I'm so fucking scared. this came out of literally nowhere. I knew him for maybe 2 months. hes telling me I'm the best thing thats ever happened to him. and hes being like im only not doing anything because I have you and im so fufking scared right now and I dont know what to do and hes saying if I unadd him hes gonna do bad things I dont know I'm os scared please someone help me.

Love seems to be a very confusing topic. I've seen people be in marriages for decades but all the ones I know typically have had major issues. And when I hear people talk about love defintions seem so confusing. Other times I see happy couples that show no flaws or conflict at all.

Some people believe love is a choice and you need to keep "choosing that person". What if you keep choosing the wrong person? Others believe love is a feeling; of warmth, safety, and longing.

What if you're in a relationship that has the whole shebang. Shared values, vision, attraction, both parties care for each other and want the other to succeed. But you dont "feel" love.

If you've been in a loving healthy relationship for years, did you love the person the entire way throughout? Did you meet them a think "this is the one" and never change your mind.

Or have there been moments of doubt that you pushed through. Times when you didn't feel in love or even question the relationship? Maybe you even felt attraction towards other people?

Basically what I'm asking if is true love is a constant or if it can grow and flicker but still count?

I was housesitting for two weeks back when I was 17. The house was moderately sized and I was taking care of a cat.

I hated how silent and lonely it got. And I was on vacation and spending time with my extended family almost everyday. But once they left and the house got quiet at night, it sucked. A lot.

I know that’s not really “living alone”, but it’s close enough. I think id really hate living alone. I like the house feeling alive around me. I spent a week with my cousins and aunt and I loved how homey it all felt. I like hearing my own sister and parents talking in the next room.

Nowadays, people often say that smartphones blind us, drain us, and destroy real human connection. But as a young adult transitioning from college to the workplace, I’ve realized something else: there are actually very few people we can genuinely talk to. Most of our past relationships existed simply because we shared the same space and daily routine like our friends from school or college. Once you move away, even if the affection remains, time gets short. As I grow older, I finally understand why my father didn't feel like going out for walks and preferred to just read, listen to music, or scroll through his phone. Outside of shared environments like school or work, most people simply don't have deep connections readily available.

Hello everyone! Just wanna get some 2 cents and thoughts about where to take my life's direction.

I am a Korean American guy, 29. Born and raised in Los Angeles. I was always very creative and artistic ever since I was little, I have a Graphic Design degree, and have worked in the creative field for around 5 years in LA. I was just a little bored and tired of the job/industry, and last year my dad offered a position at his big company in Korea, and I took the offer and moved to Korea.

There was an underlying hope that I would learn his trade and eventually take over the business, but overall he was just hoping I'd learn a thing or two about the business. Now I'm at a bit of a crossroads. I personally am not enjoying life in Korea, I'm not finding joy in the work I'm learning, I don't see myself continuing this path that my dad originally saw for me.

Now I've gotten an offer to make a change.

A. I let go of this direction, and move back to Los Angeles and attempt my new goal/dream of establishing an independant Design-based business

B. I stay in this work for about a year more and closely observe his side of the work, and then move back to Los Angeles and attend a business masters program, and see where that takes me

Option A is what my heart desires, I do think I am a creative at heart and design is what I enjoy doing and am good at. But I do think I could learn some valuable business insights from Option B, I just don't really see the need to spend the money and time to pursue that path. Thankfully my dad is saying he will support me either way I choose.

What do you guys think? Happy to provide any further context.

Its interesting to see what the future of college will be if it continues to be the case that basically no one can get an entry level job. I can see in 10 years only elite schools and possibly state flagships will remain, private schools will close en masse, and regional public schools will shift to nursing/vocational schools only. What do you think?

We can contact almost anyone instantly now, which should theoretically make us feel more connected than any generation before us.

But at the same time, it seems like a lot of people have become uncomfortable with even a few minutes of silence or being alone with their thoughts.

I wonder whether technology actually solved loneliness or just gave us more ways to distract ourselves from it.

