DianaFr

What happened to hockey? Where did that certainty go? One realization that I've had - some passions should be pursued just for fun and pleasure. As soon as you turn them into your "purpose", it puts all this pressure and expectation on you which kills the motivation eventually. But it also depends on the person heavily. Some grow by learning to loosen up and go with the flow, others - by learning to commit (which is in fact the two sides of the same coin). Let me ask you one more question - what do you truly want and how do you want to feel?

It's okay to be multipassionate. You can study biology AND do art, one does not exclude the other. Just the opposite, these two can be mutually reinforcing, since both require a different mode of thinking that can help you advance. Studying biology will engage your scientific mind and help you develop critical thinking. Art will stimulate your creative, abstract thinking. You can practice both and then exchange the skills to come up with unique, out of box perspectives in both fields. Please keep in mind that your life purpose is not a static thing you find. It's fluid, mutable and everchanging, it evolves as you evolve. Today you want to explore viruses, tomorrow you can be hit with a realization that teaching school children about biology in a creative way is what brings you the most joy and fulfillment. Don't limit yourself.

I think it comes down to clear communication. There are women who agree to casual sex even though they want something more - they will feel objectified and hurt no matter what you do because you don't have what they want but they hope you do (or feel offended you dared to offer them something other than their desire). Clarity is important here. Other than that care is always a great thing to let a woman feel good. And humor. I once had a phase in my life after a break up when I was into casual dating just to have fun and experiment. I met men who were not looking for a long term partner either. I never felt objectified because, first, we were laughing a lot, and, second, they made sure I felt comfortable and was safe. Even if it's 'just sex', it's never just that. It's still an interaction that involves conversations, making plans, going to places, maybe inviting somebody into your home, then making sure they get back safely etc.

Yeah, it's a great excuse to not to learn true intimacy and connection.

Hi Nadia, Let's be real - you have quite a radical worldview, besides it's not just that you prefer your lifestyle over other lifestyles but you are taking a stance against them which complicates your energy. And this is precisely what you attract. You are probably targeting a person that doesn't even exist. And the fact that you seem to attract different men than you try to manifest tells me your subconscious is doing most of the manifesting for you which is quite different than you consciously state - hence the complicated energy that comes from you. You will have a hard time dating if you don't loosen up and not free space for other belief systems in your vicinity. Long term partnerships can certainly work even if you two are not perfectly aligned in all aspects. Just don't lead with this energy - I'm this and that and this is what I want you to be. Rather lead with curiosity to get to know people and learn about their worldviews: this is who I am and I'm excited to get to know you too. It's very different energetically and you will start attracting different people. It will just probably take some work to loosen the rigid structures in your psyche a bit.

A fellow molecular biologist here. I will give you an advice I would give to my younger self. Stop putting so much pressure on your life purpose!!! You can't get it wrong! You seem to try so hard to identify your values and integrate them into your career, that it makes me want to say - hey, relax and just enjoy yourself! It's not that it's wrong to do that, but I don't want you to follow the perfect map you think you have to follow, just to discover you're falling short. It's okay to not know things and it's also okay to not have the success others have. It means absolutely nothing bad about you! When it comes to values and purpose, it's more about self-discovery. That involves experimenting and learning from your experiences. People often learn about their true values in their thirties, fourties or later when all the bruises and bumps gotten along the way finally click - and then they KNOW. I don't know much about you, but in order for you to reach your true values, you must strip away the layers of social conditioning that might interfere with what feels good or not to you. Just get yourself into stuff and see if the values you've identified still stand. It literally doesn't matter if you stick with biology or move to business or become a photographer and travel the world. It doesn't matter and you can't get it wrong!! You can still impact the world positively no matter how perfectly or not you live off the script. Just do stuff, see what happens, reflect, digest your lesson, lay out your next move and do stuff again. You'll be just fine!

The moment the accident happened, your body learned that bad things can happen with people you love absolutely out of the blue, and it's all out of your control. Furthermore, they can change your life in ways you never wanted or asked for. So on one hand, it's about the risk of losing, in one way or another, people you love. On the other, it's also about your personal sense of safety, and stability, and the general trust in the order of your life. If it all gets messed up, of course, your body will signal what you've experienced. What can help restore the sensation of love is grief. That's the function of it, even though we don't like it. What I pick up from your text is that you have learned and grown after the accident, and that you continue to engage with your family and show love to them (without necessarily feeling it). I'm just wondering is that learning intellectual or was it emotional? I'm assuming the needs of your brother and father have been in the spotlight for some time now, but what about you? Have you had a chance to break down and let it all flush out of your system, so you can reconstruct your identity and relationships to feel love again?

