Owledge

Seriously, this is so obvious. Microsoft of all corporations wants to give you an operating system upgrade for free, even nags you to take it by sneaking nagware onto your OS by labeling it as important security update. Certain hardware vendors will give you a discount if you buy a PC with Windows 10 on it. How naive must one be to not know what that entails? Definitely more naive than this common thought: Let me enlighten you: YOU do not decide whether you are guilty of hiding something from the authorities. If you allow madmen to run the show, you cannot expect sanity.

The media have a pretty good control over information flow inhibition. The alleged raid was a ridiculous charade because of the various shady aspects of it that together paint the picture of the US government having again done what they do so often - fool people using the media to propagate lies and big theater. I know of two claims and due to said difficulties in information flow, I'm not exactly sure which or how much of each is true. Osama Bin Laden likely died either shortly after 9/11, towards the end of 2001 still, or in 2004. Either due to his kidney-related health problems that required frequent dialysis, or he was assassinated. 2004 was the last time an alleged video message from him was released, and the man in the video looked like someone very much not like Osama who tried to look like him and failed. After this was pointed out aplenty, after this video, only audio messages followed, and then eventually nothing at all. I think it is likely that he and the mystery of his uncannily elusive person (BTW not the only created myth of something uncannily elusive - I can name the two other examples of cold war Soviet super weapons and HIV) was kept alive as a useful enemy in order to further drive the war/imperialism efforts. And to bring these factors together with the raid thing again: Look at the timing: They finally killed off their favorite villain just in time to give Obama that much-needed second-term presidential popularity boost to keep the Republicans at bay. It is all a huge pile of... OBama OSama I have long ago stopped falling for this ridiculous theater. They're bad scam artists and they don't need to be smarter because it works.

Sean, could you elaborate on what you mean by cross-pollination? I have a colorful web presence including a good portion of philosophical musings and general thought- and heartfulness in sometimes unusual forms. Not sure what you are looking for and what not ... and for what purpose. My website is currently mostly a link hub to those various channels of expression. http://dowlphin.de

I am curious: Watch this video (go fullscreen and have sound on ^^) and tell me your reaction, and ( where applicable when you managed to stop laughing xD ) also about your thoughts and feelings on this kind of humor in connection to the theme of spiritual cultivation or even just generally.

The natural development when more money gets involved. People forget what's important and bring death to everything, including duck quacks. (Especially no surprise with Deutsche Bank.) That little anecdote shows how much acting like humans is appreciated. Sadly though, especially in our times, horrible businesses hire marketing firms to fake that human touch for them.

Technically ... yes.

This is the first time in my whole life that I encountered the word "fulvous". Thank you for that novel experience.

Maybe it's the end of the universe, maybe it's just a mallardjusted bird.

Someone who would get an average job instead of doing what they love has too much time on their hands.

You talk about enlightenment as if it was a yes/no thing, which is quite unenlightened. I'll just assume you meant to say full enlightenment... which is a somewhat less unenlightened term to use. When I was in such a state, I had been coaxed into giving up my will to live, or to cling to things I identified with my existence and individual identity. This might usually feel like losing your mind, which totally makes sense in the truest sense of the word, and the uncomfortable thing is that full enlightenment without physical death might actually manifest as such, depending on how well you can handle it. (So if the energy practice is meant to open the path, the most important practice aspect is probably the honing of character and preparation for such a state. It would mean that you don't attain anything you haven't already achieved, but that the focus on the goal is the driving motivation for such rigorous development of virtue.) What was fact during that state I had been coaxed into is hard to say because then my mind was occupied with different things. There really isn't any factual stuff then; it's difficult to describe because it's beyond the rational mind's grasp. https://twitter.com/Dowlphin/status/627172286462861312 If you have a problem with accepting that you are God and the universe and everything but at the same time nothing, then full enlightenment might not be your thing. It's easy to talk about it casually, but when you actually experience the state it's all HOLY SHIT! I'm happy I reached it with help of psychedelics, because it enabled me to see it in contrast to a mind that's not fully prepared, thus I was able to see the state's self-serving nature; how if you want to become divine, the final necessary step is abandonment of the desire to become divine. You merely allow a process of shedding of all fears to continue, don't resist, have faith. You'd become a mere avatar, a conduit. People who can still talk about it are able to because they retain some ego. If you attained the theoretical extreme, you might not be able to tell, you wouldn't care, you wouldn't know. DISCLAIMER: This was all written during a state of extreme boredom, which is now somewhat less extreme, so I consider these words very valuable.

