trenton

An interesting thought experiment occured to me. It is the idea that I could take something like the Legend of Zelda, make it structurally very similar to real world religions, and then replace the content of something like the Bible with tales from Hyrule. In this experiment, the goal is to imagine a world in which Christianity never emerged because what emerged in its place was the Legend of Zelda which would shape humanity for thousands of years, including to this day. The beginning would be similar to the origins of the Abrahamic religions. Abraham would look at the statues in Egypt and ask "what if those statues are just statues?" After deep self reflection, Abraham has a vision in which he sees a divine light. Slowly, something begins to take shape. It is the Triforce, shaped by the true Goddesses that formed the Earth through Din's fire, Nayru's love, and Farore's abundance. Your temple would tell you this is the holy trinity. As humanity developed, key figures from the Bible were replaced with Zelda characters. Instead of Jerusalem, there was Hyrule. Instead of Jesus and Satan, there was Link and Ganon. The crusades still happen and your history teacher tells you about it. He says that there were different factions trying to control the holy lands in the hopes of accessing the sacred realm and claiming the Triforce which held divine power according to their theologies. These different factions splintered into different religions, each claiming that their prophets were the descendants of the Hero of Time, Link. When your family takes you to a temple which they are sure is based on truth, you see stained glass windows with the Hero of Time, Statues of Zelda characters who are worshipped, and a choir singing Zelda music. As you watch the service, a priest stands before the group and begins to to preach. He tells you about why Link is eternally worshipped as humanity's savior. The story begins in the land of Hyrule where a boy hears a cry for help, roughly 2000 years ago from the present. It is the princess Zelda using telepathy to warn the hero that the evil wizard Ganon was assembling the Triforce. Link would need to meet with the sages and receive their blessings to get the Master Sword, located in the Temple of Time in order to stop Ganon from shaping the world in his image. Ganon was a cruel sinful man, overcome by his greed and lust for power. Those faithful to the Hero of Time were humble and surrendered the selfishness which drove people to trying to shape the sacred realm in their own image. Although Link recieved the blessings of the sages and took the blade of destiny, he was too late to stop Ganon's ritual. Zelda was kidnapped and crucified as part of a ritual to extract the Triforce of Wisdom from Zelda's being. Link was too late, and Ganon now held two pieces of the Triforce. However, Link found something left behind by the princess. It was the Ocarina of Time. Guided by the sages, Link rushed to the Temple of Time where he played the sacred instrument. He was then sent back in time to before Zelda was crucified, but now he had the Master Sword when he needed it. Link challenged Ganon and stopped the ritual, using the blade of destiny to send a ball of lightening back at the demon king. Link then struck down the dark lord, saving the princess, and uniting the Triforce. Unlike Ganon, his intentions were selfless, allowing the world to be returned to harmony. The religion is heavily debated by scholars. The archeological record confirms that these were indeed real people and there are various ancient texts referencing them. There is even a person named Zelda on a list of people who were intended to be executed on the cross. Some are skeptical because the religion is unfalsifiable. For example, Link is the Hero of time who prevented catastrophes through travelling the time and thus preventing them from happening such that history unfolded without us seeing what he had prevented. Nevertheless, everybody takes it seriously despite it being considered highly improbable in any other context with no such miracles ever being witnessed. Defenders claim that the miracles would be difficult to witness if it involved reversing time, thus maintaining the unfalsifiable position. As a child you would read Hyrule Historia, a sacred book passed down through the generations. In the book of Genesis, you would learn about the origins of Earth and humanity. Instead of Noah's ark, you would learn about the trial of the water dragon from Skyward Sword. Instead of hell, you would learn about the dark world ruled by Ganon, which is where you go if you are sinful. Instead of David defeating Goliath with a slingshot, you would learn about Link defeating Queen Gohma in the Deku Tree by shooting her with a slingshot. The parallels go on and on until the entire Bible is replaced with Zelda stories like these. Some interpret them literally, others poetically. Some skeptics argue that there may be some translation issues due to parts of the holy book being written in a language other than Hylian, which is taught in your temple in place of Hebrew. I find this kind of thought experiment very amusing. It seems like this could have actually been a real religion that humanity dies over if this emerged instead of Christianity. There would probably be people who would actually believe these things and devote their lives to worshipping Link. The structure can easily be molded to match real world religions, such that the content of religion could be replaced with things like this. None of the claims made here are any more radical than those made in books like the Bible involving splitting the sea, resurrection from the dead, and walking on water. This would therefore be something that people actually believe and die for. I guess my next question is, that if this were the content of the religion you grew up with, what questions would you ask to break out of this paradigm? What inconsistencies would you be able to identify? What doubts would you raise if your family and friends were all devout believers in the Hero of Time? The question Leo would ask would be "how do you know this is true?"

Actualized changed my perspective on the war on drugs. I was initially close minded because my parents were drug addicts. Psychedelic research introduced the distinctions necessary for this issue. It gave me a different frame for interpreting drug addiction and the damage it caused me in life.