As a female, my advice 'to get laid' (I hate this expression, it devalues sex like nothing else) is to have no intention to get laid, but instead being genuinely curious about the other person. What seems to 'work' is attunement, empathy, playfulness, cheerfulness, great listening skills, on one hand, and femininity, positive attitude to your own body and sexuality, and a sense of self, on the other. Good sense of humor and openness are very helpful as well. What I've found, men (and people in general) like to be heared and seen, and appreciated, and, after some time, challenged. Most men I've met, tend to keep their wall up (whatever it means for the particular person), so they often get caught by surprise that there's actually a back door to their protection. Since I love exploring the mind, the soul, and the body of the other, it all comes quite naturally, at least it used to when I was still dating. It's like a dance - synchronizing with your (potential) partner, following their lead and leading (inviting) when needed.

Depends. There's two people in a relationship. You're not wrong for having the thoughts and attitudes you're having. If you have a compatible partner, meaning, they are not going to suffer because of your approach to relationships, then it's completely fine! But if the person secretly desires something you can't or won't offer, it's not that good. Communicate openly and try to learn about what this other person needs and desires, it will help you come to your own conclusion.

Would you say you need distance, like, having your space is a genuine need of yours, or you crave closeness and intimacy deep down, just don't know how to achieve that?

You don't really love him, do you? You describe him as if he was a job opportunity for you to accept or reject. Or perhaps you are quite detached from your feelings, at least according to your text. Building a family is a very different thing than having an affair. Do you know what he is really looking for in his life's partner? Are you her? And vice versa? None of the things you described convinces me that you are 'the ones' for each other (but maybe it's too early to tell...)

Without being married this wouldn't be a complete experience. As a woman, I like to be owned or claimed by my husband. It's like a declaration by him to me and everybody else that I belong with him. We share the same surname and we are legally bound to each other. This feels like a safe container to me, I definetely prefer to be a wife instead of a girlfriend. On a deeper level we both share a similar abandonment trauma from childhood, so securing our connection with the ultimate means possible actually provides that sense of safety we both crave. There is something about the physical things like the ring on my finger or wedding photos or having a new signature that serves as a daily reminder that this is all real. It's a big deal for someone like me who is mostly withdrawn in her inner world and quite distant from the real one. Speaking about idealism, I'd say it has no place in marriage. You marry a real person, not an extension of your own illusion. Yes, it often starts with this but as you progress and mature and get bruised and disappointed and heartbroken again and again, the idealism strips away layer by layer, until you meet your core truths and can finally perceive them in your partner as well. Then you can love him for who he is, not for the image you assigned to him. It comes with a pleasent sense of liberation because you finally realize you get to be yourself - as flawed and weird as you are - and have that safe connection with your partner - as flawed and weird as they are - at the same time. It's quite nice, albeit very very far from ideal.

I guess 'the why' also matters. I always wanted to get married because experiencing life with somebody who is my person has always felt way more desirable than the freedom of doing it solo or in a low-commitment way. I get attached to people easily and I seek emotional security, so being married is healing for me. It's not a trap for me but a safe place that is the foundation of my life. I don't think my husband feels trapped either. We support each other, cheer each other up, we know each other's deepest fears and desires and we push and pull each other when needed. I'm the first person my husband calls when good and bad things happen and he is mine. It took a lot first to learn to trust each other and we had to go through some hard stuff but that brought us closer eventually. Nobody's going anywhere for the time being. It could be a trap for some or many, but for others it's a way of life.

I don't know, you should be more specific - brain activity is such a wide concept, it literally means nothing if you say it's decreased/increased. Brain activity measured by what and under what experimental conditions, compared to what, induced, blocked, modulated by what, what organism, mouse, rat, human, cell culture or multiple, in what condition, healthy/diseased, wild type/knockout, etc. And ultimately what's your point?? If you present such a wide statement and don't relate it to anything, then it's a little difficult to have a productive discussion. I never studied the topic but thanks to your post already found quite a few interesting articles about the effect of psychedelics and it's way more nuanced and complex than increase/decrease. You, however, seem to be passionate about the topic. Can you point to a specific piece of data that is in line with your statement?

But is that really a paradox? I personally have no problem distinguishing between childhood and adulthood (no discrepancies for me there) and I also don't have a problem acknowledging that we are children and adults at the same time, within the same body. Also you say there is not an exact day or moment that something turns into something else. But how is it useful to apply this principle to natural phenomena? Sometimes you could indeed detect on/off, yes/no type of situations but more frequently there are stages and transitions and many steps in between the extremes. Why is that a paradox to you?