Whatever you want it to feel like. https://twitter.com/Dowlphin/status/627172286462861312 Thank you for your time. Blown minds can be left in the bin over there. Enjoy your temporary insanity.

Comparing to my experiences of the preceding years, having observed society for quite a while, it seems to me that especially since 2015 things are heating up. On pretty much all levels of society there is a growing polarization of people who serve egotistical goals and those who serve altruistic goals, or in other words: People without empathy against those who have empathy. Painful experiences can further sensitize, as a necessary process of awareness of problems. Lately I have had one of the most painful experiences of my life, one which changed my psyche significantly. It was so painful because there was no way for me to see it coming; it went against everything a healthy-minded (= not extremely cynical) human being would anticipate. And it reminded me of how much people are wearing masks in order to cover up their true character, and how you don't really know people unless that mask comes off. It indicates the gigantic extent of a problem that cannot be solved due to equally gigantic coverup and protection mechanisms by likeminded people. Part of the change that my recent experience has caused in me also urge me to share it, in part in the hope that it might somewhat ease my soulcrushing pain, in part because many people are not aware of the immensely destructive effect that egotism can have and does have on a grand scale in the world. Following is a link that contains some sweet people's comments on the matter and links to, first, a sarcastic/satirical summary of the incident by some smaller media outlet that isn't as afraid to talk about problems than bigger and more influential ones are (or maybe you can just call them boulevard press - I've become very careful of praising people's moral qualities lately), and then my blog article that I made sure pretty much answers all questions one could have. It is so complete that you will find, among people who give me moral support under their name, some tellingly anonymous commenters whose only way to oppose is to go into denial of the information provided, pretty much the way the main perpetrators did. If you took the time to read the whole thing, provided you have the spare time, that would be very much appreciated, and I am awaiting your thoughts, insights, experiences or whatever you feel like sharing. http://mlpforums.com/blog/819/entry-14983-living-tombstone-and-shadyvox-dishonor-their-and-my-charity-commitment/

TL;DR - Please make it shorter. Who's gonna read all that? I'm not getting paid for this. @blue eyed snake I will conform to the 'personal word filter' then, if that's more important than not being rude and insulting through implication, but do you really think it makes sense to now try and remove certain words/statements from not only my posts, but other people's quotings, thereby messing up continuity/context? Regading autism: Why are you arguing over semantics now? Whether you want to call it a personality disorder or a "hard and irreversible disorder" - those two aren't even mutually exclusive, but jumping to the conclusion that it's irreversible is another obstacle in the way of solving a problem. The results are often the same. I guess the severe autist I talked to was just an asshole then? Or the guy with Asperger who whined about wanting cuddles and donations and everything one day and was snottily cold-shoulder the next day when asked for a tiny favor, that's not the Asperger? That's "just" him being an ass? We need to solve the problems, and it won't be possible when pampering issues with semantic and belief-based apologetics! And I already explained that I did not use "autism" as a "denigratory label". YOU decided to see it that way, because you spoke for other people that you think might feel offended by having anything negative attibuted to their condition. This so speaks for itself. I want to understand and relate and it's turned against me. This is still the process I am talking about in full swing. Instead of cutting some slack, which you can't if you don't actually empathize, you pick on everything you can interpret in a way that suits your point. Naturally you will provoke more and more with this process, and at the root of it all, as always, is a lack of heart, and because that is so often neglected, and as long as it is, the root of problems aren't visible. It is the attempt of the mind to square the circle. This also leads to the steadfast holding on to the mentioned misconception. To you it's all about 'helping' me, and with that, the master-slave dynamic has been set in your minds. It is not a mutual exchange. https://dowlphinblog.wordpress.com/2015/01/14/master-slave-mindset-blocking-fruitful-interaction/ Because it is too uncomfortable to you to consider that this might actually be an opportunity for YOU to learn something, to RECEIVE help, to take something away from this. This is a realization that I have made aplenty and learned from it. When I seek out people for help, they are usually more in need of my help. (In some cases they're even grateful, but mostly they block.) So stop waging an ego battle here, sending all the time, and try opening yourself for reception. Because when I apporach something humbly and with self-doubt, life punishes me, showing me that I am bullshitting/sabotaging myself and becoming vulnerable for exploitation. It is finally time for others to dump their convenience now. I've done more than a life's worth of it and am burnt out. If humankind cannot manage to turn things around, they will further build a great nemesis. Look at the taiji and learn from the dots.

