the spectrum heart cathedral system

Got barely 6 hours of sleep. God allowed this. Deprivation wakes up the kakofoni so we can SEE them and RESIST their subtle evil

Morning food obsessing and panic
Talking to Jesus about it in Mass & Adoration
True food vs luxury
NONE OF IT MATTERS IN THE LIGHT OF THE CROSS!!!
THAT'S THE "COUNSEL & TEMPERANCE"

Also spoke to SPICE about it!!
She gave data on why those foods were useless, then pointed out FEARFUL foni, we realized their reactions ASSUME DOOM??? LIKE "NO" IS NEVER AN OPTION OR EVEN POSSIBILITY????
Spice also said "don't forget the original reason I exist" = PAIN BUFFER

Asked CHOCOLOCO for assistance in resistance but he said THAT'S NOT HIS DOMAIN??? But he IS keeping us from buying anything chocolate peppermint, so thank him

Making OCD "vows" in desperation, hoping that would "force stop" the insistent compulsions. But it didn't.
ONLY MOURNING DOES?????
We forcibly "wanted" the gingerbread cereal, even if the monkfruit makes us sick, even if we're scared of cinnamon, even if we detest the taste of sugar, even if we were genuinely terrified at the thought of actually swallowing the stuff-- none of that could stop the compulsion. Even shaking with fear, and miserably helpless, we couldn't say no; we "had to do it." We "wanted it," with no explanation or evidence other than blind & violent insistence.
And then we suddenly remembered that grandpa loved ginger snaps, and before he died, the lotophagoi stole and ate one of his bags.
The shift was IMMEDIATE. The unbearable guilt & shame & SORROW completely killed the maniacal gluttony, replacing it with a bluetone self-hatred that INSTEAD made us want, just as violently, to THROW UP and possibly kill ourself.
THIS IS INSANE. WHY ARE THE ROOTS FOR THAT ENTIRE BULIMIC-ABUSIVE HELL STILL IN OUR HEAD?????
At least we can RESIST them now, THANK GOD!!!!


BTW remember yesterday's HOMILY GLANCE that INSTANTLY & TOTALLY "reconciled" Fr. E to us.
He was saying something about the "my burden is light" gospel, i forget what, i can never remember. but he said something like, we often think God is harsh with us, or that He won't comfort us? something negative. "but that's not true," he added. something like that. "God isn't like that." and he looked straight at us.
mind you we are the only person who sits on that side of the chapel altar. he did that on purpose.
and instantly, it felt like the burden had been completely lifted from our shoulders.


today, Fr. J said THIS Antiphon right as we were struggling with the E.D. =
"O God, who gave the Priest Saint John an outstanding dedication to perfect self-denial and love of the Cross, grant that, by imitating him closely at all times, we may come to contemplate eternally your glory."
It was a clear direction for us. We humbly & gratefully realized & accepted that in the very moment, however shakily.
1) SELF DENIAL. That's the bottom line. No matter how loud the E.D. is with its demonic desire for "dainties", we MUST STAND OUR GROUND FOR CHRIST. 
2)
3)

Terce's Psalm 119 was immediately applicable to our morning warfare too, as we dwell among the manipulative lotophagoi and belligerent kakofoni who all hate peace and will never work for it.

Adoration for 90m as we "lost" the first 25m to hypochondriac food allergy terror.
Did a lot of talking with Jesus though, and He LITERALLY SHUT DOWN THE ADDICTION COMPULSIONS with gracious reason??? He didn't "wave a wand" as it were. He knows how mental we are. We discussed the struggle, and by His Words and His Love together, somehow the obsession just STOPPED.
It's oddly fitting that I can't remember how.
...


Shopping day again, as we had non-EBT funds. Exhausted but had to do it. Only local though thank God, the unwanted "compulsion" to do stupid luxury shopping was thankfully ANNIHILATED

Brain just NOT WORKING AT ALL today. Probably the lack of sleep.
The fact that we haven't gotten sick yet is a miracle.

3PM BK WTF.
OCD rituals are TERRORIZING again

Evening=
Mom car switch, she was infodumping about Longwood again, haha. She really loves it. We consciously chose to pay genuine interested attention to her, resisting the stupid devil temptation to empty distraction. We WANT to listen to her, dummy!
What was that old quote... "who is the most important person in the world? Whoever you are with right now. What is the most important thing you could possibly do? Being completely present to that person right now." That's the gist of it. We think about it a lot.

Mom then SHOCKED us by saying out of the blue, "when the January doldrums hit, remember, we're going to start watching DOCTOR WHO!"
OH MY GOODNESS I THOUGHT SHE HAD COMPLETELY FORGOTTEN OR CHANGED HER MIND IT'S BEEN TWO YEARS.
But... no coincidences, dude. Last night we started uploading 2017 at long last. That's when & where WE first met the Doctor, and we are forever grateful. Honestly we are, and always have been... but tragically I don't know if we ever expressed that to TBAS before we stupidly "bailed" on our friendship, twice. What a jerk we were.
Nevertheless, we'll always be grateful. And Eleven will always make us think of them with utmost affection.

Night=

well.
we forgot that when we try to feed this poor body after 8pm, no matter how careful we are, it WILL collapse into a bingepurge.
those stupid beans did not help, let me say that much. we put like one tablespoon of them in with the broccoli, and within minutes, we were worriedly wondering, "why do we feel so nauseous?"
WELL BUDDY THERE IS LONG-STANDING DATA THAT SAYS THAT WOULD HAPPEN IF YOU ATE THE BLOODY THINGS BUT NO ONE CAN EVER ACCESS THAT DATA WITHOUT A BRUTAL RE-TRIGGER FOR SOME ASININE REASON.
seriously WHY. why can we NEVER remember that something is painful or dangerous or otherwise a trauma trigger until we literally re-experience it and make the trigger even WORSE???
in any case, we had a hell of a night. it was agonizing.
oh yeah, and WHOEVER BOUGHT WHITE CHOCOLATE NEEDS TO LET GO OF THE PAST.
that poem does not define your life, no matter how kind the author's original intentions were. you are putting so much power in their hands, based on a snippet they wrote over a decade ago based on, what, an hour of interacting with you? and you just clung to it like a liferaft. why? is it because you were so desperate for q & y to write about you, to hear anything from either of them, some proof of love, but nothing ever happened? so when you got this unexpected thought from a total stranger, comparing your voice to an easter confection, you took it as the word of God.
stop. please. it doesn't translate to reality. you cannot be forcing our poor body to eat that stuff anymore, in the tragic frantic hope that you can become someone worth loving, someone worth writing about, as a result. whatever you're trying to do. i don't know. i'm not the one who did it. the compulsion is too blind anyway. it's the terror that if we don't buy and eat it, we're rejecting that "only hope we had." we're invalidating the only scrap of affection we received in our own language. et cetera. dude you need to work through all that stuff, it's been literally over ten years, why is it still not settled?
but now isn't the time.
all i want to say is that, please, stop letting the lotophagoi buy food. they adhere to obsessive obligations, not nutrition or sense or even system data. everything they do is in order to appease someone else, or to obey some random new rule that they read on the internet. it's all driven by fear of disobedience, fear of punishment, fear that if they don't do what the other people are doing, they will be even less human than before. something like that. i can't phrase their feelings very well, they're too raw. that's something they would have to express on their own, and we can't get that deep right now. no time. no leeway for exploration, not tonight.
God please we need time to go inside ourselves again. that's keeping us stagnant. and it's feeding these bad nights, pun horribly intended. i wonder if that's playing into it as a hidden motive somewhere. who knows.
all i know is this:
DON'T EAT LATE ANYMORE, DON'T EAT ANY CANS OR CANDY, AND DON'T EAT WHEN YOU'RE SOCIALLY OVERSTIMULATED YOU IDIOT.

there's no memory of the before or after, as usual. there's only one or two flashbulb of "during," both panicked lucid snaps when we briefly realized that we were on a highway to hell and the brakes weren't working.
but we survived. apparently. thanks be to God alone, all credit to Him. we don't know how to recover, it's always two seconds away from calling an ambulance. all we can do is try our best and pray, and when the Spirit talks, do what He says.

praying right now that we feel stable enough in the morning to go to Mass. promising God that if we do, we will. hoping He will answer that prayer. the thought of not going to Mass, even for one day, is so unbearable it's unthinkable.
no matter how stupid and foolish and afraid and sad we may be, even if we messed up bad again tonight, twice in one month, that's frightening-- no matter what, God is there in the Tabernacle waiting for us, to heal us, to give us strength to try again.
that's hope enough for everything.


------‐--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first reading at Mass today was one we actually love, and on this particular morning it spoke straight to our wretched heart anew. It was Isaiah 41, with that liturgical opening line that guts us every time.
Here it is straight from the NASB =
"‭For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand, Who says to you, ‘Do not fear, I will help you.’ “Do not fear, you worm Jacob, you people of Israel; I will help you,” declares the Lord, “and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel."
And here are our favorite translations =
(Verse 13)
"‭‭‭For I the Lord will grab you by the hand and tell you, “Don't be afraid! I myself will help you.""
‭"For I, Yahweh your God, am grasping your right hand; it is I who say to you, “You must not fear; I myself, I will help you."
"I am the Lord your God. I am holding your hand, so don't be afraid. I am here to help you."
‭"For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, “Fear not, I am The One Who helps you.”
(Verse 14)
"Do not be afraid, Jacob, poor worm, Israel, puny mite...Do not fear, you worm Jacob, you maggot Israel!"
"Others may say, "Israel is only a worm!""
"Fear not, O worm of Jacob, you who are dead within Israel."
"You are as small, lowly, weak, despised, powerless, unimportant, insignificant, and worthless as a worm..."
"‭Do you feel like a lowly worm, Jacob? Don’t be afraid. Feel like a fragile insect, Israel? I’ll help you. I, God, want to reassure you. I am The God who buys you back, The Holy One of Israel. I’m transforming you from worm to harrow, from insect to iron..."
And the last=
"Don't worry, don't be frightened... I Myself will help you, says the Lord; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel... I am your Savior, Defender, and Protector."
Do you see how much richness of mercy & power & love & humility & grace there is in those two verses alone?? Every translation reveals more nuances of God's Heart towards His people; worms though we may be, we are saved and even cherished by the Holy One Himself!!

Honestly verses 8-20 all feel so personal it aches.
...
The Universalis commentary to that reading today was just as unexpectedly headspacey as the reading itself, so actually i should comment on its clarifications alongside the raw text.
A DISCLAIMER = I am in no way appropriating this. I fully accept and honor the actual, original, divine meaning and historical application of these words of Scripture. They are not to be removed from their context. HOWEVER. God's Character does not change, and Scripture is living & active. What is true here for ancient Israel is also "true" for me, in a real yet symbolic manner, both as a member of "spiritual Israel" through my Christian baptism, and also as a mere human being experiencing the same archetypal events as they. So I apply this to my own life as a microcosm, as my own individual share in the eternal Truth of this Scripture, because if God responded to His people in this situation in this specific way, then He must respond in kind to His people in like situations in this modern age-- after all, it is HE Who orchestrates all the events of time to begin with!
So I can trust in His Word to hold true to my own foolish little life, too, as worthless and useless a worm as I am. God has still helped me. And therefore I must tell of His unchanging Goodness.

1) Isaiah 41 is "promising the ecological transformation of Israel, a sort of pledge of the return of Israel/Jacob to the land devastated by the Babylonian invaders."
My first thought? Headspace. Our innerworld was DESTROYED after CNC and never rebuilt. We've never actually returned as a result. We're living in ruins, in scraps of memory...
The "Babylonians" here-- the pagan invaders-- were not a specific person, but a military force. So too with us. Our REAL devastation, what TRULY shook our city to shambles, was wrought by what CAME INTO HEADSPACE-- which can only be the most deadly thing of all: a thought. That's all it takes. One cancer cell starts the whole takeover. One small insect starts the whole infestation. And a thought is more virulent than either.
...
But we're missing the whole point.
This entire prophecy is God PROMISING TO TRANSFORM THE LAND.
Our city is in ruins. Our forests are in ruins. Everything is devastated. God is promising to bring THE LAND back to life so we can live in it. Because let's face it-- unless He does, it is utterly uninhabitable; not just because everything has been crushed and shattered down to dust, but also because even when it was still standing, all the foundations were totally wrong.

2) "This [transformation] will NOT be the work of Israel/Jacob itself-- which receives only the uncomplimentary names of ‘worm’ and ‘insect’-- but it will be accomplished by [God alone]."
AND THAT'S WHY WE HAVEN'T GOTTEN ANYWHERE IN FIVE YEARS.
We were destroyed BECAUSE we were "trying to do everything without God." It's impossible to rebuild from that same vain mindset. Those rotten foundations need to be torn right out of the parched earth and completely re-set, just as the soil itself needs to be completely rejuvenated before it can grow anything. You get the idea. We can't do any of that ourselves. We don't have the knowledge OR the means OR the manpower; we have nothing, nothing. We're utterly bereft.
But when we can admit that and turn to God in trust, then HE will do EVERYTHING, for HIS glory. And what better glory is there, but glory to Love and Light and Truth as they REALLY are? We ignorantly and proudly thought we had those things, back in CNC, with our glitter-guts and sparkle-sins that blinded us to how base of a beast we were. we were injuriously iridescent. a pernicious prism. etc etc. the surface was all shimmer but beneath it was just scum.

3) ""The LORD, the Holy One of Israel, your Redeemer"= These three titles all express the special closeness of God to His people which is so predominant in this chapter.
‘I am the LORD, your God’ takes us back to the revelation of the Divine Name to Moses at the burning-bush; the giving of a name is itself an expression of intimacy.
‘The Holy One of Israel’ is Isaiah’s special title for God, used liberally throughout all the parts of this Book; it bespeaks the awe and reverence in which the LORD must be held.
Finally the ‘redeemer’ or go’el is a special family word in Israel. The go’el is the closest family member, who is bound in family love and lore to bail out his nearest family member if the latter is in dire trouble. The LORD can be relied on absolutely, just like the family member, to bail out Israel. This is the first time the concept has been applied to God; it is frequent in this second part of Isaiah. Clearly it is an important part of the concept of the LORD at this crucial moment that He can be relied on to deliver Israel from the captivity."
I've noticed that God really loves to use personal possessive pronouns, and it's... it's so deeply sweet, it shocks you speechless. "YOUR God," He says. "yours." and He says to us, "you are Mine." so on and so forth. it's not possession of objects. it's so intimate, so affectionate, it's almost incomprehensible to admit that this is being said BY OUR CREATOR.
What shocks me even more, and what actually hurts in light of headspace, is that bit about the bush. God shows up, reveals His existence personally to Moses, and what does He do? He gives us His Name. He ACTUALLY tells us Who He Is. I can't repeat it, I can't. But that's proof of its truth. And seriously, think about it! Who would ever think that Divinity Himself, the God of Gods, the ultimate Source and Preserver of everything, would give His Name to an old shepherd in the wilderness? To say the least. But He does. And why? Because they are His people, and He loves them, and He is coming to save them. So of course He gives them His Name. How strange, that the impossible becomes the essential, now that God Himself has declared the relationship. "I am your God," He keeps repeating. Yours. There is a belonging here, something determined by God Himself, a covenant of promise that He Himself holds faithful through all eons of time, because He wants to be ours. And that's why Jesus has a Name, too. How much more vulnerable and sweet and true and holy is that, for God to take a human name to Himself and sanctify it forever-- a name we can speak, we feeble humans, our clumsy languages and careless mouths, God has taken a human name so we can talk to Him as humans. There's so much sincere intimacy in everything God does, it's astounding.
Even so, He is ALWAYS THE HOLY ONE. Note the "the" and the "one." There is no other; there can never be any other. God is GOD. He IS holy. He is utterly beyond comprehension and description. To see Him with human eyes is to be struck dead. To touch the sacred things without His explicit command is to be struck dead. It's not by whim, it's by transcendence. Our mortal bodies and minds just shatter at the exposure, by design. Again, this is why Jesus is so amazing-- He IS this One True Holy God, but visible, tangible, comprehensible.
...



------‐--------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Today, what is one way you can love God through your obedience?
+ I can spend intentional time in prayer, seeking guidance and wisdom from God.
+ I can choose to show love to my enemies.
+ I can confess my hidden sins and bring them into the light."
1) ...oh boy, that does not describe our prayer times. Yes, still. That's genuinely disturbing. We're just so scared-obsessed with "getting all the dailies done" that we can't rest, and "talking to Jesus doesn't count" unless we're at Adoration.
...
2) My first thought: what counts as an enemy? Must it only be people? Or could it be our OCD? Because "choosing LOVE" would indeed change the game, and (if done right) defeat the enemy. Love isn't sentimental feeling, it's not romance, it's not sappy silly sensual garbage. Love is RIGHTEOUS and TRUE and PURE. Love is self-sacrificing. Love is merciful and just. Love is GOD. But then how do we "apply this" to our situation? Only through Christ.
And therefore, we must also recognize the true context of love, which is relationship. That requires PERSONS. We cannot "show love to" a disorder. But we CAN manage it in a way that shows love to GOD, in how we show love to His Son, Who has made us into part of His Own Body. Christ enables us to love our enemies because He died for them too, and if we are OF His Body Crucified then we are NECESSARILY bound to express that love TO His enemies, SPECIFICALLY, in both generous purity of undeserved grace AND the sincere hope to convert their hearts to Him through such unconditional compassion.
...
3) I personally think there is a KEY difference between "confessing" a hidden sin, and "bringing it to the light".
...

The written reflection today is very beautiful.
"We imitate those we love. As all of us grew up as kids, we imitated those around us so that we could learn and grow. During that process of growing, we naturally gravitate towards certain people we want to be like."
Let me pause here because this is something we never thought about and there's a LOT of weight in this observation.
First, though, consider this: we were isolated. We didn't have a "selection" of people to imitate. We had no neighbors, no friends, no social groups, et cetera. And yeah, we did prefer that. Even as a child, when we were given the opportunity to socialize, we rejected it with utmost distaste. We would much rather read and draw and talk to our imaginary friends.
...and really, THAT'S who we were imitating, for the most part.
Yes, we definitely did imitate our grandmother and father as a child. I can see bits of them in our personality even now. But as for the vast majority of our growth? We were copying fictional people.
It never ceases to stun me, when I pick up a piece of media from our childhood to revisit, and suddenly it's like looking into a mirror. Vocabulary, mannerisms, fashion, behaviors, interests, etc. It's jarring, to be honest, to realize that we were cobbling our "self" together from the media we were exposed to, because we had no physical people to imitate... at least, not anyone that... that we...
...We didn't want to be like our family. They fought a lot. They scared us a lot. We were punished and beaten and threatened and mocked and bullied. Oh of course we also had BEAUTIFUL days, so many good days, but... there were enough bad days and nightmares to make us afraid to imitate those people, knowing what we would be "taking into ourselves" by proxy, almost.
...
...did we truly love our family, as a child? how did we reconcile the fear alongside it?
God that makes me want to sob. did we ever learn or recognize what love truly was back then?
...


"Someone you know is grieving the loss of someone or something. Reach out and let the love of Christ touch them through your kindness and compassion."
Oh this is hitting a lot of bruises.
1) That "cold-hearted" part of us, whyever it's there, immediately reacts to this with a sneer. It thinks grieving is stupid. It thinks losses are deserved. It has no patience for mourning or tears. "Get over it," it snarls. "So what if you lost it? So what if they died? It was bound to happen. You can't do anything about it. It is what it is. Man up and move on." et cetera. empty, heartless words. where did that come from? it's not us. but it's in our head. we don't want it.
we WANT to be compassionate. we WANT to be able to see grief and not panic in fear, or scowl in disgust. why those two responses?
2) it's not about us. we have to let THE LOVE OF CHRIST work through us. and what does that say about compassion? what does that say about what REALLY IS RIGHT in this situation? If GOD reaches out to touch the hurting one, to give kindness and compassion, then to NOT do so is outright demonic.
sit with that. let it scare you. then beg for grace to stop being so evil.
3) but why are we evil. we WANT to be kind. we yearn for it ourselves, as well as for others. we see people in tears and we WANT to comfort them, but the very thought is terrifying, and then we shut down and turn cold. is that the chain of events?
...


"God, in life’s dark nights, let Your love rain down upon me. In life’s dark nights, let Your love stir the heart within me. In life’s dark nights, let Your love reach others through me."
...this is so absolutely headspace relevant it is breaking my heart.


"By the example of the saints you instruct your faithful in the ways of wisdom and love; through our pastors, help us grow to the full stature of perfection."
*immediately shows this to Chaos 0*
seriously though this is heartachingly beautiful. this means that true perfection is wise and loving.
...

