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I'm so happy I get to share a success story with you all! Reading others' stories has helped me so much through my own process and I hope mine will do the same for someone else. Sorry for the long post I just want to be thorough in case someone can be helped with it!
Early this morning I essentially got exactly what I'd been affirming what was already mine. A text from him asking if he could call me, a long conversation with everything I wanted to hear and more, a reconciled relationship and promises of a future together. The only thing standing between us now are COVID-related travel restrictions imposed by his work/our own hesitancy to travel during the pandemic (we are fairly long distance), but we are still officially back together and there's no doubt in my mind that things are unfolding as I want them to.
I don't want to repeat too much of the old story, but my boyfriend and I did break up, and trust me when I say there were plenty of circumstances that initially made me feel like this was impossible to come back from. There was no animosity or cheating but everything felt completely out of my control. I would also like to add that I spent a month being absolutely crazy, obsessive, texting/calling him endlessly, it was pretty bad. I was a desperate, low self-esteem mess. I felt helpless and was monumentally depressed until about 6 weeks post breakup when I found Neville.
Almost immediately I was able to connect the dots between my own awful mental diet and the circumstances of our breakup. Initially it felt awful to see how every negative thought about myself and our relationship unfolded almost verbatim from my brain when he broke up with me. As I read and learned more about the law of assumption this feeling faded and was replaced with a little bit of hope. If I created this bad situation, I could create a good one.
As I was totally new to the concepts of manifestation/the law of assumption, I started by building faith that it was real with things I didn't have resistance to. Manifesting gifts, coupons for free things, money/lottery ticket wins, revising arguments with friends/family, bringing home my lost dog, minor changes in my physical appearance... all came easily to me. My process for these things was simple. Imaginal act/SATS focused before bed, and then simply living as if and affirming to myself about these things. The "I remember when" technique was super helpful for me if I had a moment of doubt from the 3D.
While I was building my faith, I kept my SP in kind of a "bubble" in my mind. I knew what I wanted with him, but I realized that thinking about him too much made me obsess and spiral and I needed to take a step back. I spent time manifesting other things as well as improving my self concept. I cannot tell you enough how good it feels to finally put myself on a pedestal, to acknowledge all of my good qualities, and to feel deserving of happiness and love for the first time in my life.
When I felt confident enough, I applied the same scene Neville used when he was manifesting his wife. I imagined going to bed next to my SP every night. I imagined in the first person, seeing a wedding ring on my hand when I touched his face. Personally, I didn't "loop" the scene, but just envisioned and felt the quiet peacefulness of falling asleep next to him.
During the daytime, I mostly focused on other things. I lived in the 3D and 4D simultaneously, doing what I needed to do in the world of Caesar while acknowledging that the life I focused on internally was just as real. I assumed the state of being with him, of being the woman who gets exactly what she wants. Of course, I had a few bad days. I had doubts. I allowed myself to feel and then affirmed that one bad moment does not negate my progress. It's okay to falter, you just need to pick yourself back up and persist. Literally two days before he reached out to me I had a rough/sad day - it's okay, I promise!
How I personally knew I had reached the state/sabbath:
"Brazen impudence" as Neville called it. Of course he's mine, of course this is inevitable. There is simply no other possibility. When I saw cute couples, I no longer felt the tinge of pain and jealousy in my stomach, it was replaced with happiness and thoughts of how it reminded me of myself and SP. I was very content, I did not care about the old story, and I was no longer obsessed. I had dreams about him where everything I desired played out perfectly - I don't believe that these were "signs" or "premonitions" in the superstitious/power outside of us way, but definitely a good indicator that my subconscious mind had been impressed. I felt this way despite literally zero contact from him/no "movement" in the 3D until the moment he messaged me to talk, completely out of the blue. There is movement behind the scenes!
I don't want to specify how much time it took after I learned about the law of assumption because I don't want anyone reading this to compare their journey to mine and feel like they're doing something wrong if it's taking more time. There is no race. They're yours. When I got frustrated with the time it was taking, I learned two time-related comparisons that helped me:

"Live" television is never really live. There's a delay so the station can control what is broadcast. You are living with that short delay. Just because your SP doesn't appear in your room in a puff of green smoke the instant you think of them does not mean they're not yours.
When you buy something online, it is yours even though, again, it didn't appear in your room instantly out of a portal in the wall the moment you clicked "confirm purchase". It's yours, you know it exists and it's in a package with your name on it on it's way to you. You don't go outside every 5 seconds to look in the mailbox. It is simply yours.

I also want to point out a few things that I did that I felt were detrimental to the process and my mental health/obsession with manifesting my SP. If you do these, please don't panic, it is just my personal experience and how I was affected negatively.

Constantly looking for external reassurance. As I wrote above, I did get frustrated with the time that it took/not immediately seeing results initially in the 3D. If you experience this too, I highly recommend not immediately running to text your friends/post on Reddit/Facebook about old circumstances and this and that and the other begging someone to tell you it's going to be okay. Please learn to reassure yourself. You are the operant power, God is within you, and nobody can manifest for you. Make a list of your favorite Neville quotes, Bible verses, affirmations, even bookmark a video or two on Youtube to rewatch when you are feeling low. This leads me into my second point:
Do not oversaturate yourself with law of assumption content. Read Neville, listen to Neville lectures, and by all means if you like a few channels on Youtube that discuss the LoA don't be afraid to watch them. The issue comes with subscribing to 100 different channels each with their own techniques and limiting beliefs and conflicting teachings that will confuse you and end up making things so much more complicated than they need to be. One limiting belief from one channel sent me into a funk for a few days - be careful what you watch, and be careful how much you watch. Watching videos =/= manifesting. The best thing to do is to test things for yourself instead of piling on more information you already know explained in 200 different ways.

One final note, if you are in the throes of SP Sadness, please do not buy coaching from anyone. They cannot bring your person to you. Only you can. I don't have a personal issue with coaching, but if you are going into any of this thinking there's some magic wand that someone else can wave that will poof your desires into the 3D instantly you will be disappointed and out a few hundred dollars. I see a lot of desperation and while it is completely understandable and valid and I get it, I hate to see people being taken advantage of at their low points. Give yourself time to learn and practice on your own. If I can do this, anyone can.
Thank you for reading, thank you to everyone who has shared their own success stories and inspired me and kept me going, and thank you for being such a kind and supportive community. I'm happy to answer any questions in the replies but remember - your circumstances do not matter! 💖

debunking Sarah Salviander's FAQA

If you've ever wandered on Twitter, you may have found the account of Sarah Sallivander, an astrophysicist and old earth creationist. Her pinned post is a link to her blog, Frequently Asked Questions by Atheist. As some of those questions are personnal, answering them would be a waste of time. I will not answer questions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 16 as they are not really relevant, and mostly about being pedantic and play on words. question 16's answer can be found in question 15, and I have nothing to say about it.

5 : testability of god
here, miss Salviander shift the goalppost, by arguing we cannot prove the existence of the world. I have two problems with this statement :1: You are not answering the question. the question was "can you demonstrate god exists ?" and not "can you demonstrate reality exists ?"2 : I can prove my own existence with certainty (Descarte's cogito ergo sum), but I do not say I can prove the universe exists. I am maximally certain of it, but there is always a slim chance I might be wrong. But this technique can be flipped on its head. Can you demonstrate your god is not fooling you (even if the book says he can't, it raises problem with the omnipotence of god, and he does that several times in the bible)

6 : extraordinary claims and extraordinary "moving-away-from-the-original-argument"
let's say I tell you I won the lottery. you can take my word for it, but a more reasonable approach would be to ask for evidences. I could show you the ticket, but it might not be enough. if my name appears on the news with "Katen_Kazemegami won the lottery", it might be more convincing, because the probability of a news report lying is way lower than me lying. I made an extraordinary claim, and the news report is extraordinary evidence. we could rephrase this as "the harder to believe my claim is, the stronger the evidence needs to be."
the last part of Salviander's claim about this argument is an appeal to popularity, which is a logical fallacy. Claiming the supernatural exists is a positive claim, and the default position for a positive claim is disbelief until proven with strong enough evidences. The supernatural is, by its nature, extraordinary, and cannot be considered an ordinary claim "because lots of peoples believe in it". The price offered by James "The Amazing" Randy of one million dollar has never been claimed for a reason. The fact nobody has proven the supernatural to exist.

7 : bad reasons to believe in god
Salviander's reason to believe in god are apparently the teleological argument (a logical universe), William Lane Craig's Kalam Cosmological Argument, and the objectivity of morality and justice. Debunking all those arguments one by one would be too long her, so I will just raise one concern for each of them
Teleological argument : What do you define as "logical and intelligible" ? The human brain is pattern-seeking, and it is normal for us to find agency where there is none. This argument is based on a bias innate in us.
William Lane Craig's KCA : this syllogism is based on a false premise (reminder of the KCA syllogism : that which begins to exist has a cause ; the universe began to exist ; therefore, the universe has a cause). We do not know what happened at the beginning of the universe. we can only observe it as far as the Planck epoch, and we do not know what happened before this. the singularity might have be eternal, since when matter or energy is condensed, time slows down, and therefore, if all the universe is condensed, there would be no time for it to begin in. This is one hypothesis, but it shows there is other options.
Objectivity of justice and morality : Morality may be objective, but it is not a proof of god's existence. One explanation is any species with an innate sense of "don't kill your neighbor (I use the term neighbor as a substitute for "member of your own species") and they probably won't kill you, oh and probably better not to kill their kids too if I don't want them to kill mine" survive longer than any species not possessing this trait. With this evolutionnary advantage, creatures were then selected, and all living species have a basic form of this instinct. As for justice, it is a human construct, and probably, as Nietzsche pointed out, one of the reasons why believers claim unjust peoples by the standard of their religion will by punished after their death.
8 : more bad reasons
the fine-tuning argument is just a rebranded teleological argument, with the added "it's made for us"
life is a physical process, and consciousness is an emergent property of the brain.
near-death experience are more likely the brain hallucinating when it's nearly dead than an experience of the supernatural. christians claim to see jesus, buddhists claim to see Krishna. It would be stranger if they saw the opposite.
Jesus' life, ministry and resurrection are sourced only in one book : the bible. Most historians agree about the fact most events recorded were written at least fourty years after his supposed death, and only few scarce passages mention christ in non-christian recorded history.

9 : logical fallacies and bias toward christianity
Salviander explains here she discovered zoroastianism and sikhism after she became christians. zoroastianism is a Babylonian religion, and is more than likely the inspiration for yahweh and the origin of satan (Ahriman, also known as Al-Shatan, the opposer, ruler of the kingdom of lies and deceivers, which is located underground. Sounds familiar ?), which makes judaism (and by extension, christianity, which use the "kingdom of lies and deceit" more than judaism) copycats of this religion. Also, FYI, zoroastianism is not monotheist, and neither was judaism when it was created.

10 : a litteral "yes but actually no" genesis. also, cherrypicking.
even by Salviander's own standard, the story of genesis is at best some kind of metaphor about the creation of the universe, at worst, a fairytale (see this other article). Another concern is the fact that Salviander accepts this part of genesis with no problem, but I cannot find anywhere if she thinks other parts of genesis (like the flood) are litteral too. If those parts are metaphors, why is Genesis 1 litteral ?

11 : an impossible creation for a billion years old universe.
For this question, Salviander redirects us to this presentation, and it raises even more concerns. the first cited bible passage is Isaiah 40:22 (the stretching of the heavens). at best, it is a metaphor, at worst, an admission by the bible it thinks the earth is flat (which is the most plausible explanation). the rest is a play on words where genesis is litteral but a day is not litterally a day, and cherrypicking. A major concern is she claims the sun was not visible on earth before the great oxidation event (2,4 billions years ago), but plants formed about five hundred million years ago, which is an error of about one order of magnitude in the order of creation. Salviander also claims the difference between Adam and other hominids is the soul, as if such thing existed.

12 : no need for this hypothesis.
Salviander claims she has no need for god is her work. But this is in contradiction with the bible. God is involved all the time with the universe, He is not only the creator, but he (allegedly) interacts with us all the time. there is no need for god, if everything can be explained naturally.

13 : babies are atheists, until their parents tell them what they should believe.
The argument presented here is a mix of argument ad populum, poisonning the well, and false equivalence. Salviander claims is "if babies are not raised to read or use toilets, they are little savages" but this argument works against her. if kids learn from their parents, they will probably adopt the same belief system as them. and religion even say as much, with its "get them while they're young" policy. the second part is the fallacy of popularity. 90% of the world's population believes in the supernatural, therefore, it's probably true. Finally, she concludes her argument by poisonning the evolutionary advantage of deism and theism, using the term "evolutionary tics" and claiming to use the law of parsimony. But what is the most parsimonious ? A deity creating the universe, or some beings using a conscious agent behind every natural things to explain what is happening around them ?

14 : religion is a product of where you are born.
Her rebuttle can be summed up as "so what ?" But it is arguable that people believes things because they live in an environement where this particular belief is seen as normal. Since Salviander probably lives in America (or at least, a Western, christian-majority nation), she adopted this belief. But if she was raised in India, and had the same career, can she be sure she would not have ended buddhist ? If there is only one true god, why are people adopting beliefs that strongly look cultural in their nature ?

15 : all atheists, just one less god.
Salivander's answer to this point is the following : "this is nonsense, because it's like saying there's no difference between 1 and 0" and I can understand that. but the point is you dismiss all other deities as "not real" or as "the product of demons" or whatever. what makes you think it is impossible to dismiss all (including your) deities by this standard ? she continues by saying god is immaterial, transcendent and timeless. if he is immaterial and outside our universe, how can he interact with the universe and how can you prove his existence ? and I have to restate that zoroastrianism predates judaism and christianity, and is more than likely its inspiration. cultures do not live in bubbles, and cultural appropriation is a thing.

17 : atheists say one thing, but my book say they are lying, so my book is right.
Salviander claims there is only two options. god exists, or he doesn't. it is true. but when an atheist says he lacks belief, he is not saying "there is definitively no god", he is saying "I have not found any sufficient evidence to believe there is one". the common misconception that all atheists are just really agnostic is based on a definition problem. atheism or theism are beliefs claim (I do/do not believe in the existence of god), while gosticism and agnosticism are knowledge claim (I know / don't know god exists). she then goes on and poison the well (again) by claiming all atheists that claim to be atheists are just claiming they think there is no god.

18 : atheists have the burden of proof
For this final claim, Salviander says the burden of proof is on the atheists. but here is my first problem : how do you prove a negative ? Second, as I stated earlier, atheists are just peoples who have not found convincing enough evidences for god. we do not have to do your job, you have to prove he exists. third, claiming we have to prove he doesn't exist because a lot of peoples believe he exists is not how it works. the first position when confronting a claim is not believing it. I do not have evidence for god, you have to prove he exists, I should not be the one proving he doesn't.

