Authentically Us

In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, this is the best of Tumblrites' mental health wisdom that I've saved over the last few years, summarized and lightly edited. I have tried to give credit where credit is due.

Brains are like a beach. Shit washes up, and if you let it, it'll wash away again. Don't try to pick up intrusive or other nasty thoughts & examine them; just leave them alone and the mental tide will wash them away soon enough. - h/t cistematicchaos

Intrusive thoughts are your brain's way of processing uncomfortable things it knows by giving you seriously messed up "what if" scenarios starring yourself. It's basically a "hey wouldn't it be fucked up if this crazy thing happened?" and the best thing you can do is say, "Yup, that sure would be fucked up. Moving on…" - h/t accessibleaesthetics

Anxiety brain is like a faulty smoke alarm thinking there's smoke or fire when it's just dust or other particulates. Tell it, "Thank you for trying to keep me safe, but you're mistaken. I'm gonna press your reset button and move along now." - h/t serotoninsuggestion

Feelings make good consultants, but they shouldn't be CEOs. - h/t highlineeheartbeat

What doesn't kill you doesn't make you stronger, but healing from the thing that tried to kill you does. Healing can take quite a while; if you still feel weak, you're probably not there yet. Give yourself time. - h/t luulapants

It doesn't matter if someone else is drowning in 6 feet of water; drowning in 6 inches is still drowning! Have some compassion for yourself! - h/t roguetelepaths

Weight is weight, regardless if it's one giant rock or a bucket of sand. The trauma you're carrying is valid and needs to be addressed, regardless of whether it stemmed from one major horrible event or a series of repeated small things. - h/t lost-estradiographer

Declare "statute of limitations" on embarrassing/unpleasant memories. You couldn't prosecute someone for arson after 6 years, so quit prosecuting yourself for much less serious mistakes you made 6+ years ago! - h/t mylittleredgirl

If possible, have something in your life which is almost guaranteed to make you Feel Something, preferably something good. If you're feeling depressed and the thing cheers you up or at least makes you Feel Something, it's a psychological (e.g. thought rut or reaction to sad events) problem. If you're feeling depressed and feel nothing whatsoever when you experience the thing, that means it's a psychiatric (brain chemistry) problem. Treat accordingly. - h/t kaijutegu

Backaches aren't caused by a lack of Tylenol, but Tylenol will treat them. Mental illness may not actually be caused by a chemical imbalance, but it can be treated chemically. - h/t saphhixxx

Self-deprecation is bad. Try to improve your self-talk when you realize that you're insulting yourself again. - h/t many sources

There is no such thing as a "bad" emotion; feelings just are what they are. - h/t ineffectualdemon and others

If you have a coping mechanism, clearly it worked well (or at least was the best tool you had) at one point, even if it is maladaptive in your current situation. Be aware of what tools are appropriate when, but don't be upset at yourself for using something that isn't objectively good. - h/t ineffectualdemon

A large part of therapy's success depends on you getting and being able to use the right coping tools. If you get the wrong tools or have no space to use the right ones, nothing will change. The same idea holds true with meds; if they help you be more positive but there are no positives to see, nothing will change. Try again with different tools, at different locations, from a different "hardware store." - h/t hyperactivehedgehog

What if you are broken, but that's ok? What if "broken" is a neutral descriptor, not a negative one? - h/t crazycatsiren

A good way to combat depressive pessimism without veering into toxic positivity is to say, "I'm open to the possibility," e.g. "I'm very unhappy, but I'm open to the possibility that x will help my mood," "I'm in serious pain right now, but I'm open to the possibility that something fun will happen today." - h/t storybookprincess

A great way to be confident and not get stuck on others' judgments is to own your faults, followed up by "but I'm trying to improve." You need some pretty serious self-knowledge for this, though. - h/t stuckinapril

Addiction is a progressive narrowing of the range of things that make one happy. Regardless of potential addiction, regularly check in with yourself whether you're narrowing or widening your range of happiness. - h/t sesamie

You can't grow without sometimes being uncomfortable, but you can't thrive without also experiencing safety and comfort. If you rarely feel comfortable and/or safe, you actually have to get more comfortable before you can grow. Self-improvement doesn't mean constant suffering. - h/t lifeafterpsychiatry, spirit-of-science

When you're trying to live and move on, dwelling on past mistakes and people who are no longer there is like rereading the beginning of a book you're in the middle of every time you pick it up. It's understandable to think about the past, but try to limit it to once a day. If it comes up more often, tell yourself "it's ok, I already thought about this today. Moving on…" - h/t honeymooncupid

Crop rotation is important for farm fields to avoid the soil being depleted of nutrients. This includes letting the field lie completely fallow every few years. Similarly, your brain needs to periodically switch projects or even completely take a break from productivity in order to stay healthy. - h/t flavoracle, bomberqueen17

If executive dysfunction is a problem for you, instead of trying to convince yourself to do something with "I should…," ask yourself, "When will I…?" Listen to your brain with compassionate curiosity and be ready to receive the signal to move when it eventually comes, rather than trying to force yourself to feel the signal. - h/t star-anise

If your brain likes to say "I don't want to do that thing right now," ask it, "Ok, why specifically not now?" It might have a genuine reason that would be good to know and work with, and if its answer is "just because," you can (hopefully) tell it that it's full of nonsense and go do the thing. - h/t alyssabethancourt

- sneezed wrong

- turned your neck a little too fast

- slept weird

- took the trash out to the curb and stepped at a slightly different angle than usual

- breathed

- failed to breathe properly

- breathed in the wrong stuff. Allergy time

- looked too hard at something too far away

They do not offer paperbacks or hardbacks at this time.