 

another quick update, faster than a phone, because it's almost 1am and life has been a trip

dyspnea tonight. not sure why. it was gone for weeks and then within the past few days it's been back. not sure if it's because of the smoke outside or what, or if it's our body struggling to readjust to exertion after the jademonth, but either way it's back and it makes us twice as tired and dissociated because hey, feeling like you're slowly suffocating will do that.

anyway. important notes for today.

first, the "misdreavus effect."
remember there was this one day, way back in 2001, where jewel was playing silver version and was in mount silver, for like two solid hours, trying to find a misdreavus because she loved them... and then she suddenly realized, wait a second. they only come out at night.
well.
apparently there are nousfoni that do the same.
it completely shocked us. it was one of those lineups of circumstance that could not be planned or even expected, because it's not something we ever would have guessed could do something. like a really bizarre easter egg in a game.
we were moved by grace and penance to say ALL our night prayers tonight, the full hour. we'll talk more about that in a bit. but when we went over to the prayer rugs to say the wall set, it was too dark to see without putting a light on, and someone had the idea to grab that little sticky-button light from the drawer and use that as illumination. the thing is, that light has four color settings, and white was too bright, so we switched it to green.
and INSTANTLY we had 2009 SPATIAL FLASHBACKS.
we had forgotten that we used a green lightbulb during that time. and the literal life-feeling of that SLAMMED into us. we had to change the light color because it was messing with our temporal awareness that bad.
the blue light setting didn't do the same, because it was just slightly leaning indigo and that made it a different hue from the bulb we had during that same jayce-house period.
anyway. that's one note. there's very little memory for it because it shook us up so bad, triggering dissociation and memory failure.
HOWEVER. because of its disorientating effects, when we "came back" and still had to pray, the only way to override the inevitable worsening of flashbacks would be to have someone unrelated to that era front.
that's when it got interesting.
we didn't realize that foni can be illumilocked, as it were. trying to invent jargon on the fly. timelocked foni are well-known, those whose anchors are fused to actual chronological spans, to specific years or months or eras. but for a foni to only be able to front, or exist, AT a certain time of day-- or rather, as it even more shockingly seems, in certain contexts of luminosity-- is a new revelation, although unsurprising in principle. dark and light feel SO different, and in trauma history, certain things ONLY happen in the dark, or in the light. and day/night cycles don't necessarily affect this: you have all heard of the redlight lemur-foni in the bathroom that adelaide found. same with ashen only being triggered with the fluorescent light and closed doors. it's all about the context of the light source. it's fascinating. change that, even a little bit, and you completely shift the resonance, and therefore whether or not any foni will resonate with it at all. the specificity of triggers never ceases to amaze me, both in their existence and their effects. they can't be falsified or even guessed at. when they hit, they hit like a bomb to the brain.
anyway, this isn't the time to ramble and theorize, we're too tired. point is, it happened.
i know a few of us in the "day crew" were trying to front, but it was unusually difficult. maybe it was the green light doing it, because we turned it back on out of morbid curiosity, as it was putting that background hum of historical fear into our brain. we've prayed at night before, with white light, and nothing happened. but this green... it shook things up.
julie tried to front, i remember, and that was the turning point. when she moved into the body, but felt that old fearbuzz, she couldn't front, because she was afraid HERSELF, not in sympathetic response. she was scared of whatever in herself that green-dark was triggering. so she bailed.
and freakin' LEANNE SHOWED UP.
listen. she hasn't been seen in years. but when she moved in, not only did i KNOW it was her-- you never forget a foni's vibe once you've felt it, and her magenta hue is unmistakable-- but in such quick succession of fronting, in tangible space, i could FEEL the difference between julie, who is apparently lightlocked, and leanne, who is darklocked. there is a completely different base note to their energy which is AMAZING to suddenly have the experiential knowledge to distinguish. couldn't do that if i didn't know there WAS a feeling-shift to discern.
no sign of the jabberwock by the way. they might have died with most of the other daemons.
on that note we still don't know WHY chocoloco has survived. perhaps he was never a daengel to begin with, which honestly wouldn't surprise me. he just got lumped in with them because he's so freakin' bizarre. maybe he's a 'prototype' in some way. but i won't theorize so emptily. that only causes false ideas. i have to sit and feel things out with knowledge and memory to back it up, and now is not the time, nor am i equipped at all what with all the memory loss and locks we're still grappling with.
anyway. illumilocking. julie can't front in the dark?? actually could she EVER??? all the memories we have of the julie days-- and they are few, but horrifying-- involve her abusing us IN LIT ROOMS, either daylight or fluorescence.
when the night hacks began, the era had shifted, remember? she was still the hacker queen, but there was so much else going on, so many others working in her stead. we need to review those memories now that we know there's stuff to look for.
but. when julie fled from fronting today, that significant action "lit up a key note" in our head-- again, scrabbling at makeshift jargon here based on feeling; it's like a "new message" light on a phone, but also push-pinning something to the staff bulletin board, or hearing a single "ding" note like a code being called in a hospital; something calling a THOUGHT to attention, "attend to this, do not let this slip by, do not shove it under the rug, pursue this if possible"-- and the unstated order was, run this course. push the envelope. keep poking it with a stick. see what happens.
we continued praying, not commenting on the event or realization, but it was held by that pseudojewel "watcher" and it was a tickertape in our subconscious. so we watched too. sugar tried to front next, BUT although she felt like she could if she wanted, that garish green light (the key!!) was unnerving, and reminded HER of those old days, that awful 2015 era, so SHE left too. there was a bit of front-jostling here, as the prayer was being automated inbetween which was equally disorienting, but people couldn't say their typical prayers in this weird environment so it was defaulting. all i remember is laurie trying to come out for hers, BUT her resonance caught the light and LANCIFOLIEL SHOWED UP.
that was enlightening, pun intended. it hit 'me' that what seemed to be happening with her and julie, was that the systemind was yanking out foni with similar resonances or anchors to "substitute" for whoever had just been bounced or bailed thanks to the green. it was a kneejerk, almost instinctive action on our mind's part, something triggered by FEAR, almost a survival response. "this person left but someone NEEDS to front or we're in danger, so someone else NEEDS to take their place NOW." and it kicks out whoever is immediately accessible, which in such a context, would apparently be 1) someone with a close enough resonance TO be shoved out so fast and 2) someone who is darklocked. at least, in this situation.
might change that jargon if it proves incorrect btw. "locked" may not be true. IF people like lancifoliel & leanne CAN front in daylight situations, then we'll change the term to match.
but back to the update. lancifoliel hasn't fronted in years either, from what i can remember. and she's NEVER fronted this clearly. again, no idea why this vague terror-haze mental environment was ALLOWING these longlost foni TO be there, other than the fact that they have darker anchors and potentially NEED such environments in order to front, or even be found. again, we're going to investigate this further in the future.
but lanci was out. her hair is reminiscent of laurie's, but with much wider and smoother "spikes," all that dark vermilion, with black streaks. oddly it feels like awareness data was behind her head, and outside for the most part. same with leanne. we can't "get into their heads" even when they're in ours, not yet at least. again, it's understandable, but fascinating. so we can see the back of their heads, and get a bit of "innersensory" data on their hair (always an anchorpoint), and their vibe, but... not much else. no kinesthetic data. no eyes. no voice memory. all of that would require stronger fronting, more time, and deeper familiarity.
interestingly too, both lanci and leanne felt like they weren't choosing to front. they were being put there. they weren't really aware, either, of themselves or us, not heavily so-- there was a notable lack of "selfness" in their recorded fronting data. like they were half asleep. but they were there!

last bit, adding this later as we forgot...
after lanci left, razor moved in for her prayer (the "if we die today" one). after her was wreckage. after her was knife. after him was siobhan. all of them fronted with no problem. honestly i would say they almost felt more comfortable, in a sad way, in that context? like not a "soft" comfortable, nothing relaxing or resting, but instead a feeling of "ah yes, this is familiar. this is what i am used to. this is what i am meant for." it had an edge, even a bit of sadness, but there was an odd smile, too. "this is where i belong," at least in terms of where and how they were born. it was very bittersweet. but they ALL had it, and the foni like julie & laurie DIDN'T. but leanne & lancifoliel did. different, just slightly, but that "base note" was there again. the similar resonance. the traumabuzz in the back of the skull, echoed in that green light.
so that's important too. there are little distinctions we never knew before, because we never were aware of the contrasting data. we only saw, or felt, one side, if any.
thank You God for this, actually. this is what makes us feel alive. even frightening things. if it brings our hearts into clearer vision, into stronger feeling, into deeper unity and awareness, then we will take it gladly from Your Hands and embrace it totally.
we just want to live together, all of us, again. there is so much love here. even in the scary days. even when we feel lost and angry and afraid and empty and confused. at the very bones of it, in the very blood of us, deep down at the absolute core of everything we are, there is love. only love. always love. and thank God for that. thank God for us. no matter what. 



okay, we're starting to get dissociated and sick from... something. up too late? no idea. weird emotions moving in. feeling front slipping. simeon at the ready, hello! moving into a different space of headspace. different place in the head.
gotta hard shift here
still things to type can we get autopilot on this, is that possible, do we still have one, him, someone conscious?
no too detached. won't work for data like this. stored in different places

who was typing

second point. let's get this done quickly but importantly
BEFORE all that, actually, we were praying at the altar. memory picks up when we were saying the prayer cards, because they usually take ~20m and part of our brain was exhausted and wanting to skip them (there's always a ton of emotional interference around prayer, due to mental exhaustion). that "watching" nonself-awareness saw/felt this and the wordless thought was put out, "we need people who can pray." and it reached in to clumsily nudge JOPHAEL out. "can he do this" basically.
surprisingly, he could NOT???? apparently his job is more tied to church?? so the "watcher" instead called VEIL out to front.
two things.
one, i have NO IDEA how the "watcher awareness" can do this. "she" has a minimal sense of self, with no ability to front or exist as a person, but she acts as a sort of databank with exorbitant privileges concerning them. we need to investigate her at some point too.
two, apparently there are a LOT more foni than we thought, but just as much as we NEED, because remember back in 2015 although things were literal hell we were paradoxically learning how to FUNCTION in the midst of it all, arguably better than ever in some cases, and that was because we were LIVING FULLTIME AS A SYSTEM, and EVERYONE HAD A JOB.
and watcher-girl is apparently able to feel the "job vibe" needed, and almost blindly reach in to fish out somebody close to it.
so veil was pushed out. again, her sense of selfhood is very different from that of a centralite. i think this has to do with what level of "headspace" they exist on; foni on the body level tend to have far less of a solid self-awareness than those on the heart or head level. even so, with enough time spent fronting, it can increase-- but if you really want a lower-level foni to gain self-awareness in a pinch, get them talking to the upstairs gang. nothing boosts consciousness moreso than communication. unfortunately this can backfire with some foni, such as lotophagoi and "damaged ones"-- we need jargon here too-- solely because the more trauma they hold, or exist to live within, the more forbidden selfhood is, and any spark of such awareness can kill them. it has happened before.
anyhow. veil is still a solid violet hue, still the same physical appearance too-- lovely arabic nose, dark almond skin, surprisingly heavy eyelashes. BUT there was a surprise with her function: as she was praying, she felt a strange dissonance between praying to jesus or asking for mary's intercession? she was getting pushed into the former at the expense of the latter. like something in our subconscious was hyperfeminizing her, to the point of misandric tendencies. which is bizarre and very unlike us. however this upset her and she felt genuinely distressed-- again, selfhood!!-- and ASKED God to fix that. "fix me," she prayed. something like, "make me someone who isn't like that." and instantly, almost imperceptibly, there was a shift??? her appearance changed from just a feminine foni wearing a veil to that of a nun. like now she had a habit! but still violet of course. anyway with this appearance shift, she now felt no dissonance with prayer. so that was notable. had to write that down.
jophael, for the record, seems to be more oriented towards church than private prayer? his entire vibe data feels broader, more outward. also still unsure if he vibes yellow or amber, technically. feels hovering at the moment. we'll check it better soon when we're not so fuzzybrained from being up this late.
last important note. as we prayed the cards, we were getting "colors" from some of them? like subtle synaesthesia. not sure why. but it pushed veil out as it "no longer matched her." and as the systemind fumbled to find someone who could pray, it found two people. first was a completely new monk foni, like saint francis, wearing a simple soft-brown habit with warm brown eyes and a scrap of beard, but with such a loving heart; oh my goodness his vibe was so lovely, and he prayed with such simple ardent sincerity. second was PATRICIA???? i think??? not christina; they're sisters but chrissy has that "prissy" vibe unfortunately, or at least she used to. it's been so long since we've seen either of them, the only immediate distinguishing note is their color-- patricia leans purple, christina leans violet, and that distinction is tangible. unfortunately i can't catch any data on that from tonight, as it was such a sudden and shallow switch, i don't even know if they were able to stay to pray, but the point is one of them was pinged. is that the proper jargon? they were pushed out to front, but only because their resonance was pinged, like "ah yes, there you are, someone that matches, out you go." like a "match found!" light going on when searching data keys. something along those lines.

LAST BIT. again adding later as i almost forgot.
julie was on bodycare duty tonight, and at one point she suddenly "alarmed" the upstairs for help because there had almost been a HACK?????? apparently she had moved the body a certain way, just a brief moment, and that (again) hyperspecific action almost BLACKED OUT THE BODY and would have caused a HACK.
she was terrified, and both jay and laurie were on immediate call to help her, but julie said it was okay, she was okay, she just felt that huge and horrifying risk and needed to tell us.
...
that is genuinely scary as hell. we didn't think hacks could happen anymore, not since we got out of cnc. but... our stay in upmc reactivated the dream hacks, and we have been having them ever since (curse this weight gain), so... potentially i guess a literal hack could happen, if we were trauma-dissociated enough? i know there ARE still hackers, which is TERRIFYING to realize, but it's true. i've seen them. i don't know how or why they still exist. maybe just because of unprocessed trauma. maybe because they're holding everything infi used to swallow entire, poor wretched thing. but i can't think about that right now.
just... be careful. please. without infi, i have no idea what would happen, if something that bad happened. we haven't had a "new era" in a very very long time, we still don't know what the heck the tar and plague are doing... don't risk anything. please be careful. i still say hacks are impossible, but... when our consciousness is compromised, hell can break loose. and if julie felt a risk THAT strongly... that honestly scares me to death. be careful. please. be careful.



but yes. big takeaways from all this:
1. there are a LOT more religious foni than we realized, again this is not surprising at all but we just never thought to look.
2. we ARE hyperspecific and THANK GOD because this is the ONLY way we're going to be functional again.
3. be very aware of just how specific triggers can be, or have to be, in order to trigger out foni. we cannot predict this.
4. SUBCATEGORIES. when we're apparently this specialized, we need rolebanks for reference.
5. JARGON IS NEEDED BUDDY
6. SPECTRUM HUES. sorry about all the capslock. but we NEED to feel them out, get their vibes solid, find their realms, so any and all "new" foni CAN PROPERLY ANCHOR INTO THEM.
7. we're not as dead as we thought. go through the censuses. find us.


we'll update more tomorrow, god willing. this was imperative for tonight.
there is SO MUCH to type about concerning the jademonth and our coping or lack thereof, but that's going to take several hours if not several days worth of entries. nevertheless, it must be done. we're reeling and now it's JULY which means we're gonna get A LOT OF FLASHBACKS and i can feel them creeping in around the edges already.
considering redoing the chizu + saint ann week, to see what that does to our brain, now that the system has reawakened. gotta have a safety net first though, the last thing we need is to ironically wake up whatever or whoever was wrecking the rest of our life at that point.

archiving has been on pause for obvious schedule death reasons. also trauma avoidance. we're at 2017 and we are NOT READY to face that at all.
"jay" is still mourning infi on a daily basis, and chaos 0 is still an emotional hurricane over everything with them, and today is the 12th anniversary of the pink event, which was a literal hinge date for our history. i don't even know if that entry is public, oh wait yes it is. that xanga where laurie had to talk him out of suicide for like twelve solid hours. i know no one looked at anything for today because no one is ready to do so. man we're tired of averting our eyes from our own life. we need to just sit and read everything and remember that WE EXIST.
good news, we have one appointment with a local counseling center next month, and several phone numbers bookmarked to call for potential therapists. but we need to get help. our symptoms are getting... distressing.
someone had a baby crying in the hall today and we were actively slamming drawers and seething just to abate the misophonic ragefear so we wouldn't hurt ourselves. yeah we forgot misophonia was a thing, we were googling our symptoms the other day and bam, there it was. also apparently we DO have some subtle schizophrenia symptoms??? have to check that again but nothing obsessive, honestly i don't want to know ANYTHING about the dsm-v or whatever, i just want us to get into therapy and see what the professionals say. i want to go in blind, with just us. everything else is infectious and potentially corruptive. i don't want any vocabulary or comprehension but our own. if something is a symptom, i don't want to know! not unless we're sitting in the shrink's office. but yeah. the glimpses we've seen suggest a LOT more going on than we would ever have guessed, so we do want to get thorough help once the pros help us figure out what's actually going on here.

but. final note. most important thing.
in the end, therapy/ counseling/ whatever is only being pursued in order to lessen the "danger" level of our symptoms; less rage, less violence, less compulsions, less delusions if we have them. things like that. we want to be able to function on a daily basis without seething meltdowns and self-abusive paroxysms and numb-state abysses and the like. we want to be able to FEEL EMOTIONS other than terror, wrath, and unbearable flashes of grief. we want to be able to love again. we want to be able to live AS A SYSTEM and i am telling you right now, if ANY therapist so much as hints at nousfoni death or forced reintegration i am going to pointedly give hatchet the steering wheel. just kidding. but she will junk any and all pill bottles you throw at us, so you have been warned.
bottom line is: nothing will come between us and us. we are a system, and we love each other forever, and we will heal AS a system, no exceptions, no excuses, no objections. we do this together. and we will make sure that is respected. i promise.
if we're gonna grow and learn and heal and love, it will only happen together. it can only happen together.
if we're not us, we're nothing.


all right it's 240 good heavens we gotta get this body some sleep, see you kids

 Wednesday. 

010718.
sunday.

We finally realized why Tobiko hasn't been the one purging anymore.

Food does not register as food.
We've been using food as a stim.

We've been using a LOT of things as stims, actually.
This explains the bathroom rituals.
We brush our teeth, floss, brush again, floss some more, use mouthwash, brush our teeth again, wash our face, wash our body, wash our hands, wash our face again… over and over and over and over. We do this for an hour, sometimes, just scrubbing at our gums and our flesh, scrubbing until we are red and raw sometimes. We do this in the shower, too-- we obsessively wash over and over and over, not even thinking that much about "being" clean as we are thinking about feeling clean. It's why we cut our nails down to the nubs and shave every hair off that we can reach. It's never about the end result, not literally. It's about how it feels. It's about purging everything that hurts in the most literal way we can think of.

We eat when we don't want to because it NEVER registers as eating. It registers as stimming.
This is why preparing food used to take, what, six hours back in PA? Because it was never about food. It was, again, a matter of stimming. Of sensory soothing.

Remember that one night in SLC where we sat on the floor of our bedroom, rocking violently back and forth and flapping our hands so hard our wrists ached, blasting Serph at high volume on our headphones and stretching our legs against that rubber band until they, too, were sore from exertion? Pure stimming. Pure mindless stimming. THAT'S the key here.

We've lost all our old methods. We can no longer walk in circles in the living room, or the kitchen, or the driveway. We can no longer go hide downstairs by the furnace, or lock ourselves in the bathroom-- although the latter was always a horrific trauma trigger, as was the attic, even moreso (which is why we didn't even bother to list it here.)
We can't even self-abuse in the "traditional" way anymore. We don't have razors. We don't have knives. We don't have blades. (and oh, how our heart aches at those words-- no, those names, beloved and tender as a wound) We can't bite our arms anymore, can't slap our face, can't yank at our hair, can't claw at our skin or punch our legs or stomp our feet. All our old stimming methods, as violent as we need them, are gone, are forbidden. And our brain is boiling over.

It's been shutting down a lot lately and that terrifies us, to be honest. OV has it easy. He can stim with an adorable little squishy macaron or peach or donut, can play with fidget spinners or kaleidoscopes or even just a piece of jewelry. That's enough for him, it seems, and that makes us super happy. We love him, we love allof them, and the fact that they can use such mild methods to soothe their addled brain is deeply soothing to ours-- in a different sense. We would never inflict this aggressive need of ours on them, not for the world. And yet, here we are, needing it, and terrified because we can't explain it to him, terrified because he thinks we're doing it out of hatred, out of rage, out of suicidal ideation. It's exactly the opposite. When we don't do it, the stress and pressure gets so intense that we wantto die, and we stop caring whether or not we do. That is what's lethal. Not the stims.

The problem is, though, that the stims are dangerous in and of themselves. All of Cannon and Gamboge's old methods drew blood, marked bruises, left scars. All of them beautiful and beloved, true, but still risky to our health… and yet what we wouldn't give to be able to flay this flesh wide open again, even though I can feel Scalpel shaking his head at that thought even now. Why so?
"It's dangerous," he says. "You're right. Even though it is effective, and beautiful, it's also just as addictive. You know just as well as I do that once we start that, we can't stop. We want to bleed and scar forever. And that will kill us."
So will this "eating disorder." But I suppose that's the point of this whole entry.

Food is the simplest, easiest, most "socially acceptible" form of stimming and self-abuse that we have left at our disposal. It's all we have left on days like this.
Except, now, we can't, not without risk of condemnation and distrust, not without hurting someone else more than we ever could before or would ever want to. OV knows we have a problem, but he doesn't know why-- heck, even we didn't know that until this afternoon!
But it's why we go absolutely bonkers in the kitchen once he goes to work and MC goes to sleep. We racked our brains over that for weeks, for months even. We don't want to abuse ourselves, we don't want to suffer or humiliate ourselves anymore, so why this? Why can't we stop this? Why do all of the nousfoni tied to this have such shockingly, irresistibly powerful anchors? Why can't even Laurie stop them? Why does NO ONE, deep down, even want to? Why does it feel like we're being "betrayed" by the System itself in these nousfoni being given free reign and full power over our body and actions in the middle of the night?
We know why, now. It's because they're trying to save our life.
They're STIMMING. They're desperately attempting to soothe our hurting brain, to ease our aching heart, to comfort the poor screaming ones inside. The ONLY way we've EVER known how is to somehow "burn it off" outside. Even now, right now, although we're enjoying typing, our brain is too high-strung and our body is immediately defaulting to the urge of "eating." We aren't hungry. We never are. But that's the point. This isn't about physical hunger. This is about spiritual hunger-- psychological starvation. This is about us needing something we still can't seem to get and scrabbling at the scraps of it wherever we can find it.
Truthfully, we just want to isolate ourselves completely, close our eyes, rock back and forth like a lunatic punching bag and just let our brain turn off as completely as possible. But the key, again, is isolation-- that terribly dear thing we have NEVER been allowed to truly get, not since childhood, and which we have been aching for for longer than we can remember lately. There are no locked doors here. There's no cellar, no attic, no closet to sit in. God how we miss it now, how we miss being a child, ignored and alone in that dearly forsaken house, feeling like we were the only soul(s) existing in the entire world. Just us, and the quiet, and the sunlight, and our heart. We need that like the air we breathe, and we don't know how to get it anymore, because we never realized until we moved out here how we need love like the blood in our veins, pun entirely intended.
That's the killer. That's the real awful thing here.
God I want to cry. Our body is desperate right now, we want to just… scream and punch things and stomp the floor until our knees hurt and throw things and bite things and just let ALL the steam out. There's no malice in it, ever. But it scares people. It terrifies them. We're a monster, and we love what we are, but… we're still a monster. We're a scary, terrible, incomprehensible thing sometimes, and it hurts when our sharp edges cut even the people who try to love us regardless.