I’ve come to understand what 2016 Trump supporters wanted. It’s not 2016 anymore.

Throwback Write-Up #6: Aesop Rock - Labor Days

Artist: Aesop Rock
Album: Labor Days
Label: Definitive Jux
Date Released: September 18th, 2001
Artist Background
Ian Matthias Bavitz was born in Long Island, New York in June of 1976. After graduating high school, he attended Boston University from 1994 to 1998 where he studied visual arts. During his time at BU he met Tony Simon, who would go on to become the legendary producer Blockhead; the two quickly became close friends. At the time, Tony was also an aspiring MC. After meeting Ian, however, he decided to refocus his aspirations towards his production career.
Aesop began his rap career during his college years, releasing his first mixtape Music For Earthworms in 1997. It only sold 200 copies, as each copy was burnt and each cover was cut by Aesop himself. He followed up his underground buzz in 1999 with his Appleseed EP, which featured Blockhead production. It sold a whopping 2,000 units; an impressive feat for an unsigned student recording music in his dorm room.
Shortly after, Aesop was approached by indie label Mush Records for a one album contract. Aesop already had twenty tracks ready for release, so he saw the one album deal with Mush as a way to get his album packaged with color artwork, something he couldn’t afford previously. This lead to his debut studio album Float, which was released in 2000. This album was the first stepping stone for Aesop’s rap career, as his debut album saw him gain the attention of legendary underground MC El-P, of Company Flow fame. Aesop’s publicist at the time, Biz3 began to work with El-P as he was ramping up to launch his own label, Definitive Juxtaposition, also known as Def Jux. Aes had become close friends with Vast Aire through the NY underground show scene, which furthered the connection between himself and El-P. Eventually, El-P asked Aesop to join him on their quest to conquer New York. He brought Blockhead along with him to lay the beats down, and began working on what would become Labor Days.
After being released early to major publications, his sophomore album Labor Days began to receive positive media buzz. At the time, Aesop was still working as a server in a Manhattan diner, when he received a call from El-P in late August, 2001 inviting him on the Definitive Jux “Who Killed The Robots” 2001 North American Tour. The idea of touring and giving up his job was a huge mental undertaking for Aesop, who had recently ended a several year relationship. This culmination of stresses, and the support from his Def Jux family eventually inspired his 2002 hidden track “One of Four”, in which he opens the track “In August of 2001 my seemingly splinter-proof brain bone scaffolding exploded…I'd be lying if I said all of this made even the slightest fragment of sense to me/That's real/Simply put, I don't know what happened or what's still happening/I literally feel like I'm teetering on the blunt edge of my sanity”.
Aesop did two shows in New York City for the “Who Killed The Robots” tour in early September, before digging through a drawer to find a prescription for antidepressants that had been collecting dust for months, in an last-ditch attempt to give him the edge he needed to continue the tour. As he walked into the pharmacy to hand over the script, he glanced up at the television to witness yet another event which would forever alter his life’s perspective. The date was September 11th, 2001, and he was standing approximately 10 blocks from ground zero. Aesop never made it on tour.
One week later, on September 18th, 2001, Labor Days became the second full length album to be released through the Definitive Jux label.
Album Review
Despite being over an hour of music, sitting at 61 minutes spread between 14 tracks, Labor Days does not feel as long as it’s runtime implies, thanks to Aesop’s meticulous grooming. While the majority of the production is handled by Blockhead, Aesop tasks himself with a handful of beats, as well as Omega One tackling the beat for “Coma”. Labor Days consistently pushes the listener forward, in lieu of dragging them along for over an hour; an issue many artists face when attempting an album of this length, largely due to Aesop’s stunning technical skill and ability to feel completely at home over any multitude of beat styles and tempos.
Sonically, Blockhead and Aesop’s carefully crafted beats take on a subdued, yet crucial, backseat position for this album. The fluttering woodwind melodies of “Daylight”, the droning bassline leads of “Coma”, and the chanting string sections of “Bent Life” fastidiously set the stage for Aesop’s lyrical prowess to shine, while opened flat snares and muted high hat patterns dig the album into a meticulous, marching groove. This slowly driving, yet never faltering production approach is eerily reminiscent of a long day at the office; where monotony is anticipated and dreaded, yet simultaneously found comforting and welcomed. The repetitive, yet undeniably catchy, bassline grooves lull you into a dreary state of unease; where Aesop then unleashes his flurry of intricate rhymes, in which his nasal tone and complex flows abruptly awaken you to the belief that you’ve uncovered the truth of existence, if just for a brief, fleeting moment, only to be returned to your slumber until the next punchline.
Lyrically, Labor Days exists within the shadows cast by a mega-corporate skyscraper obfuscating your entire field of view; where focusing too much attention on details is remunerated with legal jargon purposefully designed to disorient you, eventually leaving you further away from a clear answer than where you began initially. Aesop spits witty one-liners, sandwiched between brilliant analyses of the corporate wasteland we have been forced to exist within, drenched in metaphor, further layered beneath obscure literature and science fiction references.
Critics of Aesop’s work have harped on the fact that his lyrics are dense, some even going as far to say they are nonsensical, referring to his verses as “word soup with no real meaning”. While it’s easy to dismiss lyrics such as, “Jiggy-jabberjaw vitamin idol and primal rages when bible page verse tidal waves begun, water won” as unintelligible, Aesop has maintained that his lyrics aren’t nonsense, he simply wants you to engage in what he’s saying. Yes, his lyrics are confusing. This is intentional, and honestly, part of the fun.
Attempting to analyze and fully comprehend every bar and metaphor used in the duration of this album is a fool’s errand in every sense of the phrase; quite literally impossible to do. The ambiguity of Aesop’s lyrics has always been an integral discussion point surrounding his music, and for good reason. With his breakout record Labor Days, his lyrical obscurity is without question at it’s most potent. Throughout the years, Aes has provided varying insights into his writing process and how, or why, he writes the way he does. In a 2003 interview, Aesop commented on the ambiguity of his lyrics on Labor Days.

Interviewer: Well, your lyrics seem pretty unorthodox, even though you mentioned that you’re not interested in poetry, they seem put together like poems, they have that same atmosphere of ambiguity and opacity that a lot of poetry has – you know, the tradition in hip hop is to be very clear about what you’re saying…
Aesop Rock: Yeah, being very immediate… actually I think that I am immediate, it’s just that what’s immediate in my life is pretty cryptic, and I really think that that’s more real than people who make their stuff more accessible – that stuff’s not really realistic to me. Life isn’t that easy, and people really don’t see it the same way. So, if my shit’s considered cryptic, then it can’t really get more real. It’s what’s in my head, and I do my best to transfer what’s in my head to my music. It being strange and hard to figure out, is only a fraction of how strange it is in my head, and of how reality is. You can say: ‘Johnny got shot on the block’, or you can try to decipher the actual feeling behind that, and figure out a way of saying it, which is true to what that really means.

In a 2015 interview on Open Mike Eagle’s podcast “Secret Skin”, Aes revealed that he wrote a lot of his earlier music with the intention of being as cryptic as possible. He claims that he was working through many personal issues during the time he was writing Labor Days, so to cope he would look inward at his experiences, decipher the truth beneath his emotions, and then intentionally bury that truth beneath multiple layers of deeply coated metaphors; allowing him to get the truth off his chest, while simultaneously removing the layer of accessibility that inherently comes with speaking your truth. It’s a writing technique that is used very rarely in the scope of hip-hop, a medium where being direct and braggadocios is not only expected, but lauded. However, to Aesop, he is being more honest and direct than any rapper flexing their status. He knows the meaning behind his bars; it’s simply that he’s chosen to express them in ways that purposefully diminish their accessibility.
Since he’s speaking in such intricacies and his lyrics are so thoroughly coated in metaphors for the duration of Labor Days, Aesop has essentially subverted the need to understand everything he's talking about. I’ve spent many, many hours reading the lyrics to this album in my quest to further my understanding of it, and there are still plenty of lines that continue to confuse me more with every read through. Due to this, I’ve found one of the most rewarding things to do while listening is to relax your focus. While this may seem counterintuitive to do with a hyper-conscious rapper, one of the true stand out aspects of Labor Days are Aesop’s flows and intricate rhyme schemes.
I find the appeal of Aesop’s sound akin as to why people have so heavily gravitated to the new wave of trap, which intentionally puts little emphasis on lyrical content. People like it because it’s pleasing to the ears and critical thinking is not required. If you missed what Playboi Carti said on a bar, you haven’t really missed anything. The emphasis is on the vibe. The same principle applies to Aesop’s lyrics, but on the other side of the spectrum. While he spits puzzling enigmas intended for only himself to solve, Aes further demonstrates his bewildering technical skills by fitting multi-syllable words and complex phrases into up-tempo meters with absolute grace and stunning precision, while simultaneously packing a flurry of internal rhymes into the highly detailed bars; combined with his nasal tone and voice sitting in the upper register, his flows quickly become hypnotizing. Since grasping all the content he spews is not feasible, one of the best things you can do is simply loosen your brain and allow yourself to be berated by a cascade of syllable-dense, technical flows paired with detailed rhyme schemes.
While many rappers find themselves falling into a comfortable flow and re-using it for the duration of their album, an understandable conundrum, Aesop does not allow this to occur on Labor Days. Each track has its own distinct flow, acting as a thumbprint for the song, designed to emphasize certain one-liners and details he wants you to pick up on.
While full comprehension of this album is impossible, listening carefully slowly begins to reveal the two major themes Aesop so delicately approaches throughout the record. Subtly detailing the day-to-day physical struggles associated with being forced to work in the wasteland that is American Capitalism, and the multitude of coping mechanisms we utilize are depicted on tracks like “Labor”, “Battery”, and “9-5ers Anthem”. Simultaneously, and arguably most importantly, Aesop emphasizes the necessity of the never ending struggle to create good art as an act of rebellion against the system which has forced you into a box, acting as “the crooked spoke adjacent”, as shown on cuts such as “Save Yourself”, “No Regrets”, and “Daylight”.
Opening with a devastating one-two punch, Labor Days features two of Aesop’s biggest commercial successes, “Labor” and “Daylight”. The former of which millennial fans will likely remember from the legendary soundtrack of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4, a video game which I personally played into the ground as a kid. To say the Tony Hawk Pro Skater series had an impact on my musical taste would be a massive understatement. These games defined my musical taste. Well before I was even remotely interested in hip-hop as a genre, these games were subconsciously laying the foundation for me to (re)-discover the right artists when the time was right.
“Labor” sets the lyrical tone of the album right off the bat, with Aesop posing a rhetorical question:

Who put the monkey wrench in well-oiled perfectionist emblem
Just to watch these monitors spit white noise through your office space
Automater, I infect jolly gene pool descendant clown-clusters
Brushing dust mites off your starving art revolution sound jugglers

These opening 4 bars are truly indicative of the concepts Aesop dives into throughout the album. Take the labor-based system that many of us are forced to exist as cogs within, and destroy it with awakening an art renaissance. This topical concept about the work force is expressed throughout the track with multiple beautiful metaphors, even ending the song on an apt low-note about the necessity to continue working until we reach the grave.

I work on what I love, I work to service all my burdens
And I'll work until this here little flat line closes the curtains

This concept of working for the sake of working is continually tapped on throughout the album, including the following track, “Daylight”. This Blockhead produced beat samples 1976’s “She Is My Lady” by Eric Gale. Layered atop the string section and opened wooden clap snares rests a flute melody, fluttering over a chopped and screwed version of a rare Digital Underground song, which was only released via a cassette version of their debut album Sex Packets, in which Shock-G shouts, ‘YES Y’ALL, AND YOU DON’T STOP, I KEEP ON, ‘TILL THE BREAK OF DAWN’. This classic hip-hop phrase from a legendary underground hip-hop act has now found new life, being repurposed into another underground legends smash hit. Blockhead’s ability to blend the different aspects of these two songs into a new beat which sound as if they were never meant to be apart is a truly spectacular feat.
As his biggest hit, “Daylight” has cemented itself in Aesop’s live catalog forever. This was one of three songs from his earlier work that he performed in early 2017 when I saw him play on his “Hey Kirby” tour. “Daylight” continues on themes about the struggles of people working in today’s society, while meanwhile dreaming of the work that people would prefer to do during the time they spend working for someone else. Ending the track with a prophetic line, Aesop again concentrates his brilliance into an amazing quotable:

This cat is askin' if I've seen his bit of lost passion
I told him: "Yeah," but only when I pedaled past him

While Aesop continues to work on what inspires him, he responds to someone stuck in their place asking if he’s seen their passion; replying that he has, but only as he continues on his way. This gorgeous metaphor is spit with pure confidence and braggadocio, yet somehow doesn’t sound like Aesop is talking down to you. Instead, it inspires you to break out of your place and run after him, in an attempt to see if he can give you further directions.
“Save Yourself” is one of my personal favorite songs off Labor Days. At the time this album was released, one of the major talking points in hip-hop culture revolved around the idea that “hip-hop is dead”. Many artists felt that the genre was becoming too commercial and had strayed too far from the gangster roots it originally emerged from. Dance trends became the norm, lyrics were watered down in order to garner radio play, and beats were becoming more glitzy and flashy by the day. Many spoke about how some revivalists were coming to “save hip-hop” from its current state. Aesop sees these complaints as a waste of time. As hip-hop as a genre evolved, there have always been cats making dope stuff. If you don’t think so, then you’re just not paying attention. The hook to “Save Yourself” acts as a moment for other hip-hop artists to self-reflect, begging the question, “What are you saving?”.
It’s difficult to relay how absolutely perfect this song is, acting as a wake-up call for whack MCs, without quoting the entire song. In three lines, Aesop constructs a metaphor comparing these haters to the story of Rip Van Winkle, and likens New York City’s evolving hip-hop scene to a gauntlet which will end anyone who views themselves as above it. Wondering where he fits within the scope of this ever changing scene, he labels himself a “Jabberwocky Superfly”. Referring to the nonsense poem written by Alice in Wonderland author Lewis Carroll, “Jabberwocky” features a multitude of words which have no meaning in the English language, however while reading the poem, their meanings become evident through context clues and syntax. Superfly refers to the 1972 blaxploitation movie of the same title, essentially designating himself a “nonsensical gangster”. This is the perfect description of Aesop and his style, as his lyrics can be interpreted in multiple different ways, intentionally.
This is just me picking out a few of my favorite lines from a single verse on this song. “Save Yourself” is truly one of the best-written and note-worthy tracks from Labor Days. It makes it abundantly obvious that people who believe hip-hop needs saving need to wake up and save themselves; because they’re not only the ones who are causing the most damage, they’re also the ones who need it the most.

