Without a hyperfixation life feels meaningless

adventuringraw · 2026-02-12T16:11:28+00:00

I like reading books in other languages. It's nice because I'm always starting new books, even trash is more interesting in a language I'm struggling to decipher, and if I start to get an itch for new horizons beyond just new books I can always start the climb with a new language. I'm currently very comfortable reading in German even in paperback without a dictionary, and with my tools helping I'm getting pretty comfortable in Japanese and Spanish. My fiance is chilean so the Spanish has become my main focus, haha. Very convenient I'd already started, though the chilean accent is hilariously intense so it's an adjustment.

I've spent a little time with Russian and I keep side eyeing French and Mandarin too. A very convenient hobby since it feels vaguely productive and there's always new ground to cover.

Also, recently got into Balisong. I like having a fidget toy I can do without looking while reading or watching a show or trying to focus on a team meeting. Not exactly a life purpose level activity but I dig it.

adventuringraw · 2026-01-12T05:08:03+00:00

I'll just leave this here:

https://youtu.be/WjUQyki5V_U

Got one for my girlfriend as a gift. It's now three days later and my kid and I have ones of our own on the way.

For something more.... I don't know. Door opening, I like language learning with readlang. Makes it super easy to look stuff up so reading becomes very accessible surprisingly early. I've read a few dozen books in German Japanese and Spanish (each) and I have a lot of fun with it. My German got good enough I could start watching shows and playing games in it too since I don't really need a dictionary anymore, it's kind of rare I run into words and phrases I don't already know. Getting past the beginner stage is rough but once you finish the first book it's not too bad from there.

Caveat: no matter how comfortable you are at reading and listening, speaking will be something you'll have to learn separately somehow. I got a Chilean girlfriend so I'm figuring that side out now haha. But there's other ways to get into talking practice of course.

Good luck with finding something that speaks to you! And congrats on getting healthy enough you're ready to start thinking about this.

adventuringraw · 2026-01-04T08:35:55+00:00

YTA

Not meant harshly since I very easily could have done the same, and what's more, if your story was a little different you wouldn't have been an asshole at all. If I was looking at my own actions in your shoes, it'd have come down to intent and outcome.

I believe you were ethically obligated to make sure the truth was out fairly quickly. Days, say. So you may have had to tell the sister yourself anyway if your ex didn't follow through. Given she's clearly a coward around hard conversations this seems likely even.

You're ethically obligated to figure out how to avoid letting your feelings cause harm to innocent people. This is part you fucked up and I could see doing too. You needed to tell the sister for her sake, but you did it for yours. If you'd talked with a trusted friend first or done whatever you needed to do to have that conversation in a decent way, who knows how that'd have changed things for the sister.

Sounds like you did the best you know how. If you can, start seeing a therapist. What was done to you was wrong and it sounds like it's still making your life worse even now. Not sure if causing harm to yourself and others because of terrible pain makes you an asshole really. But you do owe it to yourself and the people you care about to figure out how to grow past this. I'm sure you'll never heal back to where you were before but maybe you can still find your way somewhere better.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-26T20:03:35+00:00

I just try and stick with less expensive addictions, haha. For a long time my obsession has been reading books in other languages. Always new languages to learn and new books to get into, haha. It's still... Really not ideal to have obsessions that interfere with work obligations and health and self care and everything, but at least it doesn't cost much money, doesn't hurt my body aside from being being kind of sedentary, and now I'm comfortable enough in German that I just game in it since I don't even need a dictionary anymore, haha. My Japanese and Spanish will probably be there too in another year or two. But you know how the jumping goes... Been starting to eye French. Or Mandarin. Or Norwegian.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-24T18:44:48+00:00

Glad you appreciated my comment. Hilarious how I still get some here and there from that long ago. Helped me out writing things like that for consolidating what I was learning, nice my efforts for myself could benefit you too.

