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I've taken the survey. Possibly my first activity here this year
Interested. Already have 2 kids. Live in Poland and would like to stay in Europe.
Room full of first year pedagogy students, lecturer puts a claim "marxism is not the philosophy of Marx." He explains how marxists distorted original Marx' thought and how the original claims are so great and describe the world and how they should be followed.
If I was generous, I would say he wanted the students to argue, he wanted them to think critically and disprove his weak argument, but he had experience with students and those were 18-year-olds, who would always try to shut down my questions for explanations "because we want to have this lecture finished". The way it worked, for next two weeks all girls in my group (exept for one other older student) were avid, bona fide marxists. And likely spread this ideology to their families.
3 is happening in real life.
This article made me realize how far I've gone in healing myself. My mother abused me. As a coping mechanism when I was about 15 years old I became disattached from pretty much everything I have/can have, in order to not feel much of a loss when it is taken from me. In order not to grieve.
And the fragment about two kinds of grief after a relationship ended made it even more clear. I never imagine the future. I tell myself I live so much in the present that it just doesn't occur to me, but the thing is that I learned not to. Because anything I imagine or want - can be taken away from me, and I would look stupid for being angry at the world/fate for taking away from me something that was not even yet mine. There are parts of my life where this seems a reasonable thing to do, for example my son has a diagnosis of a genetic disease that kills 90% of affected people in infancy. He's almost 7 years old, so he's already an outlier. Any day the disease can activate and the dying will start. Not planning a future for and with him feels reasonable. In autumn I finally visited local association of deaf people with a vague intention of giving him a community, in which he'll be able to feel compatible in the future, but that doesn't count as a plan. It's a vague intention. "I'll put him in one place with the people that are a bit more like him than me and he'll have a better chance of fitting in".
Last year, for the first time in my life I bought for Tadek and me a week-long holiday in Greece. And when it was close to the end, I started planning: I want to do that again, maybe a bit closer to the season than mid-May. And in two years I want to take the kids with us for this kind of holiday. I keep that thought, I return to it. It's very strange to me, I've never had one like this. I've never made plans for me or my family and here I am making them. Making it. One plan.
Recently another plan has shown up. About owning a flat, provided that my parents give me a lot of money once they sell their valuable house (one version of this plan has them not giving me money, but buying a flat and then renting it to me at no charge for a few years until we move out of the area). There is a proverb in Polish: nie dziel skóry na żywym niedźwiedziu (do not divide the skin of a live bear), warning against planning too far in the future or basing your plans on something that is not particularly likely to happen. This plan feels a lot like a live bear. Add to that my craving for emigrating caused by gaslighting politics of the new government (I've been gaslighted over half of my life and seeing it happen on this scale makes me quite anxious). But I keep it. I've even looked at some offers, to get the idea of prices. And just now I realized there is even a third and fourth plan.
So altoghether it seems that I'm finally allowing myself to care. I'm finally allowing myself to get attached and (at least to some extent) ignore the all-pervading fear of losing things and people.
I think the first step to this revelation was rephrasing the classic greek "panta rei". Earlier only temporal permanence could give things reason to exist (since nothing is permanent, nothing had the reason to exist and I was not entitled to "have" anything) and I managed to change that a few years ago. Everything passes. But you know what? For now, for this year and maybe next and maybe even some years more - this boy is mine. Everything passes and everything will be lost, but this is my home now, even if it will not be the last, final home of my life. Impermanency does not make it any less of a home than the final one. There was the thought "therefore I am allowed to attach myself to owning this car/having this child" but I never truly believed it. Until recently, that is.
lots of ways to not let myself succeed at anything.
That seems like a different problem...
And it is a different problem, but it throws shade at everything I do. Before I properly unlearn this, I need ways around.
I haven't thought of signposting, I'll try that!
I've tried it and it doesn't work, unless those are very basic and fast things, e.g. applying night cream, but not going for a run.
I've developed (as protective mechanisms against my mother) lots of ways to not let myself succeed at anything. I know now that I need to move very slowly to get anything done, so I'm mostly untangling my thoughts and aliefs about myself.