Keep me posted as to when you grasp something mature to sit and sulk about mister
And I'll consider picking up your record

“No Regrets” is an obvious stand-out in the tracklist, as the lone straight forward story-telling track. Focusing on the life story of a woman living in NYC with a passion for visual arts, it’s easy to interpret this track at face value. However, learning a bit about Aesop’s life allows you to see this story for what it really is: an extension of Aesop’s self. As mentioned earlier, he went to college at Boston University to study visual arts; painting and drawing were big focuses during his time at BU. Lucy represents the small piece of himself where he lives the career path he imagined himself living; spending his life dedicated to his dream, eventually being fulfilled enough to leave Earth with a smile.
The song features three verses, each detailing a different time period in Lucy’s life. First, as a seven year old child, then as a thirty-seven year old adult, and lastly as an eighty-seven year old on her death bed. The first two verses tell stories of how Lucy has consistently bucked trends and has chosen to focus on her art in lieu of her social life. She ignores school children inviting her to play in order to work on her sidewalk chalk art, and politely declines lunch requests with neighbors in order to work on her charcoal drawings with a simple, “I’m busy, thank you much.”
Finally, Lucy is depicted in a senior home, where her arthritis has rendered her unable to create her art. She simply sits alone in her room, staring at her life’s work. Before departing her mortal coil, she imparts a small bit of wisdom that she believes to be true with a nurse.

She said, “Look, I’ve never had a dream in my life
Because a dream is what you want to do, but still haven’t pursued
I knew what I wanted, and did it ‘till it was done
So I’ve been the dream that I wanted to be since day one”

This is one of the most profound statements I’ve heard a rapper depict through their lyrics. It’s a truly beautiful sentiment about pursuing your passions and why doing so is so important. If you didn’t follow your dreams during your lifetime, at least a little bit, then you will leave this Earth with regrets, something Aesop believes to be a nonstarter.
The consistent themes of working for the man while you would rather be pursuing your passions displayed throughout the album are fully culminated on the second to last track, “9-5ers Anthem”. Aesop spits two, hyper-dense verses meticulously detailing what it’s like to exist within the nine-to-five work environment; a space where conformity is lauded and your personal identity is stripped away, leaving only a shell of a human intended to be a cog in a machine that creates for others, while you are rewarded only with the bare minimum, as allowed by law.
Sandwiched between Aesop’s destruction of our comfortable lifestyle(s) is a chanting chorus that truly encapsulates the concept that he’s been attempting to drill into your brain over the past hour. Stating that American’s are tired of “chasing the dreams of someone that isn’t us”, and that while we might not explicitly hate the jobs we have now, we would much rather be working to “perfect the pastimes that we have harbored based solely on the fact that it makes us smile if it sounds dope”. Aesop imagines a society where people are free to pursue their passions without the constant need to worry about money. If people could be paid solely to pursue what makes them happy, then not only would we have a more fulfilled society, but we would launch an art renaissance the likes of which the Earth has never seen prior.
Overview
I have spent the past 6 years of my life completely infatuated with this record, listening to it in full at least once a week. Upon my first listen of Labor Days, Aesop’s lyrics, while cryptic and intricate were overtly brilliant, combined with the gorgeously composed production from Blockhead and Aesop himself, it became abundantly obvious that I had just experienced a true masterpiece. While this album might seem overwhelming at first, Aesop’s hyper dense style rewards you more with each listen, slowly revealing the intricacies behind his lyrical enigmas, while you are simultaneously berated by cascading flows and meticulously groomed production. I quickly became aware of Aesop’s critiques of the American labor system, however it took me until now and my 40-some-odd hours spent reading and listening carefully, to fully comprehend the core of the concept he’s been attempting to get through to his audience. Yes, Labor Days does focus on the labor itself and the conditions that labor has been subjected to within American Capitalism, however the core concept lies beyond the title. Throughout the album, Aesop is constantly reminding you of the fact that while you waste away behind your computer screen, you could be spending your time and energy creating what brings you joy, and living your life with No Regrets. Aesop’s consistent dedication to his art and craft are what truly lies at the core of Labor Days. It’s a message that has become more and more potent throughout the past nearly twenty years, as American Capitalism has continued to spiral further and further out of control. Furthermore, the more I revisit this album, the more the idea of pursuing your passions has become deeply ingrained into my psyche. In fact, the 40-some-odd hours I’ve spent working on this review has forced me to re-evaluate how I spend my time at the job I currently have. I don’t love this job, hell I barely even like it. I would much rather be spending the eight hours per day I spend here doing something that I love to do. This is what Aesop wants to see in the world. This is what we should ALL want to see in the world. Labor Days is not just the landmark work from underground hip-hop’s most lyrical MC, it’s a passion project about convincing society to create their own passion projects.
10/10
Favorite Lyrics

Stood innocent bystand, witness the die-hard fans turn Rip Van
In the poppy fields of N.Y.'s orchestrated brick gauntlet
Now I'm thinking, "Who am I?" Jabberwocky Superfly, bent left
Pushing war without the ten step cushion, and what? (What?)
I plan to hold this B-positive sacred in these golden veins
Until the day I die from grimace overload
It's shock (It's shock)
Treatment offered by the weekend
Dystopia getaway, let's display the sequence, it goes:
One for the heartless thievery turning my guardian angel harpless
And the rest to sweep the mess under the carpet (Under the carpet)
I drag a yellow taxi meter
Behind every measure and charge cats for labeling me shepherd
"That'll be 6.50 plus tip, darling
I take cash, credit, check, money-order, gold and cigarette cartons"
Got caught up in the universe trying to zoom in on stardom
Forgot the passion plus the hatred, both were based in Carbon
Next time you wanna be a hero, try saving something other than hip-hop
And maybe hip-hop'll save you from the pit-stop

“Save Yourself” - Verse 1

"Look, I've never had a dream in my life
Because a dream is what you wanna do, but still haven't pursued
I knew what I wanted and did it till it was done
So I've been the dream that I wanted to be since day one!"

“No Regrets” - Verse 3

You won't be laughing when your covered wagons crash
You won't be laughing when the buzzards drag your brother's flags to rags
You won't be laughing when your front lawn is spangled with epitaphs (You won't be laughing!)
Then I'll hang my boots to rest when I'm impressed
So I triple knot 'em and forgot 'em
His origami dream is beautiful
But man, those wings will never leave the ground
Without a feather and a lottery ticket, now settle down

“Daylight” - Verse 1

In slid rhythm, fed a cycle bound by dilemma, debt, and vendetta
Escaped briefly back to my apartment to park in front a fan
And reminisce about the day I ran a mile with your heart in my hand
Contestants get the New York home game with real life shoot 'em up-action
Thug, vagrant, yuppie and art freak game piece all included
I told this cat the Earth was flat, he walked 'till his beard grew
Long enough to strangle himself for being stupid

“Flashflood”

Life treats the peasants like
They tried to fuck his woman while he slept inside
Well they're merely chasing perfectionist emblems
When the clock strikes nine
I'll be waking with the best of routine caffeine team players
For the cycle of it
Under a dusted angel harp string Big Brother is watching
My odometer like buzzard to fallen elk, talking stealth
We got babies, rubber stamps, and briefcase parts
We on some door-to-door now
Order ten dollars or more, we'll shove it down your throat for free
I'll sacrifice my inborn tendencies
For copper pennies for one commanding "Gimme that"
So we can retain baby fat

“9-5ers Anthem” - Verse 1

Discussion Points

How has this album aged since its release, nearly 20 years ago?
What’s your favorite beat?
What’s your favorite line (or verse)?
How does this album compare to other Aesop Rock albums?

We Were Saved Before We Believed

God bless, I thought sobriety was supposed to IMPROVE relationships.

Salvation is Beyond Belief!

Letter to my father

TLDR: Over the last couple months I have constructed a letter I want to send to my parents. I’d love any input/thoughts/critiques. I know the advice is to share less than more. It’s definitely something I struggle with.
My objective here is to let you to know where we are and how we got here. I don’t want to convince you of anything. I tried really hard not to include anything that you might find difficult to hear. I know it is really long but I really hope you take the time to read it. I know that this will be very hard for you to read. I hope you take the time so that we can move ahead and build our relationship.
EARLY YEARS - The Beginning
When I was a missionary, I had several companions that carried around a stack of stories that they would read to people as a spiritual message. None of the stories had sources, and more often than not, seemed like (at best) exaggerated versions of something that probably didn’t happen. It always made me feel uncomfortable that people would “feel the spirit” with these fictitious tales.
Since the mission, I have struggled to know the difference between the spirit and just feelings. The problem is, there isn’t one. According to scripture, the spirit manifests itself through feelings. That has been something I have always struggled with. I have always leaned more towards logic that thought than feelings. Because of my logical approach, for the last 16 years I’ve looked at the gospel (and church) from a very nuanced perspective. For years, I would pluck out the nonsense traditions of the “church” and highlight (focus on) the core precepts of the “gospel”. I use quotes to emphasize the difference. Like we discussed when you guys were here in January. The flood wasn’t a literal flood that covered the earth. The creation didn’t happen 6,000 years ago, etc.
When Grandma died, I inherited her entire library of books. From that library of books, there were two that really stood out to me the most. One was the original printed version of the BoM. The other was a compilation of letters/journals from many of Joseph Smith’s wives.
With the BoM, I was really surprised how many differences there were from what we have today. If it was translated as I was taught, I would expect some scribal errors. But it was more than just writing mistakes. There were actual changes. I never spent much time comparing the two documents. But one of the amazing things about living in our era is that we have tools that can make such comparisons so simple and easy to do, even for large books.
As for the journals, I didn’t read a lot. But I really didn’t feel comfortable with the letters from the 14-15 year-old girls.
I put both books on my shelf and moved on. But there were lingering concerns about both.
Being raised in the church, honesty has always been a basic principle that I’ve been taught to appreciate (important “gospel” principle). Honesty doesn’t just mean telling the truth. Deception through omission is just as bad. And when you lose trust in someone you start to question everything they say.
THE RECENT PAST
I started reading the church essays years ago. My first pass, I found them boring and tedious to read. I didn’t feel like I would get anything out of reading them, so I didn’t put much time towards them. I was still working at the bank so I didn’t have a lot of energy to focus on the essays. But over the years, as different topics would come up, I’d go back and read them again. From time to time, over the years, I spent a lot of time thinking about them, what they meant, etc.
After reading/pondering the church essays for years, I couldn’t help but feel like I had been deceived. Even as a missionary, I was told to memorize the first vision account. The same exact account that was retold from the pulpit in the last general conference. Which differs completely from the first written account of the first vision. In fact, every successive account becomes more detailed and elaborate. All my life mom would tell her childhood stories. I got used to seeing stories adapted and exaggerated to entertain (or otherwise). I couldn’t help but feel the same for those varying accounts of the first vision. And the conclusion of the church’s essay on the topic always felt so flimsy. Of all of the accounts, the most “correct” and “full” should be his own written account in his journal AND it shouldn’t have taken him 12 years to write it.
Then, when I would teach as a missionary, I would show the images (provided by the church) of Joseph Smith translating the BoM. I had helped in the dissemination of exaggerations, extended truths, or at worst, blatant lies. I was always taught that Joseph Smith translated the BoM and shown images of him sitting at a table with the open tablets as he read them. In reality, the plates were never used during the “translation” process. In fact, all accounts are that he used his stone in a hat. First time I had ever heard that he used a stone in a hat was an episode of South Park. When friends would ask me about it, I would do my best to explain how he “actually” translated it. Little did I know that I had been taught incorrectly. In fact, that episode portrayed a more honest representation than all of my Sunday school, seminary and institute lessons. First time I ever heard the church admit to JS using a stone in a hat was from the gospel essay and even then they weren’t direct about it’s prominent role.
Subsequently, over the last 6 months or so, I really started to feel deceived. It felt very uncomfortable. That wasn’t the spirit retreating, but learning that something that was woven into every aspect of my life, wasn’t what it claimed to be. The church that told me that “honesty” was the most important thing hadn’t been honest with me.
Aside from honesty, another of my favorite “gospel” topics has always been the pursuit of knowledge.
D&C 131:6 It is impossible for a man to be saved in ignorance.
D&C 90:15 ...and study and learn, and become acquainted with all good books, and with languages, tongues, and people
I reached out to a few people, wanting to discuss the essays. See if I was missing something. Most had never heard of the essays. But even after being introduced, they were like me early on. The essays are boring and tedious. When I asked you for your thoughts on the essay I truly wanted to know if there was something there that I was missing. It doesn’t seem that long ago when we first started talking about the essays, but I’ve definitely come a long way mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
In a previous conference, Uchtdorf gave a talk about doubting your doubts. That was a very unsettling talk. That’s not how you obtain knowledge. There isn’t any aspect of life, in which you ignore data that contradicts your hypothesis. This was a big red flag for me. If the church contains absolute truth, then it can withstand the highest scrutiny. We shouldn’t close our eyes and plug our ears in the presence of doubts. That’s something I would expect to hear from Jehovah’s Witnesses, not a church with absolute truth. Pres. J. Reuben Clark said, “if we have the truth, it cannot be harmed by investigation. If we have not the truth, it ought to be harmed.” Why such a contradiction in approaches? What happened to the confident, honest approach of J. Reuben Clark? If the church is true, if it is what it claims to be, then there is no need to worry about studying it.
THE PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE
In the introduction of the BoM it states that it “contains the fulness of the everlasting gospel” and “was the most correct of any book on earth”. We talked about this a little bit while you were here. Both of those statements have always made me feel uncomfortable. It doesn’t contain the fulness of the gospel. It lacks any mention of the most important ordinances for exaltation (endowment, sealings, etc.). Even though I never liked those two statements I always relied on the BoM being the keystone of my faith in the church. That’s what many of the leaders have told us to do. Holland recently quoted Pres. Benson, “The Book of Mormon is the keystone of [our] testimony. Just as the arch crumbles if the keystone is removed, so does all the Church stand or fall with the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon.”
During my studies to understand the timeline of the varying first vision accounts I kept seeing references to a CES letter. I assumed it was a letter from the Church Educational System. In fact, it was a letter TO the director of the CES. A young guy was struggling with the essays as I was. He spent months researching and because of his love for history wasn’t bored out of his mind. Long story short his grandfather sent the letter to the director who was a close friend of his. The letter uses church sources and brings up simple, concise points/questions. It was very eye opening, and at the same time very unsettling. There were no opinions in the letter; just questions based on historical documents. I only read about 5 of the 120 pages.
Now I was at a crossroads. The BoM says to read and pray and by my feelings I’ll know. Since I already know that feelings can be manipulated, it makes using them as a guide extremely difficult. The BoM has a perfect setup: pray if it’s true. If you feel good, then it’s true; if you don’t, it’s because you didn’t try hard enough or didn’t have enough faith. Even those little stacks of sentimental stories could make people feel good, warm and fuzzy. Throughout my life when I would ask people if they received an answer, the stories were often very similar. They didn’t receive a strong answer that it was true, but a feeling that they already knew it was. If the promise is so specific and relies so heavily on feelings that can be swayed (even just by the hope that its real) then you would think that the spirit would provide a strong, easily distinguishable answer.
I’ve always appreciated Occam’s razor: the simplest explanation is often the most correct. For the first time in my life, it honestly seemed simpler that the BoM wasn’t the inspired book it claimed to be. That scared the crap out of me. I honestly didn’t know where to go or what to do with it. The simple church answer would be to pray about it. Just read scriptures, close your eyes and bury your head. Uchtdorf would say to just ignore the new data. That seems dishonest. The new data wasn’t opinion, stories, or lies. It was just facts. It would be like saying that dinosaurs didn’t exist because they aren’t mentioned in the bible. Clearly, they did exist.
When I was at Chevron, we focused a lot on Probabilistic Analysis. One of the key things I learned from that was calculating what we called Expected Value. That is the value something has multiplied by its probability of success. For example, if the lottery is worth $1,000 and you have a 0.1% chance of winning then the EV would be $1. Therefore, if tickets only cost $0.50 each, it would make sense to buy them. Now let’s do another example. If the value of the lottery is literally infinite, then the only time that the EV wouldn’t also be infinite is if the probability is exactly zero. Even at the smallest probabilities the expected value is always infinite. If there was the slightest chance/doubt (or probability) that I am wrong, then I wouldn’t be writing this. I would just continue on hoping it were all true because the end prize would literally be infinite.
I have no intentions of sharing everything with you. If you’d be interested, I’d be more than happy to, but I will respect your right to believe what, how, or where you’d like. I would just ask that you offer the same respect to us. I completely understand how people (for various reasons) hold on to the smallest probability that it’s true. But for me, for the first time in my life I can say those words that often come across so hollow; I know, without a shadow of a doubt.
My whole life I was told that the BoM was the keystone, and that without it everything would fall. So, when it fell, everything fell with it. And that has been one of the hardest things we’ve ever gone through, at least emotionally. We wanted it to be real. We wanted all the glorified stories to be true. I’ve hated the Utah culture that permeates the church for years, but I’ve loved many of the underlying principles it teaches.
This has been one of the hardest journeys Em and I have ever been through. Its so frustrating to hear Uchtdorf refers to those that fall away as a “headstrong and unruly child, become angry with God and His Church, pack their bags, and storm out the door proclaiming that they’re running away and never coming back.” Belittling someone for having different beliefs. Such a sad and frustrating approach to helping someone. I truly hope that this is not how you see us. I truly hope that you can respect us enough to understand that we’re clearly not throwing a tantrum and storming out.
I had to keep telling myself, it’s not my fault. It’s not my fault that there are multiple, differing accounts of the first vision. It’s not my fault the first written account was 12 years after it happened. It’s not my fault the stone JS used to translate was the same one he used to search for buried treasures that he never found. It’s not my fault that there were at least three books that pre-dated the BoM that easily form the premise, writing style and plot of the BoM. It’s not my fault that Lucy Smith’s journal accounts often talk of JS telling wonderful stories of native American prophets around the fireplace. It’s not my fault there are many Bible verses in the BoM containing the same translation errors as the 1769 King James Version of the Bible. It’s not my fault that JS had 30 wives, many of whom were already married. It’s not my fault that JS scared young girls to marry him. It’s not my fault that the church has had all of this information and kept it all hidden. The laundry list is endless and none of it is my fault.
OUR FUTURE
There are a lot of amazing principles taught in the church. In fact, a lot of those are what I had extracted out over the years and called the “gospel”. But the church doesn’t own those principles. Those principles exist with or without the church. As a family we’ll decide what our core principles should be. As a family, we’ll add and subtract as we grow. The most amazing part, is being able to honestly analyze those principles and decide for ourselves which are important. In fact, that is actually one of my favorite “gospel” principles.
D&C 58:26 For behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things; for he that is compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not a wise servant; wherefore he receiveth no reward.
Where does this leave us?
We love you guys and truly want to be an important part of your lives. I would even hope that through this honest and vulnerable discussion we can actually grow closer. We’ll do our best to keep church criticism to a minimum and just ask that you’d do the same for us. We’ll respect your continued beliefs; we just ask the same reciprocated.

