Roy

Yawn. Prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, then we can talk. There are literally hundreds of millions, billions of recording devices in the world now, most of which are high quality. Yet despite all the "evidence" we haven't had a single legit video or image capture of what is clearly, and inarguably verified as an alien or alien vessel. Even the quality of the releases from the US military is total dogshit. This is just a mass hallucinatory conspiracy theory right now. When we actually do have proof there will be global public hysteria. Which right now there is not because it's clear we don't.

Nah it won't happen for quite a while. My country is still filled to the brim with rural Conservative simpletons. Who have the audacious lack of self awareness to call their party "Progressive Conservatives". lol I should start my own party called "The Up Downs". I volunteer at a local fire department, and most of the people there are generally conservative. They are fantastic people who won't hesitate or have a problem delivering Narcan and first aid to overdose patients, but if you bring up the idea of safe injection sites so that we WON'T have to go to such lengths to save people they get pissed off because socialism and it's their tax money being used to "feed their addiction". It's a good example of the cognitive dissonance of those on lower Spiral Dynamics stages.

Volunteer somewhere, anywhere. It will be one of the best decisions you can ever make. I started when I was 18 after being forced to to get my 40 community hours to graduate high school, but it was so awesome I never stopped doing it. You'll meet some amazing people to socialize with because the environment of volunteering naturally draws kind, interesting, high quality folks who will look out for you. Toastmasters is also great (and free). It's the perfect environment to practice socializing and build confidence in that area, because you are in a completely friendly risk free place for it. The people there understand exactly what it's like and are all in the same boat. Volunteering basically cured my crippling social/anxiety, and it was fucking baaaaaad.

@Emotionalmosquito You are correct. However I'm not looking to get into a gender war here about who has it worse in each area. I was offering the OP an opportunity to learn and address the bias embedded in his title.

Don't read too much into it. People in the world have all sorts of weird reactions, attitudes, and chips on their shoulders. If you legitimately didn't do anything wrong then you don't need to get in your own head about things, it's just a waste of your energy. On the topic of your title though, I urge you to step into the perspective of a woman. A lot of women DO have to worry about sexual violence, and it's not some "paranoid" joke. It's hard to appreciate as men because we typically experience our reality and go about our life in the world feeling (generally) confident in the event of a physical encounter. You are only scared of the handful of men who are clearly stronger than you, and scoff at the notion of being threatened by 99% of females. Women on the other hand are at the mercy of the overwhelming majority of men they encounter. They have to be on their guard and have a certain baseline level of fear to keep them safe and from being in situations they can be taken advantage of, because they will be mostly helpless in the event of things going horribly wrong and some fucked up guy deciding to rape them. So yes "Women are paranoid for possible rapists 24/7m", and not for no reason. Sit and contemplate the experience of a female. Go watch some videos of victims of sexual abuse/violence describing their experiences. It will be good for you to expand your worldview.

Free time, so I can appreciate this unique and wonderfully interesting existence. Why become a slave to money, when I am just going to use it to get more free time anyways? I'll just go directly to the time thanks.

It doesn't make sense because you're being a neurotic logic pedant.

Trauma breeds trauma breeds trauma.

Ooo boy. Has this been one I've had to learn, and relearn again

That may be why you feel you're getting nowhere, because you're just "generally" looking for help, instead of focusing on the things you need to work on most, your biggest problems or obstacles in life. Things will start to "actually" work when you take responsibility to search for and focus on the exact information you need to use to make changes. Just "doing personal development" doesn't really change anything. It just makes everything a tiny tiny bit better. Stop using a machine gun and get yourself a sniper rifle. What is your single specific biggest problem right now @Max8?

Take THAT for data!

It's not brainwashing, or a belief, or wishful thinking. It's literally as simple as lifting weights. How do you think you could bench press 100 pounds? You would start bench pressing what you can comfortably say 65 pounds. You would do that for a while, consistently. Then add another 5 pounds, and do that for a while, and so on. All the while keeping the vision and realizing eventually you will reach 100 pounds. At the start you might say it's "impossible" because you can't do it currently. But if we all just went about living life based on what seemed possible now and convenient, nothing would get done or accomplished. You don't have a right to bitch, or make excuses, or call it "stupid" when the road map and the work is right there in front of you. If you want to bitch, do it while you're going through the work and exhausted. That's when you can call it stupid.

It's interesting there seems to be two kinds of Stage Green. When I'm talking to people I like to play a game where I prod with certain questions and judging by their emotional reactions I'll know which one they are pretty clearly, whether they are putting it on for show or they have a chance to get past it to Yellow.

It's the ego going whatever lengths necessary to uphold the identity that it deserves to suffer, for whatever reason that may be. Of course, all of it is a fiction. If looked at hard enough, long enough, and with enough determination it's possible to see past the surface into the hollow.

