Luc1nda

“ You can turn creature design into a life purpose. You could make a whole YT channel devoted to how you design weird alien creatures and use that as your portfolio and parlay that into a career as a creature design expert for film, games, etc. What a fun career that would be! What is stopping you from becoming the world's leading creature design expert? “ Funnily enough Leo, you described my current career. If you’re interested, I’d suggest looking at Terryl Whitlatch’s books on creature design, as she had the pleasure of designing a lot of the creatures you would see in star wars. These books are full of some fascinating illustrations along with a few things you can learn. Currently I’m learning how to design, 3D model, texture and do CG fur for creatures. I can show you some things I’ve been trying to work on! Theres all sorts of things like anatomy, life cycle, adaptations, environment, diet, social adaptations, etc and also general design principles you have to think about when designing such creatures. I’ve talked to people who do this for a living and they have enormous moodboards on all sorts of animals and creatures that inspire their work. Food for thought, I could nerd on about creature design since I’m deep in the rabbit hole.

Hello Actualized.org forum, not sure if there are many on this forum who're in the rabbit hole but, whether you're someone who's starting out, or on their journey or perhaps works in industry, what's your journey been like? I'm particularly interested in art for films, animation or games. So 2D or 3D art, like 3D Modelling & Texturing, Animation & rigging, VFX, perhaps even concept art. In such a competitive industry, how did you make it/how are you making it? Since, I'm doing a computer animation course, and I only started to really learn skills seriously about a year and a half ago, like using softwares like Maya, Zbrush, Unreal Engine 5 and Houdini. (Yes, not Blender! I have yet to learn it after my student subscriptions expire) I think I've genuinely fallen in love with this craft, I had originally been set on wanting to do engineering or physics, but little did I know I would love this even more. However, surrounded by so many people who had started learning years before me, or even started at the same time as I did(and are twice as skilled as me), I can't help but feel incredibly inadequate no matter how much I work. Even if I push myself, working often from the crack of dawn to midnight, I can never escape mediocrity in my work. Everything I make I hate, and don't want to show to a single soul (unless its for feedback for improvement). I'm not attached to my work, since I'm well aware the skills matter a thousand times more, but I can't help but feel so demoralized by everyone else who got an early start getting so much more approval, recognition and even guidance and help than me. Now, I try not to compare myself to others, as I know its a massive trap, but it really is so devastating to work so hard, put so much effort, thought and love into your art and then people just think its "mid" or "okay", and for others to be praised and put on a pedestal for being top students. Sometimes being mediocre feels worse than being objectively bad. Yes, I have only been learning this for a short period of time, but, who else feels something similar? The immense pressure and anxiety (especially with all the discourse, lack of jobs in the industry currently) to improve and rise to the top in terms of skill. Sometimes it really feels like, as someone who's new, I really do not stand a chance competing for jobs against these child prodigies that learnt blender when they were 8, or could draw extremely well at a young age, or learnt to code the matrix fresh out of the womb. Yes, I need to work harder for a long period of time to get to where they are now, it just feels like theres a glass ceiling I have to break through. My end goal is to get so good people will come to me to do their work, I want to be so efficient, skilled and knowledgeable so I truly have the freedom to create whatever art I want. I want to create art so deep with wisdom and substance, it'll influence people so deeply and rock their perspective on the world. My skills are my greatest asset, and I'm investing in them so one day I can create an animated series or comic, I've been wanting to do this for 5 years and only now I'm slowly acquiring the skills and knowledge to do so, this is my greatest battle, and I am EXTREMELY serious about this. So, I'll re-phrase the question: How do you overcome the need to overcome mediocracy? Since, I don't want to give a shit what others are doing, whether or not they're beasts at what they do, will get snapped up for a job instantly, or are by miracle so much better than me despite working less. I just wanna focus on myself and making the things I love most and learn from those around me, but a part of me still can't let go of wanting to be the best, and its a form of self sabotage which is stopping me from focusing on learning and robbing me of happiness. Anyone else had similar things? Please let me know! I'm super interested in hearing anyone else's stories or obstacles they've had to overcome, whether or not you're even working in this industry. Thanks for reading! One last thing, any stupid comments about generative AI will be ignored, I don't care for AI unless it genuinely has something to do with this discussion.

