I'm migrating my org-mode notes of several years to Obsidian, and I want to make notes between concepts I've noticed in the world and it would be great if the AI could read through all those kilobytes of daily entries and point out where those ideas occurred.
But as you will see,GPT4o (playground chat) doesn't understand my ideas very well. Am I doing something wrong, or are LLMs just not there yet for this?

Example ideas

Accepting everything as it is

If you accept everything for what it is, and then take action from there, that is inspired action (that comes from love, compassion, passion). That keeps your heart open, mind open. David Hawkins, Letting Go 

Beauty is Fundamental Truth

Beauty is your inner intelligence telling you what is valuable, whta you should strive for. why do you find something beautiful? order; regularity; elegance; poise; safety; desirable feeling du jour.... these are your values. 

Clouds are a good metaphor for how change happens in the world

Watching the clouds tells you how everything in the world changes. 

Prompt

System:
I will provide two files, ideas.md and daily_lessons.md. Find instances where the ideas happened in daily_lessons.md. Do not paraphrase or summarize, simply mention the line and the idea it related to so:
excerpt -> idea
/begin ideas.md ... /end ideas.md
User:
/begin daily_lessons.md ... /end daily_lessons.md

Answer Unsatisfactory

But as you can see, GPT4o (playground chat) doesn't seem to understand my ideas very well.
Assistant:

1. **Flow with the world to steer the flow** - _daily_lessons.md: 2020-01-01 Well I guess I bought the second phone after all_ - _"I've realized that sticking with something makes me appreciate it more and be grateful for it even if there are flaws."_ 2. **Dimensions** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-01-26 Dienstag How to represent higher dimensions graphically_ - _Discussion about representing higher dimensions graphically and how thinking about the big picture is thinking in higher dimensions._ 3. **Photographer decides the Audience's Perspective** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-02-23 Dienstag Where am I at life now?_ - _"Living life as a jack of all trades allows me to keep an adaptable perspective and understanding the bigger picture."_ 4. **Positive Feedback Loop - helping others get rich helps you get rich** - _daily_lessons.md: 2020-03-19 Freitag New Crypto Investing Philosophy, DeFi to NFT to what next?_ - _"My crypto strategy is to accumulate ETH, BTC, and other coins, which helps build value in these currencies and loops back to increasing my USDT value."_ 5. **Notice how it's normal to tense up to everything, but relaxing is the best reaction** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-01-29 Freitag_ - _"It's tempting to fill empty space up - but good things can come of having empty space!"_ 6. **I treasure things that get out of my way (enable my flow)** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-01-01 Freitag: Becoming Aware of Mind Quietness/Scatteredness_ - _"I can control and notice the state of my mind and take corrective action to keep it unworried and efficient."_ 7. **Clouds are a good metaphor for how change happens in the world** - _daily_lessons.md: 2016-11-20 Sonntag_ - _"The truth is the subconscious is the one that generates ideas naturally, like clouds constantly changing form."_ 8. **Beauty is Fundamental Truth** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-03-15 Montag_ - _"By not being fixated on a specific type of beauty I can become more appreciative of various forms of beauty in life."_ 9. **Accepting everything as it is** - _daily_lessons.md: 2021-01-01 Freitag_ - _"Accepting a slower learning pattern and settling comfortably into a rhythm in a balanced way."_ 

As always these posts are meant to simply incite some friendly discussion and debate. Everyone is free to form their own conclusions but I wanted to push back on certain things stated during the episode and even correct a few things that Stephanie got wrong. I've noticed she tends to get certain facts mixed up or is just straight up incorrect when recalling information a lot in this series. I'll try my best to list things in order with how they appear in the episode.
The gun purchases :

1. Stephanie when talking about the gun purchases makes a couple of errors. She states that it was Lyle who signed for the gun paperwork and that it was his handwriting which was most similar to what was found on those documents. This is factually untrue. The prosecution had a handwriting expert testify at trial that the handwriting was most likely to be Erik's. Erik later testified that he did indeed sign the paperwork.
2. Stephanie also states in this episode that the brothers told the police after being arrested that they "bought the guns in Santa Monica". This is an example of where she gets information mixed up and confused. Like Stephanie said there is a moment during Erik's cross examination where he is impeached. This is because Erik had said that they had visited different gun stores on that day and at one point they went to a Big 5 store closer to their home. Erik testified that they inquired about handguns there and learned there was a two week waiting period to buy them which is why they went with the shotguns as they could be purchased immediately. He was impeached on this as that specific store had stopped selling handguns by 1989. Now back on direct testimony it came out that the store did sell fake handguns which looked like real ones and Erik had been diagnosed with dysnomia which meant he frequently got things like the names of places wrong. Since the brothers had testified they had visited multiple gun stores on that day, the defense claimed that Erik had simply misremembered which specific gun store it was where they were told about handguns but I digress. The main point is simply that Erik never said they bought guns in Santa Monica at any point and Stephanie got this wrong.
3. Stephanie and Derrick bring up the brothers using Donovan Goodreau's ID as evidence of premeditation. The only things I'll say on this is that it was proven at trial that neither brother had their own ID to use. Lyle did not have California identification and Erik's drivers license was suspended. Erik had Donovan's ID which he sometimes used to get into clubs and bars but he also had a fake ID which went by the name of Richard Stevens. One could argue that if they were truly thinking about the guns in terms of premeditation then they would have used the Richard Steven's ID instead since the photo on it was actually of Erik. Using the Donovan ID was risky because Donovan clearly does not look like either brother and if the police ever found the purchases (which they did) it would instantly be linked back to Lyle. They were clearly not thinking very well ahead of time which is consistent with what the brothers testified to. If the brothers were in fact buying guns for protection then they had no other choices in the ID they used.

Days leading up to the murders:

1. Stephanie relays the story about the unusual boat trip that the family took the day before the murders. Essentially the brothers were up at the bow of the boat the entire 6-7 hour trip and refused to move almost the entire time. They even got soaked by a wave at one point and still didn't move. For me this is corroboration that the brothers were afraid of the parents at this point which is why I find Stephanie's conclusions somewhat surprising. Stephanie has spoken a lot about how irrational and illogical your thinking becomes when you're raised like this as she's been in a similar situation but then she goes on to say how ridiculous she found it because (paraphrasing here) "how were the parents going to kill them on that boat when the boat captain was there". Going by her own logic if your thinking is irrational at this stage then you're probably not thinking things through very logically.
2. Sticking with this theme of being illogical or irrational I also wanted to bring up what the brothers say they did during the day of the murders. That Erik stayed out of the house all day and that Lyle stayed home to try and gauge what the parents were doing and trying to make them feel that the brothers weren't going to leave or try and retaliate against them by telling people. The brothers say they did this partly because they thought the parents wouldn't kill them separately. As Stephanie and Derrick say to a normal person this sounds ridiculous but if we accept the severe abuse that the brothers endured then someone in that situation is not going to be thinking in the most logical ways which is why some of Stephanie's comments surprised me.
3. There also is some corroboration for the fact that Erik stayed out of the house all day. Erik had a tennis session with his coach Mark Heffernan on the Thursday before the murders (murders took place on Sunday). According to Mark, Erik had told him that he would call him on the Sunday to make plans for the following weeks tennis lessons. Mark never received any phone calls though and it's (in my opinion) probably because Erik was not at home for the entire day. This also links with other information regarding the time of the murders and why it's consistent with the brother's testimony which I'll get into next.
4. According to the brothers testimony the reason why Lyle made that phone call to Perry around midday to ask him of his plans in the evening was because the brothers wanted excuses to stay away during the night. Lyle did make plans to meet Perry at 9:30PM. However since Erik had stayed away all day he came back late which is why they never met Perry at 9:30PM. Now does it make sense to know someone was expecting to see you half an hour earlier, kill your parents after 10:00PM and then don't contact that person until 11PM? Or is it more consistent with what the brothers testified to which is that Erik was late getting home and then they had a confrontation with their parents which is what led to the shootings? They just chose to go ahead with the murders knowing there was someone who was going to say "they were supposed to meet me at this time but they never showed"?

The night of the shooting and the crime scene:

1. Stephanie repeatedly refers to the ford escort being Lyle's. It was actually Erik's.
2. Stephanie also states that the guns were in the car before the shooting started. The brothers have never said this. What they testified to is that they had left most of the ammunition in their car but they both kept their guns in their rooms. On the night of the shooting after the parents went into the den, the brothers then ran to their rooms, grabbed the guns and ran straight to the car to load the shotguns with what they thought was "the proper ammunition". The guns were not fully loaded before this.
3. I believe Derrick made a comment about how he found Lyle's testimony regarding his parents making plans to kill him at that moment significant because the parents didn't have guns. This is factually untrue. The parents owned two of their own rifles.
4. I'm not sure why Stephanie was so adamant in this episode that Lyle was lying about seeing his father stood up when he was initially shot because it was testified to at BOTH trials that the most likely scenario is that Jose was stood up at first and then was blown back into the couch which funnily enough is what Derrick assumed. One of the reasons for this as testified to by the coroner was that there would have been no way for Jose to have received his leg wound being sat down. In the second trial forensic pathologist Cyril Wecht testified to blood being found next to the coffee table which would have been something that dropped on the floor because Jose was stood up and bleeding.
5. Derrick refers to Lyle's reloading and contact head wounds he inflicted as being indicative of someone who is "cold blooded". There is some bias because they were defense experts but multiple experts did conclude that the crime scene was much more indicative of heat of passion and fear which is much more in line with a hot blooded or emotional killing and they included Lyle's reloading as part of the overkill. One of these experts was the fantastic Dr Ann Burgess and I highly recommend checking out her work or even just her testimony in this case where she explains her point of view very well with her years of research. She also was interviewed a couple years ago for this podcast specifically about this case. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xynChLTVl8&t=441s . She does not believe either brother is a "sociopath".

The brothers initial police interview:

1. Stephanie states in this episode that the brothers told the police that the mob was responsible for the killings in these interviews but the truth is a bit more complex than that. Erik didn't mention anything about the mob and his interview is cut very short because he's mostly just rambling and is inconsolable. Lyle repeatedly tells Sgt Edmonds that he has no idea who could have done it. Sgt Edmonds keeps telling him that they need to find who did this and pushes him for an answer. Finally Lyle mentions that it could have been something to do with his father's business connections.

These are just some of the things I picked up on during the episode and wanted to discuss a little bit. Of course I have my own definite opinions and other people will come to different conclusions. I'm less bothered by the opinions of Stephanie and Derrick and am more bothered by the small factual errors Stephanie keeps making.

Related to Kendrick, Kanye, and why the whole industry is moving against Drake
This is probably going to get buried but i'll post it to see if people realize the manipulation going on
https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787540144393777653 https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787186424216748504
in case the tweets get deleted

All of Drake corporate partners along with UMG just finished their Zoom call and about to have lunch....emails were sent to pgLAng management an hour ago
UMG executives watching us scream "A-minorrrrrrrrrrrrrr" about their musician who is only second to Swift....dog....someone needs to step in and have a one on one with Dot....come clean and say he won but money is starting to get compromised lol...please stand down

master link: https://ktt2.com/how-umg-drke-gamma-eldridge-industries-are-manipulating-you-and-32569617
TL;DR: gamma is propped up by a massive media, promo machine and UAE that covers all types of content. Drake is a figurehead and likely has a quiet deal or a cut of gamma thru his relationship with Larry Jackson, who a weird track record with Eldridge Industries, Gamma’s parent company which itself has ties to UMG
Todd Boehly is a very wealthy powerful business owner that has dozens of companies in every sector under his holding company Eldridge Industries. Including gamma
Eldridge Industries owns all of the following in music, media, entertainment and sports: eldridge.com/businesses

• gamma.
• Billboard / Billboard music awards
• Rolling Stone
• Deadline
• Variety
• A24
• SXSW
• The Shade Room
• Deadline
• Daily Hits Double
• Luminate
• Dick Clark Productions
• The Hollywood Reporter
• VIBE
• Life is Beautiful
• Golden Globes
• Latin Music Awards
• American Music Awards
• Streamy Awards
• ViralNation
• Los Angeles Dodgers
• Chelsea FC

So they are using Rolling Stone, owned by the same conglomerate, to declare that Kendrick as the winner when Kendrick is barely getting started unveiling Drake's character and his shady dealings. Drake is spiraling but need to be taught more than a lesson than an easy fix of the suits stepping in. There need to be consequences.
The OVO umbrella consists of 20 shell companies that more less launders money from Canada's underworld including the sex trafficking of minors, which is why Baka is still around and people have been whispering about these stories since 2015.
https://twitter.com/hntrbrkmedia/status/1787548433428947030 https://twitter.com/DRBoguslaw/status/1787549681968398828
This is hip hop. The suits should not step in simply because their 'investment' is going downhill. Since when did hip hop care about what the suits have to say? Let it ride
If drake's empire falls, so does a portion of this suffocating chokehold that Todd Boehly/Lucian Grainge/Larry Jackson have on the industry. You see the music quality spiraling and there are industry plants everywhere held up by fake personas and back stories
If you love grass roots music, representing for the people, and not distilled manufactured hits to pacify the public whenever there are real issues at hand that real artists have the courage to address, you must side with the matter that Kendrick should not let off the pedal or let the beef cycle die simply because Drake's exposal or perception may lead to them losing sponsorships. Don't buy that 80th car or chain, cry more. Don't use American dollars to launder the Canadian underworld while the suits turn the blind eye, then! We want to see that empire fall and crumble because real music is so hard to come by in the record industry nowadays
To paraphrase what Kendrick said: the audience not dumb

Related to Kendrick, Kanye, and why the whole industry is moving against Drake
This is probably going to get buried but i'll post it to see if people realize the manipulation going on
https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787540144393777653 https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787186424216748504
in case the tweets get deleted

All of Drake corporate partners along with UMG just finished their Zoom call and about to have lunch....emails were sent to pgLAng management an hour ago
UMG executives watching us scream "A-minorrrrrrrrrrrrrr" about their musician who is only second to Swift....dog....someone needs to step in and have a one on one with Dot....come clean and say he won but money is starting to get compromised lol...please stand down

master link: https://ktt2.com/how-umg-drke-gamma-eldridge-industries-are-manipulating-you-and-32569617
TL;DR: gamma is propped up by a massive media, promo machine and UAE that covers all types of content. Drake is a figurehead and likely has a quiet deal or a cut of gamma thru his relationship with Larry Jackson, who a weird track record with Eldridge Industries, Gamma’s parent company which itself has ties to UMG
Todd Boehly is a very wealthy powerful business owner that has dozens of companies in every sector under his holding company Eldridge Industries. Including gamma
Eldridge Industries owns all of the following in music, media, entertainment and sports: eldridge.com/businesses

