Last week, I encountered a human, apparently AMAB, who was wandering through the railway station talking to someone on the phone and using the phrase 'banging bird', saying how he thought he was in a Bill and Ted movie and even saying 'schwing' about someone he has to work with. I hope he wakes up with nightmares when realises there are people judging him, the way he judges women.

A few months ago a work colleague tried to tell me that she couldn't handle technology because she is 'a girl.' Apparently reeling off Julia Margret Cameron, the Countess Ada von Lovelace, Margaret Hamilton, Rosalind Franklin, Delia Derbyshire, Bridgette Eickhoff and most of her own team was the wrong thing to do.

I don't understand the human mind it seems.

So I kinda just wrote this out one day off the cuff. The idea had been floating around my head. Anyone kind enough to give it a read and let me know what you think?

Shapeshifting 101

So you've found yourself a magical talisman, been cursed or blessed by a deity, accidentally fallen into the Wellspring of Mana or, by some other happenstance either good or ill, managed to become a shapeshifter. What now?

Well, you're going to have a lot of questions and learn a lot of things very quickly. The first thing you'll learn is just how easy non-shapeshifters, we call them "statics", have it in terms of holding themselves together. Holding yourself together in one shape when your body can be almost anything it wants is a challenge. So, your first experience is likely to be splattering to the ground in a formless blob. You need to pull yourself together!

This will feel almost impossible at first, with so much to concentrate on and various aspects of your to shape. The good news is that shapeshifting is like riding a walrus; once you've learned how, it becomes second nature. In fact, with enough practice, you can ride multiple walruses at once and that is one hell of a party trick to show your friends.

Being in that initial blob form is akin to being in a sensory deprivation tank or, for those of us less inclined to visit the expensive Palace spa or experience the isolation hollows in the castle dungeons, like floating in the darkest cave you can imagine with your nose and ears plugged with wax. You won't be able to see, you won't be able to hear, you don't have the necessary organs to sense anything at all. Hopefully you're not already in that state before you hear this, or you might not be able to hear it at all!

Don't panic. Sometimes there is a certain calming catharsis to staying in or reverting to this form, if you're in a safe enough space to do so, but sooner or later you're going to want to form yourself into something more capable of eating and drinking. You might be a shapeshifter, but you still have to get energy from somewhere!

As with most skills that you try to learn, you're going to want to start with small things first. Your body has a memory for things it has been before, especially the things it has been the most. Most of you will have spent your whole life to this point in one form, so you'll be able to recover that most easily. Pulling every part of you together is going to be a challenge, so start with one sense. Remember what it was like to see, your eyes being able to view the world around you, how easy that was for you. Try to do that, like opening your eyes after waking from sleep. It might take a few tries, but soon enough you'll find you're able to do it. You don't need to know how your eyes work or how they're built, your body knows this and can adapt to it again.

The rest will follow. Try a hand, put it on the end of an arm if you can. It's likely you're going to look ridiculous at some point, since putting everything together is a jigsaw that you're yet to master. It's entirely possible that you'll have eyes sticking out of your belly or hands for feet. You're learning, this is normal, but you're really going to have to get your head out of your ass, literally, if you want to be taken seriously.

Your body remembers how this all connects, so listen to it and bring yourself together. Aim for what feels normal. There will be a sense of tension through you as things connect up. At first it's going to take a lot of effort and you may not be able to hold it for long. Stamina is important and you'll need to spend time training for this, pulling together to your previous "static" or "home" form, releasing back into a blob, and then doing it again. Then holding yourself in that form for longer and longer.

The more you do it, the easier it will get. But don't try to push yourself too far. I've had to help too many beginners try to pull themselves back out of the eldritch forms they've managed to tangle themselves into because "I thought being a dragon would be cooler". Yes, I know, and it is, but it takes time to learn to shape yourself into something that isn't something you've ever been before. Learn to find yourself and release back to a formless state first, then you can start working your way through the bestiary and learning to change your face to trick your friends at parties.

But I'm getting beyond myself, that's really more for shapeshifting 102 and beyond. For now, enjoy the experience of really getting to find yourself in a more intimate and personal way than most others will ever experience. Good luck and, well, have fun.