No longer chronically suicidal, suicidality more sporadic and it’s a rather dull urge mashed up with conflicting other urges
Renewed interests in cryonics. Hmmm...
Writing, being open socially and back pain exercises are clearly improving my mental health.
Attending an outpatient mental health clinic. Approaching their upper age limit and will probably graduate to the clinic downstairs. They are helpful, but less helpful than services attended in the past like the university mental health clinic. Psychologists recently made clear that the notes shes been taking don’t contain the secrets to the universe, she doesn’t even study them after sessions, and are basically inconsequential. I’ve wasted lots of time here. Sunk costs, it’s hard, make a decision.
Relationships
Met a string of promising people lately. Two in particular stand out: 1 guy and 1 girl.
1 crush, it’s been a while. Insta-crush on the aforementioned girl. Opened up immediately about it to friends, which is a first. Plan to open up about it to girl in question when I next see her after soliciting and contingent upon her attitudes to affection and emotional vulnerability.
Low sex drive. Occasional sexual urges, ritualistic nightly sexual compulsion. It’s interesting the girl I’m crushing on is asexual..
Nutrition
Appear to be meeting my RDI’s for nutritents and micronutrients based on crude aggregations of my daily dietary intake and the NHMRC reference values
Still low weight and receiving unsolicited concerns and advice over my weight form an ecclectic mix of people
Not losing or gaining weight
No plans to change dietary strategy: will continue to eat when hungry, from the same selection of foods
No bullshit diet, except occasional chocolate or misc. treats at moments of weakness: rationalising it as ‘gaining weight’ - watch out for that!
Fitness
very poor. Nah, that’s a lie. It’s probably above average just not impressive. It’s probably your mental health telling you you’re not fit enough.
working towards getting fit enough to make the entry requirements for a reference defence force (a little harder than Australia’s) for goal-post purposes, rather than joining that military. That option is specifically excluded, despite the fitness gains, because travelling to that country would be neccersary for an interview with no guarrantees, and quickpacing to those fitness req’s would potentially cause injury. By the time I expect to get that fit (~1.5 years), the opportunity cost of a fixed minimum period of service should be untenable given hopes I have for my future
Leg pain still an issue when running. Not performing rehabilitation exercises as prescribed but half-assed attempts are made everyday. BIggest issue is probably motivation. however, motivational videos seem to have diminishing marginal motivational utility every time, and seem to be ‘narcisstic supply’, for lack of a less psychoanalytical term. No reference research or professional opinion seems to support or oppose this opinion but caution is urged.
Health
delayed sleep phases. Keep pushing commitments into the afternoon. If someone says you’re inflexible, tell them it’s medical.
Back pain is gnarly. Performed back pain exercises as prescribed for first time in months yesterday after a few days of desperate exercising in order to relieve quite bad pain lasting a few days from not taking exercises seriously for a little bit. The pain seems to have coincided with some standoffish behaviour and feeling really shoddy by memory and psychologists account. Causal? Just don’t let this happen again. Be diligent, exercise.
Otherwise in great physical health. No troubles to speak of. Be grateful!
Finance
Very low liquidity after yolobetting most of your savings into stocks (there’s a whole discussion post I made about this). Once a gambler always a gambler. You’re hemmoraging money but your strategy was for long term gains, so as dumb as the move was, the smart move is to hold your grain and don’t panic. Aim to sell in 2025. If nothing else, this will keep you from ‘investing’ in cryonics. And, you still have way more disposable income than you use.
No income other than allowance from parents and welfare from government
Employment
No employment, gainful or otherwise
Indicated to social worker that I’m interested in doing peer-worker type work. If nothing else, my mental illness differentiates me from other job canidates so perhaps it can be a strength.
Also expressed interest in doing a gardening apprenticeship. Will it be bad for my back? Will exposure to herbicides and pesticides occupationally be bad for my mental health and chronic pain?
Negligible interest in the topic of my unpaid research at uni. Not sure research lyf will be flexible enough for episodic mental health issues either. It’s stressful too, and I already exhaust my mind on mental health personal stuff already! At least it’s another dead end. So is politics, for the same reasons, and the additional stress burden it will have due to the adversarial nature and laddeness with compromise, uncertain and career instability. Not that academia doesn’t have career instability too...
Should I be applying for grad jobs? I probably wouldn’t like them anyway. Unless they were finance were I can yolobet professionally, and with some training behind me. Ok, do that, apply! Probably won’t get them anyway but at least I can say I tried
Education
Almost out of grad school. Wahoo! That was....better than the alternative. But now, you are fucked. Sink or swin in the job market. Just grind your way out of the research work you have for yourself then never look back. Sunk cost yes, but you can’t change the past, and the hardest parts are behind you. Plus, this could open up doors to lobbying...go and contact some people who work in that area, or the organisations that employ them, and see what they make of you...
