trenton

I seem to have fallen into the trap of self improvement. I was hoping that I could somehow find a purpose that gives me passionate energy. I found many possibilities, but I still feel unsure. My interests include teaching, chess, creative writing, philosophy, psychology, and political research. I feel like my inability to turn these things into a sustainable career is a sign of a personal defect. I have been using books about emotional mastery in an effort to fix myself. I fundamentally believe I cannot be good enough to live a decent life. I am also a bad choice for dating and I struggle with a family who does not see my value as strangers do. I have struggled with depression and autism among other things for many years. I am much better than I used to be and as I integrate back into society, I notice things that trigger negative thoughts. Me trying to improve myself never seemed to be enough. I am noticing that this site I try to use to improve myself in some ways feeds into my depression. I'm basically comparing myself to Leo and all the people who had God realization or have found a purpose to commit to. Meanwhile I am lost in the confusion around my identity because of the disruption of my original childhood dream to be a professional chess player. When I look at all my old habits back at home I start to think no wonder I'm so depressed.

@LordFall over the next 30 days, I plan to collect my fmla payment, return to work, manage work stress with depression and anxiety which I was hoping to get help for but didn't, I will try to get a promotion again which I am qualified for, I plan to move to Kentucky, transfer my job to another store, then set up my daily activities with an accountability partner. I will also need new insurance for my medication and possibly a therapist who specializes in autism.

@Consept here's how I did it I started watching remote chess academy when I was rated 700. I looked at video lessons like the secrets of strong players. The older lessons on youtube are what I found helpful for reaching 1600. This was combined with starting a lichess.org account and analyzing every game with a computer. I made many studies on my opening repertoire. I combined my own understanding with the computer calculation to figure out my opening play. I find that I retain more when I build my own opening rather than copy someone else. Along with that I studied many paid courses from remote chess academy and improve my chess. I found the most helpful course to be the grandmasters opening laboratory 2. It taught me techniques that applied against Master level players and shows how to make a positional sacrifice from the opening. I practiced theoretical endgames with a chess encyclopedia and a computer. This helped me to find draws in otherwise lost positions. Most of my mistakes happen in the middlegame. This is either due to misunderstanding the optimal strategy or by miscalculation. There are courses that might help but after a while I got diminishing returns from courses. Before my tournament games I looked in a mirror and started repeating affirmations. I visualized myself becoming a grandmaster and playing a beautiful game against strong opponents. This is how I ultimately beat a national master. Some good channels include John Bartholomew and chessnetwork.

@Consept I am rated about 2050 uscf. I was a chess teacher and coach. I trained some people to win tournaments. What questions do you have?

I get a lot of mixed messaging around chess. Some say it is a game and I should find a better purpose. Some say "follow your passion." Some say "don't give up." This forum conflicts with what my doctors told me. in the end, I'm alone in making these decisions. At the moment I am losing interest in chess unless I can play with enthusiastic students who want to learn. Online chess is getting less interesting to me. I have a plan for the next month. I want to build a thoughtful routine and schedule for work, play, and self help and projects.

@Leo Gura you mentioned that life has greater things for me than chess. The main problem for my recovery according to the therapists is my rigid mind and thinking due to autism. In this case I created an identity around things like strategy games, my dysfunctional family, and various trauma responses. The combination makes it look like I'm stuck and can't change. Have you made any videos about consciously constructing an identity for those who have not realized God or do you plan to? I once created an identity as a Christian. Although I felt happy, it required me to lie to myself. Ideally I would want to create an identity that does not require self deception. I don't know how to love myself without self deception.

@Consept I have tried talking to multiple therapists. Honestly, they were not as helpful as I hoped. They were not prepared to deal with autism and how my brain processes trauma. Most of my progress came from doing my own research on trauma responses. At the very least I want to use this forum for something better than just complaining about my problems out of a lack of self love.

