Kevin Beal

I don't have context for the unicorn talk, so maybe it is as you say. Maybe, even, it is exactly the kind of self justification you would be implicitly condemned of, except that rather than justifying dating where it's not healthy, it's justifying not dating where it's not healthy. Certainly worth examining, right? I said earlier that you have no excuse, but beyond being needlessly provocative, I wonder if it's actually untrue. At least, I don't think I'm in much of a position to level such criticisms. When it comes to seeking romantic relationships my own thinking gets pretty damn muddy, and I act in ways I regret. I'm willing to excuse a lot of things I wouldn't indulge if it came from a guy, or a woman I wasn't attracted to. And I also have retreated out of fear, when being honest was the right choice. I guess, I can see it a little from both sides. I don't have any certainty that if you break up with this particular woman that you will find your version of a unicorn. I can't promise you happiness either. Maybe you shouldn't listen to me, at all. But I've been thinking some more about this, and maybe it will be of some use to you, or someone else in this position. I was depressed for a good chunk of this year, but something significant has changed for me in the past few months. I'm not joyful exactly, so much as satisfied. I think the difference is in the expectations I have. Consider that if you don't expect joy, you don't get frustrated when you go without it. For a good chunk of this year, I was frustrated about things, over and over again. I had expectations about how my job should look, about how my relationships should look, about how much closure I would achieve and a lot more. My expectations weren't met, and yet, I wasn't exactly happy to let go of those expectations, either. It felt unfair that I should be denied this or that. I felt resentful that other people's interests were opposed to my own. And this contributed to a sense that my life was unmanageable, that life was too difficult and unfairly stacked against me. This caused me to grow cynical as I tried to spare myself the pain of disappointment and loss. It sapped my motivation and I felt like a fraud trying to continue to hold on to those goals and expectations when I had no motivation for it. It's like that Rolling Stone's song: My expectations weren't met, and I'm finding more and more that this is not a bad thing. And in a way, I was being a fraud, because I wasn't living in reality. I wasn't letting go of the expectations because I found relief in the fantasy that my life would work out in the way I planned. I found some motivation – however fleeting – in imagining myself in certain positions. I fantasized about being a hero, essentially. And because I wasn't willing to let that fantasy go, I frustrated myself. I became irritable, bitter, cynical and stuck in dysthymia. I realized that the way life is, is a lot more interesting than my fantasies anyway. If you don't mind humoring me, try noticing the next time you feel frustrated. Pause! Slow down and consider that for a second. Ask yourself "why am I frustrated?" Notice what your expectations were and ask yourself if those expectations are really reasonable expectations, or just a false premise stemming from a belief about how life ought to be, but isn't. I do this daily now and I'm finding it enormously helpful. My frustration turns into curiosity. I don't feel thwarted so much as creative and in control of my life. Consider my words earlier, when I said you had "no excuse". I considered RoseCodex's observation and my first impulse was to feel anxiety and then guilt, which made me feel frustrated. I expected that my post was a really good one and then feared that it wasn't good, but bad. So, I paused. I noticed that expectation, and why I felt anxious: other people's potentially negative perceptions. I was curious of what other people might actually think, and I realized that in the worst case scenario it's still not that bad. You, for example, are not going to wilt away because of such an insignificant comment. And maybe even you do know better, and don't have an excuse. Maybe it is worth reminding you. In any event, I removed it from the original post for the double edged sword such a statement could be. And I came up with this brilliant thing right here. I call that a win!

Heya Kalden! I'm sorry about the pettiness and selfishness, and the hitting. I can imagine that could get pretty maddening, and it's a terrible example to be setting, of course. I just want to make sure – you're saying that they think that drums in music cause social problems? Is it like all drums? Certain kinds of drumming? Is it like hypnotizing or something? This sounds completely psychotic... What can be done? What I did was I immediately got myself into therapy and took any work I could find to pay for it, living on couches, doing some really shitty landscaping work inhaling shredded poison oak, whatever I had to do to get professional help, and find a way to manage my life outside of my codependent relationships. (I was basically unemployed at the time). My therapist helped me stay sane as I gradually removed myself from dysfunctional situations and trying to establish a career. And I eventually got my current job in software development. With that financial security, I stopped relying on any help from family. I would have been completely overwhelmed without therapy. I wouldn't have even tried without that emotional support. I might have drowned out in the ocean of my life. When I realized that there was a way out, I fought like hell. My suggestion would be to take your life incredibly seriously and fight like hell to reclaim the potential that was lost, and taken from you.