To be honest, I don't know what can realistically help me. Nevertheless, I will take a shot because there is nothing to do with life at all other than take a shot at building the best life you can no matter what happens. I need a lot of change but I don't know how to make the change. The reason I need change is because my family caused too much structural damage to my life and future and it is beyond repair. One example I have been wrestling with again lately is trying to find an alternative life path outside of the professional chess player route I wanted. In that case, they did to much to obstruct my goals and they now seem out of reach because I am a candidate master at age 27. I have been struggling for years to find an alternative path in life which is part of what brought me to personal development. The problem with personal development is that it doesn't appear to apply to me. First of all, I already had the vision and motivation and then it was destroyed with no palatable alternative. Failure is supposed to be temporary information that guides you toward long term success. This isn't always true if failure means having the future and life you wanted denied, living you adrift due to circumstances beyond your control. The outcome is that it starts to appear as if my values, passions, and preferences are obstacles to be overcome rather than signals as to what I should pursue in life. Somehow I am supposed to find meaning in meaningless work with no real future to work toward as too much has already been taken. I also need to build an alternative support network outside of my family. They control my finances because they want to teach me financial responsibility and independence while not having any stated parameters for achieving this goal. They did not give a concrete alternative to the life they denied and they are blaming me for feeling lost. I would have been better off with a family that forced me to become a lawyer. In my case my family forced me to not be a chess player but didn't give an alternative. I need a different support network because they caused too much damage and they are incapable of taking accountability. This includes my mother who took money for drugs and didn't give any real starting point for building any future. Nevertheless, they insist that I'm an adult and I need to build something other than what was denied with no real direction or plan. Meanwhile, personal development seemed to be where I drifted to. I didn't find direction. Part of what I found was more ideas as to why I was wrong to want what I wanted, but I don't see what I'm supposed to want instead. I don't know where to go or who to get help from. Basically my experience with life has been that I am expected to just figure out everything alone without guidance. I tried learning a lot, but more information doesn't necessary give direction. What I landed on is that spiritually appears to be the only path that offers anything at all. Family can fail you. Careers are circumstancial. All of these things can fail you due to bad luck and it doesn't seem to make sense in investing in such things once they lose the meaning and joy they once had. I'm drawn to spirituality for truth, love, and a lack of alternatives. Where else does one find meaning at all? Maybe I can try dating in the hopes of finding different life possibilities. I'm unable to see possibilities worth pursuing. Of course the problem with this is that I need to come from a position of strength and not be miserable. I need to be established in an independent living situation, probably on my own with some job that probably is a terrible for me. Again there is no real support network. Autism informed employers might help with finding a match for this. Ultimately, I'm miserable because I had the vision and energy and I failed anyway. Personal development for me is not about building a vision. It is about replacing an old one while reconciling the difference between a limiting belief and an actual limit. Clearly value exercises are not enough to actually guide me in life. I just want to know what I would need to do in order to not be bitter in life. Otherwise, the perpetual bitterness makes it unclear why I shouldn't just end everything when there is no future to work toward. I need a new future, but I can't find one. I need to change, but I don't know who to change into. I don't want to become a rude asshole by allowing the bitterness to fester. I need something to prevent it from worsening.

I tend to associate evil more with sadism and impunity. It is not necessarily psychopathic but could be narcissistic. Furthermore psychopaths are not necessarily con artists, rapists, or murders. Impunity is what you get when soldiers invade another country and terrorize the population through genocidal rape. Impunity exploits a power imbalance to harm others oftentimes just because they can. The rape of Nanking comes to mind when considering "evil."

@LordFall In terms of my family being abusive, they don't just criticize me. A major piece of it has to do with a lack of accountability as a pattern of behavior. It includes things like childhood sexual abuse which crippled my identity because of the actions of my mother and father. Furthermore, if they do cross a boundary such as insisting that dad was loving and caring like a father while seeming smug even though he forced my unwanted involvement in gang activities such as child prostitution, then I will be the one blamed for my reaction to this behavior and there will be no accountability at all. The reason they stopped me from pursuing chess is because they wanted me to financially independent. If this is a factor in terms of why they don't respect my boundaries, then distance seems necessary. Also my debt shouldn't be as bad if I get a job while in college and transfer to Europe to finish the masters in social sciences. I don't like the fact that my family fundamentally crippled my identity, sexuality, and relationship to life by treating me as if I were a rapist as a child. I feel like the harm is deep enough that I can never actually feel safe in my family even if they don't appear to be abusive on the surface. The reminder of my past experiences by their presence and smug remarks makes it impossible to actually feel safe without running complex calculations in terms of how expressing my perspective may backfire. It is exhausting and there is a complete breakdown in communication such that I will likely never be understood and probably never respected. This is the price to pay by staying with my family. Sometimes my family retraumatizes me and undermines healing work. Also my aunt is mad at me for disclosing the child prostitution deal my father put me in. She sounds very angry with me and is acting like she doesn't want to believe me when I say dad was a child sex trafficker offering me money to have sex with fat ass. I live with his mother right now who was also pissed about my disclosure. Although she provides food, shelter, and partial recovery, she may not be able to provide all of the care I need. The things I am recovering from are what her son and his gang did to me and she refuses to believe it. How exactly do you define abusive? This term is highly subjective which makes it almost meaningless in terms of communication. Does it not count as abuse unless I am beaten? Or does smugly telling me dad was loving and caring like a father while the rest of the family moved to silence when I express offense count as abusive? I think I would prefer to build an identity totally separate from my family in order to stop the loop.