• gamma.
• Billboard / Billboard music awards
• Rolling Stone
• Deadline
• Variety
• A24
• SXSW
• The Shade Room
• Deadline
• Daily Hits Double
• Luminate
• Dick Clark Productions
• The Hollywood Reporter
• VIBE
• Life is Beautiful
• Golden Globes
• Latin Music Awards
• American Music Awards
• Streamy Awards
• ViralNation
• Los Angeles Dodgers
• Chelsea FC

So they are using Rolling Stone, owned by the same conglomerate, to declare that Kendrick as the winner when Kendrick is barely getting started unveiling Drake's character and his shady dealings. Drake is spiraling but need to be taught more than a lesson than an easy fix of the suits stepping in. There need to be consequences.
The OVO umbrella consists of 20 shell companies that more less launders money from Canada's underworld including the sex trafficking of minors, which is why Baka is still around and people have been whispering about these stories since 2015.
https://twitter.com/hntrbrkmedia/status/1787548433428947030 https://twitter.com/DRBoguslaw/status/1787549681968398828
This is hip hop. The suits should not step in simply because their 'investment' is going downhill. Since when did hip hop care about what the suits have to say? Let it ride
If drake's empire falls, so does a portion of this suffocating chokehold that Todd Boehly/Lucian Grainge/Larry Jackson have on the industry. You see the music quality spiraling and there are industry plants everywhere held up by fake personas and back stories
If you love grass roots music, representing for the people, and not distilled manufactured hits to pacify the public whenever there are real issues at hand that real artists have the courage to address, you must side with the matter that Kendrick should not let off the pedal or let the beef cycle die simply because Drake's exposal or perception may lead to them losing sponsorships. Don't buy that 80th car or chain, cry more. Don't use American dollars to launder the Canadian underworld while the suits turn the blind eye, then! We want to see that empire fall and crumble because real music is so hard to come by in the record industry nowadays
To paraphrase what Kendrick said: the audience not dumb

Related to Kendrick and why the whole industry is moving against Drake
This is probably going to get buried but i'll post it to see if people realize the manipulation going on
https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787540144393777653 https://twitter.com/FlyoutChase/status/1787186424216748504
in case the tweets get deleted

All of Drake corporate partners along with UMG just finished their Zoom call and about to have lunch....emails were sent to pgLAng management an hour ago
UMG executives watching us scream "A-minorrrrrrrrrrrrrr" about their musician who is only second to Swift....dog....someone needs to step in and have a one on one with Dot....come clean and say he won but money is starting to get compromised lol...please stand down

master link: https://ktt2.com/how-umg-drke-gamma-eldridge-industries-are-manipulating-you-and-32569617
TL;DR: gamma is propped up by a massive media, promo machine and UAE that covers all types of content. Drake is a figurehead and likely has a quiet deal or a cut of gamma thru his relationship with Larry Jackson, who a weird track record with Eldridge Industries, Gamma’s parent company which itself has ties to UMG
Todd Boehly is a very wealthy powerful business owner that has dozens of companies in every sector under his holding company Eldridge Industries. Including gamma
Eldridge Industries owns all of the following in music, media, entertainment and sports: eldridge.com/businesses

• gamma.
• Billboard / Billboard music awards
• Rolling Stone
• Deadline
• Variety
• A24
• SXSW
• The Shade Room
• Deadline
• Daily Hits Double
• Luminate
• Dick Clark Productions
• The Hollywood Reporter
• VIBE
• Life is Beautiful
• Golden Globes
• Latin Music Awards
• American Music Awards
• Streamy Awards
• ViralNation
• Los Angeles Dodgers
• Chelsea FC

So they are using Rolling Stone, owned by the same conglomerate, to declare that Kendrick as the winner when Kendrick is barely getting started unveiling Drake's character and his shady dealings. Drake is spiraling but need to be taught more than a lesson than an easy fix of the suits stepping in. There need to be consequences.
The OVO umbrella consists of 20 shell companies that more less launders money from Canada's underworld including the sex trafficking of minors, which is why Baka is still around and people have been whispering about these stories since 2015.
https://twitter.com/hntrbrkmedia/status/1787548433428947030 https://twitter.com/DRBoguslaw/status/1787549681968398828
This is hip hop. The suits should not step in simply because their 'investment' is going downhill. Since when did hip hop care about what the suits have to say? Let it ride
If drake's empire falls, so does a portion of this suffocating chokehold that Todd Boehly/Lucian Grainge/Larry Jackson have on the industry. You see the music quality spiraling and there are industry plants everywhere held up by fake personas and back stories
If you love grass roots music, representing for the people, and not distilled manufactured hits to pacify the public whenever there are real issues at hand that real artists have the courage to address, you must side with the matter that Kendrick should not let off the pedal or let the beef cycle die simply because Drake's exposal or perception may lead to them losing sponsorships. Don't buy that 80th car or chain, cry more. Don't use American dollars to launder the Canadian underworld while the suits turn the blind eye, then! We want to see that empire fall and crumble because real music is so hard to come by in the record industry nowadays
To paraphrase what Kendrick said: the audience not dumb

I do a bit of tutoring on the side and one of the kids I tutor is a 3-year-old girl, it’s less tutoring and more playing games toys etc and practicing using English. There’s no problems with the lessons but there’s another child— a 1-year-old girl— their mum always has sitting in on the lesson. It’s been a couple lessons and it’s pretty much become tutoring two kids for the price of one, because you can’t really ignore or disengage with a young child who is playing with the same toys and sitting in the same room. I’m fine to keep this up… if I get paid fairly. It’s a bit miffing that I accepted a job for one child and the pay of such but I regularly am dealing with both kids, but the 1-year-old is essentially a free add-in I wasn’t told about prior. The mum is really nice and clearly cares about practicing English as opposed to some tutoring I do which feels like “just babysit them for an hour, parents don’t really care”. I typically charge 2,000 p/h per kid (+ 1,000 in transport charges because they live pretty far out) and an extra 1,000 per other child being taught in the same lesson. So I essentially want to go to the mum and ask for 4,000 instead of the current 3,000. I think it’s a fair ask but I get a little tripped up on how to ask and phrase it. Anyone with a bit more experience have an idea on the right way to phrase and request this? Should I do it in person or over LINE? I want to phrase it in the way of “I love the kids and the lessons, but it’s a better pay for me for the work of two kids” essentially
Edit: Welp I sent her a message over LINE saying as nicely as possible “Hey! I’ve been really enjoying these lessons and I hope the girls are too! However conducting a lesson for two kids is a little bit stressful since I’m only supposed to be teaching X-chan. Maybe for the forthcoming lessons, you could bring Y-chan to play in a different room? If we want to continue having lessons with both X-chan and Y-chan, there’s a little bit of a fee increase as I’m doing the rate for one child lessons at the moment. For both of them the lesson cost continuing will be Y4,500. Please let me know what you think and we can discuss this further! 😊” (I’m paraphrasing off memory but that was pretty much the message) She got back to me and said “I understand. I didn’t know you were teaching English to my daughter. I will not be taking your lesson. Thank you.” Which feels… weird? Like you’ve been sitting in on all the lessons seeing me play with and engage both daughters and practice English. I feel like people saying ‘she knows what she’s doing’ were right cus I do feel a bit shortchanged and she just knew she was getting two-child English babysitting right at her doorstep for a very low price and asking for a fair price was enough to drive her away. Considering she lives in a pretty remote area and I was meeting her at her home, during very easy hours (Sat afternoons) I feel like she was getting a really good deal and I’m justified in asking for 4,500 vs 3,000. The cut to my weekly earnings stings a bit but at the end of the day I can find another client and I was probably doing myself a favour getting rid of the obligation to kill my entire Saturday for her. You live and you learn!

With all the recent conversation about Guardian, it's interesting to me how controversial everything about it seems to be. Some people think the class only need minor adjustments, others think it should be burned to the ground and reworked from scratch. Some think Taunt is useless, others think it's the best thing mankind ever created. Jest-y hyperboles aside, I started trying to figure out why such radically different experiences, and I think I arrived at something. Maybe.
What is a Tank?
Defining the word "tank" or similar terms such as "defender" has always been hard. There's been plenty of discussion over the years, memes, and even a Tank Alignment Chart for a reason. You can generally get people to agree that a tank needs to be sturdy and have a way to make people actually want to attack them, but get past that and things get really blurry.
Does a true tank need to be able to endure the entire opposing force beating on them continuously? Well that certainly sounds cool as hell but almost impossible to make work in a TTRPG scenario. Do they need to be able to tank single target bosses? Minions? Both? How directly do their abilities need to work in terms of making people want to hit you? These are all questions you'll get wildly different answers for.
But there are some interesting patterns to look at.
Narrative vs Mechanical Reality

You are the shield, the steel wall that holds back the tide of deadly force exhibited by enemies great and small.

When you open the Guardian class, this is the first sentence you see. If you look at everything else, from Irabeth's art to the feat names and ability descriptions, they all seem to paint about the same picture: you are the toughest, bravest bastard around. That means you'll be in the frontlines, smacking people's heads and taunting the scariest enemies so they keep focusing you, right? Right, Anakin?
Well... no. Right now, that doesn't seem to be a good way to play a Guardian. Being in the frontline means you can't Intercept for your squishies, and taunting a boss monster is almost suicide. Hampering Sweeps, as broken as it is, is currently the main way to make that playstyle viable, but the rest of Guardian's kit doesn't lend itself to that at all.
If you play as a mid-liner who stays very close or even adjacent to your squshies, and only use Taunt on enemies that are either too weak to be a threat to you but could be one to your allies, or that are positioned in a way that they can't attack you properly, everything starts clicking better. Is it perfect? Absolutely not. Is it as good as a Champion? I don't think so either. But at least it's functional. If you see your Guardian as a tactician, a sort of defensive analogue to the Commander who will play dirty or even cowardly when needed to win, it's a decent class.
The issue is: a lot of people, myself included, don't want to play this class like that. It's very far from the fantasy we're looking for.
The weapon proficiency/specialization weirdness ultimately comes down to a similar issue. The idea of a martial with bad weapon progression that uses Strikes as a last resort is definitely not unworkable, but how much does it really fit a "heavily armored warrior" class? At which point do you start asking yourself why the class is even a martial and not some kind of pure skill monkey/tank or a dedicated Grappler?
A New (Combat) Challenger
The 4e Fighter, later renamed Weaponmaster due to Essentials shenanigans, was a very controversial class on release. No, not because of people calling it overpowered. Wrong game. It was controversial because 4e made the Fighter an explicit Defender, with martial damage-dealing roles going to the Rogue, Ranger and later on the Barbarian instead. Anyone who actually played 4e for long knows that the Fighter dealt a shit ton of damage anyway, but I digress. This is just a fun piece of history not too related to the main point.
Fighter's main thing was a feature called Combat Challenge, which was basically two features in one. I'll be paraphrasing because I don't want the Pinkertons at my doorstep:
The first part of Combat Challenge was a passive. Whenever you attacked someone, regardless of hitting or missing, they were Marked for one round. That means they have a -2 on all attacks that don't include you as the target or one of the targets. Every Defender had a Mark ability, but Fighter's was unique in being tied to your attacks instead of an ability you had to activate.
The second part was a reactive power. As an Immediate Interrupt (in PF2 terms, that would be a Reaction that is resolved before the triggering action), you can smack someone who tries to Shift (Step) away from you or ignore your Mark and still attack an ally anyway.
Both abilities are extremely simple, but just by reading them you know exactly what you're supposed to be doing as this class. You go to whoever seems the most threatening to your party, your smack their ass, and you don't let them attack your friends properly. If they try anyway, you punish them for it. Though there was also some nuance. For example: with the way Fighter's Mark worked, it completely flipped the usual script for targeting. In almost every turn-based RPG, you want to focus all your attacks on one target to kill them as fast as possible. If Fighter had a multi-attack power, though, there was a big incentive to spread out the attacks as that was one of the only ways of Marking multiple people.
They also had another feature called Combat Superiority, which made your Attacks of Opportunity gain a bonus to hit and stop enemy movement if they do hit. That one is less relevant for us, but it rounded out their kit nicely.
Challenging Lessons
I'll preface this by saying that I don't think 4e Fighter is a perfect class, or that Guardian should be a copy of it. That said, there are some places where I believe the former succeeds and the latter not as much.
First of all, Weaponmaster did the Tough-Ass Protective Warrior fantasy like no other. Everything about their mechanics incentivized you to be as much on people's faces as possible. While other Defenders like Swordmage and Paladin would sometimes prefer staying a bit back and using their allies as bait, playing cowardly was (almost) never a good option for Fighter.
Second, your Mark was tied to your attacks, which gave you a great reason to be "the martial defender". Attacking enemies was never a selfish act, because by doing so you were also helping your team.
And lastly, their kit was extremely cohesive and intuitive. Combat Challenge's active abiltiy fed into its passive, and Combat Superiority was there in case they try to ignore both by running away. You were a walking catch-22 for enemies, which I think the PF2 Champion also achieves really well, but Guardian not so much. Their abilities feel like a set of mostly unrelated tools, and there are some situations that don't seem very well covered by any of them (like protecting a melee ally against a boss enemy).
Conclusion
Again, the point of this post is not that we should turn Guardian into a hyper-aggressive tank and ditch what it's trying to do right now entirely, but I feel like it's not exactly resonating with what myself and many others would expect from the fantasy. The fact that so many seem to not even get it and end up "playing it the wrong way" says a lot.
I think the tactical protector who taunts from far away and wiggles themselves into putting enemies in bad positions is a valid fantasy, but I'd also like to see more incentive to do the frontliner thingy in the core chassis instead of a single busted feat. I'd like the mechanics to tie into each other to serve a gameplan better, and more intuitively. I'd like the Guardian to be better at using weapons, and then be given utility-based incentives to attack enemies, just like the Commander has, so it feels more like a martial class.

