vampireapologist:

Honestly something that bothers me more than most things is having my compassion mistaken for naivety.

I know that another fish might eat this bullfrog right after I spend months rehabilitating it.

I know that turning a beetle back onto its legs won’t save it from falling over again when I walk away.

I know that there is no cosmic reward waiting for my soul based on how many worms I pick off a hot sidewalk to put into the mud, or how many times I’ve helped a a raccoon climb out of a too-deep trashcan. 

I know things suffer, and things struggle, and things die uselessly all day long. I’m young and idealistic, but I’m not literally a child. I would never judge another person for walking by an injured bird, for ignoring a worm, or for not really caring about the fate of a frog in a pond full of, y’know, plenty of other frogs.

There is nothing wrong with that.

But I cannot cannot cannot look at something struggling and ignore it if I may have the power to help.

There is so much bad stuff in this world so far beyond my control, that I take comfort in the smallest, most thankless tasks. It’s a relief to say “I can help you in this moment,” even though they don’t understand.

I don’t need a devil’s advocate to tell me another fish probably ate that frog when I let it go, or that the raccoon probably ended up trapped in another dumpster the next night.

I know!!!! I know!!!!!!! But today I had the power to help! So I did! And it made me happy!

So just leave me alone alright thank u!!!!

dimedog:

“I wish I had the time to do that.”

– me, a person who definitely has the time to do that but also has terrible time management skills and most likely to just spend 4 hours getting absolutely nothing accomplished instead of the hundred other things I could and should be doing

skeletontemple:

videohall:

Is and continues to be my favorite dance video. Dude’s so unexpectedly fluid.

> High score! What happened? Did i break it?

> You don’t see too many YouTube videos from 2005..

Weird to think that was almost a 10 years ago.

@s-e-r-p-i-c-o

vivid-ellipses:

fadingsuggestion:

Fuck anyone who says I have to forgive everyone, “for my sake.” I worked hard for this anger. I worked hard to love myself enough to hate them.

Shit, yeah, this is a thing that is hard to articulate. Some people don’t feel healed by forgiving the people who hurt them, because that’s what they kept doing over and over and it only led to getting more hurt. Sometimes you feel healed when you’re finally brave enough to say “This person was horrible to me, and I did not deserve that treatment, and I don’t have to be okay with it.”

grapehyasynth:

mattxpike:

High-functioning anxiety sounds like…

You’re not good enough. You’re a bad friend. You’re not good at your job. You’re wasting time. You’re a waste of time. Your boyfriend doesn’t love you. You’re so needy. What are you doing with yourself? Why would you say that? What if they hate it? Why can’t you have your shit together? You’re going to get anxious and because you’re going to get anxious, you’re going to mess everything up. You’re a fraud. Just good at faking it. You’re letting everybody down. No one here likes you.

All the while, it appears perfectly calm.

It’s always looking for the next outlet, something to channel the never-ending energy. Writing. Running. List-making. Mindless tasks (whatever keeps you busy). Doing jumping jacks in the kitchen. Dancing in the living room, pretending it’s for fun, when really it’s a choreographed routine of desperation, trying to tire out the thoughts stuck in your head.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen it written out as if it were describing me exactly.

Preliminary Assertiveness Research 2

The second result in my assertiveness research was a shortened version of a whole chapter on assertiveness training on another site, which has 15 chapters on different topics in total. Chapter 13 is titled “Methods for Developing Skills”, with a subsection called “Assertiveness Training“. (The title of the subsection is at the bottom of page 17, but the link leads to page 18, because that’s where the actual content starts. Sloppy layouting.)

As with the first result, I’ll quote sections and comment on them as I go along. (If you only read this blog post, your view of the quoted site will be negatively biased, though – I quote things to nitpick, not to agree.)

thexfiles:

i literally will not tell people who are hurting me that they’re hurting me because i’m afraid of hurting them by telling them they’re hurting me it’s such a mess

reblog if you think deciding not to have children, even if they would have lives worth living, is morally acceptable

Hell, of course that is morally acceptable, and if you are happier without children, it is morally *good*.

marilynhansonarchived:

there is a clear distinction between gof sirius and ootp sirius so let’s talk about it because it’s all i’ve thought about for days.

