Gesundheit

@Vytas http://mikemehlman.net/

She lost interest or met someone else. Move on.

Basically, you're asking if you can "know" anything with absolute certainty. So, there is the direct experience of the moon, for example, and then there's your interpretations of it (disk, sphere, beautiful, far, big, etc...). You want to confirm your interpretations of what you're directly experiencing, through some tangible means. Right? But the problem is that the moon that you directly experience is just an appearance of what it actually is. And your interpretations are just appearances as well. However, interpretations make it tricky because they distract you from the fact that everything is just appearances, and they make it look like their content can actually be absolutely true. But see, interpretations are just interpretations. And they can always be wrong. Therefore, it's not possible to know anything with absolute certainty, except for the previous statement

This sounds super interesting to explore!

@tsuki Thanks for sharing ?? It looks that your heightened sense of responsibility is what's stopping you from desiring kids. I'm not sure I can say the same thing about other males, because most of them are immature and irresponsible, yet they somehow share the same stance as you. I guess probably you have better chances at raising high quality kids than most other males cause of your high level responsibility. On the other hand, I don't think we can apply the same perspective on women. I mean the generational trauma part, because virtually all of us have it. But since women are generally more responsible than men, I think it could be naivety that blocks women from assessing the situation correctly, which makes them underestimate the challenges of raising a child, and in result making them want to have kids. I really don't know. This is all just my vague understanding. The more I think about it, the more I feel lost. It seems like a very complex question. But thank you for the insightful responses. You gave me a few keys to contemplate and ponder upon.

@modmyth Thanks for sharing your thorough perspective. A lot to contemplate, but I think I've got a good overall idea that helps me draw a few intuitive conclusions. @tsuki Okay, let's put it this way: conscious desire vs. unconscious desire. Your point is included. Both men and women share the same unconscious desire. But why do they differ in their conscious desires?

How is wanting to have babies similar to wanting to have sex? They're completely different experiences. Most men don't daydream about having babies. But for women, it seems like an important part of their psyche. This thread is a perfect demonstration of that. Notice that most of us would not care to think seriously about having a baby, let alone going to the edges of the earth to have them (by exchanging genitalia). But most women would go through pregnancy and labor to have a baby, even though it is an unpleasant experience overall. In other words, maternity desire is high even though the struggle is high, but paternity desire is low even though the struggle is low. Why is that? Are most humans masochists?

@LostStudent Hey, what's going on?

@Someone here Good.

Hmmm, group-think sounds like a possible answer. Although, I think there is a biological component to it too.

Don't judge the book by its cover. He's more open-minded than most Muslims. But do whatever you want.

Looks like you haven't read the comments here. How does that relate to the inquiry? Men can be supportive, but they can't be pregnant. It's the difference between putting your hands in water and her hands on a stove. It's not at all possible to share a woman's struggles of pregnancy and giving birth. Didn't know you intended to ridicule me. The question was about how some women are specific with what they want their kids to be like. Like they're ordering a doll or something. Of course, I don't mean all women. But I think 70% is a fair percentage (majority). This is from my own life experiences, and from this forum. The context I'm using here is the majority of men vs. the majority of women. I think the forum, and this thread in specific are a good specimen and represent reality well enough.

@Mesopotamian I won't say anything. Just watch the series I suggested if you're truly interested in deconstructing the myth of true Islam. Otherwise, this discussion has ended before it even started, cuz you're not trying to see what I'm trying to say.

@Mesopotamian Look, you're getting too technical here, and then you're somehow missing the point of your own thread. Sunni claims are BS. They don't know anything about Mohammad. The Quran was not written in Mohammad's life. It was written afterwards, and many of it is suspicious of loss and error. Hadith was not collected until 300 years after the death of Mohammad, and a lot of it is suspicious of loss and error. And the people who collected it were not plenty. They're one person at a lifetime, so there was no one to review their work and confirm it. One day, a man woke up and decided to voluntarily collect all the Hadith. There was no committee to proofread what he had done. The second man to collect the Hadith was a student of that guy. There's a lot of depth to this discussion. Watch the series I suggested if you're interested in understanding more. What you're suggesting here is that Sunni are superior to all other sects because they are following the true Islam, but that's just not true. And it's precisely the issue, because what is the real Islam? How do you define true Islam? And how do you know that it isn't some rare Islamic sect that you have no idea of? You see, all you know about Islam is what you've heard from Sunni, because they're the majority. You haven't heard from others. And definitely Sunnis will tell you that they have the true Islam because of 1,2,3,etc... But when you truly question them, they will call you kafir and cast you out, maybe even sentence you to death.

