Emerald

@Etherial Cat I'll definitely take what you said into consideration. In American politics, you know that it's basically going to come down to two candidates. And I always hated that and wanted to undermine that system. And up until Donald Trump (who has many fascist qualities), it was all just a bunch of Neo-Liberals. It didn't much matter who you picked because you knew things would basically run the same way. It was Coke or Pepsi. So, I haven't yet seen this strategy employed because you know that both the candidates are going to be corporatist Neo-Liberal center-right politicians. So, when Donald Trump was up for election and he was using his demagoguery against Mexicans, Muslims, and women, my response was to vote for Hillary Clinton at all costs even though I intensely dislike her. And that's because she would be the same kind of bad we'd always had. And Trump would be the same kind of bad plus much much worse for those especially in vulnerable communities. And my way of reasoning was that it was just too big of a risk not to vote strategically. Like, if I voted for Jill Stein instead (who was more aligned to my values and would help me protest the two-party system), I would not be able to participate in doing everything in my power to keep a Fascist out of office. And I would always wonder, relative to his actions (especially separating families and keeping immigrants in detention camps where they're dying) if I could have done something to prevent that as opposed to voting for Jill Stein because she matches my values more. So, I probably still err on the side of "prevent the Fascist coming to power at all costs" if that's a genuine threat (and it was), over the vote your choice regardless of outcomes and strategy. But I'll consider what you said because it could be used strategically against any disturbances to the status quo. And I am also very wary of anyone who is saying "Vote blue no matter who". I think that's a terrible take that perpetuates a lot of corruption in the Democratic party. That said, if all things stand to remain the same, I recommend voting your values instead of voting on who will likely win. So, for example, if it would have been Hillary Clinton vs Jeb Bush or something like that, I'd definitely vote third party. But I wouldn't feel comfortable taking a risk on letting a Fascist win because the vote is always super close between the two candidates. That's why the two-party system sucks. Edit: In a nutshell, because of our two party system, there isn't going to be a party that's out and out the Fascist party, like many European countries. For example, in Hungary there is the Jobik party (Fascist) and there are three other main parties. So, I could see, coming from that angle how the far right party's potential to gain power being the boogeyman to keep people with the Neo-Liberal status quo, and I will consider that perspective since it's different than what I'm used to in America. In America, for all my life up until Donald Trump, you've only gotten Neo Liberals in both parties who are basically Center-Right and there's very little difference between the two. So, I'm coming from a place of not experiencing the strategy of having one party be Fascist to encourage people toward Neo-Liberals, because up until now it's all been about the same. And if a Fascist gets the nomination in the Republican party, there is about a 50% chance of them getting elected in the first place, and that number only rises more when people ignore the threat and vote their values instead of voting strategically. So, it's a difficult situation when faced with such high stakes.

I'm fully on the side of strategic voting. Otherwise, you're just throwing your vote away. You need to vote like you're waging a war. You can't always have anything perfect. So, if you're throwing battles just to be "pure" or "voting with integrity", then I think that's a person losing sight of the overall goal of the war being waged and prioritizing their own identity concerns. And if it's your goal to be pure, you will lose the war. That said, there is great power in putting your foot down when things are mostly equal between the candidates. This is also a viable strategy for the war. But if you're faced with the choice between a Fascist and a Neo-Liberal... vote the Neo-Liberal even if they suck. But if you have an election between two Neo-Liberals and things will be otherwise the same... vote for what you actually want and try to change the system.

Law of Attraction, in the metaphysical sense, is really about mirroring your own internal state to you externally. And the internal state is a lot more than what the ego thinks it wants. So, Law of Attraction (if true... and my experiences seem to reflect it to be true) is already working its magic. You just have to know what you really want in order to ride the wave of what you're already attracting. And that wave is geared toward bringing you into alignment with yourself on the relative and absolute level.

@SunCat This is an out of body experience. I've only ever had them when I'm asleep, except once when I was really stressed and dealing with some trauma that just occurred.

Here is a video on it that I made a long time ago. But it gives an explanation of what it is. And I have a few more as well about inducing the state...