Since it feels like Its been one hell of a journey ahaha I've had to overcome a lot of things. That and, I'm 20. I have been practicing art in general for all my life every now and again, its only a year and a half ago since i've really started to take it seriously. And yes, as the work I'm doing is no where near industry quality. Super stage orange to look at it that way but, Its helpful to know what will get you a job or not. Yes and no, part of it is approval, but it all started as genuine inspiration and the need for expression and making some really cool things for self fulfillment. Of course, however I'm referring to people my age who're insane at these kinds of things. My exact intention!

Hello Actualized.org I'm 18 and have just realized how goddamn lazy and sloppy I am. I don't know what true and rigorous hard work feels like, I love my room and won't go out in the cold. I want to learn to be disciplined and to also get physically stronger. I want to start learning martial arts as consistently as I can to try change this about myself. I have always wanted to do martial arts but have never dedicated time to research into it. Problem is, I'm not sure where to start when entering this field. Does anyone know what types of martial arts I should look into? Or what I should be looking for in my local area for high quality teaching, or should I just go for anything around? I'm asking as I could spend a few hours of my day researching into where to start but strategically its easier if I ask people who know more than I do. Thank you.

(not sure if someone has already included this example or not please inform me if they have so) 2b2t is a Minecraft server thats a very good example of stage red. Yes, not a real world politics or history example but interesting regardless. If some of you have played Minecraft before 2b2t is a minecraft server thats been running for over a decade, has no rules and is called an 'anarchy' server for a reason. People create their own hack clients(which is like a mod for the game I assume exploiting the games code for your advantage, like you can fly without commands, automatically hit players, you basically have superpowers) in the for the game mostly just for this server, this server has its own factions and the only way to survive a minute in the server is by joining a group or installing a hack client which will stop you getting killed instantly. The enviroment in the server has been basically stripped bare of the games natural rescources. There was also a time where they had slave labour in the server, forcing players to mine for obsidian until they could escape or leave the game.