This is one of the few occasions when habitually seeing situations and problems from more than one side doean't help.
No actions yet. I tend to ignore any kind of actions that I plan; maybe the problem is the wrong way my brain thinks about it, so this is an attempt to change the brain before I really attemt to change the body.
To remind myself time and again, until my brain learns and understands it: without a change in diet (or lifestyle) there is no change in weight.
Today I cut my very first self-grown in a pot hokkaido pumpkin. It's 270g and I'm bursting with proud-ness (is this a word?).
That was also my first year of growing any kind of plants and I had some strawberries, nasturtium flowers, lettuce and sweet peas (those formally belonged to my daughter). I also had a tomato plant, but that didn't grow any fruit.
I had a realization today that does not grant a separate thread.
I'm reading RAZ and got to Mysterious Answers, specifically Explain/Worship/Ignore?
I have kids. Most people know that kids love the question "why?" (If you didn't know - now you do. My family of origin has a joke that the last question of a longest stretch was number 37: why is mummy chewing on the carpet?)
When my daughter asks "why", I give her some answers usually pondering how I can influence the direction of the questions and information that I give her*. But in light of Explain/Worship/Ignore I am doing the best thing - explaining, showing her that there are layers upon layers of the stuff in this world and that it's a good idea to investigate further and further.
This made me very proud in my parenting.
*e.g. when she asks "why is the bus going?", I can answer about engines or about the driver or about the route or about planning of communal transport etc.
There were studies on than with kittens or pupps and it seems that in fact this works like this:
"When I do this trick, I get a reward! Let's do the trick! I didn't get the reward? Maybe I should try again! I got the reward, the world works like it should, yay! Let's get another one! No reward? Maybe they didn't notice? I have to try harder! Still no reward? Let's try again, I'm sure I'll get it this time".
The puppies noticed the reward, not the punishment. If it was as regular as one out of four, they would notice this regularity and act according to the expectation of the result - not try when a punishment was due and try when a reward was due.
I had this at uni. It was a long time ago, so I can't really provide references.
If you want to learn something new, you need to reinforce each time
When you already know you can do the whole thing, then it's a good idea to start intermittent reinforcement. It should gradually go from 100% to 0% rewards, so you could e.g. take a d10 and roll it; first week anything over 1 gives you the reward, second week - anything over 2 etc. The die is essential, you need to randomize the reward, not just say "every 1 out of 4 gets a reward" - that in fact works worse than 100% rewards.
I used it to potty train my kids, worked like a charm.
Do that. AND come to the next LWCW.
I came to LWCW2015 struggling. This spring has been personally difficult for me, and so I didn't even want to talk about what I do, what interests me. I didn't even have it in me to tell Christian that my lightning talk was supposed to be cancelled.
This time there were places to hide from people and places to come to people. There was time that needed my own ideas. There were enough people so that I wouldn't feel awkward not knowing someone who joins my table at lunch on Sunday. Enough people so that "everybody hugs" would not be the default.
In general - there was time and space and good people to let me heal some, move and open at my own pace. I came home happier than I have been in 6 months. And I even have some anchors to keep the good parts.
I used to have migranes from about 17 until I was 25, and since my solution is strictly for women, I comment here.
My migranes were not a huge problem, mostly because they rarely lasted longer than "until the next day".
And then, when I was about 27 I realized they stopped. They stopped when I had a baby. Last few months I had some bad days, as if the migranes were cominig back, but 5 free years is still nice.
I would say that the whole thing took about 3 hours (maybe more if the walk to the cemetery took a lot of time), so now that Harry used his last hour, he's about 3 hours before his past self gets the note. He has to occupy that time, and what better way than to try to free Dumbledore?
I don't mind him not succeeding - I already have my "as good as possible" ending.