@LordFall I posted videos a while ago. Here is one of them.

@Basman well I took the first step. I got an Obama phone. The point is that I need to get off of my family's data plan while making finances more manageable in the meantime. This serves to begin the financial disentanglement. The next step is to get rid of my current phone plan and make the new phone my primary phone for the time being. Next I will need to get the application for NKU set up. If I hurry, I may be able to get on campus for the upcoming semester in Fall. If not I will go in January. Given that leaving my family is long overdue anyway, I would rather make it sooner rather than later. I hope my case manager and therapist or disability services can help me with accomodations for things like depression and sleep problems. Once I have the bachelor's degree, I will likely transfer overseas for the master's. I also need to work on getting my mom's name off of my stocks and my grandma's name off of my bank accounts. I haven't yet announced this plan to my family. If I want my money, then I'm going to need to take this up with them on financial disentanglement. In terms of skills in chess, I was a teacher and a chess coach. I am interested in social sciences and learning complex systems. I could probably teach something like sociology while using research to inform public policy and discourse. I also had good accomplishments in chess such as winning tournaments and beating a national master along with other titled players. I guess this demonstrates the depth of mastery within this domain, but the actual skill is pointed to in a book for personal development by cal Newport. It is about sustained focus, flow, and becoming really good over extended periods of practice. This is what I like most about chess. If I can transfer deep work to other areas of life, that would be great. I have already done it with other board games very easily. If I can apply that to social systems then that would be excellent, similar to deep work in the tech industry. I remember in the case of board games it was partially the competition that drove me to deeper focus. In social sciences the driver may different from competition. It might instead be finding a way to prevent unnecessary suffering while understanding humanity as clearly and comprehensively as possible. One of the bonuses is that I may prevent children from having their futures stolen by parents who are drug addicts if public policy reform is to be effective.

@samijiben I think I have my plan mapped out now. I need to get off of my family's data plan as it keeps me entangled. I also need to get Mom's name off of my stocks. Then I can live on campus to complete my degree before transferring overseas, probably to Switzerland to study social sciences. NKU should be able to help with that. It seems like my best shot realistically in terms of getting away from my family and never coming back once I am out of America which I also need to leave because I think the country is screwed. I feel like I have more clarity and I know what must be done. I hesitated because I still wanted to somehow make things work with my family, but I see that they never will respect me no until I leave them forever. I have done enough psychological prep work that I should be able to manage this. I can see my case manager and therapist soon, but I am taking steps now such as getting my documents for disability eligibility so that I can get any necessary accommodations for university. I can live and work on campus before taking off far away to build a new life and identity completely outside of my family of origin knowing that our conflicts truly are beyond repair due to the vested interest in not seeing the pain they have caused me. I've tried enough and it seems to me that they genuinely do not give a fuck at all. They just don't want me to be with them and that is why they will never respect me. Leaving them forever seems to be the best shot of earning their respect and love.

I'm running into some complications. I have 20,000 dollars in savings along with some stocks and retirement funds. I'm currently unemployed. I looked at Boston, but the housing is part of the problem with many positions requiring a bachelor's or master's degree in fields like IT. I have an associate's degree which limits my options. Rather than trying to make moving out perfect, I need to find somewhere to go where at least I have my own place. Social security knows I have a disability and I shouldn't be working in public, but I'm not disabled enough to receive benefits. It would be nice if I could get disability support somewhere, but I might need to try somewhere that can help me get a job that won't overwhelm me. Part of why I looked at Boston was the AANE support network with life coaching. One thing I am afraid of is that if I move out and lose my job again, then I won't really have a good plan anymore. Part of the reason I lost the job previously was due to severe depression and medical complications that came with it. It also disrupted my education. Do you know where I can find a human that can help with these sorts of life transitions?

I don't see a future with my family. It has caused me to much trouble to try to get them to understand. They have already crippled the future I wanted I am trying to find a new path. My biggest passion was chess. I wanted to be a professional chess player. The problem is that not only did my family block it, but there is also a problem with how chess grandmasters come to be especially on the top level. Under all cases, top level chess players have supportive families since childhood who provide the structure necessary to actualize their goals. It has never happened that a talented player was undermined by an unsupportive family and somehow reached the top level anyway. This is part of what suggests that the window of opportunity to go where I wanted to go was already closed before I was born. Grandmasters don't come from fathers who traffic children and there hasn't been any top level players ever from this background without a network of support. It isn't pure effort as they seem to believe. The discrepancy in privilege and its implications somewhat sours chess now. I used to believe that my effort was meaningful, but I now see that environment and circumstances matter equally if not more in some cases. I am trying to find an alternative passion. Maybe something completely new. Otherwise, I have lost so much that the only thing left is spirituality. Once we take away everything meaningful to you such as friends, family, career, and so forth, then all you are left with is existence, truth, and consciousness. Spirituality is where I end up when everything else fails. I need to find a way to avoid permanent bitterness in life. I no longer have the same faith and confidence in chess that I once had. I know I like intellectual groups and learning or teaching. I seem to function well in those cases.

