Ikar

Day 310 addendum: I had a meeting my father set up with one of his acquaintances, regarding business items I want like calling cards and car stickers. I also chose a new book for me to read from the uni library, as I didn't seriously read for about a month. I am getting "1984" from Orwell; I think it will have a sufficient pull for me. In the evening, I went to the philosophy courses and got good advice regarding using more online platforms to advertise my business.

If you feel that there is some old stuff resurfacing, write about it. I'm not writing this so I have more stuff to read, but I found out that writing helps me recognize patterns I am acting out, so I can be honest with myself and honest with others sooner than if I did not. The GQ forum is by and large very tolerant and compassionate, so you don't have to be afraid of someone trying to pillory you for something you wrote. I personally like confronting people and their ideas, asking them why they think X and not Y and if Z would be better. On the other hand, I think spending an hour writing here or spending an hour talking to someone IRL is incomparable in the possible return of investment of doing such a thing.

I wonder how much of a motivator to study was turning that offer down. I can imagine that in my case, even if I turned down a relatively mediocre offer to go out, I'd make sure I studied.

Day 310: I did Russian and had a slightly lighter workout, even though it was still difficult to get myself to do it. I felt oddly lonely afterwards. I truly enjoy putting in the effort to be more social and then analyzing how did that particular conversation/event go and I think that's why I got this sort of a "downtime" when I focus too much on the results and push that passion too hard. It's also the second day where I feel battered at the end of it, despite not doing anything besides the basic maintenance. On the flip-side, my past Saturday was amazing in terms output, so I think that went well and I think I'll get my energy back tomorrow.

Depends, there is a lot of stuff one can do on the computer, but watching TV or gaming for 8 hours a day is not the best course of action. Friendships are about acceptance, not about forcing your values onto others. If someone was trying to change my sexual orientation (and were serious about it), I'd tell them to piss off and worry about their own life. Good choice on not doing that anymore.

I do pull-ups, sit-ups, leg-press, bike and weights.

Day 309: I planned my next week, visited my parents and worked out. I'm feeling fairly beat after today.

I agree with that. In this regard, I need to gain more experience, because I only started being more social about 10 weeks ago. I am enjoying the process for the most part, simply because I know I can't skip it.

Day 308: I worked out, watched two videos from Peterson and wrote extensively in my blog. I went out in the evening to meet with two guys from high school.

You mention your experiences and areas in my life I want to be more knowledgeable/wise about, but I fail to make the connection in how that relates to one another. It could be that it's past midnight here, but I am unsure how to reply to this, because it seems ambiguous to me.

Day 306: I worked out and got some work done on my web. I think I might be half-way through it at this point. As for working out, I started doing more complex full-body workouts. I attended a presentation with a guy who is doing interviews with the veterans/insurgents of wars in the Caucasus. I thought it would be more history-oriented at first, but in the end it was about understanding why specific people participated in them, gaining people's trust and getting to the real roots of their participation. In the evening, I went to an English speaking event and I met a respectable young entrepreneur whom I want to chat with again, because he seems to be on the right track, at least in my eyes. We agreed on the importance of having mentors in our lives to learn from. Day 307: I went to the uni, worked out and went to bed early.

I think there's even an ethical perspective to not watching porn, because then it's possible to refocus your sexuality into the real world. Once it's back in the real world, you'll fantasize about real women you meet. Once you do that, then you have a clear bearing for what women you want to approach and perhaps date. And once you are in a relationship, your sexuality gets hopefully integrated into something greater.

Constructed only ever was about getting above 50% W/R anyway, so it was just a time-grind. I much rather played Arena and I was infinite at it, though I quit HS almost 4 years ago. @Alexanderle is right. You're doing this for yourself.

Day 304: I got mails, read, worked on my website, cooked and worked out. I went out afterwards. I had a good time chatting for an hour or two with the girl I wanted to talk to. She mentioned she and her female friend dislike the majority way of how females interact with males romantically and that they barely have any other female friends, even though they are both heterosexual. They are both unavailable for dating from what I can tell though. This is extremely interesting and motivating for me. I feel like I want a woman who is combative in an open way, rather than guilt tripping, so she can qualify in my eyes both as a person I want to have kids with and someone I can hold deep respect for as a friend as well. Day 305: I worked out, went for an interview (I think it went well), visited my grandma and attended a seminar about the power of thoughts and words.

I say go for it without the laptop. I spent my 10 weeks in Iceland without my laptop and while I still spent a few hours on the phone, I think it was less than I would've had if I had my laptop. A habit I had while I was in Iceland was to spend about an hour just lying on the coast, thinking, meditating, reading or slumbering after the day's work. I'll try something similar today after all these months. I also sometimes feel that my days are constant streams of activities and that I don't really have a sharp divide that would allow me to enter a more relaxed part of the day.

