I'm gonna do LJ Idol again! Indie has been helping me motivate to write by trading prompts with me that we both write on, but this would be very helpful too!

You can join too if you want, just sign up at the link!

I have posted an average of once a month since October. Part of this was the deep depression I was in (which is starting to lift now) but most of it was just guilt at not replying to comments and not commenting on people's posts. I kept thinking that if I didn't let myself post until I commented, I would comment but clearly that isn't working. So I need to just face the fact that I am not going to do it, and hope that y'all still value me posting, or else my relationship with LJ is going to die and stay dead.

Please do feel free to unfriend me if this is upsetting to you because I don't want to be upsetting people every time I post. I just can't manage a good reciprocal relationship here. I wish I had the executive function to comment, but I just don't. That doesn't mean I don't value your posts because I really do, I just get lost in the context switch between reading and replying.

Does the new friends feed offer the ability to comment from your actual friends page without opening a new tab? if it does I may switch, because that would be immensely helpful.

I'm going to try to post every day for 22 days to get back in the habit.

Yesterday I finally went through my flist and removed inactive journals and journals of people who I never really interacted with and who didn't interact with me, or who I never really clicked with. If I unfriended you and you still use your LJ to read, let me know.

I'm hoping this will help me keep up with my current friends better, because with the last two months getting absolutely swallowed by stress, I just haven't been able to read half as often as I wish. I'm trying to catch up now.

I've realized that even though I spend all my weeknights at home now, I still never get any real alone time because my evenings after work, workout, and commute are about 2.5 hours long and I need literally all of that time to get my brain to relax (through watching netflix/hulu) and then get ready for bed. So I need to make one weekend a month a stay-at-home weekend and I need to actually follow through and do it. Yesterday was the first full day I have had at home in months and months (unless you count sick days, which I don't).

I feel like I have been just surviving for a long time now, and my life feels mostly pointless. I feel like I am not doing anything except work, spending time with Topaz, and family-in-love events. That's not where I want all of my time to be going. I talked about this with Topaz, who felt like we don't do much family stuff but for me, more than twice a year is a LOT. I told Topaz that I need to keep it to only 1 family event per month, because it takes all of my social energy and then I have none for my friendships or for community.

Last night I ended my 17 days of not looking at facebook, and I feel pretty good about it. Initially I had only intended a week, but at the end of that week I got nervous about logging back on to a flood of notifications (since I have set up post notifications for at least 20 people, most of whom are very active) and didn't feel like logging on. So I decided to see how long it took before I had more desire than anxiety, which was another 10 days.

It was actually quite difficult for me for the first week or so. At first it was simply the habit, without which I didn't quite know what to do with myself. Then I started to feel adrift and disconnected. When I shared this on snapchat and someone asked me why I thought I was feeling that way, I realized that facebook had become my central location on the internet, in the way that livejournal used to be for me.

By central location I mean it's the place where everyone I know has an account (or at least 99% of people I know) where I can go to be around people I like without spending a bunch of effort. It feels very not-static and I think that makes it seem like people are more present. Since there is a fairly constant flow of updates, I could go there and feel like someone was talking to me, without feeling like I had to talk back or else hurt their feelings. I turned to facebook whenever I got lonely or had a moment of high stress that I wanted distraction from. But the updates were largely impersonal or superficial, and they didn't nourish me.

It became this button I pushed to try and get food, which dispensed one cracker every 40 pushes. That's how it became addictive and just really bad for me. I remember reading about how randomly dispensed rewards are more effective when training a pet than giving a treat every single time. And I don't know if that is true in general, but it is true for me -- the times when I don't get the reward I try again more quickly and with more investment in the outcome, because I need to get proof that the reward is not gone forever, that I CAN make it happen.

I really don't want to get back in the habit of opening my phone and refreshing or scrolling through facebook all the time. I bookmarked most of the people whose updates I subscribed to, and when I am next on my computer I will delete my notifications. Instead of reading notifications I'll just manually check the people I care most about -- I'll miss some things but that sacrifice will be worth the time I get back. I won't be able to check everyone, since some of the people I like the most post a lot of links and videos which are very bad for my ADHD and I'm just gonna have to go without.

My thinking patterns themselves change when I am not falling into that reloading-addiction loop. I think this is why even though this past week was draining to the utmost, I wrote several posts! Instead of scrolling through facebook, I checked my lj flist, and when I didn't feel like reading, I easily shifted gears to writing. Moving from reading LJ to writing is easy because my lj friends inspire me with their openness and meaningful sharing and I feel nourished, but moving from scrolling facebook to writing almost never happens, because I just get more intimacy-hungry and start looking for some other form of distraction.

Since I couldn't check responses or reactions to my microblog-type posts, I didn't feel like posting to facebook so that urge all shifted to snapchat, which has actually become really important to me. I have a daily reminder to post a snap -- an alarm that opens up the app. It helps me to take more photos and to think more about recording bits of my life. I have a few people who send me their photos directly, which I enjoy very much since otherwise I would miss them half of the time. I really like having more daily contact with people whose very existence makes me happy. I really like sharing tiny immediate moments. I save every snap I make as long as I don't forget, so it works as a daily record.

My takeaway from 2.5 weeks away from facebook is that it's really only good for me if I use it to share. It's not good for me to ever check my news feed, even the stripped-down one, because it sets off my ADHD and like 90% of people post almost zero original content. It was how I was getting my news and my awareness of what's going on, but I'm gonna have to rely on work for that instead (luckily someone usually sends out a company-wide alert when there is some evil legislation in the works as far as health and access goes) or maybe subscribe to some pages that only send out notifications of things to resist.

Basically my relationship with facebook has changed radically in the past few weeks and I'm feeling happy and hopeful about shifting my habits and investing where I actually want to! Which is mostly LJ, right now.

1. More LJ!
2. Host more gathers. 
3. Work on my journal-book! 
4. Make some fractals! 
5. Be amazing at work. 
6. Be in nature more. 
7. Maintain and develop my relationship with Topaz. 
8. Strengthen my local connections.
9. Strengthen my long-distance connections. 
10. Keep life records.
11. Make new friends. 
12. More physical exertion & stronger muscles. 
13. Be more active with art. 
14. Touch more people and connect intimately with people. 
15. Invest in my home and self-decorating.
16. Reach out first. 
17. Do activism. 
18. Witness more art and write about it. 


I edited them slightly because number 14 and 15 were very similar so I combined those and made a new number 15, because it is a goal I have been working towards which is also important to me.

January successes:

1. More LJ! I had my longest streak in at least a year, 11 days, and I posted an average of every other day. I'm really getting back in again! I was worried I would never manage it.

2. Host more gathers. It was only one gather which was only me and one other person, but still definitely progress! And I did a lot of work on my crafting stuff organization, which gets me closer to being able to host more.

3. Work on my journal-book! I have decided to include my life timeline on this one, which was the thing I worked on this month. I created the event pieces for 2006 and the first half of 2007, and I attached them to the pages. Describing them would be a LOT of typing so I don't think I will post them, at least not in detail. I may take an overview photo.

5. Be amazing at work. I had my performance evaluation and earned full marks, plus praise on my interpersonal skills (which honestly I would not have expected since I can be so clueless, but apparently my empathy shines through). I feel like I am really making great contributions and I think everyone on the team wants me here.

7. Maintain and develop my relationship with Topaz. We started going swimming together once a week, which has been a great time for us to play and talk and simply share space in a place that is relatively stress-free. We can put aside the other responsibilities because they are impossible to do at the same time and because we are being productive by exercising our bodies. The pool where we swim is heated (otherwise HAHA AS IF I would swim in winter!) and it has a "lazy river" with a current. One of our exercises/games is running through the water while the other person holds on to us and gets a ride. The extra current makes it way more fun, and it is still a workout to try to go faster than the current!

8. Strengthen my local connections. I hosted a hearts and crafts gather and attended one that Allison hosted, which together was spending time with Quinn, Allison, and Sande. I also had an 11-day streak of snapchatting daily with Kylei, which was a lovely way of connecting, and have been snapping pretty regularly with Quinn and Jackie.

9. Strengthen my long-distance connections. I have been snapchatting with chillychilly22, Sunny, and a little with Donovan (mostly me sending stuff). I have been reading my lj friends list more regularly and I'm starting to feel close with some new-ish friends, which is exciting!

