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Habits of Highly Miserable People

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Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#271

Post by [deleted] »

_2d30 wrote: post #212
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amen. I didn't watch your linked video, but I definitely agreed with your post. As someone who has also been highly miserable (aka clinically depressed) in the past, various sentiments along the line of "come on, life is great, why can't you appreciate it?" and "that's no so bad, suck it up" most definitely did NOT help me overcome my depression. Which makes me wonder: if the purpose of this post is to belittle "mise…

Having been both clinically depressed and just generally negative and miserable, I think there's a large difference. This article addresses the latter of those two situations in a way that resonated pretty deeply with me. Clinical depression is drastically different and should be treated more as a disease than a state of mind. I don't believe this article comes across as suggesting its conclusions can treat clinical…

[deleted]

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#272

Post by posterboy »

Draiken wrote: post #268
PascLeRasc wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the first time I've heard the quote, but I think it's to appreciate that life is short and could end at any time, and while bleeding out you'd realize that worrying about these long-term things was a waste of time.

That's not exactly the purpose Stoics do that AFAIK. One of the objectives is to appreciate what you have right now and stopping this urge that we have in today's society to always get more. If you stop and really think about how bad it would be to live without your eyesight, for example, you can appreciate even the smallest things we take for granted. It's not supposed to be a "carpe diem" thing.

> carpo#Latin

> Compare Greek καρπός (karpós, “fruit”) and κείρω (keírō, “to cut off”), English harvest, sharp, shear.

Carpe diem totally fits; You just have to consider that an optimum can be approached from two sides, ie the right time to harvest, neither too soon nor too late. In another sense it might mean the day is ripe, I guess. But it's not cape diem, not take the day away.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#273

Post by unclebucknasty »

_2d30 wrote: post #212
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amen. I didn't watch your linked video, but I definitely agreed with your post. As someone who has also been highly miserable (aka clinically depressed) in the past, various sentiments along the line of "come on, life is great, why can't you appreciate it?" and "that's no so bad, suck it up" most definitely did NOT help me overcome my depression. Which makes me wonder: if the purpose of this post is to belittle "mise…

Having been both clinically depressed and just generally negative and miserable, I think there's a large difference. This article addresses the latter of those two situations in a way that resonated pretty deeply with me. Clinical depression is drastically different and should be treated more as a disease than a state of mind. I don't believe this article comes across as suggesting its conclusions can treat clinical…

Hard to distinguish, as clinical depression produces many of the maligned behaviors, making it reasonable to read this piece as an attack on those suffering.

OTOH, there is a CBT angle here. That is, a depressed person may find relief in working to recognize and change the behaviors and thinking that supports those behaviors.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#274

Post by jamiegreen »

ModernMech wrote: post #47
kristianc wrote: post #27

I’m no expert on abject misery but reading 12pt serif text with a ridiculous line length on an iPhone screen has got to come pretty close.

"14. Be critical. Make sure to have an endless list of dislikes and voice them often, whether or not your opinion is solicited. For example, don’t hesitate to say, “That’s what you chose to wear this morning?” or “Why is your voice so shrill?” If someone is eating eggs, tell them you don’t like eggs. Your negativity can be applied to almost anything."

Oh come on, we can recognise a joke here on HN. We don't have to be serious 100% of the time. It was funny!

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#275

Post by croon »

pokemongoaway wrote: post #173
Latty wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would seriously hope that modern therapists would do their utmost to push back on any idea of virginity as an indicator of human value - an idea that comes from the idea of women as property and successor machines.

It's a value because the more people you've been with the less likely you'll stay with the one you have. However, therapists should be pushing back on the idea that we need to focus on bad things that happened to us in order to be released from them. It is simple enough to see - and one of the reasons why eastern practitioners still laugh at staunch western scientists.

> It's a value because the more people you've been with the less likely you'll stay with the one you have.

Maybe in the same way that "the more food you try, the less likely you'll stay with Mcdonalds".

Being discerning, honest and moving on if things don't work out is much better than the alternative, for everyone involved.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#277

Post by stickdogg »

RIMR wrote: post #111
DoreenMichele wrote: post #104

Give yourself a negative identity I was sexually abused as a child. I spent a total of about 3.5 years in therapy, a year in my teens and 2.5 years in my twenties. Therapy was valuable, but I quit in large part for the above reason: I was at a point where spending an hour or more every week digging around in the dirt of my past was just keeping alive an identity as a victim. It was keeping me stuck. It was keeping me…

I know this is a bit of a controversial opinion, but I always felt that society's reaction to sexual assault give victims a reason to feel even worse about their situation. Not to say that it isn't a severely traumatic thing to experience - it absolutely is. But, we regularly treat virginity as some sort of virtuous status - and then speak of rape victims who lost their virginity to their attacker as if they were str…

Absolutely. Well put.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#278

Post by Draiken »

posterboy wrote: post #272
Draiken wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not exactly the purpose Stoics do that AFAIK. One of the objectives is to appreciate what you have right now and stopping this urge that we have in today's society to always get more. If you stop and really think about how bad it would be to live without your eyesight, for example, you can appreciate even the smallest things we take for granted. It's not supposed to be a "carpe diem" thing.

> carpo#Latin > Compare Greek καρπός (karpós, “fruit”) and κείρω (keírō, “to cut off”), English harvest, sharp, shear. Carpe diem totally fits; You just have to consider that an optimum can be approached from two sides, ie the right time to harvest, neither too soon nor too late. In another sense it might mean the day is ripe, I guess. But it's not cape diem, not take the day away.

I always see this expression being used as some kind of "live life to the fullest" context. Which is what I think is wrong.

Never went after the etymology of it, interesting how it has nothing to do with "seize the day" as I originally thought.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#279

Post by ulisesrmzroche »

throwawaymath wrote: post #222
ulisesrmzroche wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a better exercise. I stole it from Seneca. Look at the back of your wrists: see those fragile greenish-blue veins? What if tomorrow - while thinking about some problem with money or love - you trip and fall, and a particularly sharp rock on the ground or a shard of glass on the street cuts one of those thin exposed blue-green veins open?

What is the reaction you're "supposed" to get by thinking about that? I took a moment to think about it and I don't think I got it. My reaction was, "Well then I probably die", but I don't feel particularly different about the present. If that's the thing I'm supposed to feel then so be it, but I feel Seneca intended for some greater profundity, or he would dispense with the mental theatrics. What am I missing? Does…

That life is absurd and fortune can bring death as easily as peace.

It’s my fault for not putting more time into my comment; it’s more about finding a scenario that scares you: since I also have no fear of poverty or sickness thinking about that does little for me.

An absurd death scares me so that’s ehy I used that, but if losing life doesn’t scare you, then maiming? Like you get hit by a self driving car and instead of losing your life, you lose both eyes, or both your arms, etc. You are also paralyzed now.

Now it’s very hard to kill yourself. Maybe impossible. But if your mind is still at peace, then you are truly wise, and you’ve made good use of your time in the world.

I would be a horrible and mean wretch if that calamity happened to me. I know I’m a mess, and I couldn’t face that future with any poise or grace.

Re: Habits of Highly Miserable People

#280

Post by ulisesrmzroche »

dandellion wrote: post #267
Noumenon72 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I understand about suicide, no little crossways cut on those veins will ever kill you. You have to go up the arm and deep. Humans aren't that fragile really.

I've come up with an alternative version of the exercise that might work better: Look at your feet: see those little toes? What if tomorrow - while thinking about some problem with money or love - you get hit by a speeding 10 ton truck and you die instantly?

That’s good too, maybe make it a self driving car instead.
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