Thought immersions; My non-daily journal.

[Skanzi]

Thursday November 7th

Some notes about sexuality in its broadest sense

For me it is difficult to relate to a woman sexually. I find it very difficult to convery sexual interest or attraction. I don't consider myself an unattractive guy, and I certainly do think I display some masculine attributes which I feel like women are attracted to to some degree. For instance: I know how to say "no". I know how to set boundaries. I know how to be uncompromising. I (okay, almost) never apologize for something that I don't feel needs an apology, even under great amount of pressure. I know how come across as centered and confident and unwavering. I know how to convey a strong, assertive body-language. I know how to speak up and project a low yet loud voice. I have the body type of a warrior: I naturally without even too much exercise have a good amount of upper body mass and an atlethic figure. And I know how to display a serious, no-nonsense facial expression.

Interestingly enough, there's also parts within that are very feminine. The masculine part of me is generally more what's on display: It's only that which I like to show to the world, and only then for people that really don't know me that well, or don't know me at all. The masculine polarity is what I'm comfortable showing glimpses of, but not what I'm comfortable fully embodying within every day social interactions. Generally, the more I am around specific people, the more of a relaxed, kind and friendly appearance I tend to have towards them. I'm actually not unfriendly to begin with, but I might in certain circumstances come across as having a low 'approachability-factor'; kind and respectful as far as my attitude is concerned, but I don't have this 'niceness' around me. Maybe this is what i was referring to when I get to know people better: My approachability-factor increases the more I know certain people. I then start coming across as a bit less masculine, a bit more feminine (but not queer-like).

I'm noticing that in my mind I'm still envisioning situations wherein the described situations above do not hold true. It's a bit difficult to describe and pinpoint as to how exactly it works for me, but I'm trying my best. I may not be completely accurate with all descriptions aforementioned.

I think generally what I'm trying to say is that I would like to display to the larger world and be perceived as is my masculine side, and once I let my guard down, what you will notice is much more my feminine side, which is to say: values such as friendliness, kindness, cooperation, humor, hospitality.

And actually, it's fair to say that often or perhaps even usually when I'm out in public I don't actually have this masculine front on. The desire for that to be displayed plays up only at certain moments in certain moods. 

What I am however uncompromisingly masculine in is my insistence and dedication to honesty and Truth. I am willing to die for Truth, for what I see righteous. If I feel like I have to do something or protect something that is essential to my life's purpose or essential to the integrity of my consciousness, I will protect it or go for it at all costs. I refuse to let myself become a playball of circumstances, and I refuse to let myself get overly attached to something or someone if it I feel that it really starts to drain my energy. This to me is very clear and it can not be compromised

However, I am generally very loose in my take on what I find ' unacceptable'. What other people sometimes seem to care so much about, I often barely can't give two shits about it. Even though I am willing to defend Truth at all costs, I am at the same time not very idealistic. I've dropped that over the last couple of years, as being very idealistic is often just a useless pursue of defending self-created ideas about what virtue is supposed to be. I am not here to defend ideas. Truth is not an idea, so it is not an idea that needs to be defended. In fact, strictly speaking, Truth also does not need any defence, as Truth already is as it is and cannot be otherwise. Any defence of Truth itself is in that sense ridiculous. What I am however am willing to defend is my right to live in accordance to Truth. So what I am defending is not Truth itself, but my nnate right for me to align myself with it; Whatever sacrifice that may require.

Even though I would like to think of myself as masculine, I have to admit that in my approach to life over the last couple of years I have been very feminine. That is to say: I just go with the flow. I let my feelings dictate my actions instead of my logic. I don't (or at least didn't) have any specific goals to work towards, so there's nothing to assert myself towards. There's has been no clearly defined vision or mission which I could feel like it was resonating within me or that I was empowered by it. Nothing like that was capable of energizing me to actually work towards something. And because there simply didn't come any inspiration, I found that the best thing to do was just to accept the fact and just go with the flow. What else was I supposed to do? I had found that there was no way to "create" a mission for myself that was sustainable, because to create a mission implies you're doing it from the ego-consciousness. As I was in the process of awakening and thus this ego was slowly eroding away, less and less any sort of attempt to align myself towards a certain goal or mission and to discipline myself for it was failing, as the ego that would have energized such motivations was disappearing simply more and more. There simply wasn't a source of energy that could sustain any form of discipline or structure.

After having gone through that including hitting the bottom of the valley which was very painful, which happened in 2017, now more and more a new phase is coming up, in where I am slowly coming more and more in contact with a source of inspiration that I do not really have to make any effort for to find, because it's finding me. I am talking mainly about singing, but perhaps also writing. Even though this inspiration and motivation for singing is coming up naturally, I do have to (re-)learn again to also discipline and structure my life in such a way that I can better align with this purpose and fulfill it more effectively. But this discipline is not done from the ego-consciousness perspective, but instead it is a recognition that in order for my purpose to manifest itself (better), I have to live and act in the world and therefore it is necessary for me to learn certain skillsets in order to manifest this vision. But now, I am in a way of speaking being allowed by spirit to pursue the development of these skillsets without having to involve my egoic self anymore. Now, my willpower is being derived from a higher source.

And because a new vision and mission is forming, I slowly start gaining more assertiveness and discipline as energy starts becoming available for everything that is in alignment with this purpose. For instance: I am starting to hit the gym again because I feel that a stronger body will benefit my singing skills. If it were not to benefit my singing skills to my idea, I wouldn't be able to derive the energy from anywhere to go to the gym. It would just feel like it would be pointless.

But still, there is a lot of yielding, passive energy within me and still a need for lots of rest and withdrawal. 

 

 

I could definitely write more and I wanted to write more, but I feel like I'm losing focus so it's best for me to quit my soliloquy now.

 

Edited November 8, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Friday November 8th

What trying to repair the gear system of my bicycle has thought me.

So the gear system of my bicycle is broken. You have setting 1,2 and 3, in which 3 is the heaviest setting mainly for going downhill, and 1 is the lightest for going uphill. 2 Is obviously in between.

So setting 3 didn't really work anymore. It sort of lost traction and it kind of kept in hanging between 2 and 3, but never really fully switching to 3.

So I set out a goal to try an repair this myself, instead of having my father let it do it for me. This is challenging for me, as learning how to do these kinds of things I usually find very stressful.

I had watched a video on how to do it, but I didn't remember too much of it and instead of trying ot get the exact facts and do it exactly by the book, I just wanted to go downstairs myself and experiment a little bit with the gear mechanism.

Whilst I had just started with it, my father saw me dealing with it and came in to help. I wasn't necessarily so much against the help, despite the fact that I had set out the intention to try to do it on my own. I was paying attention.

I don't know how these things are called, but my father said to me that in order for gear setting 3 to be repaired, it had to be a little bit looser, so that the chain thingy going into the wheel mechanism could pull back sufficiently enough. now it was too tight and therefore it couldn't pull back sufficiently enough.

We struggled with it for a bit because we couldn't figure out how to move the black thingy on the ribbled metal thingy that it was around, but then we found out that on the black thingy there was another steel thingy which you could push which then allowed the black thingy to be moved back and forth on the ribbled steel thingy, which could make the cable tighter or looser.

Eventually I decided just to go out the house and test it for myself how now the new setting was, and to adjust the tightness of the cable accordingly.

But I got confused as I didn't really completely understand what was going on, that how exactly it worked. I just experimented with it a little bit and tried different settings but for some reason because it didn't follow a certain logic I could understand or it didn't act as I expected or in a predictable pattern I had figured out, I got a bit overwhelmed. What I eventually ended up doing was making it too loose which detached the cable from the gear box mechanism (the thing you adjust with your thumb on the steering wheel), basically making the whole gear mechanism non-functional now. Now it stayed stuck in gear 3.

Back home, me and my father checked with it again. What had to be done now was to put the steel end back on the end of the cable that would hook on a certain point at the gear box. But what we also found was that the cable was starting to wear, and was close to the point of breaking. So we decided that it was best to get a new cable the next day at a bicycle (repair store). I know have the intention to simply buy an cable but not let the other guys repair it so I can learn to do something myself here.

 

So what has all of this thought me? Or what insights did I gain from this? Well...

My past self would've done one or three things, depending on which phase in my life I was at and the urgency and necessity of the situation: I would have either tried it but given up on it quickly once it started to become too confusing and overwhelming, or I would've simply not tried it at all, or I would have gone through with it all at once but find myself being very overwhelmed in the process and just trying to finish the job on pure willpower.

But my current self now actually has the desire and openness to be wiling to push through and learn it, yet take the necessary time and space to step back, reflect, and take my time for it. My current self is stlll vulnerable to being quickly overwhelmed and confused, but instead of either pushing through it by brute force or forsaking it altogether, I neither completely forget it nor drive myself crazy in trying to accomplish it. I go with what I have the space for to do at the time given, and if it becomes too much, I take a step back, think about how it is best to approach it the next time —what approach, strategy and attitude— and then I try it again with this new perspective the next day. Well... possibly not immediately the next day, but I make sure that I won't forget it entirely (by for instance noting it down on my to-do-list), and then I will make sure that I will come back to it some later time when I feel the readiness to do so.

It's interesting how before I never even really thought this to be a possibility.

And why do I get so quickly overwhelmed? Well, I guess it has a relationality with me having the diagnoses of autism (PDD-NOS) and ADD. But to completely go into the details as to what exactly autism and ADD mean and imply in the bigger picture, and all the different facets and implications it has, is a whole different topic in itself.

Like I said, I used to do one of three things:

•  I used to force myself to doing it with all the willpower I had, going through with it even if I felt very overwhelmed. This was my attitude primarily in 2013 and a good part of 2014. Back then, I still had the conviction that it was "good" to go through with it, and that I would have failed or be a failure if I were to give up. If I were to give up, I would've interpreted it as me being weak and incompetent, as not being capable of facing the challenges of life.

Yes, I used to get much more things done back then, but it came at a great cost of feeling very stressed, restless and anxious for a great part of the time

• I tried nothing at all. this was particularly applicable in the era 2014-2017 (but probably 2018 as well), when I was in my lazy phase. At such a moment, it was more comfortable to revert back to the position of acting like none of it was very important: "Well I know getting this done could make my life a bit easier, but I don't feel within me the capacity to do it, so instead of struggling with myself and acting out of guilt (or shaming myself for not having done it), it feels better to detach from the need to do it, and so let me go within and detach myself from this need so I can find a peace and rest that isn't dependent on anything from the outside world. The most important thing right now is just to let go of it"

If I were to try to make any attempt at all at such a point, there would be an instant automatic association and feeling of attachment, struggle, tension, frustration and so forth. I would notice myself tensing up. In the era of 2013 and a good part of 2014, I would've tried to force myself through this with willpower. But because I had exhausted that paradigm of using pure egoic-based willpower to break through limitations, I saw or at least felt no innate value in doing it like that anymore. I didn't feel the capacity or energy within me to do it like that anymore, so it suited me better to adopt beliefs and attitudes that would serve a lazy, incompetent self better to feel comfortable with himself.

• Or —still coming from the attitude described in the two paragraphs displayed here above (and I guess mainly my attitude prior to 2013 as well)— I would have tried it because I would have felt a sense that there was a bit more importance and/or urgency to it than usual, but then I would still give up once it became a bit too much and overwhelming.

This sense of it being more important than usual could come from outer circumstances, for instance: My phone has water damage to it and maybe if I learn how to do certain things to my phone I can get the water out and make it work properly again, instead of buying a new phone altogether and forsaking all the personal data that has been stored on the old phone, or going through with life using this not properly-working phone making my life quite a bit more difficult, as my phone has been and probably still is my greatest asset and tool.

Or it could come from an inner pressure, which is to say that a part of me is getting fed up with being lazy and incompetent, creating inner pressure to actually try to make a change for once, and to just and try to get something done for once or learn something new for once that is challenging to learn.

But even then, when this inner and/or outer pressure would be prevelant, I would still not feel the capacity (in 2014-2018-ish) to actually push through with it in the end and to actually get it done, as there would not be enough energy, conviction and inner urgency to actually get it done. The attitude (and perhaps just genuine lack of capacity, where the energy simply isn't available in the right channel) would just not allow it. Except for really exceptional cases, I would always fall back to either settling for a (great) inconvenience in my life with the attitude that it's an "invitation for me to let go for the need to have convenience", and/or the inner pressure and guilt that wanted to push me to overcome my limitations would once again subside and be replaced by my passive attitude towards life.

Now I finally start seeing the possibility of getting things done without getting overwhelmed, by being both sensitive/intelligent and determined at the same time. The attitude is basically that you take whatever rest and reflection you need, but you do not completely forget and forsake the task at hand, and you keep it in mind and you will do it again once you feel the space within yourself to be able to try it (again).

Gentle yet persistent.

Edited November 8, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

I wonder if people are finding my journal entries interesting enough to read. I myself find my journal entries very interesting . I think it contains a lot of valuable lessons in it.

If anyone happens to follow my journals, you can give a shoutout if you want to. It is alright to let yourself be heard, although I do prefer to keep the focus mainly on just writing my journal entries instead of communication from or to other people. But for now it is okay.

Even if nobody is reading it, I still feel like I have a responsibility to keep on going with it. Maybe someone in the future will read it and find it to be very valuable. Or even if nobody will ever read it, I still feel like writing down these things also contains teaching towards myself just by writing it down.

[Skanzi]

On 10-11-2019 at 8:01 AM, modmyth said:

Totally reading this still, just haven't commented again.

Friday 15 November (-ish)

It's interesting to know I have an observer. I always used to write this with only myself in mind. Yes, I did post it online because I felt like it could perhaps be of some help to people, because I in fact did feel like I had something to share, but it did somehow give solace to me to think as I was writing in my dairy that nobody else would be reading it, because then I would've felt like I wouldn't have to fear what anybody else would think of it. It gave me more comfort in being completely honest and  direct to almost the extreme degree.

