#cognition habitualization

[mentalisttraceur]

One of the biggest improvements I had with the "constantly triggered" problem, about a month ago or maybe closer to two now, was realizing that:

parts of my brain's threat-prediction and how I reflexively run scenarios are the integrated singlet's equivalent of an "abuser introject";

with most abusers, the right solution is not to argue, it's to state your boundaries, ignore their bullshit, maybe leave the situation, and be ready to defend yourself if they escalate to attempted harm - so if the introject is an accurate model of the abuser, you shouldn't argue with the introject either;

to the extent that the brain is trying to prepare for conflict with this person, an optimal abuser introject is at least as capable and persistent as the real abuser, and keeps coming up with the next argument, the next rationalization, the next difficult-to-overcome move that the person might do - so fighting with the inner model of the shitty person is just prompting your brain to escalate;

if your brain still thinks it needs to predict or be ready for an external threat, that's not going to go away no matter how many times you convince/beat the version of the threat in your head.

So this really made it instantly clear for me that my habit of mentally running scenarios of arguments/fights was literally doing more to implement flat copies of the most triggering people I could think of in my own brain, whose whole function was to shittily come at me in my thoughts in every moment such a person possibly could. Also made it clear that it was often no longer productive, because nowadays I have better solutions.

This clarity gave me the last piece I needed to quickly habitualize myself to just acknowledge it as my brain detecting a potential problem from a potential shitty person, maybe feel some gratitude, but otherwise move on and ignore it instead of engaging in the relevant arguments or scenarios in my head.

[mentalisttraceur-software]

For what it's worth, the last time that I rigorously simulated and verified the full logic and state from start to finish of a single expansion of `DEFINE_UNION` from my `tagged-union.h`, it took me many hours of intense thinking.

Obviously some of that cost would be reduced with rehearsal of the cognition. Last time I did it, it was still all slow deliberate effortful conscious cognition, like an implementation in software in an interpreted language. With enough repetition the brain would eventually sufficiently habitualize it into a fast wetware implementation.

But of course the main thinking limit was, as often the case with simulating non-trivial software, human working memory.

For example, I found that by the time I finished rigorously thinking through the expansion of `WALK` and then the first `SCAN` whose rescanning expands `STEP`, I had already lost track of the fact that I was in the rescan of the `REDUCE`, which was in the rescan of `DEFINE_UNION`, so I had a really long confused struggle where I couldn't figure out why just two `SCAN` calls wasn't enough.

Habitualization can only marginally help improve on working memory limits, mostly by making some thoughts faster and automatic, thereby reducing the amount of time that state has to be remembered while thinking deeper down the "call stack" of the thought.

The second one was stamina. You can only think full force for so long before your brain starts kinda slipping off hard work. I seem to have more stamina for it than most, most people seem to need an amphetamine like Adderall to keep going as long as I do, but even I started to run out of steam by the end. Of course, I was also going off on tangents throughout, such as noticing ways to optimize the macros thanks to rigorously totally modeling the expansion mentally, and trying alternative expansions per other interpretations of the standard, but still.

Point being, if you ever find yourself having a hard time following it or figuring out how it works, don't worry, me too.

One thing I hope to do sometime soon to help with that is make a C preprocessor that can yield or pause at each parse and expansion step that it does, and some HTML+CSS+JS GUI for it - would also be generally useful and educational for those who still have to deal with the C preprocessor.

[g8d]

tfw everyone in the system has like vaaastly different ideas about what reality fundamentally is and what it means to be

[despazito]

Idk I have such a fascination with people who coddle and baby wild animals (or even domestic ones). Maybe it's not that deep but I think in some ways it does speak to a lack of maturity in empathy, which sounds counterintuitive but I think its not unlike some forms of unhealthy parenting. It's a cognitive disconnect that perhaps the way you'd like to be treated does not always translate to what others want or feel comfortable with. That maybe your reality is not universal, and an inability to place yourself in another's shoes. People hear low empathy and assume it means distant and unloving, but it can also look like lovebombing or over imposing oneself on others with a lack of boundaries. From the outside it can look loving and pampering and an incredible life, but do they ever really stop to try and get to know the other party, what it actually feels and wants? Are you doing what's best for it, or just what you think is best? Or worse, what you think makes you look best in front of others?

They call animal care professionals who ask for more restraint and less contact with said animals uncaring and cold because they honest to god cannot place themselves in a reality where a kindhearted hug could feel terrifying and a free donut could be horrible for one's survival. And I think information based arguments can fall short because they are primarily operating through emotions and what "feels" right to them. And I think some of these people may be drawn to animals and habituating wildlife because they won't ever tell them off in clean english. Idk it intrigues me

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Three AI insights for hard-charging, future-oriented smartypantses

MERE HOURS REMAIN for the Kickstarter for the audiobook for The Bezzle, the sequel to Red Team Blues, narrated by @wilwheaton! You can pre-order the audiobook and ebook, DRM free, as well as the hardcover, signed or unsigned. There’s also bundles with Red Team Blues in ebook, audio or paperback.

Living in the age of AI hype makes demands on all of us to come up with smartypants prognostications about how AI is about to change everything forever, and wow, it's pretty amazing, huh?

AI pitchmen don't make it easy. They like to pile on the cognitive dissonance and demand that we all somehow resolve it. This is a thing cult leaders do, too – tell blatant and obvious lies to their followers. When a cult follower repeats the lie to others, they are demonstrating their loyalty, both to the leader and to themselves.

Over and over, the claims of AI pitchmen turn out to be blatant lies. This has been the case since at least the age of the Mechanical Turk, the 18th chess-playing automaton that was actually just a chess player crammed into the base of an elaborate puppet that was exhibited as an autonomous, intelligent robot.

The most prominent Mechanical Turk huckster is Elon Musk, who habitually, blatantly and repeatedly lies about AI. He's been promising "full self driving" Telsas in "one to two years" for more than a decade. Periodically, he'll "demonstrate" a car that's in full-self driving mode – which then turns out to be canned, recorded demo:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-video-promoting-self-driving-was-staged-engineer-testifies-2023-01-17/

Musk even trotted an autonomous, humanoid robot on-stage at an investor presentation, failing to mention that this mechanical marvel was just a person in a robot suit:

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/machines/elon-musk-tesla-robot-optimus-ai

Now, Musk has announced that his junk-science neural interface company, Neuralink, has made the leap to implanting neural interface chips in a human brain. As Joan Westenberg writes, the press have repeated this claim as presumptively true, despite its wild implausibility:

https://joanwestenberg.com/blog/elon-musk-lies

Neuralink, after all, is a company notorious for mutilating primates in pursuit of showy, meaningless demos:

https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-pcrm-neuralink-monkey-deaths/

I'm perfectly willing to believe that Musk would risk someone else's life to help him with this nonsense, because he doesn't see other people as real and deserving of compassion or empathy. But he's also profoundly lazy and is accustomed to a world that unquestioningly swallows his most outlandish pronouncements, so Occam's Razor dictates that the most likely explanation here is that he just made it up.

