Applegarden8

In the long term, you will ace them. Just keep going. Does not matter about short term. If they insult and troll you, it is very clear. They are not your friends. After 5 or 10 years they will look at you and it will be irritating for them. Something very subtle is changing in you. It seems like you have some answers now. Just ignore them and keep going. Just because those life choices are popular does not mean that you have to chase them. The ironic thing is that I know some group of people that have about the same values (house, car, pets or children, family, profession and what our economy has to offer) and from these people I (like my neighbours) receive the most questions about how I live... well because there are vast number of ways how to live that people acctually choose or are forced to live, but they don't want to hear it. They can laugh all they want, just to get angry and upset 1 minute later about me for reaons they don't know. This is my and your constitutional and human right to be how you want to be. Don't take it lightly. I use this argument if I get very weird criticisms, do you know your rights? For example. There is no paper stating I have to make children, besides, compared to 100 years back, do you really need kids that much? There is 8 billion people. We need to improve those who are already living otherwise my son will go to war aginst your son due to some stupid ideology and we will drown into garbage we produce. Acctually read what you constitution says, it is pretty refreshing. Understand, you SHOULD HAVE THAT FREEDOM what is written there. Nobody can request you, don't do it because I don't like it or you should do what I do as an open criticism to you - this person is a total loser who doesn't know his rights and does things basically because somebody told him to. You will be very irritating to average materialistic person which will be your friends in some time going forward. You will lose some "friends" when your interests change. You will lose some of the even when your food choices will change, there is no more time to hang out and eat junk anymore.

Interesting topic. I haven't had a relationship because I guess I did not want it enough. Right now I really want to make my life sustainable and healthy/stable in the long term, meaning that I am healthy and I have a place to stay and earn my income. I also really want to focus on my artistic desire which I am really focusing on my free time. Then I do some stuff like yoga and meditation to be healthy and not be depressed, and think about how to implement a more sustainable lifestyle. Then, I kinda have no energy for relationships. If that was to happen, well, I never really approach women or initiate, though I think I could, I do not know how that would escalate in real time, it would be entertaining of course, but if we are talking seriously then the only reason I would have a relationship is to have an artistic power couple. Means I have an artist or a musician by my side and we talk, keep each other updated, emotionally relieve ourselves and help each other to grow artistically and maybe join our artistic projects. One scenario would be if she was like a singer or performer I would help her get the technical stuff or make a duet as a side project or if she was a visual artist I would make pads for her exhibitions or even provide with music etc and the other way around. Otherwise I feel that relationships are pretty shallow and involves the same mindset and arguing about the same things for decades. Or he cheated she cheated kind of thing and endless drama about it. Better to be involved balls deep with a person and find some creative solutions to your problems and really support each other. But I will probably not get that and I will just do it myself anyway when I can.

I had a guy tell me he had to choose between 4 women recently and he had "nothing serious" with them. I am clueless what to say until this moment even. I can't even give you advice when you have to choose between 0 women.

hahahahaha, me too

I have had 0 in 27 years. Damn, maybe i should get some, in a row especially!

This is a self-dev forum, good to ask how many ppl play and how beneficial it is for people that want to build their life, it's good he is asking.

No you are not missing out, in fact, if you are still young, better get into something more tangible and social like music, painting, video editing, wood crafting, 3D printing, theater, sports, dancing, camping etc. unless you want to create/program video games, there is not much point and it will make you waste a lot of the time, but it can be fun, as the other things I mentioned are, but these other skills will develop you into a well rounded, practical and social human being that will serve to your advantage.

I believe generally bad for one reason, regardless of the gender. If you do sex or masturbation thinking about your commited partner, that's great! Great to feel wanted and want somebody and it goes full circle and it's an enjoyable experience. If you do hook up with multiple people and jerk off thinking about different people, then you will be more mentally and emotionally fragile and unstable, form my experience. If you do longer periods of no fap like a more than 2 weeks, your perception of the opposite sex will change. The natural triggers will not trigger as they would and you are able to think about other aspects of life more clearly, the impact of importance about what people think of you also reduces and there is no emotional investment and expectation how things should go from your crush or person you like if you do no fap. I am not talking about whether you should, shouldn't or suggesting that you feel any way about it. This is just purely my observation. I think it's sad that everything is so sexualized for monetary gain and people are chasing some kind of illusions just to blow one off or get laid or maintain an abusive relationship (to not be lonely) although life may be about entirely something else. And then ANYWAY you are left alone and couldn't in fact run away from it, time to sit with yourself and address it.

i believe this is true or I believe this is not true, in either case, will you find out by believing any one thing?

Having a solid and written down business idea to appeal to investors or government grants, also having a team of few people ready to go.

