Whiskey and bourbon. 🥃

Since someone already listed Powerthesaurus, I'll go ahead and toss in:
https://onelook.com/

Nothing makes me happier than lowering a reader’s guard before delivering an emotional gut punch.

Do you have a favorite notebook or do you keep tabs on your phone? :3

Aside from the obvious (active reading and writing), I personally do my best to pay attention to the world around me.

More specifically, I apply observational skills I would use as if I were sketching. Instead of drawing a picture, I try to describe what I see as if a character observed it for the first time. I also expand upon this with the other senses, especially sounds and smells. A fun exercise utilizes people watching, preferably within a busy area. Instead of trying to sketch fast-moving people as quickly as I can while they walk by, I take note of what I notice about them first: what they're wearing, how they move, the hint of perfume perchance...etc.

I also try to reflect upon personal experiences. This ranges anywhere from times in sports where my team struggled from the bottom of a tournament's bracket to experiencing the jubilation of winning the championship despite the odds...to something as isolating as losing a parent upon reaching adulthood and being surrounded by peers that don't understand how I can't just "get over it" (both true stories). These experiences allow me to analyze and convey the human condition, themes and the like relatable to many (if not all). My desire to do this, naturally leads to me to read widely and deeply as I search for ways to express these experiences and apply them to characters.

It's also cathartic.
Hope this helps and best of luck!

Sigh...
HUGS HARDER!!!

Not only is the entirety of The Agony and the Ecstasy descriptive, capturing tiny details of the setting and characters, but it often revolves around the theme of Michelangelo's desire to work with marble.

Irving Stone did a level of research I could only dream by living in Italy for years. Not only did he visit many locations in Rome and Florence, but he also worked in marble quarries, and apprenticed himself to a marble sculptor. He literally paints with his words, because he harnessed the idea that painting/drawing is “seeing”. He portrayed this by having Michelangelo paying attention to the world around him. It’s downright inspiring.

Ergo, I highly recommend you check it out. It also has a great audiobook. Hope you enjoy!

Fiction provides us with a way to examine the human condition. The stories may not be “real”, but various themes within said stories are VERY real and have been since the dawn of civilization.

That said, you can’t really force this perspective. Just let him know if he ever has questions, changes his mind, or finds an interest, you’re more than happy to feed that spark of joy.

There are dragons, but they’re extremely rare. You’re more likely to come across grand serpents of some kind. On an even grander scale, there are Elementals: massive (and often destructive) natural events that are believed to be the remnants of the world’s near destruction many winters ago. It’s unknown how sentient they are.

The same way you get people to like a protag.

Make them relatable. Reveal their vulnerabilities and flaws. Reveal what obstacles they have to contend with or overcome. In other words, make them human.

Everyone lies. Many people are opportunistic in some way. Many people often have a reason that motivates to become callus and uncaring.

Find that reason and harness it.

I remember as a police records clerk when the definition of rape changed back in 2013 to finally include male victims. I wept for y’all. Took too damn long and yet the stigma remains.

Just ALL THE HUGS EVER!!!

Not a Teacher, but I fully admit I was a late bloomer when it came to reading. Although I fully agree with parents needing to read to and with their kids, I personally need to acknowledge sometimes at-home circumstances don't always allow for this. Therefore...

I was a young athlete stereotype that used to see reading as a "passive" activity, but still had a vivid imagination I found other ways to foster. The key that unlocked my love/enjoyment of reading was finding a subject I was interested in. By about the 4th grade, I fell in love with Arthurian tales, starting with Roger Lancelyn Green's King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table. I'm also a bit of a tomboy, so I LOVED the idea of knighthood and going out into the world, adventuring and so on...only to be told snidely by teachers and others that "girls can't be knights".

Naturally, this nearly killed my interest in reading...until my mother stepped in.

She was an avid reader, mostly romance. Bless her and dad, because they were so exhausted by the time they got home from work, I can barely remember any times either of them read to me. Still, SHE never discouraged me when I found something interesting. In fact, upon realizing how upset this all made me, she promptly found Tamora Pierce's Song of the Lioness quartet for me and I've been HOOKED ever since. My interest skyrocketed as I branched out into other stories and genres, falling in love with classical mythology, and of course this led to many of the classics often found in high school and college. I can't emphasize this enough, this literally inspired me to go to college and major in the Classics.