Okay… this is me about to be incredibly truthful for once in my entire life. We all have secrets…. But I have a lot. I KNOW there’s something very wrong with me. I’ve been like this my whole life.
I’ll start from the beginning, as far back as I can remember and try to paraphrase a lot of this.
I’ve always been a show off. I’ve always craved attention. I was an only child. My father abandoned me and my mother. Messed up part was my father was a pedofile I guess. My mother was 15 and he was her teacher. I never knew my father. Never met him. My mother wouldn’t tell me much about him.
When I started to go to school, I always wanted to be the center of attention. I was rude, argumentative and selfish all from an early age… we’re taking like from age 5. I would lie about everything. It didn’t matter what it was. I wanted everyone to like me. So I would lie and say I was rich. I would steal money from my mother’s purse just to prove that I was rich to my school mates. I didn’t really have friends because I was hard to get along with. I was a spiteful child. Once I hurt a little boy (we were the same age) just because other people liked him more than me. In school I was quite smart in the early years. Really good at reading, math, spelling. Things like that. But I didn’t really have friends. This was down to me ruining friendships. I would go to kids houses and ruin it. I’d be selfish, I wouldn’t share, I was violent. The violence issue is kind of a two issue thing. My mother was violent to me. I think that made me violent to other kids. It was serious abuse. She would do things that were sickening. Burn me, cut me, suffocate me, tie me up, starve me. But her excuse was that I was naughty and needed to be taught a lesson. I don’t know if I was violent because my mother was violent…. But I’m physically weak. That’s the funny part. When I was a young, like age 5 to 9 other children weren’t as violent as me. So if I lashed out at another child, they would be hurt and cry. I wasn’t strong, it’s just the other kids weren’t violent. But after age 10, the other kids started to fight back…. I became the “victim”…. I started to get beat up a lot. Most of the time it wasn’t because I was fighting and losing. I kind of realized that I wasn’t as strong as the other kids…. But my mouth…. Oh my mouth would get my ass kicked. A real dumbass. I would get my ass kicked and still keep running my mouth. But although I was physically weak, I would act like I was a real tough guy. That became my thing…. To make people believe I was tough. The same way I wanted people to think I was rich, I wanted people to believe that I could fight. I remember realizing that no one liked me in my school when I was 11. So much so that I chose to go to a new school far away from my old one, in the hopes that no one would know me and I could have a fresh start. This would have worked. But my character was still the same. I started at a new school. A fresh start. A chance to stop the lies….. nope. I told them I was rich. “I had all these clothes and sneakers, but I wasn’t allowed to bring them to school”…. I told people I was really good at sports (I sucked at every sport). I was skinny… really skinny. Tiny little wrists and forearms. Looked like a girl (I’m a man). At age 12, this is the age where other kids go through puberty and behavior changes. Now my fake tough guy attitude was no longer tolerated and I started to get beaten up a lot. I would say sarcastic and rude things to the wrong people. One thing about me is I didn’t really have fear in that way. What started as a fresh start in a new school, ended up getting me a reputation as a loser. The other kids didn’t like me. They all knew I lied a lot. They all knew I used to get beaten up a lot. In some cases I did get bullied. Buy it was because I was trying to fit in with certain crowds and they knew I wasn’t really one of them and they decided to clown me. Girls never liked me when I was young. Too skinny, too girly and weak looking. I ended up slacking on my school work so now I wasn’t that academically inclined anymore. But I had to keep lying to my mother. She had to believe that I was the top of the class. I would tell her that I was popular in school. Good at sports and really intelligent. I moved around from school group to school group, trying to fit in. The cool kids were beating me up after they realized I was a fake. The sporty kids would beat me up and clown me after they realized I couldn’t play any sports. So I went to the smart kids. The less popular kids. But I was an asshole and always thought I was better than other people. So they ended up not liking me either. I felt so alone and isolated. But I was too blind at the time to see that this was all my fault.
Lying….. lying became my thing. I would lie about anything. Imagine I’ve had an uneventful day at school. I would get home and say some random lie like “someone set a fire in school today and I saw it”…. No fire happened. I know that I did this because I wanted to have attention. But I lied about everything.
When I got to the age of being interested in girls, this was a sad time for me. Girls didn’t like me. Well…. I think some did like me, but I had such a bad reputation that it was embarrassing to be with me. So I would try to go to other towns and talk to girls in shopping malls with one friend that used to beat me up and belittle me…. (That’s a long story. But I didn’t have much options for friends)…. I noticed that girls in other towns that didn’t know me would show me interest. I liked that. I got to be someone else completely. But I was only like 15 at this time. At this age everyone is law and gone through puberty and I was just starting. A weak, skinny teenage boy with no muscle definition. Who loved to show off and lie. So I started to wear multiple layers of clothing because I didn’t want people to know I was so skinny. I was almost medically skinny even though I ate. So I would wear like 3 or 4 sweaters to look “normal”…. I was that skinny. I told you everything about me was fake.
I discovered porn at quite an early age and got an addiction for it. I loved women’s body’s. I lost my virginity at 16. I ended up meeting a girl that thought I was cute. She was also a virgin. We dated. But I treated her like shit. I would show off and tell everyone that I was a player. I would walk around holding her by the wrist, just so other guys would think I was the man…. Karma is truly real, because at 16 I walked into that girls house when her parents were away and she was having sex with another teenage boy. Karma….
So at this age I eventually met a new girl. From another town. One where no one knew me. I had problems at home and my mother kicked me out at age 16. So I moved to a young persons hostel in a new town. Met lots of new people. But the cycle of showing off started again. Make people believe that I was a gangster, a tough guy that wasn’t scared of anyone. Lie about everything. Eventually things went really bad for me in this new town, my fake life and facade got my ass kicked a few too many times. I mouthed off to the wrong people a few too many times, to the point that I had to flee that town. I was only 17.
I then decided to move to a city. A fresh start. No one would know me. I think these “fresh starts” were my way of trying to find a place where I could lie and be believed and never found out.
The city was worse lol. In the city the trouble that finds you is worse. But now I changed physically. I was 18. And all of a sudden young women started to notice me. I all of a sudden became “handsome” I guess. This became a problem. Why you might ask…. I was a violent person with a bad attitude, but I couldn’t fight to save my life and I was weak…. Imagine of all of sudden I learned how to fight…. I would have become a nightmare. Well this is what happened with my looks. I realized that girls liked my face now. And I became a womanizer. And very good at it too. I would have no issues with having sex with multiple women. I was a liar…. A good liar. I mean I could be caught off guard and tell you a convincing lie within a split second, plus I was/am a good looking guy. But I was never honest with women. I would lead them to believe that I was their boyfriend, and make them think I was faithful. I would spend nights on the phone to 6 girls or so. I racked up a crazy number of women that I had slept with. A number that you would think within itself must be a lie. But my life became sex. My focus was to meet women, get them to fall in love with me, and have sex with them. I used to tell myself that the only reason I was sleeping with so many women, was because I was looking for the perfect woman. A perfect face, perfect body etc. The reality was, this was true on some level…. But the perfect woman would never exist, because there would always be someone prettier. Nothing and no one was enough for me. I got bored very quickly. I would sleep with a woman once or twice and not want to talk to her again. But if she was really pretty, then I would want her to be my girlfriend…. This happened with many women. I look back and think how the hell did I manage to juggle so many “girlfriends”… But it was easier when I was younger, because the women were younger too.. They required less time and attention. I was really good at it. Really good at covering my tracks. I never got caught….. At the time. I’m in my early 40s now. So social media wasn’t really a thing when I was young and running around like my penis would fall off if I didn’t have sex. I would make sure that I didn’t have too many women within the same neighborhood. Fast forward to my early twenties. I had a main girlfriend. One whom I convinced myself I loved. However, whilst I was in a relationship with her I had sex with more women than when I was “single”. I became a hunter. Facebook was in its prime at this point. I started to go to the gym. Being skinny, I became ripped quite quickly. I would send messages to women and make sure I had thirst trapping photos. Facebook and instagram became my hunting ground. I no longer had to walk the streets. I stopped going out. I would only go to work, come home and talk to women on social media. It became a sport. Could I get the pretty women on social media to give me attention, and then how quickly could I get them to come to my house and have sex. I didn’t target easy “prey”… In fact I had very little interest in the women that were easy. I wanted the ones that were going o be hard work. If she was incredibly beautiful, and had a sexy body, I would pursue her. I’m not saying I was always successful. But…. I did well. A strange thing that I did…. I would keep a record of how many women I had sex with. I have sex with a woman and then I write down her name in chronological order. It started on paper, and then evolved to an electronic record. The problem with having sex with so many women. Other than the obvious sexually transmitted infections. Was that humans naturally get attached.. Especially when sex is involved and words of love are told. So I had to make these women leave me alone after I got bored of them. But I couldn’t just say “Hey I’m bored now”.. I;’m a liar remember. My problem is that on top of being a liar, I need people to like me. I hate the idea of people hating me. So I would try to figure out a way to make these women leave ME… or find an excuse to break things off with them, based on something that did….. No matter how small the thing they did was. I’ve broken a lot of hearts. I’ve cheated. Lied. Sex has become my drug. I will do and say anything I can to get it. As I write this I do feel shame. But the shame maybe is based on knowing that everyone reading this will think I’m a piece of shit. Not necessarily because of what I have done. A very narcissistic thing indeed. I’m in my early 40s now. This behavior of lying, cheating, sleeping around has not stopped at all. I’m 42, but I look like I’m 27 to 32. I haven’t stopped my ways. They’ve gotten worse. In some instances I’m honest to women. I tell them that I’m no good and hey should keep away from me…. But deep down I know by saying this I’m manipulating them to want me more. I went through a stage where I only wanted to sleep with new women…. Meaning only once. Remember I think I have a sex addiction. So I go through stages where I sleep with so many women. This ha snot been without its dramas. This era is now full of screenshots and social media evidence. Everyone knows each other in some way now. I didn’t write this for sympathy… I don’t even think anyone would give me sympathy. I’m not a victim. But even at 42 I FIGHT with myself not to lie. Sometimes I find myself wanting to tell a random pointless lie and I truly have to fight with myself saying “what’s the point in lying”…. I no longer want or care about if people think I’m rich. But I do want EVERYONE to like me. I still lie all the time. No one knows the truth about who I am. I left the town I grew up in at an early age, never to return. I don’t talk to my mother. I move around a lot. I can’t control my urges when it comes to women. I see a beautiful woman, then I have to be with her. I will lie, cheat, and say whatever I have to. I know there’s multiple things wrong with me. I know. It’s not an excuse. I’m just not capable of telling the truth. I’m not capable of being monogamous. I hate the idea of people disliking me or blaming me for things. I know this may result in so many people leaving hateful comments. If anyone ever sees this. I think I wrote this just to get it off my chest….. Although it won’t change who I am. If you asked die how would you feel if your daughter met someone like you…. The answer is I would hate it… But I can’t change who I am. I have been this person since I was 4 years old. I wanted attention and acceptance from my school friends. I tried to get it by lying and trying to make people like me. Then I got older and did the same thing, but by having sex with women. I don’t think I’m a bad person…. But I know what I do is wrong. I always thought that when I get older I would change. I would behave… Or my looks would fade and women would stop being interested in me. I don’t have any money so I can’t buy women lol…. But …. I don’t know. I wish I could change. I with I could be honest. The problem is I’ve told so many lies that to tell people the truth now, would destroy whole families. I’ve told too many lies, that there’s no turning back. Help me.

I've received a message and I was extremely suspicious of it, and I'm glad I was and didn't press or reply to anything. I bought two plushies today from Makeship. I noticed I received a message informing me that this 2 deal transaction was flagged as suspicious and I had to reply 1 in order for the transaction to be approved. Links were provided for me to 'check' information. I did not trust it one bit, instead went to my credit card's official app (As the message was was sent by 'them') and saw nothing. Decided to check the number on an app I have that recognizes unknown numbers, and saw it was reported 77 times as spam. So glad I didn't do anything stupid. Googled the number as I was curious, it seems to be an old thing, as in I found years old Facebook posts regarding this number and the scams conducted by it.
Thing is, while I know my card is safe and everything as I didn't click on any link nor responded, I am confused and concerned on how they were able to achieve this? Back then the older posts seemed to be more general scam like, but how were they able to gain the information I literally just today ordered from the site? Should I worry about something on my computer? The website itself? The card being at risk? Should I take any actions?
Not sure if it's super important, but a few months back my Microsoft account was breached (Password guessed), fairly sure due to Minecraft as it seemed to be a common thing with other people owning an account whom I spoke to, the account was breached after several attempts and they continued afterwards. I managed to notice it fairly quickly (Within half an hour) and it seems like nothing happened luckily, but I took it as a lesson that I need to up my security, as yeah it's been bad. Used same password for a lot of stuff. Since then I use complicated master passwords & password manager with complicated generated passwords (BitWarden, research showed they're trustworthy) and I obviously changed passwords for everything and enabled two steps authentication where it was possible. I really doubt these two things are related/tied to one another, but maybe? It's the only way I can think of at least. Or was it just a coincidence from them? I'm not sure. Confused and concerned, will probably discuss this with my dad tomorrow as it's late, but I hope by the time I wake up maybe someone will be able to provide some input/enlighten me with some knowledge.
No photos added as the message isn't in English, and therefore what I described of the message is also paraphrased.

