Lost Whyspers

I've been pondering a lot about what I live for. What gives meaning to my life? That seems like an important question to answer. Yet sometimes it feels like a trick question that will absorb all your time trying to figure out. That maybe it is best to just do what you can with little things in daily life and little wins here and there and not worry about that big question. Sometimes I think I have an answer and it motivates me for a time. Maybe not always the full answer, but I get a feeling like I'm on the verge of knowing the answer and if I just pursue it down a certain path, it will become more and more clear. But then things overtake me and I soon forget where I'm going. Is it getting any better the longer I live? I have this hope and faith that it is. So even though I've failed so many times in the past, I have become more experience and wise hopefully that when I get on the path again, I'm be better prepared to follow through. And that will my experience and ...

Watched movie Everything Everywhere All At Once Still trying to process what it means to me Particularly liked a part where one character talked about how others might see him as weak However he uses kindness and positivity as his way to fight against despair in the universe Started playing Diablo 3 again a little Christmas weekend went okay

I finished reading Yes to Life: In Spite of Everything by Viktor Frankl. It really spoke to me as it has to many others. I wanted to quickly quote a paragraph from the end of the book that particularly addressed something that I've been thinking a lot about lately. It is terrible to know that at every moment I bear responsibility for the next; that every decision, from the smallest to the largest, is a decision “for all eternity”; that in every moment I can actualize the possibility of a moment, of that particular moment, or forfeit it. Every single moment contains thousands of possibilities—and I can only choose one of them to actualize it. But in making the choice, I have condemned all the others and sentenced them to “never being,” and even this is for all eternity! But it is wonderful to know that the future—my own future and with it the future of the things, the people around me—is somehow, albeit to a very small extent, dependent on my decisions in every moment. Everything I...

Trying to be positive and thankful Almost finished reading Yes to Life: In Spite of Everything by Viktor Frankl Still learning guitar Feels like slow progress Getting better at the 3 chords I'm working on Fingers don't hurt as much Still hard to switch between them Trying to get through little tasks Finished up some tasks that were tugging at me Want to chat more with people Though also afraid for some reason Feel afraid of starting things up? Feel afraid that I can't consistently reply? Why should this matter so much? Again, I think mostly I'm just afraid of having too much to think about Yet I need a release When things are going smoothly, I'm afraid to make waves Yet that is probably when I should be taking more chances I need to make myself more comfortable with confrontation And with choices and making decisions

Listening to philosophy podcasts Philosophize This! #126 - Gilles Deleuze pt. 2 - Immanence Existential Stoic Podcast - "The Republic" by Plato Existential Stoic Podcast - Reevaluating Suffering & Stress Jordan B. Peterson Podcast 291 - How to Combat Hedonism | Dr. Peter Kreeft Sunday Stoic 292: Memorize the Stoics with Dr. Kevin Vost Still struggling with balancing hope and despair Considering playing game like RimWorld or Stellaris Seem popular among FoL members Started playing tennis again Oh yeah, it's Halloween today 🙂 Made me recall times in Mobile Legends Miss those times somewhat, yet know I shouldn't return to that Couple more games starting up on FoL Chair of Deception game unfortunately canned since not enough players Not sure if I should join one or both of these new games EDIT: Adding note after listening to Jordan Peterson podcast mentioned above Dr. Kreeft says something about how our free will is all interconnected Good choice you make now will ...

Moving forward Prepared some things for future progress Brainstorming further ideas Time passing so quickly Need to stay focused and not go off on too many tangents at once Watched episode 6 of Rings of Power Enjoying this series I've read people criticize how it departs from Tolkien's actual lore Still enjoying it and not thinking too much about that Need to figure out audiobooks to listen to Even re-listening to some would be good Listening to Making Sense podcast Making Sense #291: Where is Happiness? Buddhism term "metta" translates to "loving kindness" Buddhism term "mudita" translates to "sympathetic joy"

