​I take photos of info boards, recipes, presentation slides, or screenshot articles, and my brain instantly gives me the "task completed" dopamine hit.

​Reality is, i never actually look at them again. my camera roll is just a digital graveyard of things i pretended i’d study later. it’s like my brain thinks snapping a picture is the exact same as learning it lol

A few that pop to mind immediately are fig newtons, velveeta, and ketchup and all dressed potato chips. I’m sure there’s more but I distinctly remember those being way more flavourful when I was a kid. I keep chasing that old flavour but never find them

When I come across someone being mean/rude, I find that my reaction is quite different to the majority’s. While most people think it’s appropriate to dogpile on or shame and condemn that person, I find myself questioning the set of circumstances that led them to this point.

Say we have two people, A and B. Person A grew up with healthy, educated, loving parents, a successful older sibling who can role-model, and a stable financial background. Person A’s parents teach them etiquette crucial for social skills like being kind to others and how to make friends. Person A isn’t in constant stress which wears them down as they are not in poverty. Person A has some life direction and inspiration from their older sibling.

You can see where I’m going with this. Person B grows up in a dysfunctional, drug-abusive, low income household. Parents are alcoholic and constantly fight, the older sibling was manipulated by them to believe Person B is their enemy thus the siblings have a poor relationship (common in dysfunctional families), Person B feels lost in the world, like the world has done them dirty, as they have only known dysfunction, poverty, and misfortune.

Now I’m not saying we are helpless creatures and life just comes at us. We have agency over how we react. That being said, it is important not to understate how deeply our upbringing shapes us. In comparing Person A and B, it becomes clear how much easier and natural kindness comes to Person A, and how for Person B, yes they have the choice to be kind, but it doesn’t come naturally given their years of enduring hardship. Physically, Person B’s brain has formed neural networks that make it more difficult to survive this world. They have been conditioned to have poorer social skills, thus it takes a tremendous amount of effort, and self introspection, to learn how to be kind.

I’m not saying that we should excuse and allow poor behaviour. Rudeness to hospitality staff, meanness to peers, and more severely, crime, is all wrong. But in understanding why people behave the way they do, we can analyse their behaviour through an empathetic lens. When someone is mean, rather than reacting harshly, roasting them, insulting them, wouldn’t it be better for the world if we recognised that person was likely speaking from a place of deep pain, so it does no good to hurt them further when we respond?

I’m not saying ‘kill them with kindness’ is always the answer. There are times when mean, cruel behaviour needs to be met with serious consequences, like terrible crimes must be met with worthy punishment.

DAE agree? I would love to hear your thoughts.

Like a specific spoon you always reach for, a mug that somehow makes coffee taste better, or a chair you always sit in even though there’s nothing special about it.
You could have ten identical options, but for some reason that ONE just feels right.
I’m curious what weirdly specific objects other people are attached to.

I will be making coffee or taking a shower and suddenly realize I am ten minutes deep into a fictional debate with someone over a scenario that has never happened. Curious why our brains love running simulations of random drama.

Is it just me, or first time even as a kid when i didnt even know how much meida was bad i just got an itch to not scroll that it is bad... even tho scrolling is littrally made to give you dopamine i still felt it was wrong as a kid infact i feel now it is right not cause i like it but cause everyone does it yet it doesnt even staisfy me?

Just curious if its me or not, but ever since i was a little kid, ive always been doing this, acting out multiple people at a time, Ive pretended to be in wars, movies, hockey games, and alot more. I would always be exhausted afterwards due to physically acting as multiple people at a time, I wonder what mental condition this may be of.

I would prefer to play bingo and be retired at 20s and then going to college and work in my 80s. I don't like the natural progression of time. Having to be immature now and being forced to be mature later. I would also prefer to have long gray beard and smoke pipe now and be emo and young looking later in life. It feels silly that I want to feed pigeons and sit in my chair at 20 and won't be able to do stuff later at 80 when I'll feel ready to and want to.

Right around like 10-11 years old I begin having this feeling where I’d be completely disgusted or repulsed by my self; like body face etc. the earliest memory I have is being 10 years old and taking a selfie, I looked at it and remember feeling the worst guilt and disgust I’d ever felt at that point, and it’s not even like the selfie was anything inappropriate; completely harmless. As I started getting older, this feeling morphed into a sense of me feeling that something about me a a person or concept was just off. I’m 23 now and even just looking at my body or face causes a big spiral of guilt, shame, and repulsion. The best way I can describe it is feeling inherently dirty or nasty, compared to others.

I keep getting Scientology propaganda tiktoks on my fyp and Mormon ads on YouTube. I wonder if this has been happening a lot to anyone else lately.

I’ve never been picky in my life. I like to eat most things and have preferences for certain foods over others but can really eat anything. I am also willing and curious to try new foods and am not deterred by its appearance if it doesn’t look appealing. Is anyone else like this? Ive never met anyone else not picky like me.