@WonderSeeker I would like to address the whole "I hate myself" thing. I am 26 years old. I still struggle with different trauma responses from my childhood. One of the responses was to place high standards on myself believing that accomplishment would establish a sense of self worth. I'm still doing it on this forum all the time. Basically a messed up event from when I was six made it feel impossible to love myself. I'm still punishing myself by seeing myself as unworthy of love for lack of proof of self worth. I want to get better about coming to the forum and writing about everything wrong with me. This reinforces the old habit I developed of denying myself love. Thank you

I want to provide the counter argument for this kind of reasoning. If the primary argument against abortion is that it is murder, then logically rape and incest should not be exceptions. In that case it would still be murder. Therefore, the pro life argument when coupled with these exceptions reveals the deeper truth. That is that there is a belief that women are sluts and they need to be controlled. Consent has nothing to do with abortion being murder. This is why the pro choice argument becomes that you are trying to control women and their sexual lives. You don't actually care if abortion is killing babies because killing babies is fine in the case of rape and incest.

@Bjorn K Holmstrom I have proven myself to be a great teacher. I love teaching enthusiastic students chess and it helps them win tournaments. I also show great promise in mental health and philosophy. After all the treatment centers I've been to, I consistently helped people struggling with depression and existential problems. I even did better than the staff and group facilitators when I recognized the mistakes they made in treating trauma patients. This is a result of all the self education I did with self help. I think this is a clue to what my life purpose might be. It has something to do with sharing research on a variety of topics in a way that improves people's lives. I even did this for politics. I stopped fights at the kitchen table by fact checking. My most significant accomplishment was helping a woman who was 60,000 dollars in debt due to predatory loaning. She cried tears of joy when I helped her get out of this mess that she struggled with for 15 years. I would like to create a multi disciplinary study to educate people while drawing connections between seemingly unrelated topics. This could be in the form of teaching strategy games, building my own rehabilitation center without the flaws of the other centers, joining a think tank, or maybe something else. One of my life coaches suggested becoming a life coach. There's a lot of things I could do, but I'm not sure how to go about building some kind of program like this. I'm not sure what kind of program I should aim to build, but I believe my life purpose lies somewhere in that direction. Teaching chess in schools at minimum have me needed experience with teaching and working with kids.

