Emerald

You’d be best to cultivate a really wide social circle for it, with several layers. Like being familiar with 600+ people in your in-person or online vicinity, and always being open to meeting more. Having 140-150 acquaintances within that 600 that you interact with occasionally. Then having 30 or so friends that you see at least once a month and would invite to parties and get-togethers. Then having like 5 or so really close friends that you see frequently. And ideally, you find most of these people in places where people on the same wavelength spend time. That’s what a healthy dynamic social circle looks like. It’s very similar to the social circle that high school or college sets up. So, you don’t really run out of options. And people who you just met can become really close friends of yours or even lovers over relatively short periods of time.

Not totally off the mark. It’s helpful to crystallize insights this way. And I am a bit sad because I just ended my last relationship less than a month ago. And I really didn’t want to. So, this helps that way, because I don’t want to wind up in another situation again where I invest a lot of energy and love into a situation that really can’t work out. But mostly, I wanted to share this because it is a really male-dominated space with lots of distorted viewpoints about women’s sexuality floating around... including distorted viewpoints about what men want in a partner. Mostly, if you ask half the guys on here, they would give some looks-based thing. But that only attracts but never keeps a man. And these viewpoints can genuinely take a number on women’s self-esteem because most women are not perfect 10s. And this might make them more prone to letting go of boundaries and settling for incompatible/low character men because they feel inadequate. So, I wanted to give genuinely helpful advice, which focuses on inner work, firm boundaries, individuality, and the cultivation of a Yin orientation to dating.

This is more of a list of things that I've learned from making many mistakes. These are the bits of advice I would give my younger self (though I've always known about numbers 7 and 8). And they are very much good advice. I am married but have been separated for 2.5 years and we were together for 9 years. We still live together with our children. It was a really rough relationship for me for a multitude of reasons that I don't feel comfortable with discussing. I really had to grit my teeth to keep it together for as long as I did. But it's much better now that we're just co-parents. I have had a couple of long-distance relationships in the past couple years (each lasting about a year a piece), and they were both very much mirrors to me, for better or for worse. And I've learned a lot in these relationships. That's why I recommend finding a man that mirrors you. It will give you what you need to learn. The first long-distance relationship in particular was the deepest I'd ever gone with a man, but we mirrored eachother so well that we ran into eachother's traumas eventually and I became very anxious and lost my boundaries and it turned sour. Hence the focus towards working through Shadows, setting boundaries, and knowing your deal-breakers. I loved him very much but he was a perfect mirror to what I had repressed in myself. And it was an incredibly painful breakup that brought me right into some childhood trauma that I wouldn't have otherwise brought to the surface. The second relationship I had was really nice and we mirrored eachother quite a lot as well. He's a very considerate person, which is something I hadn't experienced yet. We learned a lot together. But I sadly had to end it because our visions for the future were not compatible. I'd have gladly stayed with him otherwise. I also had a really bad relationship between age 16-20, that I was in prior to meeting my husband. I had the mindset at the time that, if I love a person then I need to sacrifice all of my boundaries for them. So, yeah... you can imagine how that went. So, here is my advice. It's good advice, I promise. It comes from a lot of trial and error.

I know that it isn't so simple. This is why I didn't tell the OP to go directly to the authorities. I've been in a situation that's milder but similar in nature with a family friend who was staying at our house. And I know I wouldn't have wanted to go through court trials and all that. But because my father and stepmother knew and kicked him out, it was a one time incident. Her father or some other adult in her family should know, so that they can take her out of harm's way. She's not safe where she is right now. It's not okay to not do anything.

Who should respect her wishes? The OP? Currently, the girl wants to keep it all a secret while she's still in danger of this happening again. If her mother isn't helping her, her father needs to know so that she can be somewhere that's out of harm's way. And the OP is an adult and would be wise to inform her father of her abuse. A 32 year old should not be keeping his knowledge of the rape of a child a secret from her dad.

Her father is not the rapist, her stepfather is. It was mentioned early on in the thread that her father is a good guy who is currently unaware of the rape.

I don't do shit tests, and I don't recommend doing them. That feels too gamey to purposefully give someone a hard time just to see what they'll do. Just take your time, have clear boundaries and know who you are, what you want, and what you don't. Say "no" when you feel that it's right to say no. Say "yes" when you feel that it's right to say yes.

You're welcome

Thank you!

