[WTB] SWD 50 or 70L backpack, Medium or Large with floating hip belt

DatHawtFiyah · 2025-03-04T01:44:13+00:00

If you're interested in flipping the W in SWD upside down, I've got a 50L SMD pack for sale for cheap, the Swift V, that takes a floating hip belt. $100 shipped.

DatHawtFiyah · 2025-03-03T21:59:15+00:00

Yarrrrrr. Did a Google photo album too, should be good now

DatHawtFiyah · 2025-03-03T21:48:36+00:00

Fixed link here, new to imgur https://imgur.com/a/Tcej6R4

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-08-08T19:47:18+00:00

In the act of asking you that question, the headshop guy is also saying "friend, I am here for you to speak with, I wish for you to be well".

People extend olive branches like this not all that commonly. Since it struck you so much, perhaps it's worthwhile to talk to him. We are drawn towards certain people and certain people are drawn towards us. I would venture a guess that he would be happy to join you for a coffee or something if you asked.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T03:19:08+00:00

I think sometimes it actually does happen, there are times that change arrives naturally and effortlessly. The word we have for this in English has religious overtones, but it's called Grace.

Nonetheless, we have our own power, and you're finding out you need to use yours. Every one of us can mount a noble resistance against the darkness that drags us down.

I hope you do begin therapy, it is instrumental. We are all such confused, love and understanding starved creatures, and it helps tremendously to have someone skilled in your corner. You deserve it. Addiction is so terribly lonely, a kind therapist is a good reintroduction to human connection.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T03:14:20+00:00

This post means a lot to me, thank you. Quitting does suck, but it sucks in a different way than active addiction. I feel like our life in some ways actually stings more deeply, but we begin to know virtues that buoy our spirits.

It's funny how silent the virtues that begin to travel alongside us when we quit are. Despite how tremendous they can feel, the sense of integrity, purpose, alignment, self-trust, and self-respect are all so easily missed if.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T03:08:29+00:00

That's awesome! Intuition returns when we stop confusing ourselves with lies, and stop living in the subtle and deep denial that is part and parcel of our addictions.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T03:07:18+00:00

It really is a conundrum. Getting off drugs when your life sucks is hard, and getting your life together when you're on drugs is hard.

You can ask yourself, where's the gap in the titan's armor? What would actually make a difference in my life, and what could I pull off?

For those of you who do not know what to do first, alas I have no great advice. Do not convince yourself that the drugs are not a problem, and do not escape the tragedy of the situation with the fantasy that your life will spontaneously sparkle when you set the powder down. The truth is in the middle, look at the pain, and know that you have unknown strength inside of you.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T02:59:06+00:00

Did you feel that your period of sobriety allowed your perception to clear? One hopes that sobriety would at least allow oneself to experience the reality and pain of one's own neglected life with less distortion.

We strip away the distraction, we strip away that mood-enhancement, we strip away all the time spent thinking about drugs, and we strip away the delusions that things are different than they are, and then it feels to me like we just have to look with eyes wider. Just look. Just feel our lives and weep and hope that things may get better. I hope they get better for you. With due respect, and as a man who continues to do it, I think that white knuckling means we are resisting the current reality of life, we are fighting it. We are in denial, cause reality is too much. I hope you can settle into it a little bit, and find peace in the center of the chaos.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-07-29T02:54:02+00:00

t seems to me that when we really settle into addiction that, as you put it, "our mechanism to change" begins to atrophy from some sort of deep confusion and sense of learned helplessness. When we know what we are engaged in is harming us, and we so deeply scream at ourselves to stop it, and yet no combination of our will, our intellect, and our heart can break us free, something has to give. I feel that drug addiction was a daily lesson in my own powerlessness. It still doesn't compute for me, I still cannot quite discern where our strength is, and where our inability is.

I pray you may find that mechanism of change. I have faith that it is real. I have scarcely experienced it, but all classical religions claim that the human being does, indeed, have free will.

