Githyanki Therapy defined

What is Githyanki Therapy?

This is the act of posting a mad and beautiful idea on the internet, bonus points for posting it in such a way so that others can participate and/or post their own mad and beautiful ideas.

For me, this usually has something to do with Githyanki. I have no idea quite why. Maybe it is because they wield silver swords or worship their liche queen or have a pact with red dragons whom they often ride into battle.

Githyanki Therapy is usually something I do after I have taken part in some kind of stupid-ass internet argument and for the record, all internet arguments are stupid. I know there are times when I see sexism, racism and homophobia and I have to speak up but when I do I should drop some thoughts and run-run-run. It just never ends well.

That is Githyanki Therapy. Go forth and find your Githyanki, some odd little thing that you enjoy and when the internet aggravates you or you have made the internet a lamer place, post about that thing in a way that is both mad and beautiful.

17 thoughts on “Githyanki Therapy defined”

I always appreciate it when you drop some Githyanki therapy, Judd. It’s a wonderful reminder of our shared enthusiasm and love when things are otherwise toxic and dumb.

–Jason M

You sir, are a poet and a scholar.

Fuck yeah, man. I love your Githyanki Therapy.

Mine is Happiness-Is therapy. Like “Holy shit, I’ve just gone mental again. I should take a step back and do another round of ‘Happiness Is…'”

Yeah I try to write a blog entry on things I’m happy about.

Githyanki therapy is also boss – like if I’m bothered by a forum I try to make the kind of post I wish I’d see more of on that forum.

Githyanki therapy renews my faith in humanity…

…OK, maybe that’s going a bit too far. It definitely makes the internet a more tolerable.

Me, I carry a sketchbook around. When I see or (worse) get involved in stupid online arguments I walk away from the computer, sit down somewhere, and sketch some real physical thing that I’m really physically looking at with my real eyes. No words, no thinking, just drawing what I see.

I find it grounds me and helps put the stupid internet argument in perspective. Sometimes I come back to the argument with a better approach, sometimes I recognize it for the dumbness it is and let it drop.

I like Githyanki Therapy better, though, as it inspires and uplifts *others*. Maybe I can combine the two somehow. Hmm…

My githyanki therapy usually comes in one of two forms:

1) Me asking people what they are playing lately. What fun things happened at the table in the last month. Stuff like that. Stuff reminding me about the culture of play more than the culture of talking on forums.

2) Pray that people stop picking at the scab and go on to make their own cool threads seeped in play-stuff. I don’t want to do it myself, for the weird reason that it feels like I’m dressing up like a clown to distract the audience from the horrible trapeze accident that just happened. But while sometimes it didn’t happen, yesterday/today it totally did: Lots of solid threads about play, and directed questions.

But anyway. If things are like they usually are, we can set our watches to the next flamewar/”community bruhaha”, which will happen roughly one week after GenCon.

Bring in the clowns. Where are the clowns?

The dressing up a clown metaphor made me wince and laugh all evening.

Morningstar

Thanks, Jason.

Thank you for the kind words.

Those happiness threads are great because you get such sunny responses. I always keep track of them when they pop up.

Re: Githyanki therapy renews my faith in humanity…

You could always scan them and post ’em up.

I love this idea. Must get breakfast and meditate on it.

Oh, I do post them. I guess what I mean is the art (which I post on Flickr) doesn’t feed back into the places where the internet stupid occurs (Story Games). I guess the best solution would be to start posting art to Story Games, once I’m better able to draw things that *aren’t* right in front of me, like Githyanki. 🙂