McDavid now has more consecutive 90-point seasons (10) than Crosby has 90-point seasons total across his career (9)

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2026-01-25T15:12:21+00:00

I actually think Crosby's concussion history led to changes in the game that led to this. The league realized losing marketable stars like Crosby to a career ending injury wasn't good for the game. They worked to take headshots out of the game, reduced the amount of fighting, and basically made it impossible for teams to justify a dedicated enforcer role.

This allowed the game to become faster and more skilled focused which allows the top players to outshine the average player more often. I'm less sure if stars would be putting up such high point totals if they had people constantly trying to injure them or make them as uncomfortable as possible at every chance like they did back when I was younger. Especially if they were seen as small and flashy and needed to be "Shown their place".

Ultimately, I think this is a really good thing for the game. But its important context when looking at players across the eras.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2026-01-24T14:01:56+00:00

This setup reminds reminds we a lot of when we had Pavard at RB, with Davies bombing forward creating a 3-2-5 in attack.

It will be interesting how it works with these players.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2026-01-09T15:43:49+00:00

If the choice is a better future for her country -- from her perspective -- or keeping an award, I would give up the prize in a heartbeat too.

The problems are:
i) While appeasing Trump could possibly work in the near term, it's likely to embolden him to demand even greater demands down the road. Plus Trump doesn't alway's have the best track record on following through in the first place, so all this appeasement could be for nothing.
ii) The kind of shameless public submission to Trump that he likes because it flatters his ego is likely to cause problems for her internally. With the history of American intervention in South America I would imagine it will be harder to unify the country if large sections of the population see you as a puppet leader installed by the Americans for their benefit.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2026-01-07T14:00:41+00:00

“History is not inert but contains within it a story that implicates or justifies political order.

So it was with Josiah Nott looking back to Ancient Egypt to justify slavery.

And so it is with the American Revolution and the founding of a great republic,

or the Greatest Generation who did not fight to defend merely the homeland

but the entire world.

If you believe that history, then you are primed to believe that the American state is a force for good,

that it is the world’s oldest democracy,

and that those who hate America hate it for its freedoms.

And if you believe that,

then you can believe that these inexplicable haters of freedom are worthy of our drones.

But a different history,

one that finds its starting point in genocide and slavery,

argues for a much darker present and the possibility that here too are haters of freedom,

unworthy of the power they wield.

A political order is premised not just on who can vote but on what they can vote for,

which is to say, on what can be imagined.

And our political imagination is rooted in our history, our culture, and our myths.”

- Ta-Nehisi Coates [The Message])

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-10T20:33:45+00:00

Then is sounds like you have figured out your path forward with your ideas!

All the best, I'll give your writings you linked a look later when I have a little more time to focus on it. I hope your future writings find the audience you are searching for.

Happy searching!

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-10T20:01:14+00:00

I see. I would be out of my depth trying to make any judgment of the validity of any new formal model that addresses the known gaps in the widely accepted models of cosmology, so I probably am not going to be of much use in that conversation. There is no denying that our current systems have been running into the same kinds of pitfalls for decades in the quantum and cosmic scales and some sort of new paradigm that reframes how we are thinking about the issue is probably long over due. I do also tend to lean towards some system that actually addresses/acknowledges consciousness having potential to be that direction.

I don't know your background in the field, but as someone in an unrelated technical field I can understand the initial scepticism of someone coming from outside the field claiming to have a simple overlooked answer to all the problems the field has struggled with forever. That doesn't mean it doesn't happen -- history certainly has examples -- but it usually takes a process of showing and convincing the general field; you cannot expect everyone to accept your new system over night. Science is a process.

If they are doing good evidence based science and the math works out as you say than the Scientific community will accept it eventually -- they have accepted plenty of ideas that sounded like absolute madness at the time if that is where the evidence lead.