Philosophy doesn't make you feel miserable, reality does. Blaming philosophy would be like blaming your nose for the smell of shit. I don't know who these prudes are, but let's just say that they exist. They don't represent philosophy. It's doubtful they even represent FDR. It is ironic, however, that you've accepted their false dilemma, that it is "no dysfunction" vs "live in illusion". Everybody has some dysfunction. "Controlling and chaotic" sounds like a whole other category, though. I wouldn't lump those two things together. There are plenty of women who aren't chaotic and controlling. Fantasy always breeds resentment. If you don't meet her in reality, you will resent her and she you. If you don't think you are capable of changing something, having other people expect or even ask that of you would sound like a cruelty. I can't change the fact, for example, that I'm attracted to certain body types. If someone expected me to change that by telling me it was bad or unhealthy or whatever, then I'd resent them. Living in fantasy is forming false expectations. There's no way around that. Because they are false, they will only result in frustration, and frustration takes many forms. Disappointment, despair, heartbreak, irritation, depression, etc. People who live in fantasy are not happy. Not for long. There are a lot of depressed people who project their own fantasy onto others, pretending to themselves that they are realists and the happy people must be living a lie. But it's them who is living the lie. They are depressed in the first place because of the many frustrations which resulted in their perception that life is too hard or stacked against them. (Or they are slaves, but you aren't a slave). You are responsible for managing your own expectations. You are responsible for being honest with yourself.

I wonder if there is any research into whether or not this is actually a causal factor or not. I guess the test case would be with strong bonds between parents who are together versus separated. If they still have healthy relationships when their parents don't model that in their own romantic relationships, then her statements may be proven, but anecdotally this does not seem to be the case. Rather, it appears that it's the parents' relationship that determines this, not the parent-child relationship. This sounds a little too Freudian for me. How would any of this translate into healthy romantic relationships? I have people who have held me in high regard, who have made me feel valued and part of the world,... I guess (not sure what that really means). But none of that adds to my competency as a lover, a negotiator, having healthy expectations specifically around romantic relationships, or anything like that. And I love this line: What the hell is she talking about?! This is some of the worst hypoagency I've ever seen. She's totally right about the importance of fathers. I'm just nitpicking.

I gave it an honest go, but you resorted to cattiness: https://board.freedomainradio.com/topic/44612-dont-feed-the-trolls/page-3

To be fair though, it's quite common for insane people to think that they are geniuses. And many geniuses are regarded as geniuses without having to die and have a hundred years pass. English may not be your first language, but your frequent misspellings, made up terms and incorrect grammar tend to make you less credible in the eyes of others. For example, I don't think you meant to use the word "geniality" here. So, part of it may be a simple misunderstanding. But if English is your first language, then it could mean a lack of concern for your audience, and laziness which would almost certainly reflect your thinking in general and not just your writing. In either case, I would recommend working on your English if your goal is to persuade others. Your passive aggressive slights and your use of the word "genius" have repeatedly been a form of leveling. Instead of making an argument, you've positioned yourself as more authoritative than other people. That's going to put people off and make them not want to listen, even if you're right about what you're saying. And now your posts are hidden by default. I would suggest that if you want to share your ideas, that you try and step into the shoes of the people you're engaging. Take care.

