Something I've found about myself is that I'm always addicted to some kind of screen-based media. So, for example, I used to be really into mobile idle games. Then when I forced myself to give that up, I found myself scrolling through social media for hours at a time. When I force myself to give that up, I find myself playing mindless puzzle games on my computer for hours at a time. Whenever I give up one addiction, I end up picking up another. This suggests to me that there is a deeper need here that is going unaddressed. It suggests that simple techniques to get rid of a habit (e.g. "Try deleting the game from your phone!") aren't sufficient in the long term. But I'm not sure what to do about that. Ideally, I would like to be able to talk to a therapist about this. But since I'm back on a waitlist to see a therapist, I don't think that's going to happen for quite a while. I've been attempting to do other things for my mental health (meditation, journaling, exercise) but I find that the problem of my screen addiction continues to persists. Every so often, in discussions about mental health, I see people recommending workbooks as an alternative for people unable to access therapy. I've been skeptical about this, but on reflection, it seems like that might be the right amount of structure for me. Meditation and journaling and exercise aren't really directed towards a specific problem the way a converation with a therapist can be, and if there are workbooks or similar resources that would help me work through this problem, I think it's worth a shot. My ideal situation would be an interactive online or physical workbook that give me prompts for writing and reflection within a structure, e.g. I don't just want a book or series of YouTube videos I can passively read or watch (I can easily find those -- HealthyGamerGG is a well known resource on YouTube) but I also don't want to be told to just generically journal about my life (I'm already doing that). If anyone knows about such a resource, please let me know.

labour WhatAnOddUsername • 1y ago • 100%

How to find contact info for people

Hello there. For the first time, I actually have some concrete questions about activism/doing my part in a union. I'm in a teaching assistant union that's currently on strike. Since I'm sick for a few days, I've requested to be part of the "remote work" group, and the task I've been assigned is to find contact information for people who've donated to the university. It occurred to me that "tracking down a person's contact information" is probably a fairly useful skill to have in the context of organizing, so I thought I should ask whether there is any advice I should follow here? The university lists the names of donors alongside the scholarships, grants, etc. So far, I've mostly just been Googling "(person's name) (name of university)" until I narrow down the right person, and usually find either a LinkedIn page or a page related to that person's business. (Or, a few times, an obituary). The only slightly more sophisticated thing I've done is "whois" lookups for websites. Is there anything else I should consider?

For context, I'm near Vancouver and am fortunate enough to have a non-zero amount of insurance. I'm over 30 and have felt disconnected from friends and have had difficulty forming relationships any closer than "friendly acquaintance" my entire adult life. I am the kind of person internet liberals are thinking of when they say "LOL, guys will do anything except get therapy", except that I am desperately trying to get therapy, so it grates on me when I see people say that. The problem is, I find myself so distracted my my own frustration (and by the problems that I'm trying to get therapy for) that I am just not in a good place to make the phone calls, fill out the forms, and keep getting disappointed when I don't find what I'm looking for. It feels like a sick Catch-22: I am not mentally healthy enough to jump through the hoops it's going to take to get mental health support. - I'm a grad student and I've tried going through the school's Health and Counseling services. I contacted them in May of this year. The earliest I was able to get an appointment with them was in July. That was just an intake appointment -- the ACTUAL appointments with my assigned therapist (another grad student) started in September, and due to scheduling conflicts, I won't have a second one until a few weeks into October. Also, I'm only allowed four meetings with them before I'm back on the waiting list. - I asked my doctor to refer me to someone for mental health support. She referred me to a hospital, and the hospital called me while I was on an airplane. I've tried calling them back several times and ended up having to leave my number on their answering machine. My doctor's schedule is very packed and it's hard to get a hold of her. - So, I tried a service offered through the school's student health insurance. I was able to get an appointment this week. However, it's still only 6 meetings. I'll take what I can get at this point, but that's not what I need. - I do have some insurance and would consider private therapy, but I know it's going to be a nightmare to figure out how much it covers, what it covers, and to find a therapist who is actually able to accept the insurance I have. I've had this problem with e.g. massage therapy, where in spite of a note from my doctor, I was still paying most of the cost of the massage therapy, even when I did find a massage therapist that accepted my insurance, and I assume the same thing would happen for mental health therapy. In the appointment I had to today (the first of 6) I mentioned that I've had a lot of thoughts about suicide, and the counselor asked what keeps me going on. I said, part of it is that I know that long-term solutions exist, that ongoing therapy is a real thing that people do, but that I just can't access it right now. She said "Hmm, that sounds frustrating". I said, if you, a professional in the field of counseling, can't give me ANY idea as to what I'm supposed to do to get the help I'm looking for, then who can? She has said she will look into existing resources, but I am rapidly losing hope. One of the standard questions that gets asked is "Do you currently have any plans to do harm to yourself or others," i.e. do I have any plans to commit suicide. The honest answer is, no, I don't. I sure think about it a lot, but it's not something I've ever had any specific plans to do. It's never been that bad -- I've just felt really, really bad for years in a way that wears at me over time. So, what I'm seriously wondering now is, what would happen if I walked into an emergency room at a hospital and said "I am going to kill myself if I do not receive ongoing low-cost therapy", and then screamed at the top of my lungs until they either helped me or had me thrown out by security? At this point, I have to consider all my options.

