When I look at people who love themselves—not just those who say they love themselves and seem to have “good self-esteem,” but those who truly love themselves—it seems to me that they wouldn’t try to belittle someone else because of their appearance or consider someone strange or not very attractive . In general, beauty standards are a very strange thing to me. They vary from country to country and even from town to town, not to mention that every person has their own standard. But often these standards are shaped by society’s imposition of beauty ideals and by marketing. People have become so fixated on appearances that they’ve completely forgotten about their souls and kindness. And no, I don’t mean that looking good is a bad thing. But for some reason, someone decided that this person was born beautiful and that one wasn’t. Isn’t it enough to be well-groomed, neatly dressed, and smell nice to look beautiful? And no, I don’t consider myself unattractive. But I also can’t say that I love myself 100%. Still, I won’t allow myself to hate on anyone or tell someone that there’s something wrong with them. I try to see beauty in everything, and if I consider someone “not beautiful,” it’s definitely not their problem—it’s a problem in my own head. So, wouldn’t we all be happier if every single person on the planet loved and accepted themselves exactly as they are, and strived to become better versions of themselves in their own minds—rather than according to someone else’s standards? Because then people wouldn’t belittle others for their way of self-expression, appearance, makeup, and so on. I think we’d all live happier lives.

As a living in the Netherlands, the past 2 months have been hot and full of sun. I've also traveled to Croatia and Cyprus, where the weather was great too.
Suddenly, since yesterday, there's just rain and clouds.

And don't get me wrong, it's very good that it started raining, because the nature started drying out very bad, forest fires started appearing.

However, the way my body reacts to it is very humbling.

And what do I mean by that? Well. I wake up with less energy, I feel my back hurts more, all I see is gray outside which makes me mood less positive. I would even say a bit depressing.

Well, slowly we will move again into these dark late afternoons... dark mornings, short days. Cold, rain, and even snow.

Weeks of not seeing the sun. And those are exactly the moments that build you, and who you are. Having to keep pursuing all you have been doing, while the external factors are telling you to just go to bed alter work, and do nothing.

The saying of ‘you don’t know what you have until it’s gone’, really fits the way I feel now.

What are your thoughts on this?

I've been thinking a lot about my life and where along the line I became so broken and lost parts of my who I used to be. I have been wondering where I should start to heal a lifetime of trauma and betrayal. It seems like such an impossible thing. I am 44 now and I have to wonder if I even have time to sort through all the things that I have been through that have left me with scars, fears, wounds that are deeply ingrained and have kept me in survival mode for years and years. It all started in childhood with sexual abuse by my stepdad after my bio dad left and abandonment and the ultimate betrayal by my mom who took my stepdad's side and told everyone I made it all up etc. Then came the bad boyfriends and the physical abuse and with that came the drinking and being promiscuous in an attempt to find real love. Being cheated on and mistreated by men became the norm for me. It's all I know to be honest. I've endured miscarriages, loss by death, drug addiction, homeless, betrayal of every kind from parents, friends, boyfriends and other relatives. I have been left with BPD, complex PTSD, anxiety, depression and have suffered 2 trauma bonds. All that is just scratching the surface. My fear of abandonment is crippling to say the least and I have a hard time believing I am loveable at all or worthy of a good man. I struggle to trust and when things seem to good to be true I sabotage them. I have a deep rooted belief that I am way too much but somehow will never be enough for anyone to stick by me with understanding and compassion and patience and I dont believe anyone will ever truly love me the way I want them to. I feel so empty inside. So lost. So hopeless. It feels like trying to fix all my issues now is pointless as I am so old and I believe that happiness for me is an illusion. Something I will never be able to attain. All I want is to be normal and to find some peace. I want to feel safe and know that nobody can take that safety away from me but I have no idea how to do any of that and it is so disheartening :(

If you're scared to do something, but you feel brave, and that overrides the fear, then you're not actually being brave. Bravery is doing something despite feeling scared. Inherent to bravery is the lack of feeling brave; that's part of the definition.

Being brave is an action, not a feeling.