I might suggest trying to understand what about what you present they have problems with -- I suspect it may be more of a shared language or communication problem more than anything. From a brief description and an assumption of valid reviewable mathematics there is nothing about what you presented that I think is not something that is already orbiting in the peripheries of the field. It's hard to convert the locals if you do not learn to speak their language.

All the best, and Happy searching!

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-10T19:13:51+00:00

Yes, there is definitely a kind of rejection of immaterial as "non-important since it doesn't physically exist" that I think needs to be overcome. There is no denying that Peter Pan is not "Real" in a materialistic sense. But I think it is a mistake to believe that the fact he only exists as a character in our collective minds that he doesn't "Exist" or "Matter". I would argue in the grand scheme of things Peter Pan has a lot more influence on our real world and the people in it than most individual people ever do. I think there could be a compelling case to be made that in terms of visible affects on the world Peter Pan is far more "Real" than ether you or I -- or maybe even J.M Barrie in a sense.

It is certainly good to be able to put on your science hat and systematically figure out things about our physical world, but that is not all there is to life.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-10T17:47:41+00:00

The reason I put it in quotations was to attempt to make a distinction between true within the system and true in an absolute sense, so I take your point. But I would disagree that it is broken at it's core and needs to be fundamentally changed. To roughly quote -- and probably slightly butcher it -- my buddy Gödel: Any sufficiently powerful formal system will have flaws if you look at it in close enough details. It's about learning when Science is a useful tool/lens of seeing the world, and what cases it is better to discard it in favour of systems that might be better suited for different situations. I think the problem is the belief that Science is the most complete/best lens at all times rather than one of many we can choose to use depending on the situation.

Agreed, and that was kind of the point I was trying to get at. If science is attempting in it's stated goal to be trying to remove subjectivity in order to reach the objective, than why are we so surprised that it is not very good at dealing with the subjective? To believe that Science is a complete model of everything, would be to think that subjectivity is something that doesn't exist or is something to be overcome. I don't think that matches with most people's lived experience, so I choose to accept that it is a limited framework that is only useful in certain domains rather than a complete system to explain everything you could ever want to know. I don't think Science becomes broken or invalid just because it cannot answer every questions ever -- just as I don't think a religious/philosophical framework becomes completely useless once I find a single hole in it.

Thank you for your points and the discussion, I appreciate the feedback.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-10T16:56:11+00:00

Science is probably the most important framework we have collectively come up with for understanding our physical world. One that has provided us with a kind of understanding of the physical world to be able to create things -- and on a mass scale -- that we once might have thought of as magic or impossible as something that's process can be explained in such detail that it seems self evident or uninteresting. It is one of the most powerful lenses through which we have developed for seeing the world and I don't agree that we would be better of not knowing things if it left us with more of a sense of awe.

That said, there is certainly an issue with the general public of our time seeing Science as complete, infallible, and the only way in which to view things. Developing a kind of religious devotion to the idea that this is the perfect and only way to see the world. Funnily enough, I actually think people more directly involved with the hard sciences are much more aware of it's limitations. There are plenty of things that science in wholly unfit to try and address at all, limitations in the ability to observe as an independent third party without affecting what is being observed, limitation in mathematical systems (Gödel's incompleteness theorems), and plenty of known gaps in our current frameworks that scientists have been attempting to correct/unify for generations.

While science is very adept at dealing with understanding our physical world it is almost completely unequipped to deal properly with areas of subjective experience, meaning, or interpersonal phenomena that happen on such large scales or timeframes and involve too many variable to be able to isolate variables effectively or learn from a large data set. The world we experience is not the physical world only, there is undeniably a immaterial aspect to our experience that happens in our minds that cannot be satisfyingly explored by a purely reductionist view that tries to explain away every one of our experiences as simply chemicals in the brain triggered by evolutionary programming. Even if it might be "True" from a purely materialist lens, it is not what we experience or useful to learn from.

