Emerald

It's very shocking that Charlie Kirk was killed. And political violence of all kinds should always be condemned. Unfortunately, the right wingers in power are already opportunistically trying to use Charlie's death as a an excuse to squash any opposition and to silence free speech of anyone remotely left of center. Some of them are even saying "This is our Reichstag Fire moment"... in reference to how the Nazis used the Reichstag Fire to name a political enemy and start arresting random Communists, which enabled the authoritarian regime to consolidate more authoritarian power. They're itching to be able to blame this murder on the Democrats, the Left, trans people, and all the other usual scapegoats. And it's awful that some people see someone murdered in cold blood and think, "Awesome! Just what I was waiting for! I'm going to use his death to silence my political opponents." It's very cold, calculated, and unfeeling. But it very much seems like this was a professional operation because of the long distance the shooter made the shot from, the two decoy men that delayed the investigation, and evidence of a private jet flying out of a nearby airport 30 minutes later. It makes me wonder if this political assassination was planned by someone (or a group of people) who hired a trained assassin. And given how his death is already being used as a cudgel, it's not beyond my imagination that the assassination could be for the purpose of making him a right wing martyr so that those in power can grab more of it. Of course, that's a huge speculation. It could also be some other powerful interest that targeted him for other reasons. But either way, it does seem to be a professional hit job, given the details. It doesn't seem like some random left or right wing radical that just decided to shoot a political figure they disagreed with. And it doesn't seem like a random crazy person. Just my two cents on the matter though. Take it with a grain of salt.

I recommend learning some emotional regulation practices before facing into really intense emotions. Those are the most challenging things to face with in the process of Shadow Work, so I don't recommend jumping straight into the deepest end of the pool. You'd certainly be better off going for lower-hanging fruit first, as there are many things that are unconscious to us that are simply unconscious because we're not looking in that direction. You may want to begin here, which has to do with becoming conscious of what you want. Sometimes people have a lot of difficulty answering that question because there are deeper things preventing them from doing so. But often, people just get their attention diverted to logistical things and lose awareness of what they want. But discovering what you want is the key to reconnecting with sovereignty and finding alignment and direction. So, it's a good place to begin with Shadow Work.

Thank you for tagging me

Sure, I have tons of videos on the topic on my channel. I'll post my Shadow Work playlist below... https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLoGNVUhpgjdNor2uS34Ix14vJS_fvq-07&si=0zyA0G3FTrPXrEbT

@Hardkill My experience of living with poor/working class people that I grew up with and then making the acquaintance of upper middle class/wealthy people when I went to college, I noticed different ways of relating to marriage and children... and life in general. But I would say it's the culture of planning for the future versus not planning for the future that is the main difference. Like, in my hometown, many of my friends had their first child by 18 (a few before that). But these friends didn't really have major plans for the future. They were just playing life by ear. So, they just followed their feelings and let the chips fall where they may... to mixed results. Then, in college, most of my friends had a set plan for the future and a timeline for marriage and children... which were later in life. And there was more of a tendency to take a birds-eye view of relationship and family plans... also to mixed results. And I was pregnant with my first child my last semester of my senior year of college (when I was 21), and I was seen as a crazy young to be having a child. I even recall a very passive aggressive girl who was in many of my studio classes making a derisive comment towards me about "teen pregnancy." Others were supportive, but I was definitely the only pregnant woman on campus. I had never encountered any others the entire time that I was there. So, it was treated as a strange anomaly... mostly with kindness. But when I phoned home to tell my longtime friend Shanna (who's my age) that I was pregnant, she was like, "It's about time! Your parents aren't getting any younger." My parents were 50 and 54 at the time, and her parents were 41 and 42. And she was concerned about my parents being able to get to be grandparents at a young enough age to enjoy. She already had 4 children at the time. And many of our friends already had a couple children. So, it was just a very different culture. But the main difference was "letting life happen" and "planning out future milestones." And planning for future milestones involves a kind of imagining of an ideal future. And it's easy to get pickier and less willing to "settle" and properly attach to a partner when you've already imagined some abstract ideal to match up to. Some people get stuck in "flipping through channels" mode who plan ahead too much.

