Emerald

Thank you

I can't give you an observable view of the Yin/Yang phenomenon any more than I can give you an observable view of ego transcendence. These are laden within the subjective experience, and I couldn't transmit them to you even if my life depended on it. Imagine that we are both blind people and most everyone on Earth is also blind. But I had several experiences where my vision came back online and I could see for a short period of time. And then, with the memory of that experience, I told you about color and attempted to describe it to you. And then you said, "Please provide me with an observable view of color." and to prove my claim and provide evidence. But the only way for you to actually get evidence is for you to have a similar experience of vision in your direct experience. There is nothing that I could show you, if you don't already see it, that would persuade you to the existence of color. And the only value my persuasion has is to open you up to the possibility of being receptive to color in the future. Now, of course I know exactly 0% about anything. I don't even know that I'm typing in this conversation for sure. Maybe the universe just began a split second ago and me writing this message is just a false memory. So, I know 0% just like every other person on the planet right now. But in so far as I can be sure of anything and can trust my direct experience and my memories of my direct experience, I'm 100% sure that they're real. You can experience them phenomenologically in your subjective experience. Note: I will come back and answer your other questions in a bit.

It's not just biology. It's in all things... living and non-living. It's a cosmic principle that informs but supersedes human gender and sexuality. You can experience it directly. No dogma. Just experience. Also, it's depicted by humans in an anthropomorphized way. But that's because we need a way to depict it in symbolic language. The energies are subtle and defy categorization. But if we talk about them symbolically, we can call them masculine/feminine or depict them as man/woman or God/Goddess. So, there is the raw, observable phenomenon. Then, there are the symbolic understandings that human beings use to understand them. One is observable... the other is either archetypal and/or cultural depiction of what that core experience is.

Actually, Yin and Yang is at least phenomenologically real as it's an observable phenomenon. You can notice them in a state of sensitivity to them. I have experienced these qualities before. They interplay in all living and non-living systems. And it isn't based upon social constructs... though many social constructs are derived from them.

Repression of the feminine side doesn't make a man more masculine. And integration of the masculine side isn't precluded by integrating the feminine side. To be masculine doesn't entail being free from the feminine side. Masculinity and femininity are inborn qualities. You can't change them. You can either do the healthy thing and own them or repress them and suffer the consequences. And men who try to try to repress their feminine side usually just end up expressing tons of shadow feminine qualities like spitefulness, pettiness, and insecurity. And this is because they haven't integrated their feminine side, so it comes out in more denigrated forms. When a man has integrated his feminine side, it comes out in the form of deeper social acuity, emotional intelligence, and a deeper connection to his inner compass and personal sovereignty. Also, a great number of masculine qualities cannot be integrated without integrating the feminine side. For example, personal sovereignty and the ability to have firm boundaries and stand up for one's self can only be integrated if the person has developed the capacity for emotional sensitivity.

You didn't read what I actually wrote. Looks aren't the primary criteria like you claimed. It's just one criterion out of many. And there's a lot of flexibility that men have in the attractiveness department that women don't. Also, minimum looks criteria will change from woman to woman. A woman who's a 3 will probably be happy to date a 1 or 2. A woman who's a 5 will probably be okay with dating a 3 or 4. A woman who's a 10 will probably be okay with dating 7 or 8. There's a bar there. But as long as you're not a 4 or 5 looking for a 10, then you probably won't have any issues.

That’s not true. If a guy is really “ugly”, he’s going to hit a barrier if he’s trying to attract a woman who’s more than a couple point ahead of him in physical attractiveness. but you could replace the word “ugly” with “average” and that would be mostly correct.

Women aren’t primarily attracted to looks. And that wasn’t even what she said. Women are attracted to the whole package. But looks can be a dealbreaker. Men can up their attractiveness by two points by developing his personality... and down their attractiveness by two points if he has an underdeveloped personality. But a female 10 probably isn’t going to go for a male 2. But she might go for a 7 or 8. A female 5 probably isn’t going to go for a male 1. But she might go for a 3 or 4. So, men do have a lot more control over how attractive they are compared to women. That said, it isn’t true that looks are irrelevant to women’s choice in partner. Most women will seek their looks-match.