in gof, sirius lives in a fucking cave eating rats in order to be near harry during the triwizard tournament. this is a decision that puts sirius in danger – being so close to hogwarts with ministry officials prowling around could easily land him back in azkaban. but here’s the thing: sirius doesn’t choose to live in hogsmeade for a laugh, or for his own personal gratification. he did it to protect harry – in the cave scene, when the trio ask what he’s doing, the first thing he says is “fulfilling my duty as godfather.”

and he is. because throughout gof, sirius gives advice, guidance, and comfort to harry. he tells him not to take unnecessary risks, to stay safe, to focus on getting through the tournament alive. sirius chastises harry after he finds out that he went into the forest with krum, he offers sympathy when harry talks about the fight he has with ron, and also, he lived in a cave and survived on rats just to be close in case harry ran into danger.

consistently throughout gof, sirius is a comforting presence to harry. he is intelligent, protective, and even paternal. this is sirius black at his best.

and sirius black at his best stands in stark contrast to the man we see in ootp: angry, mercurial, moody. reckless. he constantly makes bad, impulsive decisions: seeing the kids off at king’s cross, popping into the gryffindor fire, picking fights with snape. in ootp, sirius causes harry more worry than he assuages – directly conflicting with his goal of fulfilling his duty. not to mention, his treatment of harry, which is in direct opposition to what he displayed in gof: now, he encourages harry, compares him to james, even guilts him – “you’re less like your father than i thought.” that’s a shitty, low thing to say to the boy you’ve sworn to protect.

and all of this is leading up to the crux of the matter: sirius’s obvious illness. he’s depressed, he shows signs of bipolar disorder, he has tendencies toward alcoholism. he’s likely dealing with some form of PTSD after twelve years in azkaban. these things are true of sirius no matter where he is, but in gof, he’s in a healthier state – ironically, given his living conditions.

the trigger for sirius’s behavior in ootp is grimmauld place. it’s imprisonment, it’s being locked up in a house that he loathed, one that he was almost definitely emotionally abused in. it’s being kept from having an active role in the order, it’s being goaded by snape, it’s being stuck and unable to help, all in a place that represents everything he spent his teenage years trying to escape.

hermione consistently points to sirius’s instability, says that she thinks he’s being unwise, and when harry takes it as an insult on his mental state – it isn’t an insult, it’s a correct observation – hermione says that he’s been lonely for a very long time. and she’s right. in ootp, we see the effects of all of this on sirius, and they’re invariably negative in the extreme.

it’s heartbreaking to see the contrast here, because in one book we see the best of sirius: loyal, selfless, protective, and loving. immediately following, we see the worst.

but even at his worst, even amid his own battles with illness coupled with the fucking infuriating things about sirius black, he protects harry. he goes to the ministry to fight because harry is in danger, and he dies protecting harry.

sirius was fucked up but even at his worst, he still fought for harry in the end because there was no way in hell the person he loves more than anything else could be in danger without him there to protect him. he lost his duel with bellatrix because he underestimated her, because he’s prone to losing himself in the thrill of the fight, because he couldn’t resist the temptation to goad someone he loathed.

but he went into the ministry that night to protect harry. he would have done it for james, sirius, remus, peter, or lily at twenty; he would have done it healthy in gof; and he did it as sick as he was in ootp.

in spite of everything that happened to him – and everything intrinsic to him, all the cruelty and grudges he clings to by nature – sirius is a good person.

because there is nothing sirius black would not sacrifice for a person he loves.

Preliminary Assertiveness Research

I made my first foray into looking for tips on becoming more assertive today by typing “assertiveness practice” into Ecosia (it’s not the best search engine, but suffices for most purposes, and it plants trees), squinting suspiciously at the first three results, skimming through them and scoffing loudly at everything remotely scoff-worthy.

Then I remembered that becoming more assertive is actually important, that I should be searching out and soaking up all useful things instead of mocking the rest, and realized that a contemptuous and reluctant mindset might put me at a disadvantage there. So I took a deep breath and started over.

The very first result is a page geared towards people with disabilities. Pro: it uses simple, straightforward language, which makes it super easy to read. Contra: it offers a self-test which I immediately took (because yay, self-tests!) and which asks you to mark statements such as “You have a right to stand up for yourself” as true or false. This seemed somewhat simplistic and made me doubt if I’d find much useful stuff on this particular site. I moved on anyway, because you never know.

Below, I’ll quote passages from the site and offer my comments.