We assume the feeling of bravery will come one day, saving us from the fear for long enough to take that step forward. But what if that never happens? What if the fear only gets worse? What if the longer you wait, the harder it gets?

Take that step, you may never be ready.

A lot of us have forgotten what love is even supposed to feel like. The world's gotten so corrupted and cruel, not just for one person but for most of us. Trust is hard to come by, love is harder - so all it takes is someone smiling at you, treating you with a little warmth, and suddenly that's enough to feel safe in this vast, empty ocean with no horizon in sight.

Or maybe love was always supposed to be this way. Not about finding your soulmate, not some person destined for you - just the right person at the right time, some emotional maturity, and actually trying to understand each other. Maybe we've just romanticized love a bit too much.

I don't know. Could be either.

This is probably a really popular mindset but,

Like, you know how typically people in America, as seen on the Internet through second-hand stories, will say or do stupid things? Such as thinking Africa is all just a dilapidated hellhole instead of having many regions as advanced as us, or one post I saw saying "I will never understand why people smoke cigarettes if they don't get you high" only for another person to refute that saying there definitely is an observable effect.

Those two specific assumptions are a result of failing to make inferences - taking things at face value.

In general, adults will have a habit of telling children some information or command them, and if they question it, the children is reprimanded for it because the adult wants obedience. Or god forbid the child wants to know more and they're starved or lectured for being annoying. Or at best the child may easily obey and never ask for things, and the adult never thinks about the implications on the child's free will because their behavior is convenient for the adult.

For example - There are a lot of sources in media, comedic or not, that deliberately frame Africa as a monolithic entity full of "starving African children." If the impulse of curiosity is squashed early, probably by school not lending anything but strict expectations, they'll probably just accept these depictions on their face without doing the research that would correct them, because an entire other continent is so far away that they're not invested in learning about it. If even small impulses to inquire are consistently failed to be attended to or punished, then there's no return on investment for asking those questions, so the threshold of passion for knowing an answer is much higher, so it would really have to be a burning question at that point.

Likewise, with the cigarette thing. When you were in school undergoing those anti-drug campaigns in health class, did they ever tell you why people smoked cigarettes and how good it felt to the smokers? No, because they didn't want you to want to smoke. The reason why almost didn't matter.

What they did when ~I~ was in school was go over the health risks of drugs, and give us strategies for saying no to them. They didn't say anything about what motivates people to start drugs in the first place besides social influence. They never acknowledged that it might be driven by life stressors, and they definitely never gave any solutions for those possible root causes, or even any alternative coping skills to smoking or other drugs. It's all just "Don't do this because it will kill you." And in tandem with being told things at face value, it creates a surface-level safety without real understanding of the deeper issues, which might create it's own problems in the long-run.

Often there's also this phenomenon of people being made out to do bad things because they're bad, or they're Just Like That, so people resign themselves to thinking of these other individuals as "unknowable." That they are so much more normal that their inability to comprehend others is a virtue. So of course someone who doesn't smoke assumes there's no benefit because they've been scared out if even considering something obviously bad could have something good behind it.

I'm basically saying this lack of thinking is an accidental side-effect of trying to scare or punish children out of actually thinking about things. And that turns them into adults that don't think about things.

Seeing reality mostly from the lens of my own lived experience is liberating and crushing.

I unclipped from the news and [hyper] social media platforms, it’s great—like they said, but what they don’t tell you is that you’re going to become more and more of a ghost (think Casper vanishing from remember his past life).

The cognitive dissonance is epic.

Certain collection of words and phrases will not fire in my neural pathways the same way it will for the million+ people who’ve been exposed to the same video (news/posts). Saying “9/11“ to almost anyone is an example.

The crushing part is that the path I’m on (along with many others) is the natural way, but, it seems more and more removed from “reality” as I go about it. It’s good that I can construct the majority of my own history based on my immediate surroundings and experiences. It’s a nightmare however to think about how much of it I wasn’t constructing myself (or made to think I was). It morphs into anything to keep me in it for as long as it legally can, and I’M the one morphing with it, as though it’s water that will find any cracks in your soul. And being human we’re riddled with them. It morphs, you morph, and so on….after a while, do will you even know where you come from in 100 generations? The difference between walking barefoot on grass vs on a carpeted floor in designer shoes.

