Is it important to "care" beyond our own home, family and life? Or is life just a game with no rules and why should we give a fuck if we're dead and for ever gone in the end anyway?

I think trying to make the world a better place is important for your own mental hygiene and I believe that happinness has what it takes to be the world's first and only perpetuum mobile, meaning that once we all invested in each other's happinness and well-being, it can be maintained for ever.

So, what do you do to make this world a better place? And why do you do it?

I really feel like I don't do shit and am just an asshole and a little self-absorbed and insecure, but I work in an environment where we help our clients better their life situations and empower them. I suck at it though and used to feel guilty like I should leave and other people are better than me at it. Now I just say I'm not terrible but not great either, it's just what it is in the present and some will benefit, others won't. I can't save people, or use their problems to save them or feel better about myself, I just have to go in, live in the moment and leave without bringing it home with me.

I know you said you write music. I do too sometimes and really wish I could use that as a medium to reach out to people to look within themselves the way my musical mentors did so for me, but I don't have the backbone to handle a career like that.

[Edited 4/18/12 5:59am]

alphastreet said:

I really feel like I don't do shit and am just an asshole and a little self-absorbed and insecure, but I work in an environment where we help our clients better their life situations and empower them. I suck at it though and used to feel guilty like I should leave and other people are better than me at it. Now I just say I'm not terrible but not great either, it's just what it is in the present and some will benefit, others won't. I can't save people, or use their problems to save them or feel better about myself, I just have to go in, live in the moment and leave without bringing it home with me.

I know you said you write music. I do too sometimes and really wish I could use that as a medium to reach out to people to look within themselves the way my musical mentors did so for me, but I don't have the backbone to handle a career like that.

[Edited 4/18/12 5:59am]

Oh, I feel like that so often too... I believe everybody with a healthy conscience does. I think the notion is already a huge part of the work, because it will eventually influence little decisions you make in your life.

I think only very few people can really "save" other people - by giving them lots of money, for example.

We, who are not endlessly rich, can only settle for the "smaller" steps. I think I'm already contributing when I make someone smile or show them affection (which doesn't happen too often, I must admit ).

Sometimes I do feel like I can reach out to some people and make them happy through my music, but then again I can imagine how people would call that a non-issue and laughable compared to the bigger problems out there... Like I said, I think the notion counts. And if the notion is positive, you won't need a backbone for handling a career like that, because you'll do it out of love and for the fun that comes with it!

Having your mid-life crisis early are we...

It didn't feel like a healthy conscience when I was through this 3-4 years ago. I would look at my resume and felt it was all a big lie and I didn't do any of it though I did, and felt so half assed cause I felt like shit about myself. I had felt I didn't want to help anyone anymore, they were all selfish and ungrateful in this country and had really crashed mentally and emotionally and a chain of events didn't help, but I had nearly given up and felt this world was evil and learned over time that I just had to change my perception of the world to be able to handle all these things and my mindset. It's obvious right? But it takes work.

I seriously am beginning to believe I'm going to have an early menopause, and I'm not even 30 yet. I have messed up moods and everything.

Tell me, is this a proper sentence?

• Implementing rules in accordance with the agency policies.

[Edited 4/18/12 6:22am]

tinaz said:

Having your mid-life crisis early are we...

I've been reflective of my life ever since I knew how to use my brain, but I'd never call it a "crisis", because it's hardly ever bugging me and I've never regretted anything in my life. I just think it's always important to do things consciously, and especially to do good things consciously.

I feel like a really bad person, if not tortured though I try to make up for it, and then I feel guilty cause I get burned out if I get too mentally stimulated and then have to take long breaks from people. People have always said I was hard on myself, do you get that too?

make myself a better person

If every man, woman and child had access to education and comprehensive health care (physical, mental, etc.) we would rid the world of the vast majority of social ills.

So first, I take care of myself. Like putting on your oxygen mask first before helping others in an airplane, I need to ensure I'm healthy and happy to be in a place to help others.

Then, I do my best to take care of friends, family, etc.