True Salvation is Beyond Belief!

My 14 year old is struggling, please help

I am the parent of an AMAZING 14 year old who just started the 8th grade and whom I love 100% unconditionally. 6 weeks ago, she came out as trans. I am supportive but terrified for her. My husband and I suspected she might be gay... but Trans came out of left field for us as she had NEVER EVER expressed interest in being a boy. As a star athlete, she always dressed in athletic gear.,, a shorts and t-shirt kid both on and off the soccer field. I want to be supportive as possible to her feelings. I believe that she is body dysphoric... but does that doesn’t mean she is a boy in her brain (transgender).
The dysphoria came on very suddenly and prior to the end of 7th grade she was SUPER body confident. Though she developed early, her fit athletic body is the envy of many of her peers and she was not shy about it.., often taking off her shirt to go running in public just in a sports bra. She would often tell me she thought it was weird that girls would wait in a long line in the locker room to change clothes. She thought that was the dumbest thing ever.
We live in the Bible Belt south and In my heart of hearts, I believe she is uncomfortable in her androgynous style (which I love about her), and is searching for her “slice of normal”. She knows she’s not a girly girl and I believe she thinks being a manly man (growing beard) etc will make her “normal”.
I believe that practicing self love and being comfortable in your own skin is what will bring her true AUTHENTIC happiness. That is what I want for her!! Trans or not! She just turned 14 two months ago.., she doesn’t know what is authentic and what isn’t. These teen years and even into college are such a transformative time for everyone. How do I help her practice self love and figure out who she really is?
7th grade brought a lot of changes... including a new friend group (mostly gay or bi-curious girls). The social thing is HUGE at this age. Her friends think Trans is super cool and are helping her pick out her male name like she’s a new puppy or something. 🙄. My daughter, star athlete, great leadership qualities.., you would think would be brimming with confidence. She is NOT. There is a ton of bravado on the outside... but even more insecurity on the inside. She is beginning to exhibit signs of anxiety. Her fiends all think she is doing this and it garners her popularity in the friend group but I’m asking her to slow down and think about her choices. She is struggling.
Backstory... I knew when I was pregnant with her, that I didn’t want a super “girly-girl”. I intentionally chose gender neutral colors/toys/attitudes and to this day, my daughter has not watched Disney Princess movies as I did not approve of the misogynistic themes. I wasn’t withholding necessarily, I just chose not to introduce them to Disney Princess movies. Instead, I focused on and nurtured her ability to be smart and strong and a self sufficient leader. All attributes strongly associated with male (I now realize). We were very much a feminist “girls can do anything boys can do” kind of household. For awhile it worked... in elementary school she was praised by teachers, coaches, Girl Scout troop leaders as being a standout leader. Though dyslexic, she was Identified in first grade as a “gifted” student. She would write letters to school administrators to get school policies changed and it actually worked a few times. A teacher used my daughter as her highlight student to get her gifted certification. She was winning oratorical competitions on optimism and chosen by teachers to be a leadership ambassador heading into 6th grade.
My regret as a mom is that I didn’t realize that my choices not to indulge in more feminine aspects out of some misguided feminist idea that rejecting these ideals would make her less vulnerable to traditional female issues such as body issues and eating disorders etc. and would eventually lead to her not feeling fully connected to her peers. The guilt is overwhelming.
Always an athlete and better than average at most sports she tried... horseback riding, tennis, trophies in martial arts etc... but she found her calling in soccer. We realized at 10 years old that she was garnering special attention from people/coaches who have played at very high levels of professional soccer internationally (on their county’s World Cup teams). She is a special kind of athlete with real potential to play professionally. She was on track to be recruited with FULL RIDE to big D1 University by freshman year. We are not wealthy so a free college education is nothing to sneeze at! It’s like throwing away a lottery ticket. Before anyone assumes we are pushing this.., my husband and I have never played a sport in our lives and don’t know where she gets her talent. None of us had ever watched a soccer game before in our lives, until she unexpectedly made a very high level team and then we realized she might be good at this soccer thing. Her whole room is soccer themed and the last few years have been a whirlwind of of soccer travel and obsession with the US women’s soccer team.
So imagine my surprise when just 3 WEEKS after the big soccer tryouts that she was super excited for and made the team and committed to them... she comes to me and says.., Mom, I’m trans and want to quit soccer and grow a beard”. 😳.
Does that make sense to anyone????
I’ve been trying to piece together how this all happened.,, So in her elementary years, everyone (especially her athlete friends) wore shorts and t-shirts. No big deal. In middle school and especially last year in 7th grade... many of those girls were suddenly wearing make up and bootie shorts and fixing their hair etc. She knows that is not her. So she assumes she belongs on the other side. But in my heart, I know she’s not a boy in her brain either. I’m trying to tell her that she is somewhere in a middle... and perfect just the way she is. Her short curly hair and androgynous style is beautiful. I too, used to bind, because I hated my growing breasts. It’s part of growing up. If someone had offered me surgery at 14 to change what I didn’t like about myself.., I would be a very different person and regretfully so. I’m not a particularly feminine woman. I don’t wear dresses/high heels, don’t get manicures etc. I’m trying to explain that she doesn’t have to fit in a female or male “box”. She can pick and choose the parts of femininity or masculinity that she wants. It’s what I do. For now, she is dressing in boys shorts and t-shirts, stopping shaving her legs/underarms , and wearing 2-3 sports bras to bind.
As I said.., until the end of 7th grade she was always SUPER body confident.
In any case.., my husband and I told her she can wear what she wants, date whomever she wants, cut her hair however she wants... but we were not going to do life and body altering hormones or surgery until she is an adult.
I’m worried though (terrified actually) that a recent (2-3 months before coming out) intense internet immersion into the trans world and trans youtubers has skewed her perspective. She is now rewriting her whole history... telling me all the feminine things she used to love wasn’t real. I KNOW they were real. Everything from unicorns, to Lush bath bombs to smooth legs to pretty smelling soaps to loving horses. She used to steal those things from my bathroom so I started buying them for her. Her female friendships she now says are awkward. I WAS THERE... I saw the fun and laughter and connections being made with these other girls on these long soccer weekends in hotels. IT WAS REAL. Why is she trying to make me think I’m crazy?
This rewriting of her history is disturbing to me.
Yes, she can also spend time with guys snd feel comfortable as well. I thinks that’s mostly because she isn’t attracted to them.
How do I convince her to slow down and learn to love herself when there is so much online to combat what I’m telling her. Most of these youtubers make it all seem so easy. She doesn’t understand that most are marketing to her trying to create a career for themselves. And for every successful youtuber she sees... there are thousands struggling and suicidal. As I said, it’s only been 6 weeks since she came out to us. I’m looking into cognitive therapy . Does anyone have experience with this? I don’t want “conversion therapy”.., it’s just such a big decision that I want her to really REALLY have thought about it. My goal for her is to be her authentic self... whoever that is. I believe her authentic self is a gay androgynous/masculine woman that that she will be happiest if she practices self love... not self hate and surgery.

Even demons need to hit the books sometimes

When I was a little kid, my dad gave me an old cigar box that belonged to my grandfather. My dad didn't know what was in it, despite having kept it for years. Grandpa gave him strict orders never to peak.

I never knew my grandpa -- he passed away when I was a baby -- but my dad loved him dearly. "We never had much in the way of things, but he always had a smile for his family," my dad said, which I interpreted as both a remembrance and as a warning not to expect anything too fancy under the lid.

The box itself was decorated with a colorful circus scene full of exotic animals and balancing clowns. The ring master stood in the foreground, clutching a cigar in his teeth. "Sir Flannagan's Fine Cigars," said the logo. "For A Pure, Healthy Smoke, Everytime."

I snapped off the brittle rubber band that had held the lid on for all those years and lifted. My father need not have worried I'd be disappointed -- the small, quirky treasures I found inside thrilled me, no matter their material value.

The first thing I saw was the scowl of a little wooden demon-god from some exotic, far-away island. Clinking near it were several coins of haughty monarchs gazing outward. Underneath them were several yellowing, worn pages covered in strange hieroglyphics. I lifted these up and saw a bracelet made of twine fitted with teeth from a shark, a tiger, a man.

There was a lock of boar's hair, an onyx marble, a passenger ticket to "Siam." From my grandpa's time in World War Two was a brass rifle cartridge, its significance left for me to ponder. On the bottom of the box sat four photobooth pictures of my grandfather, looking exactly like my dad, mugging for the camera in what had to have been one of the few carefree moments of his life.

I put the box on my bed, and when I turned to look for a magnifying glass, it slipped down to the floor. That's when the letter popped out. It was hidden under the bottom panel of the box, several pages covered in scratchy handwriting. I laid next to my bedside lamp and began to read.

Dear Ben,

As I write this, I'm lying in an old Veteran's Affairs hospital with an IV in my one good arm and a catheter up the ol' battle rifle. They say they're doing everything they can to keep me comfortable but if that were true they'd let me smoke a damn cigarette. At least they cut down the morphine enough for me to stay awake and write this. What I have to tell you is important.

So -- how are you? I saw you for the very first time last week and you didn't look too happy. Cute, sure, but you seemed very angry at everything. Turns out you had some poop in your diaper. We have a lot in common already.

I gotta be honest: Life isn't going to be easy. It certainly wasn't for me. Me, your dad and your grandma had some tough times growing up. Lots of times, all we had was each other. But things are going to be different for you.

How so? Well, let me start at the beginning. Back in the middle of the Great Depression, I was a 16-year-old high school dropout. That wasn't so unusual -- a lot of teenagers were dropping out of school to try and support their families. I wish I could say that was my motivation, but I just didn't like the teachers.

I spent my days with the other neighborhood scraps. We called ourselves the Runaround Gang. We'd break shop windows, rob apple carts, snatch hats off trolley riders. My parents did their best to reign me in but they had their hands full with five other kids. I was a lost cause.

Then one day, they couldn't ignore me anymore. I got arrested for swiping a pricey necklace from an uptown department store. This was a step up from our usual petty misadventures, which is why I did it. I wanted to impress the other boys in the gang.

Well, they were impressed, all right. They cheered and screamed my name out for all to hear as they watched the squad car take me away. The cops called my dad at work. He was a day laborer, so not only did he have to pony up bail, he also lost half the day's wages.

"I'd let you stay in there if it weren't for your mom," he said. "You really broke her heart this time."

Hearing that killed me. My mother was a sweet woman. "Oh Jimmy," she said when we got home. "I'm sorry we haven't been there for you. We've been too busy to see our little boy needed help." She dabbed her cheeks with a hankerchief.

I would have preferred a smack on the head. I didn't want her to feel guilty. I decided right then and there I was going to make her proud of me. "There's a cargo ship leaving next week," I stuttered. "I signed up for it. I'll be gone three months but it's good money when I get back."

