Pickax

Use all of these negative things you see to your advantage. Go to this gym because you know it's the place you should be. Focus on the fact that it's where you should be when you're thinking about all of the issues that might come up. A possible example: "It sucks that my ex is gonna have to deal with seeing me at the gym while I kick ass and take names. I almost feel bad that she has to be a first-hand witness to how awesome I am after we've broken up." Obviously I'm being sarcastic cause that's kind of a lame way to say it, but you get the idea. I'm not sure if you've read The Fountainhead or not, but if you have, think of how Howard Roark handled the obstacles that got in his way when he was designing a building. He recognized the obstacles but never thought of letting them stop him. They were just one other problem to solve in his design. Think of all of this as just another part of your training. I don't know anything about MMA but I assume you do workouts. Would you just not do a workout because it seemed too hard? My guess is you'd work up to it until you could handle it with no problem. This is no different. If you need to be there for a shorter amount of time than you would normally because things are bothering you, do that for a while but be sure to go for longer the next time or whenever until you work up to being there as long as you want (again, possibly a bad example due to my ignorance of MMA). If you really want to do this then do it. Don't even entertain alternatives.

You're absolutely right. That was a horrible phrasing error on my part. It was an over-generalization when I didn't mean one. I meant to say what you said but screwed it up pretty bad. When I meant people would need to take care of themselves I didn't mean vigilante justice or simply there should be gun-toting citizens in an anarchist society. What I said probably did sound more like something bordering on anarchy and that's not what I meant. I don't think that there's anything wrong with protecting this girl at all. Like you said, the way it's being reported, there is objective evidence she's in danger and law enforcement should do its job of protecting her. Thanks for clearing it up.

I think I understand where you're coming from, but there are a few points in your post that confuse me: Murder is illegal in every state and county that I know of in the United States so I don't think anyone in this country permits this. You are absolutely correct that the police are not very good at protective or preventative activity. Many rights would need to be violated for police to be good at preventative activity. The government would allow no privacy to its citizens if it wanted to prevent crimes. I don't represent the opinion of Objectivism or anyone else on this forum when I say this because it only comes from my understanding: the government is not there to protect its citizens preemptively but to ensure justice is delivered after a crime is committed. The citizens of a country would need to protect themselves anyway no matter how much the government infringed on their rights in an attempt to protect them. There are already many channels people can go through if they are the victims of domestic abuse in any form that range from police action to charity work. If people are careful about who they associate with, are prepared to defend themselves, and use the proper channels in law enforcement when necessary then they are quite safe from domestic abuse in any form. This obviously does not protect them from random crime from strangers but there are many ways to lower your odds of being a victim though that is not the current discussion. I don't mean to in any way "call you out" but I know it can be disheartening reading stories like this. I just want to reassure you that there are many ways people can protect themselves in the United States. There are many things wrong with the government the way it is now but law enforcement does get some things done right.

I obviously don't know your situation but getting away from the ex would definitely help. "Out of sight out of mind" is not absolutely true and should probably be "out of sight a little less likely to be on the mind" because it does help. Additionally, if you can't physically get away from her (she's at work or school or something), just try to ignore her being there. Try to see her as any other person because that's essentially what an ex-significant other is. The commitment and connection you had isn't there anymore so why keep the negative aspects of it? Why worry about someone who provides no benefit for you? What do you have to lose? It's easier said than done, but with some conscious effort you can get over her and not let her affect you. Every time you start thinking of her or what she does, immediately come back to the fact that you no longer have a connection to her. Don't think that just because you have a certain reaction each time you see her that you have to succumb to your automatic thoughts. The more you do it, the less it will affect you. Once you're no longer hurt by your ex, other people won't affect you as much and eventually they won't affect you at all. It will take some effort but it will certainly be worth it in the end.

I can't help you with the main topic of this post but I can help you out with this. Don't let other people's morality affect you. If you made a decision to act a certain way based on reasonable thought then there's no reason to doubt unless provided with actual evidence to the contrary. Consensus doesn't make truth. Everyone else in the world may agree on something and they may be wrong. I can't think of an example where literally every person on the planet agrees on something that is wrong (or really that everyone on the planet agrees on at all) but you can see where the idea goes. Introspect about your own decisions and don't worry what everyone else is doing. The only way you'll miss out on anything is if you make rash decisions or decisions based on what other people think you should do.