I have a friend from high school who is studying to be an actor and he mentioned something related to what you pointed out. The performance/play needs to look believable in different contexts. There can be plays where the kiss is nervous, but there can also be plays where the kiss is passionate. The idea is the actor actually needs to embody the given emotion. I can't even begin to imagine how complex that must be to achieve on a regular basis, but I suppose it's practice in a way. I think I'll stay more grounded the next time as well. I'm really gripped by this area of life at the moment and I try to let the intellect work side by side with emotionality, trying to not go overboard with any. I'm enjoying trying to figure this out, at least in basic shapes.

Little did they know they were equating "good" with "robot" and that humans are not robots. It's still better to know that now than never at least 🙂

Day 303: Today, I went to the shop, thought about the design for my banner for English teaching and did Russian. I afterwards went to the gym and met the same girl I did last week at the same time (Day 296 - didn't write that down here). I already knew she did some graphics designing from the week before and meeting her again gave me the opportunity to ask her whether she'd be interesting in designing something for me, as I think some artwork might be required for either the banner or the website. But she told me she is not very happy about her artistic capabilities so far, so I let that thread go. I ate, took a shower and went ahead to meet with the local group for geographers, but there were only three of us. I got engaged in small talk for a bit afterwards. I then went to the library, where they hold English events every now and then and today there was a Taboo desktop event. I met with the older lady from Day 293, but she left a bit earlier, so I was left alone with the married librarian in her 30s I met for the first time and played Scrabble with on Day 268. To top it off, I went to the philosophy lectures in the evening. It helped me sort out some of the things below. ----- I noticed that I know of two cases of sharing food in the past several days, while asking the person if they want subconsciously without thinking. There could obviously be more cases of this recently (and in a non-materialistic way too), but in the past I felt that sharing was more of a duty I had to do. When I was a kid (about 12), I have a memory where I actually hated sharing a pack of Mentos with another guy. I'm also fairly eager to volunteer nowadays. I'm planning on going for the nature clean-up day with the people who run the philosophy courses, as they also all volunteer to give these lessons. I also enjoy employing the idea of continuous concept talk. I generally meet people on a weekly or semi-daily basis. That gives me some time to ponder what thing during our conversation caught my attention and I try to expand on the idea the next time I get to talk with them. That way, I got to sense that the girl I met at the gym was fairly disciplined and get her to mention she had a boyfriend, without explicitly asking that or laying similar overt questions. That way, I got to sense that the married librarian might be making a few too many sexually-themed references during the game. On Saturday, my friend told me he went to an event. The talk was about being present among other things. During the event they would receive and try to bend solid stainless spoons, without applying excessive force and using only two fingers of each hand to achieve that. My friend managed to bend two spoons out of four. I don't know if he managed to just accumulate enough heat in his fingertips to bend them. But he told me that when he started caring too much about the result or even being scared about what is happening, he would no longer be able to bend the spoon and stay present. This was EXACTLY what happened to me on Day 297. I was talking to a girl who was playing with her hair while talking to me. I read that it is supposed to be a classic flirtation signal. I noticed that and I got scared, because it was so damn novel to me. I probably saw a ton of women playing with their hair before, talking to me or not, it's just I never made that connection. I could be making all this shit up of course, but maybe I am slowly consciously figuring out the basics of human (sub)communication. I'm getting after it.

100% on the liberation part. Regarding gaming, liberation came to me when I understood I gamed because the rest of my life was haywire. Regarding people/relationships/myself, liberation came to me when I understood that we all have certain needs and that we all interact with one another to get those needs met, so we can prosper. I also self-diagnosed myself with addiction and depression, because I decided gaming interferes with too much that I want to do in life otherwise and doesn't provide good enough return.

I don't like writing this, because I could game several hours a day, but I'm afraid that's something that doesn't serve us well most of the time, because most of the life is about balance, rather than going all-in on one or two things. I think nailing just one goal for the day (i.e. something important that you do not want to do) is acceptable. Discipline should feel better over time and become a habit. I'm working out daily for the past 7 weeks and I can't imagine my day without that at this point.

Day 302: I did Duolingo, read, visited my parents, watched a shorter Peterson lecture, worked out, cleaned my room and I'm currently doing the laundry. I got my next week lined up and I'll try to get something done for the web every day. I didn't have any bigger project I was working on this week, so I'll try to make up for that.

Day 301: I spent most of my day visiting classes my friend teaches. I saw and participated in these types of lessons after two months. It was great to get back in touch with all of it. I fit in a bit of mailing and a workout in the remainder of the day.

Day 300: I went to the uni, worked out and scheduled my next week. No Ejaculation: 11 days, currently 1 day

It doesn't have a story-line and it's not giving any advice either. It's just text that is supposed to help you to connect some dots that you didn't see before.

Day 299: I did a couple of smaller things today. I backed up my diary here, got through more mails, Duolingo, washed the dishes, sent a classic mail and worked on some exercises from Manson's Models. I had a class later afternoon about regional development and it was quite interesting, so I took the business card from the presenter. I went outside to the English speaking event afterwards and I had alcohol-free beer (perhaps it works as placebo anyway?). I am experimenting with whether I need to drink alcohol at all, as while it's easier to combat whatever anxiety early, it makes me dip into the state of drowsiness sooner and harder and I do not like when I'm not as acute in my social interactions as I could be.