#about singularity

but what I’d never factored in -- because I didn’t know any better -- was how easily one is shaped by one’s environment and experience, and how easily one can become something else entirely when one’s environment and experience changes. I am obviously not a sociopath by any measure, but I really just mantled one for a few years because it represented my best chance for survival. and it worked! this soft heart would not have survived without the impenetrable shell I built around it. (the downside is that it’s a very well-built fortress, of course it is, and it will therefore require some very strong tools and a fair number of other people to dismantle it...)

but the real crazy thing is that now that I’ve seen that for what it is, and have disidentified with the impenetrable shell (it still exists, obviously, but I am less and less inclined to think of it as “Myself” as much as “a thing that hides Myself from the world"), the idea of being back in an environment like the one in The Before Times is earthshatteringly frightening to me

I sat here for like five minutes trying to think of how to put this, because some kinds of knowledge really don’t like trying to be described with words (especially English ones, I guess. you really gotta work for it in English)

also because the crows outside are straight up having a rap battle or something and they only shut up when I yelled “do y’all want to help me explain what a mythic self is???”

anyway. so the way I understand my existence is that there’s layers to it, and the most “restricted” or law-bound layer is my human life, right here on this planet. then you’ve got the dreamself, which has a few less rules -- you know how dreams work, you can do all kinds of weird shit in dreams and your dreamself is like “yeah, this is absolutely how reality works” and you wake up like “well that made no sense” but Dreamself does not have that dissonance because it does make sense to them

my Inworld self is another self, and is like Dreamself except with way more control and, of course, connection to/communication with the outworld self. if you think of these like layers stacked on top of each other, as you go up the scale the level of connection with the, idk, the ~primal fabric of reality~ or whatever gets greater. the truer the self gets (ironically, the self is at its truest when it’s completely unbound and at its most difficult to define)

so the highest level is the mythic self, and that’s basically like... the enduring self, the self outside of time* and entropy, the... Oversoul? and I think there are mythic selves that are inextricably bound to a neverending cycle of storied existence (this is where Dark Tower knowledge would help, because I’m really talking about Roland Deschain here) but there are also tricksters, who are... well, bound in a different way, bound to always be changing, bound to mess with and sometimes unravel bits of the fabric of the universe... “mythic” works as a term here basically because the kind of self I’m talking about is the kind that is most often depicted in humanity’s most essential and enduring stories (usually as gods, or heroic figures that never seem to die). we try to play out these parts in our everyday human lives, because we’re echoing our mythic nature, which plays out over various worlds/timelines/whatever. my mythic self has certain features -- certain experiences and traits that are integral to its fabric -- and I can see those features in this lifetime, a prosaic echo of them, but there nonetheless

when I see a character in a story and I feel that pull, that’s me recognising my mythic self in another reality. it’s like if you are a time traveller and you run into your younger self.

... that’s the best I got. also I haven’t eaten breakfast yet so I might be even more inscrutable than usual

Nicknames: my only remaining nicknames are Rev (short for exactly what you’d think; this nickname is almost a decade old but eternally relevant) and Dio (short for Dionysus, because I had that name on a Discord server in 2017 and now that’s just what that particular social group calls me). I have plenty of names but most of them just don’t get used (one of them gets used Inworld sometimes).

Zodiac: Gemini Sun, Gemini Moon, Scorpio Ascendant *throws gang sign but the gang sign is actually the Elder Sign and spreads gibbering madness to anyone who dares to behold me*

Height: 5′5″

Last Thing I Looked Up: some ancient game somebody on Discord was talkin about

Song Stuck in My Head: none, for once

Number of Followers: 154

Amount of Sleep: generally between 6 and 8 hours, depending on various environmental and mental-health factors it can drop as far as 4 hours for a few days

Lucky Number: 9 and 19, but I wouldn’t call them lucky, they’re just. Significant(tm)

Favorite Instrument: I don’t have one, can’t imagine picking when so many objects make so many amazing sounds

Favorite Song: I usually don’t bother choosing a favourite from all the different songs I love, but there’s a strong argument for You Ain’t Coming Back by Zeal & Ardor.

Dream Job: I don’t dream of labour if there’s a job on this infernal planet that would suit me, then no one’s told me about it yet and they probably should.

Aesthetic: “poor, neurodivergent goth metalhead with myriad sensory issues and body dysphoria+dysmorphia”

Favorite Author: I don’t have one

Favorite Animal Noise: I’ve never thought about it, I have no idea

Nickname: idk call me Rev if you like

Gender: what’s that, is it food (joke’s on you: everything’s food)

Starsign: Gem sun, Gem moon, Scorp rising

Height: 5′5″ or something idgaf

Time: 6p on the dot, sick

Birthday: 28th of May

Favorite Bands: hmm... Zeal & Ardor, Coheed & Cambria, Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Type O Negative, Anaal Nathrakh, Cradle of Filth, Pearl Jam, idk I’m just pullin shit off my Last.fm page at random at this point. also a bunch of Black grandparent groups like the Four Tops and shit

Favorite Single Artists: David Bowie, Orville Peck, Aurelio Voltaire, Marilyn Manson, Devin Townsend, Morrissey, Sam Cooke, Master Boot Record (p sure that’s just one dude)

Song Stuck In My Head: Tired of Being Alone by Al Green for some reason but also Safe Home by Anthrax has been firmly stuck in my head all fucking week which is fine because it slaps but god damn

Last Movie: The Borderlands which was excellent

Last Show: The Good Place because Sparrow is finally watching s4

When Did I Create This Blog: this blog specifically, February of 2019, but it’s simply the latest in a long string of accounts that I’ve had on this website since around 2010

What do I post: on this blog specifically, I post personal stuff, daily life stuff, music I like, and reblogs that feel personal to me

Last Thing I Googled: "tired of being alone al green” just to make sure I had the artist right. I do that a lot because I have a tendency to second guess myself about all sorts of random shit (like of course he sings that. who the fuck else would it be. I’ve been hearin this song since I was in diapers)

Other blogs: that’s all laid out in my pinned post. that’s what it’s there for

Do I get asks: rarely :(

Why I Chose My URL: because I was tired of being aynrandslashfiction but my two main Brand(tm) usernames -- blackthirteen and foundcarcosa -- are both irretrievable on this hellsite. so I just squeezed my brain like a fucking lemon until it gave me something new I could work with

Following: 126

Followers: 155

Average Length In Sleep: about eight hours, although badbrains and sensory issues make that number vary wildly on occasion

Lucky Number: 9 and 19 are my numbers. “luck” doesn’t factor into it

What Am I Wearing: black lounge pants with lime green aliens on them, an undershirt, and a Duff’s Brooklyn hoodie

Instruments: do I play any? no.

Dream Job: absolutely fucking nothing. leave me alone <-- that’s the fucking mood lads

Dream Trip: at this point in Pandemic Era I’d cut off my own arm just to get out of this city. just get me the fuck out of here (and preferably someplace less white)

Favorite Food: idk man just pile a vat of coconut rice and roasted veggies in my mouth. I’m hungry (like, existentially, but also just literally at this moment)

Nationality: I live in the United States

Favorite Song: ok I humoured you on “fave band” and “fave artist” but I’m gonna draw the line right here. do you have any idea how many songs I listen to

Last Book Read: well the book I’m on right now is A Mountain Walked which is a collection of cosmic horror stories but y’all know that already if you read my posts

yoinked a make-yourself-in-this-picrew meme from @sinaesthete