@Hojo I have been doing a lot of research hoping it would help. Most of what I built were psychological models that serve to protect me from things lime suicide. It was part of my plan to move out, but the weight felt unbearable. This did at least serve as some psychological preparation for making such a radical decision. I think the thing that is keeping me holding onto them is the fact that I wanted to be a professional player, but I required a robust support system in childhood in order to achieve it. They undermined that goal and my relationship with chess isn't the same anymore because the future isn't there. Thank you for paying attention and noticing. I had a problem I didn't solve. I have considered the homeless possibility already. I spend most of my time outside anyway. I'm usually wandering the streets looking for somewhere to go. I found a Buddhist temple in southern ohio that I liked. I walked some pretty far distances. I have some buff legs. Part of me wonders what would happen if I just walked to one of those organizations in Massachusetts or Wyoming. I would prefer to have bike though because it would make traveling so much faster.

I don't see any reason to be proud of being an American at all. Can you please give any reason at all why we should proud of being American? What culture do we have that is worth protecting? What future does this country have that is worth fighting for? What is my role in improving the state of American affairs? My best guess is that I am meant to be proud of my history such as the victory in WWII which is a huge propaganda point for America. I had ancestors who fought in WWII and in Vietnam. One of them was on a ship that got hit by the Japanese over shark infested waters and he was one of the survivors. Personally, I think that is a cool story in my family history. It is the closest thing I have to being proud of being an American. The problem is that I don't see why the wars America fights in today are for a good cause. At least in WWII America stopped the Nazis and the Japanese who were brutal. Today America is disastrous with our forever wars and there doesn't seem to be anything to be proud of in the Middle East after what happened in Iraq in 2003. That said, presently there is no reason to proud of America. Historically, the best case to be proud might be victory over the Nazis and Japanese in WWII or maybe victory over the British in the American Revolution. There are a couple of things to be proud of throughout American history that are pretty cool, but definitely not in the present.

@Hojo What exactly happens when I force things to happen? I remember I forced my siblings to go to the foster care system until my mother evicted my abusive stepfather by publicly confessing to homicidal thoughts. It seemed to have worked. I didn't exactly feel fulfilled by that despite getting what I wanted. I wanted to be a protector only to realize my family wasn't actually worth protecting. Does this mean that knowing what makes us happy and fulfilled requires forcing things to happen and then see how it makes us feel?

@Davino I would love to move somewhere, but I don't know where to go. Maybe I could go to Massachusetts or Wyoming for the autism support groups. Maybe South Carolina for cheaper housing. Maybe live on campus on NKU and major in sociology. Maybe Spain to enroll in a chess academy. Maybe Germany to enroll in engineering. I have a lot of maybes, but I need to commit somewhere. This seems like a lot to figure out alone. Does it even matter where I go if it is anywhere but here and at least offers some kind of future worth working towards? In that case I just need to pick any of the above options or the Buddhist monk thing in a nearby monastery, and then do it. It would be awesome to have somebody who could help with this sort of thing, but I believe the autism informed life coaches I am looking for are in Massachusetts. Therefore, I would probably have to go there to get help.