My parents looked at each other, confused. Then my dad said, "You better not be bullshitting us."

I was, in a way. I hadn't signed up for any ship, but I really did want to. As luck would have it, I found one the next day that needed workers. I was surprised they hired on a young fool like myself -- until they told me how much I'd earn. It was slave wages, but it would help.

The ship was leaving in a week. In the meantime, I did my best to stay out of trouble. I had a court date soon and I wanted to be able to plead for leniency. Truth be told, if it weren't for my family, I would have skipped it, got on the ship, and disappeared to some far-away land. Things would have turned out a lot differently then, both for me and for you.

My day in court arrived. The judge was a crusty old windbag who sweated hatred from every pore. From the second he laid his glass eye on me, I knew I was in trouble. "You claim you're trying to right your life and help your family," he said, "but you wasn't stealing food. You had a big ol' fancy lady's bracelet in your pocket when you was apprehended."

"Maybe he wanted to get his ma a present," said the bailiff.

The judge laughed. "Well, I'll be honest. You don't seem like the worst in the world. Hell, maybe you just fell into the wrong crowd. So I'm going to be lenient."

I'd had my head down, ashamed, but raised it when he said that. "Your honor, I appreciate it. I promise I'm gonna turn my life around --"

"Don't gimme that crap," he said. "There ain't 10,000 words equal to a single good deed. If you're truly committed to making your life one that respects the rule of law, then you'll commit to atoning for breaking that rule to which you've suddenly professed your loyalty. So, 'I promise'? It's not going to cut it today, boy. Therefore I'm sentencing you to one night volunteering at the Ezekial K. Wrenfeld Public Library. It's a fine institution but one in dire need of a good dusting and organizing, which you will provide as part of your 'turnaround' towards a righteous life. Understand? Good." He pounded his gavel.

I told you he was a windbag, didn't I. It took me a minute to mentally sift through all that yakking he did and realize what my sentence was. A night cleaning the library? Hell, that was nothing. To be honest, I'd never actually been in a library, but still, I wasn't worried. All I had to do was push dust under some rugs and I'd be home free.

The Ezekial K. Wrenfeld Public Library had stone columns and gargoyles and looked like the villain's mansion in a detective movie. My goody two-shoes siblings or any of the other smart kids who actually picked up a book every now and then never went there. They went to the library downtown instead.

So why was this old beast still around? Who knows. Ezekial Wrenfeld, whoever he was, must have left quite a grant for it to sit there and collect dust. Maybe it's where the judge used to study for his law exams 100 years ago.

I walked up the stairs and found a tired-looking security guard watching me on the other side of the glass. He pushed open the door, asked me what I wanted, and let me inside once I mentioned the judge. I walked inside and heard the door shut behind me. The security guard was now outside and about to head down the steps.

"Hey," I hollered out to him. "Aren't you sticking around?"

"You joking with me, kid?" he said. "They don't need a security guard during the day, much less at night. You afraid of some books?" He trotted down the stairs without waiting for a reply.

OK. Great. I had the place to myself. I let out a "woo" and looked around. I was standing on a dark red carpet worn down to threads on the walkway. There were a few desks with chairs, and all along the walls were freestanding bookshelves. There were no electric lights, just a huge window high up on the wall.

The mezzanine loomed above, the staircase to it off to my left. There looked to be a few more tables and bookshelves up there, as well as a green-bronze statue of a man resting his hand on a sword hilt while he gazed out the giant window.

Well hell, I thought. This place is huge. I didn't know where to start. I found the janitor's closet, pulled out a broom, and began to sweep. Within minutes I had a pile of dirt big enough to jump on. I scooped it up, dumped it in a can, and swiped a cloth across one of the tables.

A snowfall of dust fell onto the freshly swept floor. Maybe housekeeping wasn't my forte. I decided to take a break, having been on the job for all of 10 minutes. I strolled through the shelves, looking at the occasional book spine.

I've never been much of a reader, unless you count comic books. Still, I thought there might be a science-fiction novel for me to waste some time with, hopefully with pictures. But I had no such luck. Instead I had trouble even reading the titles:

"Of Recruiting the Lewed & Lowborn for Tasks Unseemly"
"How to Killeth the Bothersome"
"The Book of the Unseen Half"
"Encyclopaedia of Spiritual Deformities"

and so on. I finally found one I liked and tucked it into the back of my jeans for later. Then another one caught my eye. It was on a top shelf. Red and thick as a bible. I pulled it out and almost dropped it on my head, it was so heavy. The title was, "Her Majesty's Reckoning."

Lucky me -- this one actually had pictures. But they weren't the type of illustrations I usually enjoyed. The first one was a woodcut of a man smiling while he set himself on fire. The one after that showed a bunch of little figurines tie someone down in his bed and stab him.

Yikes. Mosquito Man versus SuperCat this was not. I tried to put the book back but it slipped out of my hands and thumped to the floor. That's when I heard it. A long "shhhhhhhh" coming from the other side of the room.

I froze and listened for it again. Nothing. I walked out from between the shelves and called out, "Hello?" No response.

I looked up at the mezzanine. The statue looked straight ahead, arrogant. Clouds hid the moon through the window behind it. "Is anyone here?" I said.

"Shhhhh!" This time it was more forceful. I squinted and tried to see in the darkness between two of the bookshelves. There was another statue there. It was a man with a powdered wig like the kind George Washington and all those guys used to wear.

Then the clouds moved on and moonlight shown down. It wasn't a statue. It was a real man, only his face didn't have skin on it. It was just a bunch of veins and muscles with lidless eyes and lipless teeth.

I tripped over my own feet going backwards. I looked up from the ground and the man was gone.

"What -- what happened to you?" I said. "Are you OK?"

Something scraped the floor behind me. I spun around to see a girl, about my size, turned around and sliding backward while dragging her heels on the marble. The back of her head was braided up into two ponytails. She wore an old green dress that was tattered and dirty. She flexed her hands open and shut as she came towards me.

Suddenly she started barking, jerking her head forward as she did so. "Rahrahrahrahrah!" It looked like she was doing it to the shelves, since that's where she was facing, but I knew it was meant for me. She was only a few feet away now. I still couldn't see her face, but I could see spittle flying from her mouth as her barking grew more and more vicious.

That was plenty enough for me. I ran towards the door, expecting it to be locked, but it flew right open. I ran all the way home. My dad was still awake. I could tell he was about to lay into me but then he saw the look on my face. He just shook his head and muttered, "Well. I guess you're alive."

I was, but that was about the extent of the good news. I hung my head and shuffled off to bed. I let a few weird statues and some barking prankster scare me away. Now I wouldn't be able to leave on that ship. The only place I was headed was jail, once that judge heard about what happened.

He didn't do it, though. In fact, I'm not sure he even remembered me. I sat in the galley with about 20 other miscreants and scurried in front of him when my name was called. He read over my statement, shrugged, and told me to be on my way. "Hope you learned your lesson," he said without looking up, then called out for the next defendent.

Well, I wish that was the end of my story, but it wasn't. Later that night, after a dinner of beans and biscuits, I sat up in the attic studying. Yes, that's right, studying. My experience in the library notwithstanding, I was beginning to realize the importance of education.

I took a break to lean against the wall and stare out the round attic window. The streets were quiet and the lights in all the houses were dim. Then I saw her: the barking girl from the library. She was still turned around and I couldn't see her face.

I almost grabbed a hammer or anything else for a weapon but thought better of it. I knew what she was there for. I went down the stairs and snuck past my parents in the den. I jogged down the streets -- the girl was gone. But then I heard a single sharp bark behind me.

She was within arm's reach. I could see the back of her neck now. It was reddish and raw, like there'd been a rope tied around it. She wasn't barking, but I could hear her rattled breathing, like her lungs were full of rocks. I held out the book I'd taken from the library.

The girl stretched her arm back behind her. It was an awkward angle, but she snatched the book with ease and brought it back in front of her. Then she began to turn her head to the side, very slowly, but just before I could see her profile, she jerked her head back and sprinted off into the darkness.

So, my lovely grandson, that was without a doubt the most formative experience in my life. In case you're wondering, I did make it onto that cargo ship. It was a rat-filled, seasick-inducing yuckfest of a journey, but at least I got paid.

Not long after that, I got drafted into the Army. Luckily I was never in actual combat, though I lost a few friends that were. I met your grandma when I got out.

I tried hard to give her and your dad a good life, but it wasn't ALL I could do. I had restrictions. You're probably wondering what the hell I mean. If you found this letter, then you will.

Love you, kid. And remember, don't shoplift.
Grandpa

At the time, I didn't quite know what to make of it except that it was an entertaining story. The lines at the end about restrictions baffled me, though.

That's when I took a closer look at the folded yellow pieces of paper sitting inocuously in the cigar box, the ones marked with strange hieroglyphics. It took me years to decipher them all, but when I did, I nearly fainted at the magnitude of my discovery.

Apparently my grandfather had torn some pages out of the book he'd taken from the library. A gutsy move, to be sure, and had the wraith discovered his trickery, I wouldn't exist today. But she didn't.

The rules the papers described were very clear: Whoever finds these spells curses himself if he uses them, as well as his child. But the child of his child? He can use them all he wants. One of the idiosyncrasies of magic, I suppose.

The book's title, as written on the top margin, was "Spells for Luck at Games of Chance." I thought it sounded downright silly. After I'd won the lottery twice in a row, I began to think otherwise.

I'll never forget how hard my grandfather worked to give me this advantage. And I also keep in mind the kindness and love he showed his own family, even though his bank account rarely reached four digits.

I do spend a lot of money on myself, I'll admit. I like the nicer things in life. But I also make sure I give to charity. Including a very generous yearly gift to the Ezekial K. Wrenfeld Public Library.

rah

Melee Careers & Personal Finance (Part 1)

YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW EXCITED I AM TO WRITE ABOUT THIS SUBJECT!! As more players and community figures are transferring full time into Melee, I get so excited about thinking through the opportunities available to us for making a career out of this game.
So I approached the Mods about creating a post that would detail some information about personal finance in order to create a dialogue about creating careers within melee, and highlighting a personal finance plan that would reduce risk for those who wanted to make Melee a full time or part time career. Thankfully our wonderful Mod Staff unanimously agreed that this would be a great discussion. So a big hand to them.
I'm going to be honest, we have a lot of information to get through before we get to Melee Careers with any amount of specifics. But this information is vital to creating a bright financial future for yourself. All right here we go.
Overview I am going to outline a plan for cleaning up your personal finances so that you can A) Travel & attend more tournaments, B) Grow or transfer into a Melee Career with far less risk, & C) Create a financially secure future while living & working your dream job.
I will be discussing Finance obstacles that are preventing you from living the life you have always wanted. I will show you how to create a strong financial base so that you can free yourself to pursue a career in Melee.
User u/sam_1226 has graciously agreed to lend his experience in Insurance and retirement planning, so that your years competing (and other related careers) will not alter your ability to retire comfortably. He will post his topic at a later date.
Beyond that, please feel free to treat this as an AMA. This will read more like a guide, but please ask questions. I love helping people, I am not trying to sell you anything, so please use me as a resource.
Who-tf are you? And why are you telling us this?
I was not born rich. I still remember the trailer park that my family lived in when I was young. I literally bought my initial Game Cube with LOOSE CHANGE I SAVED SINCE I WAS FOUR!! My brothers and I had a big empty jug (probably moonshine) that we stored pennies and nickles in that we added to from 1993-2001. We spent 3 hours rolling up all of the change and I remember the annoyed look on the teller's face as she counted up the rolls of small change. We had enough for the system, 2 controllers, and 4 games. Wave Race: Blue Storm, Tony Hawk 3, NHL Hitz 2002, and of course Super Smash Brothers: Melee. My dad worked 4 jobs (Jewelry store, bank teller, a disc jockey on weekends, and property manager), and my mom worked a job as a pre-school teacher to get free care for my brothers and I.
One of the gentleman at the Bank my dad worked took a liking to my dad. He admired his tenacity working four jobs, so he started to teach him how to create a better life for himself. This lead to my dad starting his own business in Property management, and slowly but surely he was able to drop jobs down to one thanks to the tutelage of the gentleman he worked with (no way you are reading this, but thanks Rick, my family can never repay you). My dad went down to one job when I was about 13, and by the time I left college my dad had $1 million in Net Worth. He should have $3 Million by the time he hits retirement age.
Of course my Dad started to teach me some of what he was learning. I say all this to show you that you don't have to be born into a rich family to retire a millionaire in America. If Financial Coach Dave Ramsey (we'll talk about him later) is to be believed, 80% of America's Millionaires are 1st generation rich. Meaning they are self made. My family was blessed, to be sure, but not because we were given everything we had, but because someone gave us the knowledge to succeed.
I consider it my duty to bless others with the knowledge that we were given. Anyone in America can retire a millionaire by following a few simple rules, and I want to make sure my Melee Family has every opportunity to succeed.
Resources
This is a long journey. There are no get rich quick schemes that work over long periods of time. So I need to give you some further resources so that you can supplement what I say here.
Robert Kiyosaki: Specifically his book "Rich Dad Poor Dad" Dave Ramsey: I'll talk about him a lot. His major contribution is "The Total Money Makeover" Suzie Orman: Dave Ramsey has my favorite plan, but he can get preachy. Here is an alternative if Dave's style doesn't float your boat. Tony Robbins: A master class in achieving your retirement dreams. "Money Master the Game" John Acuff: "Quitter" & "Start" are two books on transferring out of your dead end job, and into the career of your dreams. He's also a big friend of Dave Ramsey's, so expect some cross promotion between the two.
A lot of this information you can find for FREE by searching their names on YouTube. Dave Ramsey has put his entire radio show onto a free podcast, so money is not an obstacle to learning everything you need to get financially free. I eventually bought some of these books and audio books to get the whole messages compiled into one simple passage.
Now let's move on to achieving your dreams
Step One: Financial Myths and Obstacles
The first step in becoming wealthy is getting over some commonly held misconceptions. I can't go too deep into these, so if you have further questions, I refer you to the resources above, or just ask me in the comments below.
Money is the root of all evil: We've all heard this "quote" from the Bible to describe people with money. Problem is, it's not even quoted properly. 1 Timothy 6:10