Our body wants to food-stim because that's the only thing it can think of to do right now, and yet it KNOWS that it doesn't want to. The very thought of "eating" is making Overload want to scream and throw the plate across the room, is making The Destroyer want to set the entire freaking refrigerator on fire. We HATE food; we hate it for being the only accessible way we were able to dissociate and heal for years, without being hacked.

Yeah. Isn't that the bloody cincher.
Hacks. Why the heck do you think they kept happening for so long?? Why the heck do you think people stopped fighting after so many hellish years??
It's because they hurt, they ate hours of our time, and they isolated us from the world. Yeah, they were absolute hell, that's the indisputable truth-- but the other awful truth is that we didn't want to live in the first place.
God. Those poor, poor damaged kids, sacrificing their souls and selves just because the world at large outside was somehow even scarier than blacking out for three hours and waking up in blood and excruciating pain and mental terror. At least then they could shut down. At least then they could hard-reset their memory, splinter a little more, break a little further, forget most of their entire life and pretend nothing was happening. They just wanted to run, God forgive them, they just wanted to hide and sleep and rest and the ONLY way they could was by shutting everything off. God forgive all of us.

Hacks don't happen anymore. They can't. Not since 2016. Not since Infinitii's presence truly registered, not since we realized what we were actually looking for and what was actually happening in contrast. The truth of it, the harsh horrific reality of the situation, was too terrifying to ever allow ever again. And so hacks stopped completely.
And the eating disorder exploded.

We knew that was going to happen, really. Stop one addiction, but leave the reason why it developed in the first place, and a new addiction will return or appear to replace it. The body is just hopelessly wrecked, man, it doesn't know what else to do.
Why do you think we started flirting with EVERYTHING that would detach us from the reality our poor brain couldn't cope with anymore? We started drinking. We started smoking. We started abusing prescription meds. We experimented with asphyxiation and anesthesia and everything we could think of that would detach us from the awful soul-crushing loop of that toxic household, of that dead-end environment, of the unending mental stress.
And somehow, some days, some nights, that still hasn't changed.
Like right now.

We have nothing. No paint, no sewing kit, no exercise bike, no weights, no internet, no Xbox. No isolation, which is the TRUE need behind ALL of those things. We can't do anything if we aren't COMPLETELY alone, and it feels like a kick in the face to the Broken Arrows, but God forgive us it's true.

We want to run. But we can't. Where the heck would we go? Everywhere out there, there are people watching us, there are social contexts "to obey" and our poor terror-hardwired brain keeps kowtowing to ALL of them. Even just now, when OV laughed or sighed or whatever that little dear breath was, we looked up, wondering-- are we needed? Was that a call for attention? What is the proper way to respond?
And then we wonder why people like Quicksilver exist, why that girl who fronts in the early morning exists. The nousfoni that will even flip off the people they love and say "shove off, leave me alone." The ones that seem coldhearted and callous and brutal, when really all they are trying to do is get us alone. They're trying to PROTECT us, bless their monstrous hearts, and we know it.
We're terrified of coming across as a horrible person, like we did to the kids in SLC. This is probably why. But we had no idea this was even happening back then-- we didn’t even know we were multiple, for God's sakes. Now, though, not only do we know, we understand, more and more each day.
So when OV sighs and someone immediately fronts with a middle finger and stony expression, they aren't saying they don't care. They're saying, "we can’t care right now because we are too burnt out TO do so without utterly sacrificing our health and your respect in the process."
So we sit here, miserable and overloaded, yearning for the opportunity to just… be alone.

God we both love and hate the nights when OV works. We love him, we love all of the Broken Arrows, but… it's just like when we started doing too much for church. We adore our faith, we adore its practices, but when you're expected to attend every daily mass, every weekly funeral, every weekend mass, every choir practice, every group meeting, every picnic, every bible study, et cetera… well, something in you starts to hate it, in utter paradoxical spite, in total impossible parallel to the love you still feel, solely because it KNOWS that if you don't stop you are going to burn to the ground.
So it stops it in the most complete, sudden, brutal, total way it knows how.
It scares the bloody wits out of anyone standing in its way.
People don't like monsters. People leave monsters alone.
So we learned to be a monster.

…God. What do we do.
We're thirsty. We want to cry. More than that, we want to scream and punch things, but that'll frighten OV, and we can't… we can't risk that. That's the horrible, horribly irony of this. We have to sacrifice our terrible needs for the sake of terrible love. What do we do?

People stay up all night because we need to be alone because that's the ONLY TIME we can brutally soothe our psyche. It's always violent love with us, did you notice? Always compassion and cruelty, or at least, what others would see as cruel. For us, it's just the rawest, most selflessly pure form of love. Love that doesn't deny you your needs just because they're strange or "socially unacceptable."

We want to run outside and go hide in that stupid McDonald's bathroom because it's the only place in town that feels like an airport-- totally insulated from the outside world, cold metal and echoing tile, quiet as a grave, no time existing in there at all. It always feels like 3 in the morning there, when you're by yourself. But that's the problem. It's a freaking bathroom in a fast food joint. It's not EVER going to be a failsafe place to be safe-- heck, the sheer simple fact that it's a bathroom has ALREADY condemned the poor thing beyond hope, thanks trauma. (God, there's that awful thought process again. Poor hurting kids. I wonder how many of them we've never seen, how many of them are still contributing to this in our sub(terranean)conscious.) But the one time we were in there, we felt-- God have mercy, what a dearly desired feeling-- like we were the only people on earth. Just us, just this body, just this tiny bubblespace of a bathroom, no time or space beyond. Just that single isolated moment. THAT'S what we need. YES, it's a literal NEED. It's why we risk our mental health going out literally EVERYWHERE when we walk in the mornings, exposing ourselves to too many soul-draining social contexts, desperately seeking a place where that won't be the case, desperately seeking some secret quiet corner somewhere that we can privately own, like the study nooks at Marywood, like the tiny pockets of woods.
…I wish there was a church with unlocked doors around here. God, we wish. We're nearly in tears just thinking of that. The ultimate met need. Isolation, but in a soaring wide-open emptiness. The feeling of our dreams. Rolling hills and labyrinthine halls and massive abandoned buildings and no one, NO one but us in them. Not even a gnat for outside company. Nothing. Just us, and the air, and the sun, and the clock ticking second after second, counting down to nothing, looping without an hour hand. That's what we want. Just… infinity. Eternity. God help us, no wonder hacks were a thing, I want to cry so hard we vomit out our entire respiratory system. This is wrenching and it makes so much sense. How did we never NOTICE this before???

…
What do we do.

Where do we go. It's 7pm, it's a Sunday night, we can't stand this social context right now, we KNOW OV is worried about us and that simple passive attention is keeping our brain in overloaded status and we want to weep because we care about them, too-- so much our heart aches from it, but what do we do? We love them, but… what do we do? We'll never stop loving them. We'll love them forever. But… sometimes, we dream of running away, of just sleeping in a field somewhere, of packing a knapsack and walking the railroad tracks for days, of catching a bus and just riding it until the end of the line and wherever we are, we are. We want no roots, and yet we want a home to go home to when the solitude starts to bite. There's nothing wrong with being alone. Just… souls need souls. God split hirself because ze needed to love more. We are made to connect with those other pieces, with every other bit of reality. And humans, sure we don't identify as one but this body is one, and we adore people, we do, we just… need to do this in moderation, I suppose.

Do we have a list? Do we even have options when this happens? When our spoons are so low the entire silverware drawer is missing, what the heck do we do, where do we go? When we're so weak we can't get undressed, is there anywhere we can be that will feel like the world has ceased to exist outside? I don't know.
Maybe we can empty out the bottom of the closet, sit in there.
No, no no no, I can feel the children shrieking at that idea even now.
Idola seems piqued. Maybe we should try. See what happens. I doubt hacks will happen--
They won't, but they'll be threatened--
In isolation hacks are always a threat because we black out,

What do we do.

It's too cold outside to go hide in the woods, or to even go find spots where we can hide. But Jewel is so excited at the thought. She has ideas.
Maybe we should try anyway? Get a blanket or sleeping bag or something, bundle up good, find somewhere in the woods where it's just us and just… keep that in our heart if nothing else, if we can't go there. Find at least one place in this new local world where we can be ironically cut off from it for a while, without risk of sudden jarring intrusion. Walking distance. Where can we go?
Buses.
Buses aren't cheap, kid, we need somewhere we can go on a dime without spending a dime, that's the problem.
I'm sure there's somewhere. Let's check Google Maps, find something out. I'm sure we can. Right? Are we done writing?
For now, maybe. I… the other topics we want to write about are huge. The hacks, for one, and the eating disorder in light of this.
But we have been writing about it. Both of them. Haven't we?
Not in as brutal excruciating detail and honesty as we need to, no.
Should we start, then?
Maybe. Hold on a minute.


Food stimming.
Back in PA, we had a soup pot, huge and solid metal, and every day, we'd start the morning by blacking out over a cutting board.
I don't know what we did. All I know is that the smell of wilted lettuce is one of the biggest triggers in the world, and we still can't put spices on our food without shivering in dread. Indian food makes us dissociate immediately, as do potato chips, and ice cream, especially Klondike bars… avocados are still terrifying, so are carrots, so is mayonnaise.
All of those foods were used for blatantly self-abusive purposes in the past and you know what? I'm going to say EXACTLY why.
There was a phase, in 2016, where all we ate for about a week was namkeen. Indian snack food. Just bags of (name). It made us horrifically sick but hey, snack food is an easy time-consuming stim, right? Even if it makes you vomit nonstop for hours-- even especially because it does! Because purging makes you even more dissociative, makes you able to sleep for hours because your body is so wrecked from the past several hours to even consider staying conscious for another second. The last day we bought Indian food, someone filled at least six entire cereal bins with the stuff, separating them methodically by ingredient, then going outside (thanks Destroyer) and flinging them all into the woods… and then hours later, even days later, someone else went outside in a scavenger-desperate mess and picked the pieces off the ground and ate them. We still cannot look at that memory without feeling instantly, unbearably sick. I assume it was all purged seconds after, but memory is black, punctuated only by tiny shattered snapshots of fingers wrestling bits of chickpea flour away from bugs and brambles and rain-muddled dirt.
Remember why P&R became the devil's household?? Remember how many actual HUNDREDS of dollars were spent there over several months, because the food there was dirt cheap AND typically already was garbage? Remember the granola bags with mouse holes chewed through them? Remember the instant noodles with mold growing inside? Remember the hummus that landed us in the hospital due to food poisoning? I know you do. We ALL do.
Oh, but THAT'S the most important thing, something we've probably mentioned in the past before but NEED to reiterate today-- the MAIN reason food was our main stim for YEARS was because, if no one is watching, you don't have to eat it.
We would buy starchy, heavy, crunchy foods, time-consuming foods, chips and cookies and cereals and granola and things, and we'd chew them up, ingredient by ingredient, piece by single piece, and we'd spit them out. Organize, chew, spit. Over and voer and over. And then, when the bag or box was done, we'd chew up the chewed stuff, over and over, until it was too saliva-riddled to chew anymore, and then we'd eat that and purge it immediately, too racked by family-instilled guilt at the thought of "wasting it" by throwing it away (no matter how moldy or rotten or inedible it was) to do so, even at the risk of our own health. That went on for years.
Then we couldn't isolate anymore, then we started losing too much weight, then our body forced us to start bingeing instead in a desperate gamble to get some calories out of it.
The worst chew-spit binges were in that one autumn that we re-read A Wrinkle In Time, with whoever decided that raw oatmeal mixed with molasses was the best texture for doing so-- probably because it took ages to mix up, causing our arms to scream with exertion from doing so, eliciting the same response from our jaws once it reached those. Pain, once sharps were forbidden. A horrific rerouting. And we did that for weeks, if not longer, until the passive sugar-exposure made us SO sick we ended up bedridden with a trashed immune system and too much nausea and chronic pain and hideous gastric distress to leave the bed. But to this day, anxiety-eaten nousfoni in this system, poor desperate kids, always look to the oatmeal boxes in the grocery stores even if the sight of them triggers immediate massive panic. Part of them also remembers a time when that food was the only way they could numb themselves to the world. So they hesitate. They're afraid, but they don't know what other options they even have. And every once in a while, we'll find a box stashed in a drawer or a closet, inevitably doomed to be in the garbage within hours, either thanks to the Destroyer or some poor purgative kid who just wanted to feel like they were throwing up the pain along with the carbs.

God. No wonder so many of our Daemons are tied to food. I wonder what Rupture knows, if anything. She's mainly the fear of dying in the process, of blood in our nose and throat, of our stomach screaming at us to stop. I don't know who holds this, this stimming nightmare… no one except Chocoloco, at least, and he only catches the frayed-end dregs of it, nothing serious, nothing traumatic. He's just that initial desperate programmed seeking of comfort in places where everyone who claimed they loved you claimed it would always be, and yet never was. Chocolate and coffee. Our family's "soothing staples," both of them doing nothing but putting us through hell since childhood. Still, desperate, we never gave up trying. Choco is pretty pissed as that, although nowhere near as much as he is heartbroken. His heart-host is angry almost all the time but it's for the same exact reason that any of us are angry right now-- because we're burning up inside, ripped apart and overwhelmed and sad, and we just want to hole ourselves up in the corner of a coffeeshop somewhere, in the evening when it's dark and softly raining outside and no one knows we're here and we have nowhere else to be, just us and this warm quiet soft place, and we can weep and cry and ache inside and this tiny childlike part of us remembers the days when a muffin and a latte made us feel real, made us feel like we could exist as ourselves apart from society and our family and anyone, like this little rite of passage was proof that we could survive alone, and were, in that moment. THAT'S what our hurt ones keep seeking, in that sort of archetypal memory, but Chocoloco knows it's ultimately heartbreakingly empty, that it's not food or drink or chocolate or coffee or caffeine or sugar or anything edible that we're seeking-- we're seeking his heart, we're seeking love, we're seeking the love that only we can give each other-- we're seeking ourselves.
We can't find each other if we're suffocating in the outside world.

So. Trigger foods.
Someone once wrote about this, too-- probably Iscah-- the science of "combined" and "fused" foods (she says yes, it's in her journal in detail). Well I won't steal her thunder, but the principle of it was this: if you want to make a food inedible but still ingestible, in other words, if you're trying to make a "stim food" instead of a meal, you need to make it as easily palatable as possible in the most blatant way possible. Which means, usually, you liquefy it. You blend things. You cut things into miniscule pieces. You take things like spices, and condiments, and sauces, and drinks, and you soak every stupid thing you have with them until your stomach heaves at the very sight of it, and when it's a slurry from hell you eat that as quickly as possible so your body rejects it just as quickly. Ideally, the whole prep process will take hours, as will the purging process afterwards, in a desperate blacked-out state, trying to get every last crumb out of our system. This is how we spent our days for years, inbetween church activities and family demands.
And isn't that the irony?
We were left alone. We were ignored. And yet, we were never isolated. The grandparents were ALWAYS there, always a few feet or a room away, watching, waiting, vigilant. If we disappeared from their radar for a few minutes, they freaked out. The only time we could "get away with it" was by being in the bathroom, behind a locked door, pretending we were taking a bath, when in reality we were slumped over a toilet wishing we were dead already, sobbing because we really just wanted to be alive already.
But we were never alone. We wanted to be alone, God knew. We wanted a place where nothing could touch us but ourselves.
That's how hacks happened.
I can't talk about that right now.

Potato chips. Cookies. Trail mix. Things like that. Our grandfather would hoard them in his closet, and when we weren't allowed to prepare or eat food in the kitchen anymore without being perpetually critiqued by our grandmother or psychologically terrorized by our brother, we would sneak into his room and sneak into the closet and gorge down a whole bag, not even wanting to, just desperate to stim away the constant fear and pain by crunching something sharp and salty until our mouth bled. But potatoes and flour don't purge easy. They stick like glue in your stomach, and they WILL make the next few hours feel like the central circle of hell. We know. We made that mistake one too many times. We thought we were dead, a few times. But somehow we survived. 85 pounds and throwing up junk food for 8.5 hours a night and we still somehow survived.
There was a time when we first discovered P&R and someone bought cheese curls and chips by the cartful, but they were bean-based, and when our body loudly let us know that it did NOT like beans, we threw them ALL out on the crudpile.
It rained that night. It was cold that night. The next morning, the food was somehow soggy but preserved by the temperature, and whoever the heck was fronting was starving and "couldn’t stand the thought of wasting that poor food" (why the pity on the FOOD being unloved and rejected?? why NEVER pity on ourself being the same???) and snuck out to that horrid garbage heap and ate them right off the dirt, brushing bits of soot and soil and ants off them in the process. Good God. How did we even survive.
They/we threw everything up in a panic shortly after. That was Tobiko's doing. She remembers that more clearly than anyone.
It wasn't the last time that happened. Someone grew fond of the process at one point, of the act of scavenging, of "finding food in the wild" and the time-consuming, stimming process of that fused with a broken sense of accomplishment and achievement. It never lasted long, but God knows they tried, over and over and over, until that last day with the Indian food. Thank God that hell is over forever.

The bloody Klondike bars and avocados. That was the WORST of it, shortly before UPMC. We realized that our body hated dairy, hated fat, hated chocolate, but we ALSO realized that the consistency of those foods was ideal for bingeing and purging, plus our body was seeking sweets out of childhood comfort desperation AND everyone we knew was INSISTING we "eat as much fat as possible."
So guess who binged on like eighteen entire avocados and ten packs of Klondike bars one night.
It was forced. It was forced so hard we thought we were possessed. We thought we were going to die. There's no memory of anything outside one hysterical moment when someone was shoving more chocolate into our mouth and thinking, why?? I don't want this, NOBODY wants this, I'm scared and sick and I just want to sleep, why can't I stop???
I don't know how that ended. All we know is that the family KNEW and they WATCHED IT HAPPEN and then afterwards they asked if we had "learned our lesson."
SHUT UP. YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT THE HECK WAS GOING ON, DON'T ASK IF WE "LEARNED OUR LESSON" BECAUSE THERE WASN'T EVEN A LESSON IN IT WE WERE JUST SO DESPERATE TO NOT BE IN PAIN ANYMORE YOU IGNORANT TROLLOP
Triple, watch your language. Be angry, but don't be so brusquely inconsiderate about it, please.
IT'S WHAT VOCAB WE HAVE FOR THIS KIND OF INTENSE PAIN. i'm sorry. i have no other words besides screaming.

Let's continue.

Coconut oil. the NIGHTMARE that is coconut oil. HOW much money was blown on that??
It was the best stim food and it was the SCARIEST one BY FAR, and that is SAYING something.
Our body does NOT like oil, and when you're literally buying PACKS of it because this kind FREEZES and becomes not only biteable and sharp, but chewy if you mix it with protein powder, and your poor malnourished body is craving both those things so it's a recipe for disaster already. We… I don't even remember. Literally NO ONE we can find even remembers, nothing beyond one snapshot of lying on the bathroom floor with that unmistakable special nauseating agony that comes from eating too much oil, literally begging God to not let them die, screaming in rage and determination that they'd NEVER do this again, someone (a Protector, Wreckage maybe, the Destroyer maybe, Laurie maybe) going outside in the 10pm dark and rain and throwing all of that garbage into the woods where it couldn't be salvaged (although we all knew someone would try).


…OV just came over and kissed us and someone actually wanted to give him a double flipoff in response. Not out of hatred, just out of "what the heck do you want us to do. We're tired and angry and can't do a SINGLE THING without your permission because we DON'T KNOW what we actually want and don't trust ourselves TO know right now. But we're overstimulated and overwhelmed and heartbroken and furiously distraught and you're kissing us like we're supposed to ignore all this agony and kiss you back. And God knows we WANT to. That's the problem. We WANT to, but then you'll call it self-sacrifice, and what the heck do we do??? We love you, we WANT to be with you, but our body wants something else and until we figure out what the heck it is, we CAN'T be with you because we won't be able to pay attention To you past this screaming discomfort and unsoothed pain. We don't know what the heck to do, and we hate that we have to snub and ignore you in the process of finding out simply because our brain cannot handle the stress of having to factor in another human being's presence and needs into our decisions and thoughts right now. We can't freaking multitask. Please don't force us to context shift so shockingly suddenly or we Will hit you, or bite you, like the monster and rabid dog we are at the moment. But we won't mean it, and we hope you know it, but we still can't take that risk of hurting you, so we completely shut down. We do nothing, we say nothing, we boil over like a kettle fit to explode, and we just want to get this problem figured out so we can safely let this scalding steam out so you can touch us without getting burned. That's all."

…

Do we eat? Do we drink?
This body has to use the bathroom. These clothes are too warm and soft and do you know what that's overstimulating? Because they make us WANT to sit and rest and relax and we CAN'T.
Iscah LOVES these clothes because that's ALL SHE DID. She rested, and relaxed, and took care of our body. When we wear these clothes, the body remembers that, and wants it just as badly. But in this context, no. No, here we're too afraid of ignoring people, of rejecting them, of the fact that OV just went and lay down on the freaking bed because he probably thinks we hate him when really WE JUST WANT TO DO THAT SAME BLOODY THING BUT WE WON'T BECAUSE WE LOVE YOU TOO MUCH TO LEAVE YOU.

what do we do. god. I don't know.