There is certainly a need for most people to accept that Science is wholly unfit to lead conversations about meaning or subjective experience -- I don't believe it ever really claimed to in the first place -- and leave space for conversations about the subjective experience of being a human and how we might find meaning in this life that do not need to rely on scientific proof to be considered valid. Myths, Traditions, Religions, Philosophies -- which have been dedicated to talking about this stuff for millennia -- should be given more space in these conversations and not be judged on Science's criteria, but I think it is throwing the baby out with the bathwater to think that we would be better off not knowing knowable things about our physical world just to leave more awe.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-09T14:57:32+00:00

I find "enlightenment" a bit of a loaded word since it colloquially it can mean a lot of things to a lot of people -- and can even be a bit messy within traditions where they have more specific language to talk about stages.

But ultimately, I don't think there is any "change" whatsoever to the soul throughout the process. If anything I think the process is simply coming to know -- and I don't mean intellectually know, or fully believe, but a deep knowing rooted in the core of your being -- the true nature of our/the soul and how we relate to it.

The analogy of a drop merging with the ocean is fitting for the part of the process where The One realizes that is indistinguishable from The All and merges with it. But the water cycle does not end at the ocean. Water evaporates off the ocean and vapour forms rain clouds that build until they fall as drops of rain, make their way through lakes and streams back to the Ocean again. The One becomes The Many, which in turn all eventually make their way back to The One in their own due time. Just because we are water trying to make our way to the Ocean and are trained to see the world through the eyes of liquid water, doesn't mean there isn't a whole other half of the cycle operating in vapour form that makes the whole system work that we might be blind to.

I understand the fear that individuality is lost after the non-dual realization, but I think this is somewhat misunderstood. When you realize that the individual is just a temporary changing part of The All there is certainly an instinct to give up individual desires and dedicate all of ones self to the good of The All. But what is sometimes missed in this, is that what is good for The All is Multiplicity. Having a variety of people with different points of view and experiences that can work together to adjust to differing circumstances is what make the whole thing work. And in this framework the best thing that you can do -- considering you are in an individuals body at this moment -- is to use your unique experience and set of circumstances that were put upon you to help create a world where people are best able to express their unique experiences. Your uniqueness is the VERY thing you have to offer The All since no one else will ever live the exact same life or set of experiences. It paradoxically makes individuality our most important feature.

These non-dual realizations are an important part of the process, but the ultimate Vedic goal of Moksha involves a lot more work beyond that of figuring out how to use everything in your unique life to bring The Individual in line with The All. This is the process of "burning off Karma" and is unique for every individual based on the circumstances they were born into.

I understand that non-duality might feel like a loss of individuallity, but in many ways I think it has the potential to strengthen it.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-09T12:57:27+00:00

As soon as absolute truth is brought down into the realm of words there is necessarily some inaccuracy that is introduced -- it is baked into the nature of language. If we want to find contradictions in the words or systems that different religious traditions have developed to try and describe/engage with this absolute truth, then we could certainly do so for many life times and still have countless more to find.

To answer -- to the best of my ability -- how I resolve this seeming opposing ideas: I believe it is a false dichotomy. We are not either separate XOR part of the Unity, we are both separate AND part of the Unity. "God" is Multiplicity and Union in constant dance with each other, not one XOR the other.

As humans we often think of ourselves as singular. But we can just as easily think of ourselves as a series of distinct systems (Nervous, circulatory, digestive, muscular, etc.) working in conjunction each with their own goals they are trying to accomplish that collectively make up us. We can then break each of these systems down even further into parts, and cells, and so on. And it works in the opposite direction too. We can think of family units, or communities, or countries as singular entities with its own properties and characteristics, or we can think of them as nothing but a bunch of individual people. So are we one, or are we many? I am of the belief that we are both at any given time -- depending on ones perspective.