I tried doing the forgiveness exercise for my father. I seem to have gotten stuck at almost every point. In this case I tried to forgive my father for trafficking me. I was pretty overwhelmed to the point that the video would fade in and fade out. Sometimes I would hear it and other times it seemed to fall on deaf ears. There was one thing that did stick out though. It was this idea that by not letting go of the pain, I am hurting others and passing it onto them due to unconsciousness and ignorance as I am blinded by my own pain. This puts me in an awkward position. I suspect that I may have already hurt people as a consequence of my unresolved trauma such as the things my mother and father did to me that crippled my relationship with my sexuality and made intimacy very difficult for me. The social isolation that results is also painful and might make it less obvious as to how I might be hurting people. In reality, people apparently get vicarious trauma from me talking about these things. I also sometimes express thoughts of wanting to end my life. I don't know how much that might be hurting people, but I do feel that way and sometimes I feel like I don't care because I hate my life and want it to end. I may have also become a burden due to losing my job over severe depression. I struggle to see the point in anything and I can't find someone who can actually help. I'm sick of relying on AI for emotional support, but I struggle to find a human who would actually help. Additionally, there is the people I could have helped but didn't due to the educational disruptions over depression. I was unable to finish my education due to hospitalization. In that case it is not that I overtly harmed someone, but that my pain has prevented me from reaching my highest self from which I could have prevented more pain in myself and others. At the same time I am constantly conflicted over things like life purpose and meaninglessness and feeling lost in life but unable to resolve this problem. The main reason I struggle to let go of what my dad did to me is partially due to survivor's guilt. He and his gang claimed to engage in broader prostitution deals. The possibility that this is true and they actually raped multiple victims makes it feel like a betrayal to let these things go. At the same time, they could have lied and I may have been the only child they actually trafficked. Additionally, I sometimes feel like my silence enabled my father's behavior by not turning him into the police. I just froze and did nothing which leads it me blaming myself and feeling responsible for his behavior. The outcome is that I sometimes feel driven to be vocal about these sorts of things. This is similar to other survivors of childhood sexual abuse who may have a desire to speak out against such abuse for fear of feeling responsible if they stay silent. In my case, I did try helping other victims. What I did was I documented what happened with my father and his associates. I outlined the evidence surrounding the situation in the hopes that the patterns could be used to aid in other cases. The problem is that sometimes my grandma goes through my emails and starts deleting things she doesn't think is important. Therefore, I tried to tell her that I had some important emails incoming with regards to child sex trafficking because of what her son did to me. Now she is pissed, my aunt is pissed, and my cousin is pissed. I wouldn't have done that if she didn't delete important things in my emails, otherwise I wouldn't have needed to give her a heads up about this one to make sure it doesn't get deleted. I guess part of my problem with recovery is that I seem to weight the pain of other victims as higher than my own. It is like my caring tethers me to the pain and doesn't let it go because it feels like betrayal. This seems to be a recurring pattern in which I feel like I am responsible for preventing this kind of harm and I failed because of my father. The pain ends up being too much and it undermine my ability to function. If I could have a healthy relationship with my sexuality it would probably help along with having a sense of direction, meaning, and purpose. I just often feel like who I am isn't enough or who I am supposed to be. I remember I used to find a sense of direction through chess improvement. I wanted to be a professional chess player, but I was derailed by my family insisting on a different life path because they didn't want me playing chess all day. They stopped me originally, and now are acting like they didn't stop me and were supportive. At the same time, I no longer have the same confidence in that dream as I once did. I was given too much proof that my goal of professional chess play was a pipe dream and I needed to construct an alternative identity and life purpose as my desires and passions were obstacles to a practical survival which felt fundamentally empty and meaningless as it was void of love. I ended up researching a broad range of subjects hoping that learning would give me a path to something new and meaningful. This was originally to substitute for the love my mother and father never gave me. Chess became load bearing in the sense that it gave me a domain in which I could develop mastery and competence, and having it disrupted has now tainted it with grief and the question of what if I could somehow still make it work. It isn't very well known, but autistic depression is apparently much deeper and crippling than most cases of depression. Special interests are often load bearing and if they fall apart or interest is lost, then life loses its sense of meaning, direction, and belonging. It also doesn't seem to help that I instead get religious messages about Jesus being the key to salvation. I had some bad therapists who insisted I pray despite my objections while saying "how dare you try to control the future" with this sense that I need to surrender to God without recognizing how I concieve of God. This is why I don't tell therapists my spiritual views. At any rate, I am in a lot of misery. I tried forgiveness for my mother and father, but got stuck. In the case of my mother she gaslit me when I was six into believing I was a rapist. At the same time, if I don't forgive then I might continue to harm others as a consequence of my bitterness in life. I can see this dynamic and I am afraid of becoming someone who is like this as it seems like someone even worse who no longer cares about hurting others. In order to prevent this, I may need to find what do I need in order to avoid being bitter in life. It might not be any grand purpose. It might be just anything that can stop me from being consumed by the bitterness and depression to the point that life seems unlivable no matter what I try.

I guess I can make a few tries at this. I never did pick up, but here is what I would think of. 1. You look fine to me so long as you don't look like my mom. 2. You don't seem too intimidating to me like a really tall woman would be. I'm comfortable talking to you. 3. A wise man once told me that it is okay to ask if you are single within the first five minutes of meeting you. 4. You don't seem repulsive. What's your name? I'm sure someone could come up with better lines than these. I just made a few tries.

