flowboy

I pity these people now (of whom I was one) who force themselves to believe things that are very uncomfortable and cause great suffering to believe. Just because they got brainwashed at a young age into thinking that that is the correct way. Same with hell. "If you have anal sex, a bearded man in the sky will make sure you burn eternally". Does that feel comfortable to believe? Nope. So the comfort argument really doesn't fly as a way to discredit religious beliefs.

Hilarious attempts at rationalizing away evidence for reincarnation by practitioners of scientism: The scientific method just doesn't apply to this. You can't do an experiment using the current version of the scientific method, and prove that someone's soul reincarnates. You also can't prove with current methodology that it does not. I love how that makes these guys sweat and squirm and resort to hypocrisy and fallacies. The eggheaded guy criticized that reincarnation researchers are biased because they want it to be real. Then proceeded to set up an experiment with the goal to prove that it is not real? The experiment involved getting children to make up stories, and seeing if those correlate just as well with people that have existed. Then they picked only the stories that seemed to be very specific, linked them to a real person, and said "Tada, a made-up story is just as easily linked to a person that really existed". Conveniently ignoring that memories and imagination are very similar, especially children often mix them up. He didn't prove that telling the child to make up a story didn't trigger a past memory in her. That's what it clearly looks like to me. And the older devil: "We lost the Christian narrative that helped us cope with the mystery of death, and so we find patterns in perceptions, and pick and choose ideas that give us comfort . [And so that's why we needed the idea of reincarnation]" (notice how the choice of words makes it sound pathetic) LOL? Scientists do the exact same thing, but word it a bit differently. And they don't even see HOW it is the exact same thing. We lost the narrative that the atom is solid, which helped us understand (helped us cope with the mystery of) life, and so we find patterns in perceptions, and pick and choose new models that make sense to us (give us comfort/the illusion of complete understanding). [and now we have (that's why we needed) string theory / quantum physics] We lost the narrative that the sun spins around the earth, that made us uncomfortable, so then we looked around (measured a bunch of stuff, which is just perception with arbitrarily chosen sensors), and needed a new story to make us comfortable again. So interesting and devilish how they just reword the same process, to make it sound pathetic. I used to believe this scientism crap, not too long ago?

Interesting, thank you for your answer. So do you think the paranoid aspect of it (voices telling you not to trust your loved ones because they poisoned you), is related to the repression of it by our culture?

Hilarious attempts at rationalizing away evidence for reincarnation by practitioners of scientism: The eggheaded guy criticized that reincarnation researchers are biased because they want it to be real. Then proceeded to set up an experiment with the goal to prove that it is not real? The experiment involved getting children to make up stories, and seeing if those correlate just as well with people that have existed. Then they picked only the stories that seemed to be very specific, linked them to a real person, and said "Tada, a made-up story is just as easily linked to a person that really existed". Conveniently ignoring that memories and imagination are very similar, especially children often mix them up. He didn't prove that telling the child to make up a story didn't trigger a past memory in her. To me, it clearly did. And the older devil: "We lost the Christian narrative that helped us cope with the mystery of death, and so we find patterns in perceptions, and pick and choose ideas that give us comfort . [And so that's why we needed the idea of reincarnation]" LOL? Scientists do the exact same thing, but word it a bit differently. And they don't even see HOW it is the exact same thing. We lost the narrative that the atom is solid, which helped us understand (helped us cope with the mystery of) life, and so we find patterns in perceptions, and pick and choose new models that make sense to us (give us comfort/the illusion of complete understanding). [and now we have (that's why we needed) string theory / quantum physics] So interesting and devilish how they just reword the same process, to make it sound pathetic. I used to believe this scientism crap, not too long ago? It's very sneaky. They use the fact that "in believing this, they take great comfort" as a way to discredit it. Conveniently ignoring (or not knowing) that how a belief feels is a good indicator to how closely it aligns with truth. What a great deception! I pity these people now (of whom I was one) who force themselves to believe things that are very uncomfortable and cause great suffering to believe. Just because they got brainwashed into thinking that that is the correct way. Same with hell. "If you have anal sex, a bearded man in the sky will make sure you burn eternally". Does that feel comfortable to believe? Nope. So the comfort argument really doesn't fly as a way to discredit religion. That is a good song tho. Bro... If people who died and came back right away (the ones who had a near-death experience, of which many, many great recontations can be found in Shaman Oaks's youtube channel) remember that tunnel, AND children who were recently born remember that tunnel, then how stupid is it to say that the tunnel doesn't exist? That's like saying planets don't exist because you never looked through a telescope, and people who look through telescopes are crazy. And "it brings them great comfort" to look through telescopes and believe that we're not the only planet. ? Interesting parallel: if you die a violent death, your reincarnation remembers your past life better. If you are violently awoken from sleep, you remember your dream better. Do animals know the things they miraculously know (how to do their mating ritual, how to fly around the earth and navigate during winter trek, I'm sure there are better examples) because all of them die violent deaths again and again, and so they compensate their lack of brain size with being able to retain memory and learn across lifespans? Also what's interesting to me that in these reincarnation stories, the kids stopped remembering from the age they went to school. What would we remember if we didn't force-feed information to our children?