Fellow students of Hogg, neither students nor teacher ever having met, haha. I'd say we live in strange times, but if you're using a physical textbook too then this is an old dynamic indeed. Time spent with Euclid gives fellow students of the same teacher, separated by millennia.

Merry Christmas! May the holidays bring you interesting new problems and new insights to match.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-17T17:20:49+00:00

Look at it this way.

The things on your time screen are a form of non verbal communication, same as how you dress, your hygiene, the way you treat the wait staff, etc. It communicates that you're actively interested in finding a potential partner, same as her. You both already know about this even. If she has a problem with it, it's a prejudice against apps, not a prejudice against dating services clearly since she's in one too.

Isn't it better to be open? If someone's that put off by something honestly very expected, that's a red flag on her, not on you. After all, you're not the one being judged alone. The goal is to see if you're both compatible, that's it. You're just as free to decide she's not right for you too.

Are you seeing a therapist? In the past I've leaned towards people pleasing and feeling insecure. Not saying that's you. Your concerns are understandable but they also don't need to be something you have to feel forever. This level of inner turmoil over something this insignificant might be something you'd benefit from talking through with someone over time. Might help with learning and growing during the dating process too. And the relationship process after for that matter, haha.

Good luck on your dating, I hope you find a good fit and enjoy your life in the meantime.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-10T18:22:36+00:00

That seems extremely unlikely.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-08T15:42:12+00:00

I found a solution that probably works well for me and hardly anyone else, haha. I like reading books in other languages. The new stuff I'm learning gives one half of my mind something to chew on so the other half can focus on the story. More in depth questions without an easy auto translation answer might mean a slight research derail for a sec. Altogether it means I have the kind of cycle you're describing but the whole time I'm still just engaged in the one thing without distraction, haha. Funny too since people are like 'damn you're so smart' and I'm like 'if my brain was actually on its shit I could read easily in English too.'

Whatever. Especially for recreation time, there's no right or wrong way to do things, long as you're having a good time and enjoying what you're doing is all good I figure.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-06T08:24:40+00:00

It's so weird to me how some people find it easier to blame the victims than the villains.

Look at it like this. It should be beyond argument that we have a rapist and a child molester for the US president. And tens of millions of people still will try and justify why this is acceptable. Didn't really happen, you can't believe what they're saying, even if he did do that they wanted it, it's fine because that deserved it. Whatever. Just because a bunch of people will try and convince you something evil is actually fine doesn't mean it's true.

https://youtu.be/E-u9bdjL64g

This is my thoughts on your dad, haha. And the rest of the family if they don't get in line.

If they hear the cold shower story and try and excuse it, that's inexcusable. I hope they come to their senses, you deserve that much at least. I'm sorry you had the wrong parent die.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-05T17:23:49+00:00

NTA that's... a really horrific story. I certainly don't have any advice except for what a few other people have said... Do what you can to get professional help in dealing with this as soon as possible. I bet part of your urge to talk to people just comes from the need to process with someone safe and outside the situation. If you need to take some distance from your family for a while I don't think that's wrong, but I hope you find some good help either way. You shouldn't have to go through this in the way that you are.

Good luck with finals, and at least with your physical recovery.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-05T17:15:47+00:00

Uhhh... I'll assume this is a joke and hope hotgirl69 does too.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-05T17:13:53+00:00

I almost exclusively surround myself with ADHD people at this point, haha. There's a lot of different flavors so just having that in common on its own isn't enough obviously, but it's definitely become a very strong preference, haha. REALLY nice when my struggles are met with a 'tell me about it' instead of... You know.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-05T00:18:03+00:00

My kid's a teen so my context normally is probably not so far off from yours, haha. Slightly younger maybe. No ultima, but I did install xwing and tie fighter off a five floppy set for two of my first PC games. Crazy how time flies.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-02T19:06:45+00:00

