Not to cover it nor to avoid it nor to fill it quickly nor to deny it nor to escape from it, but to feel it, to go deep in those feelings and find the crack. Finding and accepting the existence of the crack, becoming aware and observing of the crack, starts a process where my own body heals it, just like it heals any other wound when it’s triggering pain. Then the void get’s filled by my own body with self love, as it was filled before the void-inducing crack/wound happened. It returns to an original state.
Mental note of the day: Find the crack + Fill your own cup.
The narcissist is the narcissistic supply of the codependent – the other only exists as a drug that fuels your own self acceptance.
The codependent attempts to “pay” for the drug and might even be fair in the trade, might be attempting collaborative game, not without throwing tamtrums / ultimatums of their own from time to time.
The narcissist instead “lures” offers superficial goods, caters to the codependent’s weaknesses and prey and extracts as many resources as they can before discarding them, playing competitive game since the start, and every move is calculated to win over the codependent, while every move of the codependent is calculated to control, tame and keep the narcissist or, “work things out”.
The narcissist finds someone to adore them and the codependent finds something to adore and both fill their self acceptance until the transaction gets exhausted. In the exchange, the goods go to the narcissist and the craps to the codependent. If the codependent has a martir / victim complex and the narcissist has a sadist angle, this can go on for quite a while.
The codependent ends up asking how was it possible that all the goods where there and they weren’t able to take them, and regretting all they paid for nothing. The narcissist ends up annoyed at the codependent’s attempt at a “fair exchange”, but with a feeling of superiority over the codependent’s weakness and blindness.
After many rounds, codependents might understand the competitive games and start playing them themselves – switch to narcissim.
Good presence, online, on video, in front of public, etc. Good presence is lack of shame. Not just controlled shame but lack of it. There’s stuff to be controlled, sure. The language, timing, etc. Having shame to control robs you energy from delivering the message and having presence. So with all other things being equal, even if you cant get rid of the shame, as a performer you’re better off EXPRESSING your shame as part of the message and controlling what can be controlled in the message, instead of trying to control the shame, which will kill your presence and render the message null for most people.
In more cases than not what you think as shameful, your core self or whatever is there, will be embraced if you show it like it is. Or in the cases that it doesnt, as long as you dont retreat too much, if you stand there naked with the shame and the message, this thick skin starts to grow, because there’s nothing really to defend. The ones outside throwing you stones or denying you gratification and acceptance are their own, there’s space between you and them, that space is the “skin”. If you stand there long enough you see that space and how they cannot hurt you, so you take what you can to cater the message to them if that interests you.
And for the core shame, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with you standing there and delivering a message. The shame in this situation is misplaced, it’s a misunderstanding, it’s a roleplay, it “shouldnt” be there but not like a monster that shouldnt exist, but like a piece of furniture that doesnt belong to a particular space.
I call the phenomenon I want to describe a “law” because it seems to be a fundamental principle of human mental functioning, an in-built assumption that if I am feeling bad, then someone or something is causing me to feel that way. In other words, we attribute a cause-and-effect relationship between the way we are feeling and the actions of people around us. Sometimes this attribution may be accurate — Your continual criticisms are causing me to feel terrible — but on other occasions, it may be false: The way you chew your food is driving me crazy! In the latter case, I am probably feeling irritable, tired and grouchy; rather than recognizing that I feel the way I do because I didn’t get enough sleep last night or because work today was highly stressly, I falsely account for those feelings by attributing them to you and your irksome way of chewing.
—–
I´ll bring it up a notch.
In emotionally underdeveloped people, which happen to be the most of us, when the feelings of pain arise, other people / situations are not just framed as the source, they are framed as causing those feelings on purpose.
Not just, how do you dare to be the source of my pain, but, how do you dare to do this to me intentionally.
And this is the craddle for a bunch of other sub frames, because if YOU are making ME feel this way on purpose, you’re an aggressor, Im the victim, this is unfair, I have done nothing to cause this, you’re evil, why are you hurting me so much? God – why do you permit this? you must disappear, I will have to kill / squeeze / punish you, etc to make things even. So the frame fights back. Depending on the disorder it would go for a full frontal confrontation, or a passive aggressive one, a dramatic opera one, a slow burn revenge, a soft talk, etc on top of that mis-frame.
You would see this person, the person feeling hurt, react out of “nowhere”, switch, change, act out, fully convinced that something is going on, and that you know what’s going on. Playing an old game. One so primary you cant talk them out of.
Im sure it rings a bell?
So. I’ve thought long about this subject in the past and wrote a few times about it, as you can see in my posts fear and the snake, feminist debate style, and my story with HUS. I first saw the behavior in my mom and some female members of my family, accusing me and other kids of doing evil stuff on purpose – which led me to develop a counter game where I would stick around for hours trying to rectify the misunderstanding (you can bet in subsequent years I’ve found girls who would replay that game with me… fun times, let’s not repeat that anytime soon). So my counter game was a codependent one, and depending on many factors I could have gone borderline-personality, full fledged narcissist, doormat, or even mirror the game: how you dare mom, you’re making me feel horrible on purpose! you’re not the victim, I AM the victim! let’s see who bends first.
Which sounds like a lesbian fight, doesn’t it.
I’ve seen the behavior everywhere, mostly in women and gay guys, probably because men are not supposed to be this emotional, but, for sure, we’re able to feel it, all the unfairness and conflating accusatory shit (hint, MRA), and for a while, before I learned to check for this stuff in myself thanks to therawness and gettinbetter, I thought this to be a natural part of the feminine psyche – heck, all girls are like that, deal with it! – but this isnt worth dealing with. This is not part of the feminine psyche but just plain, simple, down to earth stupidity. And luckily not everyone is like that, and the less we let it pass, the less we groom it, the better.
It is, however, an integral part of feminism - where everything bad that happens to women not just happens but is done to them, on purpose, and men are to pay. It’s also part of the marxism where poor people exist only thanks to the rich evil motherfuckers. Im sure it’s part of many other *isms. Ideologies are built by people. Most people are sick in some way and build their biases and patterns into their ideologies. Then other people identify themselves with the patterns and take on the ideology. And it’s a whole sicko party.
To be emotionally healthy you must, among other things, be able to separate your own feelings from the source, and to separate the source from the intentions / mechanics of the source.
You need to identify the three parts. Feelings, source, and intentions, and to respond to each one with the right measure.
And this doesnt constrain to the negative side of emotions only. If you dont separate all three things, when good shit happens you conflate them and “think” you deserve / it was meant to be / put up on a pedestal / perfection / you idealize. And when bad shit happens you push down / victim & aggressor / fight back / you degrade.
When you’re emotionally stupid you go from pleasure to pain exchanging frames of idealization and degrading.
Repressing emotions always magnifies them.
That rock you want to avoid is the rock you hit.
Whatever holds your imagination is whatever ends up happening.
What you put your mind into is what you make real.
So dont hold on to the negative.
She could have just taken the cat out of the box. She could have argued back. She could have done something. Out of the box.
But she was too worried about not pressing the button.
On time.
The “getting in contact with your feewwingss” thing is making me think a lot. Leap brings this up from the comments, old shit right?, but it opens new angles:
“Most men, myself included, have been trained to either ignore emotions or only relate to the ones that matter to women. I didn’t personally go all the way with that, though I’m unsure if that was a choice due to art or me drawing a line and telling society to fuck off.
Woe to the man who gets in touch with his passionate anger.”
