Often the reason people don't fit into modern society is not because they're asocial psychopathic manipulators, but because they aren't asocial, psychopathic, or manipulative *enough*.
This seems to be _the_ problem for the young men of our age, doesn't it?
Also, you know, as far as woman seduction is concerned, _status_ is just a proxy for _security_, right? And there are other security-proxies to aim for too. Like charisma, which you don't seem to lack. Economic-security was maybe the most common means for the ordinary man until outsourcing & government stripped us of that. And it's hard to start a family without that. Maybe you can obtain that through your writing without selling your soul - the artist's integrity problem. Although, I'm no artist, but I think maybe that's a solved problem too, and the solution is to create art for God, as 0HP says in The New Tlön.
I don't know man. Trust in God and do not despair. Remember Abraham. It's not over yet. Remember the Bronze Age Mindset and may it lift your spirit.
I'm reminded of the ending of Dune Messiah: "I meddled in all the possible futures I could create until, finally, they created me." I'm the same way -- I violate the Tao and wonder, why am I not happy?
What I think I'm arriving at, after taking a long, meandering, roundabout trip a la G.K. Chesterton, is just being honest. Just being truthful; just being myself. It's funny because it's really meta -- I care about studying the nature of truth and its various derivatives (beauty, meaning, semantics, value, etc.) probably more than anything else, and the first thought when talking about it is, nobody wants to hear that. Maybe that's true too -- maybe that's why Adam and Eve hid. Maybe that's why we hide.
The dumbest and stupidest and most wonderful thing about life is that it never plays out rationally. But also, the reality of it not playing out rationally is totally rational. There are exceptions to every rule -- except this one. You could philosophize about this for years and never figure it out. More Dune: "Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic." God has put eternity into the hearts of men, yet we cannot find out what he has done from beginning to end -- a riddle for which the only answer is He. Law and Gospel: perfectly distinct, diametrically opposed, yet tangled up in one Person, harmonized by the God-Man.
Being honest to people solely for the sake of being honest (provided that they don't hate your guts) breaches all reason in favor of a greater Reason. There's no reason to be honest -- that's the exact reason you do it, because by simple elimination the honesty can be nothing other than beauty. It's a gift freely given, nothing expected in return. Aslan on the Stone Table. Christ on the cross. And yet, by the virtue of being freely given, the gift evokes a response also freely given. God's law is to be followed not because he holds a gun to our heads, but because, when we follow it, we progress toward being the best possible versions of ourselves -- the most satisfied, most joyful, most beautiful, us.
But that line, breaching reason in favor of a greater Reason -- that's where we go astray. Because this is the fine line. The fine line between self-sacrifice and self-humiliation/self-exaltation, between virtue and vice, between marriage and divorce. Ambivalence. Because God created everything to be good; everything that exists is good if enjoyed in the right context, the right structure, the right framework. Enjoying it outside that context, the accident in the act -- that's where we trip up. Fuck Kant and his stupid "Jesus was a good moral teacher but not Deity" bullshit. C.S. Lewis is right: either Jesus really is the Christ, the God-Man, or else he's a raving lunatic. Either his sacrifice breached all reason in favor of the Greatest Reason, or it breached all reason and the Greatest Reason above all. I know which one I believe.
This is very un-PUA of me, but I think, in the particular case of women, what generates attraction, for her, is that you *choose* her, for the simple reason that she is herself. Like I said, full circle. You first need to have the capacity to choose her -- the potential to choose, the "right" to choose, not unlike how Jesus has to actually be God in order to be a perfect sacrifice. (This is acknowledged, as you've said, when she smiles at you.) And then you need to actually choose her. (You need to talk to her.) Because that's what relationships are, what *all* relationships are. Sacrifice. Not self-humiliation or self-exaltation, but sacrifice -- "self-humiliation" and thereby "self-exaltation." Honesty, vulnerability. The gift is the blessing of the giver. It is better to give than to receive.
Truth is marriage. Language is the bride of existence, time the bride of reason, the church the bride of Christ. Melody is the bride of rhythm. The pixels carrying these words are the bride of whatever these words actually mean, if they mean anything at all at this point. Your architecture post fits somewhere in here. Man makes a house to survive in; woman makes it a home to live in.
You say you don't want to cheat to get ahead. You don't want to play the status game. Neither of us do. So we simply shouldn't. Are women who are only interested in status-gaming really worth having? Does Solomon not talk about this in Proverbs? We should be honest with women about ourselves and let them sort themselves out -- not self-humiliating or self-deprecating or self-exalting, but honest. Some will be dishonest in return, but you'll know -- in your heart, you'll always know. My experience (albeit limited) has been, women worth caring about crave honesty and meaning.
Couple of days ago I figured it out. The thing I always wanted. The thing I was to scared to admit to myself because the answer was to LAME, to GAY.
For years I looked for something to care about. But everything was the same, nothing was exciting, life was meaningless. What was it that I wanted more then anything? What would finally fill this void inside of me?
I wanted to be Loved.
The most cliche, banal answer you can think of. But it was true.
I got married because I'm a musician. My art created the conditions for me to stumble into happiness. I found her because I gave her guitar lessons and reconnected with her years later at one of my shows. Now I can look back and be honest with myself.
I'm not special. I just wanted the same thing everyone else does.
Maybe, just Maybe, just like how Schwartz identified that there are four values of human condition (Power, Pleasure, Security, and Transcendence), there needs to be a clarification of each of such viewpoints, such that one can be in tune with it. Security (i.e. Belonging) should never be mis-identified with Power (Status), or Pleasure (PUA logic), or Transcendence ("virtue signaling"). Each would require their own form of rhetoric to function.
