lmfao

You made a video on this 4 years ago, I wouldnt mind seeing another one. There are loads of angles you can go from for this topic. Although I could see why you wouldn't feel the need to shoot a massive video on this topic.

@Alex bAlex Yeah, loads people like yourself (and me included) are socially awkward. It's a classic problem. Wanting to avoid someone you know in public might be fairly common lol. I know that for me, the person I see in public might want to engage in all sorts of small talk but I don't want that. In regards to your second situation you seem to have figured out your own problem with that second paragraph in the quote. Since you are a different person from me it would be presumptuous for me to think I can accurately speculate as to what the causes and "solutions" to your problems are but I'll try anyway. I'll just talk from my own experience. In some of the situations, you "freeze" and don't know what to say. I think that this freeze response of your might be rooted in anxiety. A small unexpected event in the external world triggers your fight or flight response. People with anxiety problems have an overactive and oversensitive fight or flight response. And in your post you've talked about childhood experiences that might be causing these problems you have. You're able to come up with all sorts of responses after the interaction is over and this could maybe be explained by having anxiety problems. If you don't have anxiety problems, don't let me typing about it make you think you have them. I hate small talk and find 90% of what people talk about to be boring. I don't give a shit about gossip or sports at any meaningful level, topics people talk about all the time. If I'm in a situation where I am forced to do such things for extended periods of time it probably means I'm not hanging out with the right people. However I would be lying if I said I hate small talk completely, since I can talk a long time about certain video games I've played or tv shows that ive watched. So perhaps theres also the problem you don't have topics of interest to talk about with most people around you. I have found personally myself that after having meditated I am more calm throughout the day and am less likely to immediately panic and freeze up. One thing which I need to do for myself is not let my disdain for small talk result in me having impaired/poor social skills. I'm setting a personal goal to accept the part of myself which hates small talk but to also have good social skills. Right now, whenever I interact socially its clunky and it drains my energy from having to put on a persona. But if I stop putting on a persona, whatever the short term consequences may be, things will be better for me in the long term. Another thing which im not sure of is whether some of your problems are worsened/caused by English not being your native language.

Facts

"Everything that we teach does not work on Asian girls, they are terrified of humans" lmao.

@RichardY regarding your signature, do you dislike "Plato (Ideal forms), John Stuart Mill (Utilitarianism), William James (Pragmatism)"

@bejapuskas Yeah true. There's a reason people mix up these different things, because it's true that neediness can disguised as extraversion and its also true that social anxiety can be disguised as introversion. I find it hard to tell the difference sometimes. Yeah, introversion can sometimes be a function of feeling uncomfortable with the group of people you're with. Someone who feels like they don't fit in anywhere and feels isolated from the world will act a bit more introverted than they might otherwise be. I'm just talking from experience here. In the past I've been with groups of people who I really don't fit in with and I can pick up on the fact that 99% of the things I say won't be on their wavelength, so I remain silent. And something I've noticed is that if you're silent and don't give away too much about yourself to other people they'll project a lot false ideas and beliefs about you so it's important to put yourself out there to the world.

@Ampresus Two things come to mind from reading your question. I can semi resonate with what you typed. I have shared my negative experiences with people before, telling them annoying shit that's happened to me and I think its a natural thing people do. From a psychoanalytical perspective, which I agree with, I think its fuelled by the subconscious motivation to have other people join in on your outrage or to have other people help you in some way. You can't believe that some negative events transpired, you're pissed and maybe it is partially because of your subconscious sense of self-importance that you want to tell the world that such and such negative things have happened to you. It's a need to announce things to the world, because its unacceptable that these transgressions against your ego have transpired. What I typed above is only partially explanatory for some situations and not all. @Leon_Mao made a good point. I believe there's also a degree of introversion vs extraversion going on here and theres also the fact that you don't like small talk. I think the introversion vs extraversion dichotomy goes deeper than simply liking or disliking small talk and even if there are correlations, but those correlations aren't causal imo. Some introverts will bore me to death with small talks, other extraverts will engage me with their motor mouth if they're talking about subjects I care about. I'm yet to figure it out for myself, but some people love and some people hate small talk. I personally see this trait as something which is linked to the Intuitive vs Sensory dichotomy within the MBTI model of personality. And on a separate note, I'm not too sure what to make of introversion vs extraversion when I think about different states of mindfulness ive been in. Even if im in a higher state of mindfulness after meditating, im still introverted but slightly less so. A few of the patterns of behaviour associated with introversion are also patterns which I adopt if im depressed and feeling volatile in mood.

