paprika

Thank you all who responded for joining me in this thought experiment. I appreciate all the comments, I felt them quite valuable.

@softlyblossoming thanks for the detailed explanation. I didn't consider a pint of beer as a "pill" as you described. Much like an external tool to stir my mind a bit to become unstuck and derive inspiration from the experience. What I'd like to understand here, how psychedelics would be different from alcohol if they're used in exactly the same way? Why are psychedelics the ones that are preferred? Does alcohol have any extra biological or psychological side-effect or difference in the way it interacts with the brain that could rule it out for personal development completely? Note that I'm aware of that alcohol isn't that effective, it isn't in the scope of my question. I believe that the bending of logic and invention of various related philosophies as you both described can apply for psychedelics as well, so I'd consider this another topic.

@Salvijus I see what you mean, but something still makes me believe that drinking alcohol consciously might make sense. Why to demonize it? What makes other tools superior? Note that I don't consider myself an addict. Above a given limit, my mind refuses to consume more of it, it clearly sees no value of that.

I've just found this interesting writing on the topic: Drunken Soulitude.

I've been thinking about this for a while now and I've recently rewatched Leo's video on using psychedelics for personal development which made me eventually raise this question: why alcohol couldn't be used for the same purpose? Given that it's used consciously, similarly what Leo said for psychedelics, drinking some safe amount of beer (~1 liter of 5.4% IPA for me) alone while focusing inside and being prepared for it, for example, was able to give me sudden insights on things were I was mentally stuck, permanently relieve stress in the inside, and also filled me with warm love (to my own surprise). Sometimes I share the same experiences when drinking pu-erh teas. I don't tell that it's on par with psychedelics (I haven't tried them, but based on what I heard about them, I have some vague assumptions about their effects) but might make an argument for "validating" the use of alcohol within some boundaries, as a lightweight and fully legal alternative.

I have been together with my wife for 5 years and we have been married for almost 2 years now. She had a rough childhood (compared to mine at least) and a dysfunctional family that earned her many traumas in the past. She is a highly sensitive person and a perfectionist, and over the years, she developed patterns of controlling and abusive behavior. She always knows what's better for me. For example, she cuts my hair but she doesn't let me to go to the barber and change it or else she says I'd look lame, and that's the same for clothing. I cannot cook food for myself unless if I share a portion with her, even if both of us know that she doesn't want to eat it. I like simple but healthy food but that's lame and she always needs something special and I shall not cook only for myself. If she feels herself provoked or attacked, she intensively fights back verbally and sometimes responds with physical aggression (throwing objects, hitting). If I don't want something, she keeps pushing her opinion aggressively and doesn't respect when I say "No" and even explain the reasons to her. She has the "champion of justice" attitude and often picks a fight with random people due to this. We share my small apartment and basically my income (since she couldn't get a job because "the world is so lame and cruel"), I never asked her to pay any of the bills or share the costs but time to time she expresses how she hates the place, which makes me feel bad. We can discuss all these things, and she sometimes acknowledges her actions and reactions, but it's often very tedious to defend myself and stand up for myself. She always tells me that she doesn't want to hurt me, sometimes cries and talks about regret and blames her family and childhood environment. And then the next day things return to their original state, like we never talked about them. I don't want to be the person who is always rebuked -- I don't consider myself such a bad one that much. I entered this relationship with love, openness, and being aware many of these things and I consciously wanted to help her to overcome her difficulties and become a better person. She has positively changed a lot in the last few years and living with her also helped me to understand many things about myself and improve both personally and spiritually, get better in assertive communication, be more detached from feelings, and so on. But recently I started to feel that balance of this relationship became negative on my side: although my wife loves me and praises me for others, I can hardly come up with good thoughts and I often think about the debates we had, and I feel the constraints around myself and that I'm told to be selfish. I'm a "live and let live" kind of a person, but that's not what I get back. I feel that my integrity is getting corrupted. This makes me hard to proceed with the marriage: have children or invest into an upgrade for a more expensive apartment. Am I also being so highly sensitive here and it's just business as usual, i.e. the man should become a married man hence more responsible, a better fit for a relationship? Or is it unhealthy to stay in such a relationship at all? Are there any tests or questions that could help me to see what's the case?

Hey folks, thanks for all the insights and nudges! @flowboy thanks for your offer regarding the Sam Owens course: I've watched a couple of his first videos on YouTube, and based on that I think right now I'm fine with the free content posted there. @UDT you're right, I'm still clinging to money, and I'll need to take care of that first. FWIW, when I was watching Sam Owens videos, I've had an impression very similar to your advice above, so that part of the business mustn't be rocket science indeed. Thank you for the push. @Tom T maybe that's a bold idea, but recently I came to the conclusion that what I'd like to do as business is something that I've done as a employee: coach/mentor professionals on 1:1 or in general such as a podcast, consult companies, and do research on topics that I consider important, go to conferences and sell my ideas. I don't think that'd need any market research to reinforce that. I'm getting more and more certain that my experience and expertise represent a very valuable asset, and it's time to enjoy the benefits.