Is our body hungry?
It's thirsty. We haven't drank in over 3 hours and someone purged most of breakfast out of sheer dissociative panicked guilt, so that's even worse. Go use the bathroom, get a drink, then figure out what to do.
We can't eat without OV anyway, and he's hiding away from us. Did we hurt him?
…I don't know. I don't even know. I just hope he's okay. If he didn't, and he wanted to be alone, but was happy, would that be okay with you?
Of course it would be, but he's obviously not happy right now and that's the problem.
…Oh. Should we go talk to him, or…?
Maybe. I don't know. Maybe.
I think we should. Apologize for not being able to respond earlier, apologize for snubbing him on purpose because we were unable to respond in honesty to him.
All or nothing, huh.
Yeah. A curse and a blessing.
Are we done with this file for now, for the record?
Maybe? I think so. The big unanswered question is still: how do we eat food without turning it into a dissociatively abusive stim?
Eat it like we do in the mornings with him. Paying attention, letting everyone share it, not being stressed the heck out in the process. Stimming beforehand, even. Really, that's probably the smartest thing to do. Gotta find what works on short notice that won't hurt us or magnify negative emotions and do that.
Sounds good.
Body does need some self-care, though, so let's call it quits for now. Everyone good? Anyone got any last thing to say before we stop?
Just that Wegmans was a living hell, too, and we never want to go back there.
Then get over that place and every other place in our memory, kid. Forget them. Live here and now, and please, learn from that experience and stop thinking about it. Okay?
…Okay.
Just… let it go. Walk into memory and burn it to the ground if you have to. Whatever works. Just don't let it suck the joy out of our present life anymore. All right? We'll help you. We're safe now, all things considered. Just confused and hurting is all. But we're safe.
I know.
Then let's go talk to OV. He's the reason we can say that, after all.
We love him, even now. Does he know that?
That's what we're going to go make sure of, kid. Give me a minute.



Oh, wait!! One last vitally important thing.
The key to a successful stim is that it HAS to let our BRAIN shut down. Low-impact, low-speed, "mindless" activity so that we can DEEPLY relax, INSIDE. Books don't work, nor does TV, because they're too mentally stimulating. Food prep is too, actually-- that's why we keep hurting ourselves when we try! Same with the garage job. We try to dissociate with repetitive motion and forget that those motions have an end, both in result and process. That doesn't work for stimming!! However, THIS DOES. Weirdly, this typing REALLY helps, at least, in a different way-- it helps us untangle what hurts, and really See it. It doesn't alleviate the stress, just lets us know what we're looking at. What DOES help in a pinch is TUMBLR, on the phone, IF we do it safely. Yes, it Does work!! Because it's "mindless browsing" and you can link-hop FOREVER and find poetry and pretty pictures and just let our mind wander for HOURS if you have to. Spotify is almost this kind of stim but not really, because music demands Attention, but we can use that to a BETTER advantage because it draws us into our mind ENTIRELY. THAT'S an ideal stim, hence the old beloved walks in circles for hours, just imagining and thinking. My thing!! We've gotta find a way to do that again if we can. Maybe in the playroom, who knows. But we will. Anyway, yeah. When in doubt, grab Nelumbo, our beloved Samsung Galaxy S8 who we saved up for a year for and now had better use to show respect and gratitude for that!! Okay? We've got this. Now go tell the Arrows that we love them because they need us just as much as we need them even if they need space too!! Bye guys!!

-J.W.L. and the Lightraye aka Lotus Cathedral System ♥

[uncensored for brutal honesty]

proverbs 9:16-18


eating disorder hell.


Allergy panic girl
Blue obligation girl
Enjoying eater girl = tied to CAKE???????
Bingeing girl (once we hit "that point") = tied to RUPTURE.
rupture's "second name" keeps feeling lke GORGE but thats sounding like a SURNAME, NOT A SECOND NAME. why is this? is that name tied to her girl instead???
cannot even theorize rupture's second name because we do't know enough about her function and/or heart host TO guess.

tobiko hasn't been out in a while?
someone ELSE keeps purging, "we're going to die why cant we stop" mindset
tobiko would panic "get the poison out" then became dpressed and QUIT??? IS HER ANCHOR CHANGING LIKE RAZORS???
but this current purge person basically BLACKS OUT in the process. existing before nd after, not during.
too much fear and trauma to have tobiko front for that anymore???

WHERE IS SPICE WHEN THIS ALL HAPPENS?????


WHO IS TIED TO THAT BIG TAURUS DAEMON???
someone definitely is. but i think that soeone is still vague. i KNOW they were out but we can't even get thier fronting data (this is simeon, hi!)

Chocoloco still tied to angry "jess" BUT he was yelling at the latter nousfoni? the one eating the chocolate candy.
did they even like it????

THERE'S A BROWN MANIC WHO ONLY FRONTS TO LOOK FOR UPPERS????
"we need to stay awake, we need to have coffee and/or chocolate!!!!" 
BUT CHOCOLOCO ISN'T FROM HER. THAT'S SURPRISING.
WHY IS THIS?
(her heart can't hold a daemon??? choco tied to the global concept??? feel this out)

IS THIS THE SAME NOUSFONI WHO KEEPS DRINKING ALCOHOL OR ARE THERE TWO OF THEM???

there's someone ANGRY who comes out when we try to read corrective or self-knowledge stuff???
girl. close to angry jess root but not her. muddy brown, feels washed out. angry at me/us fr typing this but wont stop us? just a low flat disdainful anger.
the boy from yesterday (zodiac rage) has an edge to his anger. he'll yell about it. this girl wont. like a heavy dead weight anger, no action. just shutdown.
why? what are her roots?
her response think "don't think about that" nose wrinkle and try to BLACK IT OUT. like covering eyes. total shut off! scary.
why does she do that? doesn't she want to learn
she cannot front if someone else is strongly fronting? only if in vague pseudosocial mode? like readig.
need a name for THAT state of mind. different from upstairs AND downstairs. sort of an inbetween.
headspace level parallel???
anyway we have to find someone who LIKES reading that stuff so they can OVERPOWER that, for lack of a better term. (who am i, they're thinking i'm the "bleaching optimistic" one, that stings but i think its true.)
also, whoever this good-reading person might be, they CANNOT be hyperreligious, that only compounds the problem. religious voices need to be dealt with very carefully as they bring an entire other level of tangled motives into the picture and we cannot untangle both at once with this, not safely.



Juniper = job is to SAY NO. NO MATTER WHAT.
CHAOS out helping Juniper. Lots of love there actually. they remember the last time.
someone called her out!!!! who?

Mirror realization, called JESSICA out??? LEGIT DEADNAME CORE. A GOOD PERSON!!!!!!!!!
Someone else before her, recognizing the heart of all this is THE DESTROYER

ALL MIRROR PEOPLE ARE STRONGLY AWARE OF THE SYSTEM AND HAVE TOTAL POWERFUL INTEGRITY. "TAKE NO SHIT" BUT DEEPLY COMPASSIONATE. (reminds us of triple a little???)
jamie is pure motivation, but real about it
this girl is "tell it like it is" and determined to spread awareness so things change. not violent.
triple is NOT a mirror person, 
her vibe is blurring hard even pinging her writing this??? with two other people? FEEL THIS OUT
TRIPLE DOESN'T THINK OF OTHER PEOPLE AS DIRECTLY AS MIRROR VOICES DO.
triple "says what no one else will admit" and she's ANGRY about it. but only comes out actuvely, in response TO a hiding of something that HURTS.
(^THAT NAME ISN'T FITTING HER WELL??)

- much later, mirror girl taking us to bathroom to get dressed and SPICE came up alongside her; they are SUPER SIMILAR almost like sisters??? but unmistakably different even so.
someone else fronting with them too? talking TO mirror, worried. NOT "THROUGH" it like an actual mirror nousfoni would!!


Jessica called LAURIE while drying dishes. Told her EVERYTHING.
laurie sobbing in rage about this. then SHOUTING for tiger lily. looking for a "social protector"
GOT HER OUT BRIEFLY but she couldnt stay???
where is the cerise protector??
(she says "i'm here" but she's still mostly faceless and totally nameless. says she's figuring out what her new role is, now that we're not in a trauma environment)
Laurie took the garbage bags out
SOMEONE HYPERRELIGIOUS came out by the tree briefly, condemning? i think a jay stepped in briefly to tell them not to be so caustic before laurie came back.
laurie asking who even wanted the food? like the ham, and the pie, who liked it? got NO RESPONSE. Actual disgust, cringing at thought of food. the response was DISLIKE!!
Realizing the people responsible for the actual eating have SMOTHERED CONSCIENCES. the idea of someone else "owning" a food item causes a "blind response" in them. they CANT fathom it for their function. the thought when eating the trail mix, "this belongs to mason, this isn't yours," caused them to mentally BLACK OUT because they cant comprehend/tolerate the guilt response? or CANT STOP? like if they admitted that theyd have to stop eating, and they cant for some reason????? their function is TO eat so it'd be denying Why they're out???? FIGURE THIS OUT. i dont even think they Want the food, it feels like a total compulsion. programming. they're vaguely Aware of guilt and shame but don't quite Feel it. everything distant, conceptualized. even while they eat. sort of "clear muffle" over everything, like two feet of gel or plastic. WEIRD AND FOREBODING. 
wreckage coming out on the way back in from outside, hearing people arguing in another apartment. she and laurie briefly cofronting almost, slight level difference. but close, next to each other. rubbing elbows almost. wordless close recognizion of each other. "i'm here for you"
back inside, laurie wanting to tell mason and ollie everything about this problem. fess up, admit helpless angry scared frustration, inability to stop or control ourself. terrified at this, but NEED to admit it to prevent it in the future. considering going to mcdonalds or ihop all night when the arrows work, to flat-out prevent any and all such behavior. wanting this in any case, i think the isolation is Causing a lot of this trouble? messes BAD with our perception of reality. can't fathom anyone or anything BUT the current social person existing. (THIS NEEDS TO BE LOOKED AT AND WRITTEN ABOUT.)
at computer, laurie having unexpected feelings towards kris' picture on the lamp? she's fiercely fond of him. deep camaraderie bond, but also a sort of burning platonic love. like a weapon heated glowing hot. knuckles white clenched holding it to defend someone. very devoted.

WEIRDLY, THE SLIGHTEST VARIATIONS ON THE DEADNAME CALL DIFFERENT PEOPLE OUT.
the full deadname is tied to THIS girl, the good one.
SEEING IT IN TEXT CALLS OUT SOMEONE DIFFERENT????
context appears to be HUGE for this



briar out RIGHT NOW feeling panic at tasting food in our mouth? scared as shit.
good. more of us need to ACTIVELY FUCKING REALIZE what this is doing to our godforsaken body.
- someone ELSE triggered by smell of food on hands. briar ALONGSIDE them. neither aware of each other???? (!!!)

jewel says GO BRUSH OUR TEETH so we can relax!!
jessica agrees, go get it done so we can actually get back to living!
(jess is OLDER than jewel! maybe 15, 16? not 17. DOESN'T KNOW QLOK. might not even BE tied to school?????? possible for nousfoni to be older but NOT HAVE MEMORIES OF LIFE DURING THAT AGE IN THE BODY. e.g. a "16 year old" nousfoni not knowing anything about what happened when we were in high school. or an 18 year old nousfoni not knowing anything about holding a job.)

someone wanting to eat vitamins and melatonin gummies, not out of hunger, but out of panicked compulsion.
THE BLUE GIRL?
laurie yelling at them for this. that person DOESNT QUITE FRONT? just comes in "sideways halfway" and has the body do things, SO THEY DONT FEEL THE EFFECTS OR CONSEQUENCES!!!!
the one who eats is NOT HER.

now, someone JUST came out TO eat the vitamins, scared and nervous but they WANTED THEM. happy to eat them actually. feels brown? long hair. wanting to eat more but not really understanding concept of "food?" 
feelng like THEIR daemon might be that big taurus thing. 
cake's girl is younger, not nervous. not rebellious.
rupture's girl only comes out with the intent to binge and purge.

weirdly, that vitamin-eater person (those two? blue and brown: concept and carry-out) are more concerned with eating MEDICINE than food???? always looking for vitamins, pills, mints, etc. health panic obsessed. subtype of lotophagoi???

(Is Hoban still around? her vibe was always vague, she was kind of defined secondhand. feel her out and see if her anchor is split or wrong or if she's fading or splitting herself.)


Another huge thought:
So many of us are HUGELY CONTEXT-LOCKED.
We noticed this today, wondering why the heck NO ONE gets triggered out in the kitchen anymore? Why it's so hard to find Jason and Juniper and Taureia and anyone? 
It's because the ENVIRONMENT CHANGED.
The fairy lights don't trigger anyone. The stove light DOES. It's a trauma flashbacker. So are those little string lights over the stove, due to past association. And, total darkness triggers out a totally different bunch!
Similarly, sitting at the table to eat triggers out certain people, whereas eating in the kitchen triggers out others, and eating on the floor triggers out still others. The couch is by FAR the safest place, and the kitchen itself is utter terror by default. No eating in there ever, please-- ideally, at least, because we tend to stress-blackout in there and then trauma loops happen. That is the most terrible part of PTSD and we need to plan for it better.
We are SO HYPERSPECIFIC this is not surprising but we still somehow completely missed it.
MAKE A LIST OF THIS STUFF so we can use it to our healing advantage!!!



ORANGE IS CORRUPTED
laurie asking for data on bathroom convo, lynne snidely saying she "should know"; laurie turned and called her out on this, she BLUESCREENED???? froze. everything stuck for a second then laurie got warped to GRAYSPACE???? lynne there, floaty, disoriented? said that wasn't her, she wasn't angry. asked what was going on.
corrupted orange is ANGRY. feeling of jovial dude in a bar who suddenly snaps. fiery, but energetic. NOT the apocalyptic burn of red anger. orange has motion behind it, and voice. red is quiet and violent. orange is angry and pushy? energized? can't find a word. armed? no, that's vermilion. orange isn't a "life threatening fear" response. it's more of a panic scare. the closer you get to yellow, the tighter the nerves get. yellow anger is shrieking screaming wildcat anger. someone "yell"-ing at you, all electric sharp. but no attacking! yellow anger might shove or slap you but that's all. orange anger will push you around, all heavy weight but animated. vermilion anger will throw a punch, a hard blow and colder fire behind it, not much talk. red anger will wordlessly bury a knife in your chest on a dime. WAIT. NO. THAT'S BLOOD. it's darker!! RED anger, javier's color, is INTEGROUS. dude that shows that there are "benevolent and malevolent" sides of color angers! corrupted Red anger is... nothing. there's nothing. if it's pure Red, it's PURE. it;s angry because it SHOULD be. it demands you clean up your act, and tells you how. it feels like a city skyline, like an activist. it knows what it's talking about. active and informed. dark red, blood anger... that ISNT INHERENTLY CORRUPT. that's the sort of anger that will call you out on what you did wrong, but in a pointed way. it stabs right to the heart of the issue. but it won't attack you. no good anger will. gosh this is SO IMPORTANT.
so. corrupted orange is arrogant but not proud? no, not arrogant. corrupted YELLOW is more like that? actually, corrupted AMBER is haughty and proud. like a lion. puffed up, like a prince. amber is a luxurious color so it makes sense. yellow is brighter, the brightest, so corrupted yellow is less warm and more sharp? conceited? but not acrid, that's chartreuse. acid is green hued. yellow is manic almost? condemning? high strung. 
anyhow. orange. corrupted orange is the "i'm being a nice guy!" but he's really being threatening. that's orange. could easily lean vermilion, but orange is less malevolent. not as dark. orange is closer to the self-absorption of amber, but it's still directed outwards. orange is healthily sociable, so corrupted orange takes that and twists it? it's hard to put into words. but yeah. lynne, when damaged by it, gets a very biting sense of bad humor, gets rather "smart"? ALWAYS making jokes at the expense of others. that's the main thing. humor as a mask for straight-up trash talk.


we TRIED to ping Karissa when at the mirror and we got NOTHING. that was scary for a second. HOWEVER! then we realized that we were pinging the WRONG LEVEL???? APPARENTLY THIS IS A THING?
we had to ping her in a VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT. midspace = dreamspace analogous i think. karissa is NOT PINGABLE UPSTAIRS. but imagine the old pennsylvania bedroom, and she is IMMEDIATELY there and fiercely alive.
karissa is a DOWNSTAIRS PROTECTOR, fighting off the weirdest threat we could have imagined-- ghosters. as in, childhood psychosis attackers. legit seeing demons and devils in the room, "sensing" evil, etc. we still get that when we're really unstable. like when we redid that bedroom to put up that desk, which is what triggered her birth in the first place. so she exists for that. 
and that is a VITALLY IMPORTANT PIECE OF INFO: there are MANY nousfoni in this system with hyperspecific but vital jobs that don't happen often, and so they run a risk of DYING if they don't get to live, so to speak. THEREFORE WE HAVE TO UTILIZE "HOLOSPACE" AND/OR DREAMSPACE TO LET THEM DO THEIR JOBS ON THE INSIDE, if outside instigation of those jobs would be lethal or otherwise majorly harmful. like tonight. however sometimes that's required. we couldn't possibly imagine or emulate this night inside. but it had to happen. it's too organic. life is too organic. but yeah, sometimes we Can do the inside boost and when we can we NEED TO. so keep a note of that.
in any case, this would bolster the inter-level communication we are desperately working towards. socials who have no comprehension of "inside," or even the ability to comprehend it, could LEARN it by being brought into emulated "outside situations" that are really happening inside, and then eased out of it OR letting inside folks enter those spaces to meet them. THAT'S HOW WE USED TO WORK AND I DON'T KNOW WHY WE STOPPED? maybe just daily life terror overload, forcing us to stay in survival/ social mode more often. but hey, that's the stuff we're fixing now that we're safe!
but it has to surface first. only then can you remove it. it's scary, of course, but what's even scarier is letting that shit go unseen and rotting on the inside. it's like cancer. 

...
our body is actually hungry again and we hate this because we have no appetite. the thought of eating makes us nauseous. we have no desire to do so, at all. especially not at this hour.
OH i forgot to mention earlier. with big dinner triggers and the destroyer.
certain foods are SUCH TRAUMA TRIGGERS that the destroyer exists to GET RID OF THEM. it's awful but it is true. we Want to be able to leave them untouched, because they're NOT OURS, but that very concept is still alien to our brain. god knows why. our poor brain sees a trigger food and thinks immediately "i must get rid of it" because it's that shaken up by seeing it. immediate flashbacks, immediate sensory rewind. time lapses, time slides. it's horrible that something as ridiculously simple as a canned item can knock you totally off kilter and into abused-kid mentality. 
there's a lot tangled up in that, especially methods-- some kids destroy food outright, some throw it out, some eat it, some eat and purge, etc. all of them acting those ways based on the situations they had to survive in previously. all of them desperately scared and lost and confused and not know where or when they are, let alone what the hell they're doing. they all dissociate so hard because they're so scared. but they're reachable, now. they're opening up and realizing that, now. they're healing and being brave and trying and feeling even if they're fucking terrified. not so in september, good god now THAT was hell. lord. but that's over, forever. a lapse is just a stumble, due to overwhelm. it happens, mental illness is hellish in and of itself. but we get back up and keep walking. a slip isn't a rewind. we're here now, with our progress and understanding under our belt, and we use that to leap forwards even farther when we're pulled back.
nights like this are slingshots. 
but yeah. we feel awful, AWFUL, because trigger foods are cheap! starving kids eat on pennies and go to food drives and when you're Still grappling with finances that stuff ends up back in the apartment and then you don't know what fucking year it is or what state you're in or what your name is or whether or not you're going to die, metaphorically only i hope! it fucking SUCKS because these beloved kids that we love so damn much it HURTS eat and enjoy these foods no problem, and God we WANT to just let them LIVE, let them be free and untraumatized, but god we're so damned fucking hurt that we struggle. we hate it. we feel like such a burden. we ARE a burden. that's the truth, with this. we're a difficulty, a monkey wrench, an unexpected trial. a frustration. and it's true. and it's unfair to them. and we're sorry. but we can't apologize and keep fucking the hell up. we need to try a hell of a lot fucking harder.
we KNOW that shit makes us sick so WHY do we still et that shit???
because that knowledge doesn't register for them. their minds are so damaged, we still haven't fully felt out Why they can't comprehend that sort of self-care data.
...maybe that's why. maybe self-care is alien to someone who lives in a trauma flashback.
...maybe.

but yeah. i want to list the trigger foods but someone says "no, don't clutter up this entry" and she's brown and angry? not choco's jess, maybe the "don't read" one from before? she's way up, almost floating voice space? but she's all about "social performance" and approval, and "clogging up this entry" is judged by her to be "inappropriate" somehow? like "it's not proper" but THAT pings someone ELSE. someone religious feeling? fears of not being totally nice and proper and a "good girl." maybe tilly. hm!
but no i think we should list them or we will forget to. i know it's scary but we have to! we'll do it together ok