IFS comes out of Family Systems Therapy, which explores dysfunction between family members – things like codependence, narcissistic triangulation, black sheeps, etc. The "internal" part is about exploring similar dynamics within the same psyche between different internalized aspects of the personality. Internal conflict being analogous to external conflict. If you feel excitement about seeing Star Wars tomorrow, and another part of you feels embarrassment about that excitement, then each is explored as if they were different personalities, each with interests of their own. Actually exploring past patterns of parents and grandparents may not necessarily be an IFS thing. It may actually be a Jungian thing, which is what Stef's therapist was (mine too). In the extreme case, Jungians talk about the collective unconscious where trauma is shared in some unexplained mystical way between whole societies and the human race as a whole. In a less insane way, they talk about passing trauma from parent to child. For example, seeing the narcissistic aspects of your own parent's personalities in the behavior of infants and children, resulting in displaced resentment directed unjustly at the child. The child, experiencing the abuse and neglect that is acted out in that resentment, is traumatized and gets stuck in arrested development, not growing out of their narcissistic phase. If you go to an IFS therapist, they may not explore the past as much as the relationships between different aspects of your personality. Some (most?) will definitely explore it, but that's not IFS work, strictly speaking. If it's a crisis management situation, where they expect to do only weeks or months of therapy, then therapy might not really be what you expect. They are going to focus on the present situation, and not help you gain moral clarity so much as make your life manageable in the present. If they just want moral clarity, they might consider calling into the show. If they are committed to analysis (long term therapy), and they want to really explore the past, then maybe a Jungian would be a good choice. But as Robin rightly points out, the school of therapy is one of the least important factors. For a good summary of what considerations really ought to be made, you should check out Max's research into that question here. A quotation:

I do it every week day when I arrive at my office. I usually complete 2 or 3 sentences per stem. On Saturdays I intend to do 6-10 completions of the stems "if anything I wrote this week were true, it might be helpful if I...", as suggested in 6 Pillars, but I often forget to do it. I tend to complete stems in the context of particular thoughts that I've been mulling over recently – if they are abstract enough. I try not to think very much because the more I think, the longer it takes exponentially, it seems; plus a lot of thought is not necessary. If you find your rhythm and answer them quickly, good stuff comes out. I like having a time constraint, pushing me to finish them quickly so I don't get too lost in thought. I complete them whether they are good completions or not, even if it's just a random association or trivial answer. But it's almost always about my relationships and my goals. I sometimes find it especially difficult with stems that require context from Nathaniel's books. For instance, he talks about making friends with your child and teenage selves, how there is a lack of trust and how one might reconnect with those parts of themselves, but I don't remember the dynamics from the books without re-reading, so I find it difficult to even start in those cases. I find the more abstract stems easier in that respect. The stems I found most stimulating have to do with my relationship to my own fears, insecurities, irritations, etc. Things that make me more conscious of my own behavioral patterns. It would be nice if, when I'm looking at less abstract stems, there was some kind of refresher, in the form of recommended reading, examples and the like. Definitions of each of the 6 Pillars would be helpful too so as to better keep in my mind how I want to define success: self esteem. New stems would be great too, since I've gone through all of the ones from his books multiple times. I've tried to come up with my own, though, and had a tough time of it. My own stems had less to do with self esteem, and more to do with my own curiosities, and perhaps that's the reason. I found them boring in that format. My own curiosities are better explored in journals and creative writing, I think. Seeing my previous completions for a stem are helpful too so that I remind myself of the connections I make and expand on previous considerations. A reminder would be nice too, since it takes a couple weeks for the habit to form again after stopping.

People seem to think that the identity is the thing itself, but that's a categorical error. To identify something is to make a truth claim about the objects described. The identity of a thing is not the thing itself. That would be like hitting a hit, rather than hitting a table. He identifies as a 6 year old girl? Well, he's identified what, exactly? Is being a 6 year old girl having the same sorts of thoughts and interests that 6 year old girls have? No. A 6 year old girl is a female who is in their 7th year of life. Being trans means presenting as the opposite sex, not identifying as the opposite sex. You can tell yourself that you are the reincarnation of Jesus Christ, but that doesn't make you Jesus Christ. Identity is not purely subjective. It's not anything you want it to be. If it were, the term "identity" would be absolutely meaningless. You might as well be speaking gibberish. I don't really care if men want to present themselves as women or vice versa. Gender dysphoria seems to describe real neurological phenomena, and if they feel more comfortable presenting as the opposite sex and use those pronouns, all power to them! I'll use whatever pronoun they like. It just bugs me when people make it about identity. "I identify as this, therefore I am this" is nonsense. You certainly don't do trans people justice by retreating into kaleidoscopic subjectivism. "I perceive that X is true, therefore X is true". People like this guy make trans people appear less credible, I think. It does get me thinking about the prosthetic bodies of the future, though. Have you seen Ghost in the Shell? People could stick their brains in super realistic prosthetic bodies with all kinds of modifications. That's what I want to see. That would be cool.