@Mondsee It sounds like an astral projection experience. The radio fuzz is the sound you hear when you're in sleep paralysis which is the gateway to astral projection. Now, in terms of the content of the experience, it sounds like you were experiencing things on the more ultra-normal side. Often times, when I have out of body experiences, I'll be immersed in the environment that I fell asleep in with very few divergences from consensus reality. And occasionally, I'll experience something of the nature you mentioned, where I go somewhere else. But the thing that's really marked about these experiences is that it feels very real and you can hear that high pitched radio fuzz noise, which some attribute to a change in frequency and tuning into another dimension of yourself. I also posit that it might be because you are awake when your brain waves have become slow and low-pitched enough to hear with your ears.

He's not. He really believes that.

It's so silly how people believe that they can take pills to sober up and get a clearer picture of reality. Try the no pill approach and actually see reality for what it is.

This problem has to do with either split of the shadow Queen archetype being out of wack in both partners. So, the healthy Queen is someone who is concerned with the inner workings and social dynamics of her "kingdom" or "hive". So, it has a lot to do with setting boundaries and making decisions that are good for herself/himself and also good for their relationships. But when someone has a disintegrated Queen archetype... the shadow Queen emerges in one of two forms. One form of the Shadow Queen is that of the People Pleasing Queen, who will disregard their own boundaries and better judgment just to please others. And also, they are more focused on people pleasing than toward making decisions that actually benefit themselves and others. They become doormats who lose sight of their own boundaries. The other form of the Shadow Queen is that of the Socially Manipulative Villainous Queen. And she rules her kingdom/hive with false niceness. But she really thrives off of breaking people down emotionally and manipulating her loved ones against their own interests and on another. All of this for the sake of her own entertainment, as the villainous Queen loves drama and creating social discord. Or whenever she sees the opportunity to manipulate the situation to her own selfish benefit, then she will manipulate others into working against their own interest. And relationship-wise (and even friendship-wise), self-sacrificing "People Pleasing Shadow Queens" attract villainous and manipulative "Villainous Shadow Queens" that are looking for their other half (and an easy target). And since the archetype of the Queen is present in both genders, you will see it happens regardless of gender. The trick is to know that both are seeking completion in each-other. They're trying to integrate their Queen by loving the aspect of her that has been cast into the shadow. The people pleasing Queens are externalizing their love and resistance toward their inner villain Queen by loving/submitting to a villain Queen, that they see as inherently evil. The villain Queens are externalizing their love and contempt for the people pleasing Queens by loving/abusing a people pleasing Queen, that they see as inherently weak and cowardly.

It's very interesting that you read my tone as "triggered" as my emotions were pretty flat-lined when I read your post, though honestly I did roll my eyes a bit because it didn't seem like sarcasm... it just seemed like you were saying dumb things that only made sense if you were in favor of pettiness and tyranny. I was like, does he really think all this petty stuff is good for the country? And that's specifically why I asked. I was just confused and genuinely curious about what you were trying to convey. But I've heard so many things of a similar vibe (ironically and un-ironically) before that I've gone metaphorically nose-blind to all of that. It's not really shocking because it's just a common part of culture now, especially on the internet. It's just like, "Eh... people think like that sometimes. Oh well... hopefully this fad falls out of vogue soon." It's a bit like how I used to be afraid of cockroaches as a kid before I lived with a cockroach infestation. I dealt with cockroach infestation in my early teen years for a year or so, and because of the "exposure therapy" I literally have zero emotional response to cockroaches. It's the same with hackey socio-political opinions and tired "edgy" jokes for similar reasons. I can't find anything in what you wrote funny or offensive, so the sarcasm doesn't really read nor does your opinion make much sense. Also, I'm still confused because your meaning is still not clear. Were you being sarcastic about Trump being awful and serious about the "#MakeAmericaGreatAgain"? Or were you being serious about Trump being awful but being sarcastic about the "#MakeAmericaGreatAgain"? If it's the former, it's a really dumb take because clearly what you said about Trump is true in terms of his background, and he does empirically embody those qualities. So, it again, opens up this conundrum of "Do you think pettiness and tyranny is what makes a country great?" Hence the confusion. If it's the latter, okay. That makes sense in relation to the facts you presented. But it nullifies a lot of the other things you said as well. Hence the confusion. Either way, I think the eye-roll was warranted.