Well here we are 30 something years later and I still ponder how it ended like it did. Not that we had any harsh words nor hurt feelings. Just life pulled us apart and we didnt really make the effort to stay in touch.
I get it we where young. You where a little older plenty smarter. We just had a good friendship that it seemed neither of us wanted to risk. Sure you where leaving me behind to go to college but that is how life works isnt it? We form connections and sometimes for no damn good reason it just drifts away.
We did try for a year to keep in contact. Through a few BBS we kept tabs with an occasional chat. But then AOL took over and they went the way of the dinosaur. By the time i was on my journey you where becoming a happy but ever receding memory. We had moved on. Our lives completely seperated drifting off in their own respective paths.
I met someone. I think you would like her. She is quiet like you. She has a wicked sense of humor that you would like. She is my everything and without her i dont know where i would be.
But she isnt you. Dont get me wrong i love her with every fiber of my being. Without her I doubt i would have lived another 5 years. But you had a way to draw out of me the best parts with little effort.
I regret that i didnt tell you how i really felt. It might have changed everything. Hell it might have changed the entire trajection of my life. See I had so little self esteem back then that I could not believe anyone would have an interest in me. Add to it that you where one of the few close friends i had and the risk of making that wierd or screwing it up outweighed by a mile be telling you how i really felt.
About a decade after I last saw you I ran into our mutual friend. Oddly she in some ways took over your spot when i was still in school. But i never had feelings for her. She was just a good friend that i could talk to and get feedback from about things. Which to this day still shocked me that you two knew each other so damn well. I met up with with her over a lunch. She asked me if i remembered you. After talking to my wife about you for what seemed like an hour (in reality it was 10 minutes) she dropped a bomb on me.
I had no idea you two knew each other. I didnt even know you where still in town. But what she said to this day 20 years later bothers me. She said upon learning i was married and had moved out of town that you broke down and cried. That paraphrasing here "you should have said something." That "i was the good one that got away". Hearing those words opened a scar in me that I had almost forgotten was there. Here I had assumed your kindness towards me was platonic only. But it seemed there was something there. Something that might have been above that. But sadly fate had other plans for us.
I heard you got married. I really hope he gives you the happiness you deserve. I hope you found true love like i have. As hard as this is to really compute i know there was feelings on my end for you. We never got the chance to see what they where or were they could have taken us. But at the same time I found in my wife my true soul mate. Im not really sure why it seems I feel regret. If im right we wouldnt have been a lifelong match in the end. But do i wonder what could have been for atleast a few years. What could have transpired between us that would have grown us as individuals and friends. I for one dated someone for two years that made my life extremely difficult. It was a one sided relationship mostly. She wasnt willing to open up or allow anything to move forward. Sadly my lesson from her was some people even if on paper they seem like a good match just cant seem to get the gears to match up.
I wish i could just meet up with you one last time. Id love to just hear you tell me about the journey you have been on since the last time we saw each other. Id love to introduce you to my kids. I think i heard you had one yourself. Id just love just for the hell of it to seenyou, hear you one more time just so i can say thank you for your friendship. So i can thank you for helping me understand what i wanted and needed in a friend. Just thank you for the time I had you in my life. It really meant the world to me. You where the shining light that helped me understand not everyone wanted to just screw with me. Thet some people actually enjoyed my company and wanted to have a relationship with me.
I miss you. I have since the last time i saw you. I hope you found happiness. I just wish just for one time we could meet again.
Til the next life. May we find ourselves in the same orbit again. And may the next time we have more time to be each others friend.

Kind of at least..
TLDR I feel like the original intention of BSG wasn't to maliciously scam their users. Most of the current drama is rather due to ignorance, incompetence and a disconnect with both the community and reality. The underlying issue being a chronic and total lack of transparency and communication. There is no doubt though that BSG has used deceitful and illegal practices to try and get their will, which is absolutely inexcusable. Im not trying to defend them here, im simply offering a hopefully insightful perspective and shed some light of what i think is the root cause of all this.
(Note that none of the "quotes" are actual quotes, theyre paraphrased to get the point across better)
Ever since the big influx of players in 2020, i feel like BSG has moved further and further away from interacting with the community. Back then I remember Nikita doing a poll on the website once, asking people how high labs keycard prices should be. I know, crazy stuff.
The devs and the community grew further and further apart as time went on and i almost cant blame them. Tarkov players are both the most pationate and bipolar community there is. Any kind of discussion regarding tarkov could have people wanting to either rip the devs heads off, or crown them as kings. (I wonder how many death threats nikita has recieved over the years lol.) Every player has their own perfect idea of the game and will fight to the death to defend their point. So on the surface its kind of understandable, that to retain any semblence of sanity Nikita and the rest of the team took on a very isolated approach. They do their thing and ignore most of the feedback, because you simply can't please everyone anyways. So might as well have it fully your way, "take it or leave it" so to speak. Phrases from Nikita like "players will think its shit anyways" in regards to the recoil rework (that was great btw) or "let them leave if they want, we will see who the true believers are" underline my assumption pretty well here.
Combine that with a fragile ego, a passion of his own and a russian/ authoritarian mindset, and you got yourself a terrible foundation for accepting feedback and criticism from others.
So naturally over time, if you simply go by this "take it or leave it" approach and ignore the feedback, you end up losing touch with reality as a whole. You start assuming what the players want, instead of simply asking them.
You can clearly see this mindset in regards to arena. What made Tarkovs OG endgame PVP so good was the responsive and agile movement in combination with a massive variety of guns and mods to choose from. Instead of building on that gorgeous potential, they ended up releasing arena ass backwards with inertia and of course the tragedy that is preset characters, completely and utterly missing the mark. While seemingly having no clue why it flopped and also never even considered flat out asking the community why they wont play it. Even the development mess that is team fortress managed to create small ingame polls that asked you why you prefer casual over competetive etc.
I feel like arena was a big factor in this as well, because EOD users started to be kind of a pain in BSGs ass, because of the demand that arena should be included in the package. That would mean that arena would be a big financial flop, because the largest target audience will already have the game "for free".
That might have caused a kind of apathy towards the community or EOD users, in the sense of "im giving you bastards what youve asked for for years and you just want to have it for free?"
Ultimately all those factors seem to have bled into the current drama: - disconnect from reality explains the absurdly high price point and the bending of the word "dlc"

• disconnect from the community explains the perks included in unheard and the unsuccessful attempts to "apologize" or rather bribe the community by giving them what they assume they want
  
• apathy towards EOD players explains the blatant use of sketchy business practices that try to squeeze money from an essentially dry well. "Fuck those ungrateful freeloaders"
  
• and lastly the general mindset of "take it or leave it" explains the doubling down on their practices. They were initially most likely not even aware of how morally sketchy or bad this whole ordeal actually is, leading them to double and triple down on it without realizing. "Why are people so mad? If they don't want it, simply dont buy it"
  

To get to my core point, i feel like unheard edition was never meant to be a scam, but is simply a reflection of the relationship that the devs have with the community right now and their distorted perceptions.
The drama unfolding right now seems more like a symptom of a bigger problem that should have been addressed years ago and was bound to break out eventually. I really hope if the game doesn't die, that this whole thing ends up being a lesson learned to try and establish a more healthy and functional connection between the devs and the players for the long term. In addition to that i hope that the devs manage to humble themselves a little and respect the community more.

I am srsly don't get it.. idk if it wasn't properly taught when I was in high school. now that I am in college, I feel like research is very new to me. can you give me some lessons on how to write a topic? e.g: introduction --- do I get from other sources then paraphrase or should everything come from my braincells?

This happened at the end, but seemed most important:
With the vibe of the narrator from Superliminal, a girl explains(paraphrased): The first lesson, my point of view was the student, and I didn't understand the teacher. The second lesson, my point of view was the teacher, and I didn't understand the student. But the third lesson, my view was in third person. It wasn't my experience, it was my story. That lesson was about math or some shit cause I'm that kind of child. My name is Tara Phlorsberg, but in the Dream I was nameless.
​
​
dream sequence that got my heart rate up:
description:
I am one of dozens of panicked strangers in a somewhat wide corridor. There is a large set of locked doors at the top, with a set of stairs(maybe 15) leading down to the corridor. Leading away from the corridor, there is 1 locked door at the end of the hallway(which I pressume has bullet proof glass). To the right, there is a funnel like hall leading to an elevator-like door, but not for an elevator, for a small apartment-like room that has flurecent purple lighting, and plenty of seating for sufferers. But the most important feature of this terrible place, was the rows of lights on the ceailing. In the dream, they looks like typical school ceailing lights, but you can assume they look different, like they can flashbang you like an iron man hand.
​
sequence: I start out in front of the elevator door, several people are in the room already, and I start to walk in, but someone grabs my hand, and yanks me back just as the doors close, trapping the many people inside, not that they would care, as we are all trapped in the larger corridor anyway for who knows how long. I turn around to see a small, African american girl, like the one from Annie or Wonka. "You don't want to be in there when the flashes start." she said, paraphrased. I checked the door, and it was impossible to budge. The girl motioned for me to follow her, and she leads me to near the top of the stairs, and covers her ears, while crouching/laying low. I follow her lead, but I'm near the top of the stairs, so she screams that that is one of the worst places to be, so I move near the middle of the stairs, and get into position, and then suddenly the cealing flashes, and knocks the many people around us to the ground, and they imediately cover their ears as well. The flashes hit us over and over again, its very painful to the mind. Everyone is screaming, but I hear overpowering screaming from the people in the elevator door room. After only a few flashes, those screams fade out. After about 30 flashes of increasing intensity, the flashes stop. I open my eyes, forgeting that I even closed them, and see about half of the strangers lying motionless. The other half is dizzy and disoriented, like they lost a boxing competition or something. I snap out of this daze and rush over to the elevator door, and it's open, all the people inside lay unconcious like some out here, but some have blood running from their ears, nose, and eyes. Those ones are dead. I feel an air current drifting into the room, and realised this room was a vaccumn a moment ago. Then, Just one guy runs out with his eyes closed, screaming, like a drunken ostrich. He runs into the corridor wall and falls to the floor, dead. It has been about 40 seconds, and 20 later, when I am at the top of the stairs, banging on the locked doors, the flashes start again. The first one instantly knocks me down, the most painful of any, since I'm at the top and didn't cover my ears. I quickly kick off from the door and tumble down the stairs into a clumbsy position, but can cover my ears before the 3 seconds elapses and the second flash/blast hits us. I couldn't tell if it was just me, but these flashes seemed stronger. After 30 more, it ended, and I looked around to see just 5 people still concious, excluding me. I noticed the girl from earlier had been using a dead body as a shield, like she had done this hundreds of times. we were all nonetheless very dizzy, 1 guy was just crawling toward the back door, so I started toward it, and clumbsily through myself against it. It was flimbsier than I expected. I knew it could actually be broken, but the girl screamed "No! Don't!". She told me if i tried a second time, the camera would track my movements and shoot me. Great. I went back obver to the stairs, and noticed a few people in suits and labcoats peaking through the doors at the top. They quickly disappeared, as in the window litterally disappeared and was replaced by solid door again. "Ignore them" said the girl. "They want to see your horrified face." I prepared for the 3rd set of flashes. I got under a dead body like the girl had done, and everyone else followed suit, except a young women who had succomed to the dizziness. These next few flashes were so strong, it felt like a sledgehammer was knocking me against an anvil. Within just 5 flashes, I was out cold. Then the monologue happens and I wake up.