The odds that there's a human being beta-testing Musk's neural interface with the only brain they will ever have aren't zero. But I give it the same odds as the Raelians' claim to have cloned a human being:

https://edition.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/01/03/cf.opinion.rael/

The human-in-a-robot-suit gambit is everywhere in AI hype. Cruise, GM's disgraced "robot taxi" company, had 1.5 remote operators for every one of the cars on the road. They used AI to replace a single, low-waged driver with 1.5 high-waged, specialized technicians. Truly, it was a marvel.

Globalization is key to maintaining the guy-in-a-robot-suit phenomenon. Globalization gives AI pitchmen access to millions of low-waged workers who can pretend to be software programs, allowing us to pretend to have transcended the capitalism's exploitation trap. This is also a very old pattern – just a couple decades after the Mechanical Turk toured Europe, Thomas Jefferson returned from the continent with the dumbwaiter. Jefferson refined and installed these marvels, announcing to his dinner guests that they allowed him to replace his "servants" (that is, his slaves). Dumbwaiters don't replace slaves, of course – they just keep them out of sight:

https://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/behind-the-dumbwaiter/

So much AI turns out to be low-waged people in a call center in the Global South pretending to be robots that Indian techies have a joke about it: "AI stands for 'absent Indian'":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

A reader wrote to me this week. They're a multi-decade veteran of Amazon who had a fascinating tale about the launch of Amazon Go, the "fully automated" Amazon retail outlets that let you wander around, pick up goods and walk out again, while AI-enabled cameras totted up the goods in your basket and charged your card for them.

According to this reader, the AI cameras didn't work any better than Tesla's full-self driving mode, and had to be backstopped by a minimum of three camera operators in an Indian call center, "so that there could be a quorum system for deciding on a customer's activity – three autopilots good, two autopilots bad."

Amazon got a ton of press from the launch of the Amazon Go stores. A lot of it was very favorable, of course: Mister Market is insatiably horny for firing human beings and replacing them with robots, so any announcement that you've got a human-replacing robot is a surefire way to make Line Go Up. But there was also plenty of critical press about this – pieces that took Amazon to task for replacing human beings with robots.

What was missing from the criticism? Articles that said that Amazon was probably lying about its robots, that it had replaced low-waged clerks in the USA with even-lower-waged camera-jockeys in India.

Which is a shame, because that criticism would have hit Amazon where it hurts, right there in the ole Line Go Up. Amazon's stock price boost off the back of the Amazon Go announcements represented the market's bet that Amazon would evert out of cyberspace and fill all of our physical retail corridors with monopolistic robot stores, moated with IP that prevented other retailers from similarly slashing their wage bills. That unbridgeable moat would guarantee Amazon generations of monopoly rents, which it would share with any shareholders who piled into the stock at that moment.

See the difference? Criticize Amazon for its devastatingly effective automation and you help Amazon sell stock to suckers, which makes Amazon executives richer. Criticize Amazon for lying about its automation, and you clobber the personal net worth of the executives who spun up this lie, because their portfolios are full of Amazon stock:

https://sts-news.medium.com/youre-doing-it-wrong-notes-on-criticism-and-technology-hype-18b08b4307e5

Amazon Go didn't go. The hundreds of Amazon Go stores we were promised never materialized. There's an embarrassing rump of 25 of these things still around, which will doubtless be quietly shuttered in the years to come. But Amazon Go wasn't a failure. It allowed its architects to pocket massive capital gains on the way to building generational wealth and establishing a new permanent aristocracy of habitual bullshitters dressed up as high-tech wizards.

"Wizard" is the right word for it. The high-tech sector pretends to be science fiction, but it's usually fantasy. For a generation, America's largest tech firms peddled the dream of imminently establishing colonies on distant worlds or even traveling to other solar systems, something that is still so far in our future that it might well never come to pass:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/09/astrobezzle/#send-robots-instead

During the Space Age, we got the same kind of performative bullshit. On The Well David Gans mentioned hearing a promo on SiriusXM for a radio show with "the first AI co-host." To this, Craig L Maudlin replied, "Reminds me of fins on automobiles."

Yup, that's exactly it. An AI radio co-host is to artificial intelligence as a Cadillac Eldorado Biaritz tail-fin is to interstellar rocketry.

Back the Kickstarter for the audiobook of The Bezzle here!

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/31/neural-interface-beta-tester/#tailfins

[pandemic-info]

Reposting via a redditor; re:

Is there a sound argument for why people aren’t taking this seriously?

Why do they think that way? https://essaysyoudidntwanttoread.home.blog/2022/10/09/why-do-they-think-that/? 7 psychological defense mechanisms used to downplay covid https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1737582325779624059.html? How to hide a pandemic https://howtohideapandemic.substack.com/p/how-to-hide-a-pandemic Cognitive Dissonance & Ableism https://www.tiktok.com/@fka.monstersincooperated/video/7360285749574421802 Anti-social punishment https://www.tiktok.com/@creative.neurospice/video/7269910082769653038 NYT: Why People Fail to Notice Horrors Around Them (helplessness & habituation) https://archive.is/wVL85 [article about the ongoing right to avoid infection. ... how people just can't really face reality due to death anxiety] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/side-effects/202309/how-to-socialize-during-a-pandemic Increased risk-taking behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic: psychological underpinnings and implications https://www.scielo.br/j/rbp/a/TPpQKTwfqTH5Q8qKghRkWpf/?format=pdf&lang=en Cognitive Biases https://www.instagram.com/p/C8TdduJMtKH/ We’ve Hit Peak Denial. Here’s Why We Can’t Turn Away From Reality https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/weve-hit-peak-denial-heres-why-we-cant-turn-away-from-reality/ Difficulties in Understanding Population Risk versus Individual Risk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2X_HRfJpio&list=LLkcwJR5kj80dAQNAT83d1NQ&t=2522s

See also:

Normalcy bias

Semmelweis reflex

Just-world fallacy

Survivorship bias

Compassion fatigue

Sunk cost fallacy

Learned helplessness

Informational social influence

Ableism

Nihilism

[loassbarbie]

philosophy, conciousness, the 4D (imagination) and the world

I am a philosophy enthusiast, specially when it comes to the field of Metaphysics. I consider myself somewhat of an existentialist, and I enjoy reading a lot of Sartre. In several philosophical movements and schools of thought there is an idea about how imagination has a crucial role in our individual understanding, perceptions and assumptions of ourselves, the world and the Universe.

Barthes wrote Camera Lucida in homage to Jean-Paul Sartre’s L’Imaginaire, in which Sartre discusses what the existence of imagination shows about the nature of human consciousness. His conclusion is that because the imaginary process relies on intentionality, the world is constituted not from the outside into our consciousness, but rather we constitute the world based on our intentions toward it (Falkner, 2014).