10. Keep life records. I have been doing my daylio twice a day every day this month! and I also saved my dreams a number of times. mega fail on writing down my best/worst/weird but I will try again.

11. Make new friends. I added a bunch of new people on LJ and I think some of us will become real friends!

12. More physical exertion & stronger muscles. I achieved my activity goals 16 times! Very proud of that and I am starting to feel much stronger, and it takes longer for me to get worn out. I still sweat a ton but it takes more exertion before I start sweating. Most days my activity is a brisk 1.5 mile march while carrying about 20 pounds in my backpack. I may add ankle weights starting next week just to increase my lower leg muscles.

I've also been swimming once a week with Topaz -- we play the sleigh-pulling game I mentioned and also I generally just keep moving the whole time I am in the water, which is about 70-90 minutes. I like to do this thing where I spin around in the water without touching the bottom and without my head going in, which is both fun and challenging. I have already noticed significantly increased strength in my core from that! Afterwards I am ravenous but also feel good in every part of my body. I love that about swimming! It is the only exercise that easily uses my whole body, yet I never feel exhausted in a bad way after. I just feel relaxed and sleepy, like after a great massage.

13. Be more active with art. I have been posting photos and fractals on instagram, with image descriptions. It has been very rewarding!

15. Invest in my home and self-decorating. I've done a lot with this! I made my bathroom acceptably tidy and clean, and organized a good 75 percent of my craft stuff. I got some more baskets so I should be able to have it all looking very neat the next time I attack it. I had a lot of craft stuff at Topaz' which still needs sorting, but it should be easy now that everything has a potential home.

I've been keeping my room relatively tidy and I even FOLDED MY CLEAN CLOTHES and put them away. I made a hanging rack for my winter scarves because they are too heavy for my light-scarf rack. I re-organized my clothes so that it is easy to create outfits, and I have been self-decorating (putting together an intentional, creative outfit) every day since I did that (as opposed to just grabbing something work-appropriate). It makes me feel good to self-decorate and soon I plan to take photos of my outfits (on me) and share them.

16. Reach out first. I have been pretty great about this, but I need to set a limit because after a certain number of times of me reaching out and not getting a response, I feel unvalued.

17. Do activism. My activism this month was mainly writing about consent violations, vaccines and anti-autism attitudes, and my sexual identity, but another significant part was writing image descriptions on my instagram. I feel passionate about making visual art accessible to people who are blind or who have low vision, and I think that sharing my art in an accessible way is a good way to push the culture toward that. I also have instagram post to my work facebook, where all my biofamily and family-in-love are, and I hope to increase awareness of the need for a described internet this way.

Goals I missed in January:
4. Make fractals.
6. Be in nature more. 
14.  Touch more people and connect intimately with people. 
18. Witness & write about art.

I'm gonna try to do at least a little more of these this month. I'm reeeeeally hoping that my car doesn't cost too much to fix, so that I can buy Chaotica for rendering fractals without the program crashing.

Well I lost my streak but I'm gonna try again because it was really good for me. I got a bunch of stuff posted that had been half-finished for a long time and that felt good. And 11 days is the longest streak I have had in a REALLY long time. But I remembered that part of why I don't post every day is that there's this horrible paradox where if nobody comments then I feel invisible, but whenever people comment and I don't reply I feel guilty. But I also want to read and reply on my flist and I usually don't have time for both.

So, often I don't post because I have built up too much guilt about not replying to comments. I'm just going to have to accept that I do this, and until I get enough programming knowledge to make an app (that doesn't suck) for reading and replying on LJ, I will just have to warn people: I suck at replies and am only slightly better at commenting on other people's posts. I wish I was better but it is a mental thing that I don't seem able to control. It's related to my ADHD -- because it reloads the page after every comment, each one feels like a context switch, and context switches wear my brain out SO BADLY.

My car worked for a good three days after the last examination before it went out. I have been taking lyft to the bus stop every day, and while I'm grateful that I can do this and that I know how to handle myself when I don't have enough money, it is very stressful. Worse is that Jeff -- my mechanic who I have been taking my cars to for a decade and a half -- is now semi-retired and I couldn't get in touch with him when I needed to move my car from where it had been sitting in a friend's carport.

So I asked for recommendations from locals and picked the nearest one and talked with them. They seemed decent so I had it towed to them. Then they did not check out the part I said was the problem, quoted me a price that was easily $70 over what it should have been, and informed me after the fact that they were gonna charge me $50 for glancing at my engine. I was furious, but felt helpless because I don't know that anywhere else would be better, and I was literally about to give them the go-ahead when Jeff finally texted and begged me to call him. I did, and he recommended me someone else and offered to pay for another tow (because he felt bad about being out of touch when I needed help), so now I'm waiting to hear back about that.

I feel a lot better with Jeff helping me find someone else to trust. And Jeff knows that my car is vulnerable to unethical mechanics because I have my politics clearly written on my car (literally, with paint), and he assured me that this new guy will treat me right (he referenced that the new guy had grown up in a very non-conservative part of Atlanta). He thought about something that I would be worried about and reassured me without me even having to ask.

When I thought I was going to have to find a new mechanic on my own, I felt just hopeless about it, and I realized fully how lucky I am to have a mechanic who listens to me, respects me, and treats me as a friend. Jeff is a straight cis white man over 50 who puts most white men (including young or gay or trans white men) to shame when it comes to respecting people. And Jeff has told me to call him if I am ever stranded and need a ride (and he means it). I feel so lucky to know him.

Last night I streamlined my profile (to the most stripped-down it has ever been), and while doing that I skimmed over the last few months of posts to make sure I was being accurate in listing the kinds of things I write about. I realized that I haven't been writing anything except for giant, in-depth posts about unified topics -- more like a blog than a journal. I'm sorry about this, for me and for you. Sorry for me because I have lost a lot of that history and sorry for you because I know I don't feel connected to people when they don't write anything but impersonal, philosophical type posts.

I feel like I can't put things in here unless they are really well-thought-out, complete, and important. But I need to get over that and go back to writing more often. If I write down things that don't matter, that's okay. If I end up never writing because I have set the bar for 'important enough' too high, that's a terrible loss for me.

So, I'm biting the bullet, and today begins my first 22-day challenge of 2018. I'm going to try to post every day from today through February 2nd. I'd love for you to join me!

I also want some more active people on LJ because a good half of my flist never or rarely posts, so recommend me your friends! I want to add anyone who posts entries that are kind of similar in style to these:
https://belenen.livejournal.com/697323.html
https://belenen.livejournal.com/694587.html
https://belenen.livejournal.com/692448.html

I like reading about people's daily lives and how their emotions weave with their experiences.

Usually I wouldn't post this because it's short and scattered but I'm pushing past that! here!

My new schedule is so much better for my brain that it boggles my mind. Two long days followed by three short is good in both cases because feeling like I always have to rush at the end of the day or else get caught in terrible traffic is SO BAD for me. So on my long days I'm more relaxed because the later I leave the better traffic is, and the short days I'm more relaxed because it feels like they're over very quickly. Honestly I'd kinda like to stretch the difference more but I don't wanna get there any earlier and I don't like being there alone at night.

I'm adjusting to the reality that I am never going to do much that is productive after work. I keep thinking that I'm going to "get used to" 40 hours a week and start being able to do things in the evenings but maintaining focus on detailed work for so many hours is not going to get less draining, and I'm not willing to increase my ADHD meds more. I have to face it: I'm only going to be a person on the weekends.

So I might as well spend some unperson time on developing my muscles and strengthening my heart and lungs. I may get a membership to my work's pool and try swimming on 2 of my short days, because that would decrease my deadline stress and increase my activity, and I don't think it would really take away from my life. But first, I have to find a comfortable bathing suit, which is a nearly impossible task since it hurts to smash my boobs or wear a halter top but I really need a one-piece because I can not stand for my bottom to fold down and 2-pieces all do that or are horrendously uncomfortable to put on/take off (all that I have found). In the meantime I brought my exercise machine upstairs and put it in front of my desk, so that I can use it while watching shows, which I do for at least 2 hours every time I have an evening at home. I've only had one evening at home since I did that but it was effective at keeping me moving! I really want some sort of stethoscope so I can more easily tell when my heart rate is elevated. From what I read, the best way to strengthen your heart is to do exercise that is not steady, but instead raises your heart rate and then rests, then repeats. I have this bad habit of holding my breath to try and hear my heartbeat when I take my pulse -- so silly and counterproductive but just habit!