I think there's value in writing about your thoughts, and I find that I'm able to do so more clearly if I imagine that I have an audience. I hope it's okay if I use this space for that purpose. I've been struggling to get up and do things recently. This is a problem, since I'm in the middle of doing a master's degree, and I have people to answer to. I'm lucky to live in a part of the world where at least lip service is paid to mental health, but that doesn't entail as much practical help as I would like. It mostly just means that, if I use the phrase "mental health" when I explain why I'm having difficulty getting things done, I get some verbal demonstrations of sympathy from the people I'm talking to. I have gone to counseling for various problems over the past decade or so. Sometimes it's helpful, sometimes it's not. If nothing else, I think I'm getting better at talking to counselors. What I would really like is to have a therapist I could talk to regularly in the long term, but therapy is expensive. There are free/sliding scale options, but there's usually some kind of catch -- either I have to wait a long time, or the person I'm talking to is a graduate student and not yet 100% confident in the field, and in either case, I spend every session knowing that our connection will be temporary. I have my pronouns listed as [any], so my relationship with gender is a bit complicated (yet another reason for me to want a therapist), but for most practical purposes in everyday life, I present as a man. At the very least, I'm enough of a man to feel attacked when I see people on the internet saying "Men will do anything to avoid going to therapy lol". I'm making a sincere effort to get into therapy, and when I see people say "lol go to therapy idiots" it feels dismissive, like my problems are just a punchline. I don't enjoy being taunted for not having access to something I need. It is difficult for me to talk about my problems, knowing that they are seen as either a punchline, or a burden (e.g. the dynamic of men making the people around them act as their therapists) or otherwise just unworthy of sympathy. If you take nothing else away from this post, please, if you've been saying "go to therapy" as a way to dismiss people online, consider finding something more nuanced you could say that allows for the barriers people experience in getting the help they need. I was looking at my old posts here, since some of them have resurfaced with the new website. I found [this one](https://hexbear.net/post/68458) in which I talk about my difficulty in forming connections with people at the age of 29. I remember breaking into a sweat when I saw one of the comments describe my problems as "not trivial" and emphasize how much more difficult it is to solve your mental health problems when you're in your 30s than when you're younger. I'm still panicking about that now, because I'm a couple years older and not much has improved. Okay, if I'm being objective, some things have improved. I have been on a few dates that didn't end up going anywhere, and gotten slightly more comfortable asking people out -- not a lot of yes's, but at least the no's have been polite. I've also made a conscious effort to show more appreciation to the people around me (e.g. letting friends know what I like about them, sending them a message on their birthdays). It feels like I'm still just doing the bare minimum of being a person in a society. It also still feels like a constant drag, like I'm having to initiate every interaction. I still have difficulty incorporating physical affection into my life, although I suppose I hug people goodbye more often than I used to. But my needs in this area are not being fulfilled, and I've still never had any romantic relationship or had sex (which I'm realizing is a symptom rather than a problem, although I would really like to experience physical intimacy with someone I like and who likes me back). When I think about my excuses for not doing things to improve my life, I always come back to how "busy" I am. It occurred to me recently that, in my adult life, I've never really had what you'd call a "vacation". I've had periods between jobs where I was looking for work and perhaps working for other projects, but I've never consciously set some time aside when I would just go somewhere or do something for leisure. Oh, I've spent plenty of time doing unproductive things (e.g. playing mindless games, watching YouTube videos) but with a bit of clarity, I think maybe that is my junk-food way of trying to fulfill the need of taking a genuine break. I've recently tried to honour my weekends by actually not working (my thesis advisor said that she doesn't expect me to work on weekends -- I really lucked out, and I realize I'm fortunate to have supportive people in my life, but it also put into stark relief the degree to which all of my problems are caused by myself. I sometimes joke that my parents only ever wanted me to be happy, and I couldn't even succeed at *that*.) Like, when I think about looking for a date, the first thing that occurs to me is how much time and effort that's going to take, when I'm already tired all the time. Mood-wise, I've been fluctuating lately. There were moments today when I was on the verge of tears, and a brief but sincere moment when I seriously considered going to an emergency room at a hospital and telling them I was having suicidal thoughts, not so much because I think I'm likely to commit suicide any time soon, but so that I could avoid having to work tomorrow and maybe even get access to some mental health resources quickly instead of having to wait for my first appointment a month from now. Other times, I feel some amount of clarity and calm -- I think that's how I'm feeling right now -- but the despair is there underneath. I think the way I'm processing emotions is improving, or at least changing -- I don't distract myself from negative emotions as much as I used to, and I think there are times when I feel positive emotions more intensely than before. For example, I've found myself physically laughing at jokes I hear in podcasts or in shows I watch. This is a far cry from the typical internet "slightly exhaling air from my nostrils" laughter. I have a friend who asked me how I was doing about a month ago. I said "fine", and in a well-intentioned attempt to be positive, he said "Just fine? Why not wonderful?" I noticed that his asking me that made me feel bad, because I had trouble imagining how I could possibly feel "wonderful" for more than a brief, fleeting moment. Honestly, the day before, I wasn't even "fine". "Fine" was an upgrade for me. I talked with my friend about how that was my reaction to his question -- emphasizing that he didn't do anything wrong, I just wanted to share what was going on with me -- and he listened and seemed generally sympathetic, even if he didn't completely understand. He's a good person and I wish I was able to have that kind of positive effect on the people around me. So, that's where I am right now. I don't think there was much of a narrative to what I just said, but the purpose was to help me process my own thoughts and emotion, and I think that it served that purpose, because I feel a bit better now than I did when I started. I am not in a state of utter hopelessness and despair, but I am definitely in a state of mixed motions, some of which is hopelessness and despair. I can't reasonably expect anyone to respond to that mess, let alone respond substantively, but I do appreciate responses.

