She’s So Iconic I Love Her

as much as wei wuxian lacks any sense of self preservation and just like the bare minimum level of self worth required to value himself and his own safety/comfort I don't think he actually like. hates himself. at least not in the traditional sense

I often see him characterized in fanon as constantly and very Bluntly being like "oh I'm a bad bad man who doesn't deserve any love or affection" even tho that... doesn't really match his character? like the man obviously has self worth problems and values his life and comfort below literally everybody elses, often to a harmful and deadly degree, and the way he treats and thinks of himself is clearly by no means healthy, but I certainly don't think it manifests in the way people like to depict it where wei wuxian actively has these desperately tragic self depreciating thoughts that literally Spell Out his lack of self worth to himself

he spends So much time and effort really driving home the whole "I'm just an arrogant shameless genius" act and being in complete denial of any negative emotions he has that it would be incredibly out of character for wei wuxian to sit around thinking "oh I'm so terrible and I don't deserve love or kindness because I'm such an awful awful man" much less to Say That Outloud To A Loved One

wei wuxian KNOWS that he's talented. he KNOWS that he's a prodigy and a genius and near unmatched in his skill and, even after his resurrection when he's a little less arrogant and a little more humble, he certainly is not afraid to say as much to other people or to show off. he doesn't doubt his abilities or his charm or his cleverness, it's not even that he doesn't value them, he simply doesn't put Worth to any of it. he doesn't see himself as undeserving of love and kindness and affection, just Less deserving. anything else in the world is more deserving, above him and his desires and his comfort and his safety. he doesn't hate himself, doesn't even dislike himself, he simply doesn't care for himself

even when he accepts harsh punishment too quick and without protest, it's not a form of blatant self hatred or self harm, it's a manifestation of his feelings of not being worth the effort of being spared. it probably even comes from a place of valuing himself "Too Much". because wei wuxian is very talented and very smart and he is the very best at everything he does, so if somebody he places any value or trust in decides to punish him, well, then he really must have done something terrible ("at least I could be killed by you - that would be worth it" and all that) he simply has no affection or tenderness to give himself. that is not synonymous with hatred or even with apathy

wei wuxians lack of self worth does not manifest in self depreciating thoughts or monologues about how nobody can or should love him, because for as much as wei wuxian talks, he is a man of action

wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he will provoke wen chao and accept a beating and a night in a cell with grace if it keeps others safe. everyone else at the wen indoctrination camp remaining unharmed is worth one night of his blood and tears

wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he is so very prepared to let madam yu cut off his hand, so very prepared learn to use a sword with his left, if it will spare yunmeng. everything he loves and wants to protect is worth more than a hand, no matter how unfair that punishment may be

wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he will give jiang cheng his core. because jiang chengs happiness is worth more than everything he has dedicated his life to, everything he has spent countless hours becoming the very best at. to see jiang cheng smile again, to see jiang yanli stop worrying and simply be able to rest again, that is worth far more to him than anything a golden core could offer

wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he will let the world believe he has been cast from his family to spare them. wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he will not tell wen qing he is injured, because his blood is not worth her worry

wei wuxian does not hate himself, but when the wen remnants die for him, when jiang yanli perishes by his hand, however indirect, well. those losses and those crimes are far too heavy and far too abhorrent for his life to be worth anything in the wake of them

and wei wuxian does not hate himself, but he will let the world believe for a second time that he is a liar and a villain and a monster if that will spare even just lan wangjis name. wei wuxians reputation is worth far less to him than lan wangjis

wei wuxian does not hate himself, of course wei wuxian does not hate himself. he loves himself, actually. it's just that wei wuxian does not love himself back, and he certainly loves everybody else far more

get me a lwj please

"come back to gusu with me" is so funny, I'm depressed

lwj: i desperately want to burrito blanket this man. i have never craved anything the way i crave the right to bury him in rabbits until he stops looking so stressed and i honestly don’t know what to do with that. i was told his sister gives him soup but he doesn’t look like he’s getting enough soup. …i…could give him soup.

wwx: oh you wanna lock me up? you wanna lock me up???????? fucking try it I’m feral I’ll bite you

i love wwx as much as the next person but never forget that he would use 3-in-1 shampoo. yes, he has gorgeous hair but he also 100% definitely absolutely uses 3-in-1,,, there’s no arguing this. the guy has a multi-purpose stone slab in his man-cave/bedroom/lair of angsty teenager cringiness,, that shit is his bed, his experiments table, the place where he teaches a-yuan to write and stuff, and like anything else he ever needs to do is done on the slab,, if lwj had ever come back to visit him a second time he would’ve walked into his cave and seen wwx and wq dissecting a corpse on the slab and they would’ve been like oh hey we’re trying to see if we can let wn eat again. like two hours later granny would have walked in and been like here’s lunch! and wwx would just floot floot and off the corpse walks back outside to chill with the other corpses and he takes the bowls from granny and puts them on the same slab that just had the corpse on it. now lwj is not squeamish by any means but like,, there is still blood on the slab,, a dead person was just lying there,, but wq and wwx are digging in already and he doesn’t wanna be rude so he just keeps quiet and pretends not to see the person-shaped bloodstain on the slab. when they finish lunch lwj looks around and is like hey i thought you slept here,,, where do you sleep? and when he turns around wwx is just enjoying a mid-afternoon nap on his bed (the slab),,, so yeah wwx uses 3-in-1 at the least,,, maybe even a 5-in-1 if we’re calling him out,,

txt’s cant you see me hits so much harder when you realise none of your friends understand and see that you’re falling apart or maybe they just don’t care anymore

aaj ki chai is from this scene in tapan sinha’s ek doctor ki maut (1990). shabana azmi’s understated but poignant performance as seema, the wife of a brilliant doctor whose single obsession with his research brings selfishness and callousness to his marriage is so visceral, especially in small moments like this one. seema fries puris and make two cups of tea as she waits for her husband to come home, a familiar scene in the homes of many, especially within india. her husband talks about his research, the people he met, and lists all his complaints for the day before being cajoled into sitting at the dinner table. she serves the tea and the plate of puris and sits by his side, shoulder to shoulder, as a companion. then she talks about her conversation with her sister while gently reprimanding her husband for never calling those relatives back. he agrees to please her and then quickly grabs his cup of tea and two puris to leave for his lab. and seema! shocked and baffled, she tells him she’s not yet finished with her tea only to hear that familiar indifference–”then finish it”. and shabana azmi with all the subtlety she’s know for, moves from shock to bitter acceptance and then quickly back to the briefest expression of hurt. 

and she drinks her cup of tea alone.

one thing i like about tapan sinha’s work in this film is that seema is her own person, not the archetype of a wife in indian films (even noncommercial ones) who only exists to mutely support and share the burden of her husband’s dreams. later in the film she expresses how that callousness feels and affects her, especially against the expectations of what she thought their marriage would be like–one in which she is cared for, one in which there is companionship. i feel like i know too many women in marriages who drink their cup of tea alone. or put too much hope into what differences a cup of tea can bridge. 

him :(

anyways here’s pretty wwx cause we all need it in our lives lets be honest