I have returned. Last two weeks were enough grief, was a very good thing none of us over here were meguca, but- things are getting to be okay once more, and I have resumed the having of the hope and the faith and the belief in the things being able to be fixable and fixed. Took a good many bit more days than projected, ne? (Though, still staying stepped out of the votes until we exit timestop, I think. It's a bit- closer in, even, than before the- the 16th.) But- these last two updates I love a lot. It's- everything going on, on my end, has had a lot of... point for point, word for word, moments with a... both eerily timed and unfortunate amount of echo of this... everyone. Not only a
few Homuras over here. And I'm back getting caught up after a week and a half because we're- mwargh, our Walpurgisnacht was slain for us, I suppose I could say. And isn't
that a lack of closure, ne? But
we, at the least, are definitively the better for it, though I'm not sure if I'd call that conclusion commutative to PMAS.
At any rate, though,
@Firnagzen , everyone voting and votecrafting and discussing here, really, I would just like to say that it was... it was good to come back to these last two updates. Even with the bit of ambiguously potentially concerning dialogue "I... if we win. It doesn't matter.", it's all still... moving forward. Saying our bit, and having it be
heard, and acknowledged even if it wasn't believed right now or quite yet. These whole last- it's good to be reminded in more than one place, that a conversation doesn't have to
solve, here and now, for it to do good. Even if it's just... bleeding out poison. Clearing out places for bridges, where everything flooded away, once. Giving a moment to... be allowed to breath out, for a moment. There's been a lot of that, past week and a half, for half all everyone, and it's just really good to see
that echo here as well as all the eerily mirror-y causes-me-to-flip-out-concern-people-and-duck-in-and-out-of-recusal stuff.
I dunno. That's where I'm seeing from, anyway.
So yeah. Also, I suppose my probably-gonna-be-traditional-let's-be-honest scattered replies to things that've been posted in my absence.
I feel like telling Kyubey about vague extratemporal entities is the sort of thing that causes the plot of Rebellion.
Can I add this to my short list of things that will probably flow in and out of my signature? I dunno, I just like the way it just has this tone of "ah, yes, this thing that you may say that may cause you to incite the plot of Rebellion, as you do". You know. As one does.
So...some psychology insights, particularly from someone with first-hand experience:
1) People who develop long-held beliefs about themselves--particularly negative ones--don't have those beliefs changed immediately, and if they are changed immediately, the experience of having said belief changed immediately can itself be traumatic. Even having an epiphany (at the guidance of a therapist) that almost immediately changes your point of view takes some time to really sink in and process, even if the process itself starts immediately.
2) When such beliefs form as a result of trauma, it can take a lot of reiterating the same point over and over before they come to internalize it. Part of the remedy there is the subject engaging in positive self-talk to counteract the negative belief. It's something of a spectrum:
A-> Believing something negative about oneself, both intellectually and emotionally B-> Believing something negative about oneself emotionally, but not intellectually C->Not believing something negative about oneself.
There's a lot more nuance there, but that's the general gist. Homura's somewhere between A and B, needing Sabrina to repeatedly reiterate the points so that Homura can bring herself to B, and then reminding her and encouraging her to engage in positive self-talk so that she can eventually reach C.
So I have to thank you because I have both seen and heard this explained before but something about how you phrased the whole thing, I guess, made a very critical part of it suddenly make a lot more sense in the context of something I already did properly know, and that was a very weird epiphany for 5:14am that also suddenly doubled the utility function of some of what I have going with the my-brain-is-weird-re:-easily-reaching-in-and-changing-processes-like-moving-furniture-with-an-API thing. So, again, my thanks, because you have- heh, actually though, surpassed entropy.
I mean... I think the achievement here is the fact we're someone Homura can open up to, and actually talk about all this shit with.
At the end she went back into her shell, she took refuge once more in the idea that it will all be worth it in the end, after shelving all the doubts she was expressing back into their places.
Only, this time she had someone to hold her and tell it would be OK, and,
We didn't really fix anything. We brought Homura the kind of help she's been missing since literally forever.
Hopefully that's good enough for now.
Basically all of this, yeah. Bleeding out the poison, ne? And being there, an offered hand and opened arms, metaphorically and literally. Giving all those doubts their moment to breath, even a bit, before shelving, a moment's worth of safety valve hopefully giving the chance for at least some of the pressure to fall a bit lower, on the internal 'may crack like an egg, a bit more literally than desired, sooner than later' scale.
So long as we keep that sort of direction, metaphorical and literal arms open- I reckon that is indeed rightly good enough for now.
More songs to be stuck in my head, you are responsible for! I still blame you for the
entire playlist of Nightcore in my Youtube account, I hope you know,
and also the Touhou playlist
too- wait wait wait it has just come to my attention that you recommended PMAS to me back end of last
October and I did not immediately materialize here. The list of my sins. It grows longer.
... I have just been reminded that you recommended PMMM to me nearly half a decade ago and I managed to procrastinate watching it until the end of last year. Wow, that list of sins just keeps growing. }=o)
... also been reminded what my exact reaction was as I finished the last like, four episodes of Madoka, on Octorber 22. Past me had no chill. I still have like no chill. It's more than moderately hilarious.
To break up the seriousness of some of the preceding contents of my rambling in this post, selected quotes of my reaction:
"HOMURA-CHAN ARE YOU RAIDING THE LOCAL YAKUZA AND STUFFING THEIR ENTIRE ARMORY IN YOUR FUCKING SYLLADEX"
"MADOKA THIS IS WHAT CLARA DID DID THEY WRITE THAT BECAUSE YOU DID IT DID THEY KNOW THAT THROWING YOURSELF INTO THE TIME STREAM TO COUNTERACT EVERY INSTANCE OF A THING ACROSS TIME AND SPACE WAS A THING THAT YOU HAD DONE BEFORE DID THEY"
"AND ANOTHER THING, WHAT, ARE YOU A COUNTER GUARDIAN NOW, WITH YOUR BOW AND YOUR BEING THROWN ACROSS TIME AND SPACE TO DO A THING"
"AND ALSO MADOKA THIS "SACRIFICING YOURSELF SO THAT YOU CAN SAVE THE SOULS OF EVERY MAGICAL GIRL WHO EVER WAS SO THAT THEY CAN DIE/LIVE/DIE IN PEACE, AS THEMSELVES, WITHOUT BECOMING WITCHES" SOUNDS A LOT LIKE JESUS. ARE YOU JESUS NOW, MADOKA."
"ARE YOU ASLAN NOW MADOKA, WITH THE GUIDING PEOPLE BACK TO FUCKING NARNIA AT THEIR DEATHS"
No chill, anywhere, as you can clearly see. I don't entirely remember my reactions upon reading PMAS for the first time, but I have complete faith that they exhibited exactly the same lack of chill.
And now you know.