Not that I will deviate much from how honest and open I have been before —if at all... Being completely sincere here is very important to me; Both to myself and others. Because if other people get to read it, I want them to know how life actually IS (to me) instead of what I would like to make of it. Deceiving yourself or others from what actually is does nobody any good; Or at least it's not what I am willing to bargain for in this particular context. I might draw the line at for instance confessing a horrible crime nobody would've otherwise ever found out about, or perhaps I might not even stop there. I just like it so much to be totally free and unashamed (or at least unashamed for my shame).

I might possibly post some pretty gnarly stuff in the future. Note that I'm still typing in this thread for myself first and foremost. Almost like this thread is my house and that anybody else is free to visit my house, but I dictate what happens in this house. And that anybody who is not aboard as to what is happening in this house, they are free to leave. But I won't change the way I behave and act in my house, even if angers or repulses other people. Because everybody needs to have a place where they can be totally themselves without any shame for who they are and what they want to do; Even if it's totally against the social norms.

Note that it might still appear as if I'm talking to you because I've quoted you in the beginning, modmyth, but I once again have started to switch to the mindset as if I'm only talking to myself again. So just understand that I'm not strictly speaking to you anymore, but to myself about myself, which is why my tone is the way it is.

Before I wasn't even really ready to ask the question if anybody else would be reading this. The last time you commented I also was a bit apprehensive to read what it would've been about. I have a tendency to say or state things and then never to look back at it again because I'm too nervous or uncomfortable to read what people said about it. I have made several topics on this forum which I simply posted and pretty much never looked back at. A couple of times I did read back what people had said about it, but rarely have I ever further commented on it. For similair reasons, I also didn't comment on your previous comment, although I did read it.

Often I even regret or second-guess what I have written, but I decide at that point just to let it be whatsoever it was and just never look back at it again. Because even if I did happen to utter much nonsense, I've learned that it's better to leave the statement for what it is (or was) instead of either justifying or correcting yourself. At least this is so if those justifications or corrections are coming from a place of fear. I've learned it's sometimes better to be —or come across as— being confidently wrong than to express a lot of insecurity and to keep on correcting or justifying yourself.

Not that I think a lot of what I say is actually so much untruthful or false, but I'm just saying what I just said for the sake of making a point. In fact, I think almost everything is say is true coming from a certain kind of viewpoint or perspective. For instance, I may be uttering a statement that intuitively feels to be true to me, and without me knowing for certain that it would be actually logically accurate, I still say it as if it were the truth, as the ability to allow your intuition to express itself. I have also explained this more clearly in the latest thread I made, which was about Yellow and Turquoise in Spiral Dynamics. Most people who state without thinking about it, however, are in a state of bias and delusion, because they have never learned to doubt and question.

I'm still not saying what I'm saying is necessarily going to be the ultimate Truth because I'm starting to rise above thought and doubt. I think it's in fact usually more like a half-truth that is expressed with power. Half-truths can also be very helpful in certain circumstances if they're expressed with power. Sometimes it can be exactly what a person need.

I reckon this topic perhaps needs some further contemplation later down the line

Back to what I was talking about earlier: I find it hard to really understand as to why exactly I find it so difficult to read or get feedback from other people about what I have to express. The same with singing actually. Sometimes I go to the karoake bar to sing a song. When I am singing the song I don't want to get distracted at all and I want to close myself off from the crowd as much as possible, and once I'm done singing, I like to leave the bar as soon as possible.

To be fair, I have this fear a little bit less than I used to before, but it's still definitely a thing. But I am ever so slowly getting more comfortable with not only expressing myself but also receiving the feedback or reactions to it

Alright, let's leave it with this for now

Part 2

Actually, I'm not done yet.

I'm observing within myself a lot of guilt at this point. As I've written in my journal a couple weeks back, I had written how I wanted to seek for the openings in my system that would allow me to act yet stay detached. Though I did emphasize the need to step back, and detach and rest and moments where that was applicable, I also set for myself the intention not to completely forget my intentions altogether.

Well, let's talk about that.

This inner pressure to start doing stuff and be active whenever there is the right space within me to go and do it, starts taking me to a point where it's getting very difficult to just relax with myself without me doing anything useful. I have been able switch gears in the past couple of weeks without too much guilt as by-product, or without the pressure of this guilt being too strong, but now once again this guilt is reaching a point where I have to consider that it's perhaps best to let go of these goals altogether. Well... let go of them to the extent that I can have moments where I do completely forget about them. Of course, if there's actually a certain deadline where something needs to be done if otherwise it makes my life situation very difficult, then yes, of course I won't "forget it altogether". But I do want to be able to forget about it just for the time being. Just for the moment.

And also going forward into the future, that I want to take these things on my "to-do-list" more gently with less significance. At least for now where putting this pressure on myself isn't helping anymore. This may change again if I dealt with a lot of the guilt I'm dealing with right now.

Because I have been having a really lazy past week in which I have done barely anything. Remember how I've talked about how I wanted to repair the gear mechanism of my bike last week? Nope, haven't done it.

I also wanted to repair my bag (it has some lose straps). nope, haven't done it.

In fact I've barely done anything "useful" past week. As I said, it's been really lazy. And to be fair, I've enjoyed and I felt good about it whilst I was in it. 

And if I feel good about it whilst I am in it, I don't see the point of trying to motivate or guilt-trip myself in thinking that I have to do something more useful. It's just going straight into the flow in which life is taking me at that moment.

But I tend to also be a little bit biased about the way I perceive such a period. As if the only thing I would've done in such a period was vegetating and being a plant.

I have actually really practiced a lot in singing on last Tuesday and Wednesday. this was motivated because I was approached by a band if perhaps I could be their singer.But first I had to record and send some tracks of my voice. That motivated me to practice a lot and to seek where the limit is of my voice so i could send them my best vocal accomplishments.

I had put an advertisment up like 3 months ago if anybody needed a singer. Since then I had done one audition in which I clearly felt like I wasn't ready yet, particularly for the mental aspect, and that I needed more experience. Now even though that was the case, I had never removed the advertisment and I had accepted their request because I still felt like that there could be a slim possibility that it could work out irregardless.

Even though I practiced and tried a lot on Tuesday, I actually didn't get around to sending them the voice fragments the same day because I was too perfectionistic and wanted to send them whole songs. On wednesday I actually just decided to do shorter fragments instead, but at that point my voice wasn't as good anymore. Coupled with the fact that bold voice recordings on a phone without even any instrumental backing tracks makes any sort of imperfection stand out hugely. That's at least how I perceived that to be.

Maybe for those factors, I still haven't heard back from these guys after I had send them my voice fragments on Wednesday. We'll see. I'm not too bummed about it if they thought it was bad. I am doing a course right now at a sort of creative center downtown in our city in which we can learn to operate in a band. It's paid and lead by a teacher. It's also not a permanent band or anything like that. but it should give me the oppurtunity to grow and learn a lot, and by the end of that course (in january somewhere it ends), then I want to start looking again to see if I can join a band.

Back to the main story...

So it's not like I haven't done anything 'useful' the past week if you take the whole singing thing in regard.

In fact, how to decide what is 'useful' anyways? Are we talking about practicality or things being pragmatic? Because rest can in a sense just be as useful as activity. And contemplation I certainly don't regard as being useless either. You can say that watching random video's for entertainment on youtube can be 'useless', but then again, if I enjoy it, then why does it have to be useful?

Really, the only thing i feel is actually totally useless here is worrying about whether I'm useful or not.

Like really, why do I have to be useful? Why do I have to do things that are 'of use'? Or why even say to myself that I should do one thing and not another thing?

Why should I have to repair the gear mechanism of my bike if it doesn't bother me right now?

Why should I frequently go to a karoake bar to sing there if it doesn't interest me?

Why should I go to the gym more often if I don't feel like it?

Why should I frequently write some text in my book I want to begin with?

Why should I learn to play guitar if I don't care for it right now?

Why should I try dating women if I don't feel like it's the right time to do it now?

Why should I try to repair the straps of my bag. Why not detach from the need instead and work around it right now?

Why should i have to become a singer?

Why should I need to have a significant impact in the world?

Why should I prevent my attention from being dragged around by impulses if I don't have any more comfortable or interesting alternative to focus it on? Why force my attention in any particular way?

Why should I try to do meditations based on willful concentration and discipline? 

The list goes on and on and on...

 

It's kind of like... I have desires, there are things in the outer world to be achieved, and I think it's an interesting and worthwhile game to play, and the outer isn't necessarily seperate from the inner, but... Is it okay if I can just relax right now without any need for anything to be achieved or fulfilled or worked towards right now, if it leaves me to be very uncomfortable? Can I just choose not to if I just don't want to? Even if I don't want it a little bit, even if it's just a tiny, miniscule amount of resistance, even then, can it just be okay for me at that moment not to do it?

Why should it not be okay for me to be like a cat? A cat doesn't do a goddamn useful thing all day, every day. A cat doesn't go to work, takes care of chores, gets a bike fixed, helps other people (or cats) with mental health issues... A cat doesn't care the slightest bit and yet is perfectly happy and contented. Why should I have to do any of the things that a human does as far as 'responsibility' is concerned if I can just be like a cat.. sleeping, staring blankly out of a window... you know it.

Do I genuinly want to live my life exactly the way as a cat does?

On the outer level of action and events, no... I actually like a challenge and some pressure to facilitate the growth of my intelligence

But on the inner level... Absolutely

I'm saying all of this because even though I have ambitions, goals, things to strive for and such... I feel like it's very important to at least at certain times emphasize the need to allow myself to relax and to not be bothered aout whether these goals are followed up or not, or whether they would be followed up quickly enough or not...

If for usefulness and success you have to lose your inner rest and peace, it's not worth having.

If for peace you would have to sacrifice your usefulness and desire for success, it would be worth having to some degree, but it would be limited also. You would have peace but you would not have growth. That's what we're here on earth for, to grow. 

But if you can both be peaceful and useful (or ambitious) at the same time, that's greatness...

 

But I feel like I can't have both right now. But I don't have to. i feel that it's important to stick with peace right now as I currently do not feel like I'm being called forth to challenge myself. Guilt is a very poor, a very deceiving substitute for this call for challenge. This guilt alone is certainly not the real call.

The essential thing is this: It's okay to allow myself to wait in this peace whilst being non-useful, until the call for adventure calls me forth; This can either be something challenging that pushes my comfort zone and/or requires discipline, or it can simply be a spontaneous and natural, like I just so happened start singing a lot this week. 

 

Edited November 15, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

I see what you have written, modmyth. And with all due respect. I think much of what you say isn't particularly useful to me as of now.

I find it a bit difficult to explain why in a very accurate description, but it has to do with the fact that I don't really feel that there's is any genuine need for anything to be resolved, and then obviously I don't require the assistance of others for something that doesn't need to be resolved anyway.

I know that this may perhaps strange to you, but this journal actually isn't so much about finding the solutions, but it is more for the joy of being able to express myself.

That's the hidden catch to all of this. Most of what I write here isn't actually so much about all the problems or confusions that I have, but actually it's more that I find my thoughts and my journey so intriguing that I want to share it.

God, I find it so difficult to explain this accurately. How do I say it...

It's like I'm the producer of a tv show that watches and observes how the show is made, and sees the actors and acts play themselves out. The actors and acts could be considered my thoughts and feelings. But I realize clearly enough that I'm the guy behind the scenes that watches it all, and not the actor that is so lost in the play that he forgets that he is an actor that just plays certain roles.

If you think you're talking to the actor of the show, you are mistaken. You're talking to the producer that is responsible that the show gets published.

Or maybe that's not entirely accurate either. No, I'm both the actor and the producer of the show. I play in the show, and I am also the producer of the show that sees how the show is made and who broadcasts the show once in a while. But even as the actor, I still realize to some degree that I am merely an actor, and that it's only a show I'm playing in in which certain roles are ascribed.

Or in other words: I realize that I am the witness which watches the show that is my mind, or what we call "my life". And I like to share that show, but I know on some level it's just a show.

And that's the point where some people get confused about me. They sometimes see me expressing worries or confusion, and the way most people then try to deal with this is from the perspective of 'problem-solution'; Because they themselves lack the realization of the dimension of the witness.

But I am both the actor and the one who is witnessing the actor play out its acts both together. Until the dimension of the witness is realized, the game of 'problem-solution' that the mind creates will simply go on unto infinity.

And sometimes people misjudge the degree in which they think I'm identified with my anxieties or forms of resistance. It's interesting because there can be a lot of anxiery or resistance or blocking energy in my system, possibly a huge complex, but at the same time relatively little identification and obsession about this complex.

And that's what I want to clarify to you, modmyth. I actually do have a great deal of mental/emotional/energetical disturbances or blockages in some areas, but throughout the time I've started to detach and create distance from these disturbances. I am now much more seeing it happen instead of thinking that I am those unpleasant feelings, or that I would be thinking that they need to be resisted or 'removed'. I have a great degree of yielding.

So that's the first thing. I am more detached and relaxed than you might happen to think when you are reading my journal entries, because I'm not very identified anymore with everything that's happening within me. I have developed a great capacity to yield and surrender. So don't be worried.

And I feel the reason why I don't feel so much resonance with what you're saying or asking is because I like the way the show is going, and for some reason I feel a certain resistance for the script to be altered by outside influences. I like to take amost everything by my own insight and intuition.

I think this resistance is in a way very similair to the situation where my mother was surprised that I wasn't interested in taking any feedback on the way I was singing.

With singing, I don't want feedback. I don't want suggestions. I don't even want applause or praise; Although I don't mind that either.

The way I like to learn to sing  or to act out singing is by going by intuition and kinesthetic experience. I like to feel how it feels in my body to sing a certain note a certain way. I don't need information about it from others how I'm doing it. I'm not interested in the "constructive feedback" of others about how I'm singing; particularly not if the way I was singing felt good in my body, and the reason they may be judging it negatively is because it wasn't in accordance with certain ideas they had about what a good voice was supposed to sound like, even though having listened to it without the filter of the mind would've probably made it felt like a good sound.

Rarely have I watched tutorials on "how to sing (a particular way)". And if I did, it was only to compare how they sang with how I was singing, and then to see if what they sang felt kinesthetically good to me too. If it didn't, i didn't care how much praise the particular teacher may have received, I simply didn't buy into it.

