1979 to 1989: President Reagan arms mujahideen groups in Afghanistan under Operation Cyclone to push back the Soviets. Those guerilla groups use our guns to destroy their rivals. The survivors form Al Qaeda.
2001: September 11th World Trade Center attacks happen.
US citizens: “They’re attacking us ‘cause they hate our freedom, man!”
1893-present day: The US exploits Latin American countries by exporting large portions of their natural resources and enacts regime changes to install more “friendly” leaders in various countries who will bow to this economic imperialism and make it easier to do business. Drug cartels and revolutionaries, knowing these leaders are soft, see an opportunity. Chaos ensues, and people flee their homelands to escape violence and poverty.
US citizens: “Why do all these galldern immigrants want to come here? They chose to screw up their own countries! And why do we have a drug problem?!”
Prairie exists across multiple dimensions of time and space. Every segment of her story might be true, but some parts are the memories of different versions of her. That’s why she’s experienced premonitions, and struggled with what to do with them. She’s able to see what’s going to happen, but often misinterprets the data.
That’s where the 5 Movements come in. They’re a sort of guidance system for her premonitions and memories, because they allow her (and any people they’re directed at) to access other versions of themselves across space and time, and know exactly what to do. The NDEs merely allowed glimpses of guidance.
It does not necessarily mean a person literally travels; if there is no break in time-space and others cannot see it, then they also can’t fathom how it works. The concepts of healing and escape may not be entirely what we think. Perhaps the Movements are not healing someone, but rather, bringing in a version of the person from an alternate dimension into the present one, be it in mind or body.
So many people live in comfortable illusions about who they are because they’ve lied to themselves for so long, they’ve begun to believe it. Existence itself becomes denial of your godlike nature, because we’re always railing against it. Maybe that’s the real sin. In some ways, people like feeling powerless, because then they can blame others, or renounce their personal power and absolve themselves of responsibility, letting someone or something else take control of them. Think of how much time we waste telling ourselves we can’t do something, overthinking, countless hours and sometimes even days wasted.
Truth and proficiency come when you affirm yourself and start opening your mind and heart to the natural rhythms of life. Committing to what you say, and doing it. No one else can address your own truth and the contradictions you live but you. Self-honesty is the most overlooked virtue.
Denial starts in early childhood. Every time you were made to feel “less than” by anyone else, it didn’t vibe with you, because you knew it wasn’t true. Sadness, anger, betrayal, they all hurt because pain is a response that something is wrong. We mistakenly direct much of this at ourselves, believing there’s something wrong with us. There isn’t. It simply means you have to shove your soul back into alignment.
The problem comes when we hear enough bad shit about us or go through enough heart-wrenching experiences that we say “well, that’s my luck now”. And believe it. And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, a denial of our true selves. You start taking comfort in illusions, because you haven’t built yourself up enough. Maybe you love someone, get to know them, they get you all excited because there’s love you feel that you haven’t felt in years (the love you didn’t give to yourself). And then, say that person betrays you. Your whole world comes crashing down. It’s that much harder to get back up. You lose yourself completely again, because you’re so invested in comfortable illusions that you want to believe them.
And if you’re too invested in illusions and denied yourself for so long, you won’t see them coming. Or maybe you do, at first. Then you get worn down and start accepting things and people at face value. You get sucked into their illusions about themselves, wanting to fix them.
But who’s going to fix you? You have to be your own superhero.
At this point, you have two choices: Face reality, or choose another illusion. Most people do the latter, because the former is too painful.
But hard facts: No one can fix you. No one can save you. It’s only you who can do that. I know this sounds like despair and depression, but we fall so we can learn to get back up again, not so other people can teach us to do so. Illusions become attractive and easy, if you’ve lived in them long enough. They absolve you of responsibility of the real work you must do on yourself, for a while. But…they’re not who you are.
Reality is painful, hard to live in, and excruciating to sober up to if you’re not familiar with it and the person you are. But pain is never an end, it’s the beginning of something new and stronger—the beginning of YOU.
In the end, if you don’t have yourself, you have no one. Take care of yourselves 💚
Peace, I love you all, and hope you’ve enjoyed my ramblings lol. I probably sound like a hypocrite because I’m not in the best state lately myself, but I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I wrote this as sort of a pep talk for myself and wanted to share, in case anyone else might need it. 😉
Ok, so maybe I’m just horribly naive and new to the genre, but I have to ask. Is there a yaoi anime that’s NOT abusive or manipulative af? I mean, yeah it’s just anime, it’s entertaining to a point, and yaoi is mostly gay fetishism geared toward a young female audience. BUT I find myself disturbed by the situations I’ve seen portrayed in Super Lovers and Love Stage. In real life, they’re just plain abhorrent.
While the relationships have an aura of drama to them in which the uke (submissive) is pursued by the semi (dominant), and things end up transforming into a cute relationship, an uke character is initially (and rightfully) disgusted at his pursuer. But those feelings are watered down or brushed aside, and it trivializes abusive situations. Super Lovers dealt with emotional abuse and control, and yet despite that, I could respect the fact that they at least made Ren his own person and didn’t always surrender to controlling situations.
Love Stage, however, has a scene in which Izumi is held down and assaulted by Ryouma, and ends up locking himself in his room for a week until his family’s agent barges in and basically tells him to go back to school and suck it up.
Ryouma apologizes profusely to Izumi, explaining how he had feelings for him in the past because he played a girl in a commercial they were in, and he’d come over to force his feelings to change by undressing the guy and hoping he wouldn’t feel attracted. But he was. He then goes on to whine about his experiences in showbiz, and Izumi, feeling bad for him, let’s him have his number and agrees to be friends with him.
Like, I know it’s not supposed to be realistic, and I’m on the fence about it all being fan service/fetishism for gay relationships. But it’s still a majorly disgusting fact about yaoi I’ve witnessed so far, and I really hope that trend changes to be more sensitive toward things like abuse, or otherwise omit those situations altogether. 🤦♂️
Everyone agrees! Your intestines squirming around like eels in your belly is horrifying!
IM SORRY THEY FUCKING WHAT NOW?
The racks even have hooks to keep them from squirming right off and onto the floor apparently. They desperately want to escape our bodies
Intestines are muscles, and function involuntarily. If your muscles did not squirm around, then they wouldn’t be able to move food through them, thus you wouldn’t gain any nutrients from anything you eat, and the food would spoil and make you sick. I agree the squirmy wormies are a bit unsettling, but hey it’s actually really good for you! Your intestines work so hard for it! Please give them a little love.
I don’t like that get them out
Okay…this is unsettling.
This post is actually my nightmare
Breaking News! You are full of eels!
if you have ibs your eels are just extra angry all the time
