Feelings That Come With A New Year

Tell me whats’s on your mind

Tell me what’s on your mind today, is it an ex lover you don’t talk to anymore or the job you didn’t get

Is it clouds in the sky as you stare in awe, is it the friend by your side, telling you what’s life been like for them lately.

Is it picture online of a friend doing something you would also love to do, or a love interest on a trip you would love to also be on

Is it the work you do and hate or the work you do and love

Is it lunch today or dinner plans tomorrow with your friends, is it the loneliness that sometimes visits you or the joy of sharing your space with your cat

Tell me what’s on your mind, let’s share the joy or burden together

I participated in a live quiz by a writer on Substack, which got me thinking about love, partners, and relationships. People who believe in and practice monogamy often see their love as pure, earnest, and true. In contrast, those who explore other types of relationships, such as polyamory, are often viewed as less pure, less earnest, and definitely untrue.

For a long time, I believed in the ideology that polyamorous love was somehow less pure because society teaches that true love is meant to be between two people forever. However, we are society, and we have the power to determine our own beliefs and values. Thus, we can choose to view love differently.

Regardless of other factors, love is love. If it's not genuine, then it simply isn't. When you truly love someone—or multiple people—your affection for one person doesn't diminish the love you have for another. We express love in different ways, and it's impossible to equate or quantify it.

An important aspect to consider is the notion that differing levels of commitment in polyamorous relationships indicate a lack of commitment overall. However, that is not the case. If someone is open and transparent with their partners about wanting to be involved with both, how is that not a form of commitment? In fact, it could be seen as a double commitment!

The idea that someone can love two or more people romantically because one person isn’t enough for them is a common myth. It’s important to recognize that it’s never truly about the other person. What does it even mean for someone to be "enough"? We need community and connection, and a person can thrive with more than one meaningful relationship. This doesn't automatically make each person any less whole or sufficient. In my view, the answer is no; they are still complete individuals.

I am tired of ranting and will head to bed now

Fe

Some people make the mistake of confusing “submission” with “weakness,” whereas it is anything but. Submission is a form of peaceful acceptance of the terms of the universe, including the things we are currently unable to change or comprehend.

From the forty rules of love

Hi there

I hope it hurts a little less today.

The scene at Osun Osogbo in Osun State, Nigeria by Adeolu Osibodu (@adeoluosibodu)

Franca Afegbua was a Nigerian beautician and politician who represented Bendel North in the Nigerian Senate in 1983. She was the first elected woman senator in Nigeria.

Spinoffs: Space Station Innovations in Your Cart (and Heart!)

You might think NASA technology is just spaceships and telescopes, but did you know the camera in your cell phone is, too? It’s one of many NASA innovations now found everywhere on Earth.

The International Space Station has had crew living on it for 25 years straight. In that time, the space station has enabled a tremendous amount of research, helping NASA and scientists better understand long-term living in space – but it’s not just knowledge coming back down to Earth! Technologies developed for the space station and experiments conducted aboard the orbiting lab also benefit people on the planet below. Here are a few of these inventions, or spinoffs, you can find in your everyday life.

A Sunscreen That Blocks Radiation in Space – and on Your Face

After surviving for 18 months outside the International Space Station, an extremely hardy organism is now improving sunscreens and face cream products from a cosmetics company, which licensed use of the organism from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Build Muscle With or Without Gravity

Muscles atrophy quickly in space, so when astronauts began long stays on the International Space Station, they needed some specialized exercise equipment. A resistance mechanism made of a coiled metal spring formed the basis of the first way for astronauts to “lift weights” in space. Soon after, that same design became the heart of compact home gym equipment.

Fresh Greens Every Day of the Year

The need to grow fresh food in space pushed NASA to develop indoor agriculture techniques. Thanks to the agency’s research, private companies are building on NASA’s vertical farm structure, plant-growth “recipes,” and environmental-control data to create indoor farms, resulting in higher crop yields and better-quality produce while conserving water and energy and eliminating the need for pesticides.

Cultivating Hearts and Knees in Space

Gravity is a significant obstacle to bioprinting cells and growing human tissue on Earth because heavier components settle to the bottoms of petri dishes. In the absence of gravity, each cell layer stays in place, which is how it’s possible to grow heart and knee tissue on the space station. The same principle also allows mixing of complex pharmaceuticals on orbit.

Storing Oodles of Energy

NASA chose nickel-hydrogen batteries to power the Hubble Space Telescope and the International Space Station because the technology is safe, reliable in extreme temperatures, and long-lived. NASA’s improvements brought down the cost of the technology, which is now used by large-scale utilities and renewable power plants that need to store energy generated by intermittent sources.

You can read about many more products sourced from the ISS on spinoff.nasa.gov.

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Missing her