Feeling kind of strange today Almost like I'm starting to get sick Maybe just a little queasy from nervousness Feel lost  Probably good I didn't join FM game yet Too much going on to focus yet Feel like things are settling and yet they aren't So much yet that is changing or could change suddenly Didn't reply much yesterday Really should today Just don't feel like getting into more discussions on things Having difficulty viewing problems as "challenges" Everything seems to take longer than expected Often more issues crop up But this should be a good thing, right? Gives me more to do and challenge myself? 🙂 The point is the path and not the destination, right? I'm trying to convince myself of this... Music helps

I can't focus!!! Need to just keep it to small steps! Going to try listening to Stoic podcasts again Sunday Stoic 285: Oikeiosis Sunday Stoic 286: Meditations X.1-3: Align Your Natures Sunday Stoic 287: Part of the Whole. Meditations 10.4-10.6 Sunday Stoic 288: Meditations 10.7: Change is not Evil Sunday Stoic 289: Meditations 10.8 How to find the Fortunate Islands Sunday Stoic 290: Wise Up With Karen Duffy

I want to be good at things. I want to put my effort into trying something and learning to be better. However, I still feel this hesitation for some reason. I've believed this was a hesitation related to realizing that I can never be perfect at something, so part of me feels it useless to even try. Why is that? Over the years I've realized every so often that I just have to let it go. Have to let go of the desire for perfection. Even for thinking that things could ever be perfect in any given area of life, like safety or comfort or anything. Yet even though I realize the obviousness of this, I still find that there is a part of me wishing that it could be otherwise. I do wish for there to be some master plan behind everything. That there is someone in control who knows what they are doing. That life is a story that has a plot and will have a good conclusion.

Sometimes I want so badly to complain Especially about an injustice or unfairness But if the complaining does nothing, should I? If it is just venting? Or is it better to endure in silence? I know the frustration has to be released But perhaps other forms of release like meditation are better than venting Often when dwelling on unfairness in my head, I find myself just going in circles and circles Why do some people with insecurities choose to take them out on others? While other people learn to become more empathic towards others? As I've lived life, I feel I've become better at seeing things through the eyes of others Even when I don't necessary have the same exact problems or to the same degree, my imagination is developed enough where I feel I can picture what it must be like Sometimes I feel this strongly enough that it makes me cry Sometimes I even worry about thinking on such things too long since it can hurt my soul Continuing to watch Shade's gaming streams wit...

Started off crazy busy today Felt like so many demands all at once Too much responsibility How could I ever handle being a hero? How could I decide between 2 competing needs? Need to decide which takes priority Always hoping for some way to "save" both Learning to think outside the box Learning to prioritize more quickly WindwardAway joined mod team on FoL Good choice Sometimes feel jealous of WWA She's so cool in many ways Happy for her Pondering choices Realize it's usually better to simply go with 1st choice for decisions that don't matter much Like choosing coffee or food or whatever Don't dwell too much Sometimes 2nd guess myself and think I might regret 1st choice Now tell myself oh well that's fine Also realize need to ponder things ahead of time before decision time Need to figure out my general principles so they guide me quickly at critical points Learning to short-circuit analysis paralysis

Started post Friday on dealing with difficult people Don't think I'll manage to finish it That day I had to separately deal with 2 difficult people and their blow-ups Situations were still somewhat ongoing People I've had issues with before Unfortunately can't do anything to avoid dealing with them Could feel myself getting depressed and feeling so overwhelmed Like it was end of everything good again Stopped myself from going too far down Realized I could work through it Just needed to handle things calmly Things worked out fairly well Learned my cousin has cancer She's gone through other difficulties in her life recently already Feel so bad for her Can't help feeling a bit relieved that I'm not going through that Feel grateful for what I have Feel less worried about my own problems Is it good or bad that other people's problems can make us feel better about our own? What if a scapegoat of sorts is necessary for us to put things into perspective? For us ...

