical artifact. Colima dog. It dates back to circa 100 BCE-300 CE. (x)
And, around two thousand years later it was originally shaped with care, painted with love, and adored… someone draws it. Draws it using a new technological device that allows modern people to shape things with care, paint with love, and even move them -on a screen, glowing.
And the said person decides to share it with the world. The whole world adores it.
I love the connection between past and today. We were humans back then, and we are still the same.
Cute dog :)
the sensation of being alive @joyinliving - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