I normally hate asking for help or advise or showing weakness to people but at this point I have no one to talk to about this, and its caused me a huge amount of pain to the point all I wanna do is curl up in my bed and do nothing. So buckle up, this is gonna be a long one. July 2019, 6AM on a monday morning, waking up was a piece of cake. I never thought twice about whether I should get out of bed, I just did it. Then came meditation, morning studying, visualisation, breakfast, all the monotonous tasks of morning. Then after school, I'd come home, and study for a few hours before bed, with minimal time wasted. This was a huge change from me going to sleep at 5am and waking up at 1pm, and doing nothing the entire day, and feeling fucking miserable. I had just come out of a traumatising dysfunctional abusive relationship which lasted a year long, I used to be sad, depressed, I hated myself so much for the person I was, all those little things about me, how I talked, how I presented myself and the things I did. How little I've done with my life, the fact that I have never worked properly hard in my life, I used to live life on the surface, never doing homework even though I wanted to, always DOING things, always playing video games, consuming, wasting my life, stimulating myself, and taking the poorest choices. After being in an abusive relationship, it made me value freedom, because if I wasn't there for him always, he'd cause an argument. It also made me value free time and making the most of it, as I was living life on my phone, always texting him, whether I was with friends, family, anywhere. It was like having a ball and chain attached to me, I couldn't appreciate life. This in a way motivated me, because the more time I spent wasting my life with that, the more I wanted to do after I got out of it. And when I did, boy it was great. I had been more driven by vision, more motivated than I have ever been in my entire life, I have never felt so passionate about something, I thought I had found my life purpose, and for once in my life I felt like I wasn't inadequate, or not living up to my full potential. I felt like I had woken up after sleeping my entire life, I was a million times more aware and crystal clear about my intentions. Physics fascinated me, mainly because I found such a beauty with it, to me it was the pursuit of truth. The journey for fully mapping out the mechanics of reality, how the world worked, and thats how I learnt about relativity and quantum mechanics. I was so fascinated I'd spend hours researching and thinking about these concepts, trying to map them out in my head and make sense of all this information, and even though it was hard, being someone who was never used to any straining cognitive activities, I loved every second of it. This to me was my life purpose, I wanted to know how the world worked, science as a whole intrigued me so much, to me this was a journey, a journey of discovery. I was so sure of this. This drive took me from getting 4s (Cs and Ds) in my GCSEs to getting 8s (A/A*s) in almost all my subjects, purely because this drive got me out of bed and in the best possible habits, and built an insane amount of momentum. I was sure I wanted to study Physics and Mathematics in college, (which is equivalent to grade 11 and 12), I wasn't more sure and crystal clear in my life. Months pass and month by month, my drive sorta dies down. Then lockdown hit, this is where homeostasis kicked in, and I got a nasty ego backlash. My sleep schedule had shifted at worst, to an almost nocturnal schedule, being awake playing video games with friends until 5-8am, to waking up when the sun set. I had no school, my GCSEs were cancelled, I thought that I could use this time to enrich myself in more knowledge, maybe get really good at art again, and use all that time effectively. What did I do? Waste an entite 7 months doing nothing. I felt miserable that things just didnt work anymore, I tried sticking to a routine but I just couldn't stick, trying to be more aware but then wasting my time moments later, I tried doing Math but even the simplest things I just didn't have the attention span or patience to do, I was stuck in this rut for months. Waking up, wasting time, feeling shit before I slept, repeat. Eventually I got so frustrated I tried persevering more and more, day after day I clawed one step up the mountain, it became a battle everyday just to stay focused on literally anything and not waste my time indulging myself with things like Youtube, dopamine and stimulation. To this day its like you're caught in a huge storm in the middle of the ocean, as soon as I swim up to grasp for air I get hit by a huge wave, and have to swim up again and again and again, over and over. Me trying to gain momentum, good habits, and finally reaching a good point, then homeostasis kicks in and I go back to being miserable and making absolutely no progress in my skills and things I wanna do. Nothing has been more frustrating, emotionally draining and its made me suffer countless times, because I know this isn't my full potential, but sometimes I ask myself if this is all I'll ever be. I had lost all passion in life, I was second guessing studying science and physics as a life purpose, and questioning whether that was even a true live purpose to begin with. So I tried finding new ones, I tried drawing again, and making a story I've been working on. Then I started college, I was not prepared at all. I had picked some of the hardest A levels, which means copious amounts of work, and with those awful habits I had, with the added fact that I had remote learning in the same enviroment I had wasted 7 months of my life doing fuckall, I struggled. I could barely concentrate in class, nor even do assignments, even if they were short and easy and even if I could understand the content perfectly fine. After being able to do anything with focus and clarity, to not even being able to fully focus on a simple task, I felt useless. Especially around my classmates, who could seemingly do and understand things with ease, I envy them looking fully relaxed while I'm struggling and stressing to barely pull myself together. I felt like how I was 3 years ago, intellectually disabled, like there was something wrong with me. Working was like putting two