The whole thing in a relationship is that you have to be ready to admit that youre not always right, and don't always know what's best. That's why I like the term "partner," cause if you pick a good partner, you'll form a duo that's much more capable and efficient at accomplishing tasks and reaching goals, as most big decisions become micro-scale informed consensus.
heh, I saw DC universe talked about and thought I was in the gaming thread, back to life after divorce, but that is something you can do get involved in a MMO ^_^
The whole thing in a relationship is that you have to be ready to admit that youre not always right, and don't always know what's best. That's why I like the term "partner," cause if you pick a good partner, you'll form a duo that's much more capable and efficient at accomplishing tasks and reaching goals, as most big decisions become micro-scale informed consensus.
Also isn't that analogous to any relationship (not just "relationships"). Like you plus friend/business-partner/spouse/coworker/boss/subordinate is greater than the sum of the parts. If it's done right. And worse if done wrong.
Why do you need someone to push you? If I know and want to do X, I do X. No pushing required. If I don't want to, and don't believe I need to do X, no amount of pushing will make me do it. I guess if I had a lack of willpower it would be helpful to have someone force me do things, like my mom forced me to do things as a child. I don't really need that at this point in my life.
I will consider it as an issue that you've mentioned on a recent podcast about people being depressed or not accomplishing anything. Even if Netflix makes you happy, if you sit around all day and your just content watching Netflix, even if it just dulls the pain and not help you overcome it, you need that extra push to actually overcome the adversity. And most of the time, it's someone else who gets the ball rolling.
@ Steve - Actually, dunno which model. Assume crappiest. Used. No peripherals.
I just want to play DC Universe and that Resistance game w/o spending more than five hundred dollars, because I need to have my back shaved and I don't know how much that will cost.
You just need to make sure the PS3 has a large enough hard drive to accommodate those games, since the DCU Online installation is about 20GB I believe.
Ok well I guess it can also work where neither person ever admits to being wrong heh.
Also isn't that analogous to any relationship (not just "relationships"). Like you plus friend/business-partner/spouse/coworker/boss/subordinate is greater than the sum of the parts. If it's done right. And worse if done wrong.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
Tesla Coil? Van de Graff generator? Jacob's Ladder? Full-on Organic Lab Distillation Apparatus?
Ro, these are all things I'm seriously considering. Very serious, in fact, about guitar and bagpipes.
As said before, I already have a foosball table in teh orifice.
I vote for lab glass. That way, if law stops being interesting, you can break bad.
EDIT: No but seriously, lab glass is totally cool and has a huge variety of very legal applications, but be aware that any "full-on organic lab distillation [and reaction] apparatus" look incredibly suspicious to many people. Especially if you have stuff like liebig condensers, soxhlets, kuhlrohrs, or multiple-neck reaction flasks. Which is a shame, because I want to collect those things like some collect baseball cards.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
Well there are multiple things, and while what you say is true, I think it's slightly different from what Scott was referring to. I think that sometimes people know what needs to be done, but don't feel like they can do it (or something else otherwise), and that's different from the perspective or intuition angles.
Edit: Basically, not everything is simply about gaining additional knowledge through these things. Sometimes it's just about getting certain feedback, and that's sufficient to bolster someone else.
So I'm saying Scott's still wrong on this, but your proposition is not necessarily the only answer to his question.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
In what way am I not constantly being challenged?
Wow, you really just don't get this.
That's why I'm asking, but you people aren't answering.
Because, just maybe, they'll push you into something you wouldn't have thought to try otherwise.
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
In what way am I not constantly being challenged?
Wow, you really just don't get this.
That's why I'm asking, but you people aren't answering.
Alright, here's a thought exercise:
Tell me all the things you don't know.
It's logically impossible. For the same reason that you can't prove a negative, you can't know how you're not being challenged until you are challenged in that way. Now, from whence do challenges arise? You might take stock of yourself, and decide, "Hm, I'm not being challenged in this way," but your ability to self-analyze is inherently limited. You are also biased towards yourself, so your perspective is necessarily flawed.
Aha! Think of it like a distributed computing problem - Folding@home or something like that. You have X capacity to invent challenges as a person. Your X may in fact be greater than many other people's capacities, but there's still a hard limit because of biology.
At some point, you will effectively hit your peak ability to acquire new challenges on your own, and that may be well below your capacity to deal with those challenges.
So, instead of just relying on your own ability, you farm out the generation of challenges and the acquisition of perspective to other people. Now you have a much greater capacity to generate challenges for you, because you've tapped that distributed network.
In no way does this also stop you from attempting to improve yourself. So you get much greater efficiency by using other people's extra "processing" cycles for your own purposes. Yes, you have to give up some of your own to do that, but what you get in return is much greater than what you could've done on your own.