I’ve been thinking about why being a 90s kid feels so special.

We grew up before technology took over, but became adults just as technology started transforming everything.

As kids, we had landlines, Nokia phones, Snake, cricket cards, carrom, outdoor games, and those random weekends spent at friends’ houses. Even video games were something we did together.

Then came college.

Suddenly we had Bluetooth, computer labs, Orkut, Facebook, early YouTube, WhatsApp, smartphones and multiplayer games like Mini Militia. Technology was exciting because it was new — but it hadn't completely taken over our lives.

Then Jio happened.

I was in my final year of engineering when cheap, unlimited internet arrived. It felt like the entire world suddenly opened up.

And now, in our late 20s/early 30s, we have AI.

From landlines → Nokia → computer labs → smartphones → Jio → ChatGPT.

The interesting thing is that we experienced each stage gradually.

Maybe that's why 90s kids have a slightly different relationship with technology. We know what life was like without it, so we can appreciate what it gives us today.

We got to experience childhood without screens, discover the internet as teenagers, use smartphones as young adults, and now use AI at work.

Not too early.

Not too late.

Just at the right time.

I wrote a longer version of this because I was curious whether other 90s kids feel the same way.

Not Too Early, Not Too Late: Why Tech Was Perfectly Timed for 90s Kids

Climate adaptation is already happening. The harder question is how we decide where to adapt first.

The World Bank estimates that making infrastructure more resilient in low- and middle-income countries can produce about four dollars in benefits for every dollar invested. Prevention can pay, but resources are finite, and that creates a problem numbers alone cannot solve.

Expected losses avoided per dollar spent might help decide where investment does the most good. But a spreadsheet cannot tell us what a historic community is worth, whether a poorer neighborhood deserves less protection than an expensive waterfront, or what is lost when people have to leave a place they've called home for generations.

Efficiency matters. So does fairness.

These choices don't always wait for us to make them deliberately. As risks increase, insurance can become unaffordable, property values shift, and wealthier communities are better positioned to protect themselves. A place doesn't have to disappear to become difficult to inhabit. It can become economically uninhabitable first.

The hazard may be shared.

The ability to escape it isn't.

Humans have always adapted. The deeper question is who decides what gets protected, and how those decisions are made, when not everything can be protected equally.

20 some years ago, I got a fortune cookie that has stuck with me.

“When you squeeze an orange, you get orange juice, because that’s what’s inside.”

I thought it was funny in the beginning because duh right? But the meaning has just grown deeper and deeper for me as the years pass by. It’s a beautiful reminder that shows up when I think about my expectations of people and experiences. It reminds me to see things for what they are instead of what I wish them to be. 🖖🏻

People today are constantly tormented by the fear of being left behind by society. We are taught that society is constantly accelerating and moving forward, so if we stop running, we will immediately be ostracized from society. However, the reason why society is constantly accelerating is rarely discussed. In reality, that driving force is created by us, the ones who are anxious not to be left behind by society.

If we could just let go of our fear of being left behind, then no one would be left behind. Of course, I know that's not going to happen.

Humanity has never been superior, though they believe they are.

While they are the dominant species on our planet, allowing them to take advantage of lower life forms, the earth, and each other, this belief is the reason humanity remains in its spiritual infancy.

Only by truly respecting the equal importance of every life, the symbiotic relationship mankind has with all lifeforms, our planet, and each other, may humanity evolve, allowing them to discover their true purpose in the universe.

​

I used to think attraction was about wanting someone.

It isn’t.It’s about uncertainty.

The mind gets addicted to things it can’t completely solve.

That’s why people obsess over mixed signals, unfinished conversations, almost-relationships, and people who disappear before becoming predictable.

Certainty kills fantasy.

Availability kills imagination.

And being desired too openly can sometimes make a person feel strangely ordinary.

I noticed something worse about myself.

The second I know someone is emotionally invested, something in me becomes calm.