Yogācāra is one of the philosophical backgrounds of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Its doctrine is summarized in the term vijṇapti-mātra, “nothing but cognition only” which also known as “Consciousness Only” or “Mind Only”. This school advocates the existence of the consciousness and cognitive object. An object that we think we see is an illusion according to Yogācāra School. This illusion is due to our habits. These habits come from our minds. This is for our habitual conditioning that we see that things as real and in different ways. In other words, only the subjective aspect (darsanabhaga) is real, not the objective aspect (nimittabhaga). The object world is merely the transformation of our consciousness (vijnanaparinama) (Barua, 2019).

Barua gives the example of "an itinerant ascetic, an amorous person and a dog, all catch sight of a woman, but they all have three different notions. The ascetic looks upon her as a mere carcass (made up of the five aggregates), the voluptuary or sensualist takes her to be an object of amorous delight while the dog takes her to be something eatable" (Barua, 2019), or a caregiver.

In other words, an object appears in different forms according to the conditioned, subjective state of mind.

Bottomline is, in my humble opinion of course: we perceive the world not as it is, but as we are. Since imagination (that we call the 4D) relies on intentionality, we must free our minds from the way we were conditioned if we want to see changes in our perceptions. And that the way things seem to you (your 3D) is not inherently what they are, but only your perception of what they are.

(Take Control - Kodaline / click the image for the Spotify link of the song)

References Barua, M. (2019). The Doctrine of Perception in Buddhism. The Journal of International Association of Buddhist Universities (JIABU), 12(1), 276–282. Retrieved from https://so06.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/Jiabu/article/view/216911

Grant Falkner. (2014). Roland Barthes’ Camera Lucida: Absence as Presence. Retrieved from http://grantfaulkner.com/2014/08/roland-barthes-camera-lucida-absence-as-presence/

[wraithdance]

Stray Dogs | GHOAP x Reader

Synopsis: You never had a problem with strays, but you should have been wary of the rabid dogs begging to be leashed.

Pairing: Johnny x Avoidant!reader | eventual Ghoap x Avoidant!reader Note: AFAB!Reader, No physical description but reader has background story, no y/n use or gender terms for reader, Reader is LGBT (Bisexual) Content warning: Mature | brief mentions of childhood trauma, avoidant personality, therapy and allusions to mental health issues, passive thoughts of death

Prologue: Foxy Leaves

You told your new therapist that you like putting things into categories because it was fun.

It was half a lie, minuscule really and not enough to be of consequence. You suppose you could have been honest and said the process of grouping things made the endless dread you lived in just a little bit easier.

But you didn’t really like the pitying look Dr. Sanchez gave you when she went over your intake questionnaire. She’d looked down her glasses while you numbly repeated the same spiel about ‘what brings you to cognitive therapy’ that you’d been giving for the last decade. 

You’d google her practice on your lunch break scrolling through the reviews and stuffing the last of your sandwich in your cheeks. In your car before the first session you silently prayed to the empty space that this time you could stick with her long enough to fix you.

You doubt it though because her bob bounces as she nods to your explanation of ‘The Chasm’ and how it came to be. The way that it bounces as she hums, being sure to signify her active listening. It really pisses you off. 

The familiar sense of despair boils hot when you realize that even though this is an unfamiliar office half way across from town, she’s giving you the look. The one of interest, like she wants to crack open your skull and observe your chaotic wiring in hopes to understand what your fucking problem is.

It’s the same one every other therapist has given you since you were old enough to inevitably stop showing up to mandatory sessions without consequence. 

It’s so habitually intolerable that you have a 'Therapist breakup’ text in your notes draft on your phone. It's simple, clinical, contains something vague about not thinking you were compatible as a client. It’s usually enough to keep them from doing a wellness check (or worse a call to your emergency contact.) 

When you’re done talking, Dr. Sanchez reaches for your hand in some gratuitous act of extending comfort. Her cold fingers and the sensation of her half rubbed in hand cream, makes you want to vomit. It must not show on your face because she keeps talking and squeezing your hand.

“I think that it’s brave of you to come in and I think we can work on some of your goals.” She pauses accessing you before she says the thing that signs the death of your therapeutic relationship.

“Do you also want to work on mending the relationship with your parents?”

You ignore the receptionist when she asks if you want to make a follow up appointment. You’re combing through your drafts to find the breakup text when you think that you’re glad you lied about the category thing. Your control issues are yours, precious and responsible for your ability to focus on anything but the heavy weight of being. So fuck her and her stupid fucking bob.

Her contact gets blocked as soon as the message reads delivered.

When you were anxious the familiarity of nature documentaries, specifically the ones about apex predators, were a comfort. Duckie, your best friend of nine years, had been squeamish the first time she watched one of your favorites with you.

It was about big cats in the wilds. The man with the Aussie accent narrated with excitement that belied the violence of seeing a lioness take down a gazelle. From behind the safety of your throw pillow Duckie asked why you like watching stuff like that. You shrugged like you didn’t have an answer.

You did though.

It’s because predators in the wild didn’t hide what they were. They didn’t need to pretend to be anything but carnivorous and survival driven. Would never think to explain to the gazelle that they were sorry for hurting you, but they couldn’t help themself.

It would be even more insulting than being eaten alive. 

You’re relieved when the lioness finishes the gazelle off, letting out a small sigh of 'finally' that earns you a wide eyed look from Duckie. The death was quick and even if the gazelle didn’t realize it, she was lucky. You’ve been on the end of an explanation for harm and wished you’d have the mercy of death instead.

But you couldn’t tell Duckie that. So instead you tease her about being a big baby.

For a few years now you’ve gotten into the habit of assigning everyone you meet an animal that reminds you of them. It satisfied both of your interests and it was fun. It’s how Duckie got her nickname. She’d crowed over the cuteness and tried to hug you before you threatened to bite her if she touched you.

It didn't matter the amount of time you'd known a person you grouped them. The scrawny teenager at the local Tesco was Giraffe kid, The high pitched woman next door with the ugly dog, Chihuahua.

You’re looking at your girlfriend of 3 months, Foxy, thinking how the name works for her better than Taylor does. 

She’s beautiful even while spitting vitriol as she packs her Telfar bag to the brim with stray items she left behind at your apartment. 

When she flicks her hair over a tanned shoulder you’re distracted, remembering how it felt when you gripped the long strands that morning, holding her still and demanding to be kissed. Instead of the soft look she wore then, she’s openly glaring at you now. You know your face is doing the blank thing she hates because she searches it for something. You suppose she doesn’t find whatever that something is because she’s yelling again.

“You make it so FUCKING hard to love you and I can’t do this anymore.”