In this thread, I am not asking for an answer. Instead, I am asking for clarity on what exactly I am being asked to answer. next i am looking for how inquiry should even be done to approach this kind of question. The question I am exploring is "what is the nature of anything." I am genuinely stumped on how to even approach this kind of question. The question seems extremely loaded and tricky to even try to answer. The reason I was drawn to this question is because I have done a lot of intellectual work which was ultimately in service to self-love through self-knowledge and self-understanding. In my case, it was a wounded child who felt unlovable. I used various psychological frameworks to explore the inner world. This included perpetrator psychology and developing empathy for people who cause severe harm. This empathy I applied to extreme devilry ultimately applied back to myself. It became the tool for self-love that allowed me to feel again. My feelings were previously shut down completely because love was believed to be wrong or dangerous due to being associated with my parents who hurt me. However, I questioned these frameworks deeply enough, and I noticed that there are clear limits to the psychological frameworks as well as the sociological frameworks I have been heavily exploring. Yes, they are useful and highlight certain truths, but they have limits. For example, empathy is one form of love, but then in spirituality there is now claims of metaphysical love through unity of being. This is when Leo might say things like "you are ontologically identical with a sex trafficker." What throws me off is that this does not seem to logically follow empathy. Empathy is like one approach to love by understanding someone as a human being. Leo's claim is fundamentally different in that it is about the metaphysical nature of the perpetrator and the self. From the metaphysical perspective, morality becomes irrelevant because the nature of anything at a fundamental level would be such that the surface level content could literally be anything. It could be a rock, a tree, a bird, or Ted Bundy. Leo appears to claim "I am (blank)" could be filled in with literally anything and it would not make a difference. The reason I seem to hit a wall at this point is because metaphysical unity does not logically follow empathy even if they don't contradict each other. they seem to be two different flavors of love within different domains. In the case of psychology, there are various metaphysical assumptions that don't compute with Leo's claims. For example, psychology is fundamentally the study of humans. It assumes that we are separate beings with distinct minds. Given this assumption, it would never occur to someone to ask "what if I am ontologically identical to SpongeBob?" This all raises the question, what if the reason I struggle to love myself is because I fundamentally have a wrong or limited concept as to what the nature of love even is? If it is true that metaphysical love is possible, then what if this would give me a completely different approach to self-love, which is the fundamental reason why I was drawn to philosophy and intellectual work in the first place. Ultimately, me trying to understand metaphysical love is the logical trajectory of the child trying to love himself, but I also have done at least a little bit of metaphysical inquiry which has deconstructed this identity. First of all, if it is the case that the content of existence is irrelevant in terms of the nature of love, then it suggests that I can simplify the process of love. Previously, I used complex psychological frameworks in order to make empathy for serial killers possible by studying criminology and discovering counter intuitive findings. However, these frameworks are loaded with filters like self vs. other, other mind theory, morality, humanistic approaches, and so on. All of these filters can still ultimately grasp a flavor of love, but it is also possible to go straight to love without all of these filters designed to make empathy for serial killers possible. Of course, all the love I applied to these people ultimately applies to myself as well, but it still operates within materialism and dualism. When I started doing some metaphysical inquiry, I noticed how I started to trigger a sense of being threatened due to the sense of destabilization. I noticed how when I started looking through the lens of different metaphysical frameworks such as solipsism, it radically changed my relationship with reality in that I would now see other human beings as though they were me, but just another aspect of my own mind which appears to be philosophically sound. This has all kinds of implications in terms of how worldviews are organized. Of course, there are so many questions here that I am not even close to having a clear answer, but my tentative answer which I quickly came to was metaphysical relativism. The idea is that it is possible to see reality through multiple lenses of metaphysical presuppositions which in turn changes ones relationship with self and reality. From this standpoint, there is not an obviously objective one answer to which metaphysical presuppositions are correct, but at least it is a start which recognizes how reality, self, and the relationship to other is constructed at least partly by imagination. I also noticed that in doing this inquiry, my experience and my awareness were being directed based on past ideas I heard. The questions asked seem to direct how experience is felt. This is why the problem with metaphysical inquiry is that this particular domain appears to be especially susceptible to the power of suggestion and conformity. Imagine for a moment, that Leo never told you that you were God. If you are here doing serious self reflection, then do you think that your inquiry would have been directed toward something like "I am nothing" instead or maybe "I am pure consciousness." The fact that so many people here say the idea that they are God seems like it should be impossible if not for Leo suggesting such a thing in the fist place. This is why part of the problem of doing metaphysical inquiry for me is that I first have to ask "how does it even occur to someone to ask these kinds of questions?" Imagine, that you just walk through your normal life until one day a kid at school says "Hey, I was wondering if the nature of consciousness is such that it constructs all of existence through infinite imagination. Is this the fundamental nature of God and reality?" Why would anybody even ask something like this? On top of that, the inquiry itself is already biased by the idea that I could be God. Why would it occur to me to ask "what if I am not a human?" I never would have thought of this sort of thing without a random encounter with actualized.org. How do I do metaphysical inquiry if the questions themselves appear to shape experience through suggestion? I notice that my awareness is then able to see from the perspective of the multiple possible questions as though they were true in terms of the nature of my awareness. This is also consistent with my psychological studies in that it was found that suggestion and group conformity literally changes a person's perception of reality. This applies not only to moral domains such as gang dynamics leading a person to engaging in sexual harassment for the approval of his peers, but also to the perception of beauty, physicality, and literal length of line which appears longer or shorter based on suggestion. This would also be consistent with reality being a hallucination being dreamed, which is implicated in neuroscience despite the metaphysical assumptions baked into it. All of this said, in terms of the question of metaphysical love, it opens up a completely different possibility in terms of what love could even mean. It seems to correspond to my childhood assumptions about love in some ways such as love being impossible without truth because my true nature would be lost and I would therefore love an illusion. Ultimately, my entire intellectual project of worldview building is and always was me attempting to love myself through self-understanding. If there is an absolute truth in metaphysics, then that would have implications for self-love in terms of what my relationship to love would be. The difference is that Leo appears to have been operating from genuine metaphysical curiosity from the beginning. In my case, it was trauma based intellectual work attempting to understand reality in service to self-love when I felt that I was unlovable. From this standpoint, my intellectual frameworks may not be designed to even answer a question like what is the nature of anything. My prerogative is heavily biased by a wounded child trying to love himself. I have also noticed that throughout my life, part of my mind was attached to religion despite conscious disbelief. In that case, religion was representing something that my mind could not let go of in terms of goodness and love and "truth." The problem is that religion has a lot of moralistic language which targets the wounded child and then creates a difficult cognitive dissonance which took me years to resolve. Open metaphysical inquiry appears to be superior to religion because it offers the same possibility of God's love without the mythology. This is also speaking to what the child was seeking without the moralistic language that confirms that he is irredeemable. Anyway, that is some of my inquiry into the nature of reality while sober without psychedelics. Apparently, when deeply focused it is easier for autistic individuals to enter deeper states of consciousness because the neurotypical mind has many automatic social filters for navigating the world which I do not have. One of the drawbacks is that the autistic mind is also prone to sensory overload which is why consciousness work can more easily feel overwhelming. There are pros and cons to applying the autistic mind to this kind of work because deconstruction can feel even more destabilizing due to sensory overload. I have already gotten accustomed to challenging deeply held assumptions in other domains such as politics and psychology. Even so, the metaphysical challenges still appear to sting me and trigger me more. It is just really hard, but I should be able to manage hard feelings given everything I have been through in my life. What do you think about the nature of metaphysical inquiry and how it should be done or applied? I don't need a final answer about the nature of reality, but at least we can explore the nature of inquiry about metaphysics.

