Marketing tips are saturated with strict schedules and detailed rules. TikTok gurus tell you there are specific things you need to do to succeed – post 3-5 times a day, make high-quality videos with cinematic techniques, and never EVER make mistakes.
If you’re neurodivergent – someone with differing brain functions from the typical – these “tips” just don’t sound realistic. Our minds work differently, so how can we be expected to meet the same standard as everyone else?
But not every neurodivergent person is the same. Writing a broad guide for everyone under the umbrella would be impossible. That’s why this guide is not definitive – it offers a few different structures, and you can pick the one that suits you best.
This guide explains what it means to be neurodivergent; obstacles that may cause; ways to stay productive as a content creator, and how to make TikTok more fun for you.
If you’re neurodivergent or want to learn what that means, this is for you. The goal is to help content creators, especially those on TikTok, stay consistent. But anyone can read this guide!
You can buy it and other products from my Stan Store. Check out more neurodivergent marketing tips on my TikTok!
If you didn’t know, I’m an artist, and this year I’ve decided to take my art more seriously. But there are days when I remember that being a full-time artist was never in the cards for me.
I’ve been drawing for as long as I can remember. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia when I was 17, and I’d taken a few art electives.
Chronic pain was having an effect on my schooling at this point. But luckily I was able to type out my essays and exams (with supervision, of course). Then in Year 12 Studio Arts, we got to experiment with some different methods, one of them being printmaking. I sketched out my design, then used a scalpel to carve it into the sheet of hard plastic.
This process was near excruciating. My wrists felt like they were being torn with every bit of pressure I forced them through. Maybe it was foolish and impulsive to keep pushing through. I think I was testing my limits, seeing how far I could go. I was really happy with the result, but I don’t think it was worth the pain.
People like to say that art is pain, but that takes on a bit of a different meaning for me. Being an artist with chronic pain means I can’t set aside a whole day to draw and be productive the entire time. Every artist should take breaks to stretch and rest their wrists, but it doesn’t take very long for me to reach that point. Sometimes I get so carried away with a drawing that I ignore the pain, then I’ll be out of commission for days afterwards.
The designs that I sell on RedBubble are fun, and they don’t tend to take up too much time. But my real passion, what I love drawing most, is detailed character portraits. These can take me a long time to finish, but they’re very personal and become something I’m very proud of. The problem is, sometimes I’ll give up on a project if it’s taking too long. I’ll finish the sketch and be daunted at the thought of line art. Or I’ll finally finish blocking out my colours and decide there are too many little details to shade.
I’ve been experimenting more, especially with my RedBubble designs. I want to challenge myself to draw more complex scenes, maybe with multiple characters.
If you’d like to help me have more time for art, you can buy something from my artist shop!
As another year comes to a close, I thought I’d write one last blog post. I haven’t been great at updating this blog, but that’s because so much has been happening I really haven’t had time!
This year has had a lot of ups and downs, but it’s been the most productive year in my life so far! For the first time, I was without the schedule of school or university, and I had no idea where my life was going. I just knew I wanted to write.
I began work as a freelance copywriter. It wasn’t a lot of money, but it was something. I kept working at it, and now I have more frequent work, greater responsibilities, and higher pay!
In October, I started a program to become a digital marketing coach, and I’m now running my own business! It’s been an uphill climb, but I’m learning so much about social media and content creation, and I’m having a lot of fun. I’ve learnt to see the value of my knowledge, time, and talents.
I’m gaining more confidence in my talents and I’ve opened myself up to learning new skills. This year has been emotionally exhausting and tough in a lot of ways, but I’m proud of all I’ve achieved.
New Year Resolutions
Now, I also hesitate to make these kinds of promises to myself because I know how hard it is to keep them. But it’s important to have goals, and writing them down will help me stick to them.
Finish my manuscript. This time last year, I started a novel about the princess in the Minotaur myth, called Centre of the Labyrinth. I had hoped to finish it by now, but I know I can get it done by the end of next year. Then I can move on to other writing projects!
Draw what makes me happy. I’ve spent most of this year drawing what I think will sell. While it’s fun for me to check the trends, it can be more rewarding to draw what I feel passionate about.
Update this blog more often. I’ve loved writing my Creature Features and posts about mythology. I hope to write here at least once a month (that’s much more realistic for me than twice a week). I love hearing your comments and seeing you interact with my posts, and I want to keep that going!