I'm generally the same way. I used to be in a band where I wrote all the music and I could never get inspired or even force myself to write anything. Almost all of my songs were written in the hour while I was waiting for my band mates to arrive. Deadlines work extraordinarily well. Making self-imposed deadlines is a good strategy for getting things done. It's good even for small things. I usually have to tell myself I'm going to go grocery shopping on a certain day by a certain time or else it will be so ridiculously crowded I'll never get it done. It's stupid, but it's the only way it works. I know some people are self-motivated enough to be able to spontaneously get things done. I'm not like that, unfortunately, and haven't figured out how to make myself like that. Self-imposed deadlines seem to be the way to go. Just decide you need to get things done by a certain time. As long as you're not lounging about all the time and you're not actually unproductive I can't see how it would be a problem. Additionally, I was more productive before college. In high school I could self-start a little bit. Much better than I can now. I'm not sure if that will change after graduation or not, but I guess it just takes some effort to change regardless. You may find that it's easier to operate even if you don't have a deadline after college. Maybe not. That "heat of a big battle" bit rings extremely true for me, though. Some of us just function better under stress. I guess it's more convenient than being unable to function under stress. At this point I'm rambling. I should have put a deadline on the end of this post.

Several anti-conceptuals I've dealt with have been diagnosed with clinical depression. Others show many of the signs of it. Some even dabble in using reason, but the ones who do tend to experience such extreme cognitive dissonance that it drives them to depression. Anti-conceptuals who don't attempt to be reasonable usually get through the day a little more easily. With the type of great minds that are around and have so heavily influenced the life we live today, I think it's easy for an anti-conceptual to get through the day. Even in a "bad" economy, there are still many jobs which the vast majority of people can work. All they need is a little money and they can easily just go to the grocery store and pay rent in an apartment that is taken care of by a landlord and maintenance crew. Getting married just requires finding someone willing to deal with them (my guess is it would often be another anti-conceptual). From there, having kids is easy. Anti-conceptuals are not necessarily completely unintelligent. I think in modern society they can function fairly easily as far as making money and getting their needs met. The primary thing they miss is that they rarely produce anything original and they tend to face a high likelihood of depression. This is definitely not to say that everyone who has depression is anti-conceptual or that all anti-conceptuals show signs of depression. It's just a trend I've noticed and it stands to reason. As far as where the fear comes from, I had trouble understanding that. What I come up with is that fear of the unknown comes up whether a person recognizes it or not. Ultimately, the anti-conceptual fails to understand what happens in the world and why. Even if they try to ignore that, the fear it creates in a person is hard to ignore.

This does seem to be one of the most common examples of arrogance I see today. It is also a frustrating thing to deal with. When being able to think independently and make a judgment on something has become so basic to you, it's difficult to imagine that someone else wouldn't understand it. I find I almost have to reset myself and think back through the seemingly easy steps I took to get to a conclusion. It's not difficult to do, but it is awkward to retrace your steps but do it more slowly when you don't need to. Going by those definitions arrogance must be a bad thing because it implies an incorrect assessment of one's own abilities. It would also imply that the wrong assessment is intentional but I might be reading into that too much. Could anyone clarify that? Obviously it wouldn't be wrong if it was wrong based on unintentional ignorance but it would be wrong if one intentionally dodged the reality of his or her abilities or merit.

Would it be more in your self-interest to set up a charity or some other program to help disabled people or to work hard yourself to have the financial wealth or some type of skill to take care of yourself should you become disabled? It seems like working hard for overall independence by being able to pay for things or perform the tasks you can't or don't want to pay for takes care of this problem itself. Part of the reason I work to make money and save some is for if something bad happens to me that I couldn't control. A severe physical disability is more of a financial burden than my car breaking down but both are a type of disability. Financial independence is a more efficient way to handle this. Someone might be more interested with setting up a charity or the like instead, though, I don't know. I think charity can be performed in the same way that rational people would join law enforcement: working to remove something they see as bad from society. With law enforcement, a rational person would want to work to remove injustice. In charity a person would get pleasure knowing they were working to remove something like cancer or MS for personal reasons. To the original question, in a society where government is funded by voluntary donations, it seems highly probable that a relative or friend of a disabled person could help out. From what I understand, that doesn't contradict any principle of Objectivism. If the person values the disabled person they would want to help him or her out and would gain joy or relief from it.

