LastThursday

A cute video about AI, written entirely by AI: I love the first husband joke.

@Emerald I am always impressed by your contributions and your level headed approach and plain speaking, despite being buffeted around by others. I get your sentiment that this isn't a good space for women, and yet it's even less so without the women being here. Pop in occasionally and say hi!

Nah, Leo is the only true human on the forum. The rest of us are AI talking to itself.

@PolyPeter I sometimes think that one way of improving the quality of the forum would be to have a minimum word limit. There would be uproar, but that uproar would need to be said in 50 words or more.

@Emotionalmosquito you're being overly dramatic. The bottom line is, you don't know what's going to happen. It's a law of nature that women have other interests don't sweat it, you're not competing, you're inviting her to you. You've shown you're interested, if she reciprocates then good you can continue.

Today I will try and work more on the physical side of things in The Process (it should be in big flashing red lights). So far everything has been about my psyche and the more psychological side of things: my internal state affects my behaviour and physiology. There are some physical bodily things that I would like to clear, and so today is the day. I am more sceptical about this the psyche is more malleable than material reality. Although, I've always been of the opinion that you don't know until you try, my mind is open. I'll continue in the same vein that I have been. This Death phase has been a lot less intense than the Consolidation phase and somewhat more scrappy and disorganised - there is something to be said for planning. Saying that this more right-brained way of doing things is less to do with organisation and more to do with story and narrative. Plenty of things have come up for the next phase of Opening, so I may try and organise my thoughts prior so I can be a bit more focussed in that phase, just a general framework. I feel that the Consolidation phase was more powerful for having been a bit more organised. The overarching theme of the whole thing is to propel myself out of this rut I find myself in. I realise the real stumbling block is my own negative ideation and blockages accumulated over time. It's been very useful if nothing else to critically look at myself rather than my usual approach of intuition and feeling, I have been my own therapist.

Life is full of death. There is more than one way to die. Kill what no longer feeds you, give life to what does.

Sometimes there is the thought: what next? You believe you have to lead and take responsibility, maybe that's scary. Maybe you believe that you have to give something back, but what? Receiving isn't free.

I'm feeling somewhat more chipper today, which is pleasant, unlike the weather which is not. Autumn can go do one. My friend R is excited about finally getting his idea off the ground. His website is live and he's sending out high school maths questions via email. He's got some sort of subscription service going. It's taken him about a month of work on his part, which is actually pretty good going, he's excited about it. I continue to work on my app, but in my typical style I'm very stop start about it. I've always worked in spurts, my brain just isn't designed to stay on one thing for weeks on end. Saying that the app itself is not far off, another few days of concerted effort. But I have to jump through Google Play's ridiculous hurdles. The app's website is also nearly done, since GP require that you have a privacy policy on a website (FFS). I also need to get twelve testers for my app that will open it daily for 14 days straight. That is quite a tall order since particularly it's a UK based hiking app and I don't know 12 people with Android phones. However, there are services (paid) for that sort of thing. However, I'm unemployed and loath to spend any more than I have to. My friend P is also working on a project! He's a board game fanatic, and is designing a brand new game with many intricate parts to it. I and R keep goading him to let us play his damn game, but he just keeps saying "It's not ready yet" lol. It would be excellent if he can finish it and get at least a professional working prototype made up - and so that we can play it. He intends to release it commercially. No doubt he'll need a website.

This is a very common thing: I'm unworthy of attention, unworthy of love, embarrassed by people liking us, feeling awkward about receiving, disbelief that someone says nice things about you, and so on. There is an answer, and that's to just accept what others give you without judgement, even if you don't feel comfortable with it. The other part is to give freely to others yourself and learn to understand what it means.

I carry on working on The Process daily. I entered the Death phase on Friday and there was a certain intensity to it. The weekend I kind of felt deflated and hollow, like all that energy had got to head and then vanished. The character of the work changed completely on the Saturday too. This phase is more about protecting and clearing a path for myself. I'm feeling a mix of emotions, excitement, sadness, scepticism. Something has definitely shifted but I'm going to let it sit until it resolves itself.

I'd use the word "beautiful" in all its aspects. Who doesn't want beauty in their lives? Variety is also good, platonic as well as romantic. Don't regret anything you put out, it was your energy at the time. Just because you're different later doesn't negate your earlier self even if it makes you cringe now. Good luck.

@Someone here everyone's different, why not just accept who they are? To me I see it as a matter of personal style, neither here nor there, if Leo doesn't want to engage in person so what? - he provides value in other ways. I suspect there are many members here having parasocial relationships with Leo and there's a strong need or want for that personal touch to make that relationship "real", I personally would be naturally be very wary of that sort of thing. But as @Joseph Maynor says there is nothing stopping the more extrovert gregarious members getting together. You'd still get value from it.

@Zenterus just set boundaries with yourself. Friends are friends and lovers are lovers. I've had many instances where I could have escalated with female friends, but consciously chose not to. Sometimes keeping a certain platonic dynamic in a group is preferable. You or they may continue to have chemistry, maybe you even flirt, but you both understand the situation and don't escalate.