If Donald Trump is as awful you yourself said, why did you hashtag it out with the phrase "Make America Great Again"? Shouldn't you have written out #KeepAmericaPettyandTyrannical instead if you truly think that way about Trump? Or do you genuinely think that being petty and tyrannical is what makes this country great? So, "Make America Great Again" is just another way of saying "Let us be assholes because that's the natural way of things"!

Actually, though it's true that cultural conditioning has a way of getting us to color certain things as feminine and masculine arbitrarily and keep things in boxes like that, it's very important to recognize that femininity and masculinity are real subtle energies that imbue all living and non-living systems... and often do so in ways that are recognized in esoteric texts, cultural customs, and myths across eras and cultures. Basically, what I'm saying is that femininity and masculinity (as subtle energies) are not conditioned but innate. We all have a unique energetic signature that is an interplay between the feminine and masculine... as does everything in existence. That's the meaning of the Yin/Yang symbol. And if you've tuned your sensitivity enough, you can actually pick up on these energies as themselves instead of as their culturally understood expression. Think of the feminine and masculine energies like a light and our cultural conditioning like a lens that that light refracts through in a particular way according to our conditioning and environment. And most of the time, women will have more feminine than masculine energy. And most of the time, men will have more masculine than feminine energy. But there are plenty of exceptions and people who have an even mix of both... or men that are more predominantly feminine and women who are more predominantly masculine. Now, I'll tell you why it's so important, especially now to recognize the existence of these two energies instead of ignoring their existence. Our world in many many ways is built so that Yang is valued over Yin. The masculine is valued over the feminine. And this needs to be fixed, otherwise our technology (masculine principle) will overwhelm Mother Nature (feminine principle)... and we will not survive as a species. So, I used to believe the same thing that you do, that masculinity and femininity are just social constructs. But then, I experienced directly the Divine Feminine and could no longer deny its existence. And ever since then, I've been working on re-integrating my feminine side... which was being repressed. But because I didn't believe that masculinity and femininity were real, I kept labeling everything that was in the masculine principle as good and everything in the feminine principle as stupid or trite... thus exacerbating the imbalance that already exists in greater society. So, if you have any stakes in wanting gender equality, there has to be a recognition that femininity is different than masculinity in order to realize how much our society is in a state of masculine imbalance and feminine repression... which is also causing huge global scale problems, like global warming, exploitative wars left and right, extreme income inequality, and so many other ways where the shadow masculine has taken over because the feminine is not valued. So, while human beings are mostly the same, we must also honor those differences and recognize the realness of Yin and Yang. Otherwise, we remain in a state of thinking of things as neutral... but neutrality is really just more masculinity in disguised. You ever notice that gender neutral clothing just looks like men's wear? That's one small tell that our vision of gender neutrality is still being influenced by patriarchal thinking, which sees the masculine as default.

Orange has a really hard time with emotions and the feminine because Orange has a lot of emotional stakes in its own ability to compete. And men especially have a hard time leaving Orange because men are socially looked down upon more than women for being in touch with emotions and expressing anything that would get in the way of their ability to compete. Manhood is fetishized and looked upon as an ideal all the way up until Green, and Female-ness is seen as lesser up until Green as well. So, it's harder for men to abandon that story where there is hope to meet the ideals of manhood from Orange and below... and that's true even if most men will never experience those ideals. It's a carrot on a stick... but very few can let go of the desire for the carrot and will keep coloring in the lines of social expectations to mitigate their feelings of unworthiness. And that is done through Orange's achiever nature who wants to be the best with women too. So, it really comes down to the man's ability to experience himself as a complex emotional being as opposed to a stoic achiever and/or failure who doesn't live up to that expectation. So, it's about a man being aware and honest with himself about his emotions and reading them in a more nuanced way. The masculine orientation toward emotion tends toward detachment and distance which simplifies things... but it insulates them from experiencing the full complexity and high definition resolution of their emotions. But if a man learns to integrate his feminine side, he will be able to see his emotions clearly for what they are in a way that's closer up. And with a little skill, he will both perceive and be able to articulate his boundaries and feelings. And this will paradoxically make his masculinity shine through in a more brilliant way. So, it's really about the ability to see yourself in a radically honest light, and to honor your feelings and boundaries. Sinking into being more and allowing yourself to let go of extreme attachment ambitions to be at the tippy top of the hierarchy... to which emotional awareness and honesty is antithetical.