@_Archangel_ Interesting! So symbols are just tools, but to see them as that prevents them from working. Rationality is an obstacle to magic. So you have to be willing to let yourself go crazy, to access the wisdom or whatever one is after.

Given that there's a pattern of children remembering their past lives, and talking about them as soon as they learn to talk (I just checked some documentaries), also past life regressions seem to work well, so that points to reincarnation being real. At least at the level where you and I are real. Also, they remember how they died. Which is remarkable, because most 5 year olds don't even know about death

I bet he glimpsed the ox's tail plenty of times Maybe even bit it off. When you realise that humans often have ayahuasca trips where they become jaguars, that's when it gets interesting.

@Onecirrus When you're walking around in nature, where everything that grows and walks around is unprocessed and organic, and you find something to eat, fat, salt and sugar are signs that this is good for you. McDonalds has hacked this mechanism to make you eat their garbage. Why do people keep doing it? It's addictive The "food" is so bad for the brain and mental clarity, that it literally makes you dumber. So it's hard to think clearly and decide to stop. Their friends/family do it, and you have to be pretty mentally strong to go against the grain and be laughed at. Which again, is hard if your brain is withering away because of bad nutrition.

@Alfonsoo Trying to manage it is the wrong approach

@Giulio Bevilacqua Sorry to hear you are having a rough time of it. I don't have personal experience with this, but Vivek Govekar has a cool youtube channel about his kundalini process, and it was pretty dramatic too. Lots of useful tips in there.

Good time to do the course.

@coca Oh no, we like threads about dating and sexuality. Just not this one, because it's not constructive. Pointing the finger at a group (any group) of people is bordering on hatespeech, so watch it.

Radical Experiments in Self-love (#triggerwarning for self-development junkies!) Yesterday, I had 6 things planned for the day. Instead, I watched porn all morning (didn't cum though), and spent all afternoon journaling. Today, I had no plan. But I knew what to do. I still "procrastinated" starting until 4pm, though! Zero. Negative. Feelings. I'm experimenting with not punishing myself! And it's great! Just like I hypothesized, not punishing and shaming myself made sure it was super easy to get started when I did! Before, I would have huge stress and shame built up from so much procrastination. When I finally did start, it would be because my adrenaline would be going through the roof, and my thoughts would be torturing me so hard, that I was unable to drown them out with watching youtube and being on my phone combined. I probably also would have abused caffeine to the point where I had heart palpitations and felt anxious. And would not be able to sleep at a decent time because of it. And I thought I deserved the punishment of not sleeping, because I had been "bad". Today, I really enjoy what I do instead of the work, and see the meaning in it. I'm exploring ideas. Working out insights. Helping others. Growing and consolidating my ever-increasing knowledge base. None of my time-wasters are useless. I'm simply denying the use I have for it. I even learnt a lot from watching all that porn yesterday! I experienced it from such a high level of consciousness, that I never have before. Because I was always pulled down by this layer of shame and guilt. It was a spiritual experience that made me feel unconditional love and recognize the divine. (And there was some hardcore stuff too, with metal music in the background) The porn videos I watched, had an extra layer to it of reverence, and I felt like there were spiritual insights to be gleaned. It deepened my unconditional love for people, the masculine, and the feminine. Sounds cringey but that was my experience, and I like it. Today, zero desire to watch porn. I don't even need my website blocker anymore. A behavior is unconsciously repeated until it is fully experienced. Seeing only the good side, or the bad side, but not gaining the insight or the meaning, because of being dragged down by judgment, just makes you want to repeat the experience. In an attempt to experience it fully. I actually am telling myself that I love myself in the mirror, as per Matt Kahn's advice. I think it really works. Did I have zero impulse to chastise myself then? No, the thought was there. Instead of trying to ignore it, I chose to act it out dramatically. I literally shouted, in a comically exaggerated and overly dramatic fashion: "Oh my GOD, I WASTED all this time!! I CAN't believe it, I'm SO BAD!!" and gestured wildly. But I did it with a wink. In my mind, I'm encouraging myself from the sidelines: "Yeah!! Whip yourself! Do it! Awesome! Well done! Such a nice punishment! Amazing shaming session!!" Thusly, more fully experiencing my negative self talk. And because there are now zero shaming thoughts to escape from, I can now calmly decide: "this is not the useful thing I actually want to do", and pull myself away with zero resistance. My working theory is that things like this are crucial for transforming sticky patterns. It's too early to tell whether it works, but it's looking good so far.

