cab21

I guess the definitions really matter. I think people Like Ayn Rand see free will as a ability to think or not, and that there are objective laws of nature and objective really that it seems some are calling this objective reality determinism? I think I have also seen determinism to mean events are caused external to the will. It seems both recognize laws of nature, but ayn rands free will suggests that people are able to think about a course of action, while determinism seems to suggest that people cannot think about a course of action. Though it seems some in the thread are suggesting that determinism includes any thinking that a person could make, making the consequences not so different than ayn rands free will?

what does your wife think her bullshit is that needs to be called out? is this something simply that you can call her out on? what body ishues does she have, is this about how her diet and excercise or what

I am wondering about scientific studies on free will, and not philosophy entirely from logic, should the scientific studies show something different from philosophy.

I think therapists directly contacting people on boards would be ok ethically. This would be a voluntary exchange if you chose to work together. You can do your research on the therapist , and if you don’t feel comfortable with the approach of the therapist can choose not to work with that therapist. The therapist did not put you in this situation, you have, so there would not be coercion involved. Feeling vulnerable wise, perhaps research on the therapist and seeing results could put you at ease, or you would know if you don’t feel at ease after further exploration.

How do you feel being detached benefits you/protects you vs alternative approaches that could open you up to results that are congruent with your values and new veiws?

By dating what do you mean as a goal? Do you want a relationship that leads to marriage and children or what are you thinking of when you say "leading to"?

A few sentence completions. If I am avoidant , then____ If I feel like I can’t make any progress, then___ If I am feeling constantly blank, then____ If I interpret a question based on feeling, then___ If I search for the thoughts and information that lead to my feelings, then ____ If I continue to build the social network that I want to model, then____ If I know my partner and I both enjoy the life we planned together, then____ If I or my partner changes values or priorities as a relationship goes on from what was shared at the beginning, then____ If I act assertive rather than passive aggressive, then____ If I am built back up again and no longer feel like a shell of myself, then____ If I trust myself, then___ If I choose my partner, then___ If I feel I can attract the partner I want, then ___ If I don’t try to change people who don’t want to change, then ____ If I get models from happily married people, then ____ If I never find anyone else like my ex, then____ If I never have children of my own, then____ If I work on and follow my new views rather than my old views, then___ If I don't work and and follow my new views rather than my old views, then____ if I write down and know the qualities I am looking for in my next partner, who the person is, what mindset, how the person acts, then___ If I know what kind of person my ideal next partner is looking for, then____ When dating, what is happening so that you will be able to judge depth of character accurately?

What does it matter what any of us would do, what do you think about dating her?any of us could say no for any reason, but what are your reasons for saying yes or no?

Virtue of selfishness by ayn rand explains value hierarchy a bit more I think with atlas shrugged being a big novel that covers it as well Seems as if he was not on the same page for working to keep the relationship thriving and working through his issues with people. With Scheduling times for digestion for such discussions working so you don't get flooded and shut down, were there signals or other communication signs designed for when you needed that space to digest? What connection between thoughts and feelings did you make, he make? How much introspection was done as to why you felt what you felt, and how much did he introspect his own feelings? How much if a social network have you built or gotten connected with to model what you want to model? Sounds like there were very different visions and values for what your lives would look like with you wanting to teach gardening and him wanting to live far from society, if this was discussed early, would that have helped break things off quicker with such differences in what kind of life you each wanted? How much reading of stephans books went on such as universal preferable behavior and real time relationships? When he said it was what you ( people) did that mattered, were there discrepancies between what you thought, felt, did? With his refusal to work on any therapy for the relationship, that seems like a dead end. What kept you from changing your behavior with him to be more assertive or leave earlier? For models on functional family, saying you haven't seen any, where do you think you can look? Between readings and podcasts and videos , if there was a place that had a good model would you move to that place or are you looking or create something where you already live? What old views did you have that you feel caused problems you want solved for the next relationship and what new views do you think can replace the old views to prevent the problems and enable a functional family or let you know to leave if that is not a clear path?