So how does this resistance —or perhaps more accurately described as: the lack of resonance— in regards to what you have written compare to the way I like to approach singing?

Well... Simply put: I like to blaze my own trail, guided by my own intuitive compass. It's not that my intuition is always completely correct or that I can't use feedback from others, but if I always return to listening to my own inner voice, the more precise my intuitive compass gets to be. It has to do with the love for self-reliance and autonomy.

And the resistance tends to be particularly big if the one who gives feedback is projecting their own ideas upon me in their own identification of the actor and its roles, and therefore most likely misunderstanding me what the place is of which I'm rooted in, which is the witness of the play.

It's not my intent to blame or point fingers or anything to you with what I just said, modmyth; It's just the continuation of my thought process.

In such cases, where people project their ideas upon me from their own identifaction with the actor role, they will miss the point that I don't necessarily have to be identified with many different forms of emotional pain that could still be in my system. This emotional pain is simply leftovers of past trauma, which in time will be evaporated by the ever-brightening light of my consciousness. This pain is simply momentum, and me expressing it is simply relief, and possibly even a form of enjoyment of the play. 

In these cases, people often project upon me that I would be suffering from, for instance, an inferiority complex in which they think I believe that I don't have much value and that I am unwilling to give myself permission to give credit to myself, or to take ownership of a situation or to act up where it would be appropriate. They may have projected this because I may have expressed or said that there were some feelings of shame or insecurity within me. From their perspective, if you experience feelings like that you must be identified with them, as they don't understand within themselves that there is a difference between experiencing something and being identified with something.

It's funny because I don't believe myself to be inferior at all. I don't feel like there's even a single thought I'm overly identified with (although I could be wrong). I actually on a conscious level highly value myself and in fact people tend to  think of me as rather selfish sometimes—at least in contrast to a society that is identified with being overly sympathetic and kind, in which I find myself in. But despite me valuing myself highly on a conscious level, it does not mean that I do not get visited by feelings of shame or insecurity or socially-related anxieties. But all of these feelings happen much more on the periphery instead that they have a grasp on me from the very core; I notice them coming up, I allow these feelings to flow through me, and then sometimes sooner and sometimes later, they disappear again. At pretty much no point did I take any of these feelings very seriously and latched onto them.

Yes, there can be and is still some identification, but it's much lighter and looser now than it used to be. If you are confused with what I even mean with "Identification"... Identification in its basic sense means you take it very seriously and there's a lot of gravity or heaviness that you create around it. This can be both a belief system or an emotion. You take it to be very serious and it appears as very 'real' to you. I don't have that that much anymore. There's much more lightness and distance.

I may have contradicted myself in the past with this, by using terminology interchangeably, having defined or described "identification" as something else, but let me now all correct that: I'm not very identified anymore (although there certainly still is some identification. Some areas more than others), but I do experience still a good amount of energetical/emotional/mental leftovers of past pain.

I apologize may this post have come across as too judgemental to what you have written. It may seem like i'm being very critical, but actually it's just once again mostly one of these cases where I'm "talking to myself about myself". I understand you were trying to help, and what you have written was in fact not even that wrong at all. But it did trigger in me many thoughts which I felt the need to express, which I now have done.

Edited November 21, 2019 by Skanzi

[Zigzag Idiot]

@Skanzi I appreciate your articulation.

[Skanzi]

Thanks Modmyth for your reply.

The way I like you to see the way I reacted is that you see it as me needing to get something off my chest. As if I'm directing my frustrations at the open air instead of me shouting it at you. I reckon you could see it as some shadow aspects I was still carrying within me.

Why did I get triggered? Well, I did think I explained it already for a good part, but let's see if I can explain it in a nutshell. Maybe there are more or other ways of looking at it than I previously stated (later edit: It defininitely won't be "in a nutshell")

 

I'm stlll pretty insecure about expressing myself and the effects that my expressions have on other people. In order for me to be able to express myself anyways, I feel the need to close myself off from input and feedback from other people, as expressing myself and knowing other people are aware about the fact that I'm expressing myself I already find uncomfortable enough in itself.

So when I get given feedback or asked questions about what I'm expressing, at such a point it can (depending on the kind of feedback) become quite a bit more than I am comfortable with.

At the same time, when you asked those questions, particularly those that were indicated in bold letters, I do feel a responsibility to answer. I don't feel good with just ignoring you. But it costs me a lot of energy and time to think and really reflect upon what you said. I generally don't just like to take a little bit of time for it. My mind doesn't work like that. Or at least, not at this moment.

I also felt quite nervous about getting back to my thread to read what you had responded. I had to write a couple of other entries to my journal on a word-document because I had felt too uncomfortable to get back to my thread until now. This obviously can also be an impactful factor that doesn't stimulate the desire for me to engage in conversation in this thread. But still, I don't regret having written my previous comment. I do this a lot, actually, where I say something and then for some time am too afraid to look back at it. But I think I had already stated this situation in my journal some comments ago. Even though it's uncomfortable, I think it's good for me to do it anyway.

And an additional factor is the fact that I like to keep my journal focused on my journal entries. I feel resistance against getting sidetracked a lot. Right now, I feel a lot of resistance against this thread becoming a board for discussion and exchange. I am not saying there is anything wrong with discussion, but I had not intended my thread to become like that. I had wanted to keep it very personal. I felt like I would be okay with shorter comments from others that didn't require that much of a response, but when you expressed your previous comment, I felt it was a lot to think about and a felt a responsibility to answer or at least acknowledge what you had said, but at the same time I just wanted to get on with the often pleasurable act of expressing myself and writing in my journal. I felt like I now was in a double-bind where I felt responsible to answer you, but I didn't really want to as I had no interest in getting sidetracked as I just wanted to get on with what I felt excited to write about initially.

But the mood of what I felt inspired to write about changed at that moment from wanting to express what I had come to this thread for, to reacting contextually to what you had written, but disregarding the content of what you had specifically asked and said. I didn't want to talk about what you had said specifically, but instead I wanted to talk about the context in which I regarded your comment in relation to this thread and my own current psychological dispositions and thoughts on this matter. So that gave me something to go on, whilst still not feeling like I had to exert a great amount of energy to recalibrate and contemplate on the content you had expressed. I really didn't want to switch gears and get completely sidetracked by allotting much energy to answering you. But going into the context of how I felt about what you said, it required much less effort and time, as this was all naturally and spontaneously flowing out of me.

So amongst other things, it was this that triggered me, as I wanted to clarify that such a comment you made provided a lot of internal difficulties for me and would've slowed me down and sidetracked me from what I was originally excited to do (which was to just write an entry in my journal), because I felt the responsibility to answer it.

But also, as I said before, there were other factors. One of them being that I'm a bit insecure about how others think about what I'm expressing, and therefore me having the need to close myself off and just stay focused on my own process. I feel like this is quite related to the paragraphs expressed above, but not exactly the same.

A way to compare that —although maybe not a strikingly similair comparison— is as if you imagine you're trying to reason with a person who just heard that his house has burned down and his family has died in the fire, and now this person is crying immensely and is completely overwhelmed by emotions. In such a case, trying to reason with this person in the midst of his emotional outburst, trying to give him/her logical reasons to see the situation from a different light or perspective,  isn't really what that person needs at that moment. At that moment, the person just needs to be hugged and consolidated. It doesn't even really matter so much if the other person uses really good logic or perspectives. It's just not what's needed at that moment.

I know our situation isn't comparable in either extremity or the specific context of it, but still it has some similarity in the sense that I'm not really interested at this moment in needing other people to give me other perspectives or to provoke different ways of thinking in me. I know that may be a logical thing to think as what I'm doing is expressing a lot of contemplative thoughts, so thereby you would assume that stimulating more introspection and reflection would be the appropraite thing to do, but counter-intuitively, that isn't really the case so much. Even though I'm expressing a lot of thoughts, I don't desire other people to give me more thoughts, as I desire to stay intimate with my own process and not get sidetracked from it too much.

I have this strong desire for intimacy with my own process, and discussion with other people feels as if that's distracting me and disrupting this intimacy —although it doesn't necessarily need to have that effect. I know that.

I'm still not going to tell you that you need to necessarily write less —as perhaps I do need to be challenged, and I want to practice my capacity for surrender and to not control— but just know that this is the way my mind works. I might have a different way of going about the way I respond to you, though.

"(Although... I do not see myself in your projections back either, when you responded to me more directly? I was not trying to tell you that you were definitely this or that, or that you needed to change. I guess I gave you a mirror that was broken. )"

I just wanted to get back to this real quick. No, it's true that you didn't. But I don't think that was the point, even though I may have given you a different impression. I think the main thing is just that I have difficulties getting sidetracked or distracted in general; That I encounter a situation in which I have to completely switch gears and use a lot of energy which I otherwise would've have needed to use (at least in the way I approach it right now).

But... going forwards into the future, I think I probably will be able to loosen up a bit and respond to your comments and/or questions with a bit more ease and spontenaeity, and thereby hopefully also a lesser degree of exertion and loss of focus. I think opening myself up for feedback and engaging in communication is also just something in which there is a learning curve for me, and therefore encountering a challenge in regards to it may be the appropriate event to take place.

So by all means, don't interpret all that I have written in this reply as a means to silence you. You can express yourslef, but just know that I have some... sensitive spots.

I find it important to have said that. In some way, I still do really appreciate the mere fact that you're willing to engage with me and give me the commodity of your attention . I don't think that's something I should just take for granted.

[Skanzi]

Without further a due, here's all that I had saved up on this word-document. I had also written a part on the topic of sex and sexuality, but because I was feeling that the inspiration to continue to write on that subject was leaving me as I was writing it, I want to decide not to post it right now, as I had leaved it unfinished. Normally, I would post something that was unfinished anyways, but this time I feel like I want to leave it as it is now, and get back to it a later time and then make it complete.

Saturday, November 23, 2019

I like to reflect back upon the previous couple of days

Wednesday I set my alarm clock earlier because I wanted to receive more sunlight. I kind of had this feeling that more sunlight would equate with more energy to be proactive.

When the alarm clock rang, I didn’t get up immediately, and I almost fell back asleep again. I didn’t have the feeling that there would be much of a point in getting up anyway, but just before I fell back asleep it occurred to me that I should at least just get up, have some breakfast, and then see how I would feel after I would’ve gotten up. I didn’t feel like I was in the headspace to be able to decide that correctly when I was still lying down in bed.

So I got up, and I did against my expectation find that I did feel within myself the capacity at that moment to actually go and do things.

There was one thing I had specifically in mind, and I had to take a break to do some energy work, but just doing the damn thing appeared to be the right attitude in this specific scenario.

Later on that same day I went to the swimming pool. Here, as is usual, I found myself sexually aroused by attractive female bodies in swimming gear. I’m going to elaborate on this topic later down the line.

Thursday I also wanted to continue being proactive, but I noticed that this time there was much more resistance against doing so. This time the situation was different, and the attitude of “just doing the damn thing” didn’t seem to work anymore. Not even so much because that attitude isn’t effective in getting the thing done; Of course it still is. But that attitude didn’t work anymore for me primarily because I am not capable in getting myself to believe that it is genuinely better to push yourself through any possible form of resistance or suffering just go get the thing done. There’s a difference between setting an intention and setting a requirement.

I think this is where many people mess up. Most people in such a situation where they had an intention make it into a requirement or else they have failed as a human being, they tell themselves. That’s not true at all. In fact, I think the true failure is the failure to acknowledge that you have limits, and to be intelligent and sensitive enough to not cross those limits. If you do cross those limits, you may get the thing done, but it will do much harm to you psychologically. At least in the very act itself you will feel very uncomfortable, and that’s already disputable if it’s really worth doing at such a point, not to mention the momentum that this attitude will create to affect other areas of your life, often them not being very healthy effects to your psyche.

Strangely enough I barely recall what I did this day. I remember going to the supermarket and meeting a friend/acquaintance, for actually two times in a row.

I also remember starting to watch a lot of video’s on Jordan Peterson later in the evening and night.

I never tend to catch onto a hype early on. When Jordan Peterson was really hyped up and popular (and I reckon he still is to some degree), I didn’t want to watch it because I tend to be the person who never likes to go with the ways or opinions of the crowd. Now that the hype is starting to wear off a little bit about Jordan Peterson, I actually started to take interest in him and watched some of his talks and discussions or interviews.

I like what Jordan is doing. At first I had more of the impression that he was just some guy with a strong opinion, but not that he was necessarily right. Not that I had really observed and judged his arguments, but once again, I tend to have the attitude of not being able to value a person initially when he’s hyped up by a crowd, because the idea is pretty deep-rooted in me that the crowd can’t be right.

But I have to admit that I was wrong. I like Jordan for his fire, his sincerity and integrity. He also actually knows what he’s talking about, and even though he may have a strong standpoint, he is not corrupted by this standpoint and is at the same time very fair and wise. I also like that he’s a scientist yet at the same time not limited to or biased by the scientific or otherwise materialistic paradigm.

So I think I’m going to continue watching Jordan.

Friday I had the intention to go to the gym multiple times to do a group workout that was guided (a virtual workout, though). I however never got to it, even though I had set the intention to go there at three different times. I say three different times because there was one of these group sessions I wanted to go to at three different occasions.

The reason that I didn’t go was because time after time I felt a huge degree of resistance, to the point that there was no reasonable opening for me to actually go and do it. Once again, to clarify: It’s not that I’m literally incapable of doing if I really decided to force myself, but I am in such a uncomfortable state (about this situation) at that moment, that it simply doesn’t seem reasonable or worthwhile to actually go and do it.

I figured that it was a mistake to say to myself after the second time I wanted to go but didn’t go, that I HAD to go on the third time.

Because once again at the third time, I felt a great amount of resistance and energetical tension. Because I was so keen on actually wanting to do it this time, this created a great amount of confusion, doubt, and guilt by the idea that I wouldn’t go.

I eventually didn’t go because I felt that it simply wouldn’t have been worthwhile, given the condition I was in. But I realized for myself that I had to stop making this intention so important to the degree that it becomes a “must” or “requirement” to go.

