There’s a lot to unpack here.
+the flexibility to get in that pose
+the balance to stay on the skateboard
+the strength to pull back a bowstring with your toes
+the dexterity to hit a target while moving
+the coordination… not hand-eye, but foot-eye
…I don’t know what to do with these things now that I’ve unpacked them…
Here’s the thing about the air nomads.
I introduced a friend to ATLA a few nights ago, and they had only
known two things about the entire show: the cabbage meme, and that Aang
apparently wants to ride every large and dangerous animal he can
possibly find. We got through the first five or so episodes, and my
friend noted that Aang is exactly what a 12-year-old would be like if
given godlike powers, and that this is literally just what he
could do with airbending. He can’t even wield any of the other elements,
and he’s one of the most powerful people on the planet, because he’s an
airbender.
And that got me thinking.
This snippet from Bitter Work is one of the few pieces of concrete information we get about the airbenders, at least in ATLA. Iroh is explaining to Zuko how all four of the elements connect to the world and to each other.
Fire is the element of power, of desire and will, of ambition and the ability to see it through. Power is crucial to the world; without it, there’s no drive, no momentum, no push. But fire can easily grow out of control and become dangerous; it can become unpredictable, unless it is nurtured and watched and structured.
Earth is the element of substance, persistence, and enduring. Earth is strong, consistent, and blunt. It can construct things with a sense of permanence; a house, a town, a walled city. But earth is also stubborn; it’s liable to get stuck, dig in, and stay put even when it’s best to move on.
Water is the element of change, of adaptation, of movement. Water is incredibly powerful both as a liquid and a solid; it will flow and redirect. But it also will change, even when you don’t want it to; ice will melt, liquid will evaporate. A life dedicated to change necessarily involves constant movement, never putting down roots, never letting yourself become too comfortable.
We see only a few flashbacks to Aang’s life in the temples, and we get a sense of who he was and what kind of upbringing he had.
This is a preteen with the power to fucking fly. He’s got no fear of falling, and a much reduced fear of death. There’s a reason why the sages avoid telling the new avatar their status until they turn sixteen; could you imagine a firebender, at twelve years old, learning that they were going to be the most powerful person in the whole world? Depending on that child, that could go so badly.
But the thing about Aang, and the thing about the Air Nomads, is that they were part of the world too. They contributed to the balance, and then they were all but wiped out by Sozin. What was lost, there? Was it freedom? Yes, but I think there’s something else too, and it’s just yet another piece of the utter brilliance of the worldbuilding of ATLA.
To recap: we have power to push us forward; we have stability to keep us strong; we have change to keep us moving.
And then we have this guy.
The air nomads brought fun to the world. They brought a very literal sense of lightheartedness.
Sozin saw this as a weakness. I think a lot of the world did, in ATLA. Why do the Air Nomads bother, right? They’re just up there in their temples, playing games, baking pies in order to throw them as a gag. As Iroh said above, they had pretty great senses of humour, and they didn’t take themselves too seriously.
But that’s a huge part of having a world of balance and peace.
It’s not just about power, or might, or the ability to adapt. You can have all of those, but you also need fun. You need the ability to be vulnerable, to have no ambitions beyond just having a good day. You need to be able to embrace silliness, to nurture play, to have that space where a very specific kind of emotional growth can occur. Fun makes a hard life a little easier. Fun makes your own mortality a little less frightening to grasp. Fun is the spaces in between, that can’t be measured by money or military might. Fun is what nurtures imagination, allows you to see a situation in a whole new light, to find new solutions to problems previously considered impossible.
Fun is what makes a stranger into a friend, rather than an enemy.
Fun helps you see past your differences.
Fun is what fuels curiosity and openmindedness.
Fun is the first thing to die in a war.
OP went and ended hard with the last line.
What if you intentionally put in one squeaky floorboard and tell your regulars that if they squeak it, their first drink costs 10% extra, then only new people who don’t know the rule will step on it and familiars will avoid it.
Did… did you just write an algorithm for human behavior? Because that is exactly what I would expect from a robot appreciation Tumblr.
You don’t say.
For the record, she actually abandoned the movement BEFORE they all got whooping cough, but abandoned it too late. There’d been a breakout of measles in her area that caused her to reassess, and she and her doctor had already drafted and started a catch-up vaccination schedule, but her kids caught whooping cough just before it could be started. Then she wrote a blog post for The Scientific Parent explaining how she and her husband had come to wrong decisions in the first place, how they changed their mind, the consequences they suffered as a result, and asking other parents to please vaccinate their kids. And now she’s an activist for destroying the misinformation of anti-vaxxers, and reaching out to anti-vaxxers because she’s understands their fears but knows their kids deserve better.