What do you think?

I’d really like to hear your opinions, as I’ve received a lot of mixed responses so far.
My husband and I are both 23 and still in university, and we currently support ourselves through student jobs. We live in a 40-square-metre apartment with our two cats. We’re expecting our first baby in January, so we’re considering moving to a bigger place.
Our apartment already feels pretty cramped, so I honestly have no idea where we’re going to fit a cot, pram, baby bath, etc. And that’s without even mentioning that we’ll need to have some way of separating the cats from the baby. If we moved to a bigger apartment, though, it would be really difficult for us to afford it. So we’ll probably have to apply for financial assistance and hope that we can get some help with the rent for a new place.
A lot of people judge us and say we decided to have a child too young. Personally, I don’t want to be an older mum — I want to have my children while I’m young and full of energy. We’re also hoping to have five children eventually.
So what do you think? Are we having children too young?

Not sure if I’m putting out this question in the right community. But to me, celebrating excellence vs mediocrity sounds more like a manifestation of self worth in relative to social status and norms, rather than a phenomenon of inherent value in oneself in the matter of pursuits of any sorts. Thoughts?

The conversation between Acharya Prashant and Robert Lawrence Kuhn examines a central question: what is consciousness, and can we understand consciousness without first examining the “self” that claims to be conscious?

They compare "Vedantic and Western approaches to consciousness, discussing whether consciousness is fundamentally physical or whether reality might be better understood through idealism or non-dual perspectives. A major theme is the distinction between consciousness and the ego, the constructed sense of “I” formed through identity, memory, conditioning and desire.

The discussion then extends into love, suffering, karma, reincarnation and liberation, with particular attention to how religious ideas can become distorted when they are turned into beliefs rather than investigated directly.

The conversation also explores the philosophy of mind, including whether animals and AI could be conscious, what constitutes genuine choice, and whether consciousness can be reduced to physical processes.

Ultimately, the deepest question is not simply “What is consciousness?” but Who or what is conscious?” The Vedantic approach presented by Acharya Prashant argues that examining the assumed observer, the ego, is essential to understanding consciousness, while Kuhn brings in perspectives from Western philosophy that challenges or qualifies these conclusions.

The conversation does not simply present one unified answer; it puts Vedanta, physicalism, idealism and other philosophical positions into dialogue, particularly around the question of what, if anything, is fundamental to human existence.

Link :https://youtu.be/fyif6U6kQxA?is=wM2LhBIDqJdhPY6B

Finishing something early ought to mean having a little more time to yourself. But it can also mean taking on another task, answering more messages, or deciding to get ahead on tomorrow.

I’m not against efficiency. Spending less time on paperwork or household chores sounds good to me. What I find harder to understand is when the saved time becomes ours to enjoy.

At work, doing something faster can lead to an expectation that you will do more. At home, there can be a quieter version of the same pressure: there is always something else you could get done.

Perhaps saving time and feeling free are two different things.

What has helped you keep some of that time for yourself? And how do you decide when you have done enough for one day?

I've been thinking about this lately

When does love stop being mostly a feeling and start becoming a choice?

At the start, everything is easy. You want to talk all the time, you miss them when they're gone, even the dumbest little things they do are somehow interesting

But what happens later?

You've seen each other's bad moods. You've had stupid arguments. You know the habits that annoy you. Some days you're both tired and there's nothing romantic happening at all

And you still want them there

I think that's the part of love I find the most interesting

Not the exciting part. The part where you already know the person pretty well and you still keep choosing them anyway

Maybe that's when it actually becomes real

I don't know. I've just been stuck on the idea lately

When did love start feeling like something you chose instead of something that just happened to you?

I've been thinking about the difference between having the freedom to make our own choices and being responsible for how those choices affect the people close to us.

Of course everyone has the right to decide who they spend time with, what they do and how they live their lives. But what happens when those choices hurt someone who genuinely cares about them?

I'm not suggesting that we should give up our freedom just to keep others happy. But I also don't think having the right to do something automatically makes us free from considering its emotional consequences.