Do you have fibromyalgia (FMS) and struggle to explain it to people? Are you tired of explaining yourself over and over? Or do you need some encouragement to keep going when your chronic pain is flaring up?
The Fibromyalgia Care Pack contains poster pages that you can print out and hang on your wall when you need a reminder. Pages include lesser-known symptoms; important statistics related to FMS; myths about fibromyalgia and the truths behind them; some self-care tips for those rough days, and some affirmations when you need to remind yourself that what’s happening to you is not your fault.
These are handy to give to people who are curious about the condition, or don’t believe it exists. It can give them a better understanding of what you’re going through so you don’t need to exhaust yourself by explaining every time.
They’re also useful to have nearby when you’re feeling low. The self-care tips and affirmations are a reminder to be kind to your mind and body.
I’ve had fibromyalgia since I was 17. It’s made me feel isolated and frustrated. If I had had someone else with FMS to give me advice and reassure me that I wasn’t alone, I would have been much happier.
This is a digital product, so you will not receive anything physical. Just print them out to make a little booklet; hang them on your wall, or keep them on your device to look at when you need it.
I hope this care pack helps you or your loved ones with fibromyalgia. It’s a lonely thing to deal with, but we have to remember that we are not alone <3
I love musicals. I was in my high school’s production from Year 8 to Year 12 and loved every minute of it. It’s always exciting when you learn that your favourite story is being made into a movie. But as many of us know, film adaptations often leave a lot to be desired. In my experience, movie musicals have it the worst.
My first movie musical was Chicago, which I loved. The dream sequences are a perfect example of a film doing what a stage musical can’t. Stagecraft is amazing, but film can take the characters across a range of real locations in a way that’s more immersive than a stage backdrop – in a sense.
Theatre never hides the fact that it’s performing to an audience. This makes the audience feel close and intimate with the show, especially when the actors interact with them. Movies are immersive in another way – they want to make the film seem real as possible, making the viewers voyeurs.
You just don’t get that level of connection with movies, and the humour doesn’t land in the same way (see Into the Woods, and how the darkness was toned down for a cinema audience).
Mixing these two mediums can be successful, but movie studios seem to have trouble getting it right.
Pitch Perfect
There seems to be no middle ground when it comes to singing in movie musicals.
The recent Disney live-action remakes record in the studio, then play it over the actual scenes. But they use a lot of editing to make the voices sound “pure”, which ends up erasing all the personality. Emma Watson in Beauty and the Beast is being pitch-corrected to make her sound as sweet and melodic as a Disney princess should, but all it does is make her sound manufactured. They remove the natural ridges and grittiness of the human voice for the sake of sounding “pretty” and lose all emotion.
But musical theatre is about emotion, and a convincing performance will naturally have some rough edges. Think of the biggest Broadway divas: their voices waver at the most intense part of their solos.
A Little Too Realistic
On the other end of the scale is Les Miserables, which purposely tried to avoid the over-correcting of its vocalists. They did this by having the actors sing live while filming to get the rawness of each scene.
Sounds good in theory, right?
In truth, the set of the Les Mis movie was a disaster. Hugh Jackman was severely dehydrated to look the part, damaging his voice. Anne Hathaway lost a frightening amount of weight and once spent 8 hours shooting the same scene, only to use the first take.
It was the actors leading the timing of the music, not the band, so many of the songs were out of time. The musicians had to keep up with whatever the actors were doing, and there’s a reason that isn’t the standard method in musicals.
The casting for this movie was incredible, and the actors can actually sing in the right conditions. This movie failed because the creative team were too fixated on making it seem realistic that they forgot to make it sound good.
I love Les Mis, but no amount of gritty realism will make these kinds of conditions ok.
Hope Going Forward?
I’ve just seen the trailer for the new Little Mermaid, and it looks amazing. As far as I can tell, they’ve toned down the pitch correction for Halle Bailey. It wasn’t necessary anyway, because she’s a great singer and you can hear it even in the brief footage we’ve seen. As the biggest maker of movie musicals, I hope Disney learns to embrace unique voices and let singers just be themselves. And I hope future movie musicals will reconsider recording the songs “live”.