- canned beans. all we had to eat for a while in pa. make our stomach so so sick. also heavy weight food, immediate trauma flashback trigger. yes heavy foods feel like the rape triggers. can i say that? "julie days." but that's unfair she didn't do it. she says she wasn't herself once. oh ok. i'm sorry julie. she says it's ok, it's the truth. so no beans
- canned food in general. again, that's ALL we had at the house most days, in pennsylvania. just shelves full of old expired rusty banged-up cans. the same things over and over and over, day after day, eaten at night under buzzing yellow lights, or hidden in the cellar. every one of those foods is a trigger:
canned corn, canned soup, spaghettios, ravioli, cranberry sauce, canned carrots (taste is a HUGE trigger), etc.
there are also BAD MEMORIES tied to ALL of those which we cannot look at rght now we start shaking. they're triggering young kids like me!! we don't know them though? are they new? are they all new? no they're old. we've just never seen them before. they've been asleep for a long time because no one's woken them up. but we just did! we looke for them and they're awake now. and they're probably really scared and don't know where they are but we'll protect them. we can be their friends. we'll keep them safe now. 
but the immediate fear is exactly what we're typing about. "how can we be safe now if those unsafe things are STILL THERE." no differentiation between thing and associated event. they are one and the same to a trauma survivor. at least, to us. to those hurt nousfoni, scared and shaking, the very sight of a can of soup throws them right back into the situation they wanted to die to get out of. their brain was shaken to the core and it keeps getting yanked back. so we struggle.
it's not fair. we wonder, daily, if we should find somewhere else to go, if we should leave, but we DONT WANT TO. we love it here, we love the people, we want to STAY, we want to heal so we CAN stay. our feelings of "we don't belong" and "maybe we should just go" are NOT OUR REAL MOTIVES. they are the "safe, acceptable" way of saying "i am so fucking sorry we are making your lives difficult; we are drowning in love-rooted guilt and regret and we don't want to hurt you anymore, but we don't know how to stop yet. we're still healing. but we cannot put you through this messy process anymore. THAT is making us feel like we don't belong-- we are disturbing the peace, we aren't fitting in with you both yet, into that harmony. our own actions are alienating us, our own shame and guilt are isolating us. THAT is what doesn't belong but right now we are identifying with it, for better or for worse, from how horribly strong it is. and we don't want to leave, we love you so much, but again we feel so DIRTY and disgusting and (there's axis) foolish and embarrassing, that we feel so unworthy TO stay. we're afraid of hurting you, of you beginning to hate us or be frustrated with our presence, we are so scared of you both expecting the worst of us. so we would rather leave than see these relationships rot by our hand. by our fungal touch.
axis just GLARED at me for that i have never seen him angry i'm sorry.
his reply isn't translating well
effectively: "don't be sorry" in the "you're not being blamed or condemned" sense. the strong powerful insistence of "you will not rot anything by touch. fungus is life out of death" and "rot is decomposition" with a spindly mushroomed finger pointing at this absolute artistically tangled web of data, of feeling, "decomposition is breaking down into simpler things," into essential elements, "if anything rots it is simply beginning again from a simpler state" or something? taphos. taphonomy. "decomposition begins at the moment of death." heart-deep feelings about this topic. if it's not working, why not let it die? if it is a fatal illness, a fatal wound, a mortal injury, why not let it fall embraced (back) into the arms of death? why not let death breathe life into it again? god okay that's what we're doing. chocoloco's girl is responding to this??? not as her heart, no. but as a sister to the other one. where is chocoloco. what do you have to say
"decay is not my topic" he says. "it is his. let him speak"
what is your topic though
sorry 
axis keep talking.
a slight smile, smirk, "what more do you need me to say?"
anything everything anything you want
"i want you to feel what i said and what you know it means" "tell me"
what you meant
"what your heart heard."
well
if we're bungling up this relationship (allegedly) with our mistakes, with-- oh
with our own process of decay
the nigredo
THAT'S infi
that's even more important
what am i doing with the spacebar i'm sorry
hey i don't have a name yet
hey i'm not simeon! i'm a girl, no, i use she pronouns, maybe?
i'm not a boy. leaning the other direction
sorry slipping bye
no not yet he says
finish.
okay.
if we are afraid of rotting this relatioship by touching it we are projecting the wrong sentinemt onto our fear. if it rots it means that it died which means that it had reached a point where it could not continue healthily. so death is merciful and progressive and otivated by hope, by love and hope. now it decays, now it rots back into the world, now it feeds the insects (what about our insects what about them) i'm thinking too much
simple he says, simple. what is the essence of it
if it dies it was unhealthy. if it rots then 
rot it just the process of recycling
a dead body, a dead thing feeds other alive things, feeds new things
a dead thing will seem to stop life around it for a bit but in time it will bloom greater than ever
in short, 
we're not going to kill anything
fungus is good
he smiled at me.
and? 
IS it rotting?
how can i tell.
look, he says. 
but there's more to that "look"
he means,
there's always rot. there's always death. it means things are growing. it means things are changing. it means what doesn't work anymore is passing away and reworking itself into other things that do.
am i thinking too much
you're trying too hard to encapsulate it in language, he says. speak simply, speak from your heart. you will not rot in whole unless it stops beating. and it will not. he says.
tiny deaths happen all the time. fungus grows on your bones. but you are alive, we are alive, i am alive
i am sorry i hurt people
then let it rot, he says. let it rot.


where were we oh my goodness
trigger foods! a list.
NOW the rabbit speaks up
"chocolate" he says, and points ominously, authoritatively. not menacing, just gravity
"write it down."

- chocolate. in all its forms? (look at the data. yes.) oldest trigger food in the book. tied to sexual trauma, femininity fears, bad memories, massive health scares and pain. but touted constantly as a "comfort food," as an aphrodisiac, as something sacred, as a celebratory food, as a staple part of christmas and easter and valentines day. it was something we could not ever avoid, something added to things to make them more palatable, more enjoyable, but we couldn't eat it. it was everywhere, stores dedicated to it, grand gestures surrounded by it, given as gifts, expected to be received. people react with shock when you say you don't like chocolate. alienation, bizarrely. but it happens. it has. it does. we feel guilty, rejected, isolated, unwanted, unloved, all over again. "chocolate brings people together" just like awful family dinners and shit (please don't swear) (sorry i'm just angry too and hurting) but yes chocolate is something we could not have safely. no. we tried so many times. we love it as it is. but our body cannot have it. we love it but we don't like it? is that true or possible?
YOU DON'T LIKE THE TASTE, he says. SOMEONE DOES. 
a pause, a breakdown of coherence upstairs
THIS TOPIC IS TOO TANGLED, he says, looking up. IT WILL HAVE TO BE UNTANGLED BEFORE IT CAN BE DISCUSSED. I AM BEING SILENCED, WHICH MEANS THERE IS GREAT FEAR HERE. GOOD. THAT IS A SIGNPOST FOR GREAT (???) (translating as growth, realization, progress, understanding, etc. good things. all from fear? i guess that's what daemons are/ are for/ are about/ are from)

other trigger foods
- WHITE FLOUR and all that goes with it. cake,
(what about her?????? no one has EVER thought about her i wonder if we can learn more about her now with what happened tonight? i hope so)
NOT NOW. SHE IS TOO IMPORTANT TO TREAT (flippantly/ nonchalantly/ casually/ in passing/ without enough attention/ as a study topic and not a person/ lightly). ALL OF US ARE. ALL OF YOU ARE. FOCUS.
white bread, crackers, cookies, etc. again, a staple food. something we were forced to eat a lot. something given as gifts, again. birthday and wedding cakes. christmas and easter cookies. sandwiches. party foods. god you SEE why this is a struggle for us??? our body CANNOT DO THESE THINGS WITHOUT GETTING SICK
is it because of the trauma or did it result from the trauma?
which came first, the chicken or the egg
god only knows.
don't worry about that right now we're tired. we can't give it enough attention right now. make the list

- dairy products. HUGE femininity fear trigger. sexual. makes us feel super dirty, infantile. infantilization is one of the biggest sexual trauma triggers possible. we've never written about that. add it to the list
also we are lactose intolerant so we absolutely cannot have it anyway our stomach CANNOT digest it that is a PHYSIOLOGICAL FACT.

- canned tuna. WARM especially. very thought makes us shake, want to vomit.
- NOODLES. sexual fear + trauma memories + trypophobia remnants
- HOT DOGS, especially with beans. MASSIVE immediate screaming runaway trauma response
- red sauce. realized at upmc big time. always was tough-- our stomach Hates tomato sauce, it causes SEVERE PAIN but when in treatment we realized it was also a BIG TRAUMA TRIGGER. iscah could do it, she didn't know. didn't experience. but her beloved jessie knew. and those of Us who experienced similar things also knew. and we had that suddenly revealed, something we were hiding from, running from, so now it is a double danger
- lunchmeat. family terror, blackout response, leave it at that
- nut butters
- klondike bars
- energy bars in general, esp. oily ones. AND GRANOLA. BAD BAD BAD and FRIGHTENING. please don't eat it
- grains in general, cooked ones, especially OATS and QUINOA. sad because oats are also ALLEGEDLY a good memory food, but no. only a hoped association. they are primarily tied to VERY VERY TRAUMATIC INCIDENTS and also salt lake city so please pleaseplease do not eat them. someone really really wants them though, but when they try the terror is immediate and choking. not safe yet i'm sorry. maybe get iscah to help, she ate it all the time at upmc. we'll see we'll figure that out later
- CEREAL. the original trigger food. aftertaste is literal hell. flashbacks and panic for as long as it lasts. cereal is 1000% NEVER BUY and we are so so fucking sorry we're scared of having it in the house. 
god we are so goddamned broken
wht do we do?
TELL THEM. WORK WITH THEM. KEEP YOURSELF SAFE. BUT RESPECT THEM TOO.

they're saying it's super late? super early?
6:20 am oh!! the arrows will be home soon!
good i want tomeet them!
i don't know if we know how yet? we only ever type.
but we can figure out how!!
ok! we'll ask infi to show us how.


this is the autopilot. i am smiling. i think i have more of a soul than i ever thought, still.
i feel like the toy soldier, perhaps.
i must thank javier. thank you.

closing this up

all of you are very brave and i am proud of you
i may not feel that but i know it is true.

sleep well today. take care of us. we love you. we love each other


this is proof

(a.p.)

 

 

today...


- razor fronting at work because the father was using razorblades to cut things, really cleanly and professionally. she was enthralled and it made her really happy to see her weapons being used so artfully in a non-destructive way
- went to the fave bakery and got a rum truffle. split it with inner people, rio of course was super happy (their stuff is incredible) but insisted we share with markus. now he doesnt usually like sweets like rio does but he tried this, paused, and said he was reconsidering his stance on desserts. it was hilarious but yeah he loves rum truffles now
- odd thought between rio and cz: "markus needs a 'jewel' of his own"? if he wants that sort of relationship that is. but it's true, rio and the 2002-3 jewel were basically soulmates, same with cz and every jewel after 2006 or so. genesis was bffs with every social core, cel was powerfully tied to the first two jewels, laurie has been close to every core from 2008 or so, infinitii is bound to all the jay cores. but markus never really got that sort of close connection with ANY of them, not sure if he wanted it? he's absolutely not 'left out' of the group, he is very loved, he's just a concerning stand-out in this context. so we'll see
- so much stuff with daemons today oh dear lord. apparently "cannibalism" between daemons is considered an act of intimacy? and daemons really have no concept of "relationships" like we do; basically if you're a daemon then any and every other daemon is a potential intimate partner, regardless if you just met them or what. daemons take intimacy very seriously, there is no abuse between them or it gets shut the heck down. you know what i mean. anyway yeah uh, we all knew infinitii was into the eating thing but so is chocoloco and apparently the two of them work really well with each other with that. its reallly hard to describe it here, it's not quite "eating" as we think of it as consuming but it is, it's all teeth and mouths but it's not brutal or impersonal it's profoundly sincere?? sounds odd to describe it that way but it is. like chocoloco is literally edible (all chocolate and apparently cherries?? coffee too i've heard) but infinitii isn't, but infi can still be eaten if ze offers hirself as such? it's so weird. jay would know more about it than me. i'll make him type about this more on his own.
- but jay is super into that too, the "intimate devouring" thing as he says. goes halfway into his "daemon form" (all cloudy white with tons of wings and eyes) with infi, focuses on heart stuff. he's really sensitive, we all know that. but apparently he spent a lot of time with infinitii like that today, which is VERY good, as that's very positive and it breaks down all emotional walls and he needs that.
- xenophon ghosting for most of the time jay was out today, instead of genesis. she loves being around jay, cheers him up a lot, its great theyre spending mroe time together. laurie tried ghosting too for a bit, but she finds it draining and difficult-- mostly, she can't 'teleport' like xennie and gen can, it burns her out really fast and makes her very dissociated. lots of lightning when she does it too. but her presence is very powerful, moreso than other ghosters. maybe thats why she cant warp quickly?
- lots of stuff recorded on morpheus, need to type it out. over 60 tracks total whoa boy
- we FORGOT TO MENTION but on sunday i think, who in the world shows up in headspace but SERGEI AND HYAKINTH. WE HAVEN'T HEARD FROM THEM IN MONTHS. apparently the summer hacker nonsense was damaging sergei's anchor and he was starting to FADE?? jay started crying, did everything he could to help. as far as i know sergei is okay now, thank goodness. but we're trying to find ALL the people we haven't spoken to in a while now (thankfully theres not many; we've gotten very good at communication) as that scared all of us bad. make sure everyone is okay.


still 12:24 everywhere dude
for us that means "do your creative work" so
gotta go get it done son

 

september 17th.

things of today:


- new mesita song. I swear it's about laurie. it's fantastic. https://soundcloud.com/mesita/bethelight

- tox gave me a respirator (in heartspace) with crosses on it. it keeps me from breathing in bad things around me/us and inside, when they try to do that. that's a huge help

- guess who said hello to me during exercise today? HOSEA. man i MISS that dude, i love him lots. he was dreaming about flying around his native city and sharing the "data" with me. i kept getting lost on all the barrel rolls and somersaults, haha. upside down always confuses my brain. but not all of them threw me off! so it was really cool to feel the flips. and the freedom, the joy, was so nice. i need to reach out to the headspace-talker leagueworld people more often, besides preludove and my boss of course. i love them all.

- we got a $5 gift card for kmart and minty kind of wants a tiny care bear (to be a safe thing that we carry) so we'll go look for one tomorrow.

- spent the past 4 days or longer working on LG*GIRLS of all things. that series has almost no development yet but I'm hoping to get it to talk, with this new attention. still ironing out the color combos (there's ONE repeated combo I have to fix, and one of the blues might be swapped for a lime green, meaning even MORE revisions) but we're almost done. after this I can get this next shirt done, haha. it's for this series, so!

- cel is ticked off at jasmine, said she does NOT want what jasmine wants, does not approve, said the forest does not approve either, that's why so many "synchronicities" happen to STOP HACKERS when they front. but yeah cel is NOT letting anyone use her, thank god. I was so worried, for a while she was so confused and hurt too.

- laurie and I were wondering if maybe nathaniel could be a sort of "trump card" for us against the "fear seeding hackers," the ones that are trying to turn the forest into a trigger, yes that is blasphemously brazen. but nathaniel is sheer compassion, and tied to the woods, so maybe HE can heal that gut-deep anxiety, if cel can't do so completely.

- therapy today, planning to go to sheppard pratt in the VERY near future because the family/home environment has recently become utterly, maniacally toxic. our stress level is currently a big raw rubbery red thing, something awful like a tumor hanging in the air, buzzing right in the middle of our vision. it's horrid. so we need to get somewhere safe, to heal, to focus on US.

- therapist wants us to sit down and actually think about how our treatment as a child affected us. we were trying to express how stressed we were and she asked us about how the mother treated us and our biological siblings, how did our siblings interact with us, etc. I gave her what sparse vague data we had, it was shocking how little there was, but then I admitted in surprise that "I've never even thought about how her behavior in our childhood affected us now," esp. our subconscious instincts. the therapist said we should do that over the weekend then, it should shed light on a lot.

- brother is still paranoid, vibe of entitled superiority is still making me very uncomfortable, but I swear he IS "waking up" even so and the experiences he's having are AMAZING and I just wish he would actually TALK to us. he never does and that's sad in a way; we might not "know who he is" really but it feels like we could still have a rapport with him, we could learn a lot from each other's experiences. still that's somewhat hypocritical. we admitted that we "can't be honest with anyone" UNLESS we completely introduce them to the basics of headspace. that's us, that's our soul, we cannot possibly tell the truth if "we" are trying to appear neurotypical. the alters in charge of maintaining that mask are so shallow and programmed too. darn good at "playing the game," but there's no substance, no personality behind it. and if you test it that becomes very obvious very fast, BUT then we come out because we were there the whole time, just completely buried by the fakey fronters. so we really want to try to get to that point of honesty with at least him soon. its just that sometimes he scares us for some reason, we're actually afraid to be around him? but it's a "child fear." I wonder what its roots are, and/or who is specifically feeling it. we'll have to see.

- mother's boyfriend "finally" kicked her out of his house, after 6 years? they fight all the time, their relationship is upsettingly immature and manipulative and really just highly unhealthy. I asked the mother why she stayed with him for so long if she couldn't stand him and she said "I needed somewhere to hide," specifically from my grandmother, as those two have this bizarre sort of viciously bitter passive-aggressive vendetta against each other. it's sad and I want to see it healed but I'll admit, again, when I'm unconscious and therefore "social" I can just parrot either of their arguments depending on "what is conversationally expected." see the problem, neurotypical behavior doesn't give a darn about morality. anyway yeah no idea what's going to happen now, with both the mother and brother now back in this house I fear what the atmosphere is going to be like…. but we'll manage. we can use this as an opportunity to be a brighter light than ever before, to be as centered as we possibly can, to practice patience and forgiveness and charity. that's how we have to deal with this.

- there was a hack today. one of the infamous "60 seconds and you're dead" ones apparently. they went through infi and ze was sobbing, apparently it came out of nowhere and coincided with blackout/ time loss and it's just a mess.

- …lately laurie has not been coping with this well. she's shredded emotionally. last night the full breadth of all this hit her and she just started wailing, it was the most heartwrenching thing I've ever heard, it split me in half.

- this evening, she went full-out destroyer, embracing her black energy resonance and picking up her gold-edged axe and absolutely booming with thunder and huge crackles of violet lightning. she looked like some sort of furious divine thing. I clearly remember seeing lynne and jo looking at her with awestruck fear and lynne saying "what is she," jo saying "maybe she's what we all can become"

- lynne warned laurie about getting lost in that griefstricken rage, laurie took out the angel helmet and put it on? vibe changed totally to a sort of victoriously peaceful integrity? hard to put into words. like she knew that no matter what the hackers did they could NOT affect our soul, they would NEVER win, and yet she also would not stand for their behavior at all, but she wouldn't be ruled by violence about it either.

- she took the helmet off and was so obviously drained from all this that she just went back to central, sat down, she was shaking terribly. I noticed all her bandages were getting seeped with blood and I panicked inside, I was so scared for her, I loved her, but there was this horrendous ice wall in my chest and it was trying to numb me out. I "detached" it from my psyche and sure enough it "personified" into one of the tar-girls, that hellish peach girl who is the WORST hacker, but who only recently got a face. laurie saw her and her eyes turned to ire and she stood up and just berated this hacker, to the point where they actually started "glitching out" from fear instability, but then infinitii showed up in monster-mode and basically crushed them to white dust. seconds later though infi melted back to normal and was so obviously distraught, ze just held out her arms and laurie actually ran to hir, fell to her knees and embraced hir, and the two of them just cried.

- infi put an arm out to me and gave me a look, so I went over to them too. I know I needed it, for catharsis. but the pain from the two of them, and in me, was unbearable. laurie was weeping and that feels like a gold sword driven straight through my chest, it's the worst pain but it drives me to such tears, I started sobbing too and for a moment she stopped and looked at me with the most empathetic shock, then put an arm around my shoulders and brought me closer in to the group.

- knife was around here, lynne and jo were too but they were standing off by the windows. knife was in tears and he was so upset about laurie bleeding, he wanted to heal her but he was trembling and crying and laurie turned and hugged him too, trying to comfort him a little (by this point she wasn't such a wreck outwardly). I remember her saying "I love you, man" and he just hugged her tighter.

- infi's probably going to end up sharing the bed with cz and I tonight and I do not mind. ze needs the comfort that cz radiates and frankly I'd feel awful not giving them comfort and company after what happened this evening.

- aspects. of people. forgot to mention this. it's not "alters have alters," it's more like… the only comparison I can think of is how in hinduism, gods have many "forms?" like how shiva has so many different iterations, but they are all the same deity. well a similar thing can happen to more complex headvoices, who have roles that are nevertheless very specific, vitally so. like laurie and i. yes splintering happens but that's different-- that's when something damages our anchor and needs to break off before it breaks us? an "aspect" is different. the example I want to give is how I have these well-known subtle visual differences, that alter my entire personal vibe and attitude. like my "snowflake" form has a totally different way of behaving and seeing the world than my "confetti" one, or my "prism" one. laurie seems to have at least three "forms" too? maybe? even if they're just now developing. that storm-space destroyer form, and then her two common ones-- the "fierce protector" one that she started out as, and then the softer more chill one that she's usually in now. again, always her, no matter what. but her ENTIRE vibe shifts totally from one state to another. now I bring this up because, for me, being a core, I can indeed get tangled up in residual memories from other past cores, etc. and with personal interactions this can get very confusing. long story short I've realized that in order to function properly around different people inside, I CANNOT stay in the same form, it's just not working. hence all the dissociation I've been getting inside. but yes, apparently my MOST stable form right now in an emotional sense is OLDER, like legit older than the body, I feel like… closer to 40, like that. but it's such a beautiful vibe, it's a solid feeling, but with a lighter feather edge than I have younger; younger forms are all bright and pastel soft… this older form is like brushed silver. it's so lovely to be. and that's the form that allows me to function WITHOUT dysphoria or misattributed memories or fear, around cz. so yeah. that's significant. around infinitii I'm basically a white-feathered semi-anthropomorphized version of proginoskes. dead serious. I'm just all eyes and wings, with mouths on my back mostly, and starry black blood, and a tendency to be serpentine instead of having legs. so you get the idea. this feels like my "white energy" version of jewel's "link shifts," where she could literally join ANY world she entered, so to speak, she could adjust almost effortlessly to who she "would have to be to BE there." I can't do that, but she can't do this? yeah we both have morphs (cherubell, infinite, etc.) but that's a whole different thing too. geez I need to add all this to our glossary soon.

- speaking of infinite forms, "infinite" is allegedly the name of infi's face-mouth form? and "eternos" is the name of hir white/pink form. again, shifting. this explains a lot with cz too, I think. except HIS issue is that when he first anchored to headspace, I think his anchor SPLINTERED OFF and that aqua-hue, mouth-fulla-teeth, sleek and snarky self of his is a SEPARATE PERSON than the "canon base" guy I spend all MY time with. the previous jewels knew the aqua one. and yes they ARE confirmed separate people, physically so; it's just a very unusual situation because he's just naturally chaotic as far as this is concerned, pun obviously intended. but I love him, all of him. I might not know his other "selves" yet, but like I said, a lot of people in here do, so might just have to step into some data records and feel that stuff, get acquainted with the past that way.