I reckoned that i could still keep the intention, but that I would see at the moment itself if it would be appropriate to go or not. I reckoned that I could theoretically go on like that indefinitely and not create a build-up of guilt about it, but to actually make an intelligent, sensitive and conscious decision every single time.

It’s not to say that I have to go to the opposite and that I HAVE to make a conscious decision every time not created by guilt, because if there is guilt, sometimes the best way to overcome it is to deal with it on the outer level instead of the inner level. Or in other words: doing the thing as opposed trying to detach yourself from the need of it.

But if I have the capacity to not create guilt and not to act out of this guilt, then I don’t want to do it.

Today (Saturday), I actually did end up going to the gym. Unlike yesterday, I didn’t need to make multiple ‘attempts’. I didn’t feel entirely clear still, but I felt clear enough to be able to make it seem like the decision to go would be justifiable.

I did end going a bit too late. I for some reason thought it was a good idea to take 5 minutes out of my time before going to complain to my friends on whatsapp about how they did less sugar in syrup (the thing you mix with water). I don’t necessarily regret about what I complained, or that I complained, but I do regret complaining at that particular moment in time. For some reason, I though that time would just work out in my favor and I would still be on time for this group class. I wasn’t on time at all, especially considering I still had to change clothes. It was simply just a stupid idea to do that (at that time). It’s a thing to remember for another time.

I also noticed I had quite a bit of upper back pain during this guided virtual workout (in which I was the only person participating). I also notice it when laying in bed, that my upper back tends to hurt sometimes. I always had the tendency to put my fists in my upper back and to actually crack my upper back. I always felt like that might’ve helped to relieve the pain from my upper back, but it might actually have made it worse instead. It at least hasn’t resolved the pain. I will try to stop doing it now, and instead I think a good solution is to put a pillow behind my upper back when I’m sitting or laying down. In this way, it will provide a counter-position to it being bent forward too much, which I suspect is the reason it hurts the way it does. I want to take a bit better care of my upper back, and if this fails too, I might just search up advice on what to do with this pain.

[Skanzi]

Here is an piece of text I wrote some time ago. I didn't find it too comfortable to share it as plain text in this thread as of right now, so I decided to make it a bit easier on myself and just post it as a link, just so I can get to feel a bit more comfortable getting back to my thread, which I don't want to stay away from for too long because I would be too uncomfortable to revisit it were I to post it as plain text. Right now, I just have no interest in dealing with my own anxiety about that, so I'll make it easier on myself whilst still posting it.

https://justpaste.it/2hskz

December 2nd 2019

There are a lot of things I could write about, but I'm for now only going to write about the stuff that's currently on my mind right now; The stuff that I came here for to write. I can't or don't want to write down every process that I'm going through, as this currently takes more energy than I'm willing to give this journal as of right now. I do feel it to be a little bit unfortunate; Part of me would've liked to be far more detailed, extensive and broader in my writing, so I could cover everything, but I don't feel like I want to give this journal THAT much time as of now. Maybe in the future I will do so consistently. It's hard to say.

So I went to "gym class" this monday evening, as I more often do on monday evening. It is an organised weekly event in which we do as adults roughly what we used to do in PE (physical education) class in school. That's the basic idea of it. In dutch the literal translation would be "Gym lesson". It is strange how in english I think people more quickly tend to have the interpretation of "gym" being a place where you can lift weights and stuff. Thta's not what I'm talking about here when I say "gym class". It's literally like what the english people call PE but then for adults. It's quite fun.

This time, however, I was rather distraught and distracted by something. Namely: I was distracted by sexual desires. Attractive female bodies dressed in tight clothing that outline their feminine features, can sometimes spark something within me. This time it did.

Not that I got an erection, but this attachment to this sexual energy resulted in the fact that it created a blockage in my system, which cut off my spontaneity and left me in a positiion where I found it very hard to focus. Not that I was constantly looking at these women, but it becomes sort of a mental cloud or a fog within my head that is very dominant and distracting. This resistance pattern cuts me off from my outer environment and from my body. That's the kind of effect it has. I know how to overcome it, which is to say: to retreat and do some energy work on myself, but at that time I didn't have the opportunity.

It's interesting how this subject of sex and sexuality doesn't seem to concern me for quite a long time, or to at least a much less noticable degree, until it gets triggered. I also have this at the swimming pool. Seeing attractive female bodies in which their feminine features are very much up for display, can sometimes trigger within me quite a bit of sexual desire. Other times, however, it triggers nothing at all. I have after all gone through this gym class many times and this is the first time I encountered this bubble of sexual desire to this degree.

It frustrates me that I seem to not find very good opportunities for releasing this sexual desire in context to having sex with another woman, unless I have to pay a lot of money for it. Even though I sometimes really crave it, I do hold myself a back for not only the fact that I don't want to get myself broke by going to prostitutes, or to sex clubs which you as a man obviously have to pay a good amount for. No, there is another reason. Or maybe multiple reasons.

See, i could've just decided a long time ago to just invest a lot more effort in using tinder a lot or going to dating-sites. And I am in fact in a situation now in which I am starting to use tinder and in which I do have some matches, to which I haven't replied yet, for reasons which I'm going to explain in a moment.

My bio on tinder is written like this:

"Let me be clear: don't like me if you have no interest responding to my messages. Save me the effort.

Please let us not play any games. Let's be authentic.

I have my own vision on what I find attractive in a woman. Primarily, I'm looking for a good energy: A woman that is enthusiastic, open and interested in regards to our contact. If you have these qualities, the everything else about you will be beautiful too. I then don't care what you think about yourself: then you are beautiful."

Is it authentic what I'm saying here? It depends. It is authentic when I'm not horny. When I am horny, however, the thing I care most about is an attractive female body. With attractive I simply mean clear feminine features. I don't really subscribe so much to the traditional idea of what society regards as attractive for women. Those are attractive too, though, but I don't care if the woman has some weight or has some features that would in society's eye would be seen as less attractive, yet aren't features that doesn't take away from her feminine beauty.

When my sexual cravings are stirred up, then my whole talk of wanting good energy in a woman are all bullshit. Then I honestly just want to fuck almost anyone that has a vagina. But this is if I'm exceptionally aroused. 

When I'm moderately aroused, which is what I was when I scrolled through the women on tinder a month back or so, then I like almost any woman, except for women who seem to be very dark. i'm talking about those who choose to represent themselves in their pictures as sad and serious and dark. I am not looking forward to meeting such women as this kind of energy and the sort of dynamic that would come forth out of that is not something I'm interested in to encounter. I am seeking for a lighter, more enthusiastic, more feminine and light-hearted kind of woman at such a moment when I'm on tinder. Both because I find it more attractive but also because it'd be much easier to be around that person.

So when I'm moderately aroused and browsing through tinder, I'm like: Almost anything goes as long as she doesn't showcase bad energy, or if she doesn't look to be very feminine either physically and/or energetically.

My profile seemed to have worked out quite well. I had posted a profile picture in which I had a bit (but not overly) fierce look in my eyes, and just to experiment a little bit, I also put as my profession "Future rockstar".

It seemed to have worked out okay. i'm still not sure what exactly is the best way to attract as many likes as possible, what the science behind it is (not that I'm going to sacrifice authenticity for a effective yet pretentious profile), but I remember a couple of years ago that I went on tinder and I didn't get any matches at all, where I alos portrayed myself a bit differntly then IIRC. Maybe it's also because tinder has changed or I went on it longer, but ah well.

And now that I have a about 5 likes who I still have to find as a match, and about 4 matches from which 2 have made the first contact, I feel resistance in getting back to them. For context: It's been almost a month since we matched, and only yesterday I felt the readiness to actually look up what was written to me. I don't know why I often tend to get so uncomfortable in regards to written responses to me. It may have to do with the fact that I know that it is likely going to trigger something, and I at that moment don't feel like I have the willingness or the space or simply the time for it in order for me to confront it. It takes a lot of energy to process all of it, and often I don't want to go into it because I'm too preoccupied with another process. Or I may simply not feel the space within me to confront it at that moment.

So now that I have matches and I wanted to respond to them, I suddenly find my mind judging them as not so attractive after all. It at least so was the case earlier this day, when I looked at these girls in a state in which I wasn't aroused.

I wonder if this change in judgement is because I wasn't aroused, or if it is because my ego-mind likes to come up with strategies to escape the confrontration with my sexual shadows. i feel like it's a bit of both.

I think of a woman in a paid "learning how to play in a band"-course I go to every week, and how I happen to find her moreso attractive then her co-student, who is also just like her has a physically attractive body, but I just so happen to find one more attractive than the other, and I can neither blame it on the body, and I also can't blame it on the degree of feminine energy, as that also appears to be around the same degree.

So taking that example in mind, I feel that there is a certain attractiveness too that is not dependent on me feeling horny, but that there are certain women who I happen to appreciate more for no immediately recognizable logical reasons. I can recall certain situations in the past where this too was true; I remember even an instance where the woman I was attracted too didn't have particularly pronounced feminine physical features.

it concerns me that my level of horniness seems to so much alter my perception of different women.

I oscillate a little bit between me wanting a longer-term relationship with a beautiful, compassionate woman who I match really well with, and me wanting to just bust a nut in almost any vagina possible, without wanting to make contact with the woman other than with her body. It is frustrating because it's hard to make up my mind on how to go about it if my feelings are prone to change so rapidly.

Even if I do happen to choose purely for sexual pleasure, there is another problem, apart from the costs it will probably take. i will now get back to the point which I departed from much earlier in this post.

Let's say I somehow suddenly happen to win a lottery and I would be a millionare. And let's just for the sake of a hypothetical argument say that this amount of money is so big that there is no way that all of it can be spent in the duration of the rest of my life.

Well, would I then just visit a lot of prostitutes and sex clubs to fulfill my sexual cravings?

I probably would, but still I find this largely uncomfortable.

First off, I'm physically very awkward. I find it difficult to touch other people in general, and particularly in sex I have a lot of anxiety about leading the sexual dynamic physically. It stifles me. I would really like to just touch, stroke and move the woman's body wherever I so please to, but I feel for some reason a lot of anxiety in regards to doing that.

Also, I'm very uncomfortable actually making a sort of connection with her. I am very shy with making eye contact. I am quite afraid to just connect or bond with another person in general, actually. And especially in a sexual situation I am afraid to share this intimacy.

The best sexual experience I've had so far was when I was in a sex club some time ago in 2018, and in that sex club a woman was hanging in the air with her wrists and ankles tied up, making it so that she was hanging in the air (front body towards the ceiling, back towards the fround), and her legs spread so her vagina was fully available for a line-up of guys to release themselves in. Also, and I think this an important notion: She was also blindfolded. Because she was in that position where we couldn't really make contact in any way, and there also wasn't any awkwardness about changing physical positions with her (as there was only one approach to penetrate her, really), it made it very convenient for me to just purely focus on my lust and to only take her body into account and not the woman herself. That was the best sexual experience I've had so far. She wasn't even necessarily even that attractive, but I didn't mind that much.

But where does it go if such a situation is required —which have a lot of criteria— in order for me to be able to actually enjoy a sexual experience with another woman? in almost any other situation, I feel the fear of intimacy beyond physical contact is going to give me too much anxiety, make me feel too uncomfortable. And even if it wouldn't, I feel like it would after I would have ejaculated. I notice in myself after ejaculation in masturbation aswell, that the idea of having a woman laying next to me at that particular moment doesn't seem appealing to me at all. Not that I wouldn't care about her anymore entirely, but I wouldn't know what to do with her at that point. At that point, I feel like my reflex to go back to my old habits of wanting to retreat and to be alone would take me over. 

Again, I do feel like there's some compassion still that wants to take her situation into account, and I think that precisely because of that reason I also can't find myself going to the other side of the duality or the polarity in which I become what you would call an "asshole" who only cares about himself and his own desires, and uses the woman as a piece of meat to relieve himself in, not being interested in being compassionate and sympathetic towards her. I don't feel like I have that capacity within me. I feel like I am too sensitive and compassionate to go to that polarity. I could see myself becoming dominant and leading at some point, but I wouldn't see myself becoming indifferent and careless towards her. I can still use this sort of dominant/submissive polarity as a sort of play, also in sex, but I wouldn't see myself actually being able to become that guy who doesn't care about her other than to use her for his own benefit.

So the only real possibility I see for myself is either becoming capable of intimacy without necessarily being dominant or a leader, or to combine the aspects of being dominant and masculine whilst at the same time also being able to be connect, to be intimate and loving.

But how to get there? How to get even a lot of "training" or "reference experience" without wasting a shitload of money on prostitutes or sex clubs? Well, I still want to continue taking it a bit further on tinder and trying to get dates there whilst being intelligent about how to do that, but also I think a good idea is to take a course in which I get taught by experience how to physically touch people. I know these kind of courses, therapies or classes exist. They may still be expensive, but I think i would be worth it. Yes, I may also go to a sex club a couple of times a year. But I really don't want to do that more than just a couple of times a year. Maybe I'll go to one soon again. Although I don't know how much it is really going to teach me or free me.

I think that's it for now.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 3, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Friday December 6th

I have been egaging in quite a bit of proactive, challenging activities in the past couple of days. I've for practiced guitar, went to the gym, send a couple of mails, done a lot of contemplation, tried to make a start with structuring things using a word-document, watched videos on how to structure and organize, practiced a bit of bossing in Oldschool Runescape, made contact with a sex therapist... And more

I am finding more and more energy to proactively try new things and to overcome the blocks and resistances that before prevented me from doing so.

Until I hit a certain wall...

Yesterday evening after making a long walk, I was thinking how I was making a lot of progress in trying to become more proactive and organized, and the thought occured to me that: "You know what? I've done a lot lately. Perhaps it's okay to relax a little bit and forsake the plans and goals I had set for myself today. After all, right now I'm still in a phase where I still can. Once I advance becoming more and more proactive, at some point I will have a lot of responsibilites I have to meet and then I perhaps won't really have that much space anymore to just relax and forsake it all for just the time being. Now I still get to. perhaps I should just take the time and just indulge and enjoy myself. After all, this shift in attitude from consciously going from proactivity to passivity I really haven't made in a while (I usually simply had fallen into it instead). I do feel a good some resistance against doing so, but it seems like the challenging kind of resistance that invites to come and visit it".