I started a friendzy post but need more participants! if you have an active flist, please do share a link, or alternatively, recommend me some of your friends who you think I would get along with. or both!

link: https://belenen.livejournal.com/693011.html
pretty share:
<center><a href="https://belenen.livejournal.com/693011.html"><img src="http://oi60.tinypic.com/2po5zx0.jpg" border="1" alt="two people back to back with their upper arms touching, and on each arm is half of a gold heart that reads besties"> <font size="3">friendzy: active LJ friends!</font></a></center>

LJ has become such a ghost town on the English-writing journals since the server move and new TOS, which I can totally understand but I tried to move and I just can't. I'd have to be forced out.

Currently working on a post about sex as it relates to my identity and relationships, for my and Anika's next shared prompt. It's gonna be long!

So bunnika and I are gonna be writing buddies and take turns coming up with prompts that we both write on. I'm surprised that we haven't done this before in our dozen-ish years of LJing together (or if we did, that memory is lost) but I feel hopeful. We're gonna aim for twice a week, and try to comment thoughtfully on each other's posts also. Anika is someone whose posts give me the writing itch in general so if we can really stay on it, this could be so lovely, hopefully for us both. Anyone who wants to also write on these prompts is of course welcome to, and feel free to comment with a link if you do.

The first prompt is things/ qualities /situations /experiences you've had that your lovers have envied, or what you have envied from your lovers..  I came up with this one because I randomly remembered how envious Aurilion was, and then I was curious about Anika's experience with that, if relevant. I'm just using it as a jumping off point for some wild rambles.

Aurilion was so envious of my readership here on LJ. I have never had a huge following, but I have had a steady readership of about 150 unique visits per week for many years now. Most of these readers never interact with me, even though some have been reading for literally years. I'm terribly curious, and fascinated by the fact that some of my regular readers are based in countries where I know no one. Occasionally I find out that someone is a reader because they tell me, after two or three years of silent reading, so I never assume I can get an accurate idea of how many people or who reads my LJ.  In my experience there are usually at least 5 silent readers for every commenter, so I don't take it as 'no one is reading' if I only get one or two comments. (Zero comments/reactions still makes me think maybe nobody read it, though)

I never actually talked about that with Aurilion though -- they based their ideas of my readership off of comments I get. They would get envious and have an attitude of "I deserve more comments than you" though they never said that -- they just exclaimed "how do you have so much!? Why do I have so little??" as if we wrote identical things and people inexplicably liked mine better. I tried to figure out why this happened for me, so that I could explain and help them get what they wanted, but they didn't want to change anything about how they wrote -- they just wanted to magically transfer my readers to them. And honestly back then, always eager to please, I urged everyone who read me to add them.

They weren't the first one to feel miffed that they didn't have as many readers as me. My ex-partner Ben also identified as a writer, and wanted to have people invested in what he wrote. I think he also thought I deserved readers and wanted me to have them as well, though.

Thinking back, it's been many years since I actively tried to find readers.  Back in the day, my LJ was the only way I felt I could change the world for good, so it was important to me that as many people read it as possible. And I think I also needed the validation of people affirming that they did read it through comments. That made me feel noticed and valued.

Now, I mostly affect the world through facebook and resource-sharing, and I write in LJ because it is literally the only way I can really remember my life, and because it is my truest way of connecting with people and with myself. When I write, I learn who I am in that moment, on that day, and when I don't, I can easily go months of intense change and become a new version of myself without realizing it, and by then I have forgotten the old me. Until there are literally brain upgrades, I will need this or something like it to have any sense of who I am and what I want and need.

To bounce back though, I am just guessing what drew people to me because like I said, most of my readers never talk to me. I think the thing that I offer is simply a unique way of looking at things and I think everyone can offer that-- it just takes the effort to really reflect rather than reacting automatically, and the effort to share openly and risk hurt rather than sharing only what isn't scary to share. If it doesn't scare you a little bit, you're probably not sharing anything very close to your heart. People can feel when you're sharing something vulnerable, and it means a lot. At least, it means a lot to me when people share with me like that, and many people have told me the same about when I do it, so I imagine it as broadly true of good (non-abusive) people.

Side note: anyone who uses someone's true vulnerability against them on purpose is not a safe person and not a person I can respect. If someone came to me and shared in a humble and vulnerable way, I would not be willing to use it against them even if it was the person I hate most in the world. If it was that person, I would tell them "I'm glad you're trying to be open but I am not the person for you to talk to this about; find someone else." I would not hold it over them, or use it to manipulate them, or otherwise take advantage of that moment. To me it's just such a heinous violation to accept the gift of that most innocent part of a person and then lock that innocent part in chains, or crush it, etc.

Vulnerability should be honored. But it should also be consensual! No one has to accept that gift and people who are not willing and able to accept the responsibility of holding a kind and respectful space should say so. And when you are sharing something very vulnerable, it is also important to check in and be sure the other person CAN hold that space. I have learned the hard way that if something is super important to me, I can't just blurt it out whenever or I am gonna be hurt! I have to say something like "this is hard to express and important. are you in a space to take it in?" and that is within relationships that are based on an ideal of complete openness and honestly. Outside of those I have to be a lot MORE careful.

Which is part of why I share on LJ. People can easily take whatever time they need to process something I have shared, and if they are not interested, they can just not read. I don't have to worry that my vulnerability is too much, and I don't have to feel bad if the response is tepid, because I can re-read it and give my own self that validation of "wow, yes I expressed this exactly how I meant to and it feels true all over again reading it." There is a set of posts I wrote on two or three different times with no response, and it was SO very important to me but I think people couldn't relate -- I still feel really really glad to have written them because they were about such a major shift in my understanding of my self and the universe. In a lot of ways, LJ lets me be my own best friend in a way I simply couldn't without it.

Sure enough, this new schedule is helping me do more LJ! it hasn't shown up yet but I have written several partial entries last week and I have been reading more. I am setting my priority like this: read at least 3 times a week, write every lunch even if it is small and I don't share it, post at least twice a week, reply to comments, comment on others' entries. I feel bad to put that at the bottom but I can bring it up more when I have repaired my connection with LJ more. I'm also allowing myself to be "sloppy" and reply to comments and posts here and there without trying to be perfectly fair and never miss anything, because that just sets me up for failing.

I think I also need to do some switching up of my list, because there are some lovely people who I just can't keep up with and there are a lot of defunct journals. For me to really connect with people I need them to post 2-20 times a month. Much more than that and I start feeling really guilty that I can't keep up, but any less than 2x a month and I feel like we can't build any momentum. It also helps me when there are a few new people on my flist because the extra curiosity boosts my ability to read everyone. So if you know any good friending memes or if you know people who I don't know who post reflections on their lives and relationships, please let me know.

Yesterday, I met a super-lovely person for coffee. We'd met in vague and indirect ways and had made like three plans that didn't work out, so I was feeling worried that they'd be annoyed with me but apparently they had the same worry, and weren't annoyed with me at all. We talked about books and tv shows, work and school, coding and writing. They also seem to be in love with learning and dedicated to growth. The last time we had interacted was at a gather that was about queering relationships: dismantling the idea of romance as some singular thing, or a thing only for monogamous or allosexual people. I don't remember anything that was said of course, but I remember thinking "ah, you do friendship like me!" and shortly after that was when I reached out. I think we could be great friends and I really hope they have the time & energy & inclination to build a connection with me.

They write in a style similar to how I write here (at least it seems similar to me from the two posts of theirs I have read). I was talking about how my relationship to LJ had been messed up by the server move and subsequent exodus, and how I felt really out of sorts that I hadn't been writing. How my memory is such that if I keep no record, it is as if the time never happened. They listened sympathetically and when I mentioned needing at least one person that I felt was specifically anticipating my posts, they suggested we be writing buddies. I had been thinking about this but considered it too much to ask of someone when I'm already not an easy friend, so I was very excited and relieved and hopeful that they suggested it. They mentioned needing a structure in order to follow through which was also encouraging to me as I need the same. We decided to post on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, and to take turns coming up with prompts that we both write on. I am nervous but this could be really an amazing shift for me. Even the idea is so encouraging that I was able today to just sit down and write this out without having some major need to express myself on the topic.

