Thought about it, snce it’s near New Year’s.
In my opinion, exercising/training/stretching atleast once a week would be a good thing for most people.
Learn stuff, don’t eat processed foods and get exercise - gardening and foraging are good places to start for most people. Stay far away from negative, manipulative and lying people.
Never start nicotine
I’d also like to chip in that alcoholism is sneaky. Be careful with drinking
Yeah alcohol really sucks. It’s so embedded into society most people expect you to start drinking regularly as soon as you can. I think it’s getting better but still people are nowhere near as cautious about alcohol as they really should be it accounts for 10% of deaths worldwide, that is just mind boggling.
I had to avoid alcohol for a while because of a medication I was on and it drove me mad when people would press me after I said “I’m not drinking”. I think it makes people feel weird about their own alcohol use? But if they’re that self conscious, maybe they need to do some self reflection about whether their alcohol use is a problem.
A phrase I’ve been seeing more in recent years that’s a small thing that feels impactful is stuff that says “alcohol and other drugs”. It is a drug and needs to be treated with respect, and ideally caution
Does it really matter why you aren’t drinking? I tend to avoid asking questions like that especially immediately after I find out that is the case. No matter what reason someone has it won’t (or at least it shouldn’t) change there choice if I know.
That’s exactly my point, it’s a ridiculous question to ask. Like, there are so many bad outcomes to asking it.
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But how does this improve your life? By improving your memory all around?
Turning them into letters just seems harder to me, lol
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I’m reminded of Plato’s argument against writing, in which his position was roughly that relying on writing will make us become less practiced at remembering. I especially love the line, which goes hard.
“What you have discovered is a recipe not for memory, but for reminder.”
Though the entire passage where the quote is from is great; It’s thought provoking even if I don’t necessarily agree with it.
For me, it’s reading or watching philosophies. Philosophy can change how we view things around us.
Make a list of all the tasks you want to do for the day, every day. This is so important for me if I don’t do this I just never get anything done.
Also always plan to do something productive every day even if you just feel like relaxing. You will feel so much better relaxing if you know you’ve done something your proud of.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future…
sunscreen…
would be…
it.
The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists.
~ Baz
jokes on you buddy, I don’t go outside
Which was written by Mary Schmich: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wear_Sunscreen
I wear a sunhat everywhere in the summer. People seem amused by it but I’m 50 and have lovely skin.
Goals!!
This is my skincare routine; wash with Dove soap, put the original Nivea creme in the blue tin on as day lotion, pat dry. Just before you leave add sunscreen. I don’t use makeup beyond eyeliner and very occasionally lipstick. I barely had pimples as a young woman even.
Play Dumb, even if you’re the smartest person in the room.
Bad linked article. Judging by the amount of sets of three bullets
- in: forms
- like: these,
along with the “in conclusion” prepositions and not-very-useful-but-broad headings, it was written by AI. :(
Most online sources about this Schopenhauer suggestion seem to be either AI-generated, mildly superficial (i.e. basically only talks about Schopenhauer’s mom calling him an annoying intellectual type), or MBA-manipulator-esque (e.g. Get Rich! 48 Laws of Power! Buy Today!)…
which is a bummer since scaling humility up and down can be a really useful instrument to get things done. Just be agreeably approachable, but be careful if you outshine others, especially if ego gets in the way. Idk, i wish there was a more compelling source for this
Fortunately for me, this comes naturally to me. No need to pretend.
Open a Roth IRA and make max contributions to it every year. Most Americans will not be fortunate enough to rely on a pension upon retirement and that employer sponsored 401k will not be enough. They are throwing us to the wolves once they can no longer extract value from our bodies so start preparing now. The sooner the better.
Biased take but you can’t remove meditation and mindfulness from its traditions specific goals. I get they have side benefits but therapy acting like they invested god through spreading it is just watering down what could help so many people
Do you care to elaborate?
I’ve tried getting into both a few times, to the point of noticing some benefits, but I fall off the wagon bc everything I read about it quickly goes into religious territory.
Since it appears you dislike all religion I’m not sure my main point fits your tastes but I could say many of the various goals of Buddhist meditation such as realization emptiness of self or of phenomena, realization of impermanence, especially dhyana are all absent from whitewashed or medical meditation. I would say these can all be labeled as helpful but not necessarily religious goals but ontological.
To me this does two things, one it presents a false narrative of meditation by displacing it from its thousands of years of tradition. Two, it robs the practitioners of multiple goals and benefits, instead presenting it as simply calming. Which was never its goal, except maybe samatha meditation.
Essentially, I feel western mainstream and medical meditation denies meditations long history, makes up some goals and benefits that are not within the proven one’s, all while acting like they did it themselves.