So I thought somethng along those lines.

However, as it turned out, I couldn't really make such a decision whole-heartedly, even though I had a lot of logical reasons that would make it justifiable and possibly even a good idea.

Instead, I found myself in a limbo, in a state of division. Not really being able to do A nor B.

This state of being divided is not too uncommon to me. In fact, I think I've described it many times in the past before. I think I had however used the word "resistance" in the past instead of "division". Let's set that straight now. the term "being divided" is a more accurate term to describe it.

This state of being divided, of not being able to really devote myself to either side of a decision or mode of operating, was all too common in the past, and apparently so still happens from time to time in the current phase of my life.

It leaves me very incapacitated and frozen. I can't really get to anything at such a point, not even the decision to "just relax and game some". I can't really commit to anything because if I try to go for A, then B is still tugging on me and making me unsure of my decision to go for A, and vica versa.  remain completely split, and the result is that I don't end up doing anything, neither passive 'activities' or active 'activities'. I just then fund myself in bed not finding myself being integrated enough to make a whole-hearted decision for anything. All I feel I can do at such a point is witness the energy in my head that is the result of this divided state, and make a walk once every so often to try and resolve this divided state.

And I did two walks in which I tried to resolve this confusion and division, but although I did get a bit more clarity, neither of these walks was enough to get me out of this divided and confused state that I'm in where I end up not being able to do anything. That's why instead of doing another walk I decided to go and write about it.

Sometimes I get really annoyed by my own mind. I know this struggle is completely unnecessary, but yet I can't help myself.

Something I found humorous when I listened to it, was when Austin Carlile from Of mice and men screamed in one of his songs: "I'M SO COMPLICATED!". I'll give a link to it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3LbVIif57I (at 1:00)

I actually don't like the constant screaming so much. I think it's a bit over the top. but just out of curiosity I did explore the band and their music, just to see what they were about. I like some of their songs, but most of them with the continuous screaming I think it's a bit too much. I did however for some reason really liked Austin though as a person, even though my personal opinion is that he should've toned it down a little bit. I like the guy, I've watched an interview of him, but the music I generally don't like too much. Same thing with slipknot. I think Slipknot is a really interesting band to simply study. But as far as their music is concerned... It's a bit too much. I like for instance Linkin Park so much because they got those elements of screaming and grunting, but that's only the cherry on the top of the cake and not the entire cake. And that's the way I feel it should be.

I guess songs from Of mice and men or Slipknot would be good for listening to for when working out, for instance. When you need some fire under your ass.

Anyways... moving on.

That line "I'M SO COMPLICATED"... I almost feel like that should be my new ringtone . I am in fact complicated beyond belief. Sometimes the complexity of my mind and all the little things that can come to disturb it, seems at times almost unbelievable to me. Sometimes I just really get angry at my fucking mind for throwing up this stupid shit that seems totally useless and pointless, yet I find myself being disturbed, distracted and confused by it.

But what can I do... I know it will resolve itself or it will happen to get resolved as time passes and at some point I will have a moment of clarity or an epiphany, or I remember something that I used to do in the past that suddenly seems to have its utility again.

But yeah, for now... I can't come to make a goddamn decision.

[Skanzi]

Tuesday December 10th

The intention to be proactive can also have a nasty side-effect, I have noticed.

getting back to my previous journal entry... The division had subsided somewhat that day after I had decided to play a little bit of OSRS, a computer game, and I found myself being able to be preoccupied almost all day from my waking period from saturday to sunday (I am up during the night)

from sunday to monday I did a little bit less, and yesterday (from monday to tuesday) I took a walk, in which I wanted to proactively think about a couple of items and then to act upon them after I had gotten back from the walk. But as I was about an hour into my walk, I decided that I wanted to take the last bus home and go cycling instead (and still also think whilst cycling or after having arrived somewhere with my bike, from which that point I would walk).

However, that did not happen. I found myself not really having the energy to do that anymore, and I decided to just do some OSRS instead.

After I was done with my OSRS session, the pressure of guilt and responsibility struck me. But instead of acting out of that feeling, i decided to attach myself from this need and this pressure instead.

This is where the 'stop-technique' came in. This is in fact saying "stop" to myself every time I felt the mind-pattern of the somewhat neurotic obsession with trying to change myself would come up. I also sometimes say "it's okay" to myself. And I give some physical expression to it aswell by using a corresponding expression (having my hands in front of me, with the palms facing forward).

This technique helps well for me with breaking an automatic mental pattern that has been ingrained into my psyche. It helps me to get some distance from this pattern. It can also help to witness the feeling that is created within my head as a result of this pressure from the mental pattern, but sometimes that (alone) isn't enough. Then the stop-technique often works well as a last resort.

It has helped me to detach a little bit, using that stop-technique, but I still feel like there is some of this attachment to this old mental pattern of 'activation' and 'growth' left.  probably will have to do a bit more work on it.

I am glad that I'm entering a phase in which I actually now get shit done in my life, instead of trying to forsake all (worldly and outer) responsibilities. I am glad that this change is taking place in my life, and that I am learning all these new skillsets, attributes and attracting more resourceful situations in my life because of it.

Actually, I feel the need to so some energy work coming up right now. I will just post this entry now and most likely edit this later. And if I wouldn't do that, then it will just stay as is, I guess.

Later edit:

As I was saying: I'm glad that i'm entering this phase where I'm getting stuff handled. Because this is new, I didn't use to do that before in my life, with to some degree the exception op 2013 and most of 2014. But that was a bit different, though. 

Unlike before, I understand better that there is a place for rest and detachment, and also the need to really contemplate upon a matter instead of jumping into it blindly. This understanding that there is a need for rest and detachment is certainly better than when I tried to activate myself in 2013/2014, but it is not total yet.

So I still find myself somewhat attached to the need to be active, for growth, at certain times.

Sometimes my intention to be active takes me over to some degree, and then the idea that I would take rest or enjoy myself before I have done a lot of useful stuff, seems unacceptable to me. I am however already managing to allow myself to get some rest after I have done some proactive stuff.

But it is difficult to fully let go of this wish to grow and be proactive for more than a few hours at a time.

Like I had told before. when I had been gaming yesterday night, after I had been gaming, I was in a state where I felt that I now had my time for pleasure and enjoyment, and that I now really needed to do some proactive stuff, to go and be occupied with my to-do-list.

But I did notice how compulsive this felt. There was guilt. there was need. There was attachment. I could sense it.

And I still feel that a little bit now. I find it difficult to really fully let go of the need to do anything useful at all for a while, and to just relax and enjoy myself, or to rest, even though I have been able to come up with perfectly good arguments for it.

I thought to myself just like two hours ago, that the ideal position to be in is to have the intention to be proactive and make a lot of growth in your life, yet not be attached to that intention and allow yourself to let go and detach from it, knowing you don't HAVE to do it.

But at the same time, you also don't want to attach yourself to the notion that you should stay detached. Because attaching yourself to the notion of detachment is just another trick that the mind likes to play. That detachment is simply a pseudo-detachment, but in reality it is the attachment to the notion, to the ideal of detachment.

So the ideal position is to neither be attached to action nor be attached to inaction (the ideal of detachment). If you're neither attached to action nor inaction, then you are open to the spontaneous and natural flow of your heart, and at the same time able to use your head to create a plan and foster the willpower and discipline to bring out these innate qualities to the world.

In other words: Do what you enjoy, but also create a system for yourself in which this enjoyment can be shared with the world as much as possible without forsaking the enjoyment of it. If you either become too self-indulgent by keeping it all to yourself, or if you become so obsessed with the ideal of sharing it and losing centeredness because of it, then the enjoyment will dry out.

Edited December 10, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Wednesday December 11th

This is really only a couple of hours after I had written my previous journal entry. I have also not slept in between. But... I'll write it as if it's a new day anyways

I had intended to go out and take a walk and contemplate on a couple of things that I had not come to contemplating on last night. However, i realized something.

Yesterday, I read a book from Osho called "Intuition". In this book, he explains the value of intuition and what it means.

Through this book I realized that an intuitive decision-making process isn't necessarily worse than a logical decision-making process just because logic is more clear or comforting. 

Really thinking something through has a certain feeling of safety to it. It makes you feel that you're not going to make any mistakes by being emotional, deluded and biased. You feel as if you have prevented yourself from going astray, of going down a wrong path.

The fear that the logic-based mind has of intuition is that it fears that intuition is going to be based on biases and delusion. It fears that intuition will not allow you to see where you are making mistakes. It fears that the intuition can be warped and that it is based on unexamined assumptions that are being mistaken for a 'higher and deeper intuitive insight'.

I guess this was the reason why lately I have been relying on logic so much, why I've been relying on my left-side brain so much; Why I haven't been making bigger decisions in my life without first doing really deep and scutinous contemplation on it. Because I feared it would've just ended up in... inefficiency or some degree of conflict with the situations that I would've created for myself doing it like that.

But just now when I wanted to take the walk, I really didn't feel that excited to be once again walking for 2-3 hours, as I had done before. 

I simply looked at my phone and just thought: "Why can I just not answer these items on my contemplation list right now?".

And certainly it can be done like that. I feel that sometimes there is a lot of confusion or unclarity about a topic that just a quick thought process of just a minute or so isn't going to resolve or relief, but then you have the other side of the coin where you are really trying to think hard about a certain topic just because you are very afraid that you are going to make mistakes or delude yourself if you don't think really hard and deep about it.

And right then, I was dealing with the latter situation.

There is still the argument that you want to really think deeply on topics that are involving rather big changes in your life (and these topics were somewhat revolving around that).

But... with that argument, also three questions came to mind, which I doubt would've have arisen in my mind had I not read that book called "Intuition" from Osho the night before.

The questions were as follow:

1: How can I be so sure that logic is going to get me to the most comfortable or efficient choice (talking about the results that lead from that choice)? Perhaps there is a dimension or intelligence of which I may be able to tap into that makes the best decisions for me without knowing why, or without perhaps even being able to know why altogether. Maybe there is a dimension which holds a much greater intelligence than my mind can ever behold, and the only thing I have to do to access is, is just following my feeling.

2: Even if it were to be true that through logic you come to more efficient and/or comfortable decisions (again, the outcome from that decision. not the decision itself), then how do I know that efficiency and/or comfort is really what I truly needed? How do I know that encountering difficulties or disappointments is simply not what I sometimes need? How do I know what really would best serve me best in the deepest sense? From that perspective, the most awful things may sometimes turn out to be the best thing that could have ever happened in hindsight.

3: EVEN IF we could say that through logic and contemplation you can get to better decisions and outcomes in their deepest sense, then how do I know that all the time, energy and stress it takes to go through that much thinking does truly outweigh making a decision on a much quicker and shorter term? Is a life that is well-considered better than a life that is free from any decision-making struggle and confusion?

Is all the tension and confusion surrounding the subject really worth it? Is there not a valid perspective in which it is a valuable lesson for you to learn how to drop the emphasis on the conditions of the outer world, and thereby end up with maybe a less efficient and outwardly comfortable life, but one that is much more carefree and relaxed as you are much more detached.

Or maybe you can take it even further and not only drop the emphasis on the outer world and its conditions, but to drop the mind itself including, but not limited to, the introspection and contemplation regarding the inner world also: The thinking about feelings, attitudes, and the thoughts about thoughts themselves; The idea of dropping the mind altogether whether the mind has its focus inwardly or outwardly, so you can reach to the heart and to Being, in which all the tensions that the mind created will be evaporated. 

That would also be an argument for not trying to 'figure something out' and just go and act.

Not that I think that I need to go and stay in that extreme, but I think it's good to just take into consideration.

 

There are other ways to look at it. Let's leave it with that.

Edited December 11, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Thursday December 12th

Let's talk about yesterday still.

Yesterday morning I had my first appointment with a sex coach. She was a woman whom I'd guess to be in her 50's. She has experience with tantra and taoism.

I was very pleased with the approach she took.

Instead of just (only) talking about it, she introduced me with a sensual massage in which I got to choose whether I wanted to keep my underwear on or not.

I'm a daredevil. I chose to take them off.

Before I got to doing that though, I expressed my concerns to her about fearing to get an erection. She assured my that it was okay if I would get an erection. This was the kind of response I was hoping for.

It gives a certain feeling of freedom and elation to be able to feel that you can be aroused as a man —and let is be physically shown— and not be ashamed for it.

After I had gotten this reassurance, I also wanted somehow to feel reassurance to I heard it right in that she gave me the option to take off my underwear. If I think about it now, I don't see in how there was a way how I would have not heard it right or how I would have misinterpreted it, but somehow I really feel the need to ask this question again before it can feel safe to actually take off my underwear.

And after having gotten that reassurance too, I laid down naked on the massage table, starting off with the front of my body laying on the table and her massaging my back.

I could feel that she knew how to massage. At some point she gave certain taps on my tailbone, and this stirred up a surprising amount of sexual energy.

At some point she asked me to turn around. I enjoy the image of me laying there on the table completely naked and the both of us being completely comfortable and unashamed with this fact, including the fact that I was having intermittent erections. It never really got to the point though where my erection was rock-hard, or at least where it stayed that way for a long time. It stayed a bit in between the flaccid and erect state for most of the time.

Although her massaging was very sensual, the intention of this massage was not to do me a sexual favour. She never gave me a handjob or anything like that. She did not mind sort of brushing past my (semi-)erect penis, and she pressed the base of my penis at some point with one hand and my heart with the other hand, but I could see that the intention of this was energetical movement. The intention of this massage was more to provoke sexual and sensual feelings, and I suppose also to make me more aware of my physical and energetical sensations that came along with it, but not to fulfill my instinctive desire for penetration and/or ejaculation. 

Although the idea was the I focused on witnessing the breath in my lower abdomen, at some point this felt unsatisfying so i decided to put my awareness on following the movements of her hand(s) and how this felt on my body. This felt more comfortable.