At last week's CALSA (California Association of Latino Superintendents & Administrators) event, David Noyes, our Head of Curriculum, listened to a keynote speaker about equitable instruction for multilingual learners. The speaker's comments about today’s overemphasis on assessments and underemphasis on high-quality instruction resonated with him as a veteran teacher of #MultilingualLearners.
The keynote speaker said something like (loosely paraphrased): A test is just a snapshot. Regardless of high scores, serving #EnglishLearners quality instruction with quality resources is what’s important. That’s equity.
In other words, for equitable instruction to occur, teachers must be equipped with high-quality instructional resources. From our view, equitable instructional resources for middle and high school #ELLs should feature:
⚖️ Culturally relevant (both asset-based and age-appropriate) content that engages and doesn’t alienate multilingual learners
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Title is my TLDR, that's the most important take-away. I hope that it brings you comfort if you are also having guilt-ridden moments. The rest is just a long personal rant and why that sentence has meant a lot to me today.
In the process of re-entering NC for the second time. The behavior of my parents (guilting, shaming, boundary crossing, emotional manipulation, etc) have become clearer, and more obvious to me than they were before. Not that they were unknown the first time around-- I knew them-- but my own self doubt post-decision of going into NC (by comparison) weighed heavier the first time I went NC. I worried I was making a mistake, and maybe I was the toxic one.
I know I'm not perfect but I know that my decision wasn't done to stir up things. It was to break a cycle for me. I'm not asking for much. I'm merely taking care of myself because it is clear that no one in my FOO is going to do it for me-- my parents (and ES) have made it clear that they aren't capable of "taking care of me" (in the purely emotional sense, I'm completely independent from them and have been for 20 years). My ES as even explicitly said in writing that she doesn't want to own up to mistakes. What more proof do I need? Why keep banging my head against that wall or cowering in fear of them?
This time around, I'm entering NC because I was upfront with what I needed when I broke NC, and nothing seemed to change. In fact, my parents AGREED to the boundaries and then continued to TEST these exact boundaries constantly when I was back in contact with them. What a true waste and shame it had to be that way on their part. I notice that they don't address my feelings in any of this, only their own reactive ones. They get mad/defensive/lash-out/play victim when I only merely remind them of the boundaries, let alone when I defend them. The first time around for NC I let them know that I was hurt and they couldn't heasee/listen to me. They said that NC was hurting them-- and they refused to understand that this decision was for me not for them. I explained this to them numerous times, and even after I broke NC. That still doesn't seem to register because I'm always being accused all the time that my decisions (either taking NC or even just taking a few days space to process negative emotions by myself) is out of spite and the active intention to cause pain to them (says more about them than that does about me, I recognize that). I find that very insulting-- I don't think they realize how hurtful that is when they say that. Because, what that really means is-- their perception of me is that I'm a cold, heartless, callous person. But, they also have always told me what a warm, caring, thoughtful, special person I am in their lives. I can't be both. Which is it? If your perception of me up until now has been largely positive, then maybe asking me and learning about how I feel is more of a useful answer to WHY I'm doing this rather than hurling self-serving accusations at me? It's not doing any good at all to do that to me. It even proves me point further!
I won't lie-- the guilt isn't non-existent. I have it, but it's different, it's hard to explain-- I'm used to it now. I know what to expect with this guilt. I now know that it leads to a disappointing outcome if you give into it, so there isn't this big question if I'm "making a mistake". I only feel guilt, grief, and regret about not being able to have a sense of belonging somewhere. That's the thing I miss, is the sense of belonging, no matter how flaws it kind of was. But, I don't miss their treatment of me at all. I'm willing to power through the guilt this time around. I don't feel so desperate and beholden to it. As I said, there is no big question. To paraphrase one commenter on another post I made weeks ago said: you went back to make sure and know that the well is dry. I think that's the best way to describe the processing of second-time-around NC. If your family makes the effort when you come back into your life, then that's a different story.
I just let the guilt or upset exist within me, because sometimes you just can't control it. Because it's certainly easier to power through than having to slog through trying to get through to family members who won't listen. The only person you have to talk with about this is ultimately, yourself. And, I'm a reasonable person. I know I have my best interest at heart. I know I'm my own ally in this. I'm not doing this to bring pain upon myself, I'm doing this because I need to find SOME SENSE of easy living. And I've been trying to constantly seek out more resources and read more things that help me get through those heavy fogs of guilt that come and go--- I will admit it comes with a lot of mindless scrolling and reading books that are emotionally hard to read, but sometimes it pays off and something sticks. It makes me feel light for a moment. Today I found the line on IG, it's the title of my post-- I had never heard this one little line, but I felt it helped and I wanted to share it with anyone here who might also be struggling with any guilty sensations, or self-doubting putting themselves first. Again, the line goes:
"The only people who will be upset when you set boundaries are those who benefitted from you having none"
And, I know this to be true because I have people in my life-- close relationships-- who are the counter example to this saying. They aren't people who are afraid to call me out on my own shit, they're not afraid to disagree with me, they all see me as a whole person (complexities and goodness and all) and they're the same people who don't get phased when I tell them my boundaries-- they don't get upset that I sometimes need to put myself first-- even if it upsets them or gets into the way plans or something. They're always the ones who will immediately respond with reassurance. They often respond in some manner of: "sorry I didn't realize that would make you uncomfortable, totally my bad" or "no is a perfectly acceptable answer, no problem" and "That's okay, if you're not up to being around people today then I'll catch you another day. Feel better" and "you do what you have to do" And, there was a part of me (at first) that would be suspect of this reaction. I would wonder "well do they care about me enough that they don't push back at all? Why aren't they 'challenging' me?" When I unpacked that thought a little more I realized that my family had conditioned me to view interrogation and 'challenging me' and prodding and debating my feelings were "their way" of showing that they "care" or want to "know more about me". And, that's just not true. There are so many other ways to understand a person without invalidating and undermining how they feel. I though that them engaging with my feelings negatively sometimes was just their way of giving my feelings a certain kind of attention-- but not all attention is good. (aka "calling me out on my shit") That's something I'm trying to learn and unlearn. People can give you all sorts of different forms of attention. And, I know I should have known this because I am a woman, so that's not news to me. My whole life I've had to deal with moments of unwarranted demeaning and misogynistic attention, unwanted sexual attention. But, I've also experienced positive attention, warm attention, gentle attention, respectful attention, professional attention, therapeutic attention, been given space to by myself in certain situations, etc. I know the difference but sometimes I'm not capable of labeling/recognizing or calling out certain attention for what it is when it's negative-- because I often take criticism to heart. I want to make sure I'm not actually being shitty, and sometimes that line for me is blurred when it shouldn't be at all.
And, with family it's hard. You're conditioned to implicitly trust them (and their POV). You're conditioned to trust them to look out for you. So any negative attention is is connected to that trust. You assume that any negative attention they're giving you is because they're "behavior-checking" you. And, that's totally normal. If I am ever acting immaturely, childishly, entitled, demanding, etc-- I would hope that I would be told about that! And I remember so many times that I used to behavior-check THEM in those moments (by asking "well WHY is it so bad if I feel angry at you for saying that? WHY am I not allowed to feel negative emotions? etc") and it only gave to worse backlash and treatment. I would end up talking myself out of my gut-knowing that what they were saying to me and how they were treating me was WRONG. I would convince myself that I'm not grateful enough. I'm being to strict with them. I'm not cutting them enough slack. That maybe they are right, that I am terrible. And, I will admit-- my only flaw wasn't that I had negative emotions-- it's that I didn't know how to express negative emotions properly. And, why? Because they didn't do that either, I could only learn to express how my parents express. But, even outside of my inability to express negative emotions healthily--in reality, I was doing more than my fair share of cutting them slack. I was letting them get away and cutting me down and forcing me into submission when it came to me standing up for myself when it was totally my right. Even at a young age, let alone as a teenager and an adult.
That's why that sentence makes so much sense for me. They benefitted from me talking myself out of my own emotions, or connecting with my feelings and boundaries, they benefitted from calling out the fact that I had an issue with how to express emotions but unwilling to self reflect on their own expression and lessons in that area. Because, if I kept in line-- they got an "easy" kid to parent. They never got a kid who "rebelled". They always had a kid that they could thrust into any kind of uncomfortable or inappropriate situation without much push-back (or be able to talk them out of push-back). They could confuse my sense of self with what roles I needed to play out in my family. All the while telling me that they loved me and got to revel in "pleasant" family get togethers because I was going with the flow FOR THEM. When I first started therapy, I couldn't even tell you what my actual boundaries were outside of a single one: "treat me with respect and listen to me when I say I'm hurting" That's it. Just that one. that's how low the bar was...and still remains to be.
They're angry because they don't get to selfishly benefit anymore. They have to be called into accountability, and they don't like it because they're not used to it.

This story happened just over a month ago and I think it would be perfect for this sub.
I started attending a new university back in September, and with new places comes new living spaces, which in turn come with new flatmates. All started off fine and dandy, but around December time and especially over Christmas break, the effort being put into doing the dishes was minimal. By January, some people were doing less than that even, and their stuff kept on piling up in the corner of the shared kitchen.
Our flat of eight people was starting to become more agitated by the piling mess, and feeling more and more frustrated by the lack of action and more and more guilty for the cleaners who had to come and deal with our mess (their job is not to do our dishes, so the dishes remained in their corner, but it is embarrassing to present it in such a state). One in particular, let's call her Cassie, was particularly vocal about the mess, and as time went on we were able to narrow down much of the mess to two of the others, let's call them James and Emily.
By late February, I'd had enough, and sent an ultimatum to the flat group chat to clean up the mess within a week, or have it claimed as my own. Credit where it's due, James did identify some of his own stuff in the mess and cleaned up accordingly. A week and a half later, however, much of the mess still remained. So I did what I said I would. That was probably the most strenuous 2 hours of my time here, and some of the tupperware was so coated in filth that it was literally unsalvageable. Shortly after my cleaning bonanza, I took a picture of everything I'd claimed and sent it to the group chat, with the following message (I'm paraphrasing in this segment):
"I did what I said I would and claimed your stuff as my own. Some of these dishes have been lying neglected for TWO MONTHS. Some of the mess was so dirty it was unsalvageable. I am not your cleaning lady, so while you may claim your stuff back, I will keep it for at least a week so that you learn your lesson. NEVER DO THIS AGAIN!"
Cassie reacted almost immediately with a laughing reaction, and I knew my petty revenge was justified. While nothing was claimed for two weeks after the date for beginning to reclaim their items, Emily did eventually collect a bunch of her stuff. Nevertheless, a month and a half on, half the mess remains clean and tidy under my bed, and, with the exception of one bowl, this incident has not cropped up again.
​
TL;DR: Flatmates didn't clean up after themselves, so I did it instead, and claimed their stuff as my own.

The Endocrine system, being our physiological equivalent to acknowledging our bodies from the conscious perspective, would be how we interact with the machines that are our bodies. The Pineal gland is our key to this interaction. What we have come to be allowed to believe, is throughout religions around the world, there is a balance to be had within these knowledge foundations.
I need to start the rest of this with the defining of God. To define God in the most universal manner (including one that scientific communities could accept) would require an acceptance that this is not to condemn humankind to servitude or an inevitability, but rather to set an explanation or foundation with which to continue this thesis. When I mention God, it is to describe that which we cannot explain; what is neither responsible for our creation, nor our destinies. What was conscious before our consciousnesses existed, and beyond our physical attainment. The laws of the universe and physics alike. For spiritual purposes, 'The Plan' itself. Not of some sentient being, in control of all events and potentials, an all seeing, omnipotent judge of life above life itself. To define the governmental vibration that allows all other vibrations to exist above, below, and within its own wavelengths. To have a foundational explanation with which to use the term God with as much religious and spiritual respect to all faith systems around the world while still offering a universal scientific variable for anyone to accept. If we are able and even required to have a faith in something that we cannot see or hold, then we will need a universal foundation that transcends religious precedence or necessity.
It is imperative, as the reader, to remember this is not a work of religion, nor is it a work of science alone. It is, however, important to hold those generalizations and intentions as the foundational reasons for which this is even being written. The need for unification across all faiths, beliefs, or lack thereof, is only with our species in mind. As we are all conscious, sentient thinking creatures, spawned on the same gravitous ball of molecules and atoms, balanced ever-so perfectly within our solar sentence. So perfectly that while we may have regional differences, that have led to cultural barriers, we have no where else to go (as far as common acceptance is concerned), and no guaranteed form of eternal promise under our control, for survival even if we DID have anywhere else to go. Also driving this thesis is the acceptance of our solitude in the universe. Whether we are truly alone, or if there is life other than our own in our dimensions or not, is beside the point and if referenced, it would only be used from personal perspective. That is all while still trying to include the scriptural beliefs of divine beings, and also maintaining scientifically provable occurrences as well.
To begin with Christianity, the most widespread faith (and therefore the most important to address in terms of translation or conversion), the translation is imperative; both into and out of the founded religious structural beliefs. Starting at the beginning, just like the bible does itself, the reference to the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. Of becoming like God, with the indulgence of that knowledge. While this could literally mean a fruit, plucked from a tree made of plant cells bearing such flavor as to inspire philosophical thought, or if it means the birth of self-awareness and self consciousness itself; the unifying factor is that there was a point in evolutionary history in which humankind became either aware of our responsibility and mechanical duty upon this planet, or was shamed and stricken with a knowledge of our small, small place in the universe and how fragile our existence truly was. How we were removed from a carefree existence of harmony with what we call Heaven (or otherwise a singularity of blissful ignorance free of strife and struggle).
Our search for this attainment is what blinds us to the miracles surrounding ourselves currently, and the puzzle pieces that they are comprised of, which could very well lead us to that universal level of harmonious alignment with the mechanics already in place. To truly unlock our potential as a species, or even our spiritual existences we would have to dial back our egos and accept our diminutive position as self aware molecules. Nerve cells constantly firing around to each other, only alive because of the chemically driven sexual acts of those before us, that created a vessel of cells capable of hosting the parasites of our conscious states, requiring a self aware movement resulting in our births, and thus, the life you call yourself.
On the connection of the pineal gland to the religious aspect of christianity, the conscious factor comes in consciousness itself. Our consciousness consists of that constantly firing mass of gray matter that is comprised of nerve cell synapses. The 10-14% of continual energized mass is assumedly what we inhabit at a time. The other 86-90% is speculatively up for development, as though it were real estate, if it were in an unlocked state. What connects us to the physical world in which we live, is the pineal gland and endocrine system, which offers the chemical productions necessary for our nerve cells to operate, giving our minds the sensations and triggers that help us visualize our surroundings and acknowledgment of our dimensional states. With enough acknowledgment, it can be assumed that our pineal gland, or third eye chakra, could access or interact with those higher dimensional planes of existence. Dimensional existences that connect all life, depending on the awareness attained by any individual. Where we come from, at that point, becomes less of an evolutionary topic, and more of a spiritual topic. Using this perspective, the interchangeability of all spiritual faiths and foundations can be connected and progressed with.
I personally grew up in a christian household, and having attended catholic schools for a portion of my education, have more of a knowledge of the christian faith than of any others. That leaves my knowledge base a little biased. I, however, do not intend on leaving this as a christian only document. I do not intend on converting anyone to or from their beliefs. I fully intend on bringing together the other religions and opening up all of them to each other with a universal message that can be related to science, because there are those that do not have a faith to begin with. All need to be respected if we are all to attain a higher state of existence. If we are ALL to deserve access to the cosmos. To bridge the gaps in what we have believed, and what we have learned. To reach out to the skeptics, and the believers alike. In my 6th grade religion class, first period, I will never forget what my teacher told all of us in the room that day “Black magic is real, the different magics and workings of the universe are all real. It is not sacreligious to experience those things, nor is it condemning to experiment with them an to learn from them, as long as you keep your faith in God first and foremost and do not let any others get above Him”. Might be slightly paraphrased, but if so, it is only a matte of words, and not majority of the message. When the bible talks about “no other Gods before Him”, not once does it say the other gods are not real.... not once does it say DO NOT worship other gods.. just do not put any smaller parts of God before the entirety of itself.
When Jesus and other religious/spiritual figures spoke of being connected with the divine one-ness, or God, did they mean that they had a phoneline that only they had the ability to utilize? Or did they mean that there was a vibrational frequency that flowed in and out of all that exists, beyond law and comprehension? Did jesus die on the cross as an appeasement of blood sacrifice by definition? Or was his death a necessary event to solidify the message of what he was trying to convey? To have public record of his struggle to explain that which there was no science in his time to use to define what he was shown in his enlightenment with undeniable proof that he existed to begin with? His ressurection being more of a revelation to those that believed or understood his words than a pre-television rendition of a zombie revival? None of this is to state that he was not a “messiah, or Lord and Savior”, or that he was neither a Son of God or a truly awoken teacher of higher calling. Not to claim less of these religious figures than what is deserved. The sacrifice that was made is still of divine or holy levels of teaching and a lesson for us all. Along with any other religious figure from other cultures and faiths.

Hi all,
I’m on the track to finishing my foundation year and have received offers from other schools that I’d like to attend.
I have done pretty well during my course, however, due to being out of education for a bit I was met with some learning curves.
I have exactly 1 assignment I have to resit, it’s a short essay worth 30% of a module. The resit reason? I cited all of my sources, but didn’t paraphrase a few lines well enough. Even the teacher acted like it wasn’t a big deal(because credit was properly given) but more of a lesson for me to get paraphrasing help. I followed the advice and have never had a problem since (nor had it happened before anyway).
MY QUESTION: the unis I applied to certainly aren’t as high ranking as Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, etc. but do you think this resit will make them rescind their offers? Do unis typically care about (assignment) resits??