You're frozen, caught off guard with the remote to the television still in hand as the nature documentary drones on. The ‘what?’ you blurt out is one of genuine confusion, you'd both been cuddled on the couch talking before whatever this was came to be. You wrack your mind trying to remember what the last thing you said was and come up blank. To your embarrassment, you'd been on autopilot the whole morning, so there is a gap in your memories.

Taylor, upon your continued silence makes a sound that can only be described as a screech.

“You always have an excuse why I can’t meet your parents!” She cries exasperatedly, “If you’re ashamed of me I’d rather you just say that over leading me on for God’s sake!”

Your body flinches only slightly when she throws her hands up. You’re still defensive when you bite out a sharp rebuttal that makes her frown and drop your spare key on the coffee table. You don't admit to yourself that you can't remember exactly what you say over the cotton in your ears and the dark corners that sink into your neck at the first display of conflict.

It still stings when she leaves though. You spend the next day crying under your blankets, the pillow she slept on still smells like her perfume. The scent clean and floral, one you'd gotten used to seeking out when you did the laundry.

Fuck, you really did like Foxy. But you suppose you’re going to have to call her Taylor now that she's your ex-girlfriend.  

Duckie laughs at Taylor’s comment when you tell her over brunch. Your effervescent friend’s giggle tumbles out of her uncontrollably, whilst her mimosa in hand, threatens to spill in her lap. She slaps a hand over her mouth when a loud snort escapes against her will. She shoots an apologetic smile to the couple at the table adjacent to yours when they ask her to keep it down. 

You glare until they turn back to their lunch.

Duckie straightens when she takes in your stiff form, having finally realized she’d stepped on a landmine and right into your ire.

“Darling, you certainly don't make it easy to be close to you, you're a bit…” 

She pauses in thought, shifting her glasses on her nose and placing the glass flute down on the table. Today her spectacles are fire engine red with rhinestones on the brim. You’d asked her if she was nearsighted or farsighted once and she’d told you the lenses weren’t prescription. She only wore them to seem a bit older and worldlier when out and about.

 You don't like how long it takes for her to search for an adjective and say so when she still doesn’t finish her sentence after several moments. 

“I just mean that you're purposely closed off,” She makes a panic flapping movement with her hands when your eyes narrow even more “Oh come on! You like it that way!”

“Duckie, what are you talking about?” You grit between your teeth. 

You're pushing your half eaten club sandwich out of the way to lean across the table, waiting to hear her explanation. You’d lost your appetite.

Duckie shirks from your unblinking leer and sniffs indignantly. 

“It took me nearly a year to get you to call me your friend and I swear I still feel like I don’t know you.” she gives you a pointed look, “If it weren't for the fact that you’re like that to everyone, I’d think you hated me sometimes, so I really do have to empathize with Taylor in this one.” 

She’s waiting for you to say something, you can tell by the way she brings her shoulders up to her ears as if gearing for some great big reaction.

But, that wasn’t your style, never had been. So you still don’t know what’s expected of you. To negate her statement? 

You suppose you could tell her that's absurd, she was your best friend in every way. Had been since the day she’d laughed at one of your more tasteless jokes during an intro to Psychology class in undergrad. You were softer for Duckie, more than you were- well really anyone. 

Your own mother only knew enough about you to identify you on a morgue table if it ever came down to it. But you don’t tell her that.

Instead you do what you do best. You leave.

You’re pushing up from the table gathering your purse and throwing back the last of your mimosa like a tequila shot, before you can think twice about it.

Duckie tries to reach out to you but you flinch from her touch. 

“Wait Darling, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, please don't go!”

“I’m just going to the ladies.” you mumble flatly over your shoulder. At least that's what you hope comes out because your throat is closing up with the effort to hold back the stupid tears in your eyes. 

You slam into the restroom startling the barista applying lipstick in the mirror. Her owlish eyes take one look at your dark expression and she pops the top back on her lipstick, skirting past you. You check to make sure the bathroom was truly empty before locking yourself in the biggest stall.

As soon as the lock clicks the dam breaks and it makes you so angry it hurts. The level of intensity of your crying is absolutely repulsive. Your jaw aches with the efforts to muffle the sobs that thrum through your body like a struck chord.

You’re pacing the small enclosure with tears running down your face, feeling like the lioness in the nature documentary after it’d been captured. You feel the gut punch of self loathing as soon as the thought comes up. It's insulting to compare yourself to the deadly beast when you’re trying not to get snot on your dress sleeves. 

Duckie comes to the restroom after a while tapping on the stall door, begging you to open up.

You feel only half guilty when you tell her to fuck off. She’s quiet for a while and you know she stands with only the thin door between you, you can see her colorful converses from beneath the gap in the door. 

You want to let her in. Figuratively. Literally. 

What a relief it would be to just let her crawl into the hole you’ve made at rock bottom and let her be there with you. 

You want to laugh imagining her taking the time to do that rocking thing she does when she's trying to get comfortable in the decorative chair in your office. You always remind her it was meant for aesthetics, not comfort when she huffs out the same grouchy complaint about the hardness. She scoffs in mock offense anyways. 

“Really Darling, you make enough money to get rid of this thing. Ooh let me send you the link to the bean bag I saw on Wayfair, one sec!”

You’re still crying when you consider that she's really the only person who makes the effort to visit you at the office.

Or anywhere really. 

You'd gotten accustomed to only hearing from your family when there was a crisis or need for quick cash to keep them afloat. 

If you weren’t stuffing tissues into your running nose you’d scoff at the thought of your parents caring, much less visiting. They were still content to be fuck ups well into their retirement age. You’d long stopped bothering to call to make sure they were still alive after the first year of college. 

Maybe if you told Taylor that she would have stayed.

The emotional despair rot you call ‘The Chasm’ deepens and you question if you’d ever really gotten used to the loneliness of having no parent to turn to. The years of casual disdain and dismissal. The resentment for being half a child and reluctant third parent to children that weren’t yours. Their desire for all of you and none of you and back again in an endless loop. 

Ceaseless demands of a gluttonous beast you could never please, even when you’ve flayed yourself bare. 

It stings, the reminder that you’d been living on scraps and toughness disguised as love long before you met Duckie. Long before Foxy- Taylor- or even the parade of friends and disappointed exes, who’d simply had enough of whatever caustic matter made you, you. 

Yet, Duckie is the only one who keeps coming back. Time again she comes back to your side with a smile, like she likes to be with you. Like watching nature shows with you on the couch, eating whatever snacks she brings because she knows you forget to eat, acting like it’s the highlight of her day. Never an inconvenience to care for you the way others had said it was. It makes you cry harder until you can’t breathe because you’re trying not to let her hear you.

Duckie in all her color and too big glasses, has always acted as if she can see that weak part of you peeking out from behind the thorns and quick rebuttals bordering on mean. She still stands waiting for you even now, even when you told her to fuck off in public restroom at your favorite brunch cafe. 