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ SPOILER ALERT! This contains spoilers for  Elantris  by Brandon Sanderson. I finished reading Elantris. It was an amazing read like Sanderson's other stories. I loved all the main characters. I do hope Sanderson gets around to continuing this series. I particularly liked some of the ideas the story focused on, like hope. Raoden was a source of hope for those around him. It was infectious. And even when everything seemed in despair towards the end, Galladon couldn't help but retain that hope even if he wished it would go away. There was again the idea of not knowing someone and assuming things that turn out to be false or even completely the opposite. This has made me consider my own assumptions about people and situations. I want to cultivate this source of wisdom. While it's true that my assumptions may turn out to be correct, and possibly in all likelihood, I think it is still wise to take the time to question those assumptions. So even when I am correct about the...

Continuing to play Mobile Legends Vulgard joined my squad Played game with Sassy and Cleez Their baby is already 2 years old! Feel bad for not asking more Want to learn new Edith hero Continuing to read Elantris Saw that they were doing the gift exchange for FoL Wanted to join, but felt bad for not doing something creative Saw really cool slideshow Min put together for Chloe Feel bad about not talking more with Constantyne Installed some graphics software on laptop Want to learn some stuff Still thinking of best PBF game to host on FoL Not sure if Betrayal at House on the Hill will be too complicated New BotF game already starting up on FoL Timing was perfect to allow me to sign up first as traveller Really don't want to be Demon again 🙂 Chatted with Vulgard again Learned that he plays DR roleplaying on Discord Works on creative writing for that Couple days ago I allowed my anger to get the best of me Ended up making mistake Mistake was also partially due to neglect at paying att...

Not sure what to expect from this week Still worried about another incident coming up unexpectedly Still so much to do Need to take it step by step Continuing to watch Sword Art Online: Alicization Another incident did come up just now Luckily was able to resolve it quickly Really was nothing Just a certain person trying to make problems out of nothing Continuing to listen to Existential Stoic Podcast Hosts are kind of dorks and say a lot of cliché things over and over However I find this still useful Discovered that just listening to same stuff from various people is good Sometimes gives different perspective Even gives chance to rethink things I've overlooked Above is another recent piece from WLOP

Man, I'm such a bad Stoic 😔 Letting my emotions have too much sway over me Need to be more Stoic More like a Jedi 🙂 Considering how to work on myself in this area Watching some inspirational videos I saved to my phone helped me recover Thinking about how much worse things could be helped Still playing SINoALICE Still uncertain whether to continue Only continuing for Senate guild Good people Want to help them have fun together Slowly getting organized more Making small steps Continued with Chinese studies Practiced characters Practiced vocabulary

On the Breadbox server, they were taking a moral alignment test based on the alignments in D&D. Moral Alignment Test I often like taking such tests. I got the following result. I feel like this is a good result for me. It matches well for how I see myself. I particularly like the description given.

Yesterday I was listening to an interesting podcast from  Sam Harris  on free will titled  Final Thoughts on Free Will . I think he's written a book on free will and has discussed it in other podcasts, so I might see about finding those. Anyway, Sam was saying that it's not a matter of deciding between whether things are deterministic or whether we have free will. His position is that the concept of free will itself is actually flawed. He says that thoughts really just pop into our head. Either the thoughts are based on our state of being at that time or they are random. If we the former, then the system is deterministic. If we think the latter, then really randomness has nothing to do with choosing like we normally think of with free will. So if we really think about it, free will makes no sense. We never really view things from an outside perspective where we actively choose what we think or what we want. I can somewhat agree with his point, though Sam didn't reall...

Helping to host Orangevitational game on FoL Starting to get less enthused with BGA Still fun and still plan to play some Recently liking Lords of Xidit Surprised I enjoy Splendor so much Trying to get back into reading again Continued with Rhythm of War Continued with Thinking in Bets Listened to interesting podcast from  Sam Harris  on free will Final Thoughts on Free Will Started writing here, but then decided to write separate blog post about it

Discord finally added a profile banner Changed mine to my whisper banner Also set the new About Me text Recently heard about philosophical idea Rawlsian Veil of Ignorance Nice to see my nieces playing chess together I taught them a couple years ago I'm not very good myself I mentioned I could teach them poker sometime Poker more fun because of bluffing and the unknown