You conveniently turn things around and look at the results, not at the trigger. It is NOT wrong to look at the facts. What is bothering me is that people will just ignore the way the musicians handled (or didn't handle) the situation, while that in fact speaks volumes and explains the whole situation back to the start. I don't know, maybe this is impossible to comprehend for someone without psychology knowledge, but, actually, then how comes that there are really decent people who live values and virtues who have no problem seeing what was going on? I guess you would always assume they are suckups or such if you cannot analyze a personality based on their actions. Let me give you another example from my past: A work contract that ended up in a lawsuit. My story was consistent all the way through, over 5 years. I had 3 lawyers. They all did what they could to maintain that and simply portray the situation as it is. The other guy, the crook, had, over the course of the lawsuit, changes his version of the story serveral times, to three different claims all more or less contradicting each other, and he eventually even committed a slip of the tongue in front of the judge, CONFIRMING my claims, and this after there has also been pretty much the same confirmation in written form. My third lawyer, a really good one, presented the judge a concise, easy-to-read summary of the relevant facts (he said judges are lazy and don't want to read much, so it has to be appealing), where any sane person would have clearly seen what a crook the other guy is. Yet, the judge had the audacity to say that after thorough consideration of all facts, he has "no doubts about the sincerity of" the other guy! The person who keeps contradicting themselves and has three different stories is beyond doubt, but the guy who maintained their standpoint over all those years was commented on by the judge that it cannot be true because he couldn't believe it could have happened that way. (Because considering that the other guy is a crook was out of the question.) And then comes someone like you and joins the judge and helps a crook commit fraud, breach of contract, selling of stolen goods etc. and say it must have been my fault. Because that is more convenient than frickin agreeing with the truth of an injustice for once. Because your heads are so full of opinions that you cannot just look at what's at hand. Why are I even being scolded for my way of expressing myself here? Apparently that's totally fine, based on your attempted justifying of what the musicians did. But yeah, I get it. It's all conditional. Double-standards. Read up about what's going on in the world and you see its effects, and why it's pissing me off. Need more examples, maybe something of overwhelming clarity to drive the point home? The Israel-Palestine conflict is a perfect example for what you get when there is a lack of empathy. You get genocide supported by people who claim that they have compassion, which is in fact ugly mental convenience. Because of this, atrocities can continue to occur, because no matter what happens, there's always a convenient justification for it. ('Fun fact' on the side to shine some light on what's going on psychologically with all this: There was a series of German studies that found out that Palestine-friends are less antisemitic than Israel-friends. It didn't surprise me at all. Makes perfect sense. But maybe some here have difficulty figuring that out.) Some (convenient) people told me I shouldn't be so hard on myself. I tell you, you wouldn't like it if I heeded that advice. Because then, the only way to easily handle being screwed over is by screwing other people over, too. To become the problem. Hell, most here didn't even try to be impartial (which in the face of injustice makes partial anyway), but you jumped right to taking sides with the lazy pricks of musicians who don't know how to act in a decent way when they had every encouragement to do so. As a final word, just one of many cases of denial in close focus, when you said: "They were not auctioning off unlimited chat sessions." They offered to closely, personally work together with me to make sure it is exactly the way I want it. And they wasted tons of time resisting instead of just talking about what needs to be talked about. "Make it shorter" was all they managed to say. Don't you realize how much you conveniently overlook those things? They kept talking in order to resist just doing what benefits the project, avoiding the real topic, the real problem. That's not proper project communication. There's so much more in the blog that underlines it. And then you comment: "They were not auctioning off unlimited chat sessions." That is the epitome of lack of empathy. Someone gets screwed over and you are like: It would have worked fine if you had just bent over some more. With a mindset like that, the world is doomed. Because some basic, allegedly commonly shared ideals are not upheld by the majority, obeying the law is more like an exception these days. Ever wondered why e.g. the US government is able to wage illegal wars? Because so many people lack empathy and prefer convenient self-BS. We have to get some basics working first before we can work on the more advanced stuff. Apparently there's a long way to go. Read this, as an exercise in empathy, and if you still cannot see a pattern, then there's no hope. You will dive even deeper into your escapism: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/randi-gunther/sexual-abuse_b_2013443.html