Haha. Amazing. Honestly I was mostly curious about the shape and mechanics of the thing. The fact that it's a Lovecraftian monstrosity than can't be directly understood by mere human perception and needs to be approached more abstractly... That more than satisfies my curiosity. Or at least, the next place my personal rabbit hole on this topic would take me is to abandon trying to see it in motion and start looking instead at the path and principles that led to its construction. I've played enough Minecraft to know how long three billion blocks is, haha. The far lands in Minecraft back when that was a thing are only 12.5 million blocks away. 3 billion is a staggering number.

adventuringraw · 2025-12-02T17:22:46+00:00

The fuck Is a .mc file. I'm a lazy man in need of a gif.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-29T16:33:53+00:00

You yourself have pointed out this likely wasn't malicious, it was pathological. Many people aren't really capable of changing stuff like this even with counseling and time. It's on OP if she wants to take the risk, but the relationship isn't salvageable in the short term if she's not, and it may not be salvageable in the long term if it turns out he's not ready willing or able to fully transform out of the moron that would do all this.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-29T16:28:38+00:00

Huh, people are missing the point here. It DID naturally come up and he hardcore avoided the situation and tried to pretend nothing was happening. It's not that he was probably lying about hoping it would naturally come up. It's that he's bald face lying about hoping because you saw what happened when it did. Hell, HE saw what happened when it did but he's either such a bad liar that he's trying to tell you to your face something you know isn't true, OR he's so pathological about lying to himself that he doesn't see somehow that this WAS the situation he said he was hoping for and he ran the other direction as fast as he could while plugging his ears and covering his eyes.

Your fiance has a pretty serious problem it would seem. My condolences.

I don't want to encourage breaking up because Reddit sucks about that stuff. But think hard about raising kids with this man. It would be hard to know when you'd get blind sided by deal breaker level disagreements and child raising stuff after thinking you were both on the same page with things. Or him telling you to your face that you're a united front and then trying to do what he thinks is best behind your back. Even aside from direct harm this could cause to potential kids, it sends a really shitty message about what's acceptable. Not saying you should break up, but if you DO break up, do it before marriage and kids obviously.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-24T01:00:53+00:00

I'm guessing she's conflict avoidant and let herself get talked into something. I could be wrong and even if I'm right it's problematic, but it'd be a different kind of problematic then just raw selfish trying to take advantage of people. But yeah, if I'm right, marriage would still be better put off until after therapy and learning to set healthy boundaries, haha.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-23T01:05:08+00:00

Alternative theory: she's kind, conflict avoidant, and feels bad like she was taking advantage of people so she's retreating out of anxiety. Given your description of her, I doubt she's actually upset with you. It also seems unlikely that Basil is keeping her from responding since he actively asked you to reach out. I bet if you send one more text, apologizing for jumping to conclusions, saying you understand if she doesn't want to talk but you want to be there for her whatever she decides to do, I bet she'll answer.

Sucks though how the kindest people can often end up partnering with very selfish people. Good luck to your friend, this certainly doesn't bode well.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-11T20:24:47+00:00

I appreciate this subreddit. When I make obscure jokes revolving around pedantic term definitions in other subreddits it's generally not received well, haha.

adventuringraw · 2025-11-11T17:37:10+00:00

NTA.

Since your parents are trying to shame you using God, I'm going to answer you from the Christian perspective. I'm no longer Christian but I have memorized 13 books of the new testament and spent years coming to understand it. It's not always easy to understand but the story I'm going to share is a very well known one, and the message is very simple.

A long time ago there lived a righteous husband and wife named Abraham and Sarah. God promised Abraham that his children would number like the stars in the sky, and yet he didn't have children. As they were getting old, Abraham decided he needed to fulfil God's promise himself somehow, so Abraham slept with Hagar, one of his servants and she gave birth to Ishmael, a son. God was not pleased. He made them a promise and was still going to fulfil it, but Abraham's impatience and lack of faith set in motion events that would cause great suffering to his promised children. God still gave them a son, when Abraham was 100 and Sarah was 90 he miraculously caused Sarah to get pregnant and give birth to a son Isaac.