Men who control their emotions are better suited to survive. A proper man, a strong and confident man, has to excel under stress, has to appear to make easy what is hard for everyone else. And then this man should have enough spare emotional energy to enjoy life and reap on the profits, and reproduce, and pass down his legacy. Cue: the grumpy man doesnt cut it.
But the shortcut to mastering your emotions is having none.
Does it work? yeah. Short term it does. The wave of bullshit is coming? turn it off. You have an efervescence of bad feelings and anxiety surging inside and cant turn it off? shake it out. Put it out there. Hit stuff. Man up. You don’t want to lose it under pressure. Don’t want to deal with it. Turn it off. Vampire Diaries style.
But this doesnt allow you to understand your own feelings / emotions, and, at the end, your emotions are the ones in charge, not your rational brain nor your skills. Your emotions sustain your belief and your identity and are the glue for your relational networks. So if you’re not aware and dont have emotional intelligence, if you cant command and understand and feel, and your emotional skills are limited to turn stuff off, block control repress and redirect, youre an EASY pray for emotional manipulators.
Guess whos manipulating you? Media. Society. Religions. Family. Friends. People. Relationships. Everyone. And your own emotions, that you dont control, are also manipulating other people. It’s a dark game played behind curtains and the most evident sign is what happens when you question it all.
It’s not the rational mind what’s blocking you. It’s not a logical puzzle. Question your life right now. The country, the city, the friends, your god, your pillars, and say: it’s all bullshit. Cancel your story. Take your most sacred belief and question it. Can you? or something inside shakes away from it?
What you cant handle you dont own. It owns you. You’re it’s bitch. And how exactly did you get into this position, where you respond to something and are unable to question, but you go with it. When exactly did you agree to be something else’s bitch? when did you surrender? do you remember? what if you hadnt?
Or. Who benefits from this? Who created this shit?
But I might be getting in too deep. Here’s where Emma would chime in:
“That.. sounds very profound, although I didn’t quite grasp it.”
Thanks baby, I get that a lot.
And. Women. You would think that since women are not taught to repress their emotions they are better off. But, no, since women are protected and treated like children and get a free pass and have other people to take on the consequences for them and get free respect and the natural entitlement that follows… no. They have access to a wider range of emotions, but one that is also out of touch with reality and stuck in the childhood, a meaningless, out of control limbo / mess of preferences and unsorted waves of sensorial, biological urges and minute bullshit. Sorry. Emotions for their own sake are not enlightment.
Intelligence is the ability to solve problems. The communication with reality and the know-how define it.
You have one gender with contact with reality but no emotional lexicon. And the other gender with emotional lexicon but no contact with reality.
Still, the problem is not about feeling inferior. Not on it’s own.
* * *
Feeling inferior / superior goes by hand with winning / losing. If you think you did a fantastic job but when the results come you’re last on the chain, you’re to feel inferior. That, if you have any sanity. Or if you came on top, or if you won the match, you’re going to feel confident and dominant.
If you have any sanity your feelings correlate with reality.
The thing is not what you feel but where does that push you. Like Mark said. What then? what do you do with it?
* * *
So how about when the feeling is painful.
Say, your hand is burning on the fire. Now what? do you suppress the pain? take painkillers? block it? ignore it? turn out the music really loud? get distracted? buy ice, to compensate for the third grade burns that are appearing on your skin? apply make up? do you come up with a justification that makes it OK for you to get burned? as a payout for stuff you have committed? or not? price to pay? or you blame it on someone else, or do you personalize the situation, like, the fire is EVIL and wants to HURT you? or maybe end up hating your own skin because it hurts? or you deny the whole thing? or do you chop your arm out? do you create an imaginary bitch to put your pain on? a deity? an amicable doormat? do you split yourself? whine so you get rescued? hate, because your designated rescuer doesnt care enough? what does that pain make you do? what do you do?
And then how about if the feeling is pleasurable? do you hold it? rationalize it? say you deserve it? integrate it firmly with your ego? protect it behind walls? make yourself a costume with it? do you pile it up, to make a nice cushion that distracts you from your other hand, that is burning on the fire? use it as compensation? condition yourself to it as a reward of other stuff you force yourself to go trough? keep building on top of it?
See? the more you do and retain and build structures, the more the whole thing is prone to collapse. The more you hold to your feelings, the more you lose control over reality. The might produce stupid shit like, you winning and feeling miserable, or you losing and feeling good about it, or you sabotaging or getting stuck, or old emotional states that always come back like ghosts, or, never being really, truly “here”, because you lost the emotional awareness that otherwise would tell you how your really feel, so you can’t handle the relationship between yourself and the reality.
Let’s say that again.
Doing stupid ego stuff with your feelings prevents you from developing an intelligence that tells you how you really feel.
If you dont know how you really feel, you can’t solve this.
Sorry. Affirmations can’t replace intelligence.
* * *
So. Hand is burning? How about, retiring your hand from the flame. Then learning how to handle the stuff so you dont get burned. That, without hating the fire nor all of your mental gymnastics to camouflage and justify what didn’t need a justification.
Or some event caused pleasure? how about learning how to get there once and again, without pretending that such state is an intrinsic part of yourself. One you depend on and are addicted to.
* * *
For most people… I think we’re taught this stuff. Most people just reject the undesired feelings, including the inferiority ones. Most people build structures to compensate, instead of moving and fixing and changing and taking charge of the situation that is causing the feeling. And the overall body gets sicker and sicker, and the original problem gets worse with every layer of bullshit that is placed on top of it, and the higher the structure, the more wicked and twisted it gets.
And pleasure receives the same treatment.
So. How to get better? Leave the fucking feelings alone. Let them be. Free them. Let them take charge. Let them go wherever they will go. No place is too high, and no place is too low.
* * *
Feelings are there for a reason. Embrace them. Like Shari would say. Honor your feelings. All of them. The more you feel, the more you discern, the wiser your emotional body gets, the more you gain emotional intelligence, the better you’ll perform. Yes. Even if all you feel is pain.
“Previous research has shown in the week near ovulation women become attracted to sexy, rebellious and handsome men like George Clooney or James Bond [...] Under the hormonal influence of ovulation, women delude themselves into thinking that the sexy bad boys will become devoted partners and better dads,” Durante said. “When looking at the sexy cad through ovulation goggles, Mr. Wrong looked exactly like Mr. Right.”
No. Idiot. You’re rationalizing bad boy attraction, so you can keep the comfortable lie that nice guys trigger any attraction at all, that women are “thinking long term” when it comes to attraction, and that all women want is to find a good husband… but they pick bad boys who are unsuitable for marriage, every time their body wants to procreate, by mistake!
That, and that whenever women do something that is morally wrong, it’s because somehow they have been tricked into it, and therefore they are except of responsibility – and the responsibility goes to the nearest man we can dump the blame on.
On this episode, the poor girls have been tricked, abused and manipulated by their own hormones! Bad, bad hormonal cycle! Leave women alone! These poor girls without any agency nor intelligence nor accountability!
How dare you? You evil, evil biology! Leave women alone! I warn you!
* * *
“oh hi… I know I only met you a few hours ago and Im already sucking your cock… but it’s ONLY because… I thought you were going to marry me? oh no? my body has fooled me yet again! … I was only horny and lonely and went to some party and got drunk and flirted with some guys, bounced out boring guys and ended with you… all confident and hot and dominant and you only wanted to FUCK me ohh yes yes fuck me good good…. Im so naive!! I totally thought I was fucking with a nicer guy!!”