Then I extend that reach to help others when it comes to the above things. I might focus more on some causes than others (AIDS, women's health and access to BC and abortion services) because I'm drawn to them personally, but most of the volunteer efforts and charities I give to focus on the above.

And I vote. And I write letters. And I'm learning to do more.

I agree taking care of yourself is number one, and the reason I crashed was because I thought I was doing that, but I was not acting healthy at all and had to really make major changes, which meant giving up a few things before I could stabilize again.

Personally, I miss the days when every country was somewhat isolated from the rest of the world..that was some centuries ago...lol

while I still think that the world (specially Europe) is responsible of the sorry state of the vast majority of Africa, I can't see WHY we should care about the Islamic world, or China, or Cuba, or North-Korea, or whatever...their country, their society, their rules, their reality...

of course, this WHY has a simple answer: money

personally, I still think there will ALWAYS be famine, overpopulation, wars, crisis, etc. unless the world changes DRAMATICALLY, something that I don't think will happen unless there's another global war, the global use of new forms of energy (water, sun, electricity, etc), or the colonization of other planets...(ha!)

and then there's the debate about science changing the world, which sounds good on paper, but, at what price?

hell I'm glad I'll be probably dead by 2050-60...

If everyone felt that everyone else was family, including animals.

Seriously, if everyone meditated on this, people would stop fucking like gadflies and limit our population, reform ALL religions (or get rid of them), and everything would be so much better.

But it won't happen. This kind of communal thinking will get abused like anything else,

and the world would just end up being the Soviet Union circa the cold war, or America

circa The Bush/Cheney years.

Here's how I see it happening (laugh if you will).

Man will finally invent a machine that thinks. Those machines will replcate and

improve upon themelves, until they're all supermachines. The the supermachines

will cure cancer, AIDS--you name it. They have no profit motive, and if given a concience,

they'll do it.

Then they'll start imposing laws on us, like i-Robot, and we will fear them greatly.

But, none of their laws will actually harm us--they'll all help.

And eventually, the galaxy will be populated by human beings--but the humans

will be machine extensions of ourselves--not our fleshly selves.

Machines in the end will make the world a better place, because they have nothing

to gain from exploiting it. They'll have immortality already and no need for luxury.

I don't think you're far off, Dan. It's not a laughable concept.

But you also reminded me of animals. We are learning more and more how animals are more like us than we want to believe (with communication and intelligence and community and so on). It's important we place them in their rightful context in the world.

i work every day in a field where i can help other peole redress their problems. i also donate money to charitable causes, although, not as much time as i would like

CarrieMpls said:

I don't think you're far off, Dan. It's not a laughable concept.

But you also reminded me of animals. We are learning more and more how animals are more like us than we want to believe (with communication and intelligence and community and so on). It's important we place them in their rightful context in the world.

I think the problem with animals is that they are murderous beings, especially carnivors.

And this murderous, competitive war-like quality improves their reasoning and ability

to think---it leads to becoming....well, us.

In order for any organism to be alive, it must kill. Our bodies are killing microbes constantly.

But we're not immoral because of it anymore than a snake that sufficates it's prey is immoral.

All that can be said is that pain is rife in all life.

A machine though, is free from this cycle. A machine is true nirvana. It does not need to kill

to live, and therefore does not need to 'win' anything. It's motivations for improving upon

itself would be somewhat more enlightenned (or mechanical and logical) than organisms.

But, the more I think about it, the more I realize that machines will be the next human.

Eventually, our conciousness will be able to be stored in them and we can live ...virtually

forever as machines.

But, I don't see human beings (fleshly humans like us) ever obtaining a state where

we have utopia. It'll take machines do this for us. And in my view, they will.

A matrix style world, or an i-Robot world, to me is less likely than a machine world

where the machines solve all the complex scientific problems that have been plaguing

us since the dawn of time.

I would say within the next 400 years or so, this will happen. (or sooner, possibly

much sooner). Either way, I'm not scared of this future world.

What does scare me a bit, is if governments attempt to build 'superhumans' since

we've already spliced the human genome. A race of superintelligent human beings

could be benefiical or....damned scary.

oh my god.