It's more difficult now-a-days (for men and women too) because the world is more atomized and we don't socialize face-to-face as often. So, for most people in the past, there would be more opportunities to socialize... and for attractions and relationships to emerge organically. But now, a person has to either use dating apps or go approach people. Or they may have to do extra legwork to build their own social circle. So, in the past, when people were socializing more... it was like fishing with a big net. But now, it's like having to use a fishing spear instead, where you have to actively attempt to catch a potential partner. Of course, if you socialize and create a social circle... you're then fishing with the same net as people have always used. And it will be easier for attractions to emerge organically. But if you are on dating apps... or trying to do cold approach... it's not going to be as easy to establish something deep or real.

It's good that you have strong values. But it's important to understand that the idea of a past where people had better character, is an illusion. It's just the Myth of the Golden Age. We can easily project an ideal version of humanity onto the past that we didn't' personally live in... or perhaps lived in as small children with little awareness of the terribleness of the world at the time. And this gives the illusion that society is somehow "fallen" from the grace of the past. But that isn't true. Humans have always been human... and deeply flawed. And unfortunately, if we fall for the notion that "We have fallen from the past Golden Age", we can potentially become susceptible to a lot of reactionary and Fascist rhetoric that says, "We were once great. But we have fallen... because THEY corrupted everything. And now, we are a species of degenerates when we used to be a species of proper men and proper ladies." So, it's important to recognize that humans are, have been, and will always be a combination of all the best and worst drives.

Similar to @Natasha Tori Maru I like to use the forum as a place to intellectually spar with other nerds like myself on a variety of topics. It's kind of like "debate bumper cars" or something. I also use it as a space to sharpen my own insights in the process of those intellectual sparring matches. I also find myself drawn here to play out feelings of powerlessness that I feel over macrocosmic systems operating in ways that cause suffering. Like if there's someone on here who has a particularly misaligned view that would lead to all sorts of suffering if implemented on a wide scale, it's like there's this itch to argue them out of it. When I was a kid, I always had to swallow all my anger and arguments. And I could never get the last word... even if I was the most objectively lucid person in the room. I could always be out-aggressed and out-powered. Other people were always able to be more certain than me, while I could never allow myself to be certain. This happened with both adults and peers. And this led to a dynamic of questioning EVERY SINGLE ASSUMPTION that I could be making, such that I couldn't ever communicate my pov with confidence. But then, the people around me who were the MOST certain would always win out in debates... despite the fact that they are operating off of tons of assumptions and are blinkered in their perspective. So, on the forum, I get to repeatedly play out the opposite fantasy of always being able to communicate exactly what my perspective is because it's in writing. And in the context of writing, it's much harder to grandstand and bloviate without coming across as wrong. But in real life, the more certain sounding person is deemed correct, even if they're saying nonsensical things. it just hits the lizard brain that way. So, I often get to play through the dynamic where someone tries to grandstand in writing, which would come across as certain and correct in real life. But online, it doesn't work. And then, I get to actually communicate my perspective without it immediately being waved off because of my manner of speaking and comporting myself.

It certainly is ignorance. But the specific flavor of ignorance that's happening is the literal original sin of ignorance. And that original sin of ignorance is the projection of the dichotomy of "good and evil" onto ourselves and others... and creating huge internal and external splits. This then produces shame and the tendency for those looking to wash themselves clean of shame to externalize that shame onto a scapegoated "bad guy". Trump won because precisely he unapologetically evoked the archetypal "good and evil" story and gave the ignorant people a collection of "bad guys" to scapegoat to feel like the "good guy" in relation to... and to feel like "the innocent victim" while making the scapegoats "the villain who is both strong and weak." That's what Fascism is all about, at the end of the day. It plays upon people's desires to be the good victim and/or good hero in relation to an unambiguously evil villainous other. Why else do you think that the Devil tempted Adam and Eve to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?