* * *
On a similar note, I dont think we’re going to see a scientific study rationalizing that when a man gets a hard on in presence of a hot girl, he’s really thinking long term and picturing her as a nurturing caring mom, and that men’s drives are in sync with morality and virtue, and that any “mistake” is just the result of some evil external force that… produces erections and makes us do stupid shit.
We’re not going to see it because men are expected to be pigs.
It’s the fact that women are pigs, too, what needs to be hidden and rationalized away in this culture.
There is a contempt point that seems to elude Tyler and every other PUA instructor, even when this is at the very foundation of Game:
1 ) Women are attracted to high value, confident, dominant, successful, abundance minded, social proofed, cocky, funny, resourceful, grown up, attractive, men.
2 ) The one with less value chases the one with higher value. The one with the more needy frame concedes to the one with the less needy frame. The one who needs the less controls the interaction.
3 ) 1+2 = women are naturally attracted to high value men who dont need them back as much. Once in this position, women surrender and are happy to be led, and they complement their man in every way they can and keep him happy, because he’s still a catch. She follows him, he doesnt follow her. It’s a dance.
4 ) All this wording is just: Hypergamy.
5 ) When other girls want what she has, that makes her desire increase.
6 ) Once she’s attracted to a man, once that fully kicked in, nothing else matters. As long as the strong attraction is there, as long as his high-value is there, he can do anything, other people can do and say anything: the bond will stay. Like Rollo says, “Hypergamy doesn’t care”
7 ) In other words, Hypergamy also trumps Game. Or, everything done under Hypergamy, either increases attraction or is invisible to attraction.
8 ) If she wants a man she makes it easy for him. If she doesn’t want a man, she makes it hard for him. And when I say easy / hard, I really mean those words.
* * *
Good? we all know that right? so.
1 ) You only need to “approach” women because they are not chasing you.
2 ) Every time you “open” a girl you have to establish the whole frame again? because you have nothing built.
3 ) What keeps you in the “approach” phase is that you’re low value. Actually, you keep playing the game because it reinforces your low value. You get tiny, short validations that pump your value up, a little, and make you have insecure dreams of glory and “what could have been”, then you go back to the comfort of the low value. You’re playing an addiction game.
Duh.
4 ) If you’re low value, your interactions with girls will be of the hard kind. If you’re high value, your interactions will be the easy kind. If you plan to have thousands of interactions, on which flavor do you want them? easy or hard?
5 ) Having lots of hard, low value interactions is not how you raise your value. Losing is not how you win. There’s failure and defeat and loss and mistakes on the roadmap, of course, but losing is not how you win. Winning is how you win.
6 ) So how do you want your next 1000 interactions to be like, again? easy, or hard? do you want an uphill battle, or a landslide? do you want to be embraced, or rejected? easy, or hard? abundance, or scarcity? success, or failure? what are you after?
Do you want to be successful with women, for real?
Make it easy.
Instead of keeping your current value and position in the chain, and approaching thousands of girls while trying to emulate upper value behaviors… upper your own value in the chain, and socialize everyone, thousands of people, while you’re at it, and develop real upper value behaviors that are consistent with your real upper value in the chain.
Grow up your persona and your value and make thousands of relationships that STAY. Build a net of connections that STAY. Build.
Build up your value. And socialize. Do you like game? then incorporate Game, whatever you like about it, or all of it, into you. Make what you really like, default, so there’s never a “deflating” back to the “real you”. Change who you really are. Up your value. And interact with a lot of people from there, as you go up.
I can’t say this enough.
So. You’ve seen famous, powerful people, business owners, etc? the guys other guys treat with deference and women flirt with? you’ve seen the guy who clearly owns his circumstances and has everything working for him, and emanates that before even saying a word?
“Approaching” doesnt enter his lexicon.
Fuck. I dont “approach”. I TALK. I MEET PEOPLE. I FORM RELATIONSHIPS. WITH PEOPLE WHO WANTS TO BE WITH ME AND I WANT TO BE WITH. But most of it, really, is just filtering.
Compare. Approaching vs Filtering.
You’re better off spending 3 years building up your value as a man and playing a cumulative game and growth game and socializing with lots of people and women, and knowing what you’re doing, than, spending 3 years with your current value and “approaching” thousands of women while improving your superficial “verbal / behavioral game”, that you’re using so you dont feel that bad about your real low value, anyway.
Oh boy.
And over 10 years? it’s a no brainer.
You know that “natural” PUAs keep talking about? A natural is a guy who doesnt “pretend” to have value, but just has it. So have it.
I think I have the concept of game well covered) how game works. It is using specific actions to trigger specific reactions from a woman. In a way, I see it as a social way of making a person’s leg twitch by hitting the kneecap with a rubber mallet. It is a reaction to a trigger. I don’t have any issue with understanding that. My issue is, why do we have to go through all this?
We are intelligent creatures, totally and utterly capable of overriding our most basic and strongest biological urges, yet instead of simply standing up and saying “this is stupid. lets fix it” we keep finding ways to bump woman with that rubber mallet.
You were in the military, so you have seen this plenty of times. If we could not override our nature, no human alive would run into a burning building to save a stranger. No human would go to war for their country. The fact that people can and have sacrificed themselves for another person, or even the “greater good”, proves beyond all doubt that there really is no need for “game” if we would simply stop rutting in our “nature” and rose above to become something better. THAT is the reason I keep looking for the why of it all. Not because I don’t understand how it works, but because I simply cannot fathom why we all collectively don’t just wise up and change the rules. And this is also why I tend to feel that “people” suck.
Collectively we will gravitate toward the lowest common denominator even though we have the capacity to be much more. Unless pushed, most people simply don’t care to improve. Yes, I get that the sky is blue and water is wet. But the sky and water do not have self awareness and intelligence to become something else. To simply state that something just “is” when it comes to female sexuality is completely removing intelligence and will from the equation.
———————-
OK, let’s break it down.
[Game] is using specific actions to trigger specific reactions from a woman.
No. Social interaction is what you do to trigger specific reactions from people. Really think, sit and process that one. From the moment you open your mouth, greet people, say hi, hello, thanks, all your demeanor, all your public presence an interactions, are, exclusively, actions that trigger specific reactions on people.
If you’re kind to other people you expect kindness back. If you are abusive to other people, you expect them to respond as victims do. If you tell jokes, you expect laughs. If you are generous, you expect gratitude. Whenever you dont get what you EXPECT, you’re going to feel hurt. You’re going to feel that how the world treats you doesnt match what your inputting. Simply put, your ability to get disoriented and hurt exposes your selfish, self centered, manipulative, inner bitch.
Now, this is less manipulative if what you do and what you project is “really” what you feel and how you are, and you’re not doing it “because” you expect any specific return. But go ahead, and examine if you’re doing what you’re doing because that “is you”, or because you expect something in return. How to measure that? check the pain meter. The more hurt you are, the more you’re doing whatever you’re doing to get something in return.
So, no, game is not using specific actions to get specific reactions. Action / Reaction is just socialization.
Game is a map telling you which actions trigger which reactions and why. And you can use that to overwrite the non-functioning one.
My issue is, why do we have to go through all this?
We are intelligent creatures, totally and utterly capable of overriding our most basic and strongest biological urges
No we’re not.