It’s staring at the graffiti-ed dick on the stall door when you think you can honestly say you love her and it hurts your feelings that she doesn't know that. 

You think you can be honest and tell her that it’s not about Foxy or even Duckie’s laugh at your expense. It’s about the revolving door of disappointment that still keeps you up at night. That landed you under the microscope on a a faceless therapist's couch for emergency sessions and the mementos of non-slip socks in your dresser drawers.

The half guilt turns into full fledged self loathing just thinking about how you really needed to get a cushion for your office and let her in. After a beat you think you’re in control of your crying enough to reach for the lock inside the stall. Of course, as always the universe is having a laugh at your expense. 

“Darling, I'm going to go back to the table now okay?” 

You know she's making that nervous face scrunch she does when she’s anxious, waiting for you to reply. You can’t, you’re frozen in place as always. 

“Don't want them to think we skipped the tab, so just come back when you feel a bit better, yeah?”  

She says something about her getting the bill and you can talk when you come back. You don’t hear her really because ‘The Chasm’ calls to you first. You keep it together long enough until the scuffling sounds of her shoes quiet before allowing the tide to take you under again. 

Eventually, when you’ve stuffed the feelings back into the pit, you’re able to leave the stall. You never go back to the table. Texting Duckie a simple ‘sorry’ along with a money transfer for your portion of brunch. You leave the restaurant for the safety of your home, wondering if this will be enough for her to leave you too. 

You half hope it is because it was exhausting loving someone else.

An hour later there's a timid knock on your apartment door. It’s opening to peer down at a shuffling Duckie on your steps, with flowers and the expensive bottle of wine you like, that you know that it’s not. Enough to keep her from coming back that is. 

She follows you inside like a chick behind its mother and toes off her sneakers in the hall next to your rows of shoes. She takes your general wave her way as a sign of ‘go ahead’ when she asks if she can put the flowers in water. 

You’re sitting on the couch with your knees to your chest, staring listlessly at the nature channel. You know Duckie is taking in your bare face and faux casualness. You know you look pathetic in your too big hoodie and headscarf. You at least hope you've gotten enough of your makeup off to not look like a drowned raccoon.

'Pathetic', The Chasm says.

Duckie carefully tiptoes over your outstretched legs to scrunch herself small on the other end of the couch. After a few episodes of the documentary, this one about penguins, she slowly makes her way to your side and cautiously gives you a half hug and a tearful apology.

“I’m sorry for being a bitch, I shouldn’t have laughed.” She doesn’t turn from the t.v's glow. You’re secretly thankful she doesn’t look at you because you’re embarrassed for crying again. 

With gentle prodding she asks you to tell her how you really feel about Taylor leaving. You tell her. You also tell her about your parents and why it was such a big deal introducing Taylor to them. It’s more than you’ve admitted to any therapist and she has the foresight to not make it a thing.

Duckie just hums quietly, listening. As she sleeps on your shoulder, drool wetting your sleeve, you think you can carve her a spot beside you in rock bottom. Maybe another inside the space where your heart should be, just big enough for one. It’ll just be you and Duckie for as long as she wants it that way. You’re satisfied with the thought, drinking the last of the wine.

As always nothing you ever want matters for very long.

Because Soap doesn’t give you a choice when he barrages into your life and demands you make additional space for him and his stray dog.

Masterlist | Next >>

[contemplatingoutlander]

THOM HARTMANN: Science Explains Why Republicans Can’t Accept Trump’s Guilt (Sept. 12, 2023)

Scientists discovered a fascinating reason why Republicans can’t accept criticism of Donald Trump. Thom explains.

In the above video, Thom Hartmann refers to a Raw Story column by cognitive neuroscientist Bobby Azarian, PhD (shown below):

Here are some excerpts from Azarian's column:

In 2009, a study published in PLOS ONE challenged our understanding of belief systems. Researchers placed participants into the confines of an fMRI scanner and presented them with a mixture of factual and abstract statements. The results were illuminating. Disbelief, it turns out, is cognitively demanding. It requires more mental effort than simply accepting a statement as true. From an evolutionary perspective, this preference for easy belief makes sense; a perpetually skeptical individual questioning every piece of information would struggle to adapt in a fast-paced world. What does all this have to do with Trump supporters? Well, it’s far less cognitively demanding for them to believe anything their leader tells them. Any challenge to what Trump tells them is true takes mental work. This means there is a psychological incentive for Trump loyalists to maintain their loyalty. (I wrote about this phenomenon in a slightly different context in the Daily Beast article "Religious Fundamentalism: A Side Effect of Lazy Brains?") Molding of belief: neuroplasticity at play Now, let's consider the unique predicament faced by individuals who staunchly support Trump and want him to again become president. From the moment Trump began his political career and his social engineering career, his supporters have been exposed to narratives — Trump doesn't lie, Democrats are communists, the media is an enemy of the people — that emphasize loyalty and trust in their political idol. These narratives often steer away from critical examination and instead encourage blind faith. When coupled with the brain's inherent tendency to accept rather than question, it creates an ideal environment for unwavering allegiance. No matter that Trump, time and again, has been revealed to be a serial liar, habitually misrepresenting matters of great consequence, from elections to economics to public health. For example, in the Psychology Today article "Why Evangelicals are Wired to Believe Trump’s Falsehoods," I explain that the children of Christian fundamentalists typically begin to suppress critical thinking at an early age. This is required if one is to accept Biblical stories as literal truth, rather than metaphors for how to live life practically and with purpose. Attributing natural occurrences to mystical causes discourages youth from seeking evidence to back their beliefs. Consequently, the brain structures that support critical thinking and logical reasoning don't fully mature. This paves the way for heightened vulnerability to deceit and manipulative narratives, especially from cunning political figures. Such increased suggestibility arises from a mix of the brain's propensity to accept unverified claims and intense indoctrination. Given the brain's neuroplastic nature, which allows it to shape according to experiences, some religious followers are more predisposed to accept improbable assertions. In other words, our brains are remarkably adaptable and continuously evolving landscapes. For ardent Trump supporters, residing in an environment that prioritizes faith over empirical evidence can reshape the neural circuits within their brains. [color emphasis added]

[edited]

[mindblowingscience]

Scientists from the US, UK, and Uruguay analyzed data from 378,932 people aged 40 to 69 to see how those who are genetically 'programmed' to nap regularly fared cognitively compared to those who lacked comparable genes. Nappers, they found, had larger brains, equivalent to those who were 2.6 to 6.5 years younger. "Our study points to a causal link between habitual napping and larger total brain volume," says lead author Valentina Paz, a neuroscientist at University College London (UCL). Previous research on adults over the age of 65 suggests daytime dozing improves short-term cognition, with nappers outperforming non-nappers in cognitive tests. The new study didn't record nap length, but prior studies suggest naps under 30 minutes are best, with earlier naps less likely to affect nighttime sleep.