After this massage she created a situation in which I was to lay down on the table for quite some time still, but she hadn't announced it nor did she say anything during this period of silence and non-activity. I actually didn't like this so much. I suppose the idea of this was to give me some post-massage energetical enjoyment, but I didn't really experience it as such, and I really just wanted to get off the table.

Aside from that part though, I did quite like it.

Afterwards we had a conversation, in which she said that the cost would be 65€ (I did  not know what the costs would be before that moment). This price was actually unexpectedly low. On top of that, my health insurance package refunds up to 250€ of alternative healing methods, up to a maximum of 45€ per day, of which I had not claimed anything so far. I discussed this topic with her also, and we managed to plan in another 3  appointments for this year (2019), so I could get another 135€ refunded (180€ in total) by my health insurance, and I only would need to pay another 60€ (80€ in total) from my own budget.

Looking back at this now, I was very pleased with this woman and her approach to this coaching-session.

It is because she actually made me feel my sensuality instead of just talking about it. Although just talking about it also could have had an effect, I feel such a massage and such a practical approach cuts down way more to the core than just talking about it and interchanging thoughts about it.

I feel like taking an approach from the mind is a poor way of trying to reach a domain that lies beyond it.

And because she is willing to actually engage with me in this practical, sensual way, it makes me appreciate her much more as a person. it makes me have more respect for her as opposed to when I would meet someone whom I would have a conversation about sexuality but who would not actually allow me to show by provoking or inviting direct sensual experience what it feels like or how to deal with it.

Even better than this would have been a sexual surrogate partner (someone who you can pay to have sex with who teaches you how to have sex and be sensual), but I looked it up, and the costs of those kind of trajectories are astronomical. Unfortunately I have quite a tight budget so for me that's just not an option.

I think I at some point in my life want to learn how to make lots and lots of money so I can have financial abundance and independence, So I can buy and do anything I want with that; That the lack of financial resources will never be a limitation again (or to a much, much lesser degree) for me having to deny such trajectories as a sexual surrogate partner.

The lack of financial resources sometimes really frustrates me. If I would have had lots of money, on top of this sexual surrogate partner program, I would have also probably visited a lot more prostitutes.

I want to learn how to improve my sexual competencies, but I also want to just enjoy myself. I want a bit of a mix of both.

I don't really carry any shame of going to a prostitute. I may carry a lot of general sexual shame for whatever reason, but I don't feel like I am in particular ashamed of going to a prostitute.

Well, that's not fully true. I may carry a bit of shame as far as expressing it towards other people is concerned. I however don't carry much shame towards myself about it.

I had made the agreement with myself that I would soon visit a prostitute; even despite the fact that I am now visiting a sex coach. I haven't visited a prostitute in a long time, partially because there has been some resistance which has it roots in shame, but also because of financial worries. Lately during a contemplative walk I had decided that I should visit one anyway because even though I don't have a lot of money, I did realize that I was worried about it more than was rational, and I decided on a logical basis that visiting a prostitute just for one time now would be a justifiable and probably worthwhile decision to make.

One may wonder: "Well how is merely busting a nut worthwhile all that money?". Well... It's not so much about merely that, but also about the challenge and the opportunity to learn and become more sexually unstifled and unfrozen.

The point is that these kind of visitations to a prostitute I want to do only a couple a times of year. Mainly for financial reasons, but also for the sake of self-discipline.

Seeking out the right kind of woman on this site that advertises women offering sexual favours usually turns out to be tremendously difficult, though...

Mainly because I tend to get very horny browsing through all these options and I get very impulsive and my attention gets very scattered, yet at the other hand there is the part of me that ascribes a lot of value to making a logical, clear-headed decision.

Not only that, but even if I were to decide to go with the impulsive horniness factor alone, then somehow every time that I think I have made my choice, then there always comes doubt up and I start thinking about this OTHER woman that I had seen in another advertisement. And it goes on and on like that. I'm very indecisive at such moments.

So what I had decided to do was to actually make a list of women that are in my city, and actually write down the pros and cons about their advertisments, and give them a rating based on a bunch of different factors (such as price, openness and receptiveness, possibilities, physical attractiveness etc...), and then based on that rating I would make a decision. 

That was the only way I could kind of get to a decision without becoming completely overwhelmed by all this stimulation. And even doing it this way, I found myself at some point simply becoming too horny and I just had to masturbate. But setting these kinds of boundaries and trying to make a very logical clear-headed decision I find in this particular context to be very essential.

Eventually I came down to a woman who seemed to be quite inviting and attractive too, seemingly offering a good amount of possibilities.

I approached her like this: "Hi. Your advertisment arouses me I am excited to meet you. Do you by any chance have a bath tub at home that we can use? I think that's a very horny idea  "

I had written this about 24 hours ago and she hasn't replied yet.

I wonder why she hasn't replied. Would it have to do with the way she interpreted me to be as a person in the way I talked to her, does it have to do with the fact that she only accept people calling her, or is she dealing with something right now that doesn't give her to space to respond to these kind of reactions right now? Or something else? What would it be?

If it would be the first reason, that I wouldn't have been 100% gentlemenly, then I am okay with the fact that she is not okay with that.

You see, I used to carry a lot of shame in expressing myself very sexually and bluntly towards women about my sexual desires. I always felt like I would be a creep and I just felt really ashamed and embarrassed about the idea of conveying my sexual interest directly without any sort of politeness or carefulness.

But right now, that attitude is starting to change.

I've gotten to the point where I now realize that it is actually okay for me to be very direct and possibly even vulgar in the way I sexually express myself towards women. I can use phrases as (prepare) "I feel horny", "I want to have sex with you", "That arouses me", "I want to stroke your body", "I want to suck on your nipples"...

Perhaps to some women this can be interpreted as upsetting, but this is honest. Why should I not be able to express this? Why should I not be able to express to a woman that she sexually arouses me and attracts me, and that I desire to do certain things with her? I understand that in certain context this may not be as appropriate or socially acceptable, but I feel it should CERTAINLY be acceptable to talk to a prostitute like that, who is ultimately herself someone who talks in a very similair fashion, as far as the advertisment that I had seen was concerned.

So I am starting to lose shame for talking to at least a prostitute in this very direct, sexual way. I feel like that is what she signs up for, and for her to prevent or avoid this kind of communication seems to be... Preventing men to feel unstifled and free within her presence, and to some degree even hypocritical. After all, isn't she the one who is using the same kind of language and sexual provocation to reel these men in, displaying the image in which the man feels as if he is sexually desired and thereby making him assume that she's automatically onboard with setting a very sexual and possibly even vulgar form of communication?

I feel that what they are baiting for is what they should get and accept. Unfortunately, this quite often doesn't seem to be the case. The image that they seem to be representing seems to be quite attractive and sexually promiscious and free, but the reality is often different.

If my hypothesis is correct and this prostitute (or perhaps I should say "women of pleasure", as that is how the site had advertised these women) that I had texted has not replied to me because I wasn't 100% gentlemenly (and to be fair, that may not be the reason at all), then I wonder what would decide for her not to respond to my message, then I would wonder what causes that.

Perhaps its the reasons that men are quickly to be thought as "dangerous and creepy" if you as a man happen to be sexually provoking a girl. At least so if there's still a distance in which the mind still has space to resist. I know from what I have seen that if someone is very sexually provocative towards a woman but he's actually grounded and good at it, that her mind doesn't really the capacity to prevent her from resisting as her unconscious sexual desires in such a context are stronger than what her conscious mind is able tor resist at such a moment. I've seen that this is very clearly the case when I studied movements like RSD (real social dynamics) and the pickup community in general, which I had been interested in for a long time.

Unfortunately, man's sexuality is quite repressed these days in modern western society. I don't think that is quite right. I also don't think that as a man you want to be completely insensitive to her feelings and the social context of a situation that you would just sexually harrass any woman you want, I think that is not right either, but I do feel like we could live in a much better world if men are not shamed for their sexuality and are allowed and respected when they want to express their sexual feelings towards women, or towards other men too if they happen to be going down that route. Sensitive yet direct and honest.

Maybe I'll go deeper down the rabbit hole on that topic later on, but let's continue with what I still wanted to talk about right now.

Although I could still contact this girl that I texted by calling her on my other phone (so she also doesn't know I would be the same person), I think I'm going to let this one slip. I have another girl in mind who, although she lives a bit further, has quite attracted me with her advertisment.

I'll copy and paste and translate her advertisment, and I will restructure and edit it a bit because she is grammatically a bit messy and nor very eloquent in the way she writes. I'm going to leave it as a lin because the sort of language that is going to be used is... rather explicit. I feel like there's a small chance that moderators (or an auto-detection system) will not tolerate this kind of language and I may receive certain restrictions upon my account; Even though this journal is completely personal and it is written as a quote.

https://justpaste.it/2xhwt

 

So...

You may be wondering after reading this if I am the type of guy who is interested in SM (Sado-masochistic) kinds of stuff. Well... I've certainly had the fantasies about it me being the dominant one, and I even (but much less often) also had fantasies about me being the submissive one.

But although I certainly do feel like there's a part in me that enjoys Sm kind of stuff, I am not sure if I would be able to fully live up to that role, even if I were t put in a situation where I encounter a woman who is actively inviting me to take on such a role.

If I am not sure, then why am I so interested in her advertisement? Why not just take a girl who offers regular sex services, you may ask.

Well...

The reason is that after I had sent that last text message to that other prostitute or "woman of pleasure" I had talked about a bit back in my post, I reckoned that maybe it was a good idea to just seek out a girl who was very outspokenly submissive and receptive.

Now I don't know for sure that just because she seeks out to be a submissive girl in a SM-type of setting, that this automatically means she is very feminine and yielding and open and sensitive, which is what I'm actually looking for. I'm not sure if this is the case, but my mind lays the connection to a submissive woman being the same as a receptive, sweet, soft and in  particular inviting feminine woman, who is very happy to assist a man who is discovering his own sexuality.

Inviting is the keyword. In the sense that she literally invites me to cross certain boundaries in which I otherwise might just feel to insecure to cross. The idea thatif I were to be in a sexual setting with her, that she would not only by body language but perhaps also by using verbal cues or just directly asking me if I want to do certain things to her and her body.

I feel like I am capable of being both quite dominant as well as very intimate in a sensual way, but I feel very insecure about doing so if I am not absolutely sure that the woman who I am with is absolutely 100% on board with doing so.

That's why in that sex coaching session I was talking about, I wanted to make absolutely sure that my coach was 100% comfortable with me getting an erection during that massage by asking the question. 

Sometimes it happens in certain situations that I then receive a "yes" but it doesn't feel 100% convincing. That can be frustrating. but with her, it didn't feel that way.

I like to feel the same way with this prostitute: That whatever I want to do, that I am able to suggest it and that she can give her honest opinion on it, and then hopefully authentically say "yes" to it.

I envision my meeting with her to be one in which I express that I have certain insecurities, and that she is then able to comfort me and reassure me that whatever I want to do with her is totally okay. And that hopefully she even invites me on her own initiative to take it even further.

I may take on a dominant, perhaps even domineering role with her too. I don't know that yet. I haven't really been in a situation where it was clear that this is what the woman desired, so It's very hard for me to say if I can spark up this sort of role within me and feel authentic and comfortable with it.

What I don't like too much about her advertisment is that the way she expressed herself didn't seem very eloquent or intelligent. Hopefully that doesn't mean anything, and hopefully not expressing yourself as eloquent doesn't need to be the same as unintelligent. Though, even if she isn't very intelligent, maybe this won't be a problem after all, as maybe what I'm looking for in this particular context is just primarily an energetical connection and not a mental or spiritual one.

I'm gonna send her a message in which I will express what my situation is and what I desire from her, and we will see how it goes.

 

Edited December 12, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Decided to go with a new profile picture which people will actually be able to recognize me. Even though I'm a little bit uncomfortable with it, I want to come out of hiding and not be afraid as to how other people may judge me and perceive me, and actually just own up to who I am. And this of course includes putting up an actual picture of me in which I can be recognized. I feel like it's a step I want to be taking. If I do however second-guess myself at some point, I can always use the old picture again (or another picture, or this picture in negative)

Edited December 12, 2019 by Skanzi

[Skanzi]

Part 2 (still continuing to talk about events that happened december 11th, but now for a different topic)

So In the evening that day, I was going to once again revisit the guided band training course at my local culture center that happens every week. To clarify: It's not a committed band which has formed on its own who is doing shows and stuff, but it is part of a paid course in which the people who gather there together are rather random in the sense that whoever has signed up for this course is welcome. There is no 'audition' or anything like that. It's not meant to be an 'official' band. It is just practice for people who would perhaps want to eventually be in a real band.

I was already aware that the couple of weeks before it, it hadn't gone very well. I found in myself a lot of discomfort and resistance during the rehearsals. It does however help that there are two other singers besides me.

This time I wanted to prepare a little bit so I contemplated beforehand on how I wanted to be dealing with this situation may the resistance once again act up.

My best bet was to be very keen in not trying to prove myself, and to say "stop" to myself in my head would I feel the tempation. I also decided that if thing would get too uncomfortable, I could always retreat to the toilet in the building and gather myself there.

Before I went, I already tried to do some energy work on myself in relation to this topic by using these "stop" or "it's ok" autosuggestions.

Once I was there, I already quickly noticed that this bubble of resistance started acting up. I retreated myself and tried doing some energy work. Initially when I walked back into the room, it was quite fine. There was unexpect4edly the song "Last christmas" from wham which we were singing, and I could initially do the higher octave no problem.

But as time went on, this stuggle in my mind started to return again.

How can I describe it? It's like I feel very unsatisfied with staying in a lower range when I know I can go potentially higher, but I feel to insecure and nervous about going into the higher range, which at the same time also reflects back into my voice when i try to do that, making it feel really cringy to at least myself.

And the problem is also that there are quite a lot of songs in which going with the higher octave the entire song long is very challenging and pushing for my voice even if I were to just to sing it alone. And I am also becoming more sensitive to how the way  sing fits into the enviroment. If with some song I were to try actually sing and belt the higher octave, it would make my voice really big and loud, and I feel insecure about doing so as I don't want all the attention being put on me. And I also don't want to overshadowing my fellow other two vocalists.