I wouldn't agree. As some early point she grfgrq ure yvzvgf naq qrpvqrq fur pbhyq qvivqr ure nggragvba orgjrra nal ahzore bs ohtf jvgubhg nal fbeg bs qenjonpx. Fur ybfg ure zvaq jura Cnanprn punatrq ure oenva, fb gung zvtug zrna pbagebyyvat uhznaf jnf gur gvccvat cbvag be vg jnf Cnanprn'f zvfgnxr.
I suspect he's gone. Remember when Dumbledore told Harry about phoenixes? Those who get a chance, get one chance. From then on it's their own phoenix and it can never be given to someone else. Mybe he died, maybe he left for wherever phoenixes come from.
It's the same as with Hermione's body and the unicorns. They are stones as long as they are Transfigured. When Transfiguration stops, they will soon suffer. That's why Harry kept Hermione's body and now thinks about sustaining the Transfiguration of Voldemort all the time - he wants them to stay Transfigured until their state can be helped. He's kind of frozen now.
For me chapter 114 was all I wanted it to be (and possibly more) and chapter 115 was lovely.
I did stop thinking at "so he could transfigure a tip of his wand or maybe his fingernail into a nanotube, but I have no idea what he could do with that, because there is practically no way for him to talk his way out".
No. He just learned to dispell Transfiguration without a wand when he dispelled the one on Hermione's body.
He would tell he can do it, but not necessarily how it works. Of course knowing that problem is solvable facilitates solution, but since we know the solution, we also know it would take time for Voldemort to find and use it.
So it is buffing, but with a time delay. That's why I think it's the simplest solution. Quirrelmort did start reading a book on physics, but is certainly far from understanding it deeply enough to do partial transfiguration.
This move would simply buy Harry time. It won't solve the problem of Voldemort threatening the world, but will keep Harry alive, which is the objective of this quest.
There is tonnes of things Harry could infer and then tell him
OK, then use that to buy Harry's own life. My idea was more about Harry buying his own life than telling about partial transfiguration.
About Sirius we only have the story from "Skeptical Wizard" (about Weasleys' rat) and some mentions in the Azkaban - nothing to suggest he was good.
He didn't put them on his bones; remeber the part, where resurected Voldemort takes some sticks from Quirrell, attatches them to himself and tests flying? Voldemort would likely enchant his own bones later, but right now he has sticks attached to his limbs.
Could he tell Voldemort aout partial transfiguration and request his own life spared?
BUT The students were issued with portkeys in the form of toe rings and Harry got rid of his explicitly.
I would say no to the Flamingo, but yes to any object ever mentioned in the story (e.g. car engine that he tried to use in the first battle), after all, Harry prepared his pouch for anything and everything that he could fathom.
And people stopped stating the beginning and expected end of a pomodoro on chat. Almost everybody uses Complice's pomodoro timer which just rings the beginning of a pomodoro and this might be slightly confusing for people without the timer when the chat suddenly goes all quiet for no apparent reason.
John Medina's "Brain Rules". I also recommend/give all future* parents his "Brain Rules for Baby". I have not yet had time to read his other works, but these two make me want to.
*Also to parents of small kids. And to anyone thinking about having children.
A few years ago I flossed for a whole January, but then became complacent and stopped. It might have been an altogether too hard NYR for me, so this year I have one good idea and a firm intent to keep it:
- If somebody tells me I should check something with a doctor, I will.
I have a few reasons for this. I was raised to believe that if I visit a doctor more than once a year, I must be a hypochondriac. So I just didn't. Plus, since I almost never see any doctors, I don't really know what is worrisome and what is normal, I just used to ignore anything happening with my body. This is also an excercise in trust. I know I can't really trust myself in the matter of my own health, so I will consciously put trust in other people intead of waving away their good advice.
You could raise your kids entirely in atheism and forget about Christmas altogether.
Let me point out that not having a holiday when everyone around you does (...) is not going to make your kids happy.
Poland is one of very few countries in the world, where you can be sentenced to prison for hurting somebody's religious feelings. Of course, only catholic religious feelings count. It's a country where even atheists baptize their children, because everybody does so. My son is the first child in the history of his school to not attend religion classes (and those are not religion classes, those are catholicism classes, and they are organized by the Church, so the teachers are not really subordinates of the headmasters).
