flowboy

@Hello world I don't think dating should be the first priority if your life is in such a state. Taking better care of yourself should be. Then treating the depression. Possibly with a psychedelic ceremony or treatment, for example mushrooms or especially ketamine, can be very effective against depression if done under the right supervision, unless you have schizophrenia in the family. Then developing your interests and passions. Finding new ones. Then working on a vision and life purpose. Once you are on track with that, you'll feel better and women will be more receptive to you. Because women are wired to be attracted to healthy individuals. It's for your own good. We all know that you can be a better version of you than what you are now. And when you decide to toss the bullshit aside and start being that, women reward you. Try to appreciate the beauty of that. If women didn't have that bias for healthy people, we'd all be microwaving mac'n cheeses every day. Make a commitment to become a healthy man. It's not like I haven't been there. Microwaving shitty food, not showering for days, only coming outside to smoke cigarettes, never wearing fresh clothes even, constantly being bothered by shitty negative thoughts about myself, and having to drown them out with drugs or entertainment. I've been there, and I might be there again. You never know. But you have to discover the path out of there only once. The first time is the hardest. ?

Hang on, sir. "Models" by Mark Manson is NOT redpill. Neither is NMMNG. Also, if you already found those books, what more do you need? Did you read them fully, and understand everything? Why would you be asking for more material and "systems"? Just go do what the book says!!!

How you do one thing is how you do everything I'm painting over some damaged walls. I am sure that I am wasting my time. Because I can't do it right anyway. But I'm doing it. Because if I made the effort, I can run back to mommy and say that I tried. My paint job is ugly. Splotchy. I'm not using tape, and I should have. The color doesn't match the wall, but I'm pretending that it does. As I paint, I notice myself not focusing on a single spot, but jumping all over, looking for quick wins. It's almost impossible to do one spot well, and then move on. The plan is to throw my hands up and say "I did what the document said!' (with the color code), intentionally not read it very well but cherry-pick some details that make it look like I'm innocent and honestly misunderstood. I'm playing dumb, basically. I'm almost certain that the landlord will bill me anyways for having to paint over the entire wall now. And then, because I made some pointless awkward effort now, I get to throw my hands up and feel like a victim. I'm setting myself up for an unpleasant result that I'll pretend to be surprised about, after which I get to wallow in victimhood. Now what should I probably do? I think to make this look good, the entire wall has to be painted over, which is much easier and cheaper to leave to the professionals and just pay for it. Also, the wall is damaged because I glued on some strips that hold the fly net in place. Did I know it would damage the paint if I ever ripped it off? I didn't think about it. I was so much in coping, so much in panic and pain because of sleepless nights, that my plan was to just apply these strips and hope for the best. And if they cause damage, then just throw my hands up: "It's impossible to do anything right! I'm suffering and if I want to do something about it, and it has consequences, then screw the entire world." It's either take the panicked action, from a place of coping and urgency, and have it go well, or throw up my hands and cry about it. No responsibility taken. It always worked with my mom. I'm so manipulative. As long as I could look like I tried, it was good enough for my parents. So that's how I do a lot of things now, when they're hard, or when I don't know how to do it properly. My plan is not to ace it. My plan is to exert reasonable effort and then let people know I tried, and hope they take pity on me. Doesn't work so well with other people as an adult. Having soft parents also has its drawbacks. This is one. Sloppiness and half-hearted attempts were always accepted. My dad is a DIY-everything guy, who loves imperfect quick-n-dirty solutions, so how could he disapprove. I turned it into an even worse pattern: making a show of the effort, assuming failure, and then expecting and demanding acceptance for it anyway, using my half-hearted effort as an excuse.

You're identified with being chill, which means being loud and energetic would be uncomfortable to you. You have to be willing to venture outside your comfort zone, in order to find mates. It's perfectly possible to be chill and laid back and attract women. However if you become rigid in it, and identify with it, then at moments where it would be natural to be expressive and loud, you'd hold yourself back. That means you can't flow with the energy of the situation, wherever it takes you. So let go of your comfort zone a bit. It's not your chillness that's holding you back. It's your attachment to the chillness.

