House Quest

[Laura Ingalls]

Hugs

We have lived through this in my family as well.

When you are really sick with an AUD not drinking is dangerous too. Hopefully he is accepting of whatever he needs right now.

[Violets]

@newblood,@laura ingalls @ertyu
Thank you for the sympathy/empathy. It is what it is. Eh.

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Spending this week:
41 Dollars. Under my 50 a week grocery/living expense goal, so I’m leaving it as one category.

It’s been a rice and beans week, and I’ve enjoyed it. I was burnt out on eating them, but I seem to have gotten past that.

There is a hypnotist coming to our area that specializes in quitting smoking. My dad asked if I’d like to go with him, so that we could both quit smoking. I am not a fan of the idea, but I did say I would try anything, so I guess I probably should try it. From what I remember about hypnotism, it’s usually most effective on people that already believe it works, so I’m not sure it’s an ideal answer.

I got extra responsibilities at work, and with those, some extra hours. This prompted me to leave the restaurant job I was working three nights a week. The restaurant job was great for a lot of reasons: I got to see people several times a week, the coworkers were friendly, the work was rote and fastpaced, I enjoyed practicing accents to attempt to take entire orders with without breaking character. I do not miss it though.

I posted in the minimalist game thread, not intending to get terribly involved and THEN GOT RID OF 76 pieces of clothing the next day. haha.. I’m also now aware that I have a ton of clothes. I don’t buy them, my mom gives me some for birthdays and my Schizo-but-sweet-as-sweet sister works in a higher end consignment shop and likes to give gifts from there. I did not realize just how much clothing I had because of this, ‘cause I don’t actually buy almost any. Most of what I got rid of was things that were realistically too worn/holes/ect that I have duplicates of but was still wearing (to trash.) and then a bunch of things that were too large/not flattering. I probably have twice that in clothes still, not even counting work uniforms, which is mind blowing. I might prune further.

I’m a little worried about getting rid of larger clothes. Most of my life I’ve been a certain weight range, and post mental break I gained…a ton of weight on the medication I was previously on. Not directly because of it, but also in tandem with alcoholism and being really depressed at having lost literally everything in my life. In the last year I got back to my normal operating weight, but I’m not sure I should get rid of larger clothes because…wellp, what if I it happens again?

Related:
People keep telling me to quit losing weight. I am not sure I trust their opinion—I’ve lived all over the country, including places where the majority percentage is…less overweight. In the state I live in well over 50% is overweight, nearly 50% is obese. I have checked my weight against BMI (I know it is faulty.) and If I hit my current goal weight I will still not be at the low end of it. However, currently, everyone in my life is telling me I’m too skinny… Perhaps I am wrong. The majority of people telling me this are overweight. Locally, skinniness is also associated with drug use, so it has a negative connotation. My brother has previously pointed at people that aren’t fat and asked if I wanted to look like those tweakers, so I’m aware that being skinny is…heavily associated with serious problems. I don’t think I’m shooting for an unhealthy weight though. I'm more or less happy where I am, but I've gotten into a habit that makes me continue to lose weight without thinking about it much. (Intermittent fasting.) so I figured I'd let that run it's course for another 6-8 pounds.

[ertyu]

My weight has gone up and down a couple of times and one thing i noticed is that how large other people seem is shaped by how large i am. As I increase or decrease in size, i seem a constant size to me, and this seems to me to be the normal size (normal not in relation to objective reality and what is or should be most common, rather, normal as the "default" size my brain thinks bodies are). It is the size of others that changes in my perception. E.g. on a couple of occasions I've been, "hmmm i mustve gotten fatter" bc a colleague suddenly seems smaller, and what do you know, I have. Tl;dr most of the people telling you that you are losing "too much weight" aren't telling you an objective fact. Their brains just perceive you as decreasing away from default size. Many think this is envy or malicious or whatever; i don't think it is. I think it's just one of those weird tricks of how perception works. I don't know what size you are or aren't, but in the end, the determining factor is how you feel. Do you feel comfortable? Weak? Strong? Stable energy levels, stable ability to activate and complete tasks? That's all that matters.

[Jean]

It sounds like you are worried that people might take you for an addict.
Do you yourself think you look like an addict?