All I succeeded in doing was making myself incapable of writing or engaging with either LJ or DW. So I'm going to stay here unless/until I am kicked out, lack of safety notwithstanding. Hopefully I will be able to get back in the flow.

So livejournal is now run by Russia apparently, complete with anti-queer and privacy-violating policies. If I lived in a country I trusted not to attack me, I wouldn't be too bothered, but since I can't trust the U S any further than I can throw it, I don't feel safe here now. This is the first time in my 13.5 years of LJ that I have seriously considered leaving. I don't know if I will leave yet, but I am definitely going to be more cautious about maintaining my dreamwidth backup. If you have a dreamwidth please add me there: http://belenen.dreamwidth.org

Are you staying? Going?

While I love my job, it takes up literally all of my ability to focus, most days. It's very detail-oriented and often tedious work and the past few projects I've worked on have been on stuff I find both boring and offensive (so-called history that's full of outright lies, and I have to describe it without adding commentary or arguing). So I get home and I have a very hard time controlling my brain as I have kept it on such a tight leash all day. Mostly it endlessly refreshes facebook and watches netflix. So I installed browser blocks for the first time in my life (leechblock for firefox and stayfocusd on chrome) and so far it's helped a lot, because my problem is not that that is what I actually want to be doing, but just that if I start at all I can't stop, and I need SOME down time to watch stuff and I want some time to catch up on facebook. So I gave myself 45 minutes for each one, and after that I can't use it the rest of the day. Thus, today I managed to come post! and not for LJ Idol!

But my brain still does its runaway carriage thing, as evidenced by the fact that I spent like five hours updating my layout the other day... and then as soon as I wrote that line I went and spent three hours more. (resize your browser for Fun Timez) annnnd there's still a thing I haven't figured out. oh well calling it a night since I'm overdue for sleep already arghhhh

ETA: figured it out the next day. SUPER PROUD of it right now.

My country is the internet; my state is the mid-90s to the mid-00s, and my city is Livejournal, though I have lived in other cities for short periods of time, and I visit other cities often.


My experience with the internet began with AOL on Windows 95. I used the internet to download midi files of music I liked, endlessly search for info on my favorite musical artists, and find people to chat eagerly with about music or about God (my two obsessions at the time). I made some pretty intense friendships, one with a white guy in Canada, and one with a black guy somewhere in the Midwest. I didn't seek out guys, I don't think, but there just weren't any girls my age that I could find (and at that point I didn't know that nonbinary people existed). My friendships with those two highly ethical and thoughtful people allowed me to create healthy expectations of male behavior, rather than accepting selfishness and disrespect as 'normal' which would have been the case if I did not have access to the internet.

During the early days of my interaction with the internet, my use was limited to chatting, searching for information, and exploring the Anotherworld MUD. Then at age 20 I took an intro computer course which was utter shit but one of the assignments changed my life: we had to make a simple webpage with the most basic coding. I found this really fun and started teaching myself HTML, building two websites from bare code. I probably spent more than 200 hours on them over the course of the next three years. No one I knew ever cared much about this project, but I loved it so much I didn't need external interest to keep it going. I did get interesting and meaningful responses in the guestbook of my site, particularly about my anti-racist stance. This is where I developed my ethic of content creation and self-education: I shared what I made, and when I wanted to do something I trained myself on how to do it. This was no small feat, because how-to resources were still scanty at the time.


At the same time, Allison (who is now my oldest friendship) introduced me to LiveJournal. I joined first as a way to stay in touch with Allison and it quickly took on an important role in my life. I met new people through add-me communities and through shared-interest communities. This is where I developed my norm for getting to know people: if I thought they were interesting I added them to my friends list and consumed their online content. If the interest was mutual and they added me back, I would respond to their posts and have turn-based conversations. I rarely had any direct interaction at first -- I only commented if they required it before adding them, and most of the time if they required that I just didn't add them.

That is how I would prefer to be able to get to know anyone; indirectly and not in real time but with intensely intimate levels of sharing. It's a strong enough norm for me that I can rarely have a lasting or nourishing connection with someone who doesn't share intimacies indirectly. It's usually too hard for me to sync up in real time, but I need that level of intense sharing to feel nourished and to maintain investment. But I've realized that in most places, getting to know someone indirectly first is considered 'weird' at best and people often refer to it as 'stalking' which I find utterly baffling. I accept that it's taboo and I don't talk about it to out-of-towners, but where I'm from, that's just how you do it! (obviously I don't look at anything that's not set to 'public' because that's creepy)

Also at this intense time of change, I started going to group therapy. Through the group therapy I started learning to be vulnerable with others, and within a few months I dedicated my journal to openness and honesty. It was a difficult project for a long time, because only a few months into my LJ life I started having flashbacks to childhood sexual abuse (sparked by having consensual penetrative sex for the first time). I began going to therapy weekly, and it got worse before it got better.

So for about two years I could not leave my house without someone by my side, and I had no local friends so I rarely went out. The internet saved me: I built real friendships to a depth I never had before. For the first time in my life, people sharing freely with me happened on a daily basis instead of once or twice a year. This was the first time in my life I truly felt like I belonged and like I understood how to interact in a way that would be appreciated. I rapidly dismantled my inner barriers to openness, and what I didn't dismantle was destroyed for me. It became important to me to share my own story in a public way, because I knew I was not the only one dealing with recovery from abuse. That built my immunity to trolling because when people mock you for being an abuse victim, there's not much lower they can go.


In late 2004 I also came across a community celebrating hourglass shapes and when the owner deleted it due to fighting over what counted, I decided to make a better version. I created a body-positive community with the idea of it being for medium people, like I was at the time (size 10) since there were fat positive communities but they had a minimum size requirement. But as people much smaller and larger than me joined, my idea rapidly changed, because the idea of excluding people for being 'too much' or 'not enough' was not okay to me. Within a few months, it was for anyone who self-identified as curvy, regardless of size or gender. This community was like a commune, a gathering of people who I mostly didn't know but who all were working together on the same beautiful project. It was home and work and family all at once; I took it from one person to more than 1,300, and it remained a thriving community for about four years.

That community was where I learned to love myself, and I got to watch lots of others do it too. It also brought me and Hannah together, which was a whole new experience because for the first time I met someone who was better at questioning and being open than I was. Hannah and I would regularly spend 9+ hours talking and sharing: we'd write on LJ and read each others' writing, we'd explore deviantart and share favorite works with each other, and just talk endlessly on gchat.



Deviantart was, for a time, almost as important as LJ to me. It's where I shared my artistic nudes and developed immunity about people expressing disgust toward my body. I also experienced so many people thanking me for sharing and telling me that it helped them to see their own beauty. DeviantArt is the town where I developed myself as a public artist, and I had some celebrity for a short time, but now my style has evolved so much that no one recognizes it as mine when I put up a new piece. It's a place I visit once in a blue moon to look at my old work on the walls, but all the artists I loved there moved away so even the nostalgia is dusty. I can't bring myself to stay long enough to get invested in the art circles there anymore.

Twitter was paramount for about a year in 2011; I kept up daily and interacted often. I was put off by the lack of reciprocity: I was following and interacting with people who never read my tweets and it felt cliquish. I learned a lot from the feminists there, esp the trans and WOC feminists, but it was more like a newspaper than like a social space. In a lot of ways it reminds me of my college experience: no matter how much effort I put in, no one wanted to connect at more than a surface level. Twitter is a city I drive through almost every day but never stop anymore; the roads where people live are confusing and parking is fucking torture, so I just go on through.



I got a facebook initially due to curiosity, kept it because of its value at organizing gathers, and slowly began spending more time there as my local activist network developed. Over the past two years it has become a more real space for me, as people have begun interacting with me more, but it still feels somewhat alien. Facebook feels like the building where I work: I go there often, but always in costume while leaving my more scandalous self at home. Without ever consciously deciding to, I had developed a habit of restricted my sharing on fb because fb culture is so pro-judgement. Once I realized this, I began working to bring more of myself into my facebook life because I don't actually want to make it more difficult to get to know me. Facebook will never be home, but I am making it into a workplace where I can be more of myself.