I did a little bit of self-reflection on this issue. I found that I still partially believe in the materialist paradigm. I have a book from Leo's book list on this subject that would be relevant. What I also noticed is that there are aspects of reality which the materialist paradigm can't account for. This would be non-material entities. I started looking for counter examples to materialism. I came up with ghosts, psychic powers, and consciousness. I actually met a psychic who read my mind. It raises the question, what are psychic powers made out of? I have done research that suggests ghosts are real according to the military. It was the Skinwalker ranch reports. It seems even more convincing than the picture a woman gave me on a ghost tour along with some videos she showed us. I didn't see ghosts directly though. This is second hand information unlike the psychic powers for mind reading. I then came to consciousness. I asked, what is consciousness made of? If it is not made of material, than what is it? is it a non-material substance that can generate all kinds of material in reality? I think this would explain why spiritual teachers and philosophers tend to be drawn to the question of consciousness. It seems to be designed to challenge the materialist paradigm directly. I then didn't really find a better way to study consciousness other than by sitting with it and observing it. I started being put into a meditative like trance. It seems like the natural way to explore consciousness. At the very least, I did manage to answer questions like why would somebody be drawn to contemplating the nature of consciousness. Once something shifts in you through this kind of self-reflection, the meditation starts to feel more natural and automatic rather than forced. Otherwise, it might become robotic or your habit might eventually falter. In order to do this kind of consciousness work or metaphysical exploration, you need to have a strong why. Otherwise, it will all be just abstract philosophy. In my case, my why started off as, what if there is a deeper form of love beyond human empathy or psychological understanding. This would be being and metaphysical love, whatever that might be. I then discovered metaphysical relativism, giving me more reason to explore because of the radical implications in terms of how worldviews form based on metaphysical presuppositions. I noticed that suggestion in some ways becomes an obstacle if we just take Leo's word at face value. It gets in the way of doing real inquiry if we start reasoning our way to this conclusion. It is like one discovery in consciousness triggers a deep desire to discover more because of how much might be implied in terms of understanding reality. If consciousness is the mechanism by which experience occurs, then it seems like a pretty big deal in terms of contextualizing life.

Uh guys. This is getting bad. My aunt is threatening to sue me and she is actively trying to criminalize me for my disclosure while insisting that remove my account. I will need to call for legal aid. I don't think my aunt loves me anymore. She used to be a nice person to me, but not anymore. She doesn't want me living here now and she is trying to intimidate me with legal threats.

I currently live with my grandma. I was looking into opportunities with the Polaris project. This is an anti human trafficking agency. It values survivors willing to help others in improving support systems. I reached out to this organization because of what my father and his gang did to me with their child prostitution deals. The problem is that my father is my grandma's son. I wanted to make sure that we were on the same page in terms of the job opportunity I was reaching for. I sent in a document in which I detailed what I had witnessed along with my research into organized crime. This is related to another opportunity I hesitated to tell my family about in which I would be leading a support group for male survivors of childhood sexual abuse. The problem is that my mother doesn't believe me when I say that she psychologically and sexually crippled me because of what she did to me. I can't really tell my family about that part either. My grandma said "I don't believe you." She sounded pretty pissed. She insisted that my father didn't have an extensive criminal record nor was he involved in gangs. She refuses to even admit the drug deals happened, but I documented child prostitution in a sex trafficking gang. She told me that she that I loved my father and was friends with him, but apparently not. I told her it was mixed because I was dealing with hard feelings like these for a long time. She doesn't seem to understand that it is possible for a child to love a father who did this to them. She definitely wouldn't grasp that it is possible for a father to traffic his children out of twisted sense of love. The problem is that she wants to be emotionally supportive due to my depression, but it is clearly dangerous to express the feelings I struggle with and to describe the experiences I had. I am pretty much on my own in terms of emotional support as family can't handle this information. Apparently most people can not comprehend parental sex offenders who target their own children. I can because I studied this, but others cannot. I'm not sure what better I could have done other than staying silent and suffering invisibly. There is nobody to look to who would be willing to help me with this. I probably gave more truth than she could handle, but in this case the truth is just that bad and there is no light version. I mean what else am I supposed to do? I don't mean to have suicidal depression, but the reasons for such feelings are unacceptable to others. I guess I should have kept her in the dark on this.