Most of the facts here came from thesevideos by Sideways. Check it out if you’re interested in music!
And as a reminder, I have a RedBubble store with designs like this adorable fairy dragon!
I am excited to announce that I am now a Digital Marketing Strategist! This is a new step in my life’s journey and I want to share it all with you.
I’ve been working as a copywriter for a long time, and I see business owners make the same mistakes over and over. Their products and services could be the best in the industry, but they don’t have a good marketing strategy to attract customers. So I’ve come up with a 7-week program to develop an organic marketing strategy for online course creators.
Why online courses? It’s a booming industry right now. You can learn just about anything online, and people pay good money to be taught. I work with online course creators because they provide an educational service – but often don’t know how to market it.
The most common mistake I see people make is paying for ads. This is a waste of money because it just means people see your ads, not that they’ll interact with them. An organic digital marketing strategy means that you’re the face of your business. You’re doing outreach, posting to social media, and helping clients feel like they’re talking to a person and not a robot.
My program has many tools to help attract at least 3 extra ideal clients per quarter. While I’ve just started running business owners through the program, the strategies in it have been proven to work. I want to help people make the most of marketing and get their content to the audience that will appreciate it most.
I know this is a bit of a departure from my usual post, but I’m really excited about this new stage of my life! I’ll still be writing here about bizarre animals, myths, and chronic pain stories, but you might see fewer posts from me. Thanks for supporting me!
I’ve already covered crocodiles and their success as apex predators, but now I’d like to introduce you to someone. Gustave is a prime example of his species: a man-eating Nile crocodile who is near impossible to kill. Gustave hatched around 1955 in the African country of Burundi, making him roughly 67 years old. This massive beast has reached mythical status, having allegedly killed nearly 300 people and survived many attempts on his life.
Description
Gustave has never been captured, but he’s estimated to be around 18 feet long from head to tail, weighing over 2,000 pounds. Scientists and herpetologists who have studied him put him at about 60 years due to his teeth, which indicate he is not finished growing. Aside from his unnatural size, Gustave has several distinctive markings: three bullet scars on his body and a deep wound on his right shoulder.
Gustave’s Hunting
Gustave’s unusual eating habits came about because of his extreme size. While crocodiles usually hunt antelopes, zebras, and fish, these prey are too agile for Gustave. So to fill his stomach, he is forced to hunt larger animals like hippos, wildebeest, and sometimes even humans. Crocodiles’ metabolisms allow them to go months without eating, so Gustave only has to feed every so often. A disturbing habit of his seems to be killing people and leaving their corpses, uneaten. The fact that he is killing prey without eating it has some nasty implications.
Hunting Gustave
With the crocodile posing such a dangerous threat to locals, there have been many attempts to relocate or destroy him. Herpetologist Patrice Faye had documented him since the 1990s and made a 2004 documentary, Capturing the Killer Croc. In it, a nine-meter-long cage was lowered into the river and outfitted with bait and an infra-red camera. Only a few smaller crocodiles were caught, not Gustave.
Before the research team had to leave, they made one last attempt: putting a live goat in the cage. One night a storm hit, the camera failed, and when they arrived at the scene the goat was gone. It could have escaped due to rising water or a fault in the cage, but without the camera footage, no one knows for sure.
It’s clear that Gustave would not go down without a fight. He has been shot at multiple times; not just with shotguns but machine guns as well. They haven’t done a thing to deter him.
Myth or Legend?
It’s likely that some reports of Gustave have been exaggerated. Like the mythical Beast of Gevaudan, it’s possible that it was multiple animals killing these people. There are rumours of him having burning red eyes, or people throwing hand grenades to scare him (because even those wouldn’t kill him). It’s difficult to tell how many victims have fallen to this massive crocodile, but he does exist. Or at least, he did at one point.
There were reports in 2019 that he had been killed, but there was no evidence to support these claims. Nothing has been said since then, but it’s entirely possible that this monstrous modern dinosaur is still out there, just below the surface of a Burundi river.
I firmly believe that if we replaced all hippos with manatees, the world would be a better place (I’m joking; hippopotamus dung is great for the environment but their attitude is not). Manatees are the most peaceful, serene animals in existence and it’s beautiful how simple they are. They’re such pacifists that they don’t even have any natural predators (aside from desperate crocodiles eating young calves), and their natural curiosity makes them friendly to other species!