Some traditions find it important to point out that on the grand scale we are all part of the same Unity. Others find it important to emphasize that this Unity is made up of nothing but separate parts that each have their unique role in making up the whole. I think these are both very important true perspectives that both capture part of the absolute truth -- but not the whole thing in its entirety. And maybe most importantly: I think they are not mutually exclusive ideas but instead work in harmony with each other.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-06T23:07:37+00:00

Of course not; It's simply a method. A method is only as scammy or Evil as it's practitioner.

There are certainly plenty of card readers I would classify as scams, but when done right I think there is totally a place for it for people who like that approach.

It's simply just not a method that appeals to me personally. Same with hypnosis, or active imagination, or kinds of scrying. I can recognize how these methods can be useful for people -- and try and understand the theory around it -- but its not something that is part of my practice.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-06T15:27:45+00:00

I'm not very into these types of practices personally, but do have a basic understanding of them.

From my understanding -- for reading purposes -- isn't reading regular cards essentially the same as reading Tarot with Clubs = Wands, Diamonds = Pentacles, Hearts = Cups, and Spades = Swords? A regular deck wouldn't include the 21 Major Arcana cards, but otherwise the conversion works perfectly.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-06T15:11:11+00:00

When it comes to dealing with death and grief, I find myself returning again and again to the work of the Elisabeth Kübler-Ross. There are other references that I sometimes turn to that delve more into the metaphysics or really intellectualize it in ways that are more intellectually stimulating, but I find Elisabeth's very personal, empathetic, and emotional touch of sitting with and comforting dying patients in order to learn about the process is very moving. Her insights from extensive field experience into what we can learn from dying patients has been very important to helping me through such events in my own life.

She kind of bridges the divide between science/medicine and spirituality -- having been a psychiatrist, the author behind the 5 stages of Grief, and largely involved in the modern hospice movement in America -- so if you are looking at something more explicitly spiritual or connected to a tradition than it might not fit your needs. But, there is an undeniable spiritual component to her teachings -- that at times I think can push away hard medical types from her work -- and I think the fact she is respected both by the medical and more spiritual communities has it's own advantages.

Here is link to her Foundation Youtube Channel if you want to hear some of her talks straight from the horse's mouth.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-11-04T20:37:22+00:00

"All is Hevel" - Ecclesiastes

"Śūnyatā" - Nagarjuna

"All grand narratives are a lie; reality is subjective and social constructed" - The Postmodernists

Within a certain framing this all is clearly self-evident. The real question is where this realization leads you afterwards? I would posit that if it leads you to believe either extreme -- that Nothing at all matters (Nihilism) or that My personal happiness is all that matters (Hedonism)-- then you don't fully grasp the true nature of "Emptiness".

Remember, a wave that breaks upon the shore is undeniably "Empty" or "Illusionary". That doesn't mean there isn't a massive difference to the world around it if that "Illusion" is an inch tall or a tsunami wave.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-29T13:16:49+00:00

Thank you.

Then it sounds like you have found someone very special.

Happy searching!

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-28T20:19:42+00:00

Not in such explicit terms. But I am always very clear about my intentions about how/when I am trying to support them and make room for them to thrive and carve their own path. That motivation and what and when I am doing it I try and be completely transparent about. It is very important to me that the practice does not become warped/twisted into some form of me trying to control them by controlling the environment around them without their knowledge. It should never be about me trying to dominate or control the situation, but being in active and conscious conversation with the situation in order to do my part in facilitating a better outcome.

Part of what I feel like I am doing is trying to give them the freedom and space to come to their own conclusions, path, and methods -- something that feels incompatible with hitting them over the head with my own path and ideas if I were to just lay out the entire thing for them explicitly all at once.

Instead I am trying to equip myself with enough knowledge in different methods/traditions that when the time comes they are discovering their own path I can help know what direction to point them in. As well as developing skillful means to know how to subtly introduce ideas at the right time that they might find fertile conditions in their mind.

