Can you tell if these changes were due to deliberately trying to enjoy and appreciate? Or have they occurred without you noticing how?
@Miguel Through having the drama i had to have, i think.
I feared so much being unattractive and “washed up” at 46.
In a way, it was my best attempt at enjoying life. More in a YOLO way, than actualism. I would say 95% YOLO, and 5% actualism.
Put it this way, back in 2014, Claudiu, Jon, and I started to organise the trip to see Richard and Vineeto. When Alan appeared back on the scene, and proceeded to dominate the arrangements to suit himself, i took it as the perfect excuse to end up in Taiwan instead, with a Taiwanese girlfriend. Whom i ended up in a 3 year, LDR, with her living with me for about 15 months of that.
Fast forward, more drama, i broke that off, briefly nearly had an other LDR, before ending up in Moscow engaged to a stunning woman, who otherwise wanted to have babies with me.
I am the king of LDR escapism, but in the end, I thoroughly broke myself. To the point of feeling suicidal.
It was, however, just the trick. Because i was so thoroughly broken, i saw so much of what i REALLY believed in.
I was never REALLY a Christian, New Ager, Buddhist; I was always on the search for the ONE.
Now, a life time later, i am free of it. I certainly would prefer a partner to spend time with aiming towards the naivete we talk about, enjoying sex, etc. But, it hardly matters now.
The other, unsung hero, is age. Plain old, getting old.
It always made me shake my head to read about Peter, Vineeto, Richard et al, “freeing themselves” from many aspects of the human condition, which, quite naturally, with enough drama, die anyway. I am probably over rating it, but i still think it’s unsung; the march of age.
Anecdotally, i do know of at least 2 mid-50s guys eating their hearts out over the woman i just ended things (officially) with. So, i guess psyches can hold on to the dream for well past it’s natural expiry date.
Heck, that could have been me.
I feel so solid. Not perfectly solid, but less inclined to feeling sorry or mad about things to do with finding HER. Which was always the default.
Ironically, despite being next to useless to the average reproductive women, I somehow have no sorrow about it. I was always in a grey area between being attractive for it’s own sake, and attractive for being a “draft horse” to be hitched to their compromised baby dreams.
I would like to be attractive to, and attracted by someone who wants to be free.
Not the other way around, of trying to convince myself and them to otherwise head in that direction. Rather meet them on the “road”, the wide and wondrous path, heading towards the doorway out of the ‘reality’ that ‘i’ am.
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I think your answer has been enlightening not only regarding the way in which you have managed to “wear down” the ego (by suffering rather than methodologically) but also some of the context in which that suffering and wearing down took place (regarding which subjects, people, expectations, by means of which “stories” told to yourself, etc).
Now that you are here, in this position, with your age (I’m 51), are you more inclined to apply more actualism to do “the work of thinning, diminishing, weakening the shell that ‘I’ at the centre create and which in turn separates me, this body, from experiencing the sparkling ever-present actuality” (as Vineeto put it)?. Is what you are doing already?
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No, i think what @Srinath suggested, that is have a more built up self, is what has happened.
I was already, in my own esteem, less than nothing. I was, a weird combination of extreme codependency and narcissism. Never really clinical, but a very weird mix.
So, how could i “thin” anything, when the method of thinning it is naivete and what leads from that?
I was anything but naivete. Naive, in the normal sense, (gullible, beguiled, ignorant), but in no position to head towards anything like a thinner ‘me’.
In this way, i am more of a ‘self’ than ever. However, this is where i always hung on Richard’s “megalomania” descriptions, that one is arrogant in the extreme to think that one could go beyond what is commonly thought of as impossible. To go, not only beyond, but to END the cumulative wisdom of the ages.
Now, for me, the first step in that was definitely to be so ‘selfish’ as to leave my wife and children.
To epitomise the “evil” of choosing one’s own happiness over the demands of others.
My former best friend actually helped me in this. I have since seen he is a narcissistic person, but he did help. He told me that my sons were far “tougher” than i gave them credit for.
This proved to be true. What the world widely condemns as ‘selfishness’, has, in the long run, helped my sons. I am there for them in a far more competent way, than i would ever have been capable of now. (my youngest will turn 18 next march).
So, definitely no deliberate “thinning”, though I may objectively be “thinner”, in that these days a good solid cry seems to be natural, and there is the backlog of so mant insights into who ‘i’ am, that the recent insights and discussions are “sticking” far more naturally.
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I understand…
And “you” want/can apply at least some times during the day HAIETMOBA or EAATMOBA, or “you” don’t want/can’t?
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Things have been changing a lot on that front.
Especially since “breaking up”.
It’s been much easier to naturally be in a more neutral mood, and shift that over to a pleasant mood.
I am getting some traction with the naivete angle.
That discussion yesterday really clicked. Before everything i knew about in actualism seemed like a “word salad”, now i am seeing it as far more linear, and the emphasis on naivete and especially being kind and likeable to myself.
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I will fill in the details later, but i got “black pilled” last night, and i am very happy about that.
I wish Srid was here to read that. 
It’s actually my first experience of having a belief viscerally drop away and my whole relationship with attraction make sense.
I mean, this is f**king huge.
I actually feel slightly nauseated by it, like something dropped away.
To waste my entire life on a false belief. damn… The excitement is this means that i can be free of more!!! …
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What is “black pilled”?