Heya Brandon! What's toxic about it? I like it, personally. People who stand opposed to my rational values get ran over, not out of malice, but as a consequence of being so full of integrity and ambition that toxic people aren't even speed bumps under my drive. That's how inconsequential they can be, relative to things that are actually important. It's having clarity and working toward virtue. At least, that was my interpretation.

Ostracism is a peaceful alternative to kidnapping, theft and assault. Ostracism is not the initiation of violence and neither is it immoral. Ostracism is the primary negative incentive in the Dispute Resolution Organization (DRO) model that Stef proposed at the very beginning of the podcast series. For a more full account, you can listen to: FDR1 The Stateless Society - An Examination of Alternatives FDR2 Caging the Devils: The Stateless Society and Violent Crime FDR3 These Cages Are Only For Beasts The free book Practical Anarchy also gives a full account of what would constitute a free society. It depends on your definition of a free society. The original subtitle to the show was: The Logic of Personal and Political Freedom. The word "freedom" is used in two different senses here. The first is being free from illusion, and the second is being free from coercion. Ostracism is not coercion, and it's certainly possible to ostracize without relying on moral manipulations and propaganda (i.e. illusion). In any case, it is consistent with a free society insofar as it's not coercive. Not granting access to your property is not coercion. A bunch of bronze aged tribal people sending a person out into the desert to die is obviously homicidal, but that's not typical of ostracism by any means, clearly.

Heya Patrick! How'd you come across the show? What's the value that you see in this big philosophical conversation? Some people go running in the other direction, screaming and frantically flailing their arms

Okie doke! Before you go, I was just curious – because of you ambiguous word choice – did you actually think that the topic was about the kind of trolls from fairy tales who live under bridges and are similar to ogres? Or do you mean to draw a comparison, for effect, suggesting a similar level of relevance to philosophy that actually talking about trolls and ogres would have? Or have I misunderstood completely? I keep wondering if you mean to offend when you describe my writing as unphilosophical, using phrases like those I've highlighted above. You keep getting down votes on your posts and I find engaging you increasingly confusing, rather than clarifying, so perhaps your intentions are to undermine me or my approach to philosophy. In which case, I wish you would just state it openly. Having to guess is just kind of annoying. If I've misunderstood, I apologize. I've become a bit cynical over the years. Take care

Honestly, I couldn't tell you. You seem to be using terms I'm unfamiliar with, and the ones I am familiar with are difficult to parse without more context. Specifically, I have no idea what a "psychological source of existence" or "progressive subject" could mean, or how you are using the term "project" here. I don't know the reason, but I've had a very difficult time trying to understand your writing. I would really appreciate it if you spoke to me as if I were a child, not relying on technical jargon – just speaking plainly and simply. I take it from a previous reply that you see an error in my thinking. I'm happy just granting that you perfectly understand my position, if you wanted to move forward with that.