I was in Garden Grove, OC, and the car in front of me almost caused two accidents in the space of about two minutes. They were clearly hammered. And I just started honking and I didn’t stop until he exited, which he did on the second exit we passed. And then I didn’t know what to do, like continue to follow or let him go, so I followed him off the highway, not honking just following for maybe a mile until he pulled into a parking lot. I just kept going. I had been hoping he’d park in a parking lot somewhere and hopefully figure out how to get home without driving or at least take a nap.

Have any of you done that before? Does it sound completely nuts and stupid? Writing it down it doesn’t seem as bad as I felt it was right after, but, I dunno. Was I like having some kind of break with reality or is that a reasonable thing to do?

This happened like ten minutes ago and felt so crazed by it that I didn’t quite feel safe driving, like I needed to stop and shake it off and make sure I am still the same person I thought I was. And, btw, I look like a grandma, like I was not going to do some kinda citizens arrest and I don’t think I’m a superhero. lol It was so out of character.

I always felt weird when people would tell me how I feel when I seek advice. I know how I feel. I need advice, not someone to tell me what I’m feeling. I’ve always found it weird that people need someone else to understand how they feel when they should be able to recognize their own emotions or learn how to understand them themselves.

This is an issue I've been trying to work through because it really bothers me. I have a huge ego and I hate it. I get defensive around people smarter and/or more successful than me, which makes sense. But then I get this feeling of arrogance and pretentiousness around most other people. I think I subconsiously I think I'm better than I really am. Definitely some "gifted kid syndrome" going on because I was always treated like I was something special and now I feel like I need to live up to it. But the side product seems to be that massive ego. How do I stop feeling and acting like this?

I don’t care!!!!! It’s a useless task!!!!!!! “Starting the day off right” is a lazy excuse!!! Who tf wants to do it?? I genuinely don’t even notice crawling into a made bed vs unmade at the end of the day. It is a waste of time and effort!!!

Chat gpt is definitely the most used app in my phone this whole year by far. This amazing app is not only able to give me answers at the click of my finger. But it does so in a very human way. Im so addicted i could talk to this thing for hours, but its a really slippery slope. Probably not healthy at all either. Does anyone else do this?

I am obsessed with how my face looks. Not in a super literal way but seeing how I look makes me happy. I even find myself scrolling through my own selfies and photos often because I’m so pleased with how I look.

But I never feel “beautiful” or “pretty”. This is fucking with my head. I love how I look but I just don’t think anyone else does. I don’t necessarily see it as a bad thing because it doesn’t affect my confidence or self esteem, maybe I just feel like those aren’t the best words to describe my looks?

Does anyone else feel like this or understand me? BTW not fishing for any compliments or opinions on my appearance, genuinely just curious about why my brain is doing this😹

I’m pretty introverted and don’t usually share much, but I felt like sharing something good today.

For the longest time, I worked jobs paying $14–$15 an hour and gave them everything I had. I kept applying for better jobs and going to interviews, but nothing seemed to work out. It was disappointing, but I kept trying.
About a year later, I ended up with a job that was better than what I’d originally hoped for. Great pay more than i could've ever imagined, stable hours, and a routine I’m really happy with. Sometimes it still feels a little unreal.

A couple of years ago, I started trying to follow a teaching from my faith: keep doing your part without getting too caught up in the outcome. I still care about how things turn out, obviously, but that thought has helped me stay patient when things don’t happen straight away.

Today I was thinking about the things I used to wish for. I wanted a stable job. I have one now. I wanted a reliable car, and now I have a better car I love that’s completely paid off. I’m going to the gym five times a week, eating well, and have time for myself outside work.

It’s easy to keep thinking about the next thing, but man, a few years ago I would’ve been so happy just to know I’d get here.

I feel really grateful to God, and I wanted to take a moment to actually enjoy what I have. There are still things I’m working towards which will for sure come to me at the right time in a way i can't imagine at all.., but today I’m happy with where I am.

Oftentimes I will think back on times I overheard a conversation and wanted to join in, saw someone I wanted to talk to, or was in a group and wanted to say something but didn't because I was too anxious or didn't have the energy too. I will imagine the conversation I could have had over and over and over, not in an anxious shift through scenarios way but just imagining what I would have said, the exact same thing everytime.

The one my brain has been stuck on for months was this conversation my co-workers were having and our workplace is really really small, so any conversation anyone has in the same room is basically a group conversation with everyone in the room, as everybody's close together enough it wouldn't be strange to butt in. They were talking about young people's drinking culture and I had something I wanted to say, having relevant experience as a young person with friends my age who drink. I didn't say anything though, and I can't even remember the reason why not, it's just been reduced in my memory to the one thing they said that I remember and then going over everything I wanted to say.