I've been pondering to start my own business for a while now (1-2 years, perhaps). For what it's worth, saving some money was actually part of the (somewhat unconscious) plan around this. I believe I've gained all the field-related skills: I'm both experienced on the theoretical (worked in the academia) and the practical side (worked in the industry) of my area of expertise, and I've also have a track record at people & project management, education, public speaking, and organization. So you're right: where I'd probably need more development are the actual business skills: as you wrote, marketing, for instance. Right now, I feel myself like a complete n00b. But I'm a very open-minded person and eager to learn about these, so thanks for the hint @universe , I'll check out that guy. To be honest, my strongest motivator at the moment is to be my own boss. I feel my professional values are wasted at my current employer, also I'm quite sure that I'm underselling myself. So doing my own business is that I'd feel the most efficient way to self-actualize myself. Maybe that's where my fears really lie: I'm trying to escape the "wage slavery" in a haste, without deep business knowledge, a tested business idea, and a business plan?

Okay, great, thanks for all the feedback. My next question is then: does anybody have any recommendations on what books, articles, or blogs to study about self-employment or doing contract work?

I've decided to work on my business, and I'm a bit unsure how to make the next steps. Thanks to my hard work in the last couple of years, I've earned and saved some money so I could maintain my current quality of life for years without any further income. But for some reason, I wouldn't let myself go without a salary for that long, and I'd still keep some 9-5 or contract job around for a steady but probably lower amount of income, so I could work on my own project besides that. The reason is why I feel like this is because I haven't tested my idea. At the moment, I'd definitely give it a try to start my own business with full throttle, but I'm a bit scared about its financial consequences: what if it goes wrong, my idea turns out be a failure and I'll just burn all my money? I'd need time to learn and gain experience about how business works (I haven't had clients before), do some research and experimentation while a safety net is installed that can catch me. But having a "backup" job around might decrease the amount of energy and time I can spend on my project at the same time. What would be the ideal curve here? Is this an acceptable compromise?

I think what really matters for software engineers to most is to learn about the same from different perspectives. In this context, it's called programming paradigms. What languages you've mentioned in this topic are imperative, object-oriented ones, or somewhere in between. But it can be enlightening to learn about others, such as the declarative programming. This one is especially interesting because it lets you focus on the mathematical / computer science side of a problem, which is actually closer to the way how humans generally think. For example, besides pointers (aka. indirection) another important skill to master is understanding recursion, but these days, I'd also add purity or dealing with concurrency.

@Average Investor no, it's a startup that can rely on income from customers in the industry, no investors, no grants, no debts, etc. Actually, it's a nice place in overall, but as you've also noticed, I don't work well with others, especially, with the management. And this matters me the most, more than money and even stability. Curiously, since I started this topic, I'm getting more and more motivated to focus on my own projects. Perhaps what I needed here is just some kind words and a pinch of sympathy?

@Average Investor yeah, I'm mostly happy with what I do these days, because I'm always trying to change my working environment in ways that helps me to optimise my performance, and I'm usually successful in that. But at the same time, I feel myself constrained and not understood by my peers. I often feel like an alien: I can't make my visions and actions accepted, or at least understood despite the fact I'm told to be an excellent communicator. Maybe all I need is a new environment, a new set of coworkers, or start having my own clients?

@universe I don't have my own business at the moment. I work for a startup company. My problem comes from the fact that I've put a lot of effort into that company, but those aren't valued. Actually, I'm getting actively pushed back by the management. I'm inclined to think that somebody with such a performance might be scary for them. That was one of the reasons for me to depart from academia as well: I remember when I raised that I may want to resign from the university position and explained that I don't find that place challenging enough, the head of department replied that I didn't have any impact anyway. Recently, the same happened to me at the company, when I was having a chat with my managers about my performance: they told me that I don't add that much of a company value, I'm not senior enough to move higher on the ladder, etc. I had to realise that I might have been surrounded by people of lower consciousness, and I don't have much more time to waste on proving them anything. But why I am still not motivated enough to leave? Something along the lines of @Elton.

Thanks for all the advices @Average Investor. I've listened to Earl Nightingale's talk, and I agree with all the contents from my whole heart. The problem is that I know this all well. But I don't only know those, but I've been applying them. I've been watching Leo's episodes from 5 years now, purchased the Life Purpose Course. One might actually consider me quite successful in life: I came from a small town as a child of workers, and by the age of 30, I've earned a PhD, travelled around the world as a volunteer, conference speaker, and organiser of conferences, taught at the university level, visited some of the top universities, gave classes to hundreds of students on the topics I love the most, mentored many talents. Since then I mastered my emotions and psychology, I was able to buy an apartment for myself without taking out a loan, I met and married my wife. None of those would have been possible with taking these advices. I am on the path of the self-actualisation for a while now. For what it's worth, I haven't done 30 days with these advices in mind but the last 100 days at minimum. What's curious for me here instead, why I'm finding more joy in helping others than chasing my own ideas? Perhaps my life purpose is to help others in reaching their goals in life? Sometimes this reminds me to the case when one wants to find her glasses but she can't because she's already put that on.