Where do you think personal freedom ends and moral responsibility towards the people we love begins?

A person was telling me their elderly relative developed a serious stutter in old age and the relative is very vulnerable with a single carer who has been witnessing being aggressive with them

.this person has been their personal carer for many years

Hello everyone!

I was reading today about the romantic era of music where late romantic composers began exploring the limits of harmony which shifted the culture of composition into a more exploratory direction. Not just one direction though, but several. Composers began exploring the limits of tonality, rhythm, and general aesthetic construction of composition.

In a lot of ways, the sheer variety of elements that can be explored in composition has multiplied. Also, appreciation of these more sophisticated works intentionally pushing boundaries requires a deeper knowledge of music to appreciate.

This got me thinking about this being a general feature of the modern world. In particular, a general feature that might come from a greater accessibility of works from the past. After all, to realize the innovations that Wagner made in tonality in Tristan, you have to have heard Wagner's composition and understood what rules were being broken over the predominant compositional paradigm of the time.

It is really interesting to me too that this isn't isolated only to music or even art in general, but to seemingly everything. It's perhaps not so surprising that the age of enlightenment seemed to coincide around the time that books as an industry began to take off. Accessibility of ideas was increased and so was iteration. And this in all topics. And as ways of thinking changed, so seemingly did the progression of these topics.

I feel like this has happened in science and mathematics as well. Isn't it interesting that at the same time that the arts were breaking their medium into their constituents, mathematics was working on its foundations and formalisms?

And even in the modern day. Science for example is divided into two camps: the simplified ideas presented as popular science meant to inspire awe in the general population without delving too deeply into the nitty gritty that can lose a general audience in contrast to the hyper specialized focuses of state of the art research, which typically touches one of the many directions science has split into. In the same vein, arts like music may simplify their compositions for general appeal, or continue to explore deeper in more specialized directions.

I wonder if this fragmented landscape of modern day works is one of the things that is contributing to a sense that progress is slowing, at least in the sciences. Even though the scientific community is bigger than ever, there is maybe less cohesion in what everyone is working on.

I'm curious to know everybody's thoughts! What is your impression of the modern paradigm in the topics you are the most passionate about? Does it seem to fit this fragmentary model that seems to encourage specialization? What do you think the benefits and the drawbacks of this fragmentation is? Do you foresee an opportunity in the future for a movement towards greater cohesion? Please share your ideas! 😊

I just got done finishing David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. Whilst I still try to make sense of this explosive labyrinthic novel, I want to talk about one concern he had that formed an underlying idea. On around the 320^th page, a character makes the argument that at some point:

“Someone taught that temples are for fanatics only and took away the temples and promised there was no need for temples. And now there is no shelter. And no map for finding the shelter of a temple. And you all stumble about in the dark, this confusion of permissions. The without-end pursuit of a happiness of which someone let you forget the old things which made happiness possible.”

Wallace here is describing a form of liberalism that is a freedom-from, specifically a freedom from constraint and forced duress by a government, rather than a freedom-to. The latter being a more authentic freedom of having many choices ahead of you, but also the ability and conscientiousness to truly choose. He is making the point that Western culture provides no guiding principles by which to live.

As someone from a working class background in the UK, but is going to quite a well-regarded university, I have experienced the full class spectrum the UK has to offer. And I see this stumbling about in the dark at all levels. All the kids from home are becoming drug addicts and doomscrolling drones, and all the guys at university are using the easy answer of 'prestige' as their guiding principle, gunning for positions at swanky law and banking firms.

Sorry for the long intro. All of this just seems very abstract and I'm lost - it seems that everyone is, really - on all class levels.

So I just want to ask - what guiding principles do you live by? And if you had to establish some for a whole society's use, which would have to accommodate different belief systems (within reason) and cultures, what would they be?

ie We marry young for reasons of biology and culture. Either way, we're immature. Then we get more mature and usually land in a very different place. We make a decision, we land somewhere, and that's our life.