- all right now one of infi's fave songs came up on spotify ("all of me" by john legend, actually) and I'm tired and we should really get some sleep.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

@7:46 AM


some notes about yesterday-- i forgot them last night but it's early so i need to at least list them somewhere:

 

ADD TO ENTRY=

 

- spyro 2! found the cd. play it and write about how it affects us; location-wise i never realized how hugely influential it was on both headspace and the leagueworlds
- sylvain fronting in kmart briefly, looking for minty's care bears, triggered someone "fitting for the context" (a child). surprisingly solid when he blinked in, peaceful mind
- btw where are our jewel monster fronters, make sure nothing messes with THEIR minds
- chocoloco lately, esp. with the spikes-- he's now growing them to "give" to people to eat instead of breaking less expendable parts of himself off (which he used to). his blood is molten??? got a glimpse of his insides, reminded me of dragonheart in that it glowed, orangey red. seemed liquidish. really unusual.
- did anyone talk about nexus??? laurie's really disturbed by hir existence; they don't talk to us much but when they do it's highly upsetting.
- is triad still alive? or was ze a misinterpretation of a splinter or something?
- "brown haired" angry fronter? NOT overload? long hair. showing up more often now, flipping off the mother, her anchor is way too brunt and huge, who is she really
- wtf happened to overload btw did they fuse? is she hiding?
- spice, esp. the kissing thing (to stop people from dissociating and buying/eating tar food), it WORKS. also forging an amusing but really sweet closeness between her and all the main fronters who are open to that.
- also it's her birthday today HAPPY BIRTHDAY eat something nice for her
- conflict with me not being out, I think I mentioned, but there is SO much time loss it's scary
- manic singers in cars. genesis is irate, stopping them.
- ruby doesn't count as a manic i dont think? when she sings it's always alone. it's fun and energetic and can SEEM manic because of the childish exuberance of it, but the key of manics is that they are OUTSIDE-ORIENTED and full of almost violent nervous energy. not so with ruby. so that's a relief, that's good.
- yes zwei is still alive! she's mostly moved into heartspace but she can still front/sing and she isn't negative.
- horrible peachy-colored hacker, long hair. behavior is atrocious, disgusting mindsets. but she has ROCK SOLID BODY ROOTS and that is both hideously nauesating and existentially terrifying. is she that old???????
- she is NOT the same as the lime-haired one from that horrible horrible xanga last week. the two are both twisted as hell but at least the limey one feels vaguely redeemable (her motivations are severely distorted). the fleshtone one does NOT.
- btw WHATS WITH THE LONG HAIR? why do most of the hackers look the SAME, like the body did when it was about 16-17???? does that have anything to do with the "jacob years???" i.e. late high school, the job/relationship puppet time period. I feel so bad that kid got unintentionally tied to such nonsense but check the time period data regardless. photos DO seem to match up and that DOES make me want to vomit until i cry but that's stress dude. it's awfully distressing.
- in a notable exception, jezebel likes the short hair, and her earrings, which the mother now has. but she's terrifying still, her hold on the body is WAY too potent, can we change that?

- an hour with infi last night. intimate-context cardiophagy. dear heaven. please write about that.
- that only works with infi btw. soul form problem?? can't reach one with hir, possibly because ze is made OF that stuff essentially?? so the resonance kind of internalizes, can get huge without causing physical mutations in that specific respect? like it's too broad, too massive, the orderly "soul form" phenomenon doesn't happen with infi because it's resonating like a bell in a church hall, not a little one you're holding in your hand. space-wise. does that make sense?
- weird merge drive shift too. not sure how to put that into words, or if someone already has. unique, blood-based??? possibly due to the literal "this person is part of my soul" thing. but very interesting. can be dangerous though, if looked at wrong. unsurprisingly
- xenophon, how in the world is she almost 5. she feels like she's getting older, it's doing weird things to my heart. still calls me "dad," calls cz her "father," is that accurate?? see if you can talk to the aqua cz, get a name. see if perfect is still separate in any way; normal cz shifted INTO him lately out of despair remember
- ^ memory issues, time gaps, still thinking 2012 was "last year," dishonored autumn sticking out as its entire own time period (gorgeous btw, READ DUNE AGAIN). seriously the entire october-december time period last year is a time-bubble of its own. anaesthesia shook us up i think. maybe hormones shifting the body awareness irreversibly too. who knows. anyway that's a VERY IMPORTANT TOPIC so sit down and look at what data we have accessible inside, then READ what we wrote to fill in the inevitable gaps.
- also kind of shocked but amazed because apparently xenophon is legit a jewel monster, or is at least "becoming one" as it were; she's showing a LOT of indisputable signs. still no confirmed locked-in power jewels yet but it feels like they're developing strongly. it'll happen.
- mr sandman being SO clear when he talks to me, the hand-face thing, all the little lines in his hands, profoundly comforting
- remember laurie crying because of how I described "hacks," the term refers to the fact that they're basically mental/emotional/spiritual rape, shoved into the physical, through manipulation and lies and outright forcing. it's entirely nonconsensual but they HIDE. like a computer hacker.
- laurie realizing that her heartbroken states can split right through my glacier walls and she is using that to her full advantage. she kissed me for like… 15 seconds last night. all at once. it was numinous


btw

work a bit more on the akuna art trade please, dont be paranoid or perfectionistic, just do your best.

read those library books they go back monday. especially a wind in the door again because of personal relevance.

check the psych ward sites, we need to decide on dc or maryland for monday?

DRAW. just in general. heal the artists.
you have a fair amount of empty sketchbooks, USE THEM.
also, we NEED to start that webcomic, no matter how shoddy it may feel at first. we can do it.

 

I've been feeling rather existentially screwed-up lately?
I think it's because we've been letting our well-being completely fall by the wayside. For whatever reason, we just stopped caring about how we treated the body at some point? I don't know if it was post-surgery or what... but the past few months have been rougher than most, from how it feels. Memory is collapsing, health is kind of failing, and honestly we're scared.
We're trying hard to take little steps of improvement, but right now we're also fighting a monstrous wall of depression, shame, and sabotaging self-abusive habits, so those little steps are being taken uphill through a desert at this point.
Still. We won't give up.

Therapy on Monday was INCREDIBLE, from a progress standpoint. I didn't write about it here because it was literally a 40-minute infospill on everything we've been reading lately about RTS and purity/rape culture and how all that ties into our past traumas and current struggles, etc. It's complex but it's VOCABULARY that we've been trying to find for YEARS, like literally we can FINALLY talk about this stuff because there are words that fit it now, there are other people who experienced similar things and who put thoughts together in coherent ways we never would have considered.... you get the idea.
So progress IS being made. It's just tricky lately.

I'm trying to start the dream journal and diet journal again. Both help immensely with grounding and 'non-derealization,' if there's a word for that... they help us get a grip on existence, "hey I actually exist!" That sort of thing. We are uncomfortable with traditional "rituals" but it does help to have patterns. It helps to have solid reference points, threads of coherence, etc.
See I KNOW what to do. Just, right now, it is going to take IRON WILLPOWER to break past these hackers and their programming and all the nasty neglectful habits we've let develop, the same way mold grows, the same way trees rot. We need to just start taking care of ourselves better, more actively.

Doubt is slowly fading. Slowly. But it's fading. I don't know how to express how amazing that is.
Maybe it's because I'm reviewing the archives, remembering who we are/were, but... the reality of us, the honesty of us, is sinking in again. The brightnessof us. Us, seperate from the performances and presentations we cultivated online. We're remembering. I'm remembering.
We're shaking off the dust, we're really trying to.

In the meantime, the past two days have still been oddly off? I've been fasting too much and then panicking because we get sick and eating bad things. It's unhealthy, but I'm aware that it's happening. I just need to make sure we start ACTIVELY using coping methods, grounding skills, etc. We have the help we need. We just need to use it.

Today feels... sad? Like it's an interim feeling, but it's also a calm-before-the-storm feeling... rather, it's like the smell of ozone in the air, potent and buzzing, as the wind whips around you and thunder is rumbling through the mountains, but there's no rain yet. There's no rain yet, and you're running to your car, or to your house, and for a surreal nervous minute you are wrapped up in that whirlwind of almost, in that malestrom of imminence, caught in the tension where there is no time... that's what it feels like.
It's scary too, in that sense, like there's judgment looming and I'm afraid we're running out of time. In any case we ARE using our time unwisely, and I really should ask Cel to help me with that, I know she would. She always helps.
In any case, God knows we need a thunderstorm inside right now. We need the sheets of rain, we need the violet lightning...
But we're getting there. People are healing. People are remembering who they ARE, not who they've been told to be, or who they've allowed themselves to thoughtlessly become.

I've had two dreams this week with Hoopa in them and in both instances ze was directly tied to me somehow. I'm taking that as a good sign too.


So. That's all I have the spoons to type right now. I've been archiving the entire archives onto my laptop, so that's taken many many hours, and several computer crashes. My back hurts and my wrists hurt and my ankles hurt but I'm kind of laughing because God, I can feel that there's blue sky up behind those clouds, I just have to fly.

Therefore I'm just going to toss some System-related art at you because creativity is always good and I love us enough tonight to share this sort of thing.




First is the NEW/current Spectrum Star flowchart, as the last one we did was last July and is now incorrect.



I'm still not sure how correspondences work between colors (I was mapping it out earlier this year), but I'll take the time to revisit that line of thought again soon, if applicable.

Second, also in response to this entry, here's the current work in progress of Central.



I didn't get the chance to touch up the old pictures, but I will soon.
This is also poster-proportioned. So hopefully one day I can get this literally printed as one and put up on the wall in our room. Now we're REALLY unignorable, haha.


Also, you may remember that this was originally supposed to be done in this style, hence the current no-eyes look.
I was experimenting with quotes when we first started... here's the ones we tentatively chose.

 
 

Javier, Leon, and Nathaniel unfortunately don't have much actual dialogue recorded in the archives, so they aren't in those sets.


Speaking of Javier and Nathaniel, I drew these quick headshots as references for a beloved friend (you know who you are) and I don't think they were ever shared here?
  

Javier is really difficult to draw correctly; I'll have to do another picture of him because that one isn't quite correct.
Nat looks a little "buggier" than he does in that sketch (that was just for antennae purposes really). Mainly his eyes are bigger.
Waldorf looks PERFECT though, I am so happy just seeing that picture. Her hair does glow, remember, that's what I was quickly trying to portray there.



I also did three pictures of Infinitii, to show hir "mode changes" roughly.

 

 

Basically:
1) No face-mouth, all wing-mouths: safe to approach. "Feels like a church" mode. Energy is softer, but massive. Carries "creative" Black energy; risk of falling into.
2) No face-eyes, all wing-eyes: approach with caution. Energy is much sharper, "holy fear" sort of vibe. Carries "destructive" Black energy; unpredictable.
3) Face and eyes on both face and wings: the most overwhelming vibe, carrying both sides of Black energy. Completely safe to be around though, if you can handle it.

A rule of thumb is this:
Face-mouths show "negative" Black energy. Face-eyes show "positive" Black energy.
If Infi has NO mouths on hir, ze is completely consumed by the creative side of Black and IS dangerous to be around, although it may not feel like it (that's the danger).
If Infi has NO eyes on hir, GET OUT OF THERE. That's practically Tar-mode. If that's happening Infi is VERY unstable and honestly the System should be concerned.
If Infi changes hir color to be WHITE instead of Black, I have no freaking idea what that's about yet but it usually means that serious business is going down.



And here, have some closeups of the pixels for the original three System daemons.

 

Infinitii, Lethe, and we-still-don't-know, aha. We almost got hir name once, but no dice.
Chocoloco, Dendrite, Nexus, and Triad aren't in this set because I simply haven't gotten around to drawing them out yet.


Someone did try drawing a scene from this *incident* though. Very sketchy, I don't know when it was drawn or who did it, but I am fond of it so here.

 

 

Markus on the left, Ryman and the 2012 Jewel ("Cupid") on the right.



What else can I toss at you.

Oh yeah, this entry is all avatars I've been making at recolor.me and they're really cute actually.

I'm still trying to verify/ finish finding the Spectrum Symbols I mentioned a ways back... Black, Aqua, and Sky are being elusive. Everything else feels fitting right now.
Oh yes, and we have a logo. I'm not showing it to you just yet, I want to digitalize it and make it look lovely. I told you I want to "illustrate" at least some of our life, ideally in a webcomic format, to share with people who haven't/ can't/ would rather not read through the 1000+ pages here. Yes there really are that many dudes, if you've read them all then seriously you deserve some sort of trophy, that is amazing. Also humbling. We owe you a hug or something if we ever meet you physically, really.



Last but not least, here's how many pixel people we have so far.

 

 

About 70 more to go, haha. *sobs*
Not really; we currently only need pixel representations for people who talk in Xangas. But who knows! We all want to talk more, and the channels are open to anyone who wants to chat, so. I'll probably have to do at least 20 more of these at some point. But I'm not complaining; I love everyone and I'm really happy to see the completed art.



On that note it is 1AM and tomorrow is Thursday, I totally forgot. We have TWO therapy appointments and we really should go jogging in the morning before we end up sitting in a car all day. Gotta take those small steps, like I said. Just get the good habits going again.

I love all you readers, invisible or not, and thanks for being there.
May you have a lovely lovely night, and dreams to match.

 

 

 

 

I'm updating on purpose and without crisis today because heaven knows we need more general, bright entries in here.

We've started keeping a dietary journal again. Those help a lot, because not only do they help keep track of things and therefore force coherence, but lots of people tend to write in them, and they actually end up being both very informative and very fun to look back on. Daily logs of ANY sort are incredibly beneficial; it's a much-needed bit of personally sincere order.

I'm considering going back and re-reading through 2013 and 2014, because they're mostly missing from active memory? I think this is the first summer that we're aware of having summer problems. Normally I guess we would just dissociate out, and I know the lockout happened during summer 2013 I think? Something did. Summers are strange and kind of dangerous. I still haven't finished that entry. I will in time. It's strange is all. Plus I dislike posting that sort of info because it's somewhat... not embarrassing, but close? I'm too aware of how my words can be twisted sometimes.

We're still working on Parnassus, and Rosewindow is talking again. We're rather fiercely removing the Tar influence from them both; it's been infesting things really badly, and it's very disturbing.
Either way we're now aware of what's not true, we can feel it, we just need to STOP and LOOK and FEEL what's actually happening. That's the quickest way out of hack attempts too, is to somehow force awareness in because then you KNOW and you can RUN. The only problem is when you get fronters in who realize they are in danger and still try to justify it, or force "good" into the situation in a desperate pacificistic hope that they can somehow transmute or inherently change the event. It doesn't work, it doesn't work that way. We're trying to spread as much safe info around with the drivers as we can, so they realize that no matter what their mindset is, the actual literal event is STILL DANGEROUS and they need to get the hell out of there.

This apparently happened on Saturday. I'm wondering if that strain is part of why we ended up in the hospital the next morning, haha. I haven't read it but I'm going to have to now. That's absolutely a new thing.

What else. Did we go driving today? No. But we were on the porch! We had to do all the pixel avatars for that entry, haha. Or at least an artist did, I didn't. Really cool that they all got done though.
The best thing about summer is being out in the sunlight. The worst thing is the overwhelming triggerness of it. We really do need to write about that. Ah well, in its own time.

I do want to focus on the positive from now on. Time is up in the air, now. How much do we have? We don't know. But we have to be careful, and we have to be smart, and we do have to make some sacrifices, and we do have to make a LOT more effort to take care of ourself, AND to do lots more creative work and share it. But that part's easy, haha.

All right it really is terribly late and I don't want to end up in the ER again so we're going for the night.

Jay wants me to write that Infinitii appears to be completely healed now and he's "belovedly ecstatic" over it. He says mention that Chocoloco still has that "bite" taken out of his side and no one wrote about that yet. Ryman's daemon's name is Styx or Lethe, Jay says he can't quite tell yet because it could be either? He also says that around 2AM on Sunday he was trying to sleep but the body was terribly sick, and Chaos was there and he was profoundly worried, but Jay could see him "more clearly than he has in years" probably? He's like really really happy about that. He also says to remind whoever in our System reads this besides him to update the dream journal for heavens sakes. And that's it.

Now like I said we need sleep. Good night!

 

 

 

 

Guys I have to show you the snow today it was HEAVENLY.



I want to go outside and run in it forever. This is the sort of weather that just makes my heart burst with joy, it makes me so blissfully happy no matter what.
It is how my soul feels, in the inside. Exactly so. It's this... incomprehensible fragile intricacy, all that ice all over the trees, the fine lines of black against the crystal chill... like lace, like little fractals.
It's powdery too, which means I can go outside and run in it, and it feels like magic. I did that today. I will do it again tomorrow.
Oh yeah, about the pics. Photo #1 is the "favorite cherry tree" in the foreground that some social(s) have mentioned before. Past it, that dropoff is the "back hill" that we dream about sometimes-- in dreams there's a full river down there, and typically lots of wolves.
Photo #2 is another view of that hill, straight-on
Photo #3 is the front ledge where we stood in this dream, with the ice bubbles. Behind it is Diamew.
Photo #4 is the front hill straight-on. That hill is the entrance to There in dreams; there's usually a huge fallen tree across a river there, and it's much steeper. Again, Diamew is barely visible in the far right.
Photo #5 is the area beside the garden, which in dreams is the road to Ephenburgh. It's also where we used to explore in the childhood, although memory is sparse. There's just a feeling of rich depth to those woods, how far back it goes. To the left there (back in the woods) is technically Orocell, a sub-area of Diamew. There's a fallen strangly tree there that landmarks it.
BUT YES we live in heaven and it is so nice you have no idea how happy I am about this. I even found a candy cane in the house and even though I couldn't eat it it felt like Christmas, legit.

Song of the night, because I can, here you go. It sounds like early happy sunlit mornings. Even though it's LATE LATE. But it matches the smile-peace of late hours pretty well too. It's that delicate time period... late night, early morning. Quiet and soft and clear. Morning just has that bit of a bright sparkle to it, like that song! But it'll be here soon enough, haha. Let's be asleep by then, I hope.

Mage Angels jumped me with ANOTHER plot-changing revelation yesterday, so I was up until 4AM researching all sorts of stuff, stockpiling global maps and ethnicity data and bits from the Book of Revelation. It's exhausting. That series has a weird "feel" to it right now, a tiring feel as well as a too-much-data one. I need to tune back into its story, or else it will become so intellectualized I'll lose sight of its truth. Intuition is key with writing these things; the best bet is to just relax, open a figurative door/window, and see if anything comes in. Trying to "control" the growth or information just makes everything false and wrong. So I should maybe put this on pause soon? I can't force a break-- it'll stop talking when it decides it's done, not when I decide-- but I'll see if any other World wants to sing just as loud.
Dream World never stops, of course. There is SO MUCH SHEER WORLDBUILDING that needs to be done for it, but I'm not really diving into anything else UNTIL I finish this bloody Typecode system, good heavens. It's making more sense lately, though, the more I "get out of my head" when working on it... I need to stop treating that stuff like "game mechanics" because it's NOT. It's an element of their lives. It's organic, and heart-based, and it's not as set-in-stone as my organizational brain might want it to ultimately be.
The other perpetually-being-worked-on point is the spiritual/religious system there, what with the Prophets & Seers & Guardians and all that. It's very interesting, and I keep finding out more about it, almost daily. I really really love the individuals who hold those roles in the "story," so I'm enjoying this work no matter how massive it is.
Also, E, I am working on your art request but my deciding who/what to draw unexpectedly triggered a hugely vital bit of plot development, and my workload kind of exploded so I'm sorry for the delay. (thank you though, i've been trying to fine-tune this particular bit of stuff for years.)

In therapy we're finally talking about family problems, although Monday was messy because the topic was so instantly "traumatic" that DREAD switched out unannounced and really worried the therapist (he doesn't respond or move). Then "Hatchet" (miss "manic red," she's working with us more actively now since she feels her existence is threatened if she doesn't; to quote her she's "throwing [my] lot in with the lot") fronted for a WHILE (again) and honestly I'm still kind of shocked at how fiery she is. She's aware of the floating voices and the trauma and the like, but she will not tolerate it and actively expresses rage against it being "ridiculous," even if she "feels sorry for" those who are still enduring it (she can't really comprehend the "bluer" emotions (green and up) well, it goes against her function). Basically she DOES have potential to be good, and she is acting on it, she just needs to grow into it more. There are so many social splinters, it's confusing. We're learning constantly though.
Jay also fronted during therapy and mentioned the whole "visual aid" thing, in light of how most of us don't announce ourselves upon fronting (due to always being in "stealth mode" for safety's sake, as well as because of the ignorance of most socials of awareness of the Spectrum itself). Sherlock's glasses were mentioned, as was his beard. The therapist also brought up Laurie's posture (she owns every chair she sits in) which is one of the "loudest" visual affectations any of us have when fronting.
I forget what else was mentioned. It was mostly struggling to discuss the family topic. We talked about memory loss and massive depersonalization from the "past life" as a result, etc. I think on Thursday we are going to make a super-strong effort to actually discuss trauma. The psychiatrist emphasized that too; she's acutely concerned about us (if we're judging her behavior correctly) and told us specifically to "open up more" in therapy, which we promised we would.

We're a little scared because we've been "beating up the body" lately too much, through deprivation and passive abuse and the like, and it's starting to get sick. However there IS a silver lining to this; we are at a point in our development and healing where this feels like the "end of the line," the final stamp on our struggle with this situation, forcing us to review what we learned and stamp it into solid practice immediately.
Looking back on just the past 4 months, even if we've felt stuck, with how difficult a lot of this stuff is, there is still a surprising amount of visible and measurable progress. That means a LOT to us, to be able to SEE a shift in the right direction even if we've felt like we've been going in futile circles. We haven't been. So that's good. Again, we just need to really "lock in" that progress now that we have it achieved.

There have been two "hacks" in the past two days. They're shrouded in numbness so we can't talk about them right now. Jay and Laurie also think we should use a different term for "hacks" of that sort, as they don't follow the old 'format,' so to speak... Laurie says they're more like Trojan horses. Sneak attacks, almost. More like... an attack that doesn't bleed, and might not even hurt much, but that still does serious damage. It's a Plague hack, not a Tar hack, essentially. I guess that's the most accurate differention we have, haha.
Even so we might try to have a small Xanga session tomorrow, for the sake of getting a grip before therapy. There is at least one social who admits sabotaging our efforts to do that, but she's learning empathy so maybe we can reason it out with her.