There were several shakeups here on LJ over the years and I lost friends to vox, wordpress, blogger, dreamwidth, and even facebook, but still I remain here. My LJ friends list is like a neighborhood where every single house is owned by a friend of mine. The idea of moving is absurd and always will be unless most of my friends move away. Even when it was mostly empty for a few years, I stayed in the hopes people would return, and eventually filled up those houses with new friends. Now, I have a small handful of friends who returned but most of my neighborhood is people I have met within the past three years (and I have been on LJ for more than 13 years).

I get so excited when I meet someone who is also from the internet, and even more so when I meet someone from livejournal. I imagine it is how other people feel when they live far from a hometown that they love, and then they meet someone from there. I might not get along with everyone from LJ, but if they have lived here a while, I immediately know we share similar values in a lot of ways. Especially if they love it here as much as I do.

[Poll #2061628]

Hi friends!

I've gotten terribly behind and I miss all of you. I was unfriended by a few people, one of whom I really cared about. I don't think it was the content of the stuff I did post so much as the lack of other posts and comments on people's journals, because it's probably been at least two months since I was really keeping up. When I was working at starbux, I had no energy for anything because it took so much work to be social AND on my feet for many hours AND parsing sound constantly. I just watched netflix with my spare time, or did necessary chores or watched netflix w Topaz. My new job is amazing and I feel accomplished yet not drained at the end of the day, but it does take 52-60 hours a week including driving and time for lunch (I take a 30 min lunch). And I haven't worked 40 hours a week in like 10 years, haven't driven 10-15 hours a week in years also. So I'm still adjusting to that. It will help once work starts back up again because then I will have a set schedule -- starting in December meant having work broken up by off time since we follow the academic calendar to a certain extent. Once I am definitely working M-F I can pick time to dedicate to LJ and manage to do it.

Solstice was amazing and Xmas was relatively low-stress too, but all the hustle and bustle wore me out and I am glad to have this week to recover. I'm still emotionally exhausted and having stress dreams when I sleep, about things like writing a bunch of papers or getting trapped on the wrong floor in a giant building by someone who intended to put me in the 'playpen' which sounded epic levels of ominous.

Finally caught up on replying to comments today. I really do have just the sweetest friends list. In fact, overall I think my friends list right now actually has the highest number of meaningful connections that I've ever had. I really adore many of you and am excited about getting to know some of my newer friends. LJ is my beloved home and I'm pleased that we share this building *heartglow*

Speaking of home, I'm curious as to how my current readers are scattered (only I can see who chose what).
( Please ONLY answer if you read my journal )

I had a conversation with Cass the other day about the way people perceive me through facebook. She told me that I come across as very judgemental and hasty to dismiss people as unworthy; that she in the past and others who she has talked to have this perception. At first I found this really baffling, because I am used to people who know me through the internet thinking of me as really accepting and emotionally warm, and anyone who has known me for a while knows that I always want to work shit out rather than throw people away. But it has been a long time since I took a 'fresh read' of people's opinions of me and even so, the last time I did I think people only responded if they had something nice to say (which wasn't my goal, but was nice to read). So maybe people's perceptions of me have changed in general and I just don't know it.

Anyway, there is a huge difference in my LJ presence versus my FB presence. Livejournal gets the best of me. Things I am sure I want to read again, I put on my LJ. Random comments go on twitter which cross-posts to facebook; those posts are automatically less nuanced just because they're 140 characters or less most of the time. I don't share my more warm-fuzzy or introspective stuff on FB because nobody responds so I expect that that means nobody is reading them. My tweet-sized comments usually get about a dozen likes/reactions, whereas my cross-posted LJ entries are lucky to get 3 likes/reactions.

But this means that people are never reading about how I am working out difficult friendships or how I am dealing with personal struggles, so they really don't get a good feel for who I am. And I don't want people to get the wrong impression of me, so I have decided to try and be more open on facebook, even if I get no feedback. Then at least it is not my fault if people have the wrong impression. I'm going to try to cross-post even the 'unimportant' 'too personal' stuff for a while and see if that helps.

There is also the fact that livejournal allows me to give responses to people's experiences rather than just dealing with the more surface stuff. On facebook most people do not bare their soul, so there isn't a lot of valuable reflection I can give; an "I read this and I care" means a lot more in response to a soul-baring than it does in response to a post that isn't very personal. So I can't show my caring so easily there, even with the same amount of effort. That, I do not think there is a remedy to. There are simply too many people and too many posts for me to be able to find the emotionally-deep posts that would be best for thoughtful responses.

ETA: Just realized that the fact that my comments on LJ have mood-appropriate icons (often of my face which makes me more relatable) and the fact that I am much more affectionate in my speech on LJ must also contribute to the difference in perception. The latter I can be conscious of and shift somewhat on facebook. I don't necessarily feel less affectionate toward people I know through FB, but I tend to be more reserved with affection there, not sure why. Perhaps because it does feel much more public. People can happen across my facebook pretty easily, whereas when people come to my LJ, it is a much more deliberate act of connection.

( reflecting on LJ patterns )

( job hunt stress ) Also I was super social for like a solid week and am just now feeling like I can handle voluntary interaction with human beings. My youngest sibling, Ace, came in town with almost no warning and hasn't visited in at least four years, so I hastily threw together some plans so that Ace could meet my people and vice versa.

( discomfort with biofam due to them not putting in any effort to connect with me )

Anyway, other than that discomfort, it was an okay visit. Ace wanted to go to a lesbian bar, so we did, but it was Monday night so not much was happening. Cass, Katie, Katie's person Molly, and Topaz hung out with me and Ace and just talked, and afterward Topaz and Ace and I went to dinner and Ace laid out some heavy questions. First Ace tested Topaz with a point-blank "so what do you feel about belenen?" (or something very close to that) and Topaz reeled briefly and then answered honestly and openly while looking me in the eyes, and Ace judged them as truthful. Ace is extraordinarily observant and blunt and doesn't fuck around when they want to know something.

Then Ace asked me "why do you hate our parents?" and I replied calmly that I don't hate them, I'm just not that attached. Topaz later told me that they were amazed at the full blast of the questions (because they got more pointed from there) and at how I handled them, and then I realized that they were some hard questions, but I appreciate bluntness and while Ace did ask very leading questions, I'm pretty good at not being lead. However, I was also way too literal in answering them, because I think what Ace was looking for was some empathy for their suffering, but what they were asking about was my suffering, which they were then comparing to theirs. I didn't realize this until later, talking about it with Topaz, who realized it during the conversation. I felt shitty that I didn't realize and thus missed the opportunity to connect there.

The next day I had planned a small gather which Topaz hosted, with Topaz, me, Ace, Allison, Elliot, Serenity, Kylei, Jaime, and my cousin. It was a wonderful group of people and I really enjoyed everyone's company, though my ADD got way out of hand when we all played Dixit together. I'm gonna trust the box next time and agree that more than 7 people is too many, unless everyone is a fairly quiet person. We had four or five boisterous people and I just couldn't manage it after a while. Nobody got mad when I said I needed a break or when we didn't end up returning to the game, though, so it was okay.

I was hoping to have more time with Ace but since they were smoking a lot of the time and thus were outside while I was inside we didn't really interact directly very much. They said they liked all my friends (said this to me multiple times) and said to Topaz "I love you for my [sibling]," which I was very pleased by because they're usually very suspicious of anyone I am close to. This was also the first time I got to introduce several people to each other (which I love doing) and people volunteered their positive impressions of each other to me which made me VERY happy.

Then Wednesday I spent time with Ace, my cousin, and my grandparent, very casual, working on a long-term art project of Ace's. I was so so so wiped out after that though -- family Sunday, family AND new scary place (I'd never been to a lesbian bar and I get very anxious about not looking queer enough) Monday, big social thing including family Tuesday, more family Wednesday. I took Thursday to recover and then spent Friday vacuuming the dust/dander/fur out of the rugs and then spending time with Topaz.

Saturday was a day I had been planning for two months: a Sense8 marathon. Topaz, Sande, Evelyn, Serenity, and I watched it on the projector that I borrowed from Kylei. I don't remember how many episodes various people watched but it felt really wonderful to be with people that I feel such strong connections with, watching a show that feels like a part of me. And it was good that it was low-interaction because I certainly couldn't have handled more active social at the end of such a week!