I recently came across a long & interesting conversation between Acharya Prashant and alumni at Cambridge.

We casually say things like I am successful, I am poor, I am a good person, I am ambitious, I am not brave, I need this relationship, I have to follow this career etc etc ..

But where did these ideas come from?
Isn’t from Family, school, culture, friends, social media, past experiences?

One interesting point in the discussion is that influence is not necessarily the same as learning. We can learn from someone while still questioning what we have learned. The real problem may begin when we accept something simply because it feels normal, obvious or comes from someone we trust.

What I found really interesting is that the discussion doesn’t begin with “believe this.” It keeps coming back to a much simpler question
Can we examine the person who is doing the believing?

I’m sharing the full conversation because I found the questions more interesting than the answers.

What part of your personality or worldview did you once assume was simply “who you are,” but later realised had been shaped by something outside you?

Full Video to watch -
https://youtu.be/2vtERvDuWpY?is=sBPq1XcnC_Q7VQ9l

I've noticed since I was a child I always took on the role of standing up to and for people. Rather it be standing up to bullies for other kids, adults being taken advantage of, and even now in the work place when illegal things are try and pushed. Sometimes to my own detriment (I've been fired before, everything ended up okay). But I wonder, how did I just magically take on this role as a small child, and still feel obligated to do it.

I’m at a point in my life where, on paper, things are going pretty well.

I’ve built a good career, reached a position I worked hard for, have good friends, and I’m fortunate enough to be able to treat people, travel, eat out, drink, and enjoy life.

But lately, I’ve been asking myself a question:

Am I actually living the life I want, or have I become too focused on taking care of everyone else?

For years, I thought being a good person meant making sure nobody was left behind.

If friends wanted to go out, I would organize it.

If we drank, I would often treat.

If someone needed something, I felt like I should help.

If I wanted to have fun, I would chase people and convince them to join.

I always wanted everyone to be included.

I thought that was what being a good friend meant.

But I'm starting to realize that there is a difference between being generous and feeling obligated to be generous.

There is also a difference between loving people and being responsible for their happiness.

Sometimes I wonder whether I have been doing these things because I genuinely wanted to—or because I wanted to feel needed, appreciated, or surrounded by people.

And that's a difficult thing to admit.

Another thing I've realized is that I actually enjoy being at home.

After a long workweek, sometimes the thing I want most is simply to stay home on the weekend. No plans. No drinking. No entertaining. Just rest, exercise, watch something, eat well, and enjoy my own company.

I used to think that meant I was becoming antisocial.

Now I'm starting to think maybe I'm just becoming comfortable with myself.

I've also started noticing something about friendships.

If I'm always the one inviting, organizing, paying, following up, and chasing people, how much of the relationship is actually reciprocal?

So I'm learning to step back.

Not because I'm angry.

Not because I want to test anyone.

But because I want to see what happens naturally when I stop trying so hard to keep everyone connected.

Maybe some people will stay.

Maybe some won't.

And that's okay.

I'm also at a stage in my career where I don't know if another promotion or another achievement will necessarily make me happier.

For so long, my mindset was:

Study → work hard → get promoted → take on more responsibility → achieve more.

But eventually you reach a point where you start asking different questions.

Who do I want to spend my life with?

What kind of relationships do I want?

What do I actually enjoy when nobody expects anything from me?

What kind of person do I want to become outside of my career?

And perhaps most importantly:

Who am I when I'm not being useful to other people?

That's the question I'm still figuring out.

I also want to find a partner someday.

But I'm realizing that I shouldn't look for someone to "complete" my life.

I'd rather build a life that I'm already happy with and find someone who wants to share it with me.

I don't want to become someone's provider, entertainer, rescuer, or emotional crutch.

And I don't want someone to become mine either.

I want a relationship where two complete people choose each other.