@Freakrik I guess this is where I disagree with Leo. I think Leo would say yes to this question and I base that thought on some previous things I've heard him say in a thread where I asked Leo about solipsism. When using words to talk about spirituality, words are but a finger pointing to the moon. And so perhaps I disagree with the idea that saying "yes" to this question in the quotation box will point you towards the moon. The way I see it, you just have this present moment experience. Who knows what the state of your consciousness will be in the future. Who knows if there is a future or past? Your consciousness just has the state it does now. It's spontaneous and uncreated.

"When hungry, eat. When tired, sleep."

@non_nothing good question. So long as you stop taking in and spending money you won't have to worry about tax problems, common sense would dictate. And in order for you to do that, which you know already, you'll probably be going somewhere rural so as to be self sufficient. So long as im lurking in the shadows brother I might bump this thread if it sinks too low without enough replies.

@moon777light

@Shin transendental meditation my brother

@Cammy yeah probs

@Quantum_fluctuations Whether you feel or don't feel compassion, feel sad or happy, feel anxious or scared, do it in the spirit of zen.

bump

"There is neither creation nor destruction,neither destiny nor free will, neither path nor achievement. This is the final truth." - Ramana Maharshi

@SoonHei This whole inquiry process is so weird. I try to come up with an articulate way of describing how I feel, but I end up deleting it because it feels inadequate. One way I see it, reality is always in a situation you never created. Your thoughts, awareness, sensations of pressure, everything which composes your consciousness, is uncreated by you. Existence always has and always will be effortless. And then I also feel the paradox of how can any perception of experience exist in the absence of time. Supposing all we have is now, and time doesn't exist, then how is it that any perceptions exist? Let's look at language and thought. Whenever one thinks of a word, e.g. "cat" and has it in their mind, I have the perception that I have this word totally grasped in my mind. However, it takes a time which is not equal to zero seconds for this word to pass through my mind. If everything is now, how does perception exist? Without time, how can sensations and perceptions exist and change? You don't have to look at language and thought, you can look at any perceived happening in consciousness. A random theoretical thought I have had. Just a thought experiment entertaining the existence of time. Consider an interval of time, e.g. 10s. Between 0 and 10 are an infinite(ie endless) number of numbers, and so there are an infinite number of snapshots of time. Essentially what is going on is that this 10 second interval is composed of an infinite number of points. It perhaps then be said that this 10 second interval is mathematically equal to an infinite sum of points. Within the 10 second interval, you can see all sorts of events and happening transpire. But if we are to define this interval of time as being equal to the sum of an infinite number of points, let's look at one of these points. Maybe one of these points is what we'd call "the present moment". So let's look at the present moment. Everything is frozen. Nothing is going on at an individual point (and something is happening in this 10 second interval) , yet theoretically it is impossible for this 10 second interval to not be defined as the sum of all these points. Points are zeroth dimensional objects, and graphically speaking lines of all possible sizes are composed of an infinite number of points. To get even more theoretical about infinity as it is described in maths. Between any two numbers we say that there are an "infinite" number of numbers. The way I see it, infinity can mean "more can be generated" in some situations. Suppose I'm looking at all the possible numbers between 1 and 2. Consider the number 1.01 . I can put a "1" after the last digit to generate a number, 1.011, and from that new number I can put another "1" after the last digit to generate another number, 1.0111. This process of adding numbers after the last digit goes on forever. So from a certain perspective, "infinity" is just a consequence of how the mathematical language is defined. As the mathematical language is defined, I'm allowed to generate as many numbers as I want between 1 and 2. So from a certain perspective, in this particular situation there's perhaps a certain arbitrariness to "infinity" in this context since the word "infinity" is just pointing towards an "exploit" /"glitch" in the language that we ourselves have created.

