My head was all over the place, I played really badly, I lost the run I was playing much quicker than expected, and decided to end stream early because of it... but despite all that, I'm weirdly happy about the whole thing anyway.

One of my big goals for 2024 is to stream a lot more often. For context, I've been off work on medical leave for a good long while now, and I find streaming to be (very fun but also) draining in a similar way to how work was draining - like in how "on" you have to be, and how much multitasking you have to do, that sort of thing. And so the main reason I streamed so rarely last year is that I rarely felt "on" enough to be at 100% for all that, and I worried that I wouldn't be doing a good enough job.

Today was the 1 year anniversary of when I first started playing the game I'm obsessed with these days, so I really wanted to do a special "anniversary" stream today, which for obvious reasons couldn't really be rescheduled. My brain did feel kind of fuzzy going in, and if it were any other day, I definitely wouldn't have decided to stream at all... but I'd been hyping up this idea to myself for a while, and knew I'd regret it if I bailed at the last minute, so I pushed myself to go live anyway.

And yeah, like I started this off by saying, the stream definitely wasn't perfect. I didn't play super well, made a bunch of boneheaded decisions, caught myself mentally drifting off every so often and not either playing the game or talking to chat or just being an engaging streamer at all. I lost a run that I for sure could have gotten further with if I played a bit smarter.

BUT!

I did it. I did the thing, and I still had fun, and my friends who tuned in as viewers seemed to have fun too. At the end of the day, that should really be all that matters.

I could very easily take today as a bad omen for the year to come... as in like, I'm gonna be mushy brained and keep doing embarrassing mediocre streams, because that's clearly all I'm capable of, blah blah blah. Past-me definitely would have latched onto that train of thought, hard. But right now, mostly what I'm feeling is just... proud. Proud of myself for not letting perfect be the enemy of good today for once, for actually putting myself out there, for not putting so much stock in "I have to be good at the games I play" as like part of my identity or anything (which I used to have a ton of bugaboos about, as a woman who used to play in a lot of sexist male-dominated spaces... it was kind of like, I have to be great at this game, or I'm just encouraging their sexism so much more and letting all other women down because of it, therefore I can't ever afford to be bad at games and especially not when someone else might see). I can finally feel myself starting to let go of a lot of those old toxic ideas, and while I know I still have a ways left to go with it, it already feels incredibly liberating.

Throughout my struggles with chronic illness these past few years, I've been trying my best for some time now to accept myself for where I'm at, instead of berating myself for not yet getting back to where I want to be. Moments like these are really nice reminders that that isn't nearly as hard as it used to be. :)

So, yeah. Thanks for reading. Here's hoping this story resonates with at least a few of you -- and here's to (hopefully) many more mediocre non-ideal streams to come this year, and maybe a few half-decent ones too if I'm lucky 😅

Don't really know the best way to describe this. But I bet people do know the feeling.

It's Sunday, all my chores are out of the way, and I have time to do anything, but instead I find myself not being able to decide what I want to do. I am turning on various games, looking at the title screen for a bit than turning them off again. I pick up my guitar, mess around for a few minutes then put it down again. I think about a creative project I could start, but then decide to not when I imagine how much effort it would take. Then I go back to scrolling various websites, not really interested in anything, cause it's all the same all the time. The weather is way too cold and ugly for me to go outside, so I just don't know what to do. The only nice thing is that I am listening to music in the mean time...

The Holidays by the end of the year are a time for meeting a lot of family members that we may not have seen for a long time. For a lot of people, this a joyful moment of relaxation where they can enjoy the company of those they love. For others, this can also be a stressful period, when tensions, trauma, and insecurities related to family relationships emerge, often in unexpected ways. Different people experience those events in vastly different ways.

Are you more of an introvert or an extrovert?

What does Christmas (as well as other events with a component of "forced" social gathering) mean to you?

How did you manage it this year?

Is this usually a happy time for you? Why?

I've recently made my own Chai Spice blend courtesy of Meera Sodha's cookbook, Made in India: Recipes from an Indian Family Kitchen. Instead of just turning on the kettle and throwing in a teabag, this requires a little bit more effort and setting a pot on the stove in addition to making the spice blend itself. Sure it's not instantaneous gratification, but it's a lovely slow-down in comparison to my busy days and deliciously more flavorful than a typical teabag. It allows me to be present with what I am doing and enjoy it.

The smell of the spice as it starts to simmer into the milk and tea. The need to watch my pot of chai for the right moment to turn down the heat so it doesn't scald. The delicate balancing act of straining floating spices out to make a smoother cup. The gentle clings of a spoon to sweeten it all with a touch of sugar.

I'm curious about what other folks do as mindful acts of food and drink. It can be a comfort meal, a tasty snack, a special drink, or anything in between! Maybe we could all inspire each other to incorporate a new way to find moments of peace through a hobby we mutually love in the joy of cooking.

I struggle with trichotillomania which is a compulsion to pluck my own hair. Mine is focused primarily on my beard, resulting in unsightly bare patches. I am working through the mental health component of this condition already, but a better hair and skin care regiment could help reduce the triggers that start me plucking hairs.