Often the reason people don't fit into modern society is not because they're asocial psychopathic manipulators, but because they aren't asocial, psychopathic, or manipulative *enough*.
This seems to be _the_ problem for the young men of our age, doesn't it?
Also, you know, as far as woman seduction is concerned, _status_ is just a proxy for _security_, right? And there are other security-proxies to aim for too. Like charisma, which you don't seem to lack. Economic-security was maybe the most common means for the ordinary man until outsourcing & government stripped us of that. And it's hard to start a family without that. Maybe you can obtain that through your writing without selling your soul - the artist's integrity problem. Although, I'm no artist, but I think maybe that's a solved problem too, and the solution is to create art for God, as 0HP says in The New Tlön.
I don't know man. Trust in God and do not despair. Remember Abraham. It's not over yet. Remember the Bronze Age Mindset and may it lift your spirit.
luv u
I'm reminded of the ending of Dune Messiah: "I meddled in all the possible futures I could create until, finally, they created me." I'm the same way -- I violate the Tao and wonder, why am I not happy?
What I think I'm arriving at, after taking a long, meandering, roundabout trip a la G.K. Chesterton, is just being honest. Just being truthful; just being myself. It's funny because it's really meta -- I care about studying the nature of truth and its various derivatives (beauty, meaning, semantics, value, etc.) probably more than anything else, and the first thought when talking about it is, nobody wants to hear that. Maybe that's true too -- maybe that's why Adam and Eve hid. Maybe that's why we hide.
The dumbest and stupidest and most wonderful thing about life is that it never plays out rationally. But also, the reality of it not playing out rationally is totally rational. There are exceptions to every rule -- except this one. You could philosophize about this for years and never figure it out. More Dune: "Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic." God has put eternity into the hearts of men, yet we cannot find out what he has done from beginning to end -- a riddle for which the only answer is He. Law and Gospel: perfectly distinct, diametrically opposed, yet tangled up in one Person, harmonized by the God-Man.
Being honest to people solely for the sake of being honest (provided that they don't hate your guts) breaches all reason in favor of a greater Reason. There's no reason to be honest -- that's the exact reason you do it, because by simple elimination the honesty can be nothing other than beauty. It's a gift freely given, nothing expected in return. Aslan on the Stone Table. Christ on the cross. And yet, by the virtue of being freely given, the gift evokes a response also freely given. God's law is to be followed not because he holds a gun to our heads, but because, when we follow it, we progress toward being the best possible versions of ourselves -- the most satisfied, most joyful, most beautiful, us.
But that line, breaching reason in favor of a greater Reason -- that's where we go astray. Because this is the fine line. The fine line between self-sacrifice and self-humiliation/self-exaltation, between virtue and vice, between marriage and divorce. Ambivalence. Because God created everything to be good; everything that exists is good if enjoyed in the right context, the right structure, the right framework. Enjoying it outside that context, the accident in the act -- that's where we trip up. Fuck Kant and his stupid "Jesus was a good moral teacher but not Deity" bullshit. C.S. Lewis is right: either Jesus really is the Christ, the God-Man, or else he's a raving lunatic. Either his sacrifice breached all reason in favor of the Greatest Reason, or it breached all reason and the Greatest Reason above all. I know which one I believe.
This is very un-PUA of me, but I think, in the particular case of women, what generates attraction, for her, is that you *choose* her, for the simple reason that she is herself. Like I said, full circle. You first need to have the capacity to choose her -- the potential to choose, the "right" to choose, not unlike how Jesus has to actually be God in order to be a perfect sacrifice. (This is acknowledged, as you've said, when she smiles at you.) And then you need to actually choose her. (You need to talk to her.) Because that's what relationships are, what *all* relationships are. Sacrifice. Not self-humiliation or self-exaltation, but sacrifice -- "self-humiliation" and thereby "self-exaltation." Honesty, vulnerability. The gift is the blessing of the giver. It is better to give than to receive.
Truth is marriage. Language is the bride of existence, time the bride of reason, the church the bride of Christ. Melody is the bride of rhythm. The pixels carrying these words are the bride of whatever these words actually mean, if they mean anything at all at this point. Your architecture post fits somewhere in here. Man makes a house to survive in; woman makes it a home to live in.
You say you don't want to cheat to get ahead. You don't want to play the status game. Neither of us do. So we simply shouldn't. Are women who are only interested in status-gaming really worth having? Does Solomon not talk about this in Proverbs? We should be honest with women about ourselves and let them sort themselves out -- not self-humiliating or self-deprecating or self-exalting, but honest. Some will be dishonest in return, but you'll know -- in your heart, you'll always know. My experience (albeit limited) has been, women worth caring about crave honesty and meaning.
Maybe move beyond the desire for Woman and begum Monk?
Couple of days ago I figured it out. The thing I always wanted. The thing I was to scared to admit to myself because the answer was to LAME, to GAY.
For years I looked for something to care about. But everything was the same, nothing was exciting, life was meaningless. What was it that I wanted more then anything? What would finally fill this void inside of me?
I wanted to be Loved.
The most cliche, banal answer you can think of. But it was true.
I got married because I'm a musician. My art created the conditions for me to stumble into happiness. I found her because I gave her guitar lessons and reconnected with her years later at one of my shows. Now I can look back and be honest with myself.
I'm not special. I just wanted the same thing everyone else does.
Maybe, just Maybe, just like how Schwartz identified that there are four values of human condition (Power, Pleasure, Security, and Transcendence), there needs to be a clarification of each of such viewpoints, such that one can be in tune with it. Security (i.e. Belonging) should never be mis-identified with Power (Status), or Pleasure (PUA logic), or Transcendence ("virtue signaling"). Each would require their own form of rhetoric to function.