furry WhatAnOddUsername • 2y ago • 100%

Resources (preferably video resources) specific to drawing furry art?

I think the title is a fairly good summary, but for a few clarifications: I'm not really looking for general fundamental drawing lessons -- not because I don't believe the fundamentals are important, but because those resources are easier to find for me (e.g. Proko, Ctrl-Paint, DrawABox). Those are good for fundamentals, anatomy, etc. but they can feel a bit like "eating your vegetables" sometimes, and every so often it's fun to get inspiration specific to the kind of art I'd like to make. What I'm looking for would be something more supplemental, partly for the purposes of learning, but also partly for motivation. What I'm imagining is tutorials or demos either of specific techniques, or artists who do streams of their own drawing projects -- something where I could potentially draw along and put what I've learned into practice, while also seeing into the process of a real project, not just beginner exercises. In the vast ocean of the internet, I refuse to believe that something like this doesn't exist. I know there exist artists with YouTube or Twitch channels who do videos about drawing that, while not exactly formal lessons, can still be informative about their process. And statistically, at least some of those artists must be furries. I'm just having trouble finding good ones, because it's never occurred to me that this could be a fun way to supplement my learning, and because typing "furry drawing youtubers" into Google isn't as helpful as I was hoping it would be. EDIT: In case anyone's looking, the closest I've found is this Google Doc via /r/FurryArtSchool: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OTqhtsRMR3I_tofdM7D0GqdBMcg9-7kLZ_9gbL9SFcA/edit . Still a bit more focused on fundamentals than on specifics, but at least it's focused on furry art. Since search engines weren't helping me, I tried ChatGPT in an act of desperation. Here was the result, which is fairly close in concept to what I'm looking for, although if anyone thinks they can do better, let me know: ::: spoiler Chat GPT results Q: I want to get better at drawing Furry art. Can you recommend any good YouTubers or Twitch streamers who do Furry art? A: Certainly! Here are some YouTubers and Twitch streamers who focus on furry art and may be able to help you improve your skills: Jazza - Jazza is a popular artist who creates a wide range of content, including furry art. He has many tutorials on his channel that can help you improve your furry drawing skills. Vivziepop - Vivziepop is an animator and artist who is known for her unique and expressive art style. She often features furry characters in her artwork and animations. Draw with Jazza - Draw with Jazza is a YouTube channel that is dedicated to art tutorials, challenges, and speedpaints. While the channel is not exclusively focused on furry art, it does have several videos that are relevant to the furry fandom. Vix N dwnq - Vix N dwnq is a Twitch streamer who is known for creating digital art, including furry art. She often streams her art process and provides helpful tips and insights for her viewers. Silverkitsuneart - Silverkitsuneart is a furry artist who creates both digital and traditional art. She has a variety of tutorials and speedpaints on her YouTube channel, as well as streams on her Twitch channel. Furry Little Peach - Furry Little Peach is a digital artist who creates vibrant and colorful illustrations, including many with furry characters. She often shares her process and tips on her YouTube channel. Toastyhat - Toastyhat is a furry artist who creates both fanart and original art. They often stream their art process on Twitch and share tutorials and speedpaints on their YouTube channel. I hope you find these suggestions helpful, and good luck with your furry art! :::