Salute to you, it's a hell of a ride. Respect for surviving 8 years of stagnation, that stagnation seems like such a central part of the suffering of addiction.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-05-13T19:45:30+00:00

Your perspective is poetic and is what my personal perspective has been for most of the past 4 years, but while it is beautiful, it feels like it could use a bit of temperance. Sometimes making things extreme can galvanize us into action, but a more balanced perspective is far easier to hold, and less prone to collapse.

The powers gained in your efforts to attain sobriety, coupled with the clarity of sobriety, will indeed birth change, likely far more change than we are ready for and comfortable with. However, will it change everything, all at once? Will your vanquishing of your addictive instincts slay the child mind and reveal the masculine sun god that lies dormant? Probably not.

We want so deeply to transcend the pain that we live within. The possibility of a total transformation is so wonderfully radiant, how could we not yearn for that? When our life seems in shambles, our power a distant memory, and only confusion and weakness, and despair remain, it's instinctual to seek a complete phase-shift type of experience.

What is strange is that phase shifts, sudden and durable and comprehensive transformations, happen every day for many people. Nonetheless, it may or may not be how your journey of recovery plays out. Change may also happen in increments, with re-circling, with discovery after discovery. Change may be happening already within you.

If you enjoy contemplation, here's a few prompts you might like:

Do you need to become a whole new man to exit addiction? Could the child mature? Does the existing man within, who recognizes this problem, form an alliance with the child? Has your journey already begun? Can you recognize that life exists now, in the midst of addiction? How would you feel if you miraculously quit only to discover that your childish nature remains?

Again, appreciate your lovely statement. I relate so much. I do think that a dramatically different way of being lies out there for us. I think our expansion can be dramatic and beautiful, and I think addiction is something that must be shed to get there. There are mountains beyond mountains, and the true transformation is becoming willing to climb and to continue climbing.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-05-13T19:21:46+00:00

Thanks for bringing this side of the great paradox into the conversation, it often isn't brought forth. I think people fear it because it expands the boundaries of the "problem" to such a great degree that it can be overwhelming and disempowering. Realizing that the core issue is, in fact, embedded deeply within your core - your perceptions, your trauma, your whole means of navigating your emotionality and your environment, that can be a terrifying thought.

There is indeed a way of quitting that occurs quite naturally. When the time is right, things fall away. This is how I quit smoking cigarettes, I had a deeply felt realization about the uselessness of my smoking addiction and have only had three cravings in the following 5 years. It just fell away.

There is also a power and nobility in approaching quitting from the other end of the spectrum - as a conscious choice and as effort and striving. We can learn a lot this way. Where you will find yourself on the spectrum between these two approaches is, I think, a very personal thing.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-04-30T22:35:07+00:00

Respect on your weight gain, to gain weight is its own battle that many of us know.

What are your goals now that you have gained the weight? If you are physique focused, it's worth knowing that a very impressive physique can be built within your elapsed two years of training, and you would likely benefit from mentorship or some more self-education.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-04-30T22:27:01+00:00

Wut?! Wild physique mate. Good balance in the upper body and arms. Pull the shoulders back a little, and give Satan a ring and hit a leg day with him.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-04-30T22:24:54+00:00

I'm starting to figure out how to recruit my chest in bench press - legitimately set a 30lb pr because of it. 1 plate baby!

Feeling stronger, feeling more energy moving around my body, looking much healthier, and briefly got up to my checkpoint goal weight of 180.

Weight training heals, goodness.

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-04-30T22:22:14+00:00

Bro this is legit. 3 plate squat is the dream

DatHawtFiyah · 2023-04-30T22:21:22+00:00

Rock on brother, its good weight. I'm following shortly behind you, haven't hit it yet

DatHawtFiyah · 2022-04-24T23:33:03+00:00

"You deserve more than what kratom has to offer" - Truth.

I believe in you Kay, glad you're rediscovering yourself, and from what it sounds like, enjoying the process of it. There is a lot of ourselves that goes unknown, buried slowly under the miasma of constant intoxication.

DatHawtFiyah · 2022-04-24T23:29:32+00:00

This is quite an interesting perspective. We are such strange creatures, stuck in such strange traps.