But at the same time, staying in the lower octave range is frustrating and boring to me. For some reason, there is this strong urge to prove and to push myself and to challenge myself, whilst at the same time I'm way too insecure about doing that. And for some reason even though I'm quite insecure and anxious about singing false or even somewhat uncomfortable about belting loud and big even if I would sing with a clear voice, even though I have these insecurities and fears, I still try it anyway. But at the same time BECAUSE I have these insecurities and fears and I am coming from that place trying to prove to myself and others that I can do it, the exact thing which I'm fearing most (to sing false or not very clear) starts happening anyway, and it makes me feel very embarrassed and ashamed.

It's this tug of war within myself. It's not good if I go low, because it's too boring and I don't feel like I can give it a lot of energy, and it's also not good if I go high, as I carry a lot of shame of singing false, and even if I don't sing false or unclear or choked off it still doesn't feel good to me as I am not comfortable in overshadowing my fellow vocalists. I'm damned if I do, I'm damned if I don't, is what it feels like. To make matters worse, many of the songs that are selected aren't very suitable for the kind of low bass voice I have. To go the higher octave with many of these song feels once again too big, and to go the lower octave feels once again too boring. 

Not many songs seem to be appropriate for the kind of voice type I have. Or perhaps that's not true, but that's what I came to believe about it.

What to do with this dilemma? How do I resolve this struggle where neither going high or low feels good to me?

Let's examine this.

So if I am singing alone at home, i sometimes try to go really high just for fun, and I then don't really care so much about it if I sound false or choked off or whatever. After all, I know I'm pushing and challenging myself to a point which is outside my vocal comfort zone, so i am not surprised or embarrassed about it. I used to be embarrassed even singing on my own about singing false or having some form of lack of control over my voice in the past, but right now this isn't really a concern to me anymore.

But there are quite a couple of differences between me doing this at home, and me trying to sing in this.

- The first thing is that I'm not used to singing an entire song in one go. I'm used to singing different parts of the song. Whatever parts I happen to feel like singing at that moment. Singing an entire song long requires a lot more endurance than singing just parts of a certain song. For that reason, I can sing individual parts of a song often quite nicely in a higher octave, but if I try to do the entire song in that octave, it will just demand way too much from me. ESPECIALLY if we are going to sing multiple songs in a row. I don't get to pause either.

So that's the first thing

-  The second thing is that I don't get to choose if we want to transpose the song to half an octave higher/lower. I feel that for many songs doing that could really serve me, as that would allow me to reach the fine balance in which I can give the song enough energy, but not so much energy that I overshadow the other vocalists, or that it would take too much of a toll on my vocal endurance, as described in the paragraph above.

- The third and perhaps even most important thing is the fact that I'm just actually really insecure and self-conscious about the way i sound in such an environment. I care a lot about what other people think about the way i sing. I don't wanna sound bad ro false, but I don't wanna sound boring either. I am very insecure about singing false which prevents me from feeling the freedom to experiment in a higher range, but I also want to make other people feel that I can bring something interesting to the table, and that I can vocally match up/compete with to the other two vocalists.

The main thing which is giving me all these insecurities and resistances and dividedness is simply the fact that I am insecure and being too concerned about what other people think about the way i sing. I find it hard to relax and just sing carelessly, whether it sounds beautiful, boring, cringy, awkward, overly big or just perfectly neutral and normal. I keep having this insecurity.

The interesting thing is that I didn't have this insecurity to the degree that I have it now all the way through this band practice course that I am doing. It's only been since like a week of 4/5 that these insecurities started really acting up, but before that I was a bit more comfortable and careless. I remember that for the most I sang low, but I gave those lower notes much more grit and made them much more dynamic. I was much more comfortable just owning up to these lower notes and making the most of it. I also tried to sing higher a couple of times, and even though I didn't get it quite right all of the time, that also felt quite fine, as it somehow felt that experimentation seemed much more appropriate in these earlier singing classes. 

Why did I feel more comfortable experimenting with it back then? I think it's because I have the idea in my head that back in thos eearlier days, it felt still more normal and okay to be new and not know exactly who you are and what you're capable of as a singer, and therefore it felt better to make mistakes. But right now, as we've been going on for a while now, it now feels as if i'm simply supposed to 'get it'. Things are supposed to get more serious and I am supposed to prove myself and live up to certain expectations. This is what my mind tends to think about it. ESPECIALLY as we are working towards doing a show, which is sort of the end-goal for this course. I now really feel the pressure to live up to certain standards and expectations, which is starting to make me feel really insecure.

By the way, I think we have been going for about 13 weeks now (of which I missed the firsts two or so as I was late with signing up). There will be 16 in total.

I'll post this already and will write this further a little bit later. Feel like I have to do some energy work now.

Later edit:

So what am I supposed to do or understand about this?

I think the most essential thing is not so much about what actions I change, but what attitude I take with it.

You see, I had already tried practicing the songs and tried to be really scientific about where I should go high and where I should go low, and what I should change would I happen to start feeling more uncomfortable and stifled (which then I would try to sing lower for more parts of the song or the entirety of the song).

But none of this practice or these ideals really helped me much when I was once again in this class two days ago. The insecurities and resistances and such didn't really seem to leave me just because I had certain strategies in mind.

The basic thing I already intuitively have been knowing for this whole time, is that I have to JUST FUCKING LET IT GO.

This isn't really so complicated as I make it out to be. Just let the whole damn thing go. Go low if you want to go low, go high if you want to go high. If you feel resistance and insecurity against going high, then let that go and after you've let it go just do whatever. Just go high or just go low... Neither is very essential. neither choice cuts down to the core of the issue here, because the issue isn't so much about what I do, but how I feel about it.

And the same with if I would feel resistance against going low. First thing is to just let go this resistance, then decide —the not so relevant as it seems— option whether you want to go high or low.

Yeah I can practice the songs to see what is comfortable with my voice to do. i can study it and make certain plans and strategies. That's all fine. But the essential thing here is that I simply let go of the need to prove myself, the need to live up to certain standards, the need for other people to appreciate me or for them to think I'm a good singer or not... 

But that's really tough to do.

But even more than it would be tough to do... it just takes time. Maybe it's not even that super tough, but it just takes time.

I could write more about this right now but I think I'm just going to leave it with this for now.

Edited December 14, 2019 by Skanzi

[Nightwise]

I decided to continue on with this account from now on instead of the old "Skanzi". Why? simply because I like this username much more. For some reason this feels to be quite important to me, to have this username. I love the username "Nightwise" actually. You can see it as "wise through the night", but also as "the way of the night". Both of which are very true and applicable. Unfortunately (but understandably) you can not change usernames, so I made a new account instead.

I hope this won't be a problem to the actualized.org moderators. I have read the rules and I am aware that it is officially not allowed to use two accounts for one person, but at the same time I literally intend to stop using my old account from now on and use this one instead. i don't intend to use the two account interchangeably or intermittently. On top of that I will use my Skanzi signature to indicate that Nightwise will now be my new account from now on.

If you're a moderator reading this: If it's still not allowed, I would then really urge you to contact me first (preferably on this account) before you would block one of my accounts or something. But for the love of god, please don't delete any content or block both of my accounts. I think the chance of that actually happening is really slim, but I thought I would say it anyway.

My intentions are good with this. I hope you understand.

Edited December 15, 2019 by Nightwise

[Nightwise]

Well so my old account got banned. I took the risk and seemingly it indeed did have consequences. The moderator in question had seen that I wanted to use this account from now on so Skanzi got banned instead of this account. I was notified by a private message froma moderator on this account, who had told me that my other account was banned. Upon logging into that account, this indeed seemed to be the case. The message of "you have been banned" however takes priority ovet the interface in which you can choose to log in and log out (with another account), So what I had to do in order to log back into this account again was to delete all the data from google chrome from the past hour in order to get access to the login screen again.

How do I feel about that? Well... I feel it to be a bit unnecessary to have banned that account just because some forum guidelines say that it is not allowed to happen. I feel that one can look at the specific circumstances as to why someone decided to have two accounts as well, and look at the profile of the person to see if this person intends any harm with having two accounts. I estimated the chance of not facing any consequences because of it to be about 70% or so.

Well, to be honest, I kind of screwed myself over. I had put in a "manual signature" with this account when I made a post on the forum that said this: "This is a manual signature. My old account is named "Skanzi", and I am now intending to start using this account instead of the old account, as I like this username much more. i don't intend to use these two accounts interchangeably; Only this account from now on."

And I think because of this signature it was noticed and I got banned. I care much about transparancy and I find it important that people can know what my (previous) identity is/was, but as far as for the sake of trying to preserve my accounts from getting banned is concerned, this wasn't a smart move to make. I had better just shut up. Maybe my chance would have been around 70% to preserve both if I had never put up such a signature.

But I can put the blame on others and start acting like a victim, but at the same time it's a risk I took willingly and I have to put up and acknowledge the consequences of my actions, also knowing that I was fully aware that having two accounts was officially not allowed. I also understand that making exceptions as a moderator can make certain situations quite chaotic and disorganized. I understand the need for order and structure.

I'm not too devastated about it because at least my posts that I made on Skanzi were saved and preserved (though I had made a backup just to be sure). I can continue with my journal.

Edited December 16, 2019 by Nightwise

[Nightwise]

Monday December 16th

I'm sitting here and thinking about what I should be talking about. It's hard to pinpoint.

I feel a subtle pressure within me from the idea that something should change. At the same time it's like I find myself in a sort of hypnosis which I find hard to break out of. But I feel quite a bit of resistance against doing stuff and becoming proactive again. I can't rest yet I can't act either. That's how it feels.

The idea of acting, pursuing goals, making plans and putting in effort in creating a more disciplined, organized and structured lifestyle I now find in myself a certain unwillingness to pursue it before I really understand... how and for what I want to do that.

I stlll feel that to be important to me but it yet again seems so big and tedious in my mind.

What I want to be working towards right now, or rather, something I want to be doing or capable of in year or so is to be in a band, to participate in volunteer work, to overcome some obstacles on my OSRS account, to perhaps even stream and make video's with it, to work some hours in the week in order get handouts from my municipality, to have learned the guitar decently, to be going to the gym a bit more frequently (although perhaps I should contemplate as to why I want to do this), to have maybe a couple of songs finished and online, to have a better way to organize and structure my life together...

In a year time, I'd also like to have (a couple of) girl(s) that I'd be seeing on a regular basis that I could enjoy myself with in many different ways. 

Sexuality is something I'm dealing with quite a lot right now. But so far it's been pretty frustrating.

I'm actually trying to set myself up an encounter with a prostitute, actually.

Unlike before, I've actually been quite persistent in trying to get this handled, but so far I've not really had a reaction from anyone so far, even though I've tried to contact at least 5 girls.

Many of them who I like want you to call them instead of texting or whapping them. I don't like that. With texting, I get to think a lot about what I want to say so I get to ensure I don't miss out on anything, or that i express myself as precisely as possible. I don't like calling. Because I'm a little bit uncomfortable and nervous in such a situation I quickly can come across as talking quite monotonously and serious. On top of that, I feel uncomfortable with asking them all sort of questions about what would be available and whether they would like this or not. I can do this with texting much more easily.

But alas, I decided to just get myself over it and tried to call a couple of girls today.

But none of them have answered so far...

It's getting on my nerves. I've been trying this shit for almost a week now where I have tried to contact a girl amost every single day, and this day even more.

These lack of responses is bothering me. I have difficulty understanding why they are not answering me. With texting or whapping I could still look at what I'm writing or my profile that could potentially be a factor here. But if I'm calling with number recognition ON (I checked it), then why would they not be answering. Are they busy? Are they inactive at this moment? It bothers me.

I'm unusually determined, though. I feel like I wanna continue until I finally do get a proper response. I also want to put up an advertisment myself in which I describe myself and that I want a relationship with a girl who is open for learning and experimenting in the area of sexuality. I seek this kind of partner who isn't completely caught up in this sort of ego-mode way of relating to others in which there is a certain agenda behind it, a certain transaction or a certain business-like attitude.

To be fair, I also have a certain agenda. But simultaneously, I also seek something genuine and innocent. I seek fun and joy and love, and I want this to be mutual. I am doing it for me also, but not JUST for me. 

But I wonder how I find such a girl. A girl that wants to be authentic, who doesn't want to play games of greed, pride, jealousy or anything like that. Someone who wants to know what it is like to... truly get to know someone else. Does that make sense?

At the same time, I also find it important that it's a girl who despite maybe having a higher standard of integrity doesn't shy away from sex, and accepts sex as a natural and spontaneous facet of the relationship. In fact, because there is as of currently a lot of sexual energy within me that still wants to come out, I feel that sex should be primary in that relationship. It's just because I have such a high libido, such a high horniness-factor. That's why I don't really want to seek out normal girls on tinder or anything like that. I feel that sex should intially at least be primary.

But it should be sexual experimentation. It should not merely be to relieve one another. It should be to learn what sex is and what can be done with it, and what's possible with it. All the different games that you can play with it.

I want a promiscuous girl, yes. But also a girl that has a vision for something higher and better. A girl that isn't... dull. A girl that can resonate with me as far as her intelligence, her taste for spirituality, her innocence, her devotion to a life of higher values is concerned. A girl that is compassionate and understanding.

And these kind of attributes will also be reflected back in sex. 

I guess what I'm saying is that, yes, I do find sex as of now the most important thing. But at the same time, I find it important that sex has depth. And to have sex that has depth, you need a girl that has depth.

And of course, there is indeed also a lot of enjoyment to be had with her in moments that aren't directly related to sex. Yes... I am not denying that those moments don't matter as well. They do. And I can see myself enjoying them. Perhaps after the initial sexual steam has been taken off then perhaps the sex itself won't seem that much more important anymore than the things that happen not in sex. Who would say...

 

Another topic...