I AM THE SCOTT ROBOT. I HAVE OPTIMIZED MY SUBROUTINES. SUPERIOR PROCESSOR ENABLED. ... ... ... ...BUT I AM ALONE.
Or surrounded by the gigantic FRC family, you know, out in the real world beyond forumland. ;^)
Also, just to note, I don't have any of these problems either, and I've seen most relationship problems (both mine and those of others) coming a mile away. ^_~
Ok, sure thing Pete. But how does having one significant other of the opposite sex who also provides the sexy times bring these challenges in a way that having close friends and family does not? What is so valuable about such a relationship that I should be willing to make a stupid life decision, or form that relationship with an incompatible person?
Other than biological desires, why should I make it such a high priority to find such a person? Rather than maintain my plan of taking an opportunity if a person appears, but not putting any effort into seeking someone out. Why would another person?
I AM THE SCOTT ROBOT. I HAVE OPTIMIZED MY SUBROUTINES. SUPERIOR PROCESSOR ENABLED. ... ... ... ...BUT I AM ALONE.
Or surrounded by the gigantic FRC family, you know, out in the real world beyond forumland. ;^)
Also, just to note, I don't have any of these problems either, and I've seen most relationship problems (both mine and those of others) coming a mile away. ^_~
I think for a lot of people, we see everyone else's problems, but our own. And even if we see our own, we rarely are able to take the impact to an exact level. For Scott, I just wonder if he acknowledges the power of online friendship with a system as good as FRC.
Edit: This post was in response to the conversation about people needing the involvement of others to get motivated. Not about "intimate relationships" exclusively.
- - - - -
I think I might understand Scott's perspective on this. Mine is similar. I'm just accepting that I don't quite understand the way other people think. I'm lucky in that I have two younger brothers that are both similar enough to me and wired completely different from me, so I think I've gained enogh experience so-far that I can sort of grasp at comprehending everyone else.
For me, motivation is an arbitrary thing. I pick a thing, and decide that's my motivation. I called this self-motivation for a time, but some people mean both this and some other types of motivation (any motivation that keeps the self going maybe?) with that term.
My first younger brother seems to work entirely on feedback. He's happy with himself when people are happy with him. He seems to feed entirely off of what other people want him to do. This changed slightly when he had a daughter, now he's motivated almost entirely by what he wants for her. But up until that point, he strictly operated as a motivation sponge of sorts. For the longest time me and this brother really didn't get along because I could not comprehend him because it was like he lived in an ocean and I lived on the land... mentally. Or maybe I lived in space. Probably that.
My second younger brother doesn't operate like that. He operates and takes motivation largely based on his visceral enjoyment of a thing. When things make him feel good, he reacts. We could maybe hypothesize that it's all just brain chemistry, and so he feels out where he wants to go. He wants to feel excited directly. Maybe he's just the most animal of the three of us and really just wants dopamine reactions and such in his brain. I can't be entirely certain. But that's how I kind of tell myself it might work, in order to comprehend him.
I'm just accepting that I don't quite understand the way other people think.
I do accept that I don't understand the way other people think. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to try to understand.
What boggles me the most is that I can explain to someone else how I think. But these other people can't even explain to me how they think! They don't even know themselves. Even when I ask directly, they fail to asplain. "Y U DO DIS?" "IDK!" "How you not know? You is doing it!"
Ok, sure thing Pete. But how does having one significant other of the opposite sex who also provides the sexy times bring these challenges in a way that having close friends and family does not? What is so valuable about such a relationship that I should be willing to make a stupid life decision, or form that relationship with an incompatible person?
Other than biological desires, why should I make it such a high priority to find such a person? Rather than maintain my plan of taking an opportunity if a person appears, but not putting any effort into seeking someone out. Why would another person?
The amount of time in contact with the person provides a different set of challenges. But, honestly, if you don't feel the need for a single intimate partner, then there's no need to have one. I'm talking more broadly about the utility of relationships.
However, you are missing out on specific chemical reactions by not engaging in those kinds of relationships. I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing, but your life experience is literally incomplete without it.
All I can say is that a romantic relationship provides a different specific situation, and as we are bags of machinery that change and adapt to situations, you are limited by not having those relationships.
How do you know who's compatible or not until you try it out?
But I'm also not saying you need to have a romantic relationship. Nobody really needs to do anything. Maybe it's not what you're after. Maybe you don't think you could handle the added complexity. Maybe you don't need the added complexity. I'm not you - I can't answer those questions.
EDIT:
But these other people can't even explain to me how they think!
It's because we're speaking different languages, more or less. There is a gulf of understanding that cannot be crossed, because we're dealing with brains that work in very very different ways.
