Sunshine Challenge prompt 7
Aug. 17th, 2019 09:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meridian_rosePrompt 7: Be Your Own Light
"We wanted to end this challenge with something a little different.
At this time, we want to encourage everyone to make a post to discuss at whatever length comfortable something they love about themselves. We recognize that this is both very introspective and personal, and that sharing the results can be difficult."
Some ramblings on what I'm good at and where I'm doing better and where I want to do better, under the cut.
Creativity. It's part of who I am. It's why I get so depressed when I can't write, when the ideas won't come - the words is one thing, but when the ideas go it's hell.
That I enjoy learning new things - new words, new snippets of information each day.
That I try to be a nice person; that doesn't mean I don't have strong opinions on certain things but that I try to interact in nice ways with people. I like to leave comments on fanfic, on graphics, etc. I like to take an interest in people's lives and try to find the right things to say on their personal posts.
I try to give encouragement and virtual hugs where needed.
I don't tolerate bullshit about my sexuality and I do my best to support all the expressions of sex, gender, and sexual orientations.
I don't tolerate betrayal, and as part of that I'm loyal. I've spent time building up relationships online, some good, some where we've become mutual beta-readers and cheerleaders and good friends- right up until they lose interest in their monofandom and dump all traces of fandom and online interaction; or they shit on my sexuality (really tired of this one); or they otherwise dump me. I've become more wary now about developing deeper relationships beyond being acquaintances but I'm not ready to give up completely.
This year my goal at Snowflake Challenge was to be kinder to myself and I'm doing better with it. When I'm not writing I acknowledge that I'm never going to be a 'write every day' person but a 'write in bursts' person. I let myself be sad and feel the feelings until they pass which is way better than pretending I'm not sad.
The person who hurt me while I was down last year pulled a lot of "it's not that bad...you can't still be sad about x...just watch this shitty asmr video*...ugh you're making me sad'. I've got better at accepting my feelings despite that but I still don't write a lot of personal stuff here at DW because I've had the "it's not that bad" from those at LJ, DW, as well as her at Tumblr.
Maybe I can get better at expressing myself again. I've come out of my comfort zone a bit for this challenge which has helped.
On a related note I've got behind on replying to comments and haven't downloaded personal email for months. But I've been making in-roads the last few days by trying to delete some stuff and respond to a few things on the webmail version, and have some ideas on adding filters before I open the email client to reduce overwhelming. Telling myself it's ok not to reply to every single comment, so long as I do the majority and the newest ones. That people understand when things have been rough and you can't do All the Things.
Because I've not seen email for a while I've also missed seeing birthday annoucements and I'm sorry for that. I always like to send good wishes to people. I'll try and do better in future.
One way I am expressing myself more over the past year or two is allowing myself to write fic I want, regardless of the ship, or with asexual characters for example and post. To write some fic that might get unwanted attention and post it anon at AO3 because that's better than not posting at all - I've previously thought I should willingly put my name on anything I post but in these times and where I'm at, that's not always 100% possible.
Despite my lack of writing compared to previous years, I've been posting original content every week to my writing blogs for over a year (not quite two, I think?). Sometimes it's been difficult, sometimes I've had to re-use and slightly edit older content from DW, but increasingly it's been newly written. It doesn't get much audience despite the multiple places I publish and promote, but I do the thing.
The challenge adds If you are able to share your post in some way, we also invite you to ask your friend list to comment and add things they love about you as well. You may well be surprised by the results.
Have at it :)
[*I don't have a problem with asmr vids aside from the idea that they're especially therapeutic though they can be relaxing. I don't get the tingles but they come in a wide variety beyond just 'tapping on a mic and whispering' and like fanfic run the gamut of awful to professionally performed, and some of them are do come into my areas of interest or even kinks. What I didn't appreciate was being told that some strange woman inaudibly whispering affirmations should comfort me as a substitute for interaction with a real (if online) person because they're sick of me being honest about feeling down]
"We wanted to end this challenge with something a little different.
At this time, we want to encourage everyone to make a post to discuss at whatever length comfortable something they love about themselves. We recognize that this is both very introspective and personal, and that sharing the results can be difficult."
Some ramblings on what I'm good at and where I'm doing better and where I want to do better, under the cut.
Creativity. It's part of who I am. It's why I get so depressed when I can't write, when the ideas won't come - the words is one thing, but when the ideas go it's hell.
