Oops! It Seems I Tripped And Dropped Several Million Free Books, Papers, And Other Resources

i hate that every time i look for color studies and tips to improve my art and make it more dynamic and interesting all that comes up are rudimentary explanations of the color wheel that explain it to me like im in 1st grade and just now discovering my primary colors

I can't stress enough how much I miss StumbleUpon

diet culture is so fucking sad.

i once played the asking game with my mom when she was talking to me about her diet plans.

why are you dieting? because i've gained loads of weight recently. who cares? everyone does. i don't care. but i do. why? because i don't want to be fat. why don't you want to be fat? because it's embarrassing and i don't want to be an ugly pig. is being fat hurting you? not especially, but it's not nice for other people to look at.

at this point i looked at her and said "don't you think it's sad that you're spending your whole life putting these rules upon yourself, rules that naturally skinny people aren't expected to abide by, all for the effort of trying not to be fat?" and she looked back at me with suddenly wet eyes and said, with an amount of difficulty, that yes, it is sort of sad when you think about it.

she's been fat ever since i, her eldest child, was born. she was always super skinny in her youth, but pregnancy changed her body shape and her metabolism, and i only ever knew her as a very fat woman growing up. chances are, she will never be thin again. her lifestyle is no different to how it was before my existence; her body just works differently now. she sees it as a personal failure. she doesn't eat her favorite foods anymore, doesn't go out dating, doesn't make friends, doesn't go to events, doesn't allow anyone to buy her clothes for her birthday because she can't bear anyone knowing her size. she lives a lonely life, unwilling to do her favorite things. she elected for a gastric bypass surgery which, over the last few years, has introduced multiple complications that came very close to killing her, and yet she doesn't regret the surgery because it helped her lose a few pounds. she basically does not have a stomach anymore and she still believes her fatness is because she's been doing something wrong for the last 20something years.

diet culture is deadly not only because of the self-starvation and malnutrition but because it rips away pieces of your life that you're supposed to enjoy. relationships and sex are only for thin people, a glass of wine and some chocolate at the end of a difficult day is an indulgence only allowed to thin people, cute clothes are only for thin people, family photographs are only for the thin relatives, riding a bike on vacation with your kids is only for families with thin parents.

doesn't your soul ache? doesn't it hurt you to see people doing this to themselves, to inflict this on YOURself? you can do all of these things. your life can be lived fully and joyously and with love, but you distance yourself from the things that make you happy because you feel like you aren't good enough for them. it breaks my heart.

fatphobia is something oft inflicted upon people by others, but it comes from inside too. kill the part of you that thinks you aren't good enough. your body is perfect already, my love.

reminder that not all coping mechanisms are healthy and shouldn’t be excused as helpful simply because they are coping mechanisms.

remember: don't chase the pain. if you're lucky enough to have access to an adequate supply of painkillers, use them early. if your pain is episodic, not continuous, hit the pain as soon as you notice it and your chances of avoiding a bad episode improve.

if you wait around to see if it gets 'bad enough' for painkillers, you're more likely to end up in a lot of pain that's difficult to control.

the tricky part is, if you do it right, it feels like you did it wrong. because if you catch the pain early before it gets bad, it often feels like 'it never got that bad so maybe i didn't need the medication.'

but it didn't get that bad BECAUSE of the medication! you did it right. it's okay to use the tools at your disposal. fuck the stigma.

And the most important thing to remember is that you have time. Time to discover new people and new projects and new places; time to heal from your past and your wounds. You might feel like you’re getting nothing done and nothing is happening, but you have time to discover your soul. It will happen for you <3