Another question - what do you mean by brain activity? What in particular is being decreased by psychedelics and is that supposed to be beneficial or detrimental or it depends? I'm not an expert on the subject by any means - just curious. I quickly checked the literature and found an article in eLife* which looks at LSD and brain connectivity. It's a neuroimaging study that suggests that some brain regions present increased connectivity (increased interaction) in some regions and decreased connectivity in others compared to placebo. Also, this change spatially correlates with the expression profile of a receptor that's involved in the metabolism of LSD. According to these results, it seems more appropriate to talk about the modulatory effect of psychedelics. I would love to read a more detailed argument from you to understand your point better. *Preller KH, Burt JB, Ji JL, Schleifer CH, Adkinson BD, Stämpfli P, Seifritz E, Repovs G, Krystal JH, Murray JD, Vollenweider FX, Anticevic A. Changes in global and thalamic brain connectivity in LSD-induced altered states of consciousness are attributable to the 5-HT2A receptor. Elife. 2018 Oct 25;7:e35082. doi: 10.7554/eLife.35082. PMID: 30355445; PMCID: PMC6202055.

I suggest you base your point on peer-reviewed publications from respectable journals. It's also a good idea to try to validate the other perspective at least partially by trying to understand where these arguments are coming from - it helps greatly with coming off less biased and more likely to be listened to. For scientific people, whenever you present a blog post as an evidence, especially on a controversial topic, it's an automatic downvote. It could help if you presented data with a better validity.

I've been living with C-PTSD for 35 years now. I still experience the traumatic event as vividly and intensely as if it happened yesterday whenever I'm triggered back into it. You mention you feel anger, shame and self-hatred. For me it's this endless grief and sadness. Shame as well. Can you tell more about what happened to you?

What I pick up from your story is that there are two versions of you - one that is productive, disciplined and motivated and this is the version you like and adore. The other is lazy, destructive and purposeless and you hate it because it makes you appear to yourself as a loser. These both versions are equally you, they're parts of you, just one dominates at a given time. In my experience, this could be a reflection of your internal fragmentation which perpetuates the cycle of self-sabotage and self-rejection. The type of behavior you describe as current, signals about essential needs that have not been met which is the foundation of any addiction. In some twisted way your current behavior is still serving you and the more unaware you are about the underlying issue, the more it seems to be out of control. This is also why your legendary phase could not be sustained - if success involved increasing the gap between your conscious self and the parts you have stuffed away in your subconscious, it's like pulling a rubber band - it extends because you put effort in it but as soon as you let go even for a little bit, it jumps back with force. So you never had a stable and secure inner foundation to begin with. And you can't build one with willpower and discipline. It's more about radical self-acceptance, sitting in the discomfort of your emotions, healing your traumas, connecting with your values etc. It's about inviting back what has been lost even if it goes against your current self-concept. You will be truly successful if the goals you pick resolve your internal split, not make it bigger.

In general, talk therapy is a more reflective and introspective type of intervention which is better suited for dealing with mental health issues. Coaching is more goal oriented, fast-paced and specific. However, the boundaries between the two are blurred since the methods often overlap and different practitioners have different work styles. I love both of them but I would personally seek out coaching if I wanted to clarify my goals, draft up a strategy and have someone to challenge me and keep me accountable as I move closer to my goal. I would see a therapist for emotional and personality-related issues. If you would like to primarily focus on your depression and loneliness, therapy seems to be a better option, since most coaches are not qualified to deal with mental health issues of this magnitude. If active socialization is your main priority, coaching could make if more effective. But check the certification and experience of the person you consider working with, since they could have mixed background and/or specialize on cases like yours, e.g. a psychotherapist by education working as a dating coach etc.

@Keryo Koffa Great topic! Can you elaborate more - the two examples you mention, what are they letting you cope with? What's the pain? For me, one of my grandest coping mechanisms is self-sufficiency. It gets triggered especially when I don't feel safe in relation to other people which is almost all the time because of my fundamental childhood trauma. So now it's all about learning to de-sensitize myself and become okay with the discomfort of not running away but practicing communication and conflict resolution instead. Sucks quite a bit, but that's the way up.

Even though I recognize my opinion may not be welcome but I want to throw in a different view, not necessarily as a response to the original question. Overcoming attachment is not natural. In fact, it's extremely unnatural. It goes against our deepest nature as a species. Try to raise a newborn baby and you will see the non-sense that many of these spiritual teachings are. As a parent, I would never wish for my son to become non-attached to the things he needs, to talk himself out of that. My wish is to equip him as much as I can with means to build healthy relationships and have a healthy sense of self so he feels safe in the world and provides that same level of safety to others. This is what we all should eventually strive for. Not to get rid of our desires or needs but to be able to meet them. It goes equally for mundane things like technology and deep stuff like sense of belonging and purpose. For example, what's so bad about being attached to your cell phone? If one really questions this, one may find the cell phone is not the issue at all. @Someone here Why are you so attached to creating spiritual freedom?