I've gone through that many times. The key is to accept it for yourself. Just say: "yeah sometimes this happens, whatever" and just laugh it off. You have to be fully okay with not having sex. Until you get there, you'll keep having this issue. Then chill in the bed with her, having a good time, and maybe your dick will pop up later, after you stopped putting so much pressure on it.

The video is not that bad. It's easy to misinterpret, though. Things that you don't want to provide early on, are things that you should provide later on, in a healthy manner, in order to have a good relationship with someone. When you just got someone's number and have been on one or two dates and haven't slept together multiple times yet, you should have a boundary that you don't overinvest: you're not going to play therapist, and you're not going to buy her whatever she wants. Providing emotional support is something you do for each other when you're either good friends, or in some kind of male-female relationship. If you're not able or willing to do so at that stage, you're not being a healthy, valuable man, and only emotionally damaged girls will stay with you basically. So it's more nuanced than: "never do it" or "always do it". She has to see that you treat your friends really well, you provide your friends with emotional support, and you are generous with them. This tells her that you have a great inner circle that she should want to be a part of. But to become a part of it, first she has to show you her good side, by being fun and interesting and not boring you with stories that you wouldn't care about (such as complaining about another guy). The emotional support and the generosity are two examples of something you have to earn, when you come in to someone's life. Both when making friends, and when dating. TL;DR: don't listen to any stories about other guys, or anything else that you're just not interested in, in the beginning stage of dating. She has to impress you, while you are also impressing her. If she's going on and on about this other guy, it's pretty clear that she stopped wanting to impress you, so you're wasting your time at that point. But don't take it to the extreme of making it a principle that you *never* buy girls anything, or you *never* listen to anything emotional, because then you'll be an undateable douchebag. Find your center. Feel into what stage of investment you are in, and what feels right for you to provide at this point. If you go to either extreme, you lose. If you try to stick to some hard rule that someone on the internet made for you, you come across like you have issues, and healthy girls will run away. The only way to do it authentically, and not scare healthy girls away, is to invest what feels good to you, and no more. If you say you "don't trust girls", then the most useful practice for you is to lean into your discomfort, and give the girls a bit more trust than you normally would. This will give you better results. Because if you come into it with an untrusting attitude from the start, she'll feel that, and either mirror that back to you and behave untrustworthy, or just run away to a guy with a healthier emotional state.

This is cool: My particular trauma and the reason I got into pickup was less related to parents and more related to bullying in high school, but I think it's really cool anyway that there is at least one pickup coach out there who looks a level deeper.

Don't give full approval until you have gotten to know her enough that she deserves it. Otherwise, what are you really approving? You don't know if she's fun to hang out with, whether she treats her friends well, what her values are, and if she's any good in bed. And anything else that might be important to you. Until you have found out all of that, giving her full approval is just based on projections and assumptions. And that's needy. It's okay to give out a couple breadcrumbs on the way though, notice some things you appreciate about her personality or style for example. If you don't do that at all, you're being unnaturally standoffish, and she's going to wonder why you're even talking to her.

Nobody has tried it, you're at the cutting edge. Please try and post results. I will be following this topic closely Cocoa butter contains little to no theobromine or caffeine, so shouldn't mess with your trip. I'd be careful with chocolate for that reason.