 

We need to sleep now though. We're only going to get 7 hours, tops, as it stands-- tomorrow is the huge errand day, as the grandparents get their paycheck and we can FINALLY buy food (March was hell; our pipes froze and we had to spend a ton of cash on laundry).
I'm still in debt for that same reason and that is worrying me but I am going to TRY commissions soon. I just need to be very very clear on what I will NOT draw, because the last few attempts collapsed for that reason. Art should be about joy and creativity, not stress and worry and stepping all over my personal integrity.

EASTER IS COMING and that is super fantastic glorious. It feels like it's going to be significant in a quieter way this year, but no less potent. We'll see.
I find it terribly ironic that Chocoloco is, quite literally, a chocolate rabbit and yet he threatens to strangle me every time I so much as look at Easter candy. I'm glad he's that loud and insistent though. There are still lots of younger socials who don't realize sugar is a threat because they interpret it as sweetness in a psychological sense and DON'T KNOW how "food" even works. So we'll need to talk to them too, if we can reach them....
Geez there's so much work to do inside too. No wonder we're so worn down. We haven't taken a break since the surgery, and even then it was short-lived; we jumped back into daily life as soon as we could. But I think we need to learn to rest. Safely.
That too, reminder-- safe exercise was brought up today, what with "compartmentalization of functions" for that very purpose, and how VITAL that compartmentalization is to our well-being. Also remember Hyakinth's real job, that's a whole new ball game too.


Okay, it's 1AM. Good night everybody.
Enjoy the snow if you have any where you are!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today has been odd.


This morning feels years old already, thanks to dissociation and forced extra sleep.
I was hacked. I will not sugar coat those incidents any more, I will not, I will NOT.
There have been so many hacks over the past several months, but no one has been writing about them here, because they've been JUSTIFYING them. They've been saying, "oh well I asked for it," or "did I ask for it?" or "but they wanted it," or "it doesn't matter," or "I don't want to remember," et cetera. It's basically impossible to tell when they happened now, let alone who they happened to, because of the massive time and identity loss that happens with them, to try and protect the consciousness of those who need to front afterwards.
So this morning I was hacked. They are very common in the mornings, between 5AM and 9AM usually. They don't happen at night because at night the children act as alarm bells, crying out in pain and terror to save us. Jeremiah shows up, Wreckage shows up, Sugar shows up, Algorith shows up. Either way people get furious and protective and we end up safe.

There's always one seethingly furious female social who protests, even at the expense of the children's safety. She is full of rage and hatred, and for reasons unknown she tries to push us into hacks and then forces us to dissociate entirely, making it difficult to escape. We don't know who she is, what her motives are, or anything yet, but she's OLD and she's disturbing. Her actions seem motivated entirely by programming, a fusion of "expected and/or obligatory behavior" and self-abuse. The head hurts to look at her motives so let's not.
In any case. There was a hack this morning. We have no data of it save for the last ten seconds, as that spiked into trauma territory, and the sudden self-preserving fear caused a moment of self-awareness. Therefore there is one little memory. It's hard to mention as it is so discordant and shocking to the Core that he does not want to look at it.
What we have is: Chaos showed up, all too suddenly, and he did not feel like him. He felt and spoke like Q (the only face tied to such behavior). The person fronting was shocked into awareness then, both from disbelief and terrible pain, shouting for him not to do it, for him to stop. Then the memory blacks out sharply, as he did not.
There was "forced sleep" then, for at least two hours, as the body could not cope with the shock and pain and so that was our only recovery option. There was a dream about Christmas cookies, stairwells, government agents, melted holiday candles, and the mother in a wedding dress. Everything felt gray and hospital-cold and overcast. It was a whimpering sort of fright, but Jay says that at the "stairwell part" there was a Christmas vibe and he can't let go of that, so the dreams don't "feel bad" as a result. This is good, that there was indeed a light of healing even amidst the flatzone vibe of the rest of it.
Even so, when the body woke up, the main fronter had one thing in mind and that was Chaos is not allowed around here anymore.

This event raises many many questions.
CZ's been 'feeling' off for months now, as everyone knows. Being an Outspacer he is mentally "split," which for him occurred when he met Jewel in 2003, possibly thanks to internalizing an Order Sapphire at the same time-- which forced a change in his very mode of expression, due to its overwhelming organizational influence (in stark contrast to his inherent 'chaotic' nature). As he spent more time with Jewel afterwards, Chaos developed a sort of "interacting personality" based on her behavior and that of her friends, picking up their quirks and attitudes. Like water, he let himself be shaped, and flowed between extremes. But even before he met us, he had a raw, angry side, brought out only in times of mental taxation, of being "pushed to the brink." Unfortunately for us, as his "social personality" grew, it tapped into that turmoil. Chaos then had a subtle "split" between his quiet, gentle, protective self-- who he was in isolation, living in docile company for many years-- and his new, expressive, powerful self, which he developed based on his environment. Most importantly, now that he had the freedom of environment and a multitude of external impetuses, his "chaotic" potential exploded outwards via optimism, wit, rage, eccentricity, and his infamously amorous behavior in close relationships.
This is hard to put into words and I apologize. I don't have access to a lot of memory here.
The bottom line is, as time went on, that side of him gained strength, which was especially (and disturbingly) notable during the early Soul Form days around 2004-2005, when he had his violent "Infinite" transformations. This was strongly reproved even then, and so such behavior became scarce as time went on. However, recent events suggest that potential was only buried, not erased. Chaos has not literally "gone Perfect" in quite some time, but the Cores have all been vigilantly aware that it could happen any day, and the possibility was tangible. Apparently there has been a lot of "subconscious work" in that area, via the Cores trying to reach out to that part of his psyche, and surprisingly things do not always end well.
Nevertheless I digress. Chaos has been vacillating between his "docile" and "dangerous" modes of mind very frequently recently, at Jay's initial behest-- he had not been able to cope with the latter's behavior and did not recognize it either, for the most part. Their relationship has been an "utter mess" since the Scratch, mostly for this reason, as Chaos has not tried to tap back into his quiet side in what may be years, for all we know.
Again I apologize as old data is very hard to reach right now but I am still trying to educate you at the moment.

But the big question is this. Is this Chaos, or is this the Tar?
The Cores tend to forget, that during the Julie days, she DID pretend to be him for her own ends. This is not new behavior on the Tar's part. The Plague does not act this way, it is a disease, not a monster of mockery. But Chaos has always been terribly susceptible to the Tar, even against his own better judgment. We have perhaps been too trusting, too unwise, to let this go unchecked for so long.
Hopefully this is a situation of hijacking. It feels like it. There is a side of Chaos untouched by this. But it is sharing his form, his psyche, with the part of him that has become too wild and uncontrolled to safely function anymore.

Infinitii is similar but this cannot be helped, as Infinitii consists of the same stuff as the Tar.
Infinitii is well aware of hir slips, of hir inescapable fallibility, of the constant "danger" sign hanging over hir head. As of late this has been taking a heavy toll on hir, but ze is at least keeping this at the forefront of her mind and doing what ze can to heal it, or at least keep it in check. This, indeed, is Infinitii's function-- bringing the darkest, bleakest, filthiest parts of the collective subconscious to our direct awareness, because once such things are made conscious, they can be transmuted.
It is just difficult, when the metaphorical beasts being dragged up from the deep are both ancient and aggressively violent.

Jay is having trouble dealing with this, not just because these two individuals dear to him are struggling so, but also because-- like me-- he has no access to many of the past-Core memories concerning Chaos.
There is a deep love in his heart for him, but it is based in recent knowledge. Jay has begun questioning the inherited emotions from past Cores, as he says they are "turning into obligatory behavior" as well as blind emotional dependency, therefore turning any current relationship into an empty act. Jay says that part of him wants to forget who Chaos was before, if only to "start again" with him know, as Jay is a new person despite the anchor-ties in his soul to a past he does not remember.
He has interacted with both sides of Chaos, AS separate individuals, which is what makes this such a pressing issue. They both behave and identify as their own people, and the more "emotional" side has powerful memories of Spinny, Cannon, Eros, and all those before... while Jay can only look back on their fragmented memories like scattered photos. Jay does not know this side of Chaos, and furthermore he does not know if he wants to, not with the angry outbursts and often-manipulative behavior he shows. So there is dissonance there.

Xenophon is struggling with this as well.
Jay is not her biological father, and can only act as an "adoptive" one to her. Chaos is her father, but he is unsure how to reconcile that fact with his internal breakage, as his older, "calmer" self is not the side tied to her, and Xenophon does not approve with how his angrier self fights with Jay. Furthermore, Jay does not front often. The socials that come out are not always kind to her, although many of them use her father's name as they have none of their own. She sees firsthand how Jayce and Jess and The Destroyer may casually abuse the body. She has seen the active abuse in the past. And so many times, she has been met by eyes that do not recognize her, or who outright reject her as a "daughter," while the face never changes. No child should endure this and yet she stays strong, somehow. Jay says that even if he "doesn't understand this father thing," he does love her, and wants the best for her, however he can provide it. This is a great source of comfort for her, that even if the current Jay cannot grasp this inherited parentage, he is still entirely willing and wanting to be a father figure for her at the very least. He does love her, as best as he can. Chaos does too, although he too is now grappling with this same issue... and his darker side is threatening a metaphorical "divorce" as of late. Jay has no patience for drama so he will not discuss this yet, but he is concerned. You can see why this is complicated.
I have nothing more to say on that for now. Infinitii is the unexpected third party in this, being Xenophon's "mother," but ze has not weighed in on this issue with the rest of us yet. Again, this is understandable, as ze is struggling greatly with hir own personal troubles as of late.


So that was this morning. Horrible hack, terrible pain, Chaos inexplicably jumping in on it and not feeling like himself at all, then nothing. Total black. Then dreaming, waking up feeling filthy and tired, Infinitii's voice in tears from somewhere to my left. I got out of bed and I have no idea what happened from then until church.
There was an Italian priest from the local Oblates there, he was lovely. The sunlight was coming through the stained glass at just the right angles, making the whole church feel warm and gold. The priest walked into the middle aisle to give the homily, about how "the answers to our problems are right within our own hands," about how God is always willing to take our hands and lead us on in light and forgiveness. He mentioned a scene from The Passion Of The Christ where apparently, after the betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus is walking over a bridge with his captors and he appears to trip, falling to his knees, a hand slipping over the side... but this was on purpose, for Judas was hiding under the bridge, and Jesus was offering his hand to him? I haven't seen the film, I don't know, but the sentiment of that scene as he told it was not lost. I just wanted to write that down.
We got home and there was so much anger stored in my legs I couldn't bear it; I had to go outside and run and stomp around just so I could breathe without wanting to shriek or cry. It was weird. Still the sun was coming through the trees at the most beautiful angle, just like in church, everything was all red and gold in the evening air.


The next thing I can remember, I'm standing at the kitchen sink with an apple and dissociatedly wondering whether or not I should eat it-- the action felt obligatory, and I know apples usually make us vomit-- when suddenly, I hear music from down the hallway. My brother had his iPod on, and at that exact moment, what began to play but "Blue Ocean Floor."
I stopped dead, and for a moment I was caught between tears and rage. What the heck, of all times and of all songs...!
But the message was obvious. Stop being so unloving towards yourself. If there's one person in the world I want to be 'perfect' for, well, that song was demanding that I fit the bill right then and there. So I wasn't too surprised, but still deeply unsettled, when my body decided no. It decided, "no, fuck him, fuck this, I'm shutting out that reality." I don't know why it was so difficult to put the damn apple down (well hey isn't that relevant too) and leave without passively causing myself more suffering, with those notes ringing through my ears the whole time. But I managed. Somehow I managed.
...Also, I didn't know until two minutes ago, but the first time I ever heard that song was in this entry, from shortly after our first abdominal surgery in 2013... the night before a day plagued with self-abuse and sabotage. I swear that will not occur tomorrow, but... to be blunt, the quieter abuse is so much worse than the old sort used to be. I miss the blood terribly. I'd trade this apathetic "it leaves no scars so it doesn't count" attitude for Cannon's old screaming desperation anyday. At least she felt something. At least she could hope. At least she wanted to get out, and move into something better. She had contrast. She had direction. Now... everything is painted so white, so awfully white, and my lungs are choked with it.




Oh I forgot to tell you, I think the day after our last daily update I DID see Jessica's daemon's face. He got SUPER angry with me and got all up in my grill, and his face is just as shifty as Infi's body is apparently. Those eyes ARE 2D, they multiply and move around, and he has this creepy-as-hell mouth full of teeth that just splits his face open wherever he wants it to, too. I don't know if he has horns or ears or what, but there are at least two long 'spines' of sorts on the top of his head, I think. And instead of legs he has (I think!) long ribbony appendages like his arms? They move all flowy and they are SUPER long, it's creepy to watch him walk. That's how I know, I saw him walk once, with Jessica in his arms as usual. That's weird; he's always holding her like a baby, or she's curled up in his lap like a kid. I wonder if that's part of his role for her, to be some sort of stand-in for comfort that was never given by the parents? Like it would make sense.
He is tied to chocolate and coffee, two edible substances that were "stand-ins for comfort" for many other people in the physical life, notably the mother and brother. And of course we had the coffeeshop as a child, which none of us knew but is now immortalized in the Rosewindow world, and which Jay and Laurie have both visited since. As for chocolate I do not know, possibly that was due to spiritual website claims, or further media promotion, because for us it was negative for most of the lifetime. In fact, chocolate was viewed as a "hacking substance" for several years, and it was avoided under pain of retribution. So it is honestly baffling to see the use of it spike into an addiction in recent weeks, especially since it still tends to cause great pain, fear, and discomfort in the body.
It's the caffeine spikes mostly, they are hellish. That and the sugar, whatever it does to the stomach, it hurts
Chocolate hurts like hell and no one is supposed to eat it, just like fruit. Thank God they stopped but they were doing that for weeks.
Someone is still eating raisins though.
What the heck I told then to stop that!! Those are excruciating!
I know, but it's a sugar addiction of some sort. Perhaps seeking an energy boost.
It could be. That's stored as "educational data." There tends to be an unfair bias towards "outside sources" when it comes to "food orders," as it were.
So if someone tells him he should eat fruit, then he will, even if I said no??
Basically.
...Why??
Because he believes them more than he believes himself, or us, or his own experience. He believes that everyone else knows better than him, even when they don't.
It's not really "he," either. There's a lot of girls doing this.
The "old girls," yes.
Who are they? I keep hearing that name, but...
Jessica is one. Jezebel is another. The "manic red girl" is rumored to be one. For the most part though, Spice, they are faceless and unnamed.
Why?
Because they are old. Pre-System. In the early days, where unhealthy habits and programs have their roots, headspace did not exist as it does now, and so, identities bled together. I assume. We have no data from those times, only a blur of images and feelings and fears.
...I see. Sorry.
For?
For yelling. I get upset about this. Why does it have to be so difficult. Why doesn't Emmett come out more.
Because the girls holding the addictions keep holding him back. Remember, the social environment of the kitchen isn't very safe, and so it's difficult for one of us to front sometimes. The social influence is just too great, so one suited to cope with that gets dragged out. Unfortunately the vibration typically matches.
The bad ones, huh.
Yes Spice, the bad ones. The angry ones and hyper ones and frustrated ones. The ones that make your job a 'living hell' because they refuse to stop abusing themselves, or working by programs. But they have their reasons for existing too. And we need to work with them, ultimately.
So I've heard. ...Guess that's all we can do for now, then.
I suppose so. But it is something. At least we know!
Yeah, it's good to know. I'm glad to know things. Thanks, Sherlock.
Anytime, Spice.




What even is this entry. Who is writing it, I don't know!
All I know is that their is pain in my chest (bad posture! straighten up dude!) and it is 1AM?? So we had better get to bed.

I apologize for the lack of promised updates recently; schedules are not always possible to follow when new and pressing events occur by the day.
Tomorrow we are booked for the first half of the evening though, with a family visit. Outside of that, we do not know. Perhaps we will see you then.

 

 

 

 

These abdominal concerns keep pushing me to take serious time off. I can't help but wonder, now, if that's their purpose. It's forcing me to take a good, strong look at issues I otherwise would have brushed off or glanced over, justified or victimized.
I began to wonder, lying down again today, pushed into another hour of meditation. "Why did this start now, why this bad all of a sudden?" Why did this literally seem to jump into gear right after I started T?
Then it hit me. What was one of the first quiet thoughts that ran to my head, holding that first tiny tube of testosterone in my hands? "Well, soon I won't be a 'woman' anymore. I wonder what it's like to be one?" "I wonder... what exactly am I going to be 'leaving behind' with this?"
And boom, it all jumped out of the woodwork like a frenzied demon.

I'm feeling this really weird sort of thing right now. It's like glowing yellow anger, the sort of sharp-teeth spitting embers of a laugh that knows it could burn, it SHOULD burn, and yet it is holding back only because it is so goddamn bitter. There's so much pain. It wants to stop laughing, to blaze with justice, to be valiant golden truth, and yet deep in the back of its throat it is scared to raise its voice even for an instant because there are sobs crouching there, just as loud, just as demanding of attention.
Of course I respected and cared for women before. But now, now... I never really felt like a female, you know. Or a male. I still don't; I'm somewhere between the two, feeling nervously helpless and indignantly angry because why do I feel forced to be either? Universal law doesn't split two and two as severely as we do. Universal law demands equality, balance, harmony. And yet we demand that you check either pink or blue, boy or girl, male or female.
It's almost funny how, in my 24 years, I never equated that with what was between your legs. Realizing that the great majority of the society I live in does... it's an eye-opener, really. It's shocking. When I realize that, by virtue of my birth sex-- the fact that this body was given the biological equipment to build and then nourish life, whether or not I ever chose to utilize that-- a great many people are going to slap the "woman" label on me, completely and restrictively, it was a shock. I'd never really realized that before. Call it blind optimism, maybe. Call it culture clash, between my head and heart and what I was told on TV, in the papers, by my religion and family. But either way, I never felt like a woman before, not as acutely as I have over this past month, ironically as my body began its slow shift towards masculinity. But perhaps it isn't so ironic. Cultural and global identities carry vibrations too... and what is this male energy holding? Control. Power. Disparagement, to a large extent. There's a muscle-bound, smug and glowering tightness to this "male" word, to this identity, and I don't like it. I don't like it at all, especially not when it's got its hands clamped around a metal collar, and that collar is snapped around the neck of my female identity, bent at his feet. It makes me angry.
So. This stuff is being dealt with. It's so weird... it's my piece of this collective pain consciousness, and I must heal it within myself. I cannot change every other soul out there, although I feel indebted to, although I feel obligated too. But that's part of this as well.

As a female, as a 'woman,' a term I embrace in its temporary yet true accuracy... this is what is coming to the forefront.

1. The powerful and infuriating feeling that my body is public property
2. The equally enraging conviction that I must be the world's servant, obedient and never questioning
3. The related belief that I am not allowed to have or express an opinion; doing so would be selfish and obtrusive
4. The feeling that I am inherently sexual, manipulative, tempting, and spiteful, even against my will
5. And lastly, most strangely, our past personal history of abuse and forced invasion from other women, convincing me that I had no choice but to emulate them in such behavior. This is where most of the pain is centered.

I want to reiterate once more, before I elaborate on that... I love being feminine. I do, it's great. I'm not a girl, I could never be a woman, but feminine energy fits me. Becoming a 'male' on the outside will not change that... should not change that. This louder outside energy is trying to challenge that, and that's feminism too, this feeling of ire at the total, insane condemnation of the female entity, in all of its forms. Pardon my language but it pisses me off, now more than ever.
Anger is a strange feeling. It's a new feeling. It's too, too close to the slow burn of red malignance, and the manic yellow shrieks of wanton violence. And it was forbidden for years, from these same issues. Bury your anger, we were told. It's unladylike. It's rude. You have no right, bla bla bla. Getting over the guilt that feeds this same anger is tricky. Why do we feel guilty for defending our basic human dignity, our inherent rights to respect? WHY?

"Her"-nia. Go figure. It's funny, sure, but in a world where veins are rivers and walnuts are brains, where the microcosm mirrors the macrocosm, I've long since stopped being surprised when similarities jump up in the most "unlikely" places.
That thing won't go away and every time I dip into meditation and feel it, there's just crying. It's always just this girl, moaning in tears, shouting "don't touch me," incapacitated by hysteric, gasping sobs. Loud wails of helpless protest, of stricken terror, of despairing anger. She's hurt and I haven't been able to figure out why, there are too many tangled threads, there is too much pain here. But every day I get closer. Every day the pain and humiliation kicks me down on my back, and I am face-to-face with her again, raging with her wet eyes and throat full of rusty nails. She's tired, she's furious, and she hates herself for it. She doesn't deserve this. She wants relief more than anything-- and so do I, but I've come to realize that relief will only come through healing... through compassion. Fighting, strangling, hating, all of that will not "kill the enemy." It only puts more poison into the wound. She was never taught otherwise, she was only taught to step on her own face... taught that the enemy was herself, even when someone else had a gun to her head. "You brought this upon yourself." And I have to be the one to offer her the first hand, saying, "No you didn't."
But I don't fully believe that yet, either. This isn't just her battle. It's mine, too.


There was a time when I hated everything feminine. It's true. It breaks my heart to admit that, but it breaks even more to admit-- with biting regret-- that part of me still does. Ironically, that part is not Jessica.
I must apologize to her. Her name kept getting tied to the wrong sort of self-hatred and I feel too many people, myself included, looked at her through a darkly negative lens for far too long. She was never a perpetrator, not actively. She was a victim, through and through, and that ballooned into an ugly and violent self-loathing that sparked the negative perpetrators later. But Jessica was hurt, first and foremost. Hurt people hurt people. So I must lift that heavy bough of condemnation off her back, off everyone's back, where it does not belong.