Around here, there are a lot of non addict that are non obese, so we recognize addicts with facial marking or their voices. Just not being obese isn't enough to be seen as an addict.

[Violets]

Week:
Groceries: 32.5
Beer: 3
Cigarettes: 4.5
Gas: 54
Medical: 179


I had a stressful week…I got the kind of sick you have to go to the doctor for and my brother got himself arrested. I suppose the most interesting part was learning about bail bonds, I knew nothing about that or how to try to communicate with someone in jail. It was just a missed traffic court warrant, nothing terrible.

Bought nice cigarettes because life was stressful, ended up finding a new, cheaper, local place to buy the kind I usually buy, which was great!

Read the part of the ERE book where Jacob talks about cold showers and I have been trying that. I hate it. Ha. I suppose doing something you hate is it's own victory over yourself tho'.

Annoyed myself a lot last week by getting on here to read journals while drunk and then fucking up and posting.

I depressed myself a lot this week with mind wanders into thought spools that are not useful or helpful. My parents are/were very devoutly religious, extremely so when I was young, and I chose not to be at a very young age. I started running away and hiding in the woods to avoid going to church, and went to college almost as soon as I could secure a full scholarship. I chose science. These days, when I think about what I’ve observed in the last ten years, I find myself thinking that science is almost as much of a religion as the typical ones—a narrative shaping the world and reality held in place by the belief of multiple people and it’s really depressing. I realize this is as much anathema to those that believe in science as not believing in god is to those that are very devout, and as it was my chosen operating system for years I am lost without it. Half of me is quite convinced that there exists a greater truth beyond either dominating faction as I perceive them, but I do not see any way to verify or prove that. If you lose faith in science there is nothing to hold onto as a starting point to do so. My mind wants to return to my old philosophy textbooks to look for an answer there, but I seriously do not have time for this shit. I have things I need to do and getting lost in that is a diversion that will hamper what I need to do in the physical, concrete, real world my physical body resides in. I have things I want to actually accomplish, I cannnnootttttttt go mind-wandering right now, I have enough problems that are actual and real and I can actually do something about.

Technically, I suppose I am still using a basis of scientific belief to form this belief, because it is based on observations that contradict what should be able to be held true. Meh. I am aware that my mind is capable of tricking me, so I've performed ...tests...to see if what I suspect is valid and they have been true, even when I hold onto the possibility my mind might be lying to me and try to control for that, but..ah. It's SUCH A WASTE OF TIME.

—----

Rationally, I still choose science and use it for my day to day belief systems, I’m just depressed because I don’t think it is the end all be all I thought it was. (I do believe in a higher power, or an otherly force of some sort, and I am mildly superstitious these days, but I don’t use that stuff for my life, just as a thing to observe, usually.) And obviously, I can come up with great rational explanations for whatever I need to, but I just get stuck in a suspicion that there is something beyond and it's really distracting.

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It sounds like you are worried that people might take you for an addict.
Do you yourself think you look like an addict?

Around here, there are a lot of non addict that are non obese, so we recognize addicts with facial marking or their voices. Just not being obese isn't enough to be seen as an addict.

I don't worry about that at all. My family just makes comments about it? Around here, the most attractive folk are usually the addicts. In time, they degrade to the point that they are not attractive or they die. A few recover. There are some that end up with facial tattoos, of course. Where I live we lose a lot of the population to addiction.

My weight has gone up and down a couple of times and one thing i noticed is that how large other people seem is shaped by how large i am. As I increase or decrease in size, i seem a constant size to me, and this seems to me to be the normal size (normal not in relation to objective reality and what is or should be most common, rather, normal as the "default" size my brain thinks bodies are). It is the size of others that changes in my perception. E.g. on a couple of occasions I've been, "hmmm i mustve gotten fatter" bc a colleague suddenly seems smaller, and what do you know, I have. Tl;dr most of the people telling you that you are losing "too much weight" aren't telling you an objective fact. Their brains just perceive you as decreasing away from default size. Many think this is envy or malicious or whatever; i don't think it is. I think it's just one of those weird tricks of how perception works. I don't know what size you are or aren't, but in the end, the determining factor is how you feel. Do you feel comfortable? Weak? Strong? Stable energy levels, stable ability to activate and complete tasks? That's all that matters.

