Thus_Spake_the_Nightspirit

Great plan, especially the rock band. ;-) Do you know yet what part of the city you'll be moving to?

For those who have so far enjoyed my cat's antics, in my latest video, he does a trick! The catch is, you have to suffer through 9 minutes of me talking "tolerance propaganda" on university campuses before you get to see his performance, but it is totally worth it, I promise! https://youtu.be/bL2a7zZ6avQ

Sorry to hear you are struggling. I can recommend someone who does Skype sessions and does not charge too much (if it is still too much for you, just email him and let him know- he will work with you on payment options). He's also a fan of the FDR show, very empathetic, and knowledgeable in the fields of philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. Email Jason at: [email protected] His website is: https://philosophicaltherapist.com/ Good luck, Anuojat!

I have put up a couple new videos and the latest one is an updated version of a presentation given for a workshop I ran last year under the title, "Countering Leftist Memes." Anyone wishing to run a similar workshop is free to use my video, steal my concept, or ask me for help on how to set up such a workshop. It was a two hour workshop, so obviously the speech is only a small part of it, but hopefully some people find it helpful or interesting. https://youtu.be/LijnzGq8q54

Man, some people are easily entertained... I will never understand some of these things. I am totally new to YouTube in general, so I have no idea what is cool or not. Today, the kid I look after showed me some weird video of an Asian guy singing a weird song about apples and pens and it had millions of views. How do things like that get so popular???

I'm sorry for your traumatic experiences with schooling. However, you sound like you have a defeatist attitude and a belief that because you do not have a degree, you cannot work. There are many jobs that do not require a degree. You don't say what it is you would like to do, but not having your dream job surely doesn't preclude you from working at all. It would probably do wonders for your self esteem to be working and earning a paycheck, no matter what the job was. You seem reasonably intelligent. Is starting a business out of the question? Correct me if I have misinterpreted your post, but it sounds like you've created a false dichotomy for yourself where you either go to college and get a degree or you don't work at all and can't have a family. I think there must be several other options in between these extremes.

I looked up a few unboxing videos and I do not understand why they are such a big thing. The boy I work with assures me they are all the rage at his school and he says he watches them all the time. He showed me a few and I was just like, why is this cool? (I was informed that I was uncool for not liking them!) So the title was not intentionally a play on that, but I'm a bit chuffed that it worked out like that, lol!

Unboxing videos? What's that?

Heh, he was uncooperative! He was supposed to be sitting with me the whole time, but only decided to participate at the end, although I thought he did pretty well. He's a really high maintenance cat and doesn't usually agree to do anything that isn't his idea. :-p I agree with you about "Danes". I would have preferred to do that and I regret my attempt at "working with the narrative", but I decided it wasn't worth the extra hassle to re-shoot that segment. I'll try to avoid that kind of thing in future videos. It sends the wrong message. I've made a Facebook page for the channel in case anyone wants to follow it there: https://www.facebook.com/PhilosophiCat-219355078471946/

Thanks, guys! :-) That "friend" actually unfriended me and blocked me immediately after posting her comment, so unfortunately I can't share with her the video that she inspired. Her comment was extreme enough, but then she went and threw a tantrum about it, too! Some people are sooooo averse to being asked to think!

How old of a boy are we talking about here? A lot of the stuff being recommended isn't really suitable for primary school boys, for example, but rather high school or young adult. I'll second a lot of what has been listed for the older crowd and for upper primary, I would say: Hatchet Call of the Wild Where the Red Fern Grows Red Badge of Courage Encyclopedia Brown The Hardy Boys The Secret of NIMH I'll probably think of more later.

I really struggle to make female friends. I've had maybe two good female friends in my whole life. I currently don't have any. Around other women, I, too, feel like the "odd one out". I just don't ever seem to click with them. And strangely, even with other women who have the same problem, we still struggle to connect with each other in any meaningful way. I don't know if you're doing your daughter a disservice. This is just the way you are and that's okay. As long as you're not trying to push her into being a certain way, I don't see why there is a problem. If you feel fulfilled and happy, I wonder why you think this might be a problem?

Actually, I made it and I let him help, but being a cat, he wants all the credit. Anyway, feedback is appreciated. :-) https://youtu.be/Pul2sUM-iO8

Welcome, Peter! What state are you in?

He has been physically threatening on only two occasions, where he shoved me and then claimed he didn't. I think he felt embarrassed that he did that, hence the denial of it happening. But he makes snarly faces and balls up his fists and gets all red and raises his voice and starts verbally attacking me. At that point, I usually refuse to continue the conversation. When he is angry, he does not take personal responsibility for his words, behaviour, feelings, etc. He gets very defensive and says incredibly cruel things. So in my mind, it's not a conversation anymore and I refuse to just stand there and be abused. He's sort of trying to do better; if I can catch it early enough in the conversation before he gets furious and point out how he is not taking responsibility for himself, then he will sometimes pause and consider it. The other night, he did something that I used to nag him for all the time and I noticed it and let him know that I noticed it and appreciated it and he became enraged and said I was mocking him. His anger was totally out of proportion to the situation and why would your default position be to assume that your own wife is out to get you? But that is what he does often. And I said maybe instead of focusing on how he thinks I was mocking him (I wasn't and said so), he should go reflect on why he assumed that instead of some more benign interpretation. And he did stop at that point and went away for a few minutes and came back with an "I'm sorry, but" statement, which wasn't very helpful, but it did at least de-escalate things somewhat. Conversations used to end with one of us storming off and then never talking about it again. The storming off will sometimes still happen (usually me when I decide the conversation has just turned into abuse) but then we will try to talk about it later. A lot of times we end up having to conclude major arguments in the therapist's office.