We’re intelligent. Cough. Yes. But intelligence is only needed when there’s pain, and the use of intelligence requires a deliberate, problem solving approach – it requires acknowledge of pain AND having the responsibility to go find and fix the issue. So you’re only going to use your intelligence when you cant ignore/placate the pain AND you cant use someone else to figure it out. That’s just how it is. It’s called conservation of energy.
And then, intelligence is only at the service of your basic and strong biological urges. Intelligence only works when you’re in pain, remember? you cant override your pain with intelligence. Your pain is the fuel. You will think and problem solve and reach agreements and do whatever you can to survive. Surviving is not a rational drive. Actually, I´ll wait here while you look for a single example of any human being overriding their most basic and strongest biological urges.
We dont want intelligence. Dude. You dont want the intelligence to, say, handle x1000 the problems you can handle now. You dont want the intelligence to figure out every problem in the world and take on them. What you want is pleasure, comfort, fitness, and control. You need intelligence to handle the stuff that is preventing you from reaching that state, you need intelligence to find your way through, but you’re going to use your intelligence to make yourself happy, or make yourself comfortable in whatever situation you’re in and survive, and not the other way around. Intelligence is a tool. Once you reach your destiny, you’re going to relax and turn it off. As you should.
If we could not override our nature, no human alive would run into a burning building to save a stranger. No human would go to war for their country.
Why is it then that women dont go into the burning building to save male strangers, but men do?
Check Animal Planet. Animals do fight, go to war, protect their women and children, eggs, the colmena, animals live in war and put themselves second when needed, in order for their tribe to survive. Bottom line, this isnt a human, rational construct. Wars and society and firefighters and heroes are part of our animal imprint.
Actually, try to talk rationally to a soldier into NOT going into war. And you’ll get an emotional, not rational, response.
if we would simply stop rutting in our “nature” and rose above to become something better.
But this hits the nail.
Stop rutting our nature and become something better. On one hand, you despise your nature, you’re drowning in shame and self rejection, and cant find your way to accept yourself and other people, you find yourself as an outcast, and see our base nature as defectful. On the other hand, you think you can do “better”. Say, nature rigged this thing, but Ted has a better idea, and the idea is to add more intelligence (more problem solving) to the mix. So you’re in pain right? you’re in trouble. Who do you think it’s going to dictate what that “better” is? who do you think is going to lay the rules down so your intelligence can figure out a “better” human being? because all I can see is your pain, your very defectul, unfit and rejected biological nature…. full of pain… your inner manipulative bitchy beautiful monster, unwilling to use your own intelligence to solve the problem you’re in for yourself.
In other words, you want all of us, you want the world to change and overwrite the basic nature and use their intelligence to form bridges, because your own body is in pain, and you are unwilling to use your own intelligence to figure it out.
You want to conserve your energy and waste ours.
So go fuck yourself. And I love you, my friend, but fuck yourself already. Grow the fuck up.
THAT is the reason I keep looking for the why of it all.
I hope I provided.
Not because I don’t understand how it works, but because I simply cannot fathom why we all collectively don’t just wise up and change the rules. And this is also why I tend to feel that “people” suck.
People suck. I suck. You suck. We’re are horrible. But we’re cool and beautiful too. Carry your own mess and use your own intelligence – dive into your own pain and own your own hurts, stop being lazy now and use your own energy to figure this out, instead of asking everyone else and ringing the false high-road bell. Save laziness for the future. Procastinate laziness, save that for when you’ve made it. For when you’re good.
Own your own mess. And you´ll see it.
Collectively we will gravitate toward the lowest common denominator even though we have the capacity to be much more. Unless pushed, most people simply don’t care to improve.
You’ve got it. We tend to conservate energy. Unless there’s trouble, pain, conflict, why change? we can be “so much more” really translates to “we can be different”. But if when there’s no trouble, pain or conflict… what’s the point on being different? you hold on to that state. As you should.
Converting capacity / potential into factual, real goods takes work. Now ask yourself how much work do you want to put into reaching all your capacity and potential, while holding to the idea that this is just a “different” you, not necessarily “better”, because “better” is mostly defined by the external conditions. So how much work?
If you’re sane, the response is as much work as needed, but as little as possible.
For a lot of people whatever they are doing simply works. They manage to get to the end of the week and to the end of the month. That’s all it takes to hold on.
Yes, I get that the sky is blue and water is wet. But the sky and water do not have self awareness and intelligence to become something else. To simply state that something just “is” when it comes to female sexuality is completely removing intelligence and will from the equation.
You dont become something else because you’re aware. You become something else when you dont have other choice. Let’s say the sky and water had self awareness. What would you expect them to become? what’s wrong with the sky and water to begin with? what’s going to happen? sky + water 3.0 with a usb port? what for?
How is intelligence going to change masculine and feminine sexuality, when it’s not broken? if anything, intelligence is going to break it to fit your previously broken stuff, like feminism and some other religions have.
Stop putting this stuff outside.
What you’re doing is complaining that whatever you’re doing doesnt work, doesnt give you what you expected to receive in exchange of your behavior / manipulation, and you want other people to use their intelligence, or if they dont, at least blame your pain on them for not doing it, so you dont have to own your own pain, dont have to use your own intelligence, and dont have to change and become a different version of you.
You’re like a crying baby, except you’re in age to walking to the kitchen, open the fridge, and feed yourself.
Bro, Im still digesting this stuff, but here’s the succint that explains where all of your problems come from: watch the video.
There are four pieces in play. Two people, one needing, other giving, one owning the frame, other reacting to the frame, one needing the other for survival, and an ambivalence that goes between “hey Im cute look at me!” and “fuck Im furious look at me”, and then the range of hate / love / sadness / despair / joy / safeness that happens between the two.
That circuit gets printed before we learn to talk = before we are able to form abstract and concepts. It’s a basic four piece, emotional / behavioral circuit.
There are many ways that circuit can be imprinted “wrong”. One is to have the mom (or dads) on the receiving end, making the kid the giver. Other is having him owning the frame. Other is to have the mom (or dads) respond only when the kid acts out. Other is making the kid act out and then silence him / punish him for it. Etc. Shortly, the kid understands the game and starts to play it.
And then you build everything on top.
Your experiences from ages 12-21, of course helped forming you, because you’re 35 now and this is a sum accumulative game. But honestly, what happened to you from 12-21, are the same mechanics that were already happening, only adding more external world influence, sex drive, and additional pressures.
Im trying to locate the source of the pain, and is this: like a compass or a geometrical piece that wants to find equilibrium, the pain wants to find the “good” again (from the good the bad and the ugly), but it only knows to reach that “good” by balancing violently between the bad and the ugly and episodes of rage and if that doesnt work, splitting / self mutilation ( cutting out the undesired parts of you, your past, identity, emotions, people, relationships, blocking stuff out, etc)
It’s a constant look out for the elusive “good” part of the dynamic.
Then BPD and narcissim, codependency etc: when this stuff get’s bad imprinted, it’s like the foundation of the building isnt strong enough, so the building cant grow normal. Like a bonsai or something. The learned game doesnt “work” so it keeps trying, its an internal struggle that never resolves. Like the rat that pushes the lever once and again and gets rewards randomly ( the basis of compulsive behavior / addiction ). Plus the whole identity gets build on top of it.
BPD narcissim etc equals having the emotional growth of a three year old or so. You get stuck to the mechanics that quite dont work ( yet are the only you know ) and miss the mechanics that you would have developed in the subsequent years.
Say, if you knew how to get to the good part, and how to get to the bad and ugly part on your own, with control over your emotions, by the time sexuality peaked, age 12, you would have had natural “game”, and you would have been assertive about your needs and wants.