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

Look we all know jerks who are rich. But we know jerks who are poor too! I also know plenty of kind and wonderful souls who are rich, like Rick who taught my family many of these lessons, and gives vast amounts to charity each year. I know plenty of poor people as well who give out of their scarcity simply because that's the kind of person they are. Money does the will of the one who holds it. Again, I can't go too deep on this, but trust me when I say money doesn't automatically make you evil. It is what you choose to do with your money that determines your character.
Debt is a tool to help the poor get ahead: This is a hotly debated topic even among the millionaires I listed above (Dave Ramsey is 100% anti debt, while Robert Kiyosaki advocates certain kinds of debt). What I want you to gather here, is that getting out from under bad debts is the best way to secure your financial future. The average car payment is roughly $400 in America. The average student loan payment is getting close to $350 and it's trending higher, especially with grad degrees. Imagine how many tournaments you could attend if you didn't have your car loan and student loan! Later we will go into strategies of getting out of debt, but as a general rule of thumb, bad debts are very limiting on your financial life and paying off those debts frees you to live the life you want, rather than paying some other company first before using the leftovers to live your life.
Lottery (/other financial miracles) is the only way for me to retire rich
Last year Americans spent $70 billion on lottery tickets. This is about $300 spent for each adult last year. Just so you know. The payouts last year were in the millions meaning the lotto made nearly 700% of what it paid out. Also the lottery winners pay 60% in taxes.
Look if you take that $300 per year ($25 per month) you spend and invest in low cost, average (8%) yield investments, you get just under $84,000 over your working lifetime.
Don't believe me? Here's a n investment calculator!
What if you get serious with Investing and raise from $25-$100? You get $335,000!
Look the lottery is a scam. We all know it. The problem is that most people don't know another way. Well I will tell you that other way, so stop buying scratch offs for now, and hold onto that cash until I tell you where to put it.
Enough already, Gimme the plan
All I have time left for tonight is to outline some of the steps one must take towards financial freedom. Again I want to answer all questions related to Melee Careers in general, but it would take more time than I have, so please ask me questions and I will answer to the best of my abilities over the weekend.
There are two plans of attack for financial stability. The avalanche method promoted by personalfinance (I'll let you go there, because I prefer the following method) and the Snowball Method popularized by Dave Ramsey. I prefer the Dave Ramsey method because it is about behavior modification rather than math. Dave's plan is objectively less optimal and costs you a bit more long run. So if you are the type that needs to do things the right way every time, please follow the link to the personal finance subreddit.
I choose the Dave Ramsey method because it's all about motivation. You get smaller victories early on so that you feel the momentum. You use the momentum to keep from burning out and that propels you into the later stages.
From here on out, I will follow the Dave Ramsey method, steps 1-3.
Step 0: Budget and Cut unnecessary expenses
If you want to travel and compete in Melee, you are going to have to free up some cash from your current job. It's hard to do that if you have all of your money going out the door in bills & unnecessary expenses.
Count up how much you make monthly (after taxes). This is your income. Next count up your necessary expenses. Housing, Food, Utilities, & Clothing are your four major expenses and should never be sacrificed for debt service.
For example the average salary in the US is $3,000 monthly. The average family (so if you aren't married with kids, your numbers are likely a bit lower) spends $1,050 on housing, $300 on utilities, $500 on food, and $100 on clothing (though while paying off debt, you can easily go without the latest styles).
This means the average family spends $1950/$3,000 on NECESSITIES. Again if you are out of college and on your own, don't be alarmed if these numbers are lower. This is the national average please figure out your expenses for yourself.
Cars, Student Loans, Credit Cards
The smarter ones among you noticed that I haven't yet mentioned car loans, student loans, and credit cards. This is because these are not necessities. Corporate America has done a fantastic job of marketing these products to the American people. More money is spent to advertise debt than any other product on the market. Now I'm not mad at you if you have any of these products (I'm certainly not going to 'debate' student loans here), but you have to understand that continued debt payments are likely preventing you from having the life you want.
Because you see the average car payment is $400 right now. The average student loan payment is about the same at $350. The average credit card payment varies, but America has over $1 TRILLION in credit card debt right now.
Adding on another $750 to our $1950 brings us up to $2700 of our $3,000 salary heading out the door before we've done a single fun thing for ourselves! This is before any credit card debt you may have!
YES THE AVERAGE AMERICAN SPENDS 90% OF THEIR PAYCHECK ON DEBT AND OTHER RECURRING EXPENSES. THUS 3/4 OF AMERICA LIVES PAYCHECK TO PAYCHECK
But there is hope.
Step 1: Starter Emergency Fund
(The rest of the steps are going to focus on getting out from under your debts to free you from the constraints of bad debts. Later, I would love to cover money saving techniques like Rooming with other Smashers to save money, but that will need to be another time, as this is already super long.)
Ok step one towards financial freedom is making sure you never have to go into bad debts again. This means setting aside money in an emergency fund to handle life's problems. Dave Ramsey suggests $1,000 to get started. Enough to handle the breaks in your car going out, but also small enough to "keep you motivated" to get through all the goals. Whatever number you decide on, make sure you have an Emergency fund so that you do not go back into debt to handle problems as they arrive (My wife and I did $3,000 as we had a daughter who had regular hospital visits. Choose what feels right for you.).
Step Two: The Debt Snowball List debts smallest to largest. For Example.
Credit Card: $500 Car: $6,000 Student Loan: $18,000
Pay minimum payments on all loans. Then take any leftover money and apply it to the smallest payment. Once the smallest debt is knocked out, you can use that payment towards the next debt, and so on.
Again, this is behavior modification, not the optimal strategy
Step 3: Fully Funded Emergency Fund
Once you have paid off your debts, you should already feel a huge weight off your shoulders. Again the average American frees up $700+ in debt service payments if they get to this point. Imagine what you can do with an extra $700+ each month! That opens up traveling to a major almost every month!
Step 3 is making sure you keep this new found freedom. Start saving for 3-6 months worth of expenses (again the avg. American is about $2,000 monthly expenses). Keep this safe and separate from any investment money. This $6,000-$12,000 that you save up is not an investment, or worse, Pizza Money, this money is in case of injury or life circumstance that would set you back in your financial plan.
The average American has a major financial setback ($1,000 or more) on average every 5 years! Save this emergency fund and set it aside so that you can write a check when these events happen, and move on with your life without losing any sleep.
Tip of the Iceberg
Believe me when I say this is just the beginning of this subject. I will be writing more about this in the future, but for now, I've spent 2 hours on this, and it's time to take a break.
Please ask questions This is just the beginning of the discussion! I haven't gotten into any business strategies yet, or ideas on untapped jobs in Melee yet. Hell we haven't even finished the discussion on freeing yourself financially, but I'll let u/sam_1226 lend his expertise on investing for the future.

Just Read

Hello, I want to share my story of demonic possession, and how Jesus Christ chose me [I believe] for salvation from the torture I went through during my possession.
I have never been a believer in God, Jesus, the devil, or even benevolent or malevolent spirits for that matter. All my life, I was agnostic/atheist: thinking that when one dies, he or she was buried and that was it. My view on spirituality changed this year.
I have battled depression and anxiety my entire life. I come from a dysfunctional family in which my mother was verbally, psychologically, sexually, and – at times – physically abusive towards me. My father was never around much to defend us, and when he was, he and my mother would always verbally, and sometimes physically, attack one another.
So at the age of 21, I started college. This was the best thing that I have ever done for myself. I not only had a great attitude in college, but I was able to maintain a perfect GPA, received recognition for my dedication towards achieving and maintaining high academic standards; not to mention, I was able to find a job straight out of college that I enjoy.
During my junior year of college, I started to notice something very strange. I was having numerous synchronicities (seeing repeating number patterns follow me around, thinking of words or phrases and hearing other people say the same thing, predicting songs on the radio, and a few other strange things), and it really freaked me out at times.
It was in late October of 2016 that I was admitted into a psychiatric hospital for major depression and anxiety (I was in a health course in college, and the assignment was to better one of the six dimensions of well being [in which I chose to better my mental health]). I would like to note that I was still in a good mood, but I still had the underlying trauma from child abuse. The reason I was admitted into the hospital was because I told the mental health professional about my sexual abuse, psychological abuse and physical abuse background, and I told her that it made me want to kill myself because it prevented me from making connections with people. I was in the hospital for four days, and when I got out I was excited because I thought nothing could be worse than that, and that was the worst form of suffering one could endure.
When I got out of the hospital, I was given a phone call about a job offer (the one that I am currently working for), and it is where I found a girl that I had a spiritual connection with (at least on my end [I could feel a unique energy]). This spiritual connection is unlike anything that I have ever felt in my life, and I thought for sure that it was a soulmate or twinflame, or some kind of special connection we had. I still had major anxiety and depression though, and I could not get over the sexual, physica, and psychological abuse I went through.
So roughly two years pass, and I was offered a full time position (I was a student when I was fist hired by the way). And, at approximately the same time, I was given some stones blessed by a Cherokee shaman and a spirit pouch, and I was told to carry it around with me, and it would bring happiness into my life.
I carried the stones and pouch with me, and put my heart into it. I started noticing extremely strange things: I was seeing sparkles and flashes of light; I was seeing and experiencing synchronicities (such as seeing 1:11, 2:22, 3:33 on the clock) all the time, and I started to research what all of this meant.
I came across what is known as angel numbers (which is a concept that spiritualists, psychics, and mediums constructed) to determine the meaning of what the repeating numbers meant. I started to believe the people who came up with interpretations of these numbers. I also started to interpret omens, and became superstitious (such as thinking that a twitch in my eye had a specific spiritual meaning).
Every time I saw angel numbers, I would believe that angels/spirits were communicating with me, and I would reply “I have received your message.” When I did this, it felt like spirits were entering my body. One night at around 3:00 a.m. I woke up to use the restroom, and I felt a negative energy’s presence. I said “I feel your presence, what is it that you want?” And I could feel the spirit enter my body.
It wasn’t too long after this, that I started hearing voices in my head (I am not schizophrenic, nor have I ever heard voices in my head before practicing shamanism). The voice would tell me to play the lottery at different gas stations, and I won some. They were never large amounts, but just enough to have won a little bit.
After I won the last lottery ticket, I went home and looked at myself in the mirror and I heard a voice in the back of my head say “black magic.” Then I started saying “black magic” in a demonic guttural voice to myself in my mirror. Time went on, and I became extremely irritable and hostile with people (which was out of character for me), and I became extremely jealous of people’s achievements: something I used to commend people for.
I was trying to control people it seemed like, and I didn’t want others to be successful. I tried to bring them down with me. I though that other guys were trying to move in on this girl I had a special metaphysical connection with, and the spirit inside me didn’t want that to happen.
Time went on, and I told my manager how I was experiencing synchronicities (seeing all of the repeating numbers, saying things and they would come true, thinking of words and then seeing them immediately after thinking them.), and he replied “I probably have that happen all the time, I just overlook it.” And I put my head down and thought to myself “you’re probably right. I’m just overthinking it.” Immediately after, I heard a voice in the back of my head say “let the magic happen” and my head gravitated to the right, and I saw a box for a magic keyboard, and my eyes focused on the word “magic.” I looked at the word for approximately 3 seconds, and I put my head down and grinned in an evil manner.
I started to get jealous of other guys because I assumed they were trying to pick up this girl I liked, and I tried to do everything I could do to prevent it (this is something I would never do because I like to see people happy: even at my expense). Then one night in my apartment, I was coloring, and in the back of my head I heard a voice say “black magic love spell” and I picked up my phone, went to a website (never looked up a magic spell in my life by the way), and I found a love spell that was 2 paragraphs long, read it off word by word without stuttering or slowing down, in a demonic guttural voice. I then put my phone down and thought to myself “that was strange.”
Approximately two days later, I saw a lot of sparkles of light in my apartment (what I assume was a high rank angel [possibly a demonic entity because I know that the devil will appear as an angel of light]). Two days after that, the spell worked. It was torture. REAL TORTURE!!! The symptoms include, but are not limited to:

Major depression (the most intense I’ve ever felt)
Anxiety
Suicidal thoughts
Homicidal thoughts
Hearing the person’s name every second of the day
Hearing voices (all negative)
Psychic attacks (showing me disturbing images)
Fatigue
Loss of appetite
Increased synchronicities
Erections that lasted days at a time
Heart attacks/palpitations
Burning skin sensations
Being attacked at night and lifted off of my bed
Full body paralysis
Uncontrollable self harm
and more…

The day after the spell worked, I heard a voice say “throw it in the sewer. NOW!” I am not sure if that was God or not, but I did what it said and threw the stones and spirit pouch in the sewer.
I had no idea how to stop the spell from working, and I felt so ashamed of myself that I held it in: although I am pretty sure people had an idea of what was going on. I would also like to note that I am not a rapist or manipulator, and I made sure to not see this person while we were under the influence of a spell.
I still didn’t believe in God though until one night I had taken a high dose of pure THC in a capsule (which I don’t do mind altering substances normally [I’m actually very athletic and have a strict diet and exercise regimen]), but I wanted something to take the ease off of my mind. I’ll admit I got really high, but nothing would have made me think of heaven or hell or anything like that. I was attempting to sleep, and then out of nowhere (I am assuming I entered a different level of consciousness) I saw my soul falling into an eternal darkness. Then, a very god-like/divine entity grabbed my falling soul and said “I will save you!” Then I saw a soul coming up out of the eternal darkness screaming/or my soul falling. After that, everything went pitch black, and I saw what looked like the Monster energy drink logo appear in my left eye. I levitated out of my bed without moving a muscle, and my heart was racing and my skin was burning hot. I paced the floor nervously while my heart was beating fast (probably 160-170 bpm [I know because I run a lot]). I picked up my phone and saw it was 4:44 a.m. I threw my phone down, and I got down on my knees and prayed that the other person wasn’t going through this, and that all of this negativity be brought to me. I asked for genuine forgiveness and salvation. I did this for the rest of the night (I don’t think I slept for 2 days).
I went through a lot of torture, and I am assuming that the other person (who was completely innocent) also went through the same torture (I hope not). I went to church the next Wednesday and got saved in the name of Jesus Christ, and I got baptized the following Sunday. The fix was not immediate, nor am I sure if I am completely healed, but I feel a lot better, I have my good attitude back, I have my energy back, but I still have mild heart palpitations and my skin still burns. I am assuming that miracles are still being worked on, or maybe I am eternally doomed. I am placing my faith in Jesus Christ, and praying that he can fix my issues.
All of this in relation to the Bible
Before I was too involved in shamanism, however, I did my research because I like to research everything that I am involved in. I looked up what shamanism was about, how the concepts/practices compare to the Bible, and what the shaman way is all about.
According to Wikipedia, which I know is not the source of choice for academic institutions, states that “Shamanism is a practice that involves a practitioner reaching altered states of consciousness in order to perceive and interact with what they believe to be a spirit world and channel these transcendental energies into this world...a shaman is someone who is regarded as having access to, and influence in, the world of benevolent and malevolent spirits, who typically enters into a trance state during a ritual, and practices divination and healing” (“Shamanism, 2018).
But how does this pertain to the Bible? One may ask.
In Deuteronomy 18:9-13 (The New International Version), the Bible talks about occult practices, and it states that “When you enter the land the Lord you God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord; because of these same detestable practices the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you. You must be blameless before the Lord your God.”
Basically everything in these series of verses I disobeyed, and I knew it before I was too involved in shamanism; however, I never truly believed in God before practicing shamanism.
I just wanted to share this with anyone who was wondering if there is a God, if occult practices will lead one to impending doom, or if one is interesting in spirituality in the first place. I feel a lot better placing my faith in Jesus Christ, and I believe he will prevail, and drive the evil out of my life.