It was really really wonderful to have Topaz in my house, after so long of them not being there due to allergies. I replaced the air filter very recently, dusted the week before, vacuumed the day before, and Serenity mopped the floors the day before too, and I turned the air conditioning high while Topaz was here (because cold helps). It all paid off -- Topaz didn't seem to have much of a reaction at all, and was able to stay for like five hours.

I looked at my stats today and liked the repeated numbers. Look at all the threes! also, my comments-received finally outstripped my comments-posted. *sigh* I liked having it ahead!



[purple dragon userhead] belenen
[icon: "challenging (photo of me lifting one eyebrow and slightly squinting my eyes, wearing "Red Queen" makeup: searingly red lips, darkened pointed eyebrows, black eyeliner, deep red & black eyeshadow accented with gold & silver, and black-outlined silver hearts & diamonds with red shadows on my cheeks)"]
challenging [blue down arrow]
the eclectic ecstasy of an ecphorizing eccentric
treehugging, agender, queer, fat & proud, ADD social justice activist

[gold star] Permanent Account, Created on 29 August 2003 (#1289251), Last updated on 12 July 2016
[miniature bar chart] 13 place in User ratings
[gold coin with face on it] Social capital: 193

2,363 Journal entries
33,934 Comments posted
33,994 Comments received
339 Tags

174 Memories
3,545 Photos
15 V-Gifts
163 Userpics


Share yours? (please just copy paste the text if you do so that the comment thread is accessible to screen readers, or describe your image) I am very curious to see all of them in one place to see if there are any patterns *smiles hopefully*

I realized just now that I usually do not read other people's comments before leaving my own, because I do not want to sway my response -- yet I often do read the comments before adding mine in places that aren't LJ. So I want to see if this is unusual, or if there is a discernible pattern to be found.

[Poll #2048714]

I've realized that there are some things that make it hard for me to read. One is a lack of spacing between paragraphs; making a new line but not skipping a line. This is apparently an issue for dyslexic readers as well. I am part of a facebook group that works to be inclusive and one of the guidelines is breaking up text into smaller chunks, rather than having long paragraphs. I can actually read long paragraphs without too much trouble, but I have started trying to break mine up a bit more to make it more accessible.

The other problem I have is the opposite thing, where there are several paragraphs that are each only 1-3 lines, usually list-type posts. I can't read these without a huge amount of effort. I think it must be that on some level I take in multiple lines at once when I read, and parse them together, but I can't do that with the list-type posts. It's like my eyes skitter all over the page and I have to focus very hard to actually read.

All this to say: I care about all of your posts or I wouldn't have you on my friends list, but if you post without spaces between paragraphs or if you post list-type posts, I will rarely be able to read them and it will take a lot of work for me to do so. If it doesn't matter to you, I would vastly appreciate spaces between paragraphs. There's no way to help me with the list-type posts, I'm afraid.

Lastly, small images (like emoticons or decorative text) within posts also make it difficult for me to read, as does text with background color. I understand these can be important to one's textual sense of self, so I'm not requesting anything, just sharing my experience. I don't know why these things have become an issue for me, since they weren't years ago, but I think that as my ADD-PI got worse, these things became more difficult.

Sometimes I read my posts out loud to Topaz while they're cooking or otherwise have hands and eyes occupied, and lately I was thinking about recording them for broader use. I'd like some feedback on the idea -- no one but me can see what you answered! I'm screening comments in case you want to give a private response but will unscreen unless you request otherwise.
[Poll #2046442]
Oh, and I realized that those new to my LJ might like some context for the people in my life, so here is my most recent version of the characters in the story of my life. It does need updating, but it mostly has the people I reference often.

Oh! and I automatically add people to my sex talk filter. It's the only content filter I use, and I don't use it often but if I am talking about sexual experiences I friends-lock them if the person/people I am having sex with prefer it that way (as is usually the case). Here is your chance to opt-out:
[Poll #1433403]

I have added a lot of awesome new people recently, and I'm very excited to have the chance to get to know you! I recently wrote an 'about me' that is exceedingly dense and comprehensive: it describes my identity, core values, personality characteristics, my attitudes about language and art and friendship, my access needs, and my spirituality. That is very long, so ( here is a summary )

The most important part is the part about slurs. You probably use some of these (ableist slurs are really common), and it will probably break my heart a little bit every time. Sometimes I will take damage and betray my beliefs rather than discuss it, because I am afraid of losing people, but when I feel strong enough, I will ask people not to use these. I can handle it when it's an occasional slip-up and generally people try not to use them, but if it is constant, I just can't take it. So, here's your easy exit if you feel this is an incompatibility -- you can unfriend me with no ill will (please let me know with a comment, because LJ has been failing to notify me).

If there is ever something I do or say that hurts you or seems to be adding to systemic injustice, please let me know. I can promise that I will look at my behavior and if there is a way for me to change my behavior to prevent hurt (without violating my core values) then I will absolutely make that change as quickly and completely as I can. Relevantly, I'm bad at guessing what needs a content note/trigger warning but tell me and I will keep a list and do my best to remember.

I can be rude but I am never disrespectful on purpose, and I am never (intentionally) rude to people who are open to learning. My gentleness is most often expressed privately, because that is usually how people with sincere questions approach me. Feel free to ask me any question anytime, as long as it is sincere and you're not going to get angry if I take a while to answer or need a reminder because I have forgotten.

CN: ableist slurs used in comments (by a new friend who is now unfriended).

Looking for more active LJ friends?
Post about yourself and find new people!

<b>1) Age and location:</b> <b>2) Self-labels / identity (gay, straight, old, young, monogamous, non-monogamous, etc):</b> <b>3) I live with (roommates, spouse, my children, a tiger, etc):</b> <b>4) My posts usually fall into the following categories:</b> <b>5) My favorite things to read on my friends list are:</b> <b>6) In the past few years the biggest issues for me with friendship have been:</b> <b>7) I post entries on average once every (day, 2 days, week, etc):</b> <b>8) If someone made a deluxe action figure based on me, it would have these 3 props and 3 outfits:</b>

also please spread the word!
<center><a href="http://belenen.livejournal.com/656628.html"><img src="http://oi60.tinypic.com/2po5zx0.jpg" alt="arms of two people who are back to back - each arm has one half of a heart with the word besties on it" border="1"> <span style="font-size: 2em">friending frenzy: active LJ friends!</span></a></center>

It's been a while! I have some awesome friends now and I want to share the wealth, and meet any of your awesome friends!

The weirdest thing about not dating Topaz right now is how I feel like I have an abundance of time. I take a leisurely route home, stop at the thrift store or grocery store, I make myself tea and read, I craft, I organize and tidy, and none of it in a hurry. These were things I did already but I always did them in a kind of defiant or splurge-y kind of way, and it didn't happen that often.

It's weird to realize how much I put restrictions on myself to be available for Topaz. It's a little scary, because it was an unconscious rule that I couldn't do things that would make me unavailable to Topaz unless I arranged it ahead of time. I know Topaz would never ask something like that of me, nor would I ask it of someone else, yet it was such a rule in my head that I had to work up a feeling of defiance in order to disobey it. And I know this isn't the first time I've had this subconscious rule, though it is the first time I feel sure that my person wouldn't be secretly wanting me to fall into that pattern (which is why I was able to break out of it at all).


I have this fear of love being taken away if I ever am not there for someone when they want comfort or help. I don't fear that the person will really suffer damage from me not giving to them one time -- rationally I think they will be okay (and if maybe not, then that is a completely different situation). I fear, selfishly, that if I don't do it, they will make a tally mark. Each "not there" tally mark crosses out four "good support" tally marks or eight "mediocre support" tally marks. Partly I don't want to have to make up for not being there because that's usually more work than the being there would be. I don't get afraid of this right away. It's only when it becomes a habit for me to be comforting/helpful that I get afraid of not doing it.

I think that I earn people's love and I find it very hard to resist the idea of a few more gold coins, even though I should have far more than I need. I feel a compulsion to hoard in case I make a mistake and that causes inflation that makes my previous earnings worthless. Ugh, I had no idea that my attitude toward love was so capitalist. I don't even know how to restructure it.