I spent a long time repressing my feminine side earlier in life and made it wrong to be feminine in anything other than appearance. So, I basically lived as a female on the outside but a male on the inside since later childhood in that I held myself very tightly to the ideals of male social norms around stoicism especially. So, I have a very well-developed masculine side because I've exercised it a lot. But I've spent the last 10 years getting back in touch with my feminine side, which is actually more natural to me... though my masculine side is genuine to me as well. It just carried the show for so many years, while the other aspect of me was locked away. But I find articulation and communication to be about integration of the feminine and the masculine. So, you need an integration of both sides to have the capacity to make people understand you... especially those who are of the opposite polarity. You need the feminine to have an intimate intuitive awareness of emotions. You need the masculine to understand them with logical thought and articulate them. So, a woman (or man) who has a dis-integrated masculine side may feel their emotions deeply, won't be able to articulate their emotions and will unconsciously resort to manipulation to get their point across. So, it most likely isn't a choice to not seem masculine. Women usually don't mind having an integrated masculine side because masculine values are smiled upon in both genders in our society. And a man (or woman) with a dis-integrated feminine side will have a very limited awareness of their emotions and won't be able to intuit other people's feelings. They'll be able to express general emotions (happy, sad, angry, etc.) but will miss all the nuances and details of emotions. So, when a woman can't articulate her more detailed and complex feelings to a man who can't understand or relate to them, it causes a lot of tension. To the masculine emotions are simple and clear cut and are as easy to read as Clifford the Big Red Dog. This is because the masculine has a birds eye view of the emotions and they don't see (or get lost in) the details. This enables men to make quick and detached decisions. But it also makes men with a disintegrated feminine terrible at emotional understanding, empathy, and intuitive thinking. To the feminine, emotions are complex and nuanced and it takes some know-how to read. It's like the street view of the emotions that the masculine has a birds-eye-view of. So, the feminine is like reading War and Peace and picking up on different themes and textures of the text. It takes some skill to do so... which comes from the integration of the masculine side. So a woman with no integration of the masculine side is trying to read War in Peace in a foreign language that she doesn't know. And then, she tries to communicate details from the text and themes from the text to a man with a disintegrated feminine side who has only ever read Clifford the Big Red Dog and thinks that's the only kind of book to read. And she gets frustrated by not understanding her own emotions and the fact that the man (who she hopes will stand in for her masculine side) can't understand either because he never learned that there is more nuance to the emotions than the complexity Clifford the Big Red Dog. And he goes, "Why can't she just tell me how she feels. Reading Clifford the Big Red Dog is so easy! See, happy, sad. I want this. I want that. Super easy!"

Trust me. They know that you're approaching other women. They deal with 10 guys a day approaching them ever since the beginning of puberty. So, that 23 year old, already had over a decade of experience with men approaching. So, obviously she knew. So, it stands to reason that the guys that are approaching them (and obviously only based on arbitrary factors like age/appearance/gender) are also approaching a ton of other women. By the time a girl hits 15 or 16 years old, they're already onto the numbers game because they are directly privy to the numbers games that men play... since they were like 12. That's what I'm telling you. They can smell it on you... and it's a bad smell that any woman with a shred of self esteem and life experience finds repulsive. And all the other stuff about Spiral Dynamics level and not being a PUA was irrelevant to the points I was making. I was merely telling you that, from the female perspective, you were coming off as creepy and immature for the reasons I mentioned. So, you aren't doing a very good job with social acuity. Like, I'm literally giving you pick up advice about how you're coming off from the female perspective. I'm just not sugar-coating it.

