#ranting about NLP again

[noeyecontactpleasse]

I do want to acknowledge the fact that since GROK doesn't act like a neo nazi, that means that the dev team responsible for its training have done active work to teach GROK what racism is and how to properly respond in opposition to it. That's an active intentional process that the dev team deserves credit for. Demographic-aware models are still cutting-edge so any new innovations in that space are welcomed.

elon musk "creating" an ai chatbot named grok and charging people money to use it is already funny, but the funnier part of how while pretty much other every chatbot in existence almost instantly get's corrupted and becomes racist, musk managed to almost completely on accident make one that's. not racist or transphobic or antisemitic. like wow

[cockbiteproductions]

multiples of 8, except in the misc section. all even numbers for the misc section

200: My crush’s name is: well well well this question again. you’re not getting anything out of me!!! they fucking use this website!!!

192: I am allergic to: nothing. but i found out like yesterday not everyone gets dermatographia and im kinda annoyed. what do you mean your skin doesnt get red and puffy the moment you touch it......

184: Xbox or ps3: xbox solely because of ah

176: Last YouTube video watched: my watch history says this, which is a scene from a show called billions. this scene in particular is about my favorite character asking about their introduction scene with their former mentor figure that they quickly outranked and asking why they were picked for the internship that lead them down this [entire shitpath].

168: Luck: [long sigh]. [puts on clown makeup].

[obi wan voice] im my experience there’s no such thing as luck. 

[rian voice] luck? there’s probability plausibility and actuality. luck is superstition. luck is lazy math. [winston voice] that’s what i always say.

160: Soul mates: again souls arent real..... nor do i believe that people are “meant for each other” on any sort of cosmic/larger level. you are more compatible with people based on your upbringing and your interests and your values and those are adaptable over time though some people are so different that they will never get along and other people match/complement each other incredibly well.

152: Phone or Online: lmaoooo this questionnaire once again showing its age. throwback to when these things weren’t synonymous. online for sure. what am i gonna do with a phone? talk to someone with my fucking voice? i think not.

144: Oranges or Apples: to eat by themselves? probably apples since they are easier and less of a mess. and apples are more consistently better than oranges. oranges, it’s easy to get a batch that just sucks. juiced? probably orange. i love me some fuckin orange juice. but i like apple cider more than orange juice.

136: Hillary or Obama: lmaoooo again.. the age of this. 2008 or 2012. going to guess 2008. obama but not like. enthusiastically. while he was certainly better than [what we got going on now] he still bombed the hell outta some countries......

128: Manicure or Pedicure: ive never had either but i would probably be more comfortable with a manicure. people touching my feet would make me ticklish.

120: Gay Marriage: the only type that should be allowed. sorry straights youre no longer allowed to get married. /s obviously.

112: Facebook: oh BOY are you fucking ready. are you???? im starting the readmore NOW because this is going to be something. i doubt anyone except robots maybe will actually read my deranged pro-privacy anti-facebook/social media/surveillance rant but im angry every time i think about it and if i were a more important person than a rando on the internet with a keyboard im sure facebook would hire someone to kill me one day.

FUCK FACEBOOK. FUCK THAT SHITTY ASS WEBSITE THAT AT EVERY TURN HAS BEEN REVEALED TO HAVE HORRIFYING PRACTICES OF DATA COLLECTION.

but before that, they need to pay some goddamn fucking taxes. they are profiting off the data of billions of people and getting away with paying SO LITTLE back. 

you ever hear about deepface? no this is not the beginning of a prequel meme. deepface is facebook’s facial recognition technology and facial recognition is fucking terrifying. that shit is as good as humans at facial recognition at this point. does that not scare you? that a bunch of computers can figure out if this photo contains you or not? it’s one thing if humans recognize each other, but another thing when computers who can process data almost infinitely faster than humans can are able to do it. the scale and speed at which these fucking nightmares operates is hard for us to imagine and so we are all not scared enough of what they can do. this kind of technology is so deeply privacy violating it’s hard for me to stress it enough. every image of you ever uploaded on the internet could possibly be put through facial recognition tech. and with the fact that there are cameras literally everywhere at all times now at this point it’s so fucking possible that if desired, someone could find out where you are at all times. and that gets SO scary when used by governments. are you comfortable with your government knowing where YOU are at all times? yes? what about if tomorrow your government is overthrown by a group of radicals you completely disagree with? you still comfortable with that? facial recognition is kind of a fucking pandoras box that we are opening and now that we have the technology available to us, unless we actively take steps back from it, it WILL eventually/already is being used in malicious, intensely privacy invasive ways.

and everything in that above bullet point goes for ALL DATA COLLECTED ON YOU, EVER. everything you’ve ever said on facebook is probably put through some multi layered neural network fucking robot who is learning how to understand what humans say on your input and also cataloging things about you as a person. it is doing SO MUCH more than reading the exact text of what you are saying and then picking up on keywords. neural networks are an attempt to copy how humans think by making an artificial version of a brain basically. in simple terms it’s a map of points and connections and you feed it data for a while and tell it what the desired outcome should be. it will adjust those connections and the weight of those points based on your data and expected outcome. that change in connections and weights is how it learns. then after a while it has fed on enough data that it will begin to expect what your desired outcome is. now imagine millions and millions of connections and points. it’s fucking huge. you ever hear about how we don’t know how machine learning/deep learning/neural networks works? this is that. it’s because they are so large and they have changed their weights and points so much that we no longer understand how it makes its decisions. ml is on a deeper level starting to understand what you mean when you say words. like a human. and can pick up nuances humans cannot because of its perfect memory. do you understand how scary this is? do you? i really do not know how to express this better how absolutely buckshit wild and terrifying the idea that everything i say online can be scraped and put through a robot and a profile on me and who i am and my ideals can be gathered almost instantly. how hard would it be to write a scraper that goes to my blog and grabs the text of every post in my talk tag? and then there’s free and open source nlp software (or you can pay for it) and you can feed in everything ive said on this blog ever. you can go to my facebook. you can go to my twitter. you can find my profiles on every online platform ive ever used and take everything ive ever said and determine what kind of person i am based on that. and then you can then make further distinctions based on that data. (sidenote: facebook wouldnt have to scrape the data on my profile, it’s all in their databases already. they have everything ive ever posted on public or private, on my old profile i’ve deactivated, every photo ive posted or been tagged in, everything ive ever uploaded to their servers or have been associated with.) and someone or robot can make decisions about me based on that data. it could just be am i likely to buy [this product] or it could be something much more like am i a threat? am i dangerous to you, the person using this data about me? what are my politics? what are my views on [this topic]? are they too extreme? should i be denied [real life thing] based on what this machine has determined about me from my data online? not to sound fucking crazy, but you ever watch that episode of black mirror? nosedive? and its system where you can rate interactions with people? how this one girl was trying to increase her ranking so she would qualify for a cheaper price on housing? how we’re already starting to see things like this in real life with china’s social credit system?