There is a bar there too. I'm probably about a 6 in the looks department. And my subconscious would auto-filter a guy who's 4 and under. And that's true even if he had the best personality and the most charisma. When attractions have happened to me in the past, it's almost always to men who are about my looks-match. And it's never towards men that are visibly unattractive to me upon first meeting. I know right away who I'll never be attracted to in the same way that you know it about the woman you turned down. When I do end up with an attraction, it's usually towards men who I see as average or slightly above average upon first meeting where the feelings for them end up growing over time. Now, it's true that looks isn't the number one factor that attracts me. That is a genuine divergence between female sexuality and male sexuality. Looks is one factor among many that make up the whole of a person. So, I'm always attracted to a man as more than the sum of his parts. If a man is a 10 in the looks department, chances are he won't do very much for me because my attractions are so pointed and particular towards one guy that I've been struck by the Cupid's Arrow for. But if you put a 10 next to a 5, the chances are far greater that I will become attracted to the 5. Though the odds are still slim for me to develop an attraction towards either because Cupid's Arrows don't strike often. But I'm also very aware that men who are my looks-match or slightly below will appreciate my looks more, and that would make me feel attractive and desirable. Whereas, if I were out on a date with Brad Pitt or Timothy Chalamet or something, I'd be super turned off because they're significantly more attractive than me and wouldn't see me as a catch. But it would just be untrue to say that women don't have a looks filter. It's there. It just doesn't get so much focus. Also, don't feel bad about rejecting people you're not attracted to. No one's entitled to your sexual interest. You may not be used to rejecting women because men do most of the approaching. But if you were a woman, you'd have to reject people all the time based on many reasons... looks being one of them. It's all just part of it.

Yeah, I just sense a lot of Shadow motivations behind her desire to cape for men and why it takes that particular tone. Now, there isn't anything wrong with her pointing out the problems with the way men are oriented to. There are some real issues there. But because she frames it in a way that's anti-woman/anti-feminist, it implies that root cause of the issue is women... instead of what the actual root cause is which is based in patriarchal notion of what it means to be a man.

I would be very careful about being involved with her. You can end up really traumatized if she’s having these kind of issues. It seems like it’s tugging on a need/desire in you to be a savior. But these relationships can end up very stressful because you may start putting yourself in a position where you’re the glue that has to keep her together. If you really want to help her, be a supportive friend. But getting involved with her could really put you through the ringer. You especially don’t need this at such a young age.

My parents were considering naming me Melvina before they decided to name me Emerald... I’m totally glad they didn’t.

No worries ?

Well, that’s not an accurate representation of what Patriarchy is. Patriarchy is an agrarian adaptation, largely based in the establishment of the concept of land ownership, paternity, and property rights being passed down the paternal line and the need to control/oppress women and female sexuality to ensure paternity and to have lots of children to be used as soldiers to fend off warring civilizations... or to bear future mothers who will bear and raise more sons to become soldiers to protect the people and further avoid having the land seized and the people killed by warring civilizations. But that’s a whole other can of worms with a lot of perspectives to dig into. But that’s the reason for the adaptation of patriarchy... which lead symptomatically to an overall suppression of the feminine in both men and women... and an oppression of women’s sovereignty. But you are correct that men care a lot about what women think of them. Part of that is natural, but part of that is also based in Anima disintegration. I made a video on the topic...

What I’m saying is that men have high expectations projected upon them... which benefits them in terms of societal power structures but disadvantages them in terms of their inner life. It’s not meant to invalidate the issues men are facing. It’s meant to hint at why men’s issues tend to be overlooked. People are very focused towards women’s barriers to power as power is viewed as masculine and therefore important. People are not focused towards men’s barriers to emotional vulnerability because emotions are viewed as feminine and therefore trite. There is an assumption that men neither need nor want emotional vulnerability because it is viewed as feminine. And the expectation that men dispossess themselves with everything associated with femininity. This is why lots of men bottle up and repress their feelings as there is an expectation to be strong and powerful all the time. So, no, not an invalidation at all.