That's an interesting observation, and when I think about it, I feel like you are probably right. I feel like that is similar to what I meant when I said that people are so used to seeing overweight people here that they don't perceive being overweight as a problem. I do not think my family means it maliciously.

Those are good ways to think about how much food to intake.

[7Wannabe5]

I think skinnier or heavier can also simply be an aesthetic. For example, if you are female, weight carried on your ass and thighs, given a trim waist is not indicative of any increased health risks, so a preference for "thigh gap' or a repugnance towards "cellulite" is more likely a learned cultural reaction/response or related to personal experience/imprinting. Since I am also somebody whose weight has yo-yo'd over the years while my waist-to-hip ratio stays remarkably consistent, I have had the experience of having male partners who would prefer me more slinky and also male partners who would prefer me more voluptuous.

[Scordatura]

Regarding the cold showers:
"Man conquers the world by conquering himself." ~ Zeno of Citium
I've been riding the bike to work, and there's a giant hill... I'll take voluntary hardship for 500, Alex. What is phat boi on bicycle?

I looooove philosophy, and 99% is bullshit. It's likely the human communication factor. We're such messy thinkers. Those sciencey folk trace their intellectual lineage back to the Enlightenment, and very similarly struggle to jump the hurdle of what is and what ought. There is a denial of atheism as a religion, which strictly speaking is true, yet in practice most atheists are Enlightenment thinkers, which has religious assumptions. The Four Horsemen of Atheism certainly are this flavor. I traded in atheism for a "the universe is god" mindset. Still very much secular according to those with holy books, but I don't have to dance around moral questions like the atheists. "Why are you godless, yet your morals seem almost identical to the religious lineage in your geography?" Is really a fun question to ask.

Get well, and I hope your brother screws his head back on straight. I have a brother with similar (or worse) behavior patterns.

Good tidings.

[loutfard]

I chose science. These days, when I think about what I’ve observed in the last ten years, I find myself thinking that science is almost as much of a religion as the typical ones—a narrative shaping the world and reality held in place by the belief of multiple people and it’s really depressing. I realize this is as much anathema to those that believe in science as not believing in god is to those that are very devout, and as it was my chosen operating system for years I am lost without it.

The scientific method and many expressions of religion can happily coexist in a single person. It just requires the realisation that science and religion are in different planes. One is about observable facts and the other about metaphysics.

I've observed a few stellar examples of deeply religious scientists. For them, religious devotion and scientific excellence were mutually reinforcing parts of what ERE people would call their web of goals. These are sane, grounded people. Great mutual respect and positive energy. Natural biotope: around old universities with christian roots in Western Europe.

Continuing my anthropological anthology, there's a second group. Cuckoo bananas "glider flying club" religious people are fundamentally incompatible with the scientific method. Luckily, there's no malice in them. They're usually relatively harmless energy suckers, the main exception being some "alternative healers". Natural biotope: your neighbourhood. I sometimes have no choice but to deal with a relatively harmless cuckoo bananas practitioner. At least this one honestly tries to be a nice person.

Most religious people by far will be somewhere between these two groups in their ability to successfully blend religion and science or not. Their intuitive take on either will rarely be a problem in a flourishing society unless they get poisoned by a third group.

A special kind of place in jail/hell should probably be reserved for this third group, malicious opportunists wrapping themselves in outward signs of religion and/or the scientific method, all while enjoying the material fruits of the actual thing, and kicking people in the procreative spheroids. Ayatollah Khamenei and Russian patriarch Kirill come to mind as prime examples. Unfortunately, there are many more.

All of this to encourage you. You can be both religious and meticulously follow the scientific method should you wnt!

[chenda]

The scientific method and many expressions of religion can happily coexist in a single person. It just requires the realisation that science and religion are in different planes. One is about observable facts and the other about metaphysics.

+1. Non-duality, the idea that matter is an emergent property of consciousness is very rational idea (and arguably should be our default metaphysical assumption) and can be said to be the true core of religion. Religions have a lot of excess baggage to them, as the mostly evolved in a pre-scientific age. But there is no reason we can't reform them to make them more relevant to the modern world. One swami I heard made the point that religion of the future needs to be 1) reconcilable with science (i.e. accepting the earth is not literally 7000 years old a similar literalist claims) 2) be compatible with modern values 3) universalistic in their outlook, so no 'one religion is true all others are false'.