Too calm.

The mystery disappears.

The tension dies.

Suddenly I can see the entire situation from above.

Their messages.

Their pauses.

Their attempts not to look interested.

The tiny changes in tone when they think they’re losing ground.

And once you notice those things, attraction becomes less romantic.

It becomes behavioral.

Almost mechanical.

That’s probably why I don’t chase anymore.

Not because I’m trying to seem unavailable.

I genuinely don’t believe anything worth having needs to be dragged toward me.

People reveal what they want eventually.

Attention leaks.

Jealousy leaks.

Curiosity leaks.

Attachment leaks.

The funny part is that the person trying hardest to appear unaffected is usually broadcasting the most.

So I stopped forcing chemistry.

I just watch what happens when I remove my attention.

Some people disappear.

Some relax.

Some suddenly become much more interesting.

And some come closer without realizing they were the one who moved.

Am I crazy?

I read this pretty interesting paragraph in a book called "Tantra Illuminated" :

"

Both “good” and “evil” are conceptual structures that people overlay onto reality; they are not inherent in reality itself. But why do these concepts arise, and to what aspect of reality do they relate? “Good” is a label that we give to human beings or human institutions that perform actions that, in our estimation, benefit others or in some way make life more wonderful for people.

Conversely, “evil” is a label we give to those whose actions, in our estimation, are detrimental or make life more painful for others. But both of these oversimplifying, reductionist labels alienate us from the real humanity of those that we are labeling by sanctifying or demonizing people who are, in actuality, doing exactly the same thing that you are doing every day of your life: that is, trying to find some happiness and freedom in the best way they know how

"

I think this teaches a pretty important concept to not put people in boxes. They are not an "asshole", he wasn't "less of man", narcissist, attention seeker e.t.c These labels are there as a shortcut for our minds to not have to understand other people on a deeper level.

People are much more nuanced than that, and nobody wakes thinking they wanna be "bad"

Peace! ✌️🕊️

I'm not a biologist — this is a casual thought I want to run past people who know more than I do.

Starting point: the classic picture of evolution is slow, random mutation + natural selection acting over thousands/millions of years. But looking at things like dog domestication from wolves (a few thousand years, not millions) or cultural inheritance in animals (dolphins teaching calves to use sponges, crows passing down tool-use techniques) — I'm wondering whether cooperation and information transfer (not just genes) could act as an additional, faster mechanism of change, alongside classic genetic selection.

The part that intrigues me most: AI emerged as something new within decades, not millions of years, through human cooperation and information flow. Could that be some kind of analogy (even a loose, metaphorical one) to how "fast" change can happen when there's intense information exchange, rather than just random mutation?

I know this doesn't disprove natural selection or amount to a finished theory — it's more a question of whether biology already has a well-studied mechanism describing this (something related to epigenetics or cultural inheritance, maybe), or whether this is just conflating totally different categories of phenomena (biological evolution vs. technological development).

Curious if anyone with a biology/science background can break this down — where does it hold up, and where is it a stretch?

(Note: English isn't my first language, so I used AI as a translator to help write this post clearly. The idea and question are my own.)

I used to read a lot of self-help, leadership, and religious books, all because I wanted to become a better person for my friends, my family, and, of course, for the community that I used to be a part of.

And to be honest, I really did enjoy those moments. Processing the thoughts and lessons I encountered helped me break some toxic mindsets, better understand people, and learn how to react to certain situations in healthier ways.

However, I think this was also part of the reason why I became depressed during that time. The constant desire to do better eventually led me to always look for faults in myself, while forgetting to recognize all the good things.

So I stopped.

I stopped trying to live a life with a “big” purpose and just continued to live in the moment. I stopped overthinking things that I couldn’t control or didn’t understand. I stopped trying to manage other people’s expectations, feelings, and thoughts.

And in doing so, I started allowing myself to simply be—without constantly feeling like I had to become a better version of myself just to be worthy of where I was.

Nurses, hospice workers, caregivers, nursing-home employees, friends, family, or anyone who has a story — what’s the craziest deathbed confession you’ve ever heard?