Continue Reading

[writerbuddha]

Okay so I recently saw a reblog to Jedi Apologists refutation of the Jedi being a cult which talked about mindfulness as a bad thing with it’s emphasis on self compassion leading to narcissism (I’m paraphrasing). Anyway, this really didn’t sound right from everything I’ve read about it on various pro-Jedi blogs and have taken away from Star Wars itself. And we’ll when I looked up mindfulness some of the stuff I’ve found went into how the practice has been corrupted by Western capitalism and how Buddhists have criticised the way it’s used too.

So as a practising Buddhist how does Western mindfulness deviate from its Buddhist roots and how do the Jedi use mindfulness in the truest sense?

First of all, people have a tendency to forgot or to actively ignore that there is a difference between these four:

Mindfulness

Meditation

Mindfulness meditation

Being mindful of your emotions

Mindfulness in Buddhism

Mindfulness in Buddhism can be defined as maintaining a flow of voluntarily awareness or attention, holding, bearing something in mind, without distraction, without forgetfulness. This awareness, attention is non-judgmental, not filtering things through subjective opinions, or labeling things as good and bad based on like or dislike. But it entails you to have a clear view of what's happening in your mind, body, and environment, and you can recognize which ways of speaking, behaving and using the mind is conducive to your and to other's well-being, which are afflictive, toxic, harmful to you and to others, and you can do the sensible, compassionate thing.

Buddhist Mindfulness and Western Psychology - mindfulness versus meditation

In the context of Western psychology, "mindfulness" often refers to mindfulness practices incorporated into the Western therapeutic toolkit, most often mindfulness meditation. However, one must understand that even as all forms of Buddhist meditation involve mindfulness, mindfulness is not the same as meditation and not all types of mediation is mindfulness meditation. The Buddha taught his followers to practice mindfulness all the time. It should be clear that one can make Buddhist mindfulness a day-to-day activity, but it would be very difficult to stay in the state of mindfulness as it is defined in Western psychological context.

Mindfulness in the Western context is becoming more fully aware of the present moment and becoming more fully in the present moment, completely and non-judgmentally. It generally involves heightened awareness of sensory stimuli, e.g. noticing your breathing, feeling the sensations of your body, being in the “now.”

Buddhists define meditation as a tool used to habituate yourself to constructive, realistic and beneficial emotions and attitudes, to build up good habits of the mind. It's used to transform thoughts and views so that they are more compassionate and correspond to reality. Some forms of meditation are aimed to develop mindfulness. Whereas in the Western context, meditation is often defined as a set of techniques that are intended to encourage a heightened state of awareness and focused attention.

Therapies incorporating mindfulness practices include: Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), Mindfulness-based art therapy (MBAT), Mindfulness-based pain management (MBPM) and Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MSBR).

The Jedi way: "Be mindful of your emotions"

The Jedi way of being mindful of your emotions in George Lucas' Star Wars is to hold your emotions in calm, non-reactive ("passive") and peaceful awareness. When you do that, you can realize: you are not your emotions. You are not your fear; you are not your anger; you are not your aggression; you are not your hate. They're arising within you, and when you're not mindful of them, you are pulled by them to places where you didn't really want to go. However, when one is mindful of their emotions, instead of being carried by them, one can recognize where fear, anger, hate, aggressive feelings are leading them, and can choose the light path over the dark path: to act with firmness, spacious clarity and compassion.

This kind of mindfulness practiced by the Jedi, the Jedi teachings of "be mindful of your emotions", "be mindful of your thoughts" and that one's mind should be where one is, in what they're doing, are very much identical to Buddhist mindfulness. But it should be noted that even though many Jedi - Qui-Gon, Yoda, the whole council, etc. - and even Jar Jar were meditating, this doesn't mean that they attempted to incorporate meditation into a therapeutic toolkit.

Western pop-culture mindfulness

The Western pop-culture mindfulness is to immerse yourself into the present moment, focusing your full and undivided attention to your experiences, whether it's within you or around you. It lacks the aim to discern what is conducive to your and to other's well-being, and it's just experiencing passively. Most worryingly, it's promoted as a way to increase the pleasures you receive from the present. Eat mindfully, get a massage mindfully, walk mindfully, have sex mindfully etc. And this is profoundly non-Buddhist, because it's all about squeezing out more intense and more lasting pleasure of the things that are coming and passing. When "mindfulness practice" is removed from other Buddhist teachings, guiding us to release our greed, anger, to develop empathy, kindness and compassion, and non-attachment, "mindfulness" could reinforce negative qualities. For example, if one fails to differentiate between self-compassion and self-indulgence, self-care and self-centeredness, they likely conclude that their narcissistic tendencies are self-compassion.

Most worryingly, mindfulness is conflated with mediation and is marketed as some kind of relaxation exercise or stress-reduction technique. But mediation was designed to gain insight and wisdom, not to relax. Also, it's popular to treat it as a tool or as a magical remedy for psychological healing, whereas it wasn't designed to be anything like that. It can powerfully support therapeutic processes, but one must know that Buddhist practice is not a substitute for, say, psychotherapy. And when pop-culture mindfulness fails to deliver, people often believe, what they did to themselves was Buddhism and mindfulness, whereas that wasn't Buddhism or mindfulness at all.

[mentalisttraceur]

One of the things that really frustrates me is that my upbringing has robbed me of a healthy default of confident calm in the face of cues that someone is frustrated or angry.

For now. This too I will overcome.

When I see signs of anger or frustration in others, I can't just feel like an unperturbed observer, I can't just watch or look away with curiosity, disinterest, or amusement. As if their negativity is harmless or unthreatening. I don't get that choice.

Yet. I am terraforming that choice into my mind.

My mind fires off the beginnings of a fight or flight response, I get mentally tense and vigilant and a nasty fear discomfort permeates (unless I am eagerly looking to handle the situation with anger or hostility) before I even get the chance to have any other thoughts about it.

Closer now. Better at catching myself in the moment. Shrinking the average gap between trigger and me flowing into the bypass canal towards calm confident presence. Reducing how much conscious thought it takes.

[thejockout]

A Word On Dumbing Down

In some conversations with my bros @avissapiens and @master-villain the other day, I finally managed to put a specific idea into words that had been crystallising for a long time. Nothing earth-shattering or even transformative, because I'd been exploring this same understanding with different wording for quite a while now, but it felt significant to me and sparked me to make this post.

The realisation was simple: Dumbing Down is not something you can "Do" as a standalone action. It's perhaps more accurate to say Dumbing Down is itself the perspective shift and realisation that "Smart" is something you can choose to "Not Do."

Clunky wording, I know, but pretend it's smooth for me.