@violets - You may want to look up Vedanta if you are interested in a very rational approach to religion. You might also like David Bentley Hart.

[delay]

These days, when I think about what I’ve observed in the last ten years, I find myself thinking that science is almost as much of a religion as the typical ones—a narrative shaping the world and reality held in place by the belief of multiple people and it’s really depressing.

Thanks for your journal update, recognizable thoughts! I "woke up" later, during the past five years. Now science seems like an enchantment of the masses exactly like religion is. Once I saw it, I couldn't help but notice hints left by teachers from my university days. I feel gullible for believing in science for as long as I did.

I felt relief after getting rid of the knot of paradoxes that science had become in my mind. Why was it really depressing for you?

My mind wants to return to my old philosophy textbooks to look for an answer there, but I seriously do not have time for this shit.

I did just that and found it worthwhile. Plato wrote that the truth is an Idea. One thinks up a beautiful truth and interprets the world as an approximation of that. Religion and science are both platonic in that sense.

Once I saw that, I saw how humans cannot know truth, we can only know models or approximations.

If you lose faith in science there is nothing to hold onto as a starting point to do so.

As a starting point, you could use things you see, hear, feel, taste or smell.

I was surprised by how little science has to do with actual life. Reality did not change when I saw through The Science. What changed is that I see through the enchantment and can make better choices. For example, I finally tried fasting despite it not being "scientifically proven", and learned it works for me.

[Violets]

EDIT:

(I should probably take a breathalyzer before I internet, ha.)

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Took myself on a grippy sock vacation for a few days because I’m definitely not ready for the form of enlightenment that constitutes not believing in science. I rescind all such statements. Ha. XD.



Feeling quite unnecessarily chipper about the whole thing right currently, I’m sure I’ll find a way to exit this mortal plane eventually*


*I swear I’m not depressed. HA.

Most of the above is semi-facetious. I shouldn’t be, but it is funny. EDIT: WELL....IT IS. Sue me.

—---------------

I hit my lowest acceptable weight by my own reasoning, so I’ve been trying to gain and build muscle. I can currently ift 60% of my body weight, but that’s a kinda random knowledge based on what a cement bag I moved weighed, and I suppose it’s possible I could lift more. I’m not sure.

—-----------------
I got a truck. Technically, I re-got a truck. It is my nightmare-folk-hero truck, or as my niece calls it, the Truck of the Lore. Many thanks to my super awesome software engineer brother, and his lovely wife, who had it the last 7 years and were super kind and gave it back to me. They are awesome. I should probably not have gotten it back, but it does remind me of when I still had a soul, a belief in the world, in my own innate capability. //dramas

It’s a 1980 Chevy with a living quarter sort of dealio in th back. For a 45 year old truck, it’s in really great shape, and made the 600 or so mile drive from the bitter north back to my mason-dixon line abode. We sort of had a family adventure getting it, although we ambushed my poor brother with both my father and mother. He was a good sport about it. The truck is currently housed in the old garage at my bad ass soft ware engineer sisters place.

It was almost definitely the wrong choice to get it back, but I do love the damn thing so.

Anyway. I now have two cars, although one is technically an apocalypse survival machine, so sort of a house.

My poor family, to have me in the mix. Ha.
—-----------------------------------------

House of HOUSE QUEST, or East, or Structura Sud as it is sometimes referred, is…well. Low progress at the moment.

I outfitted it with solar lights, but not like the real ones, just a handful of the little ones that are enough to see and read by~~Vaguely realized that in general I probably at most could get by with those and two actual panels in a small set up to charge my phone, and I don’t likely actually -need- the house to be hooked up to electric. Spent a lot of time living out of a tent for work, so simply having solar light to read by and a locking door really does feel like so much luxury. Especially the locking door. Locking doors are so freaking great. I absolutely love having one of those. It’s so lovely.

I cleaned a lot of animal feces out of it, so now…it smells less like hamsters. (XD 7500 house, y’know.)

______

Will Reply to replies at some point. Started to previously, but was distracted.

[delay]

Thanks for sharing your journey on the "mortal plane" !

I’m sure I’ll find a way to exit this mortal plane eventually*

So will we all. Amen.