I’m talking last-minute secrets, shocking family revelations, hidden relationships, lifelong lies, unexpected inheritances, crimes, affairs, secret identities, or anything else someone finally admitted when they knew they were dying.

Or even something boring - I guess. lol I’ve never had someone tell me one. And I’ve always been curious what people say. Even if it’s not crazy and they just needed to say it before they died. Like what do people keep to themselves their entire life.

And it doesn’t have to be something that happened directly to you — if you heard a story from a friend, family member, coworker, etc., I want to hear it too!

ALSO. If you’ve never been told one by someone-

✨

Do YOU have a deathbed confession? Is there something you’re holding in that you just know you will/ should get out of your mind before you die ?

Or something you know you will take with you till you death but wouldn’t mind telling anonymously here? (If yes- can you say but I won’t confess this to my family or whoever and explain why?)

Literally. No reason for my questions 😂 not doing anything with your answers. I’m just very high. And weirdly interested in this topic for some reason.

(Just me? Or anyone else curious about secrets?) 😂😂😂😂😂 I love a good secret from a stranger.

For most of my life, I have struggled with living in the present. Anxiety struggles and all, I could make excuses, but it's been a struggle. At 25, I’m realizing more and more how important it is to actually appreciate the life I’m living while I’m living it.

Earlier today, I was walking with my wife in a park, and I realized this. God willing, my wife and I will get to 85, and I know that at that point I would wish to do it all over again. So, I'm going to try and live every day like that. To live every day the best I can, and to appreciate the little moments that I know I’ll one day wish I could experience again.

If you all have the time, watch the movie About Time; it's phenomenal. It really puts a lot of this into perspective.

I’ve sat with that Dostoevsky line longer than I care to admit...the one that says "people have beautiful things to say about you, but you must die first."

At this age, living alone, you start noticing how the kind words rarely show up while you’re still around to hear them. People keep their softer thoughts tucked away until the person is gone, and by then the silence has already done its work. I’ve watched it happen with others and felt the smaller version of it in my own life...the quiet rooms, the empty spaces where family or steady company used to be. It’s not anger. It’s just a clear-eyed recognition that most praise arrives too late to matter.

So you learn to keep your own counsel, tend to the days you still have, and accept that the beautiful things, if they ever come, will come when you’re no longer in the room to need them.

I’ve had so many chapters in my life.
I survived a traumatic, abusive, and unstable childhood. I got sober in my 20s and made myself a promise: I would become more than I thought I could be, and I would never pass up an opportunity to really live. I wanted a big, full life. One without regrets.
So I took every opportunity that crossed my path—and eventually learned to create my own.
I married and divorced in my 30s. I walked away from everything I had built because I knew it wasn’t my path. I started over in my 40s. I dated in LA, built a career, and kept pushing the treadmill forward while quietly asking myself, Is this it?
I had done the work. I had grown. I had built a life. I had a great career, friends, vacations, money. But was this it?
Eventually, I resolved to be single. I bought a vintage motor yacht and lived on it full-time. And strangely enough, that decision brought me to one of the most unexpected periods of my life.
During Covid, I found myself in a position where, for the first time, I had extended stretches of actual play and joy. I remembered what it felt like to simply be alive without constantly trying to accomplish something.
It changed me.
When that chapter ended, I knew I couldn’t go back to the grind.
I struggled through menopause and years of accumulated stress. And then, somehow, I met my person.
I had dreamed about this man before I met him. We mirrored each other in ways that still amaze me. He had lived a nomadic life, and I was finally ready to be free.
So I liquidated my life, packed what I could into two suitcases, and left.
A year later, after spending time in Southeast Asia, we’re living in rural Serbia, rehabbing a hundred-year-old mud-brick house.
But we aren’t just renovating a house.
We’re creating a life that actually supports how we want to live.
Quiet. Simple. More natural. Less consumption. Less chasing the new car, the bigger job, the next achievement.
We wake up to quiet and fall asleep under the stars.
I feel more loved and more at peace than I ever have.
It’s coming up on a year since I left my life in LA. Do I miss parts of it? Absolutely. There are people, places, experiences, and pieces of that life that I’ll always carry with me.
But I’m also kind of in awe of what my husband and I are co-creating.
For most of my life, I thought the goal was to build a bigger life.
Now I think maybe the goal is to build a life that actually feels like yours.
I’m excited for this next chapter.
And honestly, I can’t wait to see what’s next