I don't understand the question, unfortunately. I didn't see the connection between trolls and babies, and neither did I see the difference between both options you gave. Hopefully I can still answer your question: I am convinced that trolls are depressed people and are frustrated with their lives. Experiencing enough irritating and disappointing events can contribute to a sense that life is stacked against you, that you can't get what you want out of life and feelings of impotence, despair and angst. Some people do not respond to this situation in a healthy way. By that I mean that they are avoiding their emotional distress and the beliefs which contribute to that distress. This is what I mean by meeting emotional needs: they are denying the disappointment, despair and impotence that they feel, and in so doing provoke those feelings in other people. (The need is "I must not feel this"). This is how I think it works: They put themselves in situations where they must defend untenable positions. A person interested in the truth would recognize when they are holding false beliefs and make a course correction, but if admitting fault could contribute again to their feelings of impotence, then they don't want to do that, so they will double down or manipulate or do whatever they can to avoid the frustration of being wrong again about important issues. In their avoidance, they provoke that feeling of impotence in people who engage them and would otherwise correct their errors for them, because their reason and evidence won't work to change the person's mind. Psychological projection is the emotional equivalent of the bronze age tradition of putting the tribe's sins into a sacrificial goat that they drive into the wilderness to die. Projection is a step up from denial in terms of sophistication. It takes the form of taking the things you deny about yourself and attributing those qualities to other people who you then reject. They can maintain a certain amount of distance from their feelings that way. When they provoke their own feelings of impotence in other people, they can then reject their own impotence that they see in other people. I believe that this is actually so common as to warrant generalizations like "crazy people want to infect sane people with their crazy so that they feel less insane by comparison" and "they want to make sane people ineffective since their interests are diametrically opposed and that's the only way they can win." Does that answer your question?

Hi Puck! Thanks for the question The definition of a troll that I'm using is not necessarily one that other people use, so thanks for the opportunity to clarify! The definition of a troll that I'm using is kinda like being a concern troll, or an intellectual bully, to give you a rough approximation. This being in response to events that were occurring on the boards at the time of my post. I wanted to describe a particular kind of personality, and I used the term "troll" so that I could use common phrases that people already know and can relate to – specifically: "don't feed the trolls", being that the conclusion I wanted people to draw was that they ought not engage. My thinking has developed some since posting, but I still think the description and the conclusion are still mostly right. And I think it does belong under the category "troll". To actually answer your question, I mean a person who appeals to shared values in order to advance an ulterior agenda in order to frustrate people. This is a person who appeals to your dedication to truth and integrity – to take a typical example – by saying that their perspective is a more responsible approach to gaining clarity or achieving virtue (e.x. "if you cared about philosophy, you wouldn't think that"). That alone is good and is what you would want out of a forum whose primary topic of interest is philosophy, but some people aren't actually interested in the truth of what they are saying, but are meeting some emotional need. The trolls I'm talking about taking advantage of other people's commitment and interest in the truth in order specifically to relieve themselves of certain negative emotions in the short term. There is a psychological phenomenon which may have a name that I haven't yet learned, but it's possible to cause other people to feel the way you do by denying yourself that emotional experience. For example, when you feel anxious but do not acknowledge your own anxiety, the anxiety doesn't just go away; it just goes out of conscious awareness and manifests as anxious cues, like avoiding eye contact, fidgeting, things like that. When other people see the mixed signals, picking up on their calm front and their subtly anxious behavior, it causes them to feel uneasy and anxious, unsure of what's going on. The same thing happens with other negative emotions like irritation that comes out as passive aggressive slights at your expense, which are obviously irritating to get from people. The reason I bring it up is because there is a particular result that comes about from interacting with the kind of personality I'm trying to describe. Specifically, the result is frustration, irritation and futility. If people were only engaging each other with reasoned arguments, evidence and due consideration, it would make little sense that people would end up frustrating each other. If it's true, it's true. That's not anybody's fault or to anyone's credit that a fact is a fact. So, why then does it end up this way? I'm trying to answer that question. I think the answer is that if someone persists, over and over and over, despite not getting anywhere in terms of changing minds, then the goal is almost certainly not to change minds. So what is the goal? If the goal is to frustrate people, then it would explain that. It's like how you sometimes hear that some troll is just trying to make everyone else feel as miserable as they do. It's similar to the way that babies get their needs met: by provoking their own distress in the parent via crying. I do take several premises for granted, without establishing that they are grounded in empirical reality. I expect that other people will take issue with them if there is a problem. Specifically, I take the personality itself as a given and then draw conclusions from that. How that relates to philosophy is establishing a metaphysics (the properties and features of objects) with regard to the issue, offering an epistemology (how to determine truth from falsehood) and drawing conclusions about how people ought to act with that knowledge (aesthetics). I don't however provide syllogistic proof of my claims, and I rush through some of the rigorous philosophical work necessary to provide a full account. My secondary goal was to start a discussion where errors and grey areas can be sussed out. It certainly would be a shame if a group focused on philosophy just indulged in confirmation bias in order to explain the world around them. Ironic too. Does that help you to understand where I'm coming from?