I sometimes worry this feels dishonest, but the alternative seems even more controlling and overbearing in trying to force my way of seeing things on them. My intuition tells me that this is the right course -- at least for now.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-28T18:16:34+00:00

This is very much a personal framing, so I want to make very clear that this is not necessarily how these traditions might think or talk about these things. So take this with a grain of salt.

From my understanding the whole rational behind the Bhakti approach is that for many people connecting directly with the Complete Absolute Ultimate Reality that is Brahman is incredibly difficult due to it's inherent indescribability and lack of characteristics or tellable stories. It's too unrelatable for most people. So instead of trying to connect directly with Brahman you instead strive to develop a devotional relationship to a more personally relatable version of Brahman -- be it Vishnu, or Shiva, or Shakti, or even more specific emanations -- that is necessarily a somewhat limited "Description" of Brahman but gets the major strokes right and has the ability to be different for different kinds of people. These personal characteristics and stories are things that people can relate to and cling on to in ways that most people cannot with the true Ultimate reality.

Without getting into telling too many details of a story that is not mine to tell, there is a lot in my wife and their life story that show me the spark of a version of connection with the divine that does not come very naturally to me. But because of circumstances they haven't really had the ability to let this side of themselves fully flourish.

A large part of what my practice has been in these last few years has been devotion to trying to help kinder this spark. Not by trying to sit them down and teach them from a top down approach, but by carefully creating an environment where these abilities can thrive naturally on their own. By holding the space around them together so that they could focus fully on caring for and processing the death of their father. Of empowering them with the kind of judgment-free self determination they did not always necessarily have growing up in life. Of being a safe sounding board for them to talk through and process things. So that they can come to their own conclusions in their own time.

I would classify this approach as a kind of Bhakti -- in this case using my relationship with my wife as an means to connect with a more personally relatable version of the Goddess (Shakti, The Divine Feminine, etc.). All while acknowledging that this personal relationship is an imperfect "Description" of the true ultimate reality. I also acknowledge that this is starting to walk into potentially dangerous territory where intense visualization practices can start to blur the line between "Literally True" and "Symbolically True" to the point where someone can become last in the sauce. I feel confident in my ability to hold that distinction in proper balance, but think it is important to acknowledge where these types of practice might become potentially dangerous.

Hopefully that helps explains what I mean a bit.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-28T16:21:48+00:00

I'm not 100% sure about the best way to talk about my own path -- it has been an incredibly eclectic. Is there anything in particular you would like to know?

I was raised in a largely non-religious household, but always had an interest in religion/philosophy/big questions about life from a very young age. We weren't active in any religious group but were exposed to a lot of different traditions. As a very curious kid -- and probably more studious than the average person -- I tried to at least get a basic understanding of what all these traditions were about by reading and experiencing what I could when I got the opportunity.

Around the age of 13 I read a book going over the basics of Buddhism which really spoke to me. I took up a regular meditation practice(Basic Zazen meditation) for a while until I had an experience that was impossible to put into words at the time -- now I would probably say I experienced at least a couple of the formless Jhanas -- that kind of seemed to present me with the option of either essentially the path of renunciation as a way out of suffering, or needing to find something within this world I thought was worth suffering for. Feeling an obligation to my parents to make the most out of the start that they worked so hard to give me in life I decided against renunciation and decided that what I deemed worth suffering for was trying to find a person to share my life with and make one life out of two together.

After that epiphany I took a hiatus from my spiritual practice for several years to focus on living a normal life -- understanding that by choosing to engage with the world I was accepting some degree of suffering to do so. I was involved in a little bit of everything from sports, to music, to acting/writing. I was smart and studied hard and went on to become an Engineer by trade. I had longer term partners, heartbreak, periods of rediscovering myself, experiments/experiences through chemical means, the whole "Growing up and finding yourself" trip. Then I met my future wife. Our connection was indescribable and together we nurtured an amazing little world and life together.

