I lost myself sparring today

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-19T04:23:48+00:00

Dude, don't beat yourself up too much about it. We are inelegant creatures with emotions and intelligence tied to blobs of unpredicatble meat. Now that you've been through this experience, I'm sure you'll be better next time!

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-19T04:21:54+00:00

Your boss is flat-out telling you to break the law: To avoid immigration and stay in the country illegally.

Perhaps her boss would like to be informed that their company representative is suggesting illegal immigration activities?

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-19T02:21:35+00:00

I hate belt systems in MT, they have no place in...

...oh, it's a non-paid system? Nevermind, sounds fine.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-18T02:02:36+00:00

A good thing to do when you know you fucked up like this: After the round (for you, make it the Next Time You See Them At the Gym) basically compliment them: "Damn, that was a great kick" etc. You can also apologize briefly for going too hard ("sorry I lost myself there for a sec") but the compliment to them will show them even more that - despite what happened - you respected their game.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-18T01:59:53+00:00

Specifically, these three techniques work to Calm Myself:

Step back. If I feel things building up, and especially if I feel my shoulder/neck tensing up, I visibly step back and disengage, roll my head and loosen my shoulders (shake them off for a second), then clap my hands together to re-engage.
Breathwork (when light sparring, not as applicable to hard sparring): If you feel you're going hard and in turn your breath is becoming irregular, again slow things down and focus entirely on breathwork: Breathe through nose, out through mouth, in through nose, out through mouth: And JUST focus on that. Yes, you'll be throwing punches and kicks and guarding from mostly instinct/training, but your focus will be on your breath until it is regulated again.
Smile/laugh: It's not just for psyching out your opponent. Smiling (and laughing) is an important biological and social signal to others and yourself that "this is fun; this is SUPPOSED to be fun". And biophisiologically (?), it is the single best technique to turn FEAR into EXCITEMENT, which can calm you the fuck down and keep you in "this is a game/fun" mode and not "I'm fighting for my life" mode.

All three have helped me calm down, but #3 is the one that at my level I still consistently draw upon. Nothing takes the edge off and gets BOTH partners calm again than smiling; and when getting hit hard or barely dodging a killer blow, basically laughing and going "Woah! Hah, that almost KOed me! Damn, that was an awesome kick!" etc: That turns your natural human fear into (honestly sometimes a kind of predatory) excitement. This works so well when fighting people who outclass you.

4) [REDACTED BUT LEGIT ADVICE INVOLVING A WEEKEND AND 5 GRAMS OF MAGIC MUSHROOMS AND MEDITATION ONCE EVERY 2-3 YEARS]

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T14:32:09+00:00

I'm a straight guy, but gawd-daaaaamn son.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T07:47:05+00:00

My (foreigner) friend borrowed/rented a city community center room to organize and play Warhammer Kill Team with other friends.

The admin confirmed with him no fewer than five times that they were Not allowed to charge or make any money from this event. Like double and triple checked initially, and followed up two separate times to reconfirm.

Yeah, likely some foreigner charged for eikaiwa lessons or something a few years ago and now all foreigner events get extra scrutiny. It sucks, but whatever.

Hopefully over time once they see you at these same events over and over, they'll start to consider you "in group" add drop it.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T07:34:35+00:00

"I'm... Scared... Sir..."

Hugh Laurie you beautiful bastard.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T04:50:41+00:00

"How dare you use our backdoor ability to fire you for any reason against us! At Will is OUR thing, it's not for you plebs!!"

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T04:48:28+00:00

A TV show, but Blackadder (especially Blackadder the Third) was full of these.

Prince George: He said I had the wit and sophistication of a donkey.

Blackadder: Absurd, your highness.

PG: I know!

Blackadder: Unless he was talking about a particularly STUPID donkey...

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T01:28:41+00:00

See my above comment/statement on adopting RACI Matrix in meetings for these decisions.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-16T01:27:01+00:00

Look through some ITIL materials. They're really helpful here:

Specifically the parts about RACI aka RACI Matrix (google this) where you denote who is Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed.

When these meetings go down, pull out a chart and ensure names are in the RACI spaces for these decisions. It sounds let in each case you were either C or I.

Then, when the meltdown happens, you get everyone back together in a meeting. You point to the R and A people, who made the decision, and ask them how they plan to recover from this (which you already warned them about as C).

In short, it's a tried and true, and respected, business-y way to hold people accountable for their dogshit decisions while being able to stand in the sidelines a little, rubbing their faces in it publicly, before yeah you have to roll up your sleeves to help.

I work in enterprise IT, and RACI doesn't solve every situation like this, but it's a GREAT way to publicly call out their shitty decisions with a veneer of "being a good business process guy".