I’d say at the moment happily single. By value hierarchy I mean something like this http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/teleological_measurement.html One idea is to take the list and write examples of how you and how a partner can communicate with you to help realize those values. Sharing the ups and downs with friends wise, it does depend on the person, but having people other than just a romantic relationship to share with may be a stress reliever, it does depend on the person though. A preference for fair weather only can be a style, or friendships that deal with other issues such as support group friendships can also be of use depending on the individual, and each individual just can see what works best for that individual. I think different friends can serve different roles, some can be activity buddies, while others might be confident. It just depends on what a person is looking for. If the friend does not mind sharing full experiences, the friend may look at things a different way and offer different perspectives on solutions. In saying you were afraid to share your values because he tore them down and tore down your cherished beliefs, how much building up was there during different stages of the relationship? How would you self evaluate yourself on your values during the different stages of the relationship? In what way do you think a partner could talk to you so that you feel calm, safe, and secure in sharing your values and supported in striving to reach those values both when you live up to them and when you evaluate yourself and feel like you could improve? How many of your most cherished beliefs differed from his most cherished beliefs during the relationship, and was it about you being criticized if you did not adapt his beliefs or what kinds of discussion went on about why you each hold those cherished beliefs and their validity? Were you able to talk about what stressed you and ways to de-stress yourself so that the blanking out and detachment is prevented and you feel free to be the person that you value being? The criticism bucket is a good visual , less filling that bucket and more filling the love bucket ( looking this up on urban dictionary as well as the metaphor, in more ways than 1). Did he ask what you were feeling as to become what he perceived as cold and uncaring and ways to communicate with you that would confirm whether or not the coldness and uncaring was apathy or other causes? Away from conflict , such as writing a message instead of face to face, is that a way for you to talk about being afraid of someone to that someone? What was being done on either side to work on conflict prevention and solutions, or was there a lack of willingness to work on concerns from either one or both parties? What does your vision of a functional family look like where you can bond well with the father and the children? How do you see conflicts being handled as to not have anyone shutting down or filling criticizing buckets too much as love buckets not enough?

I am in Seattle. We are going into spring here. I am currently single. I’ve been doing some of my own research lately and reading books and discussions with friends. I do have a couple close friends that I can confide in and internet forums. My own level of happiness is exploring myself and finding out how I respond to experiences I think I will enjoy before hand, I think I have found that I enjoy language a lot and thinking of questions and creative writing and comedy, as well as video creating and editing. If you created a value hierarchy for your happiness, what would it look like? If after being proactive, no solution or reconciliation seems likely, that gives information to consider choices. One journal entry method I have seen is to write the problem, come up with a few solutions of actions or thoughts that are in ones control, then pick the one that seems to fit ones values and preferences the most, then plan to take that action step, then reflect afterword’s. You mentioned the ex felt better about his ability to fix mechanical things than his social ability, and I think people making philosophy switches have a time period where it takes work to fix previous premises and assumptions and integrate the new philosophy in different areas of life, brining value to oneself and others can be made in progress and truth and listening are two ways to get there. Zero sum game wise, I think socialists can make that fallacy in places there is not a zero sum game, and it can take some work when switching to remove that premise. With being more honest about your ups and downs in life in a romantic relationship than with friends, are you getting the most of the ups or does the lack of downs make the ups with friendships not as up as it could be? What changed from the beginning of the relationship in terms of the values you were seeing in each other, was there any big event where things were different? What was done in the relationship where you would each share the values the other one was attracted to? What were the reasons for there being physical intimacy in the beginning, but a lack of afterwords? When rating your morality, it looks like ones you can control are telling the truth, being generous to people, keeping your word, not stealing, and if you think rationally and feel you provided more value than you took. Parts that you can’t control are how happy friends and family are after seeing you, and what your romantic partner thinks of you. When your ex said he thought you were being not empathetic, detached, and cold, were there facts supporting this, were there facts the countered that feeling? What, if any communication rituals were there that could be in line with being generous and keeping your word and telling the truth? From 2 years and up, so would that put in the possibility of adoption or fostering, so that the biological clock is not a issue like it seemed in the first post, or do you think that biological bond , with the risk of any of it’s complications, fits better into your family vision? One idea that family activities could fit into would be developing a teaching curriculum for2 year old and up and their families about creating gardens and horticulture and humanity’s ability to create with plants.