But you werent confident / self reassured about your needs and wants, because you were still negotiating how to even feel “good” and safe, so you didnt develop game nor saw girls / relationships for what they were – but you just added this to the previous unresolved mix, like, seeking the “good” (basic, maternal, paternal love where you’re defenseless and you’re intimally loved and taken care of and safe) from girls, mixing the defenseless and the sexual aggressive drive and the long time affection longing and the sense of dispair of never feeling safe, etc. and, adding the ugly and acting out and resenting the “big provider” for being such a manipulator, and whatever other mechanisms you needed to stabilize the original game, being a control freak, or being a doormat, or placing your needs last, or placing them first, exercising too much pressure (abusing), or letting yourself be abused, attaching too strongly, or refusing to attach at all, the places you had to go or the places you were forbidden to go, or whatever, whatever you had to learn and repeat so you could have access to the good part, or could live at all if the good part never came.
And then add years and years of rationalization that attempted to normalize this so you could do other stuff, have friends, work, study, have a life.
The idea seems to be that people are stuck on an emotional development age. It explains a hell of a lot for me.
Then of course, when you “click” with somebody, it’s your internal game, the primal game what clicks. You see the opportunity to play the game and win it this time. Whatever that game is, whatever the imprint is, “that” is what is going to repeat. You’re going to repeat what already happened, because you’re still playing that game, and you’re asking around who wants to play it with you.
Fill a broken cup and it’s gonna be drained before you even get to taste it, even though you paid its full price. Pay for a refill and that one, again, is going to be emptied before it touches your lips.
As long as you’re broken, no matter what you do, what you achieve, how much work you put into; you’ll be paying the full price and successive refills, once and again, to get only a fraction.
II
The temptation is to keep working on avoiding the pain, filling the void, reaching a spot of stability on turbulent waters, reaching a new peak of glory, finding salvation, holding to something that makes you make sense… while running away from the darkness, running away from the pain, from the unwanted, from the hurt.
The temptation is to find comfort in pleasure while in you’re in pain, or, to heal the void by filling the void.
But attempting to heal the void while filling the void won’t let you do either.
III
Healing your void involves feeling the pain to it’s root. Filling your void involves avoiding the pain.
The pain drives you to overcompensate and create a shiny illusion of yourself that balances all that darkness. While you’re driven, you spend that energy on the false self to get goods that validate that false self. But the cup is broken. When the energy runs out, the false self dissolves and you fall back to the darkness, even hungrier.
So you can’t push in both directions. Can’t heal the darkness while avoiding it. Can’t heal the pain while getting aids for the pain.
IV
The pain will heal when you stop resisting and allow yourself to feel it.
When you do, that will expose the wound. Once the wound is finally exposed, it’s gonna be infected, due the long time neglect and all the stuff and mistakes that made it worse. But it will heal. Once the wound is part of your consciousness, it will heal, like any other wound in the body, because that’s what the body does. The body repairs itself, as long as the body can detect the wound and has enough energy & resources.
So when you do it, when you stop resisting and allow yourself to feel the pain and the wound gets exposed, all of that energy is liberated and the wound begins to heal, from the bottom up. Just like a broken bone or a cut in the flesh.
All the energy you were using to avoid feeling the pain is now used by your body to heal the wound.
And when that happens the pain concedes, it’s a transition. It’s a healing process. It takes time, but it’s done, for real.
V
Once the pain is felt and wound is healed, you’re not longer driven to avoid it, the pain is not pushing you all day long to do something to silence it. There’s not longer a void, which was created by you making walls to block and isolate parts of your self. There’s not longer a need for a false self to cover the dark self and no dark impulses and no shame and no guilt. There’s no dissociation. There’s no fracture. You’re one. And you, as one, are able to feel and experience everything at it’s full, non repressed intensity. You’re not longer numb, you’re not longer lost.
Which means, your compass gets back to working properly. Like it was before it got broken. Which means you can now trust your instincts, drives, desires and needs. Which means you can continue to grow and develop on top of it.
And all that energy, all that drive, all the energy that was repressed and lost in distractions, now you can use to do the stuff that really matters to you, and get the stuff that really matter to you.
The cup is not longer broken. Fill it, fill it baby.
When you drive the story you own your circumstances, you’re the cause, your decisions have long repercussions you have to deal with, the environment is your mirror, you have the power, you’re the active element, and you are either a hero, or a villain.
When the story drives you, when the story happens to you, the circumstances own you, the environment determines your decisions and channels your actions, you’re just the mirror of your environment, you dont have power, you’re a passive element, you’re a victim on the hands of either a responsible parent or an abuser.
How should I respond to a girl staring directly into my eyes?
Women have been doing this to me often practically since I’ve left high school 10 years ago.
Sometimes I got scared because (I’m stupid), but most of the time I just don’t know how to respond. These women stare straight into my eyes, I stare back into their eyes and then I am the one to usually look to the side (before I would look down).
What should I do? are they trying to test my alpha-ness? It would be very helpful if you could answer this question. Because I have had some very attractive women stare right into my eyes, aggressively and I know that I have missed out on some amazing opportunities with women around my age (29). And now younger women are doing it to me, which is allot less intimidating.
How should I respond to strangers?
———————————————————————————————————————————
First a frame change:
“they are trying to test my alpha-ness.”
It’s not a test.
It’s a taste.
She is “wondering” what’s your alphaness. She’s curious. She wants to find out more. If you frame it as a “test” then you’ll want to “perform and score”, like she’s your judge, placing her and her interests above of yours, and by doing so, your alphaness will be low, so her curiosity won’t be satiated, and your imaginary test will fail.
So she is staring at you with status curiosity, she’s tasting you. What should you do?
Look back at her with sexual curiosity. Taste her.
Try to figure just by looking, how ready is she to go fuck with you. Look for fertility cues, look at her facial expression. Measure if she would be a pleasant fuck, picture yourself with her. Is she a moaner? what’s her favorite position? is she good at it? what’s her number? would you do it in an elevator with her? How compatible are you? vibe her, smell her, like she’s a sexual flower.
She’ll know when you’re doing that. You pinged her back.
She´ll blush and look away, then look at you again, or she´ll keep staring at you with anticipation: Go and say hi.
Or she will keep an analytical stare and then break it – like she wants to be worked for: Hold it. She´ll come when you’re with another girl.
Or she will be disinterested, or you will, in which case, it doesnt matter.
But if you liked her and you’re curious, go and say hi, find out if she’s cool.
Let’s say you have never played baseball, but you are in a situation where you will get a million dollars if you score a homerun, or get killed if you dont. And you only have one try.
You go in the field, grab the bat, breath, assume the position, the machine throws that unique ball at you, and you swing.
What are your chances of hitting a homerun?
I
See, sometimes it happens.
Sometimes someone hits that lucky homerun. And against all common sense they keep hitting one homerun after another, without really knowing how they are doing it. We call these the prodigies, the miracles, the naturals. The media and eventually the history fills us with these stories. Mozart, the Beatles, Einstein. It’s a compelling story: some people just have it.
And sometimes when pushed against the unfathomable, in do-or-die situations, when all the bridges have been burned, an unlikely prodigy awakens. David defeats Goliath, four musketeers defeat an army, a gladiator becomes king, a kiddo with two karate moves grabs the title and the girl.
Lucky strikes happen. Miracles happen. Material for movies.
Highly inspirational stuff that makes you “believe”.