I don't necessarily think the judgment is toward you being attracted to young women in general... though the way you talk about it is very off-putting and will make literally every woman's legs clench up very tightly. And I'm not trying to be judgmental here, but I'm not sugar-coating it either. The problem comes about when you approach a woman based on number (age-wise) and numbers (in terms of approaching a bunch of women), in that particular context. It feels from a woman's pov, as objectifying and creepy... and I'm sure that's why you got the reaction you did. Women are very intuitive and are approached often by TONS of guys. So, they could probably intuitively feel your mindset and see it right on you. After a while, you can almost smell it on a man. That coupled with a 17 year age difference can feel very weird. But to speak to your thought that some women like older men... that's true. But it's still creepy even for the ones that prefer older guys. I was actually really into older men when I was in my early 20s (usually by a decade or two, even). But I also knew that if the older man approached me at random that he wasn't worth my time because he wasn't considering my feelings. That would mean that he didn't have the social acuity and maturity to know that it's probably received by me as creepy. I wanted a guy who would be wise and caring enough to try to make me feel comfortable. I was looking for a fully mature 30-40 year old guy at the time that acted like one. I wasn't looking for a middle aged man who still behaved like the guys my age that were so tiring to me. And thus, if a middle aged man would try to run game at me or see me as part of numbers game, it would just feel like dating a 20 year old guy in a 40 year old man's body... which is not the sexy, warm-hearted, emotionally stable older gentleman that I was looking for at that point. The fact of the matter is that it feels creepy when random middle aged men approach young women in a random setting. And that's true no matter how much you're attracted to older men. It's not the same dynamic as when a guy approaches a woman in his age range, at all.

He is being emotionally abusive to you. He feels weak and so he feels that he needs to put you down and suppress you and put out your light. So, he will find every opportunity to cut you down. Leave now, or you will eventually grow accustomed to the abuse and will suppress so much of yourself just to exist in a small space for him. You will become a shell of the person you once were. He will not change. He does this because he has a lot of problems to work out, and most people do not change. He needs to see you small. So, if you stay in the relationship, you are agreeing to smallness.

The vibe I get is that he's has some narcissistic and self-aggrandizing tendencies, and is maybe using you as a person to bring into his narcissism to support it. Basically, he's looking for a co-dependent to control and boss around. And now he's saying nice things like "You're a blessing" and that kind of thing, but soon it may turn into disparaging thoughts and trying to change/control you. So, don't take his openness or niceties as a sign that he is good for you. Often times, manipulators will share of themselves openly just to engender a sense of trust in their victims to get them hooked.

The itches and white tongue thing reminds me a bit of Scarlet Fever. I know you said it was a reaction to the anti-biotic. But that's what popped to my mind reading this. Here are some symptoms... https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/176242.php#symptoms

Joker is definitely a movie depicting a mentally ill man's transition from struggling and falling through the cracks in Orange to becoming a shadow-leader in Green. It is Green in its critiques against wealth inequality and how society negatively impacts vulnerable groups, since the Joker comes from a the working poor class and also has a mental illness and was raised by someone with a mental illness. So, it deals directly with the theme of systemic inequalities and how they impact individuals living within the system that is Gotham City and also the mental health care system within Gotham City. It's a story about how some people fall through the cracks in our society and don't get the support they need, while everyone who excels in Orange just expects them to be like everyone else and compete in the rat race... even if they are like Arthur Fleck. So, once Arthur Fleck starts out trying to conform and "be good" and fit into an Orange Capitalist society that Gotham City is a caricature of. And this doesn't work for him. He can't fit. The social structures aren't evolved enough in this Orange society for him to fit or be accommodated to. He is oppressed and therefore suppressed... An no one REALLY sees him. And he feels it. There is no place for him to exist as himself without struggling or being ostracized or just generally misunderstood because of his mental illness and the ignorance of the people around him to the reality of mental illness... especially when poverty and mental illness intersect with one another. Those in more privileged positions are quite tone-deaf to Arthur Fleck's struggles, and so life is hell for him. And he lives a life of isolation. Then when he starts to journal and contemplate on things and experience contrast (through killing the rich guys on the subway and being celebrated as a hero of the working class) he becomes more empowered. But that empowerment comes in an unhealthy way. He becomes the leader of a systemically oppressed group of poor people that encompasses most people in Gotham City. So when he is empowered he becomes the Joker, and he is using unhealthy Green to empower himself and create fairness through chaos and a destructive leveling of power. There is no space for him to exist in society, so he takes on the space of the archetypal clown (aka trickster) and embraces his place as an outsider who seeks revenge on the powers that be. And his goal is to create anarchy where those at the top fall down, and he undermines the social structure that they've been thriving off of to turn the tables. And he rallies other similarly outcasted and vulnerable people to his cause, which starts a chain reaction against the rich... in a similar fashion to the French Revolution's leveling of power structures via public violence, rioting, and guillotining the powerful. So, he is inviting corrupt Green into a corrupt Orange society where economic oppression is the way of things (because, in this move, Gotham City is an ever-so-slightly more openly corrupt city than the average American city is in reality.)