magnets with the same poles together, you just cant get them to touch, they only repel, in this case I just couldn't focus. Still everyday I tried and tried and tried, maybe sometimes I made progress but no real academic progress, my assignments were always never done or late, and my grades were below Ds. I tried to do something different everytime something didn't work, like meditation again, setting times where I work, blocking my study times, studying little and often, going into college and asking teachers for help, working at college, cutting off social media, isolating myself from friends, minimalising distractions, all these things just never stuck, no matter how small I tried starting, because I was so lazy and unfocused, and the added stress of exams and assignments just completely stunted any growth. And yes, I have been trying to change my habits, systems and patterns and the root causes of these issues. So I tried looking for my vision again, and I just couldn't find it. I couldn't find anything compelling enough to get me to focus, get me to study and work, I tried reviving my passion for science but all I could feel was stress when thinking about it. My teachers started doubting me, and are saying that I had picked the wrong subjects. Although I had figured out this was true before they mentioned it, there is honestly nothing better I can do about it, I cant change the subjects, even if I did I wouldn't know what to pick. So I should just embrace what I have now and try do my best. All the factory-like systems, exams and assignments have completely abolished my passion for science and mathematics. As a result I've been escaping to making my story after college, sketching characters, enviroments, worlds, and building this fantasy world all of my own making. I really coundn't find it more fun, designing fantasy landscapes, scenarios, story and meaning, entire civilizations. Every cinematic idea or design idea I put into this story/world, almost subconciously, all for the joy of it. I can literally put in orchestra/soundtrack/instrumental music and escape to a world entirely of my own, visit places that only exist in my dreams, imagine beauty, meaning and story, but then I wake up for the next day of lessons, and the intense anxiety and stress returns. And for the past 4 months I've been asking myself, over and over and over, "What do I want?" copious amounts of times, everyday, the question which bothers me for hours and hours. Its plagued my entire mind and with the added stress of school, my mom pressuring me into university and telling me if I don't get a degree, I wont live a financially free life and she goes into detail about why, and it just scares me and scares me to the point of tears. While everyone around me is easing through education I'm constantly living a stressed life worrying about my grades, because I'm failing every single one of them. Its been bringing me more frustration and suffering which is stopping me from studying all together. You may be asking, what am I interested in? What do I value? I value understanding the world around me, and creativity and output. I guess my hobbies are: -Art and animation -Programming and game development -Story making -Systems thinking in science and theoretical physics -Youtube and video editing -Mathematics for fun And I have countless other things which I'm fascinated in learning but have absolutely no experience whatsoever in, such as music. I like too many things for my own good, its like having to choose one thing off a huge buffet when you want it all. I just don't know, and its caused me so much frustration and suffering see my grades drop suddenly and despite all my efforts I have made no progress, its only me making a little progress, then going back a step because of homeostasis. And now I have my exams coming up which could determine whether I get into a good university or not, or a university at all. And so far, I'm failing all my subjects, I couldn't be more anxious and stressed than I am now. I'm trying to find a vision, a reason to study, a reason to not be stressed and overwhelmed. But I just cant, with college being like a ball and chain, I can't not stop going along with these courses, I can't take a break to truly discover what I want. I have a fatal flaw, I critisize myself in my head intensely when I can't control myself. When I waste an entire evening I could of used to be studying for an exam which I got barely a few questions right in, or whether everyone around me can do something easily and I cant. And the thing is, I can understand the courses and the content just fine. I just can't study at home, focus and complete deadlines. I've always had this problem, my entire life and I just wish I didn't. I have a constant fear of inadequacy and a lack of control over myself, or being a slave to my desires, because thats been me my whole life until 2 years ago, and I couldn't feel more disgusted and disappointed with myself. This has manifested into something more toxic than I have ever imagined, an insane amount of anxiety, terrible, terrible self esteem and numbness. Currently, I've improved most of my awful toxic habits. Its mainly my emotions, intense axiety and stress holding me back from making any personal development or academic improvement. What I'm trying to do here is improve my work ethic, get better habits, read more books, enrich myself in knowledge and understand the world around me, and build the perfect foundation. But it seems impossible with all these emotional problems, and college holding me back. I want to know what I want, I want to be free from myself and from the stress college gives me. Becauseit barely gives me time to contemplate or nurture my interests, or work through the various coping mechanisms (like the one I mentioned) I have considered I might have some form of ADD, which I need to sort out. if you've read all this way, thank you. I literally have no one to talk to about this, if I told my mom she'd overreact, same with anyone else. I know I'm overthinking and stressing too much, I just feel so trapped, I know what to do, its just going to require an insane amount of more suffering to do it, at this point I think I couldn't get any worse. Feel free to Criticise the hell out of me, I know I have a lot of work to do.