Until we move out of the country, there is no way to avoid Christmas. This is of course my particular situation, but I can easily imagine more people in similar "trouble".
When I told my first family that we're not going to baptise our son and we'll raise him atheist (and implicated the same for any future children), my father asked: then how will you teach him morals, what is good and bad? Only religion can do that!
As much as I agree with the second part of your comment, I think that mentioning the small stuff is important. I know this topic is quite trivial compared to the AI topics that have overtaken LW, but we don't have to change young people into critical thinkers when they reach puberty, we can work from the very first years. And on LW there is next to nothing about parenting.
How would you phrase that truth to a 2-year old?
I don't want her to lie or believe falsehoods, but I cannot just say "it's a lie most adults tell children" (yet). Aside from her ability to understand such a complicated statement, there are other, very catholic, children in the family. Children, who got two cardboard versions of the Bible for their second birthday (because the first one was still too advanced). I think the "fairy-tale of Claus" does this quite well.
The thing is all of the other takes on this topic start from a point, when a child (usually 5-9 years old) asks "Is Santa real?" Nobody yet asked "how to raise my child Santa-free?" What to say, when a two-year-old, who just noticed that there is this character on TV asks "will he come to me, too?" A toddler may not yet understand the concept of lie, of pretending, of things not physically existing. (I think I'll just add this part to the post)
you'll have a real choice about whether to continue relating to them or not. You won't be coming from a place of neediness and shame, and will be able to set better boundaries. Nobody can predict exactly what form your relationship with them will take. You may find that you can love them for who they are, or you may find that you don't actually enjoy their company and choose not to spend time with them. You may find that you can set effective boundaries. Who knows?
I'll save this for future reference.
Right now I feel cutting myself from my parents from my perspective would be a punishment for them (and I know mother would not care, so it would be in vain - yesterday we were in the same room and as an experiment I tried to not talk first but look available to conversation. She didn't even say "hello" or "I didn't expect you here, why did you come?"). I have too much grudge yet to have a real choice.
This reply made my cry more than any other. But I know this kind of crying - it happens when somebody opens my eyes to a different perspective, so it's good crying.
My hope was mostly broken, but I kept trying to fix it. Popular psychology makes people believe that they can make almost any relationship work. Yesterday evening I felt lighter. I could start thinking "I can let go of trying now."
A quick way to begin poking holes in this belief is to imagine that you have done everything perfectly to their desire, been the exact person they wanted you to be... and then ask that same part of your brain, "What would happen then?"
I would be like my sister and have what she has. She can pull off almost any kind of abstruse plan which involves parents doing something for her or giving her money. I resent that ability of her and yet would like to be able to do almost the same. My mind has trouble going further, ponder what if I was better than her. I don't really believe your version, but in fact I can remember one situation exactly like that. When I was better and what happened next. I got a 5 on a biology test (scale 1-6, where 1 is fail, 6 is outstanding), she got a 4. Normally only people with grades lower than 3 can retake a test, but parents made her retake the test and me teach her. She got a 5+ on the retake (it's also frowned upon when getting a 6 is possible on a retake, since the second test should be a chance to pass only for those kids who failed), they were satistifed and I was bitter.
The right answer is that they would not pay attention to me being good enough. They would concentrate on her being worse than me. And try to make me help her be at least as good as me (and also push her). Since being exactly the same is not really possible, she would end up being better than me, again. And I would be even more disappointed.
I doubt myself a lot. You and others, who say "this relationship is unfixable" really say "you were right, you only doubted too much."
Now this is part is surprisingly relevant to me.
One version of family history says I was an accident (so there was a choice: should they bother with abortion or keep the baby and marry). The other version (never spoken aloud) says she used me to marry my father. I always wanted to believe the first one (and so oblige her to love me since she chose me), but the other made somehow deeper sense.
Thank you, I really needed that spelled out.
Fun fact about the questionare: when I excluded all "I don't know" and "sometimes" answers - I got "yes" exactly 80%.