You write you enjoyed seeing your family. That sounds like a spiritual rather than a material experience. And the way you talk about your truck sounds like you are meant to have it back. What does that mean? Perhaps it's a hint of some sort.

It reads like you're in a tough spot. I offer my best wishes for more sunshine in your life.

[ertyu]

Strength, Violets, rooting for you!

Tell more about the 7500 house, that sounds fun. I'm about to embark on the renovation of a really run down apartment in a month and a half or so, so i'm curious what set-up you've got going. The solar lights sound cool, I'd enjoy that. Should research -- I have no AC and electricity costs lots where I am, but I do have a very sunny balcony

Take care of yourself dude

[Violets]

Much belated Replies:

...so a preference for "thigh gap' or a repugnance towards "cellulite" is more likely a learned cultural reaction/response or related to personal experience/imprinting.

Man, that's all marketing for something or other, it's just a shame people buy into it. If you are a woman, there is almost definitely some man who is interested somewhere. Extreme curating of your appearance mostly matters if you are looking for something other than actual love out of your appearance..

I like a certain weight and amount of muscle on my meat machine because of the things I enjoy doing.

You are lucky you gain weight and become voluptuous...! I have some sisters that are that way. I am most definitely not. XD.

Regarding the cold showers:
"Man conquers the world by conquering himself." ~ Zeno of Citium
I've been riding the bike to work, and there's a giant hill... I'll take voluntary hardship for 500, Alex. What is phat boi on bicycle?

"Why are you godless, yet your morals seem almost identical to the religious lineage in your geography?" Is really a fun question to ask.

Love the quote. I've done the giant hill on a bicycle thing in the past...I never quite conquered the hill, but I did work two jobs via bike for a while. I feel ya on that.

I enjoyed googling and reading about the four horsemen, thanks for dropping that in here.

I feel like the answer to that fun question is often safety--to dare to disavow a region's primary god and also their moral code is a dangerous choice, quite often. You can be safer by disallowing one or the other, but to do both is quite risky.

The scientific method and many expressions of religion can happily coexist in a single person. It just requires the realisation that science and religion are in different planes. One is about observable facts and the other about metaphysics.


A special kind of place in jail/hell should probably be reserved for this third group, malicious opportunists wrapping themselves in outward signs of religion and/or the scientific method, all while enjoying the material fruits of the actual thing, and kicking people in the procreative spheroids. Ayatollah Khamenei and Russian patriarch Kirill come to mind as prime examples. Unfortunately, there are many more.

All of this to encourage you. You can be both religious and meticulously follow the scientific method should you wnt!

I am currently back on team science, although I think where I was at was more of a strange belief that the power of many minds can shape a reality in ways that do not quite make sense based on what I know of a scientific framework of the world. I am not currently holding that belief, although, one day, maybe, I will examine it further. Something along the lines of the placebo effect, the failed or disproven or statistically significant studies on power of prayer and the whole 100th monkey thing. I do not have time to deal with that conjecture though. I need to stay in a frame of mind that is grounded in a belief system a large portion of the world uses.

I really appreciate your turns of tongue when you write...spheroids, haha. I'll have to read on the names you mention.

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Out of battery, reply more to replies later.

[Violets]

@violets - You may want to look up Vedanta if you are interested in a very rational approach to religion. You might also like David Bentley Hart.

Chenda, I did check out vedanta and found it very interesting, thank you for the recommendation! I will check out the other when I have time.

@delay.

Thanks for the well wishes. The truck certainly has a semi spiritual, or perhaps demonic, story of origin and journey undertaken. It is special to me for very formative memories that shape who I am now versus who I was.

Tell more about the 7500 house, that sounds fun. I'm about to embark on the renovation of a really run down apartment in a month and a half or so, so i'm curious what set-up you've got going. The solar lights sound cool, I'd enjoy that. Should research -- I have no AC and electricity costs lots where I am, but I do have a very sunny balcony

I'll share a Pic of the solar, but it's not real solar, it's just...being creative. Ha. I can navigate my house by night and read without having to buy batteries, so y'know. I have some other plans, but what I have planned would probly work similarly to your balcony.

On AC: there are solar power fans that can be mounted in windows, from what I've googled. Not really a solar system just a self contained thingy.

Thanks for the kind words.