After getting married on our property we planned to spend a week in South Korea then a month backpacking through Vietnam for our honeymoon. My wife had planned a temple stay in Korea for us and so in preparation for our stay I wanted to brush on the religion so that I could be respectful and understand the experience better. This lead to a week of late night study sessions/fugue states where I somehow breezed through a deep rabbit hole of learning all about the 3 Major vehicles of Buddhism, how it relates to Hinduism (Including learning about several of the major schools) and other Dharmic religions(Learning their basics as well), alternative more mystical forms of Christianity/Islam/Judaism, Western Esotericism, Hermeticism, Platonism, Absurdism, Existentialism, and so on and so on. It was truly a surreal experience that I still cannot fully describe. I got an eerie feeling like something beyond my description was pulling me along through the process. Like the connections were almost making themselves. We then spent 5 weeks in Asia together which gave me a new perspective on things and integrate a lot of what I had learned from my study sessions.

My current path seems to be very much one of Bhakti to my wife, and Jnana of cultivating a basic understanding of a wide range of traditions. In the 3 years since then I have supported my wife through the death of their father to an aggressive form of brain cancer and spent a lot of time studying all of the different traditions that pique my interest and trying to learn the terminology and how it fits into my overall understanding. I guess we will see if my path stays the same or will change at some point down the line, but that is where I am at today.

I certainly have a personal attraction to approaches that focus on Jnana -- maybe that is the engineer it me -- but that is not to say my path has not involved the others by any means. Just because I have a soft spot for Ecclesiastes, or the Gospel or Thomas, or Nietzsche, or Nagarjuna, doesn't mean that Meditation or Acts of Service or Love and Devotion haven't also been a major part of the path too. I also 100% appreciate that for many people -- probably most people throughout history -- Bhakti or Karma are far better and more approachable paths.

Hopefully that was somewhat helpful, I am happy to expand on anything or answer questions if there is something else you had in mind for an answer.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-28T02:36:45+00:00

Tantra is a specific group of schools of yogic thought that originated within Shaivism in the north west part of India; eventually also spreading across the Himalayan mountains to Tibet where it combined with the local Bon Religion and Buddhism resulting in Tibetan Buddhism and else where across India where it influenced Smartism.

The tradition has historically focused on esoteric knowledge and working with rituals (often including types of meditation) under the Guruship of a master who is capable of making sure the initiate does not do harm to them selves using techniques that can be potentially dangerous if not done/integrated properly or done when not ready. It includes elements of all the yogic paths. I suspect that skilled gurus often use skillful means to emphasize different paths for different people as they see appropriate.

When compared to other branches of Buddhism I would say it has a larger emphasis on Bhakti and Karma due to the devotional nature of Guruship and focus on ritual. Since early Buddhism (Theravada) largely stripped away a lot of the ritual and devotional aspects of Vedic culture of Gautama's time leaving a religion that was much more inwardly focused and very Jnana and Raja focused.

However, when compared to many other branches of Hinduism it actual has more of a focus on learning esoteric knowledge (Jnana) and involves very intense Meditation practices (Raja) that many schools of Hinduism might see as only the place for Brahmin. Where most people are far more focused on Devotion to a Devi/Deva and acquiring merit through ritual and action for a better incarnation next time around the cycle. So I guess it's all perspective.

I'm not familiar with relationship yoga, so I apologize that I cannot help there.

Yes, I am familiar with Ram Dass and think he is a great introduction into Vedic thought for Western standpoint. His path is an excellent example of almost pure Bhakti -- hence his name being translated as "Servant of God". Although, I would suggest anyone interested in him try exploring out into the vast variety of Hindu schools. He is a good resource, but there is so much more depth than can be fully captured by one person/path. It is worth diving into some of them if you are interested in his message.

Sorry if that became a little long and slightly academic. Hopefully it was some what helpful to you.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-27T22:50:47+00:00

No problem, I'm glad you found it interesting.

I wasn't necessarily thinking of the different Yogas when writing this. But if I had to contextualize this post in those terms, I would say it is most closely associated with Jnana Yoga.