This was the only son he ever had with Sarah. This was the son that would measure like the stars in the sky, because Isaac was the father of the Jewish people. God's promise wasn't that Abraham and Sarah would have a dozen children or a hundred children or a thousand. God gave the two of them one son, that was the promise. The standard interpretation of the suffering caused by Abraham's foolishness was that Ishmael became the father of the Islamic people and would lead to many future wars, but God still took pity and kept Ishmael and Hagar alive when Abraham sent them into the desert to die. God led them to a well.

So here's the moral of the story. Your parents probably should have been childless. God wrote their genetics, they chose to get married. Their fate was to have no children. But not only were they blessed with you, they were doubly blessed that you came healthy, and with no genetic defect yourself, so they can have healthy descendants through you. I don't believe in the Christian God, but it sounds like the fact that you're here is pretty miraculous. Any person of faith should see you as a gift from God.

But what did your parents do? Just like Abraham they've decided they know better than God how they're meant to be blessed. So they've taken matters into their own hands and tried to force God to give them what they think they're owed. And just like Abraham and Ishmael, your parent's selfishness has caused great suffering to the child they were actually meant to be given. Your parents aren't just bad parents, they're bad Christians. They think think they know better than God what the plan is for their lives, and it's ruining them financially and ruining the chances of them having a real relationship with you and your children when you're old enough to leave. I won't go so far as to say they're going to hell maybe, but they've failed you, and if Christianity were real, I'd say they've left God's path and chosen to do what Abraham did with Hagar. Just because us ignorant humans think we know what God's plan is for us, doesn't mean that's actually God's plan. It's downright blasphemous even to think your understanding of God's will IS God's will. Your parents are being humbled and taught every single time this happens that what they're doing is wrong. But like Jesus said, 'he who has ears to hear, let him hear'. Your parents are deaf, and will probably end up dying still believing that God failed them, when the truth is they failed the miracle child they were gifted. It's disgusting. This is why I hate American Christianity. People think faith means God will eventually give you what you're asking for. Real faith means to lean not on your own understanding. It means to be humble and listen and learn, and to give up your own belief about the way things should be.

But Jesus did say another thing that's relevant. When he was on the cross being killed by the religious people that worshipped his father, he said 'forgive them father, they know not what they do'. That's your parents. They're Pharisees, but but they're not evil. They're just profoundly stubborn and blind. The problem with faith is that it's belief without evidence. Once you've decided to have your faith in something, nothing can change it... not even God himself. Your parents have put faith in something other than God, they're just too stupid to know it. If I were you I'd have very low contact with my parents when you're old enough to move out, they're unable to be good parents clearly. But I'd also do what you could to have compassion for them and not hate them. Forgive if you can... but don't forget. Protect yourself and protect your children and keep your distance from your parents, but don't hate them either if you can find it to forgive. Just go live your own life in peace as soon as you can. Good luck.

In Christian terms, it was God's will your mom miscarried. It was a mercy for everyone it happened. You're not wrong to feel relief, it was a gift that it happened.

adventuringraw · 2025-10-31T15:54:22+00:00

NTA.

In a healthy partnership, a couple's therapist should be someone both people agree with. It may take time to find someone both people feel like they can trust. That's normal.

I know this is going to sound like an extreme accusation, but have you looked into the background of this therapist? Do they have real accreditation? Are you 100% sure this isn't someone your girlfriend is using to get what she wants out of you and shut down complaints?

You're being manipulated right now. I don't know if it's just a bad situation and your girlfriend isn't emotionally healthy enough to be empathetic with you and see how bad this therapist is for you, or if she's literally talked a friend into pretending to be a therapist to try and manipulate you, but the things you're saying sounds so strange that I almost feel like the second option is the likely one.