Tournament Report, GP LA 2016 - First Place with Merfolk!

Zero Pro Points. Top GP Finish: going 6-3 to make Day 2 of GP Oakland. Top PPTQ: 2nd place. Top cash: $200 in the finals of an SCG IQ.
Who the heck is this guy?
Introduction
Apologies to anyone who came expecting focus on card choices and sideboard guides, but this whole experience has got me needing to be a bit more dramatic. Before this weekend, I had some indications I was not terrible at Magic, but nothing prepared me for this almost out-of-body experience.
Like many of us, I started playing Magic in middle school. Fallen Empires was an amazing new world to me. But Magic was mostly a social outlet, hanging out at the video store and playing crazy, massively-multiplayer games. My more competitive side came out in tournament chess. In 2000, going to college, I abandoned Magic as a fad that maybe had a few more sets left in it, but was obviously unsustainable in the long term. Chess in the college club was able to be both social and competitive outlet, and I made some life-long friends.
About 10 years later, now in grad school for physics, I start to discover that I still have friends playing Magic. They point out that my old random uncommon Wastelands have ballooned in value, get me to a pre-release here, suggest an LSV draft video there, and I am really impressed with what the game has become.
Then WotC knocks it out of the park with Innistrad, and I know I need this to be a bigger part of my life. Graduation and a bad break-up led to free time, which found its way to FNM. Drafting Theros once a week turned into a White Weenie deck Standard (just for fun), and eventually moved on to mono-blue Devotion when it looked like I could hang with the FNM toughies at MTGDeals.
I start to set myself modest goals, qualify for the WMCQ, then get some byes to GPs, then why not dabble in the PTQ system? There were prizes and who knows, maybe I get a fun story by spiking some qualifier. But the closest I’ve gotten to being a Pro is when everyone mistook me for one at GP Barcelona (50 Euro ticket on the way home from a work conference in Germany was too good to pass up). Obviously, an American who would refuse to attend a GP at home and instead fly to Spain must be a pro on his way to PT Madrid the next weekend.
Merfolk
Modern season 2014 comes around, I need a deck, and Merfolk seemed like a natural progression from Standard mono-blue Devotion. I get to keep playing Master of Waves and Thassa! (Well, maybe not Thassa.) I play a bunch of Modern and like what I’m seeing. I borrow some Force of Will from a good friend, and eventually trade into my own, and start to play Legacy. I even play proxy Vintage courtesy Knightware’s monthly tournaments - Merfolk is a real deck, and with 15 proxies, none of the other cards need to set you back more than $20 each. Perhaps I developed a fishy reputation around Los Angeles, but it’s the deck I have, I enjoy playing it, and had OK results. Even with my fairly tight-fisted budget, I got to experience a much wider array of formats than I ever really expected.
Steven Winer is one of my college chess club friends, and also one of those guys who helped me bring me back into Magic. He is a chess teacher and internationally-recognized master of that game (“FM”, for those in the know). But hey - even chess-players need hobbies. He saw I was taking Modern more seriously and caught the bug, too. We jammed hundreds of games over the course of months, as Modern itself grew and evolved. Splinter Twin versus Merfolk, Pod versus Merfolk, Abzan versus Merfolk, late into the night over Skype. This is really where my intuition for the deck’s inner workings developed. I have always had to work extremely hard to try to catch Steve at chess, and this felt no different, my “budget” deck versus his Tier 1 crushers.
Validation came when Martin Juza wrote a Merfolk deck guide for GP Boston. A real pro who plays this deck! I realize instantly that I’ve found my bible. Even though the metagame information is dated, I still consider this the best article written on Merfolk in Modern. Required reading. The card choice explanations, side boarding principles, and in-game advice are amazing and yield insight after insight into what the deck is capable of.
Of course, that didn’t stop me from deciding I could “improve” the deck by splashing Stony Silence and Lingering Souls and to fix the deck’s glaring weakness to Affinity. (I never claimed to be a deck-builder.) This doesn’t ever really work out that well, except for occasionally wrecking a Liliana of the Veil with Spirit tokens. After medium Modern qualifier seasons in 2014 and 2015, and a 6-3 (to miss Day 2) at GP Pittsburgh in November 2015, I took it kinda hard and moved off of Modern for a bit. But hey, at least I got to sit out season Eldrazi.
GP LA
But now my hometown GP is here, and I’m going to play. What are my goals? Well, I just want to have fun and earn a pro point, so I can tell my friends I have one, too.
What is my deck? I’m off the white splash, but I need an up to date list, and the meta is harder than ever for me to read. I briefly flirt with building the cute WB Eldrazi hate bears deck, but give up after reading some less than rave reviews. And anyway, we all know I was just going to play Merfolk.
I jam out some Thursday night Moderns at my local store, MTGDeals, and a few bigger weekend events, but the deck feels underpowered and I don’t get why. Known Merfolk-playing pro Ondrej Strasky comes to my rescue with a single, slightly cheeky Tweet. He includes some changes I wanted to make but couldn’t convince myself were correct (going down to 1 Phantasmal Image and adding a Merrow Reejerey) and some I didn’t understand but in retrospect clearly fix the power issues I was seeing (cutting all the Harbinger of the Tides and adding even more Reejereys. I know this will be a point of contention, to which I will say: the thing that allows Merfolk to compete in Modern is a very high turn-4 goldfish rate, and Reejerey just makes that much more likely. Even when they have interaction, it’s still to your advantage to be able to drop a ton of power, say, 17, on the board at a moment’s notice. I can think of any number of matches from the weekend where Reejerery allowed me to swing for lethal or build an overwhelming board state, while Harbinger would just lose. Reejerey is also a much better top deck in matchups like Jund. Snapcaster decks can make Reejerey look silly, but Harbinger isn’t any better against those, and these aren’t as dominant as they were under Splinter Twin. I freely admit that Harbinger is better than Reejerey when you need to play defense against the super-aggressive decks like Infect, Affinity, or even the Merfolk mirror, and Affinity in particular gave me a lot of worry. But all of these decks, even when held at bay for a turn, can rebuild an offense with one good top deck. Once you take over the aggressive role, you really need to kill them quickly, and Reejerey is so good at this that I would rather cut something else if you’re really looking to play Harbinger.)
Ondrej has 4 sideboard Hurkyl’s Recall, which I don’t take seriously, since I’m still on the “dodge Affinity” mindset from Martin’s article, and I even submit an initial email decklist with things like Remand and another Spell Pierce to help shore up other matchups. And in fact Ondrej did play Remands at the last minute, except he cut the Tec Edges instead :O.
But in the end I trust that Ondrej is a pro and understands better than me when the metagame is right to play a card like Hurkyl’s. I did have a nagging thought that Affinity had been awfully quiet lately, and we all know that’s when to fear it most. (I also have to admit, I have nostalgia for Hurkyl’s and am highly amused that I thought it was completely irrelevant when I left the game in 2000, yet here I am casting it for the win 16 years later.)
I re-submitted with essentially with 73 of Ondrej’s 75, cutting a Tidebinder main and a Reejerey for 2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner, since I saw a bunch of Jeskai/Nahiri at States and expected it to be out in force. The Kiras in the main turned out not great, since the metagame was very aggressive, and I found myself really hurting for the third Tidebinder in all the Burn matches. But I played against few decks where Kira was out and out dead, and she was crucial in the Grixis matchup. Probably the right place for her was the sideboard (which coincidentally, is exactly where Ondrej put two copies in the end - have I mentioned it’s usually a good idea to pay attention to the pros?)
One last thing I’ll say about the decklist, since I think people are asking, is the 2 Gut Shot in the sideboard were pretty great all weekend. This card has always been somewhat borderline for me but not quite good enough. But the fact that now you can also break up the Melira combo with it means there are just enough decks out there where this card does work. I brought it in against Melira, Merfolk, and Affinity, and it always felt like it was killing something relevant. Keep an eye on the metagame for this one, though; if Melira goes away, the percentages might go down enough to justify cutting it.
Creature (27)
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
1 Tidebinder Mage
1 Phantasmal Image
3 Merrow Reejerey
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4 Master of Waves
Non-creature (13)
1 Vapor Snag
3 Dismember
4 Æther Vial
1 Relic of Progenitus
4 Spreading Seas
Land (20)
2 Cavern of Souls
4 Mutavault
1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
1 Wanderwine Hub
12 Island
Sideboard (15)
1 Tidebinder Mage
2 Relic of Progenitus
4 Tectonic Edge
2 Spell Pierce
2 Gut Shot
4 Hurkyl's Recall
Matches
Day 1:
Round 1 - BYE
Round 2 - BYE
PPTQ and GP grinding all the time.
Round 3 - S. W., Affinity. 2-0 on the draw
Round 4 - Kevin Phillips, Burn. 2-1 on the play
Round 5 - Kaushik Vasudevan, Melira Combo. 2-1 on the play
Round 6 - Charles Little, Burn. 2-1 on the play
Round 7 - Daniel Clark, Merfolk. 2-1 on the draw
Round 8 - Javier Dominguez, Jund. 2-1 on the draw
Round 9 - Leo Nunez, Burn. 2-1 on the draw
Day 2:
Round 10 - Gal Schlesinger, Merfolk. 2-0 on the draw
Round 11 - Toshiya Kanegawa, Bant Eldrazi. 2-1 on the play
Round 12 - Sean Hunter, Jund. 1-2 on the draw
Round 13 - Corey Burkhart, Grixis. 2-0 on the play
Round 14 - Alex To, Affinity. 2-1 on the draw
Round 15 - Vidianto Wijaya, Jund. 2-1 on the draw
Top 8:
“Play-draw rule” allows me the play every round as top seed.
Round 1 - Erik Carson, Melira Combo. 2-1
Round 2 - Javier Dominguez, Jund. 2-0
Round 3 - Ethan Brown, Affinity, 2-1
Just from the start, this is a weird list of decks. There are only 7 different decks over 16 rounds. For comparison, I played against 8 different decks in the 8 round $5k two weekends ago, and I don’t think it was the first time that happened. This is an incredibly homogenous list of decks for a Modern tournament. There is no Scapeshift, Tron or Jeskai/Nahiri at all, which astounds me. (Ondrej nailed it by cutting the Tectonic Edges last minute, but I probably would have played them anyway, since I expected Scapeshift to be a good metagame call for some reason and I hate losing to Tron.)
Looking at the metagame breakdowns, it doesn’t seem like this list is all that far from what the actual most-played decks were, aside from dodging Infect. But in Modern, you’d think there’d be at least a couple oddballs. The only thing I was unfamiliar with was the Eldrazi deck, and that’s hardly an unknown quantity. So I think in this regard I was lucky to face mostly decks where my months-to-years-old practice was worth something. How far that can take you says a lot about Modern and how learning one deck inside and out can really help you.
I was slightly unlucky in my die rolls, losing 8 and winning 5, but this is not unreasonable. What is crazy is that for the 4 matches where you’d think being on the play would be crucial, Affinity and the Merfolk mirror, in the Swiss I was always on the draw. If you wrote it up this way ahead of time, no one would believe you, least of all me. Anyway, more later about how improbable and bizarre this all was. On to the matches!
I’m sure there are some stories out of place. Apologies to my opponents for where my memory has failed - it was a long tournament!
Round 3: S.W., Affinity. 2-0 on the draw
Game 1. On the draw. Mulligan to 5. Opponent goes Memnite, Mox Opal, Inkmoth, Duress, take your Aether Vial, go. You’re facing your worst matchup with nearly the worst possible start.
Commune with your deepest fears.
This is nearly word-for-word how GP Pittsburgh started.
Please. Not again.
Breathe.
Keep playing. Oh, he made a mistake. Maybe I’ll get lucky.
Subtle technical miscues turn into larger, game-wrecking blunders. I’m allowed to build up a board and take the game down. Game 2 is more of the same. It suffices to say that Mr. W. has not arrived in fighting shape today.
I am acutely aware this is a undeserved reprieve from my fears. There’s no good reason it should have happened. Turns out, that’s just the kind of day it’s going to be today.
Round 4: Kevin Phillips, Burn. 2-1 on the play
Kevin is a fellow player from my store, MTGDeals, who I don’t know as well as I’d like yet, but is a good sport and also had a great GP. Game 1 is over quickly, I believe due to mana troubles made worse by some Spreading Seas. Game 2 is a race where we both take a ton of Eidolon damage but he gets me at 1 life. Game is 3 is more like game 1 - a one-lander that didn’t get there.
Round 5: Kaushik Vasudevan, Melira Combo. 2-1 on the play
Game 1 he mulls to 6 and tries to go for and early combo but I have the Dismember. Game 2 he beats me down with multiple Kitchen Finks. Game 3 gets into a bit of a board stall where I have to try to grind through his Finks while holding up removal in case he can Chord for the combo, and I get there first.
Round 6: Charles Little, Burn. 2-1 on the play
I don’t remember too much about this matchup (sorry Charles!), but game 3 did involve another Spreading Seas on a land-light draw, and his lone Swiftspear doesn’t do the job. I used to be a skeptic of Seas in this matchup, but it’s just doing more and more work against Burn.
Round 7: Daniel Clark, Merfolk. 2-1 on the draw
Pretty unhappy to be on the draw in this famously play/draw-dependent matchup, especially without having any Harbingers, and him probably on them. We trade the first two games quickly, as expected. Game 3 he has to keep a hand without Vial, starts with a Silvergill that I Gut Shot, and I’m able to take the initiative and win the race. As we fill out the slip, we have a very animated conversation about sideboarding strategies and wish each other’s fish well.
Round 8: Javier Dominguez, Jund. 2-1 on the draw
I’ve made it to Table 1, and I’m starting to realize something’s going on. Javier greets me with enthusiasm and we settle in for a very interesting match. Game 1 he plays turn 2 Dark Confidant, happily saying it’s his first turn 2 Bob all day. Naturally, I turn 2 Spreading Seas a Raging Ravine, and he has trouble getting out from under his own Bob. Game 2 I mull to 6 and have not much going on. Game 3 I keep a very lord-heavy hand and face an interesting spot where he’s at 16 with a Lily on 1 counter. Usually it’s right to try to grind them out in these sorts of spots, but my gut says I have so much gas that I should just try to blow him off the board instead. I play 2 lords and decide to attack him to 12 with Reejerey, leaving Lily alive but presenting 3 lethal, un-boltable Lords. It pays off when he has to tap out the next turn for Kalitas and chump to stay alive. Lily gets two more of my cards but in the end a topdeck Mutavault and him going to 2 life means I have one more creature than he has removal.
Round 9: Leo Nunez, Burn. 2-1 on the draw
Yet again Spreading Seas shines versus Burn when in Game 2 I Spreading Seas into an angry board state, stabilize at 2 life, and wind up stranding five cards in his hand. Does this mean Spreading Seas is good? I don’t know; it feels so wrong to rely on them not top-decking a land. But it just keeps working.
Day 1 is over, and I somehow have no losses. I think to myself, “Whatever, this happens sometimes to medium players, who get hot but then fall on their face Day 2. Right?” No need to lose my head. I shoot the breeze with the other undefeateds and then my friends, joking I should by a lottery ticket. I head home for some sleep and amazing fresh shrimp curry and rice, courtesy my girlfriend Mollie’s dad. (Worth noting, I couldn’t have done any of this without Mollie’s unflagging and selfless support of me and my Magic career. I am in awe of who she is and who she is to me.)
Round 10: Gal Schlesinger, Merfolk. 2-0 on the draw (Backup Feature)
Up nice and early, back to Table 1! Gal (pronounced “Gawl”) is a friendly high-schooler, on his first GP, as I recall. He seems to be like me, extremely pleased to have overshot expectations, and loving the fish. Game 1 I go to 6 and start down in the race, but build up a force and at 2 life attack for an exactly lethal 13. Game 2 Gal seems to keep an awkward hand where he has to drop Lord of Atlantis a little early, pumping my team too, but I’m fairly removal-heavy and lord-light myself. A unusual amount of blocking ensues for a Merfolk mirror, and I pull it out at 1 life.
Round 11: Toshiya Kanegawa, Bant Eldrazi. 2-1 on the play (Backup Feature)
I don’t think Toshi (as he introduces himself) speaks much English, but we settle in for a polite match. He doesn’t get much going in game 1 and I swarm him. Game 2 we both go to 6 and I keep a removal-heavy hand, but I’m a bit too aggressive in using it on his Skyspawner, and he top decks two Reality Smashers to dominate a mostly empty board. Game 3 he goes to 6, I Seas an Eldrazi Temple, Dismember a Displacer and a Smasher, and swing past the rest. Now I know I have my pro point for sure (I wasn’t sure what the threshold was at the time), and I start to loosen my grip on my emotions a little, since the rest of this tournament is just gravy.
Round 12: Sean Hunter, Jund. 1-2 on the draw (Backup Feature)
The only undefeated, I’m now playing down against a 10-0-1. I have a sense that he’s on Jund, since I know there’s another Jund player with a draw, and what else would have a draw in that spot? So I keep a slow hand with Master of Waves and Reejerey but no 2 drops, only to have him pick it apart with three discard spells and slam two Dark Confidant. I gain hope when two turns in a row, he flips Lily and a 2-drop, losing 5 life each time, and all of a sudden he’s at 3. He tries to whittle me down while I flood out, but I hold on to a Vapor Snag for dear life, even saving a top-deck Dismember to pitch to Lily instead. He kills one of his own Bobs and flips a land two turns in a row, putting me in agony, but finally he flips a 2-drop and I can run out my Snag for lethal, while at a precarious 4 life myself. It’s the only point of damage I dealt him all game. Am I so charmed that even when I flood out, I still win? Well finally the train hits a bump as I mull to 6, keep an action-packed one-lander, but don’t get there, and game 3 I’m Junded out. But I’m still X-1, right? No need to panic.
Round 13: Corey Burkhart, Grixis. 2-0 on the play (Feature) Video
Finally on the main feature match, despite not being on table 1 anymore. Corey’s a member of Team Ultra-Pro, local to LA and an outgoing guy. I look forward to playing him again. Game 1 is a fast start for me, and he has a hard time finding red mana, to the point where I start to absently wonder if he’s even playing red. I get him down to 1, and he tries to stay alive by tapping my team with Cryptic. But I have a Cursecatcher, and he can only try to pay the tax with a fetch land. Corey honorably dies on his on sword. Game 2 was more intense. He has an early Tasigur and starts attacking for 4 while I struggle just to keep a couple fish on the board. He kills my Kira and gets an Izzet Staticaster, which threatens to just run away with the game. I can see his mood (spirits?) fall a bit when I play my second Cavern of Souls, this time on Spirit rather than Merfolk. He understands I have the second Kira, which joins the damage race with the Tasigur, seemingly too late. A follow-up Master of Waves threatens to bring the tide. A Tasigur activation reveals a fortunate (for me) Dreadbore, which he has to use on an Elemental token, breaking the Kira shield so he can ping the rest with Staticaster (a clever play, by the way). (Note that protection from red keeps the Master himself safe from removal.) I chump with the now lonely Master of Waves to go to 1, but I dodge bolt to the face and have exactly lethal on the return attack.
After this match, my flames are stoked. I know I kept my nerves and played patiently under the camera against a great opponent in an intense match. I’m pumping my fists and starting to think about what could actually happen. Still, there’s two matches left against some the best players in the field, and I could very easily lose both and miss the Pro Tour. Can’t go in expecting anything to happen; that’s the easiest way to lose focus.
Round 14: Alex To, Affinity. 2-1 on the draw
So yeah… focus… Being paired against Affinity kinda wrecks that for me. Don’t ask me what happened in this match; I can’t tell you. Game 1 I lose as planned, but then the rules of reality start to reshape themselves. At some point during game two, I realize I may not be losing. It begins to feel that there are forces at work that are outside of those that I believe in. Waves of electric fire wash through my hair. All I can recall now is that Alex's hands were not definitely not the scary Affinity hands in games 2 or 3. My life pad for the final game ends with Alex at 16, and shows me going from 20 to 10 in one hit, so I must have done something in a hurry.
I’m locked for the Pro Tour by beating Affinity. On the draw. With Merfolk. It all goes against my preconceptions and experiences. What does it even mean? Why me? How did I arrive at this kind of a time and place? I’ve thought about this day - who in my place hasn’t? But when the possibility actually materializes, it can be hard to remember that this is reality and not the dream.
Round 15: Vidianto Wijaya, Jund. 2-1 on the draw (Backup Feature)
Vidi is a well-known local pro who was kind enough to take notice of me even at that small SCG IQ I cashed and where we first met. I’m the top seed and could scoop Vidi into top 8 while very likely still making top 8 (but with worse play/draw seeding). This presents a lot of crazy emotions, on top of everything else. It’s like being forced to look into an emotional kaleidoscope, one for which I was vastly underprepared for. I do not feel it’s appropriate to share what I saw, at least not right now.
I decide to play it out. We trade Games 1 and 2, and Game 3 I Spreading Seas his only two lands.
We are rushed through a song and dance by the coverage team, and then it’s off to Top 8. The train cannot be allowed to stop. I feel like I’ve hardly had time to breathe.
Top 8, Round 1: Erik Carson, Melira Combo. 2-1
Game 1 is a heart-stopper as he plays an early Viscera Seer and Anafenza, and I feel obligated to tap out to keep up the pressure. He taps 1GG and thinks briefly, and I figure it’s the Kitchen Finks and he’s got infinite life. But no, it’s a naked Eternal Witness, and he just never gets to combo. Game 2 I lose the race to Kitchen Finks, and game 3 starts to look similar, but I have enough pressure in the end to stop the assault and crack back for the win, despite some tense turns of holding up Relic and wondering what crazy Chord target might get me.
Top 8, Round 2: Javier Dominguez, Jund. 2-0 (Rematch!) Text Coverage
I learn that Javier is a Silver Pro who has more than locked up Gold status today. Understandably, he is just as friendly as the first time we played, and I’m glad for his good result. It takes the edge off the pressure of being where we are. Game 1 I keep an Aether Vial hand, not normally what you like to see against Jund, but the rest of the hand is a curve of pure gas and I run him over. Game 2 is much closer, but I’m able to get some timely Lords and Spreading Seas.
Top 8, Round 3: Ethan Brown, Affinity, 2-1 Text Coverage Video
So here I am in the finals. I’ve been on an electric run, well beyond what I was prepared to believe in. But now, in the end, I learn why I’m here. I’ve been set up. There’s another story today, not mine. That story belongs to the youngest GP winner in history. After all this way, I’m only his foil, his nemesis. It’s all been written - he’s beaten the pros, and now just has to slip past his best matchup. His dark steel versus my soft fish flesh.
And that’s fine. That’s great! His story is one I’ll gladly play my part in. His performance is an inspiration to us all and a living testament to what a young person can achieve. I hope many more follow his example. So what if I happen to be the guy he has to beat on his way into history? I know who everyone is rooting for. I’m already half-way into the audience.
I can only be light-hearted. The text coverage captures my attitude perfectly. I’m muttering under my breath and thinking “of course he’s going to have the perfects, of course I’m going to have to try to win game 3 on the draw, how else would this go?” I’m looser than I should be, but what does it matter? I’m the mustache-twirling villain, about to be defeated by the plucky hero. The Simon Bar Sinister to his Underdog.
Game 1 was a walk for Ethan, as expected, and game 2 starts out hilariously, with my 7 card hand containing 6 lands that fail to support the single Hurkyl’s Recall. My 6 has one land with a Hurkyl’s, but fate has more humor in store as I have to painfully bottom the second Hurkyl’s to make sure I live to cast the first. A slim gamble, but better than nothing. Then the Whipflare I play right into, and on the coverage, Huey now agrees with me (for less poetic reasons) that Ethan is a lock for first place.
Marshall and Huey did a masterful job covering this match, and will walk you through most of the relevant thoughts. Pretty much every time they say I made a mistake, they were right. I should probably Dismember the Memnite with the Opal on the stack, I shouldn’t Gut Shot the Ravager in Game 3. My Spreading Seas were overly ambitious (but worked out, just as they had all day).
They match my thought process on the final turn of game 3, essentially in real time. Somehow I thought after Hurkyl’s I might get two turns to recover, but he dumps his hand faster than I expect, and I’m staring down lethal next turn. It takes so long to find the right line since you convince yourself the only way to stay alive is to copy the Ornithopter with Phantasmal Image and try to block. But I still die to a black source off the top allowing him to move Plating to the other Ornithopter mid-combat, so I really have incentive to not allow him another turn.
I calculate and re-calculate, do some double-takes, calculate again, and when I’m finally ready, I announce the attack for 17 with more pride than I should admit. Ethan double-checks my math in surprise (who wouldn’t?), and we shake hands. I then jerk back my body in disbelief at what has transpired. Whipflare your guys? And a Galv Blast? And a Plating? How I did I beat that draw? Spell Pierce your Vial? EXACTLY 17?? After everything else that’s happened this weekend! What planet am I on?
I come somewhat to my senses and remember that there are people watching me, some even cheering. My instinct for some reason is to start mugging goofily for the crowd. Hopefully, I’ll get to apologize to Ethan in person in Sydney for not being more civil towards him in the aftermath.
They run me to an interview with Marshall, who made the thing much easier and fun than I thought possible - he’s so very alert to what I’m saying and sensitive to the mental exhaustion he know’s I’m in. That he can manage that after two solid days of work is a sign of his great skill.
After that, I walk around in a daze, laughing with my friends and meeting people who now knew my name and wanted to shake my hand. And the run-goods continue throughout the night. It occurs to me about a half an hour too late that I hadn’t even told my girlfriend, Mollie, that I’d won. But as I pick up the phone to tell her she has a celebration to come join, she’s frantically texting me telling me she’s already in the convention center and freaking out as she runs to find me. She’d been watching me from the movie theater, in the restaurant, in the Uber, telling anyone who would listen how proud she was. I think she’s happier than me. After a perfect weekend, how perfect is that?
—
Over dinner, a friend hands me one of his prize packs to open. I quickly crack it, and of course, it contains Archangel Avacyn. Seems on par for the weekend. But then he hands me a second one. I know it can only be disappointing, but I can’t resist. It has nothing worth mentioning.
I know in my mind that it’s all just random - meaningless correlations. There’s no logical or physical connection between these prize packs and the games of Magic I just played. Still, I can’t escape the feeling that the reality is stiffening, and the rules of probability are slowly contracting back to their normal state.
Magic is a special game that, from time to time, when we least expect it, can elevate us from obscurity to a lofty peak. It can also put us back down just as quickly. I look forward to the Pro Tour, holding no great expectations for myself, but buoyed by the support I’ve received from so many different quarters. Maybe I will be lifted just a little bit longer.