I just went through and watched some more of her videos and she’s mostly pretty even handed in most videos I’ve seen. These are patterns that can be noticed in society. That said, I have seen other clips prior where she’s really anti-woman in her perspective and you can notice the pandering much stronger. But no, being concerned about men’s issues is not misogynistic as long as it’s not done for the sake of invalidating women’s issues.

This type of thing has been going on for a long time. It’s not a new phenomenon. I was doing this 20 years ago way back in 5th grade at age 10-11. Girls/women will often hate on other women and pander to boys/men in order to feel more desirable and powerful. It’s a coping strategy for internalized misogyny. So, understand that she actually wants the gender war because she uses it to cope with her traumas. Her goal is to tell men exactly what they want to hear and to be perceived as an ally in the gender war, so that she can feel valuable by proving to men that she is superior and more desirable compared to other women. If there’s no more gender war, she won’t be able to have a medium through which to project out her internalized misogyny onto other women. That means she’d have to face with her own self-hatred. A woman who hates women, hates herself. So, the only way she can keep herself from realizing that she hates herself is to define herself as being in a different category from all other women. Hence the reason why she tries so hard to be accepted by men and tries so hard to dispossess herself of being perceived in the same light as other women. So if the gender war weren’t there, she wouldn’t have an outlet to sooth her wounds of self-hatred by manipulating men into giving her praise for being “one of the good ones”.

Yin and Yang as subtle polar qualities/energies that can be observed when you’re in a state of sensitivity to them. As far as evidence, I can’t provide you any. It’s something you can discover in your own subjective experience. The closest thing to evidence I can give you is the similarities across cultures and eras in naming things in relation to one phenomenon or another. For example, there are typically Sky Gods and Earth Goddesses. The elements of air and fire are associated with masculinity and Yang while the elements of Earth and water are associated with feminine... hence Mother Earth and why the word matter is rooted in the latin word for mother. But these things can be directly experienced, and certain insights arise from those experiences. And one such insight is that while these qualities can be observed as distinct dichotomies, from a certain vantage point they can be recognized as two sides to the same coin. The way I speak about them are metaphorical for the sake of understanding. So, the Zooming in and finding more and more Yin and Yang symbols is a metaphor that these subtle polar energies are Always interplaying no matter how microcosmic or macrocosmic the scale becomes. So, every atom has an interplay between Yin and Yang. So, because you can always go smaller and more Zoomed in and because you can always go bigger and more Zoomed out... the scale is is infinitely big and infinitely small. And so, we are all infinitely masculine and infinitely feminine in that regard. But from the human perspective, you can notice a propensity to skew more in one direction or another. So, it’s a bit of a paradox. Just like how the number 10 is bigger than the number 1... but they are both the same distance away from being infinite.

Here's what I mean by why I question her motives...