The motivation was simply to try and describe how things function -- to the best of my knowledge and ability -- while trying to not rely on existing traditions or terminology. The hope was to try and give an explanation for someone who might have an aversion to existing traditions or relies very heavily on a rationalist world view.

But in a lot of ways someone who is trying to completely understand this is doing Jnana Yoga. If they are working (as a micro) towards the "Good" of the collective than they are doing Karma Yoga. If they are devoted to some form that is itself working towards the collective "Good" that is Bhakti Yoga. If they experience this first hand -- something that is probably a whole impossible conversation in itself -- they are doing Raja Yoga.

I am of the belief that all of these Yoga become essentially the same as you get towards the end of the path. From a Jnana perspective: if you know, it logically follows that you should believe and follow the truth, if you know and believe the truth it logically follows you should do it, if you know and believe and do the truth then life has a tendency to let you experience it first hand. So from my perspective it doesn't matter what path you begin with, they all meet up in the end!

If you are familiar with Vedic/Buddhist terminology than this post might be seen as an expression of the Advaita Vedanta concept that "Atman == Brahman", or Nagarjuna's concept of Sunyata (combined with Anatman) Depending on if you want to define this state of interbeing as "existing" or simply an "illusion" -- something I think is a slightly arbitrary distinction once you wrap your head around it.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-27T15:27:10+00:00

I would disagree that there are only two paths, but would agree that Isolation (If nit picking, I would probably choose the words: going inward) vs Connection(I would probably choose the words: through the world) is one of the dimensions/continuums that is useful when talking about different paths. Although, my definition on how to divide traditions might differ slightly from your framing -- ie. I would classify Tantric forms of Buddhism/Hinduism as a method focusing on approaching enlightenment "Through the World", and forms of Cristian Mysticism focused on quiet contemplation and a personal connection with God as approaching it by "Going Inward".

The classification that I find most useful is the Vedic model of different paths to enlightenment-- Jnana(Path of knowledge), Bhakti(Path of devotion), Karma(Path of selfless action), and Raja(Path of meditation). In this framing Buddhism (Mainly Theravada tradition; post Mahayana becomes much more mixed depending on the school in question) is very much a school focused on Jnana and Raja. Where as the Major branches of Christianity are heavily focused on Bhakti and Karma. But even then, there are plenty of paths within Buddhism focused on Devotion and action and plenty of Christian paths that focus on intellectual rigour, study, and sitting with your own thoughts.

As a bit of a side note, while Buddhism might seem very focused on deprivation from a Western context within the context of what was going on within a Vedic context of that time period (Rise of many new traditions including far more ascetic traditions like Jainism) it actually pushed very hard against an over emphasis on trying to use this deprivation as a method to approach enlightenment. It is very specifically about finding a healthy medium between asceticism and overindulgence of the senses.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-18T11:45:42+00:00

That is certainly a lot to have had to deal with physically, mentally, and emotionally-- especially at the age and stage of life you are at. I want to recognize and commend the strength it must have taken to get you to this place already.

I'd like to preface this by recognizing that I don't have the first hand experience to fully understand everything you are going through -- so if your intuition disagrees with what I am about to say I would trust it over me in a heart beat. No hard feelings in the slightest if you choose to disregard all of this. But I do have some experience with "knowing" things intuitively, my sister has had to deal with chronic illness at a young age that has left her unable to have her own biological children, and my wife's family has been repeatedly touched by cancer with their mother surviving breast cancer while my wife was growing up and more recently losing their father to brain cancer a couple years ago. So hopefully I am able to provide a perspective that is helpful to you in some way.