Reminds me of the Duke University Koru counseling group which gave a talk on how their program came up with walking meditation…
I hope that’s helpful or at least clear. I do prefer traditional what you would call religious Buddhist mediation but even traditional does not have to contain things you dislike. For instance traditional Chan/Zen and vipasana teachers have been quite open to all students while teaching the full meditation
Thank you for taking the time to reply and thoroughly so.
I think the best differentiation you made between ontology and religion is key. My issue with religious texts is that they (usually but not always) demand a full commitment with other practices and beliefs that I don’t find fitting for me personally, and it seems like an all or nothing approach, so I end up quitting.
Let alone as you mention how these ancient practices have been stripped of their original intentions to be made more palatable to western audiences. Not only that, but now some people have even tried to co-opt them by sticking a western religious approach, further (imo) disrespecting and confounding.
I’m being kinda contradictory, and this is why I haven’t sorted out my internal conflict between the search for inner peace -I wouldn’tbe so pretentious as to call it enlightment-, and my unwillingness to submit to religious dogma (I’ve had enough bad experiences, and not only with one religion).
Not waiting for a day like new years to make a change that helps you.
The best time to do it was probably years ago.
The second best time is today.
Because if you make it about “new years” or some event, then it isn’t about YOU.
Do it for YOU, because you know that you’re worth the same amount of effort and affection as the others in your life.
Would you want this change for your friend? Turn don’t you think you skills care enough about you to give it to yourself?
I quit smoking the day my niece was born.
I quit drinking on April 1st, I’ve lost track of how many years ago it was, so that’s nice.
don’t discount the power of a specific date to reinforce a change and don’t let the reputation of new years resolutions stop you from setting and crushing them.
Neither of those are New Year’s resolutions.
“The day my niece was born” is actually exactly the type of thing I’m talking about. You didn’t wait until new years, or your birthday, or something else unrelated to your motivations. You picked “now” because that was when you felt the desire.
So yes, special days can matter, but the days that matter to YOU are way more important than a day some guy named “Gregorian” chose 2000 years ago.
Nice backtracking on “some other event,” that’s better than what 90% of the internet would do!
I still think it’s fine to use external dates for self improvement. I’m not very religious, but I love lent specifically because it’s a socially encouraged time to change a habit that lasts nearly the two months it takes to make a new habit or break an old one.
One year it was soda because I drank a few cans a week, since then I very rarely have any in the house. Last year I gave up meat, which is something I would never have pushed myself to do on my own.
It’s just a lot easier to test a change when it’s not permanent. There’s certainly an argument to be made that a full year of change at new years is too long to successfully commit to, but that doesn’t mean the whole thing should be discounted.
You’re assuming it was backtracking rather than a simple clarification.
That’s unnecessarily unpleasant, and it’s cool you want to feel like you won the argument, but if you add in the context of “new years eve” and then read it as “some other event external to the reason you want to make a change” it’s not backtracking.
In fact it’s just context you missed because of your own life experiences and emotions.
Which is cool, but you look like an ass when you try and secure a win by pointing out your own misunderstanding rather than hearing my clarification.
It’s an argument on the internet, there are never really winners. It seemed like backtracking because saying that a dissenting response is “actually the type of thing I’m talking about” carries an implication that the person responding misunderstood you, rather than acknowledging the possibility that you did not clearly/fully communicate your thoughts. As far as I and I assume the person you responded to could tell, that wasn’t “actually the type of thing” you were talking about. Backtracking may have been the wrong term, but there was a level of condescension in your comment that was so close to being sincere that it rubbed me the wrong way. Combine that with me half-disagreeing with you and that made for a response with some snark at the front. I am a little sorry for that. Also, why would you write “because of your own life experiences and emotions?” Unless the discussion is focused on something related to how people become the way they are, that statement has about as much meaning as “this is an aspen. You can tell it’s an aspen because of the way it is.” All it says is that you assume there is something wrong with the person rather than actually say anything about what that person has said or done. At worst it’s empty words and at best it’s an empty ad hominem.
Tell me more about my “faults” and “condescension” and “ad hominem”, then reread your comments. Yep, there’s some condescension from me here, but you’re also once again trying to throw judgement. “Glass houses” and all.
You win, Have a nice day.
Not the commenter you were arguing with, but I really liked that last sentence. I’m going to hang on to that feeling.
Getting an electric toothbrush, and flossing daily. My dental hygienists love me.
Just use a password manager, FFS it makes all of your online interactions safer.
Once setup, it is easier than not using one.
Which app would you recommend/suggest?
I’m seconding Bitwarden. I’ll also say that whilst self-hosting (if one can do it securely) may be more secure than using a service, security is always going to be a sliding scale trade off of convenience and security.
