oftenawake

I laugh but actually this is The One that really works. If only it were possible!

Welp, that's a fuckin stupid idea. Next!

So glad to read your comment @SparrowHawk. This is exactly it, and why I am no longer a hardcore atheist. We can't connect with anyone while we're in the middle of telling them that they're wrong - even if they are completely wrong about factual matters. It's essential to build connection first, then conduct any education through the connection. Without connecting it's wasted effort.

The educating can't come through coercion or condemnation either, because those shut people down. If we don't offer something better then we push those people away. We might write them off and say "fuck em, who cares!" and that's how we end up at political deadlock and perpetual war.

This is why the fascists are so terrified of empathy, because intelligent, educated people (lots of those around!) who are highly empathic (not so many, it's a harder skill) joining together and building connections with and between the masses, already have all the tools to dismantle the whole scam we're living in.

Empathy and education, from kindness not condemnation, is unstoppable. Though I will grant that there's not much in it for rugged individualism, but lots in it for diverse, individuality-celebrating collectivism.

Of course we're supposed to be arguing - we'll never get anywhere that way.

Empathy lets you say "I absolutely disagree with your view, yet I still value you as a human, so am committed to your long-term wellbeing" and other similar bits of "radical hate speech" which, put into action will dismantle capitalism, fascism, authoritarianism, religions, prisons... you name it.

But it can't be passive, it is something for each person to be putting into action all the time.

That's my spiritual practise and I don't feel personally affronted if someone disagrees with it or doesn't understand it any more, because it's just with myself and how I want to be in life with myself and others anyway.

There are billions of us humans and we're unstoppable when we put aside our petty differences and work together for common dreams.

....besides, if you don't agree with me, you're wrong! /s

"We are not gay, we have scantily-dressed womenfolk present, thus proving our masculinity beyond question! Definitely. Not. Gay!"

Martial arts. This is why I find the spiritual (think more like "in the spirit of friendship" type spirit, or like "a way to be in life") aspect of martial arts so interesting and fertile for learning. Since if you know how much you can lose to others even in a playfight situation, you can't help but be humbled by it, often.

Meditation is great and all - and really challenging, often harrowing, not for the faint of heart. Vipassana... yikes! But why I like martial arts more is because when you connect with awareness of your body and someone else's body in realtime... like a body physics experiment from the inside of a meditative consciousness... the bullshit detector is right in your face (your training partner!) and you're not off away floating unchallenged somewhere in premature "enlightenment" land, because you can't afford to be, you will get hit in the face!

I suck in a fight - everyone ultimately sucks in a fight, that's my takeaway from 25+ years. Fighting is not any of us at our highest levels of humanity. Even if you "win" it doesn't say anything about next time. I train to be unfightable, like, "actually we're not going to fight, thank you". I can and will enforce my refusal to participate in violence - if you make me fight you, I've already lost. That's my meditation all day every day.

There is no enlightenment though, just more learning every moment! Nobody is enlightened, haha, those people are kidding themselves! But we can all have lots of little aha moments, opportunities to be less of an idiot.

So just try treat people kindly and find ways to stick up for humanity, without becoming a narcissistic fascist egoist who believes their own bullshit. That's it.

We are fuckin nothing, less than nothing, not even temporary nothing, and this experience is everything, we are kind of everything there is, just this now... it can't really be explained and it's unimportant anyway... so it's best to enjoy it, laugh at it, and allow others to do the same as long as they're harming nobody.

That's my way anyway... through the body, direct experience, and the medium of playful conflict.

I don't talk about it online very much these days because the modern internet doesn't give much of a shit about long-form discussions. Lemmy fills me with a little more optimism.

Thanks for reading my adhd ramble of the evening, if you're still here!

Try with Soylent Green!

I've been combining eggs and my interest in Go (the ancient board game) to similar effect.

We could make e-waste into a crafting activity!

My hobby is collecting broken computers and putting them on a shelf for later! Your hobby sounds pretty sensible - come the apocalypse you can craft away and you'll have loads to barter with! Artists will travel to peruse your epic retro craft supply cavern!

I'll be left wondering what to do with a Pentium Core2 if I don't take action soon! I do upcycle them but right now the backlog is silly and they probably just need to go to the dump because nobody wants a midrange PC from 20 years ago.

Maybe my hobby is e-waste!? Fark! =-O

Sounds like a great idea which neither of us is gonna remember about tomorrow. I'm in!

1. Invent incredibly dumb device.
2. Brand it as "Smart" to lean into Dunning-Kruger effect sales.
3. Profit!!

Extremely destructive to the future of the company, you say? Go on...?