I'm writing a series on how I went from a pathological people-pleaser who only used my words to gain approval from all the wrong people to the truth-seeking, free-expression fanatic I am now.

It's a process of transformation we all need in some way. spiritualsoap.substack.com/p/dont-yell-do… "Honest, thoughtful expression is fucking hard—not just hard but fucking hard;

it’s taking off your suit of anonymous armor and bearing the soft, true flesh of your genuine self." (spiritualsoap.substack.com/p/dont-yell-do…)

I’m tired of westerners blaming society for their personal problems.

Society has only provided you medicine, electricity, an abundance of food, technology, and endless entertainment but it didn’t teach you how to manage yourself well enough to use these resources, so it’s evil? When I was younger (and miserable, unproductive, and self-deceitful), my pattern was to identify a problem and simply invent a narrative for why society was to blame.

The opportunity to create the life I wanted wasn’t enough—society should give it to me, too.

Wrong. A massive portion of the world still believes women are inherently “inferior.” Are all those people worthless to engage with to you?

Holding a detestable view is exactly when curiosity for what spurs that view is most powerful.

https://twitter.com/mrgrimm/status/1557100557713559552

It doesn’t make you a bad person to recognize the difference between trying to understand a detestable view point and approving of it—

it makes you a normal person who values reason, discussion, and freedom in human relationships.

Stop being cowed into meekness.

I know this can be hollow woo-woo stuff, but the way contemporary leftism perfectly matches the “unhealthy feminine” versus healthy feminine traits is worth considering. Contemporary leftist politics are deeply pathological; within its pathology, there’s an answer to some un-confronted cultural sickness.

An individual that claims compassion while applying cruelty is by definition, backwards—a group is no exception.

How to develop an unoriginal, unclear, and easily manipulated thought process: Use your phone to consume media and communication within the first hour of waking.

Immediately let the external world dictate your thought process.

I deeply resent the progress being lost to the spread of postmodern leftism.

Where we could have been moving forward, we're instead rehashing once-settled concepts like the value of free speech.

It's an absolute waste. Perhaps for those who don't know history, it's interesting to debate whether free speech is actually good.

For those whose knowledge of history expands past their own life, we know why you don't grant even a "good" government the power to silence its people.

A person who adamantly argues for why you are powerless and takes offense at your self-determination could not be more clear about what role they prefer you in. Try putting more focus on the power you have over your life and see how people react.

Many people prefer you see yourself as powerless; a competitor who never competes is never competition.

Our culture is becoming increasingly dishonest mainly out of fear.

News orgs, artists, academics, and everyday people increasingly feel pressured to say what’s “right” rather than what’s true. Everything we enjoy depends on saying what’s true even if it doesn’t “sound right.”

Comedy, art, education, politics—all degrade when approved messaging is prioritized above honest messaging.

Fighting an oppressor or some evil can easily become one's very identity; let's not pretend a "hero" reaps no reward.

A threat not only renders your flaws irrelevant, but instantly imbues your empty life with a noble meaning. Survival threats halt your growth. The person fighting an enemy can't expend effort on analysis and introspection—they armor themselves instead.

But what happens if that threat is false and never-ending?

I've been more disturbed than usual by how warped my generation's perspective is.

I watch friends who spend more money on food delivery fees than most people on earth earn in a month bemoan their country as a wasteland. I learned barely anything about history that wasn't major-specific in college and recall only dates and some names from my grade school education.

I worry my experience is not an aberration.

The most urgent thing I wish people understood is how terrifyingly fragile and elusive peace is.

The normal state of the world is chaos. Stability is precious. Every decision you make, word you say, and action you take affects the stability of your world.

You are always either maintaining or undoing peace.

How broken is our culture that the death of someone who lived a remarkable life barely elicits even the charade of appreciation before devolving into strategizing. I’ve seen public figures who couldn’t even dedicate a full tweet to pure memorializing before pushing their angle.

This is unhealthy.

This week’s #WeirdandGud is a warning label for those who flippantly wield an ancient weapon — ostracism.

spiritualsoap.substack.com/p/weird-and-gd… No surprise here: humans have been canceling each other for eternity. We have built-in cancellation threat receptors.

Social rejection meant death for most of history, so your brain still treats it as such.

Stop letting people who do one thing well tell you what you should like.

Choose your interests because they actually interest YOU. This recommendation trend has investors recommending art and artists recommending finance books.

We’re pretending success in one area equates to all-knowingness.

The courage I lack is not the same courage you lack, but we are more confused about that courage than ever.

Here’s a breakdown of what courage is and is not.

medium.com/@salomesibonex… Our culture lost the rituals that once taught us what courage was and how to use it.

Today most are cowards, “denouncing” grandma’s politics as a brave stand.

It’s the opposite.

Schopenhauer on the crucial difference between information and knowledge.

Wield information just gained with the confidence of a tool you’ve never used — cautiously. The abundance of information & “education” online tricks us into running with new info before we’ve even studied it ourselves.

New information is only the start of study, which happens in silence.

We prioritize many things above truth — comfort, self-concept, acceptance.

Each is paid for by obscuring reality, a dangerous trade. It's striking when people repeat talking points that easily accessible information negates, but this is about priorities first, information second.

Facts are useless when truth isn't the goal.

McLuhan predicted the internet decades before we started cancelling each other on it.

More interestingly, he predicted it would come with a hefty dose of collectivism. spiritualsoap.substack.com/p/weird-and-gd… Unlike the individualized experience of reading books, the internet is a collective experience.

In this hyper-connected “global village,” everything feels like it happens in our neighborhood.

What you need is not more people around you who will “validate” you.

What you need is more people who will be truly honest with you. The obsession with being validated by other people as a kind of justice or respect is a disaster.

You are being robbed of the life changing skill of self-validation.

Our culture has been poisoned with a cynicism brewed by a system that promised meaning in success, both of which it placed farther out of reach than we knew. It doesn’t matter that your parents escaped a dictatorship or poverty if only half the achievement they earned is available to you now.

It’s a path disguised to look like something it isn’t & people have realized they’re on a goose chase.

Individualism isn't loud or neon-colored, it's a powerful call to take ownership of yourself — your views, your actions, your life.

Few people truly practice individualism. Most live halfway between collectivism & individualism; we want the freedom to choose, but we outsource the hard work of consciously choosing our beliefs & values to the group.

Some things you must do yourself.