LastThursday

Of course you will. It is if you've got no charisma or personality or nothing going for you. It's more a game of being in the right place at the right time. Increase your chances by being more social, going out, and improving yourself overall. Most importantly seizing the opportunity when it arises, most times you only get one chance to strike! You'll be friendzoned if you don't take the initiative quickly. Yes. Is there someone for everyone? No. The pool of potentials can be too small for many many reasons. In my case, I find most women lacklustre, fickle, dumb and they hurt my head, and I also don't put in the effort. But, they're still fun. (Boy if the women in my life heard me say this they'd crucify me, long live anonymity.)

Majorly procrastinating today. I have zero interest in doing work. Just want to listen to music, potter around, walk, talk. Anyway, occasional poetry, ha! Inspiration from on old cassette tape I found: Barely a woman, I fell in love, With a man from heaven, He spoke sweetly, Said he would meet me, Said he would call me, Sometime, somewhere. Barely a woman, I fell in love, I couldn't care even, Called him weekly, Said he would court me, Said he would marry me, Someplace, somewhen. Hope, hope, hope. Barely a woman, I fell in love, Said I would leave him! Why wouldn't he meet me? Said he's just friendly, Said he'd married already, Yesterday, yesterday.

Class. Reminds me of somewhere I've been to... nope it's gone.

Killing time, slowly and quickly. Floating above and on. Seeing everything, and nothing. Living with purpose and aimlessly. It's funny really. The body lives with purpose and forces that upon our other self. This other self works completely differently, it's not innately anything and so is constructed out of nothing, like a sand castle. Try as it might this other self cannot overcome the body, it needs sleep, it needs food, it gets ill, it gets old and fragile, it needs warmth, it needs to be used, it gets tired, it needs to reproduce. The other self is in complete thrall to body. The other self, can be so blind that it doesn't know why it feels bad, but the body always knows. The other self tries to subdue and control and modify the body to its own ends, and those ends of other selves. It's mostly in vain. Should the sand castle be kicked over and exposed for what it is? This self says no, it has an iron grip on its own existence. Instead it likes to get lost in itself and weave ever more complex threads into its fabric just so that it can justify itself: but it's always just a butler, a gardener, a major domo to the body's whims. When the body dies, all those machinations were for naught.

Don't underestimate the effect of flying on your health (or travel in general). Being in close proximity to a few hundred people in an enclosed space will increase your chances of getting sick. Many times I've got sick after flying, and I hardly ever get ill myself. Also look at potential vitamin deficiency, especially vitamin D in more northerly latitudes and in winter. Maintaining a base level of fitness (i.e. exercising regularly), will help a lot against getting ill.

Two things spring to mind. Eternity requires existence. Is eternity enough to permute an infinite number of things? If there are only a finite number of things to permute, then clearly only a finite number of scenarios can play out.

The fine tuning arises because of Unity. If Unity is a cake then it's whole. If you cut the cake in half, it doesn't seem so amazing that the two halves fit together, right? even though the two halves are different from each other. So it is with reality, it's like a cake with an infinite number of cuts. From that point of view it isn't surprising that there are so many happy coincidences and so many bits fit together so well. If we could work out where/what every single cut was, then it would seem a lot less like fine tuning.

Interesting stuff. From my understanding the guy's created some sort of new polymer that goes in the soil under the plant. The polymer soaks up free electrons created during photosynthesis and turns it into electricity. My engineering brain thinks it's too good to be true though. Firstly, nature isn't generally wasteful, so energy in the form of free electrons shouldn't be there, and if they are then they'll be used for some other biological process: i.e. you're stealing energy away from the plants. Secondly, it's very easy to create a battery nearly out of nothing (think potato battery using some metal strips). It could be the polymer is simply acting like the metal strips in the potato and creating a battery. In that case the energy isn't coming from the plant at all, but simply the breakdown of the soil and the polymer: so like a battery all the energy will be used up eventually. You never get something for nothing. Lastly, what's the cost of this polymer and what's the environmental cost of producing it?

@Flowerfaeiry it seems like you're looking for certainty (or Truth) and wanting to be guided by others into it. Largely truth as most people have it is in beliefs, hope and faith. The fact that you're undecided yourself shows that those three things can change over time, and so are not an absolute kind of truth, but just a temporary stepping stone and that's ok. Other people are just imperfect mirrors of truth and not the source of it. I'd say your direct experiences with Ayahuasca are closer to truth, although I'm just guessing. Truth often hides in plain sight, and sometimes it reveals itself directly to you, you just have to prepare the way and be receptive and patient.