It wasn't alcohol. It was Clonazapam (better known as Klonopins), an anti-anxiety drug that was prescribed to him by a doctor when his wife was going through cancer treatment earlier this year.

Certainly, there would be a struggle for a huge percentage of people in terms of feeling normal and having social acuity. It takes a while to learn the ropes. And I know from experience that it can be easy to feel awkward and abnormal. It's a feeling that I'm very familiar with. But even with that withstanding, take the most awkward (and even genuinely abnormal) person you can think of, and that person will still be able to get one date out of a hundred. That's why I said that I don't believe Leo's 400 approaches number.

400?!?! How?!?! This has to be an exaggeration. You could look like Quazimodo and have the social skills of a middle schooler and still get a date with like one in every hundred women you'd approach. Honestly, I could approach like 20 women, and at least one of them would give me a phone number... and I'm a woman. I get that you're trying to ramp up motivation for guys to approach lots of women by setting the expectations high for what success will mean. That way they don't get discouraged by not getting success within their first few approaches. But a lot of guys will see that and go, "Oh man. If Leo (who I look up to as a mentor) had to do it 400 times before he got any success, then I'm never going to get success. And what if it never gets better than a 1/400 chance?" You have to make the game seem winnable too... which it totally is. For the average guy, probably 1 in 30 approaches will work out. Are you really being honest about the 400 approaches number?

Stage Green is all about noticing how various groups are impacted by different systemic forces, including cultural appropriation. So, it's not that Green is hyper-focused on identifying dogmatically with a group like Blue is. It's that they recognize that the social system impacts people differently depending on which group people are in. And Green also recognizes that Orange's "everyone is an individual" perspective, glosses over and creates a blindspot in awareness toward many systemic social problems. And that's because Orange is (on some level) pretending that different groups don't exist and that they aren't impacted differently by cultural forces. It can often be difficult for people from the dominant culture in a region who are in stage Orange to understand the impact of cultural appropriation on minority groups, as they don't have any frame of reference in terms of being impacted by cultural appropriation by a more dominant social group. So, it can be abstract to understand for white people living in a white majority multicultural region why cultural appropriation would be a problem. So, Orange with its individualistic focus that has transcended Blue's hyper-focus toward absolutist group-identification and maintaining the ingroup, can confuse Green's awareness of collective dynamics and how they uniquely impact certain groups with Blue's social dogma around group identities. The difference is undetectable from Orange, usually because Orange fails to look from the collective perspective and thus can't shift into the proper perspective to see what's happening on that level. But there is a world of difference because Blue is about hyper-focus toward just one group that's seen as the best, and Green is about adopting a collectivist group-focused lens to notice macro-societal patterns and have an understanding of various social groups and trying to alleviate problems that those social groups are facing that may be in the blindspot of the dominant social groups. And you can't do the latter if you pretend that differences in social groups don't exist, like Orange does. You need to evolve to Green to see these larger dynamics play out on the global scale... which is also 100% a pre-requisite for Yellow as well.