I keep my beard relatively close cropped to my face. When the hairs in my bald patches start to regrow there is typically a lot of irritation which starts me touching my face, which leads me to find bumps like zits and blackheads and “weird hairs”, like kinky hairs, hairs growing in the wrong direction, particularly hard or soft hairs, anything that feels off when I run my fingers over them. This has the side effect of depositing more dirt and oils from my fingers onto my face, which creates a kind of feedback loop where the dirtier my face is the more I want to touch it, and the more I touch it the dirtier it gets. When I encounter these bumps and weird hairs I will want to pick at them and I won’t stop thinking about it until I do. It is a real struggle that I am working through and I figure if I can reduce that irritation that triggers it I’ll be less likely to touch and therefore pluck.

What I am hoping to find here are general care tips I can use for my short-cropped beard. What kind of products do you use for both the hairs themselves and your face, what methods do you use to trim, etc.? Currently I wash my face with a cleanser, followed by a toner, then a serum or lotion, but I don’t use any products specifically for my beard hairs themselves. I trim with an electric razor when my beard is between .5 and 1 inches long and I’ll trim it down to about 1/8 of an inch, or whatever setting 7, 8, or 9 is on my razor.

Numerous studies have shown that talking about the things going on in our life is beneficial for our mental health, but sometimes it’s hard to speak about them with the people in our lives.

So, share with us strangers. We may not be able to fix it for you, but maybe you can leave some of the burden you’re carrying in these comments and walk away a little lighter. I’ll start!

I saw that new “Aged” filter on Tik Tok this week and thought I’d give it a try. The moment my camera opened, I was looking at the spitting image of the deceased father. I panned my head, raised my eyebrows, smiled, and frowned, so many of my facial mannerisms were exactly the same as my dad’s. As I felt all the emotion of missing my dad well up inside me, watching the camera, I said “Hey boyyy” in the way my father used to say it to me. It broke my heart to see the image of my dad staring back at me and talking to me, I miss him so much.

I lost my dad 7 years ago now, and each year I can feel little details of him slip further away. The shirts I kept of his are sealed in bags so I can open them and smell him again, but ziplock can only do so much, the scent is all but gone. I can feel little details about him that I knew so well slip away as time passes. The way the skin of his hands felt when I held hands with him. The feeling of his back when I would give him big bear hugs. The comforting details slip further out of reach as I dive deeper into adulthood on my own, without my dad to help me. So the fact that I could open this app and look at a live image of my dad, embodied in me, both breaks my heart and fills it in a strange way.

Hello Folks,

I haven't posted on Tildes for a while and today I have a very strong feeling to post something.

But what exactly should I post about? In some sense, a writer's block is the exact anti-thesis of a child. Coming up with some creative content is sometimes painfully difficult for a functioning adult like me, while my 10 year old nephew can blabber hundreds of different things in a five minute span!

Now obviously, I can also come up with hundreds of different things but we all know it's not so easy to put down those things on the keyboard. I'm not an expert in writing craft but I have a strong feeling that most of us just hold ourselves back out of fear of what the world says. And honestly, the so called "world" here is acting very toxic and isn't helping by discouraging content creators who aren't always top notch. And sometimes, the content itself can be good or bad just as beauty is defined by the eye of the beholder. What is cringe for you may be good content or even humor for someone else. If only most of us start focusing on the "full half" of the cup instead of the "empty half", think just how beautiful this world will be!

Years of facing such toxic behavior on platforms like reddit and twitter has caused me to over-analyze and over-scrutinize everything before saying it. Any idea or concept has to pass through a lot of "mind filters" in order for them to get the "clean chit" for "yeah, this can be published". Perhaps, this particular post I'm writing is an exception or anomaly in that sense!

As a programmer, freelancer, writer, someone interested in things like humanities and social sciences, and an ordinary Indian dude, you guys tell me what kind of content should I write so that the writer in me thrives and also the content is at least bearable by the audience?

The problem I'm trying to solve here is difficult but I may not be the only one going through this phase. Is there a solution to this? Any proven and practical solution which you've had success with yourself?

A part of me thinks that I should try podcasting or youtubing first, and then I'll gain the confidence necessary to actually write mind-blowing content. But I have a problem with impromptu speaking and talking, is that a very common problem? Is there an easy fix available for that? I intuitively know from what I've observed in this world that most people have enough confidence to say or speak a lot of things (even the harshest of things!) right in front of others' face but when it comes to writing, they can't write so much. I'm a kind of antithesis of that, isn't it?

How exactly does one build confidence with public speaking? They say keep practicing and you'll get there. Here is a feeble attempt, not exactly a podcast but something near enough - a presentation for an app idea I've got. I want to create more of these but again, what content? I've got no ideas, especially interesting or appealing ones. And judging by the number of likes that youtube video got, I already have half a mind of just giving up on this!

If you've reached until this point, thank you for sticking with me till the end. And apologies if I picked up on your brain beyond its limits!