In a way I have been doing the same past 10 years, but only superficially. I treated my withdrawing from any emotional contact as a shielding technique, not as the only way we can have any kind of social interaction without me being in very low mood the next day.
I bought it the next day you told me about it. Started reading but not yet finished the preface.
Christian, you've met me in person, in Berlin... I live in Poland, more catholic than the Pope, as I often say. Poland, which mentally is still under 19th century partitions, so people are raised to believe that anyone of power is evil and family is the only good space in the world. It's difficult not to be driven by the culture in which I am living.
A close friend would offer those things.
This "is family somehow more important than other people" question is something I've been reluctantly thinking about for some time. I want to find a "yes", but I don't see it. Then I start doubting my expertise on the subject and scream to myself "confirmation bias!!!". And then I shut the screamer up with "but you always doubt yourself, maybe this time you are right?"
Yes. Child 1 is 5 years old and lives with Krabbe disease, Child 2 is 3 and as far as anyone can tell is healthy.
I find your writing matter-of-factly. I know lots of people who find this idea repulsive and they never hold their tongues. OTOH I live in a highly religious country.
For the first time I did it!
And want to thank the person who included "homemaker" in occupations list.
Excercises in small rational behaviours. E.g. people genrally are very reluctant to apologize about anything, even if the case means little to them and a lot to the other person. Maybe it's "if I apologize, that will mean I was a bad person in the first place" thinking, maybe something else.
It's a nice excercise: if somebody seems to want something from you or apparently is angry with you when you did nothing wrong, stop for a moment and think: how much will it cost me to just say "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you". After all, those are just words. You don't have to "win" every confrontation and convince the other person you are right and their requirements are ridiculus. And if you apologize, in fact you both will have a better day - the other person will feel appreciated and you will be proud you did something right.
(A common situation from my experience is that somebody pushes me in a queue, I say "excuse me, but please don't stand so close to me/don't look over my arm when I'm writing the PIN code etc." and then the pusher often starts arguing how my behaviour is out of line - making both of us and the cashier upset)
Come to think of it, it's a lot like Quirrell's second lesson in HPMoR...
tkadlubo's employer doesn't know about LWSH and tkadlubo's opinion is that this is none of their business as long as it does not interfere with his work.
As far as I remember, at some point the previous employer found out but didn't complain.
(oh, and I quote his opinions because I'm his wife. Maybe not as reliable source as the man himself, but close.)
I wouldn't call that a problem. This way if you just stumble there you have the most important information. And also the link to the second room in case the first one is broken.
Random tinychat users are so rare that I think this way has more utility.
I think there were too few people wearing no-touching tags to make them work (well enough). At some point I freaked out and everyone who saw me in distress and wanted to help just hugged, patted and generally invaded me - ignoring the tag and the semi-obvious reason for freaking out.
What I do not agree is what you call the ironic status of those tags. I talked to some people about it and aside from straight "I want a lot of hugs" and "don't touch me at all" there was also the opinion "I don't feel comfortable being hugged (or touched), but I can hug some of the other people" - a middle ground, which didn't have a separate tag and did not truly fit neither of the present tags. Given the generally cuddly atmosphere picking a "don't hug me" tag was the sensible action (because not picking a tag would simply put you in the majority - "hug me" group).
I don't know if having a new middle-ground tag would fix this problem. Maybe it would be ignored the same way that the "don't touch me" tag was. Maybe it simply would work better if the group was more balanced. I caught myself several times looking at somebody's tag to check if they will accept a hug and preparing my body for a hug before my brain processed the meaning of the pictogram - since almost everyone wanted hugs, this person must want them too, right?
This quota idea is a really interesting one. I like how it uses side effects (more men lured by higher pay) to get to the real goal (higher status of job). This should be done more often!
Right now know only 2 men working as kindergarten teachers (or, more specifially, one of them is working and I lost contact with the other one when he entered the job market), and it makes even me uneasy to see the first one at my son's kindergarten. On one hand I feel "yay for equality" but on the other hand I can't stop thinking "what's wrong with this guy?"