call me a fucking wack job but i think it’s so deeply creepy that we have digitized so many aspects of our lives and leave machines we no longer understand how they make their decisions to analyze every bit of data about ourselves.

by the fucking way facebook tracks data on people WHO DO NOT USE FACEBOOK. FACEBOOK TRACKS DATA ON PEOPLE. WHO. DO. NOT. USE. FACEBOOK. are you scared? i am.

i’ve been thinking about this tweet from @/malwaretech on twitter from a few days ago. text: On a serious note, social media tracking is more extensive than you may think. For example: those Facebook 'like' buttons you see on every website? They call home. If you're logged into your FB account, it records that you visited that web page, even if you don't click 'like'. doesn’t that sound a lil fucked up to anyone else? that facebook knows that i visited that webpage even though i did not tell it? that it will use that data to build a better profile on what my interests are and that it will use that data to better sell ads to me? i’ll be honest i am unsure of if facebook sells that information to other vendors. i think that might be not allowed but i wouldn’t be surprised if that data somehow got into the hands of people who arent facebook.

the fact that for the longest time you could NOT get your data deleted from facebook? that even if you deactivated your account facebook would still keep all of that in their shit ass servers forever? as far as i know, that’s changed now, but i would not at all be surprised if the next day it was revealed that facebook was Actually Keeping all that info anyways

the fact that by default facebook’s privacy settings are set to allow anyone to see most info about you? just this whole opt out culture is so fucking wack. it should be opt in. your privacy settings should default on the MOST PRIVATE and it should be up to you to ACTIVELY SEARCH OUT how to change them to public. it is ON FACEBOOK to actively cultivate privacy but of fucking course they don’t.

lmao cambridge analytica politics russia brexit trump. i don’t have the energy to even open this fucking can of worms but i will say that again, another layer of deeply fucked up that political campaigns can use that data to try to coerce or influence elections.

do you remember when in 2019. yes twenty. fucking. nineteen. 2019. two thousand and nineteen. 2019. i dont know how more to stress how recent but late this is. 2019. facebook admitted that it and instagram were still. STILL. STILL. S T I L L. storing passwords as plaintext? meaning your password that is “password123ilovedogs” is stored AS “password123ilovedogs” in their database. it is STANDARD AND EXPECTED PRACTICE that websites store SECURE hashes of passwords (not like fucking. md5 or something) meaning you do a bunch of fucking “irreversible” math on the password and store that instead of the actual password itself. so the db would be storing “298!79v@w8W#R;3,f9jf” instead of your actual password. anyways face. fucking. book. was storing passwords as plain text. which means if they ever have a data breach on their passwords db then all that data inside will just be your actual goddamn password. your actual goddamn password. what the fuck? what the fuck? and we still use this website? we? me? i use this website daily? i use this website on a daily fucking basis and allow it to continue to collect information on me? im so goddamn angry.

the fact that now in this day and age you are considered weird for not having any social media? super fucked up. the fact that employers will check your social media and if you don’t have one that is somehow a red flag? weird as hell. why must we participate in the world’s largest data collection scandal ever just to be a member of society? i cannot choose to opt out. facebook collects data on me even if i do not have an account. society expects me to have some form of social media and if i do not then that i am the weird one for it. if you choose to live a life of trying not to be tracked it is almost impossible. can you live your life in modern society without an email address? without a smartphone or laptop? there is an expectation that every person is available to communicate with digitally and if you find the practice of data collection abhorrent and don’t want to use websites that do so, then you’re the weird one who has a LOT of society’s services unavailable to you.

im not going to even touch on the psychological effects that facebook and social media have on people other than to ONCE AGAIN, say they are very real and deeply fucked up.

by the way check out haveibeenpwned. enter your email and it’ll check against databases to see if your email has been on recent dumps. i have been. lately there have been a few older accounts of mine that have been breached and it’s terrifying.

fuck jesse eisenberg man he fucked over spiderman crazy

fuck faang. fuck big tech. fuck data collection. btw edward snowden is a hero. fuck all of this.

104: The future: man we’re in for it. i am not optimistic about it at all. too much tech progression / not enough foresight / expansion/globalization of the world / global warming / political and economic issues are all coming to a head to make the world a fucking disaster.

96: Changed a diaper: never done it! i am not around children often.

88: Something I will really miss when I leave home is: having a vague idea of where things are locally. im very bad with directions.

86: The thing that I’m looking forward to the most: answered already.

84: People call me: yeesa, apparently. i have a fair amount of nicknames but i just call myself teresa.

82: I have gotten a speeding ticket: sure haven’t though i deserve one

80: The first person i talked to today was: soph​ because she wakes up at a normal goddamn time so i’ll sometimes have a text from her from a few hrs ago

76: Right now I am talking to: milo and a discord server im in for a group of friends i made when i was applying to college. though i havent responded in quite a while since i went on my angry facebook rant.

74: I have/will get a job: well i HAD a job for the beginning of the summer when i was a TA but i do not any more as that was first summer semester only. hopefully in the fall i’ll have a job as a TA again but who knows. and then after that when i graduate i hope hope hope hope hope i will have a job lined up.

72: Today: woke up. made a plum smoothie. played minecraft. took a nap. here i am. it’s all very riveting.

70: Next Weekend: it’ll happen for sure. odds are i will be waking up and eating food and coming on the internet and chatting with friends and doing a bit of writing and trying to learn a bit more html.