I can't really grasp the idea of someone not loving me less when I am not an automatic comfort/help. Of course they would! how could they not? I'm not sure where this fear came from, because I don't remember being a comfort to anyone as a child, and I don't remember having love withdrawn for not being a comfort (at least, not for the first 2 decades of my life). Although, thinking specifically on being helpful, my parents definitely withdrew love if I didn't 'help' by which they meant 'do what I want.' I think my understanding of help is muddied by their emotional abuse around 'gifted' labor.

Ultimately I think 'comforting/helpful' is the new 'smart' - the thing people value about me which is not part of my identity and which becomes a bigger deal than it should be. That feels close to the truth.

It doesn't help that almost always people refer to my various forms of giving when I ask why they love me. And it makes sense that people would love when I am generous, and I do want my giving to be appreciated, and I know that actions are part of the reason I love others. But it feels like the innate things are less important, like maybe they could take or leave those as long as I was giving. But for me, actions are almost never one of the first things I love about a person, except when they are an expression of something innate (like an artist making art).

What am I without giving? am I still worthwhile? I think I would be, to me, if I was someone else. I think if I was someone else I would feel nourished by my mere existence. I am actively nourished by myself, in that when I am being most myself, I enjoy my own company and I enjoy the space I create. Being in my bedroom (when I am in a good place and thus it is tidy) is like a constant cuddle from a rainbow and a forest together. I wish it felt that way to others. I want other people to be able to appreciate me in the way I do, because that is the way that feels like it's really about ME and not just about what I DO. I don't know how to explain this well.

I bounce back and forth between thinking that I give too much and wondering if I give at all. And also always wondering if I could be loved without earning it. If I could be appreciated for just existing, like a tree.

I'm too scared that the answer is "no" to try it out. I don't really know how to do it. I am constantly working to earn love -- it's automatic. I feel like because I can avoid making people do work or feel bad, I should. I should always be careful in my phrasing, gentle with feelings, avoiding misunderstanding, offering solutions, helping. Sometimes I try to be 'natural' but I am almost always drained by such efforts and it seems counterproductive, as it makes me feel worse about myself, and usually it makes me feel disconnected because when a bad feeling happens the other person often simply leaves it there. Sometimes people attack me in response, because my behavior changed and it made them feel bad, and they think of it as me attacking them. Other times they drop out of my life because the thing they came for is not there.

This is part of the reason that when someone doesn't care one way or the other about my journal, I feel very suspicious of the idea that they could love me. How could you possibly love me if the purest expression of who I am is something you could take or leave? My LJ is as much who I am as my face is -- nay, more so. It is more me than my cuddles, more me than the way I move, more me than my sex, more me than my presents or my fractals or my photos. Literally the only thing that is more me than my journal is my consciousness and spirit, maybe my body but that's questionable as I didn't create my body. If people don't enjoy reading in general, I can intellectually understand that but emotionally I do not understand.

There is a steep learning curve for most people to be close with me because I am so different from the default in identity, values, and language.

( my identity has many facets )

( my values and qualities )

( I am careful with language )

This on top of the fact that most people have to learn a whole new set of words/concepts to even start to understand me: queer, trans, agender, polyamorous, demisexual, fat & proud, nudist. To understand these things you have to break down the idea that gender is a continuum from male to female or that gender is any set of discrete categories, the idea that there are only two sexes, the idea that you can only be attracted to one gender, the idea that everyone has a gender, the idea that true love is exclusive, the idea that sexual attraction happens by appearance, the idea that fat is bad, the idea that nudity is sexual or scandalous -- for starters.

( I'm invested in social justice and respond to injustice in every aspect of life )

( I have non-average needs in communication )

( I cherish art, I cherish creation )

( I build my own spirituality )

( I prioritize friendship )

I'm not an easy friend! but my friends have told me that I am trustworthy, compassionate, empathetic, generous, encouraging, insightful, creative, genuine, and growth-inspiring, so I think that I am worth the effort. Still, it's so much easier for someone to be comfortable with me if they are already careful with language and already self-educate on sex, gender, relationships, race, disability, etc.

reason #652 I love LJ: notes. I use them when first adding someone so that I can check on how long we have been friends - if it has been more than 8 months and we haven't connected, I will probably take them off. Once I connect with people I make the note their name. If they are still new to me I will add several key facts because unless you use your face as your icon or regularly post photos of yourself, it's the key facts that are the link to memory.

On facebook I have added people from so many sources and I am often lost as to how we initially connected. Also I might forget who has done something terrible on FB, but on LJ notes save me. If someone is a raging bigot I don't want to accidentally add them again because they changed their default icon and I couldn't remember the name -- and re-adding someone I never clicked with after months and months is just awwwwkward.

Like Vines Toward The Sun -- a friending meme for returnee & long-term LJers!
This is fantastic! I have found a number of new awesome people (welcome!) and I know that some of you here (reed_wolf I remember, I think sidheblessed and at least two other people) were wanting a more active friends list -- I think this meme will help you find some!

( sharing my response to the questions because I really liked some of them )

What steps do you take to make your LJ into a place you want it to be, which of them work, and do any of them happen to trap you in the image of yourself you have already created here and impede you expressing everything of yourself here? (from here)

What I want my LJ to be:
1) a memory repository
2) a way for me to explore and learn myself and to note patterns in my life
3) a connection with others and a way for others to know me deeply
4) an inspiration for the pursuit of justice
5) a work of art
6) an outlet for strong emotion
7) a way to share skills I have learned
8) a resource for others who experience similar oppressions and marginalizations (queer, trans, nonbinary, femme or afab, ADD & neuroatypical people, fat, demisexual, poor, polyamorous/relationship anarchists, activists, etc).

Steps I take:
1) a memory repository:
I try to write down descriptions of events that are meaningful for my life. I title and tag so that I can have memory tags both for searching for things in my journal, and for tagging things in my brain for bringing up more easily. I re-read and explain and summarize.

2) a way for me to explore and learn myself and to note patterns in my life:
I write about things that I am just considering for the first time, things I have learned, things I am unlearning. I write about my spirituality, my goals, my desires and emotions. I use my journal to gain an overview in order to note patterns in my dreams, my moods, my experiences. I hadn't realized how continuously overwhelmed I was until I considered how often I used my 'overwhelmed' icon, for instance. I often realize things about myself as I am writing also -- trying to put things into broadly-understandable words makes me understand the things myself at a deeper level.

3) a connection with others and a way for others to know me deeply:
I add people and read their entries and comment (sometimes -- not as much as I would ideally) in order to develop friendships and connections where we mutually nourish the shared space that is LJ. I keep my journal mostly public so that anyone who has a desire to know me may do so, at their own pace. I try to keep it accessible (with photo descriptions etc) so that I am not blocking out anyone.

4) an inspiration for the pursuit of justice:
I write about justice issues as I learn them, and attempt to model growthful responses to my mistakes. I confront people about their harmful behavior (especially regarding slurs) when I feel I am able to.

5) a work of art:
I deeply customized my layout using css and html, and crafted my profile carefully over time. My journal is more expressive of my personhood than anything I wear; maybe than anything else. I also (sometimes; not often lately) share my photography, fractals, and mixed media here.

6) an outlet for strong emotion and for messiness and unedited expression:
I attempt to share my feelings thoroughly and without censoring myself. I attempt to be complete and leave myself open to mistakes and criticism.

7) a way to share skills I have learned:
When I realize I have learned a skill that is not commonly held, I try to break it down into the individual parts and explain it clearly and thoroughly so that anyone else who wants to learn the skill can use the guidelines I write in order to do so.

8) a resource for others who experience similar oppressions and marginalizations:
I share my experiences and emotions so that people who have similar ones can feel less alone. I write about how to treat me and people like me so that allies can learn how to be inclusive and respectful of our differences, so that other people don't have to do the work of explaining. I want this both to be a thing people can link to and to be an additional force for increasing awareness generally.

I think all of these steps work to some extent or another. Do any of them trap me in the image of myself I have already created and impede me expressing everything of myself here? Probably. 4 and 6 clash sometimes because to be ethical I need to be careful about my language -- English is filled with the detritus of centuries of oppression and you simply cannot speak it unthinkingly without causing damage. 4 and 3 clash sometimes because I feel that if I were to point out every instance of issues no one would want to be my friend, and I feel like I have to build some kind of connection before pointing it out would do any good, but it is hard to build connection when someone is using slurs, for instance.