Anyway, there has been further updates. The Polaris Project confirms that my account, my document, and my story stands. What I described matches child sex trafficking even though the family claims I am being disrespectful to actual victims. I really should exit sooner rather than later. Even my aunt who is normally kind to me is clearly outraged at me and she doesn't believe me even though I said nothing about her or her mother. All of this is purely their own emotional reaction to me describing my experience with my father. They actually don't have any arguments that hold against the legal description of child sex trafficking and prostitution. They refer to these arguments as me manipulating them. I am not holding out hope of them coming around to acknowledgement. Maybe they will resent me for the rest of the foreseeable future. My Aunt made it clear that her mother was defensive about my father's involvement in drug deals. Even so she maintains that Dad was a drug addict who said and did a lot of crazy shit and illegal activities. At the same time she is very defensive about her brother sexually exploiting minors such as his own child.

One of the criticisms of red pill and incel ideology is that the misogyny sometimes drives its followers to committing acts of mass violence. Sexual frustration can fuel deep resentment leading to shootings. https://cssh.northeastern.edu/the-misogyny-fueling-americas-mass-shootings/ Is this a counter example of a criticism of these ideologies that don't apply to feminism? The other examples you gave seem solid. Of course there are sexist feminists just as there sexist men who stereotype about women in harmful ways. Maybe entitlement to another person's body leading to rape would be another counter example. Currently, I haven't thought of other counter examples, but this is the first attempt that came to mind that would challenge this perspective. What do you think?

@Leo Gura regarding the distinction between reality and hallucination itself being a hallucination, I came at this from another angle. I went with the distinction between real and imaginary itself being imaginary. How exactly do get a real distinction between these without using imagination? In that sense real is imaginary. The problem is that although this makes sense it didn't break me and cause an existential crisis. it probably means I'm not conscious of it. How would I know if I'm conscious of such things?

Leo recently posted on his blog two videos about the nature of stupidity. Most people cannot be reasoned with because it is more efficient for them to just take in information and not question it. I oftentimes have difficulty communicating with people no matter how transparent I try to be. Sometimes the truth is threatening to them, and I therefore may need to be content with giving simplified lies that are true enough to be useful. I have a few principles in mind that might be refined for such communication. I believe it starts with a combination of simplicity, confidence, humor, agreeableness, emotionality, and possibly vague appeals to morality. This kind of reminds of what I have studied in psychopaths. They often appear charming and likeable even if what they say doesn't hold under logical scrutiny. So long as you say it with confidence and charisma, that is enough for most people to believe in your character even if you are a serial killer. The psychopath thinks people deserve it for being stupid. Currently, I am thinking about things like calculated stupidity. The point is that in human affairs, people find it funny when you act as stupid as you can get away with. This sometimes rises to the level of sexual assault performed for peers. My calculated stupidity would have to account for the possibility of causing harm for the amusement of others as I would prefer to avoid unnecessary boundary crossing. Navigating stupid people might change depending on the domain. Politics is interesting because I normally look into with depth for the sake of understanding. I often learn a lot, but it depends on the situation in that many people prefer an ally. Therefore, I think the optimal public position might be to say that I am an independent and I don't get into political debates. I would have to debate whether or not to tell someone that I have done enough research to know that none of the simple narratives offered are enough to contain the full truth and in fact they often obscure it on either side especially when emotions are high. I'm not entirely sure how to handle stupid people in political debates. It often seems futile. The main goal seems to be virtue signaling and tribalism. I'm not entirely sure how to apply to my family. The way the operate depends on denial of reality. They also use coercive control through shouting and threatening. The one who performs enough outrage to provoke others to try to soothe them seems to be the strategy in that environment. I think I would rather just live on a college campus and finish my degree before going away forever. At least my brother is decent and more open minded. The last context has to do with institutions. I find that I have repeatedly ended up with friction against rigid institutions because I question authority and notice the flaws in their reasoning. Their reasoning objectively does not stand against various counter examples. However, the medical staff among other authority figures move to discredit my position as subjectivity along with insistence that they must follow through with spreading information the courts told them to spread even if that information doesn't hold under scrutiny. Institutional inertia stunts my creativity on various fronts and it makes it hard to find meaningful work. Essentially I'm supposed to not think and don't show any signs of innovation and then believe that hard work will lead to self advancement despite any evidence to the contrary. Therefore, I am trying to understand institutional survival more clearly. I'm trying to find in what ways can my creativity be channeled without threatening authority figures who depend on their lies not being questioned. It would be nice to have in depth conversations with people, but it is hard to find people interested in learning. What other suggestions might there be for navigating stupid people? Is it smart to act authentically smart in the presence of people who cannot receive or understand your perspective? Or are there other principles we might consider for this dilemma?

I think I get the message. I have been seeing a lot of pretty dumb responses on this forum. This forum is probably full of stupid people too. In that sense it is no use to ask a human forum for help on navigating stupidity because said forum will give me the responses of stupid people. I'm basically on my own for this issue.