It's like the movie The Dark Crystal, if you've seen it... where there is this species of celestial beings called the Urskeks who settle on an Earth-like planet. And there's only like 10 of these beings on the Earth-like planet. And thousands of years prior to the beginning of the movie, they end up deliberately splitting themselves into two halves... a good half and an evil half in an attempt to get rid of evil and become more good/perfect. So, this splitting in an attempt to "be good and perfect" and to be "rid of evil"... actually creates an autonomous evil race of powerful beings. And the good half of each being is called a Mystic... where they are good but lumbering and impotent with no power. And the evil half of each being is called a Skeksis... where they are evil but dynamic and powerful. And they are the rulers of the entire planet. This symbolism depicts what happens, when a person (or collective of people) polarize into an identity of "goodness" as this disambiguates the identity from it what is deemed as "badness".... and this "badness" then takes hold of the person (or collective of people) in denigrated ways. And the identity of goodness on the Left is oriented around compassion while power is discarded as evil. And the identity of goodness on the Right is oriented around strength/power while compassion is discarded as weakness. So, you end up with these extreme expressions in the world of "weak goodness" and "powerful evil"... and that leads to the "powerful evil" being FAR MORE LIKELY to be entrenched in positions of power. This is why unconscious politics prevails. Those who identify with goodness in the ethical/compassionate sense of the word, would have an identity crisis if they actually used their power and strength. They would have to grapple with the problem of their own disowned evil... as opposed to being on the side of goodness fighting against the evil.

I tend to find that kinder people are usually more honest than unkind people. Unkind people have to engage in all manner of self-deceptions to explain away their unkind behaviors to themselves.

One thing that I think might be helpful along these lines that I notice in what you wrote, is that there is a lot of conscious calculation about how you want to come across and how you don't want to come across. And if I'm understanding correctly, there seems to be these two polarities that you're considering between as an image of the "nice guy" and the "toxic masculine guy." And there's an aversion to the nice guy but there's a sense that it's the nice guys who have girlfriends... and there's a sense of wanting to embody some of the pseudo-power of the toxic masculine guys despite recognizing it as neurotic on another level. That's the gist that I'm taking away from what you wrote. And I think that you should go for neither of these modes of existing... as neither are reflective of you. And you may have lost yourself in the complexity of these considerations. The challenge is to just get back to yourself and embrace whatever exists within you from either polarity and neither polarity without identifying with anything. I also sense that the resistance that arises towards the "nice guy" (or even the nice gal) is likely where some of the split from your authenticity might have originally arisen... especially if there's ever been a time in your life where you deliberately tried to carve your identity away from things like innocence or naivety or un-worldliness. So, you may associate the "nice guy" with things that you have tried to distance yourself from. I'm not 100% sure that's true. But it is something that could fit as a puzzle piece with the visceral resistance towards the "nice guy" and the desire to embody the "toxic masculine"... and the general confusion about where you are as a whole authentic being within this split. I would begin with dropping all agendas to be perceived or perceive yourself a particular way. And I'd begin by exploring the polarity you have the most resistance to (aka the "nice guy") in order to find the lost center in yourself. And feel into the aversions and discomforts if you were to perceive yourself or be perceived as one of those "nice" people.

@Ajay0 Thank you for sharing this. It's an interesting correlation that I wasn't aware of. Previously, I had assumed that the numbers of people in each of the castes were somewhat equivalent... save for the Brahman caste, as I assumed it was reserved for religious leaders. And I had also assumed the lowest caste was a somewhat smaller caste as well as, when I learned about the caste system in school, the vibe I got was one of a marginalized minority group. But given the fact that the lowest caste is the majority, it make sense that it's easier for collective bargaining... and less likely to lead to the discrimination that impacts people who have a minority status within the cultural context. And I can certainly see the correlation to the feudal system, which I have a framework for understanding in Medieval Western Europe but not in other places. My understanding of that in the context of European history is one where there's the noble class, merchant class, and peasant class. And it's clear that there are few nobles, a moderate number of merchants, and the majority is the peasants. Would you say this is similar size breakdown to the size breakdown of the castes in the caste system in India?