[Content warning: mention of sexual assault]
[EDIT: It should be noted that I am not trying to portray my actions here as intelligent or morally correct. This is a story where I fuck up a great deal and do some very stupid things. So don't come into this expecting a story with an unambiguous good guy who did something epic, despite what these types of stories tend to be. I suppose the subject matter of this sub applies to both me as well as my former friend.]
Buckle up, this is a long one.
A few years ago, I (26m) worked at a small business that does network administration and tech support for clients. When I say small, I mean small. At one point the business was just myself, my boss, and my boss's sister who handled payroll. This business's biggest contract by far was with a local charter school to maintain all of its technical infrastructure, a job so large that we effectively moved the business to operate out of a portable outside of the school. Eventually two few more people were brought into the business, and one of those people was the subject of this story. I won't say his full name, but we all just called him AJ anyway so I'll go with that. I was pretty close to my coworkers and my boss. You kind of have to be in a business of that size. We even met for weekly Dungeons & Dragons games. And that happened with AJ especially, he contacted me outside of work and we started considering each other friends.
AJ did get into a bit of trouble while we worked together. He got shit from our boss for being a little weird with the female teachers at the school, and he did date one of the teachers for a time which created all kinds of awkward situations. This teacher was in fact one of about 6 girlfriends AJ had in the time I knew him, none lasting more than about 2 months, it was a real revolving door situation. At the time though I just thought of all that as a whole lot of not my business. At the time I was in a long-distance gay relationship, and him and I didn't really have a lot in common to talk about with regards to romance. The way he treats women is the first of many red flags I missed, but at the time I didn't know how bad it gets. At the time the worst thing I knew about him is his drinking problem, which was pretty bad.
It was around this time that AJ started asking for money. I wasn't exactly in a great financial situation myself, the hours I could work were limited for disability reasons and I was barely scraping by. But sometimes he would call me asking for something like $50 or $100. He would swear that he would pay me back within a week, but usually didn't. He would insist that it's an emergency, and he convinced me to help. I am find helping a friend with financial problems, but he asked me for help so often that it started seriously threatening my ability to pay my own rent. Normally I wouldn't even bother keeping track, but sometimes I physically couldn't even help him if I wasn't paid back by the day that rent was due and he would swear that he he'd pay it back by then only to not do so. It got to the point where I started keeping track of his debt to me on a phone note, and at its worst it reached $2,000. He would also often ask me for help with transportation, at one point relying on me entirely to drive him around after he lost his driver's license from repeated drunk driving violations. At one point he has a huge fight with his father and got kicked out of his house for a few months, and I took him in for a while until he could patch things up enough to return home. He ranted a lot about how terrible his father was, painting him as a man who doesn't care if his own son lives or dies and who will flip out over the most petty things. Don't get me wrong, I was happy to help him through all of this under the pretense that I was helping out a friend in a time of need, and even the best people need help sometimes. I mention this because it's necessary context, and it later turned out that he lied about a lot of this stuff to get money and favors out of me.
Eventually, AJ and I both left that tech support job. He was fired for not showing up for a week after generally being already pushing our boss's patience, and a few months later I quit for mental health reasons that I won't get into here. Though AJ and I still interacted a lot, mostly in the form of him calling me. It wasn't all one-sided, he would sometimes do things for me. A few times he would plan out campouts where we would go cook something fancy on a charcoal fire, all paid for by him, and as someone who doesn't get out nearly enough I did need that. And at this point I wouldn't blame you for wondering if maybe this story will turn out to be one where I'm the asshole. But be prepared to change your mind real quick as I get into where things start really going downhill with our friendship.
One day, I go a call from a local jail. AJ had been arrested, and he used his one phone call to contact me. I came to learn that he is in there for domestic assault against his girlfriend at the time, who very shortly afterwards became his ex-girlfriend. The whole situation as he described was basically "she started it, I just hit harder" using so many words and he maintained that he did nothing wrong. I didn't really know what to believe about all that, I had never known AJ to be violent, but the ex-girlfriend in question was also someone who I had a very negative opinion of from what little I knew about her, and I just gave him the benefit of the doubt. The justice system did not, they locked his ass up for a few months. But he got out, and it didn't take long for him to get back in contact with me again.
At one point, AJ is introduced to another friend of mine. I'll call her Belle. I've known her for longer than I've known AJ, and we even dated for a short time (I'm bisexual, if anyone is confused) and when that didn't work out we became absolutely inseparable friends. She's a huge bookworm, has some serious self-confidence issues, and is generally one of the kindest people I know. Our reasons for breaking up were really just related to us not being sexually compatible (her sex drive is way higher than mine), but we still get along really well. So, Belle meets AJ and they hit it off almost immediately. AJ has had many girlfriends while I've known him, but I've only ever heard his side of those stories and I only half gave a fuck. This time was different, because the woman he was with was my best friend and I was getting her side of the story too. Less than a week into their relationship, I got a call from Belle asking for a ride home because she was at AJ's place without transportation and afraid for her safety. I really pushed the speed limit on the way there to bring her home and talk about what happened. She said that AJ had been getting real drunk, and AJ playfully pinning her down to the bed crossed the line into being very much not playful. She told him to stop, and he didn't. It never escalated to full-on sexual assault, but he was showing a disregard for consent that really terrified her. To this day I feel pretty responsible for not seeing the red flags and letting that happen, but nobody is more responsible for this than AJ.
Needless to say, the next day AJ got a massive earful from me. His defense was to blame Belle, accusing her of lying and trying to manipulate me. I saw through the bullshit, I knew Belle way too well to be lied to about the kind of person she is. Guy who just spent months locked up for domestic violence against the word of a woman who speaks with no filter and who would struggle to keep a Christmas present secret. It doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to solve this one. This was the moment where my friendship with AJ turned into something far more transactional. I drive him places, he pays me for gas and paying down his debt. I managed to get $1,000 of my money back over the next few months, half of the debt paid down.
[EDIT: I should add that at this point my relationship with AJ was purely transactional. I considered cutting him off, but I was his only ride to work and he owed me money. Plus, he was telling me at the time that my kindness was inspiring him to be a better person, which turned out to be a lie. I thought I was doing the right thing, but I was just being played. Some people in the comments have criticized me for staying friends with him after he tried to sexually assault my friend, and with that context in mind they are completely right. That should have been the final straw.]
It wasn't long after that though that the house of cards came crashing down completely. At one point while driving AJ home from work, I asked him a question. I don't remember what the question even was, only that it was a fairly normal and unintuitive one that wasn't super out-of-pocket. He reacted to it in a way that struck me as strangely evasive and defensive, so I pushed the question more because I found it suspicious. This set him the fuck off, he started yelling at me and insulting me over stuff that's completely unrelated to the question I asked and it escalated into a full-on argument. When we reached his home I dropped him off while tensions were still high, and left. Shortly after I got home I got a flurry of texts, AJ had been arrested again. I pieced together that AJ arrived home and shortly later started arguing with his dad in an exchange that escalated to AJ punching him in the face. Police were called, and AJ was dragged off as his dad filed a restraining order against him to keep him away from the house he had previously lived in.
As this was explained I ended up getting into an argument with AJ's dad, we both really didn't like each other and we both had a lot of unkind things to say. But as we argued, tensions were quickly diffused by the realization that both of us were mad at each other over things that didn't even happen as we thought they did. Anger turned to curiosity as we started comparing what AJ had told us both about each other, and we were able to prove to each other that it was all lies. He believed that I was intentionally and maliciously enabling AJ by shielding him from the consequences of his own actions and helping him get around restrictions that were meant to help him with his alcoholism. I believed that he was the cause of most of AJ's problems that I was shielding him from, but he's actually a pretty chill guy and once we cleared the air we actually got along very well. As we spoke, I came to learn a lot of context behind things I didn't previously know. I learned that AJ got physically violent with his 12 year old brother sometimes. I learned that he lied to me about his reasons for needing money, and that most of the time he was just using me to buy alcohol behind his dad's back. I learned that he lied to me about having ADHD and being unable to afford a visit to the doctor so that I would give him some of my prescription Adderall to just get high on. I learned the reasons behind his previous falling out with his dad, in which AJ was completely in the wrong. I learned that the reason why the people in his life weren't helping him is because he exploits them for everything they are willing to give and never tries to improve. All of this squared perfectly with what I already had come to learn about him, but it was a lot worse than I thought it was.
A few days later, AJ got out on bail. He tried to return home, but he was unable to and he ended up at a local homeless shelter. He turned to me for help, and that's when I confronted him on all this over text message. AJ had nothing to explain, only anger and hollow accusations towards me and everyone else of conspiring to be out to get him. To paraphrase the final messages we exchanged:

Me: "I'm not going to help you out of this. It's your mess, you deal with it. I tried helping you out with kindness, and you lied to take advantage of me. Maybe experiencing the full force of the consequences of your actions will teach you something. Or maybe not, but that's no longer going to be my problem. Never contact me again. Not even to pay off your debt."
Him: "I just knew you would turn on me too. Fuck you! You're an asshole!"

After this, AJ's phone service was disconnected. His dad was previously paying for it, and he stopped.
I've stayed in loose contact with AJ's dad over the last few years, neither of us have heard directly from AJ since these events. My current job is DoorDash driving, and AJ's dad works at a local pizza chain. Sometimes our jobs bring us into contact. Last I heard, AJ is now homeless on the streets of a nearby big city. Hopefully he is learning a very big lesson about not mistreating the people who would otherwise help him.
tl;dr: My "friend" took advantage of everyone around him and took a bunch of lies way too far to take advantage of everyone else's kindness. It all came crashing down as his lies were found out and he bit all the hands that fed him, and now he is homeless with nobody in his life being willing to help.

The Endocrine system, being our physiological equivalent to acknowledging our bodies from the conscious perspective, would be how we interact with the machines that are our bodies. The Pineal gland is our key to this interaction. What we have come to be allowed to believe, is throughout religions around the world, there is a balance to be had within these knowledge foundations. I need to start the rest of this with the defining of God. To define God in the most universal manner (including one that scientific communities could accept) would require an acceptance that this is not to condemn humankind to servitude or an inevitability, but rather to set an explanation or foundation with which to continue this thesis. When I mention God, it is to describe that which we cannot explain; what is neither responsible for our creation, nor our destinies. What was conscious before our consciousnesses existed, and beyond our physical attainment. The laws of the universe and physics alike. For spiritual purposes, 'The Plan' itself. Not of some sentient being, in control of all events and potentials, an all seeing, omnipotent judge of life above life itself. To define the governmental vibration that allows all other vibrations to exist above, below, and within its own wavelengths. To have a foundational explanation with which to use the term God with as much religious and spiritual respect to all faith systems around the world while still offering a universal scientific variable for anyone to accept. If we are able and even required to have a faith in something that we cannot see or hold, then we will need a universal foundation that transcends religious precedence or necessity. It is imperative, as the reader, to remember this is not a work of religion, nor is it a work of science alone. It is, however, important to hold those generalizations and intentions as the foundational reasons for which this is even being written. The need for unification across all faiths, beliefs, or lack thereof, is only with our species in mind. As we are all conscious, sentient thinking creatures, spawned on the same gravitous ball of molecules and atoms, balanced ever-so perfectly within our solar sentence. So perfectly that while we may have regional differences, that have led to cultural barriers, we have no where else to go (as far as common acceptance is concerned), and no guaranteed form of eternal promise under our control, for survival even if we DID have anywhere else to go. Also driving this thesis is the acceptance of our solitude in the universe. Whether we are truly alone, or if there is life other than our own in our dimensions or not, is beside the point and if referenced, it would only be used from personal perspective. That is all while still trying to include the scriptural beliefs of divine beings, and also maintaining scientifically provable occurrences as well. 

To begin with Christianity, the most widespread faith (and therefore the most important to address in terms of translation or conversion), the translation is imperative; both into and out of the founded religious structural beliefs. Starting at the beginning, just like the bible does itself, the reference to the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. Of becoming like God, with the indulgence of that knowledge. While this could literally mean a fruit, plucked from a tree made of plant cells bearing such flavor as to inspire philosophical thought, or if it means the birth of self-awareness and self consciousness itself; the unifying factor is that there was a point in evolutionary history in which humankind became either aware of our responsibility and mechanical duty upon this planet, or was shamed and stricken with a knowledge of our small, small place in the universe and how fragile our existence truly was. How we were removed from a carefree existence of harmony with what we call Heaven (or otherwise a singularity of blissful ignorance free of strife and struggle).

Our search for this attainment is what blinds us to the miracles surrounding ourselves currently, and the puzzle pieces that they are comprised of, which could very well lead us to that universal level of harmonious alignment with the mechanics already in place. To truly unlock our potential as a species, or even our spiritual existences we would have to dial back our egos and accept our diminutive position as self aware molecules. Nerve cells constantly firing around to each other, only alive because of the chemically driven sexual acts of those before us, that created a vessel of cells capable of hosting the parasites of our conscious states, requiring a self aware movement resulting in our births, and thus, the life you call yourself. On the connection of the pineal gland to the religious aspect of christianity, the conscious factor comes in consciousness itself. Our consciousness consists of that constantly firing mass of gray matter that is comprised of nerve cell synapses. The 10-14% of continual energized mass is assumedly what we inhabit at a time. The other 86-90% is speculatively up for development, as though it were real estate, if it were in an unlocked state. What connects us to the physical world in which we live, is the pineal gland and endocrine system, which offers the chemical productions necessary for our nerve cells to operate, giving our minds the sensations and triggers that help us visualize our surroundings and acknowledgment of our dimensional states. With enough acknowledgment, it can be assumed that our pineal gland, or third eye chakra, could access or interact with those higher dimensional planes of existence. Dimensional existences that connect all life, depending on the awareness attained by any individual. Where we come from, at that point, becomes less of an evolutionary topic, and more of a spiritual topic. Using this perspective, the interchangeability of all spiritual faiths and foundations can be connected and progressed with. I personally grew up in a christian household, and having attended catholic schools for a portion of my education, have more of a knowledge of the christian faith than of any others. That leaves my knowledge base a little biased. I, however, do not intend on leaving this as a christian only document. I do not intend on converting anyone to or from their beliefs. I fully intend on bringing together the other religions and opening up all of them to each other with a universal message that can be related to science, because there are those that do not have a faith to begin with. All need to be respected if we are all to attain a higher state of existence. If we are ALL to deserve access to the cosmos. To bridge the gaps in what we have believed, and what we have learned. To reach out to the skeptics, and the believers alike. In my 6th grade religion class, first period, I will never forget what my teacher told all of us in the room that day “Black magic is real, the different magics and workings of the universe are all real. It is not sacreligious to experience those things, nor is it condemning to experiment with them an to learn from them, as long as you keep your faith in God first and foremost and do not let any others get above Him”. Might be slightly paraphrased, but if so, it is only a matte of words, and not majority of the message. When the bible talks about “no other Gods before Him”, not once does it say the other gods are not real.... not once does it say DO NOT worship other gods.. just do not put any smaller parts of God before the entirety of itself. When Jesus and other religious/spiritual figures spoke of being connected with the divine one-ness, or God, did they mean that they had a phoneline that only they had the ability to utilize? Or did they mean that there was a vibrational frequency that flowed in and out of all that exists, beyond law and comprehension? Did jesus die on the cross as an appeasement of blood sacrifice by definition? Or was his death a necessary event to solidify the message of what he was trying to convey? To have public record of his struggle to explain that which there was no science in his time to use to define what he was shown in his enlightenment with undeniable proof that he existed to begin with? His ressurection being more of a revelation to those that believed or understood his words than a pre-television rendition of a zombie revival? None of this is to state that he was not a “messiah, or Lord and Savior”, or that he was neither a Son of God or a truly awoken teacher of higher calling. Not to claim less of these religious figures than what is deserved. The sacrifice that was made is still of divine or holy levels of teaching and a lesson for us all. Along with any other religious figure from other cultures and faiths. 