I'm so dorky.

I pay my own way and mind my own business.

Genesia said:

I pay my own way and mind my own business.

You meant to post this in the 'have you ever recorded yourself having sex' thread, didn't you?

Not much, really.

imago said:

Genesia said:

I pay my own way and mind my own business.

You meant to post this in the 'have you ever recorded yourself having sex' thread, didn't you?

Uhhhh...no.

Well, I'm a bartender...

nuff said...

I expose them to me.

cammi said:

Well, I'm a bartender...

nuff said...

Bless you.

I'm here. And if I can provide some sort of entertainment for others so be it.

Repeating verbatim what KingBAD said, before I better the world, better myself first.

I try not to be a douche most of the time.

What do I do to make the world a better place?

I mind my fucking business. The world would be a MUCH better place if more people did that.

Terrib3Towel said:

What do I do to make the world a better place?

I mind my fucking business. The world would be a MUCH better place if more people did that.

If you meant to say you simply minded your business, I would agree - it's important to mind your business.

If you, however, meant to say you only minded your own business, I'd strongly disagree that would be a good thing. If everybody minded "their own fucking business" only, you and I wouldn't even exist, let alone any sort of civilisation and humanism.

Dave1992 said:

Terrib3Towel said:

What do I do to make the world a better place?

I mind my fucking business. The world would be a MUCH better place if more people did that.

If you meant to say you simply minded your business, I would agree - it's important to mind your business.

If you, however, meant to say you only minded your own business, I'd strongly disagree that would be a good thing. If everybody minded "their own fucking business" only, you and I wouldn't even exist, let alone any sort of civilisation and humanism.

Yes, this is exactly what I meant. Case and point: this whole Trayvon Martin mess.

The media has made it race-based (which I'm not saying is wrong), but Zimmerman should have minded his own damn business, but because he didn't a young man with a bright future is now dead. Hell, I see "suspicious" people all the damn time, do I get out of my car and kill them? Hell no. Why? Because whatever they're doing isn't affecting me or the people I associate with. That doesn't mean I don't care if somone else is hurting because I do, but there is a time and place for everything.

I'll give another example. Every morning I drive to school, I pass by a planned parenthood and I see the same lady holding up the same damn sign that says something like "pray to end abortion" and I'm like bitch get a life! You have no idea what an individual is going through when they decide to terminate their pregnancy. She is doing nothing to help anybody. What she should be doing is advocating birth control and sex ed. All she is doin is making a woman feel even worse than she already is. And again, who the hell is she helping? What life is she improving?

Okay let me get off my soap box. But you understand where I'm coming from right?

Terrib3Towel said:

Dave1992 said:

If you meant to say you simply minded your business, I would agree - it's important to mind your business.

If you, however, meant to say you only minded your own business, I'd strongly disagree that would be a good thing. If everybody minded "their own fucking business" only, you and I wouldn't even exist, let alone any sort of civilisation and humanism.

Yes, this is exactly what I meant. Case and point: this whole Trayvon Martin mess.

The media has made it race-based (which I'm not saying is wrong), but Zimmerman should have minded his own damn business, but because he didn't a young man with a bright future is now dead. Hell, I see "suspicious" people all the damn time, do I get out of my car and kill them? Hell no. Why? Because whatever they're doing isn't affecting me or the people I associate with. That doesn't mean I don't care if somone else is hurting because I do, but there is a time and place for everything.

I'll give another example. Every morning I drive to school, I pass by a planned parenthood and I see the same lady holding up the same damn sign that says something like "pray to end abortion" and I'm like bitch get a life! You have no idea what an individual is going through when they decide to terminate their pregnancy. She is doing nothing to help anybody. What she should be doing is advocating birth control and sex ed. All she is doin is making a woman feel even worse than she already is. And again, who the hell is she helping? What life is she improving?

Okay let me get off my soap box. But you understand where I'm coming from right?

Wow... me and you think alike here... exactly my thoughts. I mind my business too. When we want to get in people's business, that's where a lot of problems start.

[Edited 4/18/12 23:04pm]