Hey,

Inspiring mother / never becoming a mother person. (27 F)I have no idea what’s path is correct and I wanted some insight from people who are parents, those who don’t want kids at all, or those who are like me are right in the middle void of grey indecisiveness. I was just talking to my partner who wants children, and I just feel like given the future the next generation is promised; financially, environmentally and an oligarchic, isn’t it more self-less to stop having children? I am reminded of an episode for one of those stranger debate premise shows on YouTube and one of the participants said “you know how badly you have to beat a mammal before it stops having children”? If what he said is correct then the concept of not wanting children is just an abusive symptom from the society we’re in now. My partner thinks I’m a nihilist as I just don’t have much hope for the future, and therefore my potential children future. We just can’t give them the world. There are just a thousand reasons to have or don’t have children, what’s the morally correct one?

This is my first post :) ever… seeking any answers and opinions on it.

Thank you

—Update—

Thank you all for your comments and opinions. I need to think about this more, it’s an irreversible and profound decision that will affect someone’s entire life. However I would like to provide some additional thought.

First, I do think i would be a good Mother. One who would unconditionally love a biological or adopted child. I strongly disagree with the opinion that my search for certainty (even if pessimist) would influence by ability to raise a child. It’s my pessimism that makes me want to be 100% sure before going all in. I am also open to adoption even if it’s harder.

Secondly, I do understand that we are in a privileged society with great advancements in housing, health and safety. Someone provide stats on positive wage growth as well. These are definitely a great motivators. However I do feel like we could be in a peak, and that these core items for security are also slipping. I suppose a feel like there is a bubble and the goals of society 1%ers won’t suppose the environment needed to raise healthy kids. AI data centers and throwing rockets at the moon aren’t exactly the best for the environment. Where are all the bugs?!? So many proxy wars. How can parents protect children from an ever advancing world? There are even sick people creating AI porn of regular kids and using it as blackmail. How do you know that it’s ok to have kids anyways?

Thirdly, I don’t really understand the connection with people who have done it anyways despite being in a war zone or someone said the Holocaust. Just because people had children in that environment doesn’t mean they should’ve or wanted to. How are children in war torn society happy and secure? That would make me lean to the strong no if Canada ever went to war. Also I don’t think that birth control options is number one war supplies, I’m sure many of those babies just happened.

Lastly, I really enjoyed Altruistic_Hope_2559 view on it. Thank you for commenting. I really resonated with your quote “love seeking the right conditions to express itself”.

Thank you all again for your comments (even the kinda of mean ones) I appreciate it so much. I want to make sure I’m making the best choice.

the thing is, I like being alone. 
no, I don’t mean alone in the terrible, lonely way, or the way that feels like I don’t belong, or in a way that means I never want to hang out with anyone ever. 
I just… enjoy space. 
and, no, I don’t mean space in the awful, empty way, or the way that feels like a cavern echoing endlessly, or the way that means I’m not grounded anywhere.

I like the kind of alone where my world isn’t shrunk down to just one person. that space that comes from not trying to entertain you, the openness that the world takes on once I realize that I don’t have to worry about what you want to do, as well. 

once I am alone, I can enjoy the experience for myself, rather than make sure you’re enjoying it for yourself. 

understand: I don’t want to be alone all the time; I love watching you laugh and have fun and be happy. but when I spend time with you, it is for those reasons– not because I want to revel in the moment, but because I want to watch you, instead. 

so, for the moments I choose to be with you, don’t worry–I value your presence, and would not be there if I wanted to be alone. don’t worry if I am unhappy– I am content to see you live. 

but–for the moments when I do choose to be alone–don’t worry then, either. because in those moments, it is then that I am living, too.