There is no way you haven't had any results after doing it for 4 years. The results are there, you just have to uncover them and be honest about it. They are more subtle than you realize. What is one thing that has obviously improved since you started your journey? It can be anything, it doesn't have to be big. Just pick one.

If you feel absolutely awful and doing it going there, why fight going uphill on ice? You aren't going to perform your best and get results feeling like that. Brainstorm different places you can get the same results you want, they exist. Women are everywhere, not just clubs. There is more than one way to skin a cat.

This is a lot. I am really sorry. I don't know what I can say to remedy anything for you besides that, know it is NOT your fault nor responsibility. Don't blame yourself for any of it, as the mind might be weird and play tricks on you. You didn't do anything wrong so don't feel like you have to do anything or put anything on yourself. If you want to though and ff it helps you or your family members who suffered, try to console them and offer your emotional support, if they need it and want it. Or connect them with additional resources. It's great that you restrained yourself from doing something rash. For now I wouldn't focus on him but yourself and your other family members. Perhaps you could rat him out about the gun under his bed. I'm not sure that is a good idea though, it's hard to know how things would go down. You might create more problems than creating justice. I don't know. Please be kind to yourself, get away from him as best you can, and take it easy for a while to process this. Be well Arc.

This thread made me want to watch the movies over again, so I got through the first one last night. I remember many great scenes from watching the films before, but this one really stuck out last night. Morpheus explains to Neo something that I think is quite analogous to the ego work that we talk about here and other personal development spheres generally - He explains that most people are too dependent and buried in the very system that keeps them deluded, and that they aren't ready to be "woken" up to the nature of their reality. They will actually fight to defend their ignorance. It's remarkable how true this is in the real world. You can hand someone gold, and they will throw shit back at you.

I withheld sex from my first long-term girlfriend. It was a really good decision, built a really good foundation for the relationship. Don't view me as a hero though, it was only like 2 or 3 weeks . Enough though.

I don't entirely agree nor disagree with @Leo Gura but I think he's being too harsh here. Two people should both have good communication about their general intentions about what kind of relationship it will be before having sex. So you don't "give up the cookie" and expect something more and then have the guy (or girl) bounce on you the next day. It happens way too much and people get hurt for no reason. Have the courage to set the boundary and share your ambitions (and have them share theirs too) before getting too involved with each other, because yes sex IS another layer of involvement. Sex is not a casual thing unless it's happening in an explicitly clear casual setting like a fucking brothel or in the bathroom of a bar. It's all nice to be "organic" and "flowing" about sexuality but let's be honest and not forget it's mostly a transactional thing. You are making a subtle business deal in every relationship, don't let your selfish intentions cloud you to that reality. I banged a French girl earlier this year on the first date, and while the hours up to and during the sex were great and we seemed on the same page with our energy and intentions, what we were both REALLY after were completely different things. It seemed all fine but obviously we read each other wrong somewhere because she was quite upset when I said I wasn't sure I was after a continuous thing after we did the deed. I still feel awful about it. So yeah, talk about your intentions @cjoseph90 Don't treat your encounters like a joke. It's good to have a little bit of fear, it keeps you from being stupid. There are MANY guys out there who won't hesitate to fuck you and delete your number the next morning. They will play all charming and say all the right things just to get what they want.

If you want to find something specific, like someone on the same life mission, you need to go looking for it. It's a shot in the dark waiting for a certain kind of thing to come around. That will be a lot of waiting. Which is ok if you're patient and able to handle it. It sounds like maybe though you aren't content with that anymore which is why you made this thread? Where do you think your ideal person would be (with that certain life mission)? What places could you put yourself in where you think you could meet them?

It's not great, but I wouldn't be too harsh on it. It looks like someone is just trying to learn the system and got too excited to throw together some webpage.

No shit. You can't give radically consciousness alternating and reality shattering substances to most people and expect them to make sense of it without some sort of serious ground work being laid. It's like trying to teach calculus to a camel. You might as well put a blindfolded person in a labyrinth and ask them to find their way out. Also not to pick on you personally, but more of a public service announcement - watch the hubris of thinking you "get it" while others "don't".

Reality really is a spectacle, ain't it

I have no idea what the fuck people are talking about. The 2nd and 3rd Matrix movies are good movies and not bad by any means. People just want to seem cool by unconsciously jumping in the dog pile? The Matrix trilogy is likely the best set of science fiction movies made to date. Yes even better than Star Wars, I love Star Wars and they are fun movies, but it's mostly just a simple hero's journey tale talking place in a science fiction backdrop. The Matrix on the other hand has way more complex implications that dives into real world issues and ties a lot of philosophy in as well.