Comments
You need other people for perspective, Scott.
What you just said is, "Why do I need to be challenged?" Internal challenge is only one form of challenge - the equivalent of doing solo puzzles. A relationship challenges you in the same way that another player challenges you in a game - it forces you to respond to things that would not have arisen had you been the sole driving force.
EDIT: No but seriously, lab glass is totally cool and has a huge variety of very legal applications, but be aware that any "full-on organic lab distillation [and reaction] apparatus" look incredibly suspicious to many people. Especially if you have stuff like liebig condensers, soxhlets, kuhlrohrs, or multiple-neck reaction flasks. Which is a shame, because I want to collect those things like some collect baseball cards.
...
...
...
...BUT I AM ALONE.
Edit: Basically, not everything is simply about gaining additional knowledge through these things. Sometimes it's just about getting certain feedback, and that's sufficient to bolster someone else.
So I'm saying Scott's still wrong on this, but your proposition is not necessarily the only answer to his question.
What do you see? =P
Tell me all the things you don't know.
It's logically impossible. For the same reason that you can't prove a negative, you can't know how you're not being challenged until you are challenged in that way. Now, from whence do challenges arise? You might take stock of yourself, and decide, "Hm, I'm not being challenged in this way," but your ability to self-analyze is inherently limited. You are also biased towards yourself, so your perspective is necessarily flawed.
Aha! Think of it like a distributed computing problem - Folding@home or something like that. You have X capacity to invent challenges as a person. Your X may in fact be greater than many other people's capacities, but there's still a hard limit because of biology.
At some point, you will effectively hit your peak ability to acquire new challenges on your own, and that may be well below your capacity to deal with those challenges.
So, instead of just relying on your own ability, you farm out the generation of challenges and the acquisition of perspective to other people. Now you have a much greater capacity to generate challenges for you, because you've tapped that distributed network.
In no way does this also stop you from attempting to improve yourself. So you get much greater efficiency by using other people's extra "processing" cycles for your own purposes. Yes, you have to give up some of your own to do that, but what you get in return is much greater than what you could've done on your own.
Also, just to note, I don't have any of these problems either, and I've seen most relationship problems (both mine and those of others) coming a mile away. ^_~
Other than biological desires, why should I make it such a high priority to find such a person? Rather than maintain my plan of taking an opportunity if a person appears, but not putting any effort into seeking someone out. Why would another person?
- - - - -
I think I might understand Scott's perspective on this. Mine is similar. I'm just accepting that I don't quite understand the way other people think. I'm lucky in that I have two younger brothers that are both similar enough to me and wired completely different from me, so I think I've gained enogh experience so-far that I can sort of grasp at comprehending everyone else.
For me, motivation is an arbitrary thing. I pick a thing, and decide that's my motivation. I called this self-motivation for a time, but some people mean both this and some other types of motivation (any motivation that keeps the self going maybe?) with that term.
My first younger brother seems to work entirely on feedback. He's happy with himself when people are happy with him. He seems to feed entirely off of what other people want him to do. This changed slightly when he had a daughter, now he's motivated almost entirely by what he wants for her. But up until that point, he strictly operated as a motivation sponge of sorts. For the longest time me and this brother really didn't get along because I could not comprehend him because it was like he lived in an ocean and I lived on the land... mentally. Or maybe I lived in space. Probably that.
My second younger brother doesn't operate like that. He operates and takes motivation largely based on his visceral enjoyment of a thing. When things make him feel good, he reacts. We could maybe hypothesize that it's all just brain chemistry, and so he feels out where he wants to go. He wants to feel excited directly. Maybe he's just the most animal of the three of us and really just wants dopamine reactions and such in his brain. I can't be entirely certain. But that's how I kind of tell myself it might work, in order to comprehend him.
What boggles me the most is that I can explain to someone else how I think. But these other people can't even explain to me how they think! They don't even know themselves. Even when I ask directly, they fail to asplain. "Y U DO DIS?" "IDK!" "How you not know? You is doing it!"
However, you are missing out on specific chemical reactions by not engaging in those kinds of relationships. I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing, but your life experience is literally incomplete without it.
All I can say is that a romantic relationship provides a different specific situation, and as we are bags of machinery that change and adapt to situations, you are limited by not having those relationships.
How do you know who's compatible or not until you try it out?
But I'm also not saying you need to have a romantic relationship. Nobody really needs to do anything. Maybe it's not what you're after. Maybe you don't think you could handle the added complexity. Maybe you don't need the added complexity. I'm not you - I can't answer those questions.
EDIT: It's because we're speaking different languages, more or less. There is a gulf of understanding that cannot be crossed, because we're dealing with brains that work in very very different ways.
Would you have a relationship with a female version or clone of yourself?