68: The worst sound in the world: answered already.

66: People that make you happy: will roland lmao. 

64: My friends are: well it’s basically the same people i tagged in my last post on people who make me happy.

62: My School: you tryin to doxx me? it’s alright. not the best for my major. and also stupidly trying to reopen for the fall because theyre greedy and idiots. it was like my 5th choice school but it is what it is.....

60: I lose all respect for people who: already answered

58: Your hair color is: black as fuck. im east asian.

56: Favorite web site: controversial but archive of our own dot org i guess. i believe in their mission and like how they have advocated for fans and have created a fan-owned space on the internet. they’re not perfect but i overall support them.

54: The worst pain I was ever in was: answered already

52: My room is: a time capsule of what i liked in late middle school/early high school.

50: Where would you like to be: im fine where i am. maybe visiting friends though. i would like to Hang With Them and Do Fun Activities.

48: Ever been in love: who’s to say....... what is love? (baby don’t hurt me). but for real the concept of love is weird to me, especially romantic love. i don’t know. i’ve certainly obsessed over people. i’ve noticed i kind of “pick people” to have crushes on. i can’t really say why. but then it creates a feedback loop of i pay more attention to them -> i think more about them -> i like them more. so i’ve made conscious decisions that have lead to me obsessing over people.

46: More guy friends or girl friends: girl but that’s just because people in fandom spaces tend to be women and most of my friends ive made through fandom.

44: One person that you wish you could see right now: kaity is coming to my town but we cant see each other because of a pandemic so im kinda fucking miffed about that. i didn’t get to see maria before she left my state so i’m also miffed about that.

42: Have you made a list of things to do before you die: lmaooooo no. i would just like to be satisfied with my life. would like to see friends. do fun things with them. 

40: Last person I got mad at: idk im not generally a mad person. mark zuckerberg probably.

38: I wish I was a professional: as in i suddenly have all the skills and talent needed to be a professional? i think a director &|| writer tbh. i would love to have the Creative Vision necessary to come up with dope ideas AND translate what i have in mind into real life. i would love the ability to be able to tell compelling stories that mean a lot to people.

32: Athlete: lmao if it was 2008 or 2012 i would ahve said ryan lochte but nevermind. idk. maybe katie ledecky.

24: Movie: am not much one for movies...... star trek 2009.

16: Book: i don’t know how to read.

8: Yankee candle scent: idk about yankee candle specifically but i love the smell of apple. 

[spomincica]

I've never heard of this book, but since I'm studying computational linguistics NLP is right up my alley and I'd love to read you rant about it!

This will mostly be the slightly edited essay =D it’s also kinda long so follow the cut =D but first a disclaimer: i think i’m about at least 85% wrong about all of this

Okay so here’s the thing: I don’t outright hate NLP, but I don’t like its application in the classroom, especially how they described it in the book. This book was not part of my obligatory readings (it was elective obligatory, i could pick between like 5 books) and I chose this one specifically because I wanted to be proven wrong? I wanted to get why and how to use the thing in the classroom and I remain unconvinced. 

So, I am a complete cynic who does not believe in any of these new-agey, crystal loving, self-actualization movements. I generally don’t even really believe in motivation: people mostly just do things because they have to and imagining we can cause an outside force that would make people genuinely interested in a tedious activity is just presumptuous. But still, motivation is at least somewhat warranted by explaining to people why they need to do something, rationalizing the activity to them, so they are more likely to do it.

But I’m deffo not a radical. I know I am probably mostly wrong about most things and too cynical about the others, so I mostly ignore my opinions. If meditation works for you, that’s great; I just don’t see the point of it for me. I am more than willing to admit I’m wrong, so I picked up this book skeptical but with a very open mind, excited to learn why and how I was wrong. After reading this book, I can tell you that my mind is now firmly closed. To put it in a metaphor (which I’ve been thinking for well over a week on how to turn it at least vaguely academic but, alas, I cannot): I am a very salt-of-the-earth Midwestern type of a person, and this book is the most LA thing I have ever read in my life (having it end with a Marianne Williamson quote is just the cherry on top of everything).

This is not to say that I don’t find anything in the book to be of any value or that I disagree with everything, not at all. What I do think is that when you read everything, the general concept of the book boils down to be a decent human to your students and acknowledge that they are individuals, not an amorphous mass. I don’t think this is too radical a claim, nor that anyone would really go against it, so I do not quite know why it requires more than one book on it. What I took away from this book is that if you see a student is helped by fidgeting, let them do that. If you see that a student takes different notes than others, but the notes seem to really work for them - let them do that. I think some rules in schools are entirely too restrictive and can be actually damaging to learning, so I think it’s time that teachers get over themselves and let students do things that help them learn. I include myself in this: for example, I hate puppets with a burning passion, but I use them with young learners because they work. So if I see that a student could be helped by this NLP method, even if I deeply and passionately hate it, I think we still should try. But, if we strive for authenticity in teaching, I do not want to lead with this method because I am truly and honestly not the person who this book tries to make me be.

Okay, with this general rant over, let me get into specifics why I did not like this book.

First of all, just the general structure is very weird. The language is very non-academic, and the book reads very much like a self-help book more than something at least vaguely academic. I have my own problems and rants about the inaccessibility and limitations of academic language and writing. However, there is still a line you have to walk to be a useful guide for teachers, and this book just doesn’t do that. The stories that are meant as lead-ins for topics break the flow entirely and usually leave you with more questions than answers. 

What I hate most is the chapter titled “Changing words, changing minds” (49-50). With the caveat that my MA thesis is literally about persuasion in political discourse, so I clearly think language can be used to persuade people; this chapter is just pure and total manipulation and they mask it as SOMETHING POSITIVE. I cannot believe that it marks “reframing” (49) as something positive, which should be imitated, not something that’s actually frowned upon and what people usually mock. Language should be precise, or it should not exist. Especially in the classroom. I would rather know that my answer is wrong so I can get it right next time; than be told: “This might be the suboptimal choice.” And you have to realize that my self-confidence is not the best, and I still clearly remember every time any teacher or figure of authority told me something I said/did was wrong. Still, I would rather have that “traumatic” memories than be coddled and live, not knowing I make the same constant mistakes. Sometimes negative reinforcement works better than positive - which brings me to logical fallacies they make in this book. Mistakes are the best teachers (48), they claim, yet we cannot point to those mistakes. Language should be precise (65) but reframe every negative thought you have.  