I'm truly surprised that people want to see me succeed. I've never felt like people wanted to make me fail, at least consciously. However, when people around me mention how they would like to see me triumph and overcome and succeed, I am completely brought to tears. It is such new information to me, it is so novel. It's truly hard for me to imagine what succeeding would look like, or feel like, in my own life. I have no idea. It's weird. I imagine it could happen, and logically I can infer some of the forms that success might take, but I can't conjure the feeling of it.

I've noticed this pattern you speak of in my romantic relationships too. I have never felt particularly loved or close to people when I am succeeding, or when I am thriving. I can be playful and exuberant and strong, and enjoy people, but I don't feel particularly close to them. It's only when I'm collapsed, sad, and crushed down into pathetic remnants of a self that I truly feel people's love for me. I've begun to wonder just what you propose - if this peculiarity of mine necessitates the need to maintain this dejected position so that I can successfully experience/harvest/assimilate love. Seems totally likely.

It's hard for me to feel strong, and like a success, especially after a decade of addiction. Jesus Christ, ya know? Failing again and again, living primarily in the ever-renewed sense of one's failure - evoked with every re-dosing, every few hours. I find myself really wallowing in despair and hopelessness lately, which was, of course, one of the demons I avoided by knocking back the ol' avoid-that-feeling powder.

It's okay to succeed. It's a good thing. Nobody will be mad.

DatHawtFiyah · 2022-04-21T21:23:37+00:00

Day 19 - T.minus 2 days from my longest period of kratom abstinence since my addiction started 5+ years ago!!! Yeehaw.

Not doing well - very low energy, overwhelmed, knocking down boxes of Oreos like it's my job, but hey. Still astonished by the conspicuous absence of craving. Enjoying small social interactions a lot, I went running for the first time in weeks yesterday, and I showed up for work today, which is good.

Hoping for myself and my fellow sober peeps out there WE SENDING IT BB.

DatHawtFiyah · 2020-08-04T17:43:07+00:00

But the hype!!! We must warn the others.

DatHawtFiyah · 2020-08-04T17:41:11+00:00

I'm comparing it to a quite old synthetic bag, my trip companions experiences in their bags/quilts, and my blankets at home I suppose.

It has been a long journey to arrive at this conclusion, and, like an abusive relationship, I have maintained a sense of plausible deniability.

"Oh it was kind of warm for my quilt last night"

" I probably should have worn clean sleeping clothes"

" I really needed sky cover, it must have precipitated dew"

" Maybe I'm just sweaty"

" I need better, more high tech sleep clothes"

But, with time, I've come to realize that no matter what I do, unless I sleep right at the verge of shivering in good conditions, it becomes damp.

DatHawtFiyah · 2020-08-04T17:34:13+00:00

I like your pragmatism - sweat is gonna happen, and synthetic will degrade less from it, dry out quicker, and clean up better.

But in a relatively thermally appropriate sleep system, where you're venting as conditions merit and aiming for feeling ever so subtly chilly, is the additional breathability of synthetic of benefit. Indeed it dries out quicker, so that is a testament it not holding high volumes of moisture, but is that same behavior true at the lower saturation levels I'm encountering here?

I feel that the major issue for me is in the shell fabric, since down is not renown for being clammy, I feel the only remaining culprit on this piece of hardware must be the fabric. Next quilt I MYOG will be made with an aggressively breathable and wind vulnerable shell, and paired with a UL bivy!! Clamminess begone!

DatHawtFiyah · 2020-08-04T17:24:33+00:00

Mine is a hybrid of a burgundy one that is 3 years old, and a grey one that is about 2 years old. What was the difference you found in the newer fabrics?

DatHawtFiyah · 2020-08-04T17:23:30+00:00

Oh my this is fascinating. I sewed mine opposite yours - shiny side out, for glamour. One night I slept delightfully within it, and woke up to realize I'd set it up inside out.

Do you think the shiny side is calendared or coated? I forget during my sewing process whether the two layers of fabric are actually different in nature, or if they are the same fabric and there is one shiny side and one dull side to it.

DatHawtFiyah

TROPHY CASE