I just wanted to share my experience with the three mental health centers I've gone to over the past three months. My mental state has improved, but I did not get the help I was looking for. The problem started with my medication. I was given Zyprexa from the last time I was hospitalized due to Prozac. This time the medicine damaged my liver and I was forced to stop taking it. This made me vomit constantly to the point that I could not go to work. I ended up laying in bed feeling trapped, sick, and depressed. I had a hard time eating anything. The first center was called United Recovery Project Behavioral Health. This was located in Florida and my family had a conniption because it sounded like a scam. I contacted this center over a year ago, and they have been calling me back trying to get me to come. They mentioned that my insurance was about to expire which made me think I would miss the opportunity. They said that they would do genetic testing for my medication and get an accurate diagnosis first thing. I decided to go, believing I would be back in time for college. I felt so awful I doubted that I could make it through the Semester anyway. My family was terrified because I never travelled out of the State on my own. It is worth noting that they set me up with a plane ticket without my knowledge. This kind of situation is what I shared with other people in recovery and they compared this behavior to catfishing, especially when it involved broken promises. Manipulation tactics are used to get vulnerable people to come. I felt extreme anxiety throughout this entire process and it would continue for weeks into treatment. I made my way through the airports and eventually made it to Florida. I walked into the recovery center at about 3 in the morning. I took a drug test and was sent to my room with three beds. There was one other man in there. The next day he would tell me that he was gay and he discovered it when his brother sexually abused him. The creepy part is that he thought that I seemed conflicted about my sexuality and he told me I looked beautiful while I was sleeping. I don't know how he figured that out, but I didn't want people watching me sleep. Rather than starting drama, I waited for him to be discharged which was shortly afterwards. I was having suicidal thoughts everyday just like I did before coming to treatment. Rather than attempting to kill myself, I turned myself into the staff. During this time I was having nightmares about a traumatic incident from the past. I could not let it go and it was made worse by severe anxiety. I ended up trying out a bunch of different pills. Eventually I was prescribed an anti psychotic designed for Schizo-affective disorder. This diagnosis was reversed when there was no behavior change and they concluded my behavior was due to autism. This isn't the first time mental health centers thought I was hearing voices as I had conversations with myself. I became fearful of broken promises when I never received an updated diagnosis because the staff told me it would take six months. The staff contradicted each other because the policies were inconsistent, leading to patients feeling like they were lied to. Unfortunately, I discovered that I couldn't count on these centers to keep their promises and I would have to fight them for it. For example, the case manager and therapist were frequently overloaded and had to skip sessions. My therapist was especially problematic. She asked me about my spiritual beliefs and I went into a long monologue about Love, Truth, Consciousness, Non-duality, and so forth. She ended up simplifying my conception of God to the Christian God. She then instructed me to pray to Jesus 10 times a day. I did as I was told and didn't like it. I tried writing my own prayers for God as I understand it. I don't recall Leo ever saying anything about prayer, but I tried. Apparently, I was really good at art therapy because my dream explained how I felt poetically. I drew a black abyss of death with a pool of blood and dead bodies at the bottom. Above the abyss was a light, symbolizing God and the light was connected to me. I also drew a nimbus around myself symbolizing holiness. I often shared lots of insights about spirituality and psychology that came from my research and the books I read on these subjects. Everybody thought I was a genius and believed I could do great things with my life. Meanwhile on the inside I still felt lost and confused about my identity and life purpose. I met a life coach while I was there. He and the therapists suggested that I was using my logical mind a lot and not focusing on my emotional mind. Apparently, this is one of the ways I cope with trauma. The life coach suggested I become a life coach and told me to contact him for further exercises. He never answered and he probably never will. I spent as much time with the life coach as I could because life purpose and identity are at the core of my suicidal thoughts. I tried to use these things to establish a sense of self worth which I lost a long time ago. I tried to get a new place to live in Florida, but the program would not let me because of my history with suicidal thoughts. They wanted me to go back to my family which was a major stressor for me before anyway. I was afraid of starting the cycle all over again. Although I was extremely helpful for other people struggling with God and depression, I struggled to help myself. The second program was Florida Recovery Group. I didn't have suicidal thoughts as frequently as I did before, but I did still strongly considered killing myself. Eventually, I got better and I could go a few days without wanting to die before having a relapse and another episode of depression. Because I had my cell phone back I talked with my family to give them nightly updates. I had some awful interactions with my sister because she was part of the reason I could not tolerate waiting six years to finish college while living with her. This center was helpful because we eventually found a pill combination that allows me to sleep consistently. It also helped through neuro retraining which made my brain more capable of dealing with depression. Unfortunately, I was only a third of the way through before being discharged. For the program I picked actualized videos to watch with the irritating light on the screen that my eyes had to constantly adjust to. I liked the postmodernism one. The most disturbing thing that happened here is that I was being sexually harassed by other men over my virginity. They talked about hiring a prostitute to have sex with me and I interpreted this literally. I tried reporting the men, but I wasn't taken seriously because the staff thought my autism caused the confusion. I ended up calling 988 like I do when I want to die. Eventually the therapist talked with the staff and eventually the men were both kicked out. The actual story is more complicated than that. My family panicked when they saw the hurricane coming up on Florida. It missed me and I didn't die. The final recovery center was disappointing. I was supposed to have a job to manage work stress. Instead I got an extended leave. I wanted help managing triggers for suicidal thoughts, but I didn't get it. Most of the help I got while in these centers came from me doing my own research on psychology, autism, and trauma. I got better of letting go of guilt and shame. My mind feels more clear and present because of what I discovered. I nearly had a suicide attempt by the haunted house which was causing people seizures. I saw it as a self harm method so I turned myself into the staff instead. I think that was the 28th of October where I nearly had a suicide attempt. Throughout the process of these centers I noticed that many of my behaviors were trauma responses. I started trying to change them, but my therapist thinks autism is the biggest obstacle to my recovery due to my rigid mind. This makes it easy for me to get stuck in rumination, depression, and so forth. The other patients still thought I was a genius because of how insightful I was. I have been studying this stuff for a long time because I have been trying to beat depression. Now that I am back home, I recognize behaviors that make me feel depressed. I don't have a desire to die but I am getting intrusive suicidal thoughts when I do certain activities at home. This includes listening to love songs. My therapists think I am lonely and multiple have recommended I try dating. This might be problematic because it is hard to date and be a good boyfriend while depressed. I made a separate post about this. What do you guys think about this attempt to work on myself? I think I got better, but I want to maintain my peace of mind by avoiding things that make me feel depressed. I also want to see if there are other neuro retraining programs for depression.

I posted this here because I considered the possibility of building a better treatment center. There are a lot of problems with these institutions.