If I interpret the expression correctly (otherwise I will remove my erroneous 
, 
), means that he had a big realization about an aspect of [his] reality.
“Black Pill” a metaphorical name for an opinion in the Manosphere, (online Men’s focused content) that puts forward that physical attractiveness is 90% of what causes people to be attracted, (as apposed to the “blue pill”, which maintains “kindness and personality, and being a good person”, or “red pill” which is more about “game” and confidence and learning how to maximise oneself. “black pill” is that it’s already decided how attractive you are in a split second.
I am massively simplifying the beliefs here.
Anyway, i had such an “ah ha” experience watching “black pill” videos.
It lined up so perfectly with my entire life’s experience of women, relationships, sex.
I am actually so relaxed and relieved.
Hmm, this is such a big topic, i don’t want to assume anyone is interested.
If you are, I will explain more.
I actually want this to sink in for a few days and see where it goes anyway.
@Miguel only about what “black pill” means.
It could be described a just seeing the facts, for the first time.
What has dropped away is still making me mildly nauseated. Very slightly, i guess it’s fear too of seeing more. Not so much about that teaching, but about how deeply this can “fall away”.
I can hardly describe just how much it resonated with me. Like a glass breaking at the right frequency. So, so, much pain over something that was always so very false.
It is also my first (maybe) experience of losing all hope in a “good way”. Peter and Richard talked about this in one of the DVDs. “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!”
What i want to sink in and explore is this new “space” opening up “underneath” the entire edifice i had built over a false premise.
Oh, so I was not SO wrong in the essence of what happened to you (about your realization).
Thanks for the clarification.
No, not wrong at all. I actually like that you thought that, as it does describe it.
It’s like 90% or more of what i was taught/thought to be true was completely false, and 90% of what i feared was true, was true. It would indeed be very black, if i wasn’t otherwise looking for facts to become free.
Anyway, how are you @Miguel?
I think that 90% (just to have a big number against it) of what i spent my life doing was all about this one fear, which turned out to be true.
I get this picture like it is a huge, thick, multilayer cake that has been built up to hide the most obvious and brutal fact.
I feel like i have been beaten because i wasn’t a bird. That i sat blaming myself and everything else, compensating with everything i could ever muster, believing that i couldn’t fly because i wasn’t trying hard enough. Knowing all along i can’t fly because i am not a bird!
Please go on…but I doubt such topics can be so simple and single-faceted.
@Kiman Sure, such topics are far from simple. I would say that, at least for me, it has been the driving force behind every waking (and many sleeping) moment.
So yes, i could go on for pages on the topic.
It’s not anything I didn’t already intuitively know. I knew. But, it was the hope, the compensation, the delusional efforts, for it be otherwise.
For context (as i don’t recognise your avatar name as someone i have spoken with);
I was married for 17 years. I have 3 adult sons. I have been in 5 “serious” relationships.
So, a veteran in other words.
I could sum it up like this. (which was the dawning reality before i saw these videos about “black pill”); it did not matter, or change anything at a fundamental level of “passion” in any of those women how they were attracted to me, even in the ones that were less attractive than me.
That is, attraction is objective, not subjective. I am talking about pure physical desire/attraction.
All the complexities come in as people grapple with this simple fact.
Of course there is shades of grey, personal types, etc etc. But, it is in the consistency of how they felt, (accross 6 different ethnic groups of women, mind you!). How do i know how they felt? Easy, in how they fundamentally behave in bed. Now there was a spectrum, but no where near what one may “logically” think based on their (the women’s) looks.
It is actually, very simple. It’s a brutal, universal fact. With some areas of grey. However, that grey area is still tightly centred around a noticeable point.
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It seems simple to me and not really brutal at all - there are people you find attractive and people that find you attractive. The overlap of this is the potential for an association. It does seem like a simple binary thing indeed, a yes or a no. And I don’t see anything “wrong” about this per se.
Also I think there is a feedback loop with it - part of what makes someone attractive to you is them finding you attractive. So it all seems to work out fine.
@claudiu It seems simple to me too. Definitely not a problem. Probably a good thing.
@Andrew I like girls a lot. But they don’t like me it seems. It only bothers me on those occasions when I am in need of validation. When I am bored, restless and that confuses me: Why am I not feeling so good? I’ve been asking HAIETMOBA obsessively. Nothing is clicking. I’ve been asking but with no naiveté. I’ve been demanding the universe make me feel excellent rather than naively sussing out this moment of being alive. Make this mistake for long enough and you may feel the need for validation: the frustration of being locked out of (the imitation of) paradise is painful and validation will soothe that pain. But thank goodness, I’ve learned to not go seek that validation. It’s better to get back to naively exploring this moment of being alive. Pure Intent is here. You can feel excellent. An expectation of fun develops. Trying to be someone sucks. Letting this moment live you or getting closer and closer to this is cool. It has some ups and downs. But there’s no despair, no abject misery. Some light boredom. Some light frustration at being currently locked out. There can be worry and/or concern for a loved one or money or health. There’s frequently a hard over-reaction (unexpressed or expressed only inwardly) to not getting your way. But it’s all easy stuff in comparison.
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Why wait? And, how many bitter old folks are there?
I can use this. One of my lurking objections right now is, ‘people will think it’s bold, for me to tell them that I’m feeling perfect / am perfect.’ … and that they are not ‘being perfect.’
But I’m beginning to see the facticity in it. They know that they are not.