She was trying to the best for her kids and just didn’t know how to interpret the validity of information or its sources, an actual skill that can be actually difficult and that is under-taught and a necessary first step to being able to trust vaccination research, so chose no action over taking an action she wasn’t sure of. She kept looking into it with family and friends and even eventually came to the right conclusion before her kids became sick, but it was still too late.
Honestly it was pretty brave of her to publicly admit she was wrong. She could have just quietly vaccinated her kids and not become a national news story, but instead she spoke out, even saying “I’m writing this from quarantine, the irony of which isn’t lost on me.” and also “I am not looking forward to any gloating or shame as this ‘defection’ from the antivaxx camp goes public, but, this isn’t a popularity contest. Right now my family is living the consequences of misinformation and fear. I understand that families in our community may be mad at us for putting their kids at risk.”
She understood the consequences and still put herself and her story out there.
You know what, it does take a big person to admit they were wrong so publicly and work to undo the harm. I believe I made fun of her in the past, but timemachineyeah changed my mind.
Oh my gosh - I never considered before….
THEME PARK SINGLE-RIDER LINE AU
and they were RIDEMATES
oh my god they were ridemates
Well this post was a roller coaster
Really threw me for a loop
Ways to cleanse a room
Cleansing is the act of resetting energies back to how they were naturally. This process will remove all the energies that have stuck themselves onto an person, place, or object. In this post we will be looking over how one can go about cleansing a room, so that a practitioner could clear it of all negative energies in order to make the room a more hospitable environment. There are many ways to go about cleansing a room, and we will go over a few of them, so that we can get a range of different approaches one can use to cleanse a room.
Physically cleaning the room:
This is a very straightforward way of cleansing a room in which all you have to do is physically clean it up. This does not have to be an extensive cleaning job but should be good enough that there is a clear visible difference. By straightening up the room you will rearrange the energies to a more harmonic natural state, so that energy will flow more smoothly through it, and allow it to be balanced, and cleansed.
Opening your space:
Opening windows, and doors will allow the room to be cleansed, because it will open up energy flow in the room. This will allow energy to circulate, and will return the room back to a more harmonic and natural state.
Clap cleansing:
In order to do this one all you must do is walk around the area why clapping loudly, and while focusing on your intention for the room to be cleanse. This will allow you to send out your intention with your claps, so that you can literally clap away the negative energies.
Music cleansing:
By playing forms of music that are spiritual and/or calming you will be able to cleanse the energies of the room from the sounds of the music. This works because the music will release a very calm, relaxing, and spiritual energy that will overtake the room allowing it to be cleansed.
Chant cleansing:
By walking around the room, and chanting phrases that have to do with your intent of cleansing, or are in some form of way spiritual, or religious you will be able to cleanse the room. These phrases would be like something out of a holy book, or could quite literally just be your intention. It could be something like “negativity leave this room”.
Energy cleansing:
if you have practice in energy work you will be able to use your energy in order to cleanse the room. In order to do this you must imagine your energy as a clear cleansing light. Once you have that picture in your mind force it out of your being, and allow it to wash over the room. See in your mind’s eye the negative energies breaking away, and dissipating into nothingness. Do this over, and over again until the room is cleansed.
Water cleansing:
In this method you are going to need some form of water, spiritual water, or salt water, so that you can spray it around the room in order to allow its energies to cleanse the area.
Salt cleansing:
For this method all you have to do is simply take salt, and sprinkle it around your room, so that the metaphysical properties of the salt will be able to cleanse the area.
Cleansing sigil:
You can go about finding, or creating a sigil to cleanse the area. All you would have to do is take the sigil, and charge it, and activate it, then wait for the cleansing energy to manifest.
crystals and Crystal grid cleansing:
Some crystals have the metaphysical properties of cleansing, and these crystals could be placed around the area in order for it to cleanse the space that they are in. These crystals could also be taken, and used to form a crystal grid that could be placed inside the room for the purposes of cleansing. Crystals that would be good for cleansing, and to incorporate in the crystal grid would be selenite, citrine, shungite, black tourmaline, obsidian, and onyx.
Cleansing with smoke:
You will be able to cleanse a room by burning specific forms of incense, or herb bundles in the room. For this all you must do is burn the incense or bundle in the room, and walk around it allowing the smoke to permeate all throughout the area, so that the cleansing energies of the incense or herb can cleanse the room. Herbs that would be good for cleansing the room would be things such as sage, rosemary, palo santo, lavender, frankincense, myrrh, and sandalwood.
beesandstarsart