(And as a necessary fyi, this post assumes familiarity with Dumbing Down as a hypnotic concept, which is nowadays most often written and spoken about as a general simplification of thought and cognition versus turning you into some drooling doofus. Maybe the latter is your thing, maybe it isn't - either way, I'm talking here about the more "realistic"/AKA sustainable model where the word dumb is synonymous with "so laid back, you don't want to think or care if people perceive you as dumb because of it".)

Too many subjects (myself included) work at hypnotic personality and cognition changes with a straining effort, in an energetically desperate approach. This is understandable - we tend to push hard for things we really want - and anyone can fall victim to it. It's very similar contextually to the trap many anxiety sufferers fall into when they begin therapy. In an earnest attempt to recover, many sufferers approach recovery with the exact same mindset they do life; that of a "fixer", a "do-er", someone who problem-solves and overthinks themselves into knots and runs loops around the same well-worn mental tracks over and over again to the point of exhaustion.

Don't worry, I'm not here to give some big-brain solution to mental health issues. I suffer myself and am on my own journey of recovery, so I'm in no place to play armchair psychologist. But I will speak about this topic as it relates to hypnosis and dumbing down because the overlap of people who are into Dumbing Down/IQ Reduction/Simplification/Bimbofication/Himbofication hypnosis and who suffer with anxiety (and overthinking) is quite high, so chances are that many who struggle with Dumbing Down suggestions are making the same mistakes. Please see my peer-reviewed Paint Diagram below which provides unequivocal, non-anecdotal proof of this.

IMO, there's nothing wrong with this overlap. Kink is an outlet for many people to deal with emotional issues, and often a very helpful coping mechanism. Dumbing Down is no different conceptually. But I'm talking about this because, just like approaching anti-anxiety work with an anxious energy and effort is doomed to failure, the exact same is true for Dumbing Down. Approaching it with an Intellectualist mindset OR in other words, the anxious energy of a fix-er and do-er and try-er is antithetical to the very state you wish to experience.

Does that make sense?

Successful Dumbing Down (beyond the very enjoyable, shorter-term effects of deep trance which feel like intoxication) is effectively the act of stepping back from mental action/the habit of overthinking. To give another clumsy metaphor, if your default mind works like a toy train constantly running around its track, sometimes gaining speed and sometimes slowing down... Dumbing Down comes from realising "hey, I can actually plug this thing out." No, it's not as simple as turning off an appliance, and it takes time for everyone. Overthought (in all its forms, whether anxious or just from over-intellectualising your life) is effectively a habit, and habits take time to make or break.

Therefore, Perspective Shift #1 that you need to make: recognise that thinking patterns and their frequency are ultimately behavioural and habitual, and can therefore be rewired and lessened with time and specific action. It's not an immediate thing - but it is possible, and this is effectively what dumbing in hypnosis is about.

That perspective raises some questions, I know. But I don't want to write about the answers just yet. Reread and consider that last paragraph a few times to make sure you've really processed it. Think about the questions it leaves you with, and come up with a few answers of your own if you can. You can post your thoughts in the comments or reblogs of this post, as I will be taking the time to read through them, and I'll continue this topic in future as I think more on it myself.

Later.

[sosayset]

July 3, 2024

While Republican party members band together to try and elect to the office of President of the United States a pitiful and feeble man pushing 80 years old, a man who is a likely pedophile with strong and well-known ties and connections to Jeffrey Epstein (with some implied incestuous undertones as a likely pedophile), a libel sexual abuser and rapist, a charity and business fraud, a multiple time business and real estate failure and fraud, a five time draft dodger, a felon convicted of 34 crimes and accused of over 50 more, along with dozens of guilty misdemeanor convictions throughout his entire life alongside the recent felony convictions and accusations, a habitual and pathological liar, and also very likely a possible traitor who might have committed wanton treason, Democrats are doing the opposite.

No rallying, no fortifying, no backing the incumbent. No, the Democrats are seemingly trying to call on their strongest and best candidate to step aside and step down because he "looked and sounded too old" for a very select 90 minutes of the last 4 years, while trying to respond to a verbal firehose of uninterrupted and unchallenged lies by the news media and debate "moderators" last week, and it is pathetic.

You can google "Newsroom Opening Scene" for the reference to this paraphrase, but "if liberals and Democrats are so smart, why do they lose so goddamned always."

Above is the reason why.

The most deplorable people in this country are rallying around quite possibly the worst candidate possible to ever run in any election at any level, and convincing the most vulnerable, stupid, and ignorant people they can find that it is in their best interest to vote along with them, even if means stripping those same voters, along with all of the rest of us, the basic tenants of freedoms, our fundamental rights, and even our own right to exist and live; mostly doing that convincing to simply to increase their own personal wealth, and power, and control of the people, all at the expense of those freedoms and rights being repealed.

They are rallying around someone suffering from extreme cognitive decline who is more unfit to serve in office than any other option, ever, and rallying without hesitation or doubt, en masse.

And all of this is happening while the other side is splitting off into small little factions committed to infighting, questioning, and doubting one another and the possible nominations, which, of course. more than opens the door to being beaten and losing like they always do.

I am going to put this plainly; there needs to be a commitment and complete dedication to reelecting Joe Biden to the office of President from everyone of any substance, character, decency, dignity, and intellect in this country. Period and full stop. I do not care what your opinion is of him, his age, his record in office before President, or the like; he is the one and only last best shot left to keep the most unfit and most dangerous candidate ever put forth, the one being championed and never doubted for a moment by his circle of support and enablers for any of the dozens of valid reasons there are, out of office.

This is absolute facts, and when I say this, know and understand that I am right, and there are dozens of reasons why each is true, are as follows:

If you are a woman, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you have a daughter, or a sister, or a niece, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are a person of color, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are gay, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are trans, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are poor, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are middle class, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are in a union or work a union backed job, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are a student or an educator at any level, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are a senior citizen, or would like to plan on becoming one in the next ten to fifty years, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are a doctor or a scientist or a highly educated member of your chosen field, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are an artist, a writer or author, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are a journalist, especially an independent journalist not beholden to the mainstream media committed to electing the felon, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are active duty or a veteran, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden. If you are an immigrant or a naturalized citizen who is legally eligible to do so, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden.

And if you KNOW anyone who is any of these things, at all, at any level, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden; and if you still won’t, you need to have the courage to look ANYONE of these people in the eye and explain exactly why you would use your vote to disenfranchise them, to marginalize them, to endanger them, to harm them, to punish them, and even to accept why you would knowingly do it to yourself, as well, because you likely find yourself among any of those people, as well, because, like it or not, if you value American ideals and freedoms, liberty and justice for all, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden.

Quite literally, if you are anyone EXCEPT Convicted Felon Dnald J. Trmp, it is in your absolute best interest to vote for Joe Biden.

And the sooner you realize that, the sooner you commit to that, and the sooner you tune out ANY outside influence that would suggest otherwise, and this means voting straight blue on every ticket, every election, every year, until this existential threat from the ultra radical right is gone forever, too, the better off you, and all of us will be.