@Basman I believe they were privately run. One of the therapists ended up getting fired for incompetence but this was at the second place. Most of the progress came from me doing my own research to help me recognize my trauma responses. I did nearly all the work and the therapists were not prepared to deal with autism. At the second place I wasn't taken seriously at first when reporting sexual harassment to the therapist. Unfortunately, these places are not as good as I hoped. Apparently there are even worse treatment centers where the staff relapse on drug addiction. At the third place there were people all around me relapsing on drugs constantly. I didn't have a drug problem so I didn't relate to the required AA meetings.

I saw your post about people being deeply corrupt and full of shit for supporting Trump. You mentioned that history will remember this. Although true that Trump is an embarrassment, history will not necessarily remember. The history books in schools already white wash everything. I would not count on the education system to solve this problem for future generations. Humanity might make the same mistakes all over again in the future. For example there were previous insurrections in the US and one was successful in 1898 I believe. These are not discussed in history. I am skeptical of these claims that extrapolate hundreds of years into the future. If history text books even talk about this 100-500 years from now, if the educational system doesn't change, all of it will be white washed. As it stands our schools completely ignore the civil rights era.

@Jodistrict This argument is a whataboutism. You are creating a false choice between nazi economic policies and all failures in the modern economy. Failures in the modern economy is not a defense for nazi Germany. You also assume I agree with all aspects of modern trade. Both can be morally bankrupt and need to change. Your argument is riddled with logical fallacies.

@UnbornTao that is a common myth in history. The nazi miracle economy was based on unsustainable polices that would have crashed anyway. The economic boom was based on slave labor in death camps,, cutting women from unemployment rates,, and stealing gold from targeted groups.. Hitler was awful for the long term economic well being of Germany.

@Inliytened1 I think you're crazy. Here is why. First of all, Trump literally compares himself to Hitler looking for generals like Hitler had. You seriously think donald trump as a human being is enough to overlook his lies about the 2020 election leading to an attempted coup and the rape allegations he has been found liable for and the 34 felony convictions among other things. Donald trump is sore loser because he wants to use the presidency to shield himself from all of the felonies that he is objectively guilty of committing. You seriously believe the most dishonest man alive when he says he has nothing to do with project 2025. He also said that he wanted to impose term limits as if he were anti corruption. Trump's trade wars by placing tariffs on foreign goods hurt the economy in the previous presidency. Trump would be a disaster for the economy and Elon Musk admits it. It is going to be bad for a couple of years as if the economy will rebound. The shock doctrine doesn't work. Historically this approach only takes credit for economic recovery they were not responsible for. Do you think Trickle down economics works? Long story short Trump is insane and has clear cognitive decline. He will assassinate world leaders with drone strikes like he did last time. He is not a peaceful guy. I could go on forever but I think you get the point. Trump bad.

I have been in treatment for about 2 months. Multiple therapists have recommended me dating. Dating is something I have been avoiding due to sexual trauma, distrust of relationships, and fear of being hurt. Dating triggers a lot of my defense mechanisms because I have been overprotective when it comes to sex, hence I'm a virgin. My therapists think I'm lonely. Watching how to get laid on actualized was pure torture for me. As you guys know I have a lot of problems. Sometimes I hate myself for wanting vagina. Sometimes I have suicidal thoughts and depressive episodes. My mind has a tendency to be rigid and fixate on ptsd from my childhood. My rigid mind is a consequence of trauma and autism. You guys have seen the crazy posts I've made and I developed a negative reputation on this forum. I have a job I don't like and I struggle to see a good future for myself. Most of my suicidal thoughts come from my struggle with life purpose. I feel lost and confused and it undermined my sense of self worth. I have been trying to compensate my trauma and self worth through a grandiose purpose but I never found it. I felt that love, sex, and relationships should be sacrificed to focus on leaving an impact and legacy on this earth. So far the only life purpose I came up with is being a better dad than my dad so I could give someone the love I never received. The problem is that this doesn't solve my career dilemma and Dating triggers a lot of my defense mechanisms for fear of winding up like mom and dad. When I'm on this forum I show my true thoughts and the messed up things that go on in my head. In practice I'm not like that on the outside. This is one of the reasons my therapist thinks I would be very nice to women even though I have ocd about becoming a rapist because of the severe trauma I experienced. What kind of Dating advice does the forum have for someone like me? I'm sorry for disturbing you guys in the past.