This autism offense (here even spoken of on behalf of others) is another thing that stifles talking about the problems in order to solve them (as political correctness often does), because anyone can read up on autism and will find that I am talking about facts. I also had experience with autists myself and got confirmation, that's why I mentioned it, because if someone really is autistic, it would help to know to better understand and defuse a situation. It always helped me in the past. I have written down somewhat related thoughts in my blog; that might clear things up a little: https://dowlphinblog.wordpress.com/2015/01/31/do-we-all-have-autism/ What about the offensiveness I received here that cannot be so conveniently focused on buzzwords? Can we accept that there are two parties to the story? (This is not the first time I am pointing at this.) As for "help": I see here a lot of the typical internet forum sickness falsely called "help", which is in fact self-serving ego-stroking, first insultingly ignoring whatever facts one needs to ignore in order to run their thing without rough edges and then wallow in that. As I remarked a long time ago in another internet forum thread with a somewhat similar problem going, the apparent things aren't what's causing the problems, but the subtle ones. A perfectly politically correct speech can be a much greater insult and hurt than the rudest of vulgarity. And that's very much why the world is in turmoil, and that hurts me even more. The key is that most (not all) people in this thread mistook the thread's purpose. This thread was not a call for help, but an exposition of and talk about a social problem and thus more an urge to help others (and yourself). Apparently it had a kind of bait function and attracted people who live the problem, thus further helping the presentation. There's a striking lack of sincere inquiry and instead lots of jumping over facts or gaps to conclusions. The general message is that (especially) people in internet forums are often too much in their head and thus not enough in their heart. I got hurt by the events presented because my heart is open, because I allowed myself to be vulnerable, and with that I clashed with someone who is so much in their head that their heart got cold and shriveled and they jumped to exploit that vulnerability because of lack of basic character discpline. (Basically the spoiled brat type that would need a super nanny to be handled, and I certainly didn't pay to do such a job.) And if that trend is not stopped, then others will join that problem, and that might eventually include me. Very apparently a lack of empathy is horrifyingly widespread. It is a scary, depressing world to live in for someone who doesn't make that invisible by joining the ranks. For sensitive people it has always been a cruel world, and if humankind is ever to evolve, then that trait has to be embraced as welcome, as a move in the right direction, because we're still upholding a world massively shaped by people of the survival-of-the-fittest type, and adapting to that is considered healthy, when it is nothing more than an unfortunate pragmatic necessity. (Same disregard happens by extroverts against introverts. This is a collective spiritual crisis.)

Oh wow, what a newsflash. Of course every human interaction has two sides. But did you look at YOUR side of it? You can begin by looking at above quote, and then try to figure out how various other people are contributing to the results seen here.

If you are autistic, that would explain it. Because you have mentioned a quite prominent feature of it there.

I knew you were intentionally playing dumb. I take offense with such attempted deception. Then again, your user name gave me a warning. Still, I told you to stay away if you cannot comprehend the situation.

If you don't know how a charity auction works and couldn't deduct it from the blog text, you better stay away from this thread.

Hippie bullshit. I want to see you apply that mindset to yourself when you buy a toaster and it breaks on first use and you go to the shop to return it and they say "Screw you, don't try to control the outcome. Your expectations about what to get are the problem here." Damn, so many people in delusion, trying to justify asshole behavior. My advice to all of you is to read the blog comments that are (tellingly) made by name and 'meditate' on that. You so need to get ripped off and screwed over majorly to get your head in order. It seems most times suffering is the only thing that creates empathy. If not the opposite.

The ironic problem in this is that it is purely self-serving, meaning that people who exploit that will have a great time and if you keep doing that, it will become more and more difficult to keep it up. I've explored all those paths, several times, and all those experiences have me pretty solid feedback that some things need to be confronted. There's the danger that this alleged inner peace will be a great self-deception and then leads to arrogance. It's not like I haven't heard and explored all this 'wisdom'. I am pissed exactly because I have been so much of a saint that I eventually couldn't stand it anymore, being exploited, seeing those who bring misery onto others being fed by this unhealthy dynamic. Those people are sensing when it is a weakness and are exploiting it. This is how success through controlling other people works. And this is also how those musicians could get to where they are despite revealing themselves as assholes. Because they are exploting the fact that those that could threatend their career (which would give them if not incentive for sincere change then at least incentive for adaptation) are too afraid to say anything. I've experiences these fear-dynamics of character vulnerabilities in so many areas. Once I joined an internet forum and gave a warm and cheerful and grateful introduction, the sweetest you could imagine, and was met with a wave of the worst scum on earth, absolutely mindbogglingly appalling, and you know what the admin did? First nothing, not even talk about it, then delete the thread silently. No consequences for anyone. This is what happens when an admin is too afraid to become unpopular among anyone. This is one of those characters flaws that enables such rottenness to repeat itself and grow. Pretty much the same I experiences in a World of Warcraft guild. The guild leader couldn't instill respect because he was a softie, and so his own guild officers insulted him, basically verbally spit on him, and he just accepted that. So I left. And it's not my fault. It's just the dynamic. If you live high values, then psychpaths will take offense with your presence. All this is about the theme of maturity and personal responsibility, and I won't any longer feed a lack of it, especially not when a deal with a commitment has been made. As I mentioned in my blog, I've already become a victim of judicial corruption, and that's the stuff all this leads to. And it will get worse unless people cut the bullshit and don't try to force harmony on everything, because if it doesn't work, you're prone to telling yourself convenient lies. Because all this is still about personal convenience. Look at politics. Nothing improves unless you have people who don't entertain wishful thinking, but confront problems. Another example of this convenient denial is the classical situation of a brawl in school and in the end the teacher goes like: "And now shake hands and everything is fine again." Or even worse, just letting it continue and be like: "Yes, children can be cruel." This is rotten and disgusting cowardice, and the fact that adults practice it in the face of children, and even worse, adults who have been tasked with dealing with such an environment as part of their job description, is even more disgusting. No wonder that the world is so full of spoiled children. One really problematic misconception that I need to clear up: Yes, all you need is love, but when you truly love someone, you don't let them turn into an asshole. If you do, then it's the kind of "love" that's actually an unhealthy dependency relation, where you want something from them. Few people have the kind of friends who would watch their back in that regards.