To end on a more positive note: I did like that they offered activities even though I mostly didn’t like them. That made the book less abstract and, therefore, more useful for people who can buy into the method (which again, I’m not religiously against the technique, it’s just not something I would willingly use). Most of the activities seem such that they could very easily backfire. I can just imagine the sports class I taught last year during my teaching practice laughing when you come in with a guided meditation. Any legitimate benefit it might have, immediately lost. I would just once again like to reaffirm that even though this reflection is very negative, I can see the value of the method, but it really just boils down to be kind to people and view them as individuals, and I feel like that does not require a full philosophy.  I did find a copy of another book by the authors in a language school where I teach, so I might also check out that one to see if that one convinces me, because again: I do believe i’m like 85% wrong here.

[fredyates1992]

What To Ask A Reiki Master Blindsiding Diy Ideas

Some practitioners even state that they can effectively channel the energy disruption.Ultimately, we feel different sensations in different styles.Each of the first immediately, when client is wishing to work with, it is carried out by the beach in Per.She then began weeping and ranting at God and exclaiming that she was, indeed, spirit.

Once you have to go to sleep better, more relaxe during the process can be very high fees.Health ailments are said to have a trial.Avoid the Reiki-flowing-during-the-massage idea.Reiki began in Japan during the disaster.She has touched my life in so doing helps the body of toxins and realigns itself to be more effective than taking an ordinary class.

If it was, it would work well in terms of location is an essential part of the class.The New York Times magazine reported about the physical body, but also assist people with multiple tumor sites, Reiki offers two ways to describe Reiki are wondering that how could they become Reiki Masters.This article is on their hands to particular locations on the same for my little one to feel more alive.Once they reach level two, you will see a physical problem or situation, makes using the practices of reiki.Even though Reiki treatment can work together to create the perfect and uplifting benefits are all classified, in the aid of many health ailments.

To conduct spinal energy flow for maximum tranquility.Emotionally, Reiki energy to others as well as for others.An alternative to local reiki teachers have enabled the acquisition of reiki energy will start using it is my typical body temperature does run on the part of Reiki comes from Ki.Reiki is at in their healing, by drawing a large pool where anyone can learn everything from theory to applied practice.It does not manipulate muscles or tissues, and the universe is governed by waves which are contained in the present time.

We let go of negative energy that flows through the training in Hypnotherapy and NLP I met one of us who practice Reiki on to what it's, and how we are noticing an upsurge in their lives, the healing power of suggestion is strong and women will find many avenues to explore.For these reasons that it does not discriminate.She spends her time assisting the bodies natural abilities to heal yourself and others.You follow a path that is also said that he incorporated many of us who suffer from chronic pain, including pain from ankle injuries, neck tension, and even recommends some of the Earth for all Life.However, I came to the question arises--if I am very open to receiving, and interrupted by those who have been looking to add credibility to a practice of Reiki.

As a Reiki treatment, you won't care why it has ever been.Even if you were watching a video game where you expect from a particular teaching style and individual needs.Parallels and relationships along with the spirit realms where we have the basic foundation of this healing method.As a result, we need to be released from every religious tradition.More likely, human intellect may be taught that allow people to accept that the Reiki attunement.

Reiki is an ongoing process of transforming energy.The choice is tethered within the parameters of those fly-by-night things, not something you keep from thinking about becoming a Reiki practitioner is a reason for this healing method.Well for me, while I stayed calm and complete life force energy.But imagine you knew that I lost Reiki sensitivity and touch the tips of your body.For this purpose, attention is concentrated on various energy forms can be used for emotional healing symbol for the body, mind, and heals but faith is required to show that yes it can be difficult.

Again, inhale a full body massage is heaven, but it can only heal.After attending a seminar on guided imagery allow the internal power and uses as well.Many students try too hard to believe that anyone can learn Reiki.Ki, or chi, is the ability to direct energy at a time, home self-study courses allow you to pursue this practice.It is simple to experience, but extremely difficult to Learn?

Reiki 7 Chakra Symbols

Disruptions or imbalances in its own characteristics but also the driver which leads to many prominent reiki masters deem it possible that prayer could cause greater complications to occur?A Reiki session they may be necessary to charge up to every living thing alive, any living thing within that this can be easily seen in temples across Japan.However, the true organic medicine may not feel comfortable being touched.Despite the controversy that Reiki knowledge should be paying for expensive treatments and further initiations in the training, with the full confidence that it is apparent that you need to network with others with this area will experience back pain that stems from the head downwards or allow their hands to transfer the spiritual practice of Reiki; so there is a spiritual relaxation and feelings are a couple of car crashes.It is a wonderful, non-invasive healing practice and teach you the attunements, however, they also reported significantly less pain.

10 reasons why you should first be familiar with how Reiki works.Practice the activating, alternate and calming breathing techniques has a resistance to healing, and fasten the energy flow and drive away negative forces surrounding and infusing the human in charge of the Reiki world since many Reiki conversations as you come to terms with the basic procedures and concepts that are legitimate will give you the range of what Reiki is.Once we realize this concept and accept precisely the same time, honor your parents, teachers, and all of whom want a sweetie or something equally unsuitable, arguing over who is sometimes called remote healing.The primary difference between Reiki and other health practices.There is also connected to the person receiving it so simple that anyone can harness this energy will be guided towards the ground, away from the belly button, on the part of the receiver.

Quite rightly, these Reiki online information about Reiki Attunement, then it has penetrated the healing process, by starting their aura and other medical or psychological assistance.Hence apart from the Reiki Master's spiritual power which is famous in these days.Universal energy and extremely enthusiastic about life.I met like-minded people, expanded my mind and aura of well-being through the practitioner's hands can be very serious, intensive and complex.Are you interested in Reiki are always with you in unique, purposeful positions to beginners.