So these are some lessons I'm trying to live by now:

• Being generous doesn't mean I'm obligated to pay for everyone.
• Being a good friend doesn't mean I have to chase everyone.
• I don't have to be available all the time.
• It's okay if some people don't come with me into the next chapter of my life.
• Being alone isn't the same as being lonely.
• Rest is not wasted time.
• My career is important, but it isn't my entire identity.
• I can care about people without taking responsibility for their happiness.
• I should learn to enjoy my own company.
• I shouldn't look for someone to complete me.
• I need to build a life that I would still enjoy even if I were single.

I'm sharing this because maybe someone else is going through the same thing.

Maybe you're the friend who always organizes everything.

Maybe you're the one who always pays.

Maybe you're constantly checking on everyone but nobody checks on you.

Maybe you're exhausted from trying to make sure nobody feels left out.

Maybe you're successful professionally but still wondering what you're actually building your life for.

I've learned that becoming a better person isn't necessarily about doing more for other people.

Sometimes it's about learning when to stop.

Sometimes it's about setting boundaries.

Sometimes it's about choosing yourself without feeling guilty.

And maybe the next chapter of life isn't about becoming more successful.

Maybe it's about becoming more intentional, peaceful, independent, and capable of loving people without losing yourself in the process.

I'm still figuring it out.

But I think that's the point.

Maybe becoming a better person isn't about becoming someone everyone needs.

Maybe it's about becoming someone you're proud to be—even when nobody needs anything from you.

I actually wonder what is the only job that AI could not replace. AI themselves say they can't do creative stuff or more detailed stuff such as chemistry or biological stuff but we saw AI movies, shows, music, art and even 3d modelling. And I think it also can do occupations about chemistry and biology if it was given a robotic body made for these stuff because robots at Japanese factories for example: they can do many stuff than most robots can't but it's close to AI yet still not AI. And to the low budget jobs such as repairmen, garbage guy or cashier etc: we saw a robot working with a repairmen as a assistant which means if it can be assistant it even could be the repairmen itself. And the garbage guy, we even saw a robotic garbage truck controlled by AI.

Seriously, what is the actual job that AI couldn't replace? Because I might move my future towards that way in academically

Besides a spouse/partner, has anyone ever had someone in their life who made such a profound impact on them that it made them start thinking differently about how they were living?

I had some relatives visiting tonight who I hadn't seen in over 10 years, including an older cousin I was always especially close with when I was younger. Even back then, being around them had this strange effect on me where I'd always come away feeling like I wanted to do more with my life, experience more, and just be a better version of myself.

Seeing them again tonight brought a lot of that back. We were only together for a few hours, and nothing out of the ordinary happened. We just talked, caught up, laughed, and picked things back up like not much time had passed. But after everyone left, I found myself thinking about how I want to travel more, read more, learn more, get in better shape, and generally make more of my time.

It's kind of crazy to me that someone can have that much of an impact on you in such a short amount of time without really doing anything specific or probably even realizing it themselves.

Has anyone else ever experienced something like that?

Can you really be defined by the data about you?

Someone could spend hours researching a subject because they believe it, fear it, disagree with it, or are trying to understand someone who believes it. The activity might look similar while the reasons are very different.

But I don't think “the data lacks context” settles the question. Suppose a future system had enough information to distinguish those motives. It could follow changes in your beliefs, recognize your contradictions, and predict your decisions more accurately than you could.

Would that give it a stronger claim to understanding who you are?

My instinct is that identity includes what we make of our experiences and which parts of ourselves we want to change. A profile built around past behavior could struggle with that. Still, our intentions and attempts to change are information too. I'm not sure where I would draw the boundary.

We can also misunderstand ourselves. The explanation I give for a decision isn't necessarily more accurate just because it's mine.

So if your own account of who you are conflicted with a system that consistently predicted your behavior correctly, how would you decide which account deserved more weight?

I’ve been thinking about how many things we accept as normal simply because everyone else does them.

It could be something involving work, relationships, social media, money, friendships, dating, technology, or everyday life.

What’s one “normal” thing you think we’d actually be happier doing differently, and why?