Number 3 is very important too. Your intuition should outweigh your mind's rules most of the time. The mind would sort everyone if it were in charge of this department. So, if your intuition really does fire for someone you've just met, then go with it... but bring your brain. It's just that many women do put stock in dating apps and men they just met and they end up in unfulfilling or bad relationships. And that's in large part because their intuition didn't have time to work its magic and they took a gamble. Sometimes gambles work... but mostly the house wins. It's much safer, more fulfilling, and more in tune with our communal instincts to form romantic bonds with men we already know from day to day life. Go read some erotica (which has a primary female readership). Most of the story lines are based around going to bed with someone they've known and admired from afar for a while. And that's not an accident. That's what's genuinely most exciting. You like a guy and admire him from afar. And the tension rises and rises as you wonder if he feels the same way. And then, if he does, you get together and make love and it's amazing. And if he doesn't, it's a tragedy. That's not a bug, that's a feature. Women are adapting to the way things work and meeting random guys on dating apps. But it's pretty "meh". Many women will settle for "meh" rather than be alone. But it doesn't make it not "meh." That's why I said "nothing lukewarm". Note, that you won't find very much erotica about meeting some guy on Tinder or meeting some pick up artist... unless it happens to be someone from the protagonist's past. It's always about Johnny who works over in the next cubicle or Bill that dreamy barista at the coffee shop. Or maybe even Mr. Morgan, the handsome but much older professor that the protagonist shared a special bond with when she was a student. My experience is that female sexual attraction is like Kimchi. It has to emotionally ferment for a while to be any good. But it also consequently makes it safer.

When you go to upload your video, there is an option to upload a custom thumbnail on the same page where you add title, descriptions, and tags. It has to be under a certain size though. So, be sure to be mindful of that. Also, there are many free editors where you can make your own thumbnail. Canva would probably work well for it. There was also one called PicMonkey. I usually use Photoshop myself... but I've also used Canva and PicMonkey before and both are pretty good.

For men, the challenge is attracting. So, I can see why you would think that. But for women, the challenge is not attracting... but sorting the wheat from the chaff in terms of compatibility and quality. Having fewer but higher quality/higher compatibility options is WORLDS better from a woman's perspective than just having tons and tons of options. Most of latter will be spam. This is why having a social circle of people on the same wavelength is a woman's best friend in terms of finding a compatible partner.

Maybe it is that way for some people. Though I do suspect that it isn't just me. I suspect that female sexuality generally does function that way. But regardless, I still stand by what I say as advice for women. Maybe for your girlfriend, jumping into a relationship with your right away was good because you're presumably not a bad guy. But I definitely wouldn't recommend it as general advice. Develop a strong social network. Get to know a guy for a few months platonically at first as part of your social network. Then, you'll know two things... 1. Are you really interested it him? 2. Is he a decent guy?

My experience is that I need a few platonic months to really read my intuition about someone and discover my attraction to them. And beginning a relationship with someone on a romantic foot just makes everything lukewarm because it takes all the tension out of the situation. And getting things to a boiling point is necessary for me to fall in love and sexually bond with someone. Otherwise the spell doesn't really take. I have very strong feelings about the current structure of society getting us far away from our communal natural instincts, and modern methods of dating are one reflection of this instinctual blunting. So, my experience has been that a man must already be part of my tribe for me to know intuitively if I'm interested in him.

Well, you are the adult in the situation. You can't put too much stock in what kids want for themselves in these situations because they just don't have enough perspective yet. And any bond of friendship should be put secondary. If I were in your shoes, I would get in touch with the girl's father and inform him about what has happened.

No, that's not why I asked. I asked to get more context, so that I could give you better information. It's different based on how you know her. How old are you? Are you very young too?

If you don't mind my asking, how do you know her? Are you a family friend? Teacher?

Number one, I never called for anyone to be censored. Number two, you're not important enough to be canceled. Number three, what you asked is obviously homophobic. Number four, it's important to call a thing what it is. If we see a duck, let's call it a duck. If we see homophobia, let's call it homophobia. Number five, if you're too sensitive to handle the homophobic things you say being accurately labeled as homophobic, then either own your homophobia and get less sensitive to being called out or just don't say homophobic things. It's your choice.

Actually, most progressives are pretty against stereotyping against working class folks. Though of course, wealthy progressive folks, as I've experienced, can fall into classicism just as easily because they just don't really understand what it's like to struggle with money. But I don't really understand how you see what I said was against rural people. Is it because I said that I have commercial swampland in Florida to sell you if you're gullible enough to think people are offended because of the phrase "black coffee"? By the way, I am a "rural person" from a blue collar family, who lived until adulthood in a small working class Central Florida town. And my dad's side of the family are all from rural Georgia. We would all very much be considered rednecks. And until very recently, I was very much a part of the working poor. So, don't even talk about the shaming of "rural people" to me.

Do you honestly not see his question as homophobic? I think it's fair to call a duck and duck if it quacks like one and waddles like one. We don't have to go into any mental gymnastics or reality denying tactics. We can just call something what it is.