That's one of the issues with using the term "survival" in such an overgeneralized loosey goosey way... as it muddies the definition of the phrase "survival value" to the point that it doesn't really mean anything at all. And that's where you get the problem of over-subjectivizing to the point where you're assessing vacations as possessing more survival value than water. And if you made that claim anywhere else other than in this very intellectual context where there is social clout associated with complexity of thought, everyone would look at you like you're crazy. And they wouldn't really be wrong either, as it is crazy to believe that vacations serve the ends of survival more than water. It's just that when we over-intellectualize about a simple concept and get lost in the weeds of the complexity of those paradigms, we can lose grounding to what's actually real... and even the simplest truths can get lost in the mud of that complexity. So, if everything that humans do to enhance even the most peripheral of creature comforts gets classified as "survival", then we lose the ability to assess for LITERAL survival in the way that the word 'survival' is used colloquially literally everywhere else outside of the Actualized forum. So, let's say that we could classify survival in two ways: We could call the the common definition of survival as "Life and Death Survival"... and the uncommon definition that's frequently used in this specific forum context as "Self-Interest-Based Survival." Then, we can objectively assess for the common definition of survival, which is objective as it asks the question of "What sustains life better?". So, we could state the basic and simple truth that every kindergartener already knows the answer to that, "Water objectively has more survival value than vacations because water is a necessity for sustaining life and vacations are not." Then, you can also do the more subjective assessment for individuals in terms of "Self-Interest-Based Survival" relative to the question, "What serves your self-interest more at this juncture in time?" And perhaps one individual can say, "I'd love to go on vacation. I already have tons of water." But another individual is stuck out in the desert and they would say, "There's nothing in the world that I value more than water." Ultimately, I think it's an issue of over-intellectualizing the word survival to the point where meaning is eroded. Then, when the claim is made that "Masculinity has more survival value than Femininity" with the conscious or unconscious emotional and psychological agendas behind making such a claim, there is an understood bait and switch. And that bait and switch is that the meaning starts as "Masculinity has more 'Self-Interested Survival Value' than Femininity" but then gets switched to and interpreted as "Masculinity has more 'Life and Death Survival Value' than Femininity." And then it just becomes a propaganda tool to devalue women's role in society and our labor... both in historical and traditional contexts AND in contemporary post-industrial workplace scenarios AND in modern day households where women still do the majority of the household labor whether they work a job or stay at home.

This is an idealization of women's nature, of course... as it views women as more human than human. But women do tend to have some of the qualities that the author mentioned. And men tend to push those very qualities away from themselves, usually out of a fear of it undermining their Masculine identity. And it leads to the projection of both positive and negative ideals onto women. It's likely where the author's envy and projection of ideals onto women is coming from. I have noticed that a sizable minority of men tend to have this envy and want to compete with women... and prove Masculinity as better than Femininity. And the only reason that I see for wanting to do that is to act as a salve for fears of inferiority. When I was in my teens, I used to envy maleness. And it really came down to the fact that I liked guys more than I loved myself at that point in time. I think that this could also be the case for many men who feel the insecurities that the author is speaking of.

It didn't mean literally starving. I meant very very hungry and haven't eaten in half a day. There is a saying, "Never go grocery shopping when you're hungry." And that is because you will make poor choices at the grocery store when you're making active food selections for the week from a state of ravenous hunger. Ideally, you eat something before you go grocery shopping, so as not to make impulsive choices out of desperation for food.

I'm not aware of the current circumstances with regard to Indian societal structure and the way that the caste system currently functions. Though, if it's anything like it is here, there's probably still a lot of inequities along those caste lines... even if there are some existing initiatives to help those in lower castes. Those issues won't go away very quickly. It's similar to how there might be some small amount of initiatives to help black Americans in the U.S., and we have also had a black president. But in practice, there's still a lot of inequities and discrimination. But the reason I brought it up is because it was a great lesson about underestimating the survival value of those who have less prestige in society.