Hello! This is an A level guide for CJCians (but I'll try my best to talk about things which can apply to redditors from other JCs). Mainly, through this post, I will talk about the basic rules and mindset u have to follow to do well in As, followed by how u can boost portfolio, and lastly how to study for the subjects I have studied in As.
Do note that following this doesn't necessarily mean that you will 100% gaurantee + chope you will do well in As; I'm merely stating observations based on what I see and what I have done.
P.S. If u have any questions down the road, do comment! I'll answer ASAP.
I honestly didn't feel like doing it since I am very very unqualified (I see an A levels guide by 2 90RPers with H3 dist???) and I don't want to talk about my grades, cos it feels like flexing sometimes. However, my junior wants me to finish it, so here I am! ;-;
I'll lay down my grades so you can assess my credibility when I start my yap fest later on: Subjects Prelims A Levels
H2 Math: A A
H2 Physics: A A
H2 Economics: B A
H1 Chemistry: A A
H1 GP: B B
H1 PW: -- A
H1 Chinese (Does that even matter?): From E to C
If you are lazy like me and don't want to do the math, I had a small RP jump from Prelims- 86.25RP to A levels- 88.75RP! And another minor side note, I had H3 Game Theory Pass, but not like it matters here.
And for Ppl who wanna know my O levels for the relevant subjects, A1 for pure physics, A2 for E math, A1 for A math, and C5 for English LOL.
Now that I've covered the groundwork, I will go on to talk about the main topic ya'll are visiting for. Even starting off writing this godforsaken essay, I know I am going to yap harder than our master waffler Principal Woo Soo Min (Seriously, how does she yap better than Phyllis?), so I will be inserting as many tacky CJ jokes as possible to keep ya'll entertained while you scroll. So sit back and watch, let me cook; better than Sedap Auntie's Popcorn Chicken and our BUSSIN milo (my chicago fr).

Basic Advice (Applies to All JCs):

Surprisingly, there is a lot of things to talk about for CJ than other JCs, because Science stream students (Includes arts ppl too!) are an abomination to behold. So i will list down common mistakes CJCians/Other JC ppl do that does them no good + harms their grades, in order of ranking.

1. Mugging Revenge Arc (Fueled by your inner darkness):

Ok, if you are one of these people who started hardcore mugging at January and February, pardon me if I am breaking community guidelines, but are you acoustic? You are mugging at the start of your JC syllabus, a time where they are easing you into the curriculum. So, you are quite literally maxxing out your fundamentals (which, prob like 5% will come out in As) and hitting the AS vertical range with little LRAS, cos you are trading huge amounts of effort for little gain in skills and content.
This is usually a huge red flag for burnout, and often times I see the foyer tables packed with J1s at the start of J2, only for that emo (i need my academic comeback arc) craze to end by March/early April.
I understand that you regret underperforming, I did too. I wanted to go EJC (COP: L1R5 6) but I got 14 raw, which honestly hit me like a truck. I studied from afternoon to morning (4am), grappling with covid to what end (I had to go to hospital, even until today idk why :p). Thus, it is good to remember that revenge is slow and sweet, so take your learning slow when you kickstart your JC journey. Matriculation is a time for exploration; make new friends, and prioritise productivity over time studied. We are not competing with KPIs uk. I will talk about how i study later on. Take baby steps alright? A levels isnt a 100m sprint, it is a marathon.
Remember: Alex Wong had to walk first in order to cycle, and had to roll first before he could walk (I feel so bad for saying this now alamak)

2. Hold pen, not hold hand:

Like come on man, time is so tight in JC and you still want a girlfriend?? I can tell you with confidence that 90% of the relationships formed in CJC usually die out quickly and end out with you going depresso and not motivated to study. Prior experience: I saw a PW group get all B cos of relationship issues.
Second point is, why CJ??? You can find a much better guy/girl anywhere else, so it must be because of desperation. There is a reason why pregnancy rates are not what it used to be 10 yrs ago, and it is not because we are any less horny. All in all, there's no point pursuing love during JC; it is high maintenance, and low chance of success at the cost of your grades.
My advice is to step up your game, bro. If you really want to go out with a girl/guy and have the physical touch of a woman/guy (like me fr ;-;), perhaps stay good friends and confess after A levels? In the meantime, you 2 can go on study dates. Make your relationship mutual; help each other in building your work ethic, and teach each other valuable skillsets which would ultimately help both of you on D day (i.e. A levels).
Just, don't think with your Neil Armstrong Jet Cannon as first priority ok? Focus on delayed gratification first... (YES! WE GET IT DAWN ANG!!!)

3. Drama & Hype:

I put them together since they are not that bad but still impactful to your studying
Drama is definitely inevitable in any JC, even between teachers (I heard a couple back when I was in J1, it would surprise you). ESPECIALLY in PW AHEM AHEM, it can cost you your A if drama ruins the rapport between your grp mates or their productivity. More relevant to 70RPers is that it can also affect your mentality as well. If you feel worthless, you would be worthless.
So my advice would be to steer clear of drama as much as possible, but I know it can be hard to avoid; I have had my own share of ppl trashtalking me, some for stupid and some for good reason. My take is to ignore them, and if it really directly affects you (e.g. PW), do not sound out to the teacher, it is so useless. Just strategise and find a way to make all parties happy and productive.
(I feel like I need to point this out, but when I mean do not tell cher, it means do not ask your cher to tell slackers to buck up or face a penalty. U r going to sabo ur team rapport unintentionally. If you want to seek counselling due to issues like bullying, then it is a good idea. You can also reach out to your school counsellor as well)
On the other side of the spectrum, you are high after the orientation craze (can't blame you, it is hype). The times where you glorify staircase 6 as our holiest (ironically) tourist attraction should be over, and you should lock in already. If you don't, you mind may be oriented towards getting the most out of your JC experience instead of studying, which could lead to your work snowballing and you would definitely suffer later on in J2. If you reach that stage, CJ will not be burning hot for you anymore (CJ is burning hot cheer fr).

How I study (Brief Overview but it's not brief):

There are many different ways to study and manage your time, but I will talk about mine here. If this is as boring as morning sharing, deal with it, just like how you have to stand in the piazza to wait for their yapping to cease.
It is quite simple. Just think up a simple checklist to do for the day. Always prioritise your homework/assignments first. It doesn't have to be as long as the queues during recess (apart from Oishii food stall. Poor Oishii, the food is not bad...)
This is an example of what I would usually do in a day (J1):

1. Do SLS assignment (Physics Kinematics) + take notes + do tutorial qns

Yeah. Its literally just that. But do note that some physics assignments actually take damn long to complete, with like 4 sections (A,B,C,D) and school physics notes are very difficult to simplify and conceptualise (I will talk about it later on).
I have to emphasize that you should finish assignments ahead of time (like quite literally, finish your SLS assignments and notes at least 1-4 days after they are released in the portal. I usually check it regularly) , because especially in J1 block test, you won't have time to finish assignments while studying for the papers.
I often try to give myself more things than I can chew in a day. This is so that I can max out my time. If I do finish my work, I either give myself more if I don't feel like I have done enough or take a break for the day. Honestly, my point is to do however much you can do without feeling like shit everyday. A levels is just as much of a battle with the mind as it is a battle against time and grades, so make sure you do not go insane grinding; make it your first priority.
I was also in that academic comeback arc, so I started my JC journey with asking seniors how to study as a J1. I will list them down here.

1. "Use Mid Year Hols to make sure J1 subject concepts are all strong, because content in J2 would move very fast." I cannot emphasize how this saved my entire JC journey, because that is the only time you can actually catch up before everything goes lightspeed, and this is probably the only reason why I was ahead of everyone.
2. "If the first test (i.e. Block Test) in J2 is bad, do not be demoralised, since marking is stricter." This is true, and its CJ's way of saying WAKE UP BOYYYY. They will also do it again for prelims
3. "Make sure practical should be strong. Practical would be like 10-20% of your grades"
4. "J2 would be a lot busier, so enjoy J1 life first." Please do, otherwise you would burn out for sure in J2. Try to keep your UAS within the threshold of at least 65RP/80RP to ensure you are on the right track for science students. For arts, 50RP/80RP, considering the strict marking of arts stream.

I just want to thank the guy who gave me this god tier advice when I randomly met him in an ASTAR talk on AI in CJ. Honestly, bro was the reason why I had such a good start in JC, so I wish him the best!
Before the hols, you would be given revision packages from your subject tutors (Except for physics. Another L for physics dpt). I emphasize that these are a godsend and is definitely the best way for you to get an academic comeback. You should try to complete all of them during the hols. But ofc, it is a lot, so I will talk about how to manage that further down.
This is an example of what I would do in the hols (both J2 and J1):

1. Do math revision package

You would start to realise that my checklist is very simple. You don't need so much effort to plan a timetable for what to do for the day; it can be distracting when you keep checking the time (like how I start my stopwatch whenever Phyllis Lim starts her speech). But if it suits you very well, then that is good too! Fundamentally, stick to your style.
During the holidays, I would start finishing my assignments first (which would take like 2-4 days), and then start grinding practices in the revision packages. Ranking the workload for each revision package... definitely math is the hardest to complete, it would take up half of my holidays. After that, it would be economics, and then GP (it is just doing SAQ, how bad can it be? Boy was I wrong HAHAAHA).
I would make sure that Math rev package is finished, because every question given tests a unique concept/nuance that must not be overlooked if uw that A. Afterwards, there may be a time crunch for economics, since they would give you tons of essays and CSQs to do. For J1 mid year hols, I would analyse the essays and do qn interpretation instead of doing the full essays since I have yet to know how to craft my Reqs (I will explain how later for each subject). Then, for CSQ, I would do full ans for short qns and summary for the essay qns (i.e. 8m and 10m). Then for GP, I would do like 5-10 qns for each qn type in SAQ and then yeah thats pretty much it. If u got time, you can do summary practices ig.
If you are in J2, your workload would be much higher, since concepts are going to come faster than the light shining from Mr Sandanam's bald head (Shit's a flashbang I tell you). Thus, your checklist is gnna be a bit more than usual.
An example would be this on a normal sch day (this actually happened btw):

1. Do 1 full economics essays timed practice on topic ______ and 1 CSQ (do planning for essay qns)
2. Do 1 full math paper 1 from prelim paper _____ (e.g. RJ, VJ, etc)

Another example during the break before As:

1. Do 5 full economics essays
2. Do 2 full math prelim papers
3. Do 1 Physics Paper 2 and Paper 3

Just make sure it is within your workload threshold. Otherwise, it would be joever for u before A levels (like Mark Li's BMI, buuuuut not like he minds).
And I must EMPHASIZE THIS WITH ALL MY BEING. TAKE A BREAK. You ain't batman; you can't survive on 4hrs of sleep everyday fighting crime (aka your assignments). Take a break day on a/the weekend to unwind, and go out to eat with family/friends. Personally, I would do it on a sunday, but whichever floats ur boat. This is to ensure you are productive and not studying blindly. Even if you do 1000 practices of math qns, you are not going to beat a guy who does 50 qns and actively reads the answers and his working to analyse and rectify his mistakes. It also helps in the battle of attrition; you need to make sure you are in tip top condition for As.
CJC also has a late night study programme. I advise you go for all of them, because you are going to do a lot more work than you would at home as you are under supervision of teachers (wow, shocker amirite). Just don't come for the food, like my god can yall at least register for the dates where PSG is coming pleaaaaseee? Point aside, it would definitely be productive, and if you study with friends, you can discuss topics and ask questions about topics you are weaker at in the canteen (unless uw to do alone and silent, library is the place to go). Round table next to the stairs was my favourite spot.
Lastly, there is a way to gauge your ability for science stream ppl. Always gauge based on percentile. Once you are top 5% for the subject in the exam, you are likely to get A in A levels ( to put into retrospect, Physics distinction rate last yr is ~15%). If you can do it consistently, it is pretty much gauranteed. However, being principal honours roll does not gaurantee that you are good enough to get 90RP; it is only a good chance, albeit better than anyone else.
P.S. I am only scratching the surface. If you need more clarifications, feel free to ask!