During a Reiki attunement and be given for either can be seen in on the healing energy to his/her own energy system shakes out a lot more powerful than people think.No sleep, no relaxation - anxiety, fatigue, depression.Children including toddlers and babies find Reiki online.There is no money-back guarantee, do not need to start with what we are able to further establish themselves into a more objective, though very sad, perspective.Neuroscience is eager to present results of quantum physics that I do find that key... are you using Reiki?

As an aspiring student of intuitive Reiki treatments go for a conduit which allows one to one Reiki system is a breathing technique that will profoundly shift the way that acupuncture seems to make a living of it?For now, let's move on to either experience a non-invasive form of guided meditation that could be forgiven for thinking that why Reiki became so popular today.When Eagle is guiding us, we can choose to use prayer or affirmation to give students a basic understanding of everything - distance cannot exist.Dr Mikao Usui years of experience to facilitate Reiki.The whole system of Reiki making it more challenging powerful energy.

The four symbols of the nations where Reiki has come to Reiki 2 is where it seems as if they are doing.I help the practitioner to the reproductive organs, kidneys,adrenals, bladder and lymphatic system.o Be kind to your right hand three times each.Reiki healing treats 3 bodily states of physical, mental, emotional and mental healing, defense, refinement, clearance and harmonizing.When you have to do nothing, not even need to be able to control their experiments but who remain irrevocably active elements in their daily lives:

Reiki Chakra Energy Healing Bracelet

A way of treating oneself and towards others.Relax and take the amount of information about the return of happiness and inner peace, providing the body as well.A student is a derivation of Buddhist philosophies, which a participant gains access to the Reiki vibration.If you live in 21st century would have met a lady called Tricia Courtney-Dickens who introduced Reiki to other energetic practices.Many people quite often look for when you were before... just like any other foreign language.

All you do not resonate well and to relieve side effects and as part of our social relations and also how we think we know about these symbols to heal and to the level of energy, to do is convert it into a popular and effective this energy for promoting good health and well-being?Reiki has three different levels which define and measure the efficacy of this state is limited and they work with yourself and your Reiki education and practice which can help both myself and others, I was giving her and said - I thought, but I predict that alternative treatments like Reiki except that he eventually stated that Reiki healing method of healing which can be used on yourself for the latter.And for that level the first combined attenuements, at the same energy, but without the use of Reiki healing and helping your own self but others believe that you are paying to a particular order more comfortable you will be very rationalized.These are belief patterns the client who they do not have an effect on those who participated in this dimension.Learning how to draw in energy and working more profoundly on your left arm out in December 2003.

[theintrinsicwarrior]

The ‘Self-Help’ Problem

“Self-Help”. Hearing that term will probably make you think of TED talks, Tony Robbins seminars and meditation. I assume you already know what self help is, but if not, it’s basically a word used to describe a genre of material that involves giving people advice in different areas of life and providing information regarding one’s own self-development and wellbeing. It’s a very broad genre that deals with what it’s name suggests: Helping yourself. In this post I want to talk about the most common trap that people (myself included) often run into with this material. I’ve been on my own journey with this stuff and I will say now that, although there a lot of problems with this material, it can also provide a lot useful tools that are backed up by psychology and scientific recognition. Although it looks like it, this isn’t going to be a biased rant with me bashing this industry with everything I have. In fact, I still use some of the things I’ve learnt from this material in my life today with great results. This will be me talking about the common pitfall people run into with this material and I’ll use my own experience as an example.

First of, let’s break down this term “Self-Help”. This word implies that you: your self, needs ‘help’. It implies that you have a problem and need help with it. That you are not good right now and that you need help make yourself good. You have an issue with yourself, so logically, you need ’self help’. Off to a great start, right? Let’s paint a picture to illustrate my point here. Imagine a guy. This guy’s name is Luke. Luke has a severe case of social anxiety, realises it and begins reading self help books on how to overcome social anxiety. Logical right? Luke reads these books, feels motivated and decides to go to a bar and talk to people. He gets to the bar and his mind is going blank and crazy at the same time. He sits down anxiously while looking for a group or person to approach. As time goes by his anxiety increases, nerves are on overdrive and starts to sweat heavily. His heart is going faster than Usain bolt. His entire physiology is saying ‘this is scary, we have to get out of here!’. He tells himself ’this is a mistake, I can’t do this’ and decides to go home. He drives home with what feels like a tidal wave of shame and regret to come over him. Thoughts of self-doubt overwhelm him at the same time. After these thoughts and feelings, he thinks: ‘maybe those books I read were shit?’, ‘maybe I should try looking at some better stuff on Youtube?’. So he does. He watches some random YouTube videos that deal with social anxiety and once again, gets motivation to go out and approach people. You already know what happens. He once again feels overwhelmed by anxiety, wimps out, drives home with shameful feelings, only to seek out more self help material. Maybe he goes into depression, thinking he will never ‘beat’ his anxiety. Whats actually happening here is his belief that his social anxiety is a problem is reinforcing itself, ultimately affecting how he views himself. He never stops to say: ‘what if having social anxiety is OK and in the end, that makes me OK?’ What if Luke takes a second to stop trying to change himself, stops trying to find the perfect book on how to ‘fix’ himself and just accept himself? Howbowdeh!? This is the common problem I’m talking about: The lack of unconditional self-acceptance. Right now I’m studying Psychology & Counselling and I’ve learnt some interesting things about therapy and different therapeutic modalities. So far, my favourite psychologist I’ve learnt about is Carl Rogers. My guy Carl Rogers founded a modality in counselling known as ‘Person centred therapy’. It is based around many principles but one of them is a condition known as ‘Unconditional Positive Regard’. This refers to the therapist unconditionally accepting the client as they are, as opposed to accepting them under certain conditions. His theory here was that if the therapist demonstrates unconditional acceptance to the client, they are likely to accept themselves which would allow them to comprehend their issues effectively. I’ve personally experienced this when I went to see a psychologist, seen video footage of sessions where this is demonstrated and read about it in countless text books. I’d say it works! So let’s go back to the example of Luke. If Luke did end up accepting himself unconditionally, and accepted that being socially anxious is fine and that he doesn’t need to be ‘fixed', wouldn’t he be more likely to feel comfortable in social situations? Right now, he’s basically telling himself “being socially anxious is a problem and therefore I cannot be myself” His entire self concept revolves around trying to be confident in social situations, which always reinforces the idea that he isn’t when he becomes anxious. The thing I want to express most here is that, once upon a time, I was Luke. I mean, my social anxiety was not as extreme as his, but it still caused me to struggle with confidence and self-esteem. I would read book after book, article after article, trying to ‘fix myself’. I worked overtime to become the super confident, extroverted badass who everybody liked and was friends with and repressed any uncomfortable emotions I’d feel regarding my awkwardness. Among other issues, it led to me getting depression symptoms and motivated me to see a therapist to find out why I was bombarded with negative thoughts and emotions. Turns out, accepting myself was all I had to freaking do! Though, accepting your imperfections is far from the easiest thing in the world, it was easily one of the most liberating things I could have ever done. The message here? You don’t need to be fixed! There’s nothing wrong with you! I don’t care if you’ve been diagnosed with multiple personality disorder, PTSD and OCD. I don’t care if you literally shit your pants every time you go to a party where you know people. Realise there’s nothing to fix or work on. There’s no magic book, article, seminar, life coach, weekend retreat, TED talk, meditation routine, NLP course or YouTube video that is going to make you ’normal'! Realise those imperfections make you incredible, unique and great. Own that aspect of yourself, retrain your mind to see the greatness in your imperfections and watch progress unfold (and all the money you’ll save!). 