Hi Brent From what I've read, it seems to me that you could benefit from having a clear plan or strategy to get yourself ahead in life. Here's a few things that stood out to me. First, " basic wage slave job". I see this term used in this forum excessively and, to be honest, it makes my skin crawl a little, especially if it comes from a young person, like yourself. This is a very unhelpful framing of having a job because it imposes that you are making a huge sacrifice by slaving away for penies while in fact you're somehow "above it". It would be a different story if you'd be stuck in a low-income job for years. But this is not about you. What you call a wage slave job is actually a way for you to build skills you currently lack. Discipline, work ethics, attention to detail, perfecting your craft, structuring your life, developing a routine, mastering interaction with different people (your boss, coworkers, clients, contractors etc.), learning social skills, building a network (even if it starts with a couple of people you get to know), observing things, seeing how businesses are run, what are the problems or challenges the industry faces - you get to develop all that by your mere presence at a workplace, and it doesn't matter what's your job description, as long as you keep your ears, eyes and mind open. If the job meets the occupational safety and other legal requirements, it's a good place for you to be, even if you're a janitor, a gardener, a truck driver, whatever, because you're there to build a foundation. This would be a much more helpful mindset for you to start out with. Second, being prone to anxiety and depression and not dealing well with stress. This makes a lot of sense in your situation. What I don't know is to what degree your mental health issues are a cause to your situaton. I do know, though, that they're greatly enforcing it. Being socially anxious myself, I know that it makes you want to isolate and keep away from demanding life situations, but the more you isolate and keep away, the more your anxiety increases. It's a vicious cycle that you must break by giving yourself healthy doses of challenge. Third, you say you can't hold down a job for more that a few weeks, you are not academically skilled, and you are not passionate about anything. This tells me - a radical life shift needs to happen. You must expose yourself to new situations and people so you can have new experiences that will snap you out of the current state of being. It sounds like you have nothing to lose, so if I were you I would take a year out of my life and do something totally new. Join a youth organization that serves charity, go volunteer for a cause you find important, find a way to travel to another continent (through a charity mission or labor force, for example), join the military or national guard - just make yourself useful in a grand way. I promise, being stuck in unemployment will be the last thing on your mind. You have your whole life ahead of you and there is so much that you can give and take. Just be open to it and think out of the box.

Sounds like you need to feel yourself out a little bit before commiting to anything particular. Why not experiment and see how it goes? You could decide to stick to posting regularly on Facebook for, let's say, 3 months and then evaluate how it went and if you want to continue. You could come up with a few criteria for success so you can actually measure the outcome, e.g. sharing my thoughts feels fun, I have developed a posting routine and I stick to it, I've had at least 3 meaningful discussions as a result of me posting etc. When the times up, you can decide which direction to head next. Another thought to consider - there's some difference if you just want to share your thoughts or intentionally grow your audience to achieve engagement. It's not highly realistic to build an engaged audience by putting out random posts. For that, in most cases you would have to apply a more strategic approach and apply a lot more effort. The question is - is this something you're up to?

I see suffering as unnecessary but unavoidable, at least in the present condition of the humanity. I'm an empath and one thing I've not been able to get through is the trauma and grief or the massive pain body of humanity. I used to think if only I do enough work, I can heal myself and find peace. Now I've realized that I can't fully heal unless I cut myself off from the world to not feel its pain. We collectively have been through indescribable pain and suffering, it still lingers all around, and what bothers me the most is that instead of learning from the past we want to recreate it, the horrific parts of it. Every time I see a picture of a child whose parents have just been bombed to death, my heart shrinks because that child, as innocent and pure as it may be, has now become a continuation of suffering generations before him has felt, and he will grow up and make his choices accordingly. That feels wrong. Transcending personal suffering is all good and well but another thing is to hold space for the collective suffering. For me, it feels like an endless ocean of pain and grief I can do nothing about, just breathe with it and experience it, and the weird thing is it so desperately wants to be experienced. There is something good that comes out of it, though. If you manage to not shut yourself down and you don't try to escape, there is a deep meaning to be found. It's like a reflection of all that is good about being a human, our virtues, our strengths, the very essence of humanity. At the end of the day, these are very simple things - connection, kindness, a stretched out hand for you to hold. I've lost a great deal of faith by seeing our will to war, but as long as I continue to feel deeply, I will know there is at least one uncorrupted part within me that may be a help to rebuild.