@Bob Seeker Man can I just say thanks for this, It really means a lot, god I'm feeling so much better now for just writing it. Not many people do this so I appreciate it ALOT. I mainly wrote that because I was just spiraling down negative thoughts and didn't have anyone to talk to at the time. Feeling a lot better just writing out for mental clarity, Virtual worlds is definitely something I'm interested in, I remember having loads of ideas with it a year ago and it'd be amazing if I could work on it myself, no idea why but I'm obsessed with fantasy worlds, I've been making my own for a year and enjoy it a lot. I've always had a really strong burning desire to create, like a YouTube video for example, ot an animation idea, or a feature in a game I'd wanna make, an idea in a story I wanna toy with, anything really, I love it. I could have like 50 ideas in a day but not be able to affectively execute them, and I believe thats one of my problems, the second problem is I guilt myself and criticise myself too much knowing that fact, so thats an emotional problem I need to sort out along with my lack of discipline, routine and work ethic. I've always thought that I'd need a strong vision for me to actually have the willpower to do this, but when I think about it building momentum, a good work ethic will be better than waiting or looking for a vision/reason/life purpose. It'd help me a lot better, thanks for making me realise that. Deep down I know that it isn't the end of the world if I don't do well, and I know deep down that I don't know/don't really want to go to college, but I know I'd be the only person in the family without a degree and I wouldn't have a degree if I need to go in a job for an emergency, so its sort of a backup plan. But hey I'm only 17 and know little about the systems of the world. I've been brought up to know that university is a necessity for employment, and idk if this is true or not. I think it stems from the fact that I have terrible self esteem and don't trust myself, hence why I've started reading The Six Pillars Of Self Esteem by Nathaniel Branden, and these emotional problems are holding me back. Actually when I write this down, I think its a mixture of problems which enhance themselves from the other problems, like lack of discipline makes me have worse self esteem, and worse self esteem makes me have a lack of discipline simply because I believe I am unable and am terrified of the future, that fear makes me unconcious and lose awareness, makes me more unable to be self disciplined and more anxious. Leading to more coping mechanisms which are unhealthy, its a coping mechanism which leads to more coping mechanisms, I could go into more detail but the point is, its a system! Of emotional turmoil. Ah yes, I've taken weed once before, interesting suggestion actually, I'll try it once, why not? Obviously being aware of the issues it can possibly bring. Nature is one of my favourite things, I struggle to comprehend the beauty of it honestly, even if I only walk to college and back. I could draw it, create more of it in my head, its beauty. In terms of what excites me, oh boy, thats a difficult one to answer. I spent some time thinking about this actually. The art of creation and story, and its meaning, its feeling. Art as in literally anything, an output of the human psyche, I could list almost absolutely anything beautiful created in this world, beautiful as in transcending the need for survival, just pure genuine output. It gives me so much thrill just thinking about what I can make in this human life. Also making sense of the world, discovering, experience, finding truth, reasoning with logic. Learning more and more and having a good understanding in this world, I'm not really the kind of person who has a specific thing they're interested in, literally anything beyond the subject of survival interests me. Whether its history, mathematics, theoretical physics, computer science, politics, or literally any science. I'm fascinated with making a self-evolving integrated worldview of the world. I guess thats why I resonated with Leo's content so much I suppose. Yes these are abstract, and I intend to define these into things which will first of all enable me to live a good life while pursuing higher goals. And yes, I have noticed I'm scared of asking for help, no idea why, I think it was some coping mechanism I developed, to my own detriment, as no one understood me, especially in a superficial world. I have met very few people(none my age) who somewhat resonate with me, so I guess I need to find more people like that. I did have a therapist and it helped so I'll probably try organise that again, especially in this time of need. Thank you so much for all this advise, its helped me gain some new perspectives, it means a lot @Mosess You're right, I get that a lot hahhaha thanks fot replying

