bythos

They live - Those magic sunglasses that negate the TV signal that alters our perception... Dark City - Alien run experiment that puts humans in different lives and identities Devs - Mini series about quantum computers, singularity, quantum mechanics, parallel universes Flatland - How 2d beings perceive reality Instinct (1999)- Professor ditches the games of human society and goes to the jungle, lives with gorillas, but humans do not let him be... Pi (1998) - Explores themes of religion, mysticism, and the relationship of the universe to mathematics In-shadow - Animated short film. Embark on a visionary journey through the fragmented unconscious of our modern times

A silent voice (anime)

@Breakingthewall Wow. Thank you. If she ever asks about it (she has, in the past) I'll tell her the whole truth. Otherwise I'll wait until I feel that she can take it. I didn't describe the damage done to me, but it was really extensive. For a couple of years I was unable to work to sustain myself and I could barely even hang out with friends or family. It was hard for me to even leave my room. There is some habitual behavior that is still with me today. She was there to witness it all. It is a huge deal for her.

I believe this is true. When you ask "Is there such a thing as universal NOW?" You think of the universe as "all space" right? You must also think of it as "all time". So the universal now would be all time, past, present and future.

Yes, but I'm still not as consistent as I'd like to be. Sometimes I'll drive 20 km to the forest, find a good spot, sit down and lean my back to a big oak or fir, and stay at it for hours on end. From early in the morning till the afternoon. It's not as effective for me when I'm at home. All kinds of distractions...

@puporing Thanks again. You've been really helpful. I don't have interference issues from her because I live far away. But when she gets a chance, she is so subtle and insidious at it...

How would you ever grow if your daddy always makes all the optimum decisions for you? If you have never suffered your bad choices and your delusions? How would you ever truly learn anything? No matter the form of government, the people will always be the cogs that make the machine run. If the people are corrupt and they are always looking for a chance to bend or break the law, it does not matter how well oiled the machine is or how the designer of the machine has done a perfect job. Who is going to enforce the law on the corrupt people anyway? The autocrat alone?

There is a very good documentary by national geographic that is called "Going Ape" It shows that a big part of our social behavior comes from an instinctual need to determine who is alpha and who is beta in a group. We watch the monkeys do this so blatantly and we think that it is silly. We are the same. Sometimes I find myself playing this game but when I become conscious of it, it sickens me. If you want to understand human social instincts, look at the monkeys. No need for further analysis.

@Nivsch This one perspective might be of some value to you. Consider this diagram Think of molecules that form cells, single-cell organisms that cooperate on some level and eventually they evolve into multicellular animals, animals that form societies, herds, packs, clans, nations. Lets leave the human herd alone, because it is a loaded question. Think of the cells in your body. If one gets damaged and stops seeing past its own borders, that it is actually a whole larger organism, you, the bigger picture, will call that cancer. And an even bigger picture might call that something else entirely. On each of these steps, there are borders that an ego imagines. The next step transcends those borders.

Thank you for your response. Confronting her was not the first thing that came to mind. I'm leaning towards not telling her. I've asked two friends about this and they both said the same thing. "How would you feel if your mother passes on and you still carry that burden?". I value their opinion on this, one of them is a therapist even. But I don't think I care about that. The pros in my mind are these: "It would be unfair for her to not know. It is truth and it involves her directly. She might grow from this knowledge." The cons are that I'm not so sure she can handle it in her current state. She has to be a nurse for my father 24/7. He had a car accident that caused brain damage and he can barely communicate from now on. She can't even leave the house without making arrangements and planning things ahead. My sis that was living next door to her, left because her husband found a good job abroad. So my mom now keeps complaining that she has no one to talk to, that she feels alone and abandoned, that her life is over. She is clearly getting depressed.

Same for me. I'd do it right now if I was not married, or if my relationship was unhealthy. If not in a monastery, then in 10 years I'll have a cabin in the woods. Somewhere deep in the silver fir forest.