Social network
Pretty awesome on this front. It’s just too big and compartmentalised right now. You want trim the fat and consolidate networks. Introduce people to one another. You have lots of cash and nothing to do with it, so throw dinner parties and stuff, and shout them all It will be better than buying them gifts cause people seem to freak the fuck out when you do that. Shouting food and venues is a great way to go.
Impression management
Internet footprint
Email accounts:
2 university A email accounts (active)
1 university B email accounts (inactive)
2 hotmail email accounts:
1 outlook email account
1 gmail email account (all others forward to this email account)
That’s a lot of accounts, but there’s no easy way around this. Email still gets sent through each of them and it would be such a hassle to manually switch things over, email people back saying email me at this new account, and just waiting for some email that’s coming from an unexpected source, which may not come through for months or years (and is drastically important!). Oh, if you’re an entrepreneur, please fix this problem for me and I”ll throw money at you.
Social media:
facebook: people still asking me to like stuff, still lots of bullshit distractions in feed (do something about that), unappealing photos on wall (hide them)...wait, no don’t hide them! It took you so long to become less fragile and scared to be open on facebook. The rule is, you can only be MORE transparent, you are never allowed to go back. In fact, just for thinking that, go and make some things that were visible to only me, visible to public now!
angellist: meh
youtube: meh
blogspot (inactive): meh
geni (managed by family member): I feel like my privacy is being violated. Fuck you family, ask for my permission first before expanding my internet footprint.
Possibly useful—Running with the Whole Body. I got good results (I had arches for quite a while, need to do the exercise again) from the one about the connection between hips and ankles, but you might want to skip the first one, which is self-observation while walking. Both I and someone I recommended the book to found it was too difficult.
Uncommon Sensing—a free Feldenkrais exercise every month. I’ve generally found them to be excellent, but December’s was (I think) much too difficult for most people. The advantage of the site is that you don’t have to chose from the large number available.
Thanks Nancy. Neither is available at my university library! Argh, but the online reviews are glowing to say the least. Can’t find a pirated version either online :P
Quarterly life report: 2016
Mental health
No longer chronically suicidal, suicidality more sporadic and it’s a rather dull urge mashed up with conflicting other urges
Renewed interests in cryonics. Hmmm...
Writing, being open socially and back pain exercises are clearly improving my mental health.
Attending an outpatient mental health clinic. Approaching their upper age limit and will probably graduate to the clinic downstairs. They are helpful, but less helpful than services attended in the past like the university mental health clinic. Psychologists recently made clear that the notes shes been taking don’t contain the secrets to the universe, she doesn’t even study them after sessions, and are basically inconsequential. I’ve wasted lots of time here. Sunk costs, it’s hard, make a decision.
Relationships
Met a string of promising people lately. Two in particular stand out: 1 guy and 1 girl.
1 crush, it’s been a while. Insta-crush on the aforementioned girl. Opened up immediately about it to friends, which is a first. Plan to open up about it to girl in question when I next see her after soliciting and contingent upon her attitudes to affection and emotional vulnerability.
Low sex drive. Occasional sexual urges, ritualistic nightly sexual compulsion. It’s interesting the girl I’m crushing on is asexual..
Nutrition
Appear to be meeting my RDI’s for nutritents and micronutrients based on crude aggregations of my daily dietary intake and the NHMRC reference values
Still low weight and receiving unsolicited concerns and advice over my weight form an ecclectic mix of people
Not losing or gaining weight
No plans to change dietary strategy: will continue to eat when hungry, from the same selection of foods
No bullshit diet, except occasional chocolate or misc. treats at moments of weakness: rationalising it as ‘gaining weight’ - watch out for that!
Fitness
very poor. Nah, that’s a lie. It’s probably above average just not impressive. It’s probably your mental health telling you you’re not fit enough.
working towards getting fit enough to make the entry requirements for a reference defence force (a little harder than Australia’s) for goal-post purposes, rather than joining that military. That option is specifically excluded, despite the fitness gains, because travelling to that country would be neccersary for an interview with no guarrantees, and quickpacing to those fitness req’s would potentially cause injury. By the time I expect to get that fit (~1.5 years), the opportunity cost of a fixed minimum period of service should be untenable given hopes I have for my future
Leg pain still an issue when running. Not performing rehabilitation exercises as prescribed but half-assed attempts are made everyday. BIggest issue is probably motivation. however, motivational videos seem to have diminishing marginal motivational utility every time, and seem to be ‘narcisstic supply’, for lack of a less psychoanalytical term. No reference research or professional opinion seems to support or oppose this opinion but caution is urged.