@SoonHei good post. A confusing aspect about words when trying to find out who you really are is that any set of words you use are inadequate. For example to put across what I mean, if I say that I am the mind, I then start defining the mind. After that, I then construct a sentence defining every word I used in the sentence to define the mind. After that, I then construct a sentence defining every word I used in the sentence which defined every word I used to define the mind. The process just goes on forever, words never get you anywhere.

@brugluiz According to the same test you took I got 17/20 which would apparently indicate that I am an empath. One thing I can relate to about being an "empath" is the sense that you strongly feel the atmosphere and vibe of a room, and that's something I can actually relate to quite heavily despite having autistic traits. What I find funny however is despite the fact that tests will tell me I'm an empath other tests I take will tell me I have sociopathic traits.

@Preetom What really matters probably isn't the verbal descriptions and arguments you give for free will. What really matters is probably just where your awareness is. I see no reason your view isn't workable, in fact I might like it. Who knows if there is free will or predetermination. The way I guess I might see it is that reality is always in a situation which you did nothing to create. Even the facet of reality that is your awareness is beyond your control, it is just the way it is.

@Fairy It obviously depends what you mean by "you' isn't it. There are two ways of looking at it: you do everything or everything happens to you, and both are right.

@Joseph Maynor Random question which is just me asking asking out of boredom, but how confident do you feel about the existence of the stages (e.g. blue or yellow or any other color) in spiral dynamics and the existence of the progression of these stages? I'm just interested in what you say because you seem to have thought/read about spiral dynamics a fair bit. On the one hand I sort of believe in it, but on the other hand I don't know whether any Spiral Dynamics explanations I have about things are just confirmation bias. Random thought I had on confirmation bias. Supposing that the world was entirely rational and logical and could be explained with the metaphysics of your bog-standard empiricist it follows that the human mind is neither smart enough or observant enough to logically sort through all the events and happenings in the universe (the universe is too chaotic with way too many variables). And because our brains are not powerful enough ( you could think of IQ as being a component of "power" if you want) to work out the "true answer" to certain questions my mind will instead deduce the answer to questions by using an increased number of assumptions and increased number of jumps in logical reasoning. Supposing that in reality it takes 100 logical steps to reach the true answer to a question, my mind might only use 6 steps due to the presence of further assumptions and jumps in reasoning which are caused by my world view (e.g. spiral dynamics). good answer

@Joseph Maynor Are you saying that Spiral Dynamics is "not just a set of beliefs" because you believe there's value in the beliefs?

I'm probably gonna start off at a bit of tangent just describing my experience and then I'll go into my actual question. My mood is too much like a yoyo, and this is probably the case for other people with depression. There have been moments during some of my days where I'm all of the sudden swept by a feeling of lifelessness. I'll lack the energy and motivation to move a single muscle in my body. Simple acts like even walking and talking feel like a drag. I've had what is depression for at least 2+ years now, and I'm 18 right now. I've been on an SSRI for 2 years. I also have anxiety problems. I had this feeling sweep over me today after meditating for 80 mins today. Although the feeling has significantly subsided in intensity, I've noticed that the feeling is always present in my conscious experience its just that I've never been mindful of it until now. Even as I type this sentence I notice that the feeling is in my experience, and if I wanted to I could let that emotion spread throughout my body and try to be mindful of it but Im in an extremely large habit of constantly resisting it. Because trying to be mindful of it feels hard, although it feels more doable for me than it did before. I've started to sort of accept the emotion but its a very big leap to make. It almost feels like im forced to make the conscious decision to resist the emotion because it feels like too much to digest. Any time that I've taken the first one or two steps to changing deep rooted habits I'm always ambushed by the same demon. I've tried googling what cures there are for low mood and depression, but the "cure" just basically seems to be all of self help. I initially made this thread with the intention of finding biological hacks but as I'm typing this I realise that there probably aren't any. I don't think there's some magic way that I can just easily fix my neurotransmitters or whatever the fuck it is. From a scientific view, anything about is due to a combination of genetic and environmental factors. And whilst it is unhelpful to play the role of victim with "bad genetics" I cant help but feel I'm cursed with genetic factors. One of my parents has pretty bad depression, one of them has pretty bad anxiety issues, and I have a strong family history of psychosis. Whether or not I'm genetically predisposed to depression probably has little bearing on what the solution is for me. Note: The title of this thread reached the character limit so I had omit putting "the" before "biological".