I start frustrating myself about the fact that I'm only up at night. It makes me feel... A lot more apathetic I suppose. You sort of get a bit... darker and denser if you stay up only in the darkness for a sustained period of time. I've tried changing it a couple of times, but it is really hard to change if I don't have anything to keep me active during the day in which I start getting sleepy. I am awake from 3 in the afternoon until 6 in the morning right now, and it's been like that for quite a while now. And with these days already being quite dark, I almost see no sunlight whatsoever.

But I feel like I would like to have just more daylight in my life right now. Like a walk in the daylight. And maybe also go to somewhere else for a change.

I feel like I want a reason to be more outdoors. And to be outdoors during the day.

Work and volunteer work seems fit for that, but this is just picking up sooo slowly. I had contacted a while back a center which i wanted to volunteer at, but for some reason the contact I had decided not to answer me anymore. Now I have signed myself up at another place. Luckily, they have contacted me, but for this too I have to wait.

And then for the work I am meant to do to get my handout from the municipality (I don't even know if that's the right definition or not. Just from the governance of my city who gives money to people who can't do normal work (just yet) but can already participate in society in other ways)... This is also just not picking up speed at all. i had expected that things would be happening right now, but the contact who would be in charge of these things happening has simply not letting me know anything in a while. I will send a mail again I guess...

Overall, I'm just a bit frustrated with things not working out that well or going way too slowly and that my efforts are not really producing their fruits yet. I want to challenge myself more and be more active, but it's rather difficult and I somehow keep bumping into obstacles or delays. It's rather frustrating. i wish things would just fall into place more easily.

I really do want to reset my sleeping schedule, though. So what I think I will do is to prolong my waking period by going to the swimming pool this morning and staying there for a number of hours. And maybe also take an extra walk or go somewhere else. Maybe that's also a good idea: Just to go somewhere else. Another city, another place... Just wander there a little bit. It may provide the inspiration for me to reflect better upon my situation right now and how I want to deal with it. Hopefully that will give a bit more clarity. I think it's the right step to be taking now.

I think I'm just going to take a walk right now. I feel a little bit hypnotized by my screen. Felt like this yesterday too. Like being sort of in a haze in which I don't really feel like i have a lot of clarity or space to be doing anything proactive.

Edited December 17, 2019 by Nightwise

[Nightwise]

Wednesday December 18th

Feel like I need to get into a topic which there is a certain time pressure for me to get into it.

Singing. 

A couple of days ago I said that after my quite unpleasant singing session I really wanted to have figured out or resolved my way to deal with it for the next time, which will be later today in this evening.

I've realized over the past couple of days that perhaps I don't really want to fully express myself and show all that I got.

Maybe I'm just too insecure and uncomfortable about it. And maybe it's okay to be that way as well.

I have realized also that perhaps it is okay to be triggered during this band practice course.

To be triggered means that there is an opportunity for something to be processed.

Considering the total course of 16 lessons only costs around 190€ or so (I had 10% discount), it's just a very cheap way to be able to get exposed to a situation in which i get triggered.

Why avoid being triggered? What's the harm in being triggered?

Even if I had done nothing but energy work and contemplation on this topic of singing during the past week, there still wouldn't have been any guarantees that I would have been able to avoid getting triggered altogether.

And if I had not done this course, there would have been every possibility that this trigger would have stayed dormant within me because I wouldn't have been confronted with anything that could have triggered it, and the it may have gotten triggered almost inevitably much later, and perhaps in a situation where there would have been a lot more at stake.

So yeah. I may get triggered, but at the very least it's a fairly safe environment to get triggered in.

I feel a little bit of guilt also that I hadn't addressed this trigger much more during the past week.

I wanted to yesterday, but I found myself in a situation in which I felt a great amount of resistance towards practiciing the song so I could get triggered.

But to be fair, I did get triggered regardless and also did some work on that trigger.

I feel that giving too much time and emphasis on this trigger may create the idea in your mind that this trigger is some kind of enemy that cannot be allowed to be in your psychological system. That it would be something that would have to go.

Maybe a bigger danger here is to get triggered by the trigger. To create resistance towards the resistance.

I'd say let's put te emphasis on that: If I get triggered, fine. But I want to be very alert and careful that I don't create a whole lot of drama and fuss within myself because I would be angry or frustrated by the fact that I were to be triggered.

On top of that, I need to remind myself why I get triggered in the first place.

Part of it is because I am uncomfortable with the idea of fully expressing myself. I would even go as far as saying that I'm not ready for it.

If I can acknowledge to myself that perhaps I am not ready to fully show everything that I have got, then maybe this would bring about a feeling of acceptance towards the idea of trying to reach the higher notes, or even towards the idea of trying hard to sing good or practice a lot at all.

Then I would go to that singing course just to fool around a little bit, and to allow myself to get triggered so I can have something to process.

I think those may be the most important reminders: To stay alert that I don't get triggered that I don't get triggered, and to be aware of the fact that I don't feel that I am ready to fully express myself to begin with, which makes it okay to hold myself back, and to just take the low notes.

Anyway, I feel triggered . Time to do some energy work.

 

[Nightwise]

Part 2 I guess

3 things happened today. The topic on singing I'll come back to at the end.

What happened first today was that I had another appointment with my new sex-coach (although she's been more of a sensual masseuse than a coach)

Our meeting was more or less a repitition of the first meeting. The massage got a bit more heated. I did get a firm erection this time around, and she a couple of times touched or massaged a couple of spots around my genital region that rekindled the sexual energy that made my semi-erect penis again more erect and stiff. I also liked it when she massaged my front body with both her hands and arms. That also made me feel quite aroused. She did however at no point give me an actual handjob

I notice that I'm a bit more self-conscious now about typing this than I felt last time when I talked about sex. My face is now actually visible on my profile picture, so my identity is not hidden anymore (though I doubt hardly anyone actually knows me in real-life). However, last time I typed about this I think I had already updated my profile picture to what it is now, so I don't think nothing has really changed too much, yet somehow I now find myself being a bit more self-conscious and uncomfortable about it.

But even though I feel that way a bit more, I really do value being able to express myself fully uncensored and wth very descriptive and detailed language, so I will continue along the same lines as I have been.

So that was once again an intersting meeting with my sex-coach.

But... even though that was nice and all, I still feel like I am missing a possibility for conversation about everything that's going on in my system that is sex-related. I thought what had happened last meeting was just a sort of introduction to get me continue going to her sessions. I had not expected that I would be faced with almost the same situation again.

Yes, I also had the assignment of staying alert to the sensations and/or breath, which I did still definitely give value to, but that and the massage alone felt to me to be as... insufficient; As pleasant as the massage may have been. I also wanted to have an open-hearted conversation about my sexuality for some time.

Really, I wanted both. Both the massage and a conversation.

I'll address this to her if she happens to do it this way again the next meeting.

But if I had to choose, if I could only have one or the other, I think I still would choose for the massage. I really do like the fact that she's not a convention sex therapist who ONLY talks about sex but at the same time does not give you some sort of means to experience your sexuality directly.

I must admit I am starting to fantasize about actually having sex with my sex-coach. I doubt she would be willing to take it that far, though. But it does cater to a very appealing fantasy.

"MILF sex-coach teaches younger guy about sex by example"

Ha! I've seen too much porn...

Still the fantasy lingers that she may be willing to give her clients the ultimate satisfaction of her coaching by utilizing her own body as a tool for teaching. I definitely like that fantasy. That she is willing to undress in the upcoming sessions where I can experiment with her body in differnent ways such as stroking, touching, kissing and even penetrating; that she would teach me what intimacy is like by showing it.

I think the chance is very small that that would happen. I do however see myself at some point actually expressing this fantasy towards her. I hope that she at the very least shows understanding, compassion and (total) acceptance towards those feelings, that she can make me feel that it is totally okay and natural to feel that way towards her, and of course I somewhere also secretly hope that she will actually like and be flattered by the proposal, and my ultimate hope is that she actually will agree to it.

I don't think that is going to happen, but a man can always dream, right?  

I also have something women that are a bit older. Let's say the age range from 35-60. I think what I like about older women is that they are a bit more seasoned and matured. These young women often don't really have a lot of respect and integrity, is something I've noticed. Well, maybe that has to do with the fact that I have been searching for escort and prostitutes. When trying to make an appointment with them, they tend to be sometimes quite inconsiderate or unresponsive. Just the other day I had a girl tell me that she would be available for the rest of the day, so i contacted her through whatsapp and tried to make an appointment, and the girl simply didn't respond anymore after she had said that she would be free. It created all these expectations for me that were never met, and that is frustrating. I gve a lot of time and energy to her because of what she said and she simply disappears into thin air.

Physically attractive or not, I don't want to associate myself with girls with that kind of behaviour. I don't respect girls like that.

It just really grinds my gears in general when people don't respond to my messages in general when it's a question or proposal. It's one of the things that annoys me most about other people sometimes. Just their sheer lack of attention or consideration towards me. And behind whatsapp it's easy, because you don't have to face the person. You don't have to tell the person that you're not interested or that you have something other going on. 

I don't mind a person rejecting me or denying me as much as I mind a person blatantly ignoring me. In fact, rejecting me but being direct and honest about it, I can respect that. Such a person at least doesn't leave me hanging in this place of insecurity where I don't know what to except from her(/him) anymore. At least the case will be closed in many cases if the person is just directly honest about it.

Same for the woman who is my contact person for the place I want to volunteer at. That woman just really pisses me off. She was already someone who was rather unresponsive and slow to begin with, you had to really push to get a good answer, but after I made a stupid mistake and missed our first scheduled appointment, she totally refused to contact me anymore after I apologized and made the proposal to make a new appointment. This volunteering position felt to be pretty important to me, and she just wouldn't get back to me. I would have been more easier for my mind to bear if she just had said that she didn't want me to be a volunteer anymore because I fucked up by missing that appointment. Admittedly, I still would feel like that would have been unjust, as it was a genuine mistake, so perhaps I wouldn't have been able to let it go completely (also considering the fact that I just really wanted to go there), but it would at least have been a lot more respectful and better.

Such a lack of correspondence I felt to be totally not in the spirit of the services they were providing, which was to have conversations with people about life's questions. You may hope that someone who is having conversations with people about the essential questions of life, that such a person also has a degree of intergrity and respect.

Just answer me. I care so much more about getting a reply at all than I care about getting a negative reply.

But I have to be fair: There are instances in which I myself don't really want to reply to another person. One example is when my aunt congratulated me with my birthday three days ago, and asked me how I was doing. For some reason, I feel a lot of resistance against answering such a question, so I tend not to respond at all. It's also with a good friend of my parents, who also congratulated me. I also didn't really want to respond to that, because I never know what to say at such moments.

I realize also that I don't just wanna only point fingers to others and blame others for their misbehaviours or less-than-courteous behaviours. I won't get that far with constantly blaming other people for their shortcomings and not taking responsibility for my own feelings in this matter. Because ultimately, whether justified or not, these felings of anger and frustration still are my feelings, and these are not feelings that are given to me by others. The potential for anger was already inside of me, and other people simply triggered it. But it was already there a bit more deeper in the unconscious.

So I realize that also. i can't just keep blaming people and be angry at them. I do have to take responsibility here and transform my own emotions, instead of thinking that other people should change. And I also want to look at where perhaps these behavours that 'm being angry at other people for, where these kind of behaviours would also be in myself.

Part 3 I guess

In the afternoon I had a walk planned with an old friend/acquaintance of mine. 

This was a little bit of an uncomfortable move for me. After all, I have barely been socializing at all for the past couple of years, and I had never really been good at it.

But the walk went surprisingly well. We actually had pretty good conversations that flowed pretty well, and on many topics we happened to be on the same line. He's also quite an open-minded guy.

What I found interesting is that I found myself capable of just listening without actually even trying to listen. That was something new for me: I don't think that ever before for such sustained period of time I was capable of just listening to a person and asking questions that were relevant out of sheer interest. The funny thing is that I wasn't even really aware that I was actually being a very good listener until I reflected upn the walk in hindsight. It all went so spontaneously and effortlessly, that it seemed like the most normal thing in the world. But when I think back about it, I'm not sure if for my situation it would be very normal to pay interest to another human being as much as for as long as I did.

I also didn't get triggered by random things during the walk or I didn't encounter energetical blockages or states of dividedness within myself or anything like that.

It's nice to actually have suddenly and almost out-of-the-blue myself being capable of being a good listener and a good communicator and even someone who was capable of forming somewhat of a bond. I've never really had that capacity to that extent ever before, I think. Seems like a good sign, although I know I must be aware that there can be a backlash always.

Part 4 I guess

Part 4 will be about singing. Somewhat before I started to go to this band practice course I had written my previous entry in my journal. So this part 4 comes back to what I had written in what you could call "Part 1 I guess".

So as I arrived at the location and the course started, initially things were still quite fine. Our teacher actually wanted us to play some christmas songs. That was quite okay at first.

But at some point, the trigger just went off. I think it was at a point where it was hard to decide whether I wanted to go low or high. At that point, the trigger really went hard on me.

I retreated with the excuse of going to the toilet, as I have done more often in such situations, and wanted to gather myself.

Upon my arrival, initially I felt okay again. At some point I started to get a little bit triggered again, and I was about to get really frustrated again at the whole thing, until finally a good strategy or insight on how to deal with it arose within me.

Basically, the reminder for myself was to stay very focused on the present moment; To not have any thought whatsoever about 'how I'm gonna do that one part later on this song, whether i'm gonna go low or high'.

No, just stay purely focused on the present moment and keep your attention on what is right here, right now. Don't even think a second ahead about what is going to happen, and stay really, REALLY focused on what's happening right now.

That I found to be the best possible strategy or insight or reminder or whatever your want to call it, in order to deal with this situation. Perhaps this whole situation required no strategy whatsoever other than strategy in which there are no other strategies to be had, which is to stay in the present moment and not think about anything else whatsoever.

That's a way to get back to spontaneity. I knew I had lost contact with my spontaneity and with the flow-state, but I didn't know how to get back to it and let it all go. This notion of just forgetting about it all and just resting your attention acutely on the right here, right now, might just be the way out of all these forms of resistance and division, and into the spontaneity and flow of the song.

Edited December 20, 2019 by Nightwise