@tatsumaru I'd say those make me focus well, I often listen to tracks like this: However average 3 minute long music with lyrics and all that is particularly what I meant, it makes me feel full of eratic energy and can diverge my focus a lot lol Good recommendation though, it really does relax your thoughts, which helps me stop thinking so eratically.

I have this, it holds me back from getting into a good work flow and makes time management for me extremely difficult. One minute I'm doing real work, the other I've got up from my desk and I'm looking out the window fantasizing about how insane I want my life to be 50 years later, and the problem is, how am I going to make that a reality if I can't even sit down and work towards it!!! Yet Its still difficult, I'm not sure what the root of the problem is for you but, I suppose its down to concentration and awareness, normally when you're working and are completely focusing on what I'm working on, the daydreams aren't there, music often triggers daydreaming for me, so I don't recommend listening to it while working if you do. Try being aware of your daydreaming every time it comes up, and don't let it carry you away, take a deep breath and remind yourself what you have to do, and make sure you enjoy what you're doing and get into the flow of working through it, and you'll most likely get so carried away doing what you're doing the daydreams wont come up. Try watching Leo's video on focus if you haven't, he explains the concept of 'flow' pretty well, a state which you get yourself in when doing a task you don't think of anything else but that task, and turn the daydreaming into visions which will motivate you by consciously sitting down and coming up with powerful visions, channel this ambition into something that'll benefit you and motivate you, not slow you down during the day, make sure to have structure to your day and really intend to work. Sorry if this isn't that helpful - anyone is free to correct me, I'm fighting this battle too so I haven't fully figured it out yet.

Put your alarm on the other side of your room so you have to get up to turn it off, then you're up and what ever you do DO NOT go back to bed, remind yourself what you wanna do in life and more importantly what you wanna do today to help you formulate your day. Making a routine is important. Try do this everyday and don't give up, even if some attempts are unsuccessful, and if it isn't working then try change things up.