I've come to realise that even when I'm dreaming (asleep) I'm still me. It is the same me as from waking life in the dream. This is curious as my dreamscapes are not a carbon copy of waking life. What I dream doesn't match, but who I am when I dream does. There is a strong sense of continuity there from sleeping to waking. Whenever I awake however, at some point it's like a switch is thrown and waking life comes flooding in: all the concerns minor and major and I realise I'm back "here". So in that sense some part of me is lost or inactive when I'm dreaming. But I'm still often embodied in dreams, albeit occasionally with another person's body (or anatomy!). That isn't to say that my dreams are not sensible, in that they mimic waking life, populated with characters and places and generally not fantastical in appearance, just fantastical situationally: walking in railway tunnels or hovering or hanging off a balcony ledge or exploring brooding rooms. I often wish I could switch off that part of me that switches on when I wake up. I do remember being a child and feeling much more like I do in my dreams; there isn't a running commentary and anxiety about every little thing, I just was, and integrated into my surroundings, rather than being a separate thing that doesn't quite fit, or at least has to work at fitting into my existence. It's that integrated seamlessness that I experience in dreams that I want permanently when I'm awake. A kind of non-fragmented unity, a sense that I belong in waking life and everything "just works". There are of course moments when this does happen, in social situations, or when drunk, or walking or driving, where time and inhibition disappear and I become one with my environment, but even then there is still contrivance and effort involved. Being that I at some time transitioned from being permanently in a dreamlike reality when I was a child, to the state I experience now, I wonder what it was that triggered the change? Did I really "wake up" when I hit puberty, or did I just become fractured and divorced from the comfort of "the waking dream"? I have successively woken up more times since then, and into my current state, each time having more clarity and seeing further. But, each time I somehow got pushed farther away from whatever it was I am actually supposed to be. Now I can't get back there easily, I have to sleep and go into another world entirely. So it looks like I will have to keep awakening just so that I can live a dream. What a merry-go-round.

Thanks! It's a mix of symbology and AI. It's a symbol of potential rebirth. Or possibly a symbol that I could crack at any moment. Probably the latter.

@Juns Everything is real because, as you say, it's all consciousness. But. Imagine you walk past a restaurant, and displayed on a table outside is a beautiful huge freshly made pizza. It looks so good with the cheese perfectly melted on the tomato base. You go up to it and then realise it's made of plastic (this has happened to me in Japan, but there it was noodles). Was the pizza real? This shows that a "pizza" is a thing of the imagination, a concept. The direct experience of a pizza is actually the red of the tomato, the yellow of the cheese, the smell of the bread - and you choose to call that combination of experiences a pizza.

Why not just call it what it is?: sharing. It's the primary way people bond. By opening up you also encourage others to open up and we can help each other out and become less like strangers. But bear in mind that sharing difficult things could be hard for others to handle especially if they're inexperienced: it involves a certain level of commitment others may not want to get into. You have to be able to discern if someone is "ready" to hear what you have to say, and to not get emotionally triggered if they're not interested. If you're not good at that, then be wary of sharing. I'd say sharing on the internet is far far different from sharing with close friends and family however. The audience is much larger and the range of responses you'll get much wider - so it's more difficult to work out what is good and useful advice. And if you don't get much of a response, you may feel downhearted that nobody cares about what you care about. What's also lost on the internet is context. People who know you directly have access to your circumstances and history. We on the internet have none of that, so it's much harder to give you relevant advice. On the flip-side we don't have an emotional attachment or an axe to grind, so we might be more detached and objective, and we might notice things you don't. Also, if you're not reasonable at language (on a forum say), it may be difficult for people to understand your problems. It's certainly possible to make an identity out of trauma, as a way to make people love you or notice you. I'd say that trauma can be extremely difficult to resolve and a lot of the time it's nearly impossible to do without some outside intervention of some sort - just discussing and thinking doesn't help that much - going on a forum may not be best way to resolve trauma. But, it depends greatly on what the trauma was and your response to it. Trauma is often very visceral and ingrained as part of your makeup.

It's about contrast. If you're just like everyone else, then you won't be noticed. But if you're unique then you'll stand out. Why stand out though? Simple, to get attention. Why get attention? Simple, to feel loved. Thing is, to get attention you have to be unique in very narrow ways, to the detriment of all your other qualities. The reality is that every single one of us is unique in an infinite number of ways: and we should love everyone for their unique mix of qualities.