@uriel I'm going to take a different position here than most answers so far. Don't break up, in your current state. Wait until your OCD has calmed down so much, and you are actually feeling calm and like you can see things clearly. Don't ever make big life decisions from an unhappy, stressed state. No good decisions come from that. Your most acute problem here is not your relationship with your girlfriend, it's the one with your therapist! It's not working, so you need to try different things. A different therapist, if you have the option. But also broaden your horizon of options you can explore. Then, when it has calmed down, you'll know what to do. Perhaps breaking up is the answer, perhaps not. But it's not fair to you or your partner to make that decision with a clouded mind. As long as we're talking about additional options to improve your mental health situation, let me jump on my soapbox for a bit. Watch this

@SamC There's four stages to overcoming an unhealthy pattern. Living it, unconsciously Living it, aware of it Rejection, fighting against it and being vigilant not to fall back into it Transcendence: your paradigm has changed so much that you can't even conceive of falling back anymore I'm somewhat in stage 3 still, I'm still being vigilant that I don't play the victim. Although this is diminishing lately. That vigilance doesn't stop with me, it also gets (mis)directed at other people. Whatever I'm currently working on, will trigger me in others.

I'm sorry that that's been your experience. The woman I love has multiple male friends. They are exceptional guys, and they are secure in their position as a friend. It takes an exceptional guy to be friends with a woman without getting needy and creepy on her.

@Gianna Of course not. You can have male friends. It's possible and it's a valid desire. Don't listen to these idiots. Here's the catch: they need to be so non-needy, that they don't view you as just a juicy piece of meat that they need So with experience, you can learn how to recognize that. Someone who really has their life together, and doesn't need your validation because they don't have anything to prove. Those people can be your friends. Ironically, these are the guys you will often find attractive and want to pursue. But not always. A guy who has his shit seriously together, and he's not at al scared to make a move on you, but both of you know that there's no sexual spark between you. He can be a good friend.

Fine then. She should move in with him. To tell him or not, is her choice. She can do that when she's ready. To get her to agree to therapy, negotiate with her. Sweeten the deal. What does she really want? It's important to respect a child's free will and not override it by default, but also she's 13 and doesn't have the knowledge or maturity required to clearly see what she needs. That's what you are there for now. So if you feel responsible for this person, then make it your mission to find her a good therapist who she likes, and get her to voluntarily go, preferably combined with EMDR sessions, and get her to move in with her dad where she's safe. Perhaps it's okay to say "okay you don't have to tell your dad, but then you do have to do therapy", perhaps the deal needs to be sweeter. Get creative. I applaud you sir, for taking this responsibility upon you.

Cool

Yes they may be workaholics, but they probably tried out tons of other things that they are currently not doing, to get to the thing that was actually worthwhile putting in all that work to them. See also:

@LeoX8 I don't think you're being a victim at all. You're facing adversity and looking for feedback and input. Good for you! Whether you quit depends on whether this is your dream, or an important step towards it. If it is, you never quit! You conquer the obstacle and practice relentlessness. Requisite variety. If you don't care about it (anymore), it's fine to quit. Successful people quit often and quit early. Overcoming that shame and investment attachment is what enables you to find the right thing faster. If you don't know, take 7 days off and don't do any work. Not even email. Take a trip if you can. Perhaps you're just overworked.

That sounds like she's killed people. I'm not saying that that bias doesn't exist - it exists in me as well. But it only comes up when I am feeling jealous and insecure. My issue is with the unwillingness to introspect

@coca I'm assuming you're single. Instead of focusing on what you don't want - how about focusing on what you do want? What do you want in a woman? Where could you meet someone like that?

Thanks for showing that you don't actually know what you are talking about. Burden of proof is on you here, sir. If women get brain damage from sleeping around, that's quite a bold claim to make, so you gotta back it up with some reeeal solid rationale + personal experience. Which you can't. Because you're just repeating what random internet people said

It makes perfect sense to me, but it flies over your head because you lack experience. (I assume) How long was your longest relationship? How many girls have you been with?