I do not like this soft style, except when Osho does it, it's at least funny that he is calling out somebody.

Yes

The concept and implementation of balance

Well, don't take what I said it too literally, but I can say I know something in this field by experience because of practices and some willingness to know the Truth. I don't know how big or small is this or how close or far I am, but I have some system, some infrastructure organized that works and I try to maintain. I do not feel that I am close to anything yet, these things just happen from time to time with a tendency to happen more regularly and intensely over years. I feel this is my karma to have a such a strong influence on spirituality in my life and i feel that it's my destiny. But any one can prioritize to spend time with themselves, desire the truth and do some sadhana so that eventually they have developed the receptivity to experience these things. I would love to think that I am very connected to the Source, but I have no instruments to measure that in the short term, so the only thing is to keep practicing, keep being healthy and active in life. I am not a supporter of neo-advitic terms of "it will somehow happen" or "it can happen any time", I have never seen this work for anyone I know, but I have seen practicing monks and they have a different energy about them.

yes, i have had moments where i experience extended sense of self or no-self, this usually happens when I am sitting with my eyes closed. This feeling seems to be located around seeing and breathing and somehow turns this perception turns infinite or very large and you cannot understand how much space you are taking, within minutes it goes back to normal. Pronounced feeling of energies, blockages, bliss and chakras exist in my day to day experience. There is sometimes intuition when I have done a lot of meditation the previous day where I know there will be a person around the corner and I walk and they are there, this is very sudden, non-repeatable and spontaneous but i noticed it. I have had a few other, but they are not so significant.

Well, possibly that they were already interested in it to some degree and you built their trust in you and they happened to be receptive to you. But this is not usually in my experience.

Agree, I found it the hard way. I wouldn't even mention any of this stuff unless somebody asks me. Other people are bound to enjoy or suffer their ignorance until they decide to renounce it forever, it is their right to remain how they want to be. Until then, they will take on lifetimes of burden, tension and also some pleasure joy, bliss here and there.

Hobbies, social workshops, meetups, board game events, improv theater, become manager of a local band etc.

What I would do is to be more verbally direct to them about what I want from them, also knowing that you could lose their friendship which is, let's be honest, pretty fake to begin with, if you constantly want something else with this person: "I want to go out with YOU, not those other people in our friend group.", "I like you, we should spend some time together". Women do not like men that are not assertive and direct (like me), maybe some dominant women do, but I do not know many to begin with. Also some caution to not be too sexual or too direct to force her to make a decision she is not comfortable with and she can reject you for literally any reason, how to get laid series is a lot about that. Then why would you fear losing a relationship in which you are teased for who you are and cannot have a role which you are looking for in a relationship? You can find different people, if you think she is the one then I will say you in modern times this does not work. She was quite a few "brothers" like that in her life. If it's impossible to meet women in a friend groups, then it's time to move to a different area at some point. How to get laid series are very informative but will work only if you practice the things talked about.

I think this is unacceptable answer for a moderator in this forum.

He will probably say like, whoa this guy is insane, this guy has figured some shit out and just walk away to smoke some weed.

Guru is not about masculine or feminine. There (optimally speaking) is no one behind a guru.

Because of capitalism and mass monotheism.

It is tricky. I think just saying less is a good option in general. Sometimes you do need to interfere and without asking, defend your values and so on. But this is not a lot of times, at least in my experience. In job, it's better to be more honest, authentic and vulnerable, I have jad great success in this field, but you cannot be totally honest. Remember that you are going to take risks and blind decisions, make mistakes and hope they will not influence what you are doing. So no need to throw yourself under the bus also, but then you also have to evaluate what is important to tell, and you don't really know at times at what point what is important to warn about. But in long term, honesty is better overall, even though it will hurt more. In personal life, well difficult. You can always not tell everything, switch the topic, gaslight people and so on which I don't encourage. But you can't really tell them what you really think about their behavior and their problems, MOST of the time they are not even listening to you, not even interested or open to other people's opinions, not even looking for help, did not even ask you for advice or help even though it is visible they have some kind of a problem. Or they will overreact, will take revenge on you and so on, so you kinda have to estimate if they are ready to be told something or even ask them, if they want to even know your opinion. My solution was to spend a lot of time by myself. I will be lying if I said that I am honest, but I kinda am, though I am very selective when I open my mouth. Be careful and stay strong.

Yes, I agree with this. Even if the woman you meet (in group or alone) is taken or is just stringing you along, you can still either platonically interact because there is value to what they can say or you can just spit some game and tips and spice up your emotional communication to see how she responds and to confirm some trends of behavior and see what resonates for you. Nothing sexual even needs to be said.