These are definitely patterns that can be noticed. Men have a lot of (often arbitrary and harmful) expectations placed upon them. There is particularly an expectation to compete on some random patriarchal hierarchy and to always be strong and suppress their emotions. I don't envy men for this. It's harder for men to grow themselves emotionally and psychologically because so many circles still expect men to just "man up" and bottle their emotions. And men are also viewed as being somehow less precious of a life than women and children. On top of this, men will often police other men's masculinity. So, it is no surprise that the male suicide rate is so high. So, I mostly agree with her perspective on men as I have noticed these patterns. However, men do have many advantages over women in terms of the power structures in society as they have high expectations projected upon them instead of low expectations projected upon them like women do. But it is these same high expectations that put men in a situation where they must hide their vulnerability, thus leaving them with a disadvantage in relation to their inner life. Now, as far as critique goes... because of her making this a "man vs woman" thing, I question her motives. And I've seen references to her in other videos where there's a lot of pro-man/anti-woman sentiments. And it is clear to me that she has some issues with feminine repression and internalized misogyny. I suspect that she gets a feeling of power out of being a loophole woman that isn't like the other girls. And if you go on videos like this with women sharing these videos that are sympathetic to men and that are anti-sympathetic to women or anti-feminist, you'll find cadres of men praising/worshipping them in the comments. When I was a child/teen, I used to do some version of the same thing, where I'd say that men have it worse than women and that women are worse than men and guys would gush over me. And I felt like I could have more power in the situation that way by appealing to guys. And it was something that made it possible for me to feel like I was an honorary guy and feel like I was escaping being like a girl... like I was going to be seen in a different light from all other women and escape the fate of being a member of the weaker sex. And it also, in my jealousy and misogyny towards other girls, made me feel more desirable than them because I'd get more positive male attention. It's like I could view myself in a special category of my own where I could deny my girlhood and identify more with the perspective of maleness to avoid being trashed on and disempowered for being a girl. I had internalized misogyny and saw women as inferior to men, and so I could do this to escape my own judgments of inferiority by seeing myself in a different category from other girls/women all together. Like there were three gender designations: men, women, and Emerald. And this lead me to repress my femininity and to exaggerate my masculinity. I wanted so desperately to be a girl that wasn't a girl. And this lead to a lot of deep wounds around my feminine side. So, I look at this woman, and I see myself where I was half my life ago with my own internalized misogyny. And a response to disempowerment and trying to feel like queen among men, where I would be able to distance myself from the inferior gender that I didn't want to see myself as and to ally myself with what I saw as the superior gender. And then I could impress guys with my feminine charms and masculine sympathies and have the power to make them respect me... leaving me superior to women and a true equal to men, but with the added benefit of being aesthetically female. I could be a man on the inside and thus superior personality-wise and a woman and the outside and thus superior... like a man wrapped up in a prettier package. All of this to escape my self-hatred, feelings of inferiority, and internalized misogyny. But yes, she is correct with what she's saying. Men do experience that. But I suspect she wouldn't be willing to accept that the roots of male disposability are patriarchal expectations... the same thing that creates her very own internalized misogyny.

Teal Swans perspective is based in the path of integration as opposed to the path of transcendence. So, perhaps you resonate more with the transcendental path. But I find there can be lots of Shadows with the transcendental path where a person undertakes that path to escape and spiritually bypass their humanity.., including emotions, psychology, traumas, and relationships. The integrative path, however, integrates the paths of transcendence and embodiment... like a tree that stretches its roots deeper into the ground as it stretches its branches higher into the sky. It could be just a resonance thing. But it may be helpful to suss out any avoidant tendencies that may be keeping you in resistance to integration.

That’s not a reflection on what she’s saying or the accuracy of it. That’s more about your feelings towards her personality and the traits your mind projects onto her because of her vibe. So, for me to take your perspective seriously on Teal Swan’s videos, you’ll actually have to listen to her perspective and form an actual viewpoint on the content. I’m more than happy to hear what you have to say. And no one’s perspective is perfect. But calling her perspective pathetic when you haven’t actually heard her perspective and putting the facepalm emoji, has a lot more to do with you and how Teal Swan makes you feel than it does with the validity/ truth of her perspective. But yet, you listen to Leo. His vibe is arrogant, narcissistic, and very prickly. But that doesn’t mean that his perspective isn’t rooted in truth. So, if someone tried to invalidate Leo’s perspective because of his vibe, would you think that that person is making good points? I should hope not.

It can’t be just vibe related. That’s more related to her personality and not to the content of what she says. I am off-put by her vibe also. But her content is so clear, deep, and accurate. It’s often that she shares something and it makes me realize realities that had been staring me in the face that I just never looked at. She may be self-aggrandizing and Shadowy. But she is accurate and holistic in her perspective.