what the bible says about lottery tickets video

Your chance of winning the lottery on a single ticket is one in 175 million. That means that someone has to really be greedy and have dreams of riches to still try and play the lottery. You have to pay for more and more tickets because of your greed and what you are really doing is emptying your pockets because of your covetousness. Most gamblers throw money away. Most people who go to casinos ... Question: "What does the Bible say about playing the lottery?" Answer: The word gamble means “to risk something of value on an outcome that depends on chance.” Because the outcome of a lottery “depends on chance” and playing it involves “risk,” then, by definition, playing the lottery is gambling. 72 Bible Verses about Lottery. Proverbs 13:11 ESV / 171 helpful votes Helpful Not Helpful. Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it. Hebrews 13:5 ESV / 125 helpful votes Helpful Not Helpful. Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” 1 Timothy 6:10 ESV ... Interactive Bible study with John Piper . Solid Joys. Daily devotional with John Piper. Most people in the world have no experience of lasting joy in their lives. We’re on a mission to change that. All of our resources exist to guide you toward everlasting joy in Jesus Christ. About Account Give. January 5, 2016 Seven Reasons Not to Play the Lottery Close. John Piper @JohnPiper. John Piper ... (Rom. 14:12) Of course, if a person participates, wins and only then finds out that the gift is a lottery ticket, he is under no obligation to accept it. So, there are good reasons why individuals desiring to abide by the counsel of God’s Word do not “take a chance” on the lottery. They do not trust in luck. Lottery tickets made available in grocery marts and drive-in markets make it easy for people to purchase these “chances to win the big hit.” Some spend money on the lottery tickets instead of groceries for their families. Many compulsive gamblers wreck their lives and their families as they are encouraged to risk money that they usually cannot afford to lose. An estimated 15 million people ... Considering the issue of gambling and lottery tickets, ... 10 Things the Bible Says about the Mark of the Beast. Worryphobia - Crosswalk the Devotional - February 7. Grounded in Truth - In Touch ... Answer: Although the words "gambling" or "lottery" are not in the King James Version Bible, numerous verses denounce the attitudes that are behind them. They include idol worship and greed, which are the foundations that encourage this kind of behavior. Lottery is a form of gambling. Experience has shown that gambling reflects greed. The Bible strongly condemns greed, warning that ‘no greedy person would have any inheritance in God’s kingdom.’... Bible verses related to Playing The Lottery from the King James Version (KJV) by Relevance - Sort By Book Order . Proverbs 13:11 - Wealth [gotten] by vanity shall be diminished: but he that gathereth by labour shall increase. 1 Timothy 6:10 - For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many ...

What the Bible Says About Gambling - Bible Resources

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