I have been in treatment for mental health for two months. During this time I have been required to attend meetings for drugs and alcohol. I am not an alcoholic or drug user so I have been asking about spirituality. I want to know if there is any validity to this approach to spirituality. This includes things like the 12 steps and having a spiritual awakening to overcome addiction. It seems like everybody has a different way of conceiving of God. They seem to focus on belief and faith rather than experience and they are strongly opposed to psychedelics. They say that God cannot be intellectualized. I had a hard time using spirituality for things like hope and faith. What puzzles me the most is that there were so many recovered alcoholics and it looked like the approach to spirituality worked and was practical. They still treat God as something outside of you but it works. I have been considering trying the 12 steps for mental health. The problem is that I don't get a sense of hope from God. I might be seen as a heratic if I claim I am God. I don't see God as something that guarantees positive results in life. What do you think about AA spirituality?

While in treatment I have also been going to church. I looked for any clues about the nature of God but it wasn't helpful. I feel empty and depressed when going to church because I don't believe in the Bible. I still participate however I can. It is about praising Jesus as God. One of my therapist had me pray to Jesus because she didn't know how else to help me. So far I haven't found a therapist who accounted for how I conceive of God. I end up lumped together with Christians. I still struggle with things like hope, joy, purpose, and goodness. I don't know how helpful an existential therapist would be. I still think psychedelics are helpful for understanding God but I will have to move out and travel to use that tool. This is considered blasphemy in meetings like AA. Everybody thinks I'm nuts even though they admit psychedelics can lead to spiritual awakening.

One thing that bothers me about spirituality in these mental health centers is that truth is treated as secondary. Practicality is treated as more important than truth. Many of these people tell me they would rather believe in a lie and be happy than believe in something true and be miserable. This is the kind of attitude my family takes with truth. I am not the kind of person who resonates with this attitude. All my life I felt that should avoid self deception where ever I can even if it hurts. Meanwhile the other patients think I'm a spiritual genius with profound insights. I have repeatedly helped patients restore faith in God and saved them from suicide. I am able to apply everything I learned from spirituality to group discussions and Bible studies. They think I should be the one teaching spirituality and not the delusional guy who keeps giving lectures on the mind, body, soul, and spirit based on his life experience.

I see arguments for and against this. I keep being told to work on myself and look within usually by people who don't do it themselves. I get frustrated with this messaging because I have been trying to do this my entire life and it doesn't seem to be working. The arguments that I'm not working on myself is that I lack tangible differences in my life, I still have the same mental health problems, I still don't live on my own, and I hate myself. It makes me doubt if I am truly self reflecting and working on myself. There are arguments that I am working on myself. First of all, I opened up to my family about my trauma after about 20 years. I drive to work and worked two jobs at once. I am the only one in my family even attempting therapy and recovery while the others admit they are fucked up and refuse to even try. I traveled to Florida for genetic testing to get better anti depressants as I became an inpatient again. I've been educating myself constantly but I now see that knowledge won't solve my problem. And of course I helped a lot of other people along the way. I have tried the life purpose course. I tried life coaching. I tried the book list. And so on. The reason I'm frustrated is because I keep being told to work on myself, but maybe I am working on myself too much in such a way that it is counterproductive. Instead of feeling happy I still feel hopeless, and self hating with suicidal thoughts. My therapist is supposed to do some trauma work with me tomorrow. Hopefully I can finally learn how to let shit go. It is hard to manage the combination of ptsd, depression, anxiety, autism, ocd, and adhd. He thinks my mental health problems are kicking my ass. I want to know if I am experiencing real growth or fake growth. I want to make sure I am not bullshitting myself as if I think I have grown tremendously when in fact nothing changed. At least I am about to move out from Ohio and to Kentucky. I can't live with people who normalize emotional abuse. Am I working on myself? In what ways am I tricking myself into thinking I'm doing the work but I'm not. It is possible that I am working on myself but progress is slow. Children of dysfunctional families have a tendency to be harsh on themselves and it seems to be part of the problem. I'm grateful for the help offered by you guys.

@Jacob Morres the metrics I use include things like suicidal thoughts and depressive episodes. I have those every few days. It used to be even more frequently than that. On some days suicide seems insane to me. On other days I feel hopeless to the point that I don't care about my family. Maybe I'm slightly less suicidal than I used to be. I also get better sleep thanks to the med adjustment.