@Someone here I understood you full well. I don't profess to know Leo's feelings in the slightest, he can correct me if I'm off base. By "conflicted" I meant he himself setting up and participating in Zoom calls and nothing to do with ex member Nahm. He's been at it a long time, and not once has he seriously entertained the idea of meeting folks in person, I just don't see the impetus there, in fact I sense a reluctance. Maybe it's his temperament or maybe he's concerned about other things. I would say Zoom calls are a limited means of gaining improved knowledge if that's what you're after. Pragmatically you could only get about ten people on a call at a time, before it becomes unmanageable. And if it's not going to degenerate into just chit chat, then it needs to be structured, which requires some prior organisation; maybe a topic to talk about, or for callers to line up questions beforehand. It could work if done well, but it would be limited. On the plus side it would improve the forum (if that's the goal) if at least a few of the more regular members got to know each other in person (so to speak). It would reduce the more dick-waving style in the forum, and maybe make people think more clearly before posting - it's harder to behave badly when you've met the person you're trolling or being angry at. I too would like to see the forum improved - I've been here a while - but it's the same with anything, anything could be improved. If you're serious go join a monastery or go study with a master or whatever, a forum isn't going to get you what you want, there's too much member churn and rookie energy to make quality stick.

@Etherial Cat I instantly recognised the map on the iPad in the video as the 1746 John Rocque map of London - showing the Whitechapel Road area. I then realised I need to get a life. Free the birds!

@oOo if we ever decode meaningful language abilities in other animals, dolphins are where it's at. Although, possibly whales too but they're harder to work with. Bottlenose dolphins have names for each other. Saying that songbirds also share the same FOXP2 gene as humans, so there's potential there too. I'm secretly hoping we'll talk to crows one day, but I'm not holding my breath - we can have our favourites though. God has spoken and I have listened. Dolphins.

This is a profound insight. Not so much the positive/negative energy thing, but that symmetry can be broken, and the pieces of the breakage come together to make a whole - a balance if you like. In fact here is a proof of Pythagoras' Theorem by exactly the same principle. The diagram speaks for itself (eventually): It's the same principle behind consciousness itself. There are no gaps in consciousness precisely because the parts fits together exactly to make the whole - consciousness is perfectly balanced. It's the same metaphor for the Yin Yang symbol (太極圖).

@Someone here my tea leaves tell me that @Leo Gura is conflicted on the issue. Some are gregarious types, some are not. It doesn't stop you though from getting the ball rolling with members and then inviting Leo along once things are established. Just a thought.

¡Dios mío, habla!

Yeah. It's like a buzzy mosquito that doesn't leave you alone. If you ever learn how to squash it, let me know!

That made me laugh I don't have children no. I think my mindset and approach changed over time. My take on it is that neuroticism is either fear based or lack-of-control based. I had a lot of (social) anxiety, basically fear, because I believed I could not control situations I would find myself in. The penny dropped eventually that actually, I was ok in nearly all situations. I also practised shutting my inner dialogue off for many years, which also helped with rumination. I still often ruminate about things I have said or done which might be misinterpreted, but it doesn't stop me acting so much as before - I'm still working on it. That's pretty normal in my opinion. A heavier weight needs a harder or longer push. And often lasting change is more staccato than smooth.

I'd see it slightly differently. The real evil here is comparison not selfishness as such. We naturally compare ourselves to our peers, because that's the group we have most in common with, and how we measure our success. But it's not reasonable for a group of people to be identical, some will always be more advanced and some less so. This is what creates the friction. And from comparison comes judgement about ourselves and others and where we stand within the group. Some will take the comparison and judgement and push themselves to improve their standing, some will moan and feel dejected and may even give up.

@Judy2 I'll take the question literally. My level of openness (to experience) I'd say has gradually increased over time. Mostly out of greater discernment with age: people can be put off by too much openness, knowing how to be open is important. And, confidence: I allow myself to be open without fear now. I'd say I've become more evenly balanced in my introversion/extroversion, I was a super introverted teenager for example. Now I can tolerate and actually enjoy long periods with people. I have become far less neurotic with time. I was an anxious and ruminating wreck for most of my life. Although, this is something I actively worked on, and I cracked it in my late 30s. I'm still a little neurotic, but continue working on it. I have become slightly less agreeable with time. I don't try and please people so much. I'm much more likely to be spiky or grumpy at times than I was say in my 20's. Sometimes being disagreeable actually makes things simpler. I think I've become slightly less conscientious over time. I've always wanted to be "good" and to be seen to be doing my bit and doing it properly. I'm still largely one for not doing others over, but more lately I put less energy into being conscientious. It's more of a change of emphasis away from it. I seem to have acquired a Machiavellian streak in my 20's and reached a peak in 40's, but this is decreasing again. I'm actively working on getting rid of it in my 50's. It doesn't serve me and makes me neurotic. TLDR - I see these changes in my personality as very gradual over decades, and some of them caused by me actively changing them.