Which is bullshit.
II
The win / lose, success or die, go big or go home, prodigy / miracle / luck frame is not how you get shit done.
See. While some of these stories are true, most are just fabrications. Media has a business, and its business is selling you the story. The highly inspirational figures and stories are marketing campaigns, whose aim is to raise the perceived value of a specific system, which has money and resources invested into making you believe.
So believe, you do.
And when your belief starts to fade, a new inspirational story and figure emerges out of nowhere. Oh, such a lucky strike. Or such a prodigy.
The moment you believe the story, the moment you buy into the binary thinking of success / failure, you become part of the mass of people who can only experience life by consuming.
Because the other side of the story is that you cant. You cant go in the field and make a homerun. You cant win. You’re not as talented, as lucky, or a prodigy enough. So you cant bare the thought of going all or nothing and burning every bridge ever created. The stakes are too high. You dont even try.
You consume the stories because you cant create your own.
But Im going to tell you how you can. How to get shit done.
III
Let´s say you have never played baseball, but you are going to spend a few months on the field. The machine is going to throw one ball after another. You pay by the hour, but it’s cheap and you have it covered. When you miss the ball, no one cares. When you hit the ball, you get some cheering. When you are clueless, you get some advice from a more experience hitter. Your main reward though is the learning, watching your body adjust to the game, and the sound that emerges from the ball every time you hit it hard and properly, and watching it fade in the horizon.
What are your chances of hitting a homerun?
Now let’s say when the process is over, you comprise your top game, your best moves, and make a portfolio, which is what the rest of the world are going to see. That is your net worth.
IV
In case you missed it, that second scenario is the nurturing approach. Our parents job is to enable a sandbox where we can fail and attempt without real consequences. Somewhere we can play. A game where we can find our strengths and our own moves, and polish ourselves before going into the external world.
Then the formal education is another sandbox.
Both systems are broken. The rewards are misdirected and the focus is in the wrong places. I could critique this stuff for years but let’s skip it for now. The point is that when you leave that process, if you have been properly indoctrinated, your core belief is that:
You cant.
So you have to settle. You have to aim to survive. To buy stuff to fill some weird void that was also induced in you by the system. Get social status and external worth to compensate for your lack of thereof. So you have to believe the stories and live their glory by projection. And whenever your sandbox, that you never formerly abandoned, get´s attacked or, when shit gets real, or, when a big opportunity emerges and finds you unprepared, or, when your own dissatisfaction finally pushes you to the edge and you wonder what would happen if you went for it, what was “really” waiting out there for you…
… you get derived to the first scenario. The one-hit, homerun-or-die, 0.0001% chances one. And it’s too late. And the stakes are too high.
V
But scoring homeruns isnt the problem. The frame is.
Making it big isnt the problem. The frame is.
It doesnt matter if you’re a kid or a senior or how much you have invested in your current frame. This is how you get shit done:
First, quit all distractions. Quit surviving. Quit do-or-die.
Then, embrace do-and-live.
Procure yourself with a sandbox.
Get a mother to nurture you and a father to guide you, or be your own mother and father. Create a sandbox where you can afford to make mistakes. A sandbox where you can play. To your strengths. Where the price for failed attempts is marginal, and the returns for achievements are marginal as well, and where you can ask for advice when you dont know what you’re doing. Where what really matters is your own experience, watching your mind and body adjust to the game, and the sound that emerges from the ball when you hit it hard and properly.
And every time you make a homerun, honor that, hone that. And iterate. And while you are at it, aim for greatness. Aim for excellence. Make it the best, make it count.
If you´re a company, keep it small and contained and cheap and make products. If you´re a writer, retreat to an inexpensive beach and write. If you´re a casanova, go work in a bar. If you´re a business person, make inexpensive deals and grow steadily. Or get jobs were you get paid to learn. And do you best on every step and play like there are no consequences, because there arent.
Then compile your best moves and share them with the world.
And iterate.
When you operate like this homeruns are not the goal. They are an inevitable part of the process.
VI
And last. Most of the stories out there are the nurturing kind. Someone had a kid and decided to make them a star. Some company needed a product and grabbed someone and created a sandbox around them. Some movement needed a leader and some circle needed a villain. And they contain their mistakes and maximize their achievements or viceversa, to make you believe. If you dont know already, that’s how business are made.
Making it big means achieving homeruns. And your top 10 game is all people care about. When you make it big, due to their belief, most people are going to assume that it was easy for you, that you got lucky, that you’re a natural, that you were just borned with it.
The reason you’re an easy prey is because whenever someone attempts a personal attack, you open up more, you try to reach a middle ground, you tell the agressor where it hurts, you try the empathy channel with someone who’s not showing signs of empathy.
Let’s call it the stockholm codependent approval seeking syndrome.
See. Sometimes when someone attacks you they have a reason: they have been hurt, or you may have done something wrong, etc, and dialogue is needed. However the intentions of the people attacking you are apparent very quickly.
At the first sign of peace, when you drop your weapon and go talk to them to see what is it all about… do they lower their weapons, or do they fire even more?
If you lower your weapon and open your heart – and then keep telling them how each and every one of the specific bullets they are firing you hurt you so much…
Trust me, they know. They know they are hurting you. And if they didnt know, they know now, since you narrated the last 50 bullets. The question for them is not if you’re hurt, but why you’re not dead already, why you keep coming back from the dead. “Sigh, yes I know I hit you in the head, I hit you right where it hurts, I know, it was intentional… so why exactly do you come back to life, again, you just want more right? take this bitch! you fucking zombie”
I know it’s hurting you but its quite comical.
It’s like watching the “fight” between a carrot and a horde of bunnies.
So, the thing is, there are several coping mechanism for stress. Some people are open to take a share of the blame and want to deal with the problems, some people just want to bounce the blame outside and make other people deal with the problem. We all have both systems, but some people are fixated in one.
You’ll see a lot of “bounce it back to you”, rethorics, shaming, and stuff when you touch something that crosses the emotional boundaries of other people. Then some of them will talk, negotiate, reach agreements, like what you attempted, and some other people will just “attack”. And like in war, you dont stop attacking when the enemy is hurt. When you know your attack is working, you increase it.
You dont stop attacking cancer when it starts responding to the chemo. Cool? so dont expect them to care about the pain they are inflicting, when they are transferring their own pain to you.
And last.
Shaming is emotional manipulation. Adhominen, some specific strawmans, deflections, etc, denial, crazy making… I can make a huge list but it’s always the same. Reframing situations and discourses to charge them with emotional content that might hurt you, as an attempt to gain control over you, or to put you in a chain of command that robs you of your own authority, autonomy, self esteem, etc. so they can salvage themselves at your expense.
Guys do that (AMOG), girls do that, kids do that, and people in general do that when they want to WIN on an emotional / social level and they give a fuck about others.
And, emotional manipulation is done by manipulators. Simple right? Not necessarily that they are manipulators all the time, but they are while they attempt it. So why are you talking to manipulators like they are normal people? the proper response for manipulation is not to engage.
If you find that the only way to talk to some people is to engage in their manipulation, it’s not worth it. Send them back home, walk out.
If the conversation is lost, if the relationship is lost, dont worry, there wasnt one to begin with.
The limits on your own mind are different than the limits in the real world. However the limits on your mind prevent you from doing stuff that is actually possible, making them impossible by default.
The real answer for everything is: I dont know.
If you think you know, you´re in trouble.
If you think you know, and what you know is that you “can’t”, you just materialized that.