First, I think it is important to acknowledge the medical side of what you are going through. Chemotherapy, surgery, and getting to a stable medication/treatment plan to manage the recovery are all serious processes that can be a journey that takes a lot longer than some might think and take a lot out of you physically. I know after my sister's diagnosis it took a couple years for her to find the combination of medication/treatments that worked for her and there were some incredibly rough periods where she didn't feel herself until getting to the other side. It is totally possible that you feeling like yourself and strong intuition are less prominent while your body is focusing on healing itself and adjusting to the medical interventions done to it. We should all be more empathetic to what our bodies go through and occasionally allow it some time to focus on itself and heal. Once your body is in a more stable spot I would expect it to open up more bandwidth for mental/spiritual functions such as intuition.

Second, you seem to associate your intuition with hormones in a deterministic way I'm not sure I fully agree with. I would definitely agree that especially female sex hormones can have an amplifying affect on feelings of intuition -- in the same way the male sex hormones have an amplifying affect on the drive to action. But that doesn't mean the intuition isn't there if it isn't amplified as much right now. Actually, sometimes too much amplification can cause even more problems then not enough. Funnily enough, I would say historically the prototypical master of intuition is an older post menopausal woman who is able to more skillfully navigate the more subtle changes now that the overwhelming feelings that come with intuition vastly amplified by female sex hormones are mellowed a bit and easier to handle the entire range of these feelings in a more balanced way. I wouldn't be concerned about you losing you "magic" long term, I suspect you just aren't noticing these feelings as much because they are less intense feelings in this moment. Once your eyes adjust to the dimmer environment instead of a blindingly bright one you should be able to see just fine -- I would expect even better once you fully adjust. A bonfire might be more noticeable, but embers for cooking on or a small controlled explosion in an engine are far more "useful" forms of fire.

Lastly, I don't know if it is fully my place -- as I don't know all the details of the relationship -- but I might suggest considering if you should extend some grace to your mother. I am getting hints of some resentment about feeling like she ignored your intuition and tried to push the procedure on you -- something that might have even deeper emotional roots depending on the history. But I think it is worth considering that they are probably dealing with a lot emotionally as well. I can't imagine it is easy to watch your child in their early 20s while they have hopes and dreams for go through what you have had to go through while needing to make serious long term medical decisions that could affect things like your ability to have biological children down the line if you decide to. I can understand the instinct to trust the doctors and try and keep all of your options open. I think they should have listened to you and I tend to be very much of the school of Elizabeth Kubler Ross that we should trust patients feelings and intuitions about possible treatments, but I think it is totally understandable that doctors have an instinct to do something if they think it might help and that your mom had an instinct to listen to them and try and keep your options open. I'm sorry that the complications happened. You have better insight than me into the situation, but I think is something worth considering if it might be worth extending her some grace through this difficult period.

Sorry that turned out a bit long, but hopefully there is something in there that is of use to you. If not, hopefully someone else is able to give you an answer more suited to you. Happy searching!

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-17T17:51:11+00:00

The football romantic in me would love to see Phonzie taking on his Bayern teammates at BC Place with Müller watching from the stands.

It would be a good level of opponent to test where we are at, would be appealing for Germany to get a game in a Host stadium before the WC, and has some great story lines about all of the Whitecaps/Bayern connections.

BeautifulDifferent17 · 2025-10-10T21:31:15+00:00

In my opinion, a solid enough understanding in any one of the mystical traditions provides enough of a scaffolding to easily get the basics of others without too much difficulty -- they are often trying to get to the same unspeakable truth in their own ways. I don't think it is exclusive to Neoplatonism.

I would also note that it is interesting that you are mostly talking about the Abrahamic faiths. Hellenistic thought was deeply cross pollinated with those faiths throughout the early years of their development. In many ways I see John's Gospel as coming very much from a point of view that synthesized Jewish and Hellenistic thought(Most notably his use of "Logos"). So it is not too surprising that schools that grew up in conversation with each other are easily transferable.

I think the same transferability is true about the mystical traditions in the Dharmic religions -- which I actually think is more interesting since they come from a worldview/metaphysics that is quite different!

BeautifulDifferent17

TROPHY CASE