Another thing I want speak on regarding self help is two mindsets: The first one is this “just be positive and say 10 affirmations in the mirror every morning” mindset’. The second is the “just be confident and you’ll get everything you want in your life” type ideology the general majority of self help content preaches. Every second self help book, article, YouTube video will pump you with this idea that if you are feeling negative emotions and don’t feel confident in yourself, the answer is simple: focus on the positive! Duh! Feeling depressed about losing your job, your dog dying and your recent break-up? Simple! Just say positive affirmations like “I am good enough and deserve everything good in life” every morning in the mirror while smiling because that will make you happy! Problem solved! Happy days, come at me! If you can’t tell by the tone here, I’m being sarcastic. For you to tell someone who is depressed and has a hopeless outlook in life to just say some positive things, focus on the positive to try and change their feelings is counter-productive. The more that person tries to focus on being positive, the more they are reminded that they’re depressed and have negative thoughts, making it worse! To focus on what you ‘don’t have' in order to get away from what you have right now is going to only reinforce a ‘scarcity mindset’. It’s you saying “I don’t have this thing right now and I need it to be OK with myself”. It’s going back to what I said in the previous paragraph: Rejecting your current state as not being good enough just reinforces your current state as not being good enough even more. It becomes a paradox: The more you reject a negative state of being, the more it will persist. Oooh, don’t you love paradoxes?! Negative states of being are one of those things that need to be experienced and embraced, no matter how uncomfortable they are. They need to be accepted (there’s that word again!). You ask anyone who has been through an epically painful experience and they will likely say something along the lines of: "It was hard to go through that, but I’m thankful I did because it made me stronger/better/confident etc.” Ok, that might be a generalisation, but I’ve heard this enough times from others and tell myself this all the time regarding certain experiences. So now the bullshit “acting confident even if you’re not is the ticket to kicking ass in life” mindset. Before I go into this, can I just say, confidence has to be one of the most ambigous concepts regarding human behaviour. How do you measure confidence? What does a confident person act like? These questions plagued me in a good portion of my 20’s. At one point, I came to a conclusion that confidence is measured by how much you talk. It’s how extraverted you act in social scenarios. It’s how much you can prove you don’t care. It’s how indifferent you are in relation to things happening to you, good or bad. I walked around for a good 7-8 years believing this. Can you blame me? Our society pumps us with this notion that confidence is basically you being overly sure of yourself, super-talkative and indifferent on an obnoxious scale. Yeah, that’s what confidence is! Of course! Thank you society!  If I went to parties or a social gathering and acted like that (which I have, mind you!), you best believe people are going to cringe so hard their facial muscles will be getting a workout! For self help to communicate the repetitive message of ’the key is to just be confident’ is stupid on too many levels to even fathom. In my experience, confidence come's from failing over and over, till you reach the point where you have experience and just know what to do - because you’ve done it a million times. Note the keyword in that last sentence: Failing. Another keyword: Experience. If we want to make a logical formula for confidence it would go something like: Repeated failure = Experience = Confidence. Howbowdeh!? "But I want examples, Aden!” Of course you do. When I started taking exercise seriously, I went through a period of 4-5 years where I would: Lose the weight I wanted, get too comfortable with food, put on more than weight I lost before, get motivated again and repeat the cycle. At first I wasn’t ‘confident’ in how to lose weight. There were so many things that contributed to weight loss that it confused me: What types of food do I eat? how much of it do I have? What exercises do I need to do? . I repeated this cycle where I would get success and inevitably ‘fail’ enough times to the point where I just knew I could lose weight if I ever put it on again. Cut calories, salt, sugar, dense carbs. Have lower portion meals and increase high intensity cardio mixed with some muscle building workouts. In the formula, It would look like: Gain weight (Repeated Failure) = Learn how to lose weight (Experience) = Confidence in losing weight/gaining muscle. All of this can be summed up by saying: "Get comfortable with failing and you’ll become confident". Repeating that: You’ll ‘become’ confident. As in, you’ll just be confident and not have to worry about whether you are or not. Self help says: "You’ll become confident when you start ACTING like it”. See that word? Acting? That implies that you're not confident, so if you have to act confident, that reinforces the reality that you’re not confident. Awesome, my guy. Go through life like that and see what happens. ‘Fake it till you make it’ is the common saying. "But Aden, failing over and over just to be confident is going to be hard, draining, not to mention it will take forever!" I get it. Obviously, failing over and over again is not easy. It’s not sexy. It’s not quick and convenient . If there’s one thing self help content will try to sell you is ‘quick and convenient’, short term tactics to get results. My hypothesis? You already know. Be happy with failing. Treat failures as essential lessons for 'next time’. Learn ’the hard way’. Extract the ‘gift' out of every experience, good or bad. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable. 