@Breakingthewall Ok, I don't think this is an important point, but, having said that, I believe that it is a duality if you're looking at it though an ego, but an absolute if your ego is gone, even for a moment. And that's why, for the life of me, I could not see it before that experience, but it was so clear afterwards. But then it does feel like a different concept, like you need new words to describe it. Those you mentioned work just fine. Division and unity.

"Major depression", "elements of SPD". This was the evaluation I got in my early twenties. It was quite accurate. I had this darkness in my life from early childhood. I started recovering slowly during my mid twenties. When I was a kid i thought that everyone is more or less like me. Later in life I started noticing the differences. First I realized the "schizoid elements". This was for me more like a social phobia that evolved to the point of me not wanting almost any kind of social contact. I only had 1 or 2 weird friends during childhood. In retrospect, this was my defense, the only viable one I had. Later on I realized my depression. I could see that depression made me an introvert, and introversion made me depressed. An ongoing vicious cycle. The last thing I realized about my situation was the most insidious one. Abysmal self esteem. Each one of these three demons was empowering the other two. Looking inside me for the root cause of all this, I got absolutely nothing. Therapy worked, antidepressants not so much. Meditation helped me in two ways. Silencing the mind eventually turned down the volume of its commentary. And it would commend such nice things to me like "You're thinking of saying hello to this person? Who do you think you are you worthless piece of shit, nobody likes you". The other thing it did, it stopped me from feeling panicky things like "This can't be happening to me, I'm gonna pretend it's not true". I started accepting the facts. And this is the only place from where you can see true solutions. Meditation could have done a lot more for me but my practice was very erratic. I would do 20 hours in a week and then nothing for a month or two. A few years ago I found this place with floating tanks that had just opened in the city i used to live. After the 3rd one-hour session, I returned to my old flat, the place I grew up in, kicked my shoes off, had no other plans for the day, mind went blank. And this memory comes to me that took place in the same house, at the very same spot I was sitting. I was a kid about 7 or 8 years old. Mommy comes in, shouting her usual line that she used to shout at me, while expressing disdain and contempt. I had this memory before, but now for the fist time it was like the memory track kept playing and I also remembered the feelings these incidents gave to me. It was the exact same darkness I would experience during the worst period of my life. I could also remember now, how and why I had buried these feelings, because I felt that i was totally dependent on my parents, and that I really had no other choice but to "suck it up". After that it was like I had unlocked a door to a whole room full of forgotten memories, all of them telling me that i was experiencing my mother's rejection from the earliest childhood up until the age of 13 or 14. The fact that this was her behavior only towards me and not my other siblings, made things so much worse. Among many other things, I also remembered her in my early twenties trying to apologize to me in two different occasions saying something like "I was not appreciative enough of you", "I did not understand you". And I would answer to her "What are you talking about, I remember no such thing", because I really did not. Later on she would even cry a few times while telling me how she wished she had done many things differently. So I got my root cause, when I had already stopped searching for it. The question I'm debating now, is whether I should tell her about this. Should I confront her? I really don't want to, because I know she is in a dark place herself now, and I fear this would crush her, even if i tell her that I have forgiven her.

@Octagram Eye At first I didn't think I'll read your whole text but I did, because I can relate on so many levels. I know you're in a place where any advice is unlikely to get through to you and have any meaningful impact, but do try and listen to what you've been told so far in this thread. I just want to add one thing. I feel like you need to start a meditation practice, in parallel to whatever else you decide to do with your life. Don't roll your eyes, don't think this is a waste of time, and don't think that you can't or that you're not good at it. There is no such thing. Even if you think it has no effect on you, I promise you that it does. Keep it up for a full month and you'll start seeing that where you thought you were drowning in your troubles, it will now feel like there is actually solid ground beneath your feet that you can stand on. That's how it worked for me. Make that practice a habit. While you're at work, no matter how much it sucks, for the love of god do not start thinking about all the other places you'd rather be and all the other things you'd rather do. Be there, body and mind, like there's no other thing in all of spacetime. Not even Leo and his videos, not even this forum.