Welcome, I am USA Based, I do not work in this field professionally, but I find this interesting. With the experience of finding the consequences worse if you speak your mind than if you don’t speak your mind with your parents, what if you let go of that assumption with other people until proved otherwise or find ways to test people so they earn your trust that you can speak your mind with consequences that are not worse than speaking your mind, some of this seems to be how you rank unhappiness above other consequences, so how could you rank your happiness as the highest in the rankings and unhappiness as the lowest? Voicing your concerns, potential consequences include more than being let go, they also include you deciding to leave, or your concerns being addressed, do you think that any of these would be able to free you from a culture that is taking away from your happiness? If you write down thoughts and feelings before and after events, that could be one way to rate if you feel like the event was supporting the values of enjoying and thriving in life, and check if the after is confirms the before or shows the before to have been wrong. In your current writing and journaling what are you measuring? The premise of benevolent universe and win win trades are two important features of capitalism, so it’s interesting that the socialist friends would have a positive view of human nature and your ex had a negative view, as I think that socialism has premises in a negative view while capitalism works from a view that humanity has the free will to choose and achieve their values. the premise of value to society, what does that mean to you? Mutual trade, such as a profession, offers value to other humans that value the trade, so the value of trading values with other individuals that is capitalistic, though whether or not that means society depends on viewpoints. What do you think are the natural boundaries of friendship? How does that affect your interactions and assumptions with friends? A few things that seemed to appear from the reasons you thought it did not work. Work on high self esteem, work on judging objectively not faking reality. What was he looking to get out the relationship that he considered added value, what were you looking to get from the relationship that you considered added value? Independence wise, one thing I think a person can’t get by themselves is the romantic relationship and sexual relations and intimacy, so how did each of you think that a romantic relationship could add values that independence can’t solve. There is also the relationship with children to consider if you want children as children are naturally dependent on parents in so many ways till they grow up and gain their independence in areas. As for his lack of friends, I’m not sure what he did value in friendships and romantic relationships, his negative views don’t seem compatible with fostering either, he could have been looking to you to keep yourself accountable, though I don’t know how accountable he was to himself, but it seems you said he was and valued self accountability. How are you evaluating your goodness and morality? What are some examples were you doubt your morality, and what are some examples where you lived up to , or worked on living up to your morality? How are you defining selfish and sacrifice? Say sacrifice is giving up a greater value for a lessor value, and selfishness is looking after your rational self, would you be having children because you are a happy person and want to share that happiness with others, ( children aren’t exactly predictable) and it would be giving up lessor values for greater values? how would you define a need when you say you want to be needed, as children do get less needy as they grow and it becomes more of a “want to want” situation? Is there a age of child that you feel most fits your interest or is it the whole range of growing up from dependence to independence?

In what ways to you find it secure to be in a job you don’t like or a relationship that has gone bad? If you are proactive and talk through your issues, being fired or a relationship ending because it was not a good fit seem like it would free you to pursue a job and relationship where you could talk through issues and be proactive and the relationships will get stronger. Facing the consequences wise seems to fall within open, honest, courage, so in what ways do you think you can work on your values while facing your fears of facing consequences if you are proactive? What ways can you think of that open you up to making sure the crucial conversations happen where you feel like you can be open and honest in the conversation to come to solutions or resolutions? What are you getting out the friendships with the old friends as your values may have changed while theirs stayed the same? I wonder why he started the relationship with you if you were more socialist and became capitalist during the relationship instead of before it started, and he is against you even having friends with socialists and he does not want to meet people currently socialist. Your change from socialist to capitalist shows the change can be done. What makes it such a different experience for you to confide in a romantic relationship but be afraid to confide in friends? what have you experienced with friends when you have confided in them and were vulnerable, was it empathetic or what kind of results came when that happened? What are your thoughts currently on what caused the relationship to fail? What are you confused about? What are your reasons for wanting a family and what does having a family mean to you?

How much have you explored your fear and where you let fear get in the way of honesty, openness, and courage? When he was angry, what was that like for you, was there thoughts that he would get violent or just leave? What was the thinking behind appeasing him so that he would not leave, vs being honest with him and if he left he left, or leaving him because he was not willing to work with you? Did he try and learn ways to interact with you so that he could be honest without getting angry? Why was he saying you were still a socialist and entitled? That kind of stuff is what I mean by determinism, when he thinks he should not even try or is fated to not be able to find people he would have free will with. The world has always had problems, and every baby has been born into it, parents can choose free will and the habits that put people in control of the life they live. In confiding bad days, how do you feel after confiding, does that free you up for more mutually enjoyable activities and intimacy( if with romantic partner)? What about confiding makes you feel like you are being a burden or that you could only trust a romantic partner to confide in? What would you like to achieve out of counseling? Sounds like the taking control strategy has been working, and you have been willing to answer questions.

So that example is one where he was rational in saying you were lying, as you say it came out that you were lying as you explored the topic. Since you said he was sometimes irrational about claiming you lied, are there also examples where he said you lied without such further examination? What reason would you say you had to tell him that you wanted privacy more than you wanted it, was it to please him? Why is it that you did not go to him to share values and work on settling disputes? What does kindness mean to you and what did it mean to him where his honesty could come across as critical and harsh? When you became defensive and shut down, how did that effect the communication between the two of your and yourself, or what were the consequences of defensiveness and being shut down. Just thinking about gottmans 4 horsemen of relationships here and 3 of them being criticizing, defensiveness, and stonewalling (shutting down). His lack of optimism feels like determinism rather than free will,perhaps thinking the baby would have a life more based on determinism than free will, did he seem deterministic in other areas? Was there a way you were measuring the progress of your relationship goals so that there is active communication rather than waiting? In what ways do you think you can emotionally support yourself first, and what does emotionally support mean to you and in what ways did you find it draining or celebratory if you also found it to be that way when the partner had victories? Accountable to plans and promises , what techniques do you have to help you not feel week and lost by yourself?