I'm curious if you're familiar with Real Time Relationships, the book by Stefan, or the methods in general from podcasts? How often would you say you and your husband communicate with these methods? Or how often would you say you communicate with these methods? Yes, I read it about a year ago and found it valuable. I tried to read it with him, but didn't get very far before he got angry about it. It was around the part of the story with the two fictional characters who get together for dysfunctional reasons that they are not aware of that my husband found the book offensive and it was not worth the stress for me to try to pursue it. He says I have ruined his good memories of the early days of our relationship by suggesting that anything other than pure love and affection had anything to do with why we got together. So we did not even get to the part about the actual skill of RTR. I do try to use that form of communication myself and encourage him to do so, as well, but with limited success. ------------------ You said your husband is already 50 years old. Yup, it is a big concern of mine. I'm also concerned about the number of people who tell me there is nothing to worry about in regards to his age and that I should be more concerned about my own age- this includes health professionals who should know better. From what you describe about your husband, and by his age, I think it is pretty much impossible that you will get him to want to pursue self-knowledge. Reasons being not only that the older you are the more difficult it is to change, but also that he probably lacks respect for you: you are much younger than him (12 years!), and you are denying him something that might as well be his ultimate goal in life (having kids.) 18 years younger, actually, and I do think you're right about him not respecting me in part due to my age. He does sometimes criticise me for things I do that are common to my generation, but not to his. Although he does generally take the view that the way he thinks or does things is the only right way and if I do something differently, then I must have something wrong with me. At the same time, again, he is 50 years old, my life dream is to have a loving and functional family, and it might be his as well, have you ever though about it? Again, I am 23 years old and sometimes I get extremely sad and hopeless thinking that it will be impossible for me to have a family, imagine a 50 year old man who is married! Please try to see things by his perspective and, if possible talk to him about it in an indirect way, then slowly and gently getting to the core issue. Ask him what are his biggest goals, what does he really want in life and so on and so forth. You will see that he will probably open up if he sees genuine curiosity on your part. We did recently talk about him wanting a family because I was not convinced that he really wanted kids, given his refusal to have any discussions about it or make any plans for it. My conclusion now is that he wants kids because he thinks it will fill a hole in himself, which I think is the wrong reason to have them, though I did not say that to him. --------------- Mine-sweeping, blindfolded. Be careful of the well you drink from. What are you referring to?

I'll read it first and decide for myself, but I'll also listen to Stef's show on it. :-)

I haven't started reading it yet!

We went to counselling twice last week, initiated by him because he was upset about an argument we had had. The following day, we were able to have a long conversation about that issue and a few others that didn't erupt into a conflict. I did say that I had something I wanted to talk about, but I was fearful of bringing it up because I didn't know how to do it in a way that wouldn't trigger his defenses, and he agreed we could try to talk about it at our next counselling session. This sort of thing will occasionally happen where, after a major argument, things get better for awhile. But better doesn't last and I now feel wary of being hopeful. But I guess we'll see.

No, I just feel more confused and hopeless than ever.

I literally just got this book in the mail today. Had no idea Stef had done shows on it.

Yes, he definitely does. That's part of why I wanted him to be more interested in SK so that he can work through those issues, as they cause a lot of problems in our marriage and I can see them causing issues with children, too. I don't understand why he doesn't want to or how I can make it more appealing to him.

Some things are more important than the economy. Speaking only for myself, I'll take a shit economy over demographic and cultural suicide any day. Besides, people buy way too much crap they don't need anyway, so maybe they'll start being more responsible with their purchases and demanding better quality products if they are more expensive and harder to get. I'm sick of living in a consumer-driven, throw-away society.

In my view, it's not about left vs right. They are both anti-freedom globalists. It's just that the lies of the "right" (whatever one might consider that to be) usually benefit me more or harm me less than the lies of the "left".

1. He says he does. If you pressed him, he would struggle to tell you what he loves about me specifically, but would swear up and down that he does love me. I am not sure if he just thinks that is what he is supposed to say/think/feel or if he actually does love me in a way that makes sense to him. 2. Not usually. He is a white knight, so I feel most loved and cared for when I need "rescuing". I am often ill or have injuries and he likes taking care of me. He doesn't do as well with emotional distress, but he will still try to fix it for me. Outside of that context, I do not feel loved. I have mixed feelings on the children question. He is most comfortable in situations where he needs to take care of someone and children always need care, so I could see him doting on them and always wanting to try to make them happy (which can be both good and bad). But he does get resentful about being a "resource provider" or that no one ever takes care of him. My thinking is that because he would be away at work most of the time, his kids' neediness wouldn't be too overwhelming and overall they would have a positive experience of him. He would end up being the "fun" dad, while I would have the disciplinarian role of the "mean" mom.