Open borders can only happen once we remove the corruptions in the world. This is why... 1st world nations occupy 2nd and 3rd world nations and make conditions bad so that the 1st world nations can extract resources and cheap labor. And this benefits mostly very wealthy billionaires and the heads of major industries who make money off those resources and cheap labor. And in order to keep the labor cheap, you have to keep that country poor and the citizens in a subjugated and desperate place where they're working for just pennies a day. And that way, businesses/corporations/industries in the 1st world can sell the items the poor people making pennies a day make for a huge return. So, if you open up the borders at this point, what you'll see is a mass exodus from the exploitative and squalid conditions of the 2nd/3rd world into the safer, freer, and more prosperous 1st world countries whose industries exploit them and keep them poor. And then, there wouldn't be all that cheap labor because the people of the 2nd/3rd world would be free to move wherever they want to. And this would make the standard of living in the 1st world drop, making the move from 2nd/3rd world to 1st world a moot point. So, unfortunately we're not at a stage where humanity has psychologically shifted towards community focus and living off the land. We have not yet learned to see the other as part of ourselves. And we have not yet criminalized this type of exploitation because the rich and powerful buy the politicians that makes the laws. If/when we do make that psychological shift, open borders will be just fine. But until then, our entire system is build off the backs of an exploited other. And opening those borders means that the exploited other can escape from exploitation much more easily. And the exploited other and their blood, sweat, and tears are the very bedrock of the current system.

It isn't the case. There's a lot of fear-mongering about the left and how they take everything to mean something racist, sexist, etc. But no one is freaking out about calling coffee black. And if you believe they are, I have some nice commercial swampland in Florida to sell you. Also, acceptance of the non-gender-conforming and the LGBTQ community is instrumental in the shift towards Yellow and Turquoise. And any attempt to dial that acceptance back is most surely rooted in Blue or before. Don't kid yourself otherwise. And the acceptance of the LGBTQ community is quite important even for heterosexual people, as it breaks them out of the boxes of the gender norms and getting more in touch with their deeper masculine and feminine energies. This is not possible without the acceptance of the LGBTQ community. My advice is to do your best to transcend Blue and go into Orange at least with regard to your acceptance of the LGBTQ community. That way you can start to see that it's something that regards the individual and thus is not a problem for you or anyone else. From Orange, acceptance of the LGBTQ community is all about seeing it as personal choice to stay out of. Then, once you transcend Orange, you can move to Green, where you can begin to break down your own adherence to rigid gender norms and to see the conditioned aspects of your own gendered expressions. Then, once you transcend to Yellow, you can then find your deeper core Masculine/Feminine signature and express from that. Then, once you transcend to Turquoise, you can once again discover that what you are is truly genderless and that the masculine and feminine are just two sides to your coin. You can learn a lot from the LGBTQ community in terms of breaking out of your boxes.

I say that it doesn't have to do much with women because the situation with women is more of a reflection of the wound as opposed to the origin of the wound. And the wound itself comes down to that hate/shame/unworthiness that you feel. It could be a generational wound that's been absorbed from your dad. Or it could be some events that have happened to you. Or it could be (and very likely is) both. But I recommend doing some body-work, so that you can experience those emotions directly on the level of the sensation in the body. That's what really helps you let go of those feelings. Mind you, these negative emotions are also forming part of the bedrock of your identity/ego structure as it presently is. So, letting go of these feelings will also mean a "death" of certain aspects of your identity. So basically, the first step is to focus your attention and awareness on the sensations that arise in the body when you feel hate/shame/unworthiness and really sit with them. Don't let your awareness run away from it. Face it directly. And once you do this, the body will usually shake or cry (sometimes even vomiting can happen) to release these feelings. And this is the part of the process where you have to face death.

This is probably why there's that feeling like you 'have to' approach. It attaches a meaning onto it which is connected to the deeper self-esteem wounds. You're in a position where doing pick-up won't really answer to those wounds. And chances are, if you become successful with women, those wounds will still be there but take on different forms that could be harmful to yourself and others. My advice is to practice pick-up concurrently with some deeper healing practices that address the self-esteem wounds at their roots... which (and you may not believe me) have very little to do with your relationship to women. If you focus on the former (pick-up) without focusing on the latter (deeper emotional healing), you will end up addressing the surface level issue without dealing with its roots. It will give you the illusion of growth and transcendence without actual growth and transcendence.

You misunderstood what they're saying. They're saying that that would be the internal negative narrative that a man who is neurotically approaching would have in his mind that makes him feel like he ALWAYS has to approach. He's not saying that the man is inherently undeserving. He's alluding to the man's negative mindset that keeps him feeling insecure.