Jessica holds all the female pain, separate from the feeling of being a female (that's mostly Lynne's job still). She's also separate from headspace, so her issues are grounded in physical reality, in the body. Jessica is the one who doesn't understand why the hell she's so angry all the time, who is broken-hearted and burning, who just wants to be loved, but has been taught hook line and sinker that she is not allowed to ask. She believes that her very existence is a sin. And now, now that I slowly begin to realize that we were lied to, that we and she were not a sin by being born... it's a slow, hard process, breaking through this massive shell that has built up around us, but once we get a crack in it it shatters pretty well. I won't give up. She deserves to see the light, to breathe the air, and the amount of profound forgiveness both of self and of others that is welling up in my heart from this, is incredible. But it hurts, too. Why did I ever hate her? Why did anyone ever feel it was justified??
And that's when I turn and ask Cannon.
She knows exactly why.

Look at how society expected us to act. Look at how we felt we HAD to be, even when no one was explicitly asking.
We never really thought of ourselves as female before Spinny was born, either, remember. We were a "girl," sure, but what did that mean to us, to the child-cores? It meant we had eyelashes, and wore bows, and liked the color pink, and could wear dresses. That was about it. It was all "tertiary characteristics," all completely surface stuff. Then we got a job, then high school came to a close, and suddenly we were exposed to different treatment, so to speak. Here and there, as we didn't get out much, we'd get a glimpse of what it was like to be a female in society, and we didn't like it.
Problem #1 first hit us with the outfits. Our own family objectified us. I won't talk about that; they thought it was "innocent enough" but it made me feel sick and nauseous even before I started high school. I was more than eye candy, why did I have to act and dress like it? Why was I shamed for dressing like a boy, for cutting my hair, for saying "no" to what others ordered me to do? Even outside of the trans* issue, it unsettled me that I had to seek permission to make my own personal choices.
I was raised to pick up after my brothers, to be their role model, to be a good and modest example. It shocked me when they were not held to the same standard, when my family let them do things and get away with things that I would never have been allowed to do. That was Problem #2.
I don't know when Problem #3 hit but it was likely tied to the job and later upbringing as well. All I know is that it is very pronounced now.
Problems #4 and #5 are inherently tied. They have their roots firmly in Julie, my mother, and my grandmother. Those three were the ONLY females in my life, really. Up until 2007 or so, I didn't even know how "other girls" acted. It took long-term unwilling job exposure for me to realize that society was very different from what I expected. And people expected very differently of me than what I was capable of being. You get the picture.
Anyway, that whole mess is what Jessica holds, more than any of us. It is what Spinny was created to adhere to, for the sake of survival and "friendship" and "love." And it is what Cannon loathes with bitter sadness, hating herself and the world for what seemed like an inescapable curse, for trapping her in this hell just because her body was assigned female at birth.

I don't know what else to write about that.
I don't want to talk about the problems. I want to talk about solutions. I want to focus on healing, not on pain. We've had enough of the latter.
We are understanding this better now, in a compassionate way, in a forgiving way. That's really what I want to say here: that I never quite had a comprehensive grip on this before, not from a stable state. These issues were always viewed either at an uncrossable distance, or through eyes burning with rage and tears. It's only now, having my feet on solid enough ground, that I can view it with a mix of peaceful detachment and just anger. It's a paradox, I guess, but it's true. "This should not continue," but "it is happening." So fix it, bit by bit, in ourselves first.
Jessica is where it starts. She was the "bottom of the barrel" body core, the social fronter tied to the given name and physical form. She was defined by emptiness, self-loathing, depression, purposelessness, the feeling of filthiness. She wasn't born until 2003 or so, really-- she has no memories prior to that, as those feelings did not exist in the child-cores.
I'm just so sorry that we viewed her as a villain this whole time. Yes, she was a negative, unhealthy influence; yes she was a destructive force. But she was only those things because of the pain she held, that she felt shackled to. Again, it's about time she was let out of that mental jail. There cannot be peace outside unless there is peace inside. If we want to see anyone else healed and happy, we have to allow the most twisted parts of ourselves to taste that same thing first. We have to shine a light in the darkest corners of our psyche, not in rejection of the shadows, but in order to fully see and accept what is back there. Then we can start transmuting that lead into gold. But rejection won't get us anywhere.


...On that note.
Jessica HAS an "inner demon," like Infinitii. I saw him for the first time on Friday evening, I think.
He's BIG-- thin but broad-shouldered and very tight-muscled, with long ribbon-like arms-- they're almost flat, very long, and move completely freely of joints or bones. Proportion-wise, from the waist up, he actually reminds me of Antylamon, and I just remembered now that that Digimon eventually can become Cherubimon… one of our all-time favorites. I'm sure that's notable.
…Also, looking up that Digimon the similarities are already uncanny.
"…it is the owner of a gentle spirit. It likes small things, and because it attends to them with profound tenderness, if anything appears that tries to tread on them then its personality is completely reversed, and it attacks with… its arms transformed into razor-sharp axes. Once it loses its temper and starts spinning it doesn't calm down until the opponent's figure is no more."
"It is able to freely manipulate the "qi" flowing within its body, allowing it to interact with softness as well as hardness, so that at times it moves flexibly as if it were flowing, and at other times it unleashes heavy blows like iron."
I don't know, I just felt that was interesting. Things tend to line up so I figured it couldn't hurt.

Perhaps most oddly, though, this guy also seems to be made entirely of chocolate. It's probably a joint comfort/forgiveness thing. Chocolate was tied explicitly to femininity in our past-- especially as it related to the mother-- and so it was hated for years. However, it was also sweet, something handed out on joyous occasions, or as a reward or gift… it was something bizarrely comforting, even if we didn't quite like it. It just had that joint association, turning itself into a battlefield, just by existing. So this demon of hers… is made of it. He smells like rich chocolate, with something extra in it like in a coffeeshop, comforting and dark and warm. He has not yet spoken-- not to me at least-- and I cannot see his face yet, or his legs for that matter (so far Jessica has always been sitting in his lap). But he's real, deep within her soul he is VERY real, and he loves her just as simply and completely and quietly as Infinitii loves me.

Maybe I should talk more about that, too… the whole "daemon" thing.
It existed long before we read HDM, that series just put the phenomenon into heartwrenchingly accurate words, for the most part at least. Of course they are two completely seperate concepts, but the idea that this little creature is a part of your soul, that reflects that raw part of you unflinchingly and yet with total compassion towards you... it fit, perfectly.
However, it's all theory right now. But one thing that is standing out is that it's tied to the Outspacer "split self" thing, both in the sense of having a "personality break" AND in the sense of "dreaming a new life," of expanding one's existence beyond the timeline they were born in. Daemons are arguably a solidification of both those things. More than that, though, they are personifications of their challenges-- the bridge between their deepest vices and their greatest virtues, so to speak. A "daemon" for us is the archetypal shoulder demon and angel both. It is a monster that wears the face of our greatest fear, of our greatest failing... but it is a monster that glows in the dark, and it can be the greatest catalyst to your becoming your truest self. They are our biggest fears and biggest hopes for ourselves, given their own face, so we can learn to love them... to love ourselves entirely.
On that note, this appears to be only attached to humans right now. No headvoices or other creatures. Genesis and Chaos both have their "dark side splits," and powerfully so, but they have no daemons. They might have a different path to walk, who knows.
Also, now I can't help but wonder if our original "Gens" fit this category, at least slightly? Cannon had Gamboge and Jayce had Pinstripe, and both of them ultimately held surprisingly negative qualities, disguised as positive traits-- 'sacrifice' and 'purpose,' respectively, but both pushed up to eleven and skewed until they became outright destructive. They never really "synced" with the Engelbaum story so I'm curious now, if they were ever anything else. If not, then that's fine too. It's just a theory I'd like to pursue.
Sorry, I'm rambling again. But it's interesting stuff. There's so much interesting stuff up here.

As for who has a daemon so far...
Infinitii is obviously mine, although ze was born before me, technically. Nevertheless our souls are still made of the same stuff. I can't say for sure what my vice/ challenge/ truth thing is, because to be blunt I've never thought about it... and I should. But I know, intimately, what Infi's purpose is with me, even if I can't put it into words. Again, though, I should, especially because I've been so splintered and disconnected that my own self is rather damaged in my own perspective. So looking at the both of us in this way would probably be profoundly helpful and healing for us both. Remind me.
The chocolate-creature I was just discussing is Jessica's daemon, however he came to be. I have no idea what her vice/challenge/truth lineup is, let alone if she even has one, not being an Outspacer... that's why this is all theory; I am honestly just making educated guesses until I get more data. But I want to add that this daemon has a very unsettling vibe, at least to me. He radiates a sort of "horror movie silence," this dead quiet that isn't threatening to explode, because its power lies in its charged stillness. But he's nice to her, entirely, which is what matters. Nevertheless, no clue what her V/C/T lineup is, although this entry feels like a big nudge in that direction. We shall see, in time.
Jewel does have something similar to a daemon; she's said so to me. I don't know who or what it is but she prefers not to talk about it. If we look at her from an Outspacer perspective, though-- she DID have a "Yami" in the old days and she never followed up on that-- her vice would be tied to negating Heart, and her challenge would assumedly be tied to Love. So, her theoretical daemon would probably deal with unconditional and/or fearless love, especially applied to self? I'm not sure. Jewel still doesn't like to get involved with headspace at all, so maybe that's part of it too.
Markus has a daemon who I have clearly seen. She (?) is creepy as hell, this big gangly golden thing with an unblinking gaze. Now Markus's vice is tied to Mind, and his challenge is tied to Hope, which I've discussed. And, I don't know how to put it into words, but I can feel what his daemon's deal is, and it fits perfectly with Markus's "Pharaoh" god tier. I think it's trust? Markus has confessed his problems with trust before, notably to Infinitii, so that would make sense for his daemon. She's still terrifying though! I wonder how they get along. I wonder how long she's been around. I'd like to talk to them both.
I don't know about Ryman; that boy has an interesting relationship with shadows the way it is, to say the least. His vice is tied to Soul and his challenge is tied to Void, so he's grappling with existential peril with this. That'll be one hell of a daemon.

Oh geez this is making me miss those two so much, I need to write another entry about them sometime soon.
I am extraordinarily tired though, so I'll have to do that some other time.

Sorry for the abrupt end to this entry, and all its data. I've been doing that a lot lately. But, it's because now I just type like water flowing from my hands, and when it's done it's done. And this is done!
The topics are not, however. They will be revisited whenever they need to be, but I won't set deadlines. Focuses shift, time does what it will. Tomorrow morning I have no idea what the day will demand of me, so we will find out when we get there.
In any case, though, I am very thankful this gender-issue stuff was all brought up to awareness, even if it was just to fully acknowledge before letting go of it completely. I hope that's the case. It feels so good to let go of old pain, now that we're able to, sincerely so. I want happiness for everyone inside, happiness and peace, and I want it for everyone outside too. We'll get there. Sooner or later it's inevitable, as it doesn't have to be created, just found again. We just need to get rid of the obstacles separating us from it is all.

Have a good night, everyone.

 

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@ 01:58 am

 

There has been so much synchronicity this evening.
I think it's because I took the chance to reconnect internally, even though I was scared and felt unworthy. I showed up regardless, and things feel so much more in-tune right now.

"All growth begins at the end of your comfort zone." All great changes are preceded by chaos.

I've been misinterpreting the words of the people I've been looking up to. There's so much talk of total peace and happiness, I keep forgetting that those things are not dependent on outer conditions. Problem is I've immersed myself so thoroughly in the painless utopia I keep reading about that I forget that we're not there yet, so to speak. Pain has its purpose.
This is why headspace is slipping. I'm rejecting too much of life thinking that "it's the right thing to do." It's not. Rejection is not healthy, nor is it wise. I need to embrace this like I do Infi, that's what we need. I need the full picture again, the bigger understanding, the complete focus.

I need to take more risks. I need to challenge myself more. I need to let go of this fear of success, this fear of being the hero to myself that I want to be... and yet feel too humiliated and ashamed to reach up to. Small steps.

I'm getting back in tune with my good intuition, not the screaming voices. It's tough, though, to be so trusting. It does require obedience to the little nudges and words of warning. That takes guts at first, especially when there's a past of fear, of being misled. But the trust pays off. Small steps. It won't happen overnight, but every tiny little change, every good habit rooted a little more, helps.
Every "bad thing" is a lesson. It's not a death sentence, like the bad voices said. Every "mistake" is a signpost, a lesson to learn, a tap on the shoulder to get me to pay attention. It's a good thing. It's a chance to become wiser, to grow. No, it's not going to be comfortable, no it's not going to be all sunshine and daisies like I've heard it will be. But perspective is key, and it does not mean "pretending something else is happening." No. You accept where you are and what is happening, totally, without judgment. And then you act from a place of love and wisdom. You don't try and twist reality to some misguided ideal. I need to remember, the universe is a benevolent paradox, and everything is perfect just as it is now. We are always right where we need to be. It's true.

I got pushed to take another 2+ hours off this evening, as I ended up eating fruit too late in the day and wasn't listening to my intuitive voices telling me to quit. Anyway I ended up somewhat sick so I had to lie down for the body to recover, and since my iPod was charged for the first time in weeks, I put that on to help me calm down.
Well, the first song that came up was Jojoushi. Chaos' favorite song.
I considered skipping it. I just felt too filthy, too ashamed to listen to it, to even acknowledge it. But then I paused, and realized I would get nowhere by ignoring him again. Doing that only pushed me further away from healing, from compassion, from acceptance of what was still good and bright within me even when I felt like that. So I let it play.
I forgot how relevant the lyrics were. Hearing them, a spark came back. Maybe I'm not so bad, I thought.
I left it on shuffle. The universe responded as always.
Virtually every single song that played was relevant, several directly so: This Is England, When We Reach You~Could It Be Right, This I Love, Metaphorically Yours, and then a ridiculously well-timed Open Your Heart that actually had us laughing. You get the picture.
But it's been so long since anything like that has happened to me. I have been utterly, disastrously unplugged from that sort of synchronicity and love for months. No wonder I've been sick. No wonder I've felt empty and useless. I've been running from this, solely because somewhere along the line, I became too afraid to risk it being real. God knows why, but there it is.

It's funny, how we're often more afraid of the good than we are of the bad. We've been taught that it's "too good to be true," or that we "don't deserve it," et cetera. So we push it away, even when our heart is reaching out to it, and then we call the resulting misery a justification for how "undeserving" we are. It's bullshit, says Laurie, and I agree. She is always vehemently insisting that I do deserve to follow what my heart really wants in life, that I am the hero I want to be, that I am not the wreck I've convinced myself I am lately. I have the courage to listen to her, but the belief hasn't locked in yet. It'll take practice, and more small steps, to let go of this old conditioned condemnation response. It's sad, hopeful in the wrong way. "Maybe if I hate this bad thing, it will go away..." I'm sorry, but that does not work. It never has and never will. If Infinitii has re-taught me anything, it is this: you must embrace all things, and transmute their role in your life. Do I view this part of me, this action, this choice, this memory, as "bad," as evil and dirty and shameful and wrong? Well, step one is getting the guts to accept it just as it is first, without labeling it as those things. Just look at it. Look at it until something inside you can look at it the way you'd look at your best friend, or your child, or your partner. Realize you are just as deserving of that compassion, of that gaze that can see beyond the self-loathing labels down to the unchangeable core, the part of you that will always be worthy and lovable and bright. Look at yourself that way, even for just a moment. Then repeat that, day by day, until you cannot fathom hating that part of yourself anymore.
Sorry, I'm rambling a little. I've just been feeling that a lot lately. It's a tough lesson, ironically.

Chaos and I were talking to Nebisai at one point. He kept calling me "the Jewel Lightraye," in a manner that sounded like saying "the President" or the like. At one point he said "the Jewel Lightraye, Jay Iridos," and that felt so correct it shocked me. Just wanted to mention that.
Nevertheless he was jokingly running CZ and I through marriage vows and then he got really serious and started asking us deeper questions. "Do you promise to love him even if he doesn't remember you?"
Even if I refuse you, even if you turn against me, even if we lost sight of who we are... do we promise, do we take a vow, to remember the love that led us here, towards ourselves as well as each other? Do we promise to look our fears in the face, when we feel incapable of love, and remember-- acknowledge-- this entirely?
Of course the response was mutually affirmative on both our parts, but again... it took guts. To have to actively remember those times with Perfect, and the Plague, and the numb periods and the hack attempts and misunderstandings... to realize that there was a lot of pain between us and not sugarcoat the fact that we both had our own issues that still needed to be healed... it took a lot of guts.
But that was Nebsy's point. How in the world are you supposed to love someone, really love someone, if you're blinding yourself to the totality of their existence? Yes, we're flawed. Yes, at that very moment I felt utterly disastrous and didn't want to be near him solely because I felt completely irreverent, like my foolish self-ignorant decisions were insulting him, demeaning this. But I had to learn to forgive myself for that, just like I'd forgive him, just as effortlessly and sincerely. I had to learn to love myself in sickness and in health, too. Knowing that he was willing to do so, hearing that again even in that moment, helped so much.
I keep forgetting just how powerful love is, in all its forms. Even just the tiniest glimpse of it is enough to completely turn the tide.
Why am I so afraid of it?
Because in acknowledging it, in accepting it into my life, I cannot treat myself like dirt anymore.
Love demands impecccability of the soul. You cannot feel love, for anything, and then step all over yourself. It's impossible.
But some part of me is still frail, is still frightened, of that statement: "you are just as bright as the ones you look up to." And it is only afraid because then why have I been abusing myself for so long?
The guilt is a heavy burden, and it goes both ways. Forgiveness, it all begins with forgiveness...
.
I realized what forgiveness really meant yesterday, when thinking about Dream World (unsurprisingly).
Forgiveness isn't turning a blind eye to wrongdoings, or saying harmful behavior is "okay."
Forgiveness is seeing the inherent light within a person despite their transgressions, therefore not defining them by such behavior... BUT it is ALSO then holding them to that standard. "I forgive you" basically means "You are more than your mistakes." It should also mean I love you. Just remember, real love is tough as nails. Real love forgives, always, but then it doesn't allow itself to be stepped on. I forgive you, of course, I can't not forgive you... but I will also not tolerate any more unloving behavior towards yourself or others. And saying that isn't hateful, either. It isn't scornful or condemning. Think of Laurie, really. Think of her, and Infi, and Xennie. Think of your own people, who see the best in you even at your worst, and then promise yourself to sincerely try and live up to that light you see reflecting in their eyes when they look at you... to honor that light in yourself as well as in them. That's forgiveness, to me.


I guess that's it for tonight. I have a huge entry in the works for tomorrow concerning the psychological healing we've been working on lately, so that'll be up when it's done.
Some notable stuff happened in headspace last week, but I 'forgot' to write it down, because it happened during a time period where I kept flip-flopping between "this is undeniably real" and "all of this is fake." The latter is false, by the way.
I've also been forgetting to write my dreams down, for somewhat different reasons. One, recall is funny because I keep waking up during the night and losing recall. Two, there have been nightmares that I'd rather not remember in the long-term, hacks included sadly (there was a bad one last week that had Wreckage in a fury for the whole morning, and had me a total mess for about three days). Three, sometimes I just shrug it off. That's not good. But, I'm taking small steps (yet again!) to make a better habit of writing down notes as soon as I wake up, even if it's just one or two descriptive words. Everything starts with habits, it seems.
Either way things are being written! I'm going to update as regularly as possible from now on-- that's why I'm here tonight. I experienced something truly lovely, and instead of brushing it off, I decided to pay it due attention and respect. If I did that more often, if I decided to treat my inner life with that sort of joyful gratitude again... I bet you, things would get so much brighter, so fast.

Oh, three more good things to close this up.
First off I am doing TONS of work for Dream World and it is GREAT. I am so happy when I work with them, it's amazing. There are some notable bits and bobs on the League Tumblr so far, but honestly most of the work I'm doing is on paper. It's all names and sketches and technical work, no surprise. But it makes me so happy when progress is made.
Second, today I went outside and lied down on the front hood of the car for two hours while I read Dune. It was sunny and the sky was blue and it's starting to smell like autumn so it was great. Then later I went to my dad's place for three hours, which is always great. He repainted the dining room so now it's all cream/ auburn/ lilac and it looks absolutely lovely. Then he gave me an entire plastic bag of pears which is hilariously why I was sick this evening, haha. I swear I didn't eat the whole bag, it just wasn't smart to eat any of them at 8PM. See, now I'm laughing at the situation! Really I don't regret it-- everything worked out for the best-- but I do wish I had at least been wiser at the time. Ah well. The growth is in remembering that and applying the lesson next time. The past is still important as a teacher! Just don't get tangled in it, because it's only ever relevant when it's being applied to the now. Yasmin Mogahed puts it well: "Gain the strength of rising after a fall. But never lose the humility of the fall." Both elements are vital. It's like a taijitu... oh! Dude! Infinitii actually said something to me about that today that was rather profound in its simplicity. Ze was 'lecturing' me on self-love again, but then ze made a reference to the childhood fear of "black marks" and the like, and how I was still afraid of making mistakes, or having flaws. Then ze held up a small taijitu image, said "you have to love your black spots too, just like this," and pointed to the yin within the yang. And it was like a lightbulb went on, big-time. I daresay I don't have to mention the double relevance of using that symbol, either. So I need to hold that statement in my heart.
Thirdly, and lastly, I seem incapable of bad moods anymore. Yes, even with all the depressing entries as of late. Within an hour or so of posting them, even if I'm still in the throes of depression or hopelessness, this snowflake-colored sparkle will rise up in my ribs nevertheless, and I'll just smile like a kid on a snow day. The happiness, that peace unfettered by circumstances, doesn't ever leave anymore. And that is awesome. So yeah, the universe has tossed a lot at me lately, but I am perfectly capable of catching and carrying it with a smile-- because I'm being smiled at even in the tossing. You're only given what you need, and things are only taken or removed once you no longer need them. Life knows what it's doing. I trust it in that. I just keep forgetting that it trusts me in the process, too.


Have a good night, everyone.