@Buck Edwards thank you for your support. I have tried Journaling before and I did a ton of it. I stopped doing it because I found that it devolved into more suicidal ideation. I no longer journal unless it is a prompted journal assignment. Part of what I have been learning is that children of dysfunctional families tend to judge themselves without mercy. Maybe if I stop feeling ashamed of myself over everything bad that happens to me then that would be progress. I can't seem to make this change no matter how hard I try. How can I find the patience and hope I need when change seems hard?

I have been doing some research on crimes against humanity. I have discovered that sometimes rape is seen as a valid military tactic designed to terrorize and dehumanize the population. This tactic is especially effective and terrorizing against deeply religious communities who place a strong emphasis on being proper to the point that women may be killed when violated or they are forced to marry the rapist. Rape is also a form of biological warfare designed to impregnate the victim population, destroying their race and ethnicity or to infect with STDs. I have read about several examples of genocidal rape, trying to put myself in the victim's shoes to see how I would feel. I genuinely felt disturbed by what I imagined. Here is one of many examples of genocidal rape. Rape was widespread during the Armenian Genocide, which was committed by the Ottoman Turks. During the death marches of Armenian civilians through Anatolia in 1915, Turkish soldiers frequently raped and killed Armenian women and children. In many cases, Turkish and Kurdish civilians also participated in these crimes. Turks took Armenian women and girls into sexual slavery or forced them into marriage. Those women forced into marriage also had to convert to Islam. Some perpetrators believed that women and girls could be successfully assimilated into Muslim Turkish culture, unlike men and boys. After the genocide ended, women and girls who had been forced into marriage often could not return to their former lives. They had no family left, no source of income, or otherwise feared the stigma of having married a Turk. Additionally, Turks publicly raped the wives, daughters, and other female relatives of important Armenian men. In addition to dehumanizing the victims, these targeted rapes intimidated the Armenian leadership into submission and dissuaded them from resisting. Some Armenian women and girls were sold as sex slaves. The Turkish soldiers stripped them naked and displayed them at auction. Their nudity in a conservative society served to further dehumanize them and strip them of agency. Many were forced into marriage or prostitution. In many cases women prefer to kill themselves to avoid being raped. There were cases with women being chased by soldiers through the streets only to jump off a bridge to kill themselves, avoiding rape. There were also mass suicides in Japan near the end of world war two because the women believed the enemy would rape them. Rape can also cause severe PTSD leading to suicide at a later date. Rape can also cause a challenging moral dilemma if it leads to forced pregnancy. On one hand the victim is not responsible for the child, but on the other hand the child doesn't deserve to die. Some women throw these babies in a dumpster. Meanwhile there are some anti abortion women who were raped and are now single mothers. There were some more severe cases of rape. For example, there was one woman who was nonstop gang raped for eight days believe it or not. She died shortly afterwards in one example of being raped to death. Other examples include things like the rape of nanjing in which babies were torn from the arms of their mothers by a bayonet, the mother's were raped, then the women were stabbed in the vagina with a bayonet until they died. Meanwhile boys were cut open and raped through an artificial vagina as well. I would rather die than have my penis cut off and be raped through an artificial vagina. I probably wouldn't survive such a brutal rape anyway. One last example I found was from unit 731. This was a world war 2 death camp in which prisoners were infected with STDs and then held at gunpoint being forced to have sex with each other. This process continued with this repeated rape by coercion, infecting people with more and more STDs. The result is that each rape was more agonizing than the last. In the end the victims developed horrific infections in their genitals to the point that they all died and there were no survivors. I imagined how I would feel if I were one of the victims. I would rather refuse to have sex with this woman even if I am shot to death to avoid developing a horrific infection that may be lethal. With all of that in mind, here are my questions. Is rape worse than death? How would you feel about being raped as a man or as a woman? How severe does rape have to be for you to kill yourself? Personally, if I were raped it would be severely disturbing and traumatizing. I would be damaged forever, but maybe I would survive. I think I could live with being raped once, but probably not multiple times with no hope of escape. I would definitely rather die than be a sex slave. For me I think it depends on how brutal the rape is, how many times, and what kind of STDs for me to fear it more than death.