Portfolio Boost:

Portfolio is pretty impt because it can help with ABA to unis if your RP is slightly below cutoff, scholarships and admission into highly competitive universities/courses. And, it can also help you fill up your Holistic Student Development Form, which is a godsend for uni/scholarship apps.
I gotta be fr; as a person with no leadership, a lot of extra curriculars are gated by grades/leadership.
I will cover them one by one. (leadership is very subjective, since I am not a leader, so take my words with a grain of salt)
There are different kinds of leadership in CJ; CCA exco, Student Council, SL and class committee.
What is common between all leadership types is that its admission is pretty much a popularity fest, and that applies for all JCs; you need to make yourself out to be a good leader, make new friends, etc to get elected these positions, while also making a good pitch through speeches. You can be an absolute menace to society but if you make urself out to be a good leader, boom leadership attained!
Moreover, the involvement you have in school events varies with each kind of leadership. While HTC/AHTC are both tier 1 leadership iirc, they have less (but still quite a lot) involvement in school events than SC. It would be another essay on its own to explain how CCA exco helps boost portfolio, so tldr is involvement is less than HTC/AHTC, although they tend to have similar or higher workloads, esp if we are talking about CCA presidents. Imo, SLs definitely has the highest involvement in school events, like sports carnival, etc. HTC/AHTCs generally look at class welfare and sch ceremonies, while SC organises events like teachers day, easter, etc.
If you are not in leadership, you are kind of missing out on these involvement, which can actually noticeably boost your co curriculars.
Moreover, grades can also influence your extra curriculars, albeit to a lesser extent. If you get honours roll, you would be in this talent development programme (TDP), where they would share events/activities which you can take part in to boost your portfolio. To list a few examples, outside of nomination for scholarships, there is the SUTD SEED Programme and the Halogen Programme (this one i took part in). It is reasonable why it is gated by grades; it requires quite the time commitment during school curriculum btw, so it is not suited for you if you are already struggling with studies.
I emphasize that I say all of this not to say your portfolio is joever once you don't take leadership/have good grades, but it is more like you can get all of these resources once you hit certain thresholds. Outside of these 2 areas, there are also other events to take part in to make your co curricular records look sweet.
Closer to Mid Year Hols, the school would give a couple of presentations regarding 4 programmes (u can only take part in 1 of the 4 but can apply for all), namely Work Attachment Shadowing Programme (WASP), STEM STRETCH Programme, and a law programme (i.e. JCLP) and an overseas immersion trip iirc. All of these programmes have their own prerequisites, based on MYE grades (much more lenient than TDP), which I will elaborate later on.
WASP is probably the closest thing to an internship out of all events in CJC. There is a range of different work attachments offered, and it varies from law (again, but only 1 slot) to like tech. I speculate that it is based on MYE grades, while following a class based quota of maybe 1-2 per class. people with like 40RP can get inside. you have to write an essay of application for the slot you want. I wanted the law one but was brought to CISCO LOL. Outclassed by a person who wanna go there to wear suit for fun gg. (If I am not wrong, It is headed by Ms Valerie at my time?) It takes place close to the start of hols (varies across diff attachments).
STEM STRETCH programme is what it sounds, and it should also be based on MYE grades oso. (it would be headed by Math HOD Lim Chye Fook, the NPC who walks around with his backpack like he is gearing up for a learning journey). You would be exploring science projects iirc (e.g. bottle rockets), if that tickles your fancy.
I am not too sure about the Law programme (JCLP) and the overseas immersion trip, but i am pretty sure the trip is mainly targetted towards VIA hours.
And I saved you 1hr of yapping in morn assembly/CCE which you can spend on playing brawl stars. You're welcome.
That is probably a pretty high key event for you to take part in, and a pretty impt one at that, since it is low risk on grades and high return.
Another one would be to sign up for OGL. That one is more strict on grades since you are competing with the cohort LOL. They gauge based on grades (I am quite sure above 50/80RP UAS should be fine), and then they shortlist you for an interview, which would then decide whether u r in. Iirc, the questions would be something cliche, along the lines of relations between OG ppl and you as an OGL, and how to break up conflict within ur OG.
There is also activities offered by various departments. The math department offers quite a few competitions and activities to take part in. If I am not wrong, Australian Math Competition, Math Olympiad and GC drawing competitions are some of the things the math dpt offers. Moreover, I am pretty sure the arts department also offers trips to certain areas for cultural immersion(I could be wrong tho). The school may also invite you to talks and dialogue sessions with ministers (e.g. Maliki Osman and CPDD (Economics)).
Lastly, you can also search for events to take part in online/friends can invite you to take part with them. I am talking bootcamps, competitions and programmes by universities. I heard people can also take up mentorships as well. So there is a wide range of activities to take part in, as long as you search for it. Not that it matters too much though, if you are selectively searching for local uni courses only.

How to study (Specific subjects):

I have already written 3.8k words and on the brink of insanity. So if you are still reading, congrats! You probably can survive Mark Li's grandmother stories without sleeping. Truly a pillar of pure focus.
I will cover how to study each subject here. Essentially, how to approach the subject, how to do your questions and how to ace the paper on D day. I'll start with the most boring ones.
In the general sense, I try my best to max out/finish every practice given to me, I actually finish almost all of them, so ig thats what u have to do to be decent uk
Fun fact: I only took GP tuition, so you can actually make it with just CJ stuff

H2 Physics:

You take this subject either because you are good at it, or you are a chronic gambler (like me). The quality of your learning development is sizeably dependent on your teachers (albeit more so on you), and your odds are pretty much 2/13 when getting a good cher to teach the subject, ever since our holy god Mr Nordin left the school (you guys don't know him anyways). Your best shot at As is our favourite pokemon trainer Zachary Kok, or should i say Ash Kok, if you get what I mean :) (I hate my life rn). Lim Seow Thong is also quite good and will give you the resources (and his own videos!) to help you ace your exams. If you are ignite, don't need to worry man, all your chers should be decent at worst.
The way to approach physics questions is to ground your answers in concept. In calculation qns, try your hardest to stick the the equation used in the qn and sub in values to get the answer. "Close Enough" answers won't work anymore, that was the biggest mistake I made in physics. It needs to be accurate, and based on logic. For long response qns, you need to follow cause and effect thought processes when answering questions (i.e. this happens, causing this and then finally this happens), while ensuring all logic gaps are filled, so that you hit all the keywords cambridge markers are looking for. My point is, it is alright doing grandmother stories if it means jamming in as much concepts as possible; thats what i usually do LOL.
All the chers in physics dpt definitely know their stuff, but when it comes to teaching... jesus its like listening to 18 morning sharings in a row. I can't listen like at all, like I have turned into lobotomized sand. So I can feel yall when you say science stream is pretty much a death sentence. But, you can still do well with CJ resources!
The order of which I recommend studying for the subject is:
SLS + tutorial Qns + notes Assignment Qns A level Topical TYS Promo/Prelim Papers A level Papers
What I did was:
SLS + tutorial Qns + notes Assignment Qns Supplementary Qns Promo/Prelim Papers A level Papers
Why I recommend Topical TYS instead of Supplementary qns is cos while supplementary qns use older A levels qns which help with content building, Topical TYS is more relevant in terms of application while also achieving content thresholds.
The reason why I put SLS, tutorial Qns and notes together is because I do SLS while writing notes, and the SLS gives u assignments in the form of tutorial qns to do. So in finishing SLS, I also finish notes and tutorials.
Physics Dpt also give this revision package nearer to MYE (which is a LITTLE TOOOOO LATE) but I honestly didnt even use it. If it works for you, then continue using it! I can't really testify its effectiveness though.
How I write notes for physics is really simple. Plug in definitions, and add concepts which may be impt in exams (you can use the learning outcomes to see if it is useful). Make sure that these concepts are displayed as simple as possible, without burning your eyes and making it hard to revise in. Leave some space to add special notes to certain concepts so that you can add them when you make mistakes i practice.
All of this advice applies to Papers 1,2 and 3. As for Paper 4, I have to write another essay again (fml).
Practical is pretty limited when it comes to practice, since you can only really practice during prac sessions in the lab, so do make full use of it. However, there are many things you can practice, like table values being in what sf, how to estimate uncertainty, etc. (I am not going into detail for my sanity, but if you wanna know, just comment and ask!)
Hop onto holy grail, and look for practical papers to practice. Some prac papers answer keys already have values keyed in, so write those answers into foolscap (or your qn paper, if u printed it), with the exception of uncertainty values, tables, graphs, linearization, calculation of gradients and constants, and the short and long planning (sounds like a mouthful, but it rly isnt). Do these questions on your own, practising how sf and decimal places work in calculation of values in tables, best fit line, and how the structure works in long and short planning.
You can practise like this digitally before prac exams, but on the day of exams, please print some papers beforehand to practise before/during your shift to get a feel of actual exam scenario.
Generally speaking, all prelim papers (referring to Papers 1,2,3) are generally about the same standard, so you can legit try out any paper you feel like doing and it should be fine.

H2 Math:

Home of the most NPC teachers you would meet. Clearly, being slammed with algebra and finding the normal distribution for their students actually being normal has taken a toll on their personality. Huge side note, but math teachers would dominate a game of Old Maid with their god tier poker faces. But they are the most meme dpt in the school; they made a sequel of Ginseng Impact questions from MYE to Promos ( I am not kidding.)
As a clapback, I made my own question on Ginseng Impact and answered it at the back of my paper 2 qn paper during prelim exams. They did not take too kindly to it HAHAAHAHAHA (I still got 79% overall LMAOO)
The way you need to approach it is always very structured, even for stats. As long as you understand the meaning behind each step to finding the answer to the question and apply it with equal mastery, you are Gucci.
Even the work sequence isn't really that hard. It is just:
Read notes + Watch lecture Videos + Make notes (Do at the same time) Do tutorial qns Do supplementary qns Do revision package do prelim/promo papers A level papers
Because the revision packages by the math dpt is so good, if u just finish it during the hols, you can definitely score A in the exams (at least for me it did). However, you should only be doing it during the hols. Beyond that, you should start doing prelim/A level papers
I make notes to internalise the info rather than to revise it (this applies to all my subjects, but especially for math), so I only plug in the basic eqns and structures (applies to hypothesis testing)
If you really have no time, focus more on pure math than stats. Pure math has a higher proportion of marks, and even if you have gotten the method to solve stats qns, you can still get it wrong (AHEM PNC). But only do this if u legit have no time.

H2 Econs:

Goated department. Notes are lengthy but pretty good, lectures are fun and informative. Ok, that second point can be argued for depending on the teacher. If you survive the 10.0 Magnitude Earthquake which is Mark Li and Alex Wong entering the LT, you would be in for a treat since the info they give you is pretty much liquid gold (maybe if we filter out Mark Li's story, but it adds to the fun). If its our Halimah Yacob doppelganger Marhaini, hahaha. Good luck.
So the way to approach this subject is via causal links. Every mechanism, every concept and every answer always follow a cause and effect, and the highest top notch answers have done causal links to the max, closing all logic gaps like crazy. (Causal link: ______ causes _____, which leads to ______, causing __(End goal)__) E.g. Rise in supply PAP fall in price
A huge misunderstanding is that Econs is like an arts subjects means memorise a shit ton. Nawwww. Econs is a social science, it follows the logic structure of a science subject, but is tested in a fashion similar to an arts subject.
The work sequence goes like this:
SLS + Read notes + Make notes Do planning for selected essay qns in tutorial Do revision packages Do assignments Prelim/Promo Papers A level papers
You should definitely make notes for econs, cos it is preeetty long. You can compress their 100pg notes to 20 pgs. My way of writing notes is to write a header (e.g. Chapter 1 -- PPC) and draw lines to create 2 columns on the left and right to write your notes. Leave space in the middle for special notes when the econs dpt gives u additional information in lectures, when you make mistakes in essay writing and when you see interesting points made in answer keys.
Always make sure you write your notes in causal links (e.g. AD rise real GDP rise unplanned fall in inventory stock rise in demand for factor inputs, including labor cyclical UNN falls) Pardon if my concept wrong, its been 5 months already ;-;
Other than all of this, it should be fine. Your chers should be able to carry you

H1 Chem:

Mrs Tie is going to have a field day with H1 being a pass/fail. For those who is still under the normal grading system, you still need to invest some effort into getting that A.
I need to emphasize that the bell curve for H1 Chem is rly cancerous, coupled with the fact that CJ exam papers is so much easier than other JCs. Make sure you don't just aim for excellence; aim for perfection instead. Approach H1 Chem like a memory and "common sense" subject;
As for work sequence, I am not very sure for the future 70RPers, but Mrs Tie should have planned for ya'll to not work so hard, so this is for the 90RPers;
Read notes + do practice questions make notes Do RAP (During lesson) Do practice papers given by Mrs Tie
It's pretty simple! (Coming from top in cohort) Make sure you do notes for chapters ahead of what Mrs Tie is teaching, so that you have more time for other subjects. Also, I use answers from other prelim answer schemes to beef up my answers, since Mrs Tie's answers are oversimplified (aims to help ppl pass, not score well)
Also, again, leave space for additional notes in your notes when you make mistakes when doing practices.

H1 GP:

Jeez, this is probably the most flexible one out of all subjects. My only emphasis is that one should not see GP as a subject which cannot be studied, but one which can be grinded. And yes, I am aware of the syllabus change.
Approach GP like a formula. There is a strict format to answering SAQs and essays, and with the right investment, you can actually ace the exam.
I won't give a work sequence for this, but rather things you have to do.
For SAQ and Summary writing, use the revision packages. My only mistake was underestimating how useful it is in developing skillsets essential to scoring well. And you know how impt SAQ is in paper 2. For summary writing, unless u r an arts student or really good at english, just paraphrase word for word man. At least you are accurate, and not missing out on marks because of vocab errors.
Follow the format ur cher gives you, because each GP cher teaches differently from each other, unless that cher is really horrible.
With a greater mark proportion into AQ, content is much more impt to acing GP. But, we do have to note that sometimes, the topic given is just unreasonable (like who knows photography???). When you do not have any content for AQ, draw from personal observation. Like even the most common of practices like HDB void deck marriages and Prayer sessions can be used in AQ if relevant. At the end of the day, it matters just as much to know how to plug in content than to know content.
For essay writing, specialise in preferably 8 topics (5 at min) and make sure these topics aren't so ulu. I prefer topics like SG contemporary issues and maybe tech and AI.
Study content on the topics you chose using straits times, or podcasts (just search __(topic)__ podcast) and you can probably find it. Moreover, CJ also gives content packs on certain topics which you can use too.
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It has been 6k words and I am on my final marbles. Just note that all my jokes are in good fun. All the teachers i made fun of are extremely nice and approachable, so if u need help can always ask them.
As my final words, the real challenge imo isn't As, but after it. All that pent up stress built towards A levels would be gone and you would feel confused. Despondent even. After all, you conditioned yourself to work like a machine, to the point where when you are free to make choices, you would be a bit overwhelmed (a bit of an exaggeration but u get me). If you need help, do voice out to me! I can help.
That said, this is all from me. Good luck, and all the best for As!