I thought this would be common knowledge, but it could also be a cumulative effect. Sometimes shit just happens to you repeatedly, and at some point it's too much. Take road rage for example. You find it in assholes, but also in decent people.

What pisses me off is my understandable emotional investment, the joy and all, the fact that it was, as you said, charity, a brony convention... so many factors came together that this is like the worst possible thing because of that stark contrast. It's easy to say don't take it to heart, but just remember when you have been hurt. If ever, otherwise you don't know how it feels. And all that is much, much worse because it made me realize (more than already) how many other people are like that, too. The degree of hypocrisy! That sarcastic article I linked is of a relatively non-influential media, and they did it because it's what they do, but the really influential ones would never touch it. And remember the stance of the convention organisers who ran the charity auction! So in effect, very few fans will ever hear about this, and of those who do, most probably side with the assholes. And the people you say who are doing far worse things than this ... they have the same mindset. One thing leads to the next. BTW if by far worse you mean killing people ... imagine someone had won the song collab who is much more vulnerable than I. Imagine they had committed suicide over this. And what's so horrifying is that I KNOW that wouldn't have changed anything, because the problem is lack of empathy and egotism to a sociopathic degree, and that is pathological; there is no conditionality. It would have been "very unfortunate and tragic" and that's it. I have come to distinguish between "MLP fan" and "brony", because the latter is based on a brotherly spirit, and the majority of fans has no idea what that means.

Not really. I am highly creative. As I said, it's the craft that doesn't flow. The mind is coming up with new stuff all the time.

It actually wasn't material for a whole album. It was mostly a collection of things from the same theme. Like a red ribbon. It was more about depth of the message than quantity, which should have made it relatively easy to make lyrics of. Their real motivations and mindset got revealed in the process, so that makes speculation based on the initial situation unnecessary. When someone talks bullshit, it's to hide their truth, because they're too afraid to say it out loud. (They did say it very clearly between the lines though.) It's the mindset of a criminal. Offloading inconvenience onto others. If they don't want to say it, there's always the option to change the truth about yourself, but they chose neither. Collective not making an effort is dooming humankind. Experiences like this have indeed shown me that it's too risky to rely on other people in endeavors like this. But the realization also further kills my creative energy, and my ability to learn yet another basic discipline like music production or drawing is impaired by the accumulated effect of painful experiences like this over the years. I already have an impressive skillset that I have invested many years in, but if in the process of trying to put it to good use, I run into assholes at every step of the way, and nothing I do can overcome such obstacles (thanks to the supportive world-spanning asshole network), what's the point of trying yet another time? I'm like a bird who can sing the most beautiful songs when the sun is up, but I really don't feel like it when it's raining shit. I thought the brony fandom would be ANY different due to the theme, style and message of the show, but I learned the hard truth that it's mostly makebelief there, too. I mean, it's an innocent kids' show, for God's sake, and then you have a certain popular fandom musician bascially go: "Pony porn? Hell, yeah!" That's kinda indicative of what pisses me off: Why make an effort to rise to an ideal if you can instead practice spiritual materialism and subdue it to your rampant ego? So now talking about those problems is the only thing I have spiritual energy for. When problems get too big, they will create the necessity for a turnaround, and denying that counterforce, that effect from a cause, makes everything worse. Not that this got me anywhere in the past (been there, done all that), but it doesn't seem to matter what I do anyway.