It is actually very extremely freeing to step back from a stressful situation and say, “Actually, I don’t care about this anymore.” And then just let that shit go!!!! Try it sometime! I highly suggest it!
Found my husband’s baby book. OBSESSED with an image of him, newborn baby, on what looks like a large white comforter, alone, with the caption New Guy In Town. Obsessed I tell you.
The true 90s baby aesthetic as computers in the home were normalized
legit the best advice i can give you: feed your friends
any time someone is in any kind of crisis or upheaval, offer to feed them. tell them they don’t have to choose what it is if they can’t make decisions, just ask about allergies and preferences and tell them you’re just gonna make food happen at their house.
friend having a baby? delivery gift certificate to order food to the hospital after the kid shows up.
someone’s relative passes away? offer to make them dinner.
buddy gets laid off? ask if you can order them lunch.
pal stuck in a depressive episode? offer to drive them to fucking mcdonalds, if that’s what they want.
people in crisis are tired and sad and angry and the last thing most of them are doing is thinking about feeding themselves. so if you have the ability or time or money, providing that is always, always a good move.
legit i do this all the time, and it is 100% always appreciated. i have taught all my friends that when something happens, we feed each other. it makes people feel extremely cared for, and I cannot recommend it enough.
but what might be even more important is “I didn’t say it was bad, I said I hated it”
I just wanna say if you hate something good because it sends terrible messages that’s fine but you can also just hate it because you hate it. free yourself of the struggle to find a “good enough” reason. sometimes it doesn’t hit right.
“I hate this author’s writing style”
is not the same as
“this author is bad at writing”
I love a lot of terrible things. And I hate a lot of things for absolutely no reason.
That is not a reflection of anything but my interests.
being sexy literally has nothing to do with looks… you need to be a little bit weird and strange and unusual. people who are physically perfect by societal standards are not sexy like where’s the flavour. the body hair. i’m right
This is a really helpful suggestion if you find yourself taking some time to adjust to someone’s new pronouns/name!
I think the point of this post is actually that for some people, it really is hard! As somebody else said in another thread of this post, it’s especially difficult for people with ADD/ASD/Dyslexia. I have ADD and am on the spectrum and my brain does NOT like change!
BUT—and this is the important thing—hard isn’t a reason not to put in the effort! Which is exactly what the tweet is about. It acknowledges that for some people, it IS difficult, and that that’s okay, so long as you still work on it. There’s no shame in having a brain that doesn’t adapt well to change. There IS shame is not doing everything you can with that brain to validate somebody else’s existence.
seconding this as a nb person. It definitely can be hard for people to get used to new pronouns (or names), and that’s fine! What’s not fine is not bothering to try, because it’s hard. If you’re putting the effort in, we notice and, for me at least, that’s generally much more important
Everyone slips up sometimes. It’s inevitable. Just try harder.
something I enjoy about adulthood is that most of the traits that made me weird and off-putting as a child are the same ones that make me popular as an adult
truly the end goal is not “my close friends aren’t annoyed by me and it’s all in my head, they’re my friends and they love me”, it’s “sometimes I do annoy my close friends, just as the people I love most will also annoy me sometimes, because this is normal, and we will continue to stay friends, and they’re not going to want to immediately cut me out of their life if I do something annoying once in a while”
when u have something to say but ur brain hasnt organized it into a sentence yet but u have all the words so u just go ahead and say them in whatever order ur mouth sees fit
i think sometimes that in writing and life we make the error of assuming what someone is pushed into saying in moments of extreme emotion are the Most Truthful.
there are times that difficult or ugly things are true, or when people need help letting go of ugly things they don’t WANT to believe but do despite their wishes.
but that feeling of “i wish i hadn’t said that” after an argument, or someone else saying “i regret saying that,” isn’t necessarily trying to brush away an uncomfortable “truth.” in writing conflict, and in real life, a lot of the time people are shaped by the choices that they make AGAINST their most selfish, base instincts. this is why pushing against someone until they break and spill ugly things at another person isn’t necessarily uncovering their “true” feelings.
(maybe this perspective is partly from having dealt with intrusive thoughts for so long, thoughts i’ve had to learn don’t define me or aren’t “really” me as long as i’m making the choice to not act on them or dwell on them.)
often, people have two reactions to a situation: an impulsive reaction and their considered reaction. choosing to bite one’s tongue isn’t just polite, but it can be an intentional act of love or kindness. it’s not cowardice or dishonesty to do the hard, crawling work of reshaping your own internal responses out of some greater motive or care. and the things that people say when they fail to do this aren’t always the things they WANT to hold or believe.
that’s why “clearing the air” in fiction can ring false. most people don’t feel better, not for long, about saying gross things they are frequently tempted to hold on to. sometimes, someone finally being honest can be refreshing, but most of the time unless clearing the air is actually sorting out misunderstandings that cast things in a better light? people end up feeling worse.
that’s becuase the uglier things we think about each other in our relationships are, to some degree, only true if we let them be. the compulsion to just finally say that awful thing that runs through your head when you’re already upset isn’t going to actually vent your anger the way you hope it will. you might feel better for a little, and then what you’ve done really is worn a groove in the neural pathway of being an angry, cruel person. if you do that often enough, then the actual truth in play is that you are a person who won’t do much work to shape kindness in yourself, and will always hold others flaws against them for your own emotional convenience.
in life and in fiction, kind people usually aren’t kind because they never think anything awful. it’s becuase they’ve never let those grooves wear deep. they’ve refused to become addicted to the short-lived high of explosive impulse, with all other considerations taking a backseat. choosing kindness in relationships, no matter now difficult they are, is a daily choice where the truth of what you think about another person is what you choose to focus on and say. it’s looking at someone with intentional, active love and care. it gets easier with practice.
and some hard truths are most truthful when they’re delivered with the same considerate love.
in writing relationships and in real life ones, make sure you aren’t assuming people at their worst are saying the most truthful things. sometimes, the truth is in what someone is choosing every day even when it’s hard.