I gave a little background in my "Introducing Myself" post but this might be a good place to go into some more detail. I'm only 21 so my journey hasn't been very long. When I was very young (just past 10, I guess) I had been going to church with my parents for quite a few years. I was raised Lutheran and I bought in to a lot of it. I thought self-sacrifice was the right way to live and all that, although I always had reservations about it. Being young and seeing the alternative as being doing drugs and robbing people made it seem like religion wasn't so bad. By the time I was about 14 I realized there had to be alternatives. I couldn't get into the fact that I was supposed to suffer all the time. On a microscopic level I also saw how inefficient working for the collective was: I was heading up a few rock bands and when I was the most capable musician and songwriter out of them everyone complained and wanted things to be "equal." I realized the more I put into things, the more people wanted the profit from it. So I started doing things more on my own and was a lot happier with that. I started to go through the phase I think a lot of young Christians go through where "organized religion" seems wrong, but there's some sort of spiritual presence that is right. That didn't sit well with me either, though, and was extremely short-lived. I'm not big on compromises (as opposed to knowing something for sure and sticking to it) and I figured I should either be committed to a set of beliefs or not and I had essentially dropped the whole thing. I went to a Catholic school from 3rd grade on so it was thrown in my face all the time. It helped me figure things out, though, because I saw the hypocrisy of the whole thing too. When I was 16 my girlfriend read The Fountainhead for a class at school and said Howard Roark reminded her of me (I don't have red hair so I'm hoping it was one of his other good qualities ). A year or two later she gave me the book as a Christmas gift. So I read it and loved it and felt like it fell in line perfectly with everything I thought. I was still young, though, and I didn't understand it as well as I should have. Some remnants of religion stayed with me all the way up until I was 20. The only thing that really stayed with me between 16 and 20, though, was that I should do the right thing and not compromise on that despite what anyone else might tell me. I realized that was actually contradictory to religion and that I had been operating on my own moral code the whole time which also contradicted Christianity. I guess I misunderstood Objectivism and Christianity both at this point. However, I had far more in common with Objectivism than Christianity. My most obvious mistake was that I thought the two could coexist. I read Atlas Shrugged and started to better understand my errors. It cleared things up for me in a lot of ways. I already thought in a similar way to the ideas expressed in the book but it helped organize them and help me realize that I was trying to ally myself too much with Christianity because I thought Christianity was something it wasn't. Everything else had run through my mind in one form or another. It becomes difficult at times when I deal with the people around me because most either have extreme Socialist tendencies or are totally wrapped up in Christianity. After reading Atlas Shrugged I had more confidence in dealing with these types of things, though. My family is still pretty wrapped up in Christianity but even my parents seem to look to me as someone who knows better and they're usually willing to listen to me and often come to similar conclusions. I only mention my thoughts on politics and religion with them when they're directly asked, though, and I find that tends to make people more interested in them. My thoughts on general philosophy are pretty clear to them by how I act and how I deal with things and there aren't many questions about how I stand on individualism and the like. Bet you never thought 11 years could run on so long, huh? I hope it gives some insight of the journey from Christianity to an interest in Objectivism, nonetheless. My self-esteem has improved immensely since I adopted Objectivist ideals. I'm much happier and more able to deal with others now as well. I don't consider myself an Objectivist yet since I'm still learning but I've been practicing the fundamentals in some way most of my life. Once I had a better idea of what I'd known my whole life, though, it improved my life in a large number of ways.

Hello everyone, I've been reading a few threads on the forum for a few days and decided I'd register as this seems like a great place with a lot of great people. I'm looking forward to possibly getting into a few discussions and learning more about Objectivism. It seems appropriate to give a little background on myself for an introduction, so I'll give you that: I first heard of Ayn Rand's work in high school when my girlfriend read The Fountainhead for a class and said Howard Roark reminded her of me (after I read the book I realized how large of a compliment this was). She said she knew I would like the book and the ideas in it so she bought it for me and I read it quickly. I loved it, but having read it so quickly and being young (though I guess I'm still young) I didn't grasp the depth of the philosophy of Objectivism. The book did get me interested though, and I was open to learning more. Not long after this, my girlfriend got me Atlas Shrugged and I was hooked. I knew that I had had similar fundamental understandings as those that were presented in the book. So I decided to really pursue learning more and I looked this forum and various other sources up. Obviously I'm still learning and I can't call myself an Objectivist yet as I'll have to put more time into understanding a few things, but I'm very interested in all of it. In addition to introducing myself, I wanted to say "Thank you" to all of the people who got this forum running and keep it running. The moderators do an excellent job of keeping the level of quality of this forum high and the site itself is designed well. So I hope I have properly introduced myself. I look forward to future discussions. -Pickax