The Curse Forevermore

Rowaelin Masterlist

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Kinktober 2021 (on hiatus)

Mr. and Mrs. Whitethorn’s six Yulemas

optimisation

i've been thinking about this for a while, and i even wrote about it as more of a rant, but maybe i've stewed on it enough to be able to talk about it in a more refined manner. i'm watching a video about conformity in social media and books, and it mirrors my thought process in a sense. i've been frustrated by how everyone seemed to read the same books, and even though i was once a part of that crowd, as a means to be a part of the excitement, a part of everyone, it felt eventually a bit too monotonous. the disadvantage of appealing to everyone's tastes is that you regress towards the mean. please overfit your books, and the readers with the right amount of noise will find you perfect for them. i've leaned into my tastes and the weirdness of them, and i truly do love absurdity and surrealism in my art. what's art without some boundaries being pushed?

in the video, she talks about the hesitation to ‘try’ something new, to find, seek, discover, and instead the appeal of choosing what the masses have approved, and enable yourselves to get a decent, palatable, and risk-free experience. the one thing i have learned from finance is that there is no return without risk, and in that case, money is quite an important thing to risk. i don't believe a few hours of your time are too much to risk for a piece of art that may affect the way you view the world.

this optimisation problem can stick in your head, as a way of desiring to maximise your experience in the world. i want to achieve the most i can, have the most fun i can, live the most i can, and there's no better way to ruin all these goals than this thought process. there cannot be any enjoyment with this feel hovering like an omen, reminding you to enjoy experience live more more more. breathe, listen to the air flow, feel your arms and legs, and remember that we exist here. we're lucky to. (quite literally, do you know the probabilities?) imagine everything you've ever experienced, and know that most people will not have felt what you have, and that it is you here. trust yourself, nobody knows you better. what do you want to do tomorrow?

Which superpower do you think suits me the best?🥸

i noticed you asked everyone this so im going to say the ability of charm; to convince people to do the things you ask them to

okay so i do see this too now

OHH it's because we're mutuals on my side blog

i am so confused

i hate everything but also me and i love me? and i am too much for me to handle and i am rash and i think too much i think too less i don't know how to think i don't know how to breathe this is it this is my stupidest mistake i cannot make one stupider yet i just did i cannot seem to stop disappointing myself i cannot seem to stop worrying

for what is- what is art, if not the blood of our souls

other ask games are too sexual or romantic and i dont like that so im making my own, bitch

🫂 - i wanna hug you

🧠- i love hearing you talk. you should ramble to me more often

🫀- i love you in a deeply concerning platonic way

💿- i wanna listen to music with you in a treehouse in a summer night

🌷- i wanna shittalk people with you and just be haters together. it would be fun

🪻- you are so so cool and awesome oh my god

🌻- im proud of you

🍄- you didn't deserve what happened to you

🌵- you could stab me and i wouldnt mind as long as its you

💧- you are an important presence in my life

🍬- id go to a candy store with you and steal all the candy

🕹️- i wanna go to an arcade with you

🕰️- ill love you until the end of time, dear friend

🥊- id beat someone up with you

🌑- you worry me sometimes. just remember im here if you ever wanna talk about anything <2

♟️- you, me, board games.

🍁- im so glad you're my friend

🐚- our souls are linked in ways i cant put to words

meditation media

even though it's so inextricably linked to spirituality in the way i perceived it at first, i've begun to wonder of meditation and how i'm performing it. up till recently, it'd been a while since i'd been lost in a piece of art, the way i used to spend most of my time as a kid: buried in a book, and it's beginning to happen again, to my relief. art just horrifying enough (requiem for a dream) or perplexing enough (it's what's inside) or just weird (kinds of kindness) have been engaging in a sense i'd forgotten how to feel.

i'd call engaging with such art a weaker form of meditation, provided a certain degree of 'artiness' to the art as well. we see parts of ourselves in characters we see, and it teaches us things about us. would i have felt the same paralysing fear arjun felt on the battlefield? very likely, indeed. would even the geeta have helped me overcome it, could i have killed family for dharma? who knows! i was part of a conversation about reading the mahabharat at a certain stage of life (not mine), and the introspection it provides you with through the characters.

i have learned many things about me through art, it is awfully convenient to have people who are very good at verbalising feelings do the job for you. even though there is nothing new under the sun, and to a certain extent, i agree, there's always a new combination of existing stories that finds a nerve you didn't know existed. the bones may be the same, but the skin always morphs and changes and adds a certain quasi-citrus freshness to any story. maybe one day i'll graduate to actually introspecting, but for now, i'm very thankful for art for being my gandalf through middle earth.

effort

the most important step a man can take. it's not the first one, is it? it's the next one. always the next step.

-brandon sanderson, oathbringer

as a year begins, the jokes about how arbitrary it really is begin again, and it is! but i think we need this measure. for the same reason dark humour exists, comedy works to introduce things we wish not to talk about into conversation. the onus, then, is on you. how serious about it do you have the strength to be? i will try to be a little: as all of us do, i have struggled with constant stimulation, the perpetual onslaught it arrives with, and it has severely reduced my ability to read, one of my favourite companions throughout my childhood, and i've missed it for a while, only reading once in a few months for the past couple of years, and i always felt a bit— shit about it. but then kanaad got me ensnared in the cosmere just enough to get my momentum, and the rest is history, and i'll always be grateful. “look, mom, i took the next step.”

as you can tell from the opening line, i intended to begin this with the year, but i didn't know what to write in it, so we write it at the beginning of february, and consider it equivalent (they're arbitrary anyway). i've been thinking about the word ‘effort’, and the negative connotation it carries. yes, many things require attention, but is that really so bad? it took me effort to learn a more adept way to play the keys of a piano, it took me effort to start ‘a song of ice and fire’, an exceedingly complicated book, it took me effort to learn how to make friends when i first left home, but wasn't it fun, the effort itself? i didn't anticipate my stream of thought leading me to use another stormlight archive quote, but it is relevant, so:

life before death. strength before weakness. journey before destination.

 -brandon sanderson, the way of kings

sometimes, i get entrenched in the journey so much i forget the destination itself was a beautiful place, and when i realise the gift that awaits me, i think i understand what he meant. enjoy the ride, you will reach somewhere as beautiful as you are.

my heart is lost adrift in a sea far from land oh, what I would give to float to a beach astray

there lies no comfort here out in the cold vastness of the water oh, what i would give to find a land to lay on

shouts to the sky are futile no god rescues me but to be honest anyone who would save me would be no less