Manatee Biology
Evolutionarily, manatees are most closely related to elephants and surprisingly, hyraxes, which are a species of tiny furred mammals.
A manatee’s diet consists of seagrass and other aquatic vegetation, which has informed how they’ve adapted over time. Because of their lack of natural threats and their highly specific diet, they only have about 6 teeth in each jaw. They lack incisors and canines, instead having 12 molar-like teeth towards the backs of their mouths. Their thick upper lip is prehensile, allowing them to grasp at grass, but preventing them from biting another creature. Their lack of sharp teeth, claws, or hooves means that they couldn’t hurt anyone if they tried.
Manatee Behaviour
Manatees are typically solitary, spending half of their time in the water. They swim in the shallows at about 8km an hour, eating 10% of their body weight in aquatic plants. Using their front flippers to “walk” along the river floor, they push their food into their mouth. This food occasionally includes fish, but typically only when the manatee is lacking nutrients.
As I mentioned before, manatees are extremely docile and peaceful creatures. They are also highly curious and have often come close to humans and human-built structures. Manatees share their homes with alligators, and with their inability to fight back, you might think they’d be easy prey. But alligators will more often leave them alone than attack. There are a few reasons for this: a manatee’s hide is too thick to bite through, and the alligator’s usual hunting method – drowning their prey – doesn’t work on an animal that can hold its breath for 20 minutes. So the manatee is free to go along its merry way.
Threats
While they don’t have any natural predators, humans have accounted for a large number of manatee deaths. Manatees, with their curious nature, aren’t aware of man-made danger and will get too close to speedboats and aquatic vehicles. They are frequently injured and killed by propellers, as well as collisions with ships. Manatees are susceptible to any change in their habitat, diet, or health, making their stability as a species very shaky. There are many manatee conservation efforts, like the Save the Manatee Club, which raises money to protect these threatened species.
Mythology
As I covered in an earlier post, sailors like Christopher Columbus mistook manatees for mermaids. Manatees are also important in West African folklore: they were believed to have once been human, and it is taboo to kill them.
I also just drew this cute little manatee for my RedBubble shop, which you can buy on a shirt, a mug, a sticker, or more!
If you’re anything like me, you might be familiar with this – you go out with friends, and before the end of the night, you’re wiped out. You’re exhausted, your head is killing you, you can’t eat, and you feel like you’re hungover despite not drinking. You could be having the time of your life with people you love, but if you’re an introvert, your social battery will run out eventually. This sensation is known as an “introvert hangover”.
It’s worse when you have chronic pain. I’ve always had a problem staying energetic in social situations longer than a few hours. But after my fibromyalgia diagnosis, it became harder to function. I often get exhausted because I need to put effort into smiling and making eye contact. That drains a lot of energy. I thought it was because I wasn’t enjoying the event, or wasn’t in the right mood, but it happened no matter the circumstances.
My Experience with Introvert Hangovers
Speaking for myself here, the self-inflicted pressure to “mask” and appear engaged puts a lot of stress on my body. My facial muscles are strained, jaws clenched, mind constantly “on” so I don’t rudely miss out on a conversation. The worst part about an introvert hangover is that it happens when I’m with the people I love the most.
I’ve spoken about D&D before and how much it’s helped me. It’s also been incredible for my social life. My D&D group are my closest friends. I can truly be myself around them. With all of the stressors of adulthood, we spend as much time together as we can before life gets in the way. So I’ll set aside most of a weekend to be with the people I love. We’ll play D&D for a while, then just talk for a while because we don’t want the day to end. But without fail, I get a bad introvert hangover well before the day is out.
It starts with a faint headache. This isn’t unusual for me; I get headaches all the time. But it worsens as time goes on, until I can’t move my head without splitting pain. I feel nauseous and bloated, and I know eating would probably help but I can’t bring myself to do it.
How to Treat an Introvert Hangover?
I’ve tried everything I can think of. I thought it was basic self-care, like eating enough in the morning, drinking enough water, etc. But none of that helps. I take painkillers when I can, but by then it’s usually too late. If a tension headache is my main problem, sometimes laying a wheat pack over my face and eyes helps. But the only thing that really seems to work is a good night’s rest (and not just a nap, either – that tends to make things worse).
