handmade patches

See, I had graduated early from highschool and then got my associates in Zoology. But then, from ages 18-23, I was medicated with antipsychotics and (for those last two years) a deadly combo of sedatives due to misdiagnosis after misdiagnosis, and then a psychiatrist who was legitimately on drugs and just writing random shit that almost killed me.

Anyway, needless to say, my brain turned to mush and stopped working, and it took me 6 years to get some sort of bachelors degree (in fashion??) and I graduated at the bottom of my class.

And then I got properly diagnosed (the “psychosis” was just narcolepsy) and got off all those meds. And I was so afraid my brain was permanently fucked. And it is, cause of the narcolepsy part, but the narcolepsy doesn’t kill the parts of your brain where your smarts are.

But I went back to school. Got another bachelors studying sustainable tourism. Turns out my smarts hadn’t gone anywhere when my brain turned to mush. I graduated with a 3.98 GPA.

Oh, and people don't stop being human because of what they believe, either. No matter how much you disagree with them.

It's understandable to want to appear humble while accepting a compliment, but resorting to self deprecation / self flagellation isn't exactly polite either, as it can make the compliment-er feel uncomfortable, and it can be taken as an insult to their tastes.

So for example, someone compliments your hair, and you reply with "ugh thanks but I hate my hair and think it looks so ugly and stupid", not only are you likely to make the other party uncomfortable with your sudden and unwarranted display of self flagellation, but there's also the subtle insinuation that the other party was wrong to compliment you, perhaps insinuating they have bad taste.

Now of course, in some cultures it's not uncommon for someone to playfully deflect a compliment, for example you compliment someone's jacket and they reply with "oh shucks, not this old thing :)". However there are some key differences between this type of playful deflection vs resorting to self deprecation / self flagellation. One key difference is the sense of playfulness in the tone, and it's often said with a smile or other body language to insinuate they are still happy to receive the compliment. These playful deflections also don't go too deep or get too insulting, "oh not this old thing :)" is a lot lighter and doesn't go as deep as "yeah thanks but I hate this jacket so much, it's so ugly and stupid."

And finally, if it is important to you to appear humble and gracious when receiving a compliment, try returning a compliment back to them. For example if they compliment something you're wearing then find something they're wearing or something about their appearance to compliment them back. This is going to be a much more polite way of showing humility when receiving a compliment, rather than self deprecation / self flagellation.

If you think the other person is interested in chatting, and you want to chat with them, you could respond to their compliment with thanks and a brief detail about the thing they complimented.

"I like your jacket."

"Thank you! It was my dad's when he was my age. :-)"

The other person then has an opening to continue the conversation, if they want to, with a question or comment about your father, the jacket itself, slow fashion, classic design, personal style, quality materials, and so on.

This technique also works if you aren't sure if you like the aspect of yourself that was complimented:

"Your hair looks great."

"Oh, thanks! My hairdresser suggested this style, and I'm still not sure about it, so it's nice to hear that someone else thinks it looks good."

In this way, you can admit that you're not convinced that you like the thing that was complimented, but you aren't telling the other person that they are wrong to like it.

When you use a resource such as a charitable organisation, they get to add your number to the statistic where they say "This number of people accessed our services and benefitted from it" which allows them to continue to get funding. They also usually have exit surveys etc, which again, allows them to go to funders and go "look, this person really felt like it's helped their life improve". Which causes the organisation to not only be able to continue to exist, but also to grow and serve more people.

Charitable organisations usually carry out an assessment as part of you trying to access their services. They will absolutely prioritise those that are in crisis, so never feel like you would be taking away someone's spot that you may consider to be more deserving. Also chances are, when you access the resource, you realise just how much that this actually benefits you. And look, at the end of the day, if something is really not working for you then you can quit. The charity still benefits from saying you applied to them and worked with them and you might grow to have a better understanding of the kind of support that will help your needs.

the personality and eats away its vital

unity.

Hate destroys a man's sense of values and

his objectivity. It causes him to describe

the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as

beautiful, and to confuse the true with the

false and the false with the true."

This is such lazy defeatist bullshit. You don't see another way because you want a quick fix that doesn't require much from effort. You want to feel right more than you want to save the damn country. You don't want to put in the work to reach out to your neighbors or the people in the grocery store or the other parents at your kids' school. You just want to stay in your comfort zone with your little tribe and go on comfortably hating the others from a distance.

Except that if this ever does tip over into war, you're going to find out real fucking quick that violence is neither quick nor comfortable nor easy. You're going to learn that it would have been a lot easier and a lot less painful to just talk to the weirdos down the street who vote wrong and probably you never would have come to a political consensus with them but at least you all would have figured out that you don't actually hate each other and maybe you might even get along and you certainly don't think they're so bad as all those stories you told yourself about them when they were unknown and other.

Seriously. Go talk to your weird neighbors who vote wrong. Don't talk to them about politics. Just trade recipes or talk about lawn care or what you think of the new teacher at the kids' school. You're gonna learn real quick that they're not your enemy and you don't actually want anyone to shoot them - and they're gonna learn the same about you.