@tsuki Yeah, seriously. Why don't men desire having kids as much as women do? Since men don't give birth or experience pregnancy, it should make more sense that they would want to have kids. I mean if kids = survival. Why are women so specific about that desire? Why do they focus on certain things and disregard others? Doesn't make sense to me at all.

@Elevated @Etherial Cat You guys were saying?

Well, I wouldn't risk a ban for that line, that's for sure Thanks to your wizard husband I wouldn't say it's silly. I just don't understand the reasoning behind it. Even survival cannot explain it.

No wonder it took you hundreds of approaches to get laid

Modern/Secular societies seem to have a stigma around men desiring children. Or maybe because children are perceived to be limiting their freedom. I just don't get how attached westerners are to "freedom". It's kinda funny how the master becomes the slave sometimes. Ah! And don't forget the whole antinatalism movement that reeks of nihilism, suffering, ungratefulness, and hatred towards life. All of which are a product of materialism/atheism/overrationality. Ancient cultures and less developed countries celebrate children because they celebrate life as a purely magical thing. Of course, materialism is penetrating through them too. But the essence is still there. That being said, I don't have a position on having children. I guess if I could raise them well and provide for them, then why not? The more, the better. But I don't daydream about that. When my ex asked me about kids, she had already made up her mind that she wanted a boy and a girl, with the boy being younger. I honestly don't understand why these things matter to women, perhaps because of the barbie dolls lol.

Silliest video I've seen of him, and all I've seen of him so far is silly. If the purpose is learning & education, he can simply do it at home with a gf instead.

That's just how you're choosing to see it, and that outlook is obviously biased, not really sure why. Their methods are good, but still questionable/imperfect. But you can't question them because they claim to have 100% accuracy. Watch this series (30 episodes, I think). He deconstructs the whole Sunni approach down to the simplest bits. He's Sunni btw, but since he questioned the mainstream Sunni, he's perceived by many to be a Quranist or something like that. Extensively. And I've moved past it too. I think the mistake here is that you're not acknowledging the Shiite heritage and their science and methods, probably because you didn't even bother to research it.

@Pernani All love is imagined by you, and it's all self-love. You generate the love from within before you receive it from others. Others simply follow/fulfill their agendas through you, just like you do through them. There's no real love, really. Think about it. You can have a relationship with someone where you can think they truly love you, only to find out later that they never actually loved you but have been using you the entire time for your money or something else. Notice that in that case there isn't an objective thing out there called love that you were receiving. It's simply all in your mind. And you, like a fool, believed it to be true. You actually felt that love, even though it was non-existent from the other person's pov. How is it possible to feel something that doesn't actually exist? Conversely, you can have people that truly care about your well-being and actually love you, but, for some reasons, you don't feel their love. This is super obvious in parent-child relationships. Children are rarely able to see their parents' love, even though it's arguably the truest & purest love anyone could ever receive. All of that is because love is a language that humans invented. And just like any other language, it is a survival mechanism. When you feel love for someone, what that actually means is that you don't know how to love yourself. And so, you use that someone to give you enough validation so that you can finally love yourself. The truth is that you can shortcut that thing and love yourself directly, but again, you are so disconnected from it and don't know how to do it. It takes time and effort to grow back your self-love abilities. Of course, don't beat yourself up if you are feeling a little bit lost. It's the general trend that people don't know how to love themselves. And rarely anyone ever reaches the ultimate levels of self-love (total enlightenment). But have the courage to start loving yourself again. And of course, none of that means that you can't or shouldn't have relationships anymore. You can, and actually should, because relationships give you necessary life experiences that provide important lessons. Just start by realizing the truth of the situation, and from that place you will begin to truly heal. Deconstruct all the ideas that you have about love. Question them to death. Feel into the emotions, and inquire into them. The truth is what remains after all the falsehood is removed.

@Mesopotamian It's just different contents due to different beliefs. Any rituals are in fact Purple. Sunnis have lots of Purple beliefs and practices too. For God's sake, what's all the HAJJ (pilgrimage) thing about? People circling around a black cube. And then they go and stone a piece of wood as if it represents the devil. And people celebrating the holidays by slaughtering sheep as sacrifice for Allah. Why would anyone "rational" do any of that?