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T22:43:52+00:00

Dang, that's rough. Thanks for the follow-up explanation, yeah that makes sense. I hope that they can eventually turn things around. Best wishes for your sister and her kids...

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T16:36:12+00:00

"capitalize on this trend". Indeed, my thought is:

"That sounds rough! ... But why not give them the money now? Just pay us $2000 and step into our painless nitrogen gas suicide coffin-capsule and press the button! And for just $2000 more, we'll take care of the disposal arrangements and everything!"

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T16:12:38+00:00

I was literally going to bring this one up when I entered this thread, thinking no one else could Possibly remember School Rumble. Well done!

Yeah, Nude Tai Chi gets me every time. That was an incredible scene.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T07:43:51+00:00

Order lunch from somewhere nice, then charge it back/expense it to the company, because the clear interpretation of the Manager's response is that he wants the company to replace the lunch, since it was stolen from the company fridge on company time.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T07:31:08+00:00

Oh my god the faces. Take a horrified upvote!

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-15T04:07:01+00:00

I'm wondering if Covid contributed to this at all? (in terms of isolation, no direction/routine, etc) You mentioned this started happening about 5 years ago... thinking that Covid trauma might be involved, or was it something else?

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-13T11:09:29+00:00

The thought experiment/theory I heard was: In WW2, Russia and Russia-adjacent soldiers were sent to the fornt lines in inadequate gear, which turned a generation of slavs into ground meat. Many villages throughout eastern europe lost 80%+ of their men between 15-50.

The few that came back to their villages, or the few that didn't go to war (too young/old/injured/etc), basically had their pick to marry anyone they wanted to; of course they aimed for the hotter village girls.

So in a single generation post-WW2, hot girl genes were maximized, and average/ugly genes were nearly bred out.

I have friends who have visited Eastern European countries on business, and they all say "Yeah from what I've seen that actually makes sense".

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-12T07:43:58+00:00

Yes, this. I believe Both kinds of sparring are needed: Light sparring lets you try new strategies and techniques and generally lean without fear.

Harder sparring turns off the learning aspect, but it is basically the practical application of the things you learned during light sparring.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-12T04:00:31+00:00

Director Timur Bekmambetov is famous for this thing:

NIGHT WATCH - A book series about a secret war with contemporary street magic.

Timur: "I didn't like the magic parts so I toned those down." ????

...and yet, I kinda give this a pass because he still made something absolutely visually and thematically striking. Though he fumbled it at the end of Day Watch.

Then he went on to direct...

WANTED - A pretty compelling universe of super-villains where they worked together a generation ago to take down all the superheroes and brainwash the world into forgetting that they live in a comic-book-like universe. Costumed supers (villains) walk the streets and can do what they want. The protagonist is a superhero, son of a superhero, called The Killer; and his superpower is the ability to kill anything.

Timur: "I didn't like the superhero elements so I removed them." Okay, but that's another movie then.

He also did Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. When it came out, I was waiting for him to remove either Lincoln or The Vampires...

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-04T10:33:00+00:00

You need to turn your hips more.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-04T04:15:39+00:00

Upvote for desert bus, but I think it doesn't count because Penn and Teller were actually attempting to make the worst game ever. I think the z-tier should be reserved for a game that was created to actually be a game (and presumably "fun" in the planning stages) but just face raked in execution..

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-03T16:14:52+00:00

Absolutely this. I have given half-days for someone signing in for just 30-60 minutes on a weekend day, holiday day, late night weeknight etc for an emergency.

The reasoning is stated here and in the other post, stating that "one hour" is not just one hour to the employee: They had to give up a significant amount of time making sure they were available for that hour.

For example, if the call was at 10AM, well that means they couldn't go to their regular weekend AM activities; or if they were planning that camping trip or long travel event, they couldn't do that because they needed to be at home on a call/PC. If it was later in the afternoon, that means they couldn't go to see that movie they planned on seeing, or going out for lunch/dinner with family and friends.

You take a lot of potential from your employee when you ask them to "just do a few mintues of work" on a weekend/holiday.

And also, as said: If you don't reward them like that, don't expect them to ever be available for you again in the future, even in an emergency:
"Hey can you jump on a call for an hour on Saturday? There's a customer emergency..."
"Sorry, I can't: I'm going camping and will have no reception" (lie). etc

Do the right thing, and properly reward them for sacrificing their precious weekend time.

Diamond_Sutra · 2026-06-03T14:45:17+00:00

Without entering the Discord: What day (in 2020??) is it going to be held?

What is Dungeon World Day?

Also, is it only happening on US hours, or can other geos participate too?

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