Smoking = Pickup = Acceptance = Love I just saw a hot girl in the supermarket and was completely triggered. A simultaneous impulse to: Say hi, make conversation and remember/prove that I'm cool and likeable nowadays Hide, run away, knowing I am not showing up fully, and being ashamed of that. Everyone can see that I'm not showing up fully, and I'm ashamed, but but being comfortable in that. Suddenly I project this person as judging me, being above me, seeing how small and flawed I am. Usually when this strong trigger happens, I do either of these two things: I make conversation or I don't. The times where I make conversation, it doesn't matter whether it leads to anything, it's an experience that proves I was accepted, and I am so excited and proud of myself for breaking through, that my friends hear about it for days. This also happens when I have sex with a new person. It's proof that I was accepted by somebody who to me represents people from the past who didn't accept me, and I rave about it for days. Or, option number two, I don't make conversation, and I feel shitty about myself for the rest of the day. Which is also not normal. To see someone vaguely attractive, and then feel bad and ashamed for not approaching them for the rest of the day. When the opportunity is very clear, for example I have nothing urgent to do, and the person seems unoccupied, this shame spiral is very pronounced. When I see someone in passing, where there is not a clear opportunity, for example someone on a bicycle, I get a little hit of shame that affects me unconsciously. I didn't get an opportunity to prove that I would be accepted. Every attractive woman creates a tiny hit of shame and unacceptance. It happened in an instant. I chose to not say hi, as I usually don't nowadays, and I immediately felt such a strong impulse to smoke, that I asked two random people for a cigarette. As she's rolling it for me, I make conversation. I'm not bad at making conversation anymore, but it's still coming from an endlessly low place. I feel so low and lost talking to this person, it's like I'm standing at the bottom of a deep well, and she's at the top looking down. I fidget and hide, I don't make good eye contact. I want to escape. Upon lighting it, I realised why I do it: it's a patch over the feeling of being accepted, which I lost. When the chemical enters my bloodstream, for 30 minutes I now don't feel ashamed and inferior, and I have no problem saying hi to strangers and feeling comfortable talking to them.. I prove this to myself by saying hi to someone on the way home. No shame or anxiety. Just calm, happy, 'why not' type of feeling. Addiction is a compensation for something you lost. In people who have experienced a traumatic event or period, the serotonin system and/or dopamine system don't work so well. For me, it's the base sense of acceptance that I lost. This explains why making a short conversation with a hot girl caters to the same craving for me as smoking a cigarette, which otherwise makes no sense. But it provides me with the neurochemicals that someone without this kind of trauma has by default. For 30 minutes, it's all okay and I feel accepted, and I can talk to anyone without a problem. I've been bullied quite heavily and for a long time. I've been pushed down and beaten in primary school. One time, boys conspired to lock me in a closet for an hour, and after that I cried, and a girl in my class, the only girl I somewhat trusted, saw me crying and called out to my other classmates: "If you want to see Erik cry, come watch now!" I was alone and could trust no one. Accepted by no one. In high school, there was a girl I was madly in love with (crushing on hard, let's say, I was 13). I wrote her love letters and gave her roses, which were met with disgust and insults. She called me a nerd and started to be mean to me online, telling me I had no life, I had a boring life, I was a boring person yada yada. This same girl stood by and watched while I was beaten and abused by an older guy in school, he pushed me down and I tried to kick him, which didn't work. She stood there and laughed. It's really not that strange that I found a solution in smoking cigarettes: the nicotine made it bearable how alone and unaccepted I felt every day. It enabled me to talk to people while I smoked, because under the influence of nicotine, I didn't feel this pain temporarily. Suppose I would heal this somehow. And I didn't project a mean, unreachable, superior high school girl onto every attractive woman. And suppose I would not wonder about whether she'd accept me. Suppose I would just know that she probably would accept me. If I would just have this knowing, that she'd probably be delighted to have my attention. Then there would be no reason to prove that she would accept me, either by talking to me or by having sex with me. Probably there wouldn't be such a massive dopamine hit associated with it. Would I still crave sexual diversity? Would I still fantasize about living in a castle full of women who accepted and adored me? Would I still fantasize about orgies? Or anonymity? Orgies and anonymity are basically two ways to sweep the issue of acceptance off the table. When I think of an orgy, it becomes an acceptance orgy in my mind. There's no way to predict who I would be without this trauma.

Why I like cleaning: It teaches me to focus on the process instead of the result, because the result is never satisfying or good or lasting more than a few moments anyway It allows me to listen to podcasts while still doing something useful It teaches me humility, because it's one of the most basic jobs, yet I can't do it well It invites me to talk to this pain body that feels frustrated, disadvantaged, enraged It makes me uncomfortable. It's good to do uncomfortable work every day.

Why I hate cleaning: I can never do it to a level I'm satisfied with. Some stains just stay. What's the point then. It costs a lot of time It's not exactly playing to my strengths, in fact it's a waste of my time I'm not efficient at it It makes me wet and uncomfortable and feel incompetent The first person I'm going to hire is a cleaner. Specialists are so much better at it. Stupid wasting many hours on it and doing it wrong anyway.