It's unfortunate, but I have no answer. My instinct is to go meta, but I wouldn't know what that was exactly. Maybe start by asking: "Am I truly a nihilist or do I just like scaring myself?". Maybe look for an absolute that you can rely on: the experience of existing or consciousness itself - but that doesn't give much to hold on to. And life isn't as bleak as floating in the ocean, there is actually a lot of stuff to get lost in and distracted with (i.e. kicking is more fun than drowning).

@rachMiel by your own definition, Nihilism is complete relativity. The despair comes out of naively believing in absolutes and then through some process having to reject all absolutes, it's a form of grief. Then comes the realisation: how does anything get built, if there is no base to start from? Or the flipside: there's all this stuff, but it's completely arbitrary and absurd. It's like treading water in the ocean, you're only held up as long as you keep kicking - and whether you stop or not, it's despair both ways.

I suppose an absolute is a truth that is unchanging and eternal, everything else is finite and relative. An absolute isn't relative because nothing can affect it. So to know an absolute, you must know with certainty that it is unchanging and eternal. But how can you know something is eternal without experiencing its entirety? How can you know an absolute never changes, again, without waiting for it to change? If you do anything else it's blind faith. No, we only ever experience relativity.

@caspex I think you can pick out nuggets of truth from nearly anything, but I wouldn't rely solely on Chess to give you everything. Some things Chess has highlighted for me and it's relation to living life: Positional blindness. Many times you feel stuck and can't see a way out. But actually you're not seeing the bigger picture and looking at ALL the pieces. There is nearly always a move that can be made - as in life. Being pinned. Whatever you do you will lose a piece. In some life situations, whatever you do, things will get worse. You have a great move, your opponent finds a better counter move. No matter how good you are, there will always be someone better, cleverer, more skilled. The grind of mastery. You play and play and make progress, then slide back all the way and it's soul destroying, yet you go on. You can only really get better by studying chess hard. Yes you can just play and improve, but it'll be a slow slog and you may cap out at a certain rating. As in life, sometimes study and being instructed will supercharge you. That's it.

@rachMiel I can't help but think that it's a hopeless endeavour (for me personally). Is a story ever truth? A particular truth is absolute because if it ever changes then it wasn't truth (or it was finite relative truth only). So you seek absolute truth, but use a relative tool to do it: storytelling. And if you don't seek absolute truth, then any relative truth will do and you can collect them like butterflies. If you allow in absolutes then Nihilism sort of becomes redundant. Groundhog day is an excellent film BTW. In the film the situation doesn't change, but just Bill Murray's (emotional/rational) reaction to it. He gets to escape the loop, but I don't think we have that option IRL, the absurdity continues, changing our reaction to it only makes it more bearable.

@rachMiel there's danger of circularity in what you believe. You know you're telling yourself a story, but seemingly you can't escape it? OR: You want to believe (the story of nihilism), but you can't bring yourself to do it?

More background music

A bit of background music (that's not me!).

I'm a closet perfectionist - I confess. If asked most of my acquaintences would say I was not, and may even say that I'm the opposite: anything goes. I suspect we all have an inner rocky core surrounded by a soft atmosphere of maturity and sensible experience. I've worked hard to be an anti-perfectionist. But I still feel that twinge of pain when I lose, when things don't go my way, and when reality doesn't match idealistic expectation. There are many things I want to be perfect at, I want to play the piano like an angel, I want to use perfect words to gain admiration, to be the best in my field of technology, to be unified, whole, unbroken and a perfect example to others. I'm none of those things. A few years ago I watched a program about the concept of Wabi-Sabi and it clicked that my self-enforced anti-perfectionism was just this. Wikipedia says it's: "a world view centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection". It started of as a way to ameliorate the pain of imperfection and being less than, somehow I would just pretend that the pain didn't matter. In the end it became the counterweight to my perfectionism, and it's given me a kind of freedom of expression and abandonment that I wouldn't have otherwise experienced. But the soft blanket of Wabi-Sabi still hasn't seeped deeply into my rocky core, that would be the ultimate perfection. Still. There are moments of unforced perfection. Those moments when someone allowed me to kiss them sweetly, when I played Bach without a hitch, when I didn't worry about myself, when the rain fell but the sun shone. I savour those moments. I'll continue to balance myself on the tightrope between perfection and imperfection and hope I don't fall.

Not at all, in fact in can become easier to learn new skills and take on knowledge. That's because you build on the things you learnt before. Cognitive decline only really happens much later, say past 60 if it happens at all: there's a great many factors including diet and exercise, disease and using your brain in general. What does reduce as you get older is time. You have a great many more responsibilities and your attention is spread over many more different things. This can make it exponentially harder to take on new skills or learn new things. So most people end up doing this through employment as that's really the only place you can have solid blocks of time to build up skills.