If you can control the amount of time you spend socialising, that’s the best way to keep an introvert hangover at bay. But it can be disheartening not being able to spend as much time with people as you’d like.
How Does an Introvert Hangover Effect Your Life?
To people who haven’t experienced them, they might seem like a minor inconvenience. But it’s had a very negative impact on my social and mental health. My friends and partner do everything they can to accommodate this, but I feel so bad that I can’t engage for as long as they can. I feel like I’m bringing the mood down, or wasting the time we do have together. My friends love board games and strategy, and so am I, but I just can’t process anything that’s going on when we’re playing. I desperately want to be present but I feel like I’m fading into the distance. I want to be there for my friends and I don’t want to end things early just because of me.
As someone with chronic pain, I have a very complicated relationship with my body. I want to love the body that I’m in, but it constantly feels like my body hates me; I don’t want to always be on the outside, and I don’t want to be punished for enjoying myself.
So What Now?
I’m sorry if you came here for advice – I don’t really have any. The most important thing as a chronic pain sufferer is to take care of your body’s needs, and I have not been good at doing that. I am lucky to have an excellent support system, but I still have to make the choice between caring for myself and having fun.
The best advice that I can offer is know your limits. Even if you break them every now and then (which I completely understand), if you’re aware of them then you can prepare for the worst. Chronic pain can feel hopeless and miserable, but you’re not alone. There’s someone out there who knows what you’re going through.
Madeline Miller’s Circe is a book that I enjoyed so much that I wrote my honours thesis on it. It is a feminist retelling of the character Circe from Greek mythology, which is a topic that Miller is very acquainted with.
If you’re not familiar, Circe appears in the Odyssey as another trial for Odysseus to surpass on his way home. She is the daughter of the sun, Helios, and her powerful witchcraft exiled her to an island. In The Odyssey, Circe turns Odysseus’s men into pigs and Odysseus drinks a potion that makes him immune to her magic. After drawing a knife on her, he then seduces her and she is persuaded to free his men. She then consults an oracle to tell him where his journey must take him next.
While The Odyssey is her most famous appearance, Circe is a character with a rich mythology that Miller encapsulates wonderfully. She is not reduced to the “temptress” archetype, becoming a fully realised character. We watch as she goes from the “ugly duckling” of her family, to ultimately falling in love which leads to exile. We see her grow jaded on her island, left to the whims of men, and we watch her tenacity grow.
Miller uses Circe to explore the ways women are overlooked in Greek mythology. While mythological Circe is a powerhouse, she’s never written sympathetically and is defined by the men in her life. Miller makes clear the ways that men control Circe and the other women in the story. Circe was an outcast in her family of Titans and was thus singled out. Her sister Pasiphae was favoured, but was handed off to a husband as a peace treaty between Zeus and Helios. The women in this story are wonderfully flawed and distinct. Miller doesn’t erase the effect of the patriarchy in this book; she explores how women are affected by it. They play into or reject the rules prescribed to them.
No longer does Circe’s story revolve around Odysseus: the witch-goddess is her own hero. Along with her godly family, the cast of this novel includes some big Greek mythology names. Circe brings in characters like Athena and Hermes, and incorporates the myths of Jason & Medea, Daedalus & Icarus, the Minotaur, and more. Before reading it, I considered myself pretty well-versed in Greek mythos, but this book gave me so many new things to research.
Miller’s writing is like poetry. There’s a comforting, flowing quality to it that paints very vivid pictures. The text is laced with such gorgeous metaphors, descriptions, and symbolism that I didn’t mind reading it four times. I just love the way Miller describes Circe’s emotions and the development of her powers. It’s a female empowerment story, but not in a shallow way. Circe is flawed and complex, often making the wrong decision on her path to learning the right way. The trauma she experiences in her past cause her to lash out and not trust, but she learns to be better. She finds a way to exist as herself, not the person she is expected to be.
Circe is a beautifully evocative book that leaves you in a trance. The world of Greek mythology comes alive through Miller’s well-constructed words. It is a feminist take on stories that have not been kind to women, nonetheless, it does so without being preachy. I love this book with all my heart. It’s the best I could hope for from a modern take on Greek mythology. If you get the chance to read it, I highly recommend you do!
You can find Madeline Miller’s book on her website here.