Raising kids would be an interesting one, I dont plan to do it but if I ever did, i'd firstly only have 1, and if I wanted another i'd have one 14-ish years later, around the time when children become a lot more concious and hit puberty, that way I could meet all their needs with undivided attention. I'd surround them with people, maybe older, maybe other kids who have concious parents (if there are any lmao) so they learn to socialise with other people. I'd surround them with creative material also, like building blocks or art things (which would be safe), and of course lots of nature, so they have an idea of what the outside world is like. I'd nurture them and give them a lot of love and try my best to be extremely positive around them, and teach them to be curious and go on their own adventures with their imagination. I would surround the house with natural based foods, like fruit, nuts or anything easily digestable and high in protein, I'd take them out to many places such as beaches, forests, cities, and keep them firmly by my side. If I'm honest, I wouldn't want to send them in their first years to any form of school, to avoid bad social pressures and influences, in their first years i'd firmly teach them myself, firstly that learning will help you and make you feel better, or develop some reward system to make things 'fun' and pleasant, then i'd teach them the basics like how to read, basic mathematics, how to tell the time etc, and I'd also prioritise the fact that they should avoid 'taking the path of the least resistance', by this I mean engage them in being active in their learning and not lazy and unenthusuastic. A few years down the line, I'll start teaching them basic traps in life, like bad foods, social media, technology, how to deal with bad people, things like addictions, and keep them closest to the truth as possible, but in a way which doesn't traumatize them. I'd then slowly transition them towards school before high school starts, to avoid a sudden and traumatic transition, then thats when they'll start learning a lot of things from personal experience, combined with all the things I would've taught them previously. This is when they'll probably start to drift away and rebel, if they started falling down rabbit holes and traps, i'd tell them that calmly and leave it to them whether they want to sort it out or not, and of course i'd tell them HOW to sort out emotional issues, I'd never force them unless they were close to a life threatening or life long damaging situation, i'd let them roam free in the field of life to make sense of it themselves, and they'll learn it all themselves. Of course this is only in an ideal world, there would of course be many many outside circumstances where this might not be possible at all, but those are just my thoughts But if they asked about God, I'd just tell them that God is everything, and I'd tell them to go and find out actively.

A question about infrastructure - and purely out of curiosity, what kind of systems or technology do you use? And what do you use it for and how do you use it to benefit you? By this I mean, for example Leo mentioned he uses hard drives (I think) for a storing a lot of important information, what computer you use, or if you record videos or do some form of digital art what softwares or hardware do you have? Anything worth mentioning. Although I try to avoid the whole scene about technology as most of it is low conciousness consumerism but theres definitely an amazingly useful aspect to it, or if you dont use much technology at all, feel free to mention it, I'm very curious.

Thank you for the recommendation! I suppose it does indeed have to do with me backsliding - as everytime I somewhat make some progress, I backslide, so its time to fix that. I do need to prioritise meditation, it'll be a great habit to implement, infact, i'll try it tomorrow again, as I previously had a meditation habit until my father passed away which dissolved all my motivation and momentum, but no matter. Thank you

I get the same thing, its extremely frustrating. Once school ends for me its become a habit to reward myself with dopamine, and I hate it, but I can never stop myself in the moment, and it carries on until its night and I need to sleep, wasting a whole day, and I go to sleep thinking about how annoyed I am with myself wasting the whole day, telling myself that tomorrow will be better and i'll work on what I want to work on, then I wake up, and its just a repeat, so indeed, I need to change some thing up, ALOT, with a lot of willpower. I suppose its down to intention, vision and habits, some day i'll be working on my dream and vision in almost exactly the way I want, and i'll be trying everyday to push myself forward.

Agreed, to the point where large corporations have developed insane algorithms to specifically target your weak and primative points of your brain, all for profit. Its hard to get away from it, especially if you're going to school and are 17, surrounded by those who would consider it a norm. I can normally recognise when something is harmful for me or not, but the result of me cutting all this shit out is me not having many friends at school - and its great! Only surrounding yourself with people who'd benefit you.

Nice! I often try to stop myself from using all the unconcious areas of the internet or tech overall, I only really use YouTube as means of free music or learning, but its more than easy to get sucked down a rabbit hole, and I've had to really force myself to hold myself from the temptation of clicking something like "Minecraft Dream SMP best moments" or any of that dumb shit, I try to tell myself when I'm in the moment that it's damaging.