Health
delayed sleep phases. Keep pushing commitments into the afternoon. If someone says you’re inflexible, tell them it’s medical.
Back pain is gnarly. Performed back pain exercises as prescribed for first time in months yesterday after a few days of desperate exercising in order to relieve quite bad pain lasting a few days from not taking exercises seriously for a little bit. The pain seems to have coincided with some standoffish behaviour and feeling really shoddy by memory and psychologists account. Causal? Just don’t let this happen again. Be diligent, exercise.
Otherwise in great physical health. No troubles to speak of. Be grateful!
Finance
Very low liquidity after yolobetting most of your savings into stocks (there’s a whole discussion post I made about this). Once a gambler always a gambler. You’re hemmoraging money but your strategy was for long term gains, so as dumb as the move was, the smart move is to hold your grain and don’t panic. Aim to sell in 2025. If nothing else, this will keep you from ‘investing’ in cryonics. And, you still have way more disposable income than you use.
No income other than allowance from parents and welfare from government
Employment
No employment, gainful or otherwise
Indicated to social worker that I’m interested in doing peer-worker type work. If nothing else, my mental illness differentiates me from other job canidates so perhaps it can be a strength.
Also expressed interest in doing a gardening apprenticeship. Will it be bad for my back? Will exposure to herbicides and pesticides occupationally be bad for my mental health and chronic pain?
Negligible interest in the topic of my unpaid research at uni. Not sure research lyf will be flexible enough for episodic mental health issues either. It’s stressful too, and I already exhaust my mind on mental health personal stuff already! At least it’s another dead end. So is politics, for the same reasons, and the additional stress burden it will have due to the adversarial nature and laddeness with compromise, uncertain and career instability. Not that academia doesn’t have career instability too...
Should I be applying for grad jobs? I probably wouldn’t like them anyway. Unless they were finance were I can yolobet professionally, and with some training behind me. Ok, do that, apply! Probably won’t get them anyway but at least I can say I tried
Education
Almost out of grad school. Wahoo! That was....better than the alternative. But now, you are fucked. Sink or swin in the job market. Just grind your way out of the research work you have for yourself then never look back. Sunk cost yes, but you can’t change the past, and the hardest parts are behind you. Plus, this could open up doors to lobbying...go and contact some people who work in that area, or the organisations that employ them, and see what they make of you...
Social network
Pretty awesome on this front. It’s just too big and compartmentalised right now. You want trim the fat and consolidate networks. Introduce people to one another. You have lots of cash and nothing to do with it, so throw dinner parties and stuff, and shout them all It will be better than buying them gifts cause people seem to freak the fuck out when you do that. Shouting food and venues is a great way to go.
Impression management
Internet footprint
Email accounts:
2 university A email accounts (active)
1 university B email accounts (inactive)
2 hotmail email accounts:
1 outlook email account
1 gmail email account (all others forward to this email account)
That’s a lot of accounts, but there’s no easy way around this. Email still gets sent through each of them and it would be such a hassle to manually switch things over, email people back saying email me at this new account, and just waiting for some email that’s coming from an unexpected source, which may not come through for months or years (and is drastically important!). Oh, if you’re an entrepreneur, please fix this problem for me and I”ll throw money at you.
Social media:
facebook: people still asking me to like stuff, still lots of bullshit distractions in feed (do something about that), unappealing photos on wall (hide them)...wait, no don’t hide them! It took you so long to become less fragile and scared to be open on facebook. The rule is, you can only be MORE transparent, you are never allowed to go back. In fact, just for thinking that, go and make some things that were visible to only me, visible to public now!
angellist: meh
youtube: meh
blogspot (inactive): meh
geni (managed by family member): I feel like my privacy is being violated. Fuck you family, ask for my permission first before expanding my internet footprint.
Congrats on progress.
Possibly useful—Running with the Whole Body. I got good results (I had arches for quite a while, need to do the exercise again) from the one about the connection between hips and ankles, but you might want to skip the first one, which is self-observation while walking. Both I and someone I recommended the book to found it was too difficult.
Uncommon Sensing—a free Feldenkrais exercise every month. I’ve generally found them to be excellent, but December’s was (I think) much too difficult for most people. The advantage of the site is that you don’t have to chose from the large number available.
Thanks Nancy. Neither is available at my university library! Argh, but the online reviews are glowing to say the least. Can’t find a pirated version either online :P
Uncommon Sensing is a website, not a book. Are you sure you can’t access it?
Found it. Thanks!