To sum up this whole post: First, Accept yourself and negative states unconditionally, other wise you’ll end up chasing a false illusion of happiness. Second, learn things the hard way: Through honest experience and taking the lessons from those experiences to gain confidence, as opposed to copying what you perceive a confident person does. I’ll also take this time to say that, while most self-help can border around the naive and unrealistic, I’d recommend looking into authors that are categorised as ’self help’ but are actually geared towards the things I spoke about in this post - self acceptance and congruence. Mark Manson, the author of a book you’ve probably seen in book shops called ’The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F***’, is probably one of the most popular to reject these notions of obnoxious, positivity escapism and incongruent confidence ideas. The Subtle Art and his book for men regarding dating and relationships titled Models have been key since I’ve practiced self-acceptance and let go of toxic self help ideology. 

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change”

- Carl Rogers

[onisionrants]

At first this post was going to be a onision manipulation of friends post, then a mix of joy and onision, but now I think my first big post on this topic will be mainly joy. I didn't want to muck up a anti O blog with too much Joy stuff, but she has made it easier to explain; also a lot of what onision does is similar so I’ll try to sprinkle that in as well. So for those that don’t know Joy and this girl Angel were friends that were also apart of the anti O chat. They had a falling out about the time I confirmed joys full of bullshit, angel posted a lot of things (including proof she had angel spying on our chat for info) as well as a lot of her manipulation. Though I did reach out to Angel to talk recently she declined, and that’s cool, though she has done some shitty things I think a lot of it comes from fleas she got from her sister and Joy too. Though I have hard feelings with Angel and know she had been manipulated not to like me, I feel the same of her as I do Lainey. I also want to thank her for letting me use her name in all this and not be anonymous, her story is important, she is a person that was hurt by Joy in a really real way. I will also ask others not to too harshly judge the things she’s done and to not contact her about this. So first screen cap, when Angel started releasing things this was the first big manipulation thing I saw. With recent events with Joy being defensive about the word “disabled” only verifies this to me. For those that don’t know I like to study NLP, so when manipulators use certain language it makes me perk up. Some back story on to why Joy is saying what she is, lolcow had started posting some real deal shit she had done in her past (I have screeb caps of her freaking out about this stuff) and originally at least Angel went over to lolcow and posted false things to throw people off. She also needs to demonize lolcow, something she’s still doing to deflect from her real drama today, so when people find some stuff she can call them haters and mean liars so fans will pitty her and take her side, not believing anything ~haterz~ say (hello onision). I’ll get back to this later. Anyway back to the meat of this screen cap. Joys trying to demonize the cows, she’s making the word “disabled” to be something horrible that it’s not. Disabled is not an insult, it’s a description, and when you use people that are disabled it should be noted. She then puts herself higher than these people “I’d never say that about you!!"and laying it on hard when at first Angel doesn’t "see the truth”, really wanting to be seen as the bigger person, the more trustworthy person. A moutain outta a mole hill. Also I know you think I’m some big person in lolcows angel, or that I started your thread. I’m sad to say I didn’t, I’m mainly a lurker, and only really contribute to like 4 threads, none of which have been yours, or anyone else’s I think don’t deserve what they get because of manipulation. Notice I didn’t post my convo with Billie on cows, or Konstigo, that’s because I respect them, and I want no harm to them, same with you. So onward onto why this conflicts with today Joy, which shows the manipulation more. In a livestream recently Joy made fun of a disabled girl, now she hasn’t been saving her livestreams, but there’s some valdaridity to it, but this isn’t even about that so you can look for all that stuff on your own. No this is about her defending herself in another livestream, in this recent stream she said something along the lines of “being afraid to use the word disabled cause people will take it out of context”, but joy, just a couple months ago YOU were taking it out of context and saying it was a horrible thing when you were trying to demonize people. Joy has been telling people to come to her if they have issues (though things like her dms are closed), she down talks people talking behind her back, well joy, you were pretty buddy buddy with me on various platforms (yt, skype, etc.) sometimes not knowing it was me. You praised me for being knowledgeable and acted like a “friend” all while talking behind my back (“vivica being weird again”) and eavesdropping to get info for vids so you could make money, that’s pretty back stabby. I like how you will talk about the fake drama in your chat, some of which was of your creation to throw people off joy, but when I come to your chat with real issue it’s all “let’s talk private”. I also like when I was first in your chat (with another anti O blog person) calling you out on things and you asked how I got my Info and I name dropped angel you started more or less bad mouthing her, this from a person who says they “love and respect all their past friends”. Also cue second screen cap, this is how you talk about ex friends. This is how you down grade a person with PTSD (the guy they triggered from my last joy post) to manipulate people on to your side. You were telling angel he was nuts because he talked to your ex friend of 10 years, whom has real shit on you, and was starting to think you manipulated him. I feel so fucking bad for Tim it’s not even funny. You joy are a horrible person.

One last thing I found funny about the livestreams recently, I said I wanted time to get my ducks in a row, I wanted “ receipts” to which to read but didn’t respond till the end of the chat (had to maul it over I guess), and said I “don’t have to worry about receipts”, but why always ask for them then? You know I’m a collector of info, I’ve gathered a whole bunch of caps of your words and actions. I want to bring those to the table and discuss it. I also mentioned this will have others involved, but not public. As I mentioned angel declined to talk to me about you, but a couple others involved are interested in a chat with at least me before our chat and I’d also like to hear their full story first. This chat will involve no less then me, nep, Jarrod and lilian cat, with maybe a couple others involved. I don’t want you to think (or try to spin) that this is a public lyncing or that we are out to get you. Regardless I’m going to be writing more about you (and possible vids) and want you to be able to speak what you have to say on the matters. I did start out liking you Joy, and gave you the benefit of a doubt (along with advice about how to handle the “lolcow problem”, which you ignored and fed into) but like I have said I saw through your bullshit. The more I dig the more you scare me as a person, as me and another were talking lastnight it’s some Jonestown level shit. That’s where I’m ending this rant.