That I enjoy learning new things - new words, new snippets of information each day.
That I try to be a nice person; that doesn't mean I don't have strong opinions on certain things but that I try to interact in nice ways with people. I like to leave comments on fanfic, on graphics, etc. I like to take an interest in people's lives and try to find the right things to say on their personal posts.
I try to give encouragement and virtual hugs where needed.
I don't tolerate bullshit about my sexuality and I do my best to support all the expressions of sex, gender, and sexual orientations.
I don't tolerate betrayal, and as part of that I'm loyal. I've spent time building up relationships online, some good, some where we've become mutual beta-readers and cheerleaders and good friends- right up until they lose interest in their monofandom and dump all traces of fandom and online interaction; or they shit on my sexuality (really tired of this one); or they otherwise dump me. I've become more wary now about developing deeper relationships beyond being acquaintances but I'm not ready to give up completely.
This year my goal at Snowflake Challenge was to be kinder to myself and I'm doing better with it. When I'm not writing I acknowledge that I'm never going to be a 'write every day' person but a 'write in bursts' person. I let myself be sad and feel the feelings until they pass which is way better than pretending I'm not sad.
The person who hurt me while I was down last year pulled a lot of "it's not that bad...you can't still be sad about x...just watch this shitty asmr video*...ugh you're making me sad'. I've got better at accepting my feelings despite that but I still don't write a lot of personal stuff here at DW because I've had the "it's not that bad" from those at LJ, DW, as well as her at Tumblr.
Maybe I can get better at expressing myself again. I've come out of my comfort zone a bit for this challenge which has helped.
On a related note I've got behind on replying to comments and haven't downloaded personal email for months. But I've been making in-roads the last few days by trying to delete some stuff and respond to a few things on the webmail version, and have some ideas on adding filters before I open the email client to reduce overwhelming. Telling myself it's ok not to reply to every single comment, so long as I do the majority and the newest ones. That people understand when things have been rough and you can't do All the Things.
Because I've not seen email for a while I've also missed seeing birthday annoucements and I'm sorry for that. I always like to send good wishes to people. I'll try and do better in future.
One way I am expressing myself more over the past year or two is allowing myself to write fic I want, regardless of the ship, or with asexual characters for example and post. To write some fic that might get unwanted attention and post it anon at AO3 because that's better than not posting at all - I've previously thought I should willingly put my name on anything I post but in these times and where I'm at, that's not always 100% possible.
Despite my lack of writing compared to previous years, I've been posting original content every week to my writing blogs for over a year (not quite two, I think?). Sometimes it's been difficult, sometimes I've had to re-use and slightly edit older content from DW, but increasingly it's been newly written. It doesn't get much audience despite the multiple places I publish and promote, but I do the thing.
The challenge adds If you are able to share your post in some way, we also invite you to ask your friend list to comment and add things they love about you as well. You may well be surprised by the results.
Have at it :)
[*I don't have a problem with asmr vids aside from the idea that they're especially therapeutic though they can be relaxing. I don't get the tingles but they come in a wide variety beyond just 'tapping on a mic and whispering' and like fanfic run the gamut of awful to professionally performed, and some of them are do come into my areas of interest or even kinks. What I didn't appreciate was being told that some strange woman inaudibly whispering affirmations should comfort me as a substitute for interaction with a real (if online) person because they're sick of me being honest about feeling down]
no subject
Date: 2019-08-17 03:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-08-18 11:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-08-17 05:54 pm (UTC)Off-topic but my curiosity was piqued when you mentioned your email client. It's rare to see someone mentioning webmail explicitly, lol. Are you a Linux/Unix user?
no subject
Date: 2019-08-18 11:56 am (UTC)No, Windows :) I use Mozilla Thunderbird to download all my main email addresses to, been doing so many years :)
no subject
Date: 2019-08-19 02:39 pm (UTC)humans and fandom and depression
Date: 2019-08-17 08:00 pm (UTC)re: depression, paraphrased from actual conversations…
sister: "You know if you didn't have such a negative attitude all the time, you wouldn't be so depressed."
me: ::internally screaming::
me: ::tries to describe my depression to someone who doesn't seem to be getting it::
her: "I'm going to go out on a limb here, but have you ever considered that you might be depressed?"
me: ::blinks::
her: "No, really. You should think about it."
me: ::desperately trying to reach out to someone asking for help:: (because of all that "asking for help is the first step" advice or even "asking for help is the hardest part" b.s.)
friend-who-was-apparently-not-my-friend: "This sounds like something you should talk to your friends about."
friends: "Remember that we are always here for you if you ever need us!"
me: ::begs for a shoulder to cry on when I'm having a bad day::
friends: "Sorry I'm really busy and you're being kind of a downer right now anyway and you are perfectly capable of dealing with this on your own. We believe in you!"