I recommend Bitwarden to everyone, but I’m sure there are options that are probably equally good. But most people could probably benefit from a password manager because we have so many different services demanding we make accounts that I reckon it’s next to impossible for any reasonable person to avoid reusing passwords across services (that’s one of the biggest security risks that hit regular people).
Start up tips: make sure your master password is strong and memorable. I found Bitwarden’s password generator for this. A passphrase tends to be more memorable than an equally long password — a good master pass phrase would have at least four words (four is sufficient for most people). Write this down in a physical place, as a backup, ideally not your wallet. it doesn’t necessarily need to be locked away, just make sure you’ll know where to find it if you forget it (I forgot mine a bunch at first and had to reference my backup a few times).
Password managers and security in general can feel overwhelming because of the instinct to do things properly, which might include things like self hosting a password manager, or only avoiding biometric sign-in on the phone app version rtc. However, the best password manager is one that you use, and if bits of convenience like this help, then it’s a good trade off.
It reminds me of the joke about two people who see an angry Grizzly bear in the forest, which starts charging at them. One of the people starts running away, and the other shouts “Where are you going, you’ll never outrun the bear”. The running person replies “I don’t need to outrun the bear, I just need to outrun you”. That’s a bad paraphrase, but the sentiment is that using a password manager at all puts you way ahead of many people, in terms of security. Obviously, you’d feel more secure if you knew you could outrun the bear, but if we spent too long being anxious about our ability to do that, we definitely will get eaten. (Apologies for such a long comment. I always do this when I’m procrastinating going to bed. I hope you have a nice Christmas, if you’re celebrating that wherever you are.)
KeePass is open source and is easy to sync via whatever service you use, Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive or something.
Bitwarden is the best in my opinion
I use keepass XC, and keep it up to date on all my devices using syncthing.
I have considered bitwarden with self hosting, but keepass had always worked well.
Have used LastPass before it was shit, self hosted bitwarden and KeePass synced with nextcloud (whatever cloud service works). I ended up using KeePass with nextcloud and set KeePass to automatically save changes. Use it on Android with KeePassDX that also includes auto fill across apps. KeePass doesn’t require much setup whereas you need to setup server with bitwarden. Also had some weird sync errors with bitwarden. Having said that, bitwarden is a great piece of software.
Doesn’t hosting your password database in the cloud make it vulnerable to cracking? If it transmits across a network, then an ISP (at the very least; this assumes no malicious actors) will have seen it, and you can no longer be certain no one else has access to it.
Set a timer for when you’re sitting at a desk and working. Every hour, I get up and do something or go get some water. It helps
Or have ADHD, You’ll be all over the place every 5 minutes.
Reading books on daily basis. It’s a qualitatively different experience from reading websites or consuming other form of media. If you have trouble getting into reading, I recommend picking a particular time and place, then reading at least a few pages every day. Eventually, it will turn into a habit and you’ll be reading for longer periods. Another thing I recommend is finding books on topics you’re interested in, be it fiction or non fiction, and don’t feel bad about abandoning books if you find you’re not enjoying it.
Read books.
Really anything, philosophy is great but some don’t have the patience for it.
If it’s graphic novels or “kids” books, it’s all good. Spend a bit of time every day reading.
And to add, if reading just doesn’t seem to work, be open towards audio books. They are every bit as good as the books (unabridged, anyway) but can be a better fit for some.
I have adhd and most of my reading has evolved to be listening. It works well so I can get some stimming while doing boring like dishes or whatever, and this way I actually finish books.
Don’t listen to anyone telling you it’s “not reading”. It is. Whatever works for you.
If you are not used to, at first it may be difficult to pay attention to the audio and understand it. Sometimes for me, the audio becomes background noise.
I listen to several podcasts, while it’s not the same as an audiobook I started doing it to practice languages until I found some channels I like and it’s now part of my daily activities
What I’m getting at, is not about finishing books, it’s more about the time.
Slow down, take the time, even 10 minutes, to improve your mind. Reading, any type of reading, improves your thinking.
Couldn’t agree more.
Secondly, never ask for book recommendations on Lemmy or Reddit. You’ll just get a list of pretentious, wanky suggestions that people pretend to like
The best fiction is sometimes just a trashy, edge-of-your-seat thriller
I wouldn’t go that far - oftentimes people actually do like those books that get name dropped for clout.
I would say if you take a recommendation and aren’t digging the book, drop it with absolutely no guilt. If something like (for example) Infinite Jest just feels like a slog with no payoff, and you just wanna kick back with something trashy, do it and fuck the haters.
But you may find you dig it - you won’t know without giving it a shot.