Hey, I know a lot of people have already read this and given really good advice, but I saw this thread and just thought "wow, i completely understand this", I have experienced something extremely similar, not as bad as this situation but very similar, it still hurt me the same way it hurt you. Friends online, especially in gaming communities or all these low conciousness communities, there are a lot of people like this. Honestly brave of you to confront that head on, I wouldn't of done that. I'll tell you what I experienced, it might help or give you some information or help, back when I was about 14 ish 15 (17 now), i, (of course, being an extremely unconcious little kid) loved minecraft, video games, youtube, and all that whole playing with friends thing. At the time, I was pretty miserable, due to family issues, me getting consumed to depression from all this media, and me and my school best friend drifting apart, i always wanted friends to play video games with, but never had any. I had just moved to a new school in the UK (from spain) and all I wanted was a group of friends, a team, a place to fit in. So one night i joined a discord server related to minecraft and video games in general, and met a few people who i actually felt like i got along with, talking to them didnt feel soul-less and empty, i could talk to them about my life, my interests, and for the first time i felt understood, and got invited to a bigger server with more people, it was a friend group. That week I was absolutely addicted to discord, i couldn't go 2 hours without going on it, as i was so deprived of social contact before, these were the best friends i ever knew, the next few months were awesome, i had so much fun being with them, supporting them in any way i could, talking to them about something other than typical dry conversations. I then met someone who later became my boyfriend (online, it never worked out lmao), even though we were very intimate and connected, it turned into a toxic relationship a few months after. Its a really complicated situation as he knew my group of friends and hated them, so i'll keep it short for your sake. He later isolated me from them, made me feel like shit, gaslighted me, manipulated me into thinking they (my friend group) were awful people, all that etc etc, i didnt believe him and just faked going along with it to avoid abuse from him, deep down i knew they were my friends, but as time went on it got worse. My friend group caught note of this and tried to tell me how they felt about me talking to them less and talking to them more, as they didnt know this relationship was ruining me. They were extremely aggressive about it, wrote huge paragraphs telling me that im a bad person, then they swore at me, one made fun of me, all in one discord channel, and there i was just absorbing it all, trying to pick up the pieces and trying to make this right and sort out this mess. After this i started to believe my ex, and eventually he got so mad at me for talking to my friends all together he said he'd kill himself or cut me off if i spoke to them, so i left their server and pretended to hate them just to make him stop. Even though they were innocent and weren't as awful as he made them out to be. Then for a couple months (of hell) i was alone, it was just me, and him. He was non-stop manipulating me to the point where i spent every single hour of every day on my phone speaking to him, because he demanded it, and if i didnt respond for 5 minutes to an hour he'd throw a huge tantrum and threaten to kill himself if i didnt respond (surprise he never did lmao) he even faked self harm just to get me to be with him, he was just, in a terrible mental state, and no matter how much i tried to help, how much i gave him, he just wanted more of my attention, and more. I eventually got banned from his server for waking up 30 minutes later than he expected, leaving him alone for 30 minutes! how horrible, and my old friend group who i left noticed this, and found an old group dm with me and them in and started making fun of me and laughing at me, thinking that me and my ex were done. I explained to them in shock and desperation what he was doing to me and, to my surprise, they believed me, and what they thought was wrong. I then had to lie to my ex that i wasnt speaking to them, because if i didnt he would of screamed at me for days, until i left them. I explained everything to them, and they were shocked, and i finally felt relieved, but not fully. I then came to the conclusion that, I needed to cut this shit off, as soon as i could, but it was so hard, as like leo said in one of his videos "you lie to yourself that without their toxic traits, they're a good person" referring to my ex. The next few months was me trying to find an easy way out to the relationship, one that wouldn't leave my ex hurt, but there just wasn't one. I went in and out of cutting him out, but he was so, so smart in getting me back. Anyway i feel like im going slightly off the rails, i'll get to the important bit. When i finally cut him off, my friends were still mad at me, because they never understood how hard it was to cut him off, even after i cut him off for good, they lost trust in me. (this was about 2 weeks after my dad passed away) eventually, they mentioned me in a discord channel in their main server and wrote a huge essay attacking me for the dumbest shit. And i mean the weakest, most petty shit, like for example me not being active enough, or me always being in invisible mode, and of course, me always 'going back' to my ex, even though i never wanted to go back, it was him coming after me, and me just trying to make things right between me and him. I cant remember what else they said, but it wasnt nice, they all sort of ganged up on me, swore at me, called me names, i said little to nothing, and anything i did say they'd make some meme out of what my stuttered sentences were, they then kicked me out of every server they had with me. This came as a complete, and i mean a complete shock to me. And just to make things worse, that same very night i started geting messages from my ex's friends telling me that my ex was dead because of me etc etc, but i was so in shock of the prrvious event, i believed it, not having any time to process what it actually was, like a kneejerk reaction. That morning after he was alive and well and messaged me, and that was just the last straw lmao, i never spoke to him ever again. But after that, I was probably, quite literally traumatized. This is were our situations are similar, because the place which i called home, my safe place, with the people who i loved and trusted, had just decided to throw me out and make me feel so beyond awful about it, and in some ways i felt like i deserved it for leaving them, but honestly, in situations like this, there is no such thing as right or wrong, or a moral compass, black and white turns into grey, and after a lot of reflection, i really do see that the way culture sees morality is honestly just a load of BS. Anyway, after they kicked me out, i spent an entire month not touching my phone or laptop, never going on discord, i was traumatized, and terrified of the past. They later contacted me and apologised, but it felt hollow, and i dont think they ever truly understood what i went through. In the end the real reason why they contacted me was because the friend group split into 2 and one of my friends wanted me to take sides with them. I later managed to get the 2 groups to apologise and get back together, after that i joined back, simply because they were so welcoming back, I was however still secretly resentful about the past, even though i told them how i felt about it. Things turned normal again, i was with them again, and felt like i gained my friend group back. Until one in particular, who is the most neurotic, kept causing drama after drama. About the pettiest dumbest shit, you know how people are when they get mad over literally the most absurd, "why the fuck are you mad about this, it is literally so small" things? It didnt matter who caused it, it was always about "who said this" or "they said that", and never someone actually doing something truly hurtful, it was purely distorting truth for his own egoic needs. He was addicted to gossip and was always, angry at someone, there was never not a time where he didnt have a problem with someone, and it made me wonder, who's next? He then started to ignore me, then the others started to as well, i felt like i was speaking to a brick wall when i was in vc, and they'd get mad at me countless times for just something small i say without even thinking, and they'd make fun of me again, even though i supported them in a lot of ways, and i just never understood why they hated me so much, why they made fun of me, why they treated me like shit even though i helped them in a lot of ways whenever the group split apart and needed someone to help make things right, i never understood it because i never treated them like they treated me, and one thing i never understood was, when they all made fun of me and kicked me out, we later tried to make things right and discuss it to get over it a year after it happened but, the most neurotic one said that he was the victim in the situation, and that he was the most hurt, even though my father passed away two weeks before and i was also left traumatized, it was always about him, i did however still love them in so many ways, and then the server suddenly went completely silent, (its normally active everyday), and i guessed it instantly, they were talking in another server without me, to avoid me, because they were scared of kicking me out of the main one. (they did this a lot with other people, had specific servers without certain people to avoid them) And eventually days later, they said that they wont be inviting me back again, simply because i wasnt into what they were into (anime, and really indulging themselves in it, and twitter) and for months i found it so hard to cope, because these were the only friends i ever knew, i really felt like nobody gave a shit about me anymore. I dont think i ever really got over what they did to me, and what puzzles me as it puzzles you is, how they could hurt me so much, without feeling guilty, like i did. I felt more guilt for my shitty actions more than they ever did. But in the end, im glad i left, best decision i ever made was to not go back to them after they kicked me out for the 2nd time. And tbh, I still haven't fully forgiven them, every day im trying to peacefully let it go but it unconciously always comes up in my head, so thats something im trying to work on. I guess what ive found out is, everyone has different frameworks and perceptions of reality, some extremely neurotic and toxic, some that serve you in many ways, and some people's framework just simply dont fit into yours, like concepts just arent compatible with their view of the world, so therefore they are incapable of feeling how awful you felt or understanding why its a neurotic thing to do, that'll just dig them in a worse hole. Because i bet those people that made your life hell will start regretting those things once they're in your position, maybe throughout their lives, maybe soon. With them denying that they bullied you and just made it out to be a "joke", imo it isnt a joke if the person getting made fun of isn't enjoying it. In the end, karma will take care of them. Judging by their actions they're probably neurotic, and that can lead them to probably having pretty shitty lives. I know ive poured my heart out, but if you've read to the end, thank you. In the end my advice, is to accept that they're just different and will probably never understand the perception of the world you have. And when you're ready, spend some time alone to really realise all the shit they've done to you, and just put your middle finger up to them, accept that they'll only ever give dry replies, and cut them out for good, and what ever you do, never look back or go back, work on your life, find a creative output to avoid constant negative thought of them, and whenever you do think of them and the past, either distract yourself immediately, or breath in and let go of the thought through meditation, and when the time comes, you'll eventually be able to forgive them, and find better people to surround yourself with.