Have a very Happy rest of your Third of July and enjoy the holiday weekend.

Except for maga.  Fuck you all, forever and always.

[yurizzsblog]

Quirks For Your Character(s):

Physical Quirks

Twirls Hair When Nervous: A character might habitually twirl or tug at their hair when they’re feeling anxious or deep in thought.

Fidgets with Jewelry: Constantly playing with a ring, necklace, or bracelet.

Unique Laugh: A distinct laugh that stands out, whether it's a snort, a high-pitched giggle, or a deep belly laugh.

Facial Expressions: Always raising one eyebrow, squinting, or having a habitual smirk.

Unusual Gait: A peculiar way of walking, like a pronounced limp, swagger, or bounce.

Behavioral Quirks

Obsessive Tidiness: Has to arrange everything neatly and symmetrically.

Compulsive List-Making: Makes lists for everything, from groceries to daily tasks, to life goals.

Late-Night Snacker: Routinely sneaks into the kitchen for midnight snacks.

Collects Odd Items: Collects something unusual, like antique keys, bottle caps, or comic book memorabilia.

Speaking in Riddles: Often communicates in riddles or cryptic sayings.

Social Quirks

Avoids Eye Contact: Struggles to make eye contact, often looking away during conversations.

Overly Polite: Uses excessively polite language, even in casual situations.

Interrupts: Frequently interrupts others without realizing it, out of excitement or impatience.

Unintentional Eavesdropper: Tends to overhear conversations unintentionally and often reacts to them.

Social Media Obsession: Constantly checks and updates social media accounts, even during important events.

Cognitive Quirks

Trivia Buff: Has an extensive knowledge of random trivia and loves to share it.

Over-Analyzer: Overthinks and analyzes every situation or decision in detail.

Photographic Memory: Remembers minor details and facts with astonishing accuracy.

Synesthesia: Experiences synesthesia, such as associating numbers with colors or sounds with tastes.

Daydreamer: Often gets lost in daydreams and has a vivid imagination.

Emotional Quirks

Overly Optimistic: Maintains an overly positive outlook, regardless of circumstances.

Grudge Holder: Holds grudges for a long time and finds it hard to forgive.

Easily Embarrassed: Blushes or gets flustered easily, even over small things.

Fear of Commitment: Has an intense fear of committing to anything, from relationships to decisions.

Laughs in Serious Situations: Involuntarily laughs or smiles during inappropriate times, such as serious conversations or tense moments.

Unusual Habits

Eats in Alphabetical Order: Eats food on their plate in alphabetical order or in a specific sequence.

Talks to Objects: Frequently talks to inanimate objects, like cars, plants, or appliances.

Carries a Lucky Charm: Always carries a specific item for luck or comfort, like a lucky coin or a special pen.

Personal Rituals: Has personal rituals, like tapping the doorknob three times before leaving the house.

Quirky Greetings: Uses unique greetings or farewells, such as a signature handshake or catchphrase.

Dressing Quirks

Always Wears Hats: Rarely seen without a hat, and has a large collection of different types.

Mismatch Socks: Intentionally wears mismatched socks as a personal style statement.

Signature Color: Always wears something in a specific color, like red shoes or a blue scarf.

Vintage Clothing: Prefers to dress in vintage or retro clothing styles.

Seasonal Accessories: Wears accessories that match the season, like snowflake earrings in winter or flower brooches in spring.

[aanesthesiia]

[HYSTERIA CANON - SCP-173 REWRITE.]

ITEM #: SCP-173

LEVEL-2 -- RESTRICTED

CONTAINMENT CLASS: EUCLID DISRUPTION CLASS: VLAM/KENEQ RISK CLASS: WARNING

Special Containment Procedures: SCP-173 is to be contained within Site-19's Anomalous Art & Humanoid Containment Wing, and is assigned a reinforced-concrete chamber. When personnel assigned to cleaning duty enter SCP-173's container, no less than three (3) persons may enter at any given time and the gates must be relocked behind them. Two (2) persons must maintain direct eye contact with SCP-173, while one cleans the surface area of SCP-173’s chamber, until all personnel have vacated and relocked the chamber.

Description: SCP-173 is an animate cognito-hazardous statue resembling a human composed of concrete, rebar and traces of spray paint with an atypically high concentration of isobutyl acetate (C6H1202). Its primary anomalous characteristic is its mobilization and hostile, predatory behavior towards any biological organism in the vicinity that exceeds a certain threshold of intelligence. However, when visually observed by such organisms, the anomaly becomes immobilized and temporarily activates its secondary, cognitive-damaging effects. These secondary effects are:

mild paranoia, anxiety;

subtle, unpleasant olfactory hallucinations.

These effects occur, intensify sequentially, and immediately subside when line of sight is broken. These effects typically don’t result in permanent damage to the psyche and are relatively easy to treat.

SCP-173 is also capable of instantaneous acceleration. It retains momentum when immobilized, allowing it to resume movement as if it had never stopped. SCP-173 has been observed to reach record-breaking speeds aswell, traveling roughly 22 meters a second (= 50 mph / 79 km/h) when unobserved.

SCP-173 is highly aggressive and prefers to target isolated, vulnerable individuals, presumably for an advantage as suggested in later interviews beginning from 1997 (ADDENDUM-01-1997). In addition, SCP-173’s preferred killing method is by snapping the neck at the base of the skull or violent strangulation. SCP-173’s preferred means of traveling is via the ventilation system and on foot.

The reddish-brown substance the anomaly produces resembles a mixture of bio-waste in texture and odor; the origin of these materials is unknown and exclusively manifests ectoentropically in rooms it is in while out of sight. The enclosure must be cleaned on a bi-weekly basis. Sounds of scraping stones originating from within the container are heard when no one is inside. This is considered normal, and any change in this behavior should be reported to the acting HMCL supervisor¹ on duty.

DISCOVERY: Moved to Site-19 in 1993. Origin is as of yet unknown, suggested to be an art piece constructed by an unknown sculptor who belongs to a sub-sect of GoI-2979 (“Are We Cool Yet?”) which focuses on Dadaist principles, instigating the breakdown of logical superstructures and coherency.

ADDENDUM-01-1997: As of 1997, it has been revealed that SCP-173 could participate in limited verbal communication after repeated attempts to initiate a conversation with the anomaly. Interview logs are to be added.

Note: SCP-173 has become habitually verbally aggressive and refuses to offer any information pertaining to its origin and purpose. Interviews have been indefinitely suspended and stricter containment procedures have been implemented.

REFERENCES USED: SCP-173-B DOCUMENT FROM SCP-5K. ORIGINAL SCP-173 DOCUMENT.

NOTES: ¹ “HMCL supervisor” is a role akin to the lead researcher working on an SCP. They are in charge of said SCP and control almost everything involving it. They deal with everything related to it and what course of action to take.