Say, if you go to the gym for six months, do the proper diet, do salsa and acting classes, break your comfort zone, host parties and make new friends, go spend time overseas – and by the end of it you didnt experience any transformation, then you “know”, or you almost know.
Knowing that you cant without trying is just a defense to protect your current comfort zone.
So it´s not really a “cant”, but a want. You dont want. That´s ok. But it´s not about what´s possible, but about what you´re willing to give up in exchange.
Talking you out of it wont work. Even forcing you do to the actions wont work since you would sabotage the process.
But if life forced you, by burning your house, burning your country, burning your life, and you had to survive by changing – you would do it.
The excuses are a waste of time.
You want to dance? you can. You want to become more extroverted? you can. You want to play tennis? you can.
Can you be as good as Federer, as charismatic as Clooney, as successful as Bill Gates? you´ll find the limits there. Because you´re comparing against other people, you´re entering a competition.
You can do a lot of stuff. It doesnt mean you will “win” nor that you´ll be “as good as”
Though, chances are you´re using the “as good as” as the excuse for not doing. The two are unrelated. Say, you dont need to be “as good as” the french masterchef in order to have a restaurant. Dont need to be Clooney to have charisma. Dont need to be Federer to play tennis and win tennis matches. No one of these guys are preventing you to learn and have your own quota of success.
If you’re trying the “be yourself” just to find such self isnt appreciated, and that you’re only appreciated when you bend yourself into what the world wants you to be, which is not “you”… what’s going on?
Here’s the news. You dont have a value.
As long as we talk in terms of appreciation, money, success, respect, etc, you dont have a value. Being yourself is no strategy to gain value, on its own.
Value, as a constructed thing, needs two. Needs a product and a consumer. The product screams “value”, but ultimately value is in the eye of the consumer.
Just like the price for an iphone on the middle of the ant-farm world is zero. Or just like the value of a great violinist drastically changes whether he’s playing on a subway or if he’s playing a solo act on an expensive theater. In short, who are you playing for? your audience determines your value.
But let’s get deeper.
We’ve got cards. Resources. Genes. Abilities. Stuff. How do you feel about what you’ve got, when the audience is gone? when there’s no one to pay for your stuff, when no external value and no exchange is happening… what’s left? who is you? when you stop all the games and trades and rules and stay in that moment, in silence. What’s there?
Feel happy? feel empty? feel content? anxious? do you have energy to spare or a hole that needs energy? are you self motivated and centered on your own happiness, or is it a chase? are you enough? who are you for yourself? are you, right there, playing violin on a subway on your mind, or playing on an expensive theater? notice that you’re not doing anything. But how do you FEEL and what do you PERCEIVE your value is?
That’s your inner value.
And when you stop playing games to please and comfort, when you stop all the tradings, schemas and masks… that’s your self.
And no matter how you feel about it you’re sitting on a pile of gold. We all are.
But let’s get deeper.
So you are sitting on a pile of gold. Your flesh your muscles your thoughts your abilities your… you. Your strategy, your social strategy, your survival strategy, is to exchange “you” for the stuff outside of you that you want.
And your true value, the market value, is defined by that transaction. And the value of what you get is also defined by that transaction.
Picture quickly, the value of getting the girl of your dreams in exchange of your sexual orientation. The value of getting the best food in the world in exchange of your ability to taste. The value of getting money in exchange of your freedom to spend it. And so on.
The winning strategy, like in any business, is to get more for less. More money for less work, more peace for less war, more love for less stress, more power for less conflict, etc.
And the key to do that is to maximize your market value.
So how? how do you that? Let’s summarize so far:
A) You’re a spiritual being. You’re an animal. You didnt come here to play games. You didnt come here to submit and follow and get lost in a market of values that doesnt give a fuck about “you”, but its only interested on you in terms of what they can get from you, to keep some abstract and ultimately nonsense, impersonal machine running. You came here to be you. This moment is the celebration of you. And it’s only happening once. Wasting it is a shame.
B) You want stuff. You value stuff outside of you. Even if you keep quiet, celebrating that oh so shiny moment of you, you want the exchange, you NEED the exchange. Its not so much about just needing other people, but needing to be part of that impersonal and macabre machine somehow, and play the part that “you” were meant to play on it. Because its a game. And games are fun… but not just that. You need the machine, because the machine is also you.
C) The machine still doesnt give a fuck about you. Unless you give the machine what the machine wants. The market doesnt give a fuck about you, that oh so special and shiny and real and true you. Because the machine, the market, the outside world, has its own self, its own needs, its own otherness, its own value, and it only cares about you in terms of what you have to offer.
D) Hey. Just reverse that, and that’s exactly how you view the machine and the market as well. You dont care, you dont give a fuck other than what the market has to offer you. You’re as selfish as you accuse the machine to be. You truly, honestly dont give a fuck, about other than the stuff you already give a fuck about. You are, after all, the machine. At least you are, for anyone who’s not you.
E) You’re on par on this game. You are the market.
If I had to state the strategy quickly, it goes like this: only proceed on transactions that are favorable on your own terms. That’s your succinct recipe for success and happiness.
But let’s get deeper.
How do you do this stuff? what’s the winning strategy? how do you turn your inner value, or your inner sense of self, your goods, cards, genes, your imagined pile of gold and your expensive theater where you play the solo act… how do you make that real?
Let’s start on the easy, stating how you do not.
The worst move is to sacrifice your own self in exchange of any kind of goods.
And even worse if such goods are the imaginary kind, like, the kind of goods that are supposedly going to make you feel better for having sacrificed yourself.
The “dont be yourself”, AKA fake, pua, beta, doormats, lostsoul camps fall here. You want something from the machine, love, acceptance, money, happiness, you name it. So you price yourself at zero, and give everything, in exchange of what you wanted, or at least some of it. Then wonder why you cant taste flavors anymore, why what you wanted doesnt fulfill you, etc. Like working 20 hours a day in exchange of 15 days of vacations a year. Go and really think that one. Like accepting anal rape in exchange of the medication you need to tolerate even more rape, plus some papers measuring how good of a taker you are.
Just dont. I’ll say it again. Dont. If you’re on that path, quit already.
So, when we come to this world it becomes quickly apparent, unless we’re either lucky or nurtured into an already tested mold of success and value, that our real core and persona have no value, and that the market wants something else. We get celebrated, punished, molded, into what the market wants. We learn what works our should. At best, we incorporate it. At worst, we fake it. At even worse, we fake it and then believe on it.
But even the lucky ones feel it. Every child star, athlete, successful people, even they feel it. Even if they’ve got it easy from the start, they feel it. They are worthless: their real persona has no value. Their market value depends on what the market wants. The actor would be nowhere without his physique, the tennis player would be nowhere without his trophies, the hot girl would be nowhere without… etc. It’s all on the magazines, on the buzz, on the superficial appreciation. Its all displayed and ranked on some ancient, pre-human state of things, its never about them. Its about the audience. And it all can be taken away.
And when you grow up and start discerning the market it becomes even more apparent. The market operates on face value. Appearances. Safety. Fear. Herd movements. Hunger. Primal stuff – powerful primal drives guided by simplistic, reductionist perceptions. Say. Flavor trumps substance.
The moth goes to the flame, doesnt it. It cant help it. It’s shiny.
So let’s go to the surface now. Enough of deep. Let’s tie it up:
Add sugar.