So, all in all, my two cents worth are thus:
-Let the kids explore and find what interests them...be it, sports, dragons, space marines, whatever...
-DON'T DISCOURAGE THEM. Doesn't matter if the subject interests YOU (parent/teach/mentor) or not, what matters is that it interests THEM. It's all about finding that hook.

Either way, hope this helps. Best of luck!

As a massage therapist and as someone that’s dealt with chronic pain in various degrees (including dealing with a subluxation in my right shoulder for years), you will be amazed at what the body grows use to. Oftentimes, “pain” falls off the radar, but a person will notice dysfunction in other ways. The most common I’ve personally experienced for myself and others—outside of physical limitations— is fatigue and lack of emotional regulation (usually manifesting as anger/irritability/frustration). When the pain becomes manageable and slides down the scale thanks to lifestyle changes, therapy, surgery, etc., these things likely resolve themselves with time.

Of course, as always, these experiences vary wildly. Pain is relative and the threshold or perception of it can and does fluctuate.

Just my nickel’s worth. Hope this helps and best of luck!

Caught it at pre-school along with strep. Which sucked, because the strep went unnoticed until I managed to somehow express I was hungry, but it hurt to eat.

Yes. The thing I would've liked to change was my experience during sports.

First of all, breathe. Niiiice deep breaths from the belly. There ya go.

Second, very rarely is there a linear path to "self-sufficient adulthood", let alone "happiness".

Don't know what that looks like to you, but I can almost guarantee your viewpoint will differ from others. I remember when I was 19 and thought FINALLY, I can start living life and start making all the plans ever!!! Only to lose my mother unexpectedly before reaching my 21st birthday...followed by a 15 year fog thanks to delayed grief. I literally had no support during this time aside from everyone telling me to "get over" my loss (ie code for: you're making me uncomfortable, please stop mentioning it). That said, by the very same odds of this happening to you, you could just as easily luck out at everything you set your mind to. (No joke. My mother passed away from undiagnosed Thyroidism of all things.)

Fear of the unknown is a terrible enemy. You can't win the "What If" game, but it is beneficial to sit down long enough to analyze what scares you. After you manage to narrow this down, you can develop a battle plan of sorts and move forward. On top of this, it's equally beneficial to figure out what makes you happy. For myself, I was fortunate enough to wrestle with this back around 2020 and discovered I was happiest whatever I accomplished 2 things: worked with my hands and helped people. As of January of this year, I'm a massage therapist. Looking back, I find it laughable that it took me THIS LONG to get to this point.

Ergo, in a nutshell, there's no predicting the future. Do what you can, reflect on your personal experience to figure out what makes you happy, and most importantly, focus on this mantra: "No matter what happens, you'll make it through." Whatever you go through may be rough, but it'll pass. Might pass like a damn kidney stone, but it'll pass and you'll find a way to manage.

All the hugs! I sincerely hope this helps.

ALL THE HUGS TO YOU.

I know this sounds corny af, but try to give yourself "permission" to cry. This truly sounds like you're going through a form of grief with so much change, and you are absolutely right, it's perfectly natural to feel this way. Let it all wash over you and embrace it. Know well there's many people here rooting for you.

All great suggestions so far. I definitely agree with “figure out what she finds attractive” and will piggyback here. Does what she find attractive align with her morals or clash with them? For example, consider the hypothetical:

Does he show a nurturing side? (Something often seen as attractive to a lot of women.)

Does he help kid, elder, or animal in some way without gain? Does she find that endearing since she too has a job that’s designed to aid and protect others? Or would she find that suspicious because people with malicious intent have lowered her guard before? Maybe both and finds herself pleasantly surprised or confused/conflicted in the end?

Just something to explore with your character. Best of luck!

All it does is make me miss AIM.

So far so good, but obviously that's a form of bias with limited experience. I'm curious if that changes during the wintertime and the height of flu season. lol

I think I'm more angry at Andrea's potential going to waste.

It's a tie between Party Favors and Whore.

Fashion and nicotine in vapes.

Lolz I feel this. I was a Lutheran in a sea of Baptists. 🤣

Do the research. Here's a great place to start:

https://writingwithcolor.tumblr.com/