While value in itself is subjective and in the eye of the beholder... value with a qualifier is objective, as it is seen from the perspective of the qualifier and not the beholder. So, deciding that survival is valuable in itself is purely subjective (even if nearly universal) as survival in itself is neither inherently valuable not non-valuable. From the eyes of the universe, survival as a phenomenon is empty of inherent value. But once you say the phrase "survival value", that takes away the subjectivity factors of value being in the eye of the beholder... and you are then objectively assessing something's value in relation to a particular end goal... in this case survival. And while "value" by itself is always subjective, "survival value" can be assessed objectively... especially if you use the word "survival" in more precise and accurate terms to mean, "that which sustains life." For example, if I am assessing the value of various objects towards the end goal of "brushing my teeth"... I can objectively say that toothbrushes objectively have more "tooth-brushing value" than ironing boards do. Similarly, if I am assessing the value of various commodities towards the end of "surviving"... I can objectively say that water objectively has more "survival value" than vacations.

Billionaires back corporate Democrats... but not leftists or leftwing causes. So, there is no such billionaire-funded far leftwing propaganda machine. There is no mainstream leftist media. And independent leftwing media is on a shoestring budget, getting just the default ads on YouTube. But the far rightwing propaganda machine is VERY well-funded. And even Democrat politicians and Democrat-leaning news networks tend to disparage far left and center left positions... and instead take more moderately rightwing economic stances with a smattering of uncontroversial "Let's accept everyone" liberal social positions. The main Democrat catch phrase has always been, "Let's reach across the aisle!" So, they aren't remotely leftwing. Billionaires fund the creation of a far rightwing propaganda machine that will move people further right, as it is better for their bottom line. Rightwing propaganda keeps working class people voting on culture war issues (like being anti-trans) instead of voting on their own economic interests. And that is necessary to keep working class people from waking up to the unfairness and going left and joining labor movements and engaging in strikes... which would undermine corporate interests. So, billionaires have a huge vested interest in funding far rightwing propaganda to keep working class people angry at trans people, immigrants, ethnic minorities, etc.... as opposed to focusing their ire on the powers that be and unfair treatment they get in the workplace.

I think everyone should have a social circle. And having romantic options that can develop organically is just one of the many perks of having one. So, I wouldn't even create a social circle explicitly thinking about game. Just think about it as looking for people (men and women) to have a spend time with and good time with. Honestly, before someone even considers doing pick-up, I recommend building a social circle of friends and acquaintances to connect with. Then, once you have those more basic needs met, you can go do some pick-up if you want. But doing pick-up without a social circle is a bit like going to a grocery store when you're starving. You're going to be too desperate for your needs for human connection and social support to be detached form outcomes.

It depends on how you define survival value. If you define survival value as objectively, "Things that contribute the most to human survival"... then women contribute just as much to survival value as men do, if not more because of women doing the lion's share of cyclical sustainer tasks. But if you define survival value subjectively as, "Things that contribute to human survival that people are consciously aware of due to the scarcity/rarity/novelty of what is being provided." then I can see that men's work is more visible and people will tend to take it for granted less and consciously value it more in a subjective sense. If we go with the latter subjective definition that you've proposed for the term "survival value", then novel experiences (like going on vacation) have a lot more survival value than having access to a consistent supply of drinking water because the latter is a taken for granted background element for people in first-world nations... while the former is a rarity and highly valued (and a premium can be charged for it). But I would argue that access to clean drinking water objectively has more survival value even if it's common and banal... and taken for granted. Certainly, value exists within the eye of the beholder generally. But if were are looking specially at "survival value" as "that which objectively contributes the most to the life and death survival of human beings." I would argue that access to drinking water provides objectively more survival value than other resources that are scarcer and more novel.