Hi there Della What interests you specifically about philosophy?

If the goal were to make money, then that would be a good solution. Where do you want your incentives to be? In a romantic or friend relationship, I want the incentives to be set up such that being authentically myself profits me. With insurance, I want the prevention of whatever I'm insuring to be incentivised, so that there is less damage done to my life, my property, etc. If the way that Stef et al get funded is by providing enough value to people that they enthusiastically send them support, and that's exactly what they want, to be as relevant and impactful as people want and need, then that's where there incentives should be. And if you introduce a whole bunch of money coming in from annoying ads that most people hate, people won't donate as much, since they are annoyed, or they don't think it's needed (because you have all this other revenue). You say it's not mutually exclusive and that you can do both, but I don't think you've thought it through. Of course it's mutually exclusive. The fact that they work for and require voluntary contributions from listeners in order to pay the bills is exactly the point. If they don't have to care as much about it because they're getting ad revenue, then that's at the expense of that first incentive. At least, that's what would make sense to me. I won't speak for their actual motivations.

It's such a huge topic that I think we're all novices in most respects. So, welcome to the club!

Right. It's kinda darkly funny how awkward that is to be in the situation of bringing truths that implicate people's parents. And I really respect the maturity in accepting the poor choices you've made. I've made some too that might shock some, so I am not without sin either. If my mother had admitted to these kinds of mistakes I think it would have meant a lot to me. Living with the consequences of poor decisions is bad, obviously, but it's made just so much worse when people aren't simply honest about it. Personally, making mistakes doesn't really bother me so much as the way most people seem to respond when it's pointed out. That's what really drives me crazy. I find myself in the position of wanting to make up stories about why I did whatever I did because I fear that it will mean that I shouldn't be trusted with making decisions in the future, or that it will mean X, Y and Z shameful things about me and so I do my magician tricks and distract people away from the truth. But I really don't think that the implications in my head really are true, like I shouldn't be trusted with making decisions or that it means I'm a bad guy or whatever. So, I can sympathize with people not wanting to be honest, but it's so often anti-philosophical to pretend to know those things up front without really exploring it (at least in my case). And I think that people can tell on some level when I'm not being honest, so it's not like I'm really achieving anything. Some amount of trust is still lost. So, I guess all of that is to say that I think honestly really is the best policy. When people are honest about mistakes they've made, those are some of the most respectable moments in relationships, I think.

At 31min in this video he says:

I think that typically he would suggest therapy with a trained professional who will train you to become a therapist to yourself, working themselves out of a job. The only interviewee that I'm aware of who promotes self-therapy specifically is Daniel Mackler, like Matthew said. I don't believe that he's a doctor (he is a trained psychotherapist), but he has very interesting things to say about self therapy:

Very interesting discussion Maybe so, but you did demonstrate the empathy you feel for the people who are made to subsidize other people's poor choices. It would be unreasonable to expect you to show empathy for everyone involved simultaneously, and it is indeed an important consideration to be made going forward with the discussion, especially given the title of the thread (being about the national debt) and because there is a considerable amount of propaganda surrounding the responsibility single mothers can have in important social issues. We can be safely assured that Mothra is interested in taking responsibility, being interested in a show primarily about integrity and philosophy, and because she is demonstrating a knowledge of the effect single motherhood has on the national debt (and everything she's written after), but as you rightly point out, it's an issue that requires many considerations to be made and if she were suggesting (albeit in jest) that there ought to be an acronym for single mothers who are not like that, then it seems to me to be entirely worthwhile to make sure the conversation is grounded in reality – this being a philosophy board. I appreciated your post and I up-voted it.

Could you provide a specific example? This is entirely too abstract for my feeble mind to comprehend.

This is great. I had read about a few of these points back before I entered therapy, and it confirms some of the hunches I've had about my own therapy (what was good about it, or not). I've been asked for help determining what a good therapist is before, so I'll also refer people to this next time. Bookmarked!