There’s a form of love, which might as well be the only “real” form of love, that is not about a transaction. Its a spiritual bridge that transmits information. All the truth. It’s a powerful force that barres your ego and everything you think you are and renders the whole universe to nothing, and makes you whole with it, and makes you heal and trascend and shiny happy in a pre-post-non human way. But if you are reading so far, this isnt what you are after, right?
Because wanting to get stuff from the world – wanting to know if your self is enough to get stuff from the world and how to do it is transactional.
So let’s skip love – true love.
How do you get stuff:
By giving them what they want. On your terms. And in exchange of what you want. On your terms. And I can say on your terms all day long, but it is, and will always be, about giving. Giving. Them. What. They. Want.
That’s how you get stuff.
Getting stuff is the business of giving.
Got the goods? deliver. Got ideas? ship them. Got skills? perform them. Whatever is what you’ve got, use it. Be your fucking self, on the market. Focus on giving, and if your value is high, the returns will be even higher.
And how do you maximize your value:
1) Start off your pile of gold. If you have problems dealing with who you are, if your perception of inner value is tampered with the perception of your market value, just cut it loose. If you find that “you” is nothing but an excuse, quit the excuse. Quit what you have to quit and burn what you have to burn. Destroy until what you have is whole, and you feel whole. Cut the fake until what you have is, indeed, you, and its shiny, or dark, or whatever is what is you. And from now on this is something you will never, ever betray. This is your compass now.
2) Find your market. Figure who your audience is. Figure who wants you, wants what you already have, figure who wants it the most, the very special (but hey, at the end of the day insignificant and value-less) snowflake of you, figure who benefits from it, who wants… fuck, who wants to PAY for what you already have. Find your market, find your tribe.
3) Figure how you stand up in the competition. Figure what you have to improve, figure the shape your inner-real self needs to adopt to cater to that market. This is not longer about “your self” (but dont worry, you’ll NEVER betray it) but about your presentation and how easily will YOUR market get you, and what’s your advantage over other people / products offering the same as you. Which are and will be many.
4) Cater the fuck out of them. Add sugar. Add color. Add shiny. And whatever you mold your shape into, make it as a way to make your true, real self even more apparent, even more accessible, and bigger, so you and your real self can grown and develop within. Expose that value. Push it over the top. Peacock it.
See, in Vox’s Hypergamouse comic, where the character is advised to “be himself” and he runs into a random girl stating he’s seen StarWars a hundred times… his fail aint assuming his real self. His fail is talking to THAT girl. Because he should be talking to a girl dressed as Princess Leia in a StarWars convention. His fail is not finding his market.
Got a steak? add salt and sell it to the carnivores.
Got icecream? add sugar and sell it to the fat people.
And put it in a nice package. At a price. And pass the voice.
While you can sell package / sugar / salt without an icecream or a steak on it – while you can fake what the market wants with no “you” or substance involved, the transaction will make you empty. Whavever you’ve got, that’s it. That’s your product. The truth. Then cater.
And there’s plenty of people hungry of you. Only waiting for a bridge to come over.
Whatever you’ve got, find your market. Cater to them. Compete, grow, and deliver.
To indulge vs to control. Play vs work. Orientation vs constraints. Wishes vs whats possible. Wants vs price. Dream vs reality. True self vs whats expected of you.
Being yourself. Finding your inner truth. Feeling your true desires and expressing them. Releasing yourself out there. Treasuring what you value. Doing what pleases you. Adjusting your appearance to fit your own mood. Dancing like no body is watching. Perceiving the world from the lense of how it reacts to yourself. Letting the world do its thing. Lifestyle and spontaneity.
Doing what matters. Finding what works and what doesnt. Gathering techniques and skills to defeat and conquer. Gaining dominance out there. Conquering. Doing what´s right. Doing what you have to do because there´s no other choice. Dressing the t-shirt of your cause. Getting associated with similarly goal oriented pals. One for the team. Hard work and rewards.
Being yourself is a feminine principle. Its self centered. It places the self above of the world.
Do what matters is a masculine principle. Its externally centered. It places the world above of the self.
A person focusing on being themselves loses sight of whats important. Loses sight of the consequences of their behavior. Loses sight of what they actually DO. Loses sight of cause and effect.
A person focusing on doing what matters loses sight of the self. Loses sight of their own happiness. Loses sight of what they actually WANT. Loses sight of their individual, core identity.
So.
Be yourself, do what matters.
When you find your inner truth, desires, likes, ambitions, focus on what matters. What matters out there. When you do what matters out there, focus on who you are.
Make every action a bold, irreversible statement. And then take in every experience as a bold, irreversible growth.
This is your marriage with the universe.
Go into the experience naked, with your true self. Do what matters, do whats real, do the work. Then let the experience change you.
Convey who you are in every action, and then become what you do.
As a man, the moment you channel the “be yourself and screw the world”, you slide into either alpha´s or omega´s frame. The moment you do what matters it clears out that distinction. The moment you embrace the self, is the moment what you do starts to matter.
As a woman, the moment you channel the “do what matters, screw how I feel” the world opens up with all kind of new treasures, offers and possibilities. The moment you do what matters, the moment your true self starts to shine.
Women’s natural role is to collect, preserve, filter, judge and nurture, from the pool of things given to them.
A woman´s world is like a garden of treasures. Women´s mission is maintaining, growing that garden, to attract the wonders of the outside world, and, also defending that garden and its treasures from the unwanted.
This is something I think about often when comparing it to the man´s world, which is mostly out there, in the horizon, as a land to be conquered, where its all about mission, drive and abstraction. Men attack the tide and fail. Until the tide teaches them how. Then they master the tide.
But the point today is that:
Men adapt their behavior to master the tide. Men make the tide their bitch.
Women tame the tide to make it fit on the garden. Or they create a garden around the tide.
Men subjugate. Women possess. Men conquer. Women seduce.
And the point is:
Changing behavior to get different results is counter intuitive for women. Whats intuitive for them is “being” different to get different results.
And for men “being” different is counter intuitive. They want to know what should they do different, instead of how they should “be”. When lost, they cry: “what should I do? just tell me what I have to do!” instead of “I feel horrible, how should I be?” or “you are horrible, you should be different”
When its about behavior, women feel its everyone else who should change their behavior to give them the results they want. If she has to work hard = it will feel forced, it wont naturally happen, its not meant to be, it wont feel good. Wont be natural. Wont fit.
Even the women who are trained to work hard and achieve things, in their mind, they didnt get the rewards because of the work, but because they are “special” or “deserve it” as in the work is just an extension of who they are. And if things go bad “they dont deserve it” either. Its never about the actions but about the being, the personal. Like actions shouldnt matter.
While men value hard work, on its own, and evaluate the person on the basis on the work itself, and the amount of work and challenge make the whole thing worthier. Men appreciate when things happen against what was meant to be. For men things are more valuable when they are crafted, constructed, when something got forced and defeated and conquered. When something was owned against its original will. When nature was made surrender.
We live in such different worlds.
You can do yourself a service by acquiring both worlds. Switching from the compass to the square from the magic to the logic whenever it fits. Because both systems are “smart” within some boundaries, and incredibly stupid in others. One doesnt fit all.
For a man, its useful understanding how nature also works in the terms of “beings” and leaps and jumps in the vacuum and how the tide can love you, when it doesnt want to be forced.
And women would benefit from understanding the world in mechanical, logical, action based, impersonal terms. Because the universe is all of that, too.
My name is Yohami.
Im a Singer/Songwriter.
Im on my way to have fun. 