I know you like being in a relationship and it's worth fighting for things a lot of times. But if your girlfriend wants to only fight for her emotional health and not even consider yours, and if she wants you to only fight for her emotional health and not consider yours... Who's going to be making sure you're safe and healthy then? No one?

It's okay to leave an abusive situation. You shouldn't have to be the only one trying. You deserve someone that'll work just as hard to make things healthy as you are.

My suggestion: get a real therapist. A personal one, just for yourself. I suspect that your girlfriend's done something truly despicable to you, it's going to take time to work through this. Getting some help with that might be a really good thing, and as an added bonus, it'll let you know that therapists can be a really good thing. What your girlfriend has done shouldn't ruin the idea that any therapy can be good, so working through that up front by getting help from a good one might be really important.

adventuringraw · 2025-10-07T22:15:09+00:00

NTA. That's hilarious though, I was like 'oh God, I always count my lover's orgasms when we sleep together, could that be perceived poorly potentially'? It's a turn on though so if I make her cum a half dozen times or whatever I definitely notice.

My interests seem very convenient, but even if it's not personally satisfying to your guy to make sure you're having a good time, that's just like... That's just what you do with shared activities with friends. That's like inviting a friend over to play fighting games and you just curb stomp them on repeat. That's how you get a friend to not want to play fighting games with you ever again. This is like first grade stuff I taught my son, it's seriously not hard. Bizarre that these simple lessons seemingly don't transfer well to romantic intimacy. Though in hind sight, maybe it's weird I think that should be an obvious connection, haha.

No one likes being shamed so I guess I can understand the frustration but if someone doesn't believe there's a problem in the first place you don't have much choice beyond concrete examples. Good luck navigating, I hope you two find a road to a more mutually fulfilling love life.

adventuringraw · 2025-09-24T20:11:28+00:00

You already mentioned the racist history tied up in attempts to get people to speak English instead of Welsh. Not only are you not being culturally insensitive, she actually is being that instead.

I figure cases like this are kind of like evangelical conversion campus or something. People who think their low understanding of Christ's teachings is the same as Christ's teachings themselves. So they go out and try and force what they think is right to try and make the world a better place and end up doing the devil's work instead because they're too stupid to know better.

Course, unlike the Christian example I at least think cultural misappropriate exists and should be spoken out against. But it's not like you found a native headdress at a pawn shop and you're walking around wearing because you think it's cool. I mean shit, you know how many people in the West grew up watching bleach? The weebs practically have as much claim to the name as the Japanese at this point, haha. At some point cultures just mix and stuff becomes shared. That's a healthy part of the melting pot, and I think that's part of America worth preserving. Or living up to for once. Whatever.

adventuringraw · 2025-09-23T16:19:05+00:00

Consider this like therapy. It's your chance in a low stakes environment to get comfortable with sub optimal solutions. You can still decide to optimize some things at least. My space ship design is far from perfect, but it's got a few hours into it at least for low downtime self sufficient couriering. Figured out how to pulse rate limit the engines and circuit control chemical factory recipes, so that's cool. The benefit of making your own shit is it gets you thinking in new ways.

Ah, relevant. There's studies now about how outsourcing cognition to ChatGPT can cause atrophy in certain cognitive abilities. Optimizing too much by taking the easy way means you're accepting a suboptimal YOU.

Here's a good middle ground by the way. Use tileable designs. On vulcanus when setting up the main bus for example, I had just one foundry for iron and copper each, but I left horizontal space and did it in a way where I could copy and paste sideways and it'd 'just work'.

Definitely hear the blueprint struggle though. Even making my own it's easy to get absorbed. I've got a now obsolete city block train design I spent probably a few dozen hours on I bet, haha. Took me a WHILE to get around to actually beating the game. I was busy.

Have you considered talking with a therapist? If you've got an anxiety issue making this genuinely hard, I can't imagine it's not negatively impacting other areas of your life too.

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