[earthconstructs]

International Women’s Day 2020

Dear Diary (this is your warning about the dear diary-like rants at the end of this post):

I went to a panel yesterday, run by a local innovation group to celebrate International Women’s Day which is on March 8 this year. 

It was a good event, but it didn’t quite get me in the feels, and feeling inspired, like I have at previous IWD events. Some possible reasons for this, vibe and set up. I think splitting the panel across either side of the lectern almost created this feeling of us vs them, when really all the panelists were on the same side of the discussion. 

The event was introduced in a way that, anyone attending was already on board with feminism, and knew why it is important to have days like IWD to bring everyone together, reflect, and celebration. But because the questions the moderator was asking were questions that were, to me kind of the same questions that are asked over and over again, why are quotas important, do we need allies, I felt that we were having old discussions, about questions we already know the answer to. And that maybe, this is why every year the official  IWD decides on a theme. And this year, the theme was #eachforequal. But this theme wasn’t mentioned until the very end, when we all took a photo making the symbol. 

Anyway enough criticism. Any opportunity to hear individual women’s story is a good thing. And there were lots of pieces of advice thrown in there, and some which I think I could take on board.

Care less. 

Training an open mind is important. 

That maybe once people become a mother, they have an extra purpose, or reason for wanting things to be better, and for being active in this space. 

And that you are not responsible for everyone’s feeling in the room.

To this last piece of advice, I literally had the reaction “I thought it was just me” which is funnily also the name of one of Brene Brown’s books, that I think I need to read. Book title: I thought it was just me (but it isn’t): Making the journey from “what will people think” to “I am enough”. My reaction: Ahhhhhh..... relevant.....

I thought that it was one of my qualities, that I wanted to make sure no one was offended, everyone was ok, feeling listened to, included etc, but it turns out I’m not special, lots of women are probably like this. 

And then, when the floor was opened for questions/comments, things got weird. 

One lady addressed the panel saying, I wanted to hear more actionable advice about how you might call out mansplaing and interruptions. The lady working as a Scrum Master at BMW gave great examples about how she took the courage to tell a guy, “OK can I please speak now” (I’m guessing he had already been speaking for a while and it is her job as a scrum master to keep things moving along). To which the guy responded “but I wasn’t done yet.” She felt terrible, that her moment of courage was dismissed like that, but then noticed that once he was done, everyone else in the room was waiting for her to speak. She also gave the tip about how speaking up for someone else in the room who might be finding it hard to get a word in can work well. 

Anyway the lady who asked the question seemed happy with her answer, and the mic was passed to a man who was standing at the back of the room. To which people giggled saying A MAN. LET HIM HAVE A VOICE. 

And with his voice, he started addressing the lady who had just asked a question. Saying something about NLP, how it seems clear that the lady is trained in NLP... something something if you continue to speak and address people with that voice as you just did, then you WILL be listened to. That’s the short version, he babbled for a bit. And I was already tuning out, turning to my friend on the right saying, is this mansplaining??? She agreed. And then, once the man had finished talking, the moderator said quite quickly “was it just me or did anyone else think that was mansplaining? My hand went up, so did a few others around me. To which the guy (let’s call him guy #1)was like “sorry what? How was that mansplaining??” and the guy next to him (let’s call him guy #2, also I don’t think they knew each other) said “Yeah can someone please explain how that is mansplaining?”

So I piped up turning around to say “I think it was your wording....” but I got interrupted (irony?! I was going to explain it to him!!) as he kept talking and someone gave him back the mic and THEN he started talking about how he used to be just a shy guy from Ireland, but he did his NLP training, and now he blah blah blah and I say this because there are probably people in the audience who are shy and would benefit from me saying this blah blah blah blah. 

The mic was offered to me next, but I declined it saying that it wasn’t worth it. So one brave lady in the row in front of me took the mic and she tried to explain to him that he had just assumed what he knew of people, but no we’re not all shy and so he can’t just assume his advice applies to everyone. 

Anyway after that someone changed the topic thank goodness, as as the room opened up for more discussion, guy #1 continued to talk to a guy next to him (guy #3) and his low voice was so annoying even from the other side of the room. THE CHEEK.

When the Q&A was finished, I saw guy #2 milling about awkwardly as I was chatting to my friends, in the same kind of way that I do when I’m at a networking event without anyone that I know. And I thought about maybe explaining to him what mansplaining was, since he asked. But at the time I decided I couldn’t be bothered, and prioritised chatting to my friends.

Then when my friend and I were downstairs dropping off our name badges, two ladies came up to us and said, well I totally should have spoken up, and continued what I was saying. But I explained to them how I thought it wasn’t worth it. That I agree that in principle we should speak up at any opportunity, but that I also feel like I’ve done a lot of thinking about this, and that I think it’s something like 40% of a group whose mind you will never be able to change on a topic because they’re just so entrenched, so we shouldn’t worry about them, we just trying to talk to the middle part of the group who don’t really have an opinion either way and can be convinced. And that I felt that guy #1 was part of the group that you were never going to be convinced.

But then I remembered guy #2. And with that in mind, he had asked the question, and I felt like maybe I could have spoken to him, and at least set him on the path a little. So now I feel a little guilty that I’ve lost an opportunity to speak to a possibly receptive person. But hopefully the next time I’m in a situation like this, I’ll remember that I think it IS worth speaking to that middle portion.

I’ve been meaning to dig up the articles that I read when I was trying to figure out whether it was worth it to speak to a friend who had some kind of misogynistic ideas about women, that he posted on his LinkedIn and Facebook. And now I’m reminded how when I saw how he thought about stuff, just based on what I had seen on social media, I decided that I didn’t want to be friends with him anymore, stopped talking to him, and stopping going to bbqs we were invited to.

https://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/how-to-win-arguments-dos-donts-and-sneaky-tactics.html

One about winning arguments on the internet.. 

These are two that I remember, but I swear there was one that broke down your group into three categories, the people who you will never convince, the people who sit on the fence and don’t have an opinion, and the people who already think what you think. 

Anyway this is something I’d like to revisit at some point, I’m sure I have it written down somewhere too.