One ex-friend of mine gave me the suck-it-up speech once (when all I was asking for was to hang out with someone sympathetic) and just a month or so later posted to LiveJournal about how she had a rough week and was going to go stay with her mom for the weekend because sometimes you just need to be around someone who'll love you and take care of you for a few days. And I just remember staring at my computer screen numbly thinking, "Bitch, you wouldn't even have dinner with me and you know I can't just go home to my Mom when I'm having a bad week."
I do get that depression has this feedback loop where you don't have the energy to do anything fun or even take care of yourself properly and then that makes your depression worse leaving you with even less energy to do anything fun or take care of yourself and I think from the outside people don't understand which came first. But you can't just break that loop by going "Today I'm going to suck it up and not be depressed." and having someone imply that you can and are just too stubborn/lazy to try makes the depression worse.
The worst negative internal monologue I have is a combination of every "helpful" person who told me I just need to try harder.
Re: humans and fandom and depression
Date: 2019-08-18 12:00 pm (UTC)friends: "Remember that we are always here for you if you ever need us!"
me: ::begs for a shoulder to cry on when I'm having a bad day::
friends: "Sorry I'm really busy and you're being kind of a downer right now anyway and you are perfectly capable of dealing with this on your own. We believe in you!"
This so much. one minute they're venting about their family and reblogging "This blog is a safe place, talk to me if you need to" and then next it's "ugh stop being sad and writing dark fics" :/
There's no one way or thing that helps except time, other things vary, but sometimes knowing someone is listening is important and it's hurtful when the people you trust turn on your like that and pull the "just do better" thing.
Thanks for reading and sharing your own experiences, it makes me feel less alone!
Re: humans and fandom and depression
Date: 2019-08-18 06:33 pm (UTC)My experience has made me very cynical about those "You can always talk to me" offers now because when I hit rock bottom, all but one of my friends bailed on me. And apparently a couple of them told her that she shouldn't be enabling me because I was a grown woman who should deal with my own problems. (What's the correct way to have an emotional breakdown? If I don't open up about my feelings I'm being stubborn and repressing and I deserve my problems since I won't even ask for help, but if I'm honest then I'm being a negative whiner and if I ask for help I'm being needy and shouldn't be dumping my problems on other people.)
And I even understand the "can you please stop being so negative because you're making it worse" attitude. Sometimes the best thing you can do is change the subject to break the cycle of ruminating on upsetting things. But… you don't just interrupt someone in the middle of trying to open up. Also, even if you're thinking it (even if it's true!) it's never helpful to tell someone, "You're being too negative." I think the kindest thing you can do for a friend in need is just be with them.
You are definitely not alone. It's just that depression is just such an isolating experience, it always feels that way.
Re: humans and fandom and depression
Date: 2019-08-19 11:38 am (UTC)I can't always be there either but I too never promise that, and when I am around I do my best, and that's all any of us can do!
"Just be with" yes, that's it exactly. Not try and fix things, just let you feel how you feel.
It's been eyeopening to talk with you and a few other people about all this and see that I'm definitely not alone in these feelings nor these experiences. *hugs*
just being
Date: 2019-08-19 06:02 pm (UTC)I would much rather a friend tell me "no, I don't think I can" than "yes, absolutely, count on me!" and then not be there when I need them. (And the ones who have let you down repeatedly so you stop asking, but then later go, "Well, that's your fault for not asking me. You know you can call me any time. I would have been glad to help out.")
All of the people I'm particularly grumpy about are ex-friends for this reason (plus one well-meaning-but-unreliable friend who I'm relieved moved away because even though she genuinely meant well it was very stressful never knowing when she was going to bail on plans). But I've got a new set of acquaintances where I sense the pattern repeating. Gushing promises of "You can count on me!" where I find myself being very doubtful.