There are VERY FEW big money interests that fund leftwing causes. And there is no such equivalent leftwing propaganda network, as lefties don't get big money dollars. Now, George Soros himself has donated to some progressive causes over the years. Like he helped countries democratize after the fall of the Soviet Union, funded college tuition for black South Africans during apartheid, donated a LOT of funding of a few specific universities, donated money to a cause to help pull impoverished African people out of poverty, donated to defense committees to help controversial defendants procure legal defense, and donated money to racial justice groups and criminal justice reforms. So, he is using his wealth to support philanthropic progressive causes. But none of these things have to do with funding a strategic propaganda network to brainwash people into being leftists. That's just what the right wing thinks he is. But then, when Elon Musk was helping Trump, he proudly proclaimed himself to be the "George Soros of the right". It's just yet another instance of "Every accusation is a confession." The reality is that leftists don't have anywhere near the funding and resources allotted to the far right from the billionaire class, major industries, and even foreign governments. And that's because leftist causes go against corporate interests. That's why many people who were once left-wing pundits make a big deal about, "Why I left the Left." They want the riches that come along with joining the right wing media-sphere. The reality is that there are big money interests flowing into right wing independent media and right wing think tanks. Being in leftwing independent media pays nothing. Soros most definitely isn't funding bread-tube in the way that billionaires are funding the Daily Wire lot. Right wing independent media pundits are making millions and millions of dollars... to the point where Steven Crowder accused Ben Shapiro (The Daily Wire) of "slavery" when he offered him a contract for a "measly" $50 million dollars. And Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Johnson were getting big money from Russia to say their talking points on their shows. The reality is that the right wing propaganda machine is well-oiled and constructed by big money interests to influence the masses to be more sympathetic to right wing perspectives.... and the left doesn't have anything close to equivalent to that level of power.

Well said. The issue is that Blue and Orange people (including the ones on this forum who believe themselves to be Tier 2 thinkers and critiquing Green from above), will tend to see Green as outlandish and will want to see only a caricatured strawman of Green. So, taking a common reasonable Green positions like, "People shouldn't be treated unjustly and should be respected despite their differences" gets reframed as "These crazy leftists want total equality of outcome, to castrate all men, and to turn your dog trans!" And along the lines of what you were saying, I recently ran across an article about a large-scale survey of many women (Feminists and non-Feminists) where 19% of the participants identified as Feminists and 81% did not identify themselves as Feminists. And they were asked a series of questions about their feelings and attitudes about men. And men were also surveyed in this study and asked the same questions about their feelings and attitudes about men in this study. And both Feminist women and non-Feminist women tended to hold similarly positive views of men... though both Feminists and non-Feminists were mistaken that the Feminist group would hold more negative views about men than the non-Feminists. But Feminists' views on men tended to match more with men's perceptions of men than non-Feminist women's perceptions of men. Feminists were also more likely to see men and women as similar to themselves and to chalk up most gender differences to environmental factors, while non-Feminists had more of a tendency to see men as starkly different from themselves and see gender differences as a reflection of innate nature. So, Feminists would tend to view things like Toxic Masculinity as an environmental/societal issue rather than an innate propensity towards toxicity that men have... which likely has a lot to do with why Feminists have generally positive views of men despite their critiques of culture. And that matches my experiences as a woman who subscribes to Feminism. I always felt very positively about many individual men that I interact with, depending on their individual character. So, I don't relate large-scale societal injustices that disenfranchise women to individual men. That is, unless those men are loud and proud supporters of said disenfranchisement, like Andrew Tate types and those who agree with his perspectives on women.

100%

No, the left are just convenient scapegoats to blame the rise of Fascism on. The reason why Fascism was able to come to a head (after decades of being pushed under the floorboards) is the result of a solid decade of well-strategized and expertly crafted billionaire-funded propaganda campaigns to awaken people's authoritarian instincts... and to normalize and sell far right conservatism as a lifestyle brand to young people. AND also TONS of far right people organizing on every level of society and government to warm people up to Fascism and implement their agendas. Of course, this is helped along especially by the successes of Donald Trump... as he is particularly good at getting disengaged political normies to join the cause. And even the talking point in this meme was probably workshopped in a far right think tank 10 years ago to disseminate to the masses to brand jam the left further... as to train people towards the instinct to hate the left and see the right as more reasonable by contrast. So... don't give the credit of expert-level political organization to leftists. Leftists just have ethical values... but are piss-poor at organizing and don't have two nickels to rub together. But the right wing is unified and well-funded by big money interests. So, this past decade has been a masterclass at political organizing to mobilize people towards the Fascist cause and the further empowerment of the powerful at the expense of the vulnerable.