But their digital market has the same e-book and audio market reach as D2D/Ingram and allows for library lending. So if you are an indie author who was mostly using D2D for that library access, and for whom the maintenance fees would be prohibitive against your earnings, you can use Kobo for free.

I haven't used it, because I'm not affected by the D2D fees and I didn't want to mess up my market listings by having duplicates, but when I heard about the D2D fees, I started researching so I could hopefully find a free alternative with comparable market reach. And good old Kobo was there.

It allows for the same subscription model as KU, but doesn't enforce an exclusivity clause, so you can still mass sell through the global market and also be hosted in libraries.

I know it seems risky when KU is so established, but Kobo+ subscriptions are increasing quite a bit as even the most stalwart of Kindle fans get sick of Amazon, and my Kobo+ numbers are starting to eclipse Kindle, which is delightful.

The more we as authors push readers to Kobo+, the more freedom we'll have, so I think it's a worthwhile endeavor, for us and them.

I know copperbadge uses Lulu Printing, and while they do have some access to the global distribution market, I don't think it's as wide as either Ingram/D2D. (I also think the global pricing with Lulu is a bit bonkers in comparison, but I haven't looked at it in a while, so it might be different.) And before anyone suggests Lightning Source or whatever, they're owned by Ingram. A lot of print houses people recommend when this comes up are owned by Ingram. They have monopolized a huge chunk of the market, for better or worse. Usually worse.

If you want to get your ISBN's back from Ingram, you need to go through customer support to get your books de-listed. If they fight you over the ISBN's (like they did me) those ISBN's belong to you. You paid for them, they are yours. You are within your rights to use them with a different printer. You just need to get it decoupled from Ingram.

They are starting to limit how many books you can publish with them to combat AI slop.

The new max is 100, which I think includes ebook and paperback and hardback of the same book, so there goes three of your allowed books off the bat.

Not, like, fake compliments or randomly giving scrounged up compliments to everyone you pass in the street, but -- say you see someone with an article of clothing you really really like. Cool accessories or a great haircut or something. Tell them.

I told an old woman yesterday that I liked her blouse. It was this super pretty white-at-the-top-floral-at-the-bottom shirt which was really lovely. So i backtracked where I'd walked past her and I said "excuse me - i love your shirt." And this harried, stressed-looking 80-something year old brightened up immediately, and beamed, and then when she and I headed off in separate directions, she had a pep in her step.

This other time I told a woman that I liked her boots. She gave me a company name thats since become my favourite brand of shoes. I told someone else that her scarf was cute and she was like "do you like it? Here, you can have it," and she dropped her scarf in my hands and then got on her train and left. I once saw a woman who had clearly put effort into her outfit that day but was now looking harried and frazzled as she wrangled four children across the road, and I told her that her outfit was gorgeous and she lit up like a christmas tree. I told a gay man that I loved his whole look once and he turned into a smiling, blushing mess as his super delighted and proud boyfriend was like "yea, he DOES look gorgeous doesnt he?"

Comic we made about our syscovery omg

More under the cut

Your brain is an incredibly energy-intensive organ. It makes up approximately 2% of your total body mass, but at rest it's using 22% of your total energy intake. The only thing that uses the same percentage of energy is all of your skeletal muscle (which is about 40% of your total body mass), with the liver (about 2.6% of your total mass) close behind at 21% (Aragon et al, 2017).

And that's how much energy it's using at rest.

That's the baseline.

So if you're doing lots of intellectual labour, your brain - which already has disproportionately huge energy demand - is going to use even more energy to keep up with the work. That's why you feel so wiped/drained/like you're out of spell slots after high intellectual demand - because your brain is an organ, and you've just done a lot of high-energy work with a high-energy organ.

(This is obviously a generalization that isn't true for everyone. But it is true for most people and I'm proceeding from there.)

This "top three priorities" framing has genuinely reduced my tendency toward jealousy and self-comparison a lot. Now when I feel envious of someone’s spotless, aesthetic home, I think to myself, “Having a spotless, aesthetic home is probably one of their top three priorities. It’s definitely not one of mine, so I shouldn’t expect my home to look like that.”

Or when I see an influencer with a body that takes a ton of work to maintain: “Maintaining that body is obviously one of her top three priorities, because it’s her livelihood. My livelihood is my brain, so I’m never going to prioritize my body like that.”

“You can always assume one thing about your clients; and that is that they are doing their best. Always assume everyone is doing their best. And if they’re having a day where their best just isn’t that great, or their best doesn’t look like your best, you have to be okay with that.”

Write it badly or it'll never be written

Write it badly or it'll never be written

Write it badly or it'll never be written

Write it badly or it'll never be written