Stuck to the no smoking. Watched youtube early in the day though. That was a mistake. Also had one coffee. Don't give up too many things at once. Tomorrow: video free day and entering day 3 of the smoking quit. After day 3 I expect to be fine. I/we need some plant medicine.

First stage of quitting smoking: a very, very fuzzy mind. Second stage: intermittent moments of sadness without a reason

How can the absence of kids or family be experienced as not free? Could you elaborate on how they view that? I don't see how having a family would make someone more free to do anything.

Thank you, that was satisfying to read

Yes, mescaline did this for me too. Quite shocking. The nasal passage was so open, that I felt like I had a giant hole in the middle of my head, that wind was flowing through. It was connected to a sense of strength and purpose, though. How old were you when that happened? Sounds like that was a traumatic moment, and conditioning was created that manifested psychosomatically. I'm sorry to hear that. That is not a right way to treat a child. They should have been loving and understanding towards you in that moment, but instead they were cold, unloving, and made you ignore your feelings and disown your experience. Whenever a child is being made to reject part of its own experience (in this case: you parents telling you that your lack of appetite is wrong), it creates a split. The part of you that experienced that which was deemed not okay, is now pushed into the shadow. And any experience it has, is also pushed down. When we push down something we are not allowing ourselves to experience, it can cause a blockage in the body. Numbness, pain, inability to experience pleasure in that area, or a literal blockage. Maybe that's how your nose got stuffed. It's just a theory, but it seems reasonable to me that you should treat this as childhood conditioning, incurred by this moment that was experienced as traumatic at the time. (Be careful not to minimize it. It doesn't matter what you as an adult consider traumatic. It only matters how it was experienced at that time) If that's what it is, then when you go through the process of releasing that conditioning, it could very well clear up your nose too. You won't find a medical cause in that case. Some avenues to consider: Primal therapy (I had great experience with this) Ayahuasca Body work Regression hypnosis Any therapist or healer who you trust and who specializes in childhood conditioning (not just any psychologist)

I love his podcasts. They often make me emotional to the point of tearing up. Taught me some good things too.

These interviews make it seem less scary: To answer the question: my fear of death is a 2/10 But I'm sure that should I be in danger, it will jump up quite a bit in the moment

Being on dependency creating drugs - mild or not - every day, means having detox symptoms in the morning. This goes for caffeine too. Amount doesn't matter as much as the regularity of it. If it's a daily habit, there will be a dependency. Apart from that: it's September. Do you have a pattern of feeling worse during the last 4 months of the year? In that case, you might have seasonal affective disorder. I have it. It's basically mild depression with anxiety that creeps up on you when the days get shorter and cloudier.

Following!

Committing to a video free day made me feel much better yesterday. I got work done and felt calmer. Today I feel even more stable, so I decided to do it again. Just got rid of cigarettes and coffee, don't need them anymore. I'll keep drinking some green tea over the next couple of days.

??

@EntheogenTruthSeeker Good move! If you really want a calm and optimistic mind, try giving all politics related content a rest, too. Maybe even quit talking politics. Or even holding political opinions. Any political opinion is ultimately untenable, anyway.

How come you can't, and I can? My YouTube recommendations are mostly videos about cute animals, functional medicine, health, psychedelics, and interesting speakers like Terence McKenna and Ram Dass. It sounds like you're a willing victim of the algorithm. Simple fix: only click on what makes you feel good and relaxed. Anything that is recommended which makes you feel anxious or otherwise bad, click "not interested". The algorithm will learn that you don't care about being scared or depressed anymore. Do that for a week and see what that does for you. But Erik, don't you think it's important to know what's going on in the world? Aren't you sticking your head in the sand? There is infinite bad things going on, and infinite wholesome, hopeful things going on. My capacity to take in information is limited. So I have to filter. Why not set your filters to relaxed and healthy? No one is being helped by anonymous people feeling bad about their suffering, for a second, before clicking away, anyway. People directly around you are being helped by you radiating gratitude and hope, though. So choose your content consciously.