picture this,the faintest details of my life-

Shamanism

Shamanism. According to Hmong mythology, the shamans’ art dates from the time of Shee Yee, a hero not unlike the Greek Prometheus or the Germanic Siegfried. Shee Yee discovered the secrets of healing the sick by observing the arts of dragons. He set out to heal all humanity with these secrets, but was opposed by the misanthropic Ndu Nyong, a god of sickness and death who liked to eat humans. Both Shee Yee and Ndu Nyong were greatly weakened from these campaigns, resulting in Shee Yee’s casting down his weakened shamanic tools for people to use against Ndu Nyong’s remaining army of malevolent spirits, the “dab”. (There are benevolent “dab” as well, including the “dab neeb” that assist current-day shamans in their healing labors.) There is a great deal of lay shamanism in Hmong culture as well, including using oracles like animal sacrifice to predict the future.

watercolor titled ‘Dragon Princess’ by Kao Lee Thao (I love her watercolor ‘Nestle’ -of a baby & tiger)

I'm optimistic, and you...?

People who are optimistic see a failure as due to something that can be changed so that they can succeed next time around, while pessimists take the blame for failure, ascribing it to some lasting characteristic they are helpless to change.

Optimists tend to respond actively and hopefully, by formulating a plan of action, say, or seeking help and advice; they see the setback as something that can be remedied.

Pessimists react to such setbacks by assuming there is nothing they can do to make things go better the next time, and so do nothing about the problem; they see the problem as due to some personal deficit that will always plague them.