This was a hard question to answer, but I really appreciate having explored it because being aware of my intentions makes me much better at being thorough in growing toward them! Thanks kehlen_crow!

I just cleared out my friends list of people who I hadn't interacted with significantly in at least half a year, including some read-only journals. I had never taken inactive journals off if I wanted them to read my stuff, but I decided I'd rather know who is actually here. If you still use your LJ to read and want me to re-add you, let me know. Otherwise, if you feel a desire to maintain contact elsewhere, I'm cool with being friends on FB (facebook.com/belenen).

also, I keep meaning to respond to that question -- do I like responses even when I don't reply: YES. I love reading people's responses. Especially if they contain emotion words or a description of thought process. I always intend to respond, but it often gets away from me. It is always appreciated though! never fear annoying me with too many comments -- it really won't happen.

well I just got SUPER hyperfocused stuck on updating my LJ layout (worked on it for about 7 hours solid), but I got rid of the tables and cleaned it up a lot, and made it work better on small devices (shrink your browser window and it will transform). I'm trying light background with dark text for a bit to see if it is kinder to my eyes. Check it out and tell me what you think! *grins* Also, if you notice any accessibility issues please let me know (now or anytime). I'm trying to minimize them as much as possible.

(from Topaz) What, if anything, do you think you've learned FROM me; And, what, if anything, do you feel you've learned from being with me; And, what, if any, big things have you learned since we got together?

Ummm... I have learned a huge lot and my memory is full of holes, so I'm not even gonna try to make this comprehensive.

From you?
I have learned what media really means. I learned that even hostile anti-theists can have understandings of the world that fit with my spiritual beliefs. I learned that nail polish can be butch. I learned that chameleoning can be a powerful tool against oppression and that it doesn't always touch your soul. I learned that Carl Sagan is wonderful, and that wonder is a core value of mine. I learned about and came to love Michael Jackson, M.I.A., Lowkey, Melissa Ferrick, Sonia Leigh, and Ani Difranco. I learned that I dearly love giving presents to people who love getting them and have a variety of interests. I learned that sometimes, doing dishes can be worth it. I learned that I can enjoy cauliflower. I learned that I like many kinds of sex that I hadn't been interested in before. I learned that sometimes climbing a mountain is not the worst thing. I learned what a migraine is, and why it is so not the same as a really bad headache.

From being with you?
I've learned to be more patient with communication, and that 'I can't tell you yet' is not necessarily code for 'I'm going to put this off until you forget.' I learned that I can't deal with much indirect communication, and I learned how to respond to it in a useful way. I learned that I really love sweetness. I learned that I can ask for what I want without fear of pressuring someone into giving it. I learned that I really value (maybe need) independence in a lover, mixed with willingness to express needs and desires. I learned that I can brush someone's hair for literal hours, and that I miss having hair long enough to brush.

Overall big things?
I learned I don't believe in an afterlife or in spanking (both from logical conversations with you). I learned a ridiculously huge amount about racism, cissexism, ableism, and oppression in general. I learned that I have talent in stats. I learned that my ADD is bad enough that I can't really function without meds. I learned that my fractals are beautiful to more people than just me. I learned that I suck at picking people and need to get input from my insightful friends. I learned that LJ is still alive and that I can be 'in' it like I did years ago. I learned that I can motivate myself to do things with colorful stickers. I learned that my mental health is negatively affected when I don't eat breakfast and lunch. I learned that I can forge on ahead with something completely new, even when my future rests on that thing. I learned that parts of my biofamily are kinda great and that my bioparent M is the most selfish person I've known. I learned that I need group focus time as well as one-on-one. I've learned that I need for my lover(s) to combine specific compliments with touch for me to feel desirable or aesthetically pleasing. I learned that nourishing connections are increasingly difficult for me to find. I learned that similarity of inner self or similarity of overall goals doesn't make a connection nourishing: that I need connections with people who are on a growth spiral and not too far away from me. I learned that my privilege as a colonizer race means that it would be inappropriate for me to profit from doing spiritual healings or divination (since I only have access to these things due to historical and modern spiritual theft). I learned that I can build spiritual practice that is more growth-inducing, challenging, and meaningful for me than any externally-created practice I have come across.

I love social media especially LJ for the way it lets me watch the development of other relationships. Oftentimes if I am on the fence about someone, it will be their interaction with someone else that make me decide one way or the other about whether or not I should invest in them. If someone is unkind to my friend, they're unlikely to be a decent friend to me. If someone expresses understanding and empathy to my friend, I feel affection for that person and desire to connect more with them. I like this in my real-time conversations as well, but people don't often remember to tell me or even realize I want to know. I'm always curious about my friends' interactions with each other.

The other day Abby gave me feedback about my post on 5-steps to educate or eliminate that made me realize that I have subconscious processes for a lot of things, and when I make those processes conscious and concrete, they become more useful to me. So I'm probably going to be making more stepwise-processing posts in the future, and I'm gonna go back and tag the ones I can remember. The first one that comes to mind is how I apologize when I have hurt someone -- 1) empathize 2) explain 3) change (the order of that is VERY important). I'm including lists in this too, even when they are not ordered lists, such as my draws and dealbreakers: my reasons to fight for a relationship and my reasons to end one. If you can think of any of my posts that involved processing through lists, that would be super helpful if you'd tell me about them, even a vague topic would help me find them.

------

How I set goals: I set goals by my desires, and figure out those with these questions. I used to set goals out of guilt or fear or shame, but not now. I have to be pulled to make something a goal, not pushed.

1) What do I most feel a lack of in my life? What do I have the most unfilled yearning for? What do I most quickly start missing when I don't have it?

2) What are some ways I could get more of those things?

3) How can I make small daily habits or once-a-week tasks out of #2's answers?

If you don't like being nudged on LJ, please tell me, because I love that feature. I like being nudged too. If I nudge you, it means I really love reading your posts and want more! but I am not at all bothered if you completely ignore the nudge, I won't notice because I have a bad sense of time and a shit memory. So please never feel obligated or bad about not posting in response *smiles*

FINALLY caught up on my flist. This is a sudden and HUGE difference in reading quantity, damn. Now that I have a moment of being caught up I feel like I can post first catch up later. I'm hoping it sticks because otherwise I'll not get writing done and that's super important to me.

just a corkpopping; substantial entry after I have some dinner.

I have a particular style of journaling; most of my posts are "this happened [in detail] and this is how it made me feel and these are the philosophical/spiritual/relational thoughts it inspired. [in a looooong post]" And that's the sort of journal I prefer to read, also, as it almost invariably inspires me both emotionally and mentally. For years I had several friends who posted primarily in that style -- first Anika, Ash, & Kate; then Hannah, Meliae, & Ava; then Aurilion, J, & Andie. (everyone I friend has some element of this, but they're the ones who did it the most) Now some of those have moved to other journaling sites or have changed posting style or very rarely post or have taken an indefinite hiatus, and I feel rather tenuously connected to LJ. I miss Hannah the most -- a post that takes at least half an hour to read (at least four full-screen-length paragraphs) and an hour to reply to, THAT is my kind of post! I can sink into it, live it. (sharing photos is a big part of that too) Ohhh I miss that SO much. And it makes me really sad because without that I've lost a lot of my passion for LJ. I comment really rarely now even though I read everything and often hit the reply page -- I just feel disconnected from LJ itself. And what's more annoying is that I've stopped replying to comments in MY journal. I want to find some way to revitalize my love for LJ. I think it'll involve finding new people with whom to form that sort of intellectual foursome, which seems to be unlikely amounts of too-perfect. (says the faithless one) I need to at least make an effort -- I have a permanent account f'cryin'outloud, I don't want it to go to waste.

With LJ, I only friend people who post often and in a style I like, because otherwise I'll just end up skimming their posts and I'll feel like I'm lying to them by having them on my flist but not reading them. But I friend most everyone who requests it on facebook, because I don't have the same goal there. With LJ, I want to develop real friendships; with facebook, I just want to keep in contact and get to know people. I'm open to developing friendships via facebook, of course, but I don't feel I'm setting a goal of friendship by adding someone there.

( facebook and twitter )

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Also! if you have any questions feel free to ask in comments, and I might respond directly or turn it into a post.

Been feeling so freaking overflowing with ideas that they've bottlenecked. please help me choose the first one to focus on! Choose 1-3, no more please!

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