Yes, and yes.
> I've noticed that I myself share a sort of way of thinking with the 4chan / net-present crowd I grew up with
That explains it. I spent a part of my youth there, too, while it still had the "secret club" vibes. I guess it left some influence on my way of thinking.
> I really believed that the happy people HAD to be lying about it, because I wasn't happy. I really believed everyone was secretly judging eachother, cause that's what I was doing. I really believed that various psychological techniques just had to be total bullshit, because I never genuinely tried them in good faith, and just assumed they were konk science.
I resonate with this a lot.
---
Thanks for this. It's useful to see your perspective described from outside, by someone who actually understands. Makes it easier to take myself less seriously.
I see in your "about" section that there is a "please feel free to email me" sentence - if it's okay, I'd maybe like to contact you for further conversation.
always open to this!
it makes me feel validated that others identify with similar feelings, and the ties to the net community. I honestly just threw the comment out there as the first time really putting those thoughts and this theory i've been kicking around into words, half convinced I really was just, idk, a uniquely angry internet person
Would you be able to write any more about how you moved away from this perspective?
The long work was I read a lot of philosophy and talked to a lot of people, but there's two critical things I think caused me to dramatically shift my direction and perspective: first, I read "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. It was a good first start to an open mind because his writing style is something I'd put on the list above, but, I was convinced by his research and experience that what he was writing about in terms of managing human relationships was effective, and I wanted to be effective, so I resolved to grit my teeth and try his ideas. They primarily resolved around empathy and letting go of pride, so the behavior necessary was the opposite of my running theory of how to live.
Second was I started dating a girl that was also basically the opposite of my personality and some of my interpersonal values. She was basically the nicest person at my university, the least selfish person still that I've ever met, and because we were dating I got to see again and again that nope, it really was genuine, she really did just feel and act that way. I'd interrogate her about it and she'd put up with it, telling me she didn't really have an ulterior motive, she just felt that's how she wanted to behave. Likely because of how she behaved she was by far and away one of the most well known people in our slice of university life and enormously successful in all things she did, and last I heard that continues in her current life somewhere buried inside the USA government. Thinking on this, my experience with her could probably be replicated by finding someone suspiciously selfless and trying to talk to them about it, maybe befriend them.
I was ambitious and had high standards for myself so I thought ok, apparently high empathy, selfless strategies get phenomenal results, I wanna be a Big Successful Business Guy, I need to try this, even if I'm faking it. But faking putting yourself in someone else's shoes is just putting yourself in someone else's shoes. I found myself very very slowly saying yes to more things, sometimes because I was being a sly little experimenter in the project, sometimes just surprising myself with a new interest.
The more stuff I tried the more stuff I found to be effective at achieving things for myself. Meditation, for example. I tried it enough to learn about it, then one night out in a field at my friend's ranch when we were all laying about looking at the starts I did the breathing technique someone had shown me and went through the exercise, and never again have I been as relaxed or calm as i was that night. So that's a good feeling, that I enjoyed, and forced me to recognize that meditation can be a good thing.
That superdense period of personal epoch shifting was basically all of college, 4 years. There were some stunts abroad, including a year after college where my ugly personality caused me to tremendously fail at a job I was brought out to Taiwan for, that probably contributed a lot to the journey.
Since the "unlocking" of empathy it's just been more and more times where when I bother to learn someone's perspective and feelings, I'm finding myself understand and emphathising ("I've felt that") or at least sympathizing ("I haven't felt that but I can understand why in that situation someone might"). So it's been a journey now of I guess nearly ten years.
Now I've read a great deal of philosophy and participated in some direct action and have a logical and ethical basis for living this way and thinking this way. I feel as strongly on the side of empathy now as I previously thought it was bullshit, but I'm happy I'm a skeptical person because my position was hard-fought, and I can be confident in the basis for it (using logic, deduction, evidence, etc). Skepticism isn't inherently bad, it just means you need some convincing, and imo that can be good because it can lead to better formed, more well researched, more effective positions.
Btw the other poster said drugs so just throwing it out there that I've never done anything more than some weed and alcohol so don't think it's necessary for changing ones fundamental perspective, though, I have heard plenty of similar stories about this, particular regarding shrooms.
Edit: now I'm thinking on it more and I also feel like just not being surrounded by people who are all reinforcing this depressive skepticism was probably important. Like on 4chan if you dared show hope or be happy you'd be mocked relentlessly. The attitude had to be aloof and mercilessly aggrandizing or you wouldn't survive. It was similar in my friend group before college. We told each other we were toughening each other up, and I don't regret it because I've been able to transform it into a healthy way of not taking myself too seriously.
But anyway by being with people with whom I can actually have these conversations without being mocked, it makes a difference. Note here that we're getting a generally positive reaction to sharing our thoughts. If we were being downvoted and mocked, there'd be no room for learning or change.
Back in college the force of my skeptical personality was likely so strong that even empathetic people would probably be forced to react with caution to avoid pain from my lashing out at them. Barriers go up when you're hella toxic. I'm chewing on the idea.
1. Mindfulness
2. Religion
3. White lies
4. Meditation
5. Astrology
6. ENTP whatever that pop psych test is
7. Sharing feelings
8. Psychology
9. Being very supportive of someone making obvious mistakes
10. Description placards on abstract art
11. Professionalism
12. Using the word "spaces" i.e. "creating spaces for contemplation"
This is just me thinking out loud, not necessarily describing you here, but I've noticed that I myself share a sort of way of thinking with the 4chan / net-present crowd I grew up with. I'm not sure if our personalities drew us to similar places on the internet, or if we were sort of fostered into a similar set of personalities because of the nature of these environments and cultures.
My best effort to define this vague sort of culture / personality / ideology is a sort of radical valuing of the truth, and seeking truth in all things.
> Sure it's rude to call him fat, but if I was fat I'd want someone to tell me, how are we supposed to get better if we don't know what's wrong with us?
> Depression is bullshit, everyone feels sad, you're gonna pay a psychologist 200 bucks an hour to tell you that? Life sucks, so it goes
> Yeaaah I'm not going to "talk about my feelings," that sounds like a waste of time, let's just go do xyz instead
I would feel angry if someone suggested meditation. What a fucking joke, sitting around doing nothing for 8 minutes to an hour? Come on. I would see people being really supportive and roll my eyes. "Yeah right, secretly they hate eachother / judge eachother. Take food away from both of them for just two days and watch how quickly they'll stab eachother in the back."
Again, this is not me describing you, your comment just happened to remind me of how I used to be. Looking back, I don't understand why I was so full of hate, judgement, and arrogance. I really believed that the happy people HAD to be lying about it, because I wasn't happy. I really believed everyone was secretly judging eachother, cause that's what I was doing. I really believed that various psychological techniques just had to be total bullshit, because I never genuinely tried them in good faith, and just assumed they were konk science.
I learned over time that being aware of my feelings was important and difficult, and that the various strategies I assumed were bullshit (like the ones in this post) actually can be interesting and effective ways to learn more about myself, if I set aside my anger, hatred, judgement, and genuinely tried them. I realized I was carrying a LOT of anger around, some of it directed at me for having insanely high standards for myself, my morals and values, and my failure to live those standards out perfectly, a lot of it directed outwards at other people for not being the way I thought people should be.
Regardless, activities like this, silly though they may be, were all tools in a toolbelt of self discovery. As a general rule I've learned that new skills and experiences are earned through discomfort or suffering of some kind, and thus naturally to develop myself, my Mind, my personality, I had to suffer through some stuff I really thought was just so stupid, and some of it I still do, but I try to keep an open mind and do genuinely find myself surprised at what I learn